St.
Hippolytus
MARTYR
Feast: August 13
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Information:
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Martyr, presbyter and antipope; date of birth
unknown; d. about 236. Until the publication in 1851 of the recently
discovered "Philosophumena", it was impossible to obtain
anydefinite authentic facts concerning Hippolytus of Rome and his life from
the conflicting statements about him, as follows:
* Eusebius says that he was bishop of a church
somewhere and enumerates several of his writings (Hist. eccl., VI, xx, 22).
* St. Jerome likewise describes him as the bishop of an unknown see, 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 (De viris illustribus, cap. 1xi). * 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; the Roman Calendar in the same collection records under 13 August the feast of Hippolytus on the Via Tiburtina and Pontianus in the catacomb of Callistus (ed. Mommsen in "Mon. Germ. Hist.: auctores antiquissimi", IX, 72, 74). * 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 (Ihm, "Damasi epigrammata", Leipzig, 1895, 42, n.37). * Prudentius wrote a hymn on the martyr Hippolytus ("Peristephanon", hymn XI, in P.L., LX, 530 sqq.), in which he places the scene of the martyrdom at Ostia or Porto, and describes Hippolytus as being torn to pieces by wild horses, evidently a reminiscence of the ancient Hippolytus, son of Theseus. * Later Greek authors (e.g. Georgius Syncellus., ed. Bonn, 1829, 674 sqq.; Nicephorus Callistus, "Hist. eccl.", IV, xxxi) do not give much more information than Eusebius and Jerome; some of them call him Bishop of Rome, others Bishop of Porto. According to Photius (Bibliotheca, codex 121), he was a disciple of St. Irenæus. Oriental writers, as well as Pope Gelasius, place the See of Hippolytus at Bostra, the chief city of the Arabs. * Several later legends of martyrs speak of Hippolytus in various connections. That of St. Laurence refers to him as the officer appointed to guard the blessed deacon, who was converted, together with his entire household, and killed by wild horses (Acta SS., August, III, 13-14; Surius, "De probatis Sanctorum historiis", IV, Cologne, 1573, 581 sqq.). A legend of Porto identifies him with the martyr Nonnus and gives an account of his martyrdom with others of the same city (Acta SS., August, IV, 506; P.G., X, 545-48). * A monument of importance is the large fragment of a marble statue of the saint discovered in 1551 which underwent restoration (the upper part of the body and the head being new), and is now preserved in theLateran museum; the paschal cycle computed by Hippolytus and a list of his writings are engraved on the sides of the chair on which the figure of Hippolytus is seated; the monument dates from the third century (Kraus, "Realencyklopädie der christlichen Altertumer", 661 sqq.). * The topographies of the graves of the Roman martyrs place the grave of Hippolytus in the cemetery on the Via Tiburtina named after him, mention the basilica erected there, and give some legendary details concerning him. (De Rossi, "Roma sotterranea", I, 178-79); the burial vault of the sainted confessor was unearthed by De Rossi (Bullettino di archeologia cristiana, 1882, 9-76).
The discovery of the "Philosophumean"
has now made it possible to clear up the most important period of the life of
St. Hippolytus through his own evidence, and at the same time to test and
correct the conflicting accounts contained in the old authorities. We proceed
on the assumption that Hippolytus was really the author of the aforesaid work,
an hypothesis almost universally accepted by investigators today.
Hippolytus was a presbyter of the Church of Rome
at the beginning of the third century. There is no difficulty in admitting
that he could have been a disciple of St. Irenæus either in Rome or Lyons. It
is equally possible that Origen heard a homily by Hippolytus when he went to
Rome about the year 212. In the reigh of Pope Zephyrinus (198-217) he came
into conflict with that pontiff and with the majority of the Church of Rome,
primarily on account of the christological opinions which for some time had
been causing controversies in Rome. Hippolytus had combated the heresy of
Theodotion and the Alogi; in like fashion he opposed the false doctrines of
Noetus, of Epigonus, of Cleomenes, and of Sabellius, who emphasized the unity
of God too one-sidedly (Monarchians) and saw in the concepts of the Father
and the Son merely manifestations (modi) of the Divine Nature (Modalism,
Sabellianism). Hippolytus, on the contrary, stood uncompromisingly for a real
difference between the Son (Logos) and the Father, but so as to represent the
Former as a Divine Person almost completely separate from God (Ditheism) and
at the same time altogether subordinate to the Father (Subordinationism). As
the heresy in the doctrine of the Modalists was not at first clearly
apparent, Pope Zephyrinus declined to give a decision. For this Hippolytus
gravely censured him, representing him as an incompetent man, unworthy to
rule the Church of Rome and as a tool in the hands of the ambitious and
intriguing deacon Callistus, whose early life is maliciously depicted
(Philosophumena, IX, xi-xii). Consequently when Callistus was elected pope
(217-218) on the death of Zephyrinus, Hippolytus immediately left the
communion of the Roman Church and had himself elected antipope by his small
band of followers. These he calls the Catholic Church and himself successor
to the Apostles, terming the great majority of Roman Christians the School of
Callistus. He accuses Callistus of having fallen first into the heresy of
Theodotus, then into that of Sabellius; also of having through avarice
degraded ecclesiastical, and especially the penitential, discipline to a
disgraceful laxity. These reproaches were altogether unjustified. Hippolytus
himself advocated an excessive rigorism. He continued in opposition as
antipope throughout the reigns of the two immediate successors of Callistus,
Urban (222 or 223 to 230) and Pontius (230-35), and during this period,
probably during the pontificate of Pontianus, he wrote the
"Philosophumena". He was banished to the unhealthful island (insula
nociva) of Sardinia at the same time as Pontianus; and shortly before this,
or soon afterward, he became reconciled with the legitimate bishop and the
Church of Rome. For, after both exiles had died on the island of Sardinia,
their mortal remains were brought back to Rome on the same day, 13 August
(either 236 or one of the following years), and solemnly interred, Pontianus
in the papal vault in the catacomb of Callistus and Hippolytus in a spot on
the Via Tiburtina. Both were equally revered as martyrs by the Roman Church:
certain proof that Hippolytus had made his peace with that Church before his
death. With his death the schism must have come to a speedy end, which
accounts for its identification with the Novatian schism at the end of the
fourth century, as we learn from the inscription by Damasus.
The fact that Hippolytus was a schismatic Bishop
of Rome and yet was held in high honour afterwards both as martyr and
theologian, explains why as early as the fourth century nothing was known as
to his see, for he was not on the list of the Roman bishops. The theory
championed by Lightfoot (see below), that he was actually Bishop of Porto but
with his official residence in Rome, is untenable.
This statement, made by a few authorities,
results from a confusion with a martyr of Porto, due perhaps to a legendary
account of his martyrdom. Moreover De Rossi's hypothesis, based on the
inscription by Damasus, that Hippolytus returned from exile, and subsequently
became an adherent of Novatian, his reconciliation with the Roman Church not
being effected until just before his martyrdom under the Emperor Valerian
(253-60), is incompatible with the supposition that he is the author of the
"Philosophumena." The feast of St. Hippolytus is kept on 13 August,
a date assigned in accordance with the legend of St. Laurence; that of
Hippolytus of Porto is celebrated on 22 August.
Hippolytus was the most important theologian and
the most prolific religious writer of the Roman Church in the
pre-Constantinian era. Nevertheless the fate of his copious literary remains
has been unfortunate. Most of his works have been lost or are known only
through scattered fragments, while much has survived only in old translations
into Oriental and Slavic languages; other writings are freely interpolated.
The fact that the author wrote in Greek made it inevitable that later, when
that language was no longer understood in Rome, the Romans lost interest in
his writings, while in the East they were read long after and made the author
famous. His works deal with several branches of theology, as appears from the
aforementioned list on the statue, from Eusebius, St. Jerome, and from
Oriental authors. His exegetical treatises were numerous: he wrote
commentaries on several books of the Old and New Testaments. Most of these
are extant only in fragments. The commentary on the Canticle of Canticles,
however, has probably been preserved in its entirety ("Werke des
Hippolytus", ed. Bonwetsch, 1897, 343 sqq.); likewise the fullest extant
commentary on the Book of Daniel in 4 books (ibid., 2 sqq.). Eight of his
works, known by their titles, dealt with dogmatic and apologetic subjects,
but only one has come down entire in the original Greek. This is the work on
Christ and Antichrist ("De Antichristo", ed. Achelis, op. cit., I,
II, 1 sqq.); fragments of a few others have been preserved. Of his polemics
against heretics the most important is the "Philosophumena", the
original title of which is kata pason aireseon elegchos (A Refutation of All
Heresies). The first book had long been known; books IV to X, which had been
discovered a short time previously, were published in 1851. But the first
chapters of the fourth and the whole of the second and third books are still
missing. The first four books treat of the Hellenic philosophers; books V to
IX are taken up with the exposition and refutation of Christian heresies, and
the last book contains a recapitulation. The work is one of the most
important sources for the history of the heresies which disturbed the early
Church. Origen is cited in some manuscripts as the author of the first book.
Photius attributes it to the Roman author Caius, while by others it has been
ascribed also to Tertullian and Novatian. But most modern scholars hold for
weighty reasons that Hippolytus is undoubtedly its author. A shorter treatise
agains heresies (Syntagma), and written by Hippolytus at an earlier date, may
be restored in outline from later adaptations (Libellus adversus omnes
haereses; Epiphanius, "Panarion"; Philastrius, "De
haeresibus"). He wrote a third antiheretical work which was universal in
character, called the "Small Labyrinth". Besides these Hippolytus
wrote special monographs against Marcion, the Montanists, the Alogi, and
Caius. Of these writings only a few fragments are extant. Hippolytus also
produced an Easter cycle, as well as a chronicle of the world which was made
use of by later chroniclers. And finally St. Jerome mentions a work by him on
Church laws. Three treatises on canon law have been preserved under the name
of Hippolytus: the "Constitutiones per Hippolytum" (which are
parallel with the eighth book of the Apostolic Constitutions), the Egyptian
Church Ordinance, in Coptic, and the "Canones Hippolyti". Of these
works the first two are spurious beyond doubt, and the last, the authenticity
of which was upheld even by Achelis (Die Canones Hippolyti, Leipzig, 1891),
belongs in all probability to the fifth or sixth century.
The works of Hippolytus have been edited by
Fabricius, "S. Hippolyti episcopi et mart. opera" (2 vols.,
Hamburg, 1716-18); by Gallandi in "Bibliotheca veterum patrum", II,
1766; in Migne, P.G., X; by Lagarde (Leipzig and London, 1858); and by
Bonwetsch and Achelis, "Hippolytus" I, pts. I and II (Leipzig,
1897), in "Die gr. chr. Schriftsteller", a series published by the
Berlin Academy. The "Philosophumena" was edited by Miller, as the
work of Origen (Oxford, 1851); by Duncker and Schneidewin as the work of
Hippolytus (Göttingen, 1859), and in P.G., XVI. The "Canones
Hippolyti" were edited by Haneberg (Munich, 1870); by Achelis, "Die
altesten Quellen des orientalischen Kirchenrechts:, I, in "Texte und
Untersuchungen", VI (Leipzig, 1891), 4.
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