Chapter XIV.—Abilius, the Second Bishop of Alexandria.
In the fourth year of Domitian, Annianus,1 the first bishop of the parish of Alexandria, died after holding office twenty-two years, and was succeeded by Abilius,2 the second bishop.
1 85 a.d.; on Annianus, see above, Bk. II. chap. 24, note 2. 2 ᾽Αβίλιος. According to one tradition Abilius was ordained presbyter with his successor Cerdon by Mark himself (see Smith and Wace). According to another (Ap. Const. VII. 46) he was appointed bishop by Luke. He held office thirteen years according to chap. 21, below. Valesius claims that the name should be written Avilius, regarding it as a Latin name, and citing in support of his opinion the name of a prefect of Egypt, Avilius Flaccus, mentioned by Philo, and the fact that the name of Avilius’ predecessor, Annianus, is also Latin.
Chapter XV.—Clement, the Third Bishop of Rome.
In the twelfth year of the same reign Clement succeeded Anencletus1 after the latter had been bishop of the church of Rome for twelve years. The apostle in his Epistle to the Philippians informs us that this Clement was his fellow-worker. His words are as follows:2 “With Clement and the rest of my fellow-laborers whose names are in the book of life.”
1 On Anencletus, see chap. 13, note 3. 2 Phil. iv. 3. For an account of Clement, see above, chap. 4, note 19; and upon the order of succession of the Roman bishops, see chap. 2, note 1.
Chapter XVI.—The Epistle of Clement.
There is extant an epistle of this Clement1 which is acknowledged to be genuine and is of considerable length and of remarkable merit.2 He wrote it in the name of the church of Rome to the church of Corinth, when a sedition had arisen in the latter church.3 We know that this epistle also has been publicly used in a great many churches both in former times and in our own.4 And of the fact that a sedition did take place in the church of Corinth at the time referred to Hegesippus is a trustworthy witness.5
1 This epistle of Clement, which is still extant in two Greek mss., and in a Syriac version, consists of fifty-nine chapters, and is found in all editions of the Apostolic Fathers. It purports to have been written from the church at Rome to the church at Corinth, but bears the name of no author. Unanimous tradition, however (beginning with Dionysius of Corinth, in Eusebius, IV. 23), ascribes it to Clement, Bishop of Rome, and scholars, with hardly an exception, accept it as his work. It was, in all probability, written immediately after the persecution of Domitian, in the last years of the first century, and is one of the earliest, perhaps the very earliest, post-biblical works which we have. It was held in very high repute in the early Church, and in the Alexandrian Codex it stands among the canonical books as a part of the New Testament (though this is exceptional; cf. chap. 3, above, and chap. 25, below, in both of which this epistle is omitted, though Eusebius is giving lists of New Testament books, both accepted and disputed). We have had the epistle complete only since 1875, when Bryennios discovered a ms. containing it and other valuable works. Previously a part of the epistle had been wanting. In consequence the older editions have been superseded by the more recent. See appendix to Lightfoot’s edition (1877), which gives the recovered portions of the text; so, also, the later editions of Gebhardt and Harnack’s, and of Hilgenfeld’s Apostolic Fathers. The epistle is translated in the Ante-Nicene Fathers, I. p. 5–21. 2 μεγ€λη τε καὶ θαυμασία. 3 See the epistle itself, especially chaps. 1 and 3. It was these seditions in the church at Corinth which occasioned the epistle. 4 Compare the words of Dionysius of Corinth, in Bk. IV. chap. 23. Though the epistle was held in high esteem, it was not looked upon as a part of the New Testament canon. 5 Hegesippus’ testimony upon this point is no longer extant.
Chapter XVII.—The Persecution under Domitian.
Domitian, having shown great cruelty toward many, and having unjustly put to death no small number of well-born and notable men at Rome, and having without cause exiled and confiscated the property of a great many other illustrious men, finally became a successor of Nero in his hatred and enmity toward God. He was in fact the second that stirred up a persecution against us,1 although his father Vespasian had undertaken nothing prejudicial to us.2
1 The persecutions under Nero and Domitian were not undertaken by the state as such; they were simply personal matters, and established no precedent as to the conduct of the state toward Christianity. They were rather spasmodic outbursts of personal enmity, but were looked upon with great horror as the first to which the Church was subjected. There was no general persecution, which took in all parts of the empire, until the reign of Decius (249–251), but Domitian’s cruelty and ferocity were extreme, and many persons of the highest rank fell under his condemnation and suffered banishment and even death, not especially on account of Christianity, though there were Christians among them, but on account of his jealousy, and for political reasons of various sorts. That Domitian’s persecution of the Christians was not of long duration is testified by Tertullian, Apol. 5. Upon the persecutions of the Christians, see, among other works, Wieseler’s Die Christenverfolgungen der Cäsaren, hist. und chronolog. untersucht, 1878; Uhlhorn’s Der Kampf des Christenthums mit dem Heidenthum, English translation by Smyth and Ropes, 1879; and especially the keen essay of Overbeck, Gesetze der römischen Kaiser gegen die Christen, in his Studien zur Gesch. der alten Kirche, I. (1875). 2 The fact that the Christians were not persecuted by Vespasian is abundantly confirmed by the absence of any tradition to the opposite effect. Compare Tertullian’s Apol. chap. 5, where the persecutions of Nero and Domitian are recorded.
Chapter XVIII.—The