Democratic elements in the early Church

Abstract

To designate the Christian community, the first Christians chose the Greek word

ekklesia, the term used in classical Greece to refer to the officially gathered political assembly.

In choosing the term ekklesia early Christians were very probably influenced by its use in the Septuagint to translate the Hebrew qahal (the assembly of the people) of Yahweh or of Israel It has been argued that another available term,

synagoge, which was also used in the Septuagint to translate qahal and more frequently the almost synonymous 'edhah, was too much distinctively associated with

the Greek-speaking Jewish communities and was thus put aside by the Christians. Even though one should not overlook these and perhaps other influencing factors, one must not neglect, on the other hand, the democratic undertones of the chosen term.

Although after the subjugation of Macedonia and Greece by the Romans, completed about 150 BC, the ekklesiai of the Greek cities retained little of their former

political power,s the term ekklesia still connoted to some extent the freedom and equality promised to all the citizens of the classical democratic city-state. Besides, throughout the Hellenistic world, ekklesia always retained its political reference and was never used to refer to the cultic assembly gathered for worship. For the latter, other terms were employed. It can therefore be confidently asserted that at least in the case of gentile Christians, most of whom were not so well, or not at all, acquainted with the Old Testament context, the term ekklesia was most probably understood in the light of its immediate secular derivation. It can even be said that the promise of freedom and equality implied in the

secular understanding of the term was even further accentuated in the early Christian communities where, as Paul asserts, there was to be no difference between Jew

or Greek, slave or freeman, male or female (see Gal 3, 28; 1 Cor 12,13). Unlike the Greek city-state where only adult males who were citizens by birth shared political freedom and equality, in the Christian ekklesia all shared the same freedom and equality in virtue of their baptism, which could be received by all who had faith in Jesus Christ. As will be seen in the coming section, this is not to say that in the community anybody or everybody could play any or every role at will or that there were no particular members entrusted with leadership roles.

In this article, I will be attempting to investigate some aspects of New Testament theology and early Church history, particularly those concerning the Church's

structures of authority, in order to understand better and examine the fate of the

basic freedom and equality in the Spirit belonging to all the members of the Christian ekklesia. The freedom and equality in the Spirit referred to here are not identical to the political freedom and equality understood as the foundational elements of secular democracy. However, while these evangelical values surely transcend any strictly political ideals, they do have political implications with regard to the internal government of the Church. This article will seek to explore the presence of such implications in the first centuries of the Church's existence.