In his early epistle to the Philippians, Paul makes reference to the officers that guided that church.  He sends greetings “to all the saints in Christ Jesus which are at Philippi, with the bishops and deacons” (Phil. 1:1).  Polycarp, writing to the same church in the next century, addresses the “presbyters and deacons,” showing that the apostolic order was still preserved there.

[Sidenote:  Bishops vs.  Presbyters]

In the Ignatian epistles, however, written early in the second century, there appears positional authority of a new order.  In place of the New Testament standard of a plurality of elders, or bishops, jointly teaching and guiding the local church, we find recognition of an office which was superior to that of the presbyters and to whose incumbents alone the term “bishop” was applied.  A few extracts from his writings will make clear this recognition of a threefold order of the ministry—­bishops, elders, and deacons.  “Wherefore, it is fitting that ye should run together in accordance with the will of your bishop, which thing also ye do.  For your justly renowned presbytery, worthy of God, is fitted exactly to the bishop as the strings are to the harp” (To the Ephesians, chap. 4).  “He is subject to the bishop as to the grace of God, and to the presbytery as to the will of Jesus Christ” (To the Magnesians, chap. 2).  And again, in the same epistle he says, “I exhort you to study to do all things with a divine harmony, while your bishop presides in the place of God, and your presbytery in the place of the assembly of the apostles” (chap. 6).  “In like manner, let all reverence the deacons as the appointment of Jesus Christ, and the bishop as Jesus Christ, who is the Son of the Father, and the presbyters as the Sanhedrin of God, and assembly of the apostles.  Apart from these there is no church” (To the Trallians, chap. 3).  To the Smyrnaeans he writes:  “See that ye all follow the bishop, even as Jesus Christ does the Father....  Let no man do anything connected with the church without the bishop” (chap. 8).  “It is not lawful without the bishop either to baptize or to celebrate a love-feast; but whatsoever he shall approve of, that is also pleasing to God” (chap. 8).  “It is well to reverence both God and the bishop.  He who honors the bishop has been honored of God; but he who does anything without the knowledge of the bishop, does [in reality] serve the devil” (chap. 9).

That this early recognition of a superior order of ministers was a distinct innovation is also shown from the literature of that period.  In the Shepherd of Hermas, dating from the first part of the second century, elders and presbyters are distinctly named but no bishop in contrast therewith.  In the so-called “Teaching of the Twelve Apostles,” also dating from the first part of the second century, bishops and deacons only are named as teachers and leaders of the church, showing that the original signification of the term “bishop” is here retained.  Clement of Rome, in his first epistle to the Corinthians, speaks of the ministry as an institution of the apostles, but he mentions, nevertheless, only a twofold order—­elders and deacons, presbyters and deacons, or bishops and deacons.  The same classification is made in the second epistle of Clement to the Corinthians, a work which is generally ascribed to another author; so also in the epistle of Polycarp to the Philippians.