Firmilian
Bishop of Caesarea Mazaca
Born
Died	ca. 269 in Tarsus [1]
Venerated in	Orthodox Catholic Church
Feast	28 October
Saints Portal

Saint Firmilian (died c. 269), Bishop of Caesarea Mazaca from ca. 232, was a disciple of Origen. He had a contemporary reputation comparable to that of Dionysius of Alexandria or Cyprian, bishop of Carthage. Caesarea Mazaca (modern Kayseri) is an ancient town of Anatolia which served as the residence of the kings of Cappadocia. ... Events Felix I is elected pope. ... In tetrapods, the tarsi are the cluster of bones in the foot between the tibia and fibula and the metatarsus. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... The calendar of saints is a traditional Christian method of organising a liturgical year on the level of days by associating each day with one or more saints, and referring to the day as that saints day. ... Image File history File links Gloriole. ... Events Felix I is elected pope. ... Caesarea Mazaca (modern Kayseri) is an ancient town of Anatolia which served as the residence of the kings of Cappadocia. ... Events Relics of St. ... Origen (Greek: Ōrigénēs, 185–ca. ... Dionysius served as Patriarch of Alexandria (head of the church that became the Coptic Church and the Orthodox Church of Alexandria) between 248 and 264. ... Saint Cyprian (Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus) (died September 14, 258) was bishop of Carthage and an important early Christian writer. ...

He took an active part in the mid-3rd century controversies over rebaptising heretics and readmitting lapsed Christians after the persecutions of Decius and was excommunicated by Pope Stephen I for his position. A single letter of Firmilian to Cyprian survives among Cyprian's correspondence. Jerome omits Firmilian from De viris illustribus. "To his contemporaries his forty years of influential episcopate, his friendship with Origen and Dionysius, the appeal to him of Cyprian, and his censure of Stephanus might well make him seem the most conspicuous figure of his time" (Wace). Bust of Traianus Decius. ... Stephen I, pope (about March 12, 254 to August 2, 257). ... Jerome (ca. ... http://www. ...

Gregory of Nyssa tells that Gregory the Illuminator, when still a pagan, having completed his secular studies, "fell in with Firmilian, a Cappadocian of noble family, similar to himself in character and talent, as he showed in his subsequent life when he adorned the Church of Caesarea." The two young men came to Alexandria to study with Origen by whom Gregory, at least, was baptised. Later, when bishop, Eusebius records (Hist. Eccl., VI, xxvi-xxviii), he invited Origen to his own country, at the time (232–35) when the great teacher was staying in Caesarea of Palestine. Gregory of Nyssa ( 335 – after 394) was a Christian bishop and saint. ... Saint Gregory the Illuminator (alternate: Armenian: Ô³Ö€Õ«Õ£Õ¸Ö€ Ô¼Õ¸Ö‚Õ½Õ¡Ö‚Õ¸Ö€Õ«Õ¹ translit. ... Eusebius of Caesarea Eusebius of Caesarea (c. ... Caesarea Palaestina, also called Caesarea Maritima, a town built by Herod the Great about 25 - 13 BC, lies on the sea-coast of Israel about halfway between Tel Aviv and Haifa, on the site of a place previously called Pyrgos Stratonos (Strato or Stratons Tower, in Latin Turris Stratonis). ...

In the controversies over rebaptism of lapsed Christians, Firmilian was an opponent of the stringent policy of antipope Novatian (see Novatianism), for Dionysius in 252–53 writes that the bishops of Cilicia, Cappadocia, and Palestine had invited him to a synod at Antioch to repudiate Novatianism (Eusebius, VI, xlvi, 3). Dionysius counts Firmilian as one of "the more eminent bishops" in a letter to Pope Stephen I (Eusebius, VII, v, 1), where his expression "Firmilian and all Cappadocia" implies that Caesarea was already a metropolitan see. This explains how Firmilian could invite Origen to Cappadocia, "for the benefit of the Churches". Novatian (2XX - 258) was a scholar and antipope who held the title between 251 and 258. ... The Novatianists following Novatius, or Novatian, held a strict view that refused readmission to communion of those baptized Christians who had denied their faith or performed the formalities of a ritual sacrifice to the pagan gods, under the pressures of the persecution sanctioned by Emperor Decius, in 250 A.D... Dionysius served as Patriarch of Alexandria (head of the church that became the Coptic Church and the Orthodox Church of Alexandria) between 248 and 264. ... The Novatianists following Novatius, or Novatian, held a strict view that refused readmission to communion of those baptized Christians who had denied their faith or performed the formalities of a ritual sacrifice to the pagan gods, under the pressures of the persecution sanctioned by Emperor Decius, in 250 A.D... Stephen I, pope (about March 12, 254 to August 2, 257). ...

Firmilian's letter to Cyprian

In a letter to Pope Sixtus II (257–58), Dionysius mentions that in the controversy over rebaptism of the lapsed Pope Stephen had refused communication with Helenus of Tarsus, Firmilian, and all Cilicia and Cappadocia, and the neighbouring lands (Eusebius, VII, v, 3-4), a subject touched on in the sole surviving letter of Firmilian, a response to Cyprian. When the baptismal controversy arose, Cyprian wished to gain support from the Eastern churches against Pope Stephen for his own decision to rebaptize all heretics who returned to the Church. At the end of the summer of 256, he sent the deacon Rogatian to Firmilian with a letter, together with the documents on the subject—letters of the pope, of his own, and of his council at Carthage in the spring, and the treatise De Ecclesia Catholica Unitate. Firmilian's existing reply was received at Carthage about the middle of November. It is a long letter, even more bitter and violent than the letter on this head of Cyprian to Pompeius. It has come down to us in a translation made, no doubt, under Cyprian's direction, and apparently very literal, as it abounds in Greek expressions (Cyprian, Epistle lxxv). Sixtus II was pope from August 30, 257 to August 6, 258, following Stephen I as bishop of Rome in 257. ...

In the letter, Cyprian's arguments against Pope Stephen are reiterated and reinforced. Firmilian says: "We have received your writings as our own, and have committed them to memory by repeated reading" (c. iv). Firmilian's reasoning against the validity of heretical baptism is mainly that of Cyprian, that those who are outside the Church and have not the Holy Spirit cannot admit others to the Church or give what they do not possess: " "Very many of us meeting together in Iconium very carefully examined the matter, and we decided that every baptism was altogether to be rejected which is arranged for without the Church." Firmilian is fond of dilemmas: for instance, either the heretics do not give the Holy Ghost, in which case rebaptism is necessary, or else they do give it, in which case Stephen should not forbid the laying on of hands. Firmilian enables us to gather much of the drift of Stephen's letter to Cyprian. It is "ridiculous" that Stephen demanded nothing but the use of the Trinitarian formula. He had appealed to tradition from St. Peter and St. Paul: this is an insult to the Apostles, cries Firmilian, for they execrated heretics. Besides (this is from Cyprian, Ep. lxxiv, 2), "no one could be so silly as to believe this", for the heretics are all later than the Apostles! And Rome has not preserved the Apostolic traditions unchanged, for it differs from Jerusalem as to the observances at Easter and as to other mysteries. "I am justly indignant with Stephen's obvious and manifest silliness, that he so boasts of his position, and claims that he is the successor of St. Peter on whom were laid the foundations of the Church; yet he brings in many other rocks, and erects new buildings of many Churches when he defends with his authority the baptism conferred by heretics; for those who are baptized are without doubt numbered in the Church, and he who approves their baptism affirms that there is among them a Church of the baptized.… Stephen, who declares that he has the Chair of Peter by succession, is excited by no zeal against heretics" (c. xvii). "You have cut yourself off—do not mistake—since he is the true schismatic who makes himself an apostate from the communion of ecclesiastical unity. For in thinking that all can be excommunicated by you, you have cut off yourself alone from the communion of all" (c. xxiv).

We thus learn the claims of Stephen to impose on the whole Church by his authority as successor of Peter, a custom the Roman Church claims to derive from Apostolic tradition. Firmilian reassures Cyprian's church at Carthage that with them the custom of rebaptizing may be new, but in Cappadocia it has been the custom from the very beginning (c. xix), and he can answer Stephen by opposing tradition to tradition, and that some time since, he had joined in a council at Iconium with the bishops of Galatia and Cilicia and other provinces, and had decided to rebaptize the Montanists (c. vii and xix); for these acts Stephen excommunicated the Eastern churches. Dionysius, in a letter to the Roman priest Philemon , also mentions the Council of Iconium. It was presumably held in the last years of Alexander Severus, ca 231–35. Konya (also Koniah, Konieh, Konia, and Qunia; historically known as Iconium) is a city in Turkey, on the central plateau of Anatolia. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... Cilicia as Roman province, 120 AD In Antiquity, Cilicia (Κιλικία) was the name of a region, now known as Çukurova, and often a political unit, on the southeastern coast of Asia Minor (modern Turkey), north of Cyprus. ... Montanism was an early Christian sectarian movement of the mid-2nd century A.D., named after its founder Montanus. ... Alexander Severus Marcus Aurelius Severus Alexandrus (October 1, 208- March 18?, 235), commonly called Alexander Severus, Roman emperor from 222 to 235, was born at Arca Caesarea in Palestine. ...

Proceedings against Paul of Samosata

Firmilian also took part in the first of two councils at Antioch which discussed deposing Paul of Samosata, in 266 (Wace). He may even have presided. The letter of the third council says he was too easily persuaded that Paul of Samosata would amend; hence the necessity of another council (Eusebius, VII, iii-v). He was on his way to this assembly when death overtook him, at Tarsus, in 268 (Adolf Harnack) or 269. Paul of Samosata, patriarch of Antioch (260-269), Life Paul was born at Samosata into a family of humble origin. ... Paul of Samosata, patriarch of Antioch (260-269), Life Paul was born at Samosata into a family of humble origin. ... In tetrapods, the tarsi are the cluster of bones in the foot between the tibia and fibula and the metatarsus. ... Adolf von Harnack, German theologian Adolf von Harnack (May 7, 1851 - June 10, 1930), was a German theologian and science administrator. ...

Though Firmilian was excommunicated by Stephen, it is certain that the following popes did not adhere to this severe policy. Firmilian is commemorated in the Greek martyrology (October 28) but is not venerated in the West. His great successor in Cappadocia, St Basil of Caesarea, mentions his view on heretical baptism without accepting it (Epistle clxxxviii), and says, when speaking of the expression "with the Holy Ghost" in the Doxology: "That our own Firmilian held this faith is testified by the lógoi which he has left" (De Spiritu Sancto, xxix, 74). There is no other mention of such writings, which were probably letters. Basil (ca. ...

External links

• Catholic Encyclopedia: Firmilian
• Letter of Firmilian of Caesarea to Cyprian, bishop of Carthage: concerning baptisms from a woman Montanist
• Henry Wace, Dictionary of Christian Biography Firmilianus