The Library
1577 works catalogued century by century, from the literature the Bible was written among to the present — each with a note on what it is, why it lasted, and where to read it.
201–300
1 work
c. 215; authorship disputed
Greek
Attributed to Hippolytus of Rome · c. 170–c. 235
A manual of ordination prayers, the three-year catechumenate, the baptismal rite with its questions and anointings, and the eucharistic prayer that follows.
301–400
2 works
362
Greek
Gregory of Nazianzus · c. 329 – 390
Ordained against his will by his own father, Gregory ran away, then came back and explained himself. The care of souls is the art of arts, he argues, because a physician treats bodies that can be examined and a pastor treats what cannot be seen — and no two people can be handled the same way.
c. 375–380
Greek
Anonymous
Eighty-five short rules on ordination, clerical conduct, excommunication, and the church calendar, transmitted as the eighth book of the Apostolic Constitutions.
1001–1100
1 work
c. 1057–1058
Latin
Humbert of Silva Candida · c. 1000–1061
An argument that ordinations bought with money are not merely illicit but void, and that lay rulers have no business investing bishops with ring and staff.
4 of 1577 works