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The Enigma of Ignatius of Antioch

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 June 2006

ALLEN BRENT
Affiliation:
18 St Alban's Road, Cambridge CB4 2HG; e-mail: allen.brent@ntlworld.com

Abstract

If we affirm against recent criticism the authenticity of the Middle Recension of the Ignatian letters, we are nevertheless left with the enigma of Ignatius' relations with Polycarp. This paper explains that enigma in terms of two distinct cultural worlds of early second-century Christianity that come together in the meeting of these two church leaders. Ignatius was the first great missionary bishop who reinterpreted church order, the eucharist and martyrdom against the backcloth of the Second Sophistic in Asia Minor, with its pagan processions, cult and embassies that celebrated the social order of the Greek city state in relation to imperial power. Much of Ignatius' iconography was alien to Polycarp, though the latter was finally to canonise both him and his writings by focusing on his impressively enacted refutation of Docetism through his portrayal of his forthcoming martyrdom.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© 2006 Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

CA=Les Constitutions apostoliques, i–ii, ed. M. Metzger (SC cccxx), Paris 1985–7; CIL=Corpus inscriptionum latinarum, ed. T. Mommsen, G. Henzen, J.-B. De Rossi and others, Berlin 1862–1996; ICLV=Inscriptiones latinae christianae veteres, ed. E. Diehl, Berlin 1925; I.Delos=Inscriptions de Délos, ed. F. Durrbach, Paris 1929; I.Eph.=Die Inschriften von Ephesos, ii, ed. C. Börker and others, Bonn 1979, vii/2, ed. R. Meriç and others, Bonn 1981; IG=Inscriptiones graecae, ed. U. Koehler, G. Kolbe, G. Kaibel and others, Berlin 1873–1994; IGRR=Inscriptiones graecae ad res romanas pertinentes, ed. R. Cagnat and others, Paris 1906–27; IGUR=Inscriptiones graecae urbis Romae, i–iv, ed. L. Moretti, Rome 1968–; ILS=Inscriptiones latinae selectae, ed. H. Dessau, Berlin 1892–1916; JAA=American Journal of Archaeology; SEG=Supplementum epigraphicum graecum, ed. H. W. Pleket, R. S. Stroud, and J. H. M. Strubbe, Amsterdam 1971–; Syll.3=Sylloge inscriptionum graecarum a Guilelmo Dittenbergero condita et aucta, nunc tertium edita, ed. W. Dittenberger, Leipzig 1915–24; TAM=Tituli Asiae Minoris, collecti et editi auspiciis Academiae Litterarum Vindobonensis, ed. E. Kalinka, Vienna 1901–; VCS=Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae; ZAC=Zeitschrift für Antikes Christentum
Unless otherwise stated references to the letters of Ignatius and Polycarp are from Ignace d'Antioche; Polycarp de Smyrne, ed. P. T. Camelot (SC x), Paris 1958.