It is difficult, however, for the
portrait of multiple early Christian communities to account for the ethereal
and ephemeral histories of such diverse and independent churches. If early Christianity
encompassed so many distinctive theological communities at the beginning of the
second century, why did these distinctive communities so soon evaporate,
leaving no trace of their existence?
The existence of distinctive
theological documents is insufficient evidence for the existence of distinctive
and independent theological communities. Indeed, the very question at issue is
whether scholars are justified in positing distinct communities on the basis of
documents that express points of theological difference, whether real or
imagined. By the middle of the second century, much of this supposed diversity
had evaporated.
We do not have at this time a
Johannine church (or several Johannine churches), a Pauline church (or several),
a Petrine circle, a network of Asia Minor churches under the influence of the
book of Revelation, a Q tradition, a “Diotrephite” church, a docetic church (or
several), several churches with various degrees of Judaizing, and a supposed
host of other distinctive communities reflecting the shades of emphasis found
in the Synoptic traditions. Rather what we have primarily is the “Great Church”
(Irenaeus, Haer. 1.26.22; Tertullian, De praescriptione haereticorum
33; De carne Christi 14.18; Origen, Cels. 2.2; De principiis (Peri
archon) 4.2.21; Epiphanius, Panarion (Aversus haereses) 30). . . . One
cannot ger around this problem by contending that alternative forms of
Christianity were suppressed and thus disappeared. From the available evidence,
the primary targets of suppression by what was to become the dominant church
were groups with Judaizing and docetic tendencies, and these survived far
beyond the period we are considering. Nor is the argument persuasive that there
were multiple forms of Christianity at the beginning of the second century that
by the middle o the century had congealed into the Great Church. Why would
these diverse tendencies have come to see their destinies in a common tradition
rather than in the distinctive groups in which they had successfully functioned
for several decades prior? Bauer’s claim that Rome had a major role in it was
challenged when he made it more than seventy years ago, and it has not become more
compelling since for the period we are examining here.
It seems, then, that the existence
of such numerous, diverse, and competing Christian communities is largely
unsupported by the evidence. (Thomas A. Robinson, Ignatius of Antioch and
the Parting of the Ways: Early Jewish-Christian Relations [Peabody, Mass.:
Hendrickson Publishers, 2009], 77, 78-79)
In a footnote to the above, we read that:
This is not to deny that schism
occurred within the Christian community, only that it was characteristic of
Christianity. There would have been clashes over belief and practice, some of
which resulted in separate communities. Paul’s letters offer evidence of the
competitive character of some of the early Christian mission, and opposition to
Paul continued well into the second century. Other evidence of schism comes
from the Johannine literature (1 John 2:19; 3 John 9). Ignatius himself speaks frequently
of separate assemblies or eucharists. My objection is to the practice of
creating hypothetical communities on the basis of perceived or real theological
differences between documents. (Ibid., 79 n. 124)
