ON SAINT JOHN THE CONFESSOR,
HEGUMEN OF THE MONASTERY OF THE CATHARI.
ABOUT THE YEAR 813.
CommentaryJohn, Abbot of the monastery of the Cathari (Saint)
By the author G. H.
Saint John bore not one trouble, for his assertion of the veneration of sacred images, from the iconoclasts: whose battle-trumpet was first sounded about the year of Christ 722 by a certain Hebrew conjurer called Serantampicus or Saramtapechys: who predicted to Gerid, tyrant of the Arabs, long pleasures with a principate of thirty years, The beginnings of iconomachy under Gerid, Prince of the Arabs, if throughout his whole kingdom he should have removed all the images of the Saints from the churches of the Christians. Which when he by his impious command had ordered to be done, removed the following year from among the living by a premature death, he showed the prophecy of the sacrilegious impostor to have been vain. Yet by similar persuasion of the Jews Leo the Isaurian was carried away, after having walked rightly by God's kindness for ten years, nor had made mention of the sacred images, as Pope Gregory II writes to him in an epistle; and then under Leo the Isaurian, in the tenth year of his reign, he himself having been made an enemy of the Saints, proscribed their images by an impious edict; instigated, as they say, by a certain man called Beser, who from a deserter of the Christian faith and from the chains of the Saracens was brought into bold liberty, because of bodily strength and agreement with depraved opinion, was in great authority with Leo. When the edict was published, a huge storm at once raged against the images and their worshipers: some, because they resisted such impious daring, were punished with beheading, others with prison and exile. To whose times Saint John is wrongly referred, Among whom Baronius reckons Saint John in the year of Christ 734, the 19th of Leo, transcribing from the Greek Menology on April 27 this elogium of his:
[2] "On the same day, of our holy Father John the Confessor, Abbot of the monastery of the Cathari. This one, under the impious Emperor Leo, for the defense of the holy images, when he was being sent into exile, summoning many and admonishing them, said: 'Watch, fathers and brothers, lest we be snatched away by the devil to deny the veneration of the holy images.' But being led to the Emperor, with free voice reproaching him with impiety, he was ordered to be beaten upon the eyes: and bound with iron chains, he is sent as an exile to a castle called Pentadactylum: and there enclosed in prison with his feet bound, he was kept for eighteen months. After these things they led him into the city itself, into the sight of the Emperor, as to a triumph. Finally, after many hardships, together with very many others relegated to the island of Aphusia, after two and a half years had been spent there, being warned by a certain vision; when he had predicted his death to those who were with him, he migrated to the Lord."
These things Baronius took from the Menology, in which, certainly, you will find nothing The Menaea prove that he is to be referred to the times of Leo the Armenian, that proves that Saint John must be referred to the times of Leo the Isaurian. Certainly the iconomachy begun under him went further. The war declared against the sacred images Constantine Copronymus, a son nothing better than his father, continued; from whom as by hereditary impiety it passed to his grandson Leo Porphyrogenitus, and from there by bad example to Leo the Armenian. To the times of this man, who obtained the Eastern empire in the year 813, the Menaea clearly convince that the illustrious confession of Saint John is to be assigned, while they narrate it thus.
[3] "On the same day, of our holy Father John the Confessor and Archimandrite of the monastery of the Cathari. This blessed John was born at Rhenopolis, which was one of the cities of the Decapolis, of Christian and pious parents Theodore and Gregoria, learned in letters, he sets out with his teacher to the 2nd Synod of Nicaea, at nine years old gave assiduous attention to letters, modest and obedient. For which reasons he was greatly loved by his teacher, with whom he set out for the second Synod of Nicaea. Thence his preceptor came to Constantinople, where he was made Archimandrite of the Dalmatae. He himself, since he was of outstanding bodily dignity, was made a presbyter: he becomes Presbyter and Abbot of the monastery of the Cathari, thence sent by the Emperor Nicephorus and declared President of the monastery of the Cathari, he governed the fold of Christ, at the nod of God, in the Apostolic manner for a little more than ten years, beloved by all mortals. But the temptations prepared and devised by the enemy of every good, the devil, against the best men were divinely revealed to the Blessed one: who, calling his own to an assembly and admonishing them, said: 'Watch, fathers and brothers, lest you be taken by the demon, whence, having confirmed the monks in the veneration of the sacred images, and deny the cult of the sacred images; for me you will no longer see among the living.' When he had foretold these things, there came certain men sent by Leo the Iconoclast, nearer to beasts than to men, who scattered the whole religious flock, and each seized for himself as his own what he found in the monastery. And they dragged John himself, their Abbot and Pastor, bound in chains to Constantinople, his monastery being proscribed and left as plunder for all. Moreover the holy man, when he came to the Emperor, called him both impious and apostate, and uttered many other things without blushing, Led off to Constantinople, after rebuking the Emperor he is beaten with thongs, and as it were hurled thunders upon him. Inflamed by which, the Emperor savagely beat his eyes and face with oxhide thongs: but he, struck by the blows, congratulated himself that he suffered such things for Christ.
[4] "Soon cast back into a domestic prison, and three months having been spent there, condemned to exile, he is relegated to a castle which they called Pentadactylion in the region of Lampes: punished afterward with prison and exile. where bound with iron chains and given over into dark custody, he lay hidden for a year and a half. Then, stripped of all his clothing, they dragged him into the city, the Emperor looking on. The Emperor, after many words exchanged back and forth, handed him over to John the pseudo-patriarch of the great Church of Constantinople: by whom afflicted with a thousand evils, and by hunger and abstinence for a long time almost killed, at length he was led back to the Emperor; who sent him away to a castle, which from ram and bull was called Criotaurus, situated among the Bucellarii, and shut him up there in a most obscure cage, and by afflicting and beating him nearly finished him off. The holy man, however, always praised God, and bore all things with the most grateful spirit. But with the impious Emperor killed, Michael succeeded in his place, who recalled the exiles. In the same place he piously ends his life: Whence this Saint, having proceeded as far as Chalcedon, was not permitted to enter the city. Then under Theophilus reigning, he is relegated to the island of Aphusia: where, two and a half years having been completed, a heavenly vision was offered him; and so to those who were with him, he announced his departure from life, and after three days he went to the Lord." These things the Menaea.
[5] Saint John therefore appears to have been a Decapolitan from his native place, just as Saint Procopius the Decapolitan also was, native place, Decapolis. a distinguished Confessor of Christ, having suffered very many things for the cult of the sacred images, whose contest we celebrated on February 27. Decapolis, however, in this middle age more noted and celebrated was that which, pertaining to Isauria, sent Saint Gregory the Decapolitan and his disciple John (different from this our Hegumen of the Cathari) to Constantinople for a similar cause, as said on April 18. In this, as Irenopolis was the fatherland of Gregory, so also some Rhenopolis could have been named, unless you prefer to suspect that the true name is the aforesaid Irenopolis itself, from which the carelessness of copyists took away the first syllable. So much of the native soil, Time of birth, in which he seems to have been born about the year 775, and at nine years to have taken up the studies of letters, and to have gone with his teacher to the second Synod of Nicaea in the year 787, and to have clung to that same teacher appointed Archimandrite of the Dalmatae in the royal city of Constantinople, and then made Presbyter, of monastic life, and by the Emperor Nicephorus (who reigned from the second year to the eleventh after the eight hundredth) appointed Hegumen of the monastery of the Cathari, he ruled it until the times of Leo the Armenian, who governed the Empire from the year 813 to the 20th of the said century. At this man's time, therefore, the monastery being devastated, bound, he was led to the city of Constantinople, of exile, beaten, shut in prison, and afterward sent as an exile to the castle of Pentadactynus in the dominion or territory of Lampe, a city of Asia Minor near the Maeander river, and then sent as an exile to the Bucellarii peoples of Bithynia. Meanwhile Leo the Armenian having been killed in the year 820, Michael the Stammerer succeeded, under whom it was permitted to remain at Chalcedon. Afterward under his son Theophilus, reigning from the year 829, he was again driven into exile: in which when he had lived two and a half years, the Confessor migrated from this life to Christ, about the year 832 or the years next following. Hence the elogium of the Martyrology ought to be reformed, and say: death. "Who under Leo the Armenian and Theophilus the Emperors for the cult of the sacred images suffered various contests and exiles." Concerning Aphusia, which we think should be sought in the Euxine Sea, it can be treated in the Acts of Saints Theodore and Theophanes the Brothers; who are venerated on December 26 and were exiled in the same place.