Water and the Spirit

Treasures of Our Faith with Deacon Richard Vehige

On Tuesday in the week after Epiphany to the Baptism of the Lord, our Church invites us to first read and reflect on a passage from the book of the prophet Isaiah (62: 1-12) entitled “The approach of redemption”. Our treasure, which follows, is from a sermon on the Epiphany attributed Hippolytus, priest.

Saint Hippolytus is one of the most important second–third centuries Christian theologians, whose provenance, identity and corpus remain elusive to scholars and historians. Saint Hippolytus is accorded special recognition in Church history: Not only is he the first antipope but he is also the only antipope ever canonized! In its first several centuries, the Church dealt with crises both external and internal. Externally, the Church suffered for nearly 250 years under the violent persecutions of Roman emperors, begun under mad Nero in A.D. 64 and finally stopped under Constantine in 313. Internally, the Church wrestled with heresies, schism, and matters of discipline. One of the main issues of disagreement in those early centuries concerned the treatment of the faithful who committed serious sins or who apostatized during the persecutions.

Saint Hippolytus did not suffer from indecision, and he looked to the Roman pontiff to make a quick and authoritative decision concerning the heresy known as Modalism. Hippolytus wanted Pope Zephyrinus and later his successor, Callistus 1. to rebuke and condemn the Modalists, and grew upset when they failed to do so. Hippolytus was so angered by the election of Callistus that he decided to embark on a path that would impact the Church throughout its history. He claimed that Callistus was unworthy and gathered a group of followers who elected him pope. In so doing Hippolytus opened the door to the concept of the antipope, which would rear its ugly head throughout Church history but most devastatingly during the Great Western Schism of the fourteenth century.

Hippolytus’s schism lasted for nineteen years and through three pontificates. As a rigorist who did not believe that serious sinners should be re-admitted to communion in the Church, he refused to accept the more-merciful approach of Callistus and his successors.

In 235, Thrax was proclaimed emperor by the legions in Germany. Shortly afterwards, he turned his attention to the Church and a persecution erupted that targeted the clergy. The reigning pope, St. Pontian, and the “anti-pope” Hippolytus, were arrested and sent to the mines on the island of Sardinia. Amidst the suffering and hardship of the mines, Hippolytus renounced his schism and papal claim and was reconciled to the Church by Pontian. Both men later succumbed to the harsh conditions, and their remains were transported for burial in Rome, where they were recognized as martyrs and saints of the Church. Hippolytus is considered a martyr of Rome and was given the rank of a priest, not of a bishop, an indication that He was reconciled to the Church before his martyrdom. His unique case provides an example of repentance and reconciliation for those who have separated themselves from the Church.

Isaiah, one of the greatest of the prophets, appeared at a critical moment in Israel’s history. The Northern Kingdom collapsed, under the hammerlike blows of Assyria, in 722/721 B.C., and in 701 Jerusalem itself saw the army of Sennacherib drawn up before its walls. In the year that Uzziah, king of Judah, died, Isaiah received his call to the prophetic office in the Temple of Jerusalem. Close attention should be given to chapter six, where this divine summons to be the ambassador of the Most High is circumstantially described.

The vision of the Lord enthroned in glory stamps an indelible character on Isaiah’s ministry and provides a key to the understanding of his message. The majesty, holiness and glory of the Lord took possession of his spirit and, at the same time, he gained a new awareness of human pettiness and sinfulness. The enormous abyss between God’s sovereign holiness and human sinfulness overwhelmed the prophet. Only the purifying coal of the seraphim could cleanse his lips and prepare him for acceptance of the call: “Here I am, send me!”

The ministry of Isaiah extended from the death of Uzziah in 742 B.C. to Sennacherib’s siege of Jerusalem in 701 B.C., and it may have continued even longer, until after the death of Hezekiah in 687 B.C. Later legend (the Martyrdom and Ascension of Isaiah) claims that Hezekiah’s son, Manasseh, executed Isaiah by having him sawed in two. During this long ministry, the prophet returned again and again to the same themes, and there are indications that he may have sometimes re-edited his older prophecies to fit new occasions.