Introduction
Introduction
Irenaeus was a significant figure in the history of the early Church. He received what he acknowledged to be his primary instruction in the Christian faith from someone who was himself trained by an apostle. Irenaeus insisted on the importance of remaining faithful to the Christian message as received from Jesus Christ and the apostles and passed on by succeeding generations of the Church through its leaders. With him, that message is at only one remove from the apostolic source; in Against Heresies he insisted that what he understood and presented as the Christian faith was the same message found everywhere throughout the Church in his day. Because of this, what Irenaeus presents in Against Heresies should be of keen interest to anyone interested in that message and its historical transmission. The rest of this introduction is intended to provide readers with information that will assist them in appreciating Irenaeus, his concerns in what he opposed and in what he proclaimed, and the significance of his magnum opus.
The Life of Irenaeus
Irenaeus was born between AD 130 and 140 in Asia Minor. This seems certain from his declarations that he recalled sitting at the feet of Polycarp of Smyrna and receiving (along with others) extensive instruction in Christian teaching and practice.1 Since Polycarp was martyred in 155, the tutelage to which Irenaeus refers had to have taken place before this date. With what Irenaeus says about how thoroughly and carefully he could recall Polycarp’s teaching and example, it seems certain that the student must have been at least in his teenage years to have both the capacity to understand and the ability to remember what was taught. Consequently, the judgment of scholars is that Irenaeus was born sometime in the fourth decade of the second century. The instruction he received from Polycarp also evidently was completed at some point before the latter’s martyrdom, for Irenaeus gives no indication that his tutelage had come to an untimely or premature end.
Irenaeus passed from this life in the early third century (c. 202). It is possible that he died as a martyr: in the fourth century, Jerome urged that this had been the case. However, there are no earlier indications that Christians believed Irenaeus had endured martyrdom, so the claim is somewhat suspect. It is clear that the persecution under Emperor Septimius Severus was raging in the area of southern Gaul, where Irenaeus lived, so Jerome’s statement may be accurate; however, the lack of an earlier supporting document or claim raises questions about it.
Sometime after his instruction under Polycarp, Irenaeus headed west. He spent some time in Rome, possibly studying with Justin Martyr (although this is uncertain). Eventually, he ended up in Lyons (“Lugdunum” in the Roman imperial designation) in southern Gaul. According to ancient records, a lively interchange of peoples and trade existed between Asia Minor and southern Gaul at the time, so it was not unusual for someone to take the path Irenaeus had followed. It may be that he was sent by Polycarp to assist the bishop of Lyons, Pothinus (whom Polycarp had earlier trained). Whether or not at Polycarp’s bidding, Irenaeus soon was serving as a presbyter in Lyons.
In 177, Irenaeus undertook an embassy at the behest of his bishop and the congregation at Lyons and journeyed to Rome to confer with its bishop, Eleutherus, on problems then facing the churches in the west. By the time Irenaeus returned to Lyons, persecution had carried away many members of the Lyons church, including Bishop Pothinus. At some point, Irenaeus was elected bishop to succeed him.
Between 182 and 188, Irenaeus wrote his magnum opus, A Refutation and Subversion of What Is Falsely Called Knowledge,2 which has come to be known by the shorter title Against Heresies.3 Written in Greek, the work was immediately recognized as valuable: early in the next century, it was circulating in Alexandria. At about the same time, in Carthage, Tertullian referred to it with appreciation. Rufinus, a notoriously flexible translator, soon rendered the work in Latin. In the sixth century an Armenian translation was made from the Greek, and in the ninth century the learned patriarch of Constantinople, Photius, indicated he had seen Against Heresies in a complete Greek text. At some point subsequently, though, the Greek text was lost, except for some citations found in other patristic literature. The complete text survives only in Latin.
Late in the second century, Irenaeus penned another treatise, On the Apostolic Preaching.4 He also wrote some other works, which are no longer extant. In his Ecclesiastical History, written in the fourth century, Eusebius referred to and offered brief excerpts of some letters written by Irenaeus.5
In one of these, Irenaeus addressed Victor, who had succeeded Eleutherus as bishop of Rome. The Roman hierarch had adopted a rigid stance against the practice of some churches in Asia Minor whose commemoration of Christ’s resurrection was determined by the date of the Jewish Passover. (This perspective came to be known as “Quartodeciman” [Latin for “fourteen”] since these churches celebrated Pascha [later referred to commonly as “Easter”] on Nisan 14, no matter which day of the week it fell on.) In Rome and most of the churches in the west, however, this celebration always fell on a Sunday, irrespective of the date for Passover. Unquestionably, Christ’s resurrection was a major event in the Church, so agreement on when it should be celebrated was desirable. (In due course, the Quartodeciman practice fell out of favor among the churches generally, in favor of celebrations on Sunday.) In this correspondence, Irenaeus urged the pope to view the practice in Asia Minor with Christian charity, reminding him that prior leaders in Rome had not insisted on the absolute necessity of their practice being followed—citing to this effect an earlier visit of his mentor, Polycarp, to Anicetus, former bishop of Rome. While there, among other things, Polycarp had convinced the Roman bishop not to insist that the churches in Asia Minor conform to some specific western practices.6 Irenaeus—whose name is derived from the Greek word for peace, eirene—played the peacemaker effectively in this regard, for Victor backed off his prior insistence.7
As we will see, though, Irenaeus was not ready to make peace at all costs. He was quite willing to oppose large swaths of those who claimed to be Christian but taught views he found in conflict with the apostolic message as passed down through the faithful teaching of the Church’s leaders. In that situation, this otherwise peace-seeking man was a fearsome and thorough opponent.
Opposing Gnosticism
Throughout Against Heresies Irenaeus opposed Gnosticism. Only the first two books of his work deal directly with Gnosticism’s problems and erroneous teaching, to be sure; the last three books focus on what Christians believe from the Scriptures as that had been taught and passed down since the time of the apostles. Even so, in these last three books, Gnosticism continues to remain in Irenaeus’ purview; time and again comments directly challenge and asides obliquely critique elements of Gnostic teaching. As Irenaeus saw it, Christianity faced a serious threat from Gnosticism, and he wrote to oppose it and to provide readers with what they needed to recognize its problems and oppose it as well.8
What was this Gnosticism which Irenaeus resisted so strenuously? Since almost all of his direct interaction with and analysis of Gnosticism has been elided in this book, in favor of offering instead his positive teaching on the Christian faith, we need to offer some background on Gnosticism in general, and specifically as Irenaeus challenged it. This background will give readers enough information to appreciate what Irenaeus saw as Gnosticism’s problems, to see how he opposed it, and to facilitate understanding of what remains of his interaction with Gnosticism in this condensation of Against Heresies.
It should be noted, first of all, that Gnosticism had not just burst on the scene in Irenaeus’ time. Before the end of the first century AD, an early form of Gnosticism had already arisen as a challenge for the Church: some of the apostle Paul’s statements in his Letter to the Colossians may refer to early varieties of the movement,9 but several in 1 John almost certainly do, and the more generally expressed warning in 2 John fits well with perceived dangers from Gnostic teachers.10 Apostolic opposition did not manage to expel incipient Gnosticism from within Christianity, though: the movement continued, and the appeal to secret knowledge held a genuine attraction for many in the intellectual culture of the day.
Indeed, Gnostic movements were not restricted to Christian circles: they arose in several religions of the time. Gnosticism offered a way of tying together some elements of ancient intellectual culture with religious teaching, to produce a theosophy that could attire itself in several different religious dresses. But the Gnosticism to which Irenaeus responded was what had developed in Christian circles. By his time, a bewildering proliferation of Gnostic varieties had emerged, each claiming to present true Christianity. In each and all of them, Irenaeus argued, the Gnostics distanced themselves from what the apostles had taught and the Church had proclaimed.
A thoroughgoing assessment of and response to this burgeoning movement was necessary, Irenaeus adjudged, in order to expose its falsity and warn people against it. This is what he set out to offer in Against Heresies. An encounter in Rome may have been the final prod to push him to write it, though: there Irenaeus recognized someone from Smyrna who, like himself, had been instructed by Polycarp. To Irenaeus’ consternation, he found that this person had turned from the apostolic teaching passed on by Polycarp to embrace Gnosticism.11
Until the discovery of a significant cache of Gnostic manuscripts in Nag Hammadi in 1945, most of what was known about ancient Gnosticism as it had related to Christianity was drawn from Irenaeus’ Against Heresies, so scholars interested in Gnosticism had to rely, in the main, on what Irenaeus had written.12 This very fact, though, indicates how successful Irenaeus’ venture had been: his exposé and refutation of Gnosticism, a multiform movement that had proven attractive to many, was so thorough and devastating that the movement shortly disappeared within Christian circles. To be sure, Against Heresies was not the only anti-Gnostic treatise in the early Church: subsequently, Tertullian in North Africa, Clement and Origen in Alexandria, and Hippolytus in Rome all continued the attack. But all of them were considerably indebted to Irenaeus’ magnum opus for the arguments they brought forward against Gnosticism. Irenaeus’ Against Heresies was the first post-apostolic, largest, and most imposing of these responses, and the lion’s share of the credit for the exclusion of Gnosticism from Christian circles must be given to Against Heresies. So thoroughly did the Church come to reject and oppose Gnosticism that the movement died out in Christian circles, with its writings not resurfacing until the mid-twentieth-century discovery at Nag Hammadi.
The General Gnostic Pattern
Gnosticism as a general movement focused on the privileges and benefits of a specialized knowledge (Greek, gnosis) available only to a few. Typically, that knowledge fastened on the dualistic distinction of matter and spirit (or, in other contrasts, of visible and invisible, or flesh and spirit). The material realm was disparaged in favor of the immaterial realm; the “knower” (“Gnostic”) was privileged and enabled to receive special insights into the operations of this immaterial realm, so that he or she not only now knew how it held together, but also knew how to negotiate the various steps through it to advance to oneness with the ultimate.
Gnosticism viewed humankind as made up of distinct categories of people.13 The carnal or fleshly were satisfied with the material realm and its blandishments, and would never arise from it to loftier realms; their future—if they had one—was only darkness. The soulish were also enmeshed in the material realm but did not find full satisfaction in it; if they gave themselves to nobler pursuits (which included seeking satisfaction in non-material pleasures), they might arise to a more privileged situation. The spiritual or intellectual—the “Gnostics”—were those who, although in this material world, were not of it: they had received special insights to enable them to turn fully toward the immaterial realm, and they would ultimately manage to totally escape matter and be absorbed into ultimate spirit. This third category included only a small portion of humankind.
Since the building blocks of all knowledge are numbers and letters, it is not surprising that Gnosticism discerned special significance in them, beyond their importance for counting and spelling. According to Gnostic predilections, some letters or numbers might carry special meaning, and certain combinations of them might serve for special purposes.14 The recognition and deciphering of such significance would belong to the knowledge granted to the favored ones: it would enable them to infer relationships and figure out patterns in the way the universe had come to be that would be significant for their journey to the ultimate.
Related to this, Gnosticism had to account for the anomalous situation that the ultimate source (Greek, arche) and fullness (Greek, pleroma) of spirit or intellect could relate to the messy world of matter. The ingenious answer was that it did not: rather, a series of emanations (Greek, aeons) from that ultimate one were produced, each of which was still immaterial but was slightly less purely spirit or intellect. These Aeons joined in pairs and spawned further Aeons, who were yet further removed and who also joined others like them to produce additional Aeons; this process repeated itself a series of times. Different Gnostic systems posited various numbers of these Aeons, but eventually each system ended up with an artisan (Greek, demiurge) that brought matter into existence, thus producing the physical universe. This Demiurge was so far distant from the Arche that the Demiurge did not even know the Arche or what it was like; nor did the Demiurge realize that what it was doing in producing the physical cosmos was an aberration.
For the special knowledge to come to the privileged “knowers,” a teacher had to come from somewhere in the clusters of Aeons beyond the Demiurge to enlighten the privileged ones with whatever knowledge the system urged as necessary for the human to escape this realm of matter and return to the ultimate. This knowledge was unavailable to the masses of humanity; it was only for those worthy of such knowledge. It might include special words (combinations of letters) to allow them to move through the necessary steps on their intellectual journey; it might also entail special information framed around specific significant numbers declared to be important. These numbers might be pure or special in their own right—such as prime numbers or the first in a new range (e.g., 8 after the prime number 7, or 10 after the previous series of single integers); they might also be numbers that were significant to a culture or religion for other reasons (e.g., 12 or 40 in the history of Israel). These packages of numbers received their own recognizable designations: ogdoad (for 8), decad (for 10), duodecad (for 12), and so on.
Gnosticism thus allowed certain people who were (or thought themselves to be) intellectuals to claim special status for themselves in the universe. Because of this knowledge, they were denominated “perfect” or “complete” (Greek, teleios). It also allowed these people to draw on significant elements of the intellectual culture commonly embraced in antiquity as they embraced the teachings of various religions. Even so, we know less about how Gnosticism related to other religions than we do about its development within Christian circles.
Gnostic Christianity
The general Gnostic pattern took root in Christian circles and produced a distinctive approach to the Scriptures and teaching of the Church. By Irenaeus’ time, what contemporary scholars have denominated “Gnostic Christianity” included a wide variety of Gnostic systems, each claiming to be the genuine message of Christianity for the privileged spiritual or intellectual ones. Irenaeus opposed the general movement and its various manifestations alike. But why did he oppose Gnosticism? What were his criticisms of it?
Unquestionably, the discoveries at Nag Hammadi have opened up new vistas on Christian Gnosticism that move somewhat beyond the portrayal Irenaeus drew in Against Heresies. Even so, contemporary scholars recognize that Irenaeus had carefully sought out information about Gnosticism and presented it as it could be known in his day.15 This is worth highlighting as we get ready to consider what Irenaeus set forth about Gnostic teaching.
It is important for readers to recognize that Irenaeus was not seeking to present an ostensibly objective, scholarly analysis of an interesting socio-religious phenomenon, as a twenty-first-century religion scholar might offer it. Rather, he was seeking to defend what he firmly believed to be the divinely revealed and ecclesiastically passed on understanding of the Christian faith, as received from the apostles, against what he considered to be an especially insidious threat to that faith. It is hardly surprising that he did not take great pains to give the various Gnostic teachers whose perspectives he described the benefit of the doubt. Even so, for those who keep abreast of political campaigning in the twenty-first century, for example, what should be remarkable is the care Irenaeus took to try to find out and to present responsibly and clearly what his opponents actually taught. Yes, Irenaeus pilloried, caricatured, mocked, and offered cutting asides about Gnostic teachings, but he also first read extensively in the works of several Gnostic leaders and their students, and interacted with some of them personally,16 in order to learn what they were saying and how the successive generations of Gnostic teachers related to or differed from each other, and then set out to respond to them carefully.
This calls for a second comment. It should be kept in mind that Gnosticism as it had developed and been transmitted was secretive. Gnostic teachings were not proclaimed from the housetops; they were disseminated in closed meetings to a small coterie of “knowers”17 who paid the requisite fees to receive this special knowledge.18 Thus, accurate knowledge of Gnosticism was difficult to obtain from outside the group: some would probably be available in distorted form from erstwhile devotees who became disenchanted with Gnostic teachings, but this would be suspect. Irenaeus diligently sought to avoid relying on hearsay: as he emphasizes, he sought out the written materials produced by these Gnostic teachers for their disciples and gave himself to peruse them diligently, as well as speaking with some Gnostic leaders in person.19 This all indicates a determination to get the information from the genuine sources, as much as possible; that he at times relied on inferences he drew or on testimony from some who had turned away is hardly surprising or reprehensible. Unlike some of his successors, Irenaeus did not rush to assessment and judgment: he painstakingly laid out Gnosticism in its bewildering variety as he had come to know about it and responded to the movement in that variety. The first two books of Against Heresies are virtually entirely devoted to this; it would be difficult to find a similar ancient attempt to present one’s opponents’ views as carefully and responsibly as Irenaeus managed. (Indeed, when the secretiveness of Gnostic groups and their publications is taken into account, Irenaeus’ endeavors to obtain a genuine grasp of what his opponents taught dwarfs similar attempts in much of the contemporary academic world.) That he presented some of it tendentiously is not a flaw restricted to Irenaeus or the second century; what is surprising is how thoroughly Irenaeus sought to understand his opponents and present their perspectives fully, given the secretive nature of most of the Gnostics’ teachings.
So, what did Irenaeus present as Gnostic teaching, which he rejected and warned others to avoid? While Irenaeus recognized significant differences among the Gnostic Christian teachers and criticized them severely for that (on which more below), he pointed out several teachings they held in common. They all viewed the creation with disdain, since it was matter. This entailed the assessment that its creator was not good. However powerful that creator may have been, even if the Hebrew Scriptures call him “God,” he played the role of the Demiurge; so, he was a lesser being than the true and ultimate God. As Irenaeus emphasized, the Gnostics said the creator was both a defect and the offspring of a defect20; indeed, some Gnostics adjudged him to be only an angel21; in either case, he was far inferior to the ultimate God. These two were opposed to each other: the God of the Old Testament (the Demiurge) favored a particular people (the Jews) and insisted on various physical, material ways of worshiping him; whereas the ultimate God eschewed material worship in favor of intellectual response via the right knowledge. With all this, the Gnostics affirm a multitude of gods, not the one God professed and worshiped in the Church.22
This all resulted in fracturing the oneness that, as Irenaeus had received and taught it, held together the way Christians interpreted the Old Testament and understood the work of Christ for salvation. Gnostic teachings divided the God of creation from the God of salvation, decisively removed the material realm from ultimate divine concern, and separated the savior from the promises and prophecies in the Old Testament Scriptures. For Gnostic Christianity, Christ came as the teacher or revealer of the hidden but necessary knowledge, which was unknown to the God of the Old Testament and was unanticipated in it. Christ did not come to fulfill the Old Testament’s promises; indeed, he came to destroy the God of the Jews.23 As revealer of the ultimate God, he himself was not and could not be directly involved in this material world. So, the Word of God did not become incarnate, and Christ took nothing from Mary (through whom he passed as water does through a pipe).24 To be sure, since matter cannot be saved, the Christ could not have had a genuine body: he only seemed to have one.25 Some allowed that a human being named Jesus was born of Mary, and that he was later adopted by the immaterial Christ, who descended on Jesus at his baptism but left him before his crucifixion. The one called the savior did not suffer: indeed, he could not, since he belonged to the immaterial realm.26 There was no need for this savior to suffer in a body, in any event, since nothing material can partake of salvation.27 He came to bring salvation via knowledge for the spirit or intellect; this salvation had nothing directly to do with the body or the creation.
In the face of this commonality, Irenaeus emphasizes that the Gnostic leaders differed significantly in teachings that were certainly not inconsequential. He interacts with the specific teachings of a wide number of Gnostic teachers and their disciples, all of whom he styles heretics: Valentinus, Ptolemy, Saturninus, Basilides, Carpocrates, and Cerinthus.28 Irenaeus shows the similarity of much of Marcion’s teaching with what Gnostic leaders urged,29 while recognizing that Marcion held distinct views on a number of issues. Like others, Irenaeus traced all these heretics back to Simon Magus30 as the one who spawned all subsequent heretics.31
For Irenaeus, the disagreement among them was especially telling as an argument that they were not presenting the truth from God: he returned to this point time and again.32 He urged that “there are as many schemes of redemption among these heretics as there are teachers among them,” and that “they differ so widely among themselves about doctrine and tradition.” Irenaeus observed that they each “want to be teachers on their own, and to branch off from the particular heresy in which they have been involved. . . . They insist upon teaching something new.” All this indicates that they have not followed the tradition passed down from the apostles, as received from God through Christ; rather, in Irenaeus’ assessment, “the very fathers of these fables differ among themselves, as if they were inspired by different spirits of error.”33 Irenaeus denied that such diversity could subsist, either with the Gnostics’ claim to be presenting what Christ taught, or with passing on the apostolic tradition.34 Indeed, Irenaeus categorically rejected the Gnostic assertion that their teaching had been secretly divulged by the savior to the apostles and disseminated surreptitiously afterwards to worthy hearers.35 He repudiated the way they dealt with the Old Testament Scriptures, the Gospels, and the apostles’ writings.36
Irenaeus’ Presentation of Christianity
So, where could one find Christ’s teaching, sound exposition of Scripture, and the apostolic tradition? For Irenaeus, that question was simply answered: the teaching of Christ had been carefully passed on in the Church, which expounded the Scriptures faithfully and passed on the apostolic tradition publicly, openly, and without diversity.37
Unity and Coherence
Throughout his presentation of the Christian faith in Against Heresies, Irenaeus stressed oneness. One God is both creator and redeemer. That one God also gave the Old Testament Scriptures to prepare the way for the savior he would send. The coming savior was the Word through whom those revelations were granted and who offered anticipations of his future advent in various ways. When the savior came, he fulfilled the Old Testament expectations and promises. The savior was the same Word, who became incarnate in order to be the savior of humanity and all creation. He accomplished salvation by a recapitulation of all things.38
Irenaeus set this forth, first of all, by expounding Old Testament Scripture, the Gospels, and the apostles’ writings: he does this extensively.39 This was his first line of attack against Gnostic teaching. But recognizing that they claimed apostolic tradition for their views, he also deftly handled the question of apostolic tradition.
This tradition taught that there was only one God, who created all things, formed humankind, and promised them deliverance after they fell into sin.40 The creation itself is good; indeed, the salvation achieved in Christ reclaims the entirety of creation, not just the immaterial realm.41 This savior is the Son of God, who came to fulfill the promises and prophecies of the Hebrew Scriptures; to do this, that Word genuinely became incarnate.42 In his body he suffered, died, and rose again from the dead. He empowered his disciples to become his heralds, and they trustworthily handed on what he had taught them. The apostles carefully instructed those who would follow them as leaders within the Church, to assure a faithful transmission of the apostolic message.43
Irenaeus repeatedly and insistently urged an “apostolic succession” of faithful communication of the tradition by the Church’s leaders.44 He declared that the leaders of the Church—the presbyters and the bishops—had carefully handed on that teaching since the time of the apostles.45 He urged that this could readily be seen by the fact that, wherever one went in the entire inhabited earth, all the churches founded by the apostles held to the same faith. Each of those churches could list their leaders in succession, from the apostles down to that day.46 While some of those leaders were more gifted in eloquence or insight than others, their teaching was consistent: the Church believed the same faith, everywhere.47 That proclamation was summarized in “the rule of truth,” received and confessed at one’s baptism.48 This “rule of truth” served to guide the Church in the proper interpretation of Scripture49 and to summarize what Christians believed.50 Irenaeus offered a written rendition of that rule.51
Irenaeus presented a thoughtful perspective on the Gospels and the apostles’ letters when he urged that these were the apostolic tradition in written form—that is, what would in due course be called the New Testament was tradition written down.52 For Irenaeus, Scripture was not in competition or conflict with tradition: they were two sides of the same coin. Faithful adherence to and communication of the apostolic tradition, also in its written form, had marked the Church throughout the world53; indeed, among the peoples who were illiterate but had become Christians, the apostolic tradition was known only in the oral form in which it had been handed down within the Church since the time of the apostles; commitment to this tradition was sufficient to ensure rejection of Gnostic teaching.54
He went on to argue that the apostolic tradition came first and has been passed on reliably in the intervening generations, whereas Gnostic teaching developed later, as a distortion or corruption of the truth which had historically preceded it.55 This comports with the related allegation that the Gnostics had forged some writings, passing them off as if written by apostles,56 something Irenaeus declares the Church has not done.57 He urged that the Gospels written by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John faithfully presented the apostolic tradition about Jesus Christ and were sufficient for the Church’s needs, without any falsified gospels being added to them.58
For Irenaeus, the abstract philosophizing about immaterial privilege offered by the Gnostics was not what Christianity taught or offered. Instead, the Christian faith was firmly rooted in history, in this material creation.59 The Word of God had fully entered into it, becoming incarnate; he had come to fulfill the promises made long ago by a merciful creator, the God whom he called Father. The savior’s birth, life, death, and resurrection had taken place in history, in this creation.60 His salvation would restore humanity and all creation, to enable them to become what God had intended.61 The savior had empowered his disciples to be his heralds and granted them a full knowledge of his message,62 which they proclaimed and passed on to designated followers who would succeed them as leaders in the Church. These successors had themselves faithfully passed on that apostolic tradition down through the generations since then.63 The Christian faith was found, not in the secret coteries of Gnostic assemblies, but in the Church—in any and every church, for it had received and passed on the apostolic tradition.
According to Irenaeus, the Church took her stand on the Scriptures properly expounded and on the apostolic tradition faithfully handed down. While the Gnostics’ claimed they handled Scripture rightly and passed on a special tradition, Irenaeus argued that they submitted neither to Scripture nor to apostolic tradition. When pressed to compare their Gnostic teachings with what the Church taught in these regards, Irenaeus urged that the Gnostics refused to subject their teaching either to Scripture or to apostolic tradition, claimed to be superior to the apostles in their teaching, and rejected even the idea that there could be a “rule of truth.”64
Irenaeus’ assertions on all the points above could be examined further, with many stimulating possibilities for further insights into his rich teaching. To do so, though, would carry this introduction far beyond its purpose. Even so, two closely related points need to be explored somewhat further, to point out some striking emphases of Irenaeus in his presentation of the Christian faith.
One Lord, One Faith, One History
As over against Gnostic teaching that there were numerous gods,65 Irenaeus vigorously asserted that there is only one God. The one who created both the visible and the invisible realms had formed humanity and had promised them deliverance after they fell into sin. That same God had structured his dealings with humankind to offer anticipations of the coming savior and had spoken to prepare his way. The Hebrew Scriptures’ anticipations and prophecies were alike fulfilled in Jesus Christ.66 That one savior had communicated the truth to his disciples, who then passed it on faithfully to others, who themselves handed it on to yet others. All this “took place,” in the strictest sense: Christ came, not to bring hidden knowledge, but to reclaim creation—in space and time. The Church stood, in identifiable places, in her continuity, as witness to what God had done in Christ and how he had accomplished and would continue to achieve his purposes. The truth was not multiple, but one, a faith shared by the entire Church.
This oneness of truth reflected the oneness of God. The multiple, dissimilar systems of Gnostic thought already demonstrated that the Gnostics did not teach the truth. By contrast, no matter where one traveled in the world, what he or she would find in the teaching of any and every church founded by one of the apostles was precisely what could be found in all the others. The truth had been declared and passed on; the apostolic tradition had been transmitted; the faith had been preserved: it could be found in the Church, and only in the Church. This led Irenaeus to make a bold, even audacious claim, to which we will return below. But before turning to it, we should pause to consider another main element of Irenaeus’ teaching—a special application of this emphasis on one Lord, one faith, one history.
Recapitulation
In Against Heresies, Irenaeus presents salvation as recapitulation in Jesus Christ. Irenaeus’ approach assumes and builds on the contrast the apostle Paul had articulated, in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15, between Adam and Christ as the first Adam and the last Adam. In Irenaeus’ teaching, the Son of God became human so as to begin humanity anew: Christ achieved salvation for humankind and for the cosmos by taking on the task originally given to Adam, living up to it faithfully and defeating the enemies that, since the primordial fall, had held humanity in bondage. As can be seen in Justin Martyr and Melito of Sardis,67 the teaching of the early Church reveled in unpacking this divine economy of salvation beyond the explicit utterances of the apostle; Irenaeus proved to be the leading spokesman in that endeavor.
Irenaeus interprets the entirety of the savior’s work in this fashion: “When he became incarnate and was made human, he began anew the long line of human beings and, to state it briefly, furnished us with salvation. Consequently, what we had lost in Adam—namely, the image and likeness of God—we recovered in Christ Jesus.” This was deliberate on God’s part: “God recapitulated in himself the ancient formation of man, so that he might kill sin, deprive death of its power, and give life again to humankind.”68 This was why the savior had to be formed with the same physical body as Adam had,69 which would enable the last Adam to suffer pain and death in the place of fallen humanity, in order to bring them to eternal life with God.70
According to Irenaeus, this recapitulation in Jesus Christ embraced everything that had previously transpired in the history of God’s merciful dealing with humanity71: the shedding of the savior’s blood served as the recapitulation of the blood of the righteous shed in previous ages, and the temptation of the last Adam was a recapitulation of the original temptation of the first Adam.72 As Irenaeus unpacked the elements of this recapitulation, he drew specific contrasts between Eve, the disobedient virgin through whom sin entered the world, and Mary, the obedient virgin through whom the savior entered it, and between the tree that led to death and the tree that led to life.73 At other times, Irenaeus’ view was expansive as he presented this recapitulation in Jesus Christ, embracing the whole of the history of salvation from the primeval paradise to the new heavens and new earth.74 He urges that the savior recapitulated everything in himself: in so doing, he granted “a second creation through his passion.”75 The whole of salvation, in all its breadth and depth, comes via the recapitulation accomplished in Jesus Christ.
Significance of Against Heresies
Much more could be said, even by way of introduction, to Irenaeus’ magnum opus. But rather than pursue such inquiries, we turn to reflect on the significance of the work. Among many things that could be considered, we comment on three.
First in a Long Line
We have already noted that Against Heresies offered an extended presentation of the Christian faith, the first of a long line of such works which has continued to the present. Some scholars have spoken of Against Heresies as the Church’s first systematic theology, but that misses Irenaeus’ focus: the work’s concern is not for a systematic presentation, whether built on philosophical or logical categories. (Indeed, Irenaeus was suspicious of any approach that relied too readily on human logical structures.) Rather, Irenaeus’ concern was to defend and set forth the basics of the Christian faith passed down from Christ and the apostles in the Church. Against what he denounced as the aberrant perspectives of a wide range of Gnostic teachers, Irenaeus worked from the bases of the rule of truth he so highly prized as a condensation of the apostolic tradition; from it he urged the oneness of God, the goodness of creation, the unity of Scripture, and the fulfillment of both Scripture and humanity’s original purpose in Jesus Christ, in whom all things have been recapitulated and found salvation. Even so, Irenaeus’ determination to defend and expound the Christian faith would lead to many other such presentations over the ensuing centuries, including many that could be styled systematic theologies.
An Audacious but Unanswered Claim
In addition, we have noted that Against Heresies served as the major assault on Gnosticism. Other authors in the next generations articulated their own positions against Gnostic teaching, but each of them drew significantly upon the arguments Irenaeus had offered. In that regard, it is worth noting that, in the midst of all the arguments Irenaeus puts forth, he makes an utterly audacious claim—one that, if exposed as a falsehood, would have been sufficient to scuttle the whole ship he was piloting. Irenaeus deliberately and consciously argued that, wherever one might go in any of the churches founded by an apostle, one would find precisely the same teaching offered by the respective churches’ leaders. He urged:
While scattered throughout the whole world, the Church has received this message and this faith and still—as if living in only one house—carefully preserves it. She believes these points of doctrine as if she had only one soul, and one and the same heart. She proclaims them, teaches them, and hands them down harmoniously, as if she had only one mouth. Although the languages of the world are dissimilar, yet the meaning of the tradition has remained one and the same.76
He credited this to the faithful transmission of the apostolic tradition, from the apostolic founder to the appointed successors, who had continued the pattern down to his day. Recognizing that the various leaders differed in eloquence and exegetical insight, Irenaeus nevertheless urged that they all so abode by the rule of truth, which enshrined the apostolic tradition, that no one would be able to find any leader in any such church who taught in conflict with or other than the rule of truth.77
Irenaeus was not naïve in this claim. He knew from personal experience that some who had been accepted as teachers in various churches—including some of these Gnostics—had shown they were unfaithful,78 so it was not just a question of someone engaging in teaching within a church. He dealt with that problem explicitly, immediately after exhorting his readers to follow the teaching of the presbyters in the church, who “have received the certain gift of truth.”79 He warned against those “whom many believe to be presbyters,” but whose teaching and lifestyles do not square with Christ’s teaching and apostolic tradition. Instead, those who seek the truth must “turn away from all such people” and “hold fast to those who hold the doctrine of the apostles.”80 These were the true presbyters, whose teaching stayed within and led people to the truth.
Clearly, Irenaeus intended all this as a startling contrast to the Gnostic teachers, who differed so significantly from each other in what they presented. However, if one moves beyond the shock factor to consider the import of the claim, Irenaeus’ statement leaves his whole argument fatally exposed: it would only require one Gnostic leader (or anyone else who wanted to examine the issue) to find and expose a single example of such a dissonance within these apostolically founded churches to undermine the entirety of Irenaeus’ argument. This seems a dangerous tactic for the bishop of Lyons to adopt: after all, his opponents prided themselves on their knowledge, and Irenaeus acknowledged that they were well versed in the analytical and logical tools of Aristotle,81 so they had the intellectual wherewithal to recognize such a weakness in his argument. Since Gnosticism was a phenomenon widespread throughout the ancient world, the leaders and adherents of the movement had plenty of opportunity to test Irenaeus’ claim and discover any example of its fraudulence. Further, given the fact that Gnosticism was shortly struggling for its very existence within Christian circles, largely because of the argument put forward in Against Heresies, it is striking that there is no evidence whatsoever that any Gnostic Christian rose to Irenaeus’ challenge and offered even one such example.
The claim by Irenaeus was audacious, indeed—unless it was true. The fact that it was not challenged or disproved is telling. That leads to a consideration of another way in which Against Heresies is significant—now, not with a view to the ancient Christian world, but to the scholarly one of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
Irenaeus and “Normative” Christianity
Over the last few generations, scholarship on ancient Christianity has strongly emphasized the diversity found within Christianity in the first three centuries of the Church. Undoubtedly, this has been a helpful corrective for an idealized presentation of the ancient Church, which is more suited to an introductory catechetical presentation on the Christian faith than to a careful scholarly consideration of what could actually be found within Christianity in that early era. The repudiation of what has come to be called “normative” Christianity (or “proto-orthodoxy”) as the true pattern, in favor of a more freewheeling, swirling variety of early Christianities, out of which one of the variants eventually attained dominance (under the assistance of Constantine), has become a widely held perspective within contemporary scholarship.82 Irenaeus’ magnum opus raises some serious questions, though, about this scholarly assessment and how well it actually has read the relevant information.
For one thing, neither Irenaeus nor any other early church father claimed that there were no rivals in teaching or practice; indeed, scholars today must depend, in large part, on the proto-orthodox church fathers for much of the information they have on these rival groups. Irenaeus mentions several of them in Against Heresies—Marcionites, Gnostics, and Ebionites,83 among others. The question is not whether these groups existed; they certainly did, and Irenaeus and the early church fathers give information about them. The question is also not whether these rival groups claimed to present the truth about Jesus Christ and Christianity; why else would they have existed, but to live by their teaching? Rather, the question is whether the claims of these rival groups stood the test of actually presenting that truth. The suspicion of “normative” Christianity rules that question out of consideration, in favor of an open-ended perspective that any such claim must be honored as valid.
However, this contemporary perspective does not square, either with the claims of these rival groups or of the proto-orthodox. All these groups claimed that God had acted in Jesus Christ (in some fashion) to bring salvation; equally, all claimed that God had intervened to assure a right presentation of the message about that salvation, as well as its preservation in the generations since the apostles. While contemporary scholarly predilections may not commonly move within these constraints, those ancient convictions gave the perimeters within which the argument could be conducted. The search was for the genuine article: the apostolic tradition that presented the truth about the savior and salvation.
In that regard, the utterly audacious claim of Irenaeus deserves to be given more consideration among scholars than it has received to this point. Further, the fact that it stood unanswered, given what was at stake for his opponents, is surely more telling about the actual situation in ancient Christianity than many otherwise scholarly arguments in the present day. If nothing else, this shows the significance of Irenaeus’ Against Heresies and argues that it deserves a more careful reading than it so often has received, even from scholars of ancient Christianity.
Structure of Against Heresies
Last, but certainly not least, we turn to consider the structure of Irenaeus’ magnum opus. This seems straightforward enough, since in the prefaces to its five books Irenaeus indicates what he intends to treat in that book or subsequent ones (often commenting also on what he has already dealt with in previous ones). He states that book 1 will set forth the Gnostics’ views and their differences from each other; book 2 will present the Gnostics’ diversities and criticize their various perspectives; book 3 will consider the evidence of Scripture, which supports the teaching of the Church, drawing from the teaching of the apostles; book 4 will focus on the words spoken by Jesus Christ; and book 5 will draw from further teaching of the savior and of the apostles.84 The challenge for readers in these descriptions is that what Irenaeus actually offers in each book goes considerably beyond or wanders quite a way from what he indicates in these statements.
Beyond this, within the respective books, Irenaeus’ argument can be puzzling for contemporary readers. Irenaeus often deals with a question but does not quite complete the entire argument before moving on to another question. Later (in a different chapter, or even in a later book) he sometimes returns to an earlier argument and carries it further or in another direction. This pattern can repeat more than once in the five books. This can be frustrating for those looking for straight lines and definitive conclusions.
This all has led more than one scholar to question the logic of Irenaeus’ tome. Other scholars have defended Irenaeus in this regard.85 Something further deserves to be noted on this problem.
Too much should not be made of Irenaeus’ suspicion of Aristotle’s dialectic: to be sure, he condemns it as a major shaper of Gnostic thought,86 but that hardly necessitates the conclusion that Irenaeus throws all organization of thought to the winds. Irenaeus certainly does not present his arguments in the straight lines of Aristotle’s logic, but that does not mean his argument has no structure. Further, as noted above, he is not concerned to produce a systematized version of Christian teaching. Again, too much should not be made of this. He has no desire to be disorganized in his presentation: after all, he was defending the Christian faith from what he considered a serious perversion, so he recognized the need to offer a solid presentation.
In this regard, it may be helpful to keep in mind that Irenaeus saw himself as the spiritual grandson of the apostle John.87 If a reader is familiar with the apostle’s pattern of thought in 1 John, the frustration with Irenaeus’ presentation may at least be lessened. The apostle deals with several questions in this letter in circular fashion, treating an issue nearly to a conclusion but then turning to something else. Later the original issue comes again to the fore and receives further or other comment. It is striking that a similar pattern appears in Polycarp’s sole surviving writing, his letter to the Philippians.88 Polycarp addresses various issues and then, before bringing the arguments to conclusions, comments on something else—only to return later to the earlier issues, with further comments or conclusions.89
It may be that this is a pattern of argument marking this spiritual line: the apostle John, Polycarp, and then Irenaeus seem to follow a similar way of presenting their respective cases. This is only a suggestion of a possible line of investigation in this regard: much more remains to be done to explore this similarity, articulate what held their lines of argument together, and assess how contemporaries in the ancient world would respond to it. But the very success of Against Heresies in commanding attention among the leaders of the Church, in attracting translators in the early centuries of the Church, and in shaping argument against the Gnostics indicates that the ancient world had less difficulty with this pattern of argument than recent scholars have had.
In the face of this, it is still possible to sketch out, in broad strokes, the way Irenaeus structured his work. The actual treatment in Against Heresies follows the general pattern indicated by the author in the respective prefaces to the five books. After dealing extensively with Gnosticism in books 1 and 2, Irenaeus gives in books 3–5 an expansive presentation of the Christian faith. Beyond what is explicitly indicated in the prefaces, in the latter three books Irenaeus offers extensive citation of and argument from the Old Testament, the Gospels, and the apostles’ writings. In the whole, he presents a thorough exposition of Christian teaching, rooted in the rule of truth. To get a complete treatment of any question, though, the reader needs to read all three of these books, alert to recurring themes and issues. Those who do are in for a treat: Irenaeus offers a rich, stimulating presentation of the Christian faith.
1. He offers these comments at AH 3:3,4; they are also found in his “Letter to Florinus,” preserved by Eusebius in CHE 5:20,5–8; Eusebius had already indicated that Irenaeus had been under Polycarp’s tutelage (CHE 4:14,4).
2. This title alludes to the warning in 1 Tim 6:20 (which Irenaeus unquestionably viewed as written by the apostle Paul).
3. The shorter title comes from Eusebius, who referred to Irenaeus’ work thus several times (CHE 2:13,5; 3:18,2; 3:23,3; 4:11,1; 4:14,2; 4:21,9; 4:29,1). It can be questioned, from the way Eusebius writes, whether he intended this to be simply a description of the book’s contents or a shorter title; whatever may have been Eusebius’ intent, though, the shorter title has become the one commonly used to refer to Irenaeus’ magnum opus. Eusebius cites Irenaeus’ work by the full title only once (5:7,1).
4. Long thought to be lost, this work was discovered in 1904 in an Armenian translation at a monastic library in Erevan, Armenia. It is available in two English versions: Smith, St. Irenaeus; and Behr, St. Irenaeus of Lyons.
5. These include references to letters to Blastus and Florinus (CHE 5:20,1), with an excerpt from the latter (5:20,4), and to Victor, the bishop of Rome (5:24:14).
6. Eusebius has preserved much of this letter in CHE 5:24,11–17.
7. At CHE 5:24,18, Eusebius made this point after reviewing Irenaeus’ interaction with the Roman bishop.
8. This is clear in the statements in the prefaces to each book: see AH 1:pref,1–2; 2:pref,1–2; 3:pref; 4:pref,1–4; 5:pref.
9. New Testament scholarship has discerned possible elements of early Gnostic teaching in what Paul warned against in Col 2:8–10, 18; if that is the case, then several other passages may also include responses to Gnostic teachings (e.g., Col 1:9–10, 16-17, 19–20, 22, 25–28). However, it may be that the errors against which the apostle wrote were not Gnostic in origin.
10. Several passages in 1 John speak directly to what seem, almost certainly, to be early Gnostic teachings: see 1 John 1:1; 2:18, 20–23, 26–27; 4:3, 6–7; 5:1, 20. Gnostic errors have been discerned as the probable background to the directives in 2 John 7–11. Irenaeus certainly viewed 1 John 4:1–3 and 2 John 7–8 in this fashion: see his argument at AH 3:16,8.
11. Eusebius mentioned this at CHE 5:20,4–5; Eusebius identifies this person as Florinus (who was not, however, mentioned by name in AH).
12. Most of that treatment is excised in this book. Those who wish to see what Irenaeus presented about Gnosticism should consult the contemporary English translation of book 1 in Unger, St. Irenaeus; see also Nielsen, Irenaeus of Lyons.
13. Irenaeus recognizes that some Gnostics spoke of two such categories (AH 1:6,2), but more common (at least, in Gnostic Christian circles) was a threefold distinction (with which he deals at 1:7,5); this latter approach is reflected in the comments above.
14. To appreciate this, however strange it may sound in the contemporary world, it is helpful to note that the ancient Pythagoreans discerned cosmic significance in certain numbers and engaged in a form of philosophical numbers-mysticism. So, the ancient intellectual world included a strong sense of a possible ultimate significance in letters and numbers as keys to unlock the mysteries of the cosmos.
15. In the general introduction to GS, and in the introductions to the various Gnostic documents translated in it, Layton shows appreciation for Irenaeus’ portrayal of Gnosticism; similar respect is accorded to Irenaeus’ presentation by Pagels, Gnostic Gospels.
16. See his comments at AH 1:pref,2.
17. Irenaeus points this out at AH 1:3,1.
18. See Irenaeus’ comments, with sharp criticism for this practice, at AH 1:4,3.
19. AH 1:pref,2; 3:11,9; 4:pref,2; cf. the comments at 1:16,3n4; 1:21,5n7; and 1:23,4n8.
20. AH 1:16,3; 2:1,1; 2:19,9; 4:33,3.
21. Irenaeus points this out as Saturninus’ teaching at AH 1:24,1–2.
22. Irenaeus disparages Gnostic teaching for “insanely fabricating a multitude of gods” (AH 4:34,5; see his comments also at 3:16,8); as against that, he vigorously affirms the oneness of God (from a plethora of possibilities, see his explicit assertions at 3:9,1; 3:11,1; 3:11,7; 3:12,11).
23. AH 1:24,2.
24. See the assertions at AH 1:6,1; 1:7,2; 1:9,2–3; 3:11,3.
25. AH 1:24,2; 2:22,4; 5:1,2.
26. AH 1:7,2; 1:26,1; 3:11,3; 3:16,8.
27. AH 1:6,1–2; 1:24,5; 1:27,3; 4:pref,4; 5:2,2–3; 5:6,2.
28. Irenaeus deals with Valentinus at AH 1:pref,2; 2:pref,1; 3:pref; 3:3,4; 3:4,3; 3:11,9; 4:pref,2; 4:33,3; 5:26,2; with Ptolemy at 1:pref,2; with Saturninus at 1:24,1–2; with Basilides at 1:24,4; with Carpocrates at 1:25,1; and with Cerinthus at 1:26,1; 3:3,4.
29. Irenaeus treats Marcion at AH 1:27,2–3; 3:3,4; 3:4,3; 4:13,1; 4:33,2; 5:26,2.
30. Acts 8:9–24 presents the story of Simon Magus; subsequently he achieved the status he sought, for his exotic religious teachings and lifestyle brought him notoriety and a following in Rome; see Eusebius’ presentation at CHE 2:1,10–12; 2:13,1–5 (where he cites both Justin Martyr and Irenaeus); and at 2:14,1–2:15,1.
31. See Irenaeus’ comments on Simon Magus at AH 1:23,4; 1:27,4; 3:pref; 4:33,3.
32. In addition to the citations which follow above, see AH 4:35,4; 5:20,1; 5:20,2.
33. These quotations come, respectively, from AH 1:21,1; 1:21,5; 1:28,1; 1:9,5.
34. Basilides claimed that he received his teaching from one named Glaucias, who had received it from the apostle Peter (GS 417); the disciples of Valentinus vigorously asserted the apostolic provenance of Valentinus’ teaching, claiming the apostle Paul as their source (GS 303): see the bold assertion in “Ptolemy’s Letter to Flora” (GS 308–15), where the author speaks of “the apostolic tradition, which . . . we have received by succession” (33.7.9 [GS 314]).
35. He presented this claim at AH 1:25,5.
36. Irenaeus devotes a substantial portion of books 1 and 2 of AH to exposing the fallacies of Gnostic interpretations of the Hebrew Scriptures, the Gospels, and the apostles’ writings; much of this material has been elided for this volume. Even so, in his presentation of the Christian faith as it appears below in this condensed version of AH, Gnostic error is often in the background of Irenaeus’ exposition, so readers will have abundant opportunity to see his assessment of Gnostic exegesis.
37. AH 1:10,1–2; 3:pref; 4:35,4.
38. The reader of this volume will have ample opportunity to observe these emphases in Irenaeus’ teaching.
39. This condensation of AH includes more than 760 citations of the OT and NT. Some of these are only passing allusions, showing how readily Irenaeus’ thought touched on scriptural data; some are extended quotations; and some offer careful analysis and exegesis. Together, these indicate how extensively Irenaeus relied on Scripture for what he presented.
40. AH 2:1,1; 2:2,4–5; 2:3,2; 2:30,9; 3:9,1; 3:11,1.
41. AH 3:5,3; 3:10,2–3; 3:11,1; 3:18,2; 4:9,3; 4:17,6; 4:20,4; 5:18,3; the abundant fruitfulness of creation which Irenaeus asserts will come to pass in the eschaton (see AH 5:33,3; 5:34,2; 5:36,1; 5:36,3) is a result of the salvation of the entire creation.
42. AH 1:22,1; 2:9,1; 3:9,1; 3:11,1; 5:18,3.
43. AH 2:20,3; 3:pref; 3:1,1; 3:4,1; 3:5,2; 3:17,2; 3:24,1.
44. See AH 1:10,2; 2:9,1; 3:pref; 3:1,1; 3:2,2; 3:3,1–4; 3:4,1–2; 3:5,1; 4:26,2; 4:26,5; 4:32,1; 4:33,8; 5:pref; 5:20,1.
45. Irenaeus credits this to the presbyters at AH 3:2,2; 4:32,1; to the bishops at 3:3,2; 4:33,8; to both at 4:26,2. (Like most other Church leaders in the first two centuries [with the exception of Ignatius of Antioch], Irenaeus used the two terms almost interchangeably; the distinction in role and responsibility had not yet become the firm practice of the entire Church.)
46. See Irenaeus’ extended argument to this effect at AH 3:3,1–4.
47. Irenaeus makes this point repeatedly, with slight variations: see AH 1:10,3; 3:12,7; 3:24,1; 4:35,4; 5:20,1.
48. AH 1:9,4; the rule of truth would eventually find a fixed form, with some modifications, in the Apostles’ Creed and, as elaborated in light of the early christological controversies, in the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed.
49. AH 2:27,1–2.
50. AH 2:28,1.
51. This appears at AH 1:10,1; see also a condensed version at 3:4,2.
52. See Irenaeus’ argument to this effect in AH 3:1,1; cf. 3:5,1.
53. AH 1:20,2.
54. Irenaeus asserts this was true of the people among whom he labored in Lyons (AH 3:4,2).
55. See AH 3:3,3; 3:4,3; 3:21,3; 5:14,4; 5:20,1; note also the way he uses this argument about historical originality to urge Christians to humility at 2:28,2.
56. See the assertions at AH 1:20,1; 4:33,8; Irenaeus also specifically refers (at 3:11,9) to “The Gospel of Truth,” produced by Valentinus’ followers, which is among the Gnostic writings discovered at Nag Hammadi in 1945; for a translation, see GS 253–64.
57. AH 4:33,8. This is a striking claim in the face of much critical New Testament scholarship, which asserts that several works which are part of the NT canon are pseu-donymous; it should be recalled here that Irenaeus unhesitatingly accepts the Pauline authorship of the letters historically accredited to him, including the Pastoral Letters; Irenaeus also accepts Petrine authorship for 2 Peter and Johannine authorship for the Gospel of John, the Apocalypse, and 1 and 2 John. (Whether Irenaeus was aware of 3 John or thought it apostolic is unknown, since he did not refer to or cite it in any of his extant works.)
58. See his argument at AH 3:1,1; 3:11,9; Irenaeus argues vigorously (if not quite convincingly) that there could only be four gospels at 3:11,8 (a section that offers, in other regards, some stimulating information about each of the four NT gospels).
59. AH 3:24,1.
60. AH 3:23,3; 3:18,7.
61. AH 3:18,1; 3:19,1.
62. AH 3:pref; 3:12,5.
63. AH 3:12,13.
64. AH 3:2,1–2; 3:12,6.
65. AH 3:16,8; 4:34,5.
66. AH 3:12,3; 3:24,1.
67. Justin Martyr expanded on this apostolic approach somewhat (see his Dialogue with Trypho 100 [ANF 1:249], and Melito of Sardis gave it extensive consideration throughout his On Pascha.
68. These citations are, respectively, from AH 3:18,1; 3:18,7.
69. AH 3:21,10; 5:1,2; 5:14,2.
70. AH 3:22,1; 4:22,1; 5:1,3.
71. AH 3:23,1; 3:24,1.
72. AH 5:14,1; 5:21,1-3.
73. AH 3:22,4; 5:16,3.
74. For this, see the presentation at AH 5:19,1.
75. AH 5:18,3; 5:23,2.
76. AH 1:10,2; to the same effect, see 3:24,1.
77. See his argument at AH 1:10,3; also, at 5:20,1.
78. Irenaeus wrote letters to two such presbyters, Blastus and Florinus (referred to in CHE 5:20,1). He also knew that Valentinus, the fountainhead of much Gnostic teaching, had served as a teacher in the church in Rome for some time before his views were exposed as suspect.
79. AH 4:26,2.
80. AH 4:26,3–5.
81. Irenaeus asserts that the Gnostics were facile in “that hairsplitting and subtle mode of handling questions learned from Aristotle” (AH 2:14,5).
82. A handy recent summary of this scholarly assessment, offered at a popular level, is Ehrman, Lost Christianities.
83. In addition to the material presented on these groups in books 1 and 2, see AH 4:33,2–4.
84. For Irenaeus’ indications about the content of book 1, see AH 1:pref,2; 2:pref,1; 3:pref; for book 2, see AH 2:pref,2; 3:pref; for book 3, see AH 3:pref; 4:pref,3; for book 4, see AH 4:pref,1; and for book 5, see AH 5:pref.
85. On this scholarly disagreement, see the discussion in Osborn, Irenaeus of Lyons.
86. See AH 2:14,5.
87. See AH 3:3,4.
88. See AposFrs 207–21.
89. Polycarp calls his readers to prepare for the coming judgment (2), warns against loving money (4), gives directives regarding offices and roles within the church (4–6), returns to preparations for the judgment (8–10), and then critiques a presbyter who has turned aside for money (11).