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Handout #51 |
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From Irenaeus to Jesus |
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190 A.D., Irenaeus wrote to his friend Florinus, who had entered a
heretical group. He reminded him that when they had been children, they
had both heard Polycarp. Polycarp was the link in the chain which, through
John, bound Irenaeus and his friend to Christ.
I can describe the place where blessed Polycarp sat and talked, his goings out and comings in, the character of his life, his personal appearance, his addresses to crowded congregations. I remember how he spoke of his intercourse with John and with the others who has seen the Lord; how he repeated their words from memory; and how the things that he heard them say about the Lord, his miracles and his teaching, things that he had heard direct from the eyewitnesses of the Word of life, were proclaimed by Polycarp in complete harmony with scripture. To these things I listened eagerly at that time, by the mercy of God shown to me, not committing them to writing but learning them by heart. By God's grace, I constantly and conscientiously ruminate on them, and I can bear witness before God that if any such suggestion had come to the ears of that blessed and apostolic presbyter he would have cried out and stopped his ears...Reported by Eusebius of Caesarea, Church History, V, 20, 6f |
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