Page:Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (1911).djvu/817

 time and place, or even the fact, of his ordination. That he was a priest may be inferred—not indeed from his headship of a school, for Origen was a layman, but—from the fact that he was sent by his bishop to evangelize India.

Besides authors quoted, see Baronius, Ann., s.a. 183; Cave, Primitive Fathers, p. 185 (1677); ''Hist. Lit. t. i. p. 51 (1688); Du Pin, Auteurs ecclés. t. i. pt. i. p.184; Lardner, Credibility, c. xxi.; Le Quien, Oriens Chr.'' t. ii. coll. 382, 391; Tillem. Mém. t. iii. p. 170.

[J.GW.]

Papa. [ .]

Paphnutius (2), bp. in Upper Thebias, who suffered mutilation and banishment for the faith (Socr. H. E. i. 11; Theod. H. E. i. 7). At the council of Nicaea 325, he was much honoured as a confessor, specially by Constantine (Socr. u.s.), and earnestly opposed the enforcement of the law of clerical celibacy, on the ground of both principle and expediency, and prevailed (ib.). He closely adhered to the cause of St. Athanasius, and attended him at the council of Tyre, 335. Rufinus (H. E. i. 17), followed by Sozomen (H. E. ii. 25), tells a dramatic story of his there reproaching Maximus of Jerusalem for being in Arian company and explaining to him the exact position of affairs. Fleury, H. E. xv. c. 26; Ceill. ''Aut. sacr.'' iii. 420, 450; Boll. Acta SS. Sept. 11, iii. 778.

[J.G.]

Paphnutius (5) (Pafnutius, Pynuphius, surnamed Bubalus, and Cephala), an anchoret and priest in the Scetic desert in Egypt. Cassian's words (Coll. iv. c. 1) regarding his promotion of abbat Daniel to the diaconate and priesthood have been held to prove that a presbyter had the power of ordaining, but Bingham (Ant. bk. ii. 3, 7) will not admit that Cassian is to be so understood. When Cassian visited him in 395, he was 90 years old, but hale and active (Coll. iii. c. 1). He seems to have fled twice from the Scetic into Syria for greater solitude and perfection (Cass. de Coen. Inst. iv. cc. 30, 31), and with some others had in 373 already found refuge at Diocaesarea in Palestine (Tillem. vi. 250, 251, ed. 1732). In the anthropomorphic controversy between Theophilus bp. of Alexandria and the monks of the Egyptian desert, Paphnutius took the side of the bishop and orthodoxy (Cass. Coll. x. c. 2) ; his attempt to convert the aged Serapion and his failure, till Photinus came, is very curious (ib. 3).

[J.G.]

Papias (1), bp. of Hierapolis in Phrygia (Eus. H. E. iii. 36) in the first half of 2nd cent. Lightfoot says (Coloss. p. 48), "Papias, or (as it is very frequently written in inscriptions) Pappias, is a common Phrygian name. It is found several times at Hierapolis, not only in inscriptions (Boeckh, 3930, 3912, add.), but even on coins (Mionnet, iv. p. 301). This is explained by the fact that it was an epithet of the Hierapolitan Zeus (Boeckh, 3912 , Παπίᾳ Διῒ σωτῆρι)." The date of Papias used to be regarded as determined by a notice in the Paschal Chronicle, which was thought to record his martyrdom at Pergamus under 163. But we have no ground for asserting that Papias lived so late as 163, and we shall see reason for at least placing his literary activity considerably earlier in the century.

His name is famous as the writer of a treatise in five books called Expositions of Oracles of the Lord (Λογίων Κυριακῶν ἐξηγήσεις), which title we shall discuss presently. The object of the book seems to have been to throw light on the Gospel history, especially by the help of oral traditions which Papias had collected from those who had met members of the apostolic circle. That Papias lived when it was still possible to meet such persons has given great importance to his testimony, though only some very few fragments of his work remain. Every word of these fragments has been rigidly scrutinized, and, what is less reasonable where so little is known, arguments have been built on the silence of Papias about sundry matters which it is supposed he ought to have mentioned and assumed that he did not. We give at length the first and most important of the fragments, a portion of the preface preserved by Eusebius (iii. 39), from which we can infer the object of the work and the resources which Papias claimed to have available. "And I will not scruple also to give for thee a place along with my interpretations to whatsoever at any time I well learned from the elders and well stored up in memory, guaranteeing its truth. For I did not, like the generality, take pleasure in those who have much to say, but in those who teach the truth; nor in those who relate their strange commandments, but in those who record such as were given from the Lord to the Faith and come from the Truth itself. And if ever any one came who had been a follower of the elders, I would inquire as to the discourses of the elders, what was said by Andrew, or what by Peter, or what by Philip, or what by Thomas or James, or what by John or Matthew or any other of the disciples of the Lord; and the things which Aristion and the elder John, the disciples of the Lord, say. For I did not think that I could get so much profit from the contents of books as from the utterances of a living and abiding voice."

The singular "for thee" in the opening words implies that the work of Papias was inscribed to some individual. The first sentence of the extract had evidently followed one in which the writer had spoken of the "interpretations" which appear to have been the main subject of his treatise, and for joining his traditions with which he conceives an apology necessary. Thus we see that Papias is not making a first attempt to write the life of our Lord or a history of the apostles, but assumes the previous existence of a written record. Papias enumerates the ultimate sources of his traditions in two classes: Andrew, Peter, and others, of whom he speaks in the past tense; Aristion and John the Elder, of whom he speaks in the present. As the passage is generally understood, Papias only claims a second-hand knowledge of what these had related, but had inquired from any who had conferred with elders, what Andrew, Peter, etc., had said, and what John and Aristion were saying; the last two being the only ones then surviving. But considering that there is a change of pronouns, we are disposed to think that there is an anacoluthon, and that his meaning, however ill expressed, was that he learned, by inquiry from others, things that Andrew, Peter, and others had said, and also stored up in his memory things which