NEW TESTAMENT UNDERSTANDING OF THE PRIESTHOOD: A SUMMARISED ANALYSIS

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ACCORDING TO THE NEW TESTAMENT UNDERSTANDING, WHAT IS A PRIEST AND WHO DESERVE THIS TITLE IN THE CHURCH OF CHRIST? WERE THERE OR NO SOME FORM OF RITUAL APPOINTMENT TO AUTHORITATIVE OFFICE OR ROLES IN THE CHURCH 


INTRODUCTION

When one looks at the edifices of such a city as Rome, one may immediately think of how all these came into existence. Same thing applies to the Catholic Church and process of her evolution. Most times when we do not put on a critical lens to observe the practices in the church, there is great tendency to think that the structure (physical, political and organizational wise) of the Church has always been as we have it today. The fact remains that the growth of the church is evident in the historical achieve of her evolution and development. Part of this is lucidly pictured in the New Testament Scriptural documentation and other historical Church documents. Our interest in this short easy is on the question of priesthood in the New Testament.

 

WHAT IS A PRIEST AND WHO DESERVES THE NAME IN THE CHURCH

One point one must concur to here is that before the advent of the New Testament, there has always been priests in the Judaic religion from which Christianity emerged. However, we discover a radicalization of the conception of priesthood in the New Testament in the Christ’s event. “This is particularly the case in the letter to the Hebrews where Jesus is described as the great high priest….” (Donovan Daniel, 2006: 799). Hebrews sees Christ’s work as the definitive fulfillment of the promises of the cultic order of the Old Testament and his sacrifice became the apex of all sacrifice. Coherently, Jesus becomes the very first priest in the Christian conception, but then when we address the question of who deserves the name (priest) in the Church of Christ, we look deeper. From the Lord’s Supper event, Jesus commissioned his followers to the priestly work. Consequently, their words and actions have the power and authority of Jesus’ ministry behind them. It is in this regard that the immediate apostles continued the priestly work of Jesus. Gradually, the expansion of this office became necessary. This is evident in the appointment of seven deacons to assist the apostles. Then, in the final analysis, members of the church who displayed special virtues were appointed into this priestly office, usually elders in the faith. However, the legitimacy of the exercise of their office was based on their dependence on the apostles (Ernst Niermann :1282, 1975).  It is notable that priestly ministry at this time was not stratified and defined, but these elders appointed by the apostles became the next level of priests. This chain continued and its development also was outstanding as it filtered into the 3rd century and beyond.

PRIESTHOOD BEFORE AND WITHIN THE 3RD CENTURY

In the New Testament and earliest Christian community, priesthood is identical with the office of elder. In fact, the term “priest” is simply a shortened, English version of the Greek word for “elder”–presbuteros – as any dictionary will confirm.

The Vatican Council II (cf. LG 28) based its doctrinal explanations about the priesthood of the New Testament on the concept of “consecration and mission” which the Lord Jesus claims for himself according to John 10:36: “Yet to someone whom the Father has consecrated and sent into the world you say, “You are blaspheming” because I said “I am son of God”.

Following from the above, we discover that mission is an “apostolate”. “The messianic consecration of Jesus shows his divine mission. On the other hand, it is what his own name indicates, because Christ's name means the one who has anointed and he who himself has been anointed. The one who has anointed is the Father, the anointed one was the Son and He anointed in the Holy Spirit who is the anointing (St. Irenaeus of Lyon, Adversus haereses 3, 18, 3). His eternal messianic consecration was revealed during the time of his life on earth in the moment of baptism by John, when God “consecrated him in the Holy Spirit and in power” (At 10:38), “so that he should become known to Israel” (John 1:31) as its Messiah. His deeds and his words will reveal him as “the holy one of God” (Mc 1:24; John 6:69; Acts 3:14). (CCC 438). Such consecration-mission assures that in the New Testament there remains a unique “high priest according the order of Melchisedek” (Heb 5:10; 6:20), “holy, innocent, immaculate” (Heb 10:14), who “by a unique offer has made perfect forever those who are sanctified” (Heb 10:14), by the unique sacrifice of his cross (cf CCC 1545). In this connection, one encounters uniquely the classification of one regarded as priest as evident in the above illuminated epoch.

 RITUAL APPOINTMENT TO AUTHORITATIVE OFFICE IN THE CHURCH

The New Testament clearly expresses the authority of the Apostles as ministers and representatives of Christ in the world, as those who take on and continue His mission. They play a unique and essential role in the life of the Church, having received directly from Christ His authority and mission to forgive sins, to offer the Eucharistic sacrifice and unite humanity with God. But does this ministry continue after their death? From where do our Bishops and priests get their authority today? The fact is that individual Christian ministers were not called priests until the 3rd century, when the term was first applied to bishops because of their role as celebrants of the Eucharist. The term priest (Latin sacerdos) implies a sacrificial ministry.

In the early evolution of the church, there were no ritual stratified offices or appointments as regards the work of priests. However, elders were appointed and prayed over just in line with the Apostolic Tradition as it is evident in Acts 13:3. By the beginning of the 3rd century, three distinct offices emerged clearly – bishopric, presbytery, and deaconate. The candidates for these offices are usually elected before the actual ordination. Hands are laid on them, but this is not really a sine qua none in ordination rather is a kind of general rite of commissioning. We also discover that sources like Didache, Clement I and the letters of Ignatius never mentioned the issue of imposition of hands but they refer explicitly to the election or appointment of bishops and deacons (Kirby Peter, 2012).

In the work, Ministry in the Church, Bernier Paul lists the procedure that portray this ritual appointment as follows: imposition of hands for Episcopal ordination by at least three bishops, special imposition of hand on the presbyters’ ordination by the bishop, then acceptance into the collegial through demonstration of solidarity by imposition by other presbyters, then finalization of the entire action through the celebration of the Eucharist which accents its cultic orientation and the relationship or function that result from the ordination. This author relates to the act that ritual validation is one of the means used by churches to designate ministers. Thus, Cyril Vogel asserts that the ultimate item here is the mandate of the church.

 

CONCLUSION

From the above exposition, we can grasp quickly that the radicalization of the priesthood by Jesus from its original Judaic conception, created a condition that made the Apostles priests after Jesus though this is not verbalized, and later those whom the early church elected to serve the priestly function in the church. Thus, the institutionalization process was clearly a complex one, as we have seen and also took a gradual process which continue to evolve in relation to the changes in time.

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Bernier Paul () Ministry in the Church

Donovan Daniel., “Priest” in Komonchak et al (ed) (2006), The New Dictionary of Theology,

          Bangalore: Theological publications.

Flannery Austin (ed) (1975), Vatican Council II Lumen Gentium: Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Dublin: Dominican Publications.

Kirby, Peter. "Historical Jesus Theories." Early Christian Writings. 2012. 29 May 2012

         <http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/1clement-hoole.html>.

Niermann Ernst., “Priest” in Rahner (ed) (1975), Encyclopedia of Theology: A Concise

         Sacramentum Mundi, India: Rekha Printers Pvt. Ltd.

Pope Paul VI, Message to Newly Ordained, November 28, 1970, in http://www. opusangelorum.org

 

 

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