Hippolytus of Rome
Who was Hippolytus? I have never heard of this man, and for a good reason – He is a Catholic saint; I am a Baptist. However, he has a part to play in the development of the Catholic Church, and I hope this article provides you with enough information that you can answer the question; "Who was Hippolytus of Rome"?
Venerated in: Catholic Church; Eastern Orthodox
Feast: Roman Catholic: August 13
Died: c. 235 AD (age about 65); Sardinia
Born: c. 170 AD; Rome
Hippolytus (c. 160–236) was a prolific writer and one of the most significant theologians of the third century. He is known today for promoting orthodox Christology amid the confusion and bad doctrine in the Church at Rome.
Hippolytus was a presbyter (elder) in the Church at Rome, while Zephyrinus and Callistus served as the bishops. Both bishops supported some form of Modalism[1], which viewed the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as simply three "modes" or manifestations of the same Person. They saw those with a more Trinitarian understanding as believing in separate gods. Modalism[1] is also known as Modalistic Monarchianism[1], Sabellianism[1] (after Sabellius[1], one of its strongest proponents), and Patripassianism[2] ("father-suffering") since it taught that it was God the Father who was born as the Son and died on the Cross and raised Himself from the dead. Hippolytus, in contrast, understood Jesus as a fully divine but distinct Person from the Father.
Hippolytus was elected as a rival bishop of the Roman Church for a while. For these doctrinal differences and the bishops' relaxing of moral standards, Hippolytus bitterly opposed both bishops and Callistus' successors, Urban and Pontianus. Ultimately, Hippolytus and Pontianus were exiled to Sardinia under Emperor Maximus Thorax, and a new Roman bishop was installed, ending the factional controversy. It is possible that Hippolytus died working in the mines, although, much later, some more exciting legends about his life and death became popular.
Hippolytus is known for his writings against heresy and the vital information he preserves about baptismal practices, Eucharistic services, and the ordination of ministers. He is also known for taking a hard line about the high behavioral and moral standards required of church members. His high standards were not always shared by the bishops mentioned above of Rome, which also contributed to the schism.
In what has been called Hippolytus' most important work, Refutation of All Heresies (or the Philosophumena), Hippolytus attempted to demonstrate that all Christian heresies spring from reliance upon pagan philosophy. Many of his writings, translated into English, are readily available online, including Commentary on the Prophet Daniel, Commentary on the Song of Songs, and Christ and the Antichrist, an eschatological work.
In its first several centuries, the Church dealt with external and internal crises. Externally, the Church suffered for nearly 250 years under the violent persecutions of Roman emperors, beginning under mad Nero in A.D. 64 and finally stopping under Constantine in 313. Internally, the Church wrestled with heresies, schism, and matters of discipline. One of the main issues of disagreement in those early centuries concerned the treatment of the faithful who committed severe sins or apostatized during the persecutions. Two camps emerged within the Church: those who advocated mercy for the fallen and those—called "rigorists"—who advocated harsh penalties or even permanent exclusion of the fallen.
St. Hippolytus's date of birth is not known, and only fragmentary data exists about his early life. It is known that he was a brilliant and gifted theologian and is considered a Church Father. He wrote treatises against several of the heresies afflicting the Church in the late second and early third centuries—most of them Trinitarian or Christological, as early Christians sometimes struggled to discern the correct terminology to apply to the apostolic teaching that Jesus was true God and true man.
Hippolytus's break lasted for nineteen years and through three pontificates. As a rigorist who did not believe that grave sinners should be re-admitted to communion in the Church, he refused to accept the more-merciful approach of Callistus and his successors. However, Hippolytus would soon have cause to soften his stance and even re-evaluate his separation from communion.
In 235, a career soldier named Maximins Thrax was proclaimed emperor by the legions in Germany. Shortly afterward, he turned his attention to the Church, and persecution erupted that targeted the clergy. The reigning Pope, St. Pontian, and the "antipope" Hippolytus were arrested and sent to the mines on the island of Sardinia. Amidst the suffering and hardship of the mines, Hippolytus renounced his schism and papal claim and was reconciled to the Church by Pontian. Both men later succumbed to the harsh conditions, and their remains were transported for burial in Rome, where they were recognized as martyrs and saints of the Church.
Hippolytus is accorded special recognition in Church history: Not only is he the first antipope, but he is also the only antipope ever canonized! His unique case provides an example of repentance and reconciliation for those who have separated themselves from the Church.
Early Christianity had now seemingly provided a living account of a deceitful Roman Church and its heretical leader at the very beginnings of Christianity. 'Unfortunately,' says Hippolytus, '[the Roman Bishop] Zephyrinus was not only very stupid and ignorant but, loving money very much, took bribes.'
Hippolytus of Rome before his rise to fame in the 1850s, after which he fell into oblivion once more. Little is known about this enigmatic figure, but some information can be retrieved from a statue found near Rome in 1551, including a list of works by the disputed Church Father.
Martyr, presbyter, antipope; date of birth unknown; probably about 236. Until the publication in 1851 of the recently discovered "Philosophumena," it was impossible to obtain any definite authentic facts concerning Hippolytus of Rome and his life from the inconsistent statements about him, as follows:
• Eusebius says that he was bishop of a church somewhere and enumerates several of his writings.
• St. Jerome likewise describes him as the bishop of an unknown See (see definition below), gives a longer list of his writings, and says of one of his homilies that he delivered it in the presence of Origen, to whom he made direct reference.
• The Chronography of 354, in the list of popes, mentions Bishop Pontianus and the presbyter, Hippolytus, as being banished to the island of Sardinia in the year 235.
• According to the inscription over the grave of Hippolytus composed by Pope Damasus, he was a follower of the Novatian schism while a presbyter, but before his death exhorted his followers to become reconciled with the Catholic Church.
• Prudentius wrote a hymn on the martyr Hippolytus ("Peristephanon). He places the scene of the martyrdom at Ostia or Porto. He describes Hippolytus as being torn to pieces by wild horses, evidently a reminiscence of the ancient Hippolytus, Son of Theseus. Asian writers, and Pope Gelasius, placed the See (a seat of a bishop's office, power, or authority; the authority or jurisdiction of a bishop) of Hippolytus at Bostra, the chief city of the Arabs.
General Notes:
[1] Modalism: the doctrine that the persons of the Trinity represent only three modes or aspects of the divine revelation, not distinct and coexisting persons in the divine nature.
Hippolytus disagreed vehemently with Pope Zephyrinus over a heresy known as Modalism (or Sabellianism).
• Modalism is a term for believing the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are the same, not three distinct persons of the Godhead.
• Modalism implies that God Himself suffered on the Cross, which was unacceptable to the early Church.
• Modalism stands against the idea of Trinitarianism, of which Hippolytus was a proponent.
• Hippolytus felt the Pope did not do enough to suppress Modalism.
• Modalism is also known as Sabellianism.
• Scholars believe Sabellius was an early proponent of the term "homoousian," which is the technical term adopted a hundred years later in the Council of Nicaea proclaiming Jesus to be of the "same substance" as the Father.
• Since all we know about this heresy is what its detractors wrote about it, scholars are uncertain about what Modalism proposed.
• Modalism (or Sabellianism) are the same
• Sabellianism: the theological doctrines of the Sabellians: modalistic Monarchianism
[2] Patripassianism: In Christian theology, historical Patripassianism (as it is referred to in the Western Church) is a version of Sabellianism in the Eastern Church (and a version of Modalism, modalistic Monarchianism, or modal monarchism). Modalism is the belief that God the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit are three different modes or aspects of one monadic (UNIT, ONE) God, as perceived by the believer, rather than three distinct persons within the Godhead – that there are no real or substantial differences between the three, such that the identity of the Spirit or the Son is that of the Father.
In the West, a version of this belief was known derogatively as Patripassianism by its critics (from Latin Patri- "father" and passion "suffering") because the teaching required that since God the Father had become directly incarnate in Christ, the Father sacrificed Himself on the Cross.
