The Christadelphian community is blessed with individuals who have the aptitude, the willingness and the patience to engage with academic literature, both as readers and as writers. This latter activity, participating in the wider theological dialogue, gives Christadelphians the opportunity to make representation of their doctrinal perspective to the communities that inform theological ideas at the highest level. In areas where Christadelphians diverge from mainstream Christendom, we have some different and valuable ideas to contribute to the dialogue. Of course, such differences may also impede being selected for publication, but all the more reason for Christadelphian writers to approach their subject with rigor and so earn an audience. This article by Jonathan Burke is one such piece.
The tag ‘Apostolic Fathers’ is the name given to a collection of texts dating from the first and second centuries. It is varied collection and grouping them together under a single category can mask the fact that they represent different perspectives from different authors. Yet as representatives of the period between the New Testament writers and the 2c. Apologists, they are a crucial datum in understanding early Christianity. By looking at texts written immediately after the New Testament period and finding points of continuity, one can corroborate doctrinal themes within early Christianity. One such theme is the Christian understanding of Satan and demons.
Burke begins by outlining previous work on Satan and demons in the Apostolic Fathers and, more generally, in biblical texts. He then proceeds to discuss the Jewish aetiologies of sin in the Second Temple Period. Looking at the Jewish understanding of Satan and demons is crucial given the (sometimes overlooked) fact that Jewish influence upon Christianity did not end with the apostles. The early Christians continued to draw on various strands of Judaism. Some doctrinal shifts that were previously supposed to be due to pagan influence can be more readily understood through the influence of Hellenised Judaism. In Second Temple Judaism there were two aetiologies of sin: Adamic (human origin of evil) and Enochic (demonic original of evil). This allows Burke to devise a criterion for analysis satanological terminology in a text: when accompanied by an Adamic aetiology of sin such terminology indicates a non-belief in Satan and demons. Via this methodology Burke argue that certain texts exhibit non-belief in Satan and demons without appeal to arguments from silence.
After describing his methodology, Burke proceeds to apply his methodology to the Apostolic Fathers. He identifies a number of texts that he believes exhibit non-belief in Satan and demons, namely, the Didache, First Clement, Shepherd of Hermas, Martyrdom of Polycarp, and Second Clement. He contrasts these with texts that do exhibit belief in Satan and demons, namely, the Epistle of Barnabas and the Epistles of Ignatius. In making this contrast Burke is able to further strengthen his conclusion, arguing that Barnabas and Ignatius reveal how the other writers would have written had they believed in Satan and demons. Burke takes the evidence from the Apostolic Fathers as evidence for “a first century demythological Christianity which survived well into the second century, though only as a minority report”.
Review of “The Early Earth” by John Whitcomb (1972)