apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

40 EPISTLES OF S. IGNATIUS.
to the other. The ecclesiastical order was enforced by him almost
solely as a security for the doctrinal purity. The unity of the body was
a guarantee of the unity of the faith. The threefold ministry was the
husk, the shell, which protected the precious kernel of the truth.
The frequent echoes of the Epistle to the Romans in various Acts
of Martyrdom, as well as the direct quotations from his letters in
Irenaeus and Origen, show that his memory was kept alive in the Antenicene
periods ;
but the prominence given to his martyrdom and writings
in the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius doubtless secured to him from
that time forward a wider fame.
It seemed likely however for a time that his fame would be
eclipsed by a younger aspirant to popular honours at Antioch. Babylas
was a far less considerable personality than Ignatius ;
but from nearness
of time he occupied a larger space in the field of view. Moreover
recent circumstances had invested his
was lacking to the earlier martyr.
memory with a splendour which
Babylas had won for himself a name by his heroic courage, as
bishop of Antioch. It was related of him that on one occasion, when
the emperor Philip, who was a Christian, had presented himself one
Easter Eve at the church at the time of prayer, he had boldly refused
admission to the sovereign,
till he had gone through the proper
discipHne of a penitent for some offence committed'. He acted like
a good shepherd, says Chrysostom (p. 545), who drives away the scabby
sheep, lest it should infect the flock. This anticipation of a later
and more famous scene between S. Ambrose and Theodosius at Milan
^ Eusebius {H. E. vi. 34) relates the (Chron. Pasch. p. 503 sq, ed. Bonn.)- He
incident, but does not name either the stated that Babylas repelled both Philip
place or the bishop {tov ri)viK6.he TrpoecTTu- and his wife from the church, and he
Tos). Philip however would pass through mentioned the crime of Philip. Philip,
Antioch on his way to Rome immediately when prefect, had been placed in charge
after his accession (a.d. 244); and ac- of the son of the emperor Gordian; but on
cording to the sequence of events in the death of Gordian, he perfidiously and
the History Babylas would be bishop of cxnielly slew this prince, and himself seized
that see at the time, for his accession the empire. Somewhat later Chrysostom
is mentioned earlier (vi. 29), and his tells a similar story, which he decks out
death later (vi. 39). On the other hand with all the luxuriance of his rhetoric ;
in the Chronicon (both the Armenian but he does not mention the name of
and Jerome's recension) the accession Philip or of Gordian, and he represents
of Babylas is placed after the death of the victim as the son of a foreign king
Philip (II. pp. 181, 182, Schone). Leon- handed over as a hostage on the contius,
a successor of Babylas in the see of elusion of peace (de S. Bab. c. Jul. 5 sq,
Antioch, about a.d. 350, gave the names Op. 11. p. 544 sq).