This dissertation focuses upon the use of handlaying as an initiatory rite among early Western Churches up to the point preceding the Carolingian reforms in the eighth century. The study begins by surveying the various types of handlaying rites revealed in Graeco-Roman literature, the Hebrew Scriptures, and the New Testament in order to set a potential background for the origins and significance of handlaying as an initiatory practice. Following a critical analysis of the New Testament accounts of initiatory handlaying, the evidence of this rite in patristic writings and liturgical sources is evaluated chronologically and regionally, thus providing a clear and straightforward means to speak of the commonalities and differences concerning this initiatory practice over time and from one place to another. Such an approach reveals the pitfalls of earlier studies of this rite, which have tended to assume a far greater degree of liturgical uniformity among early Churches than what the evidence actually reveals.

By assessing the evidence from a critical historical perspective and with the aid of the principles of comparative liturgy, the picture of early Christian initiatory practice appears less clear than prior assumptions have stated it to be, yet does undoubtedly demonstrate the great deal of diversity present among early Christian communities in their ecclesial structures, theologies, and liturgical practices. In addition to treating all of the extant witnesses of initiatory handlaying, other related uses of handlaying (e.g., for those baptized in the bishop’s absence, for the reception of heretics) are also examined because of the common belief that such independent handlaying rites are equivalent to initiatory handlaying, thus attesting that a particular community also employed handlaying as a part of its “normal” initiatory ritual. Arguing strongly against such a position, this dissertation maintains that the evidence can only support the view that initiatory handlaying was predominantly, though not exclusively, a North African practice during this early period, where it was interpreted in various nuanced ways as ritualizing the conveyance of the Holy Spirit.