Observations and Possible Results
RECONSTRUCTING THE SOCIAL AND
RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE:
OBSERVATIONS AND POSSIBLE RESULTS
Jurgen K. Zangenberg
1. APPROACHING THE QUESTION
If we want to examine the milieu of a given text, we are faced with a complex of difficult questions.! I perceive "milieu" as a particular cultural setting, evidenced by language, style, and content of a text. "Milieu" is effective in a particular communicative process, describing a "location" in a social, religious, and also topographical sense. While language might be the medium to construct and maintain a milieu, to offer orientation to members of that milieu, create cohesion among them, draw boundaries, express belonging and desires, and target elements that need to be changed, there are always factors in the milieu that are not part of written or spoken language. "Milieu" entails actions and location; milieu
"happens" as well as requiring a place in time and space. All these factors can certainly be made an object of language by making them a topic in texts and debates, but that is not necessarily a one-to-one reflection. Texts never are simply a mirror of a given milieu, never offer a complete representation of all or even most elements of the milieu they are part of. Texts always select, emphasize, ignore, and alter elements of that milieu in order to fulfill their intended purpose. A milieu, consequently, never only "rests" in texts alone, nor is it only present by means of language. There is, however, a certain correspondence between milieu and the language used in texts originating from it ("jargon"), and it is certainly possible to assign texts to a common milieu by identifying overlaps in content, especially in the way the content ("traditions") is presented through style and language.
Milieu is broader than a group. "Milieu" means a group or related groups plus their context, and in relation to their context. Didache, for example, was written in and by a particular group, but this group might only be part of a wider network
See also Oda Wischmeyer's article in this volume.
43.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
and belong together with other groups to a larger milieu. Milieu, in fact, is a relational term. If more than a single group exists within a milieu, these groups can be expected to be in intensive communication with each other and with the given social, practical, and intellectual environment they inhabit. These groups would share common expressions and interpretations of their milieu, but not necessarily use these common traditions in an identical manner nor in unison. Different accents, even fierce competition and conflict might be the result.
What does all that mean for the study of Didache? Ever since its first publication at the end of the nineteenth century, Didache has attracted scholars because of its—in many ways—unique form and content. The question of how Didache fits into the intellectual and geographic landscape of early Christianity, has played an especially important role. To put it differently: What, many asked, was the didachist's milieu?
And yet, despite much effort and a lot of new insights, overall "progress" was small.2 One almost gets the impression that Didache systematically escaped all attempts to pin down its social and ideological context, define its place of origin or help identify a region where it might originally have circulated. I can only agree with Clayton N. Jefford who, at the beginning of a very constructive article on "The Milieu of Matthew, the Didache, and Ignatius of Antioch," exclaimed:
"There is likely no greater issue that remains within modern research on the Didache about which is less known and more is assumed than (. . .) the question of the provenance of the text."3 The prevailing insecurity is certainly to a large extent a result of Didache's character: while Didache, on the one hand, deals with a number of issues in unparalleled detail, such as ethics, baptism, a communal meal, and itinerant functionaries, the text also is, on the other hand, awkwardly unspecific and vague when it comes to pinning these details down on our virtual map of early Christian texts and their communities. Despite its apparent concreteness, Didache shares the selective character that texts have in relation to the milieu they belong to.
The other difficulty lies in the fact that too little is known about how far New
Testament and early post-New Testament literature were connected to a particular region and how such a connection could be demonstrated. This, of course, is a result of the general vagueness of many texts about where precisely they origi2. See, for example, Gunnar Garleff, Urchristliche Identitat in Matthdusevangelium,
Didache und Jakobusbrief (Beitrage zum Verstehen der Bibel 9; Miinster: LIT, 2004), 89 who states that research is "insgesamt nicht weit tiber das Hypothetische hinausgelangt" ("in general not reached far beyond the hypothetical")
3. Clayton N. Jefford, "The Milieu of Matthew, the Didache, and Ignatius of Antioch:
Agreements and Differences," in Matthew and the Didache: Two Documents from the Same
Jewish-Christian Milieu? (ed. H. van de Sandt; Assen: Van Gorcum, 2005), 35. On Jefford's own suggestion—shared with others—that Matthew, Didache, and the Corpus Ignatianum originate from Antioch, see below.
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
nated or where they were supposed to be read. The Pauline literature only is a welcome exception to this rule. The debate over how the seemingly so explicit information on the recipients of 1 Peter and James should be interpreted is a good example. Other texts, such as the Gospels and some of the New Testament letters, do not give any explicit indication at all about where they were written and for whom. Sometimes early post-New Testament texts help fill some gaps in the record by referring to traditions and speculations about authors and contexts, but often they rise more questions than they answer. A most notable example is Papias of Hierapolis whose opinions are notoriously controversial. Wherever even that information is lacking, we are fully dependent upon implicit and indirect allusions picked from the texts themselves (language, vocabulary, the way that traditions are used). Didache belongs to precisely that category of texts.
After von Harnack's pioneering edition, two places or regions have been proposed as Didache's original context, namely, Egypt and Syria/Palestine.4 A significant number of scholars have recently made a strong case for Antioch, but others have called for caution. In my paper I do not want to discuss this hypothesis directly, nor do I want to propose an alternative location for the "community of the Didache." I rather want to go one step back and look at Didache from a distance to critically assess the clues the text provides about its origin and context.
4. I only name as examples Klaus Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), Barnabasbrief, Zweiter
Klemensbrief, Schrift an Diognet (Schriften des Urchristentums 2; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1984), 61-63 (rural place in Syria); Kurt Niederwimmer, Die Didache
(Kommentar zu den Apostolischen Vatern 1; G6ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1989),
78-79 (Syria/Palestine, but rather not Antioch); Georg Schéllgen, Didache: Zwolf-Apostel-Lehre and Wilhelm Geerlings, Traditio Apostolica: Apostolische Uberlieferung (Fontes Christiani 1;
Freiburg: Herder, 1991), 84-85 (any city in Syria/Palestine rather than Egypt, but evidence is tentative); Adolf Adam, "Erwagungen zur Herkunft der Didache," ZKG 68 (1957): 1-47 (Pella as "hypothetische Vermutung," p. 47). All these studies offer ample references. Georg Schdllgen,
"Die Didache: Ein frithes Zeugnis fiir Landgemeinden?" ZNW 76 (1985): 140-43 rejects the idea that Didache came from a rural environment (against Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 33-34 and 61-63). Symptomatic for the weak ground on which all these assumptions are moving is especially von Harnack who has repeatedly revised his opinion.
5. Apart from Jefford, "Milieu of Matthew, the Didache, and Ignatius" I only want to point to John P. Meier, "Antioch" in Raymond E. Brown and John P. Meier, Antioch and Rome: New
Testament Cradles of Catholic Christianity (New York: Paulist Press, 1983), 12-86; Michelle
Slee, The Church in Antioch in the First Century CE: Communion and Conflict (JSNTSup 244;
London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2003); Magnus Zetterholm, The Formation of Christianity in Antioch: A Social-Scientific Approach to the Separation between Judaism and Christianity
(Routledge Early Church Monographs; London: Routledge, 2003) and the article by Magnus
Zetterholm in this volume (with more references). Bas ter Haar Romeny, "Hypotheses on the Development of Judaism and Christianity in Syria in the Period after 70 C.E." in van de Sandt, ed., Matthew and the Didache, 13-33, however, is rightly cautious and suggests Didache and Matthew "were written somewhere in each other's neighbourhood, closer to Palestine, perhaps even in Galilea."
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
I will certainly offer more questions and second thoughts than answers. I hope that my Schritt zurtick is no Riickschritt, but helps to see a bit clearer why no real progress was, in fact could not, be made with regard to our question.
2. DIDACHE' $ CHARACTER
There are a couple of major obstacles that are not easy to overcome for anybody attempting to identify Didache's social and religious milieu precisely:
2.1. ANONYMITY
Many difficulties arise from the fact that Didache's original title is lost, if it had one at all.6 I am well aware of the fact that such a statement sounds awkward to many, but I am indeed more sceptical about this issue than most colleagues.
Unfortunately, manuscript tradition cannot help us retrieve a reliable candidate for an original title. P. Oxy. XV 1782, our oldest but very fragmentary witness from the end of the fourth century, only starts with Did. 1:3 and breaks off shortly thereafter, and our most important text Codex Hierosolymitanus 54 ("H") is often unreliable and contains many disputed readings." Above all, it offers two titles, a short one di5axi tov SM@Seka AtootdAwv written in a separate line, and a long one di5axi kupiov 51a tev SWSexa AnootdAwv toig EBveow which is graphically presented in such a way that it is likely the copyist considered it already part of the text.8 This duplication has long been an issue of debate with arguments put forward in favor of the originality of the shorter or the longer version (now predominately accepted).? I think H clearly shows the intention of the copyist at least of this manuscript to document variant titles he found in his Vorlagen and also his decision to adopt the shorter one as "title" of the text and relegate the longer one to a secondary position as "incipit." None of these titles, however, need be authentic.!9 Vielhauer's suggestion that the text might initially have circulated without a title at all!! should not be dismissed too quickly with reference to the textual tradition which only seemingly offers the choice of alternative titles.
6. For a different opinion on the title see Garleff, Urchristliche Identitat in Matthdusevangelium, 111-17, Aaron Milavec, The Didache: Faith, Hope and Life of the Earliest Christian
Communities 50-70 C.E. (New York: Newman, 2003) also doubts that Didache originally had a title, but on the basis of different observations than the ones proposed here.
7. On these witnesses see, for example, Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 33-39.
8. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 81.
9. Schéllgen, Didache: Zwélf-Apostel-Lehre, 25-26; Jean-Paul Audet, La Didaché: Instructions des Apotres (Paris: Gabalda, 1958), 91-103.
10. Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 15; Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 81-82.
11. Philipp Vielhauer, Geschichte der urchristlichen Literatur: Einleitung in das Neue Testament, die Apokryphen und die Apostolischen Véter (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1981), 722-25; Willy
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
There still is the option that initially there was no title at all, a feature Didache would then share with many other ancient writings including, for example, the Gospels. Above all, Niederwimmer rightly asks if the title mentioned in the testimonia does indeed refer to the Didache in particular and not in a more general way to any paraenetic text in the form of a Two Ways Tractate.!2 This is certainly a good point!
What does that mean? Schdllgen is certainly right that the text implies strong authority,!> but whoever wrote it remained anonymous and "borrowed" authority from the "sources" and instructions it propagates: insight in right and wrong ways, the Lord and scripture. This authority does not require to be expressed in a title. Moreover, the way that andéoto\o<¢ is used in Didache is not prominent enough to warrant an exclusive connection of its authority with this particular group of community leaders. To ascribe exclusive "apostolic" authorship to this text (as well as to others, see "Apostolic Traditions") makes more sense in a later period when internal authority was no longer considered sufficient, and Didache finally received its title.!4 Precisely when this happened remains unclear. It does not seem too far fetched to assume that the phrase 5i5ay) tov dnootéAwv from Acts 2:42 was instrumental in this process.
It is often claimed that Clement of Alexandria already knew (a version of) Didache, but he quotes Did. 3:5 as ypadgr without naming a specific title (Strom. 1
[20] 100.4). Strictly speaking, Clement only attests that the authority of the tradition he refers to was regarded as highly as that of Scripture itself, but it remains entirely hypothetical that Clement actually quotes from a work similar to what we now know as Didache.!5
The first to quote from "teachings of the apostles" (in fact, from a Latin translation entitled Doctrinae apostolorum) is Pseudo-Cyprian's Adversus aleatores
(around 300).!6 The fact that phrases from Did. 14:2 and 15:3 are combined and employed in a passage also containing quotations from 1 Cor merely shows how freely such paraenetic passages could be combined with each other (see also above on Clement). We do not know if Ps.-Cyprian quotes from a different version of Didache, or if he just combined and altered as appropriate what he received from general tradition. But if Ps.-Cyprian indeed quoted from a version of Didache, its alleged apostolic character seems to have encouraged him to juxtapose Didache traditions with Pauline ones whose apostolic authority had long been established.
Rordorf and André Tuilier, La Doctrine des Douze Apétres (Didaché) (SC 248; Paris: Cerf, 1978),
13-17.
12. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 81-82.
13. Schéllgen, Didache: Zw6lf-Apostel-Lehre, 17-21 and 26.
14. Bentley Layton, "The Sources, Date and Transmission of Didache 1.3b-2.1," HTR 61
(1968): 382 speaks of "a clear example of archaism" with regard to the title.
15. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 19-20.
16. Ibid., 21-22.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
In that case, Ps.-Cyprian is our oldest witness that Didache (or versions of it) has gained "apostolic" status, that is, by the year 300. Where and how that process had begun is impossible to say. What we can say is that some time before 300 some users of Didache assumed that its implicit and explicit authority, as well as its apparently encyclopedic character could only mean that it was "apostolic." But this is more a statement about the text's authority around 300 than about its origins. All other witnesses (e.g., Eusebius, Canon Lists) presuppose that status and have nothing to contribute to the question of how Didache's apostolicity came about. But I have no doubt that the "apostolic" character helped Didache to survive. Given its transitional and composite character (see below under 2.2. and 2.3.), we could well be inclined to speculate that Didache might never have been handed down further if it had not been declared "apostolic." The dim manuscript tradition, however, is a result of the fact that—in the course of time—Didache had been superseded and replaced by more comprehensive and more "orthodox"
"church orders."
Since it lacks an original title, we do not know how the author himself wanted to have his work understood and see it used.!7 A title cannot help us in defining
Didache's milieu, instead we have to approach that question on the basis of the form and content of the text alone.
2.2. DIDACHE AND "AUTHORSHIP"
Before we move on to the question of "authorship," we have to address another caveat. Speaking of an "author" might itself be problematic. "Author" implies intentionality, functionality, purpose, communication, and meaning. But did Didache have an author, and if yes, in what respect? No author is named for Didache; it is anonymous like most early Christian texts. Nor does early Christian tradition supply one, which is the case with many anonymous early Christian texts. Of course, even the Didache as we have it today must have been composed and written down by someone, but it is doubtful if Didache had an author in the way, for example, that Paul authored his letter to the Romans. In ancient literature, collections of ethical, behavioral, and "liturgical" instructions are often anonymous. I would put Didache next to texts like the Tabula Cebetis, the Sentences of Sextus or even the document represented by the various versions of 1QS and 4QS. Rainer Hirsch-Luipold rightly described the Tabula Cebetis as a "Sam17. Rordorf and Tuilier, La Doctrine des Douze Apétres (Didaché), 16-17: "Tout compte fait, les deux titres qui nous sont parvenus dans la tradition manuscrite ne peuvent nous éclairer sur les origines de l'ouvrage, son genre littéraire ou ses destinataires; et c'est dans le texte luiméme qu'il faut chercher la réponse & ces questions;" Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 82: "Man darf den Titel diSaxi) (bzw. AtSaxai) tHv ano0otéwv in keinem Fall als Leseanweisung verstehen. Er ist . . . ein nachtragliches Etikett, dessen Hinweis auf die andoto\ot fiir die Schrift selbst ohne Bedeutung bleibt."
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
melbecken unterschiedlicher . .
. Traditionen"!8 which escapes clear classification, a definition that fits Didache's character nicely.
With respect to such texts, Didache's "authorship" is of a very limited nature.
Such texts grow out of the need of the communities that use them or meet the demands of a quite anonymous Sitz im Leben (teaching, moral adhortation). In those contexts it makes sense that Didache is not transmitted under an individual's name, but under the authority of a collective.
Having such paraenetical and constitutional writings in mind, one might perhaps go one step further and ask if there ever existed a standard text of Didache at all. Texts like Didache, as well as similar traditions behind or alongside it, were always open to be edited, transplanted, supplemented, updated, or rewritten into new forms and compositions. It is very unfortunate that our scant manuscript tradition does not allow us to take a deeper glimpse into the history that led to the Didache text as we have it today. We must consider the possibility that the Didache text as we have it today only represents a moment in time in a longer development of instructional tradition. Didache 10:8 might be just such an addition.!9 A relatively unstable text as evidenced in the manuscript tradition? as well as rewritings and adoptions of material presented in Didache in later texts such as the 7th book of the Apostolic Constitutions demonstrates that catalogues of that kind are always in statu transformandi.!
18. Rainer Hirsch-Luipold, in Die Bildtafel des Kebes: Allegorie des Lebens (ed. R. HirschLuipold et al.; SAPERE 8; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2005), 23. On its alleged author see the considerations of Heinz-Ginther Nesselrath, ibid., 38-48. It should be noted that Tabula Cebetis represents a pagan version of the Two Ways motif.
19. The thanksgiving on the unguent in 10:8 is lacking in Hierosolymitanus, but is present in a Coptic translation and in later church orders just after instructions on the Eucharist. Did
H leave the passage out? On the problem see Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 57-59 (possibly part of the original Didache); Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 205-9 (early addition to Didache text). See also Huub van de Sandt, "The Egyptian Background of the 'Ointment' Prayer in the Eucharistic Rite of the Didache (10:8)," in The Wisdom of Egypt: Jewish, Early Christian, and Gnostic Essays (ed. G. H. van Kooten and A. Hilhorst; Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity
59; Leiden: Brill 2005), 227-45.
20. A particularly interesting case on the fluctuality of the Didache text is the so-called
Sectio evangelica in Did. 1:3b-2:1. Since Did. 1:3b-2:1 is attested in P. Oxy. XV 1782, it cannot be considered a later addition to Didache as often assumed (see Niederwimmer, Die Didache,
37; differently Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 20: "Interpolation in den Text der Didache"), but should be seen as an "insertion into the christianized Two Ways tradition" (thus John S.
Kloppenborg, "The Use of the Synoptics or Q in Did. 1:3b-2:1," in van de Sandt, ed., Matthew and the Didache, 129) and therefore belongs to the "pre-history" of Didache as we have it now.
Layton, "The Sources, Date and Transmission of Didache 1.3b-2.1," 382 speaks about "a cloud of uncertainty as to what constituted the 'original' Didache."
21. On the adaptation of Didache in Apos. Con. 7 see Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 45-47.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
2.3. DIDACHE AS COMPOSITE TEXT
Didache's great potential for researching its "milieu" lies in the fact that it attests to literary forms (above all the Two Ways Instruction),:community structures (functionaries, hospitality) and practices (baptism, communal meal) in one single document that are usually only known from different contexts in early
Christian literature. Didache claims normativity, while other texts are descriptive or far less comprehensive. Research in recent years has made it plausible that Didache is a composite text combining elements that each have their own history and not necessarily the same functional context. This, of course, adds to our problems.
It is worth examining to what extent the diversity of elements within Didache does or does not suggest a diversity of milieus or diversities within the milieu
Didache belongs to. In any case, Didache's composite nature requires us to differentiate between its various parts. Not all parts necessarily function on the same level and with the same purpose. I am not saying that the components I am about to discuss necessarily are Traditionsstiicke (some of them actually are), I only note that they differ in function, intention, and content. Functionally, the question of whether a particular passage has been adopted as a Traditionsstiick or not seems of little relevance since even Traditionsstticke are integrated into the present context as it is and it is in such a way that Didache is directed to and received by its audience.
We find sections in Didache that seem less intended to regulate actual behavior than to reemphasize and reassure the common ground of the audience. The doctrines of the Two Ways seems to be one such case (1:1-6:3) and the apocalyptic teaching another (16:1-8).
Intensive research on the Two Ways passage has made clear that Didache incorporates ethical material that has close parallels with early Jewish paraenesis using dual forms of the "way" imagery ("good"/"evil," "light"/"darkness,"
"death"/"life" or "broad"/"narrow;" see, for example, Deut 30:15-20; Jer 31:8; 21:8-10; Prov 12:28 (Lxx); Sir 15:11-17; 1QS III, 18-IV, 26; Ps.-Phoc. 5-79).
While terminology and content of the Didache version certainly comes from a Jewish background, the Two Ways (or a similar binary) structure of admonition in general is by far not confined to it, but has parallels in popular pagan philosophy (cf. Hesiod, Op. 287-292; Xenophon, Mem. 2.120-130; Tabula Cebetis and many others). Such imagery has enjoyed wide-spread use in paraenetical texts as it is very suitable for comprehensive and fundamental catalogues of "virtues" and "vices." It is adaptable to various contexts, easy to understand and remember, and the bipolar structure can be fleshed out with details at will and is open to combination with other formula-like sequences (see, e.g., the TéKVvov-sayings in Did. 3:1-6). It is not surprising, therefore, that Didache is not the only example of a Christian text incorporating such exhortations (the closest parallel being
Barn, 18:1-20:2; but cf. also Matt 7:13-14). Even if Huub van de Sandt and David
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
Flusser might go too far in reconstructing the Wortlaut of a Jewish "Two Ways" document with the help of Didache and Barnabas, there can be no doubt that Did. 1:1-6:3 incorporates material that comes from a Jewish background.22
Didache in its present form, however, is a Christian text. What type of audience, therefore, does the Two Ways passage target in its Didache context and why? If the Two Ways passage was addressed to members of the Didache group, it seems unlikely that it had an immediate interventive purpose. It can be assumed that community members were well familiar with the regulations and not actively engaged in committing the crimes targeted in the list.23 Some scholars, therefore, see the Two Ways passage as admonition to outsiders to bring up their behavior to the community's standard and as part of pre-baptismal catechesis (7:1).?4
That may well be the case. Didache 11:1 suggests that similar traditions were used as criteria to judge unknown Christians who sought a place in the community
—a very different function and a different audience! If Did. 7:1 and 11:1 are seen together, it becomes clear that the Two Ways teaching defined the group's identity in general, is the basis of their identity as Christians, and could be applied to various purposes ranging from instructing Gentiles before baptism over reassuring one's own fold to testing unknown Christians of their orthodoxy. More on that topic will follow below.
Other paraenetic passages are more concrete and regulate details of practices whose general structure and overall motivation remains undisputed and unchanged. That is especially the case in 7:1-10:7 where the didachist addresses central elements of communal behavior such as baptism, fasting, prayer and the communal meal. It can be assumed that these practices have the same fundamental importance to construct identity and coherence of the community as the ethical norms expressed in 1:1-6:3. While 1:1-6:3 mostly reassure the community, 7:1-10:7 in fact regulate, but by intervening only in detail, they implicitly stabilize all issues that are not specifically addressed. It is interesting to see that in the series of practices, the most "global" regulations concern baptism, while instructions on fasting, prayer, and communal meals concern practical details
22. 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, 2002), 1-190. Also see
Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 83-88; Peter Tomson, "The Halakhic Evidence of Didache 8 and Matthew 6 and the Didache Community's Relationship to Judaism" in van de Sandt, ed., Matthew and the Didache, 131-41. Skeptic about the role of T. 12 Patr. and the possibility to reconstruct a Greek Two Ways scheme are Marinus de Jonge, "The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs and the 'Two Ways," in Biblical Traditions in Transmission (JSJSup 111; ed.
C. Hempel and J. M. Lieu; Leiden: Brill 2006), 179-94 and Kari Syreeni, "The Sermon on the Mount and the Two Ways Teaching," in van de Sandt, ed., Matthew and the Didache, 92-94.
23. I agree with Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 23 who says that Didache mostly reiterates what "schon weitgehend geiibte Praxis war" in his community.
24. See, e.g., Syreeni, "Sermon on the Mount," 89 with caution.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
(fasting), new content (prayer), or new interpretive elements (communal meal).
Only in chapter 7:1-4, Didache regulates both structural (what has to happen at baptism, what after it?), practical (what can we do if we have no bd5wp G@v?), and interpretive elements (baptizing eig tT Svopa Tod natpdc Kai Tod viod Kai TOD ayiov mvevpatos).
The passage on the communal gathering on the kuptaxt tod Kupiov (chapter 14) shows a similar general character as the regulations on baptism (chapter
7). Here, too, crucial elements are named (breaking of bread, thanksgiving, confession of sins), special instructions given (14:2) and all is placed within an interpretive framework (14:3). The fact that instructions about prayers at and access to communal meals (evxaptotia, in 9:1-10:7) are not given in conjunction with regulations on the kuptaxi) tod Kupiov (in 14) might at first sight seem somewhat awkward. It makes, in fact, sense if the Didache community knew communal meals outside gatherings on kvptaxi) tod Kupiov (thanksgiving being the connecting principle, whereas 8voia and confession of sins were specially emphasized kvptaxt) tov kupiov). It also places the following instructions on énioxonot and d1dKovot in their proper liturgical context as having their prime purpose as "overseer" and "servants" at the kuptaxi) tod kupiov gatherings of local communities, and differentiates them from other functionaries who are either itinerant (chs. 11-13 a4néotoAot and mpogrtat) or are not explicitly connected to a particular way of life and locale (6t5aoxaAo1 and to a certain extent perhaps also npogrtat, see 15:1). It might also indicate a difference in ritual. The presence of functionaries at the meals on a kuptaxi) tod Kupiov indicates that these meals have a higher significance for the community as a whole (here the entire community gathers in semi-public context, therefore mutual forgiveness is an issue), whereas the meals presupposed in 9:1-10:7 could be celebrated in smaller groups or in the family, needed no "officials," but had their communityrelated significance only via the proper edxaptotia and through the exclusion of outsiders.
The difference in handling these rites (baptism and celebration on a kuptaxi} tov Kupiov over against fasting, prayer and "simple" meals) is a telling indication not about the importance of each rite for the community as reflected in Didache—they were all important—but rather about the familiarity with each rite that the didachist could expect among the members of his community and about their cultural context. It suggests that baptism and the kuptaxi) tod Kupiovcelebration were relatively new practices for the Didache community, while the other three could easily be continued only after a couple of necessary elements had been altered and adapted to the new Christian identity of the group.
A third type of passages aims at fundamentally reforming limited, but important elements of communal practice (11:1-13:7). Here, Didache's regulations aim at clearly defined persons in clearly defined situations and give very explicit instructions in a very casuistic style (generalizing mac signals the normative character of the passage, whereas av "whenever" and ei "in case" indicate
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
the goal to be comprehensive and set its internal structure). Different criteria are named on which the recommended practice should be based and consequences of certain behavior are described. Here, it seems, urgent problems are being dealt with on a very pragmatic level.
Summarizing, we thus may argue, then, that in Didache quite specific and ad hoc regulations go hand in hand with more fundamental passages that almost appear unrelated to a particular community and its situation. It is clear that each of these passages makes its own contribution to our quest for Didache's social and religious background (more on that below). While 11:1-13:7 can tell us very precisely how Didache's situation and behavior triggered the "author's" intervention and therefore opens fascinating windows into elements of early Christian life, 1:1-6:1 is on a different level, speaks in a much more general way, and does not seem to have targeted particular misbehavior. The density of "argumentation" is a helpful criterion: the more signs of actual argumentation, dissuasion and persuasion one can identify, the closer the passage seems to be to "real life" and "real issues."
Despite its suggestive encyclopedic appearance as a composite text and its normative intentions, Didache has more of an ad hoc text about it than many might expect, and the question arises how comprehensive the text actually is for the entire life and milieu of its community. Didache is not a Kirchenordnung ina general sense, it is no "encyclopedia of early Christian life," of a certain period or even perhaps a certain region. The "author" selected some topics and neglected others, he adopted and adapted traditions, and all that without giving reasons for why he mentions this and ignores the other. Neither is Didache a Bestandsaufnahme of all or even the most important practices of its community, nor does it offer a complete or nearly complete list of deviant positions or practices of its opponents. I think recent scholarship has, under the lasting influence of von
Harnack's enthusiasm, overestimated Didache's comprehensive nature.?° That insight is not entirely new, of course. Many scholars have already emphasized the fact that Didache does not present an exposition of Christian doctrine (or even parts of it), such as giving a rationale for baptism or communal meal, nor does it refer to any narratives about Jesus and his followers. Nieder25. Garleff, Urchristliche Identitdt in Matthdusevangelium, 94-97; Adolf von Harnack,
Lehre der Zwélf Apostel nebst Untersuchungen zur dltesten Geschichte der Kirchenverfassung und des Kirchenrechts (TU 2/1; 2nd ed.; Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1893), 36 writes: "Je mehr man sich
[in Didache] vertieft, desto deutlicher gewahrt man, dass ihr Verf. in seinem Sinne wirklich
Alles erschépft hat, was in einen kurzen evangelisch-apostolischen Leitfaden fiir das christliche
Leben des Einzelnen (im taglichen Verkehr der Gemeinde) hineingeh6rt." Similar, Milavec,
Didache, ix: In contrast to Paul or Acts, "The Didache . . . offers a full-blown description of nearly every aspect of community life." Or: "No document in the Christian Scriptures is as descriptive, as organized, and as comprehensive as the Didache when it comes to offering evidence about the community that lies behind the text" (ibid., xxv).
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
wimmer rightly rejects the view that Didache is a "work of theology," but he might go too far if he calls Didache only a "Reglement fiir die kirchliche Praxis, ein Handbuch fiir die kirchliche Moral, das kirchliche Ritual und die kirchliche
Disziplin."26 The fact that Didache is composite and practically oriented does not mean Didache has no theology, or that the community behind Didache was not interested in giving their behavior a rationale. The problem lies on a different level. Though quite prosaic and sometime haphazard, Didache's decisions and recommendations are certainly based on theological choices and imply doctrinal positions, but its paraenetic character and composite nature often prevented the "author" to express detailed theological motivations for recommended behavior which poses no small obstacle for anyone who wants to reconstruct Didache's milieu.27
It lies in the character of Didache as composite text, that it will be much easier to identify parallels to single elements within it than to the entire text itself.
3. CONSTRUCTIVE APPROACH
But what can we positively say after all these caveats? What information in the text can we use as basis for reconstructing Didache's social and religious context? The common method of reconstructing the Didache's social and religious background is to look at the most prominent elements and their ideological and social origin. We cautiously follow that approach,
3.1. THE "Two Ways SCHEMA" (1:1-6:1) As indicated above, David Flusser and Huub van de Sandt have intensively discussed the role of the Two Ways Schema for defining Didache's religious background and intentions. With regard to the material presented, it indeed seems beyond doubt that the schema employed in Did. 1:1-6:1 is of Jewish origin. The passage is full of Old Testament material and the Christian patina is only superficial. But such and similar lists of ethical regulations are also widely known from 26. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 13.
27. Ibid., 13 including note 8 rightly warned; "Es ware téricht, die vollstandigen Lehranschauungen des Didachisten aus der Didache erheben zu wollen. Natiirlich gibt es en passant und zuweilen implizit einiges, das die Lehrmeinungen des Didachisten (bzw. seiner Quellen) deutlich macht; aber es wire verkehrt, daraus eine 'Theologie' des Didachisten konstruieren zu wollen. Die Lehranschauungen des Didachisten diirfen nicht auf das reduziert werden, was sich en passant und implizit aus seiner Schrift ergibt. Das ist grundsatzlich auch ein Vorbehalt gegeniiber allen Versuchen, die "Theologie' der Didache zu bestimmen und gegen andere (z. B.
Mt. oder Paulus) abzuheben. . . . Solche Versuche verstoBen gegen die Regel, die es verbietet,
Texte mit verschiedenem Reflexionsniveau unmittelbar miteinander zu vergleichen. "
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
he popular pagan literature. Even materialiter there are many parallels (including the Golden Rule). Two Ways passages usually are composed of smaller units, show a tendency towards agglutination, and are open for adaptation and alteration.?8 The fact that an originally Jewish ethical "canon" forms the basis of Didache's teachings not only indicates the close connection of the didachist to Jewish paraenetical traditions, but also demonstrates how similar the practical behavior of his community must have been to that of Jews. There is in fact almost no way to distinguish "Jewish" from "Christian" apart from the context in which the Two Ways-scheme is placed in Didache. For Marinus de Jonge Didache is an "interesting case of incorporation and assimilation of traditional material" "that may be Jewish and Christian in a Christian document."29
3.2. INSTRUCTIONS ON COMMUNAL PRACTICE (8:1-10:7 AND 14)
This impression can be confirmed by observing Didache's regulations on fasting (8:1), prayer (8:2-3), and even the communal meal (9:1-10:7). Many scholars have already pointed out that all three rituals are—despite some obvious Christian peculiarities—grounded in Jewish theology and practices. One particularly instructive issue is fasting, which many scholars count among regular Jewish religious practice.39 The didachist only requires to change the days on which his community is to fast (Wednesday and Friday instead of Monday and Thursday). Peter Tomson refers to Epiphanius, Pan. II 15.1 who confirms that Monday and Thursday were common Jewish fasting days according to the Rabbis, probably even before 135.3! A recent study on markets in Roman Palestine by Ben-Zion Rosenfeld and Joseph Menirav largely confirms Tomson's findings. Rosenfeld and Menirav discuss a couple of rabbinic texts that demonstrate that Monday and Thursday were indeed periodic market days in large towns and cities (e.g., m. Ketub. 1:1; m. Meg. 1:1).32 Markets were not only occasions for economic activities, but were very important social events fostering cohesion and communication within a community. They provided the context for gatherings of the court and communal services with Torah readings, prayers in the synagogue. Rosenfeld and Menirav further emphasize that large town and 28. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 55-58; Schéllgen, Didache: Zwolf-Apostel-Lehre, 27-41.
29. De Jonge, "Testaments of Twelve Patriarchs," 185, 194. De Jonge sees close parallels between the incorporation and use of the Two Ways Scheme in Didache and the T. 12 Patr.
(esp. T. Ash.).
30. Tomson, "Halakhic Evidence of Didache 8," 135-37.
31. Ibid., 135.
32. On markets in ancient Palestine, see Ben-Zion Rosenfeld and Joseph Menirav, Markets and Marketing in Roman Palestine (JSJSup 99; Leiden: Brill, 2005), 43-45, 215. Unfortunately,
Rosenfeld and Menirav do not explicitly discuss Didache. I thank my colleague Johannes
Tromp for directing my attention to this valuable book.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
city markets should not be confused with village markets, which notably took place on Fridays. Both market days did not overlap, because they fulfilled different functions: "Villagers could thus take advantage of the business potential of the city on Mondays and Thursdays, and then on Fridays, offer the rest of their goods for sale in the village market, along with the goods which they had purchased in the city."33 Reading Rosenfeld and Menirav, one gets the strong impression that both market systems were in a delicate and useful balance, so why play one out against the other as in Didache? And why is Wednesday mentioned when it does not play a role in these rabbinic discussions? And finally why talk about fasting in this context?
Lets us start with the last point. Fasting, first of all, has a strong religious significance. It is a practice that regulates social contacts by temporarily suspending the opportunity to practice table fellowship. By refusing to eat, people send out a signal to others (e.g., in times of mourning about their status, or as a sign of their piety, cf. Matt 6:16-18). If people fast at the same time, they unite and want to be perceived by outsiders as manifestly belonging together.>4 By regulating that rite, Didache intends to secure that his group distinguishes itself from others who pursue the same practice but in a different way. By prohibiting members of his community to take part in such an occasion, Didache has very effectively cut them off from their social and religious matrix, but without requiring them to abandon an important element of common pious practice in general. As fasting is not simply a private matter, but has public implications, the Didache community's new practice would have been noticeable for everybody.
But fasting is not only a religious issue; it has economic implications, too.
Fasting means to refuse consumption of food, something that is understandably not desired at market days, because it reduces food demand and sends prices down. It is remarkable that one passage in m. Ta'an. 2:9 explicitly makes that point: "They do not decree a fast for the community in the first instance for a Thursday, so as not to disturb market prices."3> The continuation of the passage demonstrates that there was a controversial discussion among Jewish authorities about fasting on periodic city market days. There seems to have been a conflict between economic interests and the religious aspects of market days as days of communal gatherings in which some people might have fasted to underline their religious observance. Is Didache taking part in this discussion? Many exegetes have assumed that fasting on Monday and Thursday was a common and positive thing (which it certainly was), and concluded that the rejection of such a practice is a sign that Didache breaks the ties with its social and religious context.
33. Rosenfeld and Menirav, Markets and Marketing in Roman Palestine, 44.
34. Thus Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 166-67.
35. Rosenfeld and Menirav, Markets and Marketing in Roman Palestine, 44.
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
if If I understand m. Ta'an. 2:9 correctly, it is just the opposite. Fasting on Monday and Thursday was not desired by those who depended on smoothly functioning city markets. Was that the motivation behind Didache's rejecting of Monday and Thursday as fasting days? If yes, one could argue that Didache actually takes the standpoint of a city-dweller who benefits from booming market days when villagers flock into the city to buy and sell and therefore does not want to jeopardize prices by announcing a fast. That might indeed be a plausible solution, even more so because Didache does not reject fasting as such, but keeps it as a religious practice—and moves it to two days, one of which, Friday, we know was one of the traditional market days in villages. On these market days, as Rosenfeld and Menirav show,*° only villagers would come together to exchange their products largely among themselves. City dwellers would hardly participate in village market days because they only get into contact with traders from villages as the latter entered the cities—on Mondays and Thursdays. If that path is correct,
Didache would reject fasting days in order to keep in contact with the interests of the urban community its congregation lives in, not to break with it. Didache further would promote its piety at the cost of contacts with villagers (who would above all be named broxpitai).
There is only one problem: while this scenario can explain why Didache rejects Monday and Thursday and prefers Friday, it cannot explain why Wednesday is required as second fasting day. The text itself is silent on that question, so we can only speculate. It may well be that Didache refers to an unknown local practice of fasting also on Wednesdays; it can also be that Didache invents that second day of fasting as a parallel to the two days it rejected. Or Jaubert was on the right track referring to a hypothetical Jewish practice to use Wednesday,
Friday, and Sunday as fast days, now adopted by the didachist who at the same time of course had to leave out Sunday because this day has gained a completely new purpose as kuptaxki tob Kupiov (chapter 14).97 Be that as it may, the issue certainly needs further exploration. What is evident is that Didache, both with respect to the option it rejects and the option it prefers, entirely moves within the confines of Jewish debates. It is true that fasting regulates communality and that Didache intends to do exactly that, but I do not think it regulates communality at the cost of contact with Jews in general.
36. Ibid., 41-43. One should note that the only specifically Palestinian element in this debate is that we hear about it in Palestinian sources. The market day system itself was a common feature of the Roman Empire (ibid., 44).
37. Annie Jaubert, "Jésus et le calendrier de Qumran," NTS 7 (1960/61): 1-30. I agree with Tomson, "Halakhic Evidence of Didache 8," 136 and Marcello Del Verme, Didache and Judaism: Jewish Roots of an Ancient Christian-Jewish Work (New York: T&T Clark, 2004), 178-80 that this suggestion should be taken more seriously. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 167 n. 16, however, finds Jaubert's suggestion "sehr unwahrscheinlich."
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
> It is an interesting question (which I cannot pursue further here) how far the order to fast on days different from the dnoxpttai structurally equals the instruction not to let unbaptized people take part in ebxaptotiat bu@v (9:5, see below). In any case, being baptized becomes the only decisive criterion for sharing community and fellowship; it restricts "any form of commensality, of eating and drinking with Christians."38 If the same group is addressed in 8:2 and 9:5, the message is simple: when we cannot eat with you (see 9:5) we cannot not eat with you either. If not, the general intention of Didache's rulings is still evident:
Through these measures the didachist is able to create boundaries on the basis of a widely unquestioned common ground of practices. He forms identity by emphasizing boundaries and continuing to move on common ground. I find it problematic, therefore, to take Didache's instruction as step in a "Ablésungsprozess von der Mutterreligion."39 Didache might simply have opted for a different form of Judaism than that he encountered in person of the bnoxpitai, different through certain practical innovations and different through the belief in Christ.
Here, perhaps, lies the most important element of Didache's milieu. We will have to get back to this later.
The second issue that finds the didachist's attention is prayer. This, too, is an important expression of Jewish piety.
A common Jewish substratum is not only present in the instruction to pray tpic tig Hépac (8:3, see Dan 6:11), but also in the style and contents of the prayer the didachist recommends.*° Does the didachist quote the prayer word for word because his recipients did not know it? That is not unlikely,4! even more so if one considers the very close similarity with the Matthean version of the Lord's Prayer (Matt 6:9-13 over against the shorter Q-version in Luke 11:2-4)# and the explicit introduction to the prayer with obtw¢ mpooevdxeoOe. In any case, the didachist sees this prayer as coming directly from the kvptog and his evayyédtov. While Did. 8:2 should not be pressed too hard and be taken to indicate that Didache is dependent upon Matthew, it
38. Gerard Rouwhorst, "Didache 9-10: A Litmus Test for the Research on Early Christian
Liturgy Eucharist," in van de Sandt, ed., Matthew and the Didache, 148.
39. Thus Schdllgen, Didache: Zwélf-Apostel-Lehre, 47, although Schéllgen repeatedly and rightly emphasizes that Didache largely continues Jewish practices. This apparent contradiction in Schéllgen's description suggests a serious terminological dilemma when describing the "Judaism" evident in Didache, since our perspective and consequently most of our labels are formulated post factum, and thus anachronistic. For a different view see Jonathan A. Draper,
"Do the Didache and Matthew Reflect an 'Irrevocable Parting of the Ways' with Judaism?" in van de Sandt, ed., Matthew and the Didache, 217-41.
40. On the Jewish character of the Lord's Prayer see, e.g., Ulrich Luz, Das Evangelium nach
Matthdus: Mt 1-7 (EKKNT 1/1; Ziirich: Benziger, 1985), 332-53.
41. Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 79 n. 68 rejects that idea and refers to Didache's character as "Kirchenordnung, die Regularien und Formulare bietet."
42. Tomson, "Halakhic Evidence of Didache 8," 134-35 on the Lord's Prayer and Didache's closeness to Matthew.
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
demonstrates that Didache taps early Christian traditions as resources that are also present in Matthew. By quoting the Lord's Prayer, Didache standardizes
Christian prayer and replaces other formulae that might have been spoken in the didachist's community before, while the structure of praying three times a day is explicitly reiterated and retained. As in the case of fasting, Didache seems not to have left "Jewish tradition" or "Judaism" as such, but chose for one Jewish option instead of another.*? Unlike in the case of fasting, however, the alternative prayer he recommends comes from early Christian tradition, but its stance is still deeply connected to Judaism.
It is notable that fasting and prayer are also discussed in Matt 6:5-18, although in reverse order. While Matthew's discussion of prayer is quite similar to that in Didache ("wrong" practice should be replaced by adopting the Lord's
Prayer), the passage on fasting follows a different path. While in Matthew all effort is made to see Christians fast €v t@ kpu@aiw, because if they do otherwise and attract attention they will already have received their reward (Matt 6:16-18),
Didache points in a different direction and rather limits contacts with Jews who also fast.
The third element of Jewish piety mentioned in Matt (6:1-4), namely, almsgiving, is not part of Didache's list, but is mentioned in passing at the end of the paraenetic section in a very general, affirmative way (15:4). Interestingly enough, éXenuoovvat appear also in a tripartite combination with evyai and—generalizing—naoat ai mpakeic to which certainly also the vnoteiat from 8:1 belong. Here, too, the evayyéAtov tod Kupiov Nu@v is named as authority and orientation.
In addition to the three cardinal practices of Jewish piety, Didache also deals with what is called ebyapiotiat (9:1-10:7). It is clear that these ebvxapiotiat have their context in meals. A separate ebyaptotia is mentioned for the cup/drinking
(9:2, nothptov) and one for the bread/eating (9:3-4, kAdopa). The text does not say that the meals in which the evxapiotiat featured had a specifically sacramental context (see above on the relation of 9:1-10:7 to chapter 14), nor do the prayers imply any reference to Jesus's Last Supper.*4 Even if one would not want to see a direct relationship with Hellenistic symposia in particular, as Matthias Klinghard proposes,*> one should, on the other hand, not underestimate the fact that the institution narrative is lacking as well as all other references to the Last Supper and death of Jesus.4° A comparison of Didache's prayers with the Matthean "eucharistic" tradition (Matt 26:26-29) does not help to explain Didache's practice and 43. Ibid., 137-39.
44. I therefore refrain from calling this meal "Eucharist" to avoid anachronistic and alien connotations. For a different view on Did. 9-10 see Rouwhorst, "Didache 9-10," 143-56.
45. Matthias Klinghardt, Gemeinschaftsmahl und Mahlgemeinschaft: Soziologie und Liturgie frithchristlicher Mahlfeiern (TANZ 13; Tiibingen: Francke, 1996).
46. Here I criticize Rouwhorst, "Didache 9-10," 146-47, but I agree with him that Did.
9-10 makes "no clear distinction . .
. between what we would tend to call a 'normal' meal and
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
is therefore futile. But even outside of a "sacramental framework," these prayers clearly have a "liturgical" function: they structure and interpret eating practices. But instead of commemorating Jesus's death, they celebrate God's power as Seondtn¢ navtoxpatwp of all creation and especially as giver of bread and wine, the staple ingredients of any meal, and as savior through Jesus tod natddc oov (9:2; 10:2), and present the éxkAnoia as God's property (cov f éxKAnoia in 9:4). Thematically and structurally these prayers are analogous to Jewish meal prayers,4" and consequently the passage 9:1-10:6 has the same function as 8:2, namely, to replace liturgical formulae that are not considered any longer to be appropriate expressions of the new faith that Didache's audience belongs to.
The fact that the didachist's opponents are called bxoxprtai in 8:1 and 2 and Kbvec in 9:5 does not contradict the closeness of the Didache community to the practices of its opponents. On the contrary, it shows that the conflict was fought out with great determination using common polemical labels and on the basis of a wide common ground. Both broxpitai and kbwv also connect Didache with Matthew's jargon to address competitors who—on the basis of language and content of the dispute—can likely be defined as close to Pharisaic/pre-rabbinic circles.48
Didache certainly is a Christian text, but the Christianity it propagates very much remains within the common practices of Jewish piety: fasting, prayer, meal practice and almsgiving are continued within a new interpretive framework. By using such terminology, the Didache community perceives itself as, to take Marcello
Del Verme's words, "different" but not "separate" from Judaism.*? Apart from the perseverance of common structures of behavior, Didache also shows a clear intention to separate socially from the pharisaically inspired matrix. It does not suggest that Didache intended to leave Judaism as such, or in fact had done so.
3.3. COMMUNITY STRUCTURES AND COMMUNICATION (11:1-13:7 PLUS 15:1-3)
The character of Did. 11:1-13:7 and 15:1-3 is quite different, and compared with the character of regulations the issues dealt with in the previous chapters the Eucharist," apart from the fact that I would not want to call the meal in Did, 9-10 "Eucharist" at all.
47. Klinghardt, Gemeinschaftsmahl und Mahlgemeinschaft, 407-27; Rouwhorst, "Didache
9-10," 149 both righly emphasizing the characteristic blending of Jewish and Christian elements.
48. See Tomson, "Halakhic Evidence," 139-41; Draper, "Irrevocable Parting of the Ways,"
230-36; see also Del Verme, Didache and Judaism, 143-88; Jiirgen Zangenberg, "A Conflict
Among Brothers: Who were the hypokritai in Matthew?," in Festschrift for Sean Freyne (ed. M.
Daly Denton, B. McGing and Z. Rodgers; Leiden: Brill, forthcoming). See also with a different purpose Huub van de Sandt, "Do Not Give What Is Holy to the Dogs' (Did 9:5d and Matt 7:6a):
The Eucharistic Food of the Didache in Its Jewish Purity Setting," VC 56 (2002): 223-46.
49. Del Verme, Didache and Judaism, 85.
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
7-10, it is remarkably specific and detailed. Wengst might well be right in saying that the didachist reacts to acute problems here and that the level of individual innovative intervention is higher than elsewhere.5°
The passage documents that the community has local functionaries in the form of 5iSaoxahor and npogrtat, who base their role on expertise (teachers) and charisma (prophets). Prophets, whose activities are described in much more detail and contours than those of teachers, are already mentioned in 10:7: they may give thanks as often as they wish. Many more characteristics are mentioned in 11:7~12. First of all, they are inspired by the Spirit; they are independent and may not be judged by the community. Prophets are allowed to teach (5:5daoxetv), a clear parallel to the 5iSaoxa\ou. Another parallel is that prophets and teachers did not have to work, but were supported by the congregations among which they lived (13:1-7).
The limits of this privilege are mentioned in 11:9, 12: prophets (and teachers, too?) are not allowed to require food directly or ask for money for themselves in return for their service. Such behavior (tpézot) is not consistent with their gift and indicates that they are liars (on incongruent lifestyle as a criterion for wevdornpogntat see Matt 7:15-23). Although prophets appear to be mobile, they seem to stay longer in a given community than &néotoAot (13:1 KabAjoBat and 13:4 éav ph éynte mpogytny instead of 11:4 épydpevoc mpdc¢ bac). Their models are the prophets of old (oi apxaiot nmpogrtat, 11:11), and according to 13:3, prophets explicitly take the place of High Priests (apytepeic), to which the community obviously did not feel connected anymore. The Didache community copied priests in several respects: it is explicitly said that it is the prophets present in the community who are now the recipients of regular material support, called by the traditional term "first offering" (4mapy1)).>! Less explicit, but still somewhat telling is the privilege of unlimited thanksgiving, because it is well conceivable that the Didache community regarded its prayers (and especially the ones uttered by the prophets) as a form of sacrifice (see 6voia in 14:2!). One should also not forget that High Priests not only sacrificed, but gave torah, and were considered to have the gift of prophecy.° The consequences of these shifts are significant. It is obvious that community institutions, at least one as central as the prophets, replaced the temple and its prescriptions. No offerings were sent to the temple anymore, no priests were
50. Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 23.
51. On the dnapxr see Del Verme, Didache and Judaism, 188-220.
52. On (High) priests and prophecy see Oliver Gussmann, "Das Priesterverstandnis des
Flavius Josephus" (Ph.D. diss., Universitat Erlangen-Niirnberg, 2007), 263-70; Marinus de Jonge and Johannes Tromp, "Jacob's Son Levi in the Old Testament Pseudepigrapha and Related Literature," in Biblical Figures Outside the Bible (ed. M. E. Stone and T. A. Bergen; Harrisburg, Pa.:
Trinity Press International, 1998), 203-36; David E. Aune, Prophecy in Early Christianity and the Ancient Mediterranean World (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983), 138-44.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
necessary since the community pursued a non-sacrificial cult whose only sacrifices were prayers spoken during the celebration on the Kuptaxi Kupiou (Did.
14:1-3). That does not mean that the group considered itself "less" holy or that they thought their piety is of a lesser quality. On the contrary, the warning not to practice table fellowship with unbaptized outsiders (9:5) makes it clear that new boundaries between "in" and "out" are being drawn. Baptism and appropriate behavior has replaced circumcision as a criterion for belonging to the group, and participation in the community meal has substituted for taking part in the sacrificial cult in the temple. It is notable that Didache does not mention purity regulations in contexts that regulate admission or exclusion to the cultic community and social contacts, but we cannot be sure if that means that the Didache group had already abandoned purity observance—remembering that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. But even if we leave the issue of purity aside, one is tempted to ask if Didache's position might still be called "Jewish," at least in this respect?>4 In effect all these regulations taken together would indeed have made maintaining relations with Jews extremely difficult. But this does not negate the fact that Didache still has structural and behavioral parallels and similarities with Judaism (see above). Some of the innovations might have been triggered through new situations, such as was the case, in my view, with prophets taking the place of priests. If Didache was written after 70 (which I take as the most plausible hypothesis), the destruction of the temple would of course have left a vacuum that many other Jewish communities, not only the earliest Christians, would have had to fill in various respects. The urge to do so would certainly have been big, and it would make sense if a community rooted so deeply in Judaism as the one behind
Didache decided to boost a traditional, highly respected institution such as the prophets to fill the gap. In that respect, the replacement of the temple would not signal a "break" with Judaism, but rather demonstrate one attempt among others to reorganize life without it. If Didache can be shown to reflect a deliberate decision to leave the temple before it was destroyed and form substitute institutions, matters would be quite different and it would be more difficult to describe the Didache group as still being within the confines of Judaism. Acknowledging the many other elements of Jewish piety and theology, I am still inclined to favor the former option, but the latter should not be dismissed out of hand.
Finally, there are also elements in Didache, inherited from very early Christian tradition, that are potentially explosive: baptism in place of circumcision or the inclusion of Christological elements into liturgical formulae. Thus, the question is not how and to what extent Didache might be called "Jewish," the fact
53. Huub van de Sandt rightly asked this question when we were discussing this paper. He indeed has a point, especially when we consider how Ed P. Sanders defines "common Judaism" in his Judaism: Practice and Belief 63 BCE - 66 CE (London: SCM Press, 1992).
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
is that Didache represents a type of Christianity that to a very large degree still defines itself by using Jewish theologumena and following Jewish practices. Not before long, this—to us—rather ambiguous and contradictory position came under pressure from both sides, reconstituting Judaism and increasingly "Gentile" Christianity. Didache, however, belongs to a time that still had room for hybridity within both Judaism and Christianity.
The role and character of the 4méotodot is much less clear (11:3-6). Didache says little about their activities and characteristics apart from the fact that they are intinerant. No particular theological connotation nor programmatic profile is discernible. Their parallel listing with mpogrjtat under the heading "teaching" is certainly suggestive,>* but no traditional models as in 11:11 and 13:3 are employed in connection with them. Were the andéotoAo1 that Didache deals with only envoys from other Christian communities? By what authority did they claim to wander, teach, and be hosted? The temptation to supply all these details from other, more explicit Christian texts (especially Paul or Luke who have a very distinct understanding of apostleship) is strong, but all that remains hypothetical. Didache seems only interested in regulating contacts with andédotodot from outside. It is the same apostles who come and after a short stay need to leave and move on. This makes it unlikely that these 4ndotoAo1 are simply messengers holding contact between different communities comparable to the rabbinic mow.
Nowhere does Didache mention andéotoAot dispatched from its own community to others, nor do they turn up in the discussion of bishops and deacons (15:1-2), so that one can seriously ask if the Didache community had "own" andotodot in its fold at all. The methods to deal with 4ndotodo1 are harsh, but not unjust: they are only to receive a minimum of hospitality and support (see 13:2). Obviously, abuse of Christian morale was too serious to show more generosity (cf.
13:5 xptotéunopocs with Lucian, Peregr. 13). It is not for reasons of voluntary isolation or a particular Nischenexistenz that foreign andotoAot are kept at some distance. The same criteria are used to judge the apostles' practical behaviors that are also taken to assess prophets (no asking for money, only minimum support).
This does not indicate that the community was suspicious of outsiders per se.
On the contrary, although the Didache community has clear theological criteria against anybody coming from outside (11:1-2; 12:1-5) and having a permanent function (15:1), it is open and accessible. Its community structure neither prevents nor hampers outside contacts; foreigners who can support themselves can stay (13:3-4).
The real innovation, however, is the didachist's recommendation to choose énioxonot and Si4kovot in 15:1—a combination of titles that we also find in Phil 1:1. Two observations, at first contradicting each other, make it likely that 54. It is notable that in Did. 11:1-2 the more general participle and verb are used, while
Did. 13:2; 15:1-2 use the apparently more formal 515aoKakoc.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
énioxonot and Siaxovot are new functions. On the one hand, the didachist emphasizes that énioxorot and di4xovot perform the same services as the longestablished mpogrytat and 6t54oxKadot (15:1). On the other hand, he shows a strong interest in seeing them promoted to the same high level of respect as the former: apparently they still lack such honor (tetnpévot, 15:2). Why that doubling of functionaries if they do the same as prophets and teachers? Perhaps because they have, apart from teaching and prophesying, additional, different tasks that the didachist does not explicitly mention, but which become evident if one looks at the context. There can be little doubt that émioxomot and d:axovot fulfill a particular function at the communal gatherings on the kuptakr tod Kupiov (14:1-3).
In Christian literature 5a4kovot often appear in connection with communal meals (cf. Acts 6:1-7), and énioxonot in many communities function as leaders or preside over special ceremonies. Enioxonot especially betrays some Hellenistic connotations. The term used for the appointment rite (xeipotovrjoate) and the criteria used to describe them and the function in the context of communal meals very much resemble what we can read in contemporary literature of the late-first/ early-second century C.E. (cf., e.g., Ign. Trall. 3.2; 1 Tim 3:3). But instead of being directly dependent upon each other, these texts draw from similar sources and make similar developments transparent.>>
It is perhaps striking that we do not find a trace of the perhaps most common Jewish functionary, the elder (npeofvtepos), a title that also enjoyed widespread use in early Christianity (e.g., Acts 11:30; 14:23; 15:2, 4, 22-3; Jas 5:14). It is well possible that Didache speaks of 5:6aoxa\o1 where other texts name npeoBitepot,
(the authority to teach and advise often being connected to age), but we do not have positive evidence of such a usage in Didache. The lack of this title, though perhaps not its function, again underscores the relative independence of Didache's community structure.
4. PUTTING DIDACHE ON THE INTELLECTUAL MAP OF EARLY CHRISTIANITY
It is time to combine these observations and draw some conclusions about the "milieu" that Didache might have been part of, fully aware of the caveats discussed above and also fully aware of the fact that many scholars have already scrutinized potential similarities and dissimilarities between Didache and other early Christian texts, above all Matthew, the Synoptic tradition, James, but also
Paul, Ignatius, or the Johannine circle.
Before we begin to compare Didache with other New Testament texts, we have to reiterate an observation made above: Didache is witness for a type of Christianity that was deeply rooted in Judaism. Material for liturgical formulae,
; 55. Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 42-43. On the background of these instructions see
Jiirgen Roloff, Der erste Brief an Timotheus (EKKNT 15; Ziirich: Benziger, 1988), 148-89.
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
ethical teachings, and for formulating the role and designation of early Christian functionaries is—although Christianized—deeply influenced by Judaism.56
In contrast to Matthew, who directly attacks the "Pharisees" and therefore helps to put his opponents at least on an imaginary map, Didache only uses a label to identify his targets. Indirect evidence, however, might nevertheless help grasp the contours and also tentatively point to Pharisaic circles with which Didache struggled, although that should not exclude other groups as well. I find it quite likely that—despite all polemics—the didachist might have considered his group as still being "Jewish" and not "outside" even though they clearly adhered to Christian traditions. Marcello Del Verme pointedly speaks about "cohabitation."5" Here, I see the biggest common feature between Matthew and Didache: "neither community is external to Israel."58 Bas ter Haar Romeny aptly describes the milieu to which I also would assign Didache: "even after 70 c.£. there were people in the larger area of Palestine and Syria who in terms of kinship and religious background would have defined themselves as Jews, but differed from the rabbinic interpretation of the law and had come to believe that Jesus brought salvation. ...
Here, there are no grounds for assuming a separate Jewish sect of Jewish-Christian group with its own elaborate theology.">?
At the same time, Didache is a document of "alienation." Although I am unable to judge if Didache and Matthew indeed "represent different stages in the process of alienation from Israel"® nor if Matthew and Didache internally show traces of a development from a Jewish to a predominately Gentile document,®! there are clear indications of conflict. Despite a wide common theological basis with Jewish circles, Didache seems very strict about enforcing a clear separation in table-fellowship and other rituals such as fasting. The adherence to the specifically Christian interpretation of the Jewish heritage seems to have made practical cohabitation with unbaptized non-believers (in their majority certainly
Jews) increasingly problematic. This awkward relation between separation and continuity reminds me of rabbinic warnings against Samaritan blessings because they "bless by Gerizim," which was probably the only unique element that dis56. Del Verme, Didache and Judaism, 75-76 rightly sums up the evidence: "As a matter of fact, some institutions present in the Didache appear to be a mere adaptation or transposition to the new Christian environment of institutions typically Jewish."
57. Ibid., 77-78.
58. Draper, "Irrevocable Parting of the Ways," 239. See also Del Verme, Didache and Judaism, 87, who refuses to talk about an irreversible "parting of ways" and instead writes: "The picture emerging from the Didache is that of a community internally marred by divisions but not yet broken off from the coeval Judaism(s)" (ibid., 85).
59. Ter Haar Romeny, "Hypotheses on the Development of Judaism and Christianity," 32.
60. Draper, "Irrevocable Parting of the Ways," 239 (italics mine).
61. So Huub van de Sandt in our discussion over Didache or Wim Weren, "The History and Social Setting of the Matthean Community," in van de Sandt, ed., Matthew and the Didache,
51-62.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
tinguished a "Samaritan" meal from a common Jewish one.® But this element has the potential to receive unparalleled attention and to function almost to wipe out all common ground. I therefore find it likely that it was not the integration of Gentiles that created the problems,®? but the increasing integration of the christological confession into communal expressions of piety as a consequence of belonging to the group of baptized.
In terms of contents, the only manifest connection between Didache and New Testament writings concerns the Synoptic tradition, first and foremost Matthew, but nowhere is it necessary to assume a direct literary dependence. Didache participates in a pool of ethical teachings that are widely adopted in other Christian texts without being dependent on each other. It particularly shows influence from a pool of Jesus-logia that also was tapped by the Synoptics (including an archaic attitude towards logia as the highest source of authority). Above that,
Didache shares many literary forms and ideological elements with the redactional basis of Matthew. That does not mean, however, that Didache considered Matthew as the sole source of authority. When Didache quotes from the evayyé\tov to regulate the life and behavior of his audience (Did. 8:2; 11:3; 15:3-4), it most likely does not refer to a gospel book in particular, but aims at words of the living
Lord.®4 Garleff is right when he prefers to speak about "situative soziokulturelle
Kontexte" to describe Didache's theological profile among other early Christian writings rather than to look exclusively at literary relationships or concepts of intertextuality.®> Just as Matthew is not "the" gospel that provides Didache with its theological foundation, Didache does not simply offer the practical application of what Matthew presents in narrative form. The profound similarities between Didache and Matthew, of course, leave room for differences and contrasts, e.g., in the use of the Old Testament (in Didache mostly indirect adaptations, in Matthew frequent use), the role and behavior of early Christian functionaries (Didache is much more detailed than Matthew), or the character and connotations of early
Christian meals (Didache obviously differentiates between a common community meal and a particular meal, but never refers to Jesus's Last Supper like
62. See the texts in Jiirgen Zangenberg, SAMAPEIA: Antike Quellen zur Geschichte und
Kultur der Samaritaner in deutscher Ubersetzung (TANZ 15; Tiibingen: Francke, 1994), 150Be:
63. Didache certainly knows former Gentiles among its flock (see 6:1-3), but they were integrated on the basis of "a minimum of cultic purity to enable them to share table fellowship with Israelites" (Draper, "Irrevocable Parting of the Ways," 240). They were, however, not circumcised, but baptized, which did not change their status in the eyes of observant Jews and traditional Jewish-Christians who may have formed a large contingent of the milieu to which Didache belongs.
64. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 71-77; also see the article by Schréter in this volume.
65. Garleff, Urchristliche Identitét in Matthdusevangelium, 90.
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
Matthew). Aware of both similarities and differences, I concur with Clayton Jefford and assume that Matthew and Didache have indeed "drawn from the same store house of material" and could well have come from the same community.®
The relationship to Paul is a bit more complicated, as Didache seems to contradict seemingly "Pauline" tenets without referring to them directly (6:2-3).
Matthew and James are also supposed to pursue an anti-Pauline agenda, but I see no direct references from one side to the other." It is true that Didache knows a communal meal with clearly christological implications (Christ as "medium" through which God's blessings are mediated towards the community, see meal prayers connected with Jesus as maic and 514), but without references to the death of Jesus (Did. 9:1-10:7). That seems very odd if Didache should indeed have been influenced by or been in contact with Pauline theology, for whom the reference to the death of Jesus bnép bu@v was fundamental for the character of the communal meal and its proper practice (1 Cor 10:14-11:1 and 11:17-34). Of course, lacking explicit evidence we cannot know if the breaking of bread on the xvptaxt kupiovu referred to in 14:1-3 had such sacramental undertones, but the passage at least connects different theologumena with the event: prayer as ka8apa Ovoia to celebrate God, the great king of all nations. The instruction to refrain from sacrificial meat because it is A\atpeia Be@v vexp@v (Did. 6:3) at least tendentially contradicts the more liberal and community-oriented solution proposed by Paul
(1 Cor 10:23-11:1) and better fits warnings from a Jewish perspective against sympathizers or God-fearers.®* The situation is similar with respect to baptism:
Paul and Didache know the institution, but differ in its practice and motivation.
While, for Paul, baptism is strictly connected to Christ (1 Cor 1; Rom 6), Didache uses a triadic formula that is also found in Matt 28:19.
Other, non-content-related issues, such as elements of community structure (e.g., the important role of apostles and charismatics such as in 1 Cor) and the high mobility between communities, do indeed look "Pauline," but Didache and Paul are not dependent upon each other but rather share common structures.
The fact that 4mdéotodo1 and charismatic nmpogrtat also appear in Corinth does not tell us much about the Didache, as long as we do not know more about Jewish and non-Jewish community structures, which have varied considerably from place to place. The same might apply to the fact that Paul directed his letter to the Philippians to the "holy in Jesus Christ who are in Philippi" obv énioxorotc kal
StaKxovotc, a combination very similar to Did. 15:1. Unlike Didache, Paul does 66. Jefford, "Milieu of Matthew, the Didache, and Ignatius," 41 plus the discussion on pp.
39-42.
67. See Jiirgen Zangenberg, "Matthew and James," in Matthew and His Contemporaries
(ed. D. Sim and B. Repschinski; LNTS 333. London: Continuum, 2008), 104-22 with references. For a different view see the article by David Sim in this volume.
68. Wengst, Didache (Apostellehre), 96.
MATTHEW, JAMES, AND DIDACHE
not seem to have introduced that institution to Philippi, but in the end we do not know where the didachist got these concepts from. Despite all occasional similarities, I agree in the end with S. E. Johnson who writes: "The Didache is not necessarily anti-Pauline, but it is certainly non-Pauline,"®? even if the didachist might actually not have known whom he was contradicting.
Apart from similarities to Matthew and the Synoptic tradition, Didache shows a very peculiar independence from almost all we know from other Christian literature. I see no indication that Didache knew the Johannine tradition.
The few similarities with Ignatius can be explained on the basis of common, but independent, use of early Christian motifs. With the Letter of James, however, the situation seems to be different. Didache and James show a couple of similarities. Both, for example, have a positive attitude towards the law. James 1:25;
2:8-12; and 4:11-12 call the law "law of freedom," and speak of the "perfect" and the "royal law." Didache 6:1-2 warns against leaving the path tij¢ diSaxij¢ that, in the form of the Two Ways tractate, includes many precepts taken from the Torah and calls to keep the entire yoke of the Lord (Bactaoat dAov tov Cvydv tod kupiov) in order to be "perfect" (téAetog Eon). Matthew uses similar vocabulary
(11:29-30). Although referring to "bearing the yoke" is a common Jewish and Christian way to circumscribe devotion to the law, connecting it with the aim of perfection is only common to James, Didache, and Matthew." Patrick Hartin sums up his observations: "These three texts speak to groups with a common ethos, acommon vision, but at different moments in time."7! I agree with Hartin that these groups emerged "from a common milieu whereby the members continue to view themselves as firmly rooted within the house of Israel," but I am not sure if it is really possible to recognize "different stages of communities."72
Another element of that milieu was the creative adaptation of the Jesus sayings traditions."> The fact that Jas 5:14 (Xaiov) and Did. 10:8 (uspov) both attest the important role of oil in Christian communities does not necessary point to a particularly close connection between these two writings. Not only is oil also mentioned in Mark 6:13 as means of healing (paralleling Jas 5:14), even more important is the uncertain textcritical status of Did. 10:8 which may well be a later addition.74
In general, however, allusions to New Testament texts are superficial at best.
Didache seems to be a quite independent witness of early Judeo-Christian tradition that is most closely—if at all—related to the same milieu as Matthew (and 69. In Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 73, n. 43.
70. On these topics see the contributions by Hartin and Weren in this volume.
71. Hartin, p. 297 in this volume.
72. Ibid.
73. Here see the articles by Schréter, Kloppenborg, and Hartin in this volume.
74, See above note 19.
THE SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS MILIEU OF THE DIDACHE
perhaps James). It is interesting to see that all communication and interaction within and among early Christian communities through itinerant messengers (of which Didache is itself a telling witness), has at least for a certain period not led to a standardization and leveling out of theological and structural differences.
According to Niederwimmer, who is careful not to overstretch the evidence, the Jewish-Christian character of Didache's sources does not contribute much to localize Didache.'> He sees reasons to consider Syria as well as Egypt, with a slight preference towards Syria, but in the end rules out a megalopolis like
Antioch. Others, such as Slee, Zetterholm, or Jefford, plead for Antioch. Antioch is, on the one hand, big enough to function as a haven for different Christian circles, which would explain both contacts with Matthew and differences to Ignatius. Antioch is close enough to Palestine to warrant some familiarity with the Jesus tradition, but it is far enough away to give room for obvious differences.
On the other hand, Didache's distinctly non-Pauline character and the uncertain relationship with Ignatius make it very hard to reconcile the document with an Antiochene setting."° Of course, different groups, even different "milieus" could have been present in a city like Antioch, but where are the arguments that help exclude all other options? Likewise, the arguments that are usually invoked to promote Syria in general (the closeness to Matthew, the lack of water according to Did. 7:2 and the collection of crops from the mountains Did. 9:4) are too unspecific to prefer Syria over against any other candidate in the eastern Mediterranean. All these observations are only based on the fact that the text does not directly contradict them. What we lack is positive evidence, but that we will hardly ever get. From what Didache tells us directly, we can only conclude that the text came from anywhere in the Greek-speaking (eastern) Mediterranean, that it was deeply rooted in Judaism and shows striking similarities with Matthew and—to a lesser but still significant degree—with James, and all three might very well have come from a common "milieu." Speaking of a "common milieu" helps avoid to assign the texts toa common "group," which would indeed take us farther than the evidence allows.
I stop here. I have less to offer than a conclusion. My paper raised questions and came forward with observations and more or less plausible hypotheses. I leave it up future discussion what can stand and what not.
75. Niederwimmer, Die Didache, 79.
76. I must admit that I remain skeptical about explaining common features between Didache and Ignatius by postulating Didache was known to Ignatius (Jefford, "Milieu of Matthew, the Didache, and Ignatius," 44-47 is symptomatically vague), even more skeptical about the assumption that the lack of explicit references should be seen as the result of a deliberate attempt to avoid reference to it on the part of Ignatius. That is too close to circular reasoning.
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PART 2
CONFLICTS AND CONTACTS
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