Hegesippus

Hegesippus was a church writer of the second century, who wrote against the heresies of the Gnostics and of Marcion and sought to gather and preserve the apostolic tradition. He is commemorated on 7 April.

His life

Little is known of his life, and almost all comes from Eusebius of Caesarea. The years he lived are gathered from Eusebius’ words: he lived in the time of the emperor Hadrian, reached Rome from Corinth in the time of Pope Anicetus and wrote in the time of Pope Eleutherus. He is thought to have been born around 107-110 and to have died around 180. Eusebius says that he was a Jew by birth, learned in the Semitic languages and in the customs and traditions of the Jews, for he quoted from the Hebrew and knew the Gospel of the Hebrews and a Syriac Gospel. He seems to have lived in the East. In the time of Anicetus he set out on a journey, passed through Corinth and reached Rome, learning on the spot the teaching of the Churches he visited and showing that it agreed with that of Rome.

His writings

His works are almost all lost, except for eight passages quoted by Eusebius. Eusebius says that he wrote in five books, in the simplest style, Memoirs on the apostolic preaching (Hypomnemata). Hegesippus relied chiefly on the tradition preserved through the succession of bishops, and for this reason he has left us the oldest news about the first bishops. Eusebius took from him the account of the martyrdom of James, the “brother of the Lord”, called Oblias, the election of Symeon as bishop of Jerusalem and the summoning to Rome, by the emperor Domitian, of the descendants of the holy apostle Jude. In the Middle Ages the Church History of Hegesippus appears in the catalogue of a monastic library, and in Eastern libraries it survived until the seventeenth century.