other · 244 · Antioch
Eusebius reports that Philip, the Arab from the Hauran who ruled from 244 to 249, was a Christian, and that on the night of the Easter vigil he wished to take his place with the congregation and the bishop would not let him until he had first taken his place among the penitents and confessed — which he did, Eusebius says, gladly. The phrase used is that the account goes, and that carefulness is the reason this event is graded traditional rather than historical: it is a report of a report, written seventy years later, and Eusebius knew the difference. Against it: Philip performed the ordinary state sacrifices, held the millennial games of Rome in 248 with their full pagan apparatus, and was deified after death by the Senate. For it: he corresponded with Origen, which Eusebius also records and which is harder to invent, and Christians of the next generation clearly believed it. This dataset does what Eusebius did — reports the claim, names its status, and does not resolve it. The value of the story is that it was believable in 244, which is itself a fact about how far the church had reached.
Was there a Christian emperor before Constantine?
Eusebius says the story goes that there was. He is careful, and so is this page.