Eikon

Philo of Karpasia

Our Father among the Saints Philo, Bishop of Karpasia

Bishop · d. 5th century, at Karpasia in Cyprus

Commemorated 24 January — Repose in peace

Philo (5th century) was bishop of Karpasia, on the Karpas peninsula at the north-eastern tip of Cyprus — a learned pastor ordained, the tradition holds, by Epiphanius of Salamis, and remembered above all as a biblical commentator. He wrote a commentary on the Song of Songs, which survives, and is credited also with expositions of the Pentateuch and other Scriptures, together with a letter to a monk Eucarpios. He governed his see in peace and reposed in peace in the fifth century. He is commemorated on January 24.

Philo belongs to the circle of the great Cypriot father Epiphanius, archbishop of Salamis (†403). The Life of Epiphanius relates that Epiphanius, summoned to Rome, left the care of a widow and of his flock's needs to Philo and, before departing, ordained him bishop of Karpasia — the town and see of the Karpas (Karpasia) peninsula in the far north-east of Cyprus. Whatever the precise biography behind the notice, the association with Epiphanius places Philo in the late fourth and fifth centuries and in the front rank of Cypriot churchmen.

His enduring monument is his learning in the Scriptures. He composed a commentary on the Song of Songs, a work valued in antiquity and preserved in a number of Greek manuscripts — as well as, in part, in an Old Slavonic catena that goes under his name and in an Ethiopic (Geʿez) version — which makes him one of the notable patristic interpreters of that book. The tradition credits him further with a commentary on the Pentateuch (the OCA notice names the Pentateuch and the Song of Songs) and with other exegetical fragments, and preserves a letter to the monk Eucarpios on the ascetic life. He governed Karpasia as a worthy hierarch and reposed in peace in the fifth century.

Feast and commemoration

January 24 (church date; New Calendar civil January 24, Old Calendar civil February 6), a commemoration of the Byzantine rite, kept among the saints of the day; he is especially honoured in the Church of Cyprus.

Hymns

Troparion — Tone 4

A rule of faith and an image of meekness, a teacher of temperance hath the truth of thy deeds shown thee to be unto thy flock; therefore hast thou gained by humility things exalted, and by poverty things rich. O Father and Hierarch Philo, intercede with Christ our God that our souls may be saved.

Original translation from the Greek

Iconography

Philo is depicted in the settled type of a hierarch — vested in the phelonion and omophorion, holding or blessing over the Gospel-book — as an aged, bearded bishop. No securely identified pre-modern image is known to this entry, and no image is stored here; the icon is noted as wanting.

Disputed questions

  • Name and see — "Kolpasteia," "Crete." Several service-calendars, the OCA among them, style the saint bishop of "Kolpasteia" and locate him in "Crete." Both are corruptions: the see is Karpasia in Cyprus (the form Kolpasteia/Calpe is a garbling of Καρπασία, and Crete an error for Cyprus), as the manuscript tradition of the commentary and the Life of Epiphanius make plain. This entry keeps the historical Philo of Karpasia; the corrupt forms are recorded among the alternate names for the sake of the dedup search.
  • The dating and the details of his episcopate rest on the Life of Epiphanius and the synaxarion, and are given as the tradition transmits them.

Sources

  1. The Life of Epiphanius of Salamis — the ordination of Philo to the see of Karpasia by Epiphanius.
  2. Philo of Karpasia, Commentary on the Song of Songs (surviving in Greek manuscripts, an Old Slavonic catena, and an Ethiopic version) and the Letter to Eucarpios — his own works.
  3. The Synaxarion of Constantinople and the Greek Menaion, January 24 — the notice of the saint (styled in some books bishop of "Kolpasteia").
  4. Orthodox Church in America, Lives of the Saints, January 24 (Saint Philon, Bishop of Kolpasteia) — consulted live; the corruption of see and place noted under Disputed questions.