Proclaiming the Gospel with Miraculous Gifts in the Postbiblical Early Church

 

Many stories in Christian history are filled with accounts of charismatic gifts, miracles, signs and wonders.

 

The emergence of the Pentecostal, the neoPentecostal or charismatic, and third wave movements in our century has raised a variety of vital questions that demand answers. Among these is the issue of whether the spiritual gifts enumerated by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 12 remained active in the Church after the first century. Equally crucial is the question of whether these gifts, if still active, were vitally related to the proclamation of the gospel in the Church during the formative centuries.

 

Protestant Cessationism

From the Reformation era onwards, leading Protestant theologians have popularized the view that the work of the Holy Spirit in evangelism after the apostolic age was limited to dynamic proclamation of the Word of God, rather than the exercise of spiritual gifts. This was the position of Martin Luther, who openly rejected the schwärmer or enthusiasts of his day—who claimed gifts of prophecy and gave higher credence to the “inner voice” of the Spirit than to the “external word” or Scriptures.¹

The dominant strand of Protestant biblicism which Luther inaugurated has continued into our own century. It combines an emphasis on proclamation of the Word with the cessationist argument that the power gifts evidenced in the first century Church were neither necessary nor functional after the New Testament had been completed. Representative of this position is Benjamin Breckinridge Warfield (1851-1921), professor of theology at Princeton. Warfield was especially antagonistic towards defenders of revelational religious experience and those who insisted on special spiritual gifts. He felt that these substituted subjective religiosity for the completeness of Scripture.

Voices of cessationism still are with us, and presently are aimed at the healing and gift-based ministries of Pentecostals, charismatics, and third wave churches. Cessationists argue that miracles had little to do with the gospel or were incidental to the proclamation of the gospel in the New Testament. Further, they insist that gifts of healing as well as the other charismata ceased at or near the end of the first century A.D. For example, the claim has been made that “the Church Fathers, who came almost entirely from the East, believed that the apostolic gifts had ceased.”² Such a claim is simply not true, as the evidence presented below shows.

To make these claims, the cessationists have had to ignore or deprecate what was going on among Protestant fringe groups since the time of the Reformation. It is well known that a strand of enthusiasm has remained active in Protestantism, although most of the enthusiasts had been purged from the mainstream, and had been forced to function from the Protestant fringe. These include the Melchiorites, Sebastian Franck, Kasper von Schwenckfeld, the Society of Friends (or Quakers), the Prophets of the Cevennes (or Camisards), the Moravians, certain early Methodists, the Shakers, the Irvingites, and most recently, the contemporary Pentecostal movement (twentieth century charismatics and third wave evangelicals are in part mainstream).

Cessationists also have chosen to overlook the record of both Roman Catholic and Eastern Christian traditions. Any honest inquiry into the history of spirituality in both Roman and Eastern traditions leads the scholar to conclude that the Holy Spirit invested the post-Apostolic Church with the same gifts and charismatic vitality experienced during the first century.³

Protestant cessationists have been influenced by the Enlightenment, or Age of Reason, which has led many to deny the validity of anything in Christian history which falls outside accepted categories of rationality. This has resulted in a “cleaning up” of religious history, purging it of any taint of “enthusiasm” or nonrational behavior and all reports of the supernatural. The result has been what I call a “demythologizing” of the saints—an attempt to deny the many stories in the Christian tradition which are filled with charismatic giftings, miracles, signs and wonders.

In the twentieth century, Pentecostals have unwittingly added to the confusion by teaching that the Holy Spirit was somehow “deistically absent” in the eighteen hundred years between A.D. 100 and 1900, and that the second coming of the Holy Spirit occurred among them at the very beginning of the current century. This fit into their understanding of Joel’s prophecy of a former and a latter rain. In typical restorationist fashion, Pentecostals showed little appreciation for earlier waves of Christian renewal. The result of all this is that we have missed an entire chapter in the history of Christianity—namely, the story of post-apostolic Christians witnessing with power to the unconverted, with their proclamation accented and given credibility by confirming supernatural events.

 

Spirit-Empowered Ministry in the Post-Apostolic Church

It is quite clear that the Holy Spirit’s activity in the Christian Church did not change dramatically after AD 100. As with any other wave of renewal, the time immediately following that of the apostles saw a modest waning of charismatic vitality. But prophets continued to function openly in the Church in the second century, and in fringe groups, such as the Montanists, from that time onwards.

There was no cessation of miracles or signs and wonders in this period either, despite occasional claims to the contrary by a few Church Fathers, including Origen.⁴ Both the Roman church and Eastern churches have an entire genre of literature known as hagiography, or lives of the saints, which give innumerable examples of the dynamic evangelistic outreach of individuals empowered by the divine Spirit. To be sure, we must treat these accounts with a critical, even skeptical eye, given the tendency of the period not to be critical. The fact remains, however, that miracles, signs and wonders were an expected part of Christian life—at least for the spiritually elite who reached beyond their contemporaries in holy living and devotion to God. To insist that none of these accounts are credible, while at the same assuming that similar stories from the first century Church given in Scripture are believable, suggests that we are imposing our own presuppositions on the data.

What seems clear is that the supernatural has accompanied gospel preaching in all periods of Christian history (see the sources cited in note 2 for surveys of the evidence). Yes, there have been ups and downs—but there never seems to have been a total absence of the charismata. To illustrate this, I have chosen to discuss four selected examples of Spirit-empowered ministry—two from both East and West—during the first six centuries of the Christian era.

 

Gregory Thaumaturgus (“Wonder-worker”) (ca. 213-ca. 270)

Gregory was born about 213 at Neocaesarea (in Asia Minor, presently Turkey), the son of wealthy, noble parents. His father was devoted to the worship of pagan deities. When Gregory was fourteen years old, his father died and Gregory became a student of the famous Alexandrian theologian, Origen, under whose tutelage he became a devout Christian.

Origen probed his student with questions and taught him to think critically, investigating philosophy, physics, and ethics. Gregory later praised Origen as one who mediated him through divine charisma, speaking as those who prophesy and interpret mystical and divine words.⁵

Following his schooling (ca. 230), Gregory returned to his native Neocaesarea, where, according to his follower, Gregory of Nyssa, there were but seventeen Christians. When Gregory the Wonderworker died forty years later, there were only seventeen in Neocaesarea who were not Christians!⁶

How was this mass conversion accomplished? At least four of the Church Fathers speak to this question. One of Gregory’s spiritual descendants was Basil of Cappadocia. In Basil’s famous work On the Holy Spirit, he argues that Gregory should be placed among the Apostles and Prophets as a person who walked by the same Spirit as they.⁷ Specifically, Basil reports that by the “fellow-working of the Spirit” Gregory had tremendous power over demons, and was so spiritually gifted that his evangelism was dramatically successful. Basil lists a few of the miracles credited to Gregory’s ministry (including prophecy and the turning of the course of rivers). He concludes:

By the superabundance of gifts, wrought in him by the Spirit in all power and in signs and in marvels, he was styled a second Moses by the very enemies of the Church. Thus in all that he through grace accomplished, alike by word and deed, a light seemed ever to be shining, token of the heavenly power from the unseen which followed him.

Gregory of Nyssa, another of Gregory the Wonderworker’s followers, wrote an essay on his predecessor which seeks to explain the evangelistic success of the Wonderworker. Throughout it is assumed that miracles and other supernatural phenomena resulted in mass conversions.⁸

In his history of the Early Church, the fourth century historian, Socrates, reports that pagans were no less attracted to the Christian faith by his marvelous acts, than by his words. He reports many miracles, healing of the sick, and the casting out of devils even by means of his letters.⁹

Jerome, who provides us with the earliest “Who’s Who in the Church,” also tells of reports current in the late fourth and early fifth centuries that Gregory’s writings were overshadowed by the “signs and wonders” which accompanied his evangelism, bringing “great glory” to the churches.¹⁰

Curiously, the greatest Church historian of the period, Eusebius, is silent on matters miraculous in Gregory’s ministry.¹¹ This silence has been seized upon by modern “demythologizers” to suggest that they were merely figments of disciples’ imaginations. But such an argument, based on negative evidence—based on the absence of evidence for or against—demonstrates nothing. The same scholars argue, in addition, that Gregory’s philosophical and reflective tendencies would have been incompatible with a ministry which evidenced “power evangelism.” One can only wonder how, given this reasoning, they could so readily accept the same mix in the life of St. Paul (compare Acts 17:28 and Rom. 15:18-19)! Basil of Cappadocia (ca. 330-379): the Spirit and Social Concerns

Of all the Early Church Fathers, no one is more concerned about things of the Spirit than Basil of Cappadocia. His writing On the Holy Spirit may be the greatest of all such works ever produced in the Christian Church. He lived in the same section of Asia Minor as Gregory the Wonderworker. This is not at all surprising, because Gregory’s influence is directly referred to in Basil’s writings on the Spirit.

Basil understood that the vibrant Christian was a “pneumatophor”—an active receptacle, carrier and distributor of the Holy Spirit and of spiritual gifts. He is remembered first for providing Eastern Christianity’s most articulate and powerful description of the person and offices of the divine Third Person of the Trinity.¹² Basil also is remembered for establishing the monastic rule which is used by monks throughout Eastern Christianity. One of the unique aspects of Basil’s concept of the Church is that it is a charismatic body, with each person exercising unique and separate gifts, without which the community as a whole would be impoverished. Basil expected that those who exercised leadership and care must be spiritual seniors with gifts of discernment of spirits and healing the sick. They also must be able to foretell the future (i.e., have prophetic gifting: Acts 11:27-28; 20:22; 21:10-11).

One of the charismata which Basil encouraged was empowered Christian preaching. He also stressed the gift of teaching. Basil tended to depend heavily on the leadership of those with obvious spiritual endowment. As a bishop, he would, on occasion, give leadership responsibilities to a lesser monk or a lay brother who was gifted spiritually.

Perhaps the most impressive aspect of Basil’s charismatic life and outreach was the combining of preaching and teaching with care. He created an entire community, called “New Town”—later referred to as the Basilead—to deal with social needs, including those of widows, orphans, lepers, the poor, and even travelers.¹³ In the process, he guided others into the role of pneumatophor—those led by the Spirit to give of themselves, rather than to be self-seeking.

 

Augustine of Hippo (354-430): Miracles Accompanying Sermons

Without doubt, Augustine stands as the most influential Church Father in the West. He is responsible for crystallizing much of Western theology, including the traditional Western view of the Holy Spirit’s person and work.¹⁴

What most theologians and Church historians do not recognize in Augustine is the dynamic of his ministry and his recognition of the place of the miraculous in successful ministry. While some scholars argue that he was skeptical of the charismata in his early career, by the time he wrote the City of God (413-26) miracles were a part of his own experience. In this work he reports, “Even now . . . many miracles are wrought, the same God who wrought those we read of still performing them, by whom He will and as He will. . . .”¹⁵ Again, he declares that “We cannot listen to those who maintain that the invisible God works no visible miracles . . . God, who made the visible heaven and earth, does not disdain to work visible miracles in heaven or earth, that he may thereby awaken the soul which is immersed in things visible to worship him, the invisible.”¹⁶

Augustine gives several examples, including a Cappadocian brother and sister, Paulus and Palladia, who were widely known for their horrible cases of palsy. They wandered into Hippo one Spring, and attended church, where they were prayed for. On Easter morning, when the largest crowd of the year had gathered, Paulus was praying in the church, when suddenly his shaking ceased. Those around recognized what had happened, and soon the whole church was filled with the voices of those who were shouting praises to God. Augustine then ministered to the people, mediating the eloquence of God’s work among them.

At the end of the service, there were more shouts, for the palsied sister, Palladia, who had been trembling at the back of the church, suddenly found herself totally healed. At this point, Augustine reports, “Such a shout of wonder rose from men and women together, that the exclamations and the tears seemed like never to come to an end . . . they shouted God’s praises without words, but with such a noise that our ears could scarcely bear it.”¹⁷

Augustine had a practice of requiring all who had experienced miracles to make both oral and written testimony, so those who had heard would not forget, and those who had never heard would be made aware of God’s power. He also takes his own advice by reporting a variety of contemporary miracles.

Whenever a miracle occurred it was Augustine’s practice to mediate the event to the people. This was so that they would understand completely what had happened, so they would not forget, and so that God would receive the glory, rather than the priest.

Augustine insists that true gifts will bear examination. He even suggests a test to determine whether the spirit is of God: “Therefore by this understand ye the spirit that is from God. Give the earthen vessels a tap, put them to the proof, whether haply they be cracked and give a dull sound; see whether they ring full and clear, see whether charity be there”¹⁸ (cf. Mat. 7:20). Furthermore, Augustine warns against the notion that a spiritual work must be accompanied by external proof: “God forbid that our heart should be tempted by this faithlessness.”¹⁹

Strangely, the same Augustine who provides evidence of the supernatural in the fourth and fifth century Church, also denies on at least five occasions that the gift of tongues is for his generation. “In the laying on of hands, now, that persons may receive the Holy Ghost, do we look, that they should speak with tongues?” “When we laid the hand on these infants, did each one of you look to see whether they would speak with tongues, and, when he saw that they did not speak with tongues, was any of you so wrongminded as to say, These have not received the Holy Ghost?” Tongues are no longer needed because “the Church itself now speaks in the tongues of all nations.”²⁰

One can speculate that, in specifically denying glossolalia, Augustine might have been reacting against contemporary enthusiasts of whom we have no historic record. And it is equally significant that he can point to no scriptural passage which demonstrates his assertion regarding the gift of tongues.

 

Gregory the Great (540?-604): Recorder of Contemporary Miracles

Gregory the Great, the fourth and last of the traditional Latin “Doctors of the Church,” became Pope in 590. His Four Books of Dialogues on the Life and Miracles of the Italian Fathers and on the Immortality of Souls (593-94) simplified the doctrines expressed in Augustine’s The City of God, and was highly influential during the Middle Ages. This work was composed for the single purpose of recording miracles performed by Italian saints in his own time. He understood that miracles were necessary in the Early Church to accomplish the work of evangelism. So too they were necessary in his own time for the conversion of pagans as well as the Lombard heretics. They also were probably intended to deepen the faith of those who were already baptized Christians. While Gregory admits that miracles, with the exception of visions, were not as frequent as they had been in the first century because the number of the faithful had grown considerably, miracles were still a constant of Christian experience.²¹

To remove any reason for disbelief on the part of his readers, Gregory declares that he will give the authority on which each of his miracle stories is based.²² By and large, he is faithful in keeping this promise. His sources are usually eyewitnesses or members of the immediate entourage of the saints involved in the miracles. There are only nineteen episodes among the approximately two hundred reported for which no source is given, and for most of these there is some kind of explanation. Gregory also connects as many miracles as he can to similar accounts in Scripture.

Among the miracles recorded in the Dialogues, the most frequently mentioned involve healings of various ailments, raising of the dead to life, exorcisms of evil spirits, foretelling of the future, and deliverance from danger. Those from the life and ministry of Benedict of Nursia are good examples.

Gregory informs the reader that he learned about Benedict’s miracles from four of Benedict’s own disciples.²³ Benedict brought deliverance to a young monk who had been crushed under a collapsing wall. He also brought healing for numerous illnesses, including leprosy, and raised the dead back to life.

Benedict manifested a spirit of prophecy by foretelling future events and by describing to those who were with him what they had done in his absence (cf. I Cor. 14:24-25).²⁴ He even was able to know the unspoken thoughts in the minds of his monks. For example, he was forewarned of a poison placed in his drinking water by some evil monks. He discerned the work of evil spirits, and exorcised many such spirits. Gregory asserts that such gifts of prophecy and discernment are directly from the Spirit of God. “To us, then, God has made a revelation of it through his Spirit.”²⁵

Gregory the Great’s own ministry apparently was not graced with miracles. He does refer to one personal experience in which he was the beneficiary of a miracle, however. He recalls that he was seriously ill with such severe pain from an intestinal illness that he thought he was near death. He especially grieved that he would not be able to fast on the Saturday before Easter. In his distress, he asked the abbot Eleutherius of Spoleto to pray on his behalf. The prayer was no sooner said than he found strength returning to his weakened body, and his anxiety banished. Not only was he able to keep the fast, but he could have prolonged it to the next day had he so desired.²⁶

While miracle stories are most prominent in the Dialogues, Gregory systematically reports and refers to them elsewhere as well. His Homilies on the Gospels, preached on public occasions, contain many stories of contemporary miracles.²⁷ In his Homilies on Ezechiel, he insists that miracles as striking as any reported in Scripture are being performed: “Now, generally, we see holy men do wonderful things, perform many miracles, cleanse lepers, cast out demons, dispel bodily sicknesses by touch, predict things to come by the spirit of prophecy.”²⁸ In a letter of July 598 to Eulogius, Bishop of Alexandria, Gregory reports that Augustine of Canterbury and his companions in their missionary work in England had such great miracles accompany their preaching that they seemed to imitate the powers of the apostles.²⁹ In the Moralia Gregory rejoices over the success with which God had crowned their preaching with miracles, for with the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons virtually the whole world had been brought to the Christian faith.³⁰

 

Other Examples of Spirit-Empowered Ministry in the Post-Biblical Early Church

The four examples given in this paper provide but a tip-of-the-iceberg view of evangelism in the post-biblical Early Church which was accompanied by and made credible by the miraculous. For those who are sufficiently curious, the charismatic ministries of the following individuals in the post-biblical Early Church could be explored:

1. Tertullian (late second-early third century A.D.), who attempted to prove the validity of his teachings against heretics like Marcion, by pointing to the validation of gifts of the Spirit and ecstasy on his side, and not on the other.³¹
2. Martin of Tours (ca. 316 A.D.), whom Sulpicius Severus acclaimed as the virtual equal in gifted ministry, not only of the prophets and apostles, but of Christ himself.³²
3. Paulinus of Nola (late fourth-early fifth century A.D.), known to us from Gregory the Great’s Dialogues book three.³³
4. Antony of the Desert (late third-early fourth century A.D.), whose biography is provided by Athanasius.³⁴
5. Pseudo-Macarius of Egypt (fourth century A.D.), who, according to several ancient historians, exercised gifts of healing, of exorcism, and of forecasting the future.³⁵
6. Other Fathers of the desert, whose biographies are found in the Historia monachorum in Aegypto.³⁶

It should be remembered that some of the writings given above are hagiographic in nature, and must be treated critically. This does not suggest, however, that all of the stories told about these saints are spurious or without historical basis. Certainly, these stories were believed by the ancient and medieval Church, and in many cases the miracles, signs and wonders described herein were understood to be the cause of unbelievers’ conversion.

 

Conclusions

We have seen that there is considerable evidence that many of the Church Fathers recognized the continuance of apostolic gifts and, in certain cases, even practiced apostolic gifts themselves. In addition, there is sufficient testimony of the connection made in the post-apostolic Church between the exercise of spiritual gifts and successful evangelistic ministry. Finally, it seems reasonable to conclude that all true evangelism, whether or not it is accompanied by miraculous events, is led and empowered by the Holy Spirit (Rev. 19:10b). And, given the historical evidence from virtually all centuries of the Christian era of gifted preaching being accompanied by extraordinary validations, it appears that power evangelism has flourished throughout the Church’s history.

 

PR 

 

Notes

¹See K. S. Latourette, A History of Christianity, vol. 2 (New York: Harper & Row, 1975), pp. 725f.; but compare Luther’s hymn “Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott” (A Mighty Fortress is Our God) composed in 1527 or 1528 (ibid., p. 722) which affirms that “the Spirit and the gifts are ours” (verse 4).

²John Armstrong in M. S. Horton, ed., Power Religion. The Selling Out of the Evangelical Church? (Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1992), 71.

³See Kilian McDonnell and George T. Montague, Christian Initiation and Baptism in the Holy Spirit: Evidence from the First Eight Centuries (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1991); Stanley M. Burgess, The Spirit and the Church: Antiquity (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1984), and The Holy Spirit: Eastern Christian Traditions (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1989); see also Max Turner, “Spiritual Gifts Then and Now,” Vox Evangelica 15 (1985): 41-43; Donald Bridge, Signs and Wonders Today (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1985), pp. 166-177; and Ronald A. Kydd, Charismatic Gifts in the Early Church (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1984).

⁴Origen, Against Celsus 2.48, ANF 4:449-50, seems to suggest that visible miracles were appropriate only for the nascent church. But he does have a good deal to say about the gift of prophecy. He even goes so far as to suggest that a person has to open the mouth in order to receive the charism of prophecy. (On Exodus 4:4, Sources Chrétiennes (Paris: Cerf, 1942ff), 321:130. Scholars debate whether Augustine of Hippo and Gregory the Great, while young men, also were cessationists (see William D. McCready, Signs of Sanctity: Miracles in the Thought of Gregory the Great (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1989). It is clear that both Augustine and Gregory, in their later careers gave evidence of a variety of contemporary miracles, and linked these with the proclamation of the gospel.

⁵Gregory Thaumaturgus, Oration and Panegyric addressed to Origen, 15; ANF 6:36.

⁶Gregory of Nyssa, Life of Saint Gregory Thaumaturgus, Patrologiae cursus completus. Series Graeca, ed. J. P. Migne (Paris: J. P. Migne, 1857-66), 46:cols. 893-958 (henceforth PG).

⁷Basil of Cappadocia, On the Holy Spirit 74, NPF 2nd series 8:46-47.

⁸Gregory of Nyssa, Life of Saint Gregory Thaumaturgus, PG 46: cols. 893-958.

⁹Socrates, Ecclesiastical History 27, NPF 2nd series 2:111-112.

¹⁰Jerome, Lives of Illustrious Men 65, NPF 2nd series 3: 376.

¹¹Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 6.30, NPF 2nd series 1: 275-6.

¹²On the Holy Spirit, NPF 2nd series 8: 1-50.

¹³Gregory Nazianzen, The Panegyric on St. Basil 63, NPF 2nd series 7: 416.

¹⁴Augustine, On the Trinity, NPF 1st series 3: 17-228.

¹⁵Augustine, City of God 22.8, NPF 1st series 2: 490.

¹⁶Augustine, City of God 10.12, NPF 1st series 2: 188-89.

¹⁷Ibid.

¹⁸Augustine, The Epistle of St. John homily 6.13, NPF 1st series 7: 500.

¹⁹Augustine, On the Gospel of St. John 32.7, NPF 1st series 7: 195.

²⁰Augustine, Homily 6.10 (on the Epistles of St. John), NPF 1st series 7: 497-8; On Baptism 3.16.21, NPF 1st series 4:443; On the Gospel of St. John 32.7, NPF 1st series 7:195.

²¹Gregory the Great, Homiliae in Evangelia, Patrologia cursus completus. Series Latina, ed. J. P. Migne (Paris: J. P. Migne, 1844-1904), 76: col. 1091 (henceforth PL).

²²Gregory the Great, Dialogues, trans. Odo John Zimmerman (New York: Fathers of the Church, 1959), 6.

²³Dialogues 2 prologue, Zimmerman 56.

²⁴That I Cor. 14:24-25 refers to prophetic revelation which includes supernatural insight into the secrets of people’s hearts is noted by A. Oepke, TDNT, vol. 3, p. 976, n. 42; and Wayne Grudem, The Gift of Prophecy, pp. 136-137.

²⁵Dialogues 2.13, 15, 16, 26, 30, 32; Zimmerman 77-78, 80, 81, 83, 95, 98, 101.

²⁶Dialogues 3.33, Zimmerman 172-73.

²⁷Gregory the Great, Homiliae in Evangelia, PL 76:cols 1075-1312.

²⁸Gregory the Great, Homiliae in Hiezechihelem prophetam, ed. M. Adriaen, Corpus Christianorum Series Latina 142 (Turnhout: Brepols, 1971), 254-255 (henceforth CCL).

²⁹Gregory the Great, Letters 3.61, 8.29, CCL 140 and 140a, ed. D. Norberg, (Turnhout: Brepols, 1982), 209-211, 550-553.

³⁰Gregory the Great, Moralia in Iob, ed. M. Adriaen, CCL 143b (Turnhout: Brepols, 1979-85), 1346.

³¹See Stanley M. Burgess, The Spirit and the Church: Antiquity (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1984), 65-68.

³²Sulpicius Severus. Dialogi 2.5, 3.10, Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum, ed. C. Halm (Vienna, 1866), 1:186, 208.

³³Dialogues 3 prologue, Zimmerman 111-114.

³⁴Athanasius, Life of Antony, PG 26:cols. 835-975; NPF 2nd series 4: 188-221.

³⁵Sources for the life of Pseudo-Macarius are Socrates, Ecclesiastical History 4.23, NPF 2nd series 2:107; Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History 3.14, NPF 2nd series 2:291; Palladius, Lausiac History 17, ed. Robert T. Meyer Ancient Christian Writers (New York: Newman Press, 1965), 34; Rufinus, History of the Monks 28, PL 21: cols.449-52, and Rufinus, Apology 1.19, NPF 2nd series 3:444.

³⁶Historia monachorum in Aegypto, ed. A. J. Festugière, Subsidia hagiographica 53 (Brussels: Société des Bollandistes, 1971). This work has been translated by Norman Russell (Oxford: Mowbray; Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications, 1981).

 

Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the NIV®.

This chapter is from Gary S. Greig and Kevin N. Springer, eds., The Kingdom and the Power: Are Healing and the Spiritual Gifts Used by Jesus and the Early Church Meant for the Church Today? A Biblical Look at How to Bring the Gospel to the World with Power (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1993). Used with permission.