The Earliest Christian Model

Abstract

This chapter discusses participatory union with Christ, examining Pauline Christianity, Jewish Christianity, Johannine Christianity, Ignatius of Antioch, Valentinian Christianity, Justin Martyr, Tatian, Theophilus of Antioch, Irenaeus of Lyons, Hippolytus of Rome, and the early Christian approach to deification. Among Christian authors contemporary with the last New Testament writers, the chapter notes that only Ignatius of Antioch takes up the theme of participatory union. He does not use the terminology of deification but prepares the way for it by speaking of Christ as God. In around 160, Justin Martyr put forward the view that as the people of Christ were the new Israel, the gods were those who were obedient to Christ. Justin's younger contemporary, Irenaeus of Lyons, drew the implications of the conjunction of ‘gods’ with ‘sons’ and claimed that the gods were the baptised.