258 TIIIBD PEKIOD. A.D, 311-590.
Btitution as to ecclesiastical usage ; for before the outbreak of controversies in the church there was no distinction between the two, except that jprashyter is a term of age, and hishop a lerm of official dignity ; but wlien men, at the instigation of Satan, erected parties and sects, and, instead of simply following Christ, named themselves of Paul, or ApoUos, or Cephas, all agreed to put one of the presbyters at the head of the rest, that by his universal supervision of the churches, he might kill the seeds of division.' The great commentators of the Greek church agree with Jerome in maintaining the original identity of bishops and presbyters in the New Testament."
In the episcopal or catliedral churches the presbyters still formed the council of the bishop. In town and country congregations, where no bishop officiated, they were more independent. Preaching, administration of the sacraments, and care of souls were their functions. In North Africa they were for a long time not allowed to preach in the presence of the bishop ; until Augustine was relieved by his bishop of this restriction. The seniores plehis in the African church of the fourth and fifth centuries were not clergymen, but civil personages and other prominent members of the congregation.^
* Hieron. Coram, ad Tit. i. 7 : " Idem est ergo presbyter qui episcopus, et aiitcquam diaholi instinctu stadia in religione fierent . . . communi presbytcrorum consilio ecclesifc gubernabaiitur," etc. Comp. Epist. ad Evangelum presbyterum (Ep. 146, ed. Vail. Opera, i. 1074 sqq. ; Ep. 101, ed. Bcned.), and Epist. ad Oceanum (Ep. 69, ed. Vail, Ep. 82, ed. Bened.). In the latter epistle he remarks: "Apud vetercs iidem episcopi et presbyteri fuerunt, quia illud nomen dignitatis est, hoc aetatia."
^ Chrysostom, Horn. i. in Ep. ad Philipp. (Phil. i. 1, on the words trw iniaK6irois, which imply a number of bishops, i. e. presbyters in one and the same congregation), observes : Toi'? Trpe(T^VT(pov> ovTwt tKaKtcre ' rore yap reus tKoivdivovv rms bvofxaai. Of the same opinion are Theodoret, ad Phil. i. 1, and ad Tim. iii. 1 ; Ambrosiastcr, ad E[)h. iv. 11 ; and the author of the pseudo-Augustinian Questiones V. et N. T., qu. 1(»1. Comp. on this whole subject of the original identity of firiaKotros and irpia^vTfpos, my Ili.story of the Apostolic Church, § 132 (Engl, tran.slation, p. 522- 631), and Rich. Kothe : Anfiingc dcr christlichen Kirche, i. p. 207-217.
' Oplatus of Mileve calls them, indeed, ccclcsiasticos vh-os ; not, however, in the sense of clerici, from whom, on the contrary, he distinguishes them, but in the broad sense of catholic Christians as distinguished from heathens and heretics. Comp. on these xcniores plebis, or lai/ elders, as they are called, tlie discussion of Dr. Hothe Die Anfangc der chriHtl. Kirche u. ihrer Verfassung, vol. i. p. 227 sqq.
§ 52. THE LOWES CLEKGY. 259
La the Iburtli century arose the office of archpreslyterj whose duty ic was to preside over the worship, and sometime? to take the place of the bishop in his absence or incapacity.
The DKJi.coNSj also called Levites^ retained the same functions which they had held in the preceding period. In tho West, i"hcy alone, not the lectors, were allowed to read in public worship the lessons from the Gospels ; w^hich, containing the words of the Lord, w' ere placed above the Epistles, or the words of the apostles. They were also permitted to baptize and to preach. After the pattern of the church in Jerusalem, the number of deacons, even in large congregations, waij limited to seven ; though not rigidly, for the cathedral of Constantinople had, under Justinian I., besides sixty presbyters, a hundred deacons, forty deaconesses, ninety subdeacons, a hundred and ten lectors, tw^enty-five precentors, and a hundred janitors — a total of five hundred and twenty-five officers. Though subordinate to the presbyters, the deacons frequently stood in close relations with the bishop, and exerted a greater influence. Hence they not rarely looked upon ordination to the presbyterate as a degradation. After the beginning of the fourth century an archdeacon stood at the head of the college, the most confidential adviser of the bishop, his representative and legate, and not seldom his successor in office. Tlius Athanasius first appears as archdeacon of Alexandria at the council of l^ice, clothed with important influence ; and upon the death of the latter he succeeds to the patriarchal chair of Alexandria.
The office of deaconess, which, under the strict separation of the sexes in ancient times, and especiallj' in Greece, was necessary to the completion of the diaconate, and which originated in the apostolic age,' continued in the Eastern church down to the twelfth century. It was frequently occupied by the widows of clergymen or the wives of bishops, who were obliged to demit the married state before entering upon their sacred office. Its functions were the care of the female poor, sick, and imprisoned, assisting in the baptism of adult women, and, in the country churches of the East, perhaps also of the West,
• Comp. Rom. xii. 1, 12, and my Hist, of the Apost. Church § 135, p. 535 sqq.