Meletios of Lycopolis

Meletios of Lykopolis (Latin Meletius or Melitius ) was bishop of Lykopolis, today's Asyut .

During the Diocletian persecution of Christians , Meletios took on the duty to visit the Alexandrian Patriarch Petros I of Alexandria and was imprisoned and sentenced to mining work. After Petros returned in 306, Meletios, who had meanwhile been rehabilitated, was neither recognized in office, nor could he agree on the more rigorous desired treatment of the lapsi of the period of persecution. Meletius founded a "Church of the Martyrs" with a group of confessors who agreed with him and thus brought about the Meletian schism , which should not be confused with the schism of the same name by Meletius of Antioch .

Already at the time of the Council of Nicaea (325) the Meletians had around thirty bishops and were even more decisive in promoting the spread of monasticism . Major disputes then took place during the tenure of Athanasius . The traces of the Meletians can still be traced back to the 8th century.

literature

• Eckhard Reichert:  Melitius, Bishop of Lykopolis in Upper Egypt. In: Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon (BBKL). Volume 5, Bautz, Herzberg 1993, ISBN 3-88309-043-3 , Sp. 1213-1219.