The most celebrated treatise on the Christian priesthood in the history of the early Church — and it began with a deception. Around 374 AD, the young John Chrysostom tricked his closest friend into accepting ordination while he himself fled. Then he wrote six books explaining why.
Composed when Chrysostom was about twenty-eight, On the Priesthood is the foundational text of pastoral theology in the ancient Greek Church. Cast as a dialogue with his friend Basil, the treatise opens with Chrysostom's defense of his flight from ordination and builds into a sustained argument for the terrifying dignity of the priestly office. The priest, Chrysostom argues, stands between God and man, administers the sacraments, preaches the Gospel, heals souls, and will answer for each of them at the judgment.
Across six books, the reader encounters the responsibilities of preaching and ministry, the dangers of ambition and flattery, the perils of pastoral vocation in a corrupt age, the bishop as physician of souls, and the priest's accountability before God. Chrysostom writes with the rhetorical brilliance that earned him the title Chrysostomos — the Golden Mouth — and his apologetics of priestly authority shaped the theology of ordination for sixteen centuries.
The authoritative English translation for theological and seminary study since 1889.
Many modern reprints of the Church Fathers are low-quality scans or bulk website scrapes — no footnotes, no index, broken formatting. On the Priesthood is almost never sold as a standalone volume: it is either buried in expensive collected editions or lost in cheap omnibus reprints. This edition is the only standalone pocket paperback with the full scholarly apparatus intact.
The Six Books of the Treatise
For Whom This Edition Is Prepared
The Holy Nativity Press Edition
The Holy Nativity Patristic Library publishes the Early Church Fathers as individual annotated pocket editions — each with scholarly footnotes, subject and scripture indices, and professional typesetting.
