Moral Formation in the Didache

How early Christians in Syria discerned one's faith before baptism

The Didache is an early second-century document that traces traditions back to the first century in Syria or Palestine. In other words, it is a Jewish-Christian document that testifies to one region’s experience of faith. That said, when compared with slightly later documents from Egypt, Rome, and Syria, it fits into a common tapestry of early Christian thought.

As a document, the first ten chapters describe moral preparation before baptism and the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. The last six chapters detail various ecclesial matters such as how to receive a travelling preacher or prophet or the importance of forgiving one another before Christians come together on the Lord’s Day. For our purposes, I am interested in the first ten chapters and what they say about moral preparation for baptism and the celebration of the Lord’s Supper.

Why? Because for virtually all early Christians, baptism represented one’s union with Christ and entrance into his body, the church. So believers took it upon themselves to count the cost of baptism by contemplating the way of following Jesus.

To do so, the Didache opens by laying out two ways, a way of life and a way of death. The way of life leads to baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and paradise. The way of death leads to destruction (Did 5:1). Here, I want to lay out these two ways to give a sense of what early Christian moral formation looked like and to understand what this community believed must be understood before baptism.

The Way of Life

The first two verses of the Didache read:

“There are two Ways, one of Life and one of Death, and there is a great difference between the two Ways. 2 The Way of Life is this: “First, thou shalt love the God who made thee, secondly, thy neighbour as thyself; and whatsoever thou wouldst not have done to thyself, do not thou to another” (Did 1:1–2).

Note how the way of life is described. The authors basically cite Jesus in Matt 22:37–40 and 7:12, where Jesus specifically summarizes the law and prophets as the duplex love of God and neighbour and as doing to others what you want them to do to you. So here, we can already see that the way of life for early Christians began with the teachings of Jesus, especially his summaries of the Law and Prophets.

The two ways of life idea certainly has precedent in places like Psalm 1, but it seems clear that it flows from Jesus who called himself the Way and invited sojourners to follow him through the narrow gate and way that leads to life (Matt 7:13–14).

Then the Didache leads to the commandments that guide one to life, which more or less follow the Sermon on the Mount as well as broader biblical patterns.

First, it tells us to love our enemies and avoid taking revenge (1:3–6). We might call this the positive way of life—what to do. Here, one can see the Sermon on the Mount summed up in various ways as well. And that will be common throughout the Didache.

Second, the Didache turns to the commands found in the Decalogue (Didache 2:1–7), and includes New Testament teaching as it does so. These twenty-plus commands tend to be negative; they tell us what not to do while the commands in the first part of the Didache tell us what to do.

In Didache 2:1–2, the document includes particular pastoral applications of the commands as well which probably testify to early Christian pastoral concerns:

“But the second commandment of the teaching is this; “Thou shalt do no murder; thou shalt not commit adultery”; thou shalt not commit sodomy; thou shalt not commit fornication; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not use magic; thou shalt not use philtres; thou shalt not procure abortion, nor commit infanticide; “thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s goods.”

The prohibition against sodomy, magic, the use of philtres (drugs, potions), abortion, and infanticide must have been pastorally important to this community, since they exist as applications of the commandments. The authors aimed to tie commands to specific pastoral concerns.

So for example, in Greek, “Thou shalt do no murder” translates οὐ φονεύσεις, which then connects to two kinds of murder, according to the Didache: οὐ φονεύσεις τέκνον ἐν φθορᾷ, οὐδὲ γεννηθὲν ἀποκτενεῖς. The first translates “you shall not murder a child in the womb” and the second is that “you shall not slay what is born.” The latter was important because in the larger first-century world, some parents would abandon infants to exposure when they were unwanted.

In the third chapter, the Didache takes the mantle of Proverbs upon itself and advises children (like Proverbs) to live wisely and trust God. Thus, Didache 3:1–2 reads, “My child, flee from every evil man and from all like him. Be not proud, for pride leads to murder, nor jealous, nor contentious, nor passionate, for from all these murders are engendered.”

The section ends with a call to virtue and trust in God:

“be thou “meek, for the meek shall inherit the earth;” be thou long-suffering, and merciful and guileless, and quiet, and good, and ever fearing the words which thou hast heard. Thou shalt not exalt thyself, nor let thy soul be presumptuous. Thy soul shall not consort with the lofty, but thou shalt walk with righteous and humble men. Receive the accidents that befall to thee as good, knowing that nothing happens without God” (Did 3:7–10).

Didache 4 ends the instruction on the way to life with various ethical commands that guide Christians in how they treat their leaders, the poor, their families, and the Lord.

The Way of Death

The way of death is given in much simpler form, a sort of list of ways of death that do not correspond to the faith, which is a way of life. So Didache 5:1–2 says:

“But the Way of Death is this: First of all, it is wicked and full of cursing, murders, adulteries, lusts, fornications, thefts, idolatries, witchcrafts, charms, robberies, false witness, hypocrisies, a double heart, fraud, pride, malice, stubbornness, covetousness, foul speech, jealousy, impudence, haughtiness, boastfulness. Persecutors of the good, haters of truth, lovers of lies, knowing not the reward of righteousness, not cleaving to the good nor to righteous judgment, spending wakeful nights not for good but for wickedness, from whom meekness and patience is far, lovers of vanity, following after reward, unmerciful to the poor, not working for him who is oppressed with toil, without knowledge of him who made them, murderers of children, corrupters of God’s creatures, turning away the needy, oppressing the distressed, advocates of the rich, unjust judges of the poor, altogether sinful; may ye be delivered, my children, from all these.”

Summary of the Ways

Didache 6 then summarizes the discussion on the two ways: “See “that no one make thee to err” from this Way of the teaching, for he teaches thee without God. For if thou canst bear the whole yoke of the Lord, thou wilt be perfect, but if thou canst not, do what thou canst. And concerning food, bear what thou canst, but keep strictly from that which is offered to idols, for it is the worship of dead gods” (Did 6:1–3).

At this point, the Didache turns to baptism, fasting, and the Lord’s Supper, which tends to be called the Eucharist in this document.

Implications

First, the Didache lays out a Way of Life that begins as one prepares for baptism and continues without end.

Second, the Didache begins with Jesus and his commands, although it pulls from broader apostolic teaching. Still, almost every line can be connected with the Sermon on the Mount or Jesus in some way.

Third, the Didache applies the Way of Jesus in very specific, pastoral ways. The warnings of magic, potions, abortion, etc. point to the community’s need to think carefully about moral formation, ethics, as one enters the Way of Jesus.

Fourth, the Didache evinces an early catechumenate (membership classes), which solves a problem implicit in the New Testament: how do you know someone is coming to faith genuinely? The answer was: make sure they count the cost of following Jesus.

Fifth, the Didache may be an early document, but it more or less agrees with later documents of moral formation across the Christian world: in North Africa, Asia, and Rome. And then of course, later in the Medieval and Protestant communions, we have a basic continuity when we read the catechisms or moral and theological handbooks of these eras.