Eusebius: Ecclesiastical History, Books I–X

Church Hist. II. p. 457 sqq. The Fathers, in their hatred of all forms of heresy, naturally saw no good in any of them, and heretics were therefore indiscriminately accused of immorality and licentiousness in their worst forms.

See the previous chapter, note 1.

See chap. 1, note 25.

2 Cor. x. 5 .

The significance of the word “immediately” as employed here is somewhat dark. There is no event described in the preceding context with which it can be connected. I am tempted to think that Eusebius may have been using at this point some unknown source and that the word “immediately” refers to an encounter which Simon had had with Peter (perhaps his Cæsarean discussion, mentioned in the Clementines), of which an account was given in the document employed by Eusebius. The figure employed here is most remarkable.

Acts viii. 9 sqq. This occurred in Samaria, not in Judea proper, but Eusebius evidently uses the word “Judea” in a wide sense, to indicate the Roman province of Judea, which included also Samaria. It is not impossible, especially if Eusebius is quoting here from a written source, that some other encounter of Simon and Peter is referred to. Such a one e.g. as is mentioned in the Apostolic Constitutions, VI. 8.

Rome was a great gathering place of heretics and schismatics. They were all attracted thither by the opportunities for propagandism which the city afforded, and therefore Eusebius, with his transcendental conception of heresy, naturally makes it the especial seat of the devil.

See above, chap. 13, note 11.

Upon the historic truth of Peter’s visit to Rome, see below, chap. 25, note 7. Although we may accept it as certain that he did visit Rome, and that he met his death there, it is no less certain that he did not reach there until late in the reign of Nero. The tradition that he was for twenty-five years bishop of Rome is first recorded by Jerome ( de vir. ill. c. 1), and since his time has been almost universally accepted in the Roman Catholic Church, though in recent years many more candid scholars of that communion acknowledge that so long an episcopate there is a fiction. The tradition undoubtedly took its rise from the statement of Justin Martyr (quoted in the previous chapter) that Simon Magus came to Rome during the reign of Claudius. Tradition, in the time of Eusebius, commonly connected the Roman visits of Simon and of Peter; and consequently Eusebius, accepting the earlier date for Simon’s arrival in Rome, quite naturally assumed also the same date for Peter’s arrival there, although Justin does not mention Peter in connection with Simon in the passage which Eusebius quotes. The assumption that Peter took up his residence in Rome during the reign of Claudius contradicts all that we know of Peter’s later life from the New Testament and from other early writers. In 44 a.d. he was in Jerusalem (according to Acts xii. 3 ); in 51 he was again there (according to Acts xv .); and a little later in Antioch (according to Gal. i. 11 sq.). Moreover, at some time during his life he labored in various provinces in Asia Minor, as we learn from his first epistle, and probably wrote that epistle from Babylon on the Euphrates (see chap. 15, note 7). At any rate, he cannot have been in Rome when Paul wrote his epistle to the Romans (57 or 58 a.d. ), for no mention is made of him among the brethren to whom greetings are sent. Nor can he have been there when Paul wrote from Rome during his captivity (61 or 62 to 63 or 64 a.d. ). We have, in fact, no trace of him in Rome, except the extra-Biblical but well-founded tradition (see chap. 25, note 7) that he met his death there. We may assume, then, that he did not reach Rome at any rate until shortly before his death; that is, shortly before the summer of 64 a.d. As most of the accounts put Simon Magus’ visit to Rome in the reign of Nero (see above, chap. 13, note 9), so they make him follow Peter thither (as he had followed him everywhere, opposing and attacking him), instead of precede him, as Eusebius does. Eusebius follows Justin in giving the earlier date for Simon’s visit to Rome; but he goes beyond Justin in recording his encounter there with Peter, which neither Justin nor Irenæus mentions. The earlier date for Simon’s visit is undoubtedly that given by the oldest tradition. Afterward, when Peter and Paul were so prominently connected with the reign of Nero, the visit of Simon was postponed to synchronize with the presence of the two apostles in Rome. A report of Simon’s meeting with Peter in Rome is given first by Hippolytus (VI. 15); afterward by Arnobius (II. 12), who does not describe the meeting; by the Ap. Const., the Clementine Recognitions and Homilies, and the Acts of the Apostles Peter and Paul. It is impossible to tell from what source Eusebius drew his information. Neither Justin, Irenæus, nor Tertullian mentions it. Hippolytus and Arnobius and the App. Const. give too much, as they give accounts of his death, which Eusebius does not follow. As to this, it might, however, be said that these accounts are so conflicting that Eusebius may have omitted them entirely, while yet recording the meeting. Still, if he had read Hippolytus, he could hardly have omitted entirely his interesting account. Arnobius and Tertullian, who wrote in Latin, he did not read, and the Clementines were probably too late for him; at any rate, they cannot have been the source of his account, which differs entirely from theirs. It is highly probable, therefore, that he followed Justin and Irenæus as far as they go, and that he recorded the meeting with Peter in Rome as a fact commonly accepted in his time, and one for which he needed no written authority; or it is possible that he had another source, unknown to us, as suggested above (note 4).

A most amazing mixture of metaphors. This sentence furnishes an excellent illustration of Eusebius’ rhetorical style.

The origin of the Church at Rome is shrouded in mystery. Eusebius gives the tradition which rules in the Catholic Church, viz.: that Christianity was introduced into Rome by Peter, who went there during the reign of Claudius. But this tradition is sufficiently disproved by history. The origin of the Church was due to unknown persons, though it is possible we may obtain a hint of them in the Andronicus and Junta of Romans xvi. 7 , who are mentioned as apostles, and who were therefore, according to the usage of the word in Paul’s writings, persons that introduced Christianity into a new place—missionaries proper, who did not work on others’ ground.

See chap. 12, note 9, and chap. 14, note 8.

John Mark, son of Mary ( Acts xii. 12 ), a sister of Barnabas ( Col. iv. 10 ), was a companion of Paul and Barnabas in their missionary journeys, and afterward a companion of Barnabas alone ( Acts xv. 39 ), and still later was with Paul again in Rome ( Col. iv. 10 and Philemon 24 ), and with Peter when he wrote his first epistle ( 1 Pet. v. 13 ). For the later traditions concerning Mark, see the next chapter, note 1.

That Mark wrote the second Gospel under the influence of Peter, or as a record of what he had heard from him, is the universal tradition of antiquity. Papias, in the famous and much-disputed passage (quoted by Eusebius, III. 39, below), is the first to record the tradition. Justin Martyr refers to Mark’s Gospel under the name “Memoirs ( ἀπομνημονεύματα ) of Peter” ( Dial. c. Tryph. 106; the translation in the Ante-Nicene Fathers, Am. Ed. Vol. I. p. 252, which refers the αὐτοῦ to Christ, is incorrect; compare Weiss, N. T. Einleitung, p. 44, note 4). Irenæus ( Adv. Hær. III. 11. 1, quoted below, V. 8. 2), Tertullian ( Adv. Marcionem, IV. 5), and Origen (quoted below, VI. 25) confirm the tradition, which is repeated over and over again by the Fathers. The question as to the real authorship of our second Gospel, or rather as to its composition and its relation to Matthew and Luke, is a very difficult one. The relationship of the three synoptical Gospels was first discussed by Augustine ( De Consensu Evangelistarum ), who defended the traditional order, but made Mark dependent upon Matthew. This view prevailed until the beginning of the present century, when the problem was attacked anew, and since then it has been the crux of the literary criticism of the Bible. The three have been held to be dependent upon each other, and every possible order has found its advocates; a common source has been assumed for the three: the Hebrew Matthew, the Gospel according to the Hebrews (see Bk. III. chap. 25, note 24), our canonical Gospel of Mark, or an original Mark, resembling the present one; a number of fragmentary documents have been assumed; while others, finally, have admitted only oral tradition as the basis. According to Baur’s tendency theory, Matthew (polemically Jewish-Christian) came first, followed by an original Luke (polemically Pauline-Christian), then by our Mark, which was based upon both and written in the interest of neutrality, and lastly by our present Luke, designed as a final irenicum. This view now finds few advocates. The whole matter is still unsettled, but criticism seems to be gradually converging toward a common ground type (or rather two independent types) for all three while at the same time maintaining the relative independence of the three, one toward the other. What these ground types were, is a matter of still sharper dispute, although criticism is gradually drawing their larger features with more and more certainty and clearness. (The latest discussion upon the subject by Handmann, das Hebräer-Evangelium, makes the two types the “Ur-Marcus” and the Gospel of the Hebrews.) That in the last analysis, however, some space must still be left for floating tradition, or for documents irreducible to the one or two types, seems absolutely certain. For further information as to the state of discussion upon this intricate problem, see among recent works, especially Weiss, Einleitung, p. 473 sqq., Holtzmann, Einleitung, p. 328 sqq., and Schaff, Ch. Hist . I. 575 sqq., where the literature down to 1882 is given with great fullness. Conservative opinion puts the composition of all the synoptic Gospels before the destruction of Jerusalem (for the date of Luke, see III. 4, note 12); but the critical school, while throwing the original type back of that date, considers the composition of our present Gospels to have been the gradual work of years, assuming that they were not finally crystallized into the form in which we have them before the second century.

This mention of the “pleasure” of Peter, and the “authority” given by him to the work of Mark, contradicts the account of Clement to which Eusebius here appeals as his authority. In Bk. VI. chap. 14 he quotes from the Hypotyposes of Clement, a passage which must be identical with the one referred to in this place, for it is from the same work and the general account is the same; but there Clement says expressly, “which when Peter understood he neither directly hindered nor encouraged it.”

The passage from Papias is quoted below in Bk. III. chap. 39. Papias is a witness to the general fact that Mark wrote down what he had heard from Peter, but not (so far as he is extant) to the details of the account as given by Eusebius. Upon Papias himself, see Bk. III. chap. 39.

1 Pet. v. 13 . Commentators are divided as to the place in which Peter wrote this epistle (compare Schaff’s Church Hist. I. p. 744 sqq.). The interpretation given by Eusebius is the patristic and Roman Catholic opinion, and is maintained by many Protestant commentators. But on the other hand the literal use of the word “Babylon” is defended by a great number of the leading scholars of the present day. Compare Weiss, N. T. Einleitung, p. 433, note 1.

That Mark labored in Egypt is stated also by Epiphanius ( Hær. LI. 6), by Jerome ( de vir. ill. 8), by Nicephorus ( H. E. II. 43), and by the Acta Barnabæ, p. 26 (Tischendorf’s Acta Apost. Apocr. p. 74), which were written probably in the third century. Eusebius gained his knowledge apparently from oral tradition, for he uses the formula, “they say” ( φασὶν ). In chap. 24, below, he says that Annianus succeeded Mark as a leader of the Alexandrian Church in the eighth year of Nero (62 a.d. ), thus implying that Mark died in that year; and Jerome gives the same date for his death. But if the tradition that he wrote his Gospel in Rome under Peter (or after Peter’s death, as the best tradition puts it, so e.g. Irenæus) be correct, then this date is hopelessly wrong. The varying traditions are at best very uncertain, and the whole career of Mark, so far as it is not recorded in the New Testament, is involved in obscurity.

See the next chapter.

This tradition that Philo met Peter in Rome and formed an acquaintance with him is repeated by Jerome ( de vir ill. 11), and by Photius ( Cod. 105), who even goes further, and says directly that Philo became a Christian. The tradition, however, must be regarded as quite worthless. It is absolutely certain from Philo’s own works, and from the otherwise numerous traditions of antiquity that he never was a Christian, and aside from the report of Eusebius (for Jerome and Photius do not represent an independent tradition) there