43. henderson, “Didache and Orality in synoptic comparison,” 299.
43. henderson, “Didache and Orality in synoptic comparison,” 299.
44. ibid., 305.
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result of providing instruction for the recitation of prayers and ritual texts, of quoting sayings of Jesus, and of the use of other ancient literary conventions including περὶ δέ + genitive as a section heading45 and the λέγω-citation formula to cite the hebrew scriptures.46 secondly, neither the juxtaposition of conflicting norms nor the citing of a variety of authorities alleviates the tension in the Didache, especially in light of the fact that the text itself warns against deviation from the teaching presented (4.13; 6.1; 11.1). finally, the detailed nature of the text speaks against viewing it as the representation of a conversation where “there is nothing … that the reader does not already know.”47
from examining the studies of Milavec and henderson, it seems clear that the attribution to the Didache of an originally oral character, even if it is only “oral sensitivity,” does not account for the state of the text as we have it. clearly the lens of orality is more usefully applied to the portions of the Didache designated by the text itself as oral communication, that is, the Two Ways text (1–6 as indicated by 7.1), the Lord’s prayer (8.2–3), and the prayers for the eucharistic meal (9–10). These are all subtexts on a level of communication deeper than that of the surface level and have clearly been recorded for the use of the receiving audience. Recognizing anew their oral nature, scholars have been better able to appreciate the flow of these texts as performances, to speculate on how they would have been received and understood, and to understand how and where they fit into the picture in the development of worship, ritual, and liturgy in early christianity. i completely acknowledge the usefulness of such a perspective to illuminate those areas. The focus of the remainder of this paper, however, will not be on the meaning and function of these subtexts individually but rather on the reason for their inclusion in the Didache and their intended use within the community.
in a 2008 study of the vice lists of the Two Ways text, Draper respect-fully challenged the attempt by huub van de sandt and David flusser to reconstruct the Greek Two Ways text lying behind the Didache, Doctrina apostolorum, and Barnabas, a text that they saw as also related to even 45. On this see Margaret Mitchell, “concerning PeRi De in 1 corinthians,” NovT
3(1989): 229–56.
46. see “εἶπον,” BDaG 1e. examples of a parallel phenomenon outside of Jewish and christian texts, including in the work of epictetus, can be found in “λέγω,”
BDaG 1bη.
47. henderson, “Didache and Orality in synoptic comparison,” 292.
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earlier traditions used in 1Qs and seen also in the Derek Eretz materials.48
On the model of oral performance, Draper suggested instead that the Two Ways, despite its written forms, was primarily an oral tradition and continued to exist in oral forms alongside these written versions. The fact of the matter, according to Draper, was that as an oral tradition the Two Ways likely had no original form from which the others descended. Moreover, he maintains that, because the genre of the Two Ways tradition is that of catechesis, it
would have been delivered orally by a teacher over a lengthy period, during which the teaching would have been committed to memory. The text would never have been read in a silent or even in a public recital in the form that is found either in the Jerusalem Manuscript of the Didache (h54) or in the reconstruction of the Two Ways provided by van de sandt and flusser. The text is simply a skeleton, an aide de mémoire for the oral instructor.49
in support of this stance, Draper cites studies by Jan Vansina on narratives and Ruth finnegan on oral poetry and also brings in the interesting example of the lukasa memory board of the Luba people, a mnemonic device used for initiation rites. attached to the lukasa boards are a number of pegs and shells, each representing some piece of information both in and of itself and in its relationship to the other pegs/shells. some of the pegs/
shells are movable while others are more static and serve as anchors for the rite overall. The information connected with these pegs/shells serves “to recall particular aspects of the history of the Luba, its kings, and its sacred significance.”50 a performance of the initiation always contained approxi-mately the same information, roughly in the same order, but allowed for a good deal of flexibility as well, within the limits set by the anchors. Draper finds here an analogy to the vice lists of the Two Ways, where certain patterns/combinations almost always occur together and where specific vices 48. see huub van de sandt and David flusser, The Didache: Its Jewish Sources and Its Place in Early Judaism and Christianity, cRiNT 3.5 (assen: Van Gorcum; Minneapolis: fortress, 2002), 180–82.
49. Jonathan a. Draper, “Vice catalogues as Oral-Mnemonic cues: a comparative study of the Two-Ways Tradition in the Didache and Parallels from the Perspective of Oral Tradition,” in Jesus, the Voice, and the Text: Beyond the Oral and the Written Gospel, ed. Tom Thatcher (Waco, TX: Baylor university Press, 2008), 112; see also 115.
50. ibid., 118.
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or combinations anchor the tradition, but where there can also be significant variation in larger sequences, as is seen across the independent Two Ways texts. although he sees this within the Didache itself between chapters 2, 3, and 5, the similarities in the text here seem to me not to show the patterning necessary to signal a set, albeit still variable, tradition in the background. Better examples, in my opinion, are his comparisons of the lists of the Didache, the Doctrina apostolorum, and Barnabas where a variation of smaller patterns can be more clearly seen, especially between Barnabas and the other two texts. such is the case in the Way of Life in Did. 2, Doctr. 2, and Barn. 19.4–7. although Draper concedes here that the Didache and the Doctrina apostolorum are in fact quite close in order, he still does not exclude the possibility that even the slight differences are due to oral rather than written transmission.51 similar variations are found also in the way of death in Did. 5, Doctr. 5, and Barn. 20, though again the Didache and the Doctrina apostolorum are much closer to each other, while Barnabas, oddly, differs significantly from the others in the first half (20.1) but is virtually identical to them in the second (20.2). This latter instance, however, especially throws into question, in my opinion, the analogy with the lukasa. assuming that the lukasa pegs represent content and not actual verbatim texts, it is hard, in my opinion, to reconcile the verbally identical character of large portions of the Two Ways witnesses with the idea that they represent different performances of the same oral tradition or different aide mémoires. Moreover, i keep coming back to the fact that the text itself guards its content in 4.13, warning the audience to neither add nor take away from the Lord’s commandments. Draper maintains that this warning “does not necessarily protect the text when the oral tradition changes.” he compares it to Matt 5:18 (“not one jot not tittle shall pass away from the Law”) and sees it as much weaker (though in line with the similar saying in Rev 22:18–19, which also, in his opinion, attests the “pliable world of oral tradition”).52 Though Nikander agreed with Draper on this point, the question must be raised as to whether one can legitimately compare Matt 5:18 with Did. 4.13, given the different contexts of the two statements. While the christian Jewish author of Matthew is addressing other christian Jews regarding the law of Moses, that is, an outside text held by both parties as sacred, the Didache, i would maintain, 51. ibid., 127.
52. ibid., 114.
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presents a christian Jewish author addressing gentile christians about the text at hand. Matthew 5:13 was prefixed to the material that follows not as a warning, but as a claim that the teaching of Jesus was not contrary to the law of Moses. The warning of Did. 4.13, however, follows the Way of Life in order to authorize it and to safeguard its contents, in my opinion, because the Way of Life is the law of Moses for gentiles.
Thus, while Draper may indeed be correct in seeing oral influence on the variations of the Two Ways tradition, in my opinion one cannot draw from this the conclusion that the text of the Two Ways in the Didache serves only as an aide mémoire and not as a text to be performed verbatim at an initiation ceremony such as baptism. The comparison with oral renditions of artistic works (songs, poems, narratives, etc.; note that even the initiation represented by the lukasa conveys information of an historical nature) is questionable, since these differ in genre and thus in function from that of a ritual text, and one cannot necessarily transfer the means of transmission for the one category to that of the other. indeed, when one looks at the Two Ways of the Didache, one finds much more than pegs on which to hang other catechetical material. The text is very explicit and detailed. surely Draper is correct when he states that the actual catechetical training would have been more extensive, but this does not preclude that the Two Ways as we have it was the text used for the baptismal rite.
Moreover, it seems clear that the Two Ways of the Didache existed in written form before the addition of chapters 7–10, since the beginning of the text lacks any indication that it will be used for the subsequent baptism ritual. indeed, i would maintain that it is on the authority of the Two Ways that the chapters on baptism and eucharist are intended to piggy back.
similar claims, however, regarding the nature of the eucharistic prayers of Did. 9–10, that is, that they are only models from which the prayer leader would have formulated their own version, have been made by Draper and Milavec, as well as schwiebert.53 clearly these prayers are Jewish in character, and in particular Did. 10.1–5 has often been seen as a christian version of the Jewish after-meal prayer, the Birkat hamazon, as reconstructed by Louis finkelstein.54 scholars of Jewish prayer and liturgy, 53. Jonathan a. Draper, “Ritual Process and Ritual symbol in Didache 7–10,” VC
54 (2000): 121–58 (139); Milavec, Didache: Faith, Hope, and Life, 416-21; Jonathan schwiebert, Knowledge and the Coming Kingdom: The Didache’s Meal Ritual and Its Place in Early Christianity, LNTs 373 (London: T&T clark, 2008), 88.
54. Louis finkelstein, “The Birkat ha-Mazon,” JQR Ns 19 (1928–1929): 211–62.
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such as Joseph heinemann, however, have contended that the prayers of this period did not yet have a fixed form and that the evidence suggests that there existed simultaneously a number of versions of specific prayers in different communities. While earlier scholars, such as Louis Ginzberg, had drawn from the fact that specific prayers were referred to in the talmudic-midrashic material in an abbreviated, fragmentary fashion the conclusion that readers would have known the full text in a “more or less fixed character,”55 heinemann inferred from this data and from the existence of variant versions of the prayers in later witnesses that the texts of the prayers were not yet standardized and only gradually became so, taking on last of all a fixed wording. The entire process, in his opinion, did not end until the Geonic period (600–1100 ce).56 in this light Draper and others have contended that the prayers of the Didache also were not intended for verbatim recitation but rather provided only a basic model to follow. Draper writes: “The eucharistic prayers of the Didache are not literary compositions but oral tradition, which has been reduced to text.…
The written text would provide the template for oral performance in the Didache as also in the Rabbinic instructions.”57
But is this conclusion warranted? even if, as heinemann contends, the traditional Jewish prayers of this time were not yet fixed, is this evidence applicable to the Didache? as noted above, references to specific prayers in the Jewish literature are abbreviated, not written out in full. an example can be found in the instruction for the eighteen Benedictions in m. Roš haš. 4:5:
The order of the Blessings: one recites the Patriarchs, the Powers, the Holiness of God’s Name, and includes with them Sovereignty, but one does not sound, the Holiness of the Day and one does sound, the Remembrances and one does sound, the Shofaroth and one does sound, and he recites the Temple Service, and the Thanksgiving, and the Priestly Blessing; this is the view of R. Jochanan ben Nuri.58
55. Joseph heinemann, Prayer in the Talmud: Forms and Patterns, sJ 9 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1977), 45 n. 17, quoting Louis Ginzberg, “saadia’s siddur,” JQR Ns 33 (1943): 315–63 (315).
56. heinemann, Prayer in the Talmud, 29.
57. Draper, “Ritual Process and Ritual symbol,” 139.
58. Translation from Philip Blackman, ed., Order Moed, vol. 2 of Mishnayoth (New York: Judaica, 1963), 401.
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indeed, further on in the quotation cited by heinemann, Ginzberg remarked that
in the entire talmudic-midrashic literature … one does not find a single principal prayer in full.… [The prayers] are cited only by initial words or have at most a sentence quoted from them.59
heinemann himself goes on to say that
it is precisely the later prayers (from the amoraic period onwards) which were instituted with a more or less fixed wording. This would account for the fact that it is the less important prayers which are recorded in their entirety in the two Talmuds, and not the major statutory prayers.…
There would be no need to do so since every Jew knew a[t] least some formulation of these prayers. This would not be the case, however, with those prayers which were instituted at a later date and which had not yet become widespread among the people; or with the prayers for special occasions which were not recited daily and hence would not be familiar to the average man.… We cannot necessarily conclude that the version which appears in the sources is the only one that ever existed.… But certainly with respect to these special prayers there never existed the same kind of possibility for a wide range of formulations as was the case with the daily statutory prayers.60
in this light, the fact that the prayers of the Didache are given in a full form seems to indicate that they were intended to be recited as written.
support for this view can also be found in the Dead sea scrolls. stefan Reif, remarking on the oral character of Jewish prayer in the early rabbinic period as compared with that of the Dead sea scrolls, notes that this is not to say that there was no structure to Jewish prayer as far as the talmudic rabbis were concerned and that expression was totally free.
The sources indicate at least a basic, and even hardy framework, and differences of opinion about precisely how to complete the picture. Those who argued for a fixed format attempted to lay down the details; those who preferred spontaneity argued the need for the constant introduction of novel elements. But, given the efficiency of the oral transmission 59. heinemann, Prayer in the Talmud, 45 n. 17, citing Ginzburg, “saadia’s siddur,”
315.
60. heinemann, Prayer in the Talmud, 65–66.
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of the time, such a framework by no means required to be committed to writing to ensure its adoption and survival. The sect from the Dead sea thought differently and preserved written versions of their prayers.61
Moreover, given that the prayers of the Didache occur within a ritual context, it is noteworthy when James Davila, for example, writes that the “liturgical works from the Qumran library … constitute our earliest examples of fixed Jewish liturgical texts.”62 indeed, it is widely accepted that such liturgical pieces were written in the form in which they were intended to be used. One example, the prayers of 4QDibham (Words of the Luminar-ies), of which at least two copies were recovered from among the Dead sea scrolls,63 was to be recited by the community on specific days, seemingly for each day of the week. One section reads:
hymns for the sabbath Day
Give thanks.… [Bless] his holy Name unceasingly … all the angels of the holy firmament … above] the heavens, the earth and all its deep places, the great [abyss] and abaddon and the waters and all that is [in them.]
[Let all his creatures [bless him] unceasingly for everlasting [ages.
amen! amen!].64
indeed, unlike the majority of the prayers of the Mishnah/Talmud, the prayers in the Qumran texts are not simply fragments, but are prayers in their entirety. One example is that of another liturgical text, 1Q34 [bis]: i. Thou wilt cause the wicked to be our ransom and the unfaithful to be our redemption. [Thou wilt] blot out all our oppressors and we shall praise Thy Name for ever [and ever]. for this has Thou created us and [to say to Thee] this: Blessed art Thou.…
ii. the Great Light (of heaven) for the [day]time, [and the Little Light (of heaven) for the night] … without transgressing their laws … and their dominion is over all the world. But the seed of man did not understand all that Thou caused them to inherit; they did not discern Thee in all 61. stefan Reif, Judaism and Hebrew Prayer: New Perspectives on Jewish Liturgical History (cambridge, uK: cambridge university Press, 1993), 77.
62. James R. Davila, “Liturgical Works from Qumran,” EDEJ 890.
63. The fragments universally accepted are 4Q504 and 4Q506; the assignment of 4Q505 to this text is disputed.
64. Translation of the Dead sea scrolls are taken from Geza Vermes, The Dead Sea Scrolls in English, 2nd ed. (New York: Penguin, 1975).
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Thy words and wickedly turned aside from every one. They heeded not Thy great power and therefore Thou didst reject them. for wickedness pleases Thee not, and the ungodly shall not be established before Thee.
But in the time of Thy goodwill Thou didst choose for Thyself a people.
Thou didst remember Thy covenant and [granted] that they should be set apart for Thyself from among all the peoples as a holy thing. and Thou didst renew for them Thy covenant (founded) on a glorious vision and the words of Thy holy [spirit], on the works of Thy hands and the writing of Thy Right hand, that they might know the foundations of glory and the steps towards eternity.… [Thou didst raise up] for them a faithful shepherd.
finally, 4QBerakot is described by Davila as “a liturgy for the sectarian covenant renewal ceremony that is summarized in the Community Rule (1Qs 1–2).”65 a portion of this text, 4Q286–287, reads: council of the community shall all say together, amen, amen. afterwards [they] shall damn satan and all his guilty lot. They will answer and say, cursed be [s]atan in his hostile design, and damned in his guilty dominion. cursed be all the spirits of his [lo]t in their wicked design, and damned in their thoughts of unclean impurity. for they are the lot of darkness and their visitation is for eternal destruction.
That one should conclude that these prayers and other liturgical texts were intended merely as frameworks based on the practice in the Mishnah/
Talmud seems unwarranted here as it does also in the Didache. Like the sectarian texts of the Dead sea scrolls, the community that generated the Didache felt the necessity to establish correct forms of their prayers and ritual texts, perhaps especially for gentile converts unfamiliar with Jewish practice.
The expectation that the recipients of the Didache will recite the given prayers verbatim is also in line with the comment in 10.7, where it appears that the prophets are the only ones with the authority to pray in any other way. although schwiebert argues here for the interpretation that the prophets are being allowed to pray “as long as they wish” in accord with the basic translation of ὅσα as referring to “extent not manner,”66 τοῖς δὲ
65. Davila, “Liturgical Works from Qumran,” 890; see also John J. collins, “Dead sea scrolls,” ABD 2:94.
66. schwiebert, Knowledge and the Coming Kingdom, 92.
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προφήταις ἐπιτρέπετε εὐχαριστεῖν ὅσα θέλουσιν, in my opinion, must be translated in accord with the other occurrences of this relative pronoun in Did. 1.2 and 11.11.
1.2 πάντα δὲ ὅσα ἐὰν θελήσῃς μὴ γίνεσθαί σοι καὶ σὺ ἄλλῳ μὴ ποίει
11.11 πᾶς δὲ προφήτης … μὴ διδάσκων … ποιεῖν ὅσα αὐτὸς ποιεῖ οὐ
κριθήσεται ἐφ᾽ ὑμῶν
examples of such a translation for ὅσα are also seen in Mark 9:13 and Phil 4:8:
Mark 9:13 ἀλλὰ λέγω ὑμῖν ὅτι καὶ Ἠλίας ἐλήλυθεν καὶ ἐποίησαν αὐτῷ
ὅσα ἤθελον καθὼς γέγραπται ἐπ᾽ αὐτόν.
Phil 4:8 Τὸ λοιπόν ἀδελφοί ὅσα ἐστὶν ἀληθῆ ὅσα σεμνά ὅσα δίκαια ὅσα
ἁγνά ὅσα προσφιλῆ ὅσα εὔφημα εἴ τις ἀρετὴ καὶ εἴ τις ἔπαινος ταῦτα
λογίζεσθε
The meaning in these contexts, according to BDaG, is really “everything that, whatever” and even a. T. Robertson, citing Ludwig Rademacher (who cites conybeare!), states that in Philo ὅσοι often is simply equivalent to οἵ.67 Thus prophets who come into the community must be given the freedom to pray in whatever way they want. This freedom is not passed on, however, to community members at large, as indeed this exception for prophets indicates. Note that until the mention of prophets in 10.7, no other office of church leadership has been named.68
One last clue that supports seeing the prayers of the Didache as intended to be recited verbatim is the comparison of the version of the Lord’s Prayer in the Didache with that of Matthew, a community many believe to be closely related to that of the Didache. aside from the clos-67. a. T. Robertson, a Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, 2nd ed. (New York: hodder & stoughton; George h. Doran, 1915), 732, citing Ludwig Radermacher, Neutestamentlich Grammatik: Das Griechisch des Neuen Testaments im Zusammenhang mit der Volkssprache, hNT 1.1 (Tübingen: Mohr siebeck, 1911), 63.
68. it is perhaps the case that the prophets in this context perform the same duty as that of the prayer leader within the community of the Jewish synagogue. On this, see heinemann, Prayer in the Talmud, 16 passim.
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ing doxology in the Didache, the two versions are extremely close, a sign that the community is concerned with the wording of this prayer (note that this prayer is to be recited by community members three times a day) and that they likely are equally concerned with the wording of the ones that follow.
such rigid instructions from the creators of the Didache surely give us insight into the function of the text (at least at this stage in its development) as well as into the relationship between the community of origin and the community of reception. from the perspective of the originators at least, the two communities are not equal in status, nor are they identical in culture and background, and for those reasons the recipients cannot be relied upon to perform the central rituals of baptism, prayer, and eucharist correctly. indeed, in my opinion, the reason for the inscribing of the Two Ways and the various prayers is reflected in the very title of the Didache in 1.1: Διδαχὴ κυρίου διὰ τῶν δώδεκα ἀποστόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν. The text was created for use in gentile congregations where, from the point of view of the Jewish originators of the text, steps must be taken to ensure that these new converts are performing the necessary rituals correctly.69 To the original “teaching,” Did. 1.1–6.2 and 16, a later editor added (possibly 6.3
and) 7.1–11.2 and repurposed the text into a manual on how to conduct the two most important community rituals, baptism and eucharist. in this sense, rather than “de-“ and “recontextualization,” it may be better to see the sources incorporated into the Didache as “transcontextualization,” that is, the transmission of a text from one community to another for use in identical situations.
in conclusion, one must of course acknowledge the fact that the Didache was a text created in a culture still very much oriented toward oral communication and consequently that the characteristics of oral performance must be taken into consideration in any study of its composition and function. Nonetheless, one must also carefully distinguish between texts of different genres/functions. The preliminary comparison offered here between the traditions of the Didache and the prayer and ritual materials from the Dead sea scrolls and Mishnah surely demonstrates the need for a deeper investigation of the transmission of ritual materials within 69. for arguments supporting the theory that the second, longer title of the Didache was original to the text, see Pardee, Genre and Development of the Didache, 101–25.
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second Temple and rabbinic Judaism, nascent christianity, and the wider Greco-Roman world.70
70. a brief look into the Greek magical papyri, e.g., shows that οὕτως can be used to introduce incantations; see PGM iV.937, 977, 2572 (cf. Did. 7.1; 8.2; 9.1; 10.1). The question of indicators of verbatim recitation would be a necessary avenue of investigation.
from the sermon on the Mount to the Didache John W. Welch
in spite of numerous meticulous studies over the past century and a half, many issues concerning the Didache’s origins still remain puzzling and unsettled.1 if the wide array of approaches and conclusions found recently in several superb publications is any indication, no clear consensus is close at hand about the nature and setting of this very significant but generally overlooked early christian text. Reflecting on these vigorous debates, i hope to contribute to the wider discussion of the character of the Didache by looking anew at its relationship to the sermon on the Mount in Matt 5–7. in the end i am inclined to see the Didache as consciously drawing on, carefully selecting from, and purposefully transforming many elements from the sermon on the Mount (= sM). if this observation has merit, these transmutations reveal much about the main trajectories of the Didache not only by helping readers to focus on what is said and done in that text, but perhaps even more importantly by drawing attention to what it omits from the sM.
The following analysis proceeds in several steps. first, it is beyond dispute that the sM and the Didache have many words and phrases in common, indeed so many that it would not appear that these texts were independent compositions coming from a common oral or shared communal source. indeed, according to seidel’s law,2 eleven inverted word 1. see, for example, huub van de sandt and Jürgen K. zangenberg, eds., Matthew, James, and Didache: Three Related Documents in Their Jewish and Christian Settings, sBLsyms 45 (atlanta: society of Biblical Literature, 2008); Kurt Niederwimmer, The Didache: A Commentary, trans. Linda M. Maloney, hermeneia (Minneapolis: fortress, 1998).
2. Moshe seidel, “Parallels between isaiah and Psalms,” in Hiqrei Miqra (Jerusalem: Rav Kook institute, 1978), 1–97 (hebrew), discussed further below.
-335 -
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orders substantiate a direct relationship between these two texts, and thus it follows either that the sM has drawn upon the Didache or that the Didache has drawn upon the sM. Primarily on thematic grounds, i next argue that it is more likely that the Didache has made use of the sM rather than vice versa, inasmuch as the sM makes heavy use of the Psalms and other temple-related material, whereas the Didache does not, as it moves in other directions. Looking at such subjects as law, ethics, ritual, temple, and eschatology, it then appears that the Didache has reworked the sM for use by “templeless” christians in general and among gentile christians in particular. finally, all this aligns with the idea that some version of the sM
existed prior to its use in the Gospel of Matthew, a point that also is consistent with the use of material from the sM throughout the New Testament in ways that are similar to uses of the sM in the Didache.
1. similarities between the sM and the Didache
in making a comprehensive comparison of these two texts, it is helpful to begin with a careful listing of the main points at which they coincide.
appendix 1 lists in a straightforward manner words, phrases, and distinctive concepts or elements common to both of these texts.3 The overlaps are remarkable in several ways.
first, the number of congruencies is high, perhaps higher than even most serious readers might have surmised. appendix 1 is over one hundred entry lines long, an extraordinarily high number of intertextual connections gauged by any standard of comparison between two relatively short texts. Moreover, there does not appear to be any other text that compares with the sM more extensively than does the Didache, and no known text compares with the Didache more frequently than does the sM.
second, the points of intersection shown on appendix 1 are found consistently throughout most sections of the sM, running sometimes nearly verse by verse. conversely, although not quite to the same degree of uniformity, words and phrases in the sM can also be found throughout the Didache from beginning to end and in almost every chapter. appendix 1 associates twenty-one sM elements with words in Did. 1 alone. With the exception of chapters 7 and 13, sM elements can be linked to all other 3. Working with the text in aaron Milavec, The Didache: Text, Translation, Analysis, and Commentary (collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2003).
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chapters in the Didache: chapter 2 (three times), chapter 3 (ten times), chapter 4 (eight times), chapter 5 (seven times), chapter 6 (two times), chapter 8 (twelve times), chapter 9 (two times), chapter 10 (three times), chapter 11 (nine times), chapter 12 (three times), chapter 14 (three times), chapter 15 (two times), and chapter 16 (fourteen times). This degree of mutual overlap points to a full-ranging familiarity between these two texts.
While these linkages are not all equally indicative, many are quite strong. On twenty-nine occasions, marked by equal signs on appendix 1, the Greek is identical. On many other occasions the Greek is nearly the same. in six instances, for example, the congruence is quite distinctive and precise: Matt 5:26/Did. 1.5 (about not coming out of prison until you have paid the last κοδράντην); 5:39–42/1.4 (about not returning evil with evil); 5:44/1.3 (blessing and praying for those who oppose you); 6:9–13/8.2
(the Lord’s Prayer); 7:6/9.5 (not giving the holy to the dogs); and 7:12/1.2
(positive and negative versions of the golden rule). interestingly, these passages appear in the sM in chapters 5, 6, and 7. except for the Lord’s Prayer (which stands roughly at the centers of both the sM and the Didache) and the saying of the Lord about not giving “the holy thing to the dogs”
(both of which are attributed to the Lord explicitly in Did. 8.2 and 9.5, respectively), the other four of these main passages appear in the opposite order in these two texts: The elements in Matt 5:27, 5:39–42, 5:44, and 7:12
appear in Did. 1.5, 1.4, 1.3, and 1.2, respectively. While much more has been said and remains yet to be said about the intriguing and compelling similarities between these two texts, it is the overall density and structural arrangement of these textual intersections that have not been previously detected or discussed, this last point about reversed ordering in particular.
2. inverted Quotations
in addition to arguments made by others to support the dependence of the Didache on the sM, i draw attention to eleven instances of inversions that occur when texts in the sM and the Didache are verbally related to each other. Beyond the sequence mentioned above, these eleven other reversals are evident, as indicated in appendix 1 by the term “inverting.”
sermon on the Mount
Didache
5:15
men do not light/lamp
16.1 lamps/not quenched
5:21–22 murder/anger
3.2
anger/murder
5:40
tunic/cloak
1.4c cloak/tunic
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5:41
someone/you/compels
1.4B compels/you/someone
5:43
love all/hate enemy
2.7
not hate anyone/love all
5:45
father/on all
1.5
on all/father
5:47
if you love only/what special
1.3c what favor/if you love only
6:3
left not know what/right gives 12.1 give with understanding right/left 7:11
give/ask
1.5
ask/give
7:12
do/to them
1.2
to others/do not do
7:13–14 way of destruction/life
1.1
way of life/death
initially, Moshe seidel located 110 examples of inverted quotations between the book of isaiah and the Psalms, with additional instances involving inverted parallels between isaiah and Proverbs, and Micah and the Penta-teuch.4 according to seidel’s law, as it has come to be known, when hebraic texts draw on earlier texts, they tend to invert the order of the terms found in the earlier text.5 While this principle does not operate as an iron law and must be controlled sufficiently,6 with adequate controls one can reach meaningful conclusions. as shemaryahu Talmon has wisely stressed in analyzing a number of such examples within biblical and rabbinic literature, the process of identifying these reversals is primarily descriptive in nature, one without inherent prescriptive force, and therefore the appraisal of these remote parallels will “depend to some extent on the sensibility of the individual scholar, and of his readers, to such literary intricacies.”7
Proceeding cautiously, Talmon went on to conclude that the employment of this stylistic and structural tool “underlines the deep-seated effect this technique had on biblical literature in the ‘creative’ and the ‘recension-4. as tallied by isaac Kalimi, The Reshaping of Ancient Israelite History in Chronicles (Winona Lake, iN: eisenbrauns, 2005), 233, n. 8.
5. seidel, “Parallels between isaiah and Psalms.” for numerous additional examples of seidel’s law, see Kalimi, Reshaping of Ancient Israelite History, 232–74; Pancratius c. Beentjes, “inverted Quotations in the Bible: a Neglected stylistic Matter,”
Bib 63 (1982): 506–23; shemaryahu Talmon, “The Textual study of the Bible: a New Outlook,” in Qumran and the History of the Biblical Text, ed. frank M. cross and shemaryahu Talmon (cambridge, Ma: harvard university Press, 1975), 358–80; Bernard M. Levinson, Deuteronomy and the Hermeneutics of Legal Innovation (New York: Oxford university Press, 1997), 18–20, 35; Karl William Weyde, Prophecy and Teaching (Berlin: de Gruyter, 2000), 121–22; Marc z. Brettler, “Jud 1,1–2,10: from appendix to Prologue,” ZAW 101 (1989): 433.
6. Levinson, Deuteronomy and the Hermeneutics of Legal Innovation, 18 n. 51.
7. Talmon, “Textual study of the Bible,” 362–63.
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ist’ stages” and beyond.8 in his 1982 article, Pancratius Beentjes in turn identified inverted quotations occurring over a range of interrelated texts, indicating that this practice was widespread and commonly recognized.
he analyzed eleven cases of texts within the hebrew Bible being inversely quoted in other passages within the hebrew Bible (instances come from Genesis, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Psalms, isaiah, Micah, eze-kiel, haggai, zechariah, and Jonah), seven cases of sirach quoting from exodus, 1 samuel, Job, Proverbs, or Malachi, and five instances of New Testament texts in Romans, 1 corinthians, and Mark inverting word orders in isaiah, hosea, or 1 Kings.9 from this, he concludes, “it is hard to avoid the impression that [ancient authors created these inversions] on purpose,”
thereby drawing “a moment of extra attention in the listener (or reader), because the latter hears something else than the traditional words.”10 Most recently, isaac Kalami has discussed 106 instances of chiasmus between parallel texts quoted in chronicles from the books of samuel and Kings, from which he deduced that these word orders had been reversed so as “to stress a word, name, or phrase that appeared in the earlier text or to render it more prominent.”11
in the case of judging the relationship between the sM and the Didache, the frequency, concentration, location, and verbal similarities of their eleven inverted quotations objectively strengthen the hypothesis that either the Didache is consciously quoting or drawing upon the sM
or the sM is quoting or drawing upon the Didache. comparing these examples with those detected by seidel, Talmon, Beentjes, and Kalami, these inverted quotations are amply numerous, are verbally precise, are drawn only between these two texts and not from widely scattered sources, and are for the more part tightly clustered within the first segment of the Didache. While it is true that the large majority of the linkages or allusions between the sM and the Didache do not involve inverted quotations 8. ibid., 368. On its ongoing “impact,” see 371 and 381. The writers at Qumran also considered inversion “a legitimate quotation technique,” 378.
9. Beentjes, “inverted Quotations in the Bible,” 506–23.
10. Pancratius c. Beentjes, “Discovering a New Path of intertextuality: inverted Quotations and Their Dynamics,” in Literary Structure and Rhetorical Strategy in the Hebrew Bible, ed. Lénart de Regt, J. de Waard, and Jan P. fokkelman (assen: Van Gorcum, 1996), 49 (emphasis original).
11. Kalami, Reshaping of Ancient Israelite History, 232.
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or allusions, having eleven such reversals is more than insignificant12 and points to a case of intertextuality that is more than accidental.
although the question remains open to further debate, it seems more likely for several reasons (structural, sequential, logical, linguistic, dependent, and thematic) that the Didache is quoting the sM rather than vice versa. structurally, the tight order of borrowing in Did. 1.5, 1.4, 1.3, and 1.2 would seem more likely to be a conscious inversion of passages scattered from Matt 5:27–7:12 than for the sM to have taken this series and diffused it throughout the sM. sequentially, Did. 16.1 presumes that people have already lit their lamps, as commanded in Matt 5:16. Logically, the assertion that anger leads to murder in Did. 3.2, while natural enough, is used to explain or motivate the command “do not become angry” (μὴ γίνου ὀργίλος). But, because not all anger leads to homicide, this passage would rationally seem to be a truncation of the more clearly motivated statement in Matt 5:22 that anyone who becomes angry (ὀργιζόμενος) with a brother is already in danger of judgment.
Linguistically, the word order in Matt 5:41 is a more natural word order than that in Did. 1.4B. Dependently, when Did. 2.7 (which seems tacked onto the rule “do not plan evil against your neighbor”) begins with the blanket injunction “do not hate any man” (οὐ μισήσεις πάντα ἄνθρωπον), along with the eventuality that “concerning others you will pray,” all this seems to depend on and to take for granted the teachings about loving and praying for one’s neighbor in Matt 5:43–44. as will be developed next below, this is also thematic.
3. Differences between the sM and the Didache
assuming arguendo that the Didache is drawing upon and modifying the sM, it proves productive to notice what themes the Didache has omitted or transmuted from the sM and then to ask why those changes or deletions may have been made. Many elements in the sM have not been retained in the Didache, and these seem to come from a single domain. easily recognizable words and phrases on such a missing-pieces list include: receiving mercy (ἐλεηθήσονται); sons of God (υἱοί θεοῦ); rejoicing (χαίρετε) 12. Kalami (Reshaping of Ancient Israelite History, 232) finds significance even though the number of inverted quotations in chronicles “is small” compared with
“the total number of texts copied [by chronicles] in the order in which they appear in the books of samuel–Kings.”
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and shouting hallelujah (ἀγαλλιᾶσθε; Pss 5:11; 32:11); salt (ἅλας); being a light to the world to bring glory to God (δοξάσωσιν τὸν πατέρα); the lampstand (ἐπὶ τὴν λυχνίαν; the word for the menorah in exod 25); the altar (θυσιαστήριον, the term commonly used for the altar of the temple); swearing oaths (Ps 50:5, 14; Num 30); God’s throne (Ps 11:4); the city of the great king (Ps 48:2); white hair (τρίχα λευκήν; Lev 13:2–10); sun and rain bestowed by God on the earth (Pss 84:11; 147:8); giving in the secret place (ἐν τῷ κρυπτῷ); sounding of trumpets at the time of prayer (Pss 81:3; 105:3); praying where God sees and hears (1 Kgs 8:33); there obtaining forgiveness (1 Kgs 8:34); anointing, washing, treasuring up treasures (θησαυρίζετε … θησαυροὺς); being pure (ἁπλοῦς) and full of light (Ps 139:12); serving (δουλεύειν) and cleaving unto (ἀνθέξεται) the Lord alone; trusting the Lord to give necessities (Ps 23:1); spinning (νήθουσιν; used ten times in exod 26–39); glorious garments (ἐνδύματα; Pss 93:1; 104:1); entering a sacred gate (πύλης; Pss 24:4–7; 118:19–20); an archetypal tree of life and goodness (Ps 1:1–3); the wise man (φρόνιμος; Ps 94:8); and being founded upon the rock (ἐπὶ τὴν πέτραν; Judg 13:19; Ps 27:5); as well as the mention of symbolic actions portraying punishments or the ridding of impurities, facing judgment of the συνέδριον, casting away an offending right hand, being trampled underfoot, or being torn in pieces.
significantly, the list of sM features absent from the Didache is rich in elements that reflect temple themes,13 as is particularly apparent when these words and practices are characteristically found in the Psalms and other texts that are at home in the temple or tabernacle. indeed, of the 383 words in the total vocabulary of the sM, one-third of them cast a long temple shadow.14
Thus it may be argued that the Didache has systematically eliminated these temple elements altogether or has reduced them to ordinary community rules or daily ethical teachings. This fact about the rhetorical register of the sM leads to many interesting implications, but for present purposes it is to be noted that most of the words in the sM that are most 13. On temple themes, see Margaret Barker, Temple Theology (London: sPcK, 2004); Temple Themes in Christian Worship (London: T&T clark, 2007); John W.
Welch, The Sermon on the Mount in the Light of the Temple (London: ashgate, 2009), 42–45.
14. each of these elements in the sM and the points discussed below are analyzed and documented from a temple perspective in Welch, Sermon on the Mount, 41–182, with the word list regarding the temple register of the sM charted on pages 184–87.
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obviously connected with the temple are absent from the Didache or have been resituated for use in what appears to be a community that is without the temple or has distanced itself from the temple.
from the outset, gone from the Didache is any mention of going up into the mountain or any sacred space, the mountain being a thinly veiled allusion to Moses going up into Mount sinai (exod 19:3, 20; 24:9) and also to the righteous ascending into the temple, the mountain of the Lord, in Jerusalem (Ps 24:3).
The Didache never promises (at least not in so many words) that the righteous will inherit any heavenly or divine reward. Missing are the exalted blessings of the macarisms, which twice (functioning as an inclusio) promise to the righteous the kingdom of the heavens. The future and celestially oriented beatitudes of the sM are replaced with two simple remnants: “be meek, for the meek will inherit the earth” (Did. 3.7), promising a terrestrial reward, and the rule to “be/become merciful” (Did. 3.8), which carries no promise at all, whether present or eschatological. absent are the blessings of receiving mercy (readily understood as the particular blessing of the mercy-seat), seeing God (a privilege usually reserved for those who enter the holy of holies; Pss 17:5; 63:2), and becoming sons of God (as kings are called who have been anointed in the temple; Ps 2:7; Deut 14:1).
The cursing, persecution, and slander by other Jews or enemies, which only makes the followers of Jesus more like the holy prophets of former times, is reduced in the Didache to hatred, persecution, and betrayals by or among the false prophets in the last times (Did. 16.4).
Gone in the Didache is the shouting of hallelujah (so characteristic of cultic joy) and so is any reference to being the salt for the earth (or, as Mark 9:49 understood, the salt of the covenant), along with the drastic consequences of the defilement of failed discipleship, namely being cast out, banned, trodden under foot, in danger of God’s judgment and hell fire, or torn in pieces. Lacking is the strong theme of the light of God and of the temple (much is said about light in the sM, but nothing in the Didache).
The light on the mountain that, like the light of the Lord, cannot be hid in the sM becomes in the Didache a flicker of a personal lamp, as in the parable of the ten virgins, that one must take care to keep lit (16.1). When the sM talks about putting one’s lamp on a candlestick, the word used there is λυχνία, the word that the septuagint uses for the menorah, concentrated nine times inside of only six verses in the instructions in exod 25 about building the tabernacle and its utensils and implements. This idea is absent from the Didache.
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The Decalogue (which was read twice a day in the temple and is quoted three times in the sM with an overt reference to its ancient origins) is never invoked as such in the Didache, which begins its list of twenty-three vices with prohibitions against murder and adultery. in the Didache, however, these prohibitions are stated, in connection with preparing a candidate for baptism, in a future tense (you will not murder; you will not be double-tongued) rather than as imperatives.
The centrally important altar of the temple is still mentioned in the sM, but it is not remembered in the Didache, in which the offering had become an immaterial sacrifice through the eucharist, which retains some temple terminology but is placed in a setting removed from its native rock.
The requirement in Matt 5:24 of private reconciliation prior to sacrifice at the altar takes on the additional requirement of prior confession before the congregation (προσεξομολογησάμενοι) in Did. 14.1.
The concern in the Didache is only with false oaths, not with oaths that invoke improperly the holy name of God, his heavenly throne, or his holy city. The Didache’s concern with fasting, which appears in the cultic instructions of Matt 6:16–18, is only worried about the days on which one should fast (Did. 6.16), and its only functional application has been moved into the section on praying for one’s enemies and fasting for one’s persecutors (Did. 1.3).
The goodness of God and the temple, which blesses the entire world with sun, rain, and good gifts to those who ask in the sM is reduced in the Didache to an injunction for fathers to support their children (Did.
4.9). Being perfect (τέλειος) no longer relates to being like God (or completely initiated into the holy mystery), but simply bearing the whole yoke of God’s burden, or at least carrying as much as one can bear (Did.
6.2).
absent are many creation elements that can be found throughout the sM, such as letting there be light, marriage, and divorce (what God put together in eden); trees distinguished by their fruits (with the tree of life symbolized in the temple); or the thorns and thistles (an allusion in the sM to the thorns and thistles that resulted from the fall of adam and eve). The act of creation that is important for the Didache (in Did. 1.2) is God’s creation (or re-creation) of the individual convert, not the creation of heaven and earth.
Gone is any instruction about giving in secret, praying in secret, or fasting in secret, or to God seeing in secret and rewarding when all things shall be revealed. Obtaining forgiveness, another crucial temple theme that
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was of the essence in the atonement sacrifices of the temple, is minimized.
Lacking also are continued washing and anointing of ritual significance, as well as consecrating treasures to a heavenly treasury (the temple being an earthly repository of the divine storehouse).
Loving God (Did. 1.2) is given prominence at the outset of the Didache, but the reference to serving (δουλεύειν) the Lord alone as a servant, slave, or temple servant has been dropped. in Did. 9.2 and 10.3, Jesus is presented as a son or boy (παῖς) of God, not as a servant.
in Did. 10.3 the righteous are promised food and drink, but only in a eucharistic context, while the sM in Matt 6:25–34 promises that true disciples will be given care and sustenance beyond food and drink, including garments more glorious than solomon’s. in the Didache there is no promise of clothing of any kind, let alone royal or priestly vestments better than solomon’s.
false prophets in the Didache are not known by their fruits (their results) as in Matt 7:16 (καρπῶν), but by their habits (τρόπων; 11.8), such as whether they stay in the community longer than two or three days. The former requirement of giving of the typical first fruits to the temple has now become the giving of first fruits of bread, wine, oil, silver, or cloth to the prophets in the community (Did. 13.5–7), who are even identified in a nontemple setting as high priests (Did. 13.3).
The climactic objective of the sM is to allow the disciple to find the narrow gate and enter (εἰσελεύσεται) into the heavenly kingdom, qualified to be admitted by the Lord into the holy presence on that final day. The objective of the Didache is quite different, to allow the faithful to withstand the burnings as they watch from the world below as the Lord comes atop the clouds of heaven (Did. 16.8).
in the process of removing or recasting the temple elements in the sM, it is also interesting to note that the Didache appears to have consistently left out almost all of the words or phrases that appear to have been drawn in the sM from the Psalms, which were the hymns of the temple in Jerusalem. The strong presence of psalmodic phraseology in the sM is significant, because the temple is the dominant factor in the Psalms. as people ascended to the temple, they sang the Psalms: psalms of joy, penitence, prayer, and praise. The Psalms were chanted in the temple by Levitical cantors, were repeated by dispersed Jews yearning for the temple, and were sung by families giving thanks for the blessings of God and of his temple.
in the ears of Jewish listeners, several words from the Psalms would have accented the sM’s temple register.
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for example, the word μακάριοι (“blessed”) in the sM is also the first word in Ps 1:1, and it goes on to appear twenty-five more times in the Psalms, but only once in the Didache and on that occasion in a rather mundane setting and without any mention of a heavenly reward. The words “filled” and “righteousness” stand together in Ps 17:15 as they do in Matt 5:6, and the words “pure in heart” in “blessed are the pure in heart” clearly come from Ps 24, which has been thought of as a statement of worthiness to enter the temple. But neither of these are included in the Didache. in Ps 32:11 is found a double call: “Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice [ἀγαλλιᾶσθε]!” a double call (“rejoice and be exceeding glad”) is also in Matt 5:12, using the same word that is used so often in the Psalms (ἀγαλλιᾶσθε; “hallelujah”). The warning in Matt 7:6 (“lest they trample
[your pearls] under their feet, and turn again and rend you”) echoes Ps 50:22 (“lest i rend and there be none to deliver”). The distinctive phrase
“depart you workers of ἀνομίαν” in Matt 7:23 comes straight from Ps 6:8 (“Depart from me all ye workers of iniquity [ἀνομίαν]”). Psalm 94:8
contrasts the wise man and the foolish man using the same root words (φρονίμῳ and μωρῷ) found in Matt 7:24–26.
Yet none of these psalmic elements are found in the Didache. Only two direct links to the Psalms are arguably reflected in the Didache: the clearest is the promise that the “meek shall inherit the earth,” found both in Matt 5:5 and Did. 3.7, which comes from Ps 37:11; and the other is the reference to the two ways in Did. 1.1, which seems to come from Ps 1:1, although less directly so than does the double reference to the two divergent ways in Matt 7:13–14. in the sM, the “way” is mentioned twice: the wide way (ὁδός) that leads to destruction (εἰς τὴν ἀπώλειαν) and the narrow way (ὁδός) that leads to life (εἰς τὴν ζωήν). Likewise, a double occurrence of
“way” is found in Ps 1:6, which reads: “the Lord knows the way [ὁδός] of righteousness, but the way [ὁδός] of the wicked will perish.” While Did.
1.1, like the book of Psalms, commences with the idea of the Two Ways, the Didache simply takes it as an already understood and formulaically conceptualized axiom that “there are two ways [ὁδοί δύο εἰσί]: one of life
[ζωῆς] and one of death [θανάτου],” not repeating the previously double-mentioned word ὁδός.
4. considerations with chronological implications Might then these fundamental differences between the sM and the Didache help in analyzing when the Didache may have been written? Whereas the
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sM makes clear sense in a Jewish context that still accepts the importance of temple imagery, phraseology, and themes, the Didache has removed or repurposed those elements to apply in another context. This development can be seen and substantiated by considering what the Didache says and does not say about the law, ethics, ritual, and eschatology.
Regarding the use of the law, the sM has not separated itself from the law of Moses. Just as the Ten commandments and the covenant code function in exod 19–24 as the stipulations comprising the substance of the treaty-covenant between Yahweh and the house of israel, so the legal contents of the sM define the elements of the restored covenant renewed on this occasion between God and the followers of Jesus. hence, this section in the sM has rightly been compared by Roland Deines “to the preamble of a new treaty that relates what will be in force from now on but based on an existing foundation. No hints in the text indicate that this verse needs to be understood as a demand for a special Law-observant piety.”15 Law in the sM is based on the Decalogue, which was read twice a day “in the Temple, together with the Shemaʿ prayer, close to the time of the offering of the Daily Offering,”16 and the Decalogue may also be seen as a list of negative confessions required for admission into the temple.17 The Didache, however, has gone over to the more characteristic hellenistic practice of listing long strings of virtues and vices,18 a practice that is more at home in Greek ethical discourse and rhetorical polemic than in a temple context where commandments revealing the will of God are of the essence.
Regarding ethics, the sources of ethical authority that stand at the foundation of the temple include divine lawgiving, charisma, covenantal cohesion, group identity, individual commitment, honor and shame, and threats of adverse consequences and exclusion for those who fail to live up to their obligations. all of these are strongly present in the sM with Jesus 15. Roland Deines, “Not the Law but the Messiah: Law and Righteousness in the Gospel of Matthew—an Ongoing Debate,” in Built upon the Rock: Studies in the Gospel of Matthew, ed. Daniel M. Gurtner and John Nolland (Grand Rapids: eerdmans, 2007), 75.
16. Moshe Weinfeld, “The Decalogue: its significance, uniqueness, and Place in israel’s Tradition,” in Religion and Law: Biblical Judaic and Islamic Perspectives, ed.
edwin R. firmage, Bernard G. Weiss, and John W. Welch (Winona Lake, iN: eisenbrauns, 1990), 3–47 (34).
17. Moshe Weinfeld, “instructions for Temple Visitors in the Bible and in ancient egypt,” ScrHier 28 (1982): 224–50.
18. see John T. fitzgerald, “Virtue/Vice Lists,” ABD 6:857–59.
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standing as a new Moses,19 with charismatic delivery (Matt 7:29), commissioning, group loyalty (no anger with a brother), commitment (seek you first the kingdom of God), honor and shame (shall be the least in the kingdom of heaven), and threats of expulsion, casting out, cutting off, and being trampled underfoot. While some of these elements are preserved in the rabbinical giyyur ritual for the admission of proselytes (e.g., b. Yebam.
47a–b),20 they are largely absent even from the prebaptismal ritual instructions of the Didache. The ethical core of the Didache is to be found in one’s conformance with a way of daily life dominated by negative injunctions regarding things to be avoided.
Ritual also has been modified from the sM to the Didache, although perhaps less so than law and ethics. indeed, there is reason to believe that the most likely ritual use of the sM would have been connected with its role as an “early christian catechetical instruction to new converts.”21 hans Dieter Betz and others have marshaled considerable evidence that the sM
is precisely the kind of document that would have been used as a cultic text or to instruct or remind baptismal candidates of required rules of christian conduct.22 in much the same vein, the Didache explicitly requires that candidates for baptism must be given the training in Did. 1–6 before they can be immersed “in the name of the father, and of the son, and of the holy Ghost, in living [or flowing; ζῶντι] water” (Did. 7.1). But the Didache goes on in a different vein to give handbook-like instructions regarding further rituals, such as fasting, praying, the eucharist, teaching, presiding, and making first-fruit offerings that go organizationally well beyond these communitarian requirements set forth in the sM.
19. Dale c. allison Jr., The New Moses: A Matthean Typology (Minneapolis: fortress, 1993); John D. Lierman, The New Testament Moses: Christian Perceptions of Moses and Israel in the Setting of the Jewish Religion, WuNT 2/173 (Tübingen: Mohr siebeck, 2004).
20. see avi sagi and zvi zohar, “The halakhic Ritual of Giyyur and its symbolic Meaning,” JRitSt 9 (1995): 1–13; see also David Daube, “a Baptismal catechism,”
in The New Testament and Rabbinic Judaism (London: university of London, 1956), 106–40.
21. andrej Kodjak, A Structural Analysis of the Sermon on the Mount (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1986), 16.
22. hans D. Betz, Essays on the Sermon on the Mount, trans. Lawrence L. Welborn (Philadelphia: fortress, 1985), 55–70; W. D. Davies, The Sermon on the Mount (cambridge: cambridge university Press, 1966), 105–6; Joachim Jeremias, Sermon on the Mount, trans. Norman Perrin (Philadelphia: fortress, 1963), 22–23.
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Likewise, the eschatology of the sM deals almost entirely with one’s personal preparation to face the final judgment, to be forgiven by God as one has forgiven, to be condemned in that day as one has condemned others, and to receive a willing reception by the Lord on the condition that one has done the will of the father and has personally built upon the rock by hearing and doing the teachings of righteousness that lead to the narrow gate. Judging (κρίνω) is a common theme of the temple, particularly divine judgment. God’s judgment is found in several places in the sM, and one encounters this theme often in the Old Testament as well, most elaborately in the Psalms, where God is affirmed as the sole rightful judge of the world: “The Lord judges the peoples; judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness” (Pss 7:8; 35:24). in God’s appearance, he “has made himself known, he has executed judgment” (Ps 9:16; see also Pss 9:8, 19; 10:5; 50:4, 6; 58:1, 11; 72:1–2; 82:8; 96:13; 98:9; 103:6), which brings joy to his people and the whole earth (Pss 67:4; 96:12–13). in a temple-centered worldview, God is solely the rightful and righteous judge of all mankind. any other forms of judgment are likely flawed and presumptu-ous, and thus one should take care not to be judgmental. Moreover, it was thoroughly understood in second Temple Judaism that the temple was the premier place where God’s righteous judgment was found. There God dispensed judgment, seated on his throne or mercy seat: “Thou hast sat on the throne giving righteous judgment” (Ps 9:4); “righteousness and justice are the foundation of thy throne” (Pss 89:14; 97:2). These judgments of the temple are both personal (Ps 7:8) and cosmic.23 in the Didache, however, the eschatological concerns have shifted away from the operation of case-by-case judgment and more toward the cataclysm of universal fire and destruction that will occur when the world-deceiver will come as if he were a son of God, after which the Lord will come with his holy ones and the world will see him coming (16.1–8). The worldview of the sM, according to which the temple rock (the shetiyyah stone) that held at bay the destructive waters from the deep below and the torrents of rain from above (see Ps 93:1–5), had already yielded in the Didache to an apocalyptic view of the destruction of the wicked world by fire. if by the time of the Didache the temple was distant or perhaps even gone, another model 23. The little apocalypse in isa 24–27 presents a revelation of the mystery of judgment: it portended the collapse of the world, the removal of the veil of mortality, the revelation of the glory of God, the restoration of the earth, its renewal and recreation.
Margaret Barker, “isaiah,” ECB 516–17.
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of the end times was needed to take its place, ensuring the complete parting of the ways between temple Judaism and christianity in terms of law, ethics, and eschatology.
Thus, while several things carry over from the sM into the Didache (most noticeably being merciful, avoiding anger and lust, turning the other cheek, loving one’s enemies, praying the Lord’s Prayer, guarding holy things, following the way of life, and being wary of false prophets), those elements are retained in the Didache as social and local congregational concerns. What then can explain the elimination or transmutation of the many elements that were no longer seen as useful by the Didachist? The loss of or removal from the temple would seem to be the obvious answer.
The Didache is an effort to construct a “templeless” christianity. sooner or later christianity came to redefine itself after its loss of the temple, as even more so did Judaism.
This view would thus see the sM as stemming from a time when Jesus or his followers were still hoping for a cleansing, restoration, reformation, and rejuvenation of the temple, not its destruction or obsolescence.24
in looking for the temple to be a house of prayer, Jesus affirmed the
“legitimacy of its function” and desired “to see that function restored,”25
but this view problematized “the parting of the ways” between Jews and christians, making it a longer and more complicated process than one might otherwise have expected.26 as huub van de sandt has rightly summarized, it was “a gradual process of dissimilarity and definition,”27 and 24. as argued and explored in Welch, Sermon on the Mount, 210–19. On the prominent role played by the temple in the Gospel of Matthew, see David M. Gurtner, “Matthew’s Theology of the Temple and the ‘Parting of the Ways,’” in Built upon the Rock: Studies in the Gospel of Matthew, ed. Daniel M. Gurtner and John Nolland (Grand Rapids: eerdmans, 2007), 128–53. On Jesus’s attitudes toward the temple in their cultural, cultic, and noneschatological contexts, see Bruce chilton, The Temple of Jesus: His Sacrificial Program within a Cultural History of Sacrifice (university Park: Pennsylvania state university Press, 1992), 137–54; Jostein Ådna, Jesu Stellung zum Tempel: Die Tempelaktion und das Tempelwort als Ausdruck seiner messianischen Sendung, WuNT 2/119 (Tübingen: Mohr siebeck, 2000).
25. Gurtner, “Matthew’s Theology of the Temple,” 138.
26. showing that the separation of christianity from Judaism was a slow and complex process with the temple being the key issue that distinguished the various Jewish sects and movements, see Richard J. Bauckham, “The Parting of the Ways: What happened and Why,” ST 47 (1993): 135–51.
27. huub van de sandt, “introduction,” in Matthew and the Didache, ed. huub van de sandt (assen: Van Gorcum; Minneapolis: fortress, 2005), 1–9 (3).
The DiDache: a MissiNG Piece Of The PuzzLe
as Richard Bauckham has seminally stated, that parting required christians to redefine “the covenant people so as to include Gentiles,” to recast the law so that gentile converts “were not obligated to keep the whole law,” and to reshape “monotheism to include christology.” But perhaps most difficult of all, christians had to transfigure the temple, which “was the greatest, the most meaningful boundary-marker between Jew and Gentile.”28 This is the transformation one can see occurring in the shift from the sM to the Didache. as Bauckham explains, christians, who saw their community as the eschatological temple, could either choose to maintain close ties to the temple while it stood or see that temple as no longer relevant.29 in my view, the sM comes from those of the former persuasion regarding close temple ties, while the Didache stems from the latter view of temple irrelevancy. Thus, although we differ in other respects, i see Bas ter haar Romeny correct in observing that the sM and the Didache have arisen out of “diametrically opposed circumstances.”30
in the words of Joseph Verheyden, by the time of the Didache “there was no need any more for the Didache to ponder about the destruction of the Temple,”31 or, i would add, any inclination to perpetuate any of the temple’s now unavailable functions.
5. concluding Observations
While the foregoing points suggest that the Didache has drawn upon the sM, this need not mean that the Didache must be dated after the destruction of the temple in 70 ce, for even if the Gospel of Matthew was composed after the destruction of the temple, it is possible that the sM predates the final composition of the Gospel of Matthew. if it is true, as Betz has argued, that the sM draws heavily on a pre-Matthean text, then the Didache may have done likewise. although this point remains highly debatable, Betz and others have pointed out that the sM is in some 28. Bauckham, “Parting of the Ways,” 142–43.
29. ibid., 144.
30. Bas ter haar Romeny, “hypotheses on the Development of Judaism and christianity in syria in the Period after 70 ce,” in van de sandt, Matthew and the Didache, 41.
31. Joseph Verheyden, “eschatology in the Didache and the Gospel of Matthew,”
in van de sandt, Matthew and the Didache, 212.
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ways quite un-Matthean and in most ways pre-Matthean.32 speaking of the puzzling passage about not giving the holy thing to the dogs, Betz sees this mysterious mandate as “part of the pre-Matthean sM.”33 While the version of the sM finally found in the Gospel of Matthew may have been redacted and emended by Matthew, seeing the sM as beginning as a pre-Matthean text, perhaps earlier than the 40s as Betz ventures, chronologically increases the likelihood that the sM (especially in its pre-Matthean form) influenced the Didache and not vice versa.
Parenthetically, additional support for Betz’s thesis can be found in the vocabulary of the sM. as one compares the Greek words in the sM
with those used in the rest of the Gospel of Matthew, some sharp contrasts emerge. By my count, of the 383 basic vocabulary words in the sM, 73 words (or 19 percent of the total) appear (sometimes more than once, but counting them only once) never again elsewhere in Matthew. in fact, several are never used again in the entire New Testament. in some cases words used in the sM, such as δóμα (gift, Matt 7:11; see also eph 4:8 quoting Ps 68:18), appear un-Matthean, for on the two occasions outside the sM when the Gospel of Matthew speaks of gifts, where the context is similar to that of Matt 7:11 (see 2:11; 15:5), it prefers to use the word δῶρόν
(gift). Only two words in the sM, γέεννα (hell) and γραμματεῖς (scribes), are used in Matthew in greater preponderance than elsewhere in the New Testament, and in only one case, ῥαπίζει (smite; Matt 5:39; 26:67), is Matthew the sole New Testament book to use a sM vocabulary word outside the sermon. although these verbal arguments are not conclusive of authorship, especially since the text sample involved is statistically small, the results seem to be indicative. if the hand that composed the Gospel of Matthew played a significant role in drafting, selecting, or reworking the contents of the sM, it seems odd that nearly every fifth vocabulary word 32. Betz, Essays on the Sermon on the Mount, 1–15, 55–76; and hans Dieter Betz, Sermon on the Mount: A Commentary on the Sermon on the Mount, including the Sermon on the Plain (Matthew 5:3–7:27 and Luke 6:20–49), hermeneia (Minneapolis: fortress, 1995), 70–80. alfred M. Perry (“The framework of the sermon on the Mount,” JBL 54 [1935]: 103–15) similarly finds evidence that Matthew worked from a written source that he regarded “so highly that he used it for the foundation of his longer sermon, even in preference to the Q discourse” (115). On the conjectured existence of other pre-Matthean sources, see Georg strecker, The Sermon on the Mount: An Exegetical Commentary, trans. O. c. Dean Jr. (Nashville: abingdon, 1988), 55–56, 63, 67–68, 72.
33. Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 494.
The DiDache: a MissiNG Piece Of The PuzzLe
is one that never is used again in that gospel. Nevertheless, the issue is not cut-and-dried.
Pre-Matthean elements in the sM that are developed subsequently in the Gospel of Matthew are seen to include the following: the initial idea of being “the least [ἐλάχιστος] in the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 5:19) is transmuted in Matt 11:11 into the affirmation that even the lesser (μικρότερος) in the kingdom of heaven is greater than John the Baptist and then mor-alized in Matt 18:4 in its affirmation that the greatest in the kingdom of heaven is one who “humbles himself as this little child.” settling quickly with a brother in private (Matt 5:23–25) is amplified in Matt 18:15–19 in an ecclesiastical instruction about resolving a case of a brother’s transgression, first in private and then before witnesses, and then through appropriate church councils, hoping for conciliation. The simple admonition in Matt 5:28 against committing adultery in one’s heart is expanded seven times over in Matt 15:18–19: “for out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies.” The two sayings in Matt 5:29–30 about cutting off a hand (or foot) and casting it away and plucking out an eye and casting it away are invoked (significantly, in the reverse order) in Matt 18:8–10, where this extreme measure is connected with injunctions not to offend (σκανδαλίζει) or to despise (καταφρονήσητε) even the smallest child.34 Matthew 19:3–9 expands widely on the topic of divorce, which had been merely introduced in Matt 5:31–32.35 elaborating on Matt 6:14–15, Matt 18 answers the question about how often to “forgive” (ἀφήσω, 18:21) by telling the story of the unforgiving servant. Matthew 19:21 redirects Matt 6:20, about laying up
“treasures in heaven” (θησαυροὺς ἐν οὐρανῷ), when the rich young ruler is told to sell all and give to the poor in order to have “treasure in heaven”
(θησαυρὸν ἐν οὐρανοῖς) and become perfect (τέλειος), echoing “perfect”
(τέλειοι) in 5:48.36 Matthew 7:7 (“ask [αἰτεῖτε], and it shall be given you”) is clarified in Matt 21:22: “all things, whatever ye shall ask [αἰτήσητε] in prayer, believing, you shall receive” (21:22). sometimes the wording of the sM is simply invoked authoritatively in Matthew’s narrative: The essence 34. Betz (Sermon on the Mount, 236–39) questions what the right eye and the right hand have to do with adultery, but he agrees that “the connection was made prior to Matthew. That tradition appears to be more specifically the sM itself and not Q.”
35. Betz (Sermon on the Mount, 258) discusses the relation between Matt 19:3–12, Mark 10:2–12, and the earlier Matt 5:31–32.
36. Welch, Sermon on the Mount, 116–20.
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353
of doing “the will of my father which is in heaven” (ὁ ποιῶν/ὁστις γὰρ ἂν
ποιήσῃ τὸ θέλημα τοῦ πατρός μου τοῦ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς) appears virtually identically in 7:21 and 12:50, along with the proviso that otherwise one cannot “enter into the kingdom of heaven” (7:21; 18:3). The summation
“for this is the law and the prophets” (7:12; see also 5:17) marks not only the culmination of the sM, but also the final instruction given in Matt 17–22 and ends with the same “on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets” (22:40). and in Matt 25, the five foolish bridesmaids come late, saying, “Lord, Lord [κύριε, κύριε], open to us,” but are told, “i know [οἶδα] you not” (25:11–12), reiterating the warning of Matt 7:21.
Those who have not multiplied their talents (25:13–15) are told: “Depart from me [πορεύεσθε ἀπ’ ἐμοῦ], ye cursed” (25:41), carrying the same condemnation that concludes the sM: “Depart from me [ἀποχωρεῖτε ἀπ’
ἐμοῦ], ye workers of iniquity” (7:23). The fact that Matt 24–25 concludes by reiterating these final words of the sM is structurally significant. as in the Didache, Matthew’s narrative draws on about fourteen elements from the beginning, middle, and ending of the sM. One inverts the key quoted terms and of these about half appear in the Didache, which is at a rate and in transmuted ways that are generally consistent with the Didache’s use of elements from the sM.
interestingly, this same manner of drawing from, even quoting from, the sM also appears in other books of the New Testament. if one may assume that the sM was widely used during the earliest decades of christianity to instruct baptismal candidates or to teach and complete (and perfect) baptized members, that would lead one to expect that it would have been frequently quoted and that it would have been very influential throughout the first christian century. Being valued as coin of the sacred realm among early christians would explain why it would have been used heavily in the Didache. it would also account for the strong influence of pre-Matthean sM materials on the Gospels of Mark and Luke, as well as on the vocabulary of 1 Peter, and the teachings in Romans, as shown further in the following paragraphs.
in 1 Peter, for example, inverting blessed/righteousness in Matt 5:10
(μακάριοι … ἕνεκεν δικαιοσύνης) is 1 Pet 3:14 (διὰ δικαιοσύνην μακάριοι); inverting blessed/cursed in Matt 5:11 (μακάριοι … ὀνειδίσωσιν) is 1 Pet 4:14 (ὀνειδίζεσθε … μακάριοι); and reversing see/good works in Matt 5:16 (ἴδωσιν ὑμῶν τὰ καλὰ ἔργα) is 1 Pet 2:12 (ἐκ τῶν καλῶν ἔργων
ἐποπτεύοντες), both of which conclude with thereby glorifying God in the sM (δοξάσωσιν τὸν πατέρα ὑμῶν τὸν ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς) and in 1 Peter
The DiDache: a MissiNG Piece Of The PuzzLe
(δοξάσωσι τὸν θεὸν ἐν ἡμέρᾳ ἐπισκοπῆς). hypocrites (Matt 6:2, 5, 16; 7:5) are generalized as hypocrisies in 1 Pet 2:1; anxiety (μεριμνᾶτε) in Matt 6:25–31 is echoed in 1 Pet 5:7, exhorting believers to cast all anxiety (μέριμναν) on the Lord who cares, and both the sM and 1 Peter end with the same metaphor of building or being built (θεμελιόω in Matt 7:25; 1 Pet 5:10) on a solid foundation.
James uses a dozen phrases that also range from the beginning to the end of the sM and several times in inverted order. James 1:12 employs the beatitude formula (μακάριος … ὅτι). James 2:13 turns Matt 5:7 into a negative in the reverse order, no mercy will be given to the unmerciful.
James 1:19–20 (telling brothers to be slow to anger, ὀργὴ) tracks Matt 5:22
(warning brothers against being angry, ὀργιζόμενος). James 1:14–15 (on lust, ἐπιθυμία, leading to sin and death) epitomizes Matt 5:28. James 5:12
and Matt 5:33–37 both speak of not swearing oaths by heaven or earth but only by yes or no, each using ὀμνύω, οὐρανός, γῆ, ναί ναί, and οὒ
οὔ. James 1:4 and Matt 5:48 both use the adjective τέλειος. James 1:13
interacts with Matt 6:13 on temptation (πειρασμόν). James 4:11 and Matt 7:1–2 (on not speaking ill or judging a brother), each uses κρίνω. James 1:5–6 and Matt 7:7 (on asking of God) each use αἰτέω in the imperative followed by the future passive form of δίδωμι. James 1:17 and Matt 7:11
deal with good and perfect gifts coming from heaven (πᾶσα δόσις ἀγαθὴ/
δόματα ἀγαθὰ). inverting grapes (σταφυλάς) and figs (σῦκα) in Matt 7:16
is Jas 3:12, figs (σῦκα) and vine (ἅμπελος). finally, reversing hear/words/
do (ἀκούει/λόγους/ποιεῖ) from the end of the sM in Matt 7:24 is the opening injunction in Jas 1:22 to be doers of the word and not hearers only (ποιηταὶ/λόγου/ἀκροαταὶ).
Paul also was aware of verbiage from the beginning to the ending of the sM, as reflected in Romans.37 Whether Paul’s rhetoric in general reflects written or oral channels of transmission is debatable,38 but several parallels can be noted. Romans 4:7 quotes Ps 32:1–2, blessing those who have averted iniquity. These catchwords (μακάριοι and ἀνομία) are used at 37. see helmut Koester, Ancient Christian Gospels: Their History and Development (London: scM; Philadelphia: Trinity, 1990), 52–55, 64–66, 71–75. Regarding these allusions to sayings of Jesus in Rom 12–14, 1 Peter, and James, Koester opines, when such “pieces of tradition are quoted or used in early christian authors … it may not even be necessary to refer to them as traditions.” Koester, “Written Gospels or Oral Tradition?” JBL 113 (1994): 293–97 (297).
38. Betz, Sermon on the Mount, 6 n. 12.
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the beginning and ending of the sM. fulfilling the righteousness of the law (τοῦ νόμου πληρωθῇ) in Rom 8:4 compares with the fulfillment of the law (τὸν νόμον … πληρῶσαι) in Matt 5:17. Being sons of God (υἱοὶ θεοῦ) and children who inherit from God (Rom 8:14, 17) recalls being called sons of God (υἱοὶ θεοῦ) and inheriting the earth (Matt 5:5, 9). crying unto God as father (Rom 8:15) aligns with Matt 6:9. The exhortation to bless those who persecute (εὐλογεῖτε τοὺς διώκοντας) and not to curse them (καταρᾶσθε) in Rom 12:14 and its textual variants uses the same words that populate the textual variants of Matt 5:44. Not only is this exhortation followed by the directive not to render evil for evil, to feed the enemy, and conquer evil in the good (Rom 12:17, 20, 24), which precedes the rule of loving one’s enemies in Matt 5:39, but also Rom 12:17 reverses the order of evil/render (κακὸν/ἀποδιδόντες) from that of Matthew (ἀντιστῆναι/πονηροὶ). Two final rhetorical questions about judging a brother (Rom 14:10; Matt 7:2–4) and about disparaging a brother (Rom 14:10; Matt 5:22) strongly imply that Paul’s audience in Rome already knew the obligation to “judge not”
and not to call a brother a fool.
in sum, even without a fully developed analysis, which would exceed the principal focus of this paper, it is evident that several important early christian writings draw from all portions of the sM, most of these invert certain quoted material, and as a group they manifest the same wide range of adoptions and types of adaptations of sM words and phrases that are also found in the Didache, as well in the mandates of the shepherd of hermas.39 all of this can most readily be explained by seeing the Didache, along with these other texts, as drawing on the sM and not vice versa.
Otherwise, it is clearly not the case that these other New Testament have drawn on the Didache, for only the sM contains the full set the elements that reappear multiple times in these early christian writings.
appendix 1
Matthew
Didache
5:3
Blessed (μακάριοι)
1.5
Blessed (μακάριος) is the giver
5:3
The poor (πτωχοί)
5.2
The poor (πτωχόν)
39. for example, shephard of hermas, Mand. 2 (give gifts to all as God gives to all), Mand. 4 (prohibiting remarriage after divorce), Mand. 5 (no anger), Mand. 6
(walk the straight path), and Mand. 11 (distinguishing true prophets from false).
The DiDache: a MissiNG Piece Of The PuzzLe
5:4
comfort (παρακληθήσονται)
5.2
Those who are advocates
(παράκλητοι) of the rich (B18)
5:5
Blessed are the meek
3.7
Be meek (πραΰς), the meek
(πραεῖς), inherit the earth
(πραεῖς) will inherit the earth (=
(κληρονομήσουσιν τὴν γῆν)
κληρονομήσουσι τὴν γῆν)
5:7
Merciful (ἐλεήμονες)
3.8
Be merciful (ἐλεήμων)
5.2
showing mercy (ἐλεοῦντες) [in
B11]
5:8
Pure in heart (καθαροὶ)
14.1
confession makes a sacrifice
pure (καθαρὰ)
5:8
see (ὄψονται) God
16.8
The world will see (ὄψεται) the
Lord coming
5:9
Peacemakers (εἰρηνοποιοί)
4.3
Make peace (εἰρηνεύσεις) to
those quarreling
5:11
Persecuted (διώξωσιν)
5.2
Persecutors (διῶκται) [in B1]
16.4
Persecution by or among the
false prophets
5:11
all evil (πᾶν πονηρὸν) spoken 5.1
The first of all evils (πάντων
πονηρά)
5:11
falsely [in some manuscripts] 5.1
false witnessing
(ψευδομαρτυρίαι)
5:12
God will reward well (μισθὸς
4.7
God will reward well (ὁ τοῦ
πολὺς)
μισθοῦ καλὸς)
5:13
casting out (βληθὲν ἔξω)
15.3
Do not speak to those who mis-
behave until they repent
5:14
as upon a mountain (ἐπάνω
9.4
as bread scattered on the
ὄρους)
mountains (ἐπάνω τῶν ὀρέων)
5:15
Light a lamp (καίουσιν λύχνον) 16.1
Lamps not quenched (λύχνοι
ὑμῶν μὴ σβεσθήτωσαν) [invert-
ing]
5:16
Your light (φῶς ὑμῶν)
16.1
Your lamps (λύχνοι ὑμῶν)
5:17
Jesus not come to destroy
11.2
if a teacher destroys (=
(καταλῦσαι)
καταλῦσαι), do not listen
5:19
Don’t ignore any commands
4.13
Don’t ignore any command-
(ἐντολῶν)
ments (ἐντολὰς)
5:19
Don’t teach (διδάξῃ) otherwise 6.1
Beware teachers who teach
(διδάσκει) without God
5:21–37 Parts of the Decalogue
2.1–7 List of twenty-three vices
5:21
No murder (οὐ φονεύσεις)
2.2
No murder (= οὐ φονεύσεις)
5:22
No anger (ὀργιζόμενος)
3.2
No anger (μὴ γίνου ὀργίλος)
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357
anger leads to murder [invert-
ing murder-anger]
5:22
No anger to your brother
15.3
Do not reprove each other in
(ἀδελφῷ)
anger (ἀλλήλους μὴ ἐν ὀργῇ)
5:22
Danger of hell fire (πυρός)
16.5
Many led away and burned
(πύρωσιν)
5:23
Gift (δῶρόν) proper at the
14.1
Your sacrifice (θυσία) may be
altar
pure at eucharist
5:24
if you remember, go settle
4.14
Do not go to your prayers with
a bad conscience
5:24
Reconcile (διαλλαγηθι)
14.1–2 confess and reconcile
(διαλλαγῶσιν)
5:25
Judge, prison (εἰς φυλακὴν)
1.5
Trial, prison (ἐν συνοχῇ)
5:26
Not come out (ἐξέλθῃς ἐκεῖθεν) 1.5
Not come out of there
(ἐξελεύσεται ἐκεῖθεν)
5:26
until you pay the last kodrantes 1.5
until he pays the last kodrantes
(ἕως ἂν ἀποδῷς τὸν ἔσχατον
(μέχρις οὗ ἀποδῷ τὸν ἔσχατον
κοδράντην)
κοδράντην)
5:27
No adultery (οὐ μοιχεύσεις)
2.2
No adultery (= οὐ μοιχεύσεις)
5:28
Looking (βλέπων) upon a
3.3
No high-minding eye
woman
(ὑψηλόφθαλμος)
5:28
Lust (πρὸς τὸ ἐπιθυμῆσαι)
3.3
Lust (ἐπιθυμίᾳ)
5:28
adultery (ἐμοίχευσεν) in the
3.3
The path to adulteries (ὁδηγεῖ
heart
… μοιχεῖαι)
5:33
No false oaths (oὐκ
2.3
No false oaths (= oὐκ
ἐπιορκήσεις)
ἐπιορκήσεις)
5:39
slap on the right cheek (=)
1.4
slap on the right cheek (=
ῥαπίζει εἰς τὴν δεξιὰν σιαγόνα)
5:39
Turn to him the other also (=) 1.4a
Turn to him the other also (=
στρέψον αὐτῷ καὶ τὴν ἄλλην)
5:40
Tunic (χιτῶνά), cloak (ἱμάτιον) 1.4c
cloak (ἱμάτιον), tunic (χιτῶνά)
[inverting]
5:41
if someone compels you one
1.4B
compels you someone [to go]
mile (ὅστις σε ἀγγαρεύσει
one mile (ἀγγαρεύσῃ σέ τις
μίλιον ἕν)
μίλιον ἕν) [inverting someone-
compels]
5:41
Go with him two (=)
1.4B
Go with him two (= ὕπαγε μετ’
αὐτοῦ δύο)
5:42
Give to those who ask
1.4D
Don’t ask for it back (μὴ
(αἰτοῦντί)
ἀπαίτει)
The DiDache: a MissiNG Piece Of The PuzzLe
5:43
Love neighbor (ἀγαπήσεις τὸν 1.2
Love neighbor (= ἀγαπήσεις …
πλησίον)
πλησίον)
5:43
Love your enemies (ἐχθροὺς)
1.3D
Love those who hate you, have
no enemy (ἐχθρῶν)
2.7
hate none, pray for them, love
them [inverting love-hate]
5:44
[[Bless those who curse you]] 1.3a
Bless those who curse you (=
(=)
εὐλογεῖτε τοὺς καταρωμένους)
5:44
Pray for those who persecute
1.3B
Pray (= προσεύχεσθε) for your
you (=)
enemies
5:45
The father’s sun and rain falls 1.5
upon all wishes to give the
on all
father [inverting father-all]
5:47
if you love those who love
1.3c
What favor (χάρις) do you do, if
you,
you love those
what remarkable (περισσὸν) do
who love you? [inverting if-
you do?
what]
5:47
Gentiles (ἐθνικοὶ) also do this 1.3c
Gentiles (ἔθνη) also do this (=
(=)
αὐτὸ ποιοῦσιν)
5:48
Be perfect (ἔσεσθε οὖν ὑμεῖς
1.4
You will be perfect (ἔσῃ
τέλειοι)
τέλειος)
5:48
as father is perfect (τέλειός
6.2
Will be perfect (τέλειος ἔσῃ) by
ἐστιν)
bearing the whole yoke
6:3
Give alms (ποιοῦντος
1.6
Give alms (ἐλεημοσύνη … δῷς)
ἐλεημοσύνην)
6:3
Left hand, what right hand
12.1
understanding of right and
does
left hand [inverting δεξιὰν,
ἀριστεράν]
6:3
hands not know (γνώτω)
1.6
sweat in hands until you know
(γνῷς) to whom to give it
6:5
When you pray (ὅταν
8.2
Do not pray (μηδὲ
προσεύχησθε)
προσεύχεσθε)
not as the hypocrites (ὡς οἱ
as the hypocrites (ὡς οἱ
ὑποκριταί)
ὑποκριταί)
6:9
Pray thus (οὕτως προσεύχεσθε) 8.2
Pray thus (= οὕτως
προσεύχεσθε)
6:9
God as father (= Πάτερ ἡμῶν ὁ 8.2
God as father (= πάτερ ἡμῶν ὁ
ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς)
ἐν τοῷ οὐρανῷ)
6:9
hallowed be your name (=)
8.2
hallowed be your name (=
ἁγιασθήτω τὸ ὄνομά σου)
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359
6:10
Kingdom come (=)
8.2
Kingdom come (= ἐλθέτω ἡ
βασιλεία σου)
6:10
Let your will be born (=)
8.2
Let your will be born (=
γενηθήτω τὸ θέλημά σου)
on earth as in heaven (=)
on earth as in heaven (= ὡς ἐν
οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς)
6:11
Our daily bread give us today 8.2
Our daily bread give us today (=
(=)
τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον
δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον)
6:12
forgive us our debts
8.2
forgive us our debt (ὀφειλὴν)
(ὀφειλήματα)
as we forgive (ἀφήκαμεν) our
as we forgive (ἀφίεμεν) our
debtors
debtors
6:13
Do not lead us into trial
8.2
Do not lead us into trial (=
(πειρασμόν)
πειρασμόν)
6:13
Deliver us from the evil
8.2
Deliver us from the evil (=
(πονηροῦ)
πονηροῦ)
3.1
flee from all evil (= πονηροῦ)
10.5
Deliver the church from all evil
(= πονηροῦ)
6:13
Kingdom, power, glory,
8.2
Power, glory, forever; also 10.5
forever
(= δύναμις, δόξα, αἰῶνας)
6:16
When you fast (νηστεύητε),
8.1
Let your fasts (νηστεῖαι),
not as the hypocrites
not at the same time with the
(ὑποκριταὶ)
hypocrites (ὑποκριτῶν)
6:19
No treasuring treasures on
3.5
No love of glory
earth
6:19
Thieves steal (κλέπται …
3.5
Leads to theft and thefts
κλέπτουσιν)
(κλοπήν, κλοπαὶ)
6:19
Treasures in heaven do not rust 4.8
if you have in common immor-
tal things,
then share more easily things
that perish
6:24
Do not love or serve Mammon 3.5
No love of money (μηδὲ
φιλάργυρος)
6:24
Love the Master (ἀγαπήσει)
1.2
Love (ἀγαπήσεις) the God who
made you
6:25
food (τροφῆς) [and drink
10.3
food and drink (τροφήν καὶ
(πίητε)]
ποτὸν)
The DiDache: a MissiNG Piece Of The PuzzLe
6:31, 33 food and drink, shall be given
you have given to people for
enjoyment
6:33
seek (ζητεῖτε) God’s righteous- 16.2
seek (ζητοῦντες) the needs of
ness
your souls
6:33
Then all things will be added
16.2
faith will not be useful to you
to you
in the end time
if you have not first been per-
fected
7:1
Judge not (μὴ κρίνετε)
11.7
a true prophet you shall not
judge (οὐδὲ διακρινεῖτε)
11.11 You shall not judge (οὐ
κριθήσεται)
7:2
Will be judged [by God]
11.11 With God will be their judg-
(κριθήσεσθε)
ment (κρίσιν)
7:3
speck (καρφός) in own eye
4.3
fairness in reproving others for
their failings
7:6
Give not the holy to the dogs
9.5
Give not the eucharist to the
(μὴ δῶτε τὸ ἅγιον τοῖς κυσίν)
unbaptized, quoting the Lord:
“give not the holy to the dogs”
(= μὴ δῶτε τὸ ἅγιον τοῖς κυσί)
7:7
seek (ζητεῖτε)
16.2
seek (ζητοῦντες) things per-
taining to your souls
7:9
Give his son bread (ἄρτον)
11.6
Let an apostle accept bread (=
ἄρτον) when he leaves
7:11
Give to son (υἱός) and children 4.9
Take not your hand from your
son (υἱοῦ) and daughter
7:10–11 Gifts (δόματα)
1.5
Gifts (χαρισμάτων)
7:11
if you give to those who ask
1.5
Give to everyone who asks
(αἰτοῦσιν)
(αἰτοῦντί)
much more will the father
for [thus] the father wishes
give (δώσει)
to give (δίδοσθαι) [inverting
give-ask]
7:12
all you wish men to do to you, 1.2
all you wish won’t happen to
you
and so you do to them
and you to another don’t do
(ποιεῖτε αὐτοῖς)
(ἄλλῳ μὴ ποίει) [inverting
do-to]
7:13–14 Way, way (ὁδός, ὁδός)
1.1
Two ways (ὁδοί δύο)
7:13
To destruction (εἰς τὴν
1.1
Of life, of death (ὁδοὶ … τῆς
ἀπώλειαν)
ζωῆς, θανάτου) [inverting
death-life]
WeLch: seRMON ON The MOuNT TO The DiDache
361
7:14
To life (ὁδὸς … εἰς τὴν ζωήν)
1.1;
Way of life (ὁδὸς τῆς ζωῆς)
4.14
7:15
Beware (προσέχετε)
6.1
Watch out (ὅρα) for those who
lead you astray
false prophets (ἀπὸ
16.3
false prophets
ψευδοπροφητῶν)
(ψευδοπροφῆται) [also 11.5]
7:15
sheepskin, wolves (προβάτων, 16.3
Turn sheep into wolves
λύκοι)
(πρόβατα εἰς λύκους)
7:16
Known by fruits (ἀπὸ τῶν
11.8
Known by their behavior (ἀπὸ
καρπῶν)
τῶν τρόπων)
7:19
cast into the fire (πῦρ)
16.5
Many led away and burned
(πύρωσιν)
7:21
Lord, Lord (κύριε, κύριε)
11.2
Of the Lord … receive as the
Lord (κυρίου … κύριον)