Philip died in 304, an old man and a martyr who, along with a servant named Hermes, suffered an astoundingly brutal death. Beloved by a number of Christians who were being also facing persecution under Emperor Diocletian, Philip explained that martyrdom was his divine allotment in life by way of telling those who bewailed his mistreatment about a dream he had. Butler writes:

Then [Philip] said to the multitude that followed [him and Hermes to their eventual executions]: “The Lord revealed to me that I must suffer. While I was asleep, methought I saw a dove as white as snow, which, entering into the chamber, rested on my head, and descending upon my breast, presented me some meat which was very agreeable to the taste. I knew that it was the Lord that called me, and was pleased to honour me with martyrdom.”

This seems to me an amazing, wonderful dream. The dove has long represented the Holy Spirit in Christian symbology (Gospel accounts of the baptism of Jesus by John in the Jordan River speak of the Spirit of God descending upon Jesus “like a dove”–see Mark 1:10, KJV).

Now, to Philip, his dream represented a calling to martyrdom–something that, thanks to this divinely provided night visitation, became agreeable to Philip.

But to ecclesiastical historian Claude Fleury (a Frenchman who lived from 1640-1723), “the delicious meat (that the dove gave Philip in the dream) seems to mean the eucharist, which the martyrs received before the combat.”

What a difference happened when Christianity moved from being a persecuted, minority religion (at the time of Philip) to becoming the overwhelmingly dominant religion (at least in Europe, and at the time of Fleury). The dream, to Philip, involved a call to sacrifice oneself for the truth in the face of overwhelming force–and represented the sense of “martyr” in the original Greek as referring to holding fast to the truth. To Fleury, the dream signaled provisioning for combat. These simply are not the same.

For Philip, the dream comforted him with the sense of God’s pleasure in Philip’s commitment to live in the truth, despite the consequences. For Fleury and a post-Constantine church, Philip’s dream contained no sense of God’s pleasure–no confirmation or comfort for Philip–only food rations for a battle. For Philip, this dream afforded him an unshakeable peace. For Fleury, et al., the dream highlighted martyrdom as a distant (if indispensable) part of the momentum onward of Christian soldiers, marching as to war.

If it’s not clear that the difference between these two interpretations matters, consider this: In 2018 America, telling the truth (about climate change, about immorality in high places, about human rights, about the needs of the poor, about considerations for all persons without exception) is all-too-frequnetly portrayed as an act of war against large and significantly influential factions of Christians.