Polycrates the Bishop

Polycrates, bishop of the Ephesians, together with the other bishops of Asia who by an ancient custom kept the Passover with the Jews on the fourteenth of the month, wrote a synodical letter against Victor, bishop of Rome. In it he says that he follows the authority of the apostle John and of the ancients. We give the following short quotation from it: “We, then, keep the day as custom has handed it down, untouched, neither adding anything to it nor taking anything away. For in Asia lie the remains of the greatest saints, of those who will rise again on the day of the Lord, when he comes in majesty from heaven and raises all the saints to life. I mean Philip, one of the twelve apostles, who sleeps at Hierapolis, and his two daughters, who were virgins until their death, and another daughter of his, who died at Ephesus full of the Holy Spirit. “And John too, who lay on our Lord’s breast and was his high priest, wearing the golden plate on his forehead, both martyr and teacher, fell asleep at Ephesus. And Polycarp, bishop and martyr, died at Smyrna. Thraseas of Eumenia, also bishop and martyr, rests in the same Smyrna. What need is there to mention Sagaris, bishop and martyr, who sleeps in Laodicea, and the blessed Papirius, and Melito, a eunuch in the Holy Spirit, who served the Lord always, was laid to rest in Sardis, and there awaits his resurrection at Christ’s coming? “All these kept the day of the Passover on the fourteenth of the month, never departing from the tradition of the gospel and following the rule of the church. I too, Polycrates, the least of all your servants, have followed the teaching of my relatives. For seven of my relatives were bishops, and I am the eighth, and I have always kept the Passover on the day the Jewish people put away the leaven. “And so, brothers, being sixty-five years old in the Lord, having been taught by many brothers from all parts of the world, and having searched all the Scriptures, I will not fear those who threaten us. For my predecessors said, ‘It is right to obey God rather than men.’” I quote this to show by a small example the genius and authority of the man. He flourished in the reign of the emperor Severus, at the same time as Narcissus of Jerusalem. [a]