Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
  1. Home
  2. Search

Refine search

Refine search

Access:
Content type:
Publication date:
Apply   From and To filters
Subject: Show more
Journals Show more
Publishers: Show more
Societies Show more
Series: Show more
Collections: Show more

Actions for selected content:

Select all | Deselect all
  • View selected items
  • Export citations
  • Download PDF (zip)
  • Save to Kindle
  • Save to Dropbox
  • Save to Google Drive

Save Search

You can save your searches here and later view and run them again in "My saved searches".

Please provide a title, maximum of 40 characters.
Cancel
×

9 results

  • The Intellectual Role of the Early Catholic Episcopate

  • L. William Countryman
  • Journal:
    Church History / Volume 48 / Issue 3 / September 1979
    Published online by Cambridge University Press:
    28 July 2009, pp. 261-268
    Print publication:
    September 1979

  • The intellectual dominance of the clergy is an important feature of Catholic Christianity in the second and third centuries. If one goes through the roll of Christian writers from the period, one finds very few laymen: Hermas, Justin, Tertullian, Minucius Felix. The great majority were ordained men, including a disproportionate number of bishops: Ignatius, Polycarp, Dionysius of Corinth, Irenaeus, Melito, Theophilus, Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius of Alexandria, Cyprian, to give but a partial list.