Euodia and Syntyche again

Richard Fellows draws our attention to an article on Euodia and Syntyche in significant agreement with ours.
I think that wraps that particular matter up nicely! Mind you, we got there first!!!*

*(Actually James C. Watts, “Did Euodia and Syntyche Quarrel?” Methodist New Connexion Magazine and Evangelical Repository 61/3 (1893), 24–29, got there first but his contribution was totally forgotten until Dr Stewart turned it up in the British Library!)

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The ordination prayers of Traditio apostolica: the Bradshavian version

Just published is Paul F. Bradshaw, “The ordination prayers in the so-called Apostolic Tradition” Vigiliae Christianae 75 (2021), 119-129.

Abstract: The anonymous church order formerly identified as the Apostolic Tradition and attributed to Hippolytus is now regarded by many scholars as a composite work made up of layers of redaction from around the mid-second to mid-fourth centuries. This essay revises the unsatisfactory attempt to discern such strata in its ordination prayers that was made by Eric Segelberg as long ago as 1975, and argues that their earliest forms are among the oldest material in the so-called Apostolic Tradition, belonging to the first half of the second century.

There is much in common here with my own recent treatment, particularly as both use Segelberg as a springboard, though Bradshaw continues to be mistrustful of what he sees as hieratic language in the episcopal ordination prayer.

Unlike my own article, however, his gives consideration to the presbyteral ordination prayer, and makes the persuasive suggestion that this too may have some antiquity, at least in an earlier form. He points out that that no liturgical functions are mentioned, which seems to reflect a situation where the presbyters were not ministers as such but advisors to the bishop. He states “One might assume that such people would simply have been elected or appointed without any ritual act or even prayer for them, but there is no reason to suppose that this was true everywhere or that it persisted throughout the century as their role began to change” (127). This is certainly possible.

His final sentence is also worth pondering. “… it deserves emphasizing that there is no reason to think that the prayers formed a single collection prior to their absorption into the developing Apostolic Tradition, but each one may have come from a different ecclesiastical tradition.” (129)

Euodia and Syntyche

Now published online is “Euodia, Syntyche and the Role of Syzygos: Phil 4:2–3” ZNW 109 (2018), 222–234.

Abstract: In Phil 4:2–3 Paul urges Euodia and Syntyche to unite with each other. He also addresses ‘true yokefellow’, and asks him to assist the two women. This paper disputes the almost universally held assumption that Paul was asking him to mediate a conflict between the two women. Rather, Paul is here calling the church leaders, Euodia and Syntyche, to have the mind of Christ and to foster unity among the Philippian churches, and the other church members to support them. The term ‘true yokefellow’ is a piece of ‘idealized praise’ and is Paul’s way of diplomatically correcting one or more church members.

I do not post the German abstract as I realize that somebody somewhere interfered with my version by turning “Gemeinde” at each point to a singular, whereas I had plurals, reflecting the plural nature of Philippian congregations even in a single Ortskirche.

This article is chiefly the work of Richard Fellows, though I have managed to get my name on it as co-author, mainly by exercising my editorial skills.

By way of an aside, to lighten up a rather quotidian post, we may note that this in part continues my argument in Original bishops that Euodia and Syntyche were patrons, episkopoi, of Philippian Christian associations. Those interested in ancient precedents for the ordination of women (among whom I am not numbered) may do better exploring the roles of these ancient female patrons than by examining the rather dubious and difficult evidence of the church orders regarding female deacons.

Thanks also to Richard Fellows, note the article is open access, and can be read from the link above.