Ignatius of Antioch

Saint Ignatius, the second successor of Peter in the Chair of Antioch, is a figure of great importance in Christian antiquity. Sometime in the years 107-11, he was arrested and taken in chains from Syria to Rome, where he was martyred by the Emperor Trajan.

At the two stops on the sea voyage, in Smyrna and Troas, he had the opportunity to write seven letters that have come down to us. From Smyrna he wrote to the Churches of Ephesus, Magnesia, and Tralles, which had visited him through their bishops and their envoys, and also to the Church of Rome, asking it not to intercede for his release. From Troas he wrote to the Churches of Smyrna and Philadelphia, as well as a personal letter to the Bishop of Smyrna, Saint Polycarp.

These Letters, through their singular inspiration and strength of faith, made public his testimony to the faith professed by the Church of Antioch and by the whole universal Church of Christ, and they retain their imperishable value.

The main points of the ecclesial Christological faith that Ignatius sets forth with ardent zeal are:

to flee from Gnostic heresies and Judaizing doctrines

to be anchored in the Bishops, Presbyters, and deacons willed by the Father and by Christ, as handed down by the Apostles

to maintain an unshakable faith and the union of love with Christ, our God and our only hope

In this context, the brief Marian texts that we recall here took on singular importance. Being an integral part of the Letters, they bear witness to the Marian catechesis of Christianity’s beginnings, summarized in the local symbols of faith, and to the concern not to go beyond what the Apostles handed down to the Churches.

Mary takes her light from the central mystery of Christ the Savior, and the mystery of Christ postulates certain key points of Mariological doctrine as an indispensable condition:

the true motherhood of Mary

The conception, pregnancy, and childbirth that ground the human reality and the human action of the Lord

The virginity of Mary, who conceives by the power of the Holy Spirit, and which, together with the real childbirth, constitutes the fulfillment of predestination and the action willed and wrought by God, which are part of the plan of salvation for man.

The most beautiful texts of Saint Ignatius

Eph. 7:2: the “one physician” born of Mary and of God as an anti-Docetic Christological confession

Some men, with malicious deceit, want to carry the Name about everywhere, even though they do things unworthy of God: before them you must become like fierce beasts. In reality, they are rabid dogs that bite treacherously. You must keep away from them, for they are incurable.

There is only one physician, both human and divine, begotten and unbegotten, God come in the flesh, true life in death, both from Mary and from God, now passible and later impassible, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Eph. 18-19: the virginity of Mary, the childbirth hidden from the prince of this world, and the mysteries of the “economy of God”

Do not be deceived, my brothers: those who corrupt families will not inherit the kingdom of God (cf. 1 Cor 6:9-10). If, then, those who do such things according to the flesh are put to death, how much more the one who, by perverse doctrine, corrupts the faith of God for which Christ was crucified. Such a one, having become impure, will end in the eternal fire, as will also the one who listens to him.

For this reason the Lord accepted the perfume upon His head, to pour incorruption upon the Church. Do not let yourselves be anointed with the foul odor of the teaching of the prince of this world, lest you be led captive away from the life that awaits us. Why do we not all become wise by receiving the knowledge of God, which is Jesus Christ? Why should we foolishly perish, not recognizing the gift that the Lord has truly sent us?

My spirit is a victim of the Cross, which is a stumbling block to unbelievers, but to us salvation and eternal life. “Where is the wise man? Where is the inquirer?” (1 Cor 1:20), where is the boasting of those who call themselves learned?

Since our Lord God Jesus Christ was carried in the womb of Mary according to the economy of God, “from the seed of David” (Rom 1:3), indeed, but from the Holy Spirit: He was born and was baptized, in order to purify the water by His passion.

And the virginity of Mary and her childbirth, as well as the death of the Lord, remained hidden from the prince of this world:

three resounding mysteries, which were accomplished in the silence of God.

How, then, were they made manifest through the ages? A star shone in heaven above the other stars: its light was inexplicable, and its novelty caused bewilderment. Afterward, all the stars, together with the sun and the moon, formed a chorus around the star, and it spread its light above all the others. And so a tumult arose to know where this novelty, so different from the ordinary, came from. Then all magic was dissolved, every bond of wickedness was abolished, ignorance was destroyed, the old kingdom fell into ruin, for God had appeared in human form for a newness of eternal life, and what had been established by God began. Therefore everything was in turmoil, because the destruction of death was being prepared.

If Jesus Christ, through your prayers, deems me worthy, and if it is the will of God, in the second book that I am about to write to you I will set forth for you the economy of the new man Jesus Christ, of which I have begun to speak to you: in His faith and in His charity, in His passion and resurrection. Above all if the Lord reveals to me that each and all of you, through the grace that comes from His Name, gather together in one faith, and in Jesus Christ, who is of the line of David according to the flesh (Rom 1:3), who is son of man and Son of God, in obedience to the Bishop and the presbyters with steadfast concord, breaking the one bread, which is the medicine of immortality, the antidote that we should not die but live forever in Jesus Christ.

Trall. 9:1-2: the Davidic genealogy of Christ, the real motherhood of Mary, and Ignatius’s anti-Docetism

Stop your ears if anyone speaks to you otherwise than this: Jesus Christ, who is of the line of David, who is from Mary, who was truly born, ate and drank, was truly persecuted under Pontius Pilate, was truly crucified and died, in the sight of those in heaven (the angels), those on earth, and those in the underworld. He also truly rose from the dead, His Father having raised Him: the Father who, in like manner, will also raise us, who believe in Him, in Jesus Christ, apart from whom we do not have true life.

Smyrn. 1:1-2: the confession of the virginal birth from Mary and of John’s baptism as Christological foundations

I give glory to Jesus Christ, God, who has made us so wise. I have seen that you are truly perfected in an unshakable faith, as if nailed in flesh and in spirit to the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ and established in charity by the blood of Christ, firmly convinced about our Lord, who is truly “of the line of David according to the flesh” (Rom 1:3), Son of God according to the will and power of God, truly born of a virgin, baptized by John so that all righteousness might be fulfilled by Him (cf. Mt 3:15). Under Pontius Pilate and Herod the tetrarch, He was truly nailed in the flesh for us, and of His fruit are we, of His divinely blessed passion, so that through His resurrection He might raise up a standard for all ages on behalf of His saints and His faithful, whether from among the Jews or from among the Gentiles, in the one body of His Church.

To explore more deeply patristic Mariology and the testimony of the Fathers of the Church about Mary, consult the encyclical Redemptoris Mater by Saint John Paul II.

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