For instance, in the Didaché (Teaching of the Apostles), written in the last years of the first century, we read:
“If thou possessest (anything) by thy hands, thou shalt give a ransom for thy sins.”—Didaché, iv.
This was no new idea in Hebrew theology; see Dan. iv. 27: “Break off thy sins by righteousness, and thine iniquities by shoving mercy to the poor.” See Prov. xvi. 6, and also Tob. xii. 8, 9.
So in the Testaments of the XII. Patriarchs, put out in the first quarter of the second century:
“For in proportion as a man is pitiful to the poor, will the Lord be pitiful towards him” (Zabulon 7).
“Almsgiving therefore is a good thing, even as repentance from sin. Fasting is better than prayer, but almsgiving than both; and ‘love covereth a multitude of sins,’[64] but prayer out of a good conscience delivereth from death. Blessed is every man that is found full of these. For almsgiving lifteth off the burden of sin.”—2nd Epistle of Clement (part of an ancient homily put out circa A.D. 130 to 150).[65]
S. Cyprian about the middle of the third century develops almsgiving into a formal means of grace, and indeed assigns a distinct propitiatory value to alms, representing them as a means of prolonging the effectiveness of baptism and abolishing subsequent frailties.[66]
Lactantius—Inst. vi. 12—circa end of fourth century:
“Mercy has a great reward (magna est misericordiæ merces), for God promises to it that He will remit all sins.”