Oh, to Have the Faith of a Saint.

An Overview

Of all the prominent early Christians, Saint Polycarp is my favorite. Born just four years after the deaths of Saints Peter and Paul, Polycarp lived some 86 (or more) years before finally being martyred. I have not been able to find much about his early life, but we know a few things: He was apparently born into and raised as a Christian, he was disciple by the Apostle John (author of the Gospel of John, 3 Epistles, and the Revelation), and he was appointed as the Bishop of the Church at Smyrna.

During his time as Bishop, he wrote a pastoral letter to the Philippians. In it, we see that Polycarp was not as much of an intellect as Paul (the Greek was a little messy), but he was very humble, yet direct in his teachings. I love that description of him. He knew exactly what the truth was, and how to say it, but he wasn’t a boastful person as some preachers or religious authorities may be.

Dealing with Heresy
An important milestone in his story was his confrontation with one of the Church’s first major heretic, the Gnostic teach Marcion. For a point of clarification: Gnostics are those who mixed pagan Greek mythology and philosophy with that of Judeo-Christian teachings. It is a bastardization of both. Marcion was a prominent Gnostic teacher that led many of the early Church astray. He believed and taught that there were two Gods. The first was an evil Hebrew God as seen in the Old Testament. This is a God of wrath, war, and destruction. The second God was the loving God that Jesus preached about. He is the God of mercy, love, and salvation. These two Gods duel, but the God worthy of worship is the God that Jesus taught about. It should be noted that Marcion also believed Docetism, which is the heresy that Jesus was only spirit, and never man. Therefore, he was not God-in-Flesh, and never actually suffered death for the sins of mankind.

Per Saint Irenaeus, another early church father, Marcion was a disciple of Cerdo, another Gnostic who taught this dualistic view of God. Tradition states that Cerdo was a follower of Simon Magus. This is where we are going to take a break from the story of Polycarp and dive into a quick history. I only do this because of what I have discovered in my studies so far. I feel it is amazing to see so much interconnection, so I want to share.

Heresy Has a History

Before we go on with Simon, Cerdo, and Marcion, let’s go back into the Old Testament.

Like way back. Remember Abraham? Well, he had a son named Isaac. Isaac had a son named Jacob, who later was named Israel. From him, there were 12 sons, who later became 12 tribes. Here is a nifty little map of the tribes settling in the land of Canaan, which later became the Kingdom of Israel.

The tribes lived a loose confederation for some time, until the unification under King Saul. King Saul lost his kingship to David. David was a good king, but sinned, and God promised that there were some bad things coming to his family. When David dies, his son Solomon became king. Solomon was wise, but also a bit of a dictator. Upon his death, Solomon’s son Rehoboam became king. He was also a bit of a dictator which caused a secession of the northern part of Israel from the south. The north became the Kingdom of Israel, and the south was called Judah. The north was very prosperous due to its proximity to major trade lanes and powerful entities. Thus, they lost the connection to the faith of their people, and began to include idolatry.

Fast forward a little bit, and we see the King Omri take control of the Northern Kingdom. He decides to create a new capital city, and called it Samaria. Samaritans were known to follow a syncretic religious system that mixed parts of traditional YHWH worship (Judaism) and Paganism. According to the Bible, this eventually led to the conquest of Israel (and later, Judah), and the exile of the Israelites.

Now, in the time of Jesus, a few hundred years after the exile, the Jews had a disdain for the Samaritans, going way back to the secession and later conquest. This is the reason why it is astounding to see Jesus tell the parable of the Good Samaritan to the Jewish people, and then later his comfort of the Samaritan woman at the well. The Samaritans were deviants from the true faith, but Jesus extended his graces to them, because of his nature to extend grace to all humankind.


This is the point we get back to Simon Magus. This name should be familiar to anyone who has read Acts 8. Simon Magus was a sorcerer who amazed everyone in the city of Samaria. The Samaritans called him the “The Great One – The Power of God”. Simon, a Samaritan, saw that the Jewish/Christian apostles came to his city preaching the Gospel. Thus, he supposedly became a believer and followed them. Upon seeing other converts receive the Holy Spirit, and greats things were being done, Simon offered money to the apostles to receive the same power. Remember, this is a man who amazed the same people which mixed pagan idolatry with the truth of God. He had a counterfeit power, and upon seeing the true power of God, he coveted and offered earthly materials to receive it.

 Saint Peter rebuked him saying:

“May your money be destroyed with you for thinking God’s gift can be bought! You can have no part in this, for your heart is not right with God. Repent of your wickedness and pray to the Lord. Perhaps he will forgive your evil thoughts, for I can see that you are full of bitter jealousy and are held captive by sin.”  Acts 8:20 - 23

 It is because of his history, this interaction, and later tradition that Simon was held the early church to be the “Father of all Heresies”. Unconfirmed legend has him leaving Samaria and going to Rome and using his magic to impress the people so much that they made a statue of him. As I mentioned earlier, a man named Cerdo was a follower of the teachings of Simon, and was known to first teach the dualistic view of God that Marcion later made more popular. This is a literal succession of heresy.

Back to the Future

 Up to this point I have shown how a succession of evil existed from well before Christ walked this earth until the time of Polycarp (and if we look at other history, we could see it exists until now). This evil ideology mixed elements of pagan idolatry and the truth faith of God. This succession of evil existed alongside the authentic succession of God’s Kingdom on this planet. Polycarp was the disciple of John, the disciple of Jesus. Jesus is the heir to the kingdom of David, and to all things. His path is the true path, while the evil path tries to take truth and mix it with the ignorance of the world.

So these two paths of succession have run parallel for some time, and they continuously clash. One such clash was when Polycarp called out Marcion. Because of this clash, people began to turn away from the false lies of Gnosticism to the truth of Orthodox Christianity. A side note, Polycarp literally translates to “rich in fruit”, and seeing his impact on converting people away from evil shows his name was divinely given.

Polycarp was direct, and he was humble. These characteristics are just two that I pray for, that I may take after his example.

Polycarp's Martyrdom

It is, however, another characteristic that I pray for more than any other, and this is seen at the time of Polycarp’s death. He was arrested for unknown specific reasons, but there appears to have been an outbreak of persecution around Smyrna at the time Polycarp was arrested. Being that he was the Bishop it makes sense that he was probably highly sought out. Break him, and you break the Christians.

Fearing for his life, friends and family begged him to leave. He agreed to go to a small villa to hide out, but a later dream caused him to stay. He waited at home until he was betrayed by a servant and the guards came to him. Polycarp was taken before the local proconsul, and there was back and forth banter between the two, which apparently enraged the proconsul and declared Polycarp to die.

At 86/87 years old, Polycarp was placed in front of a hostile crowd. When faced with the option to die or to deny Christ, Polycarp stated:

“86 years have I served Christ, and he has never done me any wrong. How can I blaspheme against my King and Savior?”

Again they pushed him and he replied :

“Since you are vainly urgent that, as you say, I should swear by the fortune of Caesar, and pretend not to know who and what I am, hear me declare with boldness, I am a Christian. And if you wish to learn what the doctrines of Christianity are, appoint me a day, and you shall hear them.”

Finally, the leaders told Polycarp that he would be eaten by animals if he did not recant Christ. They then told him of the horror of being burned alive. To this, Polycarp stated:

“You threaten me with fire which burns for an hour, and after a little is extinguished, but are ignorant of the fire of the coming judgment and of eternal punishment, reserved for the ungodly. But why do you wait? Bring forth what you will.”

Then the guards began to place him in the spot where the fire would be. They were to nail him to a stake, but he assured them that he would stay there on his own. So, they started the fire to kill Polycarp. However, per the Christian witnesses, he was completely unharmed by the fire. Instead, he became a golden-brown color (not burnt), and instead of smelling his flesh, they smelled a strong sweet fragrance. After seeing that he would not die by the fire, they took a dagger and cut him open, so much that his blood extinguished the fire.

His body was later burned after his death, but not before the Christians grabbed some bones to have as relics of this holy man.

After that time, he was revered by some of the people of the area as a righteous man.

A Peculiar Revelation

Now, there is one detail I left out. Remember how I said that he was the Bishop of Smyrna? And that he was disciple by John?

50+ years before this execution took place, John wrote the Revelation he saw from God. In it, there are seven churches that receive a message from God. Smyrna is one of them. This is what God said to the church of Smyrna, 50+ years before Polycarp was executed:

“Write this letter to the angel of the church in Smyrna. This is the message from the one who is the First and the Last, who was dead but is now alive:
I know about your suffering and your poverty—but you are rich! I know the blasphemy of those opposing you. They say they are Jews, but they are not, because their synagogue belongs to Satan.

Don’t be afraid of what you are about to suffer. The devil will throw some of you into prison to test you. You will suffer for ten days. But if you remain faithful even when facing death, I will give you the crown of life.
Anyone with ears to hear must listen to the Spirit and understand what he is saying to the churches. Whoever is victorious will not be harmed by the second death.” Revelation 2:8 -11

I was astonished by this message. Before Polycarp was arrested, it was said he had a dream. No one know what the dream was about, but I like to think he saw the same vision that John saw. He knew that he had to suffer completely (10 being the number of completion) and remain faithful, to receive the Crown of Life.

Conclusion
This story has been near and dear to my heart over the last week or two. I probably will never have to suffer a persecution like this. But in the face of the death of my girls, it would be tempting to reject Christ and his truth, and have some sort of weird syncretic worldview. But, even in the light of their death, I cannot find any harm that Christ has brought to me. There is no way I could blaspheme him in this time, or when I am ever faced with my own death.

I will never be a Polycarp. But I do pray that God will answer my prayers to follow in his example. I pray to be humbler, more direct about the truth, and to be courageous and faithful in the face of death. In the end, the only thing that matters is Jesus.


Read the full account of Polycarp's Martyrdom here.