Basilius the Confessor

ON SAINT BASILIUS THE CONFESSOR,

Bishop of Parium in Lesser Mysia.

UNDER THE ICONOCLASTS.

Basilius, Confessor, Bishop of Parium in Mysia (St.)

BY G. H.

[1] Parium was an ancient city of Lesser Mysia, beyond the Hellespont toward the Propontis, known to Xenophon, Strabo, Ptolemy, Pliny, and others; and after the faith of Christ was received, made Episcopal under the metropolitan of Cyzicus: whose Bishop Thalassius was present at the Council of Chalcedon and subscribed the Synodal letter. Among the later Bishops sat Saint Basilius, who excellently defended the faith of Christ against the iconoclasts; and having endured scourgings, chains, and exile, as a glorious Confessor obtained the prize of eternal life. That the brilliant Acts of this man were once written we do not doubt, Solemn memory among the Greeks and we regret that they have either perished or still lie hidden. His name alone is held in the metrical Ephemeris, and the Greeks celebrate his solemn memory in the great Menaea, where his contests and victories are sung with a full ecclesiastical office, with this epitome of his life interposed.

[2] "On April 12, the memory of our holy Father Basilius, Bishop of Parium, Confessor. with an elogium in the Menaea, This holy Basilius, because of his excellent virtue and divine life, was created Bishop of Parium, at the time when the heresy of the impious Iconoclasts was raging. Lest therefore this Saint should be compelled to think with them, and to subscribe to their dogma against the sacred images, by the example of divine Paul he led his whole life in hardships, afflictions, and distresses; and as an exile he moved from place to place, everywhere declining the society of heretics: and embracing true piety, he always adhered to the teachings of the Fathers, and contended for the same. When therefore in such exercises, pleasing God and serving him, he had persevered to the end, he rested in peace." Thus far the Menaea, and other Synaxaries, which are read in the manuscript Synaxary of Paris of our Clermont College and in other manuscript Menaea, likewise in the Greek Anthology published by the authority of Clement VIII, and in the Lives of the Saints collected in Greek by Maximus, Bishop of Cythera. In the Menology of Cardinal Sirletus these few things only, which we wonder at, are published on this day: "Of our holy Father Basilius, Bishop of Parium." The same things are held in the Typicon of Saint Sabas, augmented by later writers: as also in the Tables of the Muscovite Kalendar and in the Ruthenian Fasti in Possevino, without the title and name of the Episcopate expressed, as generally in both places is usually omitted.

[3] Mention among the Latins Among the Latins there followed Genebrard in the Kalendar of the Greeks, Molanus in the additions to Usuard, and Ferrarius in the general Catalogue: who in the Notes says that he suffered much for the cult of the sacred images under Leo the Isaurian. Baronius in the Annals under the year 735, when he had reported various contests of the holy Martyrs and Confessors undertaken under the said Leo, at the end adds these things: whether he flourished under Leo the Isaurian? "So also Basilius, Bishop of Parium, whose memory the Greeks have noted to be celebrated annually in the Menology on the thirteenth day of the month of April. These and others, from the impiety and cruelty of the Emperor, wove for themselves immortal crowns." In the Menaea the name of the Emperor is not expressed. The memory of the same Saint Basilius on this April 12 is inscribed in the ancient Arabic-Egyptian Martyrology, which Gratia Simoni, a student of the College of the Maronites at Rome, translated into Latin for us, procured by Athanasius Kircher, a lover of our studies.

[4] The day which Baronius assigned, April 13, is noted in the Menology of the Emperor Basilius Porphyrogenitus, Cult on April 13 in the Menology of Emperor Basilius. in which the same elogium as we have brought above is indicated; but with greater emphasis are expressed the images defended against the most impious Emperor's edict, of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of his Immaculate Mother Mary, our glorious Lady the Mother of God and ever-Virgin, and of all Saints.