Week 12: The Didache
Section 2: The Earliest Christian Writings—Paul and His Competitors
Programming note: There will not be a reading guide next week. I’ll be traveling for part of the week, so I decided to just take a break since I cannot be sure I can commit the necessary time to writing a whole guide. We’ll be back in two weeks to start Romans.
Questions
Explain why Paul says Jesus had to die for our sins if atonement for sins is no a concept until Martin Luther?
The Didache
(50 CE - 150 CE) Link
Introduction
Happy Easter everyone. Perhaps if I had been a good planner or had any foresight whatsoever I might have made this week’s reading line up with the Easter celebrations. But, sadly, you’re stuck with me and my hyper focus on topic. Hopefully you find this as interesting as I do, and we can think deeply about Easter and the resurrection in Section 3.
In Greek didache simply means “teaching”. The longer title of this book is The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles. The Didache seems to function kind of like a user manual for the Jesus Movement. It does not read like much of the early Christian writings we have seen, which is part of what makes it so interesting to scholars. It appears to provide us a window into the early functions of a much more Jewish based faith, though late enough that serious distinctions exist between these teachings and Judaism. Because of this the most likely data is after the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. Most scholars believe that some serious tension was created between Judaism and the Jesus movement after the Temple was destroyed and the synagogue became the center of Jewish life. This is often reflected in the anti-Judaism within Matthew and John, where traditional synagogue centered Jews are labeled as the bad guys. Most scholars think that the Jesus Movement may have been thrown out of their synagogues for teaching that Jesus was the Messiah—a particularly painful message for Jews to hear given they had just seen several would-be messiahs fails so spectacularly that their sacred Temple had been destroyed.
However, dating the Didache is not quite so simple. Some of the material seems to be even earlier, and some could be much later. Most scholars believe the materials may have been compiled in the early Second Century, and possibly more material was added a little later than that. However, it is a really valuable document because so much of it appears to be early material that gives us a unique insight into the practices and beliefs of the early Jesus Movement. This gives us a firm piece of evidence that demonstrates just how different the Jesus Movement was from the proto-orthodox church, and shows us the variety in early Christianity was large and not simply a single theology as we have traditionally learned.
The material within the Didache reads as parallel to Judaism, and thus there may be some authenticity to the claimed title. That is to say, much of the material may be sourced from the twelve, and could have been learned from Jesus before he was killed. There is little in the way of theology or doctrine, but the Didache is useful to see practically the type of church opposed by Paul. Take special note of the difference in practice for ceremonies and customs between the Didache and orthodox Christianity. Rituals such as baptism and sacrament notably bear almost no resemblance to those that are more Greek in nature and were developed by the early proto-orthodox movement. Instead, these rituals read as thoroughly Jewish. The Didache seems to be organized as fundamental teaching in the first six chapters, and then basic instruction after this.
Chapter Notes
Chapter 1
The way of life should immediately be familiar to every Christian. What most Christians don’t know is this is not a teaching original to Jesus, but was a core Jewish teaching for a least a few hundred years before Jesus. In fact, when Jesus teaches to love God he is quoting the Shema, found in Deuteronomy 6:4-5. The second command, to love one’s neighbor as one’s self, comes from Leviticus 19:18. These highlight the centrality of Judaism to Jesus and the Jesus Movement. That the Jesus Movement chose to emphasize these tells us a lot about their beliefs. They are quite similar to the pharisaic school of thought of Rabbi Hillel. The core teachings of Jesus seem to be fairly similar, but the apocalypticism that is central to the Jesus Movement suggests Jesus incorporated his expectation of the Kingdom of God into Hillel pharisaism, and seems to have brought along some rituals, practices, and teachings adjacent to the Essenes to sort of create a standard of behavior for those who would be in the Kingdom of God.
I know that sounds really crazy that I would call Jesus a Pharisee given how much Jesus seems to hate Pharisees in the gospels, but I don’t think this is the case. We’ll cover this more when we get to the gospels, but for now, to prove my point, let’s read v2 together
Now this is the way of life: first, “you shall love God, who made you”; second, “your neighbor as yourself”; and “whatever you do not wish to happen to you, do not do to another.”
Now, let’s read the Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 31a
On another occasion it happened that a certain non-Jew came before Shammai and said to him, ‘Make me a convert, on condition that you teach me the whole Torah while I stand on one foot.’ Thereupon [Shammai] repulsed him with the builder's cubit that was in his hand. When [the non-Jew] went before Hillel, he said to him, ‘What is hateful to you, do not to your neighbor: that is the whole Torah, the rest is the commentary; go and learn it.”
The similarities are unmistakable. The Didache even directly quotes Hillel in it’s opening teaching. What Jesus often seems to be doing when he criticizes the Pharisees actually sounds more like a political/theological disagreement with the Shammai school, admittedly embellished by Matthew to make the Jews look like the bad guys.
One thing I love about the quotation from Jesus is that he says the second commandment is “like it” or “like unto it” depending on your translation. What this actually says is that “the second is homous to it”. If we remember from last week the meaning of homous in context of the homous-logos that was confession of sins, then we can understand Jesus as saying the second commandment—to love others—is exactly the same thing as the first—loving God. Meaning, to Jesus, loving others is how we love God. I think the importance of that teaching comes across pretty clearly here in the Didache.
It says a lot about the differences between the Jesus Movement and the proto-orthodox movement that the opening lines of the Didache are core teachings of Jesus, while Paul almost never quotes a single thing from Jesus. I am not saying one is better, or one is more correct, I am certainly not qualified to make that judgement, but it does help illustrate the differences between the movements and their focuses.
In v4, before the teaching of Jesus to turn the other cheek, the Didache teaches to abstain from bodily cravings. This mastery of the soul, from Plato, was also very influential in Judaism. Many Greeks became God Fearers because they thought strict Torah observance was a good method to master the soul. This teaching would have been key to attracting Greeks.
V5-6 are mostly teachings that appear to be quotations, but are not in the gospels. These may come from another source (possibly James or the 12) and should probably be understood to be teachings of Jesus. The emphasis is clear: charitable giving and agape are indispensable for followers of Jesus who wish to enter the Kingdom of God.
Chapter 2
In Chapter 2 we see much stricter sexual ethics than are ever laid out by Paul. Paul says no adultery and no porneia, which the Didache also teaches. However, the Didache is also explicit about having sex with children—something that Paul perhaps says when he talks about when he writes against malakoi, arsenokoitai. But, we really don’t know exactly what he means when he says this. The Didache also forbids murder, infanticide, and abortion. Abortion was surprisingly common in Rome. Most philosophy at the time—most notably stoics for the purpose of Rome—considered life to begin at the first breath. There is a lot of overlap here between the pneuma and the breath of life God breathed into Adam. For Jews and Greeks this breath was the soul, or at least the evidence of the soul. In Genesis all creatures are called “breathers” or “life breathers”, but only after God blows into Adam is he called a “living breather” or “living life breather”. This is commonly misunderstood by Christians today because verses like that in Jeremiah refer to God knowing someone before pregnancy. The Didache stands out here as uncommon because it seems to recognize a fetus as a child, where no scriptures in the Biblical canon do, and most other philosophies of the time, only considered a baby to be human at its first breath.
Sadly, abandoning a newborn was common, especially female newborns, in Rome. Often they were found and raised as slaves or sex workers. Several prominent philosophies hated this practice, and the Jesus Movement agrees with them as to the abhorrence of it.
The rest of the chapter sounds an awful lot like Jewish ethics. Not so surprising since the Jesus Movement was a Jewish philosophy. But, much of this probably sounds weird to modern Christians who are used to the Greek centered Christianity of Paul and have not encountered a Jewish Jesus following group.
These teachings sound pretty good, highly ethical, right? That may come as a surprise to modern Christians who learned the Pauline model that the Law of Moses is a terrible, horrible, no good, dirty rotten, very bad law, and the only purpose of it is to enslave people and create a harsh society for a harsh God. This mischaracterization is unfortunate, and only exists to try to justify the need for orthodox Christianity. As the Didache makes clear, the actual Law of Moses in practice is far different than modern Christianity teaches.
Chapter 3
This sounds an awful lot like the ethics in the Sermon on the Mount, and that is probably exactly where this comes from. That the Didache did not simply quote Matthew makes some scholars believe the much of the material predates Matthew, and this helps give credibility to the Sermon on the Mount as an authentic teaching of Jesus. The general principle is that if an action should be avoided then anything that might contribute to or lead to an attitude conducive to that action should be avoided too. The Didache expands on that idea to new issues that faced the Jesus Movement directly. Oddly, bird watching is mentioned in v4. I simply don’t know enough about bird watching in the Roman Empire to understand why.
Apparently, because of the multiple mentions here, the early Jesus Movement had a strong preoccupation with magic. There are Roman sources that accuse Christians of magic when they are attempting or calling for miracles. Perhaps the two were quite closely linked in the eyes of new followers, and the church had to instruct or distinguish between the two. Several other mystery cults, such as Mithras, Isis, and Dionysus were said to have practiced magic, and early Pauline Christianity has several parallels with these. Thus, the accusation would seem to fit the mold even if no magic was actually practiced by the churches themselves.
Chapter 4
The opening verses of Chapter 4 sound quite a lot like stoicism. The connection between stoic philosophy and early Christianity is unmistakable. While Paul uses Greek philosophy to help his audience understand his message, we haven’t seen him use a lot of stoicism directly. However, after Paul, as is evident in the Gospels, stoicism has a large influence on Christianity. With the Didache it seems the Jesus Movement held stoic thought in high esteem, and this may be an indication that Jesus himself did so as well. However, as we will see, the teachings of Jesus are by no means exclusive to stoicism. Perhaps, because of the clear influence Paul had on later proto-orthodoxy, he was also quite stoic, and we simply don’t see it because he is writing letters to address or respond to specific circumstances.
The radical generosity of the Jesus Movement brings to mind the information in Acts that the early church shared all their material goods communally. These are more indications of just how serious Jesus was about the moral dangers of wealth. These instructions on giving sound a lot like the Roman stoic philosopher Seneca, who felt that improper giving could make receivers feel like slaves to their donors.
It may seem like a strange transition to move from giving to directly addressing children and slaves, but this actually makes a lot of sense in the context of philosophy. Seneca, again, connects the two with his interest in proper giving. The instruction to children and slaves in v9-11 also sounds quite a bit like Seneca, who argued that people should treat their slaves in such a way that the slaves serve out of respect rather than fear. For Seneca, the noble slave or child feels they owe their parent or master and can bring benefits in to the world by doing more than is required.
Chapters 5-6:2
Unfortunately for me, Chapter 5 specifically lists “obscene speech” [aischrologia] as evil. Oh well, good thing Paul won and he never tells me I’m evil. That’s how this works…right? On a more serious note, it isn’t exactly clear what constitutes obscenity in this context. What is obscene changes over time based on culture, and as we have seen Paul used foul language, and as we will see, Jesus did too. So, we don’t know exactly what the Didache defines as obscene because we can’t place the writing to an exact date or place. Obscenity may not refer to the words used, but to the topic or content of speech. We simply don’t know.
Strike two against me. “audacity” [afovia], literally meaning to be fearless or intrepid, is also apparently evil. Maybe I should tone it down just a notch when I’m talking about shitty traditions that aren’t actually scriptural? Nah, I didn’t think so.
Maybe v2 is describing the results of v1. In which case, as long as we don’t do those things then perhaps obscenity and audacity don’t count too much against us.
In 6:2 we get a really interesting comment. “If you are able to bear the whole yolk of the Lord [Jesus], you will be perfect. But if you are not able, then do what you can.” This sheds a lot of light on Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount to be perfect as God is perfect. Perhaps perfection is not quite the same thing as sinless, they way modern Christianity seems to think it is? The Greek teleios might be better translated as “complete” or “not missing something”. The implication here seems to be that if someone follows these instructions and is generous in giving, has agape, and doesn’t focus on one’s own good against the good of the whole then they may considered teleios, even if they have committed some sins. I could be wrong, but that is how this seems to read to me. Paul phrased it as “agape covers a multitude of sins” in 1 Corinthians. The idea that Jesus would tell us all to never commit sin is a later interpretation once the concept of atonement is more fully developed and the understanding of sin changes away from the cosmic evil to something closer to what we think now.
Chapter 6:3-8
It’s kind of an awkward transition that these instructions on the way of life end, and the how-to manual begins in the middle of a chapter. But, as we have seen so many times, these chapter divisions are strange and meaningless. The instruction in the Didache is directly opposite Paul’s instruction. Here, the Jesus Movement is clear that eating meat sacrificed to other Gods is strictly prohibited.
It is a little bit weird to see such specific expectations for baptism, and so many exemptions too! But, this is where the instruction manual part of the Didache starts.
The hypocrites mentioned in 8:1 are the Jews, who fasted on Monday and Thursday. This is interesting context for the Jesus Movement. James seemed to be thoroughly Jewish, and Jesus seemed to have disagreements internal to Judaism (we’ll unpack that more in Section 3), but here there seems to be a distinction between the Jesus Movement and Judaism as the Didache calls all Jews hypocrites. This can be why dating the Didache is so difficult. This does not seem to fit in the context of James prior to his death in 62 CE. Perhaps, then, this dates to after the destruction of the Temple when there began to be a rift between Jews and the Jesus Movement. It may also be that some parts of the Didache are later than others, and this section is not one of the earliest.
Chapter 9-10
If you are reading closely, this communion is pretty strange. Nowhere in here is there any mention of the blood or the body of Christ! Isn’t that the whole point of the communion?!?! Well…that depends on whether we put more weight on Paul, or on James. Once again it is more likely that the James version is what the actual Jesus did when he was alive. However, it may be that the risen Christ gave Paul different instructions. In fact, this is exactly what Paul says—that he received his communion instruction directly from the risen Christ (1 Corinthians 11:23-26). However, given the Jewishness of Jesus, we have to see this version in the Didache as more authentic to the human Jesus. Judaism abhors anything like cannibalism, if for none other reason than humans are not kosher, so at the very least it would be like eating pork. The Torah also expressly forbids consuming blood many times, Genesis 9, Leviticus 17, and Deuteronomy 12 are all quite clear about this. For a Jewish Rabbi such as Jesus to have instituted a meal for his followers that was ritualistic cannibalism would have unheard of. In Mark, where the 12 are devout Jews, and never understand who Jesus is, it is almost impossible to believe they would have gone along with it and not raised quite a protest. Now, perhaps you are still trying to deal with the fact that I just called the communion ritual cannibalism. This cognitive dissonance is easy to understand; cannibalism is bad, but the communion is good, so how could the communion be cannibalism? Well, as far as I am aware, most major sects of Christianity subscribe to the idea of transubstantiation—that the bread and the wine are literally the body and blood of Christ—or consubstantiation—that the bread and the wine coexist in union with the body and blood of Christ. In either one of these cases the belief, whether participants are aware of this or not, is that they are eating flesh and drinking blood. That is definitional cannibalism for anyone who takes their faith literally.
Instead, what the communion in the Didache sounds like is a Jewish meal of Thanksgiving, even similar to a Passover meal. Because Jesus was thoroughly Jewish it fits that he instituted a commemorative or Thanksgiving meal for his followers during the final week of his life, when he may have thought the end was coming and he would be made king. Normally in Christianity, and this seems true as far back as Paul, the process of the communion is the bread/body, followed by the wine/blood. The Didache reverses this in a more traditionally Jewish pattern of wine then bread. There is evidence that this was the original pattern even in Luke, who seems to attempt to merge the two traditions (recall, Luke may be quite late in the game) by making that pattern wine, bread/body, wine/blood (Luke 22:14-20). Notice that in the first instance the wine is not blood at all.
Paul, on the other hand, seems to be sticking with his strategy of making Christ familiar to Greeks in order to make conversion easier and more likely for them. Mystery cults were fairly common in the Greco-Roman world. These cults often promised some sort of salvation, secret knowledge, or enlightenment through some sort of secret ritual or teaching for initiates who found themselves worthy and qualified. Think of the fuss around the Masons or the Knights Templar when The Da Vinci Code came out, and that is probably a reasonable parallel to Greco-Roman mystery cults. There were several of these, and we have already mentioned what seem to have been the most prominent—Isis, Dionysus, and Mithras. Not much is known about these cults because members were sworn to secrecy, but one thing that seems to have been common was that the initiates would eat the flesh and drink the blood of the god. It is assumed that this was most often bread and wine, but scholars have found that in some cases the wine had hallucinogenic compounds, and a guided hallucination was used to give the initiate the secret knowledge. This seems fairly similar to guided ayahuasca self realization rituals today. Some of these scholars have suggested that the early Christian communion in some congregations may have even included some hallucinogenic experience—perhaps to induce a vision of the risen Christ. This flesh and blood ritual—whether Paul purposely patterned it after mystery cults, or was instructed to do this by Jesus—would have again been familiar to Greeks, lowering the psychological burden of potential converts because it was not as unfamiliar to them as Judaism would be.
The opening verse of Chapter 10 makes clear this is all in context of the communion meal. This is not a religious ritual with a wafer or small piece of bread and a sip of wine, this is a full meal of thanksgiving and commemoration that keeps going until “you have had enough”.
Interesting that a prophet is permitted to speak how they will, while the rest of the congregation is given a written prayer. This probably all sounds very Jewish—because it was. Apparently each congregation could have a prophet or multiple prophets. Often we get the impression from the Old Testament that there was one prophet at a time for all of Israel. This isn’t the case. We know from archaeological and historic records that kings had several, and perhaps many prophets in their service. In fact, a prophet most often seemed to simply be a royal spiritual advisor. For instance, think about when Saul goes to the witch of Endor to bring Samuel’s spirit up from Sheol. He does so because he is unsatisfied with input from other prophets. We simply only have the written record of Samuel, but it is clear Saul has other prophets as most kings did, both in Judaism and in neighboring religions.
Chapter 11-13
Note that in v3 we have the second time the Didache has referred to a specific gospel (8:2). Given the parallels this sounds a lot like the Gospel of Matthew. The overtones of Matthew are the most Jewish of any of the four gospels in the cannon, and the invective toward Jews is also quite vicious. The same is true of the Didache—it is thoroughly Jewish, yet specifically insults Jews. The insults in the Didache do not seem as extreme as in Matthew, so perhaps Matthew was embellished later as it was copied, or perhaps the Jesus Movement had its own gospel of Jesus’ teachings that did not survive. Early church writers refer to several additional gospels that seem like they would fit, including a Gospel of the Ebionites (the name most commonly associated with the core of the Jesus Movement), and a Hebrew Gospel of Matthew different from our Greek Gospel of Matthew. So these may have existed, and it seems they may have existed prior to our other gospels. Perhaps Mark was writing his in response to one of these because Mark wanted a narrative to frame Jesus after Paul’s understanding.
Apparently some prophets, and certainly the apostles, traveled from one congregation to another. Interesting that in v5 the Didache expressly prescribes the amount of time that a real prophet or apostle will stay (it seems to be assumed one person can or does fill both rolls) before becoming or being found to be a false prophet. Thus it is clear that not all prophets or apostles were well known to the congregations as the 12 would be, and the congregations needed a way to know who might simply be taking advantage of them and becoming a burden. This is really interesting considering this is exactly what Paul seems to accuse those whom James sends of doing. The Didache even specifically says that if they ask for money they are a false prophet.
Speaking in the spirit is interesting here. It really sounds as if it is a formalized practice, that a person clearly knows when one is speaking in the spirit and when they are not—and it is one that anyone can do whether they are a prophet or not. In fact, it seems so common that it cannot be used to determine the validity of a prophet, which can only come through observing their behavior.
I think 11:11 is fascinating, and it really isn’t clear what it means. It kind of reads like those who are true prophets may at times do something that seems like a true prophet would not do. But, as long as they do it for a teaching example and do not encourage others to do it then it is ok? I dunno…it really isn’t clear what it means.
In 12:1 we are told that the congregation will have insight into what is true and false. The Greek here isn’t terribly clear, as it implies that the congregation will collectively be able to grasp an understanding of what is on the right and on the left. What is right and what is wrong is a good translation, but it is not clear what sort of collective grasp of understanding will happen. Translating it as insight—which is a good translation in itself—makes it easy to read modern Christian context into it and imply the spirit will tell what is right and what is wrong, but this isn’t clearly the case here. We can’t say for sure how this insight comes.
12:3-13:7 are interesting. Apparently the congregation is meant to give to a prophet almost as if they are a high priest doing a sacrifice, but only if the prophet does not trade on their preaching, but supports themselves.
The fact that these prophets are considered to be like high priests, and donating to them is similar to a sacrifice, suggests this was written after the Temple was destroyed, as Hegesippus tells us James was holy from his mother’s womb and spent a great deal of time in the Temple. Thus, if this was written during James’ lifetime we would expect these offerings to be brought to the temple. However, it may be that those in the congregation did not have the means to travel to the Temple, so taking goods to the prophet/high priest was a suitable substitute.
Chapter 14-15
It isn’t clear here whether the Lord’s own day is the Jewish Sabbath, or Sunday, the day of resurrection. Either way, it is clear v2 is a teaching directly from Jesus, as Matthew provides us a similar teaching at the end of Chapter 5.
We see in Chapter 15 an actual instruction to choose Bishops and Deacons—something Paul does not do. Paul seems to acknowledge they exist, but his structure, at least as far as we can tell, is much less formal. It is difficult to know if this was what Paul preferred, or if he simply didn’t see a need for structure since he thought that Jesus would be returning so quickly. However, what seems clear is that many congregations adopted the Jesus’ Movement practice of appointing leadership. Or, perhaps, the Jesus Movement saw this practice occurring organically and decided to approve it.
Something I find interesting is that in 15:4 the “acts of charity” are not agape or chairo, as Paul describes them. Instead they are eleimosyna, or things of mercy. Perhaps this is directly in reference to the forgiveness to a repentant offender from v3. Another possibility is that, because the Jesus Movement placed so much emphasis on helping the poor, these actions were viewed as showing them mercy rather than providing them love. This may simply be a difference of frame of reference. As Paul is trying to synthesize his message with Greek philosophy, describing these acts as showing love and/or giving to clients in a patron relationship is simply the best way to get the audience to understand what proper behavior is. Writing to a Jewish audience, or at least an audience of God Fearers who are familiar with Judaism, mercy from God is written into many of the prophetic scriptures and the Law of Moses, so the strategy may be an identification with these.
Chapter 16
The final chapter heavily emphasizes the apocalypticism inherent in all sects of belief in Jesus in the early days. This was not exclusive to Paul, but clearly a core belief of the Jesus Movement as well. This fact, that sects who seem to have had pretty serious competition and disagreement with each other but both still believed heavily in apocalypticism, is one of the reasons that most independent scholars believe that Jesus was so heavily apocalyptic in his authentic teachings—warning that the Kingdom of God would soon come and the era of evil would end, and people needed to be prepared through correct behavior.
We see a pretty serious difference again with proto-orthodox theology in v2. Here we see again, as we did in James and as we know from Matthew 5, that the Jesus Movement (and likely Jesus himself) taught that people could be perfect, or rather teleios—whole or complete. This was achieved through correct behavior. Paul does not seem to have been willing to accept this.
This is probably a fairly shocking version of the end times for modern Christians used to the traditional rapture-style second coming. The sheep won’t be invaded by wolves in sheep’s clothing, but here the sheep become wolves. It is hard not to read this and project our disgust about the tragic amount of abuse that has taken place within so many churches; abuse I know some of you have been prey to. It is difficult to know for sure what the Didache means by this phrase, and as always we have to be cautious about reading our own culture into it, but this feels like the sort of thing we see today.
Love turning to hate needs no interpretation. We see this far too often from modern Christians who say they love, but do so in word only, or worse, use love as an excuse to hate. Treating someone poorly because of their sexuality, political party, belief system, gender, race, or ethnicity, and then calling it love because you want to “save them” is exactly the sort of thing that makes agape become hate, and this is fairly clear throughout the teaching of Jesus, the Jesus Movement, and even Paul.
Amazing there that the deceiver of the world will appear as a son of God and perform signs and wonders! This is unique to the Didache, but it really isn’t all that shocking if we remember that being a son of God was a fairly common thing in the ancient world. Today we think of Jesus as THE only Son of God, but in Greece, Rome, and Israel anyone who had great achievements could be thought of this way, and many people were. The reference seems to point to an expectation that a Roman Emperor will be the deceiver of the world, and the end of the era of evil will occur during the reign of an evil emperor. Hard to point to which one it might be in this case, because there are several to choose from within the time frame that the Didache was written.
The fiery test here sounds pretty similar to Revelation 20, and this makes sense because that book is also heavily Jewish in its content and influence. Notice that here those who don’t pass the test perish [skandalisqhsontai], at least in most translations. The actual Greek “skandalisqhsontai” is a combination of what we have seen translated as Paul saying “stumbling block” and to be trapped. My Greek is not very good, but most translators take this combination to mean deceived and annihilated, and this makes sense in the context. But, no matter what way this is translated, this definitely does not mean an eternal fiery torment.
Being saved by the curse, or by the cursed one (v5) is a reference to Jesus, and I think the link I gave you says “rock of offense”. It may seem strange to use this to describe Jesus, but that is only because we have 2,000 years of culture around Jesus being perfect and holy and all the interpretive baggage that comes with that. The curse is also acknowledged by Paul in Galatians because the Law of Moses says anyone who hangs on a tree is cursed. This reference is not widely discussed in modern Christianity—which is probably why the translation I gave you says “rock of offense”—since crucifixion would have scandalized and offended people during the time of the Didache.
In the Didache it appears the belief that only the righteous will be resurrected is supported in v7. This was common among Jews, and it was debated whether this would be the case, or whether all would be resurrected and those who failed judgement would be burned and annihilated with the wicked who were alive.
Blind Explanation
Even in two brief letters we can see the sharp differences between the Jesus Movement and the proto-orthodox or Pauline movements. For most Christians it is probably fairly clear just how much Paul influenced the development of Christianity, but what should be clear after reading James and the Didache is how much Paul was influenced by his opposition to the Jesus Movement. It is an interesting thought experiment to imagine how Paul’s writings might be different, and thus the formation of Christianity, had the Jesus Movement not been in direct competition with Paul. If James had decided that Greeks weren’t terribly important, and the Jesus Movement would focus on Judaism and leave Paul to his own, perhaps Paul’s writings would all be as focused on agape as is 1 Corinthians. There may have never been a need for Paul to disparage the law or to build up the concept of faith so much that, at least in the letters, agape appears marginalized. Perhaps because of the law, the Jesus Movement appears to be more strict in their behavioral requirements as well, whereas Paul seems much more liberal in his ethics, and these appear to be somewhat fluid based on who his audience is, and his expectation of the timeline for Jesus’ return.
At its core the dispute between these two earliest sects of Christianity comes down to who Jesus was. For the Jesus Movement he was the Jewish messiah, the expected king in the line of David. The Jesus Movement came to believe, because of the resurrection, that the messiah, the suffering servant, and the cosmic Son of Man who comes in the clouds to usher in the Kingdom of God are the same individual, and that individual was Jesus. Thus, he will be the king when the Kingdom of God comes. But, what modern Christians miss in this because we tend to read our culture into it, is that Jesus was thoroughly Jewish. His teachings and ethics were well in line of Pharisaic Judaism and his practices and rituals appear to have been somewhat adapted from the Essenes. We do not see any worship of Jesus as a deity in James or the Didache; instead, we see gratitude and praise the same way one would give to a king or a great philosopher. We get the impression that Jesus did not want a religious following, but wanted Jews to follow his philosophic and practical teachings so that they could be ready for the Kingdom of God. This was clearly a strictly monotheistic belief.
For Paul, the Christ was divine. The resurrection was evidence that Jesus had been made the Christ. Though “Christ” is just a Greek translation of “messiah”, Paul clearly believed that Christ was now a heavenly being, adopted by God as the first human to successfully become divine. Because of this Christ showed other humans the way, he demonstrated how to overcome sin and death to also become a god. This very Greek understanding meant that Christ had to be worshiped, the same way Greeks understood to worship other gods. Because of this there were now two gods. There is a lot of debate about whether Paul thought Christ was equal to God or whether God would always be the supreme God, but it is clear Paul believes in multiple gods, and believes the number of gods will keep growing as more people are adopted into deity the way Christ was. This belief would have also been right at home for Greeks. Christ did away with the law. The Law of Moses was meant to be exclusionary, according to Paul, saving only those Jews who followed every single aspect. Though this is a mischaracterization of the law, with this premise Paul’s conclusion is logical. Christ shows that God want’s all people in the kingdom, and the law, by its design, cannot accomplish this. Paul sees that it is through Christ that the nations will come to the God of Israel, and his logical conclusion is that this means that no one, not even Jews, should follow the Law of Moses because Christ’s sacrifice placated the wrath of God, and thus there is no more need for sacrifice. Again, this is a mischaracterization of the law, as sacrifices are only a small part of the law, but this was convincing for many Greeks.
What seems interesting, and demonstrates Paul’s misunderstanding of the Law of Moses, is that we have no evidence the Jesus Movement still practiced Mosaic sacrifices. Despite this it is clear they still cared deeply about keeping the Law of Moses, as a strong case can be made (that Paul seems unaware of) that sacrifices are only a small and nonessential part of the law. Even if James is written directly against Paul, it is interesting that the viciousness and venom Paul uses in several places is not present in the writings of the Jesus Movement. This may be indicative of the fact that Paul had a minority status, and fought tooth and nail on the margins for recognition of his theology, while the Jesus Movement, at least prior to the destruction of the Temple, was the standard and the large force that rolled on, and sometimes rolled over Paul. They seem far less concerned with him than he does with them.
The bottom line of all of Section 2 is clear. Christianity was never a monolith. Almost as soon as Jesus died there began to pop up different interpretations of his life and his significance. Paul fought against the Jews who had a very different belief system from anything modern Christians would recognize. Next week we will begin the final book of Section 2, Romans, where Paul attempts to lay out his theology systematically to an audience he has never met. We get what is now Paul’s final argument, and the one that seems to have been most persuasive to Christians decades later who formalized a system of beliefs for what “Christianity” would mean and what it would be. Just as it is impossible to know whether the earthly Jesus or the heavenly Christ would be considered the more accurate and authentic center of worship to God, it is impossible to know if Paul would have won the theological debate had the Jewish Temple not been destroyed. Perhaps the Jesus Movement would have remained firmly within Judaism, or perhaps it would still be competing with orthodox Christianity today as a major or influential philosophy within Judaism.