The claim comes up a lot that Polycarp met John—the original Apostle, Disciple of Jesus, Brother to James, the “Pillar” of Galatians 2, He of The Twelve. Enough to warrant a response you can bookmark. The short answer to the question, “Did he?” is no. It’s not likely at any rate. Later legends claimed this. But so far as we can tell, Polycarp himself conspicuously never did.
The Claim
Polycarp was a Christian Bishop in what is now Turkey during the mid-2nd century—born around 69 and died around 155 A.D. We have one letter and some quotations from him in other authors, and a ridiculous hagiography. Legend was he studied under John the Disciple and met others who had “seen Jesus.” But there’s no evidence that’s true; and it’s highly unlikely.
We have no text from Polycarp himself making this claim. Nor do any of the letters we have addressed to Polycarp mention it. There’s also no evidence any Apostle was actually alive when Polycarp was even a schoolboy—which would have been the late 70s A.D. at the earliest, when the Apostles would have been in their late 60s or even 80s, if any were even alive at all, and we have no evidence any were. Average lifespan for an adult at that time was 48 (On the Historicity of Jesus, Element 22, Ch. 4). Not even the Martyrdom of Polycarp, which is basically a fawning eulogy of him, makes any mention of his ever knowing any Apostles or tutoring under John.
But the appeal of the legend that Polycarp had met John and other Apostles is that since Polycarp was reputed to be a hard-core historicist pushing the narrative that Jesus really visited earth and the Disciples really sat at his feet, one might try to argue this supports the historicity of Jesus. That’s not so strong an argument as imagined, as either the Apostles or Polycarp may have been party to the transition in dogma from a revelatory to an earthly Christ figure. But still. It’s worth looking into.
The Sources
Our sources for these claims are not renowned for their reliability, but are all infamous apologists and polemicists mainstream scholars tend not to trust as authorities: Irenaeus, writing in the 180s A.D.; Tertullian, writing in the early 200s A.D., and Eusebius, writing in the early 300s A.D. It’s sometimes claimed these guys said Polycarp himself had said he had met actual Disciples of Jesus. Yes, that’s multiple layers of hearsay; but it’s also not even true.
Irenaeus
Irenaeus wrote two passages about Polycarp. The first comes in the context of Irenaeus attempting to claim there’s been an uninterrupted succession of bishops at Rome from the first Apostles to his own day, specifically to combat the contrary claims of heretics. But scholars know such succession lists, which only come late and are never sourced, are precisely the kind of thing propagandists invented for this very purpose. No one really trusts them anymore. Though it’s worth noting that Irenaeus admits “the apostles had known hidden mysteries, which they were in the habit of imparting to the ‘perfected’ apart and privily from the rest” of Christians and so we can be sure “they would have delivered them especially to those to whom they were also committing the Churches themselves” (Against Heresies 3.3.1). And of these bishops Irenaeus boasts the most about Clement, the author of 1 Clement that conspicuously shows no knowledge of an earthly Jesus or any Gospel narrative at all (On the Historicity of Jesus, Ch. 8.5).
Irenaeus then inexplicably diverges to discuss Polycarp for no clear reason, other than that he just happened to be another bishop, somewhere else, whom Irenaeus was keen to justify as having similar claims to pedigree:
Polycarp also was not only instructed by apostles, and conversed with many who had seen Christ, but was also, by apostles in Asia, appointed bishop of the Church in Smyrna, whom I also saw in my early youth, for he tarried a very long time, and, when a very old man, gloriously and most nobly suffering martyrdom, departed this life, having always taught the things which he had learned from the apostles, and which the Church has handed down, and which alone are true.
To these things all the Asiatic Churches testify, as do also those men who have succeeded Polycarp down to the present time—a man who was of much greater weight, and a more steadfast witness of truth, than Valentinus, and Marcion, and the rest of the heretics. He it was who, coming to Rome in the time of Anicetus caused many to turn away from the aforesaid heretics to the Church of God, proclaiming that he had received this one and sole truth from the apostles—that, namely, which is handed down by the Church.
There are also those who heard from him that John, the Disciple of the Lord, going to bathe at Ephesus, and perceiving Cerinthus within, rushed out of the bath-house without bathing, exclaiming, ‘Let us fly, lest even the bath-house fall down, because Cerinthus, the enemy of the truth, is within.’
…
There is also a very powerful Epistle of Polycarp written to the Philippians, from which those who choose to do so, and are anxious about their salvation, can learn the character of his faith, and the preaching of the truth.
Irenaeus, Against Heresies 3.3.4
Note what Irenaeus cagily doesn’t actually say here: he never says Polycarp said he got any of this from any actual Disciple. Irenaeus just “declares” that Polycarp was “instructed by apostles” and “conversed with many who had seen Christ.” But when Irenaeus gets to mentioning having met Polycarp himself and heard him preach, neither claim is there attributed to him. Irenaeus thus never actually says Polycarp said he was “instructed by apostles” and “conversed with many who had seen Christ.” Irenaeus just believes that he did, because it is what “the Asiatic Churches” say about Polycarp, “as do also those men who have succeeded Polycarp.” In other words, Irenaeus never heard Polycarp say any of this. Later men, after Polycarp was dead, started saying it. Exactly how legends are made.
Thus when Irenaeus does discuss what he heard Polycarp taught, Irenaeus himself describes it as what Polycarp “had learned from the apostles and which the Church has handed down,” which doesn’t mean Polycarp said he actually spoke to any apostle, only that he taught what he received from the apostles via “what the Church has handed down.” In other words, a supposed apostolic tradition. Not actual conversations with apostles. Everything else Irenaeus says, he says he got not from Polycarp, but others making claims about Polycarp afterward—conveniently unnamed others. The infamous “they” are the ones who said it. (As the totally actually historical Optronix once said, “They say a lot, don’t ‘they’?”)
Irenaeus then says “there are also those who heard from” Polycarp a possibly apocryphal story about John the Disciple. Notably, Irenaeus did not evidently hear any such story from Polycarp himself, despite having attended his lectures and sermons. No, Irenaeus only heard of this from, you know, someone. “Those who heard.” Whoever that is. I’m sure they’re totes reliable. But even as skeptical as we must be of his source, even this unnamed, unvetted source did not say Polycarp learned this story about John from John. They just said Polycarp told that story.
You can see the telephone game already operating here: Polycarp relayed what he claimed to be an apostolic tradition handed down of old, which becomes “Polycarp related what he received from the apostles,” which becomes “Polycarp met the apostles.” Likewise, “Polycarp told stories about John the Disciple” becomes “Polycarp knew John the Disciple,” which becomes “Polycarp was hanging out with John the Disciple once and totes saw him pwn Cerinthus at the baths!”
In the end, the one place we should actually hear any of this, the very letter written by Polycarp that Irenaeus so forcefully recommends, never once relates any of these facts. Polycarp’s Epistle to the Philippians does not mention having ever met John the Disciple or any Apostles or having received anything directly from any of them. In fact, it pretty much reveals he can’t have; but does reveal how legends he did might have arisen, through a “creative reading” of what he did say.
For Polycarp mentions the apostles only twice in his letter, later as historical examples of sufferers-for-Christ (but no mention of Polycarp himself ever having seen them suffer; a strange opportunity missed in his letter if he had), and before that when he admonishes fellow Christians to continue enduring “as the Lord Himself has commanded us, and as the apostles who preached the Gospel unto us, and the prophets who proclaimed beforehand,” clearly meaning traditions handed down. But one could easily telephone-game this from “preached unto us” to “preached unto me” and thence to “preached unto me directly.” Though that would be no more true of what Polycarp meant than that Polycarp meant he met the prophets of old or Jesus himself. But again, that’s how legends are created. Similarly, Polycarp never mentions knowing John in this letter, but does quote the Epistle 1 John, twice, without attribution—thus easily inspiring the legend that maybe Polycarp was quoting John personally, and not just some revered letters attributed to said John. Again, how legends are made.
We start to see how this legend was growing in Irenaeus’s own hands when elsewhere Irenaeus describes Papias as “the hearer of John and a companion of Polycarp” (in Against Heresies 5.33.4). Not Polycarp was the hearer of John. Moreover, we know from Eusebius (History of the Church 3.39) that the “John” Papias meant was not John the Apostle, but a much later John, John the Elder (Ibid. 4-6). Papias was older than Polycarp. Yet Papias himself never says he met any Apostles—John or otherwise—but only rummaged the earth for rumors others were telling about what the apostles of old had said. As with Polycarp, the notion that Papias met any apostles was a later legend claimed by others, but clearly contradicted in quotations of Papias himself. And if Papias was an older companion of Polycarp, and Papias never met any Apostles, it’s fair to say Polycarp didn’t either. To the contrary, by confusing which John Papias claimed to have tutored under, the legend grew that Papias had studied under John the Disciple, and as Papias was a companion of Polycarp, this became “Polycarp studied under John the Disciple.” Just another telephone game.
Of course one could also note that all this being the case, it’s now unclear what was meant by “those who had seen Jesus.” As that could merely be a reference to those who received revelations of the Christ. We therefore cannot extract any means of verifying the historicity of Jesus here, even if we could trust anything after these several, often anonymous layers of hearsay. This is the nature of the Christian legend. And the incompetence and gullibility of its promulgators.
Tertullian
We then see the legend grow under Tertullian, writing in the early 200s A.D. When likewise trying to defend his sect’s apostolic succession lists invented to combat heresy, he insists the church of Smyrna was claiming in his own day “that Polycarp was placed therein by John,” by analogy to “the church of Rome, which makes Clement to have been ordained in like manner by Peter,” thus implying the John ordaining Polycarp the Bishop of Smyrna was John the Disciple (Prescription against Heretics 32.2). But that’s fairly impossible. Indeed, the Clement ordination Tertullian claims analogous would have to have happened a hundred years earlier, as Clement was reporting from his position at Rome that Peter had died before the late 60s A.D., before Polycarp was even born (see OHJ, Ch. 8.5).
Which is why this Polycarp legend, like most Christian legends, is wildly implausible. Polycarp was bishop in Smyrna in the mid-2nd century. John the Apostle would have to be over 100 years old to have installed him. Not likely. But more importantly, as we just saw, decades earlier, Irenaeus, who actually met Polycarp, says he was only appointed bishop there by unnamed “apostles in Asia,” thus not yet having heard the tall tale that it was John in particular. To the contrary, Irenaeus merely thought Polycarp once met John. And as we saw, even that was all decades-later, second-hand, anonymous hearsay, and most definitely wasn’t even true, as even Polycarp’s elder companion had never met John—or any Apostle. It’s possible someone named John ordained Polycarp bishop at Smyrna. But it certainly can’t have been the Disciple.
Thus, by the time this legend percolates all of the way to Jerome in the late 4th century, the legend has become full-on, “Polycarp, disciple of the Apostle John and by him ordained bishop of Smyrna, was chief of all Asia, where he saw and had as teachers some of the Apostles and of those who had seen the Lord.” But when we look earlier in the chain of custody we find none of this is true; though we can see how the telephone game got there.
Eusebius
On the road to that full blown legend is Eusebius, writing half way in between Tertullian and Jerome, and almost a century and a half after Irenaeus. Eusebius quotes a letter that he claims to be by Irenaeus against the heretic Florinus, in which Irenaeus is made to say:
I remember the events of that time more clearly than those of recent years. For what boys learn, growing with their mind, becomes joined with it; so that I am able to describe the very place in which the blessed Polycarp sat as he discoursed, and his goings out and his comings in, and the manner of his life, and his physical appearance, and his discourses to the people, and the accounts which he gave of his intercourse with John and with the others who had seen the Lord. And as he remembered their words, and what he heard from them concerning the Lord, and concerning his miracles and his teaching, having received them from eyewitnesses of the ‘Word of life,’ Polycarp related all things in harmony with the Scriptures.
Eusebius, History of the Church 5.20.6
You can see that this letter contradicts what we know Irenaeus himself said, yet clearly builds on what he said, exaggerating and embellishing it into a full-blown legend that Irenaeus himself actually heard Polycarp say all these things as a boy, the very thing Irenaeus conspicuously did not say in his own actual writings—as we just saw. What Irenaeus only heard as misinterpreted rumors decades after Polycarp died has now become “Irenaeus the direct eyewitness” to Polycarp himself saying them! Such is how legends grow.
It’s all the more telling that though we have extensive anti-heretical writings from Irenaeus, nowhere in them is any mention of a Florinus. Tertullian likewise had no knowledge of such a letter either when he wrote against Florinus decades after the time of Irenaeus. Eusebius similarly cites another dubious letter attributed to Irenaeus against a certain Victor saying much the same thing—mentioning Polycarp having “always observed” Christian rites “with John the disciple of our Lord, and the other apostles with whom he had associated” (History of the Church, 5.24.16). There is no Victor in the actual anti-heretical writings of Irenaeus either.
Conclusion
Of course many people, perhaps even Polycarp, could have lied about having been tutored by the original Apostles simply to establish their authority. Or met them once decades ago and simply altered what they really taught. But even when Irenaeus says Polycarp taught creeds from and legends about the Apostle John, he does not say Polycarp received those creeds or stories from John. And when we look at Polycarp’s own writings and those of his elder friend Papias, it becomes fairly certain he did not. Instead, we get a telephone game that only becomes a later legend that Polycarp met “John and the Apostle” and “those who saw Jesus.”
Hey Richard its been awhile since I made a comment.
About a year ago I shared with you that you had been a big factor in my change to leave religion behind.
Well it’s been 16 months and no religion and life is going great. I’ve also managed to tell a few supportive friends about your work and they have purchased your ebook, the big one. Joe is really into your research and loves your deep stuff.
Just wanted to let you know.
Dave
It always seemed to me that picking common names without really specifying who they were was likely a deliberate trick to falsely imply an authority.
Very interesting, I learned a lot. Thank you for writing this. Elaine Olson
Brilliant analysis of how legends grow and how they survive; as secondary and tertiary sources are credited as primary sources. Thoroughly enjoyed the article- a real eye opener. Best regards
what about Saint Ignatius of Antioch? did this one really meet the apostles as its claimed?
There is no authentic letter by Ignatius where he says he met an Apostle.
Thanks Richard. Curious what you think about David Trobisch’s argument that Polycarp is the most likely candidate for the person or circle of people who published the first edition of the New Testament. He makes the specific case for Polycarp here
http://trobisch.com/david/wb/media/articles/20071226%20FreeInquiry%20Who%20Published%20Christian%20Bible%20BW.pdf
but to appreciate the argument one has to read his excellent book, The First Edition of the NT.
Thanks
He presented this at the Amherst conference I attended and blogged about years ago. It’s a plausible suspect. But unprovable on present evidence.
Dr. Carrier, I have a couple questions about your discussion of Tertullian and Eusebius. First, in Chapter 32 of The Prescription Against Heretics, Tertullian says the following right before the lines that you quote:
It seems that Tertullian was confident that certain churches had written records by which they could trace their succession of bishops to the apostles. Do you think that those written succession lists would have been fabricated? If so, how might it have happened?
Second, your comments on Eusebius suggest that the quoted letters to Florinus and Victor are forgeries. If so, are there other scholars who have endorsed this view? And more importantly, how would these forgeries have been able to gain enough acceptance to fool Eusebius given their presumably late appearance?
Note the “heretics” he is talking about also had those things (he is using rhetoric here, “fake news” as we would say today). For example, Marcionite churches claimed direct succession from Paul, and Paul from Peter. Every heresy had a “fake list” of their apostolic pedigrees. Tertullian’s “orthodoxy” isn’t any different from them. His churches had fake pedigrees too. Tertullian is essentially lying, pretending only his churches had these, as an argument against them. After all, they don’t get to “respond” inside his text.
It also doesn’t help to have these lists even if authentic. Eusebius for example produces the one Tertullian would most likely be talking about, the succession list at Rome. But that list contains no information at all regarding which teachings were passed on, much less which versions of which texts (and not just books, but textual variants of books). It is certainly the case that Paul brought his teachings to “a” church at Rome, for example; but churches kept fragmenting and dividing. They could all claim succession from Paul. But none had the same teachings anymore. Every heresy was like that; and orthodoxy clearly was, too, as Tertullian’s own sect was teaching things certainly foreign to Paul, and advancing tons of ridiculous legends unknown in Paul’s day (far beyond what got in the canon). So Tertullian’s argument is facetious as well as dubious.
I can’t recall which scholars have likewise doubted the authenticity of the letters only Eusebius knew about and that contradict Irenaeus’s own writings (I know even more scholars think they are, or could be, authentic but that Irenaeus is lying, having exaggerated things he wrote more truly earlier in life, hence I don’t commit to either view: the evidence establishes it’s one or the other); but Eusebius is widely agreed to be unreliable in his gullible acceptance of forged documents. He doesn’t even blink at the letter he produces from Jesus (!) to King Abgar, for example. He also gullibly believes the Testimonium Flavianum. Eusebius simply trusted whatever was in his library, as long as it agreed with his dogmas. If something said it was by Irenaeus, for example, Eusebius presents it as by Irenaeus. As long as it supports anything Eusebius wanted said. Eusebius had no real way of “checking” authenticity, and wasn’t interested in doing so if a text supported something he wanted to say. This is one of several reasons modern historians widely regard Eusebius’s history with considerable suspicion.
Thanks for the response; it pretty much satisfies my concerns. As a follow-up question, I’m interested in the fake lists that you mention the Marcionites and other heretics having—what’s the evidence that they had (fake) succession lists?
Well, you could assume on equal evidence that all their lists were legitimate. Same result. But no one believes all these lists were real.
We can tell from Papias that no one had such lists earlier on, and that people had lost track of even what went on in Christianity in the period from the 60s to the 130s. The lists only appear later, unsourced. And everyone had their own. Which is why few scholars today trust them.
But as I noted, even if they were real, they tell us nothing, because mere names are not what we want to know. We want to know what each party said to the next one, what traditions they kept or changed, and whether they actually chose their successors or someone else did (e.g. one man can be ousted and another appointed by the congregation or a faction, causing a complete change in teachings, and it would look identical on a mere list of successors), etc. So even if we could somehow verify any of these lists were accurate and not made up later (and we can’t), we’re in the same place we started.
I worded my question poorly. I agree with you that if several lists were floating around, then there’s no good way for us to know which ones, if any, were real. What I was trying to ask earlier was for the evidence that Marcionites and other heretics had any succession lists whatsoever, real or fake (since I’ve never heard that claim before and since Tertullian seems confident enough to deny that they did).
I do have a second question, though, since you brought up Papias. What aspects of Papias would you say show that no one had succession lists early on?
And thanks for your time and patience in answering my questions.
Tertullian never actually denies his opponents also had such lists. You have been fooled by his rhetoric. He carefully avoids actually saying that.
The heretics were actually the first to claim succession lists, e.g. the Marcionite succession list is attested several places (e.g. the Adamantine Dialogue); Marcion himself claimed succession directly from the bishop of Sinope (and thus claimed the same succession list thereunder, all the way back to the Apostle Paul, and through him, Peter). Valentinus was even earlier, and he claimed succession all the way back likewise to Paul, through Paul’s successor Theudas. Similar succession claims are known for the Sabellians (through Noetus, an ordained presbyter of Tertullian’s sect), the Naasenes (claiming succession through Mary via the Apostle James the Just), the Montanists “claimed they received the prophetic gift from the prophets Quadratus and Ammia of Philadelphia, figures believed to have been part of a line of prophetic succession stretching all the way back to Agabus (1st century AD) and to the daughters of Philip the Evangelist,” who could claim endorsement from Paul, the Ebionites claimed direct succession from James (they kept to strict Torah observance and rejected all successions from Paul as illegitimate), the Ophites claimed succession from Simon Magus (and asserted he was an apostle directly taught by Jesus). Even later heresies claimed the same bishop succession lists as Tertullian’s churches did! (For instance, Nestorianism, Arianism, etc.)
Tertullian’s lists only appear to ever be mentioned after the earlier succession claims were made (e.g. by Marcion, Valentinus, etc.), and thus appear to be a response to it. Just like the canon: the original canon was Marcionite; “our” canon was invented to respond to that one.
As to Papias, no one who quotes Papias attesting facts of the early church ever quotes him mentioning succession lists (yet they surely would have, had he done do), and the quotes we do have from Papias show doctrine was then not being disseminated by any specific succession but by diverse successions, informally and orally (e.g. he says he hunted down and spoke to people who were the disciples of apostles or the disciples of the disciples of apostles; there being, evidently, no single tradition he could hew to), and what Papias reports is frequently demonstrably false, confused, or poorly informed, thus demonstrating there was no reliable transmission of anything in his day.
It seems to me that you are also in the same boat with Eusebius, et al — “as long as it supports anything [add your name] wanted said.”
You also have no way of checking those ancient sources just as “[Add your name] had no real way of ‘checking’ authenticity and wasn’t interesting in doing so.”
Just as you stated that Eusebius, et al, simply wrote what he saw or heard at face value, to promote his views, you do the same. There is No difference between those you criticize as “infamous apologists and polemicists” and yourself —
“But there’s no evidence that’s true; and it’s highly unlikely. The short answer to the question, “Did he?” is no.” (and you know this how?)
“Our sources for these claims are not renowned for their reliability, but are all infamous apologists and polemicists …”
(How do you know this!?!)
“but it’s also not even true.” “No one really trusts them anymore.” (You say this with such conviction)
“The infamous “they” are the ones who said it. (As the totally actually historical Optronix once said, “They say a lot, don’t ‘they’?”)”
(And yet you accept this because….)
“In fact, it pretty much reveals he can’t have; but does reveal how legends he did might have arisen, through a “creative reading” of what he did say.”
(“creative reading” — Is that what you call an infamous apologist’s and polemicist’s writings and readings, instead of lies?)
“We therefore cannot extract any means of verifying the historicity of Jesus here, even if we could trust anything after these several, often anonymous layers of hearsay. This is the nature of the Christian legend. And the incompetence and gullibility of its promulgators.”
Your Conclusion: “Of course many people, perhaps even Polycarp, could have lied about having been tutored by the original Apostles simply to establish their authority. Or met them once decades ago and simply altered what they really taught.”
With one fell swoop, your view is that these Christians were really not sincere “Christians” but “infamous” liars and fabricators. They “simply altered” what Christ and His apostles and disciples taught. They were living a lie, pretending to be Heralds of Truth —
Therefore, they were not “buying” into the doctrine of eternal life and forgiveness of sins, and since all this was altered, there is No eternal damnation, and judgment, either!
And so they “lied” willfully, and spread their pernicious lies to family and friends?
Furthermore, since there really is no Judgment, our family, friends, and mankind in general, will be fine and do okay, With our Lies [alterations of what we have received], there is No fuss no muss, no harm done…and we can and [did] sleep well at night. Well, except those who recanted, cursed Jesus, and offered sacrifices to the god caesar emperor, because they knew the “truth” and did not want to die for a lie!
PS: No need to reply…I am convinced that you are convinced that you have the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but…
Sincerely said and with all due respect…
This is true for Eusebius. See How To Fabricate History: The Example of Eusebius on Alexandrian Christianity.
Whereas I cite all my sources and everything I say is checkable: you have access to every source you want to check, either online or via interlibrary loan. Neither is true for Eusebius et al.
If you want advice on how to check things, see:
Because I checked. So can you.
Because I checked. So can you.
Because it’s true. You can verify that yourself.
(Though granted, that last one is hyperbole. Fundamentalists and amateurs, for example, are not being included here. I’m only speaking of mainstream, peer-reviewed scholarship on these matters.)
Because it’s true. The source is cited. So you can check and confirm it yourself.
My phrase is more inclusive of lying. So, it includes lying; it also allows other possibilities (from bad methodology to gullibility, e.g. someone speculates, then someone repeats that speculation erroneously as fact, and then our surviving sources gullibly repeat that). That way we don’t have to over-claim. We have all bases covered. None of them are good news for anyone who wants to believe this stuff.
That is a conclusion I reached from extensively studying and fact-checking them. You can replicate that process and discover this yourself. I’m just reporting my findings; which amounts to predicting what you will find if you do the same. And predictions are testable. You just have to run the experiment: go check; and see what you find.
But spoiler alert, it will be things like this and this and this and this and this and this. And so on.
Probably. This is my point. But there are other ways they err. Bad methods (poor logic, fallacious reasoning, mishearing things, misreading things) and gullibility (genuinely believing the errors and lies of others) are prominent examples.
Indeed. There are better ways to be sure of that. For example:
Yep. Like so many preachers and apologists still do. Yet at the same time, many were sincere, but simply were gullibly over-trusting, or applied bad methods to the case, per above. This is why so many false religions still exist, from Islam to Mormonism to Hinduism, and every deviant sect of Christianity today. It’s the same process.
False. This does tremendous harm.
All false religions are bad. And all epistemologies that allow you to fall for one are worse.
Lots of people die for a lie. Just look at the martyrs for Islam and even Marxism.
Some because they value the lie (it serves a cause they value greater than themselves). Some because they gullibly don’t know it’s a lie. And others are dying for something else altogether (like misplaced hope; or a mistaken belief that a vision or dream really came from gods and spirits and not themselves).
Although take care here: most stories about this are false. Even the claim that people died for this is itself often a lie.
The reason I am confident is that I checked. I did the work. I looked at all the evidence. And it was, in the end, overwhelming.
If you did the same work, if you checked as thoroughly, and did so without fallacious methods designed to protect rather than detect false beliefs, you’ll end up where I am. As countless others already have. Look around and you’ll see only the naive and the gullible and the determinedly delusional don’t. Only those who don’t think logically (or don’t argue honestly) resist the facts.
In result there are only two kinds of believers now: those who don’t really check; and those who lie about what they found.
All you are doing is proving Ploycarp wasn’t Apostle John’s disciple by circumstantial evidence and guesswork. (I admit it’s pretty convincing.)
But it’s no different than a Christian using the same circumstantial evidence to prove Polycarp was The Apostle John’s pupil.
One theory just guesses that Polycarp wasn’t because it COULD have been “The Telephone Game” .
The other says Polycarp was since circumstantial Hearsay evidence don’t always mean it’s untrue.
American Courts don’t like hearsay, circumstantial evidence, guesswork and faith. Therefore, Richard Carrier and The Christian would both lose.
It’s actually the other way around: no court of law would accept any extant evidence as evidence Polycarp was John’s Disciple. Federal Rules of Evidence for authentication require more than this. That is my point. Thus the law backs my position. It is a fallacy to argue “maybe, therefore probably.” That’s not history; that’s apologetics.
Dr. Carrier, thank you for your articles and expertise that you share with us. I was wondering if you have a book/article recommendation that thoroughly goes through why the 4 gospels are anonymous and could not have been written by the apostles. I see this scattered here and there but haven’t seen anything in depth that completely answers every apologetic argument. Thank you for your time Dr. Carrier!
It’s so mainstream I’ve never had occasion to duplicate the work that’s already been done on that. But I do summarize that work (its principle basis) in my article Three Things to Know about New Testament Manuscripts. And for an example of defending that mainstream consensus against Christian apologetics see my debate with Jonathan Sheffield regarding the Long Ending of Mark. See also Why You Should Not Believe the Apostle John Wrote the Last Gospel.
Dr. Carrier,
Does Irenaeus not also claim that he heard from Polycarp himself in “Against Heresies” in one of the sections you quoted above:
“Polycarp also was not only instructed by apostles, and conversed with many who had seen Christ, but was also, by apostles in Asia, appointed bishop of the Church in Smyrna, whom I also saw in my early youth, for he tarried a very long time, and, when a very old man, gloriously and most nobly suffering martyrdom, departed this life, having always taught the things which he had learned from the apostles, and which the Church has handed down, and which alone are true.”
He says, “whom I also saw in my early youth, for he tarried a very long time…having always taught the things which he had learned from the apostles”
Yes, he acknowledges that the Church has handed down what Polycarp had learnt from the apostles, but this not mean that Irenaeus did not also hear him say those very things as well. He could be claiming here that he also heard those things as a youth and that the Church handed them down–being he was probably too young to have any influence at that time. But he assures that what the Church handed down is true.
Thoughts?
He does not actually say he heard any of this from Polycarp. In fact he conspicuously does not say that. His source is just a legend, what “all the Asiatic Churches testify” in his own day now.
Hence as I said: “Note what Irenaeus cagily doesn’t actually say here: he never says Polycarp said he got any of this from any actual Disciple,” much less John. And “when Irenaeus gets to mentioning having met Polycarp himself and heard him preach, neither claim is there attributed to him.”
He does not say the very thing you want him to have said. He weirdly even goes out of his way to avoid saying that.
There is a tremendous amount of information in what a propagandist does not say. That information cannot be erased by replacing it with the very gullible speculations the propagandist is trying to dupe you into thinking while still having enough scruple not to openly lie to you about.
We should take Irenaeus at his word. He did not hear this from Polycarp. He heard it from later spewers of legend. His only cited sources. If he had heard it from Polycarp, he would have said so. The fact that he didn’t is why we can conclude, indeed, he didn’t get this from there. He got it from where he says he got it from. And even if you wish to gullibly resist this obvious conclusion, you still don’t have him saying he heard any of this from Polycarp. So there is no evidence of that. Not even from Irenaeus.
Add to this the fact that Polycarp himself, in his own extant letter where he surely would mention such a detail, never says such a thing, and the conclusion is clinched.
Hi Dr. Carrier,
I appreciate your response. I feel like I am missing something here. Also, there is no thing that I want him to say. Personally, I would love to be able to prove he lied about the connection between Polycarp and John. It would help to further support my belief system. But if I grabbed a hold of that notion without the available evidence at hand confirming it then I would just be deceiving myself.
So here is my interpretation. In Against Heresies, Irenaeus says that he personally saw Polycarp during his early youth and claimed that he “always taught the things which he had learned from the apostles”.
Then, in Fragments From the Lost Writings of Irenaeus, in Chapter 3, he says to Florinus:
“For, while I was yet a boy, I saw you in Lower Asia with Polycarp…I can even describe the place where the blessed Polycarp used to sit and discourse — his going out, too, and his coming in — his general mode of life and personal appearance, together with the discourses which he delivered to the people; also how he would speak of his familiar intercourse with John, and with the rest of those who had seen the Lord; and how he would call their words to remembrance. Whatsoever things he had heard from them respecting the Lord, both with regard to His miracles and His teaching, Polycarp having thus received [information] from the eye-witnesses of the Word of life, would recount them all in harmony with the Scriptures. These things, through, God’s mercy which was upon me, I then listened to attentively, and treasured them up not on paper, but in my heart;”
That is consistent, in my opinion, with what he said in Against Heresies, that he listened to Polycarp as a boy. Here, however, he elaborates on those childhood experiences of seeing Polycarp in person, claiming he personally heard Polycarp claim that he had discourse with John and the rest of those who seen Christ.
What exactly am I missing here?
He doesn’t lie. Everything he says is 100% the truth. Just pay close attention to what he actually says. He says current legends claim Polycarp knew John. That’s it. He never says Polycarp himself said this; not even when he says he saw him as a child (he doesn’t even say he saw him speak). Conspicuously, exactly where he would say Polycarp said this if he had, he doesn’t. Meaning he didn’t.
Irenaeus is being perfectly honest here. He has simply arranged the rhetoric to sound like he has said he got this from Polycarp, but in fact he has carefully arranged it to not say that. So he is being deceptive. But only by telling the hyper-literal truth. Like any clever witness in the dock who doesn’t want to commit perjury but also wants the jury to mistakenly think they said something they didn’t.
Hence, for example, when you say “Irenaeus says that he personally saw Polycarp during his early youth and claimed that he ‘always taught the things which he had learned from the apostles’,” you exhibit yourself as a fooled juror. Because you just changed what Irenaeus said. Which error Irenaeus probably intended. Here is what Irenaeus actually said: “whom I also saw in my early youth…[then] having departed this life having always taught the things which he had learned from the apostles [etc.]…to these things all the Asiatic Churches testify.”
Notice the trick. He has shell-gamed you. He mentions seeing him once. But when it comes time to say he “taught the things which he had learned from the apostles” he credits the source as “all the Asiatic Churches.” Not himself. So he has actually not said Irenaeus heard Polycarp say this. Irenaeus is saying he personally believes Polycarp was teaching what he learned from the Apostles because the churches in Irenaeus’s day claim this. You’ve been duped. And yet all he did was tell the literal truth. So literally, in fact, that he fooled you into thinking he said something that he didn’t.
As for the letter to Florinus, we don’t have that. As I explain in the article you are commenting on, we have a quotation from Eusebius, a known liar who relies on dubious and forged documents a lot (e.g. the letter to Abgar; the Testimonium Flavianum; etc.—see How To Fabricate History: The Example of Eusebius on Alexandrian Christianity). And when we look at what Irenaeus says in the document we actually have from him, it contradicts that letter (he says he only saw him once as a child, not any of this other stuff, and that the information he has about him comes from Asiatic church legend, not Polycarp himself).
This confirms the letter is a forgery. If Irenaeus really thought what he is made to say in To Florinus, it’s what he would have said in Against Heresies. But the author of the latter had never heard of the things said by the author of the former. That’s why we can’t trust it. (The letter’s content is also ridiculous and does not reflect Irenaeus’s discourse style—just compare the writing style, sentence structure, and vocabulary of the passage we actually have from Irenaeus—which are also reflective of forgeries.)
Faking claims of being a witness to the apostles was a cottage industry in Christianity (see a long list in Ehrman’s Forgery and Counterforgery, pp. 270–74; Ehrman assumes Irenaeus is lying, but all the most comparable examples Ehrman lists are forgeries, so we should conclude the same of this). And this was particularly the case for “John.” For more on that point see (with more examples) Why You Should Not Believe the Apostle John Wrote the Last Gospel.
Thanks Dr. Carrier for yet another response, and a detailed one at that. I just finished reading it and will take some time to ponder on your words. As soon as I do, I will respond again. But I just wanted to thank you in the mean time until then!
Hey Richard, I enjoyed this article. You may have already said this but could you point me to some sources that back up the fact that the consensus among scholars is that Polycarp did not meet John the Apostle? I think the best argument is the age difference.
I haven’t found much in the way of non-confessional discussions of this, of any real substance (i.e., that are based on anything like a thorough examination of the evidence and background context, e.g. the ubiquitous lying and fabrication among Christians in this period).
A common move is to change when he died (and hence when he was born), in order to bypass that argument (the circularity of that reasoning is lost on the historians who do this; invalid methodology is a ubiquitous defect in this field). Another common move is to state unexamined ambivalence (i.e. declaring for no position and simply stating that it’s possible but not certain).
The age argument isn’t conclusive, after all. The traditional age and dates put his birth in 69. We have no good evidence any apostle survived beyond that year. But if John was 30 in 30 A.D., then for Polycarp to have been instructed by him he’d have to have been at minimum 7 years old (and that’s a stretch; more likely he’d be in his teens or twenties), which puts the date at 76 A.D. So John would have to be 76. Not impossible but it does bear a statistical prior improbability. But maybe John was recruited as an apostle in his teens. Then he’d be in his 60s when he tutored Polycarp. That’s also unlikely, but an order of magnitude more likely than for him to survive into his 70s. (Again, without specific evidence he did, the probability he did falls back to the prior probability, which is the population statistical probability.) If Polycarp was supposed to be in his teens, John would have to be in his 80s. Again, not impossible. But even less probable. Polycarp himself is supposed to have unusually lived as long. And so on.
I think it’s more important to note that Polycarp never says this, and that even Irenaeus doesn’t (if you read him closely), except in a ridiculous letter produced a century later that is surely a forgery (an extremely common, indeed routine, literary production for Christians of this period). So, the earlier and more reliable the evidence, the less it sounds like he ever was tutored by John but only “saw” him once, perhaps as a child.
There remains of course the problem that Polycarp could just as easily be a liar as anyone else; likewise anyone claiming to be the apostle John. We can’t verify that any grifter claiming that really was that John, or that the real John wouldn’t pick up any scheme of lying that suited his agenda, or that Polycarp wouldn’t. So the evidence, even that we have and even read as gullibly as possible, is still unreliable. We don’t know who is telling the truth in any of these layers of tradition. And since Christians routinely lied about things like this, it’s even harder to trust any of them.
But to answer your question:
Typical examples of non-confessional treatment of this question include:
Thomas Slater, “Dating the Apocalypse to John, Revisited,” Review & Expositor 114.2 (2017), 247-53 (who offers the age argument for skepticism that you mention).
And Kenneth Berding, “John or Paul? Who Was Polycarp’s Mentor?” Tyndale Bulletin 59.1 (2008). He declares, “I am not convinced that it can be certainly known either that Polycarp had personal contacts with the Apostle John, or that he had contact with a certain John the Elder (if such a person ever actually existed). There does not seem to be enough independent material either to collaborate or to dismiss the testimony of Irenaeus (and those that follow him) on this point.”
I think he should be more skeptical. But he already is fatally skeptical enough for apologetical tastes. He also observes “It is interesting that Irenaeus does not say Polycarp was taught by John (an interesting omission since it would have helped his argument) but that John lived in Ephesus until the time of Trajan, thus implying that Polycarp would have been acquainted with him,” and it is worth pointing out that the idea of John living to “Trajan” (98 at the earliest) is effectively impossible (one could remotely imagine a teenaged John surviving to 98 A.D. or some extraordinary prodigy of a man living to the age of 98, but both lay in such low prior probabilities as to beggar belief), which suggests Irenaeus had no real information about the Apostle John, or once again confused John the Apostle with John the Elder (as so many others did, as Berding also points out).
Thank you so much for taking the time to respond with such a well thought out and thorough answer!
Dr. Carrier, first time visit your blog and want to ask you this question.
Iranaeue probably never met Polycarp as you mentioned. Perhaps, Polycarp’s claim he was the disciple of John is also fabrication narrative from Iranaeus? I don’t find Polycarp’s epistle to Philippians looks authenticity. Probably later forgery.
Iraneus mentions name Papias and Cerdo. Papias is well known for testimony who wrote Mark and Matthew. But I am thinking Papias is not real existed person but his name in Greek is ‘duck’, which symbolize ‘faithful’. His fragments are all fabricated by Iranaeus also, I think.
And about Cerdo, he is explicitly can see fake character deceived Marcion to join in his heresy. Cerdo also means in Greek ‘profit’ which Iranaeus tried to claim Marcion is depraved person like Simon Magus. This theme derive to Tertullian, he create narrative, Marcion donated 200,000 sesterces to church of Rome.
Is my question and analysis sound plausible?
It’s not especially.
First, all ancient names meant things. So there is no way to argue “this name had a meaning, therefore it isn’t real.” Indeed names can even be self-chosen or imputed nicknames. To identify a fictional name requires more evidence than this.
Second, Irenaeus is not a reliable narrator and probably not always honest, so it is reasonable to question what he says about himself. But we can’t translate that suspicion into a certainty. The letter of Irenaeus does clearly look like a forgery (and a bad one at that); but his own statements do seem to be so carefully phrased as to suggest he is telling the truth literally, just in such a way as to give some readers false impressions. I discuss this already above. But, of course, he might also be lying.
Third, Polycarp’s epistle may be a forgery, but I see no particular reason to think so, and as it contains no evidence of the things being claimed, it still leaves those claims in doubt.
Fourth, Simon Magus is someone whose existence can be doubted (his contextual invention in Acts suggests fiction; and everything else later written about him is fabulous to the point of ridiculous); but we don’t have that kind of evidence for Cerdo or Papias.
Fifth, Papias is quoted by a number of different authors, demonstrating an actual text did exist. It’s unlikely Irenaeus fabricated an entire book under a fake name just to occasionally quote it (if he did, he’d make it a far more useful trove of data to quote than it appears to have been). It’s more likely the book independently existed for him (and many others) to quote.