The Search for the Origins of Christian Worship: Sources and Methods for the Study of Early Liturgy (review)

When the first edition of this study appeared in 1992, the initial shock it caused was indicated in a review written by George Saint-Laurent for this journal: "Tacit assumptions are spelled out, presuppositions are investigated, and long-standing hypotheses are proved to be attractive and imaginative but, alas, unsubstantiated by the evidence . . . . Indeed, this reviewer has been forced painfully to conclude that he must revise the content of his own courses in substantive ways and discard many of those cherished 'insights' which he has so confidently presented for years" (JECS 2.3 [1994], 356). But Bradshaw's piercing methodological study of ancient Christian liturgiology has not yet had the impact it is due. Hence, ten years later he moves the following observation, without changing a word, from the midst of his first edition to page one of the second: "While conscious reflection on the methodologies appropriate to the discipline has constituted a significant element in scholarly research in such areas as biblical studies and ecclesiastical history in the course of recent decades, the same has not really been true in the field of liturgical history."

Nonetheless, a growing number of scholars are coming to share the main points of Bradshaw's thesis: when the fragmentary nature of the evidence and the problems of interpreting it are adequately taken into account, rather little can be known about Christian worship in the first several centuries. What we do know points to diversity of liturgical practices rather than uniformity. Hence, the notion that "a single coherent line of liturgical evolution can be traced from the apostolic age to the fourth century" must be scrapped (ix). Bradshaw powerfully proves these points with his penetrating and, at times, devastating reviews of secondary studies and thorough analyses of primary sources. Indeed, he has set the standard for future research on ancient liturgy; any scholar who ignores this foundational work risks laboring in vain.

This second edition has been expanded and restructured with very little taken out but much added. Bradshaw has amended the following chapters to include important research from the past decade: "Worship in the New Testament," "Liturgy and Time," "Ancient Church Orders," and "The Background of Early Christian Worship" (formerly "The Jewish Background of Christian Worship," now renamed to accommodate a brief section on pagan influence). The chapter on ancient church orders, which has been enriched by Bradshaw's ongoing studies of the Apostolic Tradition, is the most authoritative and concise introduction to the documents, the scholarship, and the continuing enigmas of this odd genre. He arranges the chapters on Christian Initiation, the Eucharist, and "Other Major Liturgical Sources" by geographical provenance, thereby highlighting the differences in liturgical practices among various communities.

The first chapter, "Shifting Scholarly Perspectives," has seen the most revision. It has absorbed the chapter previously entitled "Ten Principles for Interpreting Early Christian Liturgical Evidence." One can still discern the "ten principles" although they are presented under different forms and not enumerated as such. Bradshaw restructures the chapter so that it focuses on the methodologies employed by liturgical historians: philological, structuralist (Dix), organic (Baumstark), and comparative (Mateos, Taft). He then recommends the hermeneutics of suspicion for dissipating the naiveté with which previous scholars have approached the sources. The chapter on the Eucharist similarly reads as a fascinating review of scholarship. Perhaps the most significant additions are drawn from Enrico Mazza's work, in light of which Bradshaw expands his conclusions on the development of Eucharistic prayers.

The final two chapters did not appear in any form in the first edition. Devoted to Christian ministry, the first of these dwells on the roles of deacons, presbyters, bishops, and priests in both Latin and Greek sources. The second and last chapter investigates "The Effects of the...