Peregrinus the Christian

Added: 2026-05-10

[00:00:00]It might seem odd today to treat Peregrinus Proteus as a Christian since he perished in an Olympic bonfire as a cynic philosopher in the year 165.

[00:00:11]But in the year 144, cooped up in the bowels of a Syrian prison, Peregrinus very much expected to die as a Christian.

[00:00:21]He's an important example of a named figure who fit the profile of a wandering prophet, not a rare breed in 2nd century Palestine.

[00:00:29]We know about Peregrinus chiefly from Lucian of Samosata.

[00:00:34]Lucian was primarily an ancient satirist and intellectual with a penchant for popping the inflated pretensions of religious charlatans.

[00:00:43]Against Peregrinus, Lucian sharpened his pen like a sword.

[00:00:47]One way to disparage Peregrinus was to connect him to the sect that many Greek intellectuals of the time despised, that new initiatory cult called Christianity.

[00:01:00]Naturally, one can't take Lucian entirely at his word, in particular because he wrote an invective and hid behind the persona of an unnamed orator.

[00:01:10]On the other hand, if we employ a skeptical lens on Lucian's own skepticism, we can adjudicate his terminology and contextualize his report, enabling it to serve as our basis for reliably reconstructing Peregrinus as a Christian.

[00:01:30]I'm Dr. David Litwa and on this channel, we discuss early Christianity, the Greco-Roman world, and Christian gnosis.

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[00:02:18]>> [music] [music] >> Peregrinus lived from about 100 to 165.

[00:02:37]He came from Parium, a small coastal city in northwestern Asia Minor on the south shore of the Sea of Marmara.

[00:02:47]We don't know anything about his childhood, only that he came from a well-to-do family and that he had sufficient education to write.

[00:02:56]Controversy swirled over the sudden death of his father, reportedly strangled, at the age of 60.

[00:03:02]Some of the locals accused Peregrinus of killing his sire. The charges became so feverish, he fled.

[00:03:09]Peregrinus traveled south to modern Palestine, probably to an urban center like Caesarea on the coast or to Aelia Capitolina, modern Jerusalem. There he spent months and possibly years learning Christian lore with its rising class of intellectuals.

[00:03:27]He became so comfortable in Christian literature that he began not only to expound, but also to write some of it himself, though we don't know in what form. It was an age in which one could pen a gospel or revelation or letter in the name of an apostle.

[00:03:47]Peregrinus soon realized that he could thrive as a Christian intellectual and inspired expounder of Jewish and Christian oracles, otherwise known as a prophet.

[00:04:00]The ancient Syrian church order called the Didache expected traveling prophets to stay no more than two or three days at a single location, but it also acknowledged a category of prophet who wanted to settle within a community.

[00:04:17]Such a prophet would be duly tested.

[00:04:19]If he asked for money, he would be sent packing.

[00:04:23]By every indication, Peregrinus was a man who could survive, at least for short times, with no cash and little to eat.

[00:04:33]An ascetic like him could have passed easily as a holy man.

[00:04:37]When a local Christian group recognized Peregrinus's talents, his aristocratic background, his knowledge of sacred texts, and his status as a Christian author, they promoted him.

[00:04:51]Peregrinus became a prostates, a Greek word which means presider or president of a congregation.

[00:04:58]It may be equivalent to the term presbyteros or elder or even episcopus, commonly translated as bishop.

[00:05:08]Writing about 150, Justin Martyr wrote that the president, here the Greek is proestos, of his congregation provided the Sunday sermon, which was based on either gospel or prophetic texts.

[00:05:23]We don't know how long Peregrinus served as a Christian leader, but it was likely several months and even years.

[00:05:32]To designate his capacity as a cult or perhaps him leader, Lucian called Peregrinus a theasarkos, that is, the leader of a band.

[00:05:42]That Peregrinus also served as lawgiver over his community indicates that he had a role cons- in constructing church discipline.

[00:05:50]Early Christian leaders like him were just beginning to define the scope of their authority.

[00:05:58]After an unknown period, Peregrinus was arrested.

[00:06:02]We don't know on what charges.

[00:06:04]Evidently, it was for an honorable cause because the Christians didn't abandon him.

[00:06:10]All of the sudden, the engine of early Christian social services kicked into high gear.

[00:06:16]Those with enough social status and legal knowledge appealed to get Peregrinus released from the indictment.

[00:06:24]At the same time, a committee of widows and orphans arranged to have him very well fed in the local prison.

[00:06:31]Higher status Christian leaders bribed the guards so that they could spend the night with him in jail, serving him the Eucharist, and [snorts] reading the scriptures aloud.

[00:06:41]Christians from as far away as Asia Minor, Peregrinus's home province, came to encourage him, fully expecting him to be killed.

[00:06:52]It was at this time that we learn that Peregrinus wrote many letters to different Christian communities.

[00:07:01]His case eventually came to the highest ranking political leader in Syria and Palestine, the governor Sergius Paulus.

[00:07:10]Now, Paulus was a man of philosophical interests and was savvy enough to know that Christians would gain even more press if he granted Peregrinus the golden badge of martyrdom.

[00:07:21]Since he had no additional criminal charges, Paulus released Peregrinus without so much as a whipping.

[00:07:29]Given the rules laid down by the emperor Trajan that a Christian who persisted in confessing Christ ought to be executed, Paulus's ruling might surprise.

[00:07:39]The emperor Hadrian, however, had reportedly sent out a decree to the proconsul of Asia around 125 indicating that Christians brought to court must be proved guilty of other crimes as well, not just for their confession.

[00:07:55]However, his case devolved. Peregrinus, evidently to his own surprise, walked out of prison a free man.

[00:08:05]If Peregrinus had perished as a Christian martyr in the 140s, his name might even today be remembered in saintly terms.

[00:08:17]In the short term, it seems that Peregrinus became a local Christian celebrity.

[00:08:24]A confessor or would-be martyr had enormous prestige in ancient churches.

[00:08:28]Valentinus, you may recall, narrowly lost an ecclesial election in Rome because his opponent was a confessor.

[00:08:37]Peregrinus used his newfound freedom to visit his hometown in an attempt to clear his name of parricide.

[00:08:44]On that occasion, he was dressed in the garb of a cynic with hair grown long, wearing a shabby, torn cloak, a pouch hanging down with a staff in his hand.

[00:08:53]Perhaps this kind of garb was also characteristic of Christian ascetics at the time.

[00:08:58]It seems that Peregrinus had successfully fused the traits of a cynic and a Christian preacher.

[00:09:05]When Peregrinus returned to Palestine, however, he performed an act that local Christians thought intolerable.

[00:09:13]We don't know exactly what it was, but Lucian speculates that he broke some sort of food law. Now, food laws were not important to all Christians, in particularly Gentile Christians, but Christians in Palestine may have maintained more Jewish practices.

[00:09:28]Possibly, Peregrinus ate meat sacrificed to gods, different gods, at a public festival.

[00:09:36]This act would indeed have offended most Christians.

[00:09:40]At any rate, Peregrinus was no longer admitted into his particular Christian society. He found himself destitute, and he beat a retreat to Egypt.

[00:09:50]Even though most scholars seem to assume that Peregrinus ceased being a Christian immediately, there is actually no direct notice that he simply dropped all of his Christian practices and beliefs at once.

[00:10:05]It's often asserted that Peregrinus' Christian identity was never genuine. It was always skin deep.

[00:10:13]Looking back over so many centuries, however, we're not really in a position to test the authenticity of Peregrinus' faith prior to his falling out, especially since we see it through the jaundiced eye of Lucian.

[00:10:26]In terms of ethics, we can observe that Peregrinus continued to uphold early Christian ascetic ideals, things like celibacy, fasting, poverty, even after his expulsion.

[00:10:36]In a hot just outside of Athens in the 150s, Peregrinus was said to offer moralistic sermons as a serious and disciplined man.

[00:10:46]He condemned, or rather hounded, the rich and he spoke out against the emperor even in Rome.

[00:10:53]Peregrinus eventually found a way to accomplish his own martyrdom, which Lucian depicted as a bombastic suicide.

[00:11:01]After his death, Peregrinus was awarded a statue in his hometown, a statue that reportedly gave oracles and produced cures.

[00:11:12]The later Christian evaluation of Peregrinus was almost entirely negative.

[00:11:16]Shortly after he died, Tatian accused him of gluttony, selling philosophy for gain, and ignorance of God.

[00:11:24]The Christian apologist Athenagoras chided Peregrinus for jumping onto the Olympic bonfire shortly after the Olympic Games in 165.

[00:11:34]Tertullian cited Peregrinus as an example of patient suffering for the sake of fame and glory.

[00:11:41]Perhaps there's nothing surprising in these criticisms insofar as many Christian writers blasted their Cynic competitors.

[00:11:49]On the other hand, we might detect something political underlying these attacks.

[00:11:54]Peregrinus, even after his death, might still have been associated with Christianity in some ways, thus motivating Christians to condemn and disown him.

[00:12:04]In light of these subsequent and unrelenting attacks, it's easy to dismiss the faith of Peregrinus.

[00:12:11]He was a confessor expelled from his Christian assembly for what must have been thought a serious offense.

[00:12:18]Lucian aimed to depict him as a shiftless con man.

[00:12:22]Christian intellectuals typically typically employed the same exact frame, and so do many modern scholars today.

[00:12:32]Nevertheless, it's important to keep in mind several points.

[00:12:36]If the chronology of Gilbert Bagnani is right, Peregrinus was a Christian from about 120.

[00:12:45]Thus, Peregrinus was a Christian for more than a quarter of a century, from 120 to 146.

[00:12:51]Even if one prefers a different chronology, Peregrinus was still a Christian for a long time, probably at least 5 to 6 years.

[00:13:01]And that's considerable. It's a considerable commitment. It's part of his life.

[00:13:07]In 144, it seems Peregrinus set his face like flint to die as a Christian in Palestine.

[00:13:12]When he was unexpectedly released, he evidently planned to be supported as a Christian minister for the rest of his life.

[00:13:20]For at this time, he donated all his inherent wealth, a sizeable sum, to his native city.

[00:13:26]Peregrinus eventually burned his bridges with the Christian movement.

[00:13:30]At the same time, his life as a Christian leader had left its mark.

[00:13:34]Peregrinus continued to sermonize and to lead an ascetic lifestyle, one that he apparently learned first as a Christian.

[00:13:43]If, moreover, it's true that Peregrinus wrote one or more Christian texts, then possibly he made a literary impact invisible to us today.

[00:13:53]For all we know, we could be reading an apocryphal or canonical text originally written by Peregrinus.

[00:14:01]Before he leapt into the Olympic bonfire, Peregrinus promised his followers that he would arise again like the phoenix.

[00:14:08]Both Lucian and early Christians made fun of this claim, but one can see that by his act of self-sacrifice and his promise of resurrection, Peregrinus dared at least to imitate the successes of a much more famous martyr and preacher of Palestine.

[00:14:26]According to the Gospels, Jesus was teaching his disciples, saying to them that the son of the human will be betrayed into human hands. They will kill him, and when he's killed, after 3 days, he will rise.