Bible Problems Solved by Early Christians

By David W. T. Brattston and Kenn Ward

This book deals with questions or problems encountered in the Bible where answers can be found in the ante-Nicene fathers. The fathers were uniquely qualified by being close in time and culture to Christ himself, when his unwritten teachings and Scripture interpretations, and those of the apostles, were still fresh in Christian memory. It is designed for sincere readers of the Bible who may from time to time be puzzled by the occasional passage which seems out-of-step with the rest of the Scriptures or our usual impression of Christian teaching.
This work is written for individual and group Bible students without advanced theological qualifications, rather than the intellectual market. It is written for use in Bible studies in local congregations, or church history classes, especially in sessions when the pastor or teacher is unable to attend.
Bible Problems Solved by Early Christians is different from almost all other works and ministries, which give solutions to problems or questions, because the answers in the book come not from a modern-day comparison of different verses within the Bible itself or from the interpretations of any particular religious denomination, but from Christian writers who lived in the first centuries after Jesus.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Oct 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781725276574

David W. T. Brattston

Dr. David W. T. Brattston is a retired lawyer residing in Lunenburg, Canada, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. He holds degrees from three universities, and his articles on early and contemporary Christianity have been published by a wide variety of denominations in every major English-speaking country.

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Preface

Why this Booklet was Written

This booklet has been written for sincere readers of the Bible who may from time to time be puzzled by the occasional passage which seems out-of-step with the rest of the Scriptures or our usual impression of Christian teaching. It is not designed for seminary or Bible school professors but for laypeople. This pamphlet may also be of use to members of the clergy or leaders of Bible study groups when preparing a sermon or lesson who find a particular text troublesome.

The present booklet is different from almost all other works which give solutions to problems or questions about Scripture passages, because the answers on the following pages come not from a modern-day comparison of different verses within the Bible itself or from the interpretations of any particular religious denomination, but from Christian writers who lived in the first centuries after Jesus, when His unwritten sayings and scripture interpretations were still fresh in Christian memory.

There are many reasons why I have presented answers from only from ancient Christian writers rather than from later authors. The first reason is to illustrate the fact that problems in understanding God’s word is nothing new and that some verses of Scripture puzzle not only readers in our own times but also presented problems for the earliest scholars. The second reason is to introduce to twenty-first-century lay Christians, who have not been to Bible school or seminary, information about some of the earliest Christian writers. Too often it is assumed that just as soon as the last book of the New Testament was written the church immediately plunged into corruption, ignorance, and sloth in the Dark Ages and remained in this state until rescued in the 1500s. By writing this pamphlet I wish to make more twenty-first-century Christians aware that the Holy Spirit and Scripture study remained vibrant long after the Bible was completed and that the church sank only slowly and by degrees into the mire of ignorance, superstition, and decay in which Martin Luther found it. My third reason for taking answers only from early Christian writers is to demonstrate how various present-day sects, which quote particular Scripture verses in support of their distinctive dogmas, are mistaken in their interpretation because Christians who lived near the time those verses were written understood them to mean something totally different. The sects honestly misinterpret because they do not know the historical background in which these verses were composed. This background was part of the lives of the authors quoted in this booklet. Hopefully, this background and the value of consulting the books and tractates of Christians who wrote not long after our Lord will be shown in the following pages.

Christian writings immediately after the penning of the New Testament help us to reconstruct the world of thought in which authors of the present New Testament lived, taught and wrote, and the structures in which the Holy Scriptures are to be understood. Where the early Christian authors agree among themselves, it must be deduced that their interpretations were made within a structure received from the apostles not many years earlier. They present only an interpretation, but it is a better interpretation than those formulated since the sixteenth century because it was made closer in time, life, and culture to the authors of the New Testament, with whom some of them were personally acquainted.

Ancient Christians encountered many problems in the interpretation of the Bible, and produced solutions for these problems. Instead of reinventing the wheel by producing new solutions, we today can search the early written sources to find solutions formulated by Christians who were much closer to the milieu in which the New Testament was written and to the original faith preached and taught by Jesus and the apostles.

Consulting such early sources helps give us a better idea of the meaning or the most accurate meaning of New Testament teachings and events. It does this because the early non-canonical sources reveal the assumptions shared by the New Testament personages and their original hearers and thus disclose the interpretation and lesson that persons contemporaneous with the Biblical writers were intended to draw from them.¹ In this way, the ancient sources help inform us of Biblical concepts (which are sometimes quite different from ours) and help supply its conceptual framework so that we can better relate to biblical paradigms.

The ancient non-scriptural materials show what the near associates of the apostles and evangelists received in the way of criteria as to how Scripture is to be used, what parts of it are more important than others, and what is to be taken figuratively rather than literally.

Unanimity of ancient opinion on the understanding of Holy Writ faith raises a presumption that it is correct: When the [church] Fathers agree among themselves as to what is central or essential, then it would seem that the Christian of today must either agree himself or have extremely cogent reasons for disagreeing.²

It is more probable that the teaching of Jesus and His apostles was preserved among Christians who were contemporary with them or with the first few generations of Christians after them, instead of the true faith and practice disappearing around the death of the last apostle, then long afterwards being perfectly restored by Mohammed in the seventh century or by Joseph Smith of the Latter-Day Saints in the nineteenth. Similarly, it is infinitely more credible that the correct interpretation of the Bible was preserved by these early generations than suddenly lost and came to light over fifteen centuries later.

1

. Cosgrove, Appealing to Scripture in Moral Debate,

78–79

.

2

. Ramsey, Beginning to Read the Fathers,

18

.

1

Adam’s Sin and the Severity of its Consequences

According to Genesis 2:16–17, And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

In Chapter 3, Adam and his wife disobeyed this commandment, and their eyes were opened to the knowledge of good and evil. As punishment, God evicted them from paradise, increased the pains of childbirth, cursed the ground so that they could obtain food only by demanding labor, and eventually die. Was God meanspirited in begrudging them the knowledge of good and evil? Why would God create such a tree in the first place, knowing it could lead to their downfall?

The answers are found in Theophilus, who converted to Christianity in adult life after a long study of scripture. He became bishop of Antioch, in the same line of succession as Simon Peter. He wrote the following shortly after AD 180:

Adam, being yet an infant in age, was on this account as yet unable to receive knowledge worthily. For now, also, when a child is born it is not at once able to eat bread, but is nourished first with milk, and then, with the increment of years, it advances to solid food. Thus, too, would it have been with Adam; for not as one who grudged him, as some suppose, did God command him not to eat of knowledge. But He wished also to make proof of him, whether he was submissive to His commandment. And at the same time, He wished man, infant as he was, to remain for some time longer simple and sincere. For this is holy, not only with God, but also with men, that in simplicity and guilelessness subjection be yielded to parents. But if it is right that children be subject to parents, how much more to the God and Father of all things? Besides, it is unseemly that children in infancy be wise beyond their years; for as in stature one increases in an orderly progress, so also in wisdom.¹

In other words, Adam violated the natural order, created by God, that types of food and knowledge be gained gradually. Adam grasped at it before he was developed and mature enough to absorb it wisely. Adam snatched at the knowledge of good and evil against the universal rules of orderly progress.

1

. Theophilus, To Autolycus

2

.

25

(ANF

2

:

104

).

2

Keeping Busy in Heaven

Why do the usual and traditional Christian descriptions of heaven portray its inhabitants as strumming on harps, singing hymns, and otherwise always praising God? Does God need the praise of human beings and angels, or is the Lord vain and craves praise? Singing and praising God eventually becomes boring and tiresome for a few hours at a time on earth, yet the Revelation of John 4:8–10, 5:8–14, 11:16–18, 15:2–4, and 19:1–8 relate hymns of praise which the elders and the angels and other inhabitants of heaven will sing forever and ever. Does not God himself become bored in listening?

Many Christians have expressed a preference for the Muslim heaven, where a man can have all the food, wine, and women he wants while he spends eternity in idleness and sensual pleasures. Are not idleness and freedom from activity more in accord with popular ideas of eternal bliss?

Why does the God of the Bible provide that even in Paradise people must be constantly occupied?

The answer to these questions was provided long ago by Irenaeus of Lyons, a native of Smyrna near Ephesus in western Turkey who became a bishop/pastor in southern France in AD 178. Born a Christian sometime between AD 120 and 130, Irenaeus spent much of his childhood in the presence of men who had known the apostles and remembered much of what they said.

Irenaeus wrote many books on the Scriptures and on Christianity in general, especially in order to correct members of sects which had incorrect ideas about the Faith. Among his books was The Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching. At Chapter 9 he says that God does not need anything from angels, but arranges that they spend their time giving him homage and praise in order to prevent them from being idle and useless and, looking around for ways to spend their time, fall into sin. The Almighty keeps humans and angels in heaven busy at praising him to keep them from getting into trouble, which they would undoubtedly do if they had nothing else for all eternity.

In 1715, Isaac Watts also expressed the potential evils of being without something to keep oneself occupied in a harmless activity: For Satan finds some mischief still/For idle hands to do.²

2

. Watts, Divine and Moral Songs. Song

20

. Against Idleness and Mischief,

65–66

.

3

Tell No One

Jesus instructed his disciples and people for whom he had worked miracles to tell no one:

•Matthew 16:20, Mark