"For as a round stone cannot become square unless portions be cut off and cast away, so also those who are rich in this world cannot be useful to the Lord unless their riches be cut down." 
Grape gathering from elm trellises in Italy, an 1849 illustration.
The Shepherd of Hermas was one of the most popular and widely-read books in early Christianity. Written during the first half of the second century, The Shepherd was “the most widely read Christian book outside our present biblical canon in the first five centuries of the Church” with more copies discovered in Egypt before the fourth century than any other New Testament book, including even the Gospels of Matthew and John.[1][2][3] The fourth century Codex Sinaiticus included it among the books of the New Testament, and it is spoken of as scripture by theologians such as Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Tertullian.[4]
This popular text was composed in Rome over the span of about forty years and includes five visions, twelve moral mandates, and ten similitudes (or parables) given to a Christian man named Hermas.[5] Scholars today place The Shepherd within the collection of writings called The Apostolic Fathers which together give insight into the development of the Christian church in the immediate years after the New Testament was written. Historian John McGuckin writes that The Shepherd and the other writings of the Apostolic Fathers “belong to the world of the house church or the incipient rise of the monarchical bishops, and their overall focus on moral encouragement in a markedly eschatological context or outlook gives us a sense of what most of the earliest episcopal preachers must have sounded like in their own time.”[6] Although the book was not ultimately included in what we today consider to be the New Testament, The Shepherd remained very popular and was used extensively in catechesis, and later leaders like Athanasius of Alexandria in the fourth century urged literate (and therefore wealthier) Christians to use it in their private study and reading.
The reason why The Shepherd was so popular, particularly as a book for instruction of new Christians, is immediately clear as it contains striking images that convey the ‘earthy moralism’ of the church at that time. It reflects the Hellenistic Jewish moral traditions that were prevalent in second-century Rome - including a recurring theme of contrasting the way of light and life with that of darkness and death.[7]
It centers on the divine revelations made to a man named Hermas who was born a slave, freed, and became wealthy, and then lost his possessions as a result of persecutions against Christians. There are two striking images that show how Christians were continuing to wrestle with the place of wealth in the broader Church. In one vision, the church is compared to a gleaming white tower made up of square stones. Here the wealthy are depicted as ‘round white stones’ which are not useful, and who must first have their wealth cut away in order to become part of the building up of the tower. Helen Rhee observes that “Eschatological salvation and wealth are not compatible unless the latter is ‘cut away’ from the rich. However, those who repent ‘quickly’ by seeking out the hungry and doing good with their wealth, ‘until the tower is finished,’ will enter the kingdom (albeit with difficulty).”[8]
Later in the text, Hermas is given the vision of the wealthy and poor in a symbiotic relationship like that of the then-common agricultural practice of using elm trees as supports for fruiting vines. A divine shepherd reveals to Hermas that the rich - who are represented as fruitless elm trees - can offer shade, protection, and support during difficult times to the poor - represented as fruiting vines. In a redemptive exchange, the poor, who were considered to have a closer relationship to God, would then pray for the rich so that the wealthy might be spared in the final judgment. Rhee notes, “Based on the traditional notion that the rich are deficient in the things of God due to their wealth and distraction while the poor are rich in intercession and praise with effectual power, only working together, as do the fruitful vine and the barren elm, may rich and poor support and benefit each other through their respective services for the coming judgment.”[9]
The images of the tower and then that of the elm and the vine help address what was an overarching theological question and concern in the Shepherd of Hermas and the broader church of Rome at the time, which is how Christians - including wealthier Christians - could be redeemed for post-baptismal sin. Hermas’ visions revealed to Christians that post-baptismal repentance was permitted in the church, including the possibility of redemption through almsgiving to the poor.[10] Ultimately, this represented a more moderate position during a period in which Christians believed history was soon drawing to a close, as The Shepherd offered a means of repentance for those who had apostatized amidst persecution, as well as for the wealthy who were seeking a means of salvation.[11]
For the wealthy, The Shepherd would argue that the sins and distractions that come through riches could be alleviated by dispossession (round stones becoming square) but also through entering into a symbiotic relationship with the poor (elm tree to fruiting vine). This latter, symbiotic image influenced the “redemptive almsgiving” model - one in which “the distribution of some wealth in almsgiving secures (or merits) the forgiveness of sins.”[12] The rich could be redeemed for the ongoing sin of retaining most wealth through their giving some of it to the poor, who in turn would pray for God to do the impossible: namely, make the camel fit through the eye of the needle. For all things are possible with God including, even, the redemption of the wealthy.
Roman Garrison summarizes how Christians ended up here by the second century: “The hostility between rich and poor believers was relieved through the realization that the wealthy ought to provide for the needy and, in so doing, would purchase friends (and redemption) by means of unrighteous mammon. The problem of post-baptismal sin, aggravated by the continually delayed Parousia, provoked the need for a ‘supplementary’ redemption. With a renewed warning that the end was near, redemptive almsgiving was urged as a way to prepare for the return of the Lord.”[13] The Shepherd of Hermas would therefore ultimately advise the rich: “So instead of fields, buy souls that are in distress, as anyone is able, and visit widows and orphans, and do not neglect them; and spend your wealth and all your possessions, which you received from God, on fields and houses of this kind. For this is why the Master made you rich, so that you might perform these ministries for him.”[14]
The Old Woman and the Tower
The Shepherd of Hermas and the other writings of The Apostolic Fathers are characterized by an ‘earthy moralism’, by an absence of concern with doctrine and liturgical matters, by their tendency to avoid the speculative theology of later writers, and for their focus on establishing order in the Church.[15] “Their focus is not so much on the outside, but rather on the internal life of the communities: acutely aware of the need to establish polities that would work, yet would also (at least seem to) have precedence from generation of greater leaders.”[16]
This concern for ecclesiastical order is on full display in The Shepherd’s first vision which represents one of the first instances in which the church is depicted as a woman -- in this case, a rather salty and sarcastic old woman who progressively becomes younger as our protagonist Hermas repents and reforms his life.[17] Greeting Hermas with a hearty “Hail Hermas!”, the church appears as “an old woman, arrayed in a splendid robe, and with a book in her hand” and concludes two chapters later by giving Hermas the blunt advice to “Behave like a man, Hermas.”[18] Carol Osiek writes, “The older woman who first appears to Hermas early identifies herself as the church, yet she interprets for him a vision of the tower being built – which is also the church. The church has both strong and weak members and is in the process of construction. When the tower is completed, the end will come. Yet in the course of the long narrative, the tower is never completed.”[19]
Hermas’ revelations begin shortly after he is caught spying on his slave master Rhoda while she is taking a bath. The old woman who appears to him is unimpressed with the state of Hermas’ lecherous soul and begins to show him a series of visions, many of which have to do with his need for personal reform but also having to do with the need for post-baptismal repentance generally and its role within the building up of the Church. She shows Hermas a vision of a tower being built of square white stones and tells Hermas that “Those square white stones which fitted exactly into each other are apostles, bishops, teachers, and deacons, who have lived in godly purity, and have acted as bishops and teachers and deacons chastely and reverently to the elect of God. Some of them have fallen asleep, and some still remain alive. And they have always agreed with each other, and been at peace among themselves, and listened to each other. On account of this, they join exactly into the building of the tower.”[20]
In addition to the “apostles, bishops, teachers, and deacons” who join exactly together in the continuous building up of the tower, additional types of stones represent those who suffered martyrdom and those who faithfully followed God’s commandments. These too are successfully incorporated into the building up of the tower. The shepherd then shifts to a description of the variety of stones that do not fit in or are being cast away by workers as useless at the construction site. “These are they who have sinned, and wish to repent. On this account they have not been thrown far from the tower, because they will yet be useful in the building, if they repent.”[21] Among these are rough stones representing “those who have known the truth yet not remained in it”, stones with cracks in them symbolizing church members who are forever fighting with one another, as well as stones who are truly beyond saving - and are therefore cast far away from the tower - who represent “the sons of iniquity” who believed “in hypocrisy, and wickedness did not depart from them.”[22]
In addition to these categories of discarded stones, the old woman spends a considerable amount of time discussing the round white stones that symbolize the rich, an indication of the level of attention the vexing issue of wealth was during this period of the life of the church. The old woman tells us that these stones must have their wealth and privilege cut away in order to fit into the overall building up of the church. It is only in doing so that the rich - who are perpetually distracted by their wealth - will ever be able to find their place and possibly be redeemed:
“‘But who are these, Lady, that are white and round, and yet do not fit into the building of the tower?’ She answered and said, ‘How long will you be foolish and stupid, and continue to put every kind of question and understand nothing? These are those who have faith indeed, but they have also the riches of this world. When, therefore, tribulation comes, on account of their riches and business they deny the Lord.’ I answered and said to her, ‘When, then, will they be useful for the building, Lady?’ ‘When the riches that now seduce them have been circumscribed, then will they be of use to God. For as a round stone cannot become square unless portions be cut off and cast away, so also those who are rich in this world cannot be useful to the Lord unless their riches be cut down. Learn this first from your own case. When you were rich, you were useless; but now you are useful and fit for life. Be ye useful to God; for you also will be used as one of these stones.’”[23]
The Elm and the Vine
Following the severity of the image of the tower and round white stones, The Shepherd’s most well-known image of the elm tree and the vine represents a considerably more accommodating approach to the wealthy than that of requiring the rich to cut away at their wealth.
Just prior to The Shepherd’s discussion of the elm and the vine which occurs in the second similitude, the first similitude frames a vision of two homelands and their associated expenditures. There the wealthy are offered an opportunity to retain their wealth provided they practice right expenditure: “Instead of lands, therefore, buy afflicted souls, according as each one is able, and visit widows and orphans, and do not overlook them; and spend your wealth and all your preparations, which ye received from the Lord, upon such lands and houses.”[24]
This advice to the wealthy sets up the second similitude, one in which a divine shepherd (for whom the text is named) points to the symbiotic relationship that exists between the fruitless elm tree and the fruiting vine. The shepherd says that the elm and the vine have been placed on earth by God to symbolize a potentially mutually beneficial relationship between the rich and the poor, and how the rich and poor can be brought into right relationship through the life of the Church: “As I was walking in the field, and observing an elm and vine, and determining in my own mind respecting them and their fruits, the Shepherd appears to me, and says, ‘What is it that you are thinking about the elm and vine?’ ‘I am considering,’ I reply, ‘that they become each other exceedingly well.’ ‘These two trees,’ he continues, ‘are intended as an example for the servants of God.’”[25]
The rich are described as the fruitless elm tree who, on account of the sin of accumulated wealth and the many distractions that riches brings, are inherently unable to have as close a relationship to God as the poor or bear good fruit for God: “‘The rich man has much wealth, but is poor in matters relating to the Lord, because he is distracted about his riches; and he offers very few confessions and intercessions to the Lord, and those which he does offer are small and weak, and have no power above.” In contrast, “the intercession of the poor man is acceptable and influential with God.”[26] Despite the poor’s special closeness to God, they are described as a grapevine whose fruits are small when they are unsupported because of the absence of shade and protection from wild predators. The poor and the fruit of the poor are forever exposed and vulnerable to attack.
It is only when the two are brought together, with the fruitless elm tree becoming a source of shade, protection, and support for the fruiting vine, that the rich and poor can become as one organism working together for the glory of God: “Among men, however, the elm appears not to produce fruit, and they do not know nor understand that if a drought come, the elm, which contains water, nourishes the vine; and the vine, having an unfailing supply of water, yields double fruit both for itself and for the elm. So also poor men interceding with the Lord on behalf of the rich, increase their riches; and the rich, again, aiding the poor in their necessities, satisfy their souls. Both, therefore, are partners in the righteous work.”[27]
In this vision, the rich come to know their proper place as background support in the lives of the poor, and in return the poor would offer prayers to God for the possible redemption of the perpetually-distracted rich. Roman Garrison writes, “Hermas insists that wealthy Christians are obligated to help the needy. Riches are a danger to faith, even where repentance is possible (Vision l.l.8-9). Repentance by the rich must be ‘speedy’ if they are to enter the kingdom of God, and that repentance must be shown in ‘doing good.’” In this way, “almsgiving has the potential to be redemptive because of the prayers of the poor who intercede for the rich.”[28]
As already mentioned above, this image of the elm and the vine would come to symbolize what Roman Garrison and others have described as 'redemptive almsgiving', the ancient argument that emerged from Rome that the rich might be able to obtain their salvation by giving necessities to the poor: “The belief that charity was a means of gaining redemption for sin certainly fills a critical need for Hermas. It is clear that he was anxious to secure and to provide a second ‘repentance’ for those who were guilty of post-baptismal sin.” In turn, in a pattern that echoed the Roman patronage system, the poor were to faithfully offer their prayers for the salvation for the wealthy donors, and because the prayers of the poor were considered to be more effectual, it was thought that in doing so, the eye of the needle may be successfully widened and the wealthy would have at least an opportunity at redemption.
Privilege and Double Consciousness
There are many different directions I could go from here and a great deal of focus has been paid to how The Shepherd and another text - namely, 2 Clement - are milestones along the way to a full flourishing of the theology of redemptive almsgiving. As interesting as that might be, what has remained with me about The Shepherd is the fact that this text was highly recommended by the likes of Athanasius of Alexandria for wealthy catechumens.[29] It is a formational text, in other words, and would seem to ask the wealthy literate who could engage in such private study to wrestle with their wealth and privilege as part of their finding their place within the broader church.
In many ways, it isn’t surprising that this ancient text about coming to terms with one’s own wealth and privilege comes from Hermas, for he had himself traversed many socioeconomic boundaries in his life. Born a slave, sold to a Christian named Rhoda, manumitted (freed), and having become wealthy through some form of commerce, Hermas is described as looking back at his worldly success with a sense of regret if not embarrassment.[30] This Christian text is hardly the standard rags-to-riches tale in which material success serves as a stand-in for happiness. He reflects on the fact that his children are terrible -- they are the ones who denounced him to the authorities for being a Christian -- and there are not so subtle insinuations interwoven through The Shepherd that his wife has committed adultery.[31] The old woman places full blame for Hermas’ ruinous familial life on the distractions of wealth: “And you, Hermas, have endured great personal tribulations on account of the transgressions of your house, because you did not attend to them, but were careless and engaged in your wicked transactions.”[32]
Hermas also expresses repeated concerns about the vapid nature of a luxurious life, and how it results in fretting over what are ultimately trivialities. The wealthy are told to distance themselves from such trappings including “the desire after another’s wife or husband, and after extravagance, and many useless dainties and drinks, and many other foolish luxuries; for all luxury is foolish and empty in the servants of God.”[33] Hermas, then, is a formerly wealthy man who realizes that for all the external successes of his life, he had no inner core, no moral center, and that his life was being wasted on silly things.
Also in keeping with The Shepherd’s exploration of privilege is a theme of double-mindedness or double-spiritedness. Throughout The Shepherd of Hermas a great deal of attention is paid to the inner reality of two spirits - the holy and the demonic - and making sure that a Christian is making room only for the former in one’s life. Carol Osiek notes that “double-mindedness”, in contrast, results in “too much attention paid to daily and business affairs, and the concern for what others (non-believers) will think to see them associating with lower status persons.”[34] Double-mindedness is linked with concern over socioeconomic status. Osiek writes that overinvolvement in business affairs and concern over status “fit very well what we know of the freedman class in the first centuries of the empire: many were economically very successful and at the same time, in a highly status-conscious society, they were some of the most sensitive to their exclusion from high-status civic positions and to their own striving for status within their own socially limited sphere.”[35]
On its surface, this is fairly straightforward, yet I can’t help but note how Hermas’ words - which are, after all, those of an ex-slave made successful businessman - have intriguing similarities with the words of W.E.B Du Bois who famously described a type of double-consciousness and warring within himself as he bridged racial and socioeconomic divides. “It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness,—an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.”[36] Hermas, at least, appears to have found some measure of peace as a result of having been dispossessed of his wealth (albeit a dispossession that came as a result of his children’s denunciation of him as a Christian), and through his subsequent return to a lower status in Roman society as a Christian.
In contrast to the notion that discussions of privilege are relatively new, The Shepherd of Hermas can be read as an early meditation on what it means to come to terms with one’s own wealth and privilege as part of a movement where it is the poor who are seen as having a closer relationship to God and who were in leadership positions. I continue to be struck by the fact that The Shepherd was considered to be scripture, and was later used as a text in catechesis, and was depicted as beneficial for private study for the literate wealthy. The image of cutting away one’s wealth and privilege in order to fit into the church, as well as the instruction to become like an elm tree and offering shade and support, still speak across the millennia as sound advice for anyone - including myself - who wrestles with the distractions and privileges of having wealth and power in society. Such a symbiotic relationship represents a reversal of the normally parasitic relationship between the rich and the poor, the persistent and all-too-familiar reality of the very few growing wealthy from the labor and resources of the poor who are kept barely alive so as to continue to benefit the host. The Shepherd suggests that the church may be a space where such a pattern is inverted. Is it? Can it be? What would it mean for this to be more so the case?
At times, it feels as if The Shepherd of Hermas could still serve as a kind of catechesis for today's church. Both images have been particularly beneficial for me as I’ve reflected on my own wealth and privilege and what it would mean to bring these into ‘right relationship.” The Shepherd’s potent images, earthy moralism, and its relative simplicity of concepts and language make it an extraordinary text for discussion and lend insights into what the first generations of Christians may have sounded like when preaching. The assumption that the wealthy must cut away at their wealth and privilege before they fit into the overall project of Christianity is still relevant today, as is the challenge for those accustomed to power to learn to reposition themselves as a supportive elm tree, offering shade and support for a fruiting vine. In this respect, although The Shepherd offers a significantly more moderated vision than the intense reversal we see in the Magnificat, for instance, it nevertheless maintains many aspects of that same spirit while portraying the Church as a unique space where the rich and poor might be able to enter into a new, more symbiotic relationship.
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[1] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (pp. 533-535). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. “The Apostolic Fathers” by Carolyn Osiek
[2] Rhee, Helen. Wealth and Poverty in Early Christianity (Ad Fontes: Early Christian Sources) . Augsburg Fortress. Kindle Edition. Location 193
[3] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (p. 469). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition.
[4] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (p. 469). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition.
[5] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (pp. 533-535). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. “The Apostolic Fathers” by Carolyn Osiek
[6] McGuckin, John. 54
[7] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (pp. 533-535). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. “The Apostolic Fathers” by Carolyn Osiek
[8] Rhee, Helen. Wealth and Poverty in Early Christianity (Ad Fontes: Early Christian Sources) . Augsburg Fortress. Kindle Edition. Location 193
[9] Rhee, Helen. Wealth and Poverty in Early Christianity (Ad Fontes: Early Christian Sources) . Augsburg Fortress. Kindle Edition. Location 202
[10] McGuckin, John. Pages 62-63
[11] McManners, John. Illustrated HIstory. Page 44
[12] Garrison, Roman. Thesis ...Garrison, R. (1990). Redemptive almsgiving in early christianity (Order No. NL56946). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (303910643). Retrieved from http://ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/dissertations-theses/redemptive-almsgiving-early-christianity/docview/303910643/se-2?accountid=10226. Abstract
[13] Garrison, Roman. Thesis ...Garrison, R. (1990). Redemptive almsgiving in early christianity (Order No. NL56946). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (303910643). Retrieved from http://ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/dissertations-theses/redemptive-almsgiving-early-christianity/docview/303910643/se-2?accountid=10226. Abstract
[14] Rhee, Helen. Wealth and Poverty in Early Christianity (Ad Fontes: Early Christian Sources) (p. 2). Augsburg Fortress. Kindle Edition. / Shepherd of Hermas, Location 665
[15] McGuckin, John. 54-55
[16] McGuckin, John. 55
[17] McGuckin, John. 61
[18] Vision 1, chapters 2 and 4
[19] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (pp. 533-535). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. “The Apostolic Fathers” by Carolyn Osiek
[20] Hermas, Third Vision, Chapter 5
[21] Hermas, Third Vision, Chapter 5
[22] Hermas, Third Vision, Chapter 6
[23] Hermas, Third Vision, Chapter 6
[24] Hermas, First Similitude
[25] Hermas, Second Similitude
[26] Hermas, Second Similitude
[27] Hermas, Second Similitude
[28] Garrison, Roman. Thesis ...Garrison, R. (1990). Redemptive almsgiving in early christianity (Order No. NL56946). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. (303910643). Retrieved from http://ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.cul.columbia.edu/dissertations-theses/redemptive-almsgiving-early-christianity/docview/303910643/se-2?accountid=10226
[29] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (p. 495). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition.
[30] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (pp. 533-535). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. “The Apostolic Fathers” by Carolyn Osiek
[31] McGuckin, John. 61
[32] Vision 2, Chapter 3
[33] Twelfth Commandment, Chapter 2
[34] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (pp. 533-535). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. “The Apostolic Fathers” by Carolyn Osiek
[35] The Early Christian World: Volume 1 (Routledge Worlds) (pp. 533-535). Taylor and Francis. Kindle Edition. “The Apostolic Fathers” by Carolyn Osiek
[36] Du Bois, W. E. B. The Souls of Black Folk. New York, Avenel, NJ: Gramercy Books; 1994
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