Celebrating

Perpetua

March 7

The Story

From "The story of our Christianity; an account of the struggles, persecutions, wars, and victories of Christians of all times Year: 1893 (1890s)" by Frederic Mayer Bird and Benjamin Harrison.

So it happened that in Carthage several young catechumens were arrested for being Christian. Their names were Revocatus and Felicity (both slaves), Saturninus, Secundulus, and finally Vibia Perpetua - a woman who was of high birth, had received a liberal education, and was married with a child. Perpetua had a father, a mother, and two brothers - one of whom was also a catechumen.

While Perpetua was still with the prosecutors, her father tried to change her mind and get her to renounce the faith.

She said to him, "Father, do you see this vase lying here?"

He said "I see it."

She said, "Can it be called by another name other than what it is?"

He said, "No."

Perpetua confessed, "In the same way, I am unable to call myself other than what I am, a Christian."

Her father then tried to attack her, but left right along with his devilish attacks. In the following days, Perpetua and her companions were baptized.

When they were thrown in prison, Perpetua lamented the darkness and began to worry about her infant son who was going hungry.

Their teacher, Saturus, turned himself in. He could not bear the thought of his catechumens being put to death while his life continued.

Two deacons of the Carthaginian Church - Tertius and Pomponius - bribed the guards to have the catechumens released from prison for a few hours. Perpetua brought her child and entrusted him to her mother and brother. She then wrote in her diary that being freed from worrying about her child, "the prison became my palace, so that I wanted to be there rather than anywhere else."

Perpetua then prayed to God and received a vision in the night. There was a bronze ladder reaching up to heaven, but so narrow that only one person could climb up it at a time. On the sides of the ladder were swords and lances and hooks and knives and daggers, so that if anyone climbed up carelessly he was torn to pieces. At the foot of the ladder was a serpent who would gobble up anyone who fell after being pierced, or who gave up and climbed back down the ladder.

The first to climb the ladder was Saturus the teacher. Perpetua followed after him and saw a garden and a man with white hair dressed in shepherd's clothes. There were thousands of people there all dressed in white. The shepherd looked at her and said "You are welcome here, child." He then gave her some of the milk and cheese that he had taken from the sheep. As she ate it, the whole crowd said "Amen."

Perpetua awoke and told her brother about the dream.

The Christians were taken to their sentencing and Perpetua's father once again tried to convince her to renounce the faith. She refused, but as her father persisted, the inquisitor ordered that he be beaten with rods. When none of the Christians would renounce the faith, they were condemned to the beasts. The Emperor and his sons were in town and it was the birthday of the younger named Geta.

The night before they were to fight, Perpetua had another vision: Pomponius the Deacon had come to the prison and was knocking on the door. He was wearing a white robe and said "Perpetua, we are waiting for you." He then took her hand and led her to the amphitheater. Out of breath he said, "Don't be afraid. I am here with you." Instead of a beast, an Egyptian soldier came out to fight her. Perpetua was then stripped naked and realized that in the vision she was no longer a woman, but a man. A Gladiator appeared and said "If the Egyptian wins, he will kill her with a sword. But if she defeats him, she will receive this branch." She eventually defeated the Egyptian and the Christians who were watching began to sing hymns. Then she received the branch from the gladiator and said "Daughter, peace be with you," as she walked toward the Gate of Life. Then she awoke and reasoned that she was not going to fight with animals, but with the Devil. She knew that she would win.

The Lutheran View of the Saints

Our Confession approves honors to the saints. For here a threefold honor is to be approved. The first is thanksgiving. For we ought to give thanks to God because He has shown examples of mercy; because He has shown that He wishes to save men; because He has given teachers or other gifts to the Church. And these gifts, as they are the greatest, should be amplified, and the saints themselves should be praised, who have faithfully used these gifts, just as Christ praises faithful business-men, 5 Matt. 25:21, 23. The second service is the strengthening of our faith; when we see the denial forgiven Peter, we also are encouraged to believe the more that grace 6 truly superabounds over sin, Rom. 5:20. The third honor is the imitation, first, of faith, then of the other virtues, which every one should imitate according to his calling. 7 These true honors the adversaries do not require. They dispute only concerning invocation, which, even though it would have no danger, nevertheless is not necessary.

Written Sources

Virtually everything we know about Perpetua comes from a third century document called the “The Passion of Saints Perpetua and Felicity.” The first ten chapters are presented as an autobiography of Perpetua. It ends with "This is the story of what I did the day before the final conflict. But concerning the outcome of that contest, let whoever wishes to write abou tit, do so. (Heffernan, The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity, 130). Chapters 11-21 were added at a later date, though presumably not long after the martyrdom itself.

The manuscripts have a preface written by an editor. The preface uses “you” and “you all” when discussing the brothers and sisters who witnessed the persecution. This points to the edited version being compiled while some of the witnesses were still alive. Chapters 11-21 are written in third person.

The Passion exists in nine Latin manuscripts and one Greek manuscript. The earliest manuscript we have is from the early 900s and is an incomplete. If the date of Perpetua’s martyrdom is indeed from the early third century, this is a large distance between the event and the earliest physical manuscript we have.

There is a calendar from the year 354 called the Philocalian Calendar that says Perpetua and Felicity were martyred on March 7 but provides no year. Tertullian of Carthage (c. 155 - c. 220) mentions Perpetua in his work De Anima:

“... in Paradise, you tell me, whither already the patriarchs and prophets have removed from Hades in the retinue of the Lord's resurrection. How is it, then, that the region of Paradise, which as revealed to John in the Spirit lay under the altar, Revelation 6:9 displays no other souls as in it besides the souls of the martyrs? How is it that the most heroic martyr Perpetua on the day of her passion saw only her fellow martyrs there, in the revelation which she received of Paradise, if it were not that the sword which guarded the entrance permitted none to go in thereat, except those who had died in Christ and not in Adam? A new death for God, even the extraordinary one for Christ, is admitted into the reception-room of mortality, specially altered and adapted to receive the new-comer.” (Tertullian, De Anima, Chapter 55)

Thus, we can confidently conclude that there was indeed a woman named Perpetua who was martyred for the faith sometime before 220 and that there was some account of her martyrdom that included things like having a vision of heaven. That she could be mentioned in passing tells us that she was popular enough that Tertullian could simply mention her name and the audience would know exactly who he was talking about.

There is also a reference to Caesar Geta who was killed in December of 211. (cf. Edward Gibbon, The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire, Chapter VI Part I ). If the games were held during his birthday, then we it is possible that they were held on March 7 (one of the recorded dates of Geta’s birth) and were possibly held on his fourteenth birthday when he would receive the “Toga of Manhood” and such an important date may have been cause for holding games and a festival. Furthermore, there are reports that Geta and his brother were already in Africa in the spring of 203. (Heffernan, The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity, page 70)

Based on evidence from the text itself and from other historical documents, we can concludes that March of 203 is the most likely date for the martyrdom. If the report of March 7 being Geta's birthday is correct, then we can rightfully continue to celebrate Perpetua on this day.

More reading:

Thomas J. Heffernan, The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).

A parallel Greek/Latin edition can be found here

"If the old examples of the faith, which testify to the grace of God and lead to the edification of men, were written down so that by reading them God should be honored and man comforted -- as if through a reexamination of those deeds -- should we not set down new acts that serve each purpose equally?" (Heffernan, Passion, 125).

The opening line of the Passion's preface appears to say nothing more than "if the New Testament and the early fathers wrote down the stories of martyrs, why shouldn't we?" But the editor goes on to speak about why prophecy is actually superior to the canon of Scripture, citing Joel 2:28 as proof that prophecy and revelation will continue. This rightly raises Lutheran eyebrows, and should give at least some pause to accepting the martyrdom account outright.

Those who pay attention to the Saints' Calendar will notice that Felicity is all but absent in the above story. This is because the first-person narrative by Perpetua ends with her vision of the Egyptian man. The editor adds quite a bit of content, including Felicity giving birth in prison, and the specific animals that were used to kill each person. There's also an implication that the last meal they receive in prison is in fact the Eucharist. Some of these added stories are problematic, but for the most part they jive with what Perpetua tells us in the first few chapters.

Following Perpetua's vision of the Egyptian man, the editor inserts a vision of Saturus in which all the party was carried up to heaven by angels and saw old friends that had been martyred. After they enter into heaven proper and are greeted by Christ, they see their pastors - Optatus the Bishop and Aspasius the Priest. The two clergymen throw themselves at the feet of Saturus and Perpetua and ask why they had left the earthly church. The angels intervene and begin rebuking Optatus, telling him to use his office to correct disagreements in the Carthaginian Church. It is an odd episode, to say the least, and sets the stage for the subsequent chapters.

I won't deal with the additions by the editor, largely because this project is meant to focus on the historically reliable data. One can dispute how reliable the first person account is, but its early attestation and early additions tell us that its composition was incredibly close to the date of the martyrdom.

In regards to the charismatic thread, it should be noted that Perpetua's visions are strange, but not always opposed to Scripture. For instance, after Perpetua was baptized, "The Spirit told [her] that nothing else should be sought from the water other than the endurance of the body," (Heffernan, Passion, 126). In Perpetua's vision when she follows after Saturus she says "In the name of Jesus Christ [the serpent] will not hurt me." She then stepped on the head of the serpent as though it were the first step up the ladder (Heffernan, Passion, 127). The Spirit's words to her are odd, and are rightly left out in the Lutheran retelling above. So too, her stepping on the serpent is omitted, but it should be noted that she doesn't "crush the serpent's head," she merely uses it as stepping stool to heaven. The poetic and homiletical implications are massive.

In the above Story, Perpetua's second vision is omitted. She sees her brother Dinocrates who had died at the age of seven from cancer. In the vision he is thirsty, but cannot drink from a basin of water because it was too high. She then knew that he was suffering and reasoned to pray for him. The content of her prayer isn't recorded, so we can't assume a much later developing Roman theology of "praying for the dead," (least of all because the souls in hell are not prayed for). But given that Perpetua has another vision in which the basin was lowered so that Dinocrates could drink from it, we may wonder its theological legitimacy. He begins to splash and play and Perpetua "woke up" and "knew that he was freed from his suffering," (Heffernan, Passion, 129). Whether or not his soul was transferred from hell to heaven because of Perpetua's prayers or for some other reason, the theology is problematic and the episodes with Dinocrates are rightly omitted from Lutheran retellings of the story.

What we are left with is a remarkably reliable account from Perpetua herself from (presumably) the year 203. If the additions are from second or third hand witnesses, they add texture and depth to the martyrdom account. They are certainly much more fabulous than the account Perpetua gives us and may well reflect the very same legends against which we are warned in the Book of Concord.

Potential Problems

It was profitable that such examples as these, which contain admonitions for either faith or fear or the administration of the state, be recited. But certain triflers, endowed with no knowledge either of faith or for governing states, have invented stories in imitation of poems, in which there are nothing but superstitious examples concerning certain prayers, certain fastings, and certain additions of service for bringing in gain [where there are nothing but examples as to how the saints wore hair shirts, how they prayed at the seven canonical hours, how they lived upon bread and water]. Such are the miracles that have been invented concerning rosaries and similar ceremonies. Nor is there need here to recite examples. For the legends, as they call them, and the mirrors of examples, and the rosaries, in which there are very many things not unlike the true narratives of Lucian, are extant.

- Apology of the Augsburg Confession XXI:36-37