The martyrdom of Cyprian

The church in North Africa was a leading centre of Christianity throughout the Ancient World. It was only with the conquests of Islam in the seventh century that this witness was quenched forever. Thankfully, much of the literary witness of the Christian authors of those centuries – from men and women like Tertullian, Perpetua, Cyprian, and Augustine – has survived.

In this column this year, we have been thinking about the matter of martyrdom in the Ancient Church. This month we think about the witness of the Carthaginian Cyprian, or, to give him his full name, Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus (c.200‒258). He had been radically converted from a lifestyle of public prominence, luxury and wealth in his early forties and subsequently served as the bishop of Carthage for about a decade. His leadership was especially important during the first empire-wide persecution of the church, initiated by the Emperor Decius (c.201‒251).

In the late summer of 257, he was exiled from Carthage and placed under house arrest. He was arraigned before the Roman proconsul Aspasius Paternus, who informed Cyprian that he had been instructed by the emperor Valarian (c.199‒264) and his son and co-emperor, Gallienus, to require all within the empire to engage in the traditional worship of the Roman state. Cyprian was asked where he stood on this matter. The bishop of Carthage replied: “I am a Christian and a bishop. I recognise no other gods but the one true God who made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them. This is the God to whom we Christians pay homage; night and day we pray to Him for you and for all of humanity, as well as for the health of the emperors themselves.”

When pressed by Paternus to recant, Cyprian refused. Surprisingly Paternus did not have him executed at this point. Rather, he exiled him to the nearby city of Curubis (modern Korba in Tunisia) and effectively placed him under house arrest.

Paternus’ successor, Galerius Maximus was not so lenient. When it came to Christianity, he was quite prepared to mete out brutal punishment to believers. In August of 258, he condemned a large number of Christians – at least 150 or so – to a brutal death in a pit of lime in Utica, which was not far from Carthage. These martyrs were later remembered as the mass candida, “the white mass”, a term that Augustine many years later explained in his Sermon 306 to be a reference to the large number who were killed together. The adjective “white” was used, he reckoned, was due “to the splendour of their cause”.

The very next month, on 14 September 258, Cyprian was returned to Carthage to stand trial for his faith. Galerius held the trial on the estate of a friend on the outskirts of Carthage. When Galerius ordered Cyprian to worship the Roman gods, Cyprian’s reply was terse and to the point: “I will not.” Galerius threatened him, but Cyprian’s faith did not waver. “Do as you have been ordered,” he told the Roman official.

Galerius took time to consult with his staff. Cyprian had been a man of influence and substance in Carthage and ordering his death would be no light matter. This was possibly a reason why Aspasius Paternus had had him exiled and placed under house arrest. Galerius, though, felt he had no choice but to pass the death penalty.

In his decision he described Christianity as a “conspiracy” (conspiratio), literally “a breathing together”. In legal contexts, this word was employed to describe an organised plot against the state. Galerius went on to state that Cyprian, as the leader of this band of conspirators, was thus guilty of “a most heinous crime”. In other words, being a Christian was nothing less than an act of political treason. He then read out his decision – and there were a good number of Christians present, presumably praying for their bishop – “Thascius Cyprian is sentenced to die by the sword.”

At this point, a number of the believers began yelling that they wished to die with their beloved leader. Cyprian was taken behind the estate where one of his elders, a man named Julian, helped him tie a strip of cloth around his eyes. Before he did so, though, Cyprian told the deacons who were present to pay the executioner “twenty-five pieces of gold”.

To the Romans, such an act would initially have seemed totally odd: you pay a man for killing you! Here, though, Cyprian powerfully turned his death by decapitation into a final act of witness: this man was doing him the remarkable service of sending him to his God. A judicial killing was thus turned into a moment of pastoral witness to the lordship of Jesus Christ.