Apostle 1st century

Apostle Hermas of the Seventy

Also known as Hermas of Philippopolis

One of the Seventy, greeted by the Apostle Paul in the Epistle to the Romans, who served as bishop of Philippopolis in Thrace and reposed in peace after much suffering from the pagans.

Feast Day

May 31

Also Mar 8

Draft

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Commemorated as

The Holy Apostle Hermas of the Seventy

Come to them for

Missionary Work

Life

Hermas is numbered among the Seventy Apostles and is one of the companions of the Apostle Paul greeted by name in the closing of the Epistle to the Romans, where Paul writes, "Salute Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermas, Patrobas, Hermes, and the brethren which are with them" (Romans 16:14). By tradition he was a Greek who lived for a time in Rome before being sent out into the missionary field of the early Church.

According to the synaxarion he became bishop of Philippopolis in Thrace (the city later known as Plovdiv, in present-day Bulgaria). There he preached the Gospel and, as the tradition relates, endured much grief and suffering from the pagans, yet he was not put to death; he reposed in peace.

Because the New Testament greeting in Romans names two similarly-spelled men, Hermas and Hermes, Orthodox tradition commemorates them as distinct apostles of the Seventy. Hermas of Philippopolis is to be distinguished from the Apostle Hermes, who is also greeted in Romans 16:14 and is venerated separately as a bishop in Dalmatia.

Hermas is celebrated principally on May 31, and also on March 8, and is commemorated together with a company of the Apostles of the Seventy on November 5.

Contributions & Legacy

1 contributions Read Hide

Identification with the author of The Shepherd

By an early tradition, this Hermas was identified with the author of The Shepherd (Greek: Poimen), an instructive Christian text built on a series of visions and parables attributed to revelations from an angel. The OCA synaxarion records this tradition directly, and some accounts further ascribe to him the related works titled The Church and The Ten Parables.

The identification is ancient but disputed. It was advanced by Origen and followed by Eusebius and Jerome, who took the author of The Shepherd to be the same Hermas greeted by Paul. Most modern scholars, however, reject this on chronological grounds: the language and theology of The Shepherd place its composition in the second century, and the Muratorian fragment (c. 170) instead names its author as the brother of Pope Pius I of Rome, whose pontificate fell around the mid-second century. The traditional liturgical commemoration preserves the older identification while these questions of authorship remain unsettled.

Works & Further Reading Read Hide

Notable Works

The Shepherd — An early Christian work of visions and parables traditionally ascribed to Hermas, though the attribution is disputed and most scholars date the text to the second century.

Commemorated with Read Hide

The Seventy Apostles

Commemorated together · Jan 4

Notes

Of the Seventy; distinct from Apostle Hermes of the Seventy (OS-0796, Mar 8).

Sources: OCA Synaxarion (oca.org), Lives of the Saints