The Mystery of Virtue in the Shepherd of Hermas and its Role in the Edifice of the Church and of Salvation

Abstract

The intention of the author is to provide a more systematic, not exhaustive, insight into the mystical meaning, place, and role of virtue in the economy of salvation, based on the revelation recorded in the early Christian writing of the New Testament prophet and apostle Hermas – The Shepherd. The author locates the place of virtue in the realism of simultaneous and interdependent building of salvation (of man) and building of the Church as a unique (multidimensional) process. Like very few paternal writings, the Shepherd gives us an explicit conclusion that the virtues are the ones that “hold” and build the Church, “dressing” the faithful in the “clothes,” “powers” and Name of the Son of God. By “dressing” in virtues, Christians achieve that “in the likeness,” they are likened to Christ, thus becoming similar and compatible to each other, thus gaining, as a new genus, a one unique identity. That is why the Church, which is being built as the Tower of Salvation, is composed of a multitude, by repentance and virtue shaped and ennobled elects (stones), manifesting itself, thus, in a „monolithic“ building, monochromatic white, as from one carved stone. For this reason, the paper aims to re– evaluate the ontological connection of virtue with the Church (ecclesiology).