The Roman Church Writes to Corinth (1 Clement)

The letter names no writer. It is addressed from “the church of God which sojourns at Rome” to the church at Corinth, and it begins by apologising that troubles at Rome have delayed an answer on matters the Corinthians had raised (1 Clement 1). A few headstrong people, it says, had stirred up a revolt in the Corinthian church, and men who had served blamelessly had been put out of their ministry (1 Clement 1) (1 Clement 44).

Most of the long letter is a sermon against jealousy and for humility, argued from the Scriptures. Among its examples it names Peter and Paul, who suffered and died “in our own generation”, and a great number of others (1 Clement 5–6). It then turns to order. As Israel had its high priest, priests and Levites, each with an appointed service, so in the church God sent Christ, Christ sent the apostles, and the apostles appointed their first converts as bishops and deacons (1 Clement 40–42). Foreseeing strife over this office, they also arranged that when those men died other approved men should succeed them. To depose such men is therefore a serious sin (1 Clement 44). The letter calls the office from which men were removed the “episcopate” and the revolt a sedition against the presbyters (1 Clement 44) (1 Clement 47), and it names no single bishop at Corinth or at Rome. It recalls that Paul once wrote to Corinth about parties (1 Clement 47), tells the leaders of the revolt to submit to the presbyters (1 Clement 57), and warns that those who disobey what God has said “through us” put themselves in danger (1 Clement 59). Three envoys carried it and were to bring back word of peace (1 Clement 63–65).

About 170 Dionysius, bishop of Corinth, told the Romans that the letter “written to us through Clement” was still read in his church (Eusebius, Church History 4.23.11). Irenaeus, about 180, says that the church of Rome sent it in the time of Clement of Rome, whom he counts third after the apostles (Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.3.3), and Eusebius knew it as read in many churches (Eusebius, Church History 3.16).

The churches do not read the letter alike, and only two of their readings are given here. The Catholic Church cites it for the teaching that the apostles appointed successors whose office continues in the bishops (Catechism of the Catholic Church 861), and Pope Benedict XVI said that the letter could be called a first exercise of the Roman primacy after the death of Peter (Benedict XVI, General Audience, 7 March 2007). The Orthodox patriarchs answered in 1848 that Corinth turned to Rome as the nearer great church, in the imperial capital, and that such brotherly help is no proof of papal power over the churches (Encyclical of the Eastern Patriarchs (1848) § 14). No Protestant confession that discusses the letter was found for this entry, so a Protestant reading is not represented; the question of what the letter shows about bishops, presbyters and the standing of Rome is not closed.