fortunately, and come to a definite conclusion as to how the Truth was still regarded from

approximately the middle of the second century onwards. We must bear in mind that, by

this time, the churches were spread widely throughout the Roman Empire and in the east,

beyond it.

This was an early manual of Church instruction, claiming to give the teaching of

the Lord as handed down through the twelve Apostles. It probably had as its basis

Matt. 28: 19, "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations baptizing them in the name of

the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things

whatsoever I have commanded you". The Didache was discovered in a Greek manuscript

at Constantinople in 1873, and published by Bryennius ten years later. It is apparently

composite, and dates from the early part of the second century. An earlier Latin version

has been discovered which Professor E. J. Goodspeed considers is separate from the

work, a primitive form of it. The Didascalia, late in the third century, and the Apostolic

Constitutions, late in the fourth, clearly made use of The Didache. We can say it is

roughly contemporary with Ignatius, Polycarp and 1 Clement.

It evidently had the recent convert in mind, and presents the Christian life under the

titles of the "Way of Life" as opposed to the "Way of Death", but when we step from

the N.T. to this writing, it is like entering another world. Do we find set forth the

"worthy walk" and the practical outworking of the Truth as set forth in the epistles of

Paul? The answer is decidedly `No'. We are back in a negative legalism, and one

wonders whether the author or authors had the slightest understanding of the body of

Truth given by the Lord through this great servant of His. When we remember how

much Paul's indignation and wonder was evoked by the legalistic spirit that had affected

the Galatians, we cannot help feeling that his cause for amazement would have been

increased a hundredfold, could he have lived a half century or more later and read this

document. One might be pardoned for looking on it solely as a Jewish writing, for there

is strangely wanting the great characteristic of grace and love that permeate the Gospel of

Christ as made known through the Apostle of the Gentiles;  in fact the failure to

distinguish between Law and Grace, Salvation and Reward is most characteristic, as the

following quotations will show: