Apologeticae sive Theologiae Fundamentalis, Tomus II (Pars Altera): Demonstratio Catholica

1. As to the name. In general it must be said that the hierarchical names of the New Testament do not take their origin from the hierarchical terminology of the old covenant. Nowhere in the writings of the apostles are Christian superiors called high priests, priests, and Levites. The reason seems to be that, from the same name thus taken over, the faithful might suspect that the Christian hierarchy was a continuation of the Aaronic priesthood. Afterwards, however, when the temple of Jerusalem had been overthrown and the old priesthood abolished, as the first century drew to its close the Christian hierarchs began to be compared to the high priest, the priests, and the Levites,¹ and finally, from the third century on, the clergy of the New Testament are frequently designated by these names.²

The name of deacon, i.e. minister, derives from the office which the clerics of the third grade discharged, because it was the deacons' task to "minister", namely to help the apostles and their successors in temporal affairs,³ in preaching⁴ and in baptizing.⁵ The name of presbyters or elders arises from the manner of speech of the Jews. Already in the Old Testament⁶ and especially in the age of Christ, the colleges of superiors, who in individual places took charge of religious affairs (the magistrates of the synagogues) and civil affairs (the magistrates of the cities), were called presbyters or presbyteries.⁷ Whether the presidents of these presbyteries were sometimes called bishops, i.e. superintendents, overseers, presidents, is not clear. Certainly, however, in the Septuagint version a certain prefect of the priests and Levites,⁸ or even of soldiers,⁹ was called by the word bishop, while by the word episcopate was meant the prefecture itself, or the charge or office of the prefect.¹⁰ And indeed it was from the Septuagint version that the apostles adapted this word episcopate to the Christian hierarchy.¹¹

Yet the name of bishop in the New Testament does not constantly designate a hierarch of the first grade. For the title of bishop is given now to Christ,¹² now to the apostles,¹³ and finally to presbyters simply, whether of the first or of the second grade.¹⁴ Hence the name of bishop was not yet a technical term by which only the highest hierarchs were called; indeed all the hierarchical names were often interchanged. E. g. Peter and John are called "presbyters",¹⁵ Peter, "a fellow presbyter", beseeches the "presbyters" to feed the flock of God, "overseeing" (ἐπισκοποῦντες) not under constraint, but willingly;¹⁶ Paul and Apollo are called "deacons",¹⁷ and everywhere in the New Testament the whole apostolic office is called a ministry (διακονία). Therefore, since the nomenclature of the hierarchical offices in the New Testament and in the other writings of the first century was not yet constant, from the current name of bishops one certainly cannot conclude that the episcopal office strictly so called was already present.

Yet:

2. As to the episcopal office, these things are established from the writings of the apostles. The apostles, as we have shown, established stable presbyteries in all and each of the Christian communities, whose members were adorned with either priestly or episcopal dignity. The supreme direction, however, the apostles reserved to themselves.¹⁸ Hence the first bishops of all the churches were the apostles themselves. Soon, however, as the number of the churches grew, the apostles delegated certain of their vicars, who, endowed with supreme episcopal power, would pass through the churches, visiting them, enacting laws, judging offenders, imposing hands on those to be ordained.¹⁹ Gradually, in many places, they placed standing bishops, who would preside over the churches in the place of the apostles and succeed them. Thus Paul established Timothy at Ephesus as president of the neighboring churches;²⁰²¹ He left Titus in Crete, "that he might set right the things that were wanting, and appoint presbyters in every city".²² In like manner the apostle John instituted bishops in various churches of Asia Minor, namely at Ephesus, Smyrna, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea²³ For the "angels" of these churches, to whom John is bidden to write in the Apocalypse, were, by the common consent of interpreters, monarchical bishops.²⁴ The truth of this interpretation, moreover, is fully confirmed from elsewhere. For that three of those seven churches mentioned in the Apocalypse were episcopal sees a few years after John is evident from the epistles of s. Ignatius.²⁵ That the apostle John set Polycarp over Smyrna, Papias over Hierapolis,²⁶²⁷²⁸ and other bishops over other churches, is well established. Likewise it is established that Dionysius the Areopagite was set over the Athenians by the apostles,²⁹ that Simeon succeeded the apostle James at Jerusalem, that Annianus succeeded Mark the Evangelist at Alexandria, that Evodius succeeded the apostle Peter at Antioch, that Linus succeeded the princes of the apostles, Peter and Paul, at Rome.³⁰

But how many and which churches already then had bishops is not established.³¹ S. Clement of Rome, writing as the apostolic age drew to its close, seems indeed to hint that a hierarch of the first grade presided over each of the Christian churches in place of the high priest of the Old Testament: "For to the high priest his own offices were given, to the priests a place of their own" was assigned, and the Levites have their ministries incumbent upon them.³² Yet it is certain that not all, but only the more important Christian communities were diocesan sees, in much the same way as happens today.³³ For the rest, the college of bishops could properly succeed the college of the apostles and fully develop itself only after the death of the apostles.³⁴