[This post is part of a series on The Pastoral Epistles in the Apostolic Fathers. RWB]
There are some affinities between 1Cl 29.1 and 1Ti 2.8.
1Cl 29.1 || 1Ti 2.8
29.1 Προσέλθωμεν οὖν αὐτῷ ἐν ὁσιότητι ψυχῆς, ἁγνὰς καὶ ἀμιάντους χεῖρας αἴροντες πρὸς αὐτόν, ἀγαπῶντες τὸν ἐπιεικῆ καὶ εὔσπλαγχνον πατέρα ἡμῶν ὃς ἐκλογῆς μέρος ἡμᾶς ἐποίησεν ἑαυτῷ.
29. Let us, therefore, approach him in holiness of soul, lifting up to him pure and undefiled hands, loving our gentle and compassionate Father who made us his chosen portion.
Holmes, M. W. (1999). The Apostolic Fathers : Greek texts and English translations (Updated ed.) (60, 61). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books.
8 Βούλομαι οὖν προσεύχεσθαι τοὺς ἄνδρας ἐν παντὶ τόπῳ ἐπαίροντας ὁσίους χεῖρας χωρὶς ὀργῆς καὶ διαλογισμοῦ. (1Ti 2.8, NA27)
8 Therefore I want men everywhere to pray, lifting holy hands without anger or dispute. (1Ti 2.8, my own translation)
The concepts here are parallel, but dependence is not likely. The image of lifting hands in prayer and/or blessing is known elsewhere in the NT as well as in the LXX and the deuterocanonical books. Four examples will suffice:
50 Ἐξήγαγεν δὲ αὐτοὺς [ἔξω] ἕως πρὸς Βηθανίαν, καὶ ἐπάρας τὰς χεῖρας αὐτοῦ εὐλόγησεν αὐτούς. 51 καὶ ἐγένετο ἐν τῷ εὐλογεῖν αὐτὸν αὐτοὺς διέστη ἀπʼ αὐτῶν καὶ ἀνεφέρετο εἰς τὸν οὐρανόν. (Lu 24.50-51, ESV)
50 Then [Jesus] led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up his hands he blessed them. 51 While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven. (Lu 24.50-51, ESV)
6 καὶ ηὐλόγησεν Εσδρας κύριον τὸν θεὸν τὸν μέγαν, καὶ ἀπεκρίθη πᾶς ὁ λαὸς καὶ εἶπαν Αμην ἐπάραντες χεῖρας αὐτῶν καὶ ἔκυψαν καὶ προσεκύνησαν τῷ κυρίῳ ἐπὶ πρόσωπον ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν. (Ne 8.6, LXX)
6 And Ezra blessed the Lord, the great God; and all the people answered and said “Amen”; they lifted up their hands and bowed, and worshipped the Lord with their faces toward the ground. (Ne 8.6, my own translation)
1 Ἰδοὺ δὴ εὐλογεῖτε τὸν κύριον, πάντες οἱ δοῦλοι κυρίου οἱ ἑστῶτες ἐν οἴκῳ κυρίου, ἐν αὐλαῖς οἴκου θεοῦ ἡμῶν. 2 ἐν ταῖς νυξὶν ἐπάρατε τὰς χεῖρας ὑμῶν εἰς τὰ ἅγια καὶ εὐλογεῖτε τὸν κύριον. (Ps 133.1-2[134.1-2 English])
1 Behold, now bless the Lord, all bond-servants of the Lord who stand in the house of the Lord, in the courts of the house of our God. 2 In the night, lift up your hands unto the holy place and bless the Lord! (Ps 134.1-2[133.1-2 LXX], my own translation)
20 τότε καταβὰς ἐπῆρεν χεῖρας αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ πᾶσαν ἐκκλησίαν υἱῶν Ισραηλ δοῦναι εὐλογίαν κυρίου ἐκ χειλέων αὐτοῦ καὶ ἐν ὀνόματι αὐτοῦ καυχήσασθαι, (Sir 50.20, LXX)
20 While he was descending, he lifted up his hands over the whole congregation of the sons of Israel, to give a blessing of the Lord from his lips and to glory in his name. (Sir 50.20, my own translation)
One difference between these examples and the 1Cl/1Ti example is that the hands are not further qualified with some sense of “pure” or “holy”. But that is not to say such examples do not exist; they’re just not in the canonical literature. Lightfoot compounds these with additional quotations from Athenagoras (Suppl. 13), επαιρωμεν οσιους χειρας αυτω, and Heliodorus the tragedian in Galen. de Antid. ii. 7 (XIV. p. 145, ed. Kuhn), αλλʼ οσιας μεν χειρας ες ηερα λαμπρον αειρας, commenting further “The expression describes the attitude of the ancients (as of the Orientals at the present day) when engaged in prayer, with extended arms and uplifted palms”. (Lightfoot, vol 2 p. 93)
On top of that, note similar imagery of “stretching” (ἐκτείνω) out one’s hands in 4Ma 4.11; Jos. Apion 1.209; 1Cl 2.3 and Ep.Barn. 12.2 (L.T. Johnson, p. 198) though these contexts are slightly different than our primary example passages(s). Johnson also lists Seneca, Natural Questions 3, Preface 14; Jos. Wars 5.380; and the Athenagoras citation also listed by Lightfoot as examples of the picture.
On the whole, the concept of lifting hands in prayer to the Lord or in the act of bestowing blessing from the Lord seems well documented across different corpora. There is no reason to think the image used in First Clement comes directly from the use in First Timothy.
Next up: Ign Eph. 14.1; 20.2; Magn. 8.1 || 1Ti 1.3-5