Nicolaitanes
The church at Ephesus (Rev. 2:6) is commended for hating the
"deeds" of the Nicolaitanes, and the church of Pergamos is
blamed for having them who hold their "doctrines" (15). They
were seemingly a class of professing Christians, who sought to
introduce into the church a false freedom or licentiousness,
thus abusing Paul's doctrine of grace (comp. 2 Pet. 2:15, 16,
19), and were probably identical with those who held the
doctrine of Baalam (q.v.), Rev. 2:14.
Nicolaitanes, followers of Nicolas