The Function of Bishops
Abstract.
A great deal of nonsense is talked about concerning the purpose and functions of 'bishops' in the Early Church and this paper seeks to correct some of these errors. The fundamental problem has been that historians have resolutely used 'tinted optics' when viewing these far distant days. There has been an insistence of adhering to medieval concepts, laws and procedures and transposing them in toto to the times of the Early Church. In so doing there has been a reluctance to accept, let alone consider, that 'the church' was in fact established long before the time when the Bishop of Rome exercised plenipotentiary power across Europe.
For over five hundred years, clerics of the various orders of priesthood exercised their zealous efforts for the good of the people before the influence of Rome was established on these shores. There were bishops amongst them - there had to be in order that priests and deacons might be ordained - but they were not even remotely bishops in the mould that most people imagine. Dioceses had no formal boundaries, bishops had no sees or fixed cathedrals, priests, especially those in episcopal orders, were peripatetic wandering across the land to wherever there was greatest need for their ministry.
These were the Epicopi Vagantes whose ranks included some of the most famous early 'fathers' of Christianity in these lands and whose lives we would do well to study by placing them in an accurate historical context.
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