Irenaeus of Lyons
Life and Ministry
Many consider Irenaeus to be the most important figure in the church in the 2nd century AD. In an era where we have few written sources, Irenaeus is an articulate voice. He gives us great insight into the development of the early church and the main challenges Christians faced.
Like Justin Martyr and Polycarp of Smyrna (who we previously looked at), Irenaeus lived during a time when the church was marginalised and persecuted. He was born into a Christian home sometime between 120 and 140 AD in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey) and sat under the ministry of Polycarp in his youth. His familiarity with the church in Rome suggests that he possibly studied and even taught at Rome under Bishop Anicetus. By 175 Irenaeus was well established in or near Lyons in Gaul (modern day France). In 177 he was sent to Rome to deliver a letter. While away a horrific persecution was ordered by the Emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Many Christians including the bishop of Vienne and Lyons, Pontinus were brutally martyred. Upon his return, the members of the church appointed Irenaeus as bishop.
He was active in the wider church and was appointed to represent the churches in Southern Gaul in the Montanist controversy in 177. In the late 180s he was called to mediate in a dispute between a bishop called Victor and the churches in Asia. We last hear of Irenaeus in about 190. It is possible that he was martyred sometime after this date.
What can we learn from Irenaeus?
Irenaeus is best known for his five-volume work, Against Heresies. This work gives us great insight to conflict in the church and orthodox doctrine at the end of the 2nd century. In it we see an early development of New Testament Canon. He also provides us with high calibre articulations and defences of the doctrines of God, the Trinity and the Holy Spirit, creation, providence, salvation and covenant theology. On the negative side there is a minor veneration of Mary, an undue deference to the church in Rome and appeals to tradition which were later used and developed by Roman Catholicism to support papal supremacy and Mariology.
In many ways I could write several articles on Irenaeus, dealing with each of his major contributions to Christian theology. But Gnosticism, which dominates the writings of Irenaeus, is an increasingly contemporary issue. Gnosticism is described by one writer as the fiercest battle the church has had to face. This heresy is notoriously hard to define succinctly. Below is an imperfect attempt to summarise the main Gnostic beliefs:
Radical dualism: The material world is made up of good and evil. Good is associated with an unknowable god and the bad associated with the (true) creator God of the Old Testament. Think ‘Star Wars’ (apologies to those who don’t know anything about it!) and the never-ending battle between the Jedi (good) and Sith (evil) as attempts are made to ‘bring balance to the force’. It’s a dual of the fates.
Anti-creation: Linked to the radical dualism is the view that creation was the mistake of the ‘inferior' creator. The true God was thought of as masquerading as the unknowable god. The world is a kind of prison to control the mind. ‘Believers' know they are imprisoned and know they have to escape. It sounds a lot like the plot of ‘The Matrix’.
Salvation through self-knowledge: The true account of creation and the fall (found in Genesis) is twisted. Wisdom enters the serpent and he teaches the true way of salvation. Eve listens to the serpent and saves Adam. The problem of humanity isn’t sin but a lack of knowledge. As Irenaeus says, “They affirm that the inner and spiritual man is redeemed by means of knowledge and that they having acquired knowledge of all things and stand henceforth in need of nothing else. This then is the true redemption.” Jesus comes not to save people from their sins but to reveal knowledge.
Creation structures rejected: As creation is deemed a bad mistake, to be free means to reject all the creation structures. Gnostics rejected the family, state and gender. In its most extreme forms, Gnostics believed that the goal for the believer was a sexless state and homosexuality was praised as a path to redemption.
You can see how contemporary Gnosticism is. We are long past the days of the average person having any knowledge of the Bible. It is therefore unsurprising that our culture as once again embraced Gnosticism, but under a different guise. We see the Gnostic idea of radical dualism in many different areas, but perhaps no more so than in the acronym LGBTQIA+. For example, Homosexuality is a sin that results from a distorted understanding of mind and body. And we see this even more radically in transgenderism. Transgender ideology says that a human being is simply composed of unrelated bits and pieces. That gender has nothing to do with biology. This ideology is increasingly influential and has given rise to greater numbers of people saying “my body doesn’t match what I am” – The assumption that our bodies are not part of what we are.
So how does a pastor who lived over 1,800 years ago help us with this complex issue today? Irenaeus had to deal with some of the most basic questions about reality in a way that, until recently, we in the West have not had to do. To answer these questions and to show that this Gnostic teaching was heresy, he went back to the beginning, to Genesis. Why Genesis? Genesis provides us with the historical account of reality. It provides us with the essential information for understanding who God is, how the world was created, what human beings are and the effects we now experience because of the fall. If we get Genesis 1-3 wrong, we will get just about everything else wrong. We will misdiagnose the human problem and provide the wrong solution.
Irenaeus focuses on two men, two representatives. Adam represents all of the world in rebellion against God. Jesus (the second Adam) represents of all of God’s people. Everyone is either ‘in Adam' or ‘in Christ’. Using Romans 5:12-21 he shows how things were, how things are and how things will be. Through Adam, the once perfect, sinless man, came sin which led to distortion and death. And through the death and resurrection of the sinless, perfect man, Jesus Christ, we have redemption and restoration.
How do we as Christians speak into all the gender confusion which stems from a radical dualistic view of the world? We go back to the beginning. We show people how things were – man, both male and female, created in the image and likeness of God. Righteous before a Holy God. We show how things are – Adam’s original sin and its implications for all of humanity. We are all guilty before God. By nature we are corrupted by sin and have an inability to do good. Our image is severely damaged. Finally, we point people to the remedy, the God-man, Jesus Christ. Only in him can we understand reality and have our minds and bodies, so ravaged by sin, restored and eventually made new.
