Nepos: A Church of God leader who opposed the allegorists

An African named Nepos from the area of Arsinoe in Egypt was an early Church of God leader.

In the early 3rd century Nepos was one who opposed Origen and his allegorical approach. Here is what The Catholic Encyclopedia reported:

About the middle of the third century, Nepos, bishop in Egypt, who entered the lists against the allegorism of Origen, also propounded millenarian ideas and gained some adherents in the vicinity of Arsino. (Kirsch, Johann Peter. "Millennium and Millenarianism." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 10. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911. <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10307a.htm>)

An Egyptian bishop, Nepos, taught the Chiliastic error that there would be a reign of Christ upon earth for a thousand years, a period of corporal delights; he founded this doctrine upon the Apocalypse in a book entitled "Refutation of the Allegorizers". (hapman, John. "Dionysius of Alexandria." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 5. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1909. 14 Aug. 2008 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05011a.htm>)

Since it was Origen who really popularized the allegorical approach against the millennial teachings of the Bible, this work by Nepos dealt, to a degree, with Origen and others of his view.

A nineteenth century anti-millennial scholar named Giovanni Battista Pagani went as far as to write the following about Nepos and those who supported the millennium:

…all those who teach a millennium framed according to Jewish ideas, saying that during the millennium, Mosaic law will be restored…These are called Judaical Millenarians, not as being Jews, but as having invented and upheld a millennium according to Jewish taste. The principal authors of this error were Nepos, an African Bishop, against whom St. Dionysius wrote his two books on Promises; and Apollinaris, whom St. Epiphanius confound in his work against heresies (Pagani, Giovanni Battista. Published by Charles Dolman, 1855. Original from Oxford University. Digitized Aug 15, 2006, pp. 252-253).

It should be of interest to note that neither Nepos nor Apollinaris were Jews (Nepos may have been black), but were condemned for having a religion that had “Jewish” beliefs. And since Apollinaris is a Greco-Roman Catholic saint (see article Apollinaris of Hierapolis), it should be clear that the respected and non-Jewish Christian leaders in the early third century clearly did hold to ideas that were condemned by the allegorists.

Here is the entry in the New Schaff–Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge about Nepos:

NEPOS, nî'pes: Egyptian bishop before the middle of the third century. He is known from the attack by Dionysius of Alexandria on his lost " Refutation of the Allegorists " in the second book of the Peri Epangelion. From this it is clear that the chiliasts in Arsinoe regarded the works of Nepos as irrefragable proof of the future reign of Christ on earth and of the realistic interpretation of the Apocalypse. According to Gennadius (De ecclesiasticis dogmatibus, lv.), Nepos held that after the resurrection of the righteous there would be through- out the millennium a world of the unconverted, which would war upon the just at the expiration of the thousand years, only to be destroyed by God. Nepos was also a writer of hymns, and seems to have been an excellent exegete. His position represented the conflict between the eschatology of the early Church and the spiritualizing tendency of Origen; but the Nepotians mentioned by Fulgen- tius (MPG, lxv. 709) were at most mere chiliasts, having no organic affiliations with the doctrines of Nepos. (N. BONWETSCH.) (In Jackson, Samuel Macauley (ed.). New Schaff–Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge. Vol. 8 (third ed.). London and New York: Funk and Wagnalls. pp. 114–115.)

The following from Dionysius clearly shows that Nepos was still respected after he died (Nepos died prior to Dionysius’ mid-third century writing of the following) and really did not refute him from a biblical perspective:

But as they produce a certain composition by Nepos, on which they insist very strongly, as if it demonstrated incontestably that there will be a (temporal) reign of Christ upon the earth, I have to say, that in many other respects I accept the opinion of Nepos, and love him at once for his faith, and his laboriousness, and his patient study in the Scriptures, as also for his great efforts in psalmody, by which even now many of the brethren are delighted. I hold the man, too, in deep respect still more, inasmuch as he has gone to his rest before us. Nevertheless the truth is to be prized and reverenced above all things else. And while it is indeed proper to praise and approve ungrudgingly anything that is said aright, it is no less proper to examine and correct anything which may appear to have been written unsoundly. If he had been present then himself, and had been stating his opinions orally, it would have been sufficient to discuss the question together without the use of writing, and to endeavour to convince the opponents, and carry them along by interrogation and reply. But the work is published, and is, as it seems to some, of a very persuasive character; and there are unquestionably some teachers, who hold that the law and the prophets are of no importance, and who decline to follow the Gospels, and who depreciate the epistles of the apostles, and who have also made large promises regarding the doctrine of this composition, as though it were some great and hidden mystery, and who, at the same time, do not allow that our simpler brethren have any sublime and elevated conceptions either of our Lord’s appearing in His glory and His true divinity, or of our own resurrection from the dead, and of our being gathered together to Him, and assimilated to Him, but, on the contrary, endeavour to lead them to hope for things which are trivial and corruptible, and only such as what we find at present in the kingdom of God. And since this is the case, it becomes necessary for us to discuss this subject with our brother Nepos just as if he were present (Dionysius of Alexandria. From the Two Books on the Promises. Copyright © 2008 by Kevin Knight. Viewed 8/14/08).

In other words, Nepos knew his Bible, but did not hold to the same position that allegorists like Dionysius of Alexandria held. But those who held to Judaeo-Christian beliefs, while slightly chastised, simply were almost never condemned by the early allegorists. Mainly, because the early allegorists knew that the original Christians held to beliefs and practices that the allegorists considered to be Jewish–and at this stage, the allegorists simply did not have the ability to condemn the literalists because most who professed Christ at the time knew that the literalists had ties to the original apostolic church. (More information on faithful Christians in northern African locations can be found in the article Arabic Nazarenes May Have Kept Original Christian Practices.)

Yet, Nepos was still held in respect. Presuming he was in the true Church of God as it appears that he was, Nepos would have had at least the Laying on of Hands Succession that all true COG pastors/bishops would have had (watch also Laying on of Hands and Succession)--he seems to have been succeeded by Macarius of Edessa.

Notice the report about some of those allegorists:

Dionysius was born of a noble and wealthy pagan family in Alexandria, and was educated in their philosophy. He left the pagan schools to become a pupil of Origen, whom he succeeded in the charge of the catechetical school of Alexandria… Clement, Origen, and the Gnostic school were corrupting the doctrines of the holy oracles by their fanciful and allegorical interpretations…they obtained for themselves the name of “Allegorists.” Nepos publicly combated the Allegorists, and maintained that there will be a reign of Christ on the earth… Dionysius disputed with the followers of Nepos, and by his account… “such a state of things as now exists in the kingdom of God.” This is the first mention of the kingdom of God existing in the present state of the churches…

Nepos rebuked their error, showing that the kingdom of heaven is not allegorical, but is the literal coming kingdom of our Lord in the resurrection unto eternal life... So the idea of the kingdom come in the present state of things was conceived and brought forth in the Gnostic school of Allegorists in Egypt, A.D. 200 to 250, a full century before the bishops of the empire came to be regarded as occupants of the throne… Clement conceived the idea of the kingdom of God as a state of true mental knowledge of God. Origen set it forth as a spiritual meaning hid in the plain letter of Scriptures. (Ward, Henry Dana. The Gospel of the Kingdom: A Kingdom Not of this World; Not in this World; But to Come in the Heavenly Country, of the Resurrection from the Dead and of the Restitution of All Things. Published by Claxton, Remsen & Haffelfinger, 1870, pp. 124-125)

Thus, while Bishop Nepos taught the gospel of the Kingdom of God, the allegorists tried to come up with a false, less literal, understanding of it. Those truly in the Church of God stood for the truth of the literal Kingdom of God throughout history.

Interestingly, those who held to what are called “Judeo-Christian” beliefs, while slightly chastised, were almost never condemned by the early allegorists--that condemnation really began in a big way with Emperor Constantine and the fallout from him (see also What is the Appropriate Form of Biblical Interpretation? and What is the Appropriate Form of Biblical Interpretation?).

But what is bizarre now, is that the Greco-Roman churches and their Protestant offspring seem to claim that Polycarp of Smyrna, Thraseas of Eumenia, Apollonius of Ephesus, Apollinaris of Hierapolis, Serapion of Antioch, and Nepos were indeed faithful early Christian leaders, yet, they do not have many of the same doctrines that they had. Polycarp of Smyrna, Thraseas of Eumenia, Apollonius of Ephesus, Apollinaris of Hierapolis, Serapion of Antioch, and Nepos taught the true gospel, the kingdom of God, millenarianism, and other doctrines that are opposed by the current Greco-Roman (including Protestant) churches.

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