Teaching
(, )
The place and function of teaching in the establishment of Christianity are facts of great historical interest and practical importance. That its effectiveness, as an instrument for the diffusion of the Christian religion, was recognized by the Jewish rulers is apparent from the prohibitions and persecutions with which they sought to prevent the apostles teaching in the name of Jesus (Act 4:18; Act 5:28). As in the ministry of Jesus teaching occupied a prominent place (together with preaching and healing), so also with His followers it was one of the main features of their evangelical work. It was a chosen instrument for the spread of the new religion, and it gradually tended to reduce the truths which expressed the faith of the early Church to a recognized body of doctrine.
A distinction is to be drawn between the process of teaching and the subject-matter of teaching. To speak of the teaching of St. Paul, for example, is ambiguous, since teaching may mean either instruction (the act of imparting truth) or doctrine (the body of truth imparted). Sometimes, indeed, the biblical usage includes both meanings. The NT employs two terms for teaching, viz. and . Generally speaking, the former signifies the act and the latter the substance of teaching. This distinction is not made so apparent in the Authorized Version , where both and are usually rendered doctrine, whereas in the Revised Version (which occurs 16 times) is always rendered teaching (Rom 16:17 Revised Version margin), and (occurring 17 times) is rendered doctrine (11 times), teaching (5 times), and learning (once). To render by the somewhat ambiguous word teaching is convenient, as it always signifies the act and in many instances both the act and the content of Christian instruction, whereas more frequently denotes the content alone, and is well expressed by doctrine. Literally means that which belongs to a teacher (), and, in the judgment of H. Cremer (Bibl.-Theol. Lex. of NT Greek3, Edinburgh, 1880, p. 182), is used for the most part in the objective, and therefore passive sense, that which is taught, the doctrine. That the content of teaching is suggested by this term is apparent from such phrases as precepts and doctrines (Col 2:22), sound doctrine (1Ti 1:10, 2Ti 4:3, Tit 1:9), and absolutely the doctrine (1Ti 6:1; 1Ti 6:3, Tit 2:10).
1. The work of teaching.-The ability to impart Christian truth was looked upon by the members of the early Church as a spiritual gift of Divine grace. Teaching was therefore numbered among the charismata () which resulted from the bestowal of the Holy Spirit, and which included such gifts as prophesying, healing, working of miracles, and tongues (Rom 12:6, 1Co 12:10 f.).
(1) Teaching and preaching.-While mentioned in close association with preaching, the gift of teaching was regarded as conferring on its recipient a distinct function in the ministry of the Word. As in the Gospels our Lord is described first as preaching the glad tidings of the Kingdom (Mar 1:14) and then as teaching His disciples the inner meaning and principles of the gospel (Mar 4:1), so, in the early Church, preaching was one thing and teaching another, although in both instances they were often combined (Mat 4:23, Act 5:42; Act 28:31). Preaching was primarily the proclamation of the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ, whereas teaching was the calmer and more systematic instruction in the details of Christian truth and duty which followed the summons to repentance and saving faith. While preaching and teaching were distinct as functions, they might, in some cases at least, be united in the ministry of one person (1Ti 2:7, 2Ti 1:11), especially as the content both of the preaching and of the more elaborated instruction was necessarily often the same (Act 5:42; Act 15:35, Col 1:28).
(2) The position of teaching.-In the two more formal lists of the spiritually endowed, given by St. Paul, teachers are mentioned after apostles and prophets (1Co 12:28 f., Eph 4:11), and in a less formal list of spiritual functions teaching is mentioned after prophecy (Rom 12:6 f.), whereas in 1 Cor. the word of wisdom and the word of knowledge, which together constituted charismatic teaching, are placed before prophecy (1Co 12:8;1Co 12:10), and a teaching comes before a revelation (1Co 14:26). Prophecy was a specialized form of teaching. The difference between the two, says A. C. McGiffert, lay in the fact that while prophecy was the utterance of a revelation received directly from God, teaching, specifically so called, was the utterance of that which one had gained by thought and reflection. The teacher might be led and guided by the Spirit,-indeed, he must be, if he were to be a true teacher and his teaching truly spiritual,-but what he said was in a real sense his own (History of Christianity in the Apostolic Age, Edinburgh, 1897, p. 529). Some prophets were able also to teach, but not all teachers were able to prophesy. The apostles might also teach. St. Paul speaks of himself as appointed to be both an apostle and a teacher (1Ti 2:7, 2Ti 1:11). Teachers, like apostles and prophets, travelled about from place to place, being greatly honoured (Did. iv. 1) and having the right to expect support (ib. xiii. 1-3). They were not officials appointed by any ecclesiastical body. Teaching was not a clerical office, for even as late as the 5th cent. laymen are mentioned as teachers (Apostolic Constitutions, VIII. xxxii.). But local congregations tested both the message and the moral character of these visiting instructors. Teachers were more likely than apostles and prophets to settle down in one place, and the reference to pastors and teachers (Eph 4:11) shows this tendency at work. At a later stage it was one of the qualifications of a bishop that he should be apt to teach (1Ti 3:2).
(3) Limitations and dangers.-Women were not permitted to teach (1Ti 2:12)-at least in public-although, apparently in harmony with St. Pauls healthful teaching (Tit 2:1), it was allowable for aged women to impart moral instruction (privately, it would seem) as part of the Christian training of young women in such duties as love of husband and children, sobriety, chastity, and kindness (Tit 2:4 f.). Warnings against false teachers occur frequently in apostolic and sub-apostolic times. From the first, Judaizers dogged the footsteps of the apostles (Act 15:1; Act 21:27 f., Gal 1:7) to pervert the teaching of the gospel. Next, the existence of many teachers within the Church (Jam 3:1) promoted an unhealthy spirit of rivalry and faction which could be eliminated only by a demand for a good life in one who professed, as a teacher, to be wise and understanding (Jam 3:13). Then strange teachings began to multiply (Heb 13:9). False teachers arose, encouraging lusts of the flesh (2Pe 2:2; 2Pe 2:18), fornication (Rev 2:14; Rev 2:20), false doctrine (1Jn 2:28 f., 1Jn 4:1 f., 1Ti 1:3, 2Ti 4:3 f.), being prompted, too often, by a covetous love of gain (2Pe 2:3; 2Pe 2:14, Tit 1:11).
(4) Methods of teaching.-Instruction was often given collectively, in public or in private, in the temple and at home (Act 5:42), in the Christian congregation (Act 11:26), and more generally in the meeting for edification such as St. Paul describes in detail (1 Corinthians 14). In the latter the teaching came between the psalm (or hymn of praise) and the prophetic revelation (1Co 14:26). Supplementary teaching was given privately from house to house (Act 20:20) or to individuals (Act 18:26). The imparting of Christian truth to catechumens, who were to contribute towards the support of their teacher (Gal 6:6), developed in the more settled churches of cities and even villages (Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica (Eusebius, etc.) VII. xxiv. 6). Many churches came to have regular schools for the teaching of catechumens, that of Alexandria being especially famous in later times.
The teaching was oral, as a rule, but it might be conveyed by means of didactic epistles, such as those contained in the NT or those of Clement of Rome and Ignatius, or works like the Didache and the Shepherd of Hermas. In addition to a recital of the facts concerning the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ (Rom 1:3 f., 1Co 15:1 ff., Gal 4:4 f.), there would be doctrinal explanations of these facts, such as those contained in Acts and the Epistles. Then there were authoritative accounts of such institutions as the Christian sacrament (1Co 11:23 f.). Instruction was also conveyed in hymns and spiritual songs (Col 3:16) and would include admonition (Col 1:28), exhortation (1Ti 4:13; 1Ti 6:2), and even reproof and rebuke (2Ti 4:2), the administration of which called for patience and longsuffering on the part of the teacher.
(5) Historical development.-The place of teaching in the early Church underwent modification in process of time. In the earliest stage it was somewhat overshadowed by the supernatural gifts of prophecy and tongues. To the ordinary listener, the presence and influence of the Spirit were more evident in the revelations of prophecy or the ecstatic utterances of tongues than in the calmer discourse of teaching. Against the tendency to ascribe undue, importance to glossolalia St. Paul had early to make protest in the interest of prophecy (1 Corinthians 14). A second stage was reached when the early enthusiasm roused by prophetic and ecstatic speech cooled down and greater attention was given to the more systematic utterance of the teacher. The prophetic gift was sporadic, that of teaching was continuous; the former came by momentary inspiration, the latter was the outcome of long experience; and in the long run teaching won the day. The effect of stricter oversight and completer organization tended (up to a certain point) to encourage it. The very directions given by St. Paul to the Corinthians for the orderly conduct of their edification meetings gave to teaching a growing importance in the process of spiritual upbuilding. In the third stage (noticeable in the 2nd cent.) the function of teaching became absorbed in the office of administration and leadership. The teacher outlasted both the apostle and the prophet, but was eventually subordinated to the bishop, who combined in his office the functions of ruling and teaching. In earlier times the apostles, prophets, and teachers had authority because they possessed gifts of insight and knowledge qualifying them to give directions in belief and practice. But, as the need for organization and discipline increased pari passu with the decline of inspired utterance, teaching, at first overshadowed by prophecy, now became absorbed by leadership, although it remained a permanent function in the Church.
2. The content of Christian teaching.-The NT Epistles and the specimens of instruction preserved in Acts embody the content of Christian teaching during the 1st century. The amplification and modification of this primitive norm of belief and practice can be traced in the Didache, the Epistles of Clement and Ignatius, and the Shepherd of Hermas in the immediately succeeding years.
The detailed exposition and co-ordination of the contents of Christian teaching will be found in the various articles dealing with the subjects concerned. All that can be attempted here is to characterize broadly the early Christian teaching as a body of truth. Compared with the varied literature of the ancient world it was exclusively religious in character, and in contrast with the philosophic speculations of the Greek and Hellenistic schools it claimed to be a body of revealed truth. The Christian teacher did not so much unfold a philosophy of religion as expound and apply the truths embodied and revealed in Christ. He taught in the name of Jesus (Act 4:18; Act 5:28), he used the doctrines of the OT inasmuch as they bore witness of Christ, he repeated the teaching given by Christ with the formula Remember the words of the Lord Jesus (Act 20:35), he continued in the apostles doctrine (Act 2:42), and as occasion arose he applied the principles underlying the teaching of Jesus to the doctrinal and ethical problems that arose within the Church. In the later Epistles a conservative tendency is noticeable. The content of Christian teaching came to be fixed and authoritative. It was called the teaching (1Ti 6:1, 2Jn 1:9; cf. Rev 22:18 f.) or the sound doctrine (2Ti 4:3). St. Paul early utters a warning to the Romans against departing from the doctrine which ye learned (Rom 16:17), and later Timothy is called a good minister because he had been nourished in the words of the faith, and of the good doctrine (1Ti 4:6), and in which he had continued.
The general character of the content of the teaching may be inferred from the fact that it is described (1Co 12:8) as the word of wisdom ( ) and as the word of knowledge ( ). The message of the teacher consisted of a discourse in which either wisdom or knowledge () would predominate according to the special nature of the gift of teaching bestowed. A difference is to be noted between wisdom and gnosis. The former consisted in an acquaintance with Gods wisdom (1Co 1:21), or the Divine plan of redemption, which St. Paul calls elsewhere the mystery of God (1Co 2:1). O. Pfleiderer describes it as the knowledge of elementary Christian truths in the simplest and most direct form of actual fact (Paulinism, Eng. translation , 2 vols., London, 1877, i. 235). On the other hand, knowledge (gnosis) came by intuition and consisted of insight into truth through spiritual illumination. In Christian wisdom the truth was arrived at by the teachers powers of observation and reasoning; in the Christian gnosis the truth was bestowed as an immediate gift of the Spirit. The first enabled the teacher to explain the truth, the latter qualified him to interpret it. The knowledge of the teacher was largely an experimental acquaintance with the process of human redemption through Christ (Php 3:10).
The continuity of NT with OT teaching must not be overlooked. The teacher began with such truths as were common to Judaism and Christianity. The fundamental doctrine of the existence, unity, and holiness of God he would learn from the OT. He appropriated the Jewish beliefs as to the creation of the world and the nature and sinfulness of man. He insisted on the primary demands of the Moral Law.
After allowing for what was taken over from the OT and embodied in the NT, the remaining subject-matter of specifically Christian teaching consists of two elements-doctrinal and ethical.
(1) Doctrinal content.-The outstanding and ever-recurring subject in Christian instruction was the Person and Work of Christ. St. Pauls declaration to the Corinthians that he determined not to know anything among them save Jesus Christ and him crucified (1Co 2:2) was true of himself not only as a preacher, but also as a teacher. The teaching of apostolic times, whether soteriological, eschatological, or practical, was essentially Christocentric. While the preacher, as a herald (), made his proclamation that Jesus was the Christ of God, and the Saviour of mankind, the teacher, in the meeting for edification or to individual listeners, had to unfold and explain the deep truths involved in this momentous fact.
The story of the events of the earthly life of Jesus, together with an account of His sinless character and His death and resurrection, had to be told (1Co 15:1 ff., 2Co 8:9, Gal 4:4 f.) much in the same way as it has been preserved for us in the Four Gospels. But the doctrinal and theological implications of these historical facts had to be made explicit by appeal both to Scripture and to spiritual experience. The gospel concerning Jesus Christ needed much exposition. In order that men should intelligently believe that Jesus was the promised Christ, as proved by His resurrection according to the scriptures (1Co 15:4), that He was the Saviour of sinful men through His expiatory death upon the Cross (Rom 5:6; Rom 5:8, 2Co 5:18; 2Co 5:21), that He was the redeeming head of the human race (Rom 5:15, 1Co 15:22), that, moreover, He was the eternal Son of God and the creative ideal of the whole universe (Eph 1:10, Col 1:16 f., Col 2:9), time was needed, and methods of explanation which were not at the disposal of the preacher. To the teacher was allotted the important task of expounding and co-ordinating the truths proclaimed in the preaching of the gospel.
The experiences of salvation, which came to believers through their faith in Christ, required reflective consideration; hence the prominence given in Christian teaching to the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. The historic gift of the Day of Pentecost proved to be also the indwelling principle of the new Divine life in redeemed men (Rom 5:5; Rom 8:14, 1Co 2:12, Gal 4:5, Eph 3:16). Although the dogma of the Divine Trinity was the outcome of much later reflexion, the elements of a doctrine of the three-fold nature of the Divine existence emerged in the teaching of the 1st century.
The preacher having summoned men to repentance and saving faith in Christ, the teacher exhibited the resultant state of salvation in many aspects. The legal aspect required the teacher to present the truth as evangelical justification; its regenerative results enabled him to speak of it as a new creation. The family life illustrated the blessing as adoption and the possession of filial consciousness. The Jewish Dispensation supplied such ideas as the New Covenant and royal priesthood, by which the Christians new relationship to God could be understood. Religious and ceremonial observances in the ancient world afforded the basis for a fresh and more ethical conception of salvation as mystical union with a dying and risen Saviour or as sanctification through the indwelling Holy Spirit.
Moreover, things to come occupied a large place, not only in the teaching of Jesus, but in the more developed doctrine of the apostles. The preacher heralded an impending Parousia; he exhorted his hearers to repentance in view of the certain approach of Christ as Judge; he proclaimed the sure and certain hope of resurrection. The teacher, on the other hand, while including these great truths in his doctrinal instruction, had many questions to face in view of the apocalyptic fancies and hopes so rife in contemporary Judaism and the Greek speculations concerning immortality so widely propagated through the Hellenistic schools of religious philosophy. The very lapse of time brought its problems. The hope and belief of the primitive Church that Christ was immediately to appear called for explanation in view of what would appear to some a disappointing postponement. This drew from the teacher a deeper and more spiritual interpretation of eschatological truth. 2 Thessalonians shows St. Paul, as teacher, correcting the hopes roused in his hearers by the eschatological message of St. Paul, as preacher (Act 17:3, 1Th 1:10; 1Th 4:13 f.). In Corinthians the Apostle deals with problems of individual immortality raised through the grim fact of death among believers. In his later Epistles the cosmical aspect of things to come emerges as implicated in his maturer and final teaching concerning Christ as the eternal Son of God, who existed before the visible universe and in whom all created things are recapitulated (Eph 1:10 f.) and will find their final consummation in glory (Php 3:20 f., Col 1:13 ff.).
(2) Ethical content.-In speaking of the teaching of Jesus or the apostles teaching, it is usually the doctrinal or theological content that is primarily thought of, to the exclusion of the practical and moral. But a careful study of the records and specimens of our Lords instruction and that of His followers shows that the proportion of ethical teaching is very great. The historic interest in apostolic doctrine aroused through centuries of controversy has overshadowed the moral teaching. While it may be straining the niceties of philosophical terminology to speak of the ethics of the NT as though it constituted a system of moral principles and precepts based on human reason, yet no one can be blind to the substantial body of ethical teaching contained in the NT. In the apostolic and sub-apostolic literature this teaching receives full and explicit exposition. Nor again can any one overlook the influence of such moral teaching upon the subsequent developments of human civilization.
The teacher in apostolic times based his moral commands as to conduct upon the requirements of the Moral Law. But there was a distinctively Christian way (Act 9:2) or mode of life, which was taught and applied by the Christian teacher much in the same manner as the Jewish Rabbis dealt with their Halakha. The authoritative norm of such teaching was the moral teaching of Jesus as Lord. Hence St. Paul speaks of my ways which be in Christ, even as I teach everywhere in every church (1Co 4:17). In warning the Ephesians against their former Gentile vices, the Apostle says, Ye did not so learn Christ; if so be that ye heard him, and were taught in him (Eph 4:20). The various precepts, however, were all applications of the central principle of love, thus fulfilling the law of Christ (Gal 5:14; Gal 6:2). Negatively, the Christian ethic prohibited open vice, such as fornication and drunkenness; it exposed the sinfulness of spiritual errors, such as pride and covetousness; positively, it enjoined purity, self-control, humility, and above all Christian love (). The supreme end of moral perfection, of holiness, was set before believers by the apostles and teachers, whom we see not only instructing converts in doctrine, but also admonishing every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ (Col 1:28).
Literature.-In addition to the works quoted above, see W. F. Adeney, article Teacher, Teaching, in Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible (5 vols) ; T. M. Lindsay, The Church and the Ministry in the Early Centuries2, London, 1903; E. von Dobschtz, Christian Life in the Primitive Church, Eng. translation , do., 1904; C. von Weizsacker, The Apostolic Age of the Christian Church2, do., 1897-99.
M. Scott Fletcher.
Fuente: Dictionary of the Apostolic Church
Teaching
Twelve Hebrew words are used to convey the idea of teaching in the O.T in Deu 6:7, ‘Thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children,’ the word Shanan (), to whet or sharpen, is used. Here the idea seems to be not so much the sharpening of the children’s understanding as the plying of the Divine statutes to and fro in their hearts, and the setting forth God’s truth in all its aspects in 2Ch 30:22, where we are told that the Levites ‘taught the good knowledge of the Lord,’ the word Sacal (, Ass. sukhallu, ‘intelligence’), ‘to make wise,’ [This word, which is almost always used in the Hiphil voice, seems to signify sometimes the receiving and sometimes the giving of instruction in Dan 12:3 the words ‘they that be wise’ might be rendered ‘they that teach’ Sacal has sometimes been rendered prosper, as in Jer 33:5, ‘A king shall reign and prosper;’ but it may here signify do wisely, or give instruction. The title of several of the Psalms, maschil, is derived from it. The LXX usually renders it and .] is used, to mark the fact that the Levites were not content with superficial teaching. The same word is found in Pro 16:23, ‘The heart of the wise teacheth his mouth.’ in Isa 43:27, ‘Thy teachers have transgressed against me,’ the marginal rendering ‘interpreters’ is probably the best, reference being made to the expositors () of the law in Pro 31:1, and Eze 23:48, Yasar (), ‘to chasten,’ is used, a word which answers to the Greek , by which it is usually rendered, the instruction often involving chastisement in Psa 105:22 we find Chacam (), a word often heard in a modern Jewish school, and cognate with the Arabic hakim, a wise man in Exo 18:20 the word used is Zahar (), to illuminate, and hence to warn. Thus the analogy of spiritual and intellectual light was set before Israel at the beginning of their history. This is the word rendered shine in Dan 12:3.
Alaph (), a verb connected with the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet, is found in Job 33:33, ‘I shall teach thee wisdom,’ and 35:11, (God) ‘teacheth us more than the beasts of the earth, and maketh us wiser than the fowls of heaven.’ It is also found in chap.15:5, ‘Thy mouth uttereth (margin, teacheth) thine iniquity.’ Compare Pro 22:25, ‘Lest thou learn his ways.’ Evil, like good, has its alphabet. Davar (), to speak or to broach a subject, is used in Jer 28:16; Jer 29:32, ‘Thou hast taught rebellion against the Lord.’ The so-called prophetic utterances of Hananiah had really been rebellious words. Bin (), ‘to make to understand,’ is found in 1Ch 25:8, where the teacher is put in contrast, or rather in compare, with the scholar; it also occurs in 2Ch 35:3, and Neh 8:9, with reference to the teaching of the Levites. Yada (, Ass. idu), ‘to make to know,’ is used in Deu 4:9, and Jdg 8:16, ‘He taught the men of Succoth,’ i.e. gave them a less on which they would not readily forget. Compare 2Ch 23:13; Ezr 7:25; Job 32:7; Job 37:19; Psa 90:12; Pro 9:9; and Isa 40:13.
Lamad (, Ass. Iamadu), whence the name Talmud is derived, is frequently used; it signifies to chastise, and hence to teach, and is rendered , and . Also Yarah (), to cast forth, hence to .guide or direct, is applied to teaching several times. The master and the scholar in Mal 2:12 are literally the awakener and the answerer. It is the teacher’s business to awaken thought in the heart of the pupil, and it is the scholar’s business to answer to the test to which his understanding is put.
Fuente: Synonyms of the Old Testament
Teaching
See Instruction; Minister, A Sacred Teacher, Duties of
Instruction; Minister, A Sacred Teacher, Duties of