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While claiming a conversion to Christianity, Montanus preached and testified what he purported to be the Word of God as he traveled among the rural settlements of his native Phrygia and Asia Minor. In these travels he proclaimed the village of Pepuza as the site of the New Jerusalem. The Orthodox Christians, however, regarded his teaching to be heretical. He claimed not only to have received a series of direct revelations from the [[Holy Spirit]], but personally to be the incarnation of the [[Holy Spirit|paraclete]] mentioned in the [[Gospel of John]] 14:16. Montanus was accompanied by two women, Prisca, sometimes called Priscilla, and Maximilla, who likewise claimed to be the embodiments of the [[Holy Spirit]] that moved and inspired them. As they traveled, "the Three" as they were called, spoke in ecstatic visions and in the first person as of the Father or the paraclete. They urged their followers to fast and pray, so that they might share these personal revelations. His message spread from his native Phrygia across the Christian world of the second century, to Africa and Gaul.