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HERMAS, SHEPHERD OF
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See also:HERMAS, SHEPHERD OF , one of the See also:works representing the Apostolic Fathers (q.v.), a hortatory See also:writing which " holds the See also:mirror up " to the See also: See also:Schmidt. He also and an awakened See also:conscience as before the " See also:glory of God," the Creator and Upholder of all things. His responsibility also for the sad See also:state of See also:religion at See also:home is emphasized, and he is given a See also:mission of repentance to his erring See also:children. How far in all this and in the next vision the author is describing facts, and how far transforming his personal See also:history into a type ( after the manner of See also:Bunyan's See also:Pilgrim's Progress), the better to impress his moral upon his readers, is uncertain. But the whole See also:style of the See also:work, with its use of conventional apocalyptic forms, favours the more symbolic view. Vision ii. records his See also:call proper, through revelation of his essential message, to be delivered both to his wife and children and to " all the See also:saints who have sinned unto this See also:day " (2. 4). It contains the assurances of forgiveness even for the gravest sins after See also:baptism (See also:save See also:blasphemy of the Name and betrayal of the brethren, Sim. ix. I0)," if they repent with their whole heart and remove doubts from their minds. For the See also:Master hath sworn by His glory (` His Son,' below) touching His elect, that if there be more sinning after this day which He hath limited, they shall not obtain salvation. For the repentance of the righteous hath an end; the days of repentance for all saints are fulfilled. . . . Stand fast, then, ye that work righteousness and be not of doubtful mind. . . . Happy are all ye that endure the See also:great tribulation which is to come. . . . The See also:Lord is nigh unto them that turn to Him, as it is written in the See also:book of Eldad and Modad, who prophesied the people in the See also:wilderness." Here, in the gist of the " booklet " received from the See also:hand of a See also:female figure representing the Church, we have in germ the message of The Shepherd. But before Hermas announces it to the Roman Church, and through " See also:Clement "1 to the churches abroad, there are added two Visions (iii. iv.) tending to heighten its impressiveness. He is shown the " See also:holy church " under the similitude of a See also:tower in See also:building, and the great and final tribulation (already alluded to as near at hand) under that of a devouring beast, which yet is innocuous to undoubting faith. Hermas begins to deliver the message of Vis. i.-iv., as bidden. But as he does so, it is added to, in the way of detail and See also:illustration, by a fresh See also:series of revelations through an See also:angel in the See also:guise of a Shepherd, who in a preliminary interview announces himselt as the Angel of Repentance, sent to administer the See also:special " repentance " which it was Hermas's mission to declare. This interview appears in our See also:MSS. as Vis. v.,2 but is really a prelude to the Mandates and Similitudes which form the bulk of the whole work, hence known as "The Shepherd." The relation of this second See also:part to Vis. i.-iv. is set forth by the Shepherd himself. " I was sent, quoth he, to show thee again all that See also:thou sawest before, to wit the sum of the things profitable for thee. First of all write thou my mandates and similitudes; and the rut, as I will show thee, so shalt thou write." This See also:programme is fulfilled in the xii. Mandates—perhaps suggested by the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (see DIDAcuE), which Hermas knows--and Similitudes i.-viii., while Simil. ix. is " the See also:rest " and constitutes a distinct " book " (Sim. ix. I. 1, x. 1. I). In this latter the building of the Tower, already shown in outline in Vis. iii., is shown " more carefully " in an elaborate See also:section dealing with the same themes. One may infer that Sim. ix. represents a distinctly later See also:stage in Hermas's ministry—during the whole of which he seems to have committed to writing what he received on each occasion,' possibly for See also:recital to the church (cf. Vis. ii. fin.). Finally came Sim. x., really an See also:epilogue in which Hermas is " delivered " afresh to the Shepherd, for the rest of his days. He is " to continue in this ministry" of proclaiming the Shepherd's ' More than one See also:interpretation, typical or otherwise, of this " Clement " is possible; but none justifies us in assigning even to this Vision a date consistent with that usually given to the traditional bishop of this name (see CLEMENT I.). Yet we may have to correct the dubious See also:chronology of the first Roman bishops by this datum, and prolong his See also:life to about A.D. 110. This is See also:Harnack's date for the See also:nucleus of Vis. ii., though he places our Vis. i.-iii. later in Trojan's reign, and thinks Vis. iv. later still. 2 That a See also:prior vision in which Hermas was " delivered " to the Shepherd's See also:charge, has dropped out, seems implied by Vis. v. 3 f., Sim. x. 1. I. ' Harnack places " The Shepherd " proper mostly under See also:Hadrian (117-138), and the completed work c. 140-145.teaching, " so that they who have repented or are about to repent may have the same mind with thee," and so receive a See also:good See also:report before God (Sim. is. 2 2-4). Only they must " make haste to do aright," lest while they delay the tower be finished (4. 4), and the new See also:aeon See also:dawn (after the final tribulation: cf. Vis. iv. 3. 5). The relation here indicated between the Shepherd's instruction and the initial message of one definitive repentance, open to those believers who have already "broken" their "See also:seal" of baptism by deadly sins, as announced in Visions i.-iv. is made yet plainer by Sim. vi. 1. 3 f. " These mandates are profitable to such as are about to repent; for except they walk in them their repentance is in vain." Hermas See also:sees that See also:mere repentance is not enough to meet the backsliding See also:condition in which so many Christians then were, owing to the recoil of inveterate habits of worldliness' entrenched in society around and within. It is, after all, too negative a thing to stand by itself or to satisfy God." " Cease, Hermas," says the Church, " to pray all about thy sins. Ask for righteousness also " (Vis. iii. I. 6). The See also:positive Christian ideal which " the saints " should attain, " the Lord enabling," it is the business of the Shepherd to set forth. Here lies a great merit of Hermas's book, his insight into experimental religion and the See also:secret of failure in Christians about him, to many of whom See also:Christianity had come by See also:birth rather than personal conviction. They shared the worldly spirit in its various forms, particularly the See also:desire for See also:wealth and the luxuries it affords, and for a See also:place in " good society "—which meant a See also:pagan See also:atmosphere. Thus they were divided in soul between spiritual goods and worldly pleasures, and were See also:apt to doubt whether the rewards promised by God to the life of " simplicity " (all See also:Christ meant by the childlike spirit, including generosity in giving and forgiving) and self-See also:restraint, were real or not. For while the expected " end of the See also:age " delayed, persecutions abounded. Such " doubled-souled " persons, like Mr Facing-both-ways, inclined to say, " The Christian ideal may be glorious, but is it practicable?" It is this most fatal doubt which evokes the Shepherd's sternest rebuke; and he meets it with the ultimate religious See also:appeal, viz. to " the glory of God." He who made See also:man " to See also:rule over all things under See also:heaven," could He have given behests beyond man's ability? If only a man " hath the Lord in his heart," he " shall know that there is nothing easier nor sweeter nor gentler than these mandates " (hand. xii. 3-4). So in the forefront of the Mandates stands the secret of all: " First of all believe that there is one God. . . . Believe therefore in Him, and fear Him, and fearing Him have self-mastery. For the fear of the Lord dwelleth in the good desire," and to " put on " this master-desire is to possess See also:power to curb " evil desire " in all its shapes (Mand. xii. 1-2). Elsewhere " good desire " is analysed into the "See also:spirits " of the several virtues, which yet are organically related, Faith being See also:mother, and Self-mastery her daughter, and so on (Visa iii. 8. 3 seq.; cf. Sim. ix. 15). These are the specific forms of the Holy Spirit power, without whose indwelling the mandates cannot be kept (Sim. x. 3; cf. ix. 13. 2, 24. 2). Thus the " moralism " sometimes traced in Hermas is apparent rather than real, for he has a deep sense of the enabling See also:grace of God. His defect lies rather in not presenting the historic Christ as the Christian's See also:chief See also:inspiration, a fact which connects itself with the See also:strange See also:absence of the names " Jesus " and " Christ." He uses rather " the Son of God," in a See also:peculiar Adoptianist sense, which, as taken for granted in a work by the bishop's own brother, must be held typical of the Roman Church of his day. But as it is implicit and not part of his distinctive message, it did not hinder his book from enjoying wide quasi-canonical See also:honour - during most of the Ante-Nicene period. The absence of the historic names, " Jesus " and " Christ," may be due to the form of the book as purporting to quote angelic communications. This would also explain the absence of explicit scriptural citations generally, though knowledge both of the Old Testament and of several New Testament books—including the congenially symbolic See also:Gospel of See also: Here comes in Hermas's See also:doctrine of works of See also:supererogation, in fulfilment of counsels of perfection, on lines already seen in Did. vi. 2, cf. i. 4, and reappearing in the two types of Christian recognized by Clement and See also:Origen and in later Catholicism. Again his doctrine of See also:fasting is a spiritualizing of a current See also:opus operatum conception on Jewish lines as though " keeping a See also:watch " (statio) in that way atqned for sins (Sim. v.). The Shepherd enjoins instead, first, as " a perfect fast," a fast " from every evil word and every evil desire, . from all the vanities of this See also:world-age " (3. 6; cf. See also:Barn. iii. and the Oxyrhynchus Saying, " except ye fast from the world ") ; and next, as a counsel of perfection, a fast to yield somewhat for the See also:relief of the widow and See also:orphan, that this extra " service " may be to God for a " See also:sacrifice." Generally speaking, Hermas's piety, especially in its See also:language, adheres closely to Old Testament forms. But it is doubtful (See also:pace See also:Spitta and Volter, who assume a Jewish or a See also:proselyte basis) whether this means more than that the Old Testament was still the Scriptures of the Church. In this respect, too, Hermas faithfully reflects the Roman Church of the See also:early 2nd See also:century (cf. the language of 1 Clem., esp. the liturgical parts, and even the Roman See also:Mass). Indeed the See also:prime value of the Shepherd is the See also:light it casts on Christianity at Rome in the otherwise obscure period c. 110-140, when it had as yet hardly See also:felt the influences converging on it from other centres of tradition and thought. Thus Hermas's comparatively mild censures on Gnostic teachers in Sim. ix. suggest that the greater systems, like the Valentinian and Marcionite, had not yet made an impression there, as Harnack argues that they must have done by c. 145. This date, then, is a likely See also:lower limit for Hermas's revision of his earlier prophetic memoranda, and their publication in a single homogeneous work, such as the Shepherd appears to be. Its wider historic significance—it was felt by its author to be adapted to the needs of the Church at large, and was generally welcomed as such—is great but hard to determine in detail). What is certain is its See also:influence on the development of the Church's policy as to discipline in See also:grave cases, like See also:apostasy and See also:adultery—a burning question for some generations from the end of the 2nd century, particularly in Rome and See also:North See also:Africa. Indirectly, too, Hermas tended to keep alive the See also:idea of the Christian prophet, even after See also:Montanism had helped to discredit it. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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