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Bible Encyclopedias
Holy Order
1911 Encyclopedia Britannica
or Holy Orders " (ordines sacri ) may be defined as the rank or status of persons empowered by virtue of a certain form or ceremony to exercise spiritual functions in the Christian church. Thus Tertullian (Idol. 7, Monog. i i) mentions the " ecclesiastical order," including therein those who held office in the church, and ( Exhort. Cast. 71) he distinguishes this ordo from the Christian plebs or laity. We may compare the common use of the word ordo in profane writers, who refer, e.g., to the ordo senatorius, ordo equester, &c. It is true that the evidence of Tertullian does not carry us back farther than the close of the znd or opening of the 3rd century A.D. But a little before Tertullian, Irenaeus, though he does not use the word ordo, anticipates in some measure Tertullian's abstract term, for he recognizes a magisterii locus, " a place of magistracy " or " presidency " in the church. Indeed, phrases more or less equivalent occur in the sub-apostolic literature, and even in the New Testament itself, such as those who are " over you in the Lord " (r Thess. v. r2), those " that bear the rule " (Heb. xiii. 7; cf. i Clem. i. 3; Herm. Vis. ii. 2, 6). Here we pause to remark that in Tertullian's view the church as a whole possesses the power of self-government and administration, though in the interest of discipline and convenience it delegates that power to special officers. It is, he says, the " authority of the church " which has constituted the difference between the governing body and the laity, and in an emergency a layman may baptize and celebrate ( Exhort. Cast. 7 ), nor can this statement be lightly set aside on the plea that Tertullian, when he so wrote, had lapsed into Montanism. The fact is that the Montanists represented the conservatism of their day, and even now the Roman Church admits the right of laymen to baptize when a priest cannot be had. The Apostolic Constitutions (viii. 32) allow a layman to preach, if he be skilful and reverent, and the language of St Ignatius ( Ad Smyrn. 8), " Let that be esteemed a valid Eucharist which is celebrated in the presence of the bishop or of some one commissioned by him," is really inconsistent with any firmly established principle that celebration by a layman was in itself absolutely null (see also Eucharist).
When we go on to inquire what special offices the church from the beginning, or almost from the beginning, adopted and recognized, two points claim preliminary attention. In the first place, much would be done in practical administration by persons who held no definite position formally assigned to them, although they wielded great influence on account of their age, talents and character. Next, it must be carefully remembered that the early church was, in a sense hard for us even to understand, ruled and edified by the direct action of the Holy Spirit. St Paul (r Cor. xii. 28) furnishes us with a list of church offices very different from those which obtain in any church at the present day.' " God," he says, " hath set some in the church, first apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helps, governments, (divers) kinds of tongues." Ministry of this sort is not to be confounded with " order," of which this article treats. It died out very gradually, and the Didache or Teaching of the Apostles, compiled probably between A.D. 130 and 160, gives clear information on the nature of this prophetic or charismatic ministry. The title of " apostle " was not limited to the immediate disciples of our Lord, but was given to missionaries or evangelists who went about founding new churches; the prophets spoke by revelation; the teachers were enabled by supernatural illumination to instruct others. All of these men were called to their work by the internal voice of the Holy Spirit: none of them was appointed or elected by their fellows: none of them, and this is an important feature, was necessarily confined to a local church. Nevertheless, side by side with this prophetic ministry there was another, mediately at least of human appointment, and local in its character. Here we have the germ of orders in the technical sense. At first this local ministry was twofold, consisting of presbyters or bishops and deacons. Christian presbyters first appear (Acts xi. 30) in the church of Jerusalem, and most likely the name and office were adopted from the Jewish municipalities, perhaps from the Jewish synagogues (see Priest). Afterwards St Paul and St Barnabas in their first missionary journey " appointed (Acts xiv. 23) presbyters in every church." Further, we find St Paul about A.D. 62 addressing the " saints " at Philippi " with the bishops and deacons." The word iriCrK07r03 or overseer may be of Gentile origin, just as presbyter may have been borrowed from the Jews. There is strong proof that presbyter and episcopus are two names for the same office. It has indeed been maintained by eminent scholars, chiefly by Hatch and Harnack, that the word episcopus was given originally to the chief officer of a club or a confraternity, so that the episcopus was a financial officer, whereas the presbyters regulated the discipline. To this it may be objected that presbyters and bishops are never mentioned together, and that the names were interchangeable (Acts xx. 17 and 28; r Pet. v. r, 2; I Tim. iii. 1-7 and v. 17-19; Tit. i. 5-7). The work of the presbyter or bishop was concerned at first with discipline rather than with teaching, which was largely in the hands of the charismatic ministry; nevertheless, the Pastoral Epistles (r Tim. iii. 2) insist that an episcopus must be " apt to teach," and some presbyters (r Tim. v. 17) not only ruled but also " laboured in the word and in teaching." They also " offered the gifts " (1;Clem. 44), i.e. to adopt Bishop Lightfoot's interpretation, " they led the prayers and thanksgivings of the congregation, presented the alms and contributions to God and asked His blessing on them in the name of the whole body." Under the bishops or presbyters stood the deacons or " helpers " (Philipp. i. r, 1 Tim. iii. 8-r3). Whether they were the successors, as most of the Fathers believed, of the seven chosen by the church of Jerusalem 1 A partial exception may be made in favour of the " Catholic Apostolic Church " founded by Edward Irving.
Josephus, e.g. Antiq. vi. 4.2, abundantly justifies this translation.
to relieve the apostles in the administration of alms (Acts vi.) is a question still disputed and uncertain. Be that as it may, the deacon was long considered to be the " servant of the widows and the poor " (Jerome, Ep. 146), and the archdeacon, who first appears towards the end of the 4th century, owes the greatness of his position to the fact that he was the chief administrator of church funds (see Archdeacon). This ancient idea of the diaconate, ignored in the Roman Pontifical, has been restored in the English ordinal. The growth of sacerdotal theories, which were fully developed in Cyprian's time, fixed attention on the bishop as a sacrificing priest, and on the deacon 3 as his assistant at the altar.
Out of the twofold grew the threefold ministry, so that each local church was governed by one episcopus surrounded by a council of presbyters. James, the Lord's brother, who, partly because of his relationship to Christ, stood supreme in the church at Jerusalem, as also Timothy and Titus, who acted as temporary delegates of St Paul at Ephesus and in Crete, are justly considered to have been forerunners of the monarchical episcopate. The episcopal rule in this new sense probably arose in the lifetime of St John, and may have had his sanction. At all events the rights of the monarchical bishop are strongly asserted in the Ignatian epistles (about A.D. I ro), and were already recognized in the contemporary churches of Asia Minor. We may attribute the origin of the episcopate to the need felt of a single official to preside at the Eucharist, to represent the church before the heathen state and in the face of rising heresy, and to carry on correspondence with sister churches. The change of constitution occurred at different times in different places. Thus St Ignatius in writing to the Romans never refers to any presiding bishop, and somewhat earlier Clement of Rome in his epistles to the Corinthians uses the terms presbyter and episcopus interchangeably. Hermas (about A.D. 140) confirms the impression that the Roman Church of his day was under presbyteral rule. Even when introduced, the monarchical episcopate was not thought necessary for the ordination of other bishops or presbyters. St Jerome ( Ep. 1 4 6 ) tells us that as late as the middle of the 3rd century the presbyters of Alexandria, when the see was vacant, used to elect one of their own number and without any further ordination set him in the episcopal office. So the canons of Hippolytus (about A.D. 250) decree that a confessor who has suffered torment for his adherence to the Christian faith should merit and obtain the rank of presbyter forthwith - " Immo confessio est ordinatio ejus." Likewise in A.D. 314 the thirteenth canon of Ancyra (for the true reading see Bishop Wordsworth's Ministry of Grace, p. 140) assumes that city presbyters may with the bishop's leave ordain other presbyters. Even among the medieval schoolmen, some (Gore, Church and Ministry, p. 377) maintained that a priest might be empowered by the pope to ordain other priests.
The threefold 4 ministry was developed in the 2nd, a sevenfold ministry in the middle of the 3rd century. There must, says Cornelius (aped Euseb., H.E. vi. 43), be one bishop in the Catholic Church; and he then enumerates the church officers subject to himself as bishop of Rome. These are 46 presbyters, 7 deacons, 7 subdeacons, 42 acolytes, 52 exorcists and readers, together with doorkeepers. The subdeacons, no doubt, became a necessity when the deacons, whose number was limited to seven in memory of their original institution, were no longer equal to their duties in the " regions " of the imperial city, and left their lower work, such as preparation of the sacred vessels, to their subordinates. The office of acolyte may have been suggested by the attendant assigned to heathen priests. The office of doorkeeper explains itself, though it must be remembered that it was the special duty of the Christian ostiarius to exclude the unbaptized and persons undergoing penance from the more solemn part of the Eucharistic service. But readers and exorcists claim 3 " Fixed attention " on the deacon's ministration, the ministration itself being much more ancient. See Justin, Apol. i. 65.
4 The Nestorians may be said to have a fourfold ministry, for they reconsecrated a bishop when he was made catholicos or patriarch. Chardon, v. p. 222.
special notice. The reader is the only minor official mentioned by Tertullian (Praescr. 41). An ancient church order which belongs to the latter part of the 2nd century (see Harnack's Sources of Apostolic Canons, Engl. Trans'. p. 54 seq.) mentions the reader before the deacon, and speaks of him as filling " the place of an evangelist." We are justified in believing that both exorcists and readers, whose functions differed essentially from the mechanical employments of the other minor clerics, belonged originally to the " charismatic " ministry, and sank afterwards to a low rank in the " orders" of the church (see Exorcist and Lector). There were also other minor orders in the ancient church which have fallen into oblivion or lost their clerical character. Such were the copiatae or grave-diggers, the psalmistae or chaunters, and the parabolani, who at great personal risk - whence the name - visited the sick in pestilence. The modern Greek Church recognizes only two minor orders, viz. those of subdeacons and readers, and this holds good of the Oriental churches generally, with the single exception of the Armenians.' The Anglican Church is content with the threefold ministry of bishops, priests and deacons, but in recent times the bishops have appointed lay-readers, licensed to read prayers and preach in buildings which are not consecrated. The Latins, and Armenians who have borrowed from the Latins, have subdeacons, acolytes, exorcists, readers and doorkeepers. Since the pontificate of Innocent III., however, the Latin Church has placed the subdiaconate among the greater or sacred orders, the subdeacon being obliged to the law of celibacy and bound to the daily recitation of the breviary offices. The minor orders, and even the subdiaconate and diaconate, are now regarded as no more than steps to the priesthood. Roman theologians generally reckon only seven orders, although, if we count the episcopate an order distinct from the presbyterate, the sum is not seven, but eight. The explanation given by St Thomas ( Supp. xl. 5.) is that, whereas all the orders have reference to the body of Christ present on the altar, the episcopate, so far forth, is not a separate order, since a simple priest no less than a bishop celebrates the Eucharist. The Council of Trent takes the same view; it enumerates (Sess. xxiii. cap. 2) only seven orders, and yet maintains (cap. 4) the ecclesiastical hierarchy of bishops, priests and ministers, the bishops as successors of the Apostles holding the highest place. The Roman Church forbids ordination to higher grades unless the candidate has received all the inferior orders. Further, a cleric is bound to exercise the minor orders for a year before he can be ordained subdeacon, he must be subdeacon for a year before he is ordained deacon, deacon for a year before he is made priest. However, instances of men elevated at once from the condition of laymen to the priesthood were known in the early church, and Chardon ( Hist. des sacraments, vol. v. part i, ch. v.) shows that in exceptional cases men were consecrated bishops without previous ordination to the priesthood.
Passing to the effect of ordination, we meet with two views, each of which still finds advocates. According to some, ordination simply entitles a man to hold an office and perform its functions. It corresponds to the form by which, e.g., a Roman official was put in possession of his magistracy. This theory is clearly stated by Cranmer: " In the New Testament he that is appointed bishop or priest needed no consecration, by the Scripture, for election or appointment thereto is sufficient."2 This view, widely held among modern scholars, has strong support in the fact that the words used for ordination in the first three centuries (xaporov€ v, xaOcvTav€CV, «Afpova9at, constituere, ordinare ) also expressed appointment to civil office. Very different is the medieval theory, which arose from the gradual acceptance of the belief that the Jewish was the prototype of the Christian priest. According, then, to the Roman view, 1 The Syrian Jacobites and the Maronites also ordain " singers," Denzinger, Rit. Oriental, i. p. 118 seq.; Silbernagl, Kirchen des Orients, pp. 2 54.315.
z Cranmer's works are to be found in Burnet, " Collection of Records " appended to his History of the Reformation (ed. Pocock), iv. 478. Cranmer also maintained that " bishops and priests are but both one office in the beginning of Christ's religion," ib. p. 472.
holy order is a sacrament, and as such instituted by Christ; it confers grace and power, besides setting a mark or character upon the soul, in consequence of which ordination to the same office cannot be reiterated. Such is the teaching of the Roman Church, accepted by the Greeks and with certain modifications by Anglicans of the High Church school, who appeal to i Tim. iv. 14, 2 Tim. i. 6. We may conclude with brief reference to the most important aspects of the Roman doctrine.
The ordinary minister of orders is a bishop. The tonsure and minor orders are, however, still sometimes conferred by abbots, who, though simple priests, have special faculties for the ordination of their monks. Some account has been already given of scholastic opinion on presbyteral ordination to the diaconate and even to the priesthood. Can a heretical or schismatical bishop validly ordain ? Is a simoniacal ordination valid ? All modern theologians of the Roman Church answer these questions in the affirmative, but from the 8th to the beginning of the 13th century they were fiercely agitated with the utmost divergence of opinion and practice. Pope Stephen reconsecrated bishops consecrated in the usual way by his schismatical predecessor Constantine. Pope Nicholas declared orders given by Photius of Constantinople null. St Peter Damian was grievously perplexed about the validity of simoniacal ordinations. Similarly William of Paris held that degradation deprived a priest of power to consecrate. 3 St Thomas, on the contrary, contends that " heretics and persons cut off from the church " (Summ. Suppl. xxxviii. 2) may ordain validly, and that a priest who has been degraded can still celebrate the Eucharist ( Summ. iii. 82.8) validly, though of course not lawfully. This opinion, defended by Bonaventura, Alexander of Hales, Scotus and others, soon became and is now generally accepted.
The Schoolmen had no historical sense and little historical information; hence they fell into one error after another on the essentials in the rite of ordination. Some of them believed that the essential matter in the consecration of a bishop consisted in the placing the book of the gospels on his head and shoulders. True, this rite was used both in East and West as early as the 4th century; it was not, however, universal. According to common opinion, the matter and form of ordination to the episcopate were the imposition of the consecrating bishop's hands with the words, " Receive the Holy Ghost." The words in question, and indeed any imperative form of this kind, are still unknown to the East and were of very late introduction in the West. The final imposition of hands and the bestowal of power to forgive sins at the end of the ordination rite for priests in the Roman Pontifical is later even than the tradition of instruments. For like reasons the tradition of the instruments, i.e. the handing over of paten and chalice in ordination to the priesthood, are admittedly non-essential, unless we adopt the opinion of some Roman theologians that our Lord left the determination of matter and form to the church, which has insisted on different rites at different times.
The necessity of reference to sacerdotal power in the ordination of priests and bishops will be considered a little farther on in connexion with Anglican orders.
Deaconesses in the East received the imposition of the bishop's hands, but could not ascend to the priesthood. The Roman theologians regard them as incapable of true ordination, alleging i Tim. ii. 12. An unbaptized person is also incapable of valid ordination. On the other hand, St Thomas holds that orders may be validly conferred on children who have not come to the use of reason. For lawful ordination in the Roman Church, a man must be confirmed, tonsured, in possession of all orders lower than that which he proposes to receive, of legitimate birth, not a slave or notably mutilated, of good life and competent knowledge. By the present law (Concil. Trid. Sess. xxiii. de Ref. cap. 12) a subdeacon must have begun his twenty-second, a deacon his twenty-third, a priest his twenty-fifth year. 4 The In reality this is a survival of the primitive view that holy order is institution for an office which the local church confers and can therefore take away.
4 The canon law fixes the thirtieth year as the lowest age for episcopal consecration.
Council of Trent also requires that any one who receives holy orders must have a " title," i.e. means of support. The chief titles are poverty, i.e. solemn profession in a religious order, patrimony and benefice. Holy orders are to be conferred on the Ember Saturdays, on the Saturday before Passion Sunday or on Holy Saturday (Easter Eve). The ancient and essential rule that a bishop must be " chosen by all the people " ( Can. ii. 7) has fallen into disuse, partly by the right of confirmation allowed to the bishops of the province, partly by the influence of Christian emperors, who controlled the elections in the capital where they resided, most of all by the authority exercised by kings after the invasion of the northern tribes and the dissolution of the empire (see Church History).
Such in brief were the doctrine and use of the early churches, gradually systematized, developed and transformed in the churches of the Roman obedience. The Reformation brought in radical changes, which were on the whole a return to the primitive type. Calvin states his views clearly in the fourth book of his Institutes, cap. iii. Christ, as he holds, has established in His church certain offices which are always to be retained. First comes the order of presbyters or elders. These are subdivided into pastors, who administer the word and sacraments, doctors, who teach and expound the Bible, elders pure and simple, who exercise rule and discipline. The special care of the poor is committed to deacons. Ordination is to be effected by imposition of hands. The monarchical episcopate is rejected. This view of order was accepted in the Calvinistic churches, but with various modifications. Knox, for example, did away with the imposition of hands (M`Crie's Knox, period vii.), though the rite was restored by the Scottish Presbyterian Church in the Second Book of Discipline. Knox also provided the Church of Scotland with superintendents or visitors, as well as readers and exhorters, offices which soon fell into disuse. Nor do Scottish presbyterians now recognize any special class of doctors, unless we suppose that these are represented by professors of theology. Independents acknowledge the two orders of presbyters and deacons, and differ from the Calvinistic presbyterians chiefly in this, that with them the church is complete in each single congregation, which is subject to no control of presbytery or synod.
Luther was not, like Calvin, a man of rigid system. He refused to look upon any ecclesiastical constitution as binding for all time. The keys, as he believed, were entrusted to the church as a whole, and from the church as a whole the " ministers of the word and sacraments " are to derive their institution and authority. The form of government was not essential. Provided that the preaching of the gospel was free and full, Luther was willing to tolerate episcopacy and even papacy. Hence the Lutheran churches exhibit great variety of constitution. In Scandinavia they are under episcopal rule. The Lutheran Bugenhagen, who was in priest's orders, ordained seven superintendents, afterwards called bishops, for Denmark in 1527, and Norway, then under the same crown, derives its present episcopate from the same source. Sweden stands in a different position. There three bishops were consecrated in 1528 by Peter Magnusson, who had himself been consecrated by a cardinal with the pope's approval at Rome in 1524, for the see of Westiras, to which he had been elected by the chapter. J. A. Nicholson (Apostolical Succession in the Church of Sweden, 1880) seems to have proved so much from contemporary evidence. A reply to Mr Nicholson was made in Swedish by a Roman priest, Bern-. hard, to whom Mr Nicholson replied in 1887. Unfortunately Mr Nicholson gives no detailed account of the form used in consecration, and on this and other points fuller information is needed. We may say, however, that Mr Nicholson has presented a strong case for the preservation of episcopal succession in the Swedish Church.
If the Swedish Church has preserved the episcopal succession, it does not make much of that advantage, for it is in communion with the Danish and Norwegian bodies, which can advance no such claim. On the other hand, the Church of England adheres closely to the episcopal constitution. It is true that in articles xix. and xxxvi. she defines the church, without any express reference to the episcopate, as a " congregation of faithful men in which the pure word of God is preached and the sacraments be duly administered according to Christ's ordinance," and simply adds that the ordinal of Edward VI. for the consecration of bishops, priests and deacons, contains all that is necessary for such ordination and nothing which is of itself superstitious. The preface to the ordinal (1550) goes farther. Therein we are told that the threefold ministry of bishops, priests and deacons may be traced back to apostolic times, and in the final revision of 1662 a clause was added to the effect that no one is to be accounted " a lawful bishop, priest or deacon in the Church of England," unless he has had episcopal consecration or ordination. The words " in the Church of England " deserve careful notice. Nothing is said to condemn the opinion of Hooker (Eccl. Pol. vii. 14. I I) that "there may be sometimes very just and sufficient reason to allow ordination made without a bishop," or of the High Church Thorndike ( apud Gibson on the Articles, ii. 74), who " neither justifies nor condemns the orders of foreign Protestants." The church lays down a rule of domestic policy, and neither gives nor pretends to give any absolute criterion for the validity of ordination.
But while the Church of England has declined communion with non-episcopal churches, she has been involved in a long controversy with the Church of Rome on the validity of her own orders. It will be best to give first the leading facts, and then the inferences which may be drawn from them.
The English Church derives its orders through Matthew Parker, archbishop of Canterbury, who was consecrated in 1559 by William Barlow, bishop-elect of Chichester. We assume that the rite employed was serious and Anglican may reverent, and there is no longer any need to refute the fable of a ludicrous consecration at the "Nag's Head " tavern. We may further take for granted that Barlow was a bishop in the Catholic sense of thQ word. He had been nominated bishop of St Asaph in 1536, translated to St David's in the same year, and to Bath and Wells in 1547. He also sat in the upper house of Convocation and in the House of Peers. Now if Barlow all this time was not consecrated - and so far the only form of consecration known in England was according to the Roman rite - he would have incurred the penalties of praemunire, let alone the fact that Henry VIII. would not have tolerated such a defiance of Catholic order for a moment. The registers at St David's make no mention of his consecration, but this counts for nothing. No reference in the registers can be produced for many ordinations of undoubted validity. Parker thus was consecrated by a true bishop according to the Edwardine ordinal, i.e. he received imposition of hands with the words," Take the Holy Ghost and remember that thou stir up the grace of God which is in thee by imposition of hands." The corresponding form for the ordination of a priest was " Receive thou the Holy Ghost: whose sins thou dost forgive," &c. These were the sole forms in use from 1552 to 1 562.
Roman authorities have from the beginning and throughout consistently repudiated orders given according to the Edwardine ordinal. The case first came under consideration when Cardinal Pole returned to England early in Mary's reign with legatine authority for reconciling the realm to the Holy See. In his instructions to the bishops (Burnet Collect., pt. iii., bk. v., 33 see also Dixon, Hist. Ch. of England, v. 238 seq.') he clearly recognizes orders schismatical but valid, i.e. those conferred in Henry's reign, and so distinguishes them by implication from invalid orders, i.e. those given according to the Edwardine book. In the former alone were " the form and intention of the church preserved." He could not doubt for a moment the utter invalidity of Edwardine ordinations to the priesthood. He knew very well that the theologians of his church almost without exception held that the handing over of the paten and chalice with the words, " Receive power of offering sacrifice," &c., were the essential matter and form of ordination to the priesthood; indeed he published the decree of Eugenius IV. to that effect 1 Compare also the article on Anglican orders in the Catholic Encyclopedia, vol. i., especially at p. 492.
(Wilkins, Concil. iv. 121). The Anglican priesthood being gone, the episcopate also lapses. For according to the Pontifical, the episcopate is the " summum sacerdotium "; the bishop in consecration receives " the sacerdotal grace "; it is " his office to consecrate, ordain, offer, baptize, confirm." Thus in the Pontifical the words " Receive the Holy Ghost " are determined and defined by the context. There is nothing in the Anglican ordinal to show that the Holy Ghost is given for the consecration of a bishop in the Roman sense. In 1704 John Gordon, formerly Anglican bishop of Galloway, gave to the Holy Office an account of the manner in which he had been consecrated. The Sacred Congregation, with the pope's approval, declared his orders to be null. The constant practice has been to reordain unconditionally Anglican priests and deacons. In 1896 Leo XIII. summoned eight divines of his own communion to examine the question anew. Four of those divines were, it is said, decidedly opposed to the admission of Anglican orders as valid; four were more or less favourably disposed to them. The report of this commission was then handed over to a committee of cardinals, who pronounced unanimously for the nullity of the orders in question. Thereupon the pope published his bull Apostolicae curae. In it he lays the chief stress on the indeterminate nature of the Anglican form " Receive the Holy Ghost " at least from 1552 till the addition of the specific words, " for the office and work of a bishop (or priest) in the church of God," as also on the changes made in the Edwardine order " with the manifest intention... of rejecting what the church does." His conclusion is that Anglican orders are " absolutely null and utterly void." Moreover, in a letter to Cardinal Richard, archbishop of Paris, the pope affirms that this his solemn decision is " firm, authoritative and irrevocable." For Roman Catholics the decision necessarily carries great weight, and it may perhaps have its influence on Anglicans of the school which approximates most closely to Roman belief. It need not affect the opinion of dispassionate students. It is not the judgment of experts. The rejection of Anglican orders in the 16th and 17th centuries was based on a theory about the " tradition of instruments," which has long ceased to be tenable in the face of history, and is abandoned by Romanists themselves. The opinion of a liturgical scholar like Mgr. Louis Duchesne, who was a member of the papal commission, on the general question would be interesting in the highest degree. Unfortunately we know nothing of his vote or of the reasons he gave for it, and outside of the Roman pale the unanimous decision of a committee of cardinals counts for very little. We may grant the pope's contention that the Edwardine church had no belief in priests who offered in sacrifice the body and blood of Christ or in bishops capable of ordaining such priests. We may grant further that the medieval offices have been deliberately altered to exclude this view. But then the liturgy of Serapion, the friend of Athanasius, recently discovered, contains forms for the ordination of priests and bishops which do not say a word about power to sacrifice, much less about power to sacrifice Christ's literal body and blood. The canons of Hippolytus, which are about 150 years older, and indeed all the oldest forms for celebration, absolutely ignore any such power of sacrifice. If they speak of sacrifice at all, it is a sacrifice of the gifts brought by the faithful and distributed in the congregation and among the poor, or again they refer to those spiritual sacrifices which a bishop is to offer " day and night." The Didache and Justin Martyr are no less unsatisfactory from the Roman point of view. In short, the English reformers knew very well that the ordinal and communion office which they drew up could not satisfy the requirements of medieval theology. They appealed not to the school divines, but to Scripture and primitive antiquity. That is the standard by which we are to test their work.
Authorities
- For holy order in the apostolic and sub-apostolic age the reader may consult R. Rothe, Anfange der christlichen Kirche (1837); A. Ritschl's Entstehung der altkatholischen Kirche (2nd ed., 1857); J. B. Lightfoot's dissertation on the " Christian Ministry " in his commentary on the Philippians (1868). A new era was opened by E. Hatch's Organization of the Early Christian Church (1880); to this Bishop C. Gore's Church and Ministry (1888) is a reply. The facts are judicially stated and weighed in Bishop J. Wordsworth's Ministry of Grace (1902). Dr T. M. Lindsay's Church and Ministry in Early Centuries (1902) on the whole agrees with Hatch, but is too eager to find modern Presbyterianism in the early church. A. Harnack's edition of the Didache (1884), his Sources of the Apostolic Canons (Eng. trans., 1895), the edition of the Canons of Hippolytus by H. Achelis, in Texte and Untersuchungen, vol. vi. (1891), the translation of Serapion's Prayer-book (translated by Bishop J. Wordsworth, 1899), are indispensable for serious study of the subject.
Joann Morinus, De sacris ordinationibus (1655) and A. C. Chardon, Histoire des sacraments, vol. v. (1745), are rich in material chiefly relating to the patristic and medieval periods.
For the controversy on Anglican orders see P. F. Courayer, Validite des ordinations anglaises (1732), and two works in reply by M. Le Quien, Nullite des ordinations anglicanes (1725), Nullite des ordinations anglicanes de'monstree de nouveau (1730). In recent times Anglican orders have been defended by A. W. Haddan, Apostolical Succession in the Church of England; F. W. Puller, The Bull Apostolicae Curae and the Edwardine Ordinal. They have been attacked by E. E. Estcourt, Question of Anglican Ordinations (1873), and by A. W. Hutton, The Anglican Ministry, with a preface by Cardinal J. H. Newman (1879). (W. E. A.*)
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Chisholm, Hugh, General Editor. Entry for 'Holy Order'. 1911 Encyclopedia Britanica. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/bri/h/holy-order.html. 1910.
