Polycarp and Anicetus retain communion despite differing Paschal customs
About this date: 155 is a navigation anchor, not a date supplied by the surviving letter. The encounter belongs to Anicetus's Roman episcopate; reconstructions of his dates and Polycarp's last years differ.
Irenaeus recalls Polycarp and Anicetus disagreeing over Paschal observance without breaking communion. Eusebius preserves the recollection in his account of a later controversy.
Historical context
Writing to Victor of Rome near the end of the second century, Irenaeus appeals to an earlier encounter as a precedent for peace. Eusebius, writing in the fourth century, quotes the letter. The event, the letter recalling it, and the history transmitting that letter belong to different moments.
Key points
- Each bishop appeals to inherited practice rather than accepting the other's calendar.
- Irenaeus says Anicetus allowed Polycarp to preside at the Eucharist as a mark of respect.
- The appeal to this encounter is part of Irenaeus's later argument against cutting off whole churches.
People
- Polycarp of Smyrna
- Anicetus of Rome
- Irenaeus of Lyons
Primary sources
In the letter preserved by Eusebius, Irenaeus recalls:
Irenaeus remembers continued communion despite the unresolved disagreement about observance.
But though matters were in this shape, they communed together, and Anicetus conceded the administration of the eucharist in the church to Polycarp, manifestly as a mark of respect.
Passage context and translation
Irenaeus recalls an encounter under Anicetus while urging Victor not to cut off churches over inherited Paschal observance. The preceding section says neither bishop persuaded the other to change his practice.
After the excerpt
And they parted from each other in peace, both those who observed, and those who did not, maintaining the peace of the whole church.
Sources and further reading
- Irenaeus recalls Polycarp and Anicetus
Read the encounter inside the letter to Victor, not as a separately preserved contemporary account. McGiffert's public-domain translation.