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17 - The Fragments of Papias

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 May 2021

Michael F. Bird
Affiliation:
Ridley College, Melbourne
Scott Harrower
Affiliation:
Ridley College, Melbourne
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Summary

Papias of Hierapolis flourished in the early second century and wrote five books of Exposition of Dominical Oracles (logiōn kyriakōn exēgēseōs), of which only scattered quotations from his readers survive, including Irenaeus, Eusebius, Apollinaris, and Andrew of Caesarea. Among these excerpts, we learn that Papias was commended by Irenaeus as a hearer of John and a colleague of Polycarp. Eusebius mentions him too for his testimony on the origin of the Gospels of Mark and Matthew, and this is the main reason why Papias holds our interest today. Yet his materialistic views about the millennial kingdom of Christ fell out of favor in the third century and ultimately led to the loss of his magnum opus. The largest edition of his remains to date is that of M.W. Holmes, which has twenty-eight separate “fragments” of Papias, though my forthcoming edition for the Oxford Early Christian Texts series will have more than triple the number of items.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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References

Further Reading

Ehrman, Bart D. The Apostolic Fathers. LCL 24. Vol. 2. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003.Google Scholar
Hill, Charles E.The Fragments of Papias,” in The Writings of the Apostolic Fathers, ed. Foster, Paul. New York: T&T Clark, 2007, 4251 .Google Scholar
Holmes, Michael W. The Apostolic Fathers, 3rd ed. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2007.Google Scholar
Körtner, Ulrich H.J. Papias von Hierapolis: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des frühen Christentums. FRLANT 133. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1983.Google Scholar
Kürzinger, Josef. Papias von Hierapolis und die Evagelien des Neuen Testament. EM 4. Regensburg: Pustet, 1983.Google Scholar
MacDonald, Dennis R. Two Shipwrecked Gospels: The Logoi of Jesus and Papias’s Exposition of Logia about the Lord. ECL 8. Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012.Google Scholar
Norelli, Enrico. Papia di Hierapolis, Esposizione degli Oracoli del Signore: I frammenti. Letture cristiane del primo millennio 36. Milan: Paoline, 2005.Google Scholar

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