This page is about Cyprian, bishop of Carthage. For other Cyprians, see Cyprian (disambiguation).
Saint Cyprian (Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus) (died September 14, 258) was bishop of Carthage and an important early Christian writer. He was probably born at the beginning of the 3rd century in North Africa, perhaps at Carthage, where he received an excellent classical (pagan) education. After converting to Christianity, he became a bishop (249) and eventually died a martyr at Carthage.

Early life
Not long after his baptism he was ordained deacon, and soon afterward presbyter; and some time between July 248 and April 249 he was chosen bishop of Carthage, a popular choice among the poor who remembered his patronage as demonstrating good equestrian style, while a portion of the presbytery opposed it, for all Cyprian's wealth and learning and diplomacy and literary talents. Moreover, the opposition within the church community at Carthage did not dissolve during his tenure.
Soon however the entire community was put to an unwonted test. Christians in North Africa had not suffered persecution for many years: the church was assured and lax. The intense following of martyrdom as a Christian career still lay in an unexpected future. Early in 250 the Emperor Decius issued the edict for the suppression of Christianity, and the "Decian persecution" famous to Christians began. Measures were first taken demanding that the bishops and officers of the church sacrifice to the Emperor, a matter of an oath of allegiance that was taken by Christians as profoundly offensive. The proconsul on circuit, and five commissioners for each town, administered the edict; but, when the proconsul reached Carthage, Cyprian had fled.
It is quite evident in the writings of the church fathers from various dioceses that the Christian community was divided on this occasion, among those who stood firm in civil disobedience, whatever price they actually paid, and those who buckled, submitting in word or in deed to the order of sacrifice and receiving a ticket or receipt called a libellus ("booklet"). His secret departure from Carthage was interpreted by his enemies as cowardice and infidelity, and they hastened to accuse him at Rome. The Roman clergy (the see being vacant at that time) wrote to Cyprian in terms of disapproval. Cyprian rejoined that he fled in accordance with visions and the divine command. From his place of refuge he ruled his flock with earnestness and zeal, using a faithful deacon as his intermediary.
For the context of the "Decian persecution" in the Empire, see the entry at Decius.

His contested election as bishop of Carthage
The persecution was especially severe at Carthage, according to Church sources. Official Roman sources are silent on the severity of the "Decian persecution." Many Christians fell away, and were thereafter referred to as lapsi, but afterward asked to be received again into the Church. Their requests were granted early with no regard being paid to the demand of Cyprian and his faithful among the Carthaginian clergy, who insisted upon earnest repentance. The confessors among the more liberal group intervened to allow hundreds of the lapsed to return to the Church.
Though he had remained in seclusion himself, Cyprian now censured all laxity toward the lapsed, refused absolution to them except in case of mortal sickness, and desired to postpone the question of their readmission to the Church to more quiet times. A schism broke out in Carthage. One Felicissimus, who had been ordained deacon by the presbyter Novatus during the absence of Cyprian, opposed all steps taken by Cyprian's representatives. Cyprian deposed and excommunicated him and his supporter Augendius. Felicissimus was upheld by Novatus and four other presbyters, and a determined opposition was thus organized.
When, after an absence of fourteen months, Cyprian returned to his diocese, he defended leaving his post (guided by a vision, all for the good of the community) in letters to the other North African bishops, and a tract De lapsis ("On those who fall away"), and called a council of North African bishops at Carthage, to consider the treatment of the lapsed and the apparent schism of Felicissimus (251). The council in the main sided with Cyprian, it is said, and condemned Felicissimus, though no Acts of this council survive. The libellatici, i.e., Christians who had made or signed the written statements (libelli) that they had obeyed the behest of the emperor, were to be restored at once upon sincere repentance; but such as had taken part in heathen sacrifices could be received back into the Church only when on the point of death. Afterward this regulation was essentially mitigated, and even these were restored if they repented immediately after a sudden fall and eagerly sought absolution; though clerics who had fallen were to be deposed and could not be restored to their functions.
In Carthage the followers of Felicissimus elected Fortunatus as bishop in opposition to Cyprian, while in Rome the followers of the Roman presbyter Novatian, who also refused absolution to all the lapsed, elected their man as bishop of Rome, in opposition to Cornelius. The Novationists secured the election of a rival bishop of their own at Carthage, Maximus by name. Novatus now left Felicissimus and followed the Novatian party.
But these extremes strengthened the firm but moderating influence exhibited in Cyprian's writings, and the following of his opponents grew less and less. He rose still higher in the favor of the people when they witnessed his self-denying devotion during the time of a great plague and famine.
He comforted his brethren by writing his De mortalitate, and in his De eleomosynis exhorted them to active charity towards the poor, while he set the best pattern by his own life. He defended Christianity and the Christians in the apologia Ad Demetrianum. directed against a certain Demetrius and the reproach of the heathens that Christians were the cause of the public calamities.

Controversy over the lapsed
But Cyprian had yet to fight another battle, which broke to the surface in 255, in which his opponent was Pope Stephen I. The matter in dispute was the efficacy of baptism in the conventional accepted forms, when it was administered by heretics.
Stephen declared baptism by heretics valid if administered according to the institution either in the name of Christ or of the holy Trinity. This was the mainstream view of the Church. Cyprian, on the other hand, believing that outside the Church there was no true baptism, regarded that of heretics as null and void, and baptized as for the first time those who joined the Church. When heretics had been baptized in the Church, but had temporarily fallen away and wished to return in penitence, he did not rebaptize them.
Cyprian's narrow definition of the Church led him to certain inferences that made him in this respect the connecting-link between his model, the rigorist Tertullian, and the comparable Donatist controversy that split North Africa later, concerning the efficacy of the mass, when said by an unworthy priest.
The majority of the North African bishops sided with Cyprian; and in the East he had a powerful ally in Firmilian, bishop of Caesarea. But the position of Stephen came to find general acceptance. Stephen in his letters used the claim of superiority of the Roman See over all bishoprics of the Church. To this claim Cyprian answered that the authority of the Roman bishop was coordinate with, not superior to, his own. Stephen broke off communion with Cyprian and Carthage, though perhaps without going as far as a formal excommunication of Cyprian.
The 1911 Catholic Encyclopedia article on Cyprian claims that at the time the issue was seen only as a matter of discipline and not of doctrine. The modern Catholic church holds dogmatically that baptism by heretics and even by atheists or other non-Christians is valid if intentionally done according to the manner that the Church prescribes and that the person doing the Baptizing be Baptised themselves. The doctrinal basis for this was articulated by St. Augustine in his conflict with the Donatists, who claimed the authority of Cyprian for their own position.