IV. CONCLUSION
There are many additional features of the early church catechumenate that we could discuss with profit, such as the size of the group, the role of mentors, the issue of a separate worship service for them, and what characterizes a true seeker. I have chosen to focus here on some of the principal characteristics of the early church catechumenate that are widely attested geographically and chronologically.

The early church sets for us a challenging example on how to train new believers and help them grow in Christ during the first three years of their walk with the Lord. It is my hope that evangelical churches would invest more time, thought, prayer, planning, and resources into a healthy assimilation of new believers.

Perhaps one of the greatest pieces of advice comes from Augustine who passed it on to his friend Deogratias in advising him on how to carry out his teaching responsibilties with the catechumens. he says that "we should endeavor to meet them with a brother's, a father's, and a mother's love" and seek to be "united with them thus in heart" (De Catechizandis Rudibus 12.17). The heart of the Father is to give all good things to his children.

1 This paper is a revised form of my presidential address given at the annual meeting of the Far West region of the Evangelical Theological Society on Friday, May 2, 2003.
3 Although commonly known as the Apostolic Tradition, it is also referred to in a variety of other ways in the literature, including the Traditio Apostolorum (or, Traditio), the Church Order of Hippolytus (or, Hipp. Church Order], and the Egyptian Church Order.
4 Paul F. Bradshaw, Maxwell E. Johnson, and L. Edward Phillips, The Apostolic Tradition (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002). Prior to this, the most popular English translation was by Gregory Dix, ed., The Treatise on the Apostolic Tradition of St. Hippolytus of Rome (reissued with corrections, preface, and bibliography by H. Chadwick; London: Alban; Ridgefield, CT: Morehouse, 1991 [1937]). In recent years, the standard edition has been Bernard Botte, Hippolyte de Rome. La Tradition Apostolique d'apres les Anciennes Versions (Sources Chretiennes 11; 2d ed.; Paris: Cerf, 1984).
5 Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1910; rpt. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1992) 2.758-59, has described Hippolytus as "one of the most learned and eminent scholars and theologians of his time." Hippolytus is well known as a bishop of the church in Rome and as the author of Refutation of all Heresies.
6 This is "an attribution very generally accepted" according to the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (3d ed.; Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997) 774. The Apostolic Tradition is now also extant in Arabic, Ethiopie, and Coptic (Sahidic) manu????s.
7 Bradshaw, Johnson, and Phillips, Apostolic Tradition 14. Alistair Stewart-Sykes, On the Apostolic Tradition (Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 2001) 11, 31-32, similarly contends that the work contains numerous earlier traditions, but suggests that Hippolytus is the final hand in its composition.
8 sec Dix, Apostolic Tradition xxxvii-xliv.
9 see the discussion in Bradshaw, Johnson, and Phillips, Apostolic Tradition 9-11.
10 The Didache probably dates to the end of the first century AD and was compiled in Syria or Palestine. see Huub van de Sandt and David Flusser, The Didache. Its Jewish Sources and its Place in Early judaism and Christianity (CRINT 3/5; Assen: Royal van Gorcum and Minneapolis: Fortress, 2002) 52.
11 This church order was probably composed in Syria during the first half of the third century. see van de Sandt and Flusser, Didache 2.
12 The consensus view is that the final form of the document was put together c. AD 375 in Syria (probably Antioch). Books 1-6 had an earlier independent existence (3d century) as a church order known as the Didascalia Apostolorum, Book 7 incorporates portions of the Didache, and Book 8 utilizes the Apostolic Tradition. see Bradshaw, Johnson, and Phillips, Apostolic Tradition 9.
13 This is a church order that incorporated portions of the Apostolic Tradition. It probably originates in fifth-century Syria. see Bradshaw, Johnson, and Phillips, Apostolic Tradition 11.
14 As cited by Paul F. Bradshaw, "The Gospel and the Catechumenate in the Third Century," JTS 50 (1999) 143.
15 Even the Roman Catholic historian of the catechumenate Michel Dujarer, Catechumenate 64 could affirm, "Admission to the catechumenate supposes an authentic conversion." he cites Didascalia 2.39.4-6, which states, "We do not refuse salvation even to the heathen if they repent and renounce and remove themselves from error . . . when they wish and promise to repent and say, 'We believe,' we receive them into the congregation that they may hear the Word."
16 Lawrence D. Folkemer, "A Study of the Catechumenate," in Studies in Early Christianity. A Collection of Scholarly Essays, vol. 11: Conversion, Catechumenate, and Baptism, in the Early Church (ed. E. F. Fcrguson; New York: Garland, 1993) 245, notes, "Though they [catechumens] were not strictly members, they were in some measure considered within the pale of the Church and reckoned as one of the orders. They were part of the Christian community and were regarded as Christians."
17 G. Beasley-Murray, "Baptism," NIDNTT 1.158, correctly observes, "In the New Testament, baptism and faith do normally come very close together: the Acts of the Apostles shows adults being baptized as soon as they profess conversion, with no catechumenate in between."
18 Dujarer, Catechumenate 31. Alan Kreider, "Baptism, Catechism, and the Eclipse of Jesus' Teaching in Early Christianity," TB 47 (1996) 316-18, suggests four reasons why by the second century the church developed a lengthy catechumenate that it required candidates to complete prior to baptism: (1) most first-century converts were Jews or god-fearers; second-century converts were pagans who needed extensive instruction and resocialization; (2) the longer catechetical process was as a result of the theological disputes present in the second century; (3) in an age of persecution, there was a need to screen out possible spies and informers; and (4) the teachings of Jesus required significant time to incarnate and practice as part of the process.
19 see, for example, Clement, Pedagogue 1.30.1-2. Clement appears to envision a process, but states that at baptism, "all our sins are washed away, and immediately afterwards we are no longer evil." he then says that "catechetical instruction leads to faith, and at the moment of baptism faith is instructed by the Holy Spirit." see also, justin, First Apology 66, who speaks of the baptized person "who has been washed with the washing that is for the remission of sins, and unto regeneration." see the discussion in Annewies van den Hoek, "The 'Catechetical' School of Early Christian Alexandria and its Philonic Heritage," HTR 90 (1997) 67-71.
20 see the discussion in Georg Kretschmar, "Katechumenat/Katechumenen I," TRE 18.2.
21 Dujarer, Catechumenate 35, rightly comments, "it was less an institution than a way of doing things."
22 It is doubtful that the one-year probation and two-year novitiate for people entering the Qumran community was the source of inspiration for a three-year catechuraenate in early Christianity as suggested, for instance, by Dujarer, Catechumenate 22-24. It appears that the notion of a lengthy catechumenate did not begin in Jerusalem but rather in Syria at the end of the first century. There were also some significant qualitative differences in the structure and content of the two approaches (e.g. the relinquishing of all property to the leader of the Qumran community).
23 Emil Schurer, The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (175 B.C.-A.D. 135) (rev. ed. by G. Vermes, F. Millar, and M. Goodman; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1986) 3.1.172.
24 see Dujarer, Catechumenate 48, who notes, "it usually lasted three years."
25 Some of the earliest Fathers speak of the catechumenate without mentioning the amount of time involved. Such is the case with justin Martyr and Tertullian. With regard to Tertullian, Thomas M. Finn, Early Christian Baptism and the Catechumenate (Message of the Fathers of the Church 6; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1992) 116, notes, "That prebaptismal instruction was required is clear; the extent of it is not, though several years is a reasonable supposition."
26 see the discussion in Dujarer, Catechumenate 42-43.
27 Finn, Early Christian Baptism 2.
28 As cited in William Harmless, Augustine and the Calechumenate (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1995) 66.
29 Similarly, Dujarer, Caiechumenate 55 notes, "This astonishingly dynamic man never ceased to concern himself with the seriousness of baptismal formation. In the expanding Church of his time, it hurt him to see numbers threatening to submerge quality, and he struggled for the purity of the Christian life as it was during the second century."
30 Harmless, Catechumenate 45.
31 see his Prochatechesis; Catecheses ad illuminandos; Mystagogiae; and Titull Catechesium.
32 William Harmless, Augustine and the Caiechumenate (Pueblo Book; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1995).
33 In some places, the catechumens gathered together early in the morning before going to work for ????ure reading, teaching, and prayer. This practice is attested in the Apostolic Tradition (39:1-2; see also 18:1-5; 19:1-2). see the discussion in Bradshaw, Johnson, and Phillips, Apostolic Tradition 188-90, and Dujarer, Catechumenate 51-52.
34 Pierre Nautin, "Introduction," in Origen, Homelies sur Jeremie (Sources Chretiennes 232; Paris: Cerf, 1976) 102-5, as cited in Harmless, Catechumenate 42.
35 As cited in Harmless, Catechiimenate 65.
36 As cited in ibid. 66.
37 Ibid. see Pamela Jackson, "Cyril of Jerusalem's Use of ????ure in Catechesis," TS 52 (1991)431-50.
38 Jackson, "Use of ????ure" 436. In the structure of the Catechetical Homilies, the Creed is expressed at the end of the fifth homily and expounded in homilies 6-18.
39 Klaus Wegenast, "Catechesis," The Encyclopedia of Christianity (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999) 1.360.
40 Wegenast, "Catechcsis" 1.361.
41 Kurt Niederwimmer, The Didacfie (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998) 53.
42 Finn, Early Christian Baptism. 6, notes that "although the rites differed, the dynamics of exorcism remained fairly constant" in the various catechetical traditions.
43 Bradshaw, Johnson, and Phillips, Apostolic Tradition 109, views it as a period of time following the election to baptism. see also the Canons of Hippolytus 19, which speaks of an exorcism taking place on the Saturday before baptism: "On Saturday, the bishop assembles those to be baptized; . . . [heI extends his hand over them; he prays and drives from them every malignant spirit by his exorcism, and these spirits will not return to them henceforth through their actions" (as cited in Finn, Early Christian Baptism 221).
45 Pseudo-Clement, Recognitions 2.71, as cited in Henry A. Kelly, The Devil at Baptism. Ritual, Theology, and Drama (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1985) 124.
46 Walter Wink, Naming the Powers (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984) 4.
47 Hans Hubner, An Philemon, an die Kolosser, an die Epheser (HNT 12; Tubingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 1997) 267-68: "Der Teufelsglaube verlor seine Plausibilitat. Wer heute noch mit dem Teufel droht oder sich in seinen Fangen glaubt, ist meist selbst in den Fangen fanatischer Sekten."
48 See, for instance, Peter Jones, Spirit Wars. Pagan Revial in Christian America (Winepress, 1997).
CLINTON E. ARNOLD*
* Clinton E. Arnold is professor of New Testament at Talbot School of Theology, 13800 Biola Avenue, La Mirada, CA 90639.
Copyright Evangelical Theological Society Mar 2004
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