Purpurius

Purpurius[1] was a Donatist bishop from 305 to 320 AD, who was instrumental in establishing the Donatist movement of Roman North Africa.

He is known from several correspondences.[2] It was Purpurius who first introduced the likening of the Donatist community as a new expression of the Israelites following Moses in the Desert.[3]

Cirta in Roman times was protected to the south and west by the "Limes romanus" called Fossatum Africae

He was an attendee at the Synod of Cirta, the beginning of the Donatist movement. Optatus tells he had a dispute with Secundus of Tigisis,[4] who charged him as a murderer,[5] a charge he admitted. The accusation was he had murdered his nephews at Milevus, though we are not told what the circumstance of the act were. Augustine[6] describes him as a violent man.

Optatus also claims he was brigand and had stolen vinegar from the imperial stores.[7]

All this, however, was not enough to exclude him from the meeting though, as Tilley puts it

...since Purpurius had not been a traditor... he was still a member – albeit a sinful member – of the true church. His private affairs, even murder, were no bar to his participation in the ritual of consecration.[8]

References
  1. Henri Irénée Marrou, André Mandouze, Anne-Marie La Bonnardière, Prosopographie de l'Afrique chrétienne (303-533) (Éditions du Centre national de la recherche scientifique, 1 Jan. 1982) .
  2. Maureen A. Tilley, The Bible in Christian North Africa: The Donatist World (Fortress Press, 1997) p80-81
  3. Maureen A. Tilley, The Bible in Christian North Africa: The Donatist World (Fortress Press, 1997). p80.
  4. Wace, Henry, Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature (Delmarva Publications, Inc., 1911).
  5. Charles Joseph Hefele, A History of the Councils of the Church: from the Original Documents, to the close of the Second Council of Nicaea A.D. 787 (Wipf and Stock Publishers, 1 Feb. 2007 ) p 129.
  6. Augustine, Contra Cresconium, III.30
  7. J. Stevenson, W. H. C. Frend, A New Eusebius: Documents Illustrating the History of the Church to AD 337 (Baker Books, 1 Jul. 2013)
  8. Maureen A. Tilley, The Bible in Christian North Africa: The Donatist World (Fortress Press, 1997)p102.
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