August 5, 2025 • 28 mins
On today’s Bible Answer Man broadcast (08/05/25), we pick up where we ended on our previous broadcast and present more of an episode of the Hank Unplugged podcast. Hank is talking with Dr. Marcellino D’Ambrosio, author of When the Church Was Young: Voices of the Early Fathers. Hank and Dr. D’Ambrosio discuss the importance of holy tradition, understanding that the early church did not have the Bible as we do today, the centrality of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist as argued by Ignatius of Antioch, the martyrdom of Polycarp of Smyrna, the significance of relics, The Didache, and apologetics and the First Apology of Justin Martyr.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
From the Christian Research Institute in Charlotte, North Carolina. This
is the Bible answer Man Broadcast with Hank Canagraph. We're
on the air because truth matters and life matters. More
on today's special edition of The Bible answer Man. We
pick up where we ended on our previous broadcast and
present more of the pre recorded episode of the Hank
(00:29):
Unplugged podcast. Hank is talking with doctor Marcellino Dembrosio, author
of When the Church Was Young Voices of the Early Fathers.
Let's now rejoin Hank Canigraph and doctor Dembrosio in their conversation.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Even before the New Testament writings are assembled together into
a canon or a rule, you see Clement, this one,
who is the successor of Peter and Paul and Rome, saying,
you know, you have to submit to the rule of
the life that's been passed on. That's what tradition means.
What's been handed over, that sacred trust that's been handed over,
(01:06):
And that's what really tradition is. It's not just a
few little extraneous practices. It's the whole life of the
church from which the New Testament writings spring and against
which the New Testament writings must be interpreted. If you
don't interpret the writings of the New Testament against the
backdrop of the whole tradition of the Church, you end
(01:27):
up making all sorts of crazy errors. So it's important
to understand that the New Testament scriptures flow from the
Apostolic tradition, and they're constantly accompanied by that tradition, which
gives us the lens, the proper lens with which to
view and understand the New Testament writings.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Yeah, and the Church passes that on. And Paul talks
about the Church in scripture as the ground and pillar
of truth, and I think that's an important maxim for
Christians to grasphold. It's the Church that is the ground
and pillar of truth. That is the Church that is
the center of the universe. It is the Church that
(02:08):
is the God ordained vehicle through which these truths are
propagated and passed on.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Absolutely, And it was the Church that really all the
writers of the New Testament are members of that church,
and they speak not only for themselves, but they give
voice to that church and the Church's tradition. And it
was the Church that discerned which writings that bore names
of apostles were authentic and were to be regarded as
(02:37):
inspired scripture and read in the eucharistic assembly. So without
the church, you don't have the scriptures or the Bible.
So you can't really pit tradition against Bible, and Bible
against tradition. They really stand or fall together.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
You know. What's interesting, as you mentioned early on that
when Clement was talking about the scriptures, he was talking
about the Old test Scriptures. And I think it's noteworthy
that the early Church, the church that we're talking about
right now, is a church that didn't have the Bible
(03:13):
as codified today, at least with respect to the New Testament,
the twenty seven books of the Canon that wasn't codified
as a canon till somewhere in the fourth century, late
fourth century, three sixty seven. I think it was by Athanasias.
So we have this sense that people always had the Bible,
but they didn't. And as we noted early on, even
(03:37):
the Letter of Clement was coudified with the Canon read
for many centuries within the church, but now we don't
have it as part of the canon. But this is
a decision that was made based on principles, a determination
made within the Corporate Council of the Church.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Yes, I think it's important to realize that the vehicle
for the development of the New Testament canon was the
liturgy of the Apostolic churches. It was there that people
heard the scriptures. You know, we have to keep in
mind there's no printing press, books are expensive, books are rare. Actually,
the technology to have a bound Bible as we know
it wasn't developed till the fourth century. So you had scrolls,
(04:20):
and you had individual folios of maybe eight pages of
a booklet as we might know it, and those collections
were kept largely in the church and read in public worship.
So that's how people were exposed to the scriptures. And
what was read in worship was a discernment of the church.
So you know, Clement's letter was read for a while.
(04:42):
After a while, the majority felt like Clement's letter is magnificent,
but we're not going to read it in the liturgy
because Clement wasn't an apostle. But it was very, very important.
This is how the New Testament canon developed. What is
read in the liturgy of the Apostolic churches, and then
eventually that gets codified in local councils like the Council
(05:03):
of Carthage and the Letter of Athanacius that lists books,
but they are books that are read in the liturgy
of the Church of Alexandria. So the liturgy of the
Church itself is the bearer and the primary vehicle of
this tradition that gives us the canon of Scripture. I
think that's one of the things that we need to understand.
In the New Testament, there is one page that's definitely
(05:26):
not inspired, and that is the Table of Contents that
didn't drop from heaven, that wasn't written by an apostle,
but that is discerned by the Church's tradition. And so
all of us who have a Bible and look at
that table of Contents and accept the books in the
Old and New Testament are really relying on the tradition
of the Church that's passed on by the fathers of
(05:47):
the Church in a very special way.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
Maybe one more thing we ought to say about Ignacious
of Antioch. First, that he is Ignacious of Antioch. This
was where Christians were first called Christians. But more to
the point, Ignatius makes an argument for the Eucharist, for
the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and I
(06:10):
love the argument. It's codified in your book. But he's
asserting that just as the historical body of Jesus was
not a mere fantasm, neither is the Eucharist an empty symbol. Rather,
this is the real body. This is the pure body,
the precious blood of Jesus Christ. And this was shrouded
(06:32):
in mystery. How this could be no one could tell,
just as we cannot fully explain how Christ could be
one person with two natures, so we can't fully explain
how Christ could be really present. But that was a
central teaching of the Church. The Church was energized by
(06:53):
the Eucharist. They were energized not by biological power, but
zoetic energy. The Church is energized by a force that
is in them, not of them, and by that they
turn a world right side up.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Absolutely, you can't miss it when you read the Fathers
and starting with Clement and Ignacious. And by the way,
you know, Ignacious is very early. We're talking we don't
know the exact date of his letters, but somewhere between
one ten and one seventeen, so that's really early. It's
only fifteen years maybe after the last New Testament book,
(07:27):
which we're guessing twenty years at the most. So it's
really amazing. But you see the centrality of the Eucharist
as well as the centrality of Sunday. You know, as
you mentioned earlier when we talked about Sunday worship, Ignacious
says very clearly that it was the Apostles who taught
us to worship on the Lord's Day. So this is
(07:49):
again he's a witness to Apostolic tradition. Why do we
celebrate on Sunday because the Resurrection begins a new creation.
Sabbath is wonderful, it's the admiration of the first creation
and God's resting. But God does a new work on
the eighth Day and the Resurrection. So this is a
very deliberate teaching of the Apostles. That's why we find
(08:11):
it in all the Apostolic churches, this Sunday worship. But
we also find this Eucharistic worship that it is what
Jesus did at the Last Supper, done again. And the
belief here is very clear. Just as Jesus was truly incarnate,
the immaterial, invisible God comes to us visibly through the
humanity of Christ. So the Eucharist really is his tangible,
(08:33):
visible presence of his body and blood, and so you know,
he doesn't try to explain it. You're right, Hank, he
doesn't try to explain it. He just witnesses to the
centrality of it. And he basically says that the people
who are not doing the eucharists and refraining from it
are those who are uncomfortable with the humanity of Christ
and don't believe in it. They don't believe that Jesus
(08:56):
was truly man. So there's a beautiful link here, very
clear link in the early Church between believing in the
reality of the sacraments and the reality of Christ's humanity.
Their link the incarnation is linked to the reality of
the Euchrist and the sacraments.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
One of my all time favorite Apostolic fathers, the one
I've quoted most over the years, is Polycarpus Schmerna. Schmerna,
as you alluded to earlier, as one of the seven
Churches of the Apocalypse. And by the way, this is parenthetical,
but I think all of the Bibles completed before eighty seventy,
and there are a lot of reasons for that. I've
(09:32):
done a lot of work on that particular subject, but
I think that if in fact, these letters were written after,
or anything was written after eighty seventy, it would most
certainly have mentioned the most apocalyptic event in Church history,
which was a destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. But
that's another story. But Polycarp of Schmerna was a disciple
(09:55):
of John. He was a colleague to Ignacious, and there
were parallels between his martyrdom and that of Christ. And
I'll tell you so often I think about what he said.
It's emblazoned on the canvas of my consciousness. Eighty and
six years have I served him? Will I now deny
(10:16):
the Lord that saved me? And so he too was
like Ignacious, martyred for the faith.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
It's really a touching story, isn't it. I mean, I
love his letter, but I love the account of his martyrdom.
And it is so important to see that the martyrs
died not because they were just loyal to an idea
or an ideology, but it was union with Christ. They
wanted to share in his suffering.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Don't go away, We'll be right back and rejoin Hank
Hanigraft's conversation with doctor Marciollino dem Brosio long before the
schism between East and West. Long before the words Catholic, Orthodox,
and Evangelical referred to communities and separated from each other,
the fathers of the Church gloried in the one faith
(11:05):
of the United Body of Christ, which can be none
other than Evangelical, Catholic and Orthodox. It's time to rediscover
our common inheritance. Marcellino Dembrosio wrote, When the Church was Young.
To take modern Christians on a journey to the days
when the Church was young. By exploring our roots together,
(11:26):
we will experience new growth that will produce new fruit,
new unity, and great joy. To receive your copy of
When the Church Was Young Voices of the Early Fathers,
call eight eight eight seven thousand curi and make a
gift to support the Christian Research Institute's life changing outreaches
(11:47):
eight eight eight seven thousand curi or visit us at
equip dot org. The Complete Bible answer Book Collector's Edition
is the comprehensive collection of the most often asked questions
Hank Hannigraph has received throughout his four decades as host
(12:11):
of the Bible answer Man broadcast. With more than half
a million copies already in print, this newly revised and expanded.
Collector's Edition helped seekers and skeptics alike sort through the
truth on topics such as reliability of the Bible, religions
and cults, the resurrection and afterlife, and many more issues
(12:31):
vital to a better understanding of God in Christ and
our relationship to Him. To receive your copy of the
Complete Bible answer Book Collector's Edition Revised and Expanded, call
eight eight eight seven thousand CRII and make a gift
to support the Christian Research Institute's life changing outreaches eight
(12:51):
eight eight seven thousand CRII or visit us at EQUIP
dot org. Anyone who's been paying attention knows there's a
war going on, not just on traditional morality, civility, and decency,
but even more fundamentally on historic notions of truth. And
(13:12):
the enemy isn't just the onslaught of fake news, facilitated
by a post truth culture and turbocharged by growing legions
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(13:32):
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(13:55):
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Speaker 4 (14:02):
Do you ever wonder what the early Church was like
in When the Church was young? Doctor Marcellino Dembrosio dusts
off dry theology and brings to life the lives of
early Church heroes Augustine, Athanasius, Chris System and many more.
Long before the words Catholic, Orthodox and Evangelical referred to
distinct and separated communities, the fathers of the Church gloried
(14:25):
in one faith, the United Body of Christ, which can
be none other than Evangelical, Catholic and Orthodox. It's time
to rediscover our common inheritance and return to the days
when the Church was young, to experience new growth that
will produce new fruit, new unity and joy. To receive
your copy of When the Church was Young, Voices of
(14:45):
the Early Fathers Call eight eight eight seven thousand, CRI
and make a gift to support the Christian research institutes
Life Changing Outreaches eight eight eight seven thousand CRII or
visit equip dot org.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Let's rejoin Hank Hanograph and doctor Marcialino Dmbrosio as they
continue their conversation.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
It is so important to see that the martyrs died
not because they were just loyal to an idea or
an ideology, but it was union with Christ. They wanted
to share in his sufferings. We see that ignacious we
see it in polycarp and so the martyr imitates Christ.
It wants to be conformed to Christ in every way.
(15:35):
And that's clear that it's just ironic here that even
the person's name, there's a herod who happens to be
involved in this story, who's a police chief or something.
So it's really so much his forgiveness of the crowd
that it calls for his death. Is the nobility of
(15:56):
his prayer, which sounds a lot like an Eucharistic prayer.
That's the beautiful thing and it shows us actually also
where the Church calendar of Saints comes from. This martyrdom,
which took place around one point fifty five AD. The
one who writes the story. A member of the church
who witnessed this event says that every year the faithful
(16:19):
gather at the place where his ashes are kept to
celebrate his day of death as a birthday, a birthday
into eternal life. So this is really where the calendar
comes from, and it's also where the idea comes from
that the early Christians were hiding out in the catacombs.
They didn't celebrate necessarily Sunday worship there, but they celebrated
(16:42):
the feasts of the martyrs at their graveside, which in
Rome would have been in catacombs. So it just shows
you how central and important the love of the martyrs
the commemoration of the martyrs are, and there's no real
contest between honoring the martyrs and work shipping Jesus. They
didn't confuse the two. They saw the two as being interrelated.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
To that point, the point of bringing the ashes elaborate
on the significance of relics and the practice of bringing
the remains of martyrs into churches. A lot of people
find that to be very, very strange in the modern world,
but in the ancient world this was not strange at all,
because we believe that we are in dwelt by the
(17:30):
power of the Holy spirits. So our bodies are temples
of the Holy Spirit, and therefore the bones of our
bodies are impacted by the dunamus of God, and those
relics are very, very significant. We're held to be significant
in the ancient Church, and I think ought to be
in the modern church as well.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
Absolutely, it was so important, you know. We do have
to just keep in mind we're products of our own culture,
and those who have died, you know, are sequestered far
away from us, you know. We very seldom see them
in the cemeteries or go there, you know, and we
live in a society that is very afraid to confront
(18:12):
the issue of death and remember the dead. But that
wasn't the way it was even in secular society of
the ancient world. In Rome, you know, in the time
of the first and second century, people had little houses
in the graveyards were above ground, and this is Saint
Peter's is built over one and families would go and
visit and have meals in commemoration of the dead. So
(18:36):
that was the general culture. Well, Christians had much more
reason to feel a sense of unity with those who
deceased because of the unity of the body of Christ.
And as you said that the body of the martyr
was in dwelled by the spirit and was sacred. So,
first of all, Christians went to the graves in you know,
originally in the first century in above ground cities of
(18:57):
the dead, and then in the second and third century
when they changed the burial method and did it below ground,
they went into the catacombs, and they actually used the
grave as an altar. So when they came out of
the catacombs, they took relics of the saints and put
them in the altars. And that's kind of you know,
where that practice comes from. But it's really the mystery
(19:21):
of the communion of saints and the honoring of those
in whom Christ's holy spirit dwells. That's where the reverence
to the relics of the saints comes from. And actually,
you know, you can even see in the Old Testament
a sense of the spiritual power of God passing through things,
you know, like for example, Elijah's body. Somebody throws a
(19:42):
dead body into the grave of Elijah because as a
raid happening, and that person comes back to life. So
you know, the cloak of Elijah, the bones of Elisha,
the staff of Moses. You know there's a way in
which these things are made holy by the power of
God passing through them.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Absolutely, you devote a good bit of time in your
book to the d de Kay and I want to
talk about that a little bit and have you elaborate,
because here you have an early church catechism and also
a document that gives us a sense of church order
or how church took place, and therefore we have an
(20:22):
early prototype for how we are to do church today.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Absolutely, it's really fascinating how this document again was lost
for a long time. It was found only in the
nineteenth century and identified for what it was, and since
it caused a great sensation when it was found. But fascinating.
This is a testimony to tradition and to humility in
(20:48):
the church. The author does not name himself, and that's
because he's really passing on something that doesn't come from him.
He's passing on the Church's tradition, the teaching of the
Twelve Apostles. He passes on really how early Christians were
formed before baptism, and we see really the earliest catechism
(21:08):
that follows the ten Commandments, and by the way, it's
the first explicit and very very clear and explicit prohibition
of abortion and contraception as being against the Fifth Commandment.
But then he passes on into explaining how Christian worship
ought to take place, and he talks about baptism. And
you see here and this document probably as we have
(21:30):
it now, it's probably from about one twenty five AD,
that's the best guess, but it stitches together two earlier
documents that are most probably first century documents, so contemporaneous
like possibly with New Testament writings. By what we see
the centrality of the eucharists. And we see in baptism
how baptism was done, yes, ideally in the leading water
(21:53):
and by immersion, but if that was impossible, over pouring
three times in the name of the Father's side and
the Holy Spirit. So we see that the current way
the Church baptizes today in East and West, the Trinitarian
Christian churches, you know, that has its roots right back
in the way early Christians baptized in the late first century.
(22:15):
So it's pretty amazing document, really, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
And you have instructions on fasting, also praying three times
a day. I think that's particularly interesting because what you
have here is an imitation, as it were, of what
the Jews did. The Jews pray the Shema Hero Israel,
the Lord your God. The Lord has won, and instead
of praying the Shema, we now pray the Lord's prayer
(22:39):
three times a day. We have this pattern, and during
the coronavirus pandemic, this was one of the calls that
I had to churches all over the world to pray
three times a day, just as the early Church did, morning, noon,
and night. Pray the Lord's prayer three times a day.
And the beauty of it is we are able to
(23:04):
call God our father, something that was unthinkable to the
Jewish community. They weren't even able to pronounce the name
of God, much less address him as father. And this
is precisely what Jesus tells us to do, because we've
been adopted coers, adopted into the family of God.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
Yes, it is so central, it is so absolutely central
to the uniqueness of our relationship with God, taught to
us by the Savior himself, calling Godfather. So it was
clear that the our Father that we find in Matthew
and Luke's Gospel was the central prayer of Christians, and
it did replace that Sheemah and was like the brand
it identified. And this helped to distinguish Christians from Jews
(23:50):
who did not accept Christ. And so did the fast days.
You know, Jews, it seems that they faceted on Tuesdays
and Thursdays, and it says in the day, okay, we
fast not like the hypocrites, but we pass on Wednesdays
and Friday. So we see actually the Wednesday and Friday
penitential days, which is still the Christian East still observes
these days penitentially, and the West at least has a memory.
(24:13):
In the Latin Church has a memory of Friday being
a penitential day all throughout the year. But this goes
really back to the first century.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
Yeah, absolutely. And then also the emphasis that is placed
in the Eucharist is central to the worship service. Want
to move from the apostolic fathers to the apologist the
Christian Research Institute, I've been president here for something like
thirty five years. We're called an apologetic ministry. We're always
ready to give an answer reason for the faith that
(24:43):
lies within us, with gentleness and with respect. And when
we think about apologetics, so often people say, well what
are you apologizing for? But denotatively, we're talking about a
defense of the faith against Christian heretics, Jewish critics, against
Pagan persecutors. And this is precisely what a group of
(25:06):
men did who followed in the train of the Apostolic fathers.
And one of the most noteworthy and early of these
apologists was Justin Martyr. His ultimate act of witness, which
you have cautified in the book, is actually worth reading.
I don't know if you want to read it. I
(25:27):
just think it's fantastic, or maybe you can summarize it.
But here you have the ultimate act of witness where
he's going to die, or he's going to give his life,
he's going to be beheaded, he's going to be martyred,
and he doesn't shy away from martyrdom Ordain. Rather he
gives an apology for the faith, a defense of the faith.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Well, we've run out of time for today's special edition
of the Bible answer Man Broadcast. Be sure to tune
in again next time, when we will continue hack Hannagraft's
conversation with doctor Marcellino Dembrosio. An appreciation for your vital
gift to help strengthen and expand the life changing outreaches
of the Christian Research Institute. Hank would like to send
(26:11):
you doctor Dembrosio's book When the Church Was Young Voices
of the Early Fathers. Simply call eight eight eight seven
thousand CRI and make a gift to support CRI's life
changing outreaches eight eight eight seven thousand CRI or visit
equip dot org. You can also write to CRII at
(26:34):
Post Office Box eighty five hundred, Charlotte, North Carolina, two
eight two seven one. The preceding program was pre recorded.
The Bible Answerman Broadcast is funded solely by listeners like you.
We're on the air because truth matters and life matters more.
(27:00):
The Complete Bible answer Book Collector's Edition is the comprehensive
collection of the most often asked questions Hank Hannigraph has
received throughout his four decades as host of the Bible
answer Man Broadcast. With more than half a million copies
already in print, this newly revised and expanded Collector's Edition
helped seekers and skeptics alike sort through the truth on
(27:23):
topics such as reliability of the Bible, religions, and cults,
the resurrection and afterlife, and many more issues vital to
a better understanding of God in Christ and our relationship
to Him. To receive your copy of the Complete Bible
answer Book Collector's Edition, Revised and expanded, call eight eight
(27:43):
eight seven thousand CRII and make a gift to support
the Christian Research Institute's life changing outreaches eight eight eight
seven thousand CRII or visit us at EQUIP dot org.
From the Christian Research Institute in Charlotte, North Carolina. This
is the Bible answer Man Broadcast with Hank Canagraph. We're
on the air because truth matters and life matters. More
on today's special edition of The Bible answer Man. We
pick up where we ended on our previous broadcast and
present more of the pre recorded episode of the Hank
(00:29):
Unplugged podcast. Hank is talking with doctor Marcellino Dembrosio, author
of When the Church Was Young Voices of the Early Fathers.
Let's now rejoin Hank Canigraph and doctor Dembrosio in their conversation.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Even before the New Testament writings are assembled together into
a canon or a rule, you see Clement, this one,
who is the successor of Peter and Paul and Rome, saying,
you know, you have to submit to the rule of
the life that's been passed on. That's what tradition means.
What's been handed over, that sacred trust that's been handed over,
(01:06):
And that's what really tradition is. It's not just a
few little extraneous practices. It's the whole life of the
church from which the New Testament writings spring and against
which the New Testament writings must be interpreted. If you
don't interpret the writings of the New Testament against the
backdrop of the whole tradition of the Church, you end
(01:27):
up making all sorts of crazy errors. So it's important
to understand that the New Testament scriptures flow from the
Apostolic tradition, and they're constantly accompanied by that tradition, which
gives us the lens, the proper lens with which to
view and understand the New Testament writings.
Speaker 3 (01:46):
Yeah, and the Church passes that on. And Paul talks
about the Church in scripture as the ground and pillar
of truth, and I think that's an important maxim for
Christians to grasphold. It's the Church that is the ground
and pillar of truth. That is the Church that is
the center of the universe. It is the Church that
(02:08):
is the God ordained vehicle through which these truths are
propagated and passed on.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Absolutely, And it was the Church that really all the
writers of the New Testament are members of that church,
and they speak not only for themselves, but they give
voice to that church and the Church's tradition. And it
was the Church that discerned which writings that bore names
of apostles were authentic and were to be regarded as
(02:37):
inspired scripture and read in the eucharistic assembly. So without
the church, you don't have the scriptures or the Bible.
So you can't really pit tradition against Bible, and Bible
against tradition. They really stand or fall together.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
You know. What's interesting, as you mentioned early on that
when Clement was talking about the scriptures, he was talking
about the Old test Scriptures. And I think it's noteworthy
that the early Church, the church that we're talking about
right now, is a church that didn't have the Bible
(03:13):
as codified today, at least with respect to the New Testament,
the twenty seven books of the Canon that wasn't codified
as a canon till somewhere in the fourth century, late
fourth century, three sixty seven. I think it was by Athanasias.
So we have this sense that people always had the Bible,
but they didn't. And as we noted early on, even
(03:37):
the Letter of Clement was coudified with the Canon read
for many centuries within the church, but now we don't
have it as part of the canon. But this is
a decision that was made based on principles, a determination
made within the Corporate Council of the Church.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Yes, I think it's important to realize that the vehicle
for the development of the New Testament canon was the
liturgy of the Apostolic churches. It was there that people
heard the scriptures. You know, we have to keep in
mind there's no printing press, books are expensive, books are rare. Actually,
the technology to have a bound Bible as we know
it wasn't developed till the fourth century. So you had scrolls,
(04:20):
and you had individual folios of maybe eight pages of
a booklet as we might know it, and those collections
were kept largely in the church and read in public worship.
So that's how people were exposed to the scriptures. And
what was read in worship was a discernment of the church.
So you know, Clement's letter was read for a while.
(04:42):
After a while, the majority felt like Clement's letter is magnificent,
but we're not going to read it in the liturgy
because Clement wasn't an apostle. But it was very, very important.
This is how the New Testament canon developed. What is
read in the liturgy of the Apostolic churches, and then
eventually that gets codified in local councils like the Council
(05:03):
of Carthage and the Letter of Athanacius that lists books,
but they are books that are read in the liturgy
of the Church of Alexandria. So the liturgy of the
Church itself is the bearer and the primary vehicle of
this tradition that gives us the canon of Scripture. I
think that's one of the things that we need to understand.
In the New Testament, there is one page that's definitely
(05:26):
not inspired, and that is the Table of Contents that
didn't drop from heaven, that wasn't written by an apostle,
but that is discerned by the Church's tradition. And so
all of us who have a Bible and look at
that table of Contents and accept the books in the
Old and New Testament are really relying on the tradition
of the Church that's passed on by the fathers of
(05:47):
the Church in a very special way.
Speaker 3 (05:49):
Maybe one more thing we ought to say about Ignacious
of Antioch. First, that he is Ignacious of Antioch. This
was where Christians were first called Christians. But more to
the point, Ignatius makes an argument for the Eucharist, for
the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and I
(06:10):
love the argument. It's codified in your book. But he's
asserting that just as the historical body of Jesus was
not a mere fantasm, neither is the Eucharist an empty symbol. Rather,
this is the real body. This is the pure body,
the precious blood of Jesus Christ. And this was shrouded
(06:32):
in mystery. How this could be no one could tell,
just as we cannot fully explain how Christ could be
one person with two natures, so we can't fully explain
how Christ could be really present. But that was a
central teaching of the Church. The Church was energized by
(06:53):
the Eucharist. They were energized not by biological power, but
zoetic energy. The Church is energized by a force that
is in them, not of them, and by that they
turn a world right side up.
Speaker 2 (07:06):
Absolutely, you can't miss it when you read the Fathers
and starting with Clement and Ignacious. And by the way,
you know, Ignacious is very early. We're talking we don't
know the exact date of his letters, but somewhere between
one ten and one seventeen, so that's really early. It's
only fifteen years maybe after the last New Testament book,
(07:27):
which we're guessing twenty years at the most. So it's
really amazing. But you see the centrality of the Eucharist
as well as the centrality of Sunday. You know, as
you mentioned earlier when we talked about Sunday worship, Ignacious
says very clearly that it was the Apostles who taught
us to worship on the Lord's Day. So this is
(07:49):
again he's a witness to Apostolic tradition. Why do we
celebrate on Sunday because the Resurrection begins a new creation.
Sabbath is wonderful, it's the admiration of the first creation
and God's resting. But God does a new work on
the eighth Day and the Resurrection. So this is a
very deliberate teaching of the Apostles. That's why we find
(08:11):
it in all the Apostolic churches, this Sunday worship. But
we also find this Eucharistic worship that it is what
Jesus did at the Last Supper, done again. And the
belief here is very clear. Just as Jesus was truly incarnate,
the immaterial, invisible God comes to us visibly through the
humanity of Christ. So the Eucharist really is his tangible,
(08:33):
visible presence of his body and blood, and so you know,
he doesn't try to explain it. You're right, Hank, he
doesn't try to explain it. He just witnesses to the
centrality of it. And he basically says that the people
who are not doing the eucharists and refraining from it
are those who are uncomfortable with the humanity of Christ
and don't believe in it. They don't believe that Jesus
(08:56):
was truly man. So there's a beautiful link here, very
clear link in the early Church between believing in the
reality of the sacraments and the reality of Christ's humanity.
Their link the incarnation is linked to the reality of
the Euchrist and the sacraments.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
One of my all time favorite Apostolic fathers, the one
I've quoted most over the years, is Polycarpus Schmerna. Schmerna,
as you alluded to earlier, as one of the seven
Churches of the Apocalypse. And by the way, this is parenthetical,
but I think all of the Bibles completed before eighty seventy,
and there are a lot of reasons for that. I've
(09:32):
done a lot of work on that particular subject, but
I think that if in fact, these letters were written after,
or anything was written after eighty seventy, it would most
certainly have mentioned the most apocalyptic event in Church history,
which was a destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple. But
that's another story. But Polycarp of Schmerna was a disciple
(09:55):
of John. He was a colleague to Ignacious, and there
were parallels between his martyrdom and that of Christ. And
I'll tell you so often I think about what he said.
It's emblazoned on the canvas of my consciousness. Eighty and
six years have I served him? Will I now deny
(10:16):
the Lord that saved me? And so he too was
like Ignacious, martyred for the faith.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
It's really a touching story, isn't it. I mean, I
love his letter, but I love the account of his martyrdom.
And it is so important to see that the martyrs
died not because they were just loyal to an idea
or an ideology, but it was union with Christ. They
wanted to share in his suffering.
Speaker 1 (10:44):
Don't go away, We'll be right back and rejoin Hank
Hanigraft's conversation with doctor Marciollino dem Brosio long before the
schism between East and West. Long before the words Catholic, Orthodox,
and Evangelical referred to communities and separated from each other,
the fathers of the Church gloried in the one faith
(11:05):
of the United Body of Christ, which can be none
other than Evangelical, Catholic and Orthodox. It's time to rediscover
our common inheritance. Marcellino Dembrosio wrote, When the Church was Young.
To take modern Christians on a journey to the days
when the Church was young. By exploring our roots together,
(11:26):
we will experience new growth that will produce new fruit,
new unity, and great joy. To receive your copy of
When the Church Was Young Voices of the Early Fathers,
call eight eight eight seven thousand curi and make a
gift to support the Christian Research Institute's life changing outreaches
(11:47):
eight eight eight seven thousand curi or visit us at
equip dot org. The Complete Bible answer Book Collector's Edition
is the comprehensive collection of the most often asked questions
Hank Hannigraph has received throughout his four decades as host
(12:11):
of the Bible answer Man broadcast. With more than half
a million copies already in print, this newly revised and expanded.
Collector's Edition helped seekers and skeptics alike sort through the
truth on topics such as reliability of the Bible, religions
and cults, the resurrection and afterlife, and many more issues
(12:31):
vital to a better understanding of God in Christ and
our relationship to Him. To receive your copy of the
Complete Bible answer Book Collector's Edition Revised and Expanded, call
eight eight eight seven thousand CRII and make a gift
to support the Christian Research Institute's life changing outreaches eight
(12:51):
eight eight seven thousand CRII or visit us at EQUIP
dot org. Anyone who's been paying attention knows there's a
war going on, not just on traditional morality, civility, and decency,
but even more fundamentally on historic notions of truth. And
(13:12):
the enemy isn't just the onslaught of fake news, facilitated
by a post truth culture and turbocharged by growing legions
of ideological spind Doctors note the real enemies of truth
range from postmodernist convictions that there is no objective truth
to militant scientism that claims that only science can determine truth,
(13:32):
and religion is little more than primitive superstitions. But CRI
Support Team members are not waving a white flag of surrender.
They're holding the fort by undergirding everyone of Christian Research
Institute's mind shaping and life changing outreaches twenty four to seven.
To learn how you can make a difference and enjoy
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(13:55):
dot org.
Speaker 4 (14:02):
Do you ever wonder what the early Church was like
in When the Church was young? Doctor Marcellino Dembrosio dusts
off dry theology and brings to life the lives of
early Church heroes Augustine, Athanasius, Chris System and many more.
Long before the words Catholic, Orthodox and Evangelical referred to
distinct and separated communities, the fathers of the Church gloried
(14:25):
in one faith, the United Body of Christ, which can
be none other than Evangelical, Catholic and Orthodox. It's time
to rediscover our common inheritance and return to the days
when the Church was young, to experience new growth that
will produce new fruit, new unity and joy. To receive
your copy of When the Church was Young, Voices of
(14:45):
the Early Fathers Call eight eight eight seven thousand, CRI
and make a gift to support the Christian research institutes
Life Changing Outreaches eight eight eight seven thousand CRII or
visit equip dot org.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Let's rejoin Hank Hanograph and doctor Marcialino Dmbrosio as they
continue their conversation.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
It is so important to see that the martyrs died
not because they were just loyal to an idea or
an ideology, but it was union with Christ. They wanted
to share in his sufferings. We see that ignacious we
see it in polycarp and so the martyr imitates Christ.
It wants to be conformed to Christ in every way.
(15:35):
And that's clear that it's just ironic here that even
the person's name, there's a herod who happens to be
involved in this story, who's a police chief or something.
So it's really so much his forgiveness of the crowd
that it calls for his death. Is the nobility of
(15:56):
his prayer, which sounds a lot like an Eucharistic prayer.
That's the beautiful thing and it shows us actually also
where the Church calendar of Saints comes from. This martyrdom,
which took place around one point fifty five AD. The
one who writes the story. A member of the church
who witnessed this event says that every year the faithful
(16:19):
gather at the place where his ashes are kept to
celebrate his day of death as a birthday, a birthday
into eternal life. So this is really where the calendar
comes from, and it's also where the idea comes from
that the early Christians were hiding out in the catacombs.
They didn't celebrate necessarily Sunday worship there, but they celebrated
(16:42):
the feasts of the martyrs at their graveside, which in
Rome would have been in catacombs. So it just shows
you how central and important the love of the martyrs
the commemoration of the martyrs are, and there's no real
contest between honoring the martyrs and work shipping Jesus. They
didn't confuse the two. They saw the two as being interrelated.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
To that point, the point of bringing the ashes elaborate
on the significance of relics and the practice of bringing
the remains of martyrs into churches. A lot of people
find that to be very, very strange in the modern world,
but in the ancient world this was not strange at all,
because we believe that we are in dwelt by the
(17:30):
power of the Holy spirits. So our bodies are temples
of the Holy Spirit, and therefore the bones of our
bodies are impacted by the dunamus of God, and those
relics are very, very significant. We're held to be significant
in the ancient Church, and I think ought to be
in the modern church as well.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
Absolutely, it was so important, you know. We do have
to just keep in mind we're products of our own culture,
and those who have died, you know, are sequestered far
away from us, you know. We very seldom see them
in the cemeteries or go there, you know, and we
live in a society that is very afraid to confront
(18:12):
the issue of death and remember the dead. But that
wasn't the way it was even in secular society of
the ancient world. In Rome, you know, in the time
of the first and second century, people had little houses
in the graveyards were above ground, and this is Saint
Peter's is built over one and families would go and
visit and have meals in commemoration of the dead. So
(18:36):
that was the general culture. Well, Christians had much more
reason to feel a sense of unity with those who
deceased because of the unity of the body of Christ.
And as you said that the body of the martyr
was in dwelled by the spirit and was sacred. So,
first of all, Christians went to the graves in you know,
originally in the first century in above ground cities of
(18:57):
the dead, and then in the second and third century
when they changed the burial method and did it below ground,
they went into the catacombs, and they actually used the
grave as an altar. So when they came out of
the catacombs, they took relics of the saints and put
them in the altars. And that's kind of you know,
where that practice comes from. But it's really the mystery
(19:21):
of the communion of saints and the honoring of those
in whom Christ's holy spirit dwells. That's where the reverence
to the relics of the saints comes from. And actually,
you know, you can even see in the Old Testament
a sense of the spiritual power of God passing through things,
you know, like for example, Elijah's body. Somebody throws a
(19:42):
dead body into the grave of Elijah because as a
raid happening, and that person comes back to life. So
you know, the cloak of Elijah, the bones of Elisha,
the staff of Moses. You know there's a way in
which these things are made holy by the power of
God passing through them.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Absolutely, you devote a good bit of time in your
book to the d de Kay and I want to
talk about that a little bit and have you elaborate,
because here you have an early church catechism and also
a document that gives us a sense of church order
or how church took place, and therefore we have an
(20:22):
early prototype for how we are to do church today.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Absolutely, it's really fascinating how this document again was lost
for a long time. It was found only in the
nineteenth century and identified for what it was, and since
it caused a great sensation when it was found. But fascinating.
This is a testimony to tradition and to humility in
(20:48):
the church. The author does not name himself, and that's
because he's really passing on something that doesn't come from him.
He's passing on the Church's tradition, the teaching of the
Twelve Apostles. He passes on really how early Christians were
formed before baptism, and we see really the earliest catechism
(21:08):
that follows the ten Commandments, and by the way, it's
the first explicit and very very clear and explicit prohibition
of abortion and contraception as being against the Fifth Commandment.
But then he passes on into explaining how Christian worship
ought to take place, and he talks about baptism. And
you see here and this document probably as we have
(21:30):
it now, it's probably from about one twenty five AD,
that's the best guess, but it stitches together two earlier
documents that are most probably first century documents, so contemporaneous
like possibly with New Testament writings. By what we see
the centrality of the eucharists. And we see in baptism
how baptism was done, yes, ideally in the leading water
(21:53):
and by immersion, but if that was impossible, over pouring
three times in the name of the Father's side and
the Holy Spirit. So we see that the current way
the Church baptizes today in East and West, the Trinitarian
Christian churches, you know, that has its roots right back
in the way early Christians baptized in the late first century.
(22:15):
So it's pretty amazing document, really, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
And you have instructions on fasting, also praying three times
a day. I think that's particularly interesting because what you
have here is an imitation, as it were, of what
the Jews did. The Jews pray the Shema Hero Israel,
the Lord your God. The Lord has won, and instead
of praying the Shema, we now pray the Lord's prayer
(22:39):
three times a day. We have this pattern, and during
the coronavirus pandemic, this was one of the calls that
I had to churches all over the world to pray
three times a day, just as the early Church did, morning, noon,
and night. Pray the Lord's prayer three times a day.
And the beauty of it is we are able to
(23:04):
call God our father, something that was unthinkable to the
Jewish community. They weren't even able to pronounce the name
of God, much less address him as father. And this
is precisely what Jesus tells us to do, because we've
been adopted coers, adopted into the family of God.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
Yes, it is so central, it is so absolutely central
to the uniqueness of our relationship with God, taught to
us by the Savior himself, calling Godfather. So it was
clear that the our Father that we find in Matthew
and Luke's Gospel was the central prayer of Christians, and
it did replace that Sheemah and was like the brand
it identified. And this helped to distinguish Christians from Jews
(23:50):
who did not accept Christ. And so did the fast days.
You know, Jews, it seems that they faceted on Tuesdays
and Thursdays, and it says in the day, okay, we
fast not like the hypocrites, but we pass on Wednesdays
and Friday. So we see actually the Wednesday and Friday
penitential days, which is still the Christian East still observes
these days penitentially, and the West at least has a memory.
(24:13):
In the Latin Church has a memory of Friday being
a penitential day all throughout the year. But this goes
really back to the first century.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
Yeah, absolutely. And then also the emphasis that is placed
in the Eucharist is central to the worship service. Want
to move from the apostolic fathers to the apologist the
Christian Research Institute, I've been president here for something like
thirty five years. We're called an apologetic ministry. We're always
ready to give an answer reason for the faith that
(24:43):
lies within us, with gentleness and with respect. And when
we think about apologetics, so often people say, well what
are you apologizing for? But denotatively, we're talking about a
defense of the faith against Christian heretics, Jewish critics, against
Pagan persecutors. And this is precisely what a group of
(25:06):
men did who followed in the train of the Apostolic fathers.
And one of the most noteworthy and early of these
apologists was Justin Martyr. His ultimate act of witness, which
you have cautified in the book, is actually worth reading.
I don't know if you want to read it. I
(25:27):
just think it's fantastic, or maybe you can summarize it.
But here you have the ultimate act of witness where
he's going to die, or he's going to give his life,
he's going to be beheaded, he's going to be martyred,
and he doesn't shy away from martyrdom Ordain. Rather he
gives an apology for the faith, a defense of the faith.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Well, we've run out of time for today's special edition
of the Bible answer Man Broadcast. Be sure to tune
in again next time, when we will continue hack Hannagraft's
conversation with doctor Marcellino Dembrosio. An appreciation for your vital
gift to help strengthen and expand the life changing outreaches
of the Christian Research Institute. Hank would like to send
(26:11):
you doctor Dembrosio's book When the Church Was Young Voices
of the Early Fathers. Simply call eight eight eight seven
thousand CRI and make a gift to support CRI's life
changing outreaches eight eight eight seven thousand CRI or visit
equip dot org. You can also write to CRII at
(26:34):
Post Office Box eighty five hundred, Charlotte, North Carolina, two
eight two seven one. The preceding program was pre recorded.
The Bible Answerman Broadcast is funded solely by listeners like you.
We're on the air because truth matters and life matters more.
(27:00):
The Complete Bible answer Book Collector's Edition is the comprehensive
collection of the most often asked questions Hank Hannigraph has
received throughout his four decades as host of the Bible
answer Man Broadcast. With more than half a million copies
already in print, this newly revised and expanded Collector's Edition
helped seekers and skeptics alike sort through the truth on
(27:23):
topics such as reliability of the Bible, religions, and cults,
the resurrection and afterlife, and many more issues vital to
a better understanding of God in Christ and our relationship
to Him. To receive your copy of the Complete Bible
answer Book Collector's Edition, Revised and expanded, call eight eight
(27:43):
eight seven thousand CRII and make a gift to support
the Christian Research Institute's life changing outreaches eight eight eight
seven thousand CRII or visit us at EQUIP dot org.
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