What Is A Bishop?
In the New Testament, in the Gospel According to St. John, the following passage appears in Chapter 20, verses 19-22, described as occurring after Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection from the dead:
On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.
Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”
Later, in the Acts of the Apostles, the remaining eleven of Jesus’ original twelve disciples/apostles decide to restore their number to twelve, to replace the traitor apostle Judas who had died. In Acts 1:12-26, they voted and cast lots to determine the new apostle, and wound up choosing Matthias. Later in the book of Acts, such as chapters 6 and 8, the apostles lay hands on believers to impart upon them the Holy Spirit and certain powers and authorities, a tradition that stems itself apparently from the Old Testament Jewish practice of laying hands to spread the priesthood and for other functions (see Genesis 27 and Leviticus 16). In later New Testament verses (Philippians 1:1; Acts 20:28; 1 Timothy 3:2-7; Titus 1:5-11 for example), the specific titles of “bishop” and “deacon” and “prebyter” emerge, with the term “bishop” coming from the Greek “episcopos,” which is where we get both the words “bishop” and “episcopacy” (or “episcopalian”). There is some debate within the Christian community over each of these terms and their exact function, but all are broadly understood to stem from these events, practices, traditions, and scriptures.
For the vast majority of Christians worldwide today, it is broadly understood that the direct successors to the apostles are the bishops. The oldest lines of Christianity can point to specific bishops who draw their authority through direct succession by the laying of hands and the Holy Spirit to certain of the original twelve apostles; the current Bishop of Rome in the Catholic Church is widely regarded as the bishop inheritor of the apostleship of Peter, whereas the head bishop of the Assyrian Church of the East is broadly believed to be the successor through the laying of hands of the apostle Thomas, and the head of the Coptic church in Egypt is widely believed to be the successor of the apostle Mark, also directly through the laying of hands and the action of the Holy Spirit.
Thus, when someone asks “where are the apostles today?” most of the world’s Christians would say, “they’re right there” and point to the bishops, whose job is to stand as the apostles, to exercise the teaching authority of the church and to convey lesser offices onto others such as priests and deacons.
What is notable about all this is that, in America at least, there is a large segment of “protestants,” of the evangelical/fundamentalist bent, who know little or nothing about this stuff, or who simply reject it. It is not insulting to say that they are a minority of Christians worldwide, because they are. What I have described here is in no way unique to Roman Catholic theology; it is basically how it is viewed not just by the Roman Catholic Church, but also the Eastern Orthdox, the Oriental Orthodox, the Assyrian Church of the East, and the Independent Catholic movement. Amongst Protestants, this is also the basic view of the Lutherans and the Anglicans/Episcopalians–indeed, the latter group is called “Episcopalian” precisely because they are a branch of Protestantism which accepts this view of apostolic succession, and is thus ruled by Bishops whom they believe to have come down from the original 12 apostles in precisely the same way as all the others (through the original original Archbishop of Canterbury, who received his office through the Bishop of Rome initially but in later generations split with Rome).
It is always difficult to talk about what “Protestants” think about apostolic succession, since there are so many varieties of Protestant. Methodists still use the term “Bishop,” for example, but they mean something a little different by it than the Episcopalians or the Orthodox. I’ve heard that some Pentacostalists and Baptists have taken to using the rank “Bishop” again, and I know the Mormons have their own bishops. I’ve never quite wrapped my head around how the Presbyterians view all this, but they basically seem to have split the difference and lumped everything under the term “elder,” which is what a “presbyter” is. But in short, no one can give you a concrete answer as to what “protestants” think bishops are because there are so many opinions on the matter.
However, all the oldest lines of Christianity view it exactly the same way, whether they’re in communion with the Bishop of Rome or not: a bishop is a successor to the office of apostle, through the laying on of hands and the guidance of the Holy Spirit, from the time of the original 12 apostles to the present day.
For more on bishops as they’re seen in various Christian denominations, see this excellent Wikipedia article.
Next in this series: what’s a Pope?
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10 comments
Question:
If the varying sects of Christianity believe that the authority of the Apostles now reside in the Bishops, assuming this is correct (I’m not going to argue it one way or another), why do the schisms that exist within the Church exist at all? If Apostolic authority is truly handed down as you explain it to be, and this authority is sanctioned by God, shouldn’t all the Bishops within Christianity be on the same page theologically? I mean, why aren’t inroads being made to unify the Church when, instead, we see the exact opposite happening?
Why isn’t there a shift within the Church to truly unify. It’s great to talk about Apostolic authority existing within the office of the Bishop but what does that authority matter if we’re talking about Protestant Bishops, Catholic Bishops, or Orthodox Bishops instead of one universal Bishop that all sects will recognize?
I didn’t comment on the Catholic post, but it was pretty accurate as I learned it while getting my Bible degree from Wheaton College, a very evangelical college.
This post, too, is pretty accurate. (I don’t have statistics on percentages of believers that are Protestant vs. Catholic vs. Orthodox vs. whatever, but it wouldn’t surprise me to learn Dean is right about those, too.)
To come to the defense of Protestantism, I think that a lot of the anti-bishop stuff is a reaction to the specific bishops of past eras, many of whom were terrible, laying on of hands or not. Paul said “Follow me as I follow Christ”, and many Protestants would say that their rejection of the old hierarchy was based on following those who actually had the blessing of God, and not those who had the blessing of some organization which had descended, in their view, into corruption.
Now, maybe some of those Protestants have thrown the baby out with the bath water. But, again, that’s not a vice unique to Protestantism.
Jeff,
You hit the nail on the head when it comes to my rejection of Apostolic Succession. Any vain organization can place their seal upon anyone. Because a seal is placed does not mean whatever is being sealed is worth a lick.
“Follow me as I follow Christ,” seems to say to me there is a way of verifying that Paul is indeed righteously following Christ outside of Apostolic say-so. If there wasn’t these words would be meaningless because we’d only have Paul’s word for knowing how Christ conducted Himself.
So, the question is: If Apostolic Succession fails, what authority do we petition to know the ways of Christ? And if there isn’t an outside authority to take our petitions to, how can we recognize when corruption enters into the Church?
Perhaps I should say instead, my rejection is of how we’re told to accept Apostolic Succession as presented by the Church today. The passing down of authority from one to another is Biblical. I don’t reject that. I do reject that Archbishop So-And-So has Apostolic authority simply because some cabal of men say he does. I follow Christ, not Paul. And if Archbishop So-And-So doesn’t line up with the Word of God he isn’t a man to be listened to.
Apparently some Anabaptists (those radical reformers from whom both fundamentalist Baptists and pacifist Quakers descend) have claimed unbroken apostolic succession as well.
I don’t really have a dog in this fight, but I find the various positions to be rather interesting in themselves, not to mention the interesting fact that many of these positions have analogous ones in various disputes within the Islamic tradition.
Another fine application:
Bishop Pair
“Okay, Devious, don’t move!”
“The Bishop!”
(Note, “Special Effects by the Moderator of the Church of Scotland”)
Liked that one, Paul. Yes, indeed.
Even though Monty Python isn’s exactly my deity either.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
“These powers of Apostles were passed on to the Pope and Bishops. The Bishops, through the ordination of priests, transmit to others to a precise extent the power to consecrate; the power to teach and govern belongs to the Pope and Bishops.
Pope Pius XII
I suppose Monty Python wouldn’t agree.
Your questions are interesting, Kevin, and worth following up on. Especially because some of what you say is just in error; the Orthodox, the Catholic, the Anglicans, the Lutherans, and many others are still quite active in finding ways to get back together. Most of them recognize that they have far more in common with each other than what separates them, and in fact all of these old line churches are more in agreement with each other than they are with you “bible-only” Christians, who are in fact a radical and fairly modern minority, not just within Christendom as a whole but even amongst Protestants—and it’s no insult to you to say so. You’re part of why I’m writing this series and providing links. After I finish the article on the ecumenical councils and the Bible, perhaps some of your questions will be answered a bit more fully.
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