Canonised Father of the Church
Cyprian of Carthage
Bishop of Carthage and martyr, whose letters and treatises are the best evidence we have for how a third-century church handled persecution, penance and schism.
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- Dates
- around 200 - 258 — Beheaded at Carthage in 258 under Valerian; the date of his death is secure, his birth is not.
- Region
- Roman North Africa
- See
- Carthage
- Language of composition
- Latin
- Commemoration
- 31 August (Orthodox Church in America and other Orthodox jurisdictions) — Julian-calendar jurisdictions observe the date thirteen days later on the civil calendar. Western commemoration is on 16 September.
Life
Cyprian was a wealthy and cultivated Carthaginian who became a Christian in middle age and was made bishop within a few years, to the annoyance of some senior presbyters. Almost immediately the Decian persecution broke out.
He went into hiding and governed his church by letter, a decision that was criticised then and has been ever since. The letters survive and are extraordinarily revealing: they show a bishop managing a crisis in real time, arguing with confessors, negotiating with Rome, and trying to hold a church together.
He was exiled and then beheaded in 258 under Valerian, having refused to sacrifice.
Works
Generally accepted as authentic
- On the Unity of the Church
- On the Lapsed —
- The Letters —
Disputed, spurious or lost
- Works in the Pseudo-Cyprianic corpus —
Theological and spiritual contribution
Cyprian's central question was what to do with the lapsed — Christians who had sacrificed or bought certificates during persecution. Against rigorists who would readmit nobody and laxists who would readmit everyone on the word of a confessor, he insisted on a graded penance administered by the bishop. The system of penitential stations that appears in the canons of Nicaea and Ancyra grows out of this period.
He also wrote the classic third-century statement of the unity of the Church, grounded in the unity of the episcopate: bishops hold the one episcopate jointly, and to separate from the bishop is to separate from the Church.
He held that baptism administered outside the Church is no baptism, and disagreed sharply with Stephen of Rome about it. The disagreement did not break communion, and the Church's later practice on receiving converts follows neither position mechanically.
Controversy and reception
Related in this archive
-
Tertullian
The first major Christian writer in Latin, who gave the West much of its theological vocabulary and who ended his life outside the Church's communion. He is not counted among the Fathers.
-
The First Council of Nicaea
The council that confessed the Son to be of one substance with the Father, addressed the date of Pascha, and issued twenty disciplinary canons. It did not decide which books belong to the Bible.
-
Repentance
From the ancient penitential stations to the sacrament of confession as it is practised now.
-
Canon XI of Nicaea
Those who lapsed without compulsion under Licinius are to be dealt with mercifully: three years as hearers, seven as prostrators, two communicating in prayers without oblation.
Your notes
Sources for this page
- Tier C Fathers of the Third Century: Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian Treatise I: On the Unity of the Church translated edition of primary texts Archived in full, with the textual warning. Source record (opens in a new tab)
- Tier C Eusebius: Church History, Life of Constantine, Oration in Praise of Constantine Eusebius, Church History, Book VII, Chapters 2-5 translated edition of primary texts On the disagreement with Stephen of Rome over baptism. Source record (opens in a new tab)
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