Introduction and Overview

Abstract

Abstract The Wrst modern editor to refer to a collection of early Christian writings as the Apostolic Fathers appears to have been J. Cotelier, whose edition was published in 1672. The most recent is Bart D. Ehrman, a contributor to this collection, whose Greek–English edition in the Loeb Classical Library replaces the original and much-used Loeb volumes produced by Kirsopp Lake. Lists of those who are included in the conventional but largely arbitrary collection known as the ‘Apostolic Fathers’ do vary slightly (Ehrman takes a more inclusive approach than both Lake and the Oxford Committee),1 but included in The Reception of the New Testament in the Apostolic Fathers and in Trajectories through the New Testament and the Apostolic Fathers are treatments of the central texts in this category, as found also in the 1905 volume, The New Testament in the Apostolic Fathers: the Didache, 1 Clement, 2 Clement, the letters of Ignatius, Polycarp’s Letter to the Philippians, the Letter of Barnabas, and the Shepherd of Hermas. Also included in the second of these 2005 volumes is the Martyrdom of Polycarp, which the Oxford Committee did not consider.