Feeling better. Watched more videos.
Today’s session moved into the Greek and Hebrew roots of apostleship — apostolos and sheliach. The sheliach concept is particularly useful: a servant sent with a specific assignment, carrying the full authority of the one who sent him. His actions were received as the actions of his master. Four categories of apostleship: Christ himself, the Twelve, Paul commissioned directly by the risen Christ at Damascus, and those commissioned by the apostles as their sheliach to complete the apostolic mission.
That framework keeps sharpening the esse/bene esse question. I’m still bene esse, but the historical record complicates a clean position. Churches that abandon the episcopacy tend to drift from apostolic teaching over time — Baptists lose a robust Eucharistic theology, Unitarians lose the Word, some Reformed traditions lose grace itself. The drift isn’t accidental.
Anglicanism holds both together: apostolic succession and apostolic teaching. TEC is the cautionary tale — they kept the succession and lost the teaching. The episcopacy without the apostolic deposit it’s meant to transmit is just an elaborate hat.
Tomorrow: more videos.
Leave a Reply