John Chrysostom Early Church Summary

Historical Background
John Chrysostom was a contemporary of the Cappadocians (Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus), and his ministry flourished during the so-called “golden age of early Christian literature.” According to Yngve Brilioth, “The history of the ancient church does not present a more thrilling life story.” John was born in Antioch on the Orontes River, in the province of Syria, probably around the year A.D. 349. His father was a civil servant in the Roman military government but passed away while John was still an infant. Anthusa, John’s saintly mother, had him educated in the literary and oratorical traditions of Greek culture, and he studied under Libanius, a distinguished rhetorician of the period.
He was baptized in A.D. 368, and he may have served as an aide to Melitius, bishop of Antioch, for three years. Around this time John committed himself to ascetic living, including the wearing of a habit, remaining celibate, abstaining from meat and wine, and devoting himself to prayer. John was made an ecclesiastical lector (“reader”) at the age of twenty-three, but he refused to join the priesthood. Instead, he was tutored by an aged monk, lived for a time in monastic seclusion, and then resided for two years as a hermit in a cave on Mount Silpios. He committed himself to constant communion with God and to the memorization of both the Old and New Testaments. The rigor of his ascetic lifestyle broke his health, however, and he returned to Antioch a few years later. John was named to the diaconate in 381, and five years later he was ordained to the priesthood (in A.D. 386). His ministry among the churches of Antioch flourished over the next decade, and his congregation reveled in his splendid and powerful
Women of the imperial court, political leaders, and powerful clerics formed a coalition in opposition to John. Five years into his Constantinopolitan ministry, John was deposed and exiled, but was quickly recalled and reinstated after an earthquake and rioting. When rioting broke out shortly after on Easter Eve in 404, the situation escalated. Mobs invaded churches and desecrated them, and the emperor published another order of exile. John died on September 14, 407, at the age of fifty-eight, while being transported to a more remote