Introduction

Based on the contents of this paper, I must have written it for a class entitled, “The Early Church and its Creeds.” This was a first-semester class I took at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg in the fall 1985 semester.

Paper

Once the early church received the charge from Christ to “…go therefore and make disciples of all nations…” (Matthew 28:19a) and reached the size where the original apostles could no longer maintain personal contact, the need to codify the basic teachings of the Christian faith became apparent. Once in writing, these teachings could be passed on to newcomers to the faith. One such collection of teachings is, in fact, called The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, or The Didache. It points to “…two ways, one of life and one of death; and between the two ways there is a great difference.” (The Didache 1:1) The “way of life” follows the great commandment: “First, you must love God who made you, and second, your neighbor as yourself.” (The Didache 1:2) Rather than leaving the implications of this general rule for the newcomer to discover, The Didache explores its applications to daily life. The body of The Didache then, sets out for the newcomer to the Christian faith the numerous ramifications of that great commandment in both personal and corporate action.

In its first six chapters, The Didache unpacks the great commandment in terms of personal action, prescribing modes of conduct in response to enemies and vice. Many of the prescriptions take the form “Do not….” (The Didache 2:2 ff.) This negative approach to positive living follows from the formulation of the Golden Rule given in the document: “And whatever you want people to refrain from doing to you, you must not do to them.” (The Didache 1:2b) This formulation seems to define virtue through the omission of bad acts rather than the commission of good acts. Nevertheless, if one follows fully the instructions of The Didache, one will stay on the “way of life,” as the document states:

If you can bear the Lord’s full yoke, you will be perfect. But if you cannot, then do what you can. (The Didache 6:2)

Perfectly complying with the instructions in The Didache leads to perfection, yet the document recognizes the impossibility of doing so.

Chapters seven through fifteen catalogue models for corporate action in the life of the community of believers. Included are basic liturgies, developed in the early church, for the sacraments of baptism and Eucharist, as well as descriptions of the disciplines of prayer and fasting. Further, The Didache describes how to respond to teachers, apostles, and prophets, and outlines ways to observe the Sabbath, elect bishops and deacons, and resolve disputes among members of the community of believers. These chapters, while seemingly rather loosely connected to the contrast between the ways of life and death, do describe the ideal workings of a community of believers seeking to love fully both God and neighbor.

The Didache is a manual for novices of the Christian faith, delineating rules and models for personal conduct and corporate action. Through its compaction of the moral and ethical teachings of Jesus Christ and its inclusion of basic liturgies and guidance, The Didache operates to answer the question, “How should Christians act to show love for God and other people?”