The Really Early Church
Submitted by JohnQ on January 15 2002 13:59:34
In reply to Re: Concerns.. submitted by Dakota on January 14 2002 22:50:13
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I have read several translations of the Didache, one of the earliest documents for the Church and I'd like to point out some aspects of this document related. First off, I don't recall the word sin occuring anywhere in it, although I'll have to check my sources again to be sure of this point. Rather, it lists a Way of Life and a Way of Death. Homosexuality (literally in the Greek boy-pressing)is listed among the ways of Death, along with theft, adultery, abortion, infanticide, murder, and a long list of actions based on the Decalogue. Secondly, those things listed in the Way of Death are all in the negative future. The implication I get from this is that the Really Early Church was telling its new converts, "You may have done any or all of these actions in the past, but from now on, as a Christian, you'll refrain from them." It seems to me that the Really Early Church wanted to set up a way of life based on the Decalogue that was different from the surrounding pagan Graeco-Roman life style. They avoided judgements on actions by refraining from calling these actions "sins." They were simply actions Christians were not supposed to do, so that they might be distinguishable from the pagans. |
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