The Letters to the Seven Churches of Asi

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE CHRISTIAN LETTERS AND THEIR TRANSMISSION. In the preceding chapter we have described the circumstances amid which the Christian letter-writing was developed; and it was pointed out in conclusion that in the pressure of those circumstances, or rather in the energetic use of the...
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE CHRISTIAN LETTERS AND THEIR TRANSMISSION. In the preceding chapter we have described the circumstances amid which the Christian letter-writing was developed; and it was pointed out in conclusion that in the pressure of those circumstances, or rather in the energetic use of the opportunities which the circumstances of the Roman Empire offered, there came into existence a kind of letter, hitherto unknown in the world. The Christians developed the older class of letter into new forms, applied it to new purposes, and placed it on a much higher plane than it had ever before stood upon. In their hands communication by letter became one of the most important, if not the most important, of the agencies for consolidating and maintaining the sense of unity among the scattered members of the one universal Church. By means of letters the congregations expressed their mutual affection and sympathy and sense of brotherhood, asked counsel of one another, gave advice with loving freedom and plain speaking to one another, imparted mutual comfort and encouragement, and generally expressed their sense of their common life. Thus arose a new category of epistles. Dr. Deissmann in Bible Studies, p. I ff, following older scholars, has rightly and clearly distinguished two previously existing categories, the true letter?written by friend to friend or to friends, springing from the momentary occasion, intended only for the eye of the person or persons to whom j ' '; it is addressed?and the literary epistle?written with an eye to the public, and studied with literary art. The literary epistle is obviously later in origin than the true letter. It implies the previous existence of the true letter as a well-, .5 i - recognised type of composition, and the deliberate choice ' '...