§ 31.2. =Church Teachers of the Asiatic Type.=
a. =Irenæus=, a pupil of Polycarp, was a native of Asia Minor.
According to the _Vita Polycarpi_ of Pionius he lived in
Rome at the time of Polycarp’s death as a teacher, and it
is not improbable that he had gone there in company with
his master (§ 37, 2). Subsequently he settled in Gaul, and
held the office of presbyter at Lyons. During his absence at
Rome as the bearer of a tract by the imprisoned confessors
of Lyons on the Montanist controversy to the Roman bishop
Eleutherus, Pothinus, the aged bishop of Lyons, fell a
victim to the dreadful persecution of Marcus Aurelius which
raged in Gaul. Irenæus succeeded him as bishop in A.D. 178.
About the time and manner of his death nothing certain is
known. Jerome, indeed, once quite casually designates him
a martyr, but since none of the earlier Church Fathers, who
speak of him, know anything of this, it cannot be maintained
with any confidence. Gentleness and moderation, combined
with earnestness and decision, as well as the most lively
interest in the catholicity of the church and the purity of
its doctrine according to scripture and tradition, were the
qualities that make him the most important and trustworthy
witness to his own age, and led to his being recognised in
all times as one of the ablest and most influential teachers
of the church and a most successful opponent of heretical
Gnosticism. His chief work against the Gnostics: Ἔλεγχος καὶ
ἀνατροπὴ τῆς ψευδονύμου γνώσεως (_Adv. hæreses_) in 5 books,
is mainly an _ex professo_ directed against the Valentinians
and the schools of Ptolemy and Marcus There is appended to
it, beyond what had been proposed at the beginning, a short
discussion of the views of other Gnostics, the basis of
which may be found in an older treatise, perhaps in the
Syntagma of Justin. The last four books give the express
scripture proofs to sustain the general confutation, without
doing this, however, in a complete manner; at the same time
there is rapid movement amid many digressions and excursuses.
This work has come down to us in a complete form only
in an old translation literally rendered in barbarous
Latin, even to the reproduction of misunderstood words,
which was used as early as by Tertullian in his treatise
against the Valentinians. We are indebted to the writings
of the heresiologists Hippolytus and Epiphanius for the
preservation of many remarkable fragments of the original,
with or without the author’s name. Of his other writings
we have only a few faint reminiscences. Two epistles
addressed to the Roman presbyter Florinus combat the
Valentinian heresy to which Florinus was inclined. During the
controversy about Easter (§ 37, 2) he wrote several epistles
of a conciliatory character, especially one to Blastus in
Rome, an adherent of the Asiatic practice, and in the name
of the whole Gallic church, he addressed a letter to the
Roman bishop, Victor, and afterwards a second letter in his
own name.[71]
§ 31.3.
b. =Hippolytus=, a presbyter and afterwards schismatical bishop
at Rome, though scarcely to be designated of Asia Minor, but
rather a Lyonese, if not a Roman pupil of Irenæus, belonged
to the same theological school. He was celebrated for his
comprehensive learning and literary attainments, and yet
his career until quite recently was involved in the greatest
obscurity. Eusebius, who is the first to refer to him,
places him in the age of Alex. Severus (A.D. 222-235),
calls him a bishop, without, however, naming his supposed
oriental diocese, which even Jerome was unable to determine.
The Liberian list of Popes of A.D. 354, describes him
as _Yppolytus presbyter_ who was burnt in Sardinia about
A.D. 235 along with the Roman bishop, Pontianus (§ 41, 1).
In the fifth century, the Roman church gave him honour as a
martyr. The poet Prudentius († A.D. 413) who himself saw the
crypt in which his bones were laid and which in the book of
his martyrdom was pictorially represented, celebrated his
career in song. According to him Hippolytus was an adherent
of the Novatian schism (§ 41, 3), but returned to the
Catholic church and suffered martyrdom at Portus near Rome.
According to his own statement quoted by Photius he was
a hearer of the doctrinal discourses of Irenæus. A statue
representing him in a sitting posture which was exhumed at
Rome in A.D. 1551, has on the back of the seat a list of
his writings along with an Easter cycle of sixteen years
drawn up by him (§ 56, 3). Finally, there was found among
the works of Origen a treatise on the various philosophical
systems entitled _Philosophoumena_, which professes to be
the first book of a writing in ten books found in Greece in
A.D. 1842, Κατὰ πασῶν αἱρέσεων ἔλεγχος. Starting from the
position, and seeking to establish it, that the heretics
have got their doctrines not from holy scripture, but from
astrology, pagan mysteries and the Greek philosophers, this
treatise is generally of great importance not only for the
history of the heresies of the Gnostics and Monarchians,
but also for the history of philosophy. The English editor,
E. Miller (Oxon., 1851), attributed the authorship of the
whole to Origen, which, however, from the complete difference
of style, point of view and position was soon proved to be
untenable. Since the writer admits that he was himself the
author of a book Περὶ τῆς τοῦ πάντος οὐσίας, and Photius
ascribes a book with the same title to the Roman Caius
(§ 31, 7), Baur attributes to the latter the composition of
the Elenchus. Photius, however, founds his opinion simply
upon an apocryphal note on the margin of his copy of the
book. Incomparably more important are the evidences for
the Hippolytus authorship, which is now almost universally
admitted. The Elenchus is not, indeed, enumerated in
the list of works on the statue. The book Περὶ τῆς τοῦ
πάντος οὐσίας, however, appears there, and it contains
the statement that its author also wrote the Elenchus. The
author of the Elenchus also states that he had previously
written a similar work in a shorter form, and Photius
describes such a shorter writing of Hippolytus, dating
from the time of his intercourse with Irenæus, under the
title Σύνταγμα κατὰ πασῶν αἱρέσεων. Lipsius has made it
appear extremely probable that in the _Libellus adv. omnes
hæreticos_ appended to Tertullian’s _De præscriptione
hæreticorum_, and so usually styled a treatise of the
Pseudo-Tertullian, we have an abbreviated Latin reproduction
of that work; for this one as well as the other begins
with Dositheus and ends with Noëtus, and both deal with
thirty-two heresies. Epiphanius and Philastrius [Philaster]
have used it largely in their heresiological works. The
discussion in the Elenchus agrees therewith in many passages
but also in many is essentially different, which, however,
when we consider the much later date of the first named
treatise affords no convincing evidence against the theory
that both are by one author. The Elenchus thereby wins a
high importance as giving information about the condition of
the Roman church during the first decades of the 3rd century,
about the position of the author who describes himself in
his treatise as a pupil of Irenæus, about his own and his
opponents’ way of viewing things, and about his conflict
with them leading to schism, though all is told from
the standpoint of an interested party (§§ 33, 5; 41, 1).
A considerable fragment directed against the errors of
Noëtus (§ 33, 5) was perhaps originally a part of his
Syntagma,--though not perhaps of the anonymous, so-called
Little Labyrinth against the Artemonites (§ 33, 3) or
probably against the Monarchians generally, from which
Eusebius makes extensive quotations, especially about the
Theodotians. This work is ascribed by Photius to the Roman
Caius, but without doubt wrongly. Great probability has been
given to the recently advanced idea that this book too may
have been written by Hippolytus.[72]
§ 31.4. =The Alexandrian Church Teachers.=
a. The first of the teachers of the catechetical school at
Alexandria known by name was =Pantænus=, who had formerly
been a Stoic philosopher. About A.D. 190 he undertook
a missionary journey into Southern Arabia or India, and
died in A.D. 202 after a most successful and useful life.
Jerome says of him: _Hujus multi quidem in s. Scri. exstant
Commentarii, sed Magis viva voce ecclesiis profuit_. Of his
writings none are preserved.
b. =Titus Flavius Clemens [Clement]= was the pupil of Pantænus
and his successor at the catechetical school in Alexandria.
On his travels undertaken in the search for knowledge he
came to Alexandria as a learned pagan philosopher, where
probably Pantænus gained an influence over him and was
the means of his conversion. During the persecution under
Septimius Severus in A.D. 202 he sought in flight to escape
the rage of the heathens, in accordance with Matt. x. 23.
But he continued unweariedly by writing and discourse
to promote the interests of the church till his death in
A.D. 220. The most important and most comprehensive of his
writings is the work in three parts of which the first part
entitled Λόγος προτρεπτικὸς πρὸς Ἕλληνας (_Cohortatio ad
Græcos_) with great expenditure of learning seeks to prepare
the minds of the heathen for Christianity by proving the
vanity of heathenism; the second part, Ὁ παιδαγωγός in
three books, with a _Hymnus in Salvatorem_ attached, gives
an introduction to the Christian life; and the third part,
Στρωματείς (_Stromata_), that is, patchwork, so-called from
the aphoristic style and the variety of its contents, in
eight books, setting forth the deep things of Christian
gnosis, but in the form rather of a collection of materials
than a carefully elaborated treatise. The little tractate
Τίς ὁ σωζόμενος πλούσιος (_Quis dives salvetur_) shows how
even wealth may be made contributory to salvation. Among
his lost treatises the most important was the Ὑποτυπώσεις
in eight books, an expository review of the contents of holy
scripture.[73]
§ 31.5.
c. Great as was the reputation of Clement, he was far
outstripped by his pupil and successor =Origen=,
acknowledged by pagan and Christian contemporaries to be
a miracle of scholarship. On account of his indomitable
diligence, he was named Ἀδαμάντιος. Celebrated as a
philosopher, philologist, critic, exegete, dogmatist,
apologist, polemist, etc., posterity has with equal right
honoured him as the actual founder of an ecclesiastical and
scientific theology, and reproached him as the originator
of many heretical opinions (§§ 51; 52, 6). He was born of
Christian parents at Alexandria about A.D. 185, was educated
under his father Leonidas, Pantænus and Clement, while still
a boy encouraged his father when he suffered as a martyr
under Septimius Severus in A.D. 202, became the support
of his helpless mother and his six orphaned sisters, and
was called in A.D. 203 by bishop Demetrius to be teacher
of the catechetical school. In order to qualify himself
for the duties of his new calling, he engaged eagerly in
the study of philosophy under the Neo-Platonist Ammonius
Saccas. His mode of life was extremely simple and from
his youth he was a strict ascetic. In his eager striving
after Christian perfection he had himself emasculated,
from a misunderstanding of Matt. xix. 12, but afterwards
he admitted that that was a wrong step. His fame advanced
from day to day. About A.D. 211 he visited Rome. Accepting
an honourable invitation in A.D. 215 he wrought for a long
time as a missionary in Arabia, he was then appointed by the
celebrated Julia Mammæa (§ 22, 4) to Antioch in A.D. 218;
and in A.D. 230 undertook in the interest of the church
a journey to Greece through Palestine, where the bishops
of Cæsarea and Jerusalem admitted him to the rank of a
presbyter. His own bishop, Demetrius, jealous of the daily
increasing fame of Origen and feeling that his episcopal
rights had been infringed upon, recalled him, and had him
at two Alexandrian Synods, in A.D. 231 and 232, arraigned
and excommunicated for heresy, self-mutilation and contempt
of the ecclesiastical laws of his office. Origen now
went to Cæsarea, and there, honoured and protected by the
Emperor, Philip the Arabian, opened a theological school.
His literary activity here reached its climax. But under
Decius he was cast into prison at Tyre, in A.D. 254,
and died in consequence of terrible tortures which he
endured heroically.--Of his numerous writings[74] only a
comparatively small number, but those of great value, are
preserved; some in the original, others only in a Latin
translation.
1. To the department of =Biblical Criticism= belongs the
fruit of twenty-seven years’ labour, the so-called
Hexapla, that is, a placing side by side the Hebrew text
of the O.T. (first in Hebr. and then in the Gr. letters)
and the existing Greek translations of the LXX., Aquila,
Symmachus and Theodotion; by the addition in some
books of other anonymous translations, it came to be
an Octopla or Enneapla. By critical marks on the margin
all variations were carefully indicated. The enormous
bulk of fifty volumes hindered its circulation by means
of transcripts; but the original lay in the library
at Cæsarea open to the inspection of all, until lost,
probably in the sack of the city by the Arabians in
A.D. 653.[75]
2. His =Exegetical works= consist of Σημειώσεις or
short scholia on separate difficult passages, Τόμοι
or complete commentaries on whole books of the bible,
and Ὁμιλίαι or practical expository lectures. Origen,
after the example of the Rabbinists and Hellenists,
gave a decided preference to the allegorical method
of interpretation. In every scripture passage he
distinguished a threefold sense, as σῶμα, ψυχή, πνεῦμα,
first a literal, and then a twofold higher sense, the
tropical or moral, and the pneumatical or mystical.
He was not just a despiser of the literal sense, but
the unfolding of the mystical sense seemed to him
of infinitely greater importance. All history in the
bible is a picture of things in the higher world. Most
incidents occurred as they are told; but some, the
literal conception of which would be unworthy or
irrational, are merely typical, without any outward
historical reality. The Old Testament language is
typical in a twofold sense: for the New Testament
history and for the heavenly realities. The New
Testament language is typical only of the latter.
He regarded the whole bible as inspired, with the
exception of the books added by the LXX., but the New
Testament in a higher degree than the Old. But even the
New Testament had defects which will only be overcome
by the revelation of eternity.
3. To the department of =Dogmatics= belongs his four books
Περὶ ἀρχῶν (_De Principiis_), which have come down to
us in a Latin translation of Rufinus with arbitrary
interpolations. His Στρωματεῖς in ten books which
sought to harmonize the Christian doctrine with Greek
philosophy is lost, and also his numerous writings
against the heretics. His comprehensive apologetical
work in eight books, _Contra Celsum_ (§ 23, 3), has
come down to us complete.[76] Gregory of Nazianzus
[Nazianzen] and Basil the Great made a book entirely
from his writings under the title Φιλοκαλία, which
contains many passages from lost treatises, and a
valuable original fragment from his Περὶ ἀρχῶν. His
principal doctrinal characteristics are the following:
There is a twofold revelation, the primitive revelation
in conscience to which the heathen owe their σπέρματα
ἀληθείας, and the historical revelation in holy
scripture; there are three degrees of religious
knowledge, that of the ψιλὴ πίστις, an unreasoned
acceptance of the truth, wrought by God immediately in
the heart of men, that of γνῶσις or ἐπιστήμη to which
the reasoning mind of man can reach by the speculative
development of scripture revelation in his life, and
finally, that of σοφία or θεωρία, the vision of God,
the full enjoyment of which is attained unto only
hereafter. For his doctrine of the Trinity, see § 33, 6.
His cosmological, angelological and anthropological
views represent a mixture of Platonic, Gnostic
and spiritualistic ideas, and run out into various
heterodoxies; thus, he believes in timeless or eternal
creation, an ante-temporal fall of human souls,
their imprisonment in earthly bodies, he denies the
resurrection of the body, he believed in the animation
and the need and capacity of redemption of the stars
and star-spirits, in the restoration of all spirits to
their original, ante-temporal blessedness and holiness,
ἀποκατάστασις τῶν πάντων.
4. Of his =Ascetical Works=, the treatise Περὶ εὐχῆς with
an admirable exposition of the Lord’s prayer, and a
Λόγος προτρεπικὸς εἰς μαρτύριον have been preserved.
Of his numerous epistles, the _Epistola ad Julium
Africanum_ defends against his correspondent the
genuineness of the history of Susannah.
§ 31.6.
d. Among the successors of Origen in the school of Alexandria
the most celebrated, from about A.D. 232, was =Dionysius
Alexandrinus= [of Alexandria]. He was raised to the rank
of bishop in A.D. 247, and died in A.D. 265. In speculative
power he was inferior to his teacher Origen. His special
gift was that of κυβέρνησις. He was honoured by his own
contemporaries with the title of The Great. During the
Decian persecution he manifested wisdom and good sense
as well as courage and steadfastness. The ecclesiastical
conflicts of his age afforded abundant opportunities for
testing his noble and gentle character, as well as his
faithful attachment to the church and zeal for the purity of
its doctrine, and on all hands his self-denying amiability
wrought in the interests of peace. Of his much-praised
writings, exegetical, ascetical, polemical (Περὶ ἐπαγγελιῶν
§ 33, 9), apologetical (Περὶ φύσεως against the Atomism
of Democritus and Epicurus), and dogmatical (§ 33, 7),
only fragments are preserved, mostly from his Epistles
in quotations by Eusebius. We have, however, one short
tract complete addressed to Novatian at Rome (§ 31, 12),
containing an earnest entreaty that he should abandon his
schismatic rigorism.
e. =Gregory Thaumaturgus= was one of Origen’s pupils at Cæsarea.
Origen was the means of converting the truth-seeking heathen
youth to Christianity, and Gregory clung to his teacher with
the warmest affection. He subsequently became bishop of his
native city of Neo-Cæsarea, and was able on his death-bed
in A.D. 270 to comfort himself with the reflection that he
left to his successor no more unbelievers in the city than
his predecessor had left him of believers (their number was
seventeen). He was called the second Moses and the power of
working miracles was ascribed to him. We have from his pen
a panegyric on Origen, an Epistle on Church Discipline, a
Μετάφρασις εἰς Ἐκκλησιάστην, a Confession of Faith important
for the history of the Ante-Nicene period (§ 50, 1): Ἔκθεσις
πίστεως. Two other tracts in a Syrian translation are
ascribed to him: To Philagrius on Consubstantiality, and
To Theopompus on the Passibility of God. Dräseke, however,
identifies the first-named with Oratio 45 of Gregory
Nazianzus [Nazianzen] and assigns to him the authorship.[77]
f. The learned presbyter =Pamphilus= of Cæsarea, the friend
of Eusebius (§ 47, 2) and founder of a theological seminary
and the celebrated library of Cæsarea, who died as a martyr
under Maximinus, belongs to this group. His Old Testament
Commentaries have been lost. In prison he finished his work
in five books which he undertook jointly with Eusebius, the
Apology for Origen, to which Eusebius independently added a
sixth book. Only the first book is preserved in Rufinus’
Latin translation.
§ 31.7. =Greek-speaking Church Teachers in other Quarters.=
a. =Hegesippus= wrote his five books Ὑπομνήματα, about A.D. 180,
during the age of the Roman bishop Eleutherus. From his
knowledge of the Hebrew language, literature and traditions
Eusebius concludes that he was a Jew by birth. He himself
says distinctly that in A.D. 155 during the time of bishop
Anicetus he was staying in Rome, and that on his way thither
he visited Corinth. The opinion formerly current that
his Hypomnemata consisted of a collection of historical
traditions from the time of the Apostles down to the age of
the writer, and so might be called a sort of Church History,
arose from the historical character of the contents of eight
quotations made from this treatise by Eusebius in his own
Church History. It is, however, not borne out by the fact
that what Hegesippus tells in his detailed narrative of the
end of James the Just (§ 16, 3) occurs, not in the first
or second but in the fifth and last book of his treatise.
Moreover, among writers against the heretics or Gnostics,
Eusebius enumerates in the first place one Hegesippus,
having it would seem his Hypomnemata in view. From this
circumstance, in conjunction with everything else quoted
from and told about him by Eusebius, we may with great
probability conclude that the purpose of his writing was
to confute the heresies of his age. In doing so he traces
them partly to Gentile sources, but partly and mainly to
pre-Christian Jewish heresies, seven of which are enumerated.
He treats in the first three books of the so-called Gnostics
and their relations to heathenism and false Judaism. Then in
the fourth book he discusses the heretical Apocrypha and, as
contrasted with them, the orthodox ecclesiastical writings,
mentioning among them expressly the Epistle of Clemens
[Clement] Romanus [of Rome] to the Corinthians. Finally,
in the fifth book, he proves from the Apostolic succession
of the leaders of the church, the unity and truth of
ecclesiastically transmitted doctrine. The historical value
of his writing, owing to the confusion and want of critical
power shown in the instances referred to, cannot be placed
very high. The school of Baur, more particularly Schwegler
(see § 20), attached greater importance to him as a supposed
representative of the anti-Pauline Judaism of his time.
The value of his testimony in this direction, however, is
reduced by his acknowledgment of the Epistle of Clement that
accords so high a place to the Apostle Paul. His relations
to Rome and Corinth, with his judgment on the general unity
of faith in the church of his age, prove that he would be by
no means disposed to repudiate the Apostle Paul in favour of
any Ebionitic tendency.
b. =Caius of Rome=, a contemporary of bishop Zephyrinus
about A.D. 210, was one of the most conspicuous opponents
of Montanism. Eusebius who characterizes him as ἀνὴρ
ἐκκλησιαστικός and λογιώτατος, quotes four times from
his now lost controversial tract in dialogue form against
Proclus the Roman Montanist leader.
§ 31.8.
c. =Sextus Julius Africanus=, according to Suidas a native of
Libya, took part, as he says himself in his Κεστοῖς, in the
campaign of Septimius Severus against Osrhoëne in A.D. 195,
became intimate with the Christian king Maanu VIII. of
Edessa, whom in his Chronographies he calls ἱερὸς ἀνὴρ,
and was often companion in hunting to his son and successor
Maanu IX. About A.D. 220 we find him, according to Eusebius
and others, in Rome at the head of an embassy from Nicopolis
or Emmaus in Palestine petitioning for the restoration of
that city. In consequence of Origen addressing him about
A.D. 227 as ἀγαπητὸς ἀδελφός it has been rashly concluded
that he was then a presbyter or at least of clerical rank.
The five books, Χρονογραφίαι, were his first and most
important work. This work which was known partly in the
original, partly in the citations from it in the Eusebian
Chronicle (§ 47, 2), together with its Latin continuation
by Jerome proved a main source of information in general
history during the Byzantine period and the Latin Middle
Age. Beginning with the creation of the world and fixing
the whole course of the world’s development at 6,000 years,
he set the middle point of this period to the age of Peleg
(Gen. x. 25), and in accordance with the chronology of the
LXX. and reckoning by Olympiads, proceeded to synchronize
biblical and profane history. He assigned the birth of
Christ to the middle of the sixth of the thousand year
periods, at the close of which he probably expected the
beginning of the millennium. From the fragments preserved
by later Byzantine chroniclers, Gelzer has attempted to
reproduce as far as possible the original work, carefully
indicating its sources and authorities. Of the other works
of Africanus we have in a complete form only an Epistle
to Origen, “a real gem of brilliant criticism spiced with
a gentle touch of fine irony” (Gelzer), which combats the
authenticity and credibility of the Pseudo-Daniel’s history
of Susannah. We have also a fragment quoted in Eusebius
from an Epistle to a certain Aristides, which attempts
a reconciliation of the genealogies in Matt. and Luke by
distinguishing παῖδες νόμῳ and παῖδες φύσει with reference
to Deut. xxv. 5. According to Eusebius “the chronologist
Julius Africanus,” according to Suidas “Origen’s friend
Africanus with the prænomen Sextus,” is also the author of
the so called Κεστοί (_embroidery_), a great comprehensive
work of which only fragments have been preserved, in which
all manner of wonderful things from the life of nature and
men, about agriculture, cattle breeding, warfare, etc.,
were recorded, so that it had the secondary title Παράδοξα.
The excessive details of pagan superstition here reported,
much of which, such as that relating to the secret worship
of Venus, was distinctly immoral, and its dependence on
the secret writings of the Egyptians seem now as hard to
reconcile with the standpoint of a believing Christian, as
with the sharpness of intellect shown in his criticism of
the letter of Susannah. It has therefore been assumed that
alongside of the Christian chronologist Julius Africanus
there was a pagan Julius Africanus who wrote the Κεστοί,--or,
seeing the identity of the two is strongly evidenced both
on internal and external grounds, the composition of the
Κεστοί is assigned to a period when the author was still a
heathen. The facts, however, that the Chronicles close with
A.D. 221 and that the Κεστοί is dedicated to Alex. Severus
(A.D. 222-235), seem to guarantee the earlier composition
of the Chronicles. The author of the Κεστοί, too, by his
quotation of Ps. xxxiv. 9 with the formula θεία ῥήματα,
shows himself a Christian, and on the other hand, the author
of the Chronicles says that at great cost he had made himself
acquainted in Egypt with a celebrated secret book.
§ 31.9.
d. =Methodius= bishop of Olympus in Lycia, subsequently at
Tyre, a man highly esteemed in his day, died as a martyr
in A.D. 311. He was a decided opponent of the spiritualism
prevailing in the school of Origen. His Συμπόσιον τῶν δέκα
παρθένων is a dialogue between several virgins regarding
the excellence of virginity written in eloquent and glowing
language (transl. in Ante-Nicene Lib., Edin., 1870). Of his
other works only outlines and fragments are preserved by
Epiphanius and Photius. To these belong Περὶ αὐτεξουσίου καὶ
ποθὲν κακά, a polemic against the Platonic-Gnostic doctrine
of the eternity of matter as the ultimate ground and cause
of sin, which are to be sought rather in the misuse of
human freedom; the dialogues Περὶ ἀναστάσεως and Περὶ τῶν
γεννητῶν, the former of which combats Origen’s doctrine of
the resurrection, and the latter his doctrine of creation.
His controversial treatise against Porphyry (§ 23, 3) has
been completely lost.
e. The martyr =Lucian of Samosata=, born and brought up in
Edessa, was presbyter of Antioch and co-founder of the
theological school there that became so famous (§ 47, 1),
where he, deposed by a Syrian Synod of A.D. 269, and
persecuted by the Emperor Aurelian in A.D. 272, as supporter
of bishop Paul of Samosata (§ 33, 8), maintained his
position under the three following bishops (till A.D. 303)
apart from the official church, and died a painful martyr’s
death under the Emperor Maximinus in A.D. 312. That
secession, however, was occasioned less perhaps through
doctrinal and ecclesiastical, than through national and
political, anti-Roman and Syrian sympathies with his
heretical countrymen of Samosata. For though in the Arian
controversy (§ 50, 1) Lucian undoubtedly appears as the
father of that Trinitarian-Christological view first
recognised and combated as heretical in his pupil Arius in
A.D. 318, this was certainly essentially different from the
doctrine of the Samosatian. About Lucian’s literary activity
only the scantiest information has come down to us. His most
famous work was his critical revision of the Text of the Old
and New Testaments, which according to Jerome was officially
sanctioned in the dioceses of the Patriarchs of Antioch
and Constantinople, and thus probably lies at the basis of
Theodoret’s and Chrysostom’s exegetical writings. Rufinus’
Latin translation of Eusebius’ Church History gives an
extract from the “Apologetical Discourse” in which he seems
to have openly confessed and vindicated his Christian faith
before his heathen judge.