Trending in the 3rd Century

During the 3rd century, the church was under constant attack from heresies and persecution. On this episode of 5 Minutes in Church History, Dr. Stephen Nichols describes the darkness of this age without forgetting the faithful Christians who took a stand for truth.

Welcome back to another episode of 5 Minutes in Church History. It has been a long time since we've done a “Trending in Whatever Century” episode. I think we hit about five or six centuries back when we were doing them in earnest. Well, it's time to pick it up again.

This time we are going to do “Trending in the Third Century.” So, if you were alive during the 200s, what would people be talking about and what would be in the news? Well, in terms of church history, it was a time of heresies. One of the heresies that was trending was Manichaeism. Mani was born in 216 in what is modern day Iraq. He died in 274 in modern day Iran. His religion, or heresy, involved the secret, the mysterious. It was very much like Gnosticism. There was a lot of dualism in it, good versus evil, light versus darkness. It's a combination of Judaism, of a little Christianity mixed in, Buddhism, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, and Plato. Mix it all together and you get Manichaeism. His followers are called Manichees, or Manichaeans. And the religion, or the heresy, is called Manichaeism. It is going to pop up in the next centuries, and it is even for a time going to capture the attention of Augustine.

Well, Christological heresies also abounded. The Ebionites, they denied Jesus’ deity. There was also the heresy of Adoptionism. This is the idea that Jesus was born, and then sometime during his life, God adopted Jesus as his son—maybe at Jesus' baptism or perhaps at his resurrection—but it was sometime, certainly, after his birth. There was the heresy of Sabellianism. Jesus was not a person. This is not Trinitarianism, with the idea of one God in three persons; but, rather, Jesus was simply a manifestation of God, a sort of mode of God's appearing. And then there was Docetism. This goes back to the pages of the New Testament. But it was very prevalent in the 200s, and it was the idea that Jesus was not truly human; he only appeared to take on flesh.

Well, it was not only time of heresy, it was also a time of persecution. Under the Emperor Decius, from 249 to 251, there was a full-court press, empire wide, persecution of the church and of Christians. It would happen again as the third century was coming to a close under Diocletian. His reign was from 284 and into those early years of the 300s, ending in 305. Under Diocletian, there was another intense time of persecution.

A lot of challenges for the church in the 200s, these heresies, these persecutions, but we also have to remember, there were indeed faithful witnesses in the church in the third century. We've talked about a lot of these people on past episodes. I'm going to lump them all together now, and we have five. Five faithful people through this time of persecution and heresy.

The first is Irenaeus. He just made it into the early years of the third century; he died in 202. He was a disciple of Polycarp. He was the Bishop of Lyons, and he took on the heretics. He would say, "When you hear the heresies or they want to talk to you, stop your ears." Great advice from Irenaeus.

Next up is Tertullian. Tertullian was born in 155 and died sometime around 230. He, of course, coins the term “the Trinity.” He even coins the notion of the Old Testament and the New Testament, and so we have Tertullian.

There’s Hippolytus, another defender of the faith against the heretics. He died in 235 and he wrote this...I love the title of his book, The Refutation of All Heresies, addressing all contenders against the Christian faith.

There’s Anthony of Egypt, the Desert Father, beginnings, really, of early monasticism. His biography would later be written by none other than Athanasius.

And then we have Cyprian, the Bishop of Carthage. Carthage is on the coast of North Africa, under Roman rule at the time. He was involved in a few controversies there at Carthage, but he was, ultimately, imprisoned, and in September of 258 he was martyred in Carthage.

So, there it is, what was trending in the third century. I'm Steve Nichols. Thanks for listening to 5 Minutes in Church History.