Martyrdom of Polycarp 2.3 · Sophia Scriptura

Greek text · Lake, LCL 25:314–316

καὶ προσέχοντες τῇ τοῦ Χριστοῦ χάριτι τῶν κοσμικῶν κατεφρόνουν βασάνων, διὰ μιᾶς ὥρας τὴν αἰώνιον ζωὴν ἐξαγοραζόμενοι. καὶ τὸ πῦρ ἦν αὐτοῖς ψυχρὸν τὸ τῶν ἀπηνῶν βασανιστῶν. πρὸ ὀφθαλμῶν γὰρ εἶχον φυγεῖν τὸ αἰώνιον καὶ μηδέποτε σβεννύμενον, καὶ τοῖς τῆς καρδίας ὀφθαλμοῖς ἀνέβλεπον τὰ τηρούμενα τοῖς ὑπομείνασιν ἀγαθά, ἃ οὔτε οὖς ἤκουσεν οὔτε ὀφθαλμὸς εἶδεν οὔτε ἐπὶ καρδίαν ἀνθρώπου ἀνέβη, ἐκείνοις δὲ ὑπεδείκνυτο ὑπὸ τοῦ κυρίου, οἵπερ μηκέτι ἄνθρωποι, ἀλλʼ ἤδη ἄγγελοι ἦσαν.

English · Claude translation

And giving heed to the grace of Christ, they despised the tortures of the world, purchasing eternal life at the cost of a single hour. The fire of their savage torturers was cold to them, for they kept before their eyes escape from the fire that is eternal and never quenched; and with the eyes of the heart they looked up to the good things kept for those who endure, “which neither ear has heard nor eye has seen, nor has it entered into the human heart,” but which were shown by the Lord to them, since they were no longer human beings but already angels.

About this passage

Source

Lake, LCL 25:314–316 · Kirsopp Lake, ed. and trans., The Apostolic Fathers, vol. 2, LCL 25 (London: Heinemann; New York: Macmillan, 1913), 312–345 · Greek text: K. Lake, The Apostolic Fathers (LCL, 1912-1913), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0

Also in

PG 5:1032a–1032b (found by text match)

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-26 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Lake (LCL 25, 1913); made independently of existing English translations.

Scripture

1 Cor 2:9 · quotation, high confidence
Isa 64:4 · allusion, medium confidence
Mark 9:43 · echo, low confidence
Eph 1:18 · echo, medium confidence
Matt 22:30 · echo, low confidence

Topics

Martyrdom, Eschatology

Notes

Translation notes

The quotation puts “ear” before “eye,” unlike 1 Cor 2:9; the same order occurs in 1 Clem. 34.8.
“No longer human beings but already angels”: compare Jesus's saying that the resurrected are “like angels” (Matt 22:30).
“Eternal life”: the text followed here (Lake). Other manuscripts read “eternal punishment” (“buying themselves off from eternal punishment”), which older translations such as the Ante-Nicene Fathers (1885) follow.

Cite this passage

Mart. Pol. 2.3 (PG 5:1032a–1032b; trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/mart-pol/2/3/).

Plain text

Mart. Pol. 2.3 (PG 5:1032a–1032b; trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/mart-pol/2/3/).