Paul of Samosata

Paul of Samosata (Ancient Greek: Παῦλος ὁ Σαμοσατεύς, lived from 200 to 275) was patriarch of Antioch from 260 to 268 and the originator of the Paulianist heresy named after him.

Edward Gibbon describes him as follows: The wealth of that prelate was a sufficient evidence of his guilt since it was neither derived from the inheritance of his fathers nor acquired by the arts of honest industry.

His ecclesiastical jurisdiction was venal and rapacious; he extorted frequent contributions from the most opulent of the faithful and converted to his own use a considerable part of the public revenue.

His council chamber and his throne, the splendour with which he appeared in public, the suppliant crowd who solicited his attention, the multitude of letters and petitions to which he dictated his answers, and the perpetual hurry of business in which he was involved, were circumstances much better suited to the state of a civil magistrate than to the humility of a primitive bishop.

When he harangued his people from the pulpit, Paul affected the figurative style and the theatrical gestures of an Asiatic sophist, while the cathedral resounded with the loudest and most extravagant acclamations in the praise of his divine eloquence.

Against those who resisted his power, or refused to flatter his vanity, the prelate of Antioch was arrogant, rigid, and inexorable; but he relaxed the discipline, and lavished the treasures of the church on his dependent clergy, who were permitted to imitate their master in the gratification of every sensual appetite.

For Paul indulged himself very freely in the pleasures of the table, and he had received into the episcopal palace two young and beautiful women, as the constant companions of his leisure moments.

Since he had friendly relations[5] with Zenobia, the separatist queen of Palmyra ruling in Syria, he maintained his occupancy of the bishop's house in Antioch for another four years.