Shepherd of Hermas (also called Pastor of Hermas)

Brief description:

The Shepherd of Hermas contains a series of visions that a man named Hermas received. Hermas lived in Rome and wrote The Shepherd some time between the late first century and the middle of the second century. The third century writer Origen thought that Hermas was the person mentioned by Paul in Romans 16:14. The anonymous Muratorian Fragment claims that The Shepherd of Hermas was written during the time that Pius was overseer in Rome (~140-154 A.D.).

The Shepherd of Hermas was so widely appreciated and read by the Christians of the second and third centuries that there are more surviving fragments of it from that era than there are of all of the books that are a part of the New Testament with the exception of Mathew and John.¹ The Shepherd of Hermas is bound along with the New Testament books in one of the oldest surviving complete Christian Bibles, the Codex Sinaiticus. These facts make it likely the most helpful early Christian writing outside of the New Testament for understanding early Christianity.

Suggested first translation(s):

An easy-to-read, modern English translation that is freely available is the one by Graydon F. Snyder from 1968 listed below. A more literal translation that is also in modern English and freely available is the anonymous one from 2013 listed below.

English translations:

• William Wake (translated ~1719)
  • The Genuine Epistles of the Apostolical Fathers… (published 1719) — facsimile
  • The Genuine Epistles of the Apostolical Fathers… (published 1810) — facsimile
  • The Suppressed Gospels and Epistles of the Original New Testament of Jesus the Christ, volume. 9 — text/HTML
• Fredrick Crombie (translated ~1867)
  • Ante-Nicene Fathers volume 2 (published 1885)
    • read online
• Charles H. Hoole (translated ~1870)
  • The Shepherd of Hermas (published 1870) — facsimile
• George A. Jackson (translated ~1879)
  • The Apostolic Fathers and The Apologists of the Second Century (published 1879, this is a partial translation only) — facsimile
• J.B. Lightfoot & J.R. Harmer (translated ~1891)
  • The Apostolic Fathers (published 1912) — facsimile
  • The Apostolic Fathers (published 1891) — text/HTML
• C. Taylor (translated ~1903)
  • The Shepherd of Hermas, Vol. I (published 1903) — facsimile
  • The Shepherd of Hermas, Vol. II (published 1906) — facsimile
• Kirsopp Lake (translated ~1917)
  • The Apostolic Fathers, Volume II (published 1917) — facsimile
• Joseph M.-F. Marique (translated ~1947)
  • The Apostolic Fathers, Volume 1 of The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation, The Catholic University of America Press (published 1947) — facsimile
• Edgar J. Goodspeed (translated ~1950)
  • The Apostolic Fathers: An American Translation, Harper & Brothers. (published 1950)
• Graydon F. Snyder (translated ~1968)
  • The Shepherd of Hermas, Volume 6 of The Apostolic Fathers: A New Translation and Commentary, Thomas Nelson & Sons (published 1968)
  • a minor language update of this translation
• Michael W. Holmes (translated 1989-2007)
  • The Apostolic Fathers in English, Baker Academic (various editions, published 1989-2006)
  • The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations of Their Writings, Baker Academic (various editions, published 1992-2007)
  • The Two Ways: The Early Christian Vision of Discipleship from the Didache and the Shepherd of Hermas, Plough Publishing House (published 2018) – text/ePub & text/PDF
    • This book only has exceprts of Micahel Holmes’s translation of The Sherpherd of Hermas.
• Carolyn Osiek (translated ~1999)
  • Shepherd of Hermas: a commentary, Fortress Press (published 1999) — facsimile
• Bart D. Ehrman (translated ~2003)
  • The Apostolic Fathers, Volume II, Harvard University Press (published 2003)
• Anonymous (translated ~2013, but updated since)
  • Shepherd of Hermas (published 2013 but revised since) — text/PDF
• Daniel Robison (translation update ~2013)
  • The Shepherd of Hermas, CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (published 2013)
    • This translation is a language update of the translation by Fredrick Crombie into modern English.
• Rick Brannan (translated ~2017)
  • The Apostolic Fathers: A New Translation, Lexham Press (published 2017)
• Michael J. Svigel & Caroline P. Buie (translated ~2023)
  • The Shepherd of Hermas: a new translation and commentary, a volume in Apostolic Fathers Commentary Series, Cascade Books (published 2023) — facsimile (preview)