At the Origins of Christian Worship: The Context and Character of Earliest Christian Devotion

by Larry W. Hurtado

The great Harnack thought that were the historian of dogma to include within his bag of evidence the liturgy, he would be giving himself over to superstition outright. This book counters and corrects such a claim, which is also a premise in the works of the late Jaroslav Pelikan. Distinct from paganism by its monotheism, and distinct from Judaism with its binitarian (not ditheistic) devotion to Christ, Hurtado argues that the early, and limited, amount of liturgical evidence from the Christians offers an insight into the Christian understanding of God with an application to today's worship.

The whole question of who Jesus was thought to be by his followers and their immediate successors, and thus who we are to think he is, is tied directly not only to the scriptures of the old and new testaments, but to how they were written for and used in the Church's liturgical worship. Make no mistake about it, Christianity is a liturgical religion through and through, and without this hermeneutical principle in place, how we understand Christ will be skewed. To this extent Hurtado's work comes as a welcome read on the whole, since it places Christian worship in its true sitz im leben of Jewish, Roman and Greek religion and public life.

His summary of public and private worship during the late BCE and early CE is worth the cost of the book, fitting it all in the first 39 pages. He moves from there to consider a few key themes of Christian worship: intimacy among believers, especially around the Eucharist, equal participation of all regardless of socio-economic standing through baptism into Christ, fervor and zeal, perception as the redeemed Body of Christ on earth, eschatological hope and participation in the kingdom of heaven here and now as a foretaste and finally, charismatic potency, something that is often overlooked in modern accounts.

Following this, Hurtado considers the strong binitarian nature of their worship, with the Father as the one who is accessed and praised in the Son, Jesus Christ. Hurtado proposes that the role of the Spirit was more of the whole ambiance, imbued with the Spirit's potency, which is the "same Spirit whom Jesus has sent". This is a very useful section for those who believe Jesus "became a God" only in the 3rd of 4th century for political reasons after Constantine. (If you have any background with the primary sources, you understand quickly that this late deification theory is a bunk proposal, long outdated, used to sell books under controversial titles.) Readers may be interested to pursue this idea further in Hurtado's amazingly detailed door stopper, Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity or the short version, How On Earth Did Jesus Become A God?: Historical Questions About Earliest Devotion To Jesus.

Finally, Hurtado tries to apply the previous knowledge to our modern context of confused, silly and downright heretical worship that tries to pass itself off as Christian. He does it rather gently with the typical calls to being clear who is being worshiped (not confusing the persons/roles of the Trinity, e.g. the Father did not die on the cross, etc), not being patriarchal (whatever that means for worship he doesn't exactly say, only that we are not create God in a male image after our own likeness) and worship as a participation in the heavenly worship even now (a shock that most Protestants are wary of given their soft belief or downright rejection of the "communion of saints" idea from Hebrews 11 and 12). See Any Friend of God's Is a Friend of Mine for some food for thought.

There are only a few points that I think could be better explained or corrected. First, he claims early on (46) that the early church had no priesthood (presbyteros). Well, perhaps it is semantics, and I suppose is depends on how you define it, but if it means "someone in a position of spiritual authority who leads the community and deals with a religious sacrifice/offering to God", then by all means they did have a priesthood. Why? Because the early Church understood their Eucharist as an offering of thanksgiving (the meaning of the word) unto God, which was a participation in the "once for all" sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross for our salvation. And we know from the NT and the witness of people like Saint Ignatius of Antioch and Saint Polycarp that certain men, not women, officiated at the gatherings doing this action. The NT calls them overseers, which is an English translation of episkopos/oi, which is another way of saying "Bishops". The fact is that the distinction between the episcopacy and a parish priest/elder was blurry in the first century and even in the second in some parts (see Acts 20:17 and Titus 1:5,7), but the role of priest/elder only developed when the house churches expanded in a given city beyond the liturgical participation of the "one bishop to every city" rule and Christ's return was not as soon as expected. In a sense, the Church had to be more structured for the foreseeable future, which could be a long time. But the liturgical action was the same, which is the point. See Elders in Every City: The Origin an Role of the Ordained Ministry and Apostolic Succession for two brief introductions to the topic.

That early worship was rather "informal" may not be the case, and I am not sure that is the only perspective to take from the primary sources. Whatever "relatively informal" means, it doesn't mean "make it up as you go along". Yes, there is was certainly a place for that, but the main structure of readings, homily, meal was set based upon synagogue and temple worship. It was still a very Jewish event. See The Shape of the Liturgy and In the Shadow of the Temple: Jewish Influences on Early Christianity.

I also feel that Hurtado could make much more of the significance of both baptism and the Eucharist, since they are defining liturgical elements in what it means to "do Church". It seems he stayed out of any areas of theology that may ruffle feathers. In this regard, please see Jeremias' two brief studies Infant Baptism in the First Four Centuries and The Origins of Infant Baptism: A Further Study in Reply to Kurt Aland and Werner Elert's magisterial Eucharist and Church Fellowship in the First Four Centuries . Christians were very much of one mind that they participated in the body and blood of Christ and were born again in union with Jesus through participation in baptism for remission of sins (little kids, too, and babes in arms) and regeneration. He skimps out on the Eucharist part, but does show that baptism was more than a "me and Jesus" affair. His explanation of what it means to be "called out" (ekklesia) is very good, however.

His ending discussion on gender, God the Father and idolatry is interesting, but I am not sure where he goes with it. He writes that we are not to think God is a male, so males run the show. It is unclear if he means that woman can therefore lead the Eucharistic assembly as the bishop or elder, or if he means that men and women are otherwise equal, or what. Maybe I need to reread him. Be that as it may, I think it is not a proper use of liturgical theology, if this is what he means to say, that woman can officiate the Eucharist since we are all one in Christ with no male or female, rich or poor, etc. The elder/priest/bishop represents Christ, serves as an icon of Christ. I am not entirely convinced that this excludes woman from that role, but I would not make that sort of argument based upon talk of God as Father. It has everything to do with Jesus and his role, not the Father. When St Paul says that we function as images of the Father and not vice versa, this is not what he is writing about, so I wonder where to apply Hurtado's theme. Since the book is about liturgy, it seems to apply it there, but he never comes out and says it that way. On this point, see Speaking the Christian God: The Holy Trinity and the Challenge of Feminism, This Is My Name Forever: The Trinity & Gender Language for God and Women and the Priesthood.

Lastly, in the context of his argument about gender he seems to say we cannot use images in worship, citing Exodus. Yet he could go on to cite a few verses further where God commands Moses to use images and he fails to see that post-incarnation we very much may image God in Christ, along with the saints, who are deified by his grace alone, which is done very early on as seen at Dura Europas and Rome. Seems a little truncated in the conclusion department. And that the book lacks an index is unacceptable. Seriously, what text of a scholary nature should go without an index? A major pet peeve! Still definitely worth the read.