Introduction
Church and its liturgy were born in a
cultural context. Further, religion and culture always have interactions and
interconnectedness, though they have certain divergence in several aspects.
Culture is the symbolic-expressive dimension of the social life. Christian
worship is expressed through language, symbols, rituals and customs. To meet
the pastoral need of the community, early church often depended on the local
cultural elements. Consequently, in this expression of the worship, early
church often borrowed from or was influenced by the local cultural context.
This paper deals with such influences and borrowings of the early church up to the fourth century.
Early Christian Worship
and Culture
Early Christian worship was mainly
influenced by the Jewish and Greco-Roman cultural and religious elements.
Following discussion may explore this aspect. Though the paper discusses it in
different headings such as language, rituals, symbols and custom, they are
often interconnected.
Language
Church borrowed the language and concept
from the culture that it encountered. Jonhanine gospel borrowed the word Logos from Greek philosophical school. To address God in
prayers, Christians used the Jewish term Abba which Jewish
people never used to address God. The term can be found in the Lord’s Prayer
and early church liturgies.[1] Another term Christians
borrowed from the synagogue worship is amen which is used to
affirm endorsement of the word of the other in the liturgical context.[2] Early church also used
Jewish psalms used
for the worship of the early church. In fact, several songs that were recorded in the New
Testament have influence of the Old Testament themes and Psalms.[3]
In Roman Empire, especially the western
part, the majority of the Christians were Greek speaking people up to the third century.
However, later Latin got
prominence among the Christians. Both languages influenced the Christian
worship. For example, it was usual to praise attributes of the deity in Greek prayers and the
same element can be found in the early Christian prayers. Clementine liturgy of the
fourth century contains such element. Latin liturgy was also influenced by Roman juridical way of
thinking.[4] Further, the stylistic form of
liturgical prayer which seems to be based on pre-Christian Roman custom is the litany
which consists of series of invocations. The dismissal formula at the end of the Christian
service (ite missa est-Go, this is
the dismissal) is borrowed from the Roman custom of declaration or announcement
about the dismissal of the audience officially at the end of the imperial palace and public court.[5]
Rituals
Reading
the scripture and exposition of it was a common practice in
the synagogue worship. Having been influenced by it, early church included the
reading of the scripture in its worship. For example, while describing about
the Sunday service in Rome, Justin
Martyr in 150 CE tells about the reading of the memoirs of the Apostles
and the writings of the Prophets as long as the time permits.[6] Further, Synagogue worship elements such as singing songs, reading the
scripture and prayer were also present in the early church worship.[7]
One may presume that early Christians
might have sung the way
they sang in the synagogues and domestic religious festivals but by
third century onwards the songs that were composed in the non-Christian manner
became a part of the Christian worship. Though hymns were the part of Christian
worship right from the beginning of the Church (e.g. Hymn after the Lord Supper
of Jesus with disciples), with the introduction of the basilica church, music became more professional
and influenced with the contemporary artistic quality and culture.[8]
Several scholars argue for the influence
of the Jewish Passover
festival on the origin of the Lord Supper in the early church.[9] On the other hand, several
scholars perceive the origin of the Lord Supper from the background of Communal
meal which was very common in Jewish and Hellenistic societies.[10] The Lord supper was
celebrated in a domestic setting in the early period but later with
introduction of basilica the domestic elements were removed and started to use vessels of imperial
quality and Eucharistic liturgy language was influenced by the rhetoric
style and culture of the period.[11]
Symbols
There
were different baptism ceremonies in Jewish and Hellenistic societies. Josephus talks about
full-body wash of his own teacher. Several Qumran texts talk about the bathing and
purification washing.[12] It seems there are commonalities
in such washing and John’s
and Christian baptism. Further, ritual and verbal elements of the pagan mystery cults
were added to the baptism from the time of Justin Martyr onwards. The words
like mystagogia and mystes from such cults became a part of
the Christian vocabulary and their symbols like giving of white garment and the lighted candle became the
part of baptismal rite.[13] Chupungco notices that some other cultural symbolic elements also
influenced baptismal rite of the church. Examples of such cultural element in
the early church baptismal rite are prebaptismal anointing, washing of feet, the cup of milk and honey and
the legal terms used by Tertullian when he spoke about the baptism.[14]
After joining of Emperor Constantine to
Christianity, the emperor started to build buildings for the church. These
church buildings are known as
basilica which is essentially a secular form of assembly hall. Basilica type buildings were used
by several religious sects for their religious purposes. Such pagan architectural styles and symbols were
accommodated by the church in the church building.[15]
Customs Kissing each other was a common practice in the
early Christian church. Such displays of the intimate affection would probably have been
emerged from the cultural context and Greco-Roman familial terms.[16] Further, when someone was
initiated into a fraternity
or a society, it was the
kiss which formed the sign of such an initiation. Likewise, someone who was
initiated into the
Christianity through baptism, the bishop followed by others kiss the new
member.[17] In addition, kissing the
temple, its altar and idols was a religious practice of the Greco-Roman cults.
Seemed by the influence of this, Christians also started to kiss the altar after the Mass.[18]
Another
custom that was borrowed from the sun-cult of Roman is that turning to the east while praying. It was the custom of
sun-cult to worship their god by turning to the east.[19] Having the influence of
the sun-cult, Christians seem to perceive Christ as their sun and Sunday as the day of their sun Christ. For
example, Justin Martyr from the second century describes Sunday as “the day
called the Feast of the Sun.”[20]
Evaluation and Conclusion
From
above discussion, following conclusions can be drawn:
a)
Early Christian worship borrowed language, rituals, customs and symbols from
Jewish religious culture especially from synagogue and Greco-Roman culture.
b)
After the joining of the Constantine to Christianity, early church borrowed
several cultural elements from the Roman imperialism and the Greco-Roman
religions.
c)
While encountering the Jewish-Greco-Roman culture, early church and its worship
underwent an inculturation process. It might be need of that hour to meet the pastoral
needs. In that process, early Christians attempted to make Christianity relevant
to the local culture, they accepted or Christianized several local cultural
elements. It may be noticed that after Constantine event, many pagan elements
penetrated to the Church and thereby a clear shift from the first century
Christian church happened. Consequently, more institutionalized, ritualized and
rigid Christianity came to exist as a reflection of Christianity as a stage
religion. In that process, Christian worship might have lost it vitality as an
apostolic movement of Jesus.
Bibliography
Jones,
Cheslyn, Geoffrey Wainwright, Edward Yarnold and Paul Bradshaw, eds. The Study of Liturgy. London:
SPCK,1992.
Jungmann, Josef A.
the Early Liturgy to the Time of Gregory
the Great. London: Darton,Longman &Todd Ltd.,1959.
Martin,
Ralph P. Worship in the Early Church.
Grand Rapids: Erdmans,1964.
Maxwell, Willwam
D. An Outline of Christian Worship. London: Oxford University Press,1958.
Stringer, Martin
D. A Sociological History of Christian
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Wootton,
Canon R.W.F. Christian Worship of God.
Madras: CLS,1966.
[1] Ralph P Martin, Worship in the Early Church (Grand
Rapids: Erdmans,1964),35.
[2] Ibid.,36-37.
[3] Canon R.W.F.
Wootton, Christian Worship of God
(Madras: CLS,1966),48.
[4] Josef A.
Jungmann, The Early Liturgy to the Time
of Gregory the Great (London: Darton,Longman &Todd Ltd.,1959),127.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Martin, op.cit.,69.
[7] Wootton,op.cit.,50.
[8] Anscar J
Chupungco, “Liturgical Music and its Early Cultural Setting” in Worship and Culture in Dialogue, edited
by S. Anita Stauffer (Geneva: Lutheran World Federation,1995),118-119.
[9] R.T Beckwith, “The Jewish
Background to Christian Worship,” in The
Study of Liturgy, edited by Cheslyn Jones, Geoffrey Wainwright, Edward
Yarnold and Paul Bradshaw(London: SPCK,1992),77.
[10] Wootton,op.cit.,53.
[11] Anscar J. Chupungco,
“Eucharist in the Early Church and its Cultural Settings,” in Worship and Culture in Dialogue, edited by S. Anita Stauffer
(Geneva: Lutheran World Federation,1995),100-102.
[12] Gordon W.
Lathrop, “Baptism in the New Testament and its Cultural Settiong,” in Worship and Culture in Dialogue, edited by S. Anita Stauffer
(Geneva: Lutheran World Federation,1995),25-26.
[13] Anscar J
Chupungco, “Baptism in the Early Church and its Cultural Setting,” in
Worship and Culture in Dialogue,
edited by S. Anita Stauffer (Geneva: Lutheran World Federation,1995),54.
[14] Ibid.
[15] Peter G. Cobb, “The Architectural
Setting of the Liturgy,” in The Study of
Liturgy, edited by Cheslyn Jones, Geoffrey Wainwright, Edward Yarnold and
Paul Bradshaw(London: SPCK,1992),529-530.
[16] Martin D.
Stringer, A Sociological History of
Christian Worship (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,2005),31.
[17] Jungmann, op.cit.,128.
[18] Ibid.
[19] Ibid.,137.
[20]Willwam D. Maxwell, An
Outline of Christian Worship (London: Oxford University Press,1958),12.