Church Fathers

This page will be a work in progress.  Learning what I can about the Fathers of Christianity

Peter


Paul


Barnabas


John Calvin


Martin Luther


John Chrisostom


Saint Augustine


Justin Martyr


St. Ignatius

Eusebius: Provides a detailed list of bishops that stretched from James, the brother of Jesus, to the time of Bar-Kokhba (Ecclesiastical History 4.5; contradicting his claim that the followers of Jesus had all fled to Pella during or after 70 C.E.)

He then lists the 15 bishops as follows:

James, ‘the Lord’s brother,’ First Bishop of Jerusalem
Symeon, Second Bishop of Jerusalem
Justus, Third Bishop of Jerusalem
Zacchaeus, Fourth Bishop of Jerusalem
Tobias, Fifth Bishop of Jerusalem
Benjamin, Sixth Bishop of Jerusalem
John, Seventh Bishop of Jerusalem
Matthias, Eighth Bishop of Jerusalem
Philip, Ninth Bishop of Jerusalem
Seneca, Tenth Bishop of Jerusalem
Justus II, Eleventh Bishop of Jerusalem
Levi, Twelfth Bishop of Jerusalem
Ephres, Thirteenth Bishop of Jerusalem
Joseph, Fourteenth Bishop of Jerusalem
and Judas, Fifteenth Bishop of Jerusalem, and the last Jew to hold that office till modern times.
Eusebius then finishes by saying that

“that was the number of bishops in the city of Jerusalem from Apostolic times to the date mentioned (i.e., A.D. 135), all of them of the Circumcision.”

Jerusalem Bishops of Gentile Origin

We know that in A.D.135, the Emperor Hadrian banished all Jews from Jerusalem, and its surrounding area, and for the very first time put an end to the Jewish name of the country/province of Judaea, by renaming it Syria Palaestina, making it the first record ever that the name Palestine was used by anyone.

It is interesting for us Hebrew Catholics to note how different the name of the next fifteen bishops of Jerusalem are, since A.D. 135, all of whom, of course, are Gentiles. Eusebius lists them as follows:

Marcus, Sixteenth Bishop of Jerusalem
Cassian, Seventeenth Bishop of Jerusalem
Publius, Eighteenth Bishop of Jerusalem
Maximus, Nineteenth Bishop of Jerusalem
Julian, Twentieth Bishop of Jerusalem
Gaius, Twenty-first Bishop of Jerusalem
Symmachus, Twenty-second Bishop of Jerusalem
Gaius II, Twenty-third Bishop of Jerusalem
Julian II, Twenty-fourth Bishop of Jerusalem
Capito, Twenty-fifth Bishop of Jerusalem
Maximus II, Twenty-sixth Bishop of Jerusalem
Antoninus, Twenty-seventh Bishop of Jerusalem
Valens, Twenty-eighth Bishop of Jerusalem
Dolichianus, Twenty-ninth Bishop of Jerusalem
Narcissus, Thirtieth Bishop of Jerusalem
The Modern Era

This brings us up to the modern era, while firmly recalling that no less than a total of fifteen of the very first Catholic bishops of Jerusalem were Jews.

Our Holy Father, Pope John Paul II, successor of another Jew, St. Simon Peter, first Bishop of Antioch, and later first Bishop of Rome, capital of the vast Roman Empire, named Jean-Baptiste Gourion, Abbo of the Benedictine Abbey at Abu Ghosh, Israel, Auxiliary Bishop of Jerusalem, for the Hebrew-speaking Catholics of Israel.This was the first time since 135 A.D. that a Hebrew Catholic was named Bishop of Jerusalem.

Thus, when Abbot Gourion was consecrated Bishop at the nearby Church of Our Lady, Ark of the Covenant (where the Ark of the Covenant was brought after its return from the Philistines, as per I Sam 7:1 and II Sam 6:3-4) by the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Michael Sabbah, on 9 November 2003, he was the first Jew in 1868 years to be made a Bishop of the Holy City of Jerusalem.

As Hebrew Catholics, we greatly rejoice and say with feeling Baruch haShem Adonai! (Blessed be the Name of the Lord!)

Arius: 
Consider a heretic.  Arius (erroneously) taught that Christ, the Living Word of God, was subordinate to the Father.  According to Arius, Jesus was distinctly "other" than the Father, a created being, created before time began. To suggest that Jesus was fully God was to deny the oneness of God.  His teachings were quickly rejected and condemned by the Bishop Alexander.  In 320, Arius was removed from his position. (1)


Athanasius:
Stood as a defender of the Nicene faith.  The church remembers him as one of the greatest champions of right belief.  He was (falsely) accused of practicing magic.  (Falsely) Charged with killing another bishop.  He was exiled, in all, 5 times. He was a staunch deefender of the doctrine of the incarnation and full divinity of Christ.  Affirming that God is three in one, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

In his Easter Letter (there are 45 Easter Letters, this is referring to #39), he listed 27 books of scripture for the NT.  These are the ones we include in most Christian Bibles. (1)



Marcion:
Wanted to exclude the OT from scripture, he believed the God of the Old Testament was not the same God revealed in Jesus Christ.  His list was rejected by church leaders. (1)


Basil The Great:
Brother of Gregory (of Nyssa).  Maternal grandfather martyred. A presbyter (leader of a local congregation) against his will, he eventually became bishop.  Wrote theological treatises advancing the Nicene cause.  And his work influenced the outcome of the Council of Constantinople.  (1)


Gregory of Nyssa:
Brother of Basil.  Maternal grandfather martyred. Pulled into the fray when Basil appointed him Bishop of Nyssa.  Attended the Council of Constantinople and vigorously defended orthodoxy.  (1)

Gregory of Nazianzus:  
Was friends with Basil and Gregory (of Nyssa) and his writings were influential in the outcome of the Council of Constantinople.  (1)


Jerome:
The translator of the Bible into Latin, the language of the people.
The Vulgate, the Latin translation of the Bible. Not translated from the Greek Septuagint, but from the original Hebrew text.


Augustine: Nov 13, 0354

Schooled in Rhetoric.

Was a Manichaean for 9 years.  They believed the material world was evil and the spiritual world was good.  They used rhetoric to draw him in.  But didn't hold him because his questions about evil and guilt were never answered.

His mother sent him to Ambrose, bishop of Milan, to listen to his sermons.  He went to judge his rhetoric.  But got engrossed in the sermons. Ambrose was eloquent and used rational arguments, and helped Augustine see the OT has not crude or barbaric.

He surrendered to Christ, when in response to his confusion over unlearned men mastering their fleshly desires, and young child gave him Romans.  Where he read "Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarrelling and jealousy.  But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify it's desires".  He took that as a divine sign (rightly so) and surrendered!

"You made us for yourself and our hearts find no peace until they rest in you."

Against his will, he was ordained a priest in Hippo, and very soon became the bishop when his predecessor Valerius died.

Most notable argument was again Pelagianism.  Pelagius was a British monk who argued that man was capable of living a sinless life and it was theoretically possible for a person to achieve salvation through his or her own works.  Augustine knew from personal experience this could not be true.

He fathered the concept of Original Sin called total depravity.

He argued that God alone initiates salvation, not man.  Salvation is fully a work of God.  God chooses whom to save, and those He has chosen cannot resist His grace. (Predestination picked up and expanded on by John Calvin and Martin Luther later on)  (1)


Patrick:
One of the best known saints.
He did NOT drive out all the snakes from Ireland, there were none there to begin with.
He wrote Confessions and  the Soldiers of Coroticus.
Kidnapped by pirates as a boy and sold into slavery.
Given a vision by God when he was to escape.  He did escape and made his way back to his family.
Was later called by God to return to his captors as a missionary.


Saint Benedict of Nursia:
Wrote The Rule, simple instructions on monastic life.







Resources

(1) IF: Anno Domini - The First 500 Years of the Church