Lecture 6 Material — Persecution in the Second Century

St. Ignatius of Antioch

In the year 107, this elderly bishop was con­demned to death by the Roman author­i­ties. Since the Romans at that time were cel­e­brat­ing their vic­to­ries in war, they decided to trans­port St. Ignatius to the cap­i­tal so that his exe­cu­tion might pro­vide some enter­tain­ment for the Roman cit­i­zens. On his way to Rome, St. Ignatius wrote seven let­ters or epis­tles that are among the most valu­able doc­u­ments of the Early Church. In these let­ters, St. Ignatius repeat­edly calls him­self Theophoros, which means “the bearer of God.” This title led to the early Chris­t­ian tra­di­tion that St. Ignatius was the lit­tle child that our Lord Jesus Christ picked up and placed before His dis­ci­ples in Mark 9:36, which reads,

“Then He took a lit­tle child and set him in the midst of them. And when He had taken him in His arms, He said to them, “Who­ever receives one of these lit­tle chil­dren in My name receives Me; and who­ever receives Me, receives not Me but Him who sent Me.”” (Mark 9:36–37 NKJV)

The early Chris­t­ian tra­di­tion is that St. Ignatius was this child. Since that time, he went on to become one of the most respected fig­ures of the Early Church. This is clear from the fact that he became the bishop of the Church of Anti­och, which was one of the most ancient churches. A bishop, of course, was sec­ond only to the Holy Apos­tles in the Holy Church.

On his way to Rome, St. Ignatius passed through Asia Minor where many Chris­tians vis­ited him. He received three bish­ops from three churches, includ­ing Bishop Ones­imus of Eph­esus, who is quite pos­si­bly the same Ones­imus men­tioned in St. Paul’s Epis­tle to Phile­mon. He wrote let­ters to each of these churches from Smyrna and addi­tional let­ters to other churches from Troas.

Although we do not have his­tor­i­cal infor­ma­tion con­cern­ing the actual exe­cu­tion of St. Ignatius, the tra­di­tion of the Holy Church is that he received the eter­nal crown of mar­tyr­dom by being thrown to the wild beasts in the Col­i­seum  shortly after he arrived in Rome.

Here are online ver­sions of his seven let­ters which have survived.

• Epis­tle to the Eph­esians: Shorter and Longer Versions
• Epis­tle to the Mag­ne­sians: Shorter and Longer Versions
• Epis­tle to the Tral­lians: Shorter and Longer Versions
• Epis­tle to the Romans: Shorter and Longer Versions
• Epis­tle to the Philadel­phi­ans: Shorter and Longer Versions
• Epis­tle to the Smyrnæans: Shorter and Longer Versions
• Epis­tle to Poly­carp: Shorter and Longer Versions

St. Poly­carp

When St. Ignatius was on his way to mar­tyr­dom in Rome, he stopped in Smyrna to receive Chris­tians and to write epis­tles to sev­eral churches. The bishop of Smyrna at the time was a young man named Poly­carp, who accord­ing to our tra­di­tion, was a dis­ci­ple of St. John the Evan­ge­list. Nearly fifty years after St. Ignatius’s mar­tyr­dom, the time would come for St. Poly­carp to be mar­tyred, as well.

When he was brough to trial, the pro­con­sul urged him to wor­ship the emperor in light of his old age, because Poly­carp was around 86 years old at this time. The pro­con­sul ordered him to shout, “Out with the athe­ists!”, which was the chant used by the pagan mob to refer to the Chris­tians. St. Poly­carp agreed, and pointed to the pagan mob while say­ing, “Out with the athe­ists!” Of course, this angered the mob. The pro­con­sul tried to per­suade St. Poly­carp to curse Christ so that he could be set free, but St. Poly­carp refused, say­ing, “For eighty-six years I have served Him, and He has done me no evil. How could I curse my King Who has saved me?” The dia­logue between St. Poly­carp and the pro­con­sul con­tin­ued. When St. Poly­carp was threat­ened with death by burn­ing at the stake, he responded that, while the fire of exe­cu­tion would last for a moment and end, the fire of eter­nal con­dem­na­tion would last for­ever. Finally, unable to con­vince him, the pro­con­sul ordered St. Poly­carp tied to a stake and burned alive. As the fire burned, St. Poly­carp prayed these words,

Lord, Sov­er­eign God, I thank You for You have deemed me wor­thy of this moment, so that, jointly with Your mar­tyrs, I may have a share in the cup of Christ. For this, I bless and glo­rify You, Amen.

Here is the full account of the mar­tyr­dom of St. Polycarp:

• The Mar­tyr­dom of Polycarp

 

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