Deaconesses: An Historical Study

By Aime Martimort

Since the 17th century the history of deaconesses in the Church has been the subject of numerous monographs. What is most evident about the history of deaconesses, however, is how complex the whole subject is. In this exhaustive and thoroughly researched work, Martimort presents a very readable analysis that has become the standard study of the role of women deaconesses in the early Church. He presents in as complete and objective fashion as possible the history, who and what these deaconesses were and what their functions were.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ignatius Press
• Release date: May 5, 2017
• ISBN: 9781681497631

Book preview

Introduction

Since the seventeenth century the history of deaconesses in the Church has been the subject of numerous monographs. There are two modern works, however, that outclass everything written before them. The first of these is Adolf Kalsbach’s Die Altkirchliche Einrichtung der Diakonisse bis zu ihrem Erlöschen, published in 1926.¹ In 1957 the author provided a very complete summary of this work in the dictionary Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum under the entry "Diakonisse".² The second of these works is that of Roger Gryson, Le Ministère des femmes dans l’Eglise ancienne, which came out in 1972.³ The introduction to each of these works provides a complete bibliography of earlier works on the subject.

Given the existence of these two excellent works, is there room for yet another study? It seems to mc that there is, in part because the caution wisely recommended by Roger Gryson has not always been observed of late. He wrote that the conscientious historian, who is accustomed not to affirm anything except on the basis of careful and sustained research, is surely obliged to question the naïve assurance of those for whom everything is simple and clear at first glance.⁴ What is most evident about the history of deaconesses, however, is the complexity of the whole subject. Even the Latin and Greek names, diacona and διακόνισσα, designated institutions that, in the history of the Church, were very different depending upon the era as well as upon the region concerned. The great scholar Du Cange was already well aware of this fact as early as the seventeenth century.⁵

Another reason for an additional study, I believe, is the amount of light that can be thrown on the subject by looking at the liturgical formulas of both East and West, and also by extending the inquiry into the Middle Ages and even beyond by studying the documents of theology and canon law of the period. We cannot, of course, do more than sample the latter, since many of the applicable documents remain unpublished. Nevertheless, we must corroborate—or correct—the testimony provided by purely liturgical books by looking also at other documentary sources. As is well known, liturgical books were often copied from earlier liturgical models, and they frequently preserved rites that had long since fallen into disuse. Thus it was that the Roman Pontifical of 1888 continued to include medieval ordines which had not been used for centuries: for example, the rite for the degradation of clerics. A similarly careful study must be made of compilations and collections of canon law, which often include texts from many sources and are of uneven value and sometimes uncertain authenticity.

Two methodical principles are required today for the type of inquiry I propose to conduct. First, in writing the history of any ecclesiastical institution, one must respect the particular geographical localities where the inscriptions and documents attesting to the existence of that ecclesiastical institution were produced. The churches of antiquity, like those of the Middle Ages, permitted and preserved great diversity in their ecclesiastical discipline, and there were numerous reciprocal influences at work. We must therefore examine a whole series of monographs relating to particular localities before ever venturing to construct a synthesis—if indeed it is possible to construct such a synthesis even then.

Second, regarding the specific question of deaconesses, it is not enough that texts are available that attest to their existence. We must also attempt in each instance to understand who and what these deaconesses and their functions were, for the historical reality about them was constantly shifting and unstable: sometimes they were recruited from the ranks of widows, other times from the ranks of virgins. Often ecclesiastical legislation about them was conflicting or confused, as have been also both ancient and modern authors. Typically, they have simply been assimilated into the deaconesses mentioned in the Pastoral Epistles. One of the merits of the work of Roger Gryson is that it tries so patiently to unravel the tangled skein of evidence for the period of the early Church.⁶

Having presented in as complete and objective a fashion as possible the history of deaconesses in their various concrete manifestations in history, I think it necessary to confront, at least in a modest way, the theological controversies that the institution of deaconesses in the Church has inspired in our own day. I will content myself with the reflections suggested to me by this inquiry, which extended over several years, and also, especially, with those reflections suggested to me by the history of the liturgy in general.

Rome, September 28, 1980

Abbreviations of the Works and

Collections Consulted

AASS = Acta sanctorum quotquot toto orbe coluntur. . . Antuerpiae, apud Ioannem Meursium (now: Brussels, Society of Bollandists), from 1643.

Andrieu OR = M. Andrieu, Les Ordines Romani du haut moyen âge, Louvain, 1931-61. 5 vols. (Spicilegium sacrum Lovaniense. . . 11, 23, 24, 28, 29). Vol. of tables in preparation.

Andrieu PR = M. Andrieu, Le Pontifical romain au moyen âge, Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1938-41. (Studi etesti, 86, 87, 88, 99). 4 vols.

BAC = Biblioteca de autores cristianos, Madrid, from 1944.

Baumstark, Geschichte der syrischen Literatur = A. Baumstark, Geschichte der syrischen Literatur, mit Ausschluss der christlich-palästinensichen Texte, Bonn, Marcus and Weber, 1922 (reprinted Berlin, 1968).

CCL = Corpus christianorum, Series Latina, Turnhout, Brepols, from 1954.

CCLCM = Corpus christianorum, Continuatio mediaevalis, Turnhout, Brepols, from 1971.

CCOF = S. Congregatio pro Ecclesia Orientali, Codificazione canonica orientale, Fonti, Tipografia Poliglotta Vaticana, from 1930.

CSCO = Corpus scriptorum christianorum orientalium, curantibus I. B. Chabot, I. Guidi, H. Hyvernat, B. Carra de Vaux (now: editum consilio Universitatis catholicae Americae et Universitatis catholicae Lovaniensis), Parisiis, e typographia Regia, etc. (now: Louvain, Secretariat du Corpus SCO), from 1904.

CSEL = Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum Latinorum, editum consiliis et impensis Academiae litterarum Caesareae Vindobonensis, Vindobonae, C. Gerold (now: Hoelder-Pichler-Tempsky), from 1866.

Denzinger = H. Denzinger, Ritus orientalium, Coptorum, Syrorum et Armenorum in administrandis sacramentis, Wirceburgi, Stahel, 1863-64 (reprinted).

DTC = Dictionnaire de théologie catholique. . . begun under the editorship of A. Vacant. . . , continued under that of E. Mangenot. . . , Paris, Letouzey (and Anc), 1908-72, 15 vols, and 3 vols, of tables.

EL = Ephemerides liturgicae, Commentarium de re liturgica, Roma, Edizioni liturgiche, from 1887.

GCS = Die griechischen christlichen Schriftsteller der ersten drei Jahrhunderten, Leipzig, Hinrichs (now: Berlin, Akademie Verlag), from 1897.

Gryson, Ministère des femmes = R. Gryson, Ee Ministère des femmes dans l’Eglise ancienne, Gembloux, Duculot, 1972 (Recherches et syntheses, Section d’histoire, 4).

Joannou = P. P. Joannou, Discipline générale antique (IIe—Xe siècle). Grottaferrata, Tip. S. Nilo, 1962-64 (CCOF 9). 4 vols.

JTS = The Journal of Theological Studies, London-Oxford, from 1900.

Kalsbach, Altkirchliche Enrichtung = Α. Kalsbach, Die Altkirchliche Einrichtung der Diakonissen bis zu ihrem Erlöschen, Freiburg, B. Herder, 1926 (Römische Quartalschrift, 22 Supplementheft).

Kalsbach, Diakonisse = A. Kalsbach, Diakonisse, in Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum, vol. 3, Stuttgart, Heirsemann, 1957, 917-28.

Leroquais, Pontificaux = V. Leroquais, Les pontificaux manuscrits des bibliothèques publiques de Prance, Mâcon, Protat, 1937, 4 vols.

LQF = Eiturgiegeschichtliche (later: Eiturgiewissenschaftliche) Quellen und Forschungen. . . Münster, W. Aschendorff, from 1918.

MAMA = Monumenta Asiae Minoris antiqua, Manchester University Press, 1928-62 (Publications of the American Society for Archeological Research in Asia Minor). 8 vols.

Mansi = I. D. Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio. . . Florentiae, A. Zatta, 1759-98, 31 vols. Continuata. . . curantibus Ioanne Baptista Martin et Ludovico Petit, Parisiis (etc.), H. Welter, 1900-1927, vols. 32-53.

OC = Oriens christianus. . . from 1901.

OCA = Orientalia christiana analecta. . . Roma, P. Institutum orientalium studiorum, from 1923.

OCP = Orientalia christiana periodica, Commentarii de re orientali. . . , Roma, P. Institutum orientalium studiorum, from 1935.

OS = L’Orient syrien, Revue trimestrielle d’études et de recherches sur les Eglises de langue syriaque, Paris, 1956-67. 12 vols.

PG = J. P. Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus. . . , Series graeca. . . , LutetiaParisiorum, apud J. P. Migne, 1857-86. 161 bks. in 165 vols.

PL = J. P. Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus. . . , Series latina. . . , Lutetia, Parisiorum, apud J. P. Migne, 1844-64. 221 vols.

PO = Patrologia orientalis (ed. R. Graffin, F. Nau, then F. Graffin), Paris, Firmin-Didot, from 1907.

RAC = Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum. . ., Stuttgart, Hiersemann, from 1950.

RechSR = Recherches de science religieuse, Paris, from 1910.

REDF = Rerum ecclesiasticarum documenta, cura Ρ, Athenaei Sancti Anselmi de Urbe édita. . . , Series maior, Fontes, Roma, Herder, from 1956.

RevBén = Revue bénédictine, Abbaye de Maredsous, from 1884.

RevSR = Revue des sciences religieuses, published under the direction of the professors of the Faculty of Catholic Theology of the University of Strasbourg, from 1921.

RHE = Revue d’histoire ecclésiastique, Louvain, from 1900.

SC = Sources chrétiennes, founders-directors, H. de Lubac and J. Daniélou; director C. Mondésert, Paris, Editions du Cerf, from 1943.

ST = Studi e testi, Roma, Tipografia Vaticana (later: Vatican City, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana), from 1900.

TS = Texts and Studies, Contributions to Biblical and Patristic Literature, edited by J. A. Robinson, Cambridge University Press, from 1891.

TU = Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur. . . , Leipzig, Hinrich, 1883-1941; from vol. 56 on; Berlin, Akademie Verlag, from 1951.

CHAPTER ONE

Were There Deaconesses in

The Church of the First Two Centuries?

A considerable number of exegetes and historians have attempted to supply an answer to this question, whether by citing texts from the New Testament or by scrutinizing authors of the second and early part of the third centuries. The sheer number of commentaries that these documents have inspired, however, demonstrates conclusively that their proper interpretation is anything but simple; in no way can simple recourse to citations from them settle a controversy that was already being heatedly debated among the Fathers of the Church.

1. THE NEW TESTAMENT TEXTS

Let us pass over Luke 8:2-3, a passage in which the Evangelist, describing the group accompanying Jesus on his itinerant ministry, indicates that several women were present along with the Twelve: Mary Magdalen, Joanna, the wife of Chuza, Susanna and many others, who provided [διηκόνουν] for them out of their means. Luke must have wanted to include this detail in order to emphasize the role that women would play in the work of the Kingdom, no matter how unusual the inclusion of women in this fashion might have appeared to the Palestinian mentality of the time. But can we suppose that Luke was thinking of deaconesses as such?¹ That hypothesis must surely appear to be gratuitous.²

A. The Case of Phoebe (Rom 16:1-2)

As is well known, there are critical problems surrounding this passage from Romans 16.³ In it St. Paul commends to the Romans our sister Phoebe, a deaconess of the church at Cenchreae (Φοίβην χήν άδελφήν ημών, ούοαν διάκονον χής εκκλησίας χής έν Κεγγρεαϊς). According to St. Paul, Phoebe deserved to be received and assisted for she has been a helper of many and of myself as well (και γαρ αύτη προσιάχις πολλών έγενήθη και έμοϋ αύχοϋ). How must we understand the expression that appears here: ούσαν διάκονον χής εκκλησίας χής έν Κενχρεαϊς (a deaconess of the church at Cenchreae)? The adjective διάκονος, which did not have a feminine ending, appears frequently in the New Testament.⁴ There are at least two instances of this where the word must be understood in a technical, hierarchical sense. The first of these is found in the salutation of the Epistle to the Philippians (1:1): To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons (ιιάσιν χοϊς άγίοις έν Χριστώ Ίησοϋ τοις ούσιν έν Φιλίπποις συν έιιισκόιιοις και διακόνοις). The second instance is found in the First Epistle to Timothy (3:8, 12). In both of these cases the technical, hierarchical sense of the term is justified by the parallelism of its appearance with the word επίσκοποι. Latin versions of these passages, grasping the parallelism, preserve the Latinized Greek word diaconi, as they do also in the case of the Latinized Greek word episcopi. In other New Testament passages where the term diakonos is encountered, it has often been translated as minister or an equivalent word because it was not perceived in a technical, hierarchical sense. In fact, the verb διακονεϊν, which appears often in the Gospels, usually refers to the activity of a servant, especially at table; it also signifies more generally an attitude of being available to serve, and even a spiritual orientation (Jn 12:26). In apostolic times, the word was employed to describe every type of service to the community. The same was true of diakonos. St. Paul employs the word often but qualifies it in various ways; he speaks of a diakonos, or servant, of God, of Christ, of the gospel, of the new Covenant, of justice—but also of Satan, of sin and of the circumcision. The Prince himself is a servant of God for the good. All of these Pauline senses of the word certainly go beyond the simple profane notion of servant; they suggest in each case some sort of mission, some sort of effective action that transcends the person who is acting. None of these correspond to the diaconate as such, however.

For Phoebe also the word diakonos is qualified: she is διάκονος of the church at Cenchreae. One is tempted to understand this usage in the same way as Colossians 1:25, where Paul speaks of the Church. . . of which I became a minister (ιης Εκκλησίας. . . ής έγενόμην εγώ διάκονος). Nevertheless, there is a difference here in spite of appearances, because Paul is not tied to any particular church; his service, like that of Apollos (1 Cor 3:5), is primarily a missionary service. In the case of Phoebe, the ancient Latin versions of the Scriptures, with the exception of the version utilized by Ambrosiastcr, unanimously translated this passage as "quae est in ministerio".⁵ In the version employed by Ambrosiaster, however, we read ministra.⁶

There seems to have been a certain evolution in interpretation as far as modern exegesis is concerned. Fr. Lagrange, for example, did not even raise the issue and simply translated Phoebe, a deaconess of the church at Cenchreae.⁷ He was followed in this in 1953 by S. Lyonnet, in 1956 by the Jerusalem Bible and in 1975 by the French Ecumenical Translation of the Bible. Nevertheless, this last work, in the notes to its complete edition, recognizes that the title of deaconess is unknown to the New Testament and that other exegetes have translated the word as she who serves the church at Cenchreae.⁸ More and more, scholars are emphasizing that there is an anachronism involved in giving this word a precise meaning corresponding to an ecclesiastical institution⁹ to which the first real references, as we shall see, date from much later—from some time after the year 200 A.D. Even more than that, it is possible to argue that what follows in the text provides the best clue to the nature of the service rendered by Phoebe. St. Paul specifies that for him, as for many others, she has been a helper, or protectress (ιιροαιάας).¹⁰ This term suggests activities pertaining to the established and accepted practices, recognized by all, of providing hospitality and assistance. This interpretation is especially plausible when we remember that Cenchreae was the port of Corinth facing cast; it was there that the Christian brethren from Syria or Asia Minor would normally have debarked in Greece.¹¹

B. The Prescriptions of 1 Tim 3:11

The desired qualities of bishops and deacons are described in 1 Timothy. A phrase referring to women is found in the passages that deal with deacons (1 Tim 3:8-13):

Deacons likewise must be serious, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for gain; they must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. And let them also be tested first; then if they prove themselves blameless let them serve as deacons. The women likewise must be serious, no slanderers, but temperate, faithful in all things [γυναίκας ωσαύτως σεμνός μή διαβόλους, νηφάλιους, moi ας έν ιιάσιν].

Let deacons be husbands of one wife, and let them manage their children and their households well, for those who serve well as deacons gain a good standing for themselves and also great confidence in the faith which is in Christ Jesus.¹²

Occurring as it does in the middle of a passage concerned with the desirable qualities of deacons, the sudden reference to the women has suggested to some commentators that we are here dealing with an interpolation.¹³ If so, it must be a very early one, since no extant manuscript or version provides any variant to the text as we have it. Other critics have remarked that this Epistle is badly written, with the logical development of the chain of ideas in the text interrupted in this fashion in more than one place.¹⁴ But who are the women referred to here? Exegetes of antiquity provided very different answers to this question. They tended to read into the text the particular discipline of their own various local churches; we shall have occasion to encounter citations from some of them. The exegetes of the twentieth century are no more agreed on the question, however, than were those of antiquity.

According to J. G. Davies,¹⁵ the reference is to women in general. A nearly identical enumeration of requisite virtues is to be found in the letter of Titus 2:3-5 apropos of πρεσβύτιδες (older women). As R. Gryson has correctly remarked, this is a word denoting age, not function, as is clear from the context. The same passage mentions in succession πρεσβύται (older men), verse 2; πρεσβύτιδες (older women), verse 3; νεαί (young women), verse 4; and νεώτεροι (young men), verse 6.¹⁶ But the context of 1 Timothy 3 is very different from this: it is entirely concerned with hierarchical ministries. A reference to women in the middle of a passage concerned with deacons makes it seem likely that the women in question did have some relationship to the deacons being discussed; this would presumably have been the intention of the redactor or interpolator who included the reference to women at that particular point.

Were these women, then, the wives of the deacons? This hypothesis, although presenting several difficulties, should not be excluded.¹⁷ If the author had really intended to specify the wives of deacons, why did he not write τάς γυναίκας αυτών, instead of just γυναΐκας? Moreover, the author then goes on to discuss the families of deacons, specifying that a deacon must be the husband of one wife, without relating this specification to what has just been said before about the women, as would have seemed normal. And why would he have spoken about the things required of wives of deacons in particular without also saying anything about what was required of the wives of the bishops?¹⁸

It is because of these questions that a certain number of commentators¹⁹ believe that the reference to women here is to a specific category of feminine ministry bearing some relationship to the ministry of deacons. But is it a legitimate reading of the author’s intention to assert that these women are simply deacons themselves? It is possible to hold that the name itself was not included along with the mention of women because diakonos, as we have seen, does not have a feminine form. Therefore the author did not think it necessary to repeat the word; the context was sufficient to make clear what he meant by the reference to γυναίκας.²⁰ There is also the parallelism of verses 8 and 11, where deacons likewise must be serious (διακόνους ωσαύτως σεμνούς) corresponds to the women likewise must be serious (γυναίκας ωσαύτως σεμνός). The qualities required in deacons thus turn out to be the same as those required in the women.²¹ This parallelism, however, is so conspicuous as to arouse some suspicion of artifice, and indeed this is another argument in favor of considering the sentence to be a later interpolation into the text. Nevertheless, no specific function is mentioned in connection with the women, nor are they given any special name. Whatever ministry they may have carried out was thus in no way as definite as the ministry of deacons.²² And in contrast to the references to the families of both bishops and deacons, nothing at all is said about the family situation of the women. In the eyes of both ancient and modern commentators, therefore, this text from the third chapter of 1 Timothy contains serious unresolved difficulties; it cannot be read in just a single sense that compels absolute conviction about its meaning.²³

C. The Widows of 1 Tim 5:9-10

It is owing to these unresolved difficulties of 1 Tim 3:11 that the prescriptions concerning widows set forth in 1 Timothy 5:9-10 (below) very early came to be considered as extending to deaconesses; indeed some have preferred to ground the origin of deaconesses in this later passage rather than in the earlier one:

Let a widow be enrolled χήρα καταλεγέοθω if she is not less than sixty years of age, having been the wife of one husband; and she must be well attested for her good deeds, as one who has brought up children, shown hospitality, washed the feet of the saints, relieved the afflicted and devoted herself to doing good in every way.²⁴

Here we are clearly dealing with a group of women who enjoyed official recognition in the Church. Entry into membership in this group was not merely the result of some spontaneous personal decision to join it; rather, one had to be designated, enrolled in the group. No doubt the decision for this enrollment emanated from the authority presiding over the community. A widow who was chosen to be enrolled thereby had conferred upon her a distinct honor. It was for this reason that she had to have given an exceptional example by doing good in every way (έν εργοις καλοΐς μαρτυρουμένη) in her family life and in other spheres of charitable activity. She had to be no less than sixty years of age and the wife of only one husband. This latter condition made the group of widows comparable to groups of both bishops and deacons. We must not, however, read into this passage any disapproval of second marriages—second marriages are expressly approved, in fact, a few lines later (verse 14). Rather, this condition fulfilled an important demand of ecclesial symbolism: those in the Church who occupied a place that distinguished them from the simple faithful were obliged to embody a sign of the Covenant in their own lives; they were obliged to live the nuptial mystery of the Church united to Christ, her unique Spouse.²⁵ But did this mean that they were invested with a clerical ministry? A certain number of commentators have certainly believed this to be the case.²⁶ Most often, however, as A. Kalsbach has remarked,²⁷ they only reach this conclusion as a result of their more or less conscious desire to carry all the way back to the apostolic age feminine ministries in the Church whose evolution actually occurred later. In fact, nothing in the context of 1 Timothy provides support for linking the women of chapter 3 with the widows of chapter 5.

The complete passage of 1 Timothy 5:3-16, in fact, covers the whole range of pastoral problems connected with widows. For widows who are still young, it is deemed desirable that they should marry, bear children, rule their households and give the enemy no reason to revile us (verse 14). Nothing is worse than idleness for them (verse 13). Widowhood always created difficult material problems, of course. Normally it was the children, grandchildren or near relatives who had the duty to provide for the needs of widows (verses 4, 8 and 16); the Church took responsibility only for those widows who were real widows (τάς όντως χήρας) (verses 3 and 16). For these real widows, the Church provided a service of assistance, but their very aloneness and lack of immediate family would help to orient them toward a more spiritual life: She who is a real widow and is left all alone has set her hope on God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day (verse 5). This ideal, of course, had already been sketched out by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 7:8-9. With regard to the widows mentioned in 1 Timothy 3:9-10 as being enrolled, must we understand them to have all been widows assisted by the Church or was only a more restricted group of those assisted actually enrolled? The fact is that these two verses describe an ideal state of perfection; implied in them is both recognition by the Church and commitment on the part of the individual widow herself; this is why widows were not enrolled before the age of sixty—to guarantee the fidelity of their commitment. There can be no question, therefore, of responsibilities that were exercised within the community, at least directly, unless they were perhaps a continuation of the widow’s earlier charitable activities, described in verse 10 (having shown hospitality, washed the feet of the saints, relieved the afflicted and. . . doing good in every way). The apostle certainly seems to want to discourage widows from going visiting house to house (verse 13).²⁸

In the final analysis, the texts of the New Testament that we have examined here derive their principal interest from the retrospective value placed upon them by later commentators.²⁹ These texts could never be accepted as proving the existence of deaconesses—female deacons—in apostolic times unless the documents of the second century were to confirm this finding by demonstrating the continuity of this supposed apostolic institution of deaconesses. The role of women in evangelization and catechesis, described in the Acts of the Apostles, represents an undisputed reality, one highly important in many ways. It is a reality, however, that risks causing us to neglect the search for the true origins of a feminine ministry that in fact developed later. This ministry appeared only toward the second decade of the third century—and when it did appear, it did so only in a limited number of churches.

2. DOCUMENTS OF THE SECOND AND EARLY THIRD CENTURIES

There is an observation of some significance to be made at the outset regarding the period to be covered here: the Biblia Patristica does not contain any reference to cither Romans 16:1 or 1 Timothy 3:11 as having been cited in the Christian literature of the second century.³⁰ Moreover, with the exception of one passage from Pliny the Younger, all of the texts usually employed in the effort to prove that the institution of deaconesses existed uniformly during this period refer to widows, not deaconesses.

A. The Letter from Pliny the Younger

To the Emperor Trajan

In his famous letter on the subject of Christians sent to the emperor Trajan some time during 111—113 A.D., Pliny the Younger, then governor of Bithynia, pointed out that in order to obtain exact information on what he regarded as the sect of Christians, "quo magis necessarium credidi ex duabus ancillis, quae ministrae dicebantur, quid esset veri et per tormenta quaerere."³¹ The word ministrae, of course, is certainly not a synonym for ancillae. R. Gryson aptly notes in this regard: "In this passage, ancilla is a term designating the social condition of the women in question, while ministra is the title given to them among their fellow Christians.³² Marcel Durry does not hesitate to translate Pliny’s supposed meaning as follows: I believed it all the more necessary to worm the truth out of two servants who were called deaconesses.³³ Now Bithynia was a Greek-speaking region, and Pliny’s quae ministrae dicebantur could be a Latin version of the Greek formula αι καλούμενοι διάκονοι. This phrase is very close to the manner in which St. Justin the Martyr, writing in 150 A.D., speaks about deacons: oi καλούμενοι παρ' ήμϊν διάκονοι".³⁴ The similarity here is striking, but it refers only to the words themselves. Justin expressly attributes to deacons a liturgical role in the distribution of the Eucharist, but we know absolutely nothing, from Pliny or any other witnesses, about what the role or function might have been of these ministrae in the community of Bithynia. [Thus, to translate this word simply as deaconess is certainly to force the sense of the text unduly and to get caught in a plain anachronism.] R. Gryson reaches the following conclusion about this particular point: "We are permitted on the basis of the title given to these ministrae to associate them with ‘the women’ who are themselves associated with deacons in 1 Timothy 3:11, but in so doing we must not lose sight of the fact that this association remains a very fragile and contingent one."³⁵

B. St. Ignatius of Antioch and St. Polycarp of Smyrna

The epistles of St. Ignatius of Antioch date from approximately the same period as the letter of Pliny the Younger. It is true, of course, that the ecclesiastical institutions found in Syria’s great capital of Antioch did not necessarily correspond to those in Bithynia, but the epistles of St. Ignatius of Antioch bear witness to the existence there of a well-established local church hierarchy composed of bishops, presbyters and deacons. At the same time, these epistles do not contain even the faintest trace of the existence of any feminine ministry. It is in vain that some have looked to one curious expression in the Epistle to the Smyrnaeans as possibly providing that trace: I greet the families of my brothers, St. Ignatius wrote, with their wives and children and the virgins called widows (και τάς ιιαρΟενους ιάς λεγομένας χήρας).³⁶ We shall shortly find Tertullian complaining loudly about virgins in the assembly taking a place among the widows; but here it does indeed seem that young virgins were given the title of widows on the model of 1 Timothy 5. This term seems to refer above all to a state of perfection recognized by the community at Smyrna and characterized by a commitment to continence. St. Ignatius, however, included these virgins called widows among the laity. A few lines earlier, he had rendered his greetings separately to the bishops, presbyters and deacons—that is to say, to the clergy. To imagine that these women were invested with any specific ministry or function is a supposition that finds no support in the text.³⁷

The bishop of Smyrna, St. Polycarp, writing during roughly the same period to the Christians of Philippi, was lavish in the advice he offered to widows, following the advice about their duties he had offered to married couples:

Widows ought to be wise in the faith that they owe to the Lord. They should intercede tirelessly for all; they should shun all calumny, slander, false witness, love of money and every other evil. They should realize that they are the altar of God.³⁸

St. Polycarp went on in his epistle to exhort deacons, young men, virgins and presbyters. The lack of any rhyme or reason to this listing prevents us from basing any argument upon the fact that deacons come right after widows. Nor is it possible to assimilate the qualities that St. Polycarp wants to see embodied in widows to the women of 1 Timothy 3:11. On the contrary, they correspond naturally with the widows of 1 Timothy 5. They are supposed to intercede tirelessly for all, just as those described by St. Paul were supposed to continue in supplications and prayers night and day (1 Tim 5:5). The expression of St. Polycarp, they are the altar of God, is a most striking one, but, as we shall see, it is one that was taken up by other Christian writers.³⁹ These other writers did so, no doubt, because it was by means of these widows that the uninterrupted prayer of the Church rose up to God; but it was also because, living as they did on the offerings of the faithful, they resembled in a literal sense the altar on which offerings were customarily presented to God.⁴⁰ There is no indication, however, that would permit us to conclude that they exercised any of the functions of a minister.

C. Tertullian

With Tertullian we have already reached the end of the second century and the beginning of the third. The first Christian writer in Latin, Tertullian engaged abundantly in polemics in both his Catholic period and the period after he became a Montanist. His works permit us to observe in a very precise way the organization of the churches of his time in the face of the disorders of various splinter sects. Nowhere in any of his works do we encounter the words diacona, ministra or their equivalents; nor does he make the slightest allusion to either Phoebe or 1 Timothy 3:11.⁴¹ There are, however, certain authors who have imagined that when he spoke about widows he was really speaking about deaconesses.⁴²

It is true that the language Tertullian employed indicates that he believed the widows described in 1 Timothy belonged to an ordo, or order: "Disciplina ecclesiae et praescriptio apostoli. . . cum viduam adlegi in ordinem nisi univiram non concédât."⁴³ Thus, even within the assembly, widows constituted a group with a special place. After he became a Montanist, Tertullian complained bitterly about a bishop who had associated a young virgin with the group of widows (in viduatu collocatam), allowing her to be seen seated (sedet) in their midst, although she did not fulfill any of the conditions St. Paul had specified: she was not yet twenty years old, for example, and she did not wear the customary veil that consecrated virgins wore.⁴⁴

But of what, then, did this ordo