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Apollonius, an extremely talented man, wrote a well-known lengthy work against Montanus, Prisca and Maximilla, in which he claims that Montanus and his mad prophetesses were hanged, and much more. For example, about Priscus and Maximilla: “If they denied that they accepted gifts, then let them admit that prophets do not accept gifts, and I will give a thousand proofs that they received gifts, but prophets are visible by other fruits. Tell me, does the prophet dye his hair? Does the prophet paint his eyes with antimony? Does a prophet adorn himself with beautiful clothes and priceless stones? Does the prophet play dice? Does he approve of usury? Let them answer whether this is permissible, and my task will be to prove that they do all this.” In the same book he says that he wrote this work in the fourteenth year since the appearance of the Catafrigian heresy. Tertullian added a seventh to the six volumes of On Ecstasy, directed mainly against Apollonius, trying to defend everything that he refuted. Apollonius lived during the time of Commodus and Severus. Serapion, Bishop of Antioch since the twelfth year of the reign of the Emperor Commodus, wrote an epistle to Caric and Pontius about the heresy of Montanus, in which he says: “That you may know that the madness of this false doctrine, the doctrine of the new prophecy, is condemned by the whole world, I have sent you the epistles of the most holy Apollinaris, bishop of Hierapolis in Asia.” He also wrote a work to Domnus, who went to the Jews during times of persecution, and another opus, signed in the name of Peter, about the Gospel, as well as a letter to the Rosenian church in Cilicia, who, after reading it, abandoned the heresy. There are other messages of his that are consistent in nature with the ascetic life of their author. Apollonius, a Roman senator under the Emperor Commodus, was accused by a slave of being a Christian and, having received permission to express the reasons for his faith, wrote a remarkable work, which he read in the Senate; but nevertheless, by the will of the Senate, he was beheaded for his faith in Christ, since, according to the ancient law, Christians brought before the court should not be released until they renounce their faith. Theophilus, bishop of Caesarea in Palestine, in the city formerly called Turris Straton, during the reign of the Emperor Severus, wrote, together with other bishops, a conciliar letter against those who celebrated Easter with the Jews on the fourteenth day of the month. Bacchilus, bishop of Corinth, lived during the time of the same emperor Severus and wrote, as the representative of all the bishops of Achaia, an elegant work “On Easter”. Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, with other bishops of Asia, who, in accordance with ancient tradition, celebrated the Passover with the Jews on the fourteenth day of the month, wrote a conciliar letter against Victor, Bishop of Rome, in which he claims to rely on the authority of the Apostle John and other ancient authors. Here is a quotation from this message: “We therefore celebrate this day according to custom, unshakably, without adding anything to it or taking anything away, for in Asia are the remains of those greatest saints who will rise again on the day of the Lord, when He will descend in His majesty from heaven and revive all the saints, i.e. Philip, one of the twelve apostles, who rests at Hierapolis, and his two daughters, who remained virgins until their death, and his other daughter, who died at Ephesus, filled with the Holy Spirit; and John, who rested in the bosom of our Lord and was his high priest, bearing on his brow the golden sign of martyrdom and healing, buried in Ephesus; and also Polycarp, bishop and martyr, who died at Smyrna; and Thraseus of Eumenius, bishop and martyr, also buried in Smyrna. Is it worth mentioning Sagaris, bishop and martyr, who rests in Laodicea, and the blessed Papyrus and Melito, a eunuch in the Holy Spirit, who always served the Lord, buried in Sardis and there awaiting his resurrection with the coming of Christ. All of them observed the day of Easter on the fourteenth day of the month, without deviating from the gospel tradition and following the religious canon. Also I, Polycrates, the least of your servants, according to the teaching of my relatives, which I also followed (seven of my relatives were bishops, I was the eighth), always celebrated Easter at a certain time. And thus, brothers, being 65 years old and having studied with many brothers from all parts of the world, having searched all the Holy Scriptures, I will not be afraid of those who threaten us, since my predecessors said: “It is fitting to submit to God and not to man.” I quote this in order to show, by this small example, the genius and authority of Polycrates. He lived during the reign of Emperor Severus, at the same time as Narcissus of Jerusalem. Heraclitus, who lived during the reign of Commodus and Severus, wrote commentaries on the Acts of the Apostles. Maxim, who lived at the same time, discussed in a remarkable work well-known questions: what is the origin of evil, and was matter created by God? Candide, who lived at the same time, published remarkable works on the six days of creation. Appion, who lived during the reign of Emperor Severus, also wrote works on the six days of creation. Sixtus, who lived during the reign of Emperor Severus, wrote the book On the Resurrection. Arabian, who lived at the same time, published small works related to Christian doctrine. Jude examined in detail the seventy weeks mentioned in the book of the prophet Daniel, and wrote a chronography of former times, which he brought up to the tenth year of the reign of Severus. He is accused of making a mistake in this work in predicting the imminent coming of the Antichrist, but this was because the intensity of the persecution seemed to foretell the end of the world. Tertullian, a presbyter now considered the chief Latin writer after Victor and Apollonius, a native of the city of Carthage in the African province, the son of a proconsul or centurion, was a man of strong and energetic character. He lived during the reign of the emperors of the North and Antoninus Caracalla and created many works, which we will not mention, because they are widely known. I myself met one Paul, an elderly man from the Italian city of Concordia, who in his youth was the secretary of the blessed Cyprian, who at that time was already of venerable age. He himself saw that Cyprian did not spend a day without reading Tertullian and often said: “Give me a teacher,” meaning Tertullian. Tertullian was a presbyter of the church until the middle of his life, and then, persecuted by the envious and evil priests of the Roman Church, he turned to the teachings of Montanus and mentioned the new prophecy in many of his books. He created works directed against the church: “On Modesty”, “On Persecution”, “On Fasting”, “On Monogamy”, six books “On Ecstasy” and the seventh - against Apollonius. It is said that he lived to a ripe old age and wrote many small works that have not survived to this day. Origen, nicknamed Adamantov (Indestructible). His father Leonidas was awarded the crown of martyrdom during the persecution of Christians in the tenth year of the reign of Severus Pertinax. Seventeen-year-old Origen, his mother and six younger brothers lived in poverty, because the property was confiscated for his father’s adherence to the Christian faith. At eighteen he began teaching catechism in the churches scattered throughout Alexandria. Subsequently he lived in this city for many years; the Alexandrian bishop Demetrius appointed him to succeed presbyter Clement. Around the middle of his life, he was ordered to go to Athens due to the fact that the churches of Achaia were divided by many heresies. On the way there, in Palestine, Origen was ordained a priest by the bishops of Caesarea and Jerusalem, Theoctistus and Alexander. Demetrius regarded this as an insult and, in a rage, sent out letters discrediting Origen's reputation. It is also known that before his trip to Caesarea, Origen visited Bishop Zephyrinus in Rome. Immediately upon his return to Alexandria, he made presbyter Hercules his assistant at the catechism school, who continued to wear his philosophical robe. Hercules became bishop of the church of Alexandria after Demetrius. How great was the glory of Origen is evident from the fact that Firmilian, bishop of Caesarea [Cappadocia], and all the bishops of Cappadocia desired his visit and received him for a long time. Later, having gone to Palestine to visit the holy places, Firmilian arrived at Caesarea [Palestine] and received detailed instructions from Origen on the Holy Scriptures. In addition, Origen visited Antioch at the invitation of Mamaea, the mother of Emperor Alexander, a religious woman, and was received there with great honors; he wrote letters to Emperor Philip, the first Roman ruler to convert to Christianity, as well as to his mother - these messages have been preserved. It is well known that he showed such zeal in the study of the Holy Scriptures that, contrary to the spirit of the time and the views of his people, he studied the Hebrew language and, using the translation of the Septuagint, collected other translations into a single work, that is, the translations of Aquila, Pontik the proselyte, Theodotian the Ebionite and Symmachus, an adherent of the same sect, who wrote a commentary on the Gospel of Matthew, on the basis of which he tried create your own doctrine. And besides this, he found three more translations, which also came to us from his library, with great diligence and compared them with other publications. And since I gave a list of his works in the epistle against the works of Varro, included in the books of my epistles to Paul, I will leave it without attention for now, mentioning, however, the immortal talent of Origen, and that he understood dialectic as well as geometry, arithmetic, music, grammar and rhetoric, and taught all the schools of philosophers so wisely that he had diligent students in secular literature. He taught them daily, and the crowds that gathered around him were amazing. He wanted to convert them to the Christian faith through secular literature. It is needless to speak of the cruelty of the persecution of Christians during the reign of Decius, the enemy of the religion of Philip, whom he killed—a persecution during which Fabian, bishop of the Roman Church, was killed in Rome, and Alexander and Babyla, high priests of the churches of Jerusalem and Antioch, were imprisoned for their faith in Christ. If anyone is interested in what was done about Origen, he can clearly learn this, firstly, from his own letters, which after the persecution were sent to various people, and secondly, from the sixth book of the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius of Caesarea and from his six works in defense of Origen. Origen lived until the times of Gallus and Volusianus, and at the age of sixty-nine he died in Tyre, where he was buried. Ammonius, a talented man of great philosophical knowledge, was famous in Alexandria at the same time. Among the numerous and outstanding monuments of this genius, the perfect work “The Concord of Moses and Jesus” and the Gospel canons, on which Eusebius of Caesarea subsequently relied, stand out. Porfiry falsely accused him of becoming a pagan again after being a Christian. But it is known that he remained a Christian until the end of his days. Ambrose, who was at first a Marcionist and subsequently set on the true path by Origen, was a deacon and a revered confessor. For him, as well as for the presbyter Protoctetus, Origen wrote the book “Exhortation to Martyrdom.” Thanks to Ambrose's diligence, money, and perseverance, Origen dictated a large number of works. Ambrose himself, as one respected person reports, also possessed no less literary talent, as indicated by his letters to Origen. He died before Origen and is blamed by many for the fact that, being a rich man, he did not remember his old and needy friend in his will before his death. Tryphon, a disciple of Origen, to whom some of the surviving epistles are addressed, was very well versed in the Holy Scriptures, as many of his books testify, and especially the work on the sacrificial heifer in Deuteronomy and on the animals which, together with the dove and turtle dove, were given to Abraham, as recorded in the book of Genesis. Minucius Felix, a famous lawyer in Rome, wrote the dialogue Octavius, which is a dispute between a Christian and a pagan. There is also another book signed with his name - “On Fate, or Against Mathematicians”, the talent of its author is obvious, but it seems to me that it does not correspond in style to the work mentioned above. Lactantius also mentions Minucius in his work. Gaius, bishop of Rome, who lived in the time of Zephyrinus, that is, during the reign of Antoninus, the son of Severus, wrote a very significant work "Against Proculus", a follower of Montanus, accusing him of the folly of defending a new prophecy, and in the same book, listing only thirteen epistles of Paul, asserts that the fourteenth, now called Hebrews, does not belong to Paul. The Romans to this day believe that this letter did not belong to the Apostle Paul. You might be interested in: