Fifty Works From the Early Church That Every Christian Should Read

List Challenges ^ | January 7, 2020

[Antoninus]

These books contain important accounts and teachings from the early Church that every Christian should at least be familiar with. Unfortunately, many of these ancient resources are unknown to Christians today.

How many of these have you read? Take the challenge here: Fifty Works From the Early Church That Every Christian Should Read

If you have read less than 5 of these, you rank as a catechumen.
If you have read at least 5, you are a novice.
If you have read at least 10, you are an acolyte.
If you have read at least 20, you would qualify as a sub-deacon.
If you have read at least 30, you could be a deacon.
If you have read up to 40, you should consider the priesthood.
If you have read all 50, we may declare you a bishop by acclamation.

I enjoyed compiling this list because the process revealed how lacking I am in my own patristic reading. For every one of these works I've read, there seem to be a dozen more that I haven't!

1. The Douay-Rheims Bible (Various Catholic Translators)
2. The Shepherd of Hermas (F. Crombie, Translator)
3. Epistle of St. Barnabas (Apostolic Fathers, Vol. 2) (Bart D. Ehrman (Translator))
4. Epistles of Sts. Clement of Rome and Ignatius of Antioch (James A. Kleist, Translator)
5. The Didache
6. Polycarp's Epistle to the Philippians (Alexander Roberts (Translator))
7. Embassy for the Christians (Athenagoras)
8. The Writings of Saint Justin Martyr (Thomas B. Falls, Translator)
9. I Am a Christian: Authentic Accounts of Christian Martyrdom and Persecution From the Ancient Sources (Anthony Schiavo, ed.)
10. Apology and Spectacles (Tertullian)
11. The Paedagogus (Christ the Educator) (St. Clement of Alexandria)
12. Against Celsus (Origen)
13. Against Heresies (Irenaeus of Lyons)
14. The Complete Works of Saint Cyprian of Carthage (St. Cyprian)
15. Letters and Treatises (Dionysius of Alexandria)
16. The Octavius (Minucius Felix)
17. Refutation of All Heresies (Hippolytus of Rome)
18. Life of the Blessed Emperor Constantine
19. The Divine Institutes (Lactantius)
20. Eusebius: History of the Church
21. Life of Saint Anthony of Egypt by Saint Athanasius
22. On the Incarnation (St. Athanasius)
23. Apocriticus (Macarius Magnes)
24. Lausaic History (Palladius of Aspuna)
25. The Desert Fathers (Sayings of the Early Christian Monks)
26. Life of Saint Martin of Tours (Sulpitius Severus)
27. The Pilgrimage of Egeria (Anne McGowan (Translator))
28. The Ecclesiastical History (Hermias Sozomen)
29. The Ecclesiastical History of Socrates (Socrates Scholasticus)
30. On the Duties of the Clergy (St. Ambrose of Milan)
31. The Life of Saint Ambrose (Paulinus of Milan)
32. Select Orations (St. Gregory Nazianzen)
33. Exegetical Homilies on the Hexameron, Psalms, Etc. (Saint Basil the Great)
34. On the Soul and Resurrection (St. Gregory of Nyssa)
35. Saint Augustine--Confessions
36. Saint Augustine's City of God
37. On Marriage and Family Life (St. John Chyrsostom)
38. Psychomachia (Aurelius Prudentius Clemens)
39. The Life of Saint Augustine (Possidius of Calama)
40. The Confession & Letter to Coroticus (Saint Patrick)
41. Seven Books of History Against the Pagans (Orosius)
42. The Life of Saint Simeon Stylites (Frederick Lent, Translator) 43. On Illustrious Men (St. Jerome)
44. History of the Vandal Persecution (Victor of Vita)
45. The Book of the Popes (Liber Pontificalis) (Louise Ropes Loomis (Ed.))
46. Ecclesiastical History (Evagrius Scholasticus)
47. The Paschale Chronicle, AD 284-628 (Michael Whitby, Translator)
48. The Dialogues of Saint Gregory the Great
49. Lives of the Fathers (St. Gregory of Tours)
50. Ecclesiastical History of the English People

[Elsie]

Those who are indifferent to the Early Church are in practice skeptical of the Holy Spirit,

While...

Those who are indifferent to the CURRENT church's POPE are in practice skeptical of the Holy Spirit who SURELY leads the voters in the right direction!

[Elsie]

No. I'm saying that protestants are expert at cherry-picking out-of-context sayings from the Fathers and are loath to attempt to read them in their entirety

That's damned aggravating; isn't it!!

---

 

As regards the oft-quoted Mt. 16:18 (And less understood)

 

 

 

• Augustine, sermon:

"Christ, you see, built his Church not on a man but on Peter's confession. What is Peter's confession? 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.' There's the rock for you, there's the foundation, there's where the Church has been built, which the gates of the underworld cannot conquer. — John Rotelle, O.S.A., Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine , © 1993 New City Press, Sermons, Vol III/6, Sermon 229P.1, p. 327

 

Augustine, sermon:

Upon this rock, said the Lord, I will build my Church. Upon this confession, upon this that you said, 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,' I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not conquer her (Mt. 16:18). — John Rotelle, Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City, 1993) Sermons, Volume III/7, Sermon 236A.3, p. 48.

 

• Augustine, sermon:

For petra (rock) is not derived from Peter, but Peter from petra; just as Christ is not called so from the Christian, but the Christian from Christ. For on this very account the Lord said, 'On this rock will I build my Church,' because Peter had said, 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.' On this rock, therefore, He said, which thou hast confessed, I will build my Church. For the Rock (Petra) was Christ; and on this foundation was Peter himself built. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Christ Jesus. The Church, therefore, which is founded in Christ received from Him the keys of the kingdom of heaven in the person of Peter, that is to say, the power of binding and loosing sins. For what the Church is essentially in Christ, such representatively is Peter in the rock (petra); and in this representation Christ is to be understood as the Rock, Peter as the Church. — Augustine Tractate CXXIV; Philip Schaff, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: First Series, Volume VII Tractate CXXIV (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf107.iii.cxxv.html)

 

• Augustine, sermon:

And Peter, one speaking for the rest of them, one for all, said, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God (Mt 16:15-16)...And I tell you: you are Peter; because I am the rock, you are Rocky, Peter-I mean, rock doesn't come from Rocky, but Rocky from rock, just as Christ doesn't come from Christian, but Christian from Christ; and upon this rock I will build my Church (Mt 16:17-18); not upon Peter, or Rocky, which is what you are, but upon the rock which you have confessed. I will build my Church though; I will build you, because in this answer of yours you represent the Church. — John Rotelle, O.S.A. Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City Press, 1993), Sermons, Volume III/7, Sermon 270.2, p. 289

 

• Augustine, sermon:

Peter had already said to him, 'You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.' He had already heard, 'Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona, because flesh and blood did not reveal it to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I tell you, that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the underworld shall not conquer her' (Mt 16:16-18)...Christ himself was the rock, while Peter, Rocky, was only named from the rock. That's why the rock rose again, to make Peter solid and strong; because Peter would have perished, if the rock hadn't lived. — John Rotelle, Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City, 1993) Sermons, Volume III/7, Sermon 244.1, p. 95

 

• Augustine, sermon:

...because on this rock, he said, I will build my Church, and the gates of the underworld shall not overcome it (Mt. 16:18). Now the rock was Christ (1 Cor. 10:4). Was it Paul that was crucified for you? Hold on to these texts, love these texts, repeat them in a fraternal and peaceful manner. — John Rotelle, Ed., The Works of Saint Augustine (New Rochelle: New City Press, 1995), Sermons, Volume III/10, Sermon 358.5, p. 193

 

• Augustine, Psalm LXI:

Let us call to mind the Gospel: 'Upon this Rock I will build My Church.' Therefore She crieth from the ends of the earth, whom He hath willed to build upon a Rock. But in order that the Church might be builded upon the Rock, who was made the Rock? Hear Paul saying: 'But the Rock was Christ.' On Him therefore builded we have been. — Philip Schaff, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1956), Volume VIII, Saint Augustin, Exposition on the Book of Psalms, Psalm LXI.3, p. 249. (http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf108.ii.LXI.html)

 

• Augustine, in “Retractions,”

In a passage in this book, I said about the Apostle Peter: 'On him as on a rock the Church was built.'...But I know that very frequently at a later time, I so explained what the Lord said: 'Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church,' that it be understood as built upon Him whom Peter confessed saying: 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,' and so Peter, called after this rock, represented the person of the Church which is built upon this rock, and has received 'the keys of the kingdom of heaven.' For, 'Thou art Peter' and not 'Thou art the rock' was said to him. But 'the rock was Christ,' in confessing whom, as also the whole Church confesses, Simon was called Peter. But let the reader decide which of these two opinions is the more probable. — The Fathers of the Church (Washington D.C., Catholic University, 1968), Saint Augustine, The Retractations Chapter 20.1:.

 

[Elsie]

In context stuff seems to get short changed as well...

Call no man father

[Elsie]

Council at Jerusalem; APPARENTLY in THEIR own words as well:

Acts 15

The Council at Jerusalem

 ¹ Certain people came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the believers: "Unless you are circumcised, according to the custom taught by Moses, you cannot be saved." ² This brought Paul and Barnabas into sharp dispute and debate with them. So Paul and Barnabas were appointed, along with some other believers, to go up to Jerusalem to see the apostles and elders about this question. ³ The church sent them on their way, and as they traveled through Phoenicia and Samaria, they told how the Gentiles had been converted. This news made all the believers very glad. ⁴ When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and elders, to whom they reported everything God had done through them.

 ⁵ Then some of the believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, "The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to keep the law of Moses."

 ⁶ The apostles and elders met to consider this question. ⁷ After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: "Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. ⁸ God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. ⁹ He did not discriminate between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. ¹⁰ Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear? ¹¹ No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are."

 ¹² The whole assembly became silent as they listened to Barnabas and Paul telling about the signs and wonders God had done among the Gentiles through them. ¹³ When they finished, James spoke up. "Brothers," he said, "listen to me. ¹⁴ Simon has described to us how God first intervened to choose a people for his name from the Gentiles. ¹⁵ The words of the prophets are in agreement with this, as it is written:

 ¹⁶ "'After this I will return
   and rebuild David's fallen tent.
Its ruins I will rebuild,
   and I will restore it,
¹⁷ that the rest of mankind may seek the Lord,
   even all the Gentiles who bear my name,
says the Lord, who does these things'
 ¹⁸ things known from long ago.

 ¹⁹ "It is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. ²⁰ Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood. ²¹ For the law of Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath."

The Council's Letter to Gentile Believers

 ²² Then the apostles and elders, with the whole church, decided to choose some of their own men and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They chose Judas (called Barsabbas) and Silas, men who were leaders among the believers. ²³ With them they sent the following letter:

   The apostles and elders, your brothers,

   To the Gentile believers in Antioch, Syria and Cilicia:

   Greetings.

 ²⁴ We have heard that some went out from us without our authorization and disturbed you, troubling your minds by what they said. ²⁵ So we all agreed to choose some men and send them to you with our dear friends Barnabas and Paul— ²⁶ men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. ²⁷ Therefore we are sending Judas and Silas to confirm by word of mouth what we are writing. ²⁸ It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: ²⁹ You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things.

   Farewell.

 ³⁰ So the men were sent off and went down to Antioch, where they gathered the church together and delivered the letter. ³¹ The people read it and were glad for its encouraging message. ³² Judas and Silas, who themselves were prophets, said much to encourage and strengthen the believers. ³³ After spending some time there, they were sent off by the believers with the blessing of peace to return to those who had sent them. ^{[34] 35} But Paul and Barnabas remained in Antioch, where they and many others taught and preached the word of the Lord.

Disagreement Between Paul and Barnabas

 ³⁶ Some time later Paul said to Barnabas, "Let us go back and visit the believers in all the towns where we preached the word of the Lord and see how they are doing." ³⁷ Barnabas wanted to take John, also called Mark, with them, ³⁸ but Paul did not think it wise to take him, because he had deserted them in Pamphylia and had not continued with them in the work. ³⁹ They had such a sharp disagreement that they parted company. Barnabas took Mark and sailed for Cyprus, ⁴⁰ but Paul chose Silas and left, commended by the believers to the grace of the Lord. ⁴¹ He went through Syria and Cilicia, strengthening the churches.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Every one of the 21 epistles in the NT addresses or alludes problems in the communities they address, and/or in the Church at large.

..Hm. Jesus didn't do a very good job, did He??!

Quite the contrary. People re always free to go off the rails if they want. It is a sad consequence of having the inestimable gift of free will.

u Most of His hand-picked 12 Apostles went off the rails (except John). (Jesus not doing a good job again??) But all His hand-picked, personally-trained men (except Judas) repented and were restored. Some do repent, and some don't.

But we were talking about the Canon, the official Bible book list or table of contents. The Bible doesn't have one: not in print, as given.

[Elsie]

It makes me smile, Luircin, to read your caution that I will "hurt my reputation" if I don't take your bald assertions as fact.

It makes me weep, Mrs.Don-0, to read Rome's caution that I will "lose my assumed SALVATION" if I don't take it's bald assertions as fact also!

---

"One indeed is the universal Church of the faithful, outside which no one at all is saved, in which the priest himself is the sacrifice, Jesus Christ, whose body and blood are truly contained in the sacrament of the altar under the species of bread and wine; the bread (changed) into His body by the divine power of transubstantiation, and the wine into the blood, so that to accomplish the mystery of unity we ourselves receive from His (nature) what He Himself received from ours."

--Pope Innocent III and Lateran Council IV (A.D. 1215)

 

 

 "We are compelled in virtue of our faith to believe and maintain that there is only one holy Catholic Church, and that one is apostolic. This we firmly believe and profess without qualification. Outside this Church there is no salvation and no remission of sins, the Spouse in the Canticle proclaiming: 'One is my dove, my perfect one. One is she of her mother, the chosen of her that bore her' (Canticle of Canticles 6:8); which represents the one mystical body whose head is Christ, of Christ indeed, as God. And in this, 'one Lord, one faith, one baptism' (Ephesians 4:5). Certainly Noah had one ark at the time of the flood, prefiguring one Church which perfect to one cubit having one ruler and guide, namely Noah, outside of which we read all living things were destroyed… We declare, say, define, and pronounce that it is absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff."

--Pope Boniface VIII, Bull Unam sanctam (A.D. 1302)

[Elsie]

Perhaps he hoped no one would check his source:

 Though the Assumption was dogmatically defined in 1950 by Venerable Pope Pius XII in his apostolic constitution, Munificentissimus Deus, the traditional belief in the Assumption of Mary goes back to the earliest days of the Church.

 The first is taken from a homily preached by Theoteknos, Bishop of Livias in Palestine in the late 6th century AD:

HMMMmmm...

...only off by FIVE centuries!

 

[aMorePerfectUnion]

“ But we were talking about the Canon, the official Bible book list or table of contents. The Bible doesn’t have one: not in print, as given. ”

Also doesn’t need one..

[aMorePerfectUnion]

You couldn’t find a single source in the first century for the assumption of Mary?

There goes any chain of continuity!

And you seemed so breezy and confident...

[Luircin]

Nor second century, nor third, nor fourth, nor fifth.

I, on the other hand, gave you actual quotes from the actual church fathers.

Funny, you dismiss my evidence as “taken out of context” but you can’t even provide a single shred of evidence, in context or not!

[Mrs. Don-o]

I don’t understand that answer. If you don’t need a canon, how do you know what books comprise the Bible? That would be important to know, wouldn’t it?

[aMorePerfectUnion]

“ If you don’t need a canon, how do you know what books comprise the Bible? That would be important to know, wouldn’t it?”

Yes, but a table of contents comes after a canon is recognized and gathered.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

I forgot: happy new year!

[Mrs. Don-o]

But you said you don't need a canon. So you can't have a table of contents. Back to the question: how do you know what books should be in your Bible?

For instance, here is the booklist (table of contents) of the 1611 King James Bible

It has 85 entries.

Any reason you would or wouldn't accept this booklist as your Bible?

[boatbums]

Honestly...I just don't get why so many Roman Catholic Internet apologists feel the need to continually debate the subject of the Apocrypha/Deuterocanonical books! Those writings were NEVER judged to be Divinely-inspired/Holy Spirit breathed to holy men of God who were led to record them for all time. I've asked this question repeatedly and nobody has answered: WHY would the Jews - who were originally entrusted with the Oracles of God (see Romans 3:2) - NOT have received these writings as from God as they did the other 39? Don't bother with the lame excuse, "Well they didn't accept the New Testament books!".

These extra-Biblical writings may have some historical, poetical or whimsical things in them - maybe a few inspirational tidbits - but they didn't come from Divine revelation. Had they been, there would be no reason why the Jews or Christians would reject them as Holy Scripture. There would also not have been errors and mistakes in them. That they were included in some early Christian canons - usually in separate sections apart from the undisputed books - doesn't automatically impart Divine authority to them nor does it instill them with immutability or inerrancy. In fact, in a few places some of them even admit they are NOT prophets of God and they could be mistaken!

So, by all means if you want to read them and you find spiritual nourishment by doing so, be my guest! Just stop with the, "You Protestants cut/took out/threw out/discarded/trashed God's word and you are missing out with your incomplete/truncated Bible!". I can read those books any time I want, I just don't have to pretend they are Holy Scripture.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

I said a table of contents is not necessary. Sorry if there was confusion.

“ how do you know what books should be in your Bible?”

The most important way, is God has worked to inspire, preserve, and make His Word recognized.

He used people in the process.

The canon was re-examined many times and earlier errors corrected.

“ Any reason you would or wouldn’t accept this booklist as your Bible?”

Yes. Errors.

[rollo tomasi]

Somebody give me a accurate rundown of the number of Biblical (Complete) manuscripts in circulation between the time of Pentecost to (I will give you) the Leningrad Codex. Constaintine order 50 copies of Scriptures (Left that to the Church Patriarchs to figure that out) to be produced and distributed. How many more? Also, please document the price of papyrus (Paper wasn't a known discovery for awhile, in fact China only started the first paper industry in the early 2nd century, Europe/Levant took another 800 years or so to figure that out) during this time (Very $$$ and extremely heavy for long works/didn't last long, perishable especially in humid areas).

Also, give me a rundown of the percent of people who could actually read complex written compositions (Like the Bible and don't give me that stuff about the Church forcing peasants to be dumb-down, there was no industry to propel that need for many centuries). A lot of people ignore schematics and the importance of the political Church structure during this 1400 or so year period when the beginnings of the Renaissance propelled discoveries (Some good, some bad). We take our technology for granted and in some cases, technology and dubious translations to promote a certain propaganda *cough* almost rhymes with Blofeld, *cough* becomes a spiritual hindrance.

[Mrs. Don-o]

How do you know?

The Septuagint includes the 7 books often called the Deuterocanonicals. Protestant Scripture scholar, Douglas Woodward, notes: "The Septuagint was the Bible for every Christian for almost 500 years and for at least half of Christendom during its next 1,000 years." SOURCE

Would you dispute this?

So it was not the opinion of one genius scholar or another, but the rule of "ubique, semper, ab omnibus" (Everywhere, always, and by everyone." By this triple measure of diffusion, endurance, and universality, the books of the Bible were canonized.

In this way, God has worked to inspire, preserve, and make His Word recognized.

BTW, this rule held for the early Protestant translations as well. The Greek canon wasn't dumped from major Protestant canons until the first decades of the 17th and some cases into the 19th century. For instance, The English (Protestant) Bible Society didn't decide to eliminate the Deuterocanonicals until 1885.

Oh! And I just looked it up (biblesociety.org.uk) and I see they're putting them back in again!

[aMorePerfectUnion]

"The Septuagint includes the 7 books often called the Deuterocanonicals. Protestant Scripture scholar, Douglas Woodward, notes: "The Septuagint was the Bible for every Christian for almost 500 years and for at least half of Christendom during its next 1,000 years."

Yes, of course it was. Rome had a lock on Christianity, controlled Scripture, slaughtered those that dared disagree.

Forced control means nothing in regards to whether a book is inspired.

The rejected books were rejected for many reasons that are beyond a simple post. You can easily Google this.

"So it was not the opinion of one genius scholar or another, but the rule of "ubique, semper, ab omnibus" (Everywhere, always, and by everyone." By this triple measure of diffusion, endurance, and universality, the books of the Bible were canonized."

I disagree that this was the basis of inclusion. I delved into this deeply in seminary. There were many factors in the decision - and of course the sovereignty of God working through history.

"BTW, this rule held for the early Protestant translations as well. The Greek canon wasn't dumped from major Protestant canons until the first decades of the 17th and some cases into the 19th century. For instance, The English (Protestant) Bible Society didn't decide to eliminate the Deuterocanonicals until 1885."

Again, NBD.

"Oh! And I just looked it up (biblesociety.org.uk) and I see they're putting them back in again!"

This does not surprise me...

(from their website)

"Dr Paula Gooder appointed Bible Society's Theologian in Residence

Dr Paula Gooder is to join Bible Society as Theologian in Residence. The New Testament theologian will take up the role in September to help Bible Society advocate the Bible to the widest possible audience and contribute to shaping the Society's theology.

Dr Gooder said 'I have long admired the work of Bible Society and am very excited to be able work with them in this new role. My great passion has, for many years now, been to excite people to read the Bible either for the first time, or again so that they are transformed to be more and more like Jesus.

'This role with the Bible Society allows me to join in more with the work that they are already doing in this area and I am honoured to work with them.'

Already a Vice President of Bible Society, Dr Gooder is a freelance writer and lecturer in Biblical Studies. She is Canon Theologian of Birmingham and Guildford Cathedrals, Lay Canon at Salisbury Cathedral, a Six preacher of Canterbury Cathedral, visiting lecturer at King's College, London, and Associate lecturer at St Mellitus College, London. Dr Gooder is also a Reader in the Church of England and a member of General Synod.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

Should have added this about Gooder...

“She is passionate about ecumenism and is a current member of the Anglican Roman Catholic International Commission (ARCIC III, 2011-present day).”