Response to Holy Orders – Part 3A

Jewish Background to the Polity of the Christian Church

This is the first section of my review of the third part of Tim Troutman’s article on Holy Orders over at Called to Communion. I would encourage my readers to read Tim’s article, especially this third part. It will be more enlightening to see how he handles the intertestamental history and especially the NT data (which, D.V., I’ll review within the next week in a separate article) than it will be to read me talking about how he does it. Please go read him, then come back and read this. That said, this post will be a clear (if cursory) look at the Jewish background to the polity (government) of the NT church.

Capernaum Synagogue Doorway

Tim Troutman quite readily concedes that the NT church takes its cue from the Jewish system of polity. He affirms that “the hierarchy of the Church was built on the existing Jewish paradigm.” He might be surprised that I quite agree with him. The issue I have with his analysis is that he takes a very narrow view of the “Jewish” paradigm. Let’s take a bit of a broader look and see how the NT church makes use of the on Jewish practices that came down to them.

The synagogue is the most immediate Jewish background of local Christian churches. While there is some difficulty knowing the many details regarding the synagogue in the intertestamental period, we do know that “actual leadership was in the hands of the elders, respected heads of families in the community.” Each synagogue was ruled by a plurality of elders. The Apostle Paul both practiced (Acts 14:23) and instructed (Titus 1:5) that the local churches have a plurality of elders, which follows the long-standing practice of the synagogue. These elders represented the people: “Always now the elders are representatives of the whole people” (TDNT, 6:655). As representative, the elders appointed an archisynagogos (a synagogue chief), a hazzan (minister – among other things, the hazzan ran the synagogue services), and an almoner (one who received and distributed alms). These are the three offices of the synagogue and they correspond very nicely to the three offices of the Reformed/Presbyterian polity: Ruling elder (archisynagogos), minister/teaching elder (hazzan), and deacon (almoner) – (cf. J. Julius Scott, Jr., Jewish Backgrounds of the New Testament, 142-3).

In addition to the local rule of elders, the synagogue also became the model for the local Christian church in matters of worship and liturgy.

There were no altars nor sacrifices in the synagogue; instead only the sacred books (scrolls) were absolutely necessary. Although priests who were in attendance were usually selected to be the public readers and to pronounce the blessings, their presence was not required for a synagogue service as it was for worship in the temple. The revered leaders of the synagogue were the elders of the community and those with recognizable expertise in the law. (Julius, 140)

Early Christian worship largely followed the form of the synagogue. Christian worship centered on the reading and exposition of the Scripture, the singing of praises, offering up prayers, and blessing, all of which were patterned after the worship and liturgy of the synagogue. Further,  the early Christians were zealous to help the poor, which was also an emphasis of the synagogue (see Emil Schürer’s magisterial work, A History of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ, div. 2, vol. 2, sect. 27).

Even the disciplinary process which Christ gives the churches in Matthew 18 is so closely akin to the disciplinary process of the synagogue “that some have supposed Jesus to be speaking of the current synagogue rather than the future church” (Edmund Clowney, “A Brief for Church Governors,” in Order in the Offices: Essays Defining the Roles of Church Officers, 49). Jesus is, of course, speaking to his disciples, not to the Jews (vv. 1-2). He’s confirming that the church (certainly indicating the local church, for how else could this process work?) has the power of discipline, to bind and loose. Further, it is likely that the phrase “where two or three are gathered” is phraseology drawn from Jewish usage and would most naturally refer to the elders of the local body (see Clowney, 50). In any case, the local leadership and discipline in the synagogue are in the hands of the local college of elders [TDNT, 6:660-661].

I have just skimmed the surface of the meaningful connections between early Christianity and the synagogue system. Tim did not bother to mention them at all. Why do you suppose that is? Rather than focus on the synagogue, Tim (briefly) examines the Sanhedrin, which he says is “one obvious and immediate contextual reference for Christian clergy. Yet this collegial body,” he goes on, “was not entirely egalitarian; the elders were united and ruled under the authority of the high priest. This structure is reflected in the single bishop surrounded by presbyters in the early church.” Tim’s notion that the prelacy of the early church was reflected in the structure of the Sanhedrin is simply cosmetic. Very little is known about the authority structure of the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem. Let’s examine what we do know.

The Sanhedrin was the supreme Jewish council, which has roots back Moses (Num 11). Through the OT until the captivity, very little is said of this body (or anything resembling it), but it came into prominence after the return from captivity. By NT times membership in the body was primarily drawn from the priestly nobility, but also included elders and scribes. Luke 23:50 shows that it included men from places other than just Jerusalem. This indicates that it likely drew from the broader Jewish leadership in representative fashion.

Model of the Great Synagogue

The Sanhedrin in Jerusalem was called the Great Synagogue and the Great Sanhedrin, so as to distinguish it from regional sanhedrins and local synagogues. The relationship between the synagogues, regional sanhedrins, and the Great Sanhedrin is largely unknown, so there is no definite proof that these bodies functioned as a system of ascending courts. On the other hand, we certainly should note the cosmetic similarity between the Jewish system moving into the NT and the Presbyterian system.

The position of the high priest was certainly functioning into the NT, but was not quite the unifying power of the elders that Tim lets on. In the OT, the office of the high priest was hereditary and the occupant filled it for life. By the time of Roman domination, the office was greatly modified.

Herod the Great and other Roman rulers following him saw the high-priestly office as far too important to leave it to the chance of generational succession. They set aside the provision that a high priest serve for life. Instead, they installed and deposed chief priests at their pleasure. Josephus lists twenty-eight different persons who held the office between 37 B.C. and the suppression of the revolt in A.D. 70. These, it seems, essentially came from only a few aristocratic families. (Julius, 92)

The high priesthood was, thus, a wildly politicized and greatly modified position by NT times. That office could not have been much of a unifying factor in the Great Sanhedrin. This is clear from the inconsistency and volatility of the office. In any event, the office of the high priest in NT times, contrary to Tim’s assertion, was not a clear picture of a bishop surrounded by a presbyteriate. His analysis is superficial and based upon a simple observation of mere form.

Taken as a whole, the polity of Israel moving into the NT looks a great deal like a Presbyterian system. In Presbyterian theory each congregation is ruled by elders. In addition, there are regional sanhedrins (now called presbyteries), which correspond to the “church” of a city which contained more than one congregation. Finally, there was the great Sanhedrin (now called a General Assembly), which corresponds quite closely to the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15. These intertestamental considerations (of themselves) neither prove nor disprove any particular polity, but they do weigh heavily on how we understand the NT data. For example, Luke did not offer any explanation of the office of the elder, even upon referencing it for the first time in Acts 11:30. This bare mention would be quite impossible if the church office of elder were not quite similar to intertestamental “elder” in the Jewish system. Along with Tim, then, I concur that the historical context of Jewish polity is foundational to the polity of the Christian church. The historical evidence moving into the NT, however, is favorable neither to episcopal nor congregational forms of polity, but heavily favors a presbyterian style of polity in the Christian church.