Polycarp’s faith, life, writings, and even his death revealed the fruit of faith and love grafted into his heart by Christ the Vine.
One of my favorite Orthodox icons is a depiction of Jesus’ words in John 15, “I Am the Vine.” At the center of the icon, Christ, the root of Jesse (Isaiah 11), grows out of and rests in the center of the tree, foreshadowing and foretelling his crucifixion on the tree of the cross. In his hands he holds the Scriptures, the words that give life to his disciples, his beloved branches, past and present. Stretching outward from Christ the Vine, the branches of his tree wrap around pictures of the twelve apostles. Icons like this one help us to see with our eyes and imagination what Jesus proclaims to us in his word.
“I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing” (John 15:5).
John is one of those branches. But he is not alone. There are twelve apostles. And if we were to paint more branches and fruit, we could add the generations of Christians who sat at the feet of the apostles. Here, we would find St. Polycarp, who was one of the early church fathers to learn at the feet of the disciples: Jesus taught John. John taught Polycarp. Eventually, Polycarp taught Irenaeus. And the branches of Christ’s fruitful tree continue to grow down through the generations, each one striving to do, by God’s grace, what Jesus taught in his word.
“Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit.”
Speaking of fruit. That’s part of the meaning of the name of St. Polycarp, whose life and faith we remember and give thanks to God for on February 23rd. His name in English, Polycarp, comes from the Greek (poly=many/much; karpos = fruit), meaning “much fruit,” “many fruit,” “fruitful,” or “rich in fruit.” A fitting name for a fruitful and faithful witness of Christ, who gave to Polycarp what he also gives to you: the first fruits of his resurrection from the dead.
Polycarp’s name, however, isn’t the only part of this apostolic father’s history that bears witness to Christ. Polycarp’s faith, life, writings, and even his death revealed the fruit of faith and love grafted into his heart by Christ the Vine.
Polycarp was born in Smyrna (A.D. 69), located in modern-day Turkey, not too far south of Ephesus. Smyrna is one of the cities the apostle John addresses in his seven letters to the churches in Asia Minor, included in the book of Revelation (See Rev. 2:8-11).
Not only were John’s words apostolic, they were prophetic. Smyrna, like many cities in the Roman Empire, faced growing hostility, persecution, and martyrdom for the sake of the gospel both while John was writing to the seven churches in Revelation and in subsequent decades. This tribulation came in many forms for the early church and particularly for Polycarp in his ministry as bishop.
Like other church fathers of the apostolic era and the ante-Nicene fathers, Polycarp spent a great deal of time as bishop declaring and defending the Christian faith against early church heretics such as the gnostics, and protecting his fellow Christians in Smyrna from swallowing the rotten fruit of false teachers. One such false teacher Polycarp encountered was Marcion of Sipone. Marcion was later condemned for his heretical and gnostic denial of Christ’s humanity and his teaching that the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament were completely different and irreconcilable deities. This led him to prune the entire Old Testament, and much of the New Testament from his list of authoritative Scripture. The story goes that when Polycarp journeyed to Rome, Marcion found him and asked him, “Do you know who I am?” To which Polycarp replied, “I know who you are; you are the son of Satan.”
While this might sound harsh to modern ears, Polycarp knew that the mold of false teaching can easily spread its decay to other branches of Christ’s church. He knew that the bad apple of Marcion’s false teaching could spoil the fruit of God’s faithful people. Not surprisingly, he learned this from John, who learned this from Jesus. Polycarp’s defense and witness of Christ were steadfast. In the surviving letter, we have from Polycarp, entitled The Letter of Polycarp to the Philippians, he wrote.
“For whosoever does not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, is antichrist; 1 John 4:3 and whosoever does not confess the testimony of the cross, is of the devil; and whosoever perverts the oracles of the Lord to his own lusts, and says that there is neither a resurrection nor a judgment, he is the first-born of Satan.”
What Jesus said of his disciples in John 15 is true of Polycarp as well. In his life, writings, and witness, his desire was to abide in the words of Jesus, and for the words of Jesus to abide in his life and faith. His letter to the Philippians, though brief, is soaked in the words of Jesus. Hardly a paragraph goes by without a quotation or allusion to Scripture. Christ’s words were the soil, trunk, and vine from which Polycarp was given life and hope. Polycarp’s letter reveals a man rooted in Christ crucified and risen.
We live and die as Polycarp lived and died, by the faithful and fruitful life of Christ our crucified and risen King.
Eventually, the tribulation that John warned Christians in Smyrna about in Revelation 2 came to pass. Persecution increased to the point where Christians were thrown in the arena with wild beasts. And yet many of these nameless martyrs faced their bloody death with boldness. Who had taught and given them such confidence in the face of such cruelty and calamity? Their bishop Polycarp. “Down with the atheists; let Polycarp be found,” the crowds demanded.
Soon enough, Polycarp was found. The soldiers who arrested him offered him a way out: Recant. Renounce Christ. Just a pinch of incense. It’s only three little words. All you have to say is, “Caesar is lord. And it will all be over.”
But Polycarp could not recant his faith or renounce Christ. Polycarp believed, confessed, and witnessed that Christ is Lord. “Eighty and six years have I served Him, and He never did me any injury: how then can I blaspheme my King and my Saviour?”
Again, at the arena, the proconsul offered Polycarp a way out. “Swear by the fortunes of Caesar.” But he would not.
The proconsul then said to him: “I have wild beasts at hand; to these will I cast you, unless you repent.”
But he answered, “Call them then, for we are not accustomed to repent of what is good in order to adopt that which is evil; and it is well for me to be changed from what is evil to what is righteous.”
But again, the proconsul said to him, “I will cause you to be consumed by fire, seeing you despise the wild beasts, if you will not repent.”
But Polycarp said, “You threaten me with fire which burns for an hour, and after a little is extinguished, but are ignorant of the fire of the coming judgment and of eternal punishment, reserved for the ungodly. But why do you tarry? Bring forth what you will” (The Martyrdom of Polycarp, 11).
Finally, Polycarp was burned at the stake (A.D. 155), and stabbed to death because the flames could not quench the life of this saint. his body was mutilated, killed, and burned so that only his bones were left for his fellow Christians to gather.
The faith Rome tried so hard to extinguish through the martyrdom of Polycarp, and many others, was not so easily doused. The blood and water of Jesus crucified is enough to quench all the fiery arrows of the evil one. And in the end, it was not Polycarp’s steadfastness, his witness, or even his martyrdom that saved him from the flames and the sword. Polycarp is as we all are, branches and fruit of Christ the Vine. Only our faithful and fruitful savior Jesus can save: “Let us then continually persevere in our hope, and the earnest of our righteousness, which is Jesus Christ, who bore our sins in His own body on the tree, 1 Peter 2:24 who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth, 1 Peter 2:22 but endured all things for us, that we might live in Him” (The Letter of Polycarp to the Philippians, 8).
Until the resurrection, where we will join Polycarp and all the faithful departed, we live and die as he lived and died, by the faithful and fruitful life of Christ our crucified and risen King.
“Now may the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and Jesus Christ Himself, who is the Son of God, and our everlasting High Priest, build you up in faith and truth, and in all meekness, gentleness, patience, long-suffering, forbearance, and purity; and may He bestow on you a lot and portion among His saints, and on us with you, and on all that are under heaven, who shall believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, and in His Father, who raised Him from the dead” (The Letter of Polycarp to the Philippians, 12).
