ON ST. NONNA,
MOTHER OF ST. GREGORY NAZIANZEN, ARCHBISHOP OF CONSTANTINOPLE.
About the year 374.
A HISTORICAL COLLECTION.
Nonna, mother of St. Gregory Nazianzen (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. P.
§ I. The etymology of her name; a sketch of her virtues.
Among very many other ornaments of nature and grace with which St. Nonna was endowed, she had these as proper to herself: Whence her name took its origin. that she was the wife of a holy husband, that she was the parent of holy children, that she was sprung of holy stock. Of her husband, St. Gregory, bishop of Nazianzus, it was treated among us on the I day of January; but of her children, St. Gregory Nazianzen, surnamed the Theologian, on the IX of May; of St. Gorgonia it will be treated on the IX of December; of St. Caesarius it was treated on the XXV day of February. But the present day is dedicated to the festive cult of St. Nonna. As regards the name, says Baronius in the notes to his Roman Martyrology at this day, nuns were called "nonnae," as Caelius Rhodiginus notes, Ancient Readings, book 5, chapter 13, at the end, and the same you have in book 5 of the Capitularies of the Frankish kings, chapters 2 and 3. In the same sense, perhaps, St. Jerome, letter 22 to Eustochium, On the Keeping of Virginity, says: Having experienced the dominion of husbands, they prefer the liberty of widowhood: they are called chaste, and "nonnae," etc. But not only among the Greeks did such an appellative name sometimes pass into a proper one, but also among the Latins: for St. Augustine's mother too was called by nearly the same name; although for "Monacha" she was called "Monica," which is the same as "Nonna." And thus the mothers of two most eminent Doctors of the Church are held to have been called by the same name.
[2] The Saint sprung from holy parents. But since St. Gregory Nazianzen, her son, was the most knowing and most certain examiner and witness of his mother's virtues, I take from his Works, published at Paris in the year 1619, those things which serve to suggest a sketch of them. And so in volume 2, in the Poem "On his own life," page 2, he says that she is
Sprung from holy parents, holier still.
And in the next Poem, page 33, the holy Man pronounces thus of her:
She indeed, drawing from her fathers the pious seeds of faith, Bound the necks of her children with a golden chain, Bearing in a woman's form a manly mind and spirit, And touching the earth and the affairs of this fleeting world Only so far as, provident, she might carry all her wealth To heaven, and, unburdened, fly up to the highest stars.
In the fourth Poem, page 71, the holy Doctor attributes these praises to her:
But my mother, holy offspring of holy parents, And excellent shoot of a pious stock: Not inferior to those matrons to whom it fell to see Christ When he came alive again from the tomb.
In volume 1, oration 11, page 178, he says: Who is there, then, who does not know the Sarah of our memory? In oration 19, page 293, he proclaims her as one who from of old and from her ancestors was endowed with the love of God and of Christ, and had received the inheritance of virtue from her fathers. She had nothing of a woman, save only her sex, from St. Gregory's Poem "On his own life," page 2:
A woman in sex; but in character above men.
[3] But now concerning her virtues in particular I find these things. The endowments of her tongue, her patience, Of the endowments of her tongue he speaks thus on page 2 just cited, calling
My Parent as witness, than whom none is truer: Who would keep silent things illustrious to all, Rather than tell what was hidden, hunting for praise. For a great master, fear, was her guide in this.
Of her patience, volume 1, oration 19, page 293, this brief word: that she surpassed all women in the praise of patience and fortitude. What of this, that, as in the same place, page 292, she never so indulged in bodily grief (though otherwise she was moved in a greater degree even by the calamities of strangers) that a mournful cry burst forth from her before thanksgiving, or a tear flowed from eyelids mystically signed, or a mourning garb remained when a bright day was present: although very many troubles often befell her. For she judged it belonged to a pious soul dear to God to submit all human things to divine ones. Virginity amid conjugal bonds, and the austerity of life which preserves it, are in the same place, page 291: What woman more wore down her flesh with fastings and vigils, or fixed herself like a column with psalmody by day and by night? What woman held virginity in greater admiration, though bearing the bond of marriage?
[4] The care of the household aptly joined with the exercises of piety, in the same place. Now while some women excel in the praise of increasing the household estate, the exercises of piety, the gift of prayer, confidence, efficacy: others in the glory of piety (for it is difficult to attain both), she surpassed all women on both counts: both because she performed each of these to the highest degree, and because she alone embraced those two together. For she so increased the household estate by her industry and skill, according to the laws laid down by Solomon for the valiant woman, as though she knew not how to cultivate piety; and again she so devoted herself to God and to divine things as though she were quite far from the management of household affairs. Nor was she in any way hindered by either of these from fulfilling the other; nay rather, she supported and strengthened each by the help of the other. The gift of prayer, and hope, in the same place: What time of prayer, what place, escaped her? (For there was nothing in the whole day to which she was sooner impelled.) Nay rather, what woman ever had equal hope that as soon as she had asked something, she would at once obtain what she asked? Further, to these prerogatives of prayer is added efficacy: for she asked her son Gregory of God and obtained him. In the Poem "On his own life" he sings thus, page 2:
She desired to behold a male offspring in her house, As a great part of mortals desire. As a suppliant, therefore, she prays God to fulfill her vows.
But in the fourth Poem, page 71, Gregory relates this:
But Christ granted me a special honor: For first of all he gave me to my mother's prayer.
In the first Poem, from page 38, he brings in his mother speaking thus:
Kindled with desire of offspring, Imitating Hannah, she sent forth such words from her breast: Grant me, I pray, most high Ruler, a son: And in your house he shall serve you all his years. She had spoken, and, moved by her prayers, in the night you Assign the boy's name to his parent: and the offspring followed.
Finally, that the praised mother brought help by her prayers to her Gregory when he was in peril of his life in a storm ("by prayer," as it is in the Greek), see oration 19 from page 306. She never reckoned herself more adorned than when she was farther from feminine ornaments, but nearer to the uncreated beauty. In the same place, page 291: For it is she who, whereas other women are wont to glory and be lifted up in mind on account of elegance of form, whether native or feigned and adventitious, she on the contrary acknowledged this one beauty, which is placed in the soul, and in the divine image either to be guarded or, so far as one may, to be cleansed again: but painted ornaments sought by art she flung away to little stage-women.
[5] her esteem of virtue, her beneficence toward the poor Her one and only nobility was virtue. In the same place: Likewise she judged that the one nobility lay in piety, and in this, that we understand whence we have our origin and whither at last we are to come. She esteemed as riches only those which cannot be taken away, beneficent toward her needy kinsfolk. In the same place: These moreover she reckoned the only safe wealth and immune from all pilfering, namely, to God
and upon the poor to pour out wealth, and especially upon those who had fallen from their fortunes as from a kind of flower: to whom to supply only what was necessary she judged to be not a driving away of calamity but a monument of it; but to help them more liberally and more amply, that at last is firm honor and most perfect solace. Nay, she burned with a wondrous desire of pouring out her substance upon any poor whatever with unexhausted liberality; for whom indeed, in the same place, page 299, not even the Atlantic sea, or anything else that is greatest, could have sufficed to be drained. (With so great and so immoderate a love of bestowing did she burn!) Who emulated Solomon's leech in the opposite direction, namely surpassing by an unfillable desire for good the insatiable greed for evil, and endowed with such eagerness for deserving well that she could not be sated with it. Who finally deemed not only all the wealth which she either had from the beginning or afterward obtained to be less than her desire; but she would readily and gladly have sold even herself, if it could have been done, and her children, as I have often heard from her, that they might be spent for the uses of the poor. To her he had committed the whole reins of largess. After her death she left all to the poor: for St. Gregory in his Testament, which is had in the appendix to volume 1, says: I have destined all things for the poor; or rather I have complied with my most blessed parents, who had so promised.
[6] without any vainglory; but with great prudence But in these things she was very far from all petty vainglory. Which thing, says St. Gregory on the cited page 299, is in my judgment more excellent and more sublime than any example: for greatness of soul in money one may easily find in others too, whether you regard that which is lavishly poured out on public and civic ambitions, or that which is lent to God through the poor, and is laid up only for those who spend it: but one who has yielded to another the glory gathered from that deed, we shall not so easily find. For very many are led by the desire of honor alone to make outlays with ready mind: but where largess lacks onlookers, there too largess languishes and is blunted. And so great was her liberality that we shall leave still more to those who know: so much so that if anything of this kind is recorded of us, it flows from that fountain and is a part of that stream. Besides, in distributing alms she so joined prudence with mercy that this province was handed over to her by her husband. For although, as is said in the same place, his wealth and readiness to bestow were shared with his wife — since indeed with her he vied in every fairest virtue — yet he left the greater part of the largess to her, as the best and most faithful dispenser of matters of this kind.
[7] Besides, she was outstanding in other works of mercy. Other works of mercy, her aversion from the heathen. For, as is had on page 291, What woman was a greater protection to orphans and widows? What woman equally relieved those mourning calamities? She reverenced sacred places wonderfully: and this is clear from this, page 292, that her voice was never heard in sacred assemblies or places — I except only the necessary and mystical utterances. But if it was once a great and ample thing for an altar that no axe had gone up upon it, nor had an adze been seen or heard (by which surely something more sublime was signified, namely that whatever is consecrated to God ought to be native and simple, and free from art and paint), why should it not also be great to her praise that she honored holy things with silence, that she never turned her back upon the venerable table, nor spat upon the divine pavement? She is said in the same place to have shrunk so from the company of the heathen that she never laid her hand in the hands of any heathen woman, however otherwise most honorable and most closely related, nor mingled lips with her lips; nay, neither with those who came from a profane and impure table did she, not only of her own accord but not even under compulsion, share common salt, nor did she ever endure, against the law of conscience, either to pass by or to look upon an impure and sacrilegious house, nor did she suffer her ear and tongue, which partly received and partly uttered divine things, to be contaminated by heathen tales and theatrical songs: for she held that nothing profane befits sacred things.
§ II. Her affection toward her children; her husband's conversion; the Saint's wondrous healing; the time of her death; her cult.
The Saint toward her son Caesarius, Her most tender and truly maternal affection toward her son Caesarius, who was living in the household of Julian the Apostate without his most pious Mother's knowledge, we understand from letter 51 of St. Gregory, volume 1, page 780: My lady mother, he says, if she should learn anything of your affairs (for down to this day we have concealed it from her by many devices), I would have you think that she would have such grief that it could be soothed by no consolation at all, being a woman of weak spirit, and otherwise, on account of the greatness of her piety, unable to keep measure in matters of this kind.
[9] But although she both called and esteemed her husband lord, and how she was disposed toward her husband: and on that account obtained in some part the praise of justice, from oration 11, page 178; yet under the title of orthodox religion how greatly did she deserve concerning his conversion? For a mother, says the holy Doctor in oration 10, page 161, from holy first-fruits a truly holy lump: which she also so increased and enlarged that some believe and proclaim that even her husband's perfection (for I shall say it, though this speech is not without rashness) must be ascribed to none other than to her; and that she (O wonderful thing!) received as the reward of her piety a greater and more perfect piety.
[10] But indeed the difference of religion which stood between herself and her husband she bore so grievously and painfully, and held it so impressed upon her inmost heart, that, from oration 19, page 293, she converted him, estranged from the orthodox faith, this one thing she could not bear with equanimity… that she was joined to God only by half, on account of the estrangement of her other portion, and that to the joining of bodies there was not added the joining of the spirit: and therefore day and night she fell at God's feet, and besought him for the salvation of her head with many fastings and tears, and pressed her husband diligently, and strove to win him in various ways — by reproaches, admonitions, compliances, quarrels, and, what was of greatest weight, by the uprightness of her own character and by fervent zeal for piety: by which chiefly the soul is bent and softened, and drawn willingly to virtue. Nor indeed could it be otherwise but that at last by unceasing blows the drop should hollow the stone, and in the progress of time accomplish what she strove for, as will clearly appear from what follows next. These things, therefore, she sought and held in hope, as one who burned more with faith than with youth. For no one trusted so in things present as she in things placed in hope. Nor is it a wonder, since she had already made trial of the divine liberality and munificence. But to his salvation there was a help both reason itself, gradually admitting a cure, and also the vision of dreams, through which God often helps a soul worthy of salvation… He thought that he was singing, what he had never done before (although his wife was frequent in prayer), that part of David's Psalms: I rejoiced in the things that were said to me, We shall go into the house of the Lord.
[11] showing herself a teacher of faith and piety, This song was new and unaccustomed: and desire enters together with the song. And when the woman heard this, having now obtained her wish, she seizes the occasion, interpreting this vision in the most joyful sense, and declaring the greatness of the benefit by the gladness of her mind, and urging on his salvation, lest anything intervene which might obstruct the calling, and break off the business on which she was bent with the utmost zeal. And presently in the same place there follows the conversion of St. Gregory, Nonna's husband, to the faith of Christ: for he was before imbued with the errors of the Hypsistarii; from page 289. Now that sect was compounded of Gentile error and legal vanity… For rejecting the idols and sacrifices of the former, they worship fire and lamps; but venerating the sabbath of the latter, and a certain fasting abstinence from some foods, they spurn circumcision… and they render veneration to the Almighty alone; as is there said. Was not therefore the unbelieving husband sanctified (to speak with the Doctor of the Gentiles, 1 Corinthians, chapter 7, verse 14) by the believing wife? For, from page 290, To this husband of whom we treat the woman, granted by God's benefit, was not only a helper… but also a leader and standard-bearer, drawing him by her life and speech to all that was best through herself: and in other matters indeed judging it best to obey her husband, as the laws of matrimony required; but by no means blushing to show herself also a teacher of faith and piety.
[12] and likewise a true mother toward her son Gregory. As true a wife as St. Nonna proved herself toward her husband Gregory, so genuine a mother did she show herself toward her son Gregory, procuring for him true and divine goods. Hear him, oration 1, page 32: From my very youth I was called, he says, and cast upon God from the very womb, and given by my mother's promise, and afterward confirmed by dangers. And in poem 1, page 39, the pious mother dedicates her offspring to God from its tender years, on Gregory's testimony, when he sings this:
But she at once devoted me, like Samuel, To your temples — if indeed I have ever Expressed Samuel in my ways.
And presently, some lines being interposed, he continues thus:
For she diligently purified our hands with the divine books, And, embracing my tender body also, Gave forth such words: There was once a man most illustrious, Who undaunted led to the holy altar (Wonderful thing!) a son received by divine gift, Running to the slaughter — a praiseworthy offering, the dear Offspring of late-bearing Sarah, and the root of a race That sought it, which hope carved out, and the promises Of the great Godhead. Abraham, moreover, discharged the grave office Of sacrificer, and Isaac took the place of the victim. But I offer you alive to Christ, most dear son, As a gift, keeping faith and rendering my promises. See that you fulfill the pious vows of your dear parent: I who conceived you by prayers, and who desire That you be best, and that nothing be purer than your ways. These distinguished revenues I hold out to you both now And hereafter: but far better things are yet to come. This was my mother's vow: to which I myself judged That I must at once yield, though of tender age.
You have here indeed, reader, some heads of St. Nonna's virtues summarily excerpted from the writings of her son St. Gregory, most faithful witness of the things done by her; yet we have not pursued all the ornaments of divine graces with which that holy Mother shone: for after he had reviewed some of her virtues, he says on page 292: Those things which are more hidden than these I pass over in silence, of which God is witness, and the maidservants to whose fidelity she committed matters of this kind.
[13] St. Gregory Nazianzen narrates a wondrous healing of his mother from illness in oration 19, The Saint is healed of an illness in a wondrous way: from page 305: Sickness, he says, attacks her, a woman otherwise brave and enduring, and who through all the time of her life had enjoyed convenient health. But among many pains, not to draw out my discourse further, nothing was so grievous as the inability to eat, from which she was dangerously suffering now for many days, nor did she find any remedy for this evil. In what manner, then, does God feed her? Not by raining manna, as once for Israel, nor by breaking the rock to pour out water for a thirsting people, nor by feeding her through ravens, as that Elijah; nor by satisfying her through a prophet caught up on high, as formerly Daniel, when he was pressed by hunger in the den. In what manner, then? It seemed to her that I, whom she held most dear (for she preferred no other of us to me, not even in her dreams), suddenly came upon her by night with a basket and with loaves especially white, blessed after my custom and signed with the cross, and fed her, and that thus she recovered and gathered strength. And that nocturnal vision was a work of truth: for from that time she returned to herself and conceived a better hope. But by what is this clear and manifest? By an open and evident proof. For when on the following morning I had come in to her, and had first seen her more cheerful than before; and then had asked the usual questions — how she had passed the night, and whether she needed anything — You, she answered me quite readily and with tranquil countenance, my son, have fed me: and do you afterward ask how I am? And at the same time the maidservants signified to me by a nod of the head that I should not contradict, but should at once accept this answer, lest, the truth being disclosed, she should be dismayed with grief. Thus far St. Gregory Nazianzen.
[14] The time of her death: At the oration, partly funeral in praise of his dead father, partly consolatory to his mother Nonna, delivered by the praised St. Gregory in Basil's presence, which is the nineteenth in number, and has taught us a good many things bearing on our matter — at that oration, I say, our Saint herself was present, from page 315. But she does not seem to have long survived her husband, who, Pagi judges in the Baronian Critique at the year 354, number 13, was taken from life in the year of Christ 373, or more probably one year later, since the sequence of the things that followed does not permit, as he adds, that he be said to have lived longer. But the reason why she seems not to have long survived him is, first, because she was of the same age, from oration 19, page 315, as her aged husband was; inasmuch as he had lived nearly a hundred years, in the same place from page 313: so that not much time seems to be added for Nonna. Second, because St. Gregory joins the death of his father and mother together in the poem "On his own life," page 9, singing:
But when my parents, their last day discharged, Held long the seats they had sought, etc.
That she was no longer living at the time when her son withdrew to Seleucia is proved by this, that he treats of that matter in the same place among those things which he did after his parents' death. There may be seen what Baronius says in the Life of St. Gregory Nazianzen published among us at the IX day of May, page 397; as also the annotations, page 398, letter r. But that departure is attached by Tillemont, volume 9 of the Ecclesiastical Monuments, in the chronological table, page 795, to the middle of the year 375. The great Menaea of the Greeks, printed, indicate that a funeral oration was delivered by him at his mother's death; as is plain from the little verses to be cited shortly. These are the things which I have gathered concerning St. Nonna's deeds. Now concerning the public cult which followed upon them among Greeks and Latins.
[15] Her public cult both among the Latins and among the Greeks. And among the latter indeed she is thus announced on this V day of August in the Roman Martyrology: Of St. Nonna, mother of blessed Gregory Nazianzen: but among the former, On the same day St. Nonna, mother of St. Gregory the Theologian, is consummated in peace. This distich is added:
At the death of Conna, the fair one, her fair son Gives a fair funeral gift — his words.
At the death of his fair mother, the fair son Sounds forth fair funeral honors with his tongue.
Besides, our Saint is inscribed in the Menology which was published in Henry Canisius from Cardinal Sirleto's translation.