The last few years have given me the opportunity to spend a significant portion of study in the writings of the early church.
The introductory notice of volume 1 of the Ante-Nicene Fathers (vii) set by Hendrickson captures why I love reading the early church the best.
Speaking of the period surrounding the Apostolic Fathers (A.D. 100-200), whose most prolific witnesses were Polycarp, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, and the like, Coxe says,
Those were the times of heroism, not of words; an age not of writers but of soldiers; not of talkers, but of suffers. Curiosity is baffled, but faith and love are fed by these scanty relics of primitive antiquity. Yet may we well be grateful for what we have. These writings come down to us as the earliest response of converted nations to the testimony of Jesus, They are primary evidences of the Canon and the credibility of the New Testament.
Disappointment may be the first emotion of the student who comes down from the mount where he has swept in the tabernacles of evangelists and apostles: for these disciples are confessedly inferior to the masters; they speak with the chives of infirm and fallible of men, and not like the New Testament writers, with the fiery tongues of the Holy Ghost. Yet the thoughtful and loving spirit soon learns their exceeding value. For who dow not close the records of St. Luke with longings to get a glimpse of the further history of the progress of the Gospel? What of the Church when its founders were fallen asleep? Was the Good Shepherd ‘always' with his little flock, according to his promise? Was the Blessed Comforter felt in his presence mind the fires of persecution? Was the Spirit of Truth really able to guide the faithful into all truth, and to keep them in the truth?
In case someone conflates the Fathers, Coxe reminds us, “The Fathers are inferior in kind as well as in degree” to Scripture; “yet their words are lingering echoes of those whose words were spoken ‘as the Spirit gave them utterance.' They are monuments of the power of the Gospel.”
Are you familiar with the writings of the early church?
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