The Teaching Of The Twelve Blog Tour

Posted by Jonathan Brink
December 8, 2009

Tony Jones has a new book out called, The Teaching of the Twelve: Believing and Practicing the Primitive Christianity of the Ancient Didache Community by Paraclete Press.  It explore the little known document call the Didache (DID-ah-kay), an ancient text written around the same time as the early Gospels.  As part of this blog tour, you can see the specific responses to each section of the book by other below.

The question I was asked to wrestle with is, “Is this text – The Didache – really so important? Why? Do we know that it was important to the earliest communities of Christians?”

My unequivocal answer is, “YES!’

To get a sense of why, I pulled out two pieces of data from Tony’s book that shed some important light on why I think so.  The first is Tony’s own assertion about the content of the book.

The real power of the Didache is its ability to remind us what is truly important in Christianity: showing the love of Jesus to the world. (p 14)

The Didache focuses on what it means to be a follower through action, as opposed to a stricter western focus of simply belief.  The emphasis is on love, which reveals life.

The second quote comes from Trucker Frank who shared some insights on his exploration of the Didache.

(Trucker) Frank continued, “All the people in the Didache community had was this person Jesus who had lived an extraordinary life and died an extraordinary death. That’s all they had.” What I think Frank meant was that, although the people in the Didache community were likely versed in Jewish theology and Greek philosophy, they didn’t have much Christian theology yet. (p.16)

We can’t ignore a book that focuses on love, which also existed before any Christian theology is developed.  In other words, the absence of a Christian theology means its raw.  It’s the first exposure we have to what the early followers of Jesus were wrestling with.  And it just happened to be on the practice of love.  They didn’t seem to get bogged down into doctrinal issues.  They didn’t focus on with creed is exactly correct.  They focused on love. This has to inform the conversation.

The Didache breaks down into different sections but the two main themes that stood out to me were the way of life, and the way of death.  The two read like a practice manual.  In other words, instead of spending a ton of time figuring out what you believe, just go do this thing called, “love”.  Focus on giving life, and stay away from death.

In many ways I think our conversations and even arguments would be transformed if we spent time talking about life, instead of belief.  And I’m not advocating getting rid of the dialog of doctrine.  But we’ve been debating it for thousands of years.  And we’re still not satisfied.  The early church focused on love, and it still captures our attention.

Gee, I wonder why.

Well done Tony, for exploring “the most important book you’ve never heard of.”  Leave it to Tony to shed light on one of the truest emerging church books ever written.

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The The Teaching of the Twelve: Believing and Practicing the Primitive Christianity of the Ancient Didache Community Blog Tour

November 30: An introduction with Tony Jones

December 1: Chapter 1 – The Most Important Book You’ve Never Heard of – with Adam Walker Cleaveland at pomomusings and Thomas Turner at everydayliturgy

December 2: Chapter 3 – The Didache Community – Then and Now – with Ted Gossard at Jesus Community and Amy Moffitt at Without a Map

December 3: Chapter 4 – There Are Two Ways – with Tripp Fuller at homebrewedchristianity and with Holly Rankin-Zaher at happydaydeadfish

December 4: Chapter 5 – Sex, Money, and Other Means of Getting Along – with Chris Monroe at Paradoxology and Mike Todd at Waving or Drowning?

December 5: Chapter 6 – Living Together In Community – with Brother Maynard at Subversiveinfluence and Mike King

December 6: Chapter 7 – The End is Nigh – with Greg Arthur at Holinessreeducation.com and Mike Stavlund at Awakening

December 7: Epilogue – with Luke C. Miller and Carl McColman at The Website of Unknowing

December 8: Special Question – Is this text – The Didache – really so important? Why? Do we know that it was important to the earliest communities of Christians? with Jonathan Brink at Missio Dei

December 9: Special Question – Does the Didache teach or advise anything that substantively differs from what was decided at the earliest ecumenical church councils (such as Nicaea) with Dwight Friesen

December 10: Special Question – Why is the Didache relevant, in particular today? Is it more relevant today than it was, say 100 years ago? Why? with Bob Hyatt

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  • I would like to gently push back on the statement "We can’t ignore a book that focuses on love, which also existed before any Christian theology is developed. In other words, the absence of a Christian theology means its raw." I've read the Didache, and while it is concrete, it isn't non-theological. I also think it is a big mis-statement to say that it "existed before any Christian theology is developed." Really? Paul's earliest writings (and Jesus' utterances) are theological. Unless, of course, by "theology" you mean abstract systematized propositional statements about God.

    The Didache talks about loving the God who made us...about loving one another, about giving to the poor, living simply, about fleeing from sin, about baptising in the name of the Father and Son and Spirit in living water, about praying the Lord's prayer (the Didache uses the Matthean formulation), about life and knowledge being made known through Jesus Christ the Son, and about waiting for the Day of the Lord. There is other stuff in there too, but these things alone are VERY theological. They have implications for how we think, as well as how we do, since these things are intrinsically inter-related.

    The only way, it seems to me, to get past the sort of growing dichotomy between theology and ethics is to refuse to allow theology to mean something distinct from ethics. In other words, our theology--our thoughts and beliefs about God--should, perhaps, be anchored in praxis. Praxis brings together both action and reflection, and is a sufficient anchor for theology.
  • Mark, I'm not disagreeing with you. When I said Christian theology, I was referring to our present interpretations which are heavily shaped by history which we had almost no part of. At the time of the Didache, the followers were not shaped by a long traditional history, littered with assumptions that got in the way. They weren't arguing about petty doctrinal issues, but instead how to live.

    I appreciated Trucker Frank's insight. The Didache is in many ways a living out of theology, or ethics, but it was a document that seems fresh because it is not shaped by our present history. It is the moment when they were still trying to figure out what Jesus really meant.
  • I thought that was what you meant. Sorry if it sounded like quibbling. :)

    I love the didache--I also find it unsettling how early some practices formed. It certainly pushes against some of the minimalist house churchy understandings floating around today.

    The thing I love the most about it is how everything flows out of love of God and neighbor...that is seen as the centering and driving impetus for the document. What if everything we wrote and said was similar in that regard?

    To me, this is the most important writing project Tony's offered. Good work Tony, and thanks, Jonathan, for helping get the word out.
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