cal wisdom of life.
In order to enforce this moral, he passes to "another sort of _gnosis_ and
instruction" (xviii. i), _viz._ the precepts of the "Two Ways," cited in a
slightly different form from that found in the first part of the _Teaching
of the Apostles_. The modifications, however, are all in a more spiritual
direction, in keeping with the genuinely evangelic spirit which underlies
and pervades even the allegorical ingenuities of the epistle.

Its opening shows it to have been addressed to a Church, or rather a group
of Churches, recently visited by the writer, who, while not wishing to
write as an authoritative "teacher" so much as one who has come to love
them as a friend (i. 8, cf. ix. 9), yet belongs to the class of "teachers"
with a recognized spiritual gift (_charisma_), referred to _e.g._ in the
_Didach[=e]_. He evidently feels in a position to give his _gnosis_ with
some claim to a deferential hearing. This being so, the epistle was
probably written, not to Alexandria, but rather by a "teacher" of the
Alexandrine Church to some body of Christians in Lower Egypt among whom he
had recently been visiting. This would explain the absence of specific
address, so that it appears as in form a "general epistle," as Origen
styles it. Its date has been much debated. But Lightfoot's reading of the
apocalyptic passage in ch. iv.--with a slight modification suggested by Sir
W. M. Ramsay--is really conclusive for the reign of Vespasian (A.D. 70-79).
The main counter-view, in favour of a date about A.D. 130, can give no
natural account of this passage, while it misconstrues the reference in ch.
xvi. to the building of the spiritual temple, the Christian Church. Thus
this epistle is the earliest of the Apostolic Fathers, and as such of
special interest. Its central problem, the relation of Judaism and
Christianity--of the Old and the New forms of a Covenant which, as Divine,
must in a sense abide the same--was one which gave the early Church much
trouble; nor, in absence of a due theory of the education of the race by
gradual development, was it able to solve it satisfactorily.

LITERATURE.--Besides collected editions of the Apostolic Fathers, see O.
Braunsberger, _Der Apostel Barnabas, ... u. der ihm beigelegte Brief_
(Mainz, 1876); W. Cunningham, _Epistle of Barnabas_ (1877); sections in J.
Donaldson, _The Apostolic Fathers_; E. Reuss, _Theologie chretienne_, vol.
ii., and in M. von Engelhardt, _Das Christenthum Justins