Polycarp
bishop of Smyrna and martyr (69–155)
b. 69 · d. 23 Feb 155
Polycarp was a Christian bishop of Smyrna. According to the Martyrdom of Polycarp, he died a martyr, bound and burned at the stake, then stabbed when the fire failed to consume his body. Polycarp is regarded as a saint and Church Father in the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Catholic Church, Oriental Orthodox Churches, Lutheranism, and Anglicanism.
Related people
- John the Apostle disciple of · traditional
- Irenaeus teacher of · traditional
Events
Commemorated
Places
- İzmir death
- Smyrna martyrdom
- Rome travel
- Tomb of Saint Polycarp burial
How we know
Recorded as a historical figure.
- Ecclesiastical History 5 claims — The road from Antioch to Rome; Irenaeus hears Polycarp at Smyrna; Polycarp and Anicetus at Rome
Documents
Sayings
- For neither I, nor any other such one, can come up to the wisdom of the blessed and glorified Paul. He, when among you, accurately and stedfastly taught the… Checked word-for-word against the book it cites — Writing to the church Paul had founded, Polycarp refuses the comparison before anyone can make it — he writes about righteousness only because they asked him to, and he is not…
- and whosoever perverts the oracles of the Lord to his own lusts, and says that there is neither a resurrection nor a judgment, he is the first-born of Satan. Checked word-for-word against the book it cites — Polycarp's judgement on those who explain away the resurrection — the phrase Irenaeus says he used to Marcion's face at Rome, here written down in his own letter and aimed at no…
- For if a man cannot govern himself in such matters, how shall he enjoin them on others? If a man does not keep himself from covetousness, he shall be defiled… Checked word-for-word against the book it cites — Polycarp on Valens, a presbyter of Philippi who had disgraced himself: the argument is not that he sinned but that a man who cannot govern himself cannot enjoin anything on…
Glosses
- Whether Ignatius argues or describes Ignatius writes to six churches about 110 and tells each of them to do nothing without the bishop. Whether that is evidence of a new thing or of an old one is the oldest live argument about the shape of the early…
- Why a saint's day is the day they died A feast is normally the dies natalis — the day of death, understood as the day of birth into heaven. The custom begins with the martyrs and is visible in the Martyrdom of Polycarp, whose church resolved to gather at…