Martyrs of Lyons

Neither the letter nor the “persecution” it describes, therefore, is attested anywhere in Christian literature until some two hundred years after the events. Even apart from the lack of external evidence for the events in Gaul, there are excellent reasons for doubting the historicity of the account. The account begins with the circumstances of the arrests. Apparently, animosity against Christians had built up over the summer of 177, and after some time violence erupted in Gaul. The Christians were attacked by a mob and dragged to the forum, where they were questioned by the local authorities. No reason is given for the arrests, but once on trial the martyrs begin to reveal more about themselves

- Another legal problem emerges with the evidence of some of the Christians’ slaves. The slaves provide legal testimony that the Christians committed incest and cannibalism. As shocking and counterintuitive as it seems to us, under Roman law slaves had to be tortured in order for their witness to count as legal testimony. Yet the slaves are not tortured, as the law required; they simply are permitted to offer their stories.
- This whole enterprise is illegal and pointless. There are some other strange details in the text. At one point the martyrs refer to the church as the “virgin mother.” This is a distinctive concept that does not appear anywhere else until the late third century, when another Christian writer named Methodius of Olympus introduces it in his Symposium.
- Finally, the account opens by describing the events as “worthy of undying remembrance,” an expression used by Eusebius in the Martyrs of Palestine and his Church History.
- The most likely and simplest explanation, however, is that Eusebius has edited the letter himself. The Martyrs of Lyons, therefore, is a theological early church letter edited by a strong-minded church historian. Eusebius is correct when he says that the letter is not only historical; the problem is that we may not be able to discern which parts of it are at all historical.

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