Social Origins of Christian Architecture. Volume I: Building God's House in the Roman World: Architectural Adaptation Among Pagans, Jews and Christians; Volume II: Texts..., The

Anglican Theological Review, Summer 1998 by Vivian, Tim

The Social Origins of Christian Architecture. Volume I: Building God's House in the Roman World: Architectural Adaptation Among Pagans, Jews and Christians; Volume II: Texts and Monuments for the Christian Domus Ecclesiae and Its Environment. By L Michael White. Valley Forge, PA: Trinity Press, 1990 (vol. 1), 197 (vol. 2). xi 211 pp. (vol.1); xi 524 pp. (vol. 2). $30.00 each (paper).

When teaching the history or theology of Early Christianity, I ask students to imagine themselves as Christians walking through the forum of any Roman city in the third century: imagine the monumental buildings, the temples dEdicated to Greek, Roman, Egyptian, and Syrian gods, the baths, the theaters, the statues. Now imagine how dwarfed, how outnumbered, the Christians must have felt, architecturally, and probably psychologically, psychically. Now, with such books as these two impressive volumes bv L. Michael White, we can more securely imagine the Christians of the late Roman Empire at home in their churches, their own sacred spaces.

These two volumes, "more than fifteen years in the making" (2.ix), grew out of the author's Ph.D. dissertation at Yale. Volume I is a study of "the development of the place of assembly and church building" of the early Christians which, the author believes, offers "one of the best ways to see the historical development of Christianity" (1.4). Volume II provides a "collectiOn of texts, architectural sites, inscriptions, and papyri" (2.x) that supports the study in volume I . The two volumes together offer "a more comprehensive analysis of the beginnings of Christian development in church building-the progression from house church meetings to basilical architecture" (1.9). To White's credit, his study in Volume I is not narrowly architectural but is, rather, "a social history that depends on the most careful recoistructive possible of the evidence (both archaeological and literary) in its historical context , (1.9).

Prospective readers should take seriously the subtitle of Volume I: after a chapter examining the history of the subject (ch. 2), the author provides a chapter (clo. 3) on how groups "adapted private domestic structures for public religious or collegial use" (1.44), and a chapter on "Synagogues in the Greco-Roman Diaspora" (ch. 4). The writing, though always clear, will sometimes be overly technical for the general reader: a glossary would have been of great help. Readers of this journal will probably be most interested in chapter five, "From House Church to Church Building." Here White alves together the history of early Christian architecture with social and liturgical considerations, along with developments in other hellenistic religions, primarily Judaism and Mithraism.

The author posits four stages in the development of the early church building: ( 1) the "house church" of the Pauline communities, with "no distinguishing features, since there was no move toward spatial articulation or architectural adaptation" (1.105). (2) The domus ecclesiae or "house of the church," with its adaptation and renovation of the house church, from the mid-third century; Dura-Europos is the prime example. The shift to the domus ecclesiae came at the end of the second century, probably for two reasons: the growth of the Christian community, and the separation of the eucharist from the agape meal, which then required different liturgical functions and different space (a hall rather than a dining room). By the end of the third century and the beginning of the fourth, church buildings were recognizable landmarks, though they were not yet monumental. (3) The aura ecclesiae, or "church hall," "larger, more regular halls of assembly" which had "a direct comunity with the domus ecclesiae, from which it evolved" (1.128). Finally, (4) the monumental basilica, which came into being after Constantine's accession and the "peace of the Church" early in the fourth century.

I have just one (Christmas stocking) wish that the author create a CDROM version that vividly presents the isometric drawings that he offers here and, even further, color recreations of the churches he discusses. lt would open an even livelier and more exciting doorway for Christians today to enter into the sacred spaces of their ancestors in the faith.