Who Is Fit for Martyrdom

It was not only the Aesopians, the Macedonians, and the Spartans who held out when they were put to the torture, as Eratosthenes says in his book On Things Good and Evil. Zeno of Elea did the same. When they tried to force him to give up a secret, he held out against the tortures and admitted nothing; and as he was dying he bit off his own tongue and spat it at the tyrant — a man some call Nearchus and some Demylus. Theodotus the Pythagorean behaved the same way, and so did Paulus, the friend of Lacydes, as Timotheus of Pergamum says in his book On the Courage of Philosophers, and Achaicus in his Ethics. Postumius the Roman, when he was captured by Peucetion, would not give up a single secret; he laid his hand on the fire and held it there as though it were a piece of bronze, without moving a muscle of his face. I say nothing of Anaxarchus, who called out, “Pound away at the sack that holds Anaxarchus. Anaxarchus himself you are not pounding,” while by the tyrant’s orders he was being pounded with iron pestles. [a]

So neither the hope of happiness nor the love of God takes badly whatever happens to it. It stays free, though it be thrown among the wildest beasts or into the all-devouring fire, though it be racked by a tyrant’s tortures. Because it hangs on God’s favor, it rises up unenslaved, and hands over to the men who can lay hold of it nothing but the body.

There is a foreign people, not burdened with philosophy, who are said to choose an ambassador every year to send to the hero Zamolxis — Zamolxis was one of Pythagoras’ students. The man judged to be of the most sterling worth is the one put to death, to the grief of those who have practiced philosophy and were not chosen, since they are reckoned unworthy of so happy an errand.

So the church is full of people, women who live pure lives as well as men, who have spent their whole life with their minds on the death that raises a person up to Christ. For anyone whose life is framed the way ours is can be a philosopher without formal schooling — barbarian or Greek, slave, old man, boy, or woman. Self-control belongs in common to every human being who has chosen it. And we hold that the same nature exists in every race, and the same virtue. As far as human nature goes, the woman does not have one nature and the man another; they have the same, and it is the same with virtue. If self-control and righteousness and everything reckoned to go with them are the virtue of the male, then being virtuous belongs to the male alone, and being unrestrained and unjust belongs to the woman. It is offensive even to say it. So a woman is to practice self-control and righteousness and every other virtue as much as a man does, whether she is slave or free, since it follows that one and the same nature has one and the same virtue.

We are not saying that a woman’s nature is the same as a man’s in respect of her being a woman. Obviously there has to be some difference between them, the difference by which one of them is male and the other female. Pregnancy and childbirth, then, we say belong to a woman as a woman, not as a human being. If there were no difference between man and woman, both would do and undergo the same things. Since, then, there is sameness as far as the soul goes, she will reach the same virtue; but since there is a difference in the particular build of the body, she is set toward bearing children and keeping the house. “I want you to know,” says the apostle, “that the head of every man is Christ, and the head of the woman is the man. For the man is not from the woman, but the woman from the man. Yet the woman is not without the man, nor the man without the woman, in the Lord.” For just as we say that a man ought to be self-controlled and stronger than his pleasures, so we reckon that a woman should be self-controlled and trained in the fight against pleasures.

“But I say, walk in the Spirit, and you will not carry out the cravings of the flesh,” the apostle’s command advises. “For the flesh craves against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. These, then, are opposed to each other” — not the way good is opposed to evil, but as two fighters whose contest does us good — and so he adds, “so that you cannot do the things you want. Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, uncleanness, debauchery, idolatry, sorcery, hostilities, quarrels, jealousies, outbursts of anger, rivalries, dissensions, factions, envyings, drunkenness, wild parties, and things like these. I tell you beforehand, as I have told you before, that people who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, self-control, goodness, faith, gentleness.” By “flesh” I think he means sinners, and by “spirit” the righteous.

Manliness has to be taken on as well, to produce confidence and endurance, so that “to the one who strikes you on one cheek you give the other, and to the one who takes your cloak you let him have your tunic too,” holding your anger down hard all the while. For we do not train our women like Amazons to be manly in war; we want even the men to be peaceable. I hear that the Sarmatian women practice war no less than the men, and the women of the Sacae besides, who shoot backwards while they feign flight, exactly as the men do. I know too that the women around Iberia do a man’s work and labor, and do not let up on their tasks even when their delivery is near; in the very struggle of her pains, when the child is born, the woman picks the infant up and carries it home. And the females no less than the males run the house, and hunt, and keep the flocks:

So women are to practice philosophy just as men do, though the males are better at everything, unless they have gone soft. Discipline and virtue, then, are a necessity for the whole human race, if people mean to chase after happiness. And how recklessly Euripides writes, now one thing and now another! In one place:

And in another:

So the ruling power is the head. And if “the Lord is the head of the man, and the man is the head of the woman,” then the man, “being the image and glory of God, is lord of the woman.” That is why it is written in the letter to the Ephesians: “Submit to one another in the fear of God. Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, and he is the Savior of the body. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the church. So husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. The man who loves his wife loves himself; no one ever yet hated his own flesh.”

And in the letter to the Colossians it says: “Wives, submit to your own husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this is pleasing to the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, or they will lose heart. Slaves, obey in everything those who are your masters according to the flesh, not with an eye to being watched, as people-pleasers, but with a single heart, fearing the Lord. And whatever you do, do it from the heart, as serving the Lord and not men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance; for you serve the Lord Christ. The one who does wrong will get back the wrong he has done, and there is no favoritism. Masters, give your slaves what is just and fair, knowing that you too have a Master in heaven — where there is no Greek or Jew, circumcision or uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free, but Christ is all and in all.” And the church on earth is the image of the church in heaven, which is why we pray that God’s will may be done on earth as it is in heaven. “So put on hearts of mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, bearing with one another and forgiving one another if anyone has a complaint against anyone; as Christ also forgave us, so must we. And over all these put on love, which is the bond of perfection. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, the peace you were called to in one body; and be thankful.”

There is no harm in bringing forward the same passage of Scripture again and again if it will put Marcion to shame — supposing he can be persuaded and turned around — by teaching him that the faithful ought to be grateful to God the Creator, who called us and who preached the good news in the body.

From all this the unity of the faith is clear, and it is shown who the perfect man is. So even where some hold back and put up all the resistance they can, and are threatened with punishment at the hand of husband or master, the household slave and the wife will still practice philosophy. And the free man, though he is threatened with death at a tyrant’s hands, hauled before the courts, and has all his property put at risk, will not on any account abandon his reverence for God. Neither will the wife who lives with a wicked husband, nor the son who has a bad father, nor the household slave who has a bad master, ever fail to hold nobly to virtue. Just as it is a noble thing for a man to die for virtue, for freedom, and for himself, so it is for a woman. This does not belong to the nature of males, but to the nature of the good.

So the old man, the young man, and the household slave will all live faithfully, and if need be will die — which will mean being made alive by death. We know that children and women and household slaves have often reached the highest excellence against the will of their fathers and masters and husbands. People who have made up their minds to live reverently, then, ought to be no less ready when some appear to be forcing them; much more, I think, it becomes them to show eagerness and to strain with unusual vigor, in case they are beaten and give up the best and most necessary counsels. For there is no comparing the two — whether it is better to be a follower of the Almighty or to choose the darkness of demons.

The things we do for other people’s sake we should always do with an eye to those for whose sake they ought to be done, taking the pleasure we give them as our rule. But the things we do for our own sake rather than for anyone else’s are to be done with the same earnestness whether or not they are likely to please certain people. If some matters of indifference have won such honor that they seem worth taking up even against somebody’s will, then virtue is much more to be reckoned worth fighting for, with an eye to nothing but what can rightly be done, whether or not it looks good to other people.

Well then, Epicurus, writing to Menoeceus, says: “Let no young man put off practicing philosophy, and let no old man grow tired of it. No one is either too young or past the age for attending to the health of his soul. The man who says the time for philosophy has not come yet, or that it has gone by, is like the man who says the time for happiness has not come yet or has gone. So young and old alike ought to practice philosophy — the old man so that as he grows old he may grow young in good things, out of the gratitude he owes for what is past; the young man so that he may be young and old at once, because he has no fear of what is coming.”

On martyrdom the Lord has spoken plainly, and we are gathering here what is written in different places. “But I tell you, whoever confesses in me before men, the Son of Man will also confess him before the angels of God; but whoever denies me before men, I will deny him before the angels.” “Whoever is ashamed of me or of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will also be ashamed of him when he comes in the glory of his Father with his angels. So whoever confesses in me before men, I will also confess him before my Father in heaven.” “And when they bring you before synagogues and rulers and authorities, do not work out in advance how you will make your defense, or what you will say. For the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you must say.” [v]

Explaining this passage, Heracleon, the most distinguished man of Valentinus’ school, says in so many words: “There is a confession made by faith and conduct, and one made with the voice. The confession made with the voice, before the authorities, is what most people reckon to be the only confession — and that is not sound, because hypocrites can also confess with that confession. Nor will this saying be found to apply to everyone, since not all who have been saved confessed with the confession made by the voice and then departed; among them are Matthew, Philip, Thomas, Levi, and many others. Confession with the lip is not universal, but partial. The one he is speaking of here is universal: the confession made by deeds and actions that match faith in him. This confession is followed by the partial one, before the authorities, if it is needed and reason calls for it. For the man who has first confessed by his disposition will confess rightly with his voice too. And he used the words rightly: ‘in me’ of those who confess, and ‘me’ of those who deny. For those people, even though they confess him with the voice, still deny him, because they are not confessing him by their conduct. Only those confess ‘in him’ who live in the confession and the conduct that go with him, in which he too confesses, since he is contained in them and held by them. That is why ‘he can never deny himself.’ And those deny him who are not in him. He did not say, ‘whoever denies in me,’ but ‘me.’ For no one who is in him will ever deny him. And the phrase ‘before men’ covers both the saved and the pagans alike — by conduct before the one and by voice before the other. That is why these can never deny him; but those deny him who are not in him.” So much for Heracleon. In other respects he seems to think as we do about this passage, but he has not noticed this: that people who have not “confessed Christ before men” by their conduct and in their lives are shown to have believed with the heart when they confess him with the mouth at the tribunals and do not deny him under torture to the death. And when the disposition is confessed, and above all when it is not changed by death at any point, it cuts away all the passions that were bred by bodily craving. For at the close of life there is, so to speak, a sudden repentance in action, and a true confession toward Christ in the testimony of the voice.

But if the Spirit of the Father bears witness in us, how can we still be hypocrites, we who are accused of bearing witness with the voice alone? Some, though, will be given the chance to make a defense, if it serves a purpose, so that everyone may profit from their witness and confession: those in the church are strengthened, and those of the pagans who have given themselves to the search for salvation are amazed and led to faith, and the rest are struck with astonishment. So confession is necessary in every case, since it is in our power; but making a defense for our faith is not necessary in every case, since that does not depend on us. “But the one who endures to the end will be saved.” For which of the wise would not choose to reign in God, or even simply to serve him? So some people “confess that they know God,” as the apostle says, “but by their works they deny him, being detestable and disobedient and unfit for any good work.” Yet even these, though they confess nothing but this, will have done one good work at the end. Their witness, it seems, is the washing away of sins, and with glory. As the Shepherd says: “You will escape the fury of the wild beast, if your heart becomes pure and blameless.” And the Lord himself says: “Satan has asked to sift you, but I have prayed.”

So the Lord alone “drank the cup,” for the cleansing of the men who plotted against him and refused to believe him; and in imitation of him the apostles, so as to be truly people who know, and complete, suffered for the churches they had founded. In the same way those who truly know, and who walk in the apostles’ footsteps, ought to be free of sin, and out of love for the Lord to love their brother too, so that if the occasion calls for it they may endure hardship for the church without stumbling, and “drink the cup.” Those who bear witness by their deeds in life and by their words at the tribunal — whether they are carried by hope or are still reckoning with fear — are better than those who confess salvation with the mouth alone. But if a man climbs higher still, to love, then he is truly blessed and a true martyr, having confessed perfectly both to the commandments and to God, through the Lord. Having loved that man, he acknowledged him as a brother; he gave himself up wholly for God, and when he was asked for the man, he handed him over gladly and lovingly, the way a deposit is handed back.

Again, when he says, “When they persecute you in this city, flee to the other,” he is not recommending flight as though persecution were an evil thing, nor telling them to escape death by running because they dread it. What he wants is that we should be neither the authors nor the accomplices of any evil to anyone — not to ourselves, and not to the persecutor and murderer either. In a way he is telling us to take care of ourselves. The man who disobeys is rash and foolhardy. If the man who kills a servant of God sins against God, then the man who presents himself before the judgment seat becomes guilty of his own death. And it is the same with the man who does not avoid persecution but out of bravado offers himself up to be taken: as far as it lies with him, he becomes an accomplice in the persecutor’s crime. And if he provokes them as well, he is entirely guilty, having challenged the wild beast. In the same way, if he gives any cause for a fight, or for punishment, or for retaliation or hostility, he is providing the occasion for persecution. That is why we are told to cling to nothing that belongs to this life, but “to give our tunic to the man who takes our cloak” — not only so that we may go on free of disordered attachment, but so that we may not, by paying people back, turn our persecutors savage against us and stir them up to blaspheme the name. [ai]