Epiphanius of Salamis

Epiphanius of Salamis
Epiphanius

Icon of St. Epiphanius (Graanica monastery, Kosovo) Bishop of Salamis (Cyprus), Oracle of Palestine Born ca. 310-320 Judea 403 at sea

Died

Honored in Eastern Orthodoxy Oriental Orthodoxy Roman Catholic Church Feast [1] May 12 17 Pashons (Coptic Orthodoxy) Vested as a bishop in omophorion, sometimes holding a scroll

Attributes

Epiphanius of Salamis (inter 310320 403) was bishop of Salamis at the end of the 4th century. He is considered a saint and a Church Father by both the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Churches. He gained a reputation as a strong defender of orthodoxy. He is best known for composing a very large compendium of the heresies up to his own time, full of quotations that are often the only surviving fragments of suppressed texts, and for instigating, with Tychon (Bishop of Amathus), a persecution against the non-Christians living on Cyprus, and the destruction of most of their temples.

Ecclesiastical Life
Epiphanius was born into a Christian family in the small settlement of Besanduk, which is near Eleutheropolis, Palestine,[2] and lived as a monk in Egypt, where he was educated and came into contact with Valentinian groups. He returned to Palestine around 333, when he was still a young man, and he founded a monastery at Ad nearby [3] which is often mentioned in the polemics of Jerome with Rufinus and John, Bishop of Jerusalem. He was ordained a priest, and lived and studied as superior of the monastery in Ad that he founded for thirty years and gained much skill and knowledge in that position. In that position he gained the ability to speak in several tongues including Hebrew, Syriac, Egyptian, Greek, and Latin and was called by Jerome on that account Pentaglossis ("Five tongued"). His reputation for learning prompted his nomination and consecration as Bishop of Salamis, Cyprus[4] in 367. He was also the Metropolitan of the Church of Cyprus. He served as bishop for nearly forty years, as well as traveling widely to combat unorthodox beliefs. He was present at a synod in Antioch (376) where the Trinitarian questions were debated against the heresy of Apollinarianism. He upheld the position of Bishop Paulinus, who had the support

Epiphanius of Salamis of Rome, over that of Meletius of Antioch, who was supported by the Eastern Churches. In 382 he was present at the Council of Rome, again upholding the cause of Paulinus. During a visit to Palestine in 394 he attacked Origen's followers and urged the Bishop of Jerusalem, John II, to condemn his writings. Origen's writings were eventually condemned at the Second Council of Constantinople in 553. He also urged the same bishop to be careful of the "offense" of images in the churches. He noted that when travelling in Palestine he went into a church to pray and saw a curtain with an image of Christ or a saint which he tore down. He told Bishop John that such images were "opposed . . . to our religion."[5] When Epiphanius was nearly 80, in 402, at the behest of Bishop Theophilus of Alexandria, the saint went to Constantinople to support Theophilus in his campaign against Saint John Chrysostom, and the four "Tall Brothers." When he realized he was being used as a tool by Theophilus against Saint John Chrysostom, who had given refuge to the monks persecuted by Theophilus and who were appealing to the emperor, Epiphanius started back to Salamis, only to die on the way home in 403.

Writings
His earliest known work is the Ancoratus (the well anchored man), which includes arguments against Arianism and the teachings of Origen. His best-known book is the Panarion which means "medicine-chest" (also known as Adversus Haereses, "Against Heresies"), presented as a book of antidotes for those bitten by the serpent of heresy. Written between 374 and 377, it forms a handbook for dealing with the arguments of heretics. It lists 80 heresies, some of which are not described in any other surviving documents from the time. While Epiphanius often let his zeal come before facts - he admits on one occasion that he writes against the Origenists based only on hearsay (Panarion, Epiphanius 71) - the Panarion is a valuable source of information on the Christian church of the fourth century. It is also an important source regarding the early Jewish gospels such as the Gospel according to the Hebrews circulating among the Ebionites and the Nazarenes, as well as the followers of Cerinthus and Merinthus.[6] One unique feature of the Panarion is in the way that Epiphanius compares the various heretics to different poisonous beasts, going so far as to describe in detail the animal's characteristics, how it produces its poison, and how to protect oneself from the animal's bite or poison. For example, he describes his enemy Origen as "a toad noisy from too much moisture which keeps croaking louder and louder." He compares the Gnostics to a particularly dreaded snake "with no pangs." The Ebionites, a Christian sect that followed Jewish law, were described by Epiphanius as "a monstrosity with many shapes, who practically formed the snake-like shape of the mythical many-headed Hydra in himself." In all, Epiphanius describes fifty animals, usually one per sect.[7] The Panarion was only recently (1987 and 1990) translated into English. Aside from the polemics by which he is known, Epiphanius wrote a work of biblical antiquarianism, called, for one of its sections, On Measures and Weights ( ). It was composed in Constantinople for a Persian priest, in 392.[8] The first section discusses the canon of the Old Testament and its versions, the second of measures and weights, and the third, the geography of Palestine. The texts appear not to have been given a polish but consist of rough notes and sketches, as Allen A. Shaw, a modern commentator, concluded; nevertheless Epiphanius' work on metrology was important in the History of measurement. The collection of homilies traditionally ascribed to a "Saint Epiphanius, bishop" are dated in the late fifth or sixth century and are not connected with Epiphanius of Salamis by modern scholars.[9]

Epiphanius of Salamis

Works
The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis, Book I (Sects 1-46) Frank Williams, translator, 1987 (E.J. Brill, Leiden) ISBN 90-04-07926-2 The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis, Book II and III (Sects 47-80, De Fide) Frank Williams, translator, 1993 (E.J. Brill, Leiden) ISBN 90-04-09898-4 The Panarion of St. Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis Philip R. Amidon, translator, 1990 (Oxford University Press, New York) (This translation contains selections rather than the full work.) ISBN 0-19-506291-4

Notes
[1] (Greek) (http:/ / www. synaxarion. gr/ gr/ sid/ 3117/ sxsaintinfo. aspx). 12 . . [2] The Panarion of Epiphanius of Salamis: Book I (Sects 1-46), By Epiphanius, Epiphanius of Salamis, Translated by Frank Williams, 1987 ISBN 90-04-07926-2 p xi [3] The more famous Monastery of Epiphanius near Thebes, Egypt was founded by an anchorite named Epiphanius towards the end of the sixth century; it was explored by an expedition from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1912-14. [4] Salamis was also known as Constantia after Constantine II. [5] Part 9, Letter LI. From Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, in Cyprus, to John, Bishop of Jerusalem (c. 394), http:/ / www. newadvent. org/ fathers/ 3001051. htm. [6] Panarion, Epiphanius 30 iii 7 [7] Verheyden, Joseph (2008). "Epiphanius of Salamis on Beasts and Heretics" (http:/ / secure. peeters-leuven. be/ content. php?url=article. php& id=2035279& journal_code=JECS& download=yes). Journal of Eastern Christian Studies 60 (1-4): 143173. . [8] Allen A. Shaw, "On Measures and Weights by Epiphanius" National Mathematics Magazine 11.1 (October 1936: 3-7). [9] Alvar Erikson, Sancti Epiphani Episcopi Interpretatio Evangelorum (Lund) 1938, following Dom Morin.

External links
St Epiphanius of Salamis (http://ocafs.oca.org/FeastSaintsViewer.asp?SID=4&ID=1&FSID=101356) Orthodox Icon and Synaxarion "Epiphanius of Salamis" (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13393b.htm). Catholic Encyclopedia. New York: Robert Appleton Company. 1913. Epiphanius, On Biblical Weights and Measures (http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/ epiphanius_weights_03_text.htm) English translation of a Syriac text Some excerpts from the Panarion (http://www.tertullian.org/rpearse/epiphanius.html) ( Further excerpts from the Panarion (http://essenes.crosswinds.net/panarion.htm)) Currently dead. Letter from Epiphianus, Bishop of Salamis, in Cyprus, to John, Bishop of Jerusalem (http://www.ccel.org/ fathers/NPNF2-06/letters/letter51.htm) Opera Omnia by Migne Patrologia Graeca with analytical indexes (http://www.documentacatholicaomnia.eu/ 30_20_0320-0403-_Epiphanius_Salaminis_Episcopus.html) This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain:Herbermann, Charles, ed. (1913). "Epiphanius of Salamis". Catholic Encyclopedia. Robert Appleton Company.

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