{"id":32448,"date":"2015-02-12T07:00:21","date_gmt":"2015-02-12T14:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/?p=32448"},"modified":"2016-11-02T07:34:12","modified_gmt":"2016-11-02T14:34:12","slug":"was-irenaeus-wrong","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2015\/02\/12\/was-irenaeus-wrong\/","title":{"rendered":"Was Irenaeus wrong?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A while ago, I had a chap called Roscoe commenting on my blog, denying the Catholic claims concerning St.\u00a0Peter and the See of Rome. In response, I quoted St. Irenaeus, one of the most important witnesses concerning\u00a0the Church at Rome:<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026that tradition derived from the apostles, of the very great, the very ancient, and universally known Church founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul<\/strong>; \u2026which comes down to our time by means of the successions of the bishops.\u00a0For it is a matter of necessity that every Church should agree with this Church, on account of its preeminent authority\u2026<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2026The blessed apostles, then, having founded and built up the Church, committed into the hands of Linus the office of the episcopate [of Rome]. Of this Linus\u2026Anacletus\u2026Clement\u2026[and] Eleutherius does now\u2026hold the inheritance of the episcopate.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIn this order, and by this succession, the ecclesiastical tradition from the apostles, and the preaching of the truth, have come down to us. And this is\u00a0most abundant proof that there is one and the same vivifying faith, which has been preserved in the Church from the apostles until now, and handed down in truth<\/strong>\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\u2013 Against Heresies III.3.3 (c. AD 180)<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Iren\u00e6us_af_Lyon<\/p>\n

Not founded by Peter and Paul<\/h2>\n

In reply to my quotation of Irenaeus, Roscoe wrote\u00a0the following:<\/p>\n

There are no historical facts to support the idea that Peter and Paul founded the church at Rome<\/span>. Rome was over 1000 miles away from where they were. We can see what Peter was doing in Acts and he was not in Rome at this time. Most likely the faith was brought there by pilgrims who were converted in the early chapters of Acts<\/span>.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Roscoe’s main argument seems to be:<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Irenaeus says Peter and Paul “founded”<\/span> the church at Rome.<\/p>\n

2. Jews from Rome were present at Pentecost and converted to Christianity. It would have most likely been these Christians who would have brought the faith to Rome.<\/p>\n

3. Irenaeus is proven demonstrably wrong and therefore his testimony concerning Rome should be regarded as extremely\u00a0dubious.<\/p>\n

I’ve heard this kind of argument a few times in the comment section of other blogs, so today I’d like to respond to it…<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

What’s the reason?<\/span><\/h2>\n

I asked Roscoe\u00a0why<\/strong> he thinks Irenaeus gets this issue of the founding of Rome\u00a0wrong. Was it through ignorance<\/strong>? Or was it through malice<\/strong>? Or…could it be that Roscoe is misinterpreting Irenaeus’ words?\u00a0I received no answer to these questions, but I would now like to look at each of these\u00a0possibilities…<\/p>\n

Option #1: Ignorance?<\/span><\/h3>\n

Nobody doubts that Christians were in Rome from a very early date. We have two pieces of Scriptural testimony to support this idea:<\/p>\n

1. Acts of the Apostles<\/strong>
\nIn his account of Pentecost, Luke explicitly mentions that pilgrims from Rome were in Jerusalem (Acts 2:10<\/a>).<\/p>\n

2. Epistle to the Romans<\/strong>
\nSt. Paul wrote a letter to them! In this\u00a0magnum opus\u00a0<\/em>Paul\u00a0even specifically says that he generally prefers to preach in areas where the Gospel has yet to reach (Romans 15:20<\/a>).<\/p>\n

So, was Irenaeus just ignorant of these facts? Had he never read Acts of the Apostles or Paul’s Epistle to the Romans? Well, that seems rather unlikely, particularly given the popularity of the Roman epistle. Not only that, it’s also rather unlikely because Irenaeus quotes both of these books in his own masterwork,\u00a0“Against Heresies”<\/em>!<\/p>\n

1. Acts of the Apostles<\/strong>
\nQuoted\u00a0in Adversus Haereses<\/em>, Book 3, Chapter 14.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Epistle to the Romans<\/strong>
\nQuoted\u00a0in Adversus Haereses<\/em>, Book 3, Chapter 16.<\/span><\/p>\n

Once we recognize this, we can no longer accuse Irenaeus of ignorance.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Option #2: Maliciousness?<\/span><\/h3>\n

However, could we charge Irenaeus\u00a0with maliciousness? Was he purposefully subverting the truth? Well, if we were to attempt to demonstrate that,\u00a0we’d first at least to establish a motive, the reason Irenaeus would lie. Personally, I can’t think of one, so we have to discount this option.<\/span><\/p>\n

Option #3: Misinterpretation?<\/h3>\n

This brings us to the third option and the one with the simplest explanation. Could it be that Roscoe simply be misinterpreting Irenaeus’ words?\u00a0Could it be that when Irenaeus is talking about the “found[ing]” <\/span>of Rome, he’s not<\/strong> talking about when Christians first arrived in Rome?<\/p>\n

Analogy: The founding of a city<\/span><\/h4>\n

I live in the western portion of the United States and, as I drive through California, I’m often reminded of the pioneer days when\u00a0settlers moved across the land beginning\u00a0farms, towns and cities. Consider for a moment, the process of founding a city:<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Scouting Party<\/span><\/strong>
\nThere is a preliminary scouting party which goes ahead. These are the first people on the ground in that territory.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Early Community<\/span><\/strong>
\nWhen a good spot is found, a few people start to settle. A community is established.<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Rubber Stamped<\/span><\/strong>
\nThere comes a moment when a city\u00a0becomes “official”. This could be marked by a number of different events:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

(a) The community reaches a certain size<\/p>\n

(b) The construction of a certain feature or building e.g. cathedral, pub, town hall, clock tower etc.<\/p>\n

(c) The community receives certain recognition or honour by the ruling government or monarch.<\/p>\n

We might consider for a moment, the “founding” of the United States.\u00a0The land of North America has been around for a long time and people have lived here for a significant period of time, but there was a definitive moment in history when the\u00a0United States became an official country.<\/p>\n

Now let’s look at the sequence of events in the early years of Christianity:<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Scouting Party<\/span><\/strong>
\nJews from across the Empire were in Jerusalem at Pentecost. Some were converted and received baptism\u00a0in response to Peter’s preaching. This handful of Christians returned to Rome.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Early Community<\/span><\/strong>
\nOver the next few years, the Church in Rome began to grow through evangelization efforts of these Pentecostal Catholics \ud83d\ude09<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Rubber Stamped<\/span><\/strong>
\nThe community then became “official”. This idea is found in earliest Church Fathers. For example, in AD 110 St. Ignatius of Antioch spoke of the necessity of having a bishop:<\/span><\/p>\n

Wherever the bishop shall appear, there let the multitude [of the people] also be; even as, wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church
\n<\/em>\u2013 Letter to the Smyrnaeans<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

So, at a later point in time,\u00a0Peter and Paul go to Rome, bringing to it prestige and making it the focal point of Christian activity. I would submit that it is to this that\u00a0Irenaeus<\/span>\u00a0refers as the “founding”<\/span> of the Church.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Hopefully this makes sense of Irenaeus’ comments about Rome. We don’t have to accuse him of either ignorance or malice, but we have to simply interpret his words carefully and to understand that, while Romans looked back to Romulus and Remus for the founding of the city of Rome, the first Christians looked back to Peter and Paul for the founding of the Church in the Eternal City.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A while ago, I had a chap called Roscoe commenting on my blog, denying the Catholic claims concerning St.\u00a0Peter and the See of Rome. In response, I quoted St. Irenaeus, one of the most important witnesses concerning\u00a0the Church at Rome: \u201c\u2026that tradition derived from the apostles, of the very great, the very ancient, and universally known Church founded and organized<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54277,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[51,2969,1436,2728,309],"class_list":["post-32448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faith","tag-early-church-fathers","tag-featured","tag-history","tag-ireneaeus","tag-rome"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/Iren\u00e6us_af_Lyon.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32448"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32448\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62473,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32448\/revisions\/62473"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}