Who's a Father?

A question that's recently been circulating around my brain is "Who gets to be a Church Father? And why?" I have noticed two circular claims made by those who study primarily patristic literature:

1. This man said great things that we ought to hear because he is a Holy Father.
2. This man is a Holy Father because he said great things that we ought to hear.

OK, so it's circular. Big deal. However, it got me thinking about the whole selection process for becoming a Father. Of course, you've got to have written something important. That right away eliminates everyone in the era who spent most of his time preaching and little time writing. However, one's writings are only "important" if someone else recognizes them to be so. This "someone" in the case of patristic literature would be the later copyists. The works of blacklisted theologians such as Nestorius and Origen are lost to us for precisely this reason. However, who else is out there that we don't get to see? We have evidence from Augustine and Jerome that there were theologians in their day who neither held to their Stoic view of sexuality nor to the perpetual virginity of Mary. It seems obvious why nothing they said has been preserved--desert monastics transcribing scrolls likely wouldn't have too much interest in someone who believed that sex is no impediment to holiness.

All this is to say that when we say we are speaking of the "view of the Fathers," we implicitly mean the "views of men that monastic scribes thought we should listen to." Of course, a big fan of the Fathers would say that the scribes themselves were also quite holy, being monks, and therefore we should humbly receive that which they have determined we ought to hear.

But I myself don't take such a view. I certainly recognize the value in Augustine, Irenaeus, Athanasius, etc, but at the same time I come at the extant works we have with a recognition that later developments in church history and a profound, uncritical affection for imperial Roman Christianity have played a large part in determining who the "Fathers" are and the particular kind of piety and reverence associated with reading their works.