He is mentioned in the Book of Revelation as Antipas, my faithful witness (2:13), who was killed among you, where Satan dwells, i.e. in the city of Pergamum. The inhabitants of this city lived in the darkness of idolatry and in extreme impurity; they were slaves of passion, degenerates, violent, bloodthirsty, in other words, servants of Satan. And there among them lived Antipas “like a light in the midst of darkness, like a rose among thorns, like gold in the midst of mud”. He was considered good and righteous who would capture and kill a Christian. All pagan faith consisted of divination, in the interpretation of dreams, in the service of demons and in extreme debauchery. Terrified by Antipas as by fire, demons appeared to the priests in a dream and confessed how they feared Antipas, and how they had to flee from that city because of him. The priests raised a crowd of people against Antipas, and began to torture him and force him to deny Christ and worship idols. Antipas said to them: “When your so-called gods, the masters of the universe, fear me, a mortal man, and have to flee from this city, do you not know by this that your entire faith is a delusion?” And the saint continued to speak to them about the faith of Christ, as the only true and saving one. But they became enraged like wild beasts and dragged the elder Antipas before the temple of Artemis, before which stood a cast-bronze bull. The bull glowed with fire, and they threw the servant of God into it. St. Antipas, inside the fiery ox, glorified God with gratitude, like Jonah in the whale or the three children in the fiery furnace. And Antipas prayed for his flock and for the whole world until his soul was separated from his corruptible body and ascended among the angels to the Kingdom of Christ. He died in torment and was crowned with unfading glory in the year 92.

Holy Martyrs Procesus and Martinian.