Raymond Brown - Antioch and Rome

Raymond E. Brown et John P. Meier, (Antioch and Rome).
Conclusion p. 211-216.

(Detailed summary)

Summary on Antioch

In his analysis of Antioch, Meier describes a first generation marked by conflicts between different types of Christians of Jewish origin and their pagan converts. In the 40s, in Antioch, disputes broke out between the Hellenists and Paul on one side, and Peter and the disciples of James on the other. The issue at stake was the meaning of the Gospel in relation to the Jewish heritage. Until the second generation, the Christian tensions arising from these initial struggles persisted in Antioch, so that after 70, the local church included conservative and liberal Jewish Christians, as well as a growing majority of Christians of pagan origin. By introducing new ideas while combining the “old” traditions of the different tendencies, Matthew, the evangelist of Antioch, sought to maintain the unity of this heterogeneous Christianity by establishing a clear ecclesial identity. His conception of salvation history and the Law was more conservative than Paul's, but his attitude toward pagans was more liberal than that associated with James. The figure of Peter served as a bridge for Matthew, embodying the teaching of the Church and allowing him to insist on a centrist position. Apparently, this authority was still exercised by prophets and teachers, and Matthew was very careful to ensure that no particular current dominated and exercised a monopoly. Nevertheless, in the two decades following Matthew, and thus in the era of the next generation, a solid authoritarian structure composed of a single bishop, presbyters, and deacons emerged in Antioch. And Ignatius, the bishop of Antioch, became a propagandist for this structure in response to the incessant theological struggles between the Christian “left” and “right.” Because of their openness to the pagan world, the more liberal Christians were moving toward Gnosticism, pushing a Christology elevated to a Docetism that erased the humanity of Jesus. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the Judaizers remained, even if they were relatively few in number. Adopting a middle ground, Ignatius seems to have had only marginal communion with the extremes, even if a complete schism did not yet exist. Ignatius's notion of the Catholic Church had Pauline roots, but a broader heritage.
Summary on Rome

In his analysis of Rome, Brown suggests that the strongest Christian tendency in Rome originated in Jerusalem in the 40s and represented an attitude similar to that of James and Peter toward Judaism. The pagans converted by this mission would therefore have been more faithful to the Jewish heritage than the pagans converted by the Pauline mission. When Paul wrote to Rome in the late 50s to gain support for his collection for Jerusalem and in the ultimate hope of visiting Rome, his position toward Judaism was more moderate than it had been before, a change due in part to experience and in part to the desire to be well received. This more moderate Paul was welcomed in Rome, but it was above all his martyrdom in that city (after being denounced by extremely conservative Judeo-Christian zealots?) that earned him a place of honor alongside Peter in the Roman list of heroes (“pillars”). The image of Peter remained dominant; and in the name of Peter (1 Peter) or Peter and Paul (in that order: 1 Clement), the Roman Church took up the ancient mission of Jerusalem to the pagans, attempting to instruct the other churches. These instructions presupposed the continuing value and imagery of the Jewish cultic heritage; for even the letter to the Hebrews, eloquently emphasizing the replacement of cult by Christ, failed to persuade Rome. At the end of the century, 1 Clement associated the Levitical heritage with another heritage characteristic of Rome's situation, namely, an appreciation of Roman imperial order and authority. Although Antioch had already attributed cultic and doctrinal authority to a single bishop (with presbyters and deacons under his command), Rome retained the plural structure of presbyter-bishops (with deacons under their command) for longer. Nevertheless, the authority of the Roman Church was no less great, for the ideology of the Levitical and imperial order was associated with the structure of the Church. Therefore, while Ignatius of Antioch influenced the Catholic Church in its definitive adoption of the triple order of bishops, presbyters, and deacons, Rome's appreciation of a fixed order based on apostolic succession, as seen in 1 Clement, gave this structure much of its sacred and sociological importance.
This study could be pursued in two directions.
1. First, we emphasized the provisional nature of much of what we propose. We are aware of the weak links in the chain of evidence, particularly in the second generation. Meier, in positing that within two decades Antioch moved from the prophets/teachers of Matthew to the bishops/presbyters/deacons of Ignatius, is making a huge leap. Brown's diagnosis that the Epistle to the Hebrews is an unsuccessful correction addressed to Rome and his use of this attack as a mirror reflecting the Roman situation are bold, but constitute a plausible hypothesis in relation to a New Testament work about which we can only make assumptions. If other researchers are willing to study our thesis, they may be able to help us strengthen these weak links. We therefore extend an invitation to those who are tempted to pass a completely negative judgment: give us a better reconstruction that makes more sense of the disparate elements discussed. All biblical study involves reconstruction, and we reiterate that if we fail to gain acceptance for our own solution, we will be happy to have inspired someone else to propose a better one.
2. Second, other Christian centers and their mixtures of Christianity need to be studied. For example, through the Pastoral Epistles, the Epistles to the Colossians and Ephesians, and the Acts, one can trace the currents of Pauline Christianity and their divergences after Paul's death. Studies on Johannine Christianity have already been carried out. If Ephesus (rather than Syria) was the center of the Johannine community, it may be that two powerful legacies, that of Paul and that of John (as well as other currents of Christianity), coexisted there in a tense relationship. Asia Minor was much more daring than Rome in the development of new Christian currents in the 2nd century. Does the life of the two churches in the 2nd century reflect their different lives in the 1st century, with Ephesus as a region where no Christianity dominated and Rome as a region where a dominant (more conservative) Christianity prevailed?
For a holistic approach to Christianity

Some biblical scholars prefer to study the various works of the New Testament in isolation, without bothering to draw up an overall picture. This overlooks the fact that Peter, Paul, and James maintained relationships with each other, preserving koinōnia or communion, even when they disagreed. A work written later in the name and tradition of one sometimes mentions the other (2 Peter mentions Paul), or implicitly refers to the other's thinking (James rejects a Pauline slogan about faith and works), or deals with the same characters (Ignatius and Clement both mention Peter and Paul; the Pauline writings and 1 Peter both mention Mark). In other words, the Christianity of the works we have discussed was interdependent, and a proper interpretation of these works requires an effort to uncover this interdependence.
Studies that remain relevant today

The studies we conduct are not purely academic. Antioch may have disappeared as a church, but Rome continues to exist; and as we have seen, the advice of Paul and Ignatius to the early church in Rome remains good advice for the church in Rome today. On a broader level, the theological debates and political struggles, the changes in Christian existence and reinterpretations of Christian life, the internal divisions and external persecutions that marked the New Testament churches during the first three generations, all provide abundant lessons and paradigms for Christian churches and individual believers in our own time. For example, the place of a moderate center between the left and right wings that threatened to divide the church is one of the most enduring images left by the early church. In the 80s and 90s, both the church in Antioch (Matthew) and the church in Rome (1 Clement) appealed to the image of Peter as a symbol of the center. For James and Paul left a legacy to varying degrees in both churches, but it seems that during their lifetimes they were too absolute to serve as an ideal image of reconciliation for these communities. During his career, Peter was rebuked face to face by Paul, while being pulled in the opposite direction by James's men (Galatians 2:11-12). In a twist of history, his position, which saw him caught between two fires, was used after his death to justify a middle ground between those who used James and Paul as figureheads for increasingly harsh extremism.