Authorship
Authorship
The author of the Didache is unknown, as is the provenience of the work. There is little to indicate the author’s identity or gender. Given early issues of literacy and gendered roles, it is more likely that the author was male; at least, there is no evidence to point to the author having been female.
Because the author probably used a number of earlier sources, the chief elements of creativity exist in two areas: 1) the author’s decisions about what to include in the teaching, and 2) how to rework that material for his intended audience. Indeed, in the case of the Didache, we can’t really determine to what extent the author made a creative selection and to what extent the decision was already made for him by the need to reproduce the existing tradition and practice of his Church community. For this reason, it may be more correct to refer to the author as an “editor,” “redactor,” “tradent,” or “compiler.” Some scholars call this anonymous figure “the Didachist.”
As is the nature of instructional manuals, the Didache is impersonal in its approach; the compiler’s personality and individual viewpoints fail to peek through as evidence of where or when the document originated. Most scholars date it in either the late first century or early second century; some put it as early as the mid-first century. Arguments for an early date include:
1) The lack of explicit doctrine
2) The absence of a NT canon
3) The lack of leadership hierarchy
4) The simplicity of the ritual formulae
5) The failure to mention heretical groups
6) The absence of sacred days apart from the Lord’s Day
How one dates the Didache is also dependent upon how one views its use of earlier materials. For example, if one believes the compiler was familiar with the Gospel of Matthew and used it as a source, then the text could not be earlier than the Gospel of Matthew itself (ca. 70 or 80), so no earlier than about the year 90. If, on the other hand, one thinks that the Didache used oral materials that were earlier than Matthew, then it is possible that the Didache could be even earlier than the Gospel of Matthew, making the Didache a very important document indeed!
The Didache would not be later than the early third century because it was a source for later materials, including the Syriac text known as the Didascalia.
Discussion about the provenance of the book centers on Syria and Egypt. Most scholars prefer a Syrian location to an Egyptian one, but that conclusion rests on very little evidence. There were ancient Jewish communities scattered throughout Syria-Palestine, Egypt, and elsewhere in the Roman world. In fact, the early 1st century Jewish philosopher and historian Philo of Alexandria (Egypt) tells us (perhaps with some exaggeration) there were few areas where Jews were not to be found (Legatio 214; In Flaccum 45-46).
The compiler of the Didache also alludes to the far-ranging locations in which the Church had been established. The reference in the Didache to wheat being gathered on hills suggests the hills of Syria-Palestine rather than the terrain of Egypt. Yet a number of the surviving Didache fragments stem from Egypt, indicating its popularity there, if not its origin.