The Life of Irenaeus of Lyon – the True Story | Church Fathers

Irenæus claimed when he was young, he listened to Polycarp teach in Smyrna of Asia Minor. Polycarp had listened to the Apostle John teach when Polycarp himself was young. This means that Irenæus got to hear reliable accounts of Jesus’ life and teaching from eyewitnesses. Although the details of Irenæus’s birth are unknown, it is plausible that Irenæus was a native of Smyrna and was born sometime in the AD 130s or even 140s. After a brief time of studying in Rome, Irenæus headed across the Alps to Lugdunum of Gaul now known as Lyons, France. 

Lyons has always been an important center of trade in the region of southeastern France. There was a large Celtic population there when Julius Cæsar conquered Gaul in 52 BC. Nine years later, a former lieutenant in Cæsar’s army, Munatius Plancus, built and settled a military post there at the intersection of a few roads and the Rivers Rhône and Saône. From that time until the mid-third century AD, Lyons remained the most important city in Northwest Europe. In addition to the Celtic gods worshiped in Lyons, the Romans paid special tribute to Mercury, Apollo, Hercules, and Jupiter at that location. Christianity was first found in Lyons by the mid-second century AD as merchants and missionaries passed through Lyons and settled among the inhabitants. In about AD 150, Polycarp sent a man named Pothinus to Lyons to found a church at that location. Pothinus was the first Bishop of Lyons. When Irenæus arrived at Lyons to become one of the church’s presbyters in about AD 170, the local church was still new, and Christians faced intense persecution. The church of Lyons sent Irenæus to Rome in 177 on their behalf to discuss with the young bishop, Eleutherius, how much toleration should be shown to the Montanists and their heresy in Asia Minor. The Montanists were a sect within the church in Asia Minor, who highly valued prophetic revelation, a high standard of morals, and the belief that the Lord was going to return at any moment to Pepuza, an ancient town in Phrygia, Asia Minor, where the Montanists had their headquarters. 

When Irenæus returned to Lyons from Rome in the year 178, he was deeply grieved to discover that a mass martyrdom had claimed the lives of almost fifty Christians and greatly grieved the church in that location. Among the martyrs were a slave girl named Blandina and a man named Sanctus whose stories of martyrdom are famous to this day. Also among the martyrs was Pothinus, the church’s bishop. Upon Irenæus’s return, Irenæus was promptly named as Pothinus’s replacement. Irenæus would remain Bishop of Lyons for a quarter of a century. 

As bishop, Irenæus chose missionaries to send throughout Gaul to spread the Gospel among the Celts and Romans in addition to encouraging and organizing those Christians scattered throughout the region. Irenæus believed that the largest threat to the growth of the church in Gaul was the group of heresies which later became known as Gnosticism. Although their beliefs varied greatly, they commonly held the notion that physical matter is evil, and the goal of this life is to escape the physical world and rejoin the spiritual one. They denied the physical humanity of Jesus and were promoting themselves as the only “true Christians” instead of the established church. Irenæus’s most important literary work is his Against Heresies, in which he exposes the folly of Gnostic claims and clearly explains the Christian doctrine that was practiced in all churches everywhere—east, west, north, and south. As a result, Irenæus’s “work remains . . . of the greatest importance for the knowledge of the Gnostic systems and the theology of the early Church and he deserves to be called the ‘founder of Christian theology.’”

Another matter of practical theological disagreement within the global church in the late second century was the question of when exactly Christians should celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. This is referred to as the Quartodeciman Controversy. The Eastern Churches, following the instructions of the Apostle John and Polycarp of Smyrna tended to celebrate the crucifixion of Christ on the same date as Jews celebrated the Passover, even if that date fell on a different day of the week than Sunday. The Western Churches, especially Rome, to distinguish themselves from the Jews, adopted a different dating system, so the resurrection of Christ was always celebrated on the Sunday following Passover. Irenæus, living up to the meaning of his name, “peaceful,” wrote a letter to Pope Victor in the year 190, urging Victor to allow the Eastern bishops to remain in good fellowship with the Western church even though there were two different ideas of when to celebrate the death and resurrection of Christ. 

Irenæus later wrote a theological work entitled The Demonstration of Apostolic Preaching, and at least four other writings that were lost and are only known by references from Eusebius are attributed to him. These include: On the Oxgoad, On the Subject of Knowledge, On the Monarchy, and On Easter. Irenæus died in about AD 202. Later accounts suggested he died a martyr’s death during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, but no mention of such a death was made until Gregory of Tours wrote a history of the Franks in the sixth century. Lyons was a crucial center of Christianity in Gaul. Thanks especially to the ministry and writing of Irenæus, the town of Lyons will forever be associated with early French missionary work and orthodox theology in response to the Gnostic crisis of the second century.

  1.  Irenæus, Letter to Florinus as cited in Eusebius’s Ecclesiastical History, 5:20.
  2.  Bryan Litfin suggests circa AD 130 in Getting to Know the Church Fathers: An Evangelical Introduction (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2007), 79; González suggests circa 135 in A History of Christian Thought, vol. 1, From the Beginnings to the Council of Chalcedon, revised edition (Nashville: Abingdon, 1987), 157; Everett Ferguson suggests 130-140 in “Irenæus” in Great Leaders of the Christian Church, edited by John D. Woodbridge (Chicago: Moody Press, 1988), 44; and A. Cleveland Cox suggests anytime between 120 and 140.
  3.  Bryan Litfin, Getting to Know the Church Fathers: An Evangelical Introduction (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2007), 80.
  4.  William Tabbernee, editor, Early Christianity in Contexts: An Exploration across Cultures and Continents (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2014), 445.
  5.  William Tabbernee, editor, Early Christianity in Contexts: An Exploration across Cultures and Continents (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2014), 436.
  6.  William Tabbernee, editor, Early Christianity in Contexts: An Exploration across Cultures and Continents (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2014), 445.
  7.  Justo González, A History of Christian Thought, vol. 1, From the Beginnings to the Council of Chalcedon, revised edition (Nashville: Abingdon, 1987), 157.
  8.  David Christie-Murray, A History of Heresy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976), 33-37.
  9.  Justo González, A History of Christian Thought, vol. 1, From the Beginnings to the Council of Chalcedon, revised edition (Nashville: Abingdon, 1987), 157.
  10.  Roger E. Olson, The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition and Reform (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1999), 71-78.
  11.  Johannes Quasten, Patrology: Volume 1—The Beginning of Patristic Literature from the Apostles Creed to Irenaeus (Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1990), 290, 294.
  12.  A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs, s.v. “Quartodecimans” (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1998).
  13.  The Jews celebrate Passover on the 14th of the month of Nisan, no matter what day of the week it falls on.
  14.  Gregory of Tours, Historia Francorum, 1:27.