Читать книгу A Source Book for Ancient Church History - Joseph Cullen Ayer - Страница 4

Table of Contents

The period in the Church before the clash with Gnosticism and the rise of an apologetic literature comprises the apostolic and the post-apostolic ages. These names have become traditional. The so-called apostolic age, or to circa 100, is that in which the Apostles lived, though the best tradition makes John the only surviving Apostle for the last quarter of a century.

The principal sources for the history of the Church in this period are the books of the New Testament, and only to a slight degree the works of contemporaneous Jewish and heathen writers. It is hardly necessary to reproduce New Testament passages here. The Jewish references of importance will be found in the works on the life of Christ and of St. Paul. As the treatment of this period commonly falls under a different branch of study, New Testament exegesis, it is not necessary in Church history to enter into any detail. There are, however, a few references to events in this period which are to be found only outside the New Testament, and are of importance to the student of Church history. These are the Neronian persecution (§ 1), the death of the Apostles (§§ 2, 3), and the persecution under Domitian (§ 4). The paucity of references to Christianity in the first century is due chiefly to the fact that Christianity appeared to the men of the times as merely a very small Oriental religion, struggling for recognition, and contending with many others coming from the same region. It had not yet made any great advance either in numbers or social importance.

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