From: Kenneth Litwak (kenneth@sybase.com)
Date: Sun Jan 21 1996 - 22:53:23 EST
Bruce Terry asks:
> A point of clarification, please. By technical meanings, are you referring to
> usage that refers to an appointed position vs. a general meaning or to the
> period in church history when these two terms take on distinctive meanings?
>
What I'm getting at is that by the 3rd century certainly an EPSIKOPOS
was an appointed, official office. I don't get the feeling from any NT
documents, the Pastoral epistles included, that that stage has been reached.
So I'm unsure, when translating the Apostolic Fathers, when EPISKOPOS and
PRESBUTEROS refer to the appointed, official offices of bishop and elder
and when they only seem to have their more, shall we say, low-key NT
flavor (they don't seem to be in the NT time an "office" worth fighting over,
and you had, at least according tot he Pastoral epistles, to have moral
and spiritual qualities appropriate to these positions, rather than just
the political connections to get them. While I tend to the view that
Euodia and Synteche were in this category addressed in Phil 1:1-2, I don't
think they were bishops in the 3rd cent. sense, let alone in an office developed
to where you have to wear a funny hat "-).
Ken Litwak
GTU
Bezerkley, CA
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