by
Damien F. Mackey
“To the angel of the church in Pergamum write:
These are the words of him who has the sharp, double-edged sword.
I know where you live—where Satan has his throne. Yet you remain true to
my name. You did not renounce your faith in me, not even in the days of Antipas, my faithful witness, who was put to death in your city—where Satan lives”.
A Revelation 2:12-13
Who was this “faithful witness” of Jesus Christ, Antipas?
Nothing is known of Antipas except that he was an early Christian martyr associated with the city of Pergamum (Pergamon).
Usually there will be a legend or two to help fill out an otherwise unknown person who had nevertheless been involved in something significant.
But further reliable information about Antipas is about as scarce as hen’s teeth.
https://antipas.net/about-us/who-is-antipas
“While Antipas was martyred late in the lifetime of the Apostle John, precious little else is factually known about Antipas from respected historical sources”.
Apparently we have to turn to late Orthodox Christian sources to get any further clues – which, however, may not necessarily be accurate (loc. cit.):
However, traditions originating within the Eastern Orthodox Christian church, around and after CE 1,000, paint a fuller picture only if one can believe them as factual.
The traditional (possibly fictional) Antipas was reputed to be the Bishop of the Christian church at Pergamos, and that he was martyred for his faith because of his consistent faithful witnessing in the face of all the satanic evil present there.
When Antipas was advised:
"Antipas, the whole world is against you!",
Antipas reputedly replied:
"Then I am against the whole world!"
Antipas was supposedly roasted alive in a hollow life-size bull, which had a bonfire under its belly, because Antipas refused to renounce his faith in Christ Jesus.
Antipas may have been the prophet Agabus
The prophet Agabus of Acts 11:28 would be my selection for an alter ego of Antipas.
Agabus, apparently from Jerusalem, ministered in the northern city of Antioch, as Antipas did in Pergamum, and he, likewise, was a contemporary of the Apostle John.
Acts 11:27-30:
During this time some prophets came down from Jerusalem to Antioch. One of them, named Agabus, stood up and through the Spirit predicted that a severe famine would spread over the entire Roman world. (This happened during the reign of Claudius.) The disciples, as each one was able, decided to provide help for the brothers and sisters living in Judea. This they did, sending their gift to the elders by Barnabas and Saul.
There is extra-biblical evidence for severe famine in the time of the emperor Claudius.
See, for instance:
The Universal Famine under Claudius
Kenneth Sperber Gapp
The Harvard Theological Review
Vol. 28, No. 4 (Oct., 1935), pp. 258-265 (8 pages)
“They have power to shut up the heavens so that it will not rain
during the time they are prophesying …” (Revelation 11:6).
In Acts 21 we meet the prophet Agabus again, now in Caesarea, forewarning Paul of his own captivity and martyrdom (vv. 10-14):
After we had been there a number of days, a prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. Coming over to us, he took Paul’s belt, tied his own hands and feet with it and said, “The Holy Spirit says, ‘In this way the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem will bind the owner of this belt and will hand him over to the Gentiles’.”
When we heard this, we and the people there pleaded with Paul not to go up to Jerusalem. Then Paul answered, ‘Why are you weeping and breaking my heart? I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die in Jerusalem for the name of the Lord Jesus’. When he would not be dissuaded, we gave up and said, ‘The Lord’s will be done’.
Tradition may tell us a little more about Agabus – for instance, he was martyred, but, we are told, in Jerusalem: https://ucatholic.com/saints/agabus-the-prophet/
“Saint Agabus the Prophet, one of the seventy disciples, and martyr. The seventy disciples were chosen by the Lord to go before Him to preach the gospel. St. Agabus was with the twelve disciples in the upper room on the day of Pentecost, and he was filled with the Holy Spirit, the Comforter.
He received the gift of prophecy, as the Acts of the Apostles tells us, “And as we stayed many days, a certain prophet named Agabus came down from Judea. When he had come to us, he took Paul’s belt, bound his own hands and feet, and said, ‘Thus says the Holy Spirit, so shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man who owns this belt, and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles.'” (Acts 21:10-11) This prophecy was fulfilled. (Acts 21:17-36)
He also prophesied about a famine on all the earth, and this was fulfilled during the time of Claudius Caesar, the Roman Emperor. (Acts 11:27-28) He preached the gospel together with the holy apostles. He went to many countries, teaching and converting many of the Jews and the Greeks to the knowledge of the Lord Christ. He sanctified them by the life-giving baptism.
This moved the Jews of Jerusalem to arrest him, and they tortured him by beating him severely, and putting a rope around his neck, and they dragged him outside the city. They stoned him there until he gave up his pure spirit. At this moment, a light came down from heaven. Everyone saw it as a continuous column between his body and heaven. A Jewish woman saw it and said, “Truly this man was righteous.” She shouted in a loud voice, “I am a Christian and I believe in the God of this saint.” They stoned her also and she died and was buried with him in one tomb”.
Regarding the unusual name, Abagus, we read this at:
https://www.abarim-publications.com/Meaning/Agabus.html
It's not wholly clear where the name Agabus comes from but it's most probably Semitic. The term agabus/agabos does not exist in Latin or Greek. There are very few Latin words that start with gab- and none that start with agab-. Likewise, in Greek there are no common words that start with γαβ- (gab-) or αγαβ- (agab-).
Fortunately, there are quite a few Hebrew constructions that would transliterate into Greek in forms that would closely resemble our name. Most obviously, our name Agabus (Αγαβος, Agabos) may be a Hellenized version of the familiar name Hagabah (Αγαβα, Agaba), which in turn stems from the common noun חגב (hagab), grasshopper:
Could Agabus even be a variant form of the phonetically like Antipas?:
A[NT]IPAS
A[G] ABUS
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