Of his works, which were very numerous, only a few scanty fragments have survived[[176]]. The imperfect lists however, which have reached us, bear ample testimony both to the literary activity of the man, and to the prominence of the Church, over which he presided, in the great theological and ecclesiastical controversies of the age.
He takes part in the two chief controversies of the day.
The two questions, which especially agitated the Churches of Asia Minor during the last thirty years of the first century, were the celebration of the Easter festival and the pretensions of the Montanist prophets. In both disputes Claudius Apollinaris took an active and conspicuous part.
1. The Paschal question.
1. The Paschal controversy, after smouldering long both here and elsewhere, first burst into flames in the neighbouring Church of Laodicea[[178]]. An able bishop of Hierapolis therefore must necessarily have been involved in the dispute, even if he had been desirous of avoiding it. What side Apollinaris took in the controversy the extant fragments of his work do not by themselves enable us to decide; for they deal merely with a subsidiary question which does not seriously affect the main issue[[179]]. But we can hardly doubt that with Polycarp of Smyrna and Melito of Sardis and Polycrates of Ephesus he defended the practice which was universal in Asia[[180]], observing the Paschal anniversary on the 14th Nisan whether it fell on a Friday or not, and invoking the authority of St John at Ephesus, and of St Philip at his own Hierapolis[[181]], against the divergent usage of Alexandria and Palestine and the West.
2. Montanism.
2. His writings on the Montanist controversy were still more famous, and are recommended as an authority on the subject by Serapion of Antioch a few years after the author’s death[[182]]. Though later than many of his works[[183]], they were written soon after Montanus had divulged the extravagance of his pretensions and before Montanism had attained its complete development. If a later notice may be trusted, Apollinaris was not satisfied with attacking Montanism in writing, but summoned at Hierapolis a council of twenty-six bishops besides himself, where this heresy was condemned and sentence of excommunication pronounced against Montanus together with his adherent the pretended prophetess Maximilla[[184]].
His other hæresiological writings.
Nor were his controversial writings confined to these two topics. In one place he refuted the Encratites[[185]]; in another he upheld the orthodox teaching respecting the true humanity of Christ[[186]]. It is plain that he did not confine himself to questions especially affecting Asia Minor; but that the doctrine and the practice of the Church generally found in him a vigorous advocate, who was equally opposed to the novelties of heretical teaching and the rigours of overstrained asceticism.
Nor again did Apollinaris restrict himself to controversies carried on between Christian and Christian. He appears alike as the champion of the Gospel against attacks from without, and as the promoter of Christian life and devotion within the pale of the Church. |His apologetic| On the one hand he was the author of an apology addressed to M. Aurelius[[187]], of a controversial treatise in five books against the Greeks, and of a second in two books against the Jews[[188]]; on the other we find mentioned among his |and didactic works.| writings a work in two books on Truth, and a second on Piety, besides several of which the titles have not come down to us[[189]]. He seems indeed to have written on almost every subject which interested the Church of his age. He was not only well versed in the Scriptures, but showed a wide acquaintance with secular literature also[[190]]. His style is praised by a competent judge[[191]], and his orthodoxy was such as to satisfy the dogmatic precision of the post-Nicene age[[192]].