12 - Ignatius and Polycarp

All right, well, we press on in our study of church history this morning.

I'm going to try to pick up the pace a little bit. We are still looking at Ignatius.

And I want to get to Polycarp today and to the martyrdom of Polycarp. That sounds strange.

I want to get to the martyrdom. That's actually one of the things we'll be talking about is whether Polycarp wanted to get to the martyrdom of Polycarp too.

That's another issue. Interestingly enough,

I did a program just yesterday. I recorded a half hour program that will be aired this week with Dr.

Michael Brown on the testimony to the deity of Christ found in Ignatius. So let me sort of just, yeah, so would you like to talk about it?

I said, well, you know, we're talking about this at Sunday school, so let's go for it. So that'll air sometime this week,

I think. We looked at Ignatius to the

Ephesians. Looking at the epistle to the Magnesians, there is an interesting statement here.

The only accusation I have heard or the only way that I've heard people try to get around some of the very clear testimonies in Ignatius is to accuse him of something called modalism.

Now, we will probably be going into far more detail than you want to go into in regards to the various Christological heresies of the ancient church.

Interestingly enough, one of the earliest was not what we would call subordinationism or Arianism or the view that, for example,

Jehovah's Witnesses hold today. That came about at a later point in time.

One of the earliest heresies called modalism, that God has different modes of being.

And the simplest way to put it would be, well, when I first started asking questions about the doctrine of the

Trinity once I ran into Mormons, unfortunately, most of the answers

I was given in my Southern Baptist church were actually heretical answers and were modalistic answers.

And I have said many times that I think if we were to take a poll of the majority of people who identify themselves as evangelicals that they would turn out to be modalistic in the majority out of ignorance, not out of conviction, but simply out of ignorance.

And so if you've ever heard someone say, well, the Trinity is sort of like water.

It can be ice, and it can be liquid, and it can be steam. No. Well, the

Trinity is like me. I can be a father, and a son, and a brother.

No. All of that is blithering heresy. And you may be going, oh, great.

That's how I explain it. No, sorry, it doesn't work that way. The idea of modalism is that there are manifestations of God, but there's only one person of God.

So the one person of God is the Father. And then maybe it takes on the mode of the

Son, takes on the mode of the Holy Spirit now. That would be one form. The most common modern form of modalism in the

United States takes a little different perspective. You've heard of the Jesus Only Movement, the

Oneness Pentecostal Movement. And that perspective focused in the denomination that has its headquarters in St.

Louis, Missouri, the United Pentecostal Church International, their doctrine is that there is one person of God who in the

Old Testament was Jehovah, who we call the Father. And then the Son is a created being.

And so the Son's just a human being who is indwelt by God. So Jesus was two persons.

He was the Father and the Son. But the Son's not divine. Jesus was divine because God was dwelling in him, but the

Son's not divine. And now has transitioned into the role of the Spirit. I'm a little unclear, because there's different opinions as to exactly what the

Son does now, what the Son's role is, or anything like that. But that's another issue.

So there's variations on exactly how it works. And one of the arguments that has been put forward that I've heard in the past is that, well, you can't look to Ignatius, because Ignatius was modalistic in his thought.

Well, I just think that's a gross misreading of Ignatius. And I think here in his

Letters to the Magnesians, we have an example of this. In section eight, well, section seven, therefore, as the

Lord did nothing without the Father, either by himself or by the apostles, et cetera, et cetera.

Section eight, be not seduced by strange doctrines nor by antiquated fables which are profitless.

If even unto this day we live after the manner of Judaism, we avow that we have not received grace. For the divine prophets lived after Christ Jesus.

Now, by the way, that is somewhat relevant to the fact that the

Magnesians evidently were, well, early forms of Gnosticism, early forms of a kind of Jewish legalism.

We know existed from Paul's epistles, continues to be an issue even in Ignatius' epistles, which is what he's talking about if we live after the manner of Judaism.

And there is even a reference to the issue of the

Lord's Day and Sabbaths and things like that in the controversy in Ignatius' letters.

But we might touch on that at a different point. But for this cause also, they were persecuted, being inspired by his grace to the end, that they which are disobedient might be fully persuaded there is one

God who manifests himself through Jesus Christ his son, who is his word that proceeded from silence, who in all things was well -pleasing unto him that sent him.

Now, I guess I could see how a modalist might say that in some strange circumstance, but that's not normal modalistic language.

That is, even though the term manifestation is used there, it's used as a verb rather than as a noun.

And there is a distinction being made between God and the word just as there is in John 1.

So I think that's one of the many places where it really seems that it is inappropriate to charge

Ignatius with the error of modalism. He also wrote a letter to the

Troleans. And again, I just mentioned what we mentioned briefly before.

There is a reference to the supper here and to the reality of the incarnation.

Remember, the Gnostics denied that Jesus took on a physical body. And so Ignatius is frequently misused by modern

Roman Catholics to try to read back into him some idea of transubstantiation or something. What he was really doing was pointing out that there's no reason to celebrate the

Lord's Supper if Jesus didn't have flesh and blood in the first place. So in section 8, do you therefore arm yourselves with gentleness and recover yourselves in faith, which is the flesh of the

Lord, and love, which is the blood of Jesus Christ? So again, the emphasis upon the reality of the incarnation, the flesh and the blood of Christ.

Be ye deaf, therefore, section 9, when any man speaketh to you apart from Jesus Christ, who was of the race of David, who was the son of Mary, who was truly born and ate and drank, you hear the emphasis there, was truly persecuted under Pontius Pilate, was truly crucified and died in the sight of those in heaven and those on earth and those under the earth, who moreover was truly raised from the dead, his father having raised him.

That just pretty much ends any modalism there. Who in the like fashion will so raise also us who believe on him.

His father, I say, will raise us in Christ Jesus, apart from whom we have not true life. Now that's a pretty full creedal statement.

I mean, that certainly rings to me of First Corinthians chapter 15, the gospel that was delivered to you, et cetera, et cetera.

That section 9 of the letter to the Troleans is, again, just so much there.

But again, that the two natures of Christ, son of Mary, son of God, truly born, was truly persecuted under Pontius Pilate, truly crucified, died in the sight of those in heaven, those on earth, those under the earth.

A rather full statement of a fundamental Christian confession that is found here in section 9 of the epistle to the

Troleans. I think we started with the epistle to the

Romans, if I recall correctly. And I mentioned at that point the fact that the letter is addressed to the church, rather than to a single bishop.

That will come up again here in a little while when we talk a little bit about that. Next is to the Philadelphians, which is nothing to do with Pennsylvania, obviously.

And once again, the emphasis upon the unity of the church. There can't be schisms.

The flesh and blood of Jesus Christ emphasized, again, in regards to those issues.

These are obviously important for Ignatius. Then to the Smyrnians, after the introduction,

I give glory to Jesus Christ, the God who bestowed such wisdom upon you.

And I think this is probably where some of the arguments come up about the modalism.

But the New Testament itself teaches that the

Father raised Jesus, that Jesus had authority to receive back his own life, and that the

Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead. These are all biblical phrases, that each of the divine persons is involved in the resurrection.

And that is seen as well in section 2 to the Smyrnians, for he suffered all these things for our sakes, that we might be saved.

And he suffered truly, as also he raised himself truly, not as certain unbelievers say, that he suffered in semblance, being themselves mere semblance.

And according to their opinions are, so shall it happen to them, for they are without body and demon -like.

So once again, this idea, who is he specifically aiming at? The people who, not as certain unbelievers say, that he suffered in semblance.

And we know, up until 50, 60, 70 years ago, we had to put together what the

Gnostics believed solely on the basis of what their enemies said about them. And that can be a rather tricky thing, because human nature and human tendency is such that we don't generally accurately represent our opponents as well as we might, even as Christians.

But it was fascinating that once the, especially the Nag Hammadi library was discovered, some of the papyri at Oxyrhynchus and places like that in the 40s and 50s especially, and some of the original

Gnostic writings were uncovered at that point in time, that they had been fairly accurate in what they had said.

Perfectly accurate? No. Was there perfect balance? No. But the idea had been pretty clearly communicated in regards to what they really believed.

And there are a number of Gnostic writings that have been discovered that talk about how, well, one of them, for example, specifically has the crucifixion scene.

And the true Christ is sort of off on a hillside watching all of this and laughing, because the

Jews think that they've actually crucified him. And they can't crucify him, because the true

Christ is spiritual. So it's just they've been fooled. It's a semblance.

And again, some people do theorize that this is where Muhammad got his ideas in the

Quran. And the Quran shows zero insight or discernment in regards to the sources that it uses.

So it wouldn't necessarily be out of the realm of possibility, given the

Quran's use of other Gnostic sources for other stories that it repeats about Jesus, for this to be the source of Surah 4, verses 1 to 7.

It's possible. It can't be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, obviously. But it is possible.

So we read this, and there is a clear distinction, because from Ignatius's perspective, these are unbelievers.

And obviously, people like Bart Ehrman and stuff, well, these were the Christian Gnostics. It was all just one big mishmash, and nobody knew what in the world was going on.

It's from the Greek term gnosis, which means knowledge. They taught that salvation came through obtaining secret knowledge, which was offered through the various rites and rituals of their religion.

Basically, you were taught that you were a spark of the divine, and that being reabsorbed back into the divine and the loss of your own personality really was your truest goal.

But this was only meant for the enlightened. This was information that was not meant for the hoi polloi, the people of the land, but it was only for the initiated ones.

And you obtained it by going through almost Masonic -like rituals and ordinances and things like that.

And so gnostic comes from the term gnosis. You'll notice that at the end of, I think,

Second Timothy, Paul warns Timothy against those who profess what's falsely called gnosis.

And so that's the origination of the term. All right.

Smyrnians 6, let no man be deceived, even the heavenly beings and the glory of the angels and rulers visible and invisible.

If they believe not in the blood of Christ, who is God, judgment awaiteth them also. So you have another reference there.

I did mention to you, to the Smyrnians section 6, they abstain from Eucharist, Thanksgiving, and prayer.

This is where we talk about the Gnostics. Resurrection, the bishops, we already looked at that in the

Smyrnians. And then finally, there is an epistle to Polycarp, very short epistle.

There's only eight sections to it. He says, mark the seasons, await him who is above every season, the eternal, the invisible, who became visible for our sake, the impalpable, the impassable, who suffered for our sake, who endured in all ways for our sake.

So another one of these tremendous creedal statements here in section 3 of the epistle to Polycarp, where the eternal, the invisible, who became visible for our sake, the incarnation very clearly said as well.

Now, having introduced Polycarp, let's mention him briefly. And we know very little about Polycarp.

We have one epistle to the Philippians, and it's fairly short and, again, focused upon primarily issues within the church, orderliness within the church, so on and so forth.

He was the Bishop of Smyrna. So obviously, he sent a letter to the Smyrnians, probably included a specific epistle to Polycarp as well.

He was a martyr, died under the reign of Marcus Aurelius. According to Irenaeus, Polycarp was a disciple of John, though in his extant letter to the

Philippian church, there is no definite reference to John or any of John's writings, which would be somewhat unusual.

But the primary fame of Polycarp in church history is due to a letter written, well, we don't know when it was written.

He dies somewhere around 155, 156. So he dies approximately 45, 50 years after Ignatius.

And the martyrdom of Polycarp is far more well -known than the life of Polycarp, to be perfectly honest with you.

And it's a fairly lengthy little thing. I can't get through all of it, but I do want to read some portions of it.

Because what it does is it will introduce us a little bit to the issues of not only persecution, but also to one of the more important subjects, and that was the attitude of Christians toward martyrdom.

And the fact that there were those in the early church who sought martyrdom.

Obviously, we would think that the vast majority of Christians were not running out into a cohort of Roman soldiers to sign around their necks saying,

I'm a Christian, kill me. But there were people who, upon seeing persecution coming and knowing what it was going to mean, actively sought to bring about their own martyrdom.

They did not flee, and they did not hide. They did what they could to make sure that they would die as a martyr.

And I'm sure we all know that the very term martyr comes from the Greek term that means one who testifies, one who gives witness.

So its initial meaning was one who gives testimony and witness, and then it came to have as its meaning one who dies in the giving of that witness because of how often that happened.

But in regards to Polycarp, the way that this letter is constructed is it is a letter from the church at Smyrna, where he was bishop, to the church in Philomelium, narrating the events of Polycarp's death.

Now, as we read it, some of the questions are going to arise is, and one of the issues that definitely comes up, is the issue of embellishment when it comes to the death of the martyrs.

And there is a long history of this. Even in modern times, we have

Fox's Book of Martyrs, written from the Protestant perspective. There's similar literature from the

Roman Catholic perspective exalting

Catholic martyrs who died in Protestant lands. And it is not unusual for supernatural events to be associated with these stories.

And it raises the question of exactly how much one can believe of these things, what the purposes were, how this eventually was going to lead into what we call hagiolatry.

Hagios means a saint. Hagios means holy, literally, but used as a substantive, where you're referring to a saint, the saint's hagiolatry.

Latria is the worship of something or the veneration of something, depending on what language you're using and what your context is.

But hagiolatry, the veneration of saints, which begins to develop during the periods of persecution and grows and grows and grows in normality and in grievousness,

I guess, down to the centuries. This is part of that foundational documentation that gives us an idea of where all this came from and how it started and things like that.

And so it starts off talking about polycarp. And what happens to him.

And let me see here. And like man are also those that were condemned.

The wild beast endured fearful punishments, being made to lie on sharp shells and buffeted with other forms of manifold tortures.

The devil might have possible, by the persistence of the punishment, bring them to a denial, for he tried many wiles against them.

But thanks be to God, for he verily prevailed against all. For the right noble Germanicus encouraged their timorousness through the constancy that was in him.

And he fought with the wild beast in a signal way for when the proconsul wished to prevail upon him and bade him to have pity on his youth.

He used violence and dragged the wild beast toward him, desiring the more speedily to obtain a release from their unrighteous and lawless life.

So after this, all the multitude, marveling at the bravery of the God -beloved and God -fearing people of the

Christians, raised a cry, away with the atheists. Let search be made for polycarp. So they were searching for polycarp.

Then it tells, but one man, Quintus by name, a

Phrygian, newly arrived from Phrygia. When he saw the wild beast turned coward, he it was who had forced himself and some others to come forward of their own free will.

This man, the proconsul, by much intrigue, persuaded to swear the oath and offer incense. Swear the oath and offer the incense.

We'll see this again in the future. Swear the oath of allegiance to Caesar. Say, Caesar curia,

Caesar is Lord. What's the Christian confession? Jesus curia, Jesus is Lord. So he swears the oath and offers the incense.

He would offer a pinch of incense upon the altar to the genius of Caesar. This was, in essence, how you demonstrate your faithfulness to the

Roman state. And this is what Christians would not do. And this is why they were persecuted.

So there is a Quintus who swears the oath, offers the incense.

This cause, therefore, brethren, we praise not those who deliver themselves up, since the gospel doth not so teach us.

So here's just a sentence. Even though Polycarp had been martyred, they're saying, we praise not those who deliver themselves up.

We do not praise those who voluntarily expose themselves to martyrdom.

For here is one who did so, and then backed out, and as a result, brought shame upon his profession, upon the

Christians. So where was the balance? Where would we have been in this particular argument?

It's real easy to sit back from 2 ,000, 1 ,900 years later and go, hmm,

I don't know. Little bit hard of them. Now, the glorious Polycarp at first, when he heard it so far from being dismayed, was desirous of remaining in town, but the greater part persuaded him to withdraw.

So he withdrew to a farm not far distant from the city, and there he stayed with a few companions, doing nothing else night and day but praying for all men and for the churches throughout the world.

This was his constant habit. And while praying, OK. And then it talks about, it is revealed to him, it needs to be that I should be burned alive.

So he has a vision that this is what's going to happen to him. They moved to another farm.

One of the slave boys is captured and tortured and tells where he is, and so on and so forth. So taking the lad with them, on the

Friday about the supper hour, the gendarmes and horsemen went forth with their accustomed arms, hastening as against a robber.

And coming up in a body late in the evening, they found the man himself in bed in an upper chamber in a certain cottage. And though he might have departed thence to another place, he would not saying the will of God be done.

So when he heard that they were come, he went down and conversed with them, the bystanders marveling at his age and his constancy and wondering how there should be so much eagerness for the apprehension of an old man like him.

Thereupon and forthwith, he gave orders that a table should be spread for them to eat and drink at that hour as much as they desired. And he persuaded them to grant him an hour that he might pray unmolested, and on their consenting, he stood up and prayed, being so full of the grace of God that for two hours he could not hold his peace.

And those that heard were amazed, and many repented that had come against such a venerable old man. But when at length he brought his prayer to an end after remembering all who at any time had come in his way, small and great, high and low, and all the universal church throughout the world, the hour of departure being come, they seated him on an ass and brought him into the city, it being a high

Sabbath. And he was met by Herod, the captain of police, and his father Nicetes, who also removed him to their carriage and tried to prevail upon him, seeing themselves by his side and saying, why, what harm is there in saying,

Kaiser Kurios, Caesar is Lord, and offering incense, with more to this effect than saving thyself?

But at first he gave them no answer. When, however, they persisted, he said, I am not going to do what you counsel me.

Then they, failing to persuade him, uttered threatening words and made him dismount with speed, so that he bruised his shin as he got down from the carriage.

Without even turning around, he went on his way promptly and with speed, as if nothing had happened to him, being taken to the stadium. There being such a tumult in the stadium that no man's voice could be so much as heard.

But as Polycarp entered into the stadium, a voice came to him from heaven, be strong, Polycarp, and play the man."

Probably the background, by the way, of a conversation that we'll see much, much, much later in the

Reformation in London, Latimer and Ridley, at their death, one said to the other, before they're burning, play the man, probably referring back to this particular incident.

And I think I've mentioned to you that the first time I preached here, as we went through the little room over there, the last thing

Pastor Fry said as we were about to open the door to me was, play the man. So knowing that I had already taught church history at that time,

I was sort of like, so I'm about to be burned. OK, all right, great. Interesting way of trying to encourage someone.

And no one saw the speaker, but those of our people who were present heard that voice. And at length, when he was brought up, there was a great tumult, for they heard that Polycarp had been apprehended.

Then he was brought before him. The pro -council inquired whether he were the man on his confessing that he was. He tried to persuade him to a denial, saying, have respect to thine age and other things in accordance therewith, as is their wont to say.

Swear by the genius of Caesar. Repent and say away with the atheists. Who are the atheists?

The Christians, because the Christians denied that the other gods existed. So they were called atheists. Then Polycarp, with solemn countenance, looked upon the whole multitude of lawless heathen that were in the stadium and waved his hand to them.

And groaning and looking up to heaven, he said, away with the atheists. But when the magistrate pressed him hard and said, swear the oath and I will release thee, revile the

Christ, Polycarp said, fourscore and six years have I been his servant, and he hath done me no wrong.

How then can I blaspheme my king who saved me? But on his persisting again and saying, swear by the genius of Caesar, he answered, if thou supposest vainly that I will swear by the genius of Caesar as thou sayest and faintest that thou art ignorant of who

I am, hear thou plainly, I am a Christian. But if thou wouldst learn the doctrine of Christianity, assign a day and give me a hearing.

Proconsul said, prevail upon the people. But Polycarp said, as for thyself, I should have held thee worthy of discourse, for we have been taught to render as is meat to princes and authorities appointed by God such honor as does us no harm.

But as for these, I do not hold them worthy, that I should defend myself before them.

Whereupon the proconsul said, I have wild beasts here and I will throw you to them except you repent. But he said, call for them, for the repentance from better to worse is a change not permitted to us, but is a noble thing to change from untowardness to righteousness.

Then he said to him again, I will cause you to be consumed by fire if you despise the wild beasts unless you repent.

But Polycarp said, you threaten that fire which burns for a season and after a little while is quenched, for you are ignorant of the fire of the future judgment and eternal punishment which is reserved for the ungodly.

But why do you delay? Come, do what you will. Saying these things and more besides, he was inspired with courage and joy and his countenance was filled with grace.

So not only did it not drop and dismay the things which were said to him, but on the contrary, the procouncil was astounded and sent his own herald to proclaim three times in the midst of the stadium,

Polycarp has confessed himself to be a Christian. When this was proclaimed by the herald, the whole multitude, both of Gentiles and of Jews who dwelt in Smyrna, cried out with ungovernable wrath with a loud shout, this is the teacher of Asia, the father of the

Christians, the puller down of our gods, who teaches numbers not to sacrifice nor worship. Hate to point out, but it sort of sounds like how the denizens of Planned Parenthood respond today.

Anyway, saying these things, they shouted aloud and asked the Asiarch Philip to let a lion loose upon Polycarp, but he said that it was not lawful for him since he had brought the sports to a close.

Then they thought fit to shout out with one accord that Polycarp should be burned alive, for it must needs be at the manner of the vision should be fulfilled, which was shown him concerning his pillow when he saw it on fire while praying and turning around, he said prophetically to the faithful who were with him,

I must needs be burned alive. These things then happened with so great speed, quicker than words could tell. The crowds forthwith collecting from the workshops and bath timbers, baths, timbers and wood, and the

Jews were especially assisting with zeal as is their want, keep that in mind. But when the pile was made ready, divesting himself of all his upper garments and loosing his girdle, he endeavored also to take off his shoes, though not in the habit of doing this before, because all the faithful at all times vied eagerly who should soonest touch his flesh, for he had been treated with all honor for his holy life even before his gray hairs came.

Forthwith, when the instruments that were prepared for the pile were placed about him, and as they were going likewise to nail him to the stake, he said, leave me as I am, for he that hath granted me to endure the fire will grant me also to remain at the pile unmoved, even without security which you seek from the nails.

So he did not nail him, but tied him. Then he placing his hands behind him and being bound to the stake like a noble ram out of a great flock for an offering, a burnt sacrifice made ready and acceptable to God, looking up to heaven said, oh

Lord God almighty, the father of thy beloved and blessed son Jesus Christ, through whom we have received the knowledge of thee, the

God of angels and powers and all of creation, and of the whole race, the righteous who live in thy presence,

I bless you for that you have granted me this day and hour that I might receive a certain portion amongst the numbers of martyrs in the cup of thy

Christ under resurrection of eternal life, both the soul and the body, in the incorruptibility of the Holy Spirit.

May I be received among these in thy presence this day as a rich and acceptable sacrifice, as thou didst prepare and reveal it beforehand, and as accomplished it, thou art the faithful and true

God. This case, yea, and for all things, I praise thee, I bless thee, I glorify thee through the eternal and heavenly high priest,

Jesus Christ, thy beloved son, through whom with him and with the Holy Spirit be glory both now and forever and for ages to come, amen.

When he had offered up the amen and finished his prayer, the fireman lighted the fire and a mighty flame flashing forth, we to whom it was given to see saw a marvel, yea, and we were preserved that we might relate to the rest what happened.

The fire making the appearance of a vault like the sail of a vessel filled with the wind made a wall around the body of the martyr, and it was there in the midst, not like flesh burning, but like a loaf in the oven, or like gold and silver refined in a furnace, for we perceived such a fragrant smell as if it were the wafted odor of frankincense or some other precious spice.

So at length the lawless man, seeing that his body could not be consumed by the fire, ordered an executioner to go up to him and stab him with a dagger, and when he had done this, there came forth a quantity of blood so that it extinguished the fire, and all the multitude marveled that there should be so great a difference between the unbelievers and the elect.

In the number of these was this man, the glorious martyr Polycarp, who was found an apostolic and prophetic teacher in our own time, a bishop of the holy church which is in Smyrna, for every word which he uttered from his mouth was accomplished and will be accomplished."

And then there is a continuation of the story, what happened afterwards, so on and so forth.

But there is the story of the martyrdom of Polycarp.

And there eventually comes to be a fairly voluminous body of literature in regards to the martyrs.

And of course, the more literature like this that comes into existence, the more likely it is that someone upon reading these things might be encouraged to engage in behavior so as to go out in the same way.

We see this today, and it's not even in regards to following the truth, though we see it sort of in a dark black opposite.

I saw a video of a young man who was the jihadi martyr in Syria, who they're showing him in this sort of armored vehicle and it's filled with explosives.

And they're sort of using him honestly, given the nature of what's going on in Syria right now.

The factions are so close to one another in these completely bombed out, shelled out cities, that it's the kind of horrific warfare that took place on the

Russian front in World War II. Once Germany was collapsing as they fell back in the various cities at the end in Berlin and things like that.

These bombed out buildings and things like that. So what he did is he drove this armored vehicle sort of across no man's land.

And he's getting shot at the whole time. And then turns into this, evidently, one of the buildings that the other side was using as a strong point.

And then the whole thing goes up in flames. It's sort of the black backwards idea.

You have the same concept of martyrdom, but for a completely different purpose, a completely different reason. You have taking others lives as the means of making your martyrdom meaningful over against freely giving life without taking any life because one already sees oneself as the recipient of a supernatural life that the world cannot touch.

And there's a huge difference between those two. But there is obviously a tremendous amount of literature today online in Arabic.

That's why most of it's not seen is because most of us can't read Arabic. But with similar stories promoting the concept of martyrdom, except in a violent fashion.

But there was literature like that in the ancient world as well.

And we just read a portion of it in regards to Polycarp. I think

I already mentioned to you, I know I mentioned to you the Epistle of Barnabas.

I think I mentioned you the Shepherd of Hermas and mentioned that it was considered, yes, yes.

Didn't matter. He may have been a philosopher, but there was a lot of persecution under Marcus Aurelius. Seemed to, yes.

I know that Marcus Aurelius was made to look so wonderful and kind and loving in Gladiator.

But we need to remember that films are often historically naive. And that one actually conflated about four stories that were separated by about 175 years.

Because Maximus lived. He just lived a century after Aurelius. Sort of threw it all together and made a nice story out of it.

Great movie, but didn't really happen. But yeah, Marcus Aurelius, though he was a philosopher, didn't change.

Being a philosopher doesn't necessarily make you a kind toward Christianity because obviously the fundamental worldview issues were still very much there.

He was still a politician too. We're gonna get into the persecution and the result a little bit later on.

Yeah. In fact, we only have, we're gonna look at what the church structure was in the apostolic period a little bit more and then the very next subject is persecution and the church's response to it.

So that'll be coming up. Yes.

Yes, very much so. The political aspect of this as well. Yeah. Yeah, they didn't want to execute because they realized that would probably just create more martyrs.

They would much rather see apostasy because that can, well, even as that letter indicated, there's one poor guy's name that's been recorded for history who decided to be a martyr and then backed out and as a result caused all sorts of problems and they recognized it was far better to get people to recant and hence to, you know, dampen the whole thing than it was to have to go through all the rigmarole of an execution.

Well, the funny thing is, you do wonder about that and we do know one of the most creepy relics of martyrs in the modern period, especially

Anabaptist martyrs in Europe, all the way into the early 18th century, in some places, was the tongue clip for that very reason.

Michael Sattler, if you remember the film, The Radicals, which you've shown a number of times on New Year's Eve over the decades, if you remember

The Radicals, his tongue was torn out by hot tongs before taking him to the place of burning so that he could not testify for that very reason and to this day in the

Netherlands and places like that and museums, they'll have the tongue clips that they would put on Anabaptists where they would screw it onto the tongue so you couldn't talk when they burned you or drowned you or whatever for that very reason.

But Rome did have certain laws. If you were a Roman citizen, you were treated differently than if you weren't a

Roman citizen. So yeah, there were those things. Okay, all right.

Let's close the time with a word of prayer. Our Heavenly Father, once again, we do thank you for this time to consider our past.

We do ask that you would give us wisdom as we consider these things, always examining history in the light of your truth, recognizing that no one, no generation ever has everything exactly right.

They're always influenced by other things, but may we once again be given a point of perspective that we might be able to look upon our own selves and have a balance in how we look at the world around us as well.