Letters of Ignatius

From the road to Rome — the bishop in chains writes unto the saints at Ephesus, Magnesia, Tralles, Rome, Philadelphia, Smyrna, and unto Polycarp; on the unity of the Church, the bishop, and the bread of God.

1Ignatius — also called Theophorus, the God-bearer — unto the Church at Ephesus, blessed in the greatness of God the Father, and predestined before the ages unto everlasting and abiding glory: in Jesus Christ our God, abundant greeting in blamelessness.

2I received your whole multitude in the name of God in the person of Onesimus, a man of inexpressible love, and your bishop. I beseech you, in Christ Jesus, that ye may love him; and that ye all may be in his likeness. For blessed is He that hath granted unto you, being worthy, to obtain such a bishop.

3Wherefore it becometh you to walk according unto the will of the bishop — even as also ye do. Your reverend presbyters, worthy of God, are joined with the bishop as the strings unto the harp. Therefore in your concord and harmonious love is Jesus Christ being sung. Each one of you, then, ye must form yourselves into a chorus — that being harmonious in your accord and taking the keynote of God ye may sing in unison with one voice through Jesus Christ unto the Father; that He may both hear you and acknowledge you, by your good works, to be members of His Son. It is profitable, then, that ye should be in unblemished unity — that ye may always partake of God.

4If in so short a time I had such intercourse with your bishop — not as a mere man, but in the Spirit — how much more do I count you blessed which are joined in love with him as the Church is with Jesus Christ, and as Jesus Christ is with the Father, that all things may be in concord by unity? Let no man be deceived: if any one be not within the precinct of the altar, he lacketh the bread of God.

5I have written boldly unto your love. I am one condemned; but I am not yet thereby justified. Now I begin to be a disciple. I greet you from Smyrna with the Churches of God which are present with me — they have refreshed me in all things in flesh as well as in spirit.

6Your prayer goeth forth unto the Church which is in Antioch of Syria — whence I am led a prisoner unto Rome. I am not worthy to be called a member thereof, being the very least of them. Yet by the divine will am I held worthy — not from any goodness of mine own, but by the grace of God.

7Have ye no man among you set up to lead, more than they that hold the office of presbytery? Be ye one with the bishop and with them that preside, and be subject unto them. As long as ye are in subjection unto the bishop and unto the presbytery and unto the deacons, ye shall be sanctified in all things. Without these no Church is named.

8Be careful, therefore, to use one Eucharist; for there is one flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup unto union with His blood; one altar, even as there is one bishop, together with the presbytery and the deacons, my fellow-servants — that whatsoever ye do ye may do it after God.

9Take heed, therefore, that ye be confirmed in the ordinances of the Lord and of His apostles; that whatsoever ye do, ye may prosper, in flesh and in spirit, in faith and in love, in the Son and in the Father and in the Spirit, in the beginning and in the end, with your most reverend bishop, and with your fitly-wreathed spiritual crown, the presbytery, and with the deacons.