ON ST. PAPIAS, BISHOP OF HIERAPOLIS IN PHRYGIA
AT THE BEGINNING OF THE SECOND CENTURY
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.
Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis in Phrygia (S.)
By G. H.
Section I. The sacred veneration of St. Papias. Whether he was a hearer of St. John the Evangelist, or only of John the Elder?
[1] That the city of Hierapolis in Phrygia was illuminated with the faith of Christ by the holy Apostle Philip, and thereafter cultivated by SS. Papias, Abercius, and Claudius Apollinaris, we stated on the seventh of February, St. Papias is venerated on 22 February on which day St. Apollinaris is principally venerated; we do not wish to repeat those matters for this twenty-second of February, dedicated to the veneration of St. Papias. Concerning him, the following is found in the published Bede and the manuscript of the monastery of Richenberg: and is called a hearer of St. John the Apostle: "At Hierapolis, St. Papias the Bishop, a hearer of John the Apostle." The manuscript of Trier agrees; but Notker and Ado, with slightly altered phrasing, report the same thus: "At Hierapolis, St. Papias the Bishop, a hearer of St. John the Apostle." In the manuscript of Ado from the Church of the Morini, the manuscript of Cologne of the Carmelites, the manuscript of Liege of St. Lambert, and the ancient manuscript of Centula, which bears the name of Bede, he is called: "a hearer of St. John the Apostle and Evangelist." In the manuscript of Ado from St. Lawrence, it was added in a more recent hand: "and a fellow-disciple and companion of Blessed Polycarp." These are taken from Usuardus, in whose very many and principal manuscript copies, as well as in the printed editions, this is recorded: "On the same day, of Blessed Papias, Bishop of the city of Hierapolis, who was a hearer of John the Apostle, and moreover a fellow-disciple and companion of Polycarp." The same is found in the very ancient Antwerp manuscript of the Society of Jesus, which is also designated by the name of Bede, likewise in Bellinus in his Martyrology according to the custom of the Roman Church, Maurolycus, and others. In the manuscript Florarium it is added: "He flourished in the year of salvation one hundred and five." Galesinius embellishes these facts in a more ample style: "At Hierapolis," he says, "of St. Papias the Bishop. He, an Asian, a hearer of Blessed John, a disciple of the Apostles, an intimate of the divine Polycarp, consecrated Bishop of Hierapolis, presided over that Church for many years with the highest praise. he is also venerated on 17 May, Concerning the present-day Roman Martyrology, we shall treat presently. The solemn commemoration of the same St. Papias is again made on the seventeenth of May in the manuscript Martyrologies of Centula, of St. Lambert at Liege, and of St. Lawrence, and others, in these words: "At Hierapolis, of Blessed Papias the Bishop, who was a hearer of John the Apostle, and moreover a fellow-disciple and companion of Polycarp." Maurolycus also commemorates him there. But on the twenty-second of January, the manuscript Florarium assigns and perhaps on 22 January, the Translation of St. Papias, Bishop and Confessor, where we indicated at that day that this appears to concern this Bishop of Hierapolis.
[2] That in nearly all these Martyrologies Papias is called a disciple of St. John the Apostle and Evangelist, he is also held to be a hearer of St. John the Apostle by St. Jerome, we believe to be drawn from St. Jerome. For, first, these words are found in the Chronicle of Eusebius as augmented by him, at the third year of Trajan according to Pontacus, or the second according to Miraeus: "Irenaeus the Bishop writes that the Apostle John survived until the times of Trajan," which is found in Greek in the Chronicle of Eusebius; to which St. Jerome adds: "After him" -- namely, St. John who had died -- "his notable hearers were Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, and Polycarp of Smyrna, and Ignatius of Antioch." Then the same Jerome, in Chapter 9 of On Ecclesiastical Writers, concerning St. John the Evangelist, says this: "Some think there are two memorials of the same John the Evangelist, concerning which matter, when we come in order to Papias his hearer, we shall discuss." And afterward, in Chapter 18: "Papias," he says, "a hearer of John, Bishop of Hierapolis in Asia, wrote only five volumes, which he entitled: Explanation of the Sayings of the Lord." Finally, the same St. Jerome, in Epistle 29 to Theodora in the epitaph of her husband Lucinius, while discussing Marcus the heretic, records this about SS. Irenaeus and Papias: "Irenaeus reports -- a man of apostolic times, and a disciple of Papias, who was a hearer of John the Evangelist, Bishop of the Church of Lyons -- that a certain Marcus, descending from the stock of Basilides the Gnostic, first came to Gaul and stained with his teaching those regions through which the Rhone and Garonne flow." Indeed, St. Irenaeus his disciple by St. Irenaeus, affirms the same about his master in Book 5 Against Heresies, Chapter 33: "These things," he says, "Papias also, a hearer of John and a companion of Polycarp, an ancient man, attests in writing in the fourth of his books; for there are five books written by him." These are the words there, which Eusebius cites in Book 3 of the Ecclesiastical History, Chapter 33: Tauta de kai Papias, Ioannou men akoustes Polykapou de hetairos gegonos, archaios aner, engraphos epimartyrei, etc. Where he is called a hearer of John, we have already stated from St. Jerome that the Apostle and Evangelist is meant. by Andreas of Caesarea, Both Latin authors in the aforementioned Martyrologies and various Greek authors have followed this interpretation. Andreas, Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, in his commentary on the Apocalypse -- from which Arethas of Caesarea excerpted his compendium -- in Chapter 34, or Discourse 12, calls Papias a disciple of Blessed John. But in plain words, St. Anastasius of Sinai, Patriarch of Antioch, by St. Anastasius of Sinai, in Book 7 on the Hexaemeron, confirms that the celebrated Papias of Hierapolis was a disciple of John the Evangelist. Finally, Oecumenius, on Acts of the Apostles, Chapter 2: "This, however," by Oecumenius, he says, "Papias, a disciple of John the Apostle, narrates more clearly," in Greek: Touto de saphesteron historei Papias ho Ioannou tou Apostolou mathetes.
[3] St. Maximus the Martyr, on Chapter 7 of the great Dionysius's On the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, asserts that Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis in Asia, flourished together with St. John the Evangelist, he is read to have flourished with St. John in St. Maximus, in Greek synakmasanta to theio Euangeliste Ioanne. Petrus, Bishop of Equilinum, adds more in the Catalogue, Book 3, Chapter 141, in these words: "Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, was a hearer of John the Apostle, and also a fellow-disciple and companion of Polycarp. He was ordained Bishop of that city by the same Apostle while preaching at Hierapolis, ordained Bishop by him, according to Equilinus, and after presiding laudably over the Lord's flock for many years, he rested in Christ with a blessed end on the eighth Kalends of March. He composed five books on the words of the Lord." But Petrus Halloix, in volume 1 of the Holy Writers of the East, in the Life of St. Papias, Chapter 2: "I would not hesitate," he says, "to accept as true that the care of the episcopate was entrusted to him by St. John the Apostle, or the care of the episcopate was committed to him, according to Halloix, when he was partly founding and partly governing the already-founded Churches of Asia, just as it was also entrusted to Polycarp." For the rest, that St. Polycarp was elected by laypeople with the consent of the entire ecclesiastical assembly, and that the ordinary consecration was performed by Bishops through the laying on of hands, is related by the ancient author of his Life on the twenty-sixth of January, Chapter 5. Eusebius explains these matters thus in Book 3 of the Ecclesiastical History, Chapter 30: "In those same times," [he is recorded to have lived in the age of SS. Polycarp and Ignatius, in Eusebius:] he says, "Polycarp, who enjoyed great intimacy and acquaintance with the Apostles, flourished in Asia, and obtained the episcopate of the Church of Smyrna by the votes of those who had seen the Lord and had been his ministers." And concerning SS. Papias and Ignatius, he adds: "In whose time Papias, Bishop of the Church at Hierapolis, was a man of great fame and renown, truly most learned in the knowledge of all other arts, and not unversed in the understanding of the sacred Scriptures. Ignatius likewise, who is celebrated to our own memory by the speech and report of many, obtained the episcopate of Antioch as second in succession after Peter."
[4] Whether, however, that ordinary election and consecration by which St. Polycarp was called to the episcopate was also employed in the episcopate of SS. Papias and Ignatius, we have not read. Baronius seems to disagree in the present-day Martyrology, he is called a hearer of John the Elder by Baronius: where the John whose hearer Papias was is called not the Apostle and Evangelist but the Elder. "At Hierapolis," he says, "in Phrygia, of Blessed Papias, Bishop of that city, who was a hearer of St. John the Elder and a companion of Polycarp." And in the Annals at the year 118, number 6, he asserts that an error crept into the Martyrologies, not of John the Apostle, so that he who should be called a disciple of John the Elder is called a disciple of John the Apostle. We have thus far set this out accurately, but let us now see for what principal reason Baronius departs from others. And first, at number 3, from Eusebius, Book 3, Chapter 33, or the last chapter, the following is adduced: "Papias himself in the preface of his books demonstrates that he was by no means a hearer or eyewitness of the holy Apostles; nor of the Apostles, according to Eusebius but he teaches that he received what pertains to the faith from those who were known to and familiar with them." But Petrus Halloix, in his question on the Life of St. Papias, denies that this is contained in his words, or can even be inferred from them. Now, these are the words written by Papias and reported by Eusebius:
[5] "I shall not be reluctant to set forth for you, together with their expositions, those things which I once rightly learned from the Elders and the memory of which I rightly retained, but this is poorly proved from this preface of St. Papias: in order to confirm the truth of those things which have been handed down by them. For I did not, as most do, take pleasure in those who say many things, but in those who teach true things; nor in those who recall foreign precepts, but in those who recall the commandments given by the Lord through faith and proceeding from the Truth itself. And if perchance anyone had come who had accompanied the Elders, I would inquire about the discourses of those same Elders: What did Andrew say, or what did Peter say? Or what did Philip, or what did Thomas, or James, or what did John, or Matthew, or any other of the disciples of the Lord say? And what do Aristion and John ho presbyteros, the disciples of the Lord, say? For I did not think I would derive as much benefit from books as from the living and abiding voice." These are the words of St. Papias; after reporting which, Eusebius draws this conclusion: from this it is established that there were two Johns, the Evangelist, "Whence it is worth noting that the name of John is reviewed by him twice: once indeed when he enumerates him with Peter, James, Matthew, and the other Apostles, he clearly signifies John the Evangelist; but the other, with a variation of his discourse, he assigns to others outside the number of the Apostles, placing Aristion before him, and clearly calls him presbyteron:" and the Presbyter, "so that by these things the narrative of those who said there were two of the same name in Asia is shown to be true, and that there are two monuments at Ephesus, and each is called John's to this day. And it is necessary to attend to these things. For it is probable that the latter John (unless one prefers the former) saw that Apocalypse which is circulated under the name of John." Thus Eusebius. In the same manner, from the reported words of St. Papias, St. Jerome draws this conclusion in On Ecclesiastical Writers, Chapter 18, under Papias: "From which it appears that in the catalogue of names itself, the John who is placed among the Apostles is one person, and the Elder John is another, or the Elder: whom he enumerates after Aristion. We have said this, however, on account of the earlier opinion which we reported as handed down by most, that the two latter epistles of John are not the Apostle's but the Presbyter's" -- whom he himself earlier calls the Elder, and the Greeks presbyteron -- a term also used by Christophorsonus in his translation of Eusebius. Concerning the opinion of some who attribute both the book of the Apocalypse and the two epistles of John to John the Presbyter or Elder, consult the preface of Cornelius a Lapide and of other interpreters to those treatises.
[6] Here, assuming both Johns -- namely the Apostle and the Presbyter -- we say only that it is not correctly inferred from the words of St. Papias that he did not see the Apostles or was not a disciple of St. John the Apostle: because if anyone returned from the company of the Apostles or of the Disciples of the Lord, he would equally inquire what Aristion and John the Presbyter were saying, as much as what Andrew, Peter, Philip, Thomas, James, John, and Matthew were saying. Eusebius, however, seems to have understood this differently, for after the above-reported words he adds the following: Kai ho nyn d' hemin dedelomenos Papias tous men ton Apostolon logous para ton autois parekolouthakoton homologei pareilephenai. [from other and lost books, Eusebius reports that he was a hearer of Aristion and John the Presbyter:] Aristionos kai ou presbyterou Ioannou autekoon heauton phesi genesthai. onomasti goun pollakis auton mnemonausas, en tois autou syngrammasi tithesin auton paradoseis. "Indeed, Papias, about whom we have just spoken, acknowledges that he received the sayings of the Apostles from those who had accompanied them. He says that he himself was a hearer of Aristion and John the Presbyter. And so, frequently mentioning them by name, he includes their traditions in his writings." And with some intervening matter he adds that Papias in his books included not only the explanations of Aristion on the sayings of the Lord, but also the traditions of John tou presbyterou. These are Eusebius's words about Papias, whose lost works cannot furnish testimony for him. But granted that St. Papias somewhere wrote that he was a hearer of John the Presbyter or Elder, by those words he does not demonstrate that he was by no means a hearer or eyewitness of St. John the Apostle, which we said above was poorly inferred from the preface of Papias's books in Eusebius. Nicephorus Callistus largely transcribes Eusebius and adds that the same Papias made use of testimonies and authorities from the first epistle of John and likewise from the first epistle of Peter. Concerning St. Aristion, we have also treated on this same day.
Section II. St. Papias adhered to the error of the Millenarians. Was he Bishop of Pergamum? Was he a companion of St. Onesimus?
[7] The same Eusebius then adds this about the writings of St. Papias: "The same author also appends other things, as if conveyed to him by unwritten tradition, including certain new parables and teachings of the Savior, [In the writings of St. Papias is the error of the Millenarians, observed by Eusebius,] and some rather fabulous matters, among which is the notion that after the resurrection from the dead there will be a thousand years during which the kingdom of Christ will subsist bodily on this earth. I think he received these things through a misinterpretation of the apostolic narratives, not penetrating what was said mystically by them through similitude. For he was a man of very limited understanding, as one may gather from his writings." Jerome also confirms the same in On Ecclesiastical Writers, Chapter 18: by St. Jerome, "He is said to have published a Jewish deuterosis of a thousand years, whom Irenaeus, Apollinaris, and others followed who say that after the resurrection the Lord will reign in the flesh with the Saints. Tertullian also in his book On the Hope of the Faithful, and Victorinus of Pettau, and Lactantius are led by this opinion." St. Jerome has similar things in the preface to Book 18 on Isaiah, and in Chapter 36 of Ezekiel, Book 11, and Chapter 14 of Jeremiah, Book 4, where he adds this: "Although we do not follow these things, nevertheless we cannot condemn them, because many churchmen and Martyrs have said them, and let each one abound in his own understanding, and let all things be reserved for the judgment of the Lord."
[8] After reporting these things, Baronius adds in the Notes on the twenty-second of February: "Thus St. Jerome, from whose time it appears that nothing had yet been defined by the Church on this matter." by Baronius, "Shortly afterward, however, when Apollinaris the heresiarch strove to establish this opinion about the millennium and attempted to defend it with all his might, and in order to establish it as a Catholic dogma wrote (as St. Jerome says in the preface to Book 18 on Isaiah) two volumes against Dionysius of Alexandria, who had published a book on that matter against Irenaeus, soon the zeal of the holy Fathers blazed against him and other Millenarians, so that they inveighed more freely against the heresy and its patron -- especially since he added other impieties to that opinion, saying that men would rise again to observe the Law, Circumcision, and Sabbaths, to eat select foods as of old, and to build a material temple. This is what St. Basil writes about him in Epistle 74 to the Westerners. Then, just as the other perverse opinions of Apollinaris, so also this one about the millennium is believed to have been condemned by Pope Damasus at Rome." Thus Baronius. But the same Baronius reports in the Annals at the year 118, number 2, that because of the great esteem for the man, several great men followed that opinion of St. Papias about the millennium. SS. Justin, Irenaeus, and Victorinus followed him: Among these are the celebrated Martyrs Justin the Philosopher, inscribed in the Roman Martyrology on the thirteenth of April; Irenaeus on the twenty-eighth of June; and Victorinus on the second of November, when there will again be occasion to treat of this error of the millennium. The exaggerated calumnies and falsehoods heaped up by Isaac Casaubon against St. Papias in Exercise 16 on the Annals of Baronius, number 16, are rejected and censured by Petrus Halloix in his Notes on Chapter 1 of the Life of St. Papias, letter d.
[9] The same Halloix, at Chapter 2 of the Life, letter b, rejects the futile conjecture of Antiochus Brondus, who dared to assert that St. Papias was the Angel of Pergamum, St. Papias was not the Bishop of Pergamum reproved in the Apocalypse: to whom these words are spoken in Apocalypse 2: "I know where you dwell, where the throne of Satan is, and you hold fast my name and have not denied my faith ... But I have a few things against you: because you have there those who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balac to cast a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat and to fornicate. So also you have those who hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans. Repent likewise; otherwise I will come to you quickly and fight against them with the sword of my mouth," etc. On which passage Brondus says it is possible that John entrusted this Church of Pergamum to Papias his hearer, and that afterward in the course of time he governed the Church of Hierapolis in Phrygia after the exile of John, having left the Church of Pergamum to some other Pastor. These are his words, based on mere conjecture, because he asserts it could have happened -- which is not sufficient for us.
[10] Halloix, in Chapter 3 of the Life of St. Papias, narrates his perseverance in adversity and his blessed departure from this world, and writes the following: "It is found in the Acts of Blessed Onesimus, a disciple of St. Paul, who was then a Bishop in the same province of Asia and a contemporary of our Papias, that he was led to Rome, [the Papias who is a spiritual fellow-soldier in the Acts of St. Onesimus is not the same person,] and there, together with Romulus his assistant and Papias his spiritual fellow-soldier (for so he seems to call our Papias on account of their equality in dignity and struggle), he was brought before Tertullus, the Prefect of the City, who, after examining them and finding them to have steadfastly confessed the faith in Christ, ordered them to be cast into a dark prison and tortured with torments; but after they had spent a full eighteen days in affliction, because of the frequent gathering of the people around them, he expelled them from the city under a pretense of leniency. Accordingly, Onesimus with Apitio headed for Puteoli; but where Papias went with Romulus is not recorded there ... But to say nothing of the others, certainly about Papias I think I can say this: nor should he be considered a Martyr, either he attained the full palm of martyrdom by bravely undergoing death for Christ (since by some he is called not merely a Bishop but a Bishop and Martyr) or at least he endured very many things in sustaining the cause of the faith. For that the illustrious title of Martyr was given to some on this ground, the writings of many Saints attest." Thus Halloix. He who attributed martyrdom to St. Papias, however, is Stephanus Gobarus the Tritheist, as recorded in Photius, Bibliotheca, Codex 232, number 52: "That he does not approve," he says, as he appears to be called by error in Photius. "what was said about the restoration of things by St. Gregory, Bishop of Nyssa, nor does he accept Papias, Bishop and Martyr of Hierapolis, nor St. Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons: where indeed they say that the kingdom of heaven consists of a certain enjoyment of tangible foods." Thus the passage reads, and perhaps the title of Martyr was attributed to St. Papias by error, since it should have been given to St. Irenaeus, his disciple. For the rest, concerning Blessed Onesimus, the disciple of St. Paul and, after the death of St. Timothy, Bishop of Ephesus, we treated on the sixteenth of February, omitting the Greek Acts which, rendered into Latin by Gentianus Hervetus, are found in Lipomanus, Surius, and others, St. Onesimus was killed at Puteoli under Decius. because those Acts are plainly confused, and in their principal part pertain to St. Onesimus the teacher of SS. Alphius, Philadelphus, and Cyrinus, who was arrested under Decius and killed for the faith of Christ at Puteoli on the thirty-first of July. Hence the Papias who was his spiritual fellow-soldier is a different person from this St. Papias, being one hundred and thirty or forty years younger.
[11] The same Petrus Halloix, in the cited Chapter 3, asserts that the holiness of St. Papias is commended the holiness of St. Papias, from what matters it is gathered. first by the fact that in those times he was selected from the good supply of fervent Christians and advanced to the dignity of Bishop, when Christian simplicity was valued far more highly for duties of this kind than the nobility of worldly lineage, and the riches of the Spirit more than the treasures of the earth, and a modest knowledge of the divine law more than a proud accumulation of many sciences. Secondly, by the fact that among men most distinguished for both holiness and learning, he possessed such authority on account of his ancient and venerable probity of character that even when they departed from his opinion on some point, they nevertheless held his holiness in great esteem and reverence. Finally, a proof of the remarkable holiness of Papias, he says, can and rightly should be that most vehement and ardent zeal of spirit with which he followed the Apostles and apostolic men, and with which he burned, if anyone did, to hear and inquire about their words and deeds. But we have proved his sacred veneration from the ancient Martyrologies.
[12] How long he presided as Bishop over the Church of Hierapolis, or in what year of his life, of his See, or of Christ he died, we have not read. time of his See, his successor. St. Abercius was afterward Bishop of the same See, and he flourished principally under the Emperors Marcus Antoninus and Lucius Verus; we have his Greek Acts to be illustrated on the twenty-second of October.