Hunter White
Dr. Herod
Honors Apologetics
4 September 2014
On Refutation: Saint Irenaeus
Thesis: As one of the early church bishops in Lyon, Irenaeus serves as an example as a missionary, a writer, and as an apologist.
1. Basic biography and missions
2. Teachings
3. Apologist
4. Doctrinal application to modern day apologists.
As one of the early church bishops in Lyon, Irenaeus serves as an example as a missionary, a writer, and as an apologist. Irenaeus was one of the church’s greatest defenders of doctrine due to his writings against the mainstream heresies of his time. His accomplishments are in mission work, writings, and in being an avid apologist.
”Irenaeus of Lyons was the most important Christian controversialist and theologian…show more content… They tell us, however, that this knowledge has not been openly divulged, because all are not capable of receiving it, but has been mystically revealed by the Saviour through means of parables to those qualified for understanding it.” (Christian…show more content… These Gnostics believed the Holy Spirit and Jesus were both offspring of the goddess of wisdom. Irenaeus wrote his famous book Against Heresies or also known in the original as Refutation and Overthrow of Gnosis, Falsely So Called. Irenaeus primarily tackled the Gnostics in their ideas of secret knowledge, many gods, Christ, and God the Father. Irenaeus stated that” “We are in a position to reckon up those who were by the apostles instituted bishops in the Churches, and [to demonstrate] the succession of these men to our own times; those who neither taught nor knew of anything like what these [heretics] rave about. For if the apostles had known hidden mysteries, which they were in the habit of imparting to the perfect in private and in secret, they would have delivered them especially to those to whom they were also committing the Churches themselves (Christian Apologetics). He focused and ordained that there is only one triune God who is holy and perfect, Christ was born from a virgin and died for our sins, and that God the Father is the creator and judge of all things (Christian Apologetics 103). Irenaeus also states that the gods that Gnostics made are based off of Greek myths and of Homer’s stories just with different names (Christian Apologetics 105). Irenaeus strove to unify the Church rather than divide it