This Christian text you've never heard of, The Shepherd of Hermas, barely mentions Jesus − but it was a favorite of early Christians far and wide

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Writings that didn’t make it into the Bible, on the other hand, are often called “apocrypha,” a Greek term that refers to hidden or secret things.

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https://theconversation.com/this-christian-text-youve-never-heard-of-the-shepherd-of-hermas-barely-mentions-jesus-but-it-was-a-favorite-of-early-christians-far-and-wide-212737https://theconversation.com/this-christian-text-youve-never-heard-of-the-shepherd-of-hermas-barely-mentions-jesus-but-it-was-a-favorite-of-early-christians-far-and-wide-212737
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Tuesday, September 26, 2023
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People, Gospel, Orthodox, Shepherd, Education, Gospel of Matthew, New Testament, Fear, Research, Emotion, Codex Sinaiticus, Protestantism, Old Testament, Christianity, Self-control, Reading, Catholic Church, British, Church, Book, Jews, Old, Bookbinding, New
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BIBLE, IRELAND, CHINA, ROME
Summary
Key Points: 
  • Writings that didn’t make it into the Bible, on the other hand, are often called “apocrypha,” a Greek term that refers to hidden or secret things.
  • There are hundreds of apocryphal Jewish and Christian texts that, for one reason or another, were not included in different versions of the Bible.
  • Just because a text was deemed apocryphal, however, does not mean that it was unpopular or lacked influence.

Enslaved to God

    • The Shepherd urges self-control and fear of God, trying to instill obedience and avoid allowing emotions like fear or doubt to overcome believers.
    • My own research on the Shepherd focuses on how the text depicts believers as enslaved to God, as is true of some other early Christian literature as well.
    • The writer imagines that God’s holy spirit is able to enter loyal believers’ bodies and possess them, urging them to do what God wills.
    • Instead, readers find a story about an otherwise unknown enslaved man named Hermas experiencing visions and talking with divine beings in the Italian countryside.

‘Useful for the soul’

    • The Shepherd became one of the most popular texts among Christians for the first five centuries C.E.
    • The Shepherd is even included in what scholars consider one of the oldest and most complete Bibles in the world.
    • The Codex Sinaiticus, however, a fourth- or fifth-century manuscript now held at the British Library, ends with the Shepherd.
    • Even figures who did not include the Shepherd among New Testament texts thought it was too important to be discarded.

An open Bible

    • As the Shepherd helps demonstrate, whether a religious text is included or excluded from the Bible is not necessarily an indicator of its popularity or significance.
    • While scholars often lament that the Shepherd is boring, pedantic or too long, its style likely made it ideal teaching material for early Christians.
    • In religious communities, the idea of “canonical texts” can be especially limiting, determining what believers can or can’t read or believe.
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