Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature to the End of the Sixth Century/Leucius, author of N.T. apocryphal additions

Leucius (1), the reputed author

of large

apocryphal additions to the N.T. history, which originated in heretical circles, and which, though now lost, were much current in early times. The fullest account is that given by Photius (Cod. 114), who describes a book, called The Circuits of the Apostles, which contained the Acts of Peter, John, Andrew, Thomas, and Paul, and purported to have been written by Leucius Charinus. This second name Charinus is peculiar to Photius, earlier writers calling the author simply Leucius, a name variously altered by transcribers. Photius characterizes the book as in style utterly unlike the genuine N.T. writings, and full of folly, self-contradiction, falsehood, and impiety. It taught the existence of two gods—an evil one, the God of the Jews, having Simon Magus as his minister, and a good one, from Whom Christ came. It confounded the Father and the Son; denied the reality of Christ's Incarnation, and gave a Docetic account of His life on earth and especially of His crucifixion. It condemned marriage and regarded all generation as the work of the evil principle; denied that demons were created by God; related childish stories of miraculous restoration to life, of both men and cattle; and in the Acts of John used language which the Iconoclasts regarded as favouring them. From this description we can identify as the same work a collection of Apostolic Acts, from which extracts were read at the 2nd council of Nicaea (Actio v., Mansi, xiii. 167), the story of Lycomedes (see D. C. B. 4-vol. ed.) being that made use of by the Iconoclasts, and the Docetic tales being from this work. In the council was next read a citation from Amphilochius of Iconium, denouncing certain heretical Acts of the Apostles, and in particular arguing against the truth of a story, evidently that to which we have just referred, because it represented St. John as on the Mount of Olives during the crucifixion, and so contradicted the gospel, which relates that he was close to the Cross. With this evidence that the work read by Photius was in existence before the end of the 4th cent., we may probably refer to the same source a statement of Epiphanius (Haer. 51, p. 427) that Leucius was a disciple of John and joined his master in opposing the Ebionites. Church writers frequently reject the doctrine of heretical apocrypha and yet accept stories told in such documents as true, provided there were no