ON ST. CEDONIUS OR SIDONIUS CONFESSOR AND BISHOP AS IS REPORTED
AT AIX IN PROVENCE,
HISTORICAL-CRITICAL SYLLOGE.
The public cultus of this Saint, and the opposed tradition of the people of Aix and of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux concerning him.
Cedonius or Sidonius, confessor, and bishop, as is reported, at Aix in Provence (St.)
BY G. C.
The name of this Saint, which we have expressed in the title in two ways, is by others written in yet other manners, St. Cedonius or Sidonius seems as the curious reader will easily observe in the course of this Sylloge. But we little care for the divers expression of the name, if those things which are narrated of this Saint could be proved by genuine and ancient instruments: for the common tradition of the people of Aix holds that this St. Cedonius was that man blind from birth whom Christ enlightened, as is read at length in the Gospel of St. John, chapter 9. Moreover the people of Aix would have it that he landed in Provence out of Palestine with SS. Mary Magdalene, Martha, Maximinus, and others, and that after the death of St. Maximinus, whom they set as the first prelate of their church, he was raised to the chair of Aix. Afterwards we shall report what certain learned Frenchmen judge of that tradition, when we shall first have set forth the immemorial and public cultus of St. Cedonius or Sidonius.
[2] Andreas Saussay, in the Appendix to his Gallican Martyrology, volume 2, page 1220 and following, celebrates the memory of this Saint of today in these words: who is recorded on this day in the Gallican Martyrology, St. Cedonius or Chelidonius, disciple, fellow worker, and successor of St. Maximinus, first bishop of Aix, a man of Apostolic age and grace; to whom, being brought into the Gauls by the divine will, he clung with a continual bond, and, in disseminating the Gospel and subduing the people of this city to the laws of Christ, was to him a vast helper: after whom, being exalted to the assembly of the heavenly senators, he fulfilled in every way the charge of the pastoral office transmitted to him, and at length, being consummated in every good work, he rested by a death precious before the Lord, and was buried beside his master, the marks of Apostolic grace and virtue being manifest. He is reported to have been that man born blind, whom Christ, the true light of grace and the sun of justice, enlightened. Saussay in this place timidly indicates that tradition by the word is reported, and Ferrari in the new Topography to the Roman Martyrology, under the name of the city of Aix, uses a like phrase.
[3] Nevertheless, in the proper Offices of the church and diocese of Aix, and he is honored in the Breviary of Aix, in which on this day the feast of St. Sidonius, archbishop of Aix, is celebrated under the greater double rite, this opinion is affirmatively set forth in the prayer or collect and in the antiphons, one of which at first Vespers at the Magnificat has thus: From the beginning of the world it hath not been heard that any man opened the eyes of one born blind, save Christ the Son of God. ℣. The Lord loved him and adorned him. ℞. He clothed him with a robe of glory. Prayer. We beseech Thee, almighty God, that as Thou didst grant bodily sight to blessed Sidonius, Thy confessor and pontiff, so by his glorious merits Thou mayest vouchsafe to bestow upon us Thy servants the light of Thy vision. Through our Lord, etc. The rest is from the common of a confessor pontiff, save the Antiphon at the Benedictus, which runs thus: Rabbi, wherein hath this man sinned, that he was born blind? Jesus answered and said: Neither hath he sinned, nor his parents, but that the works of God may be made manifest in him. Finally the Antiphon at the Magnificat at second Vespers is read thus: That man who is called Jesus made clay of spittle, and anointed my eyes, and now I see.
[4] to have had a cultus from immemorial time, Since the most reverend and most illustrious Dom Alphonse de Richelieu, archbishop of Aix, in the year 1627, not long after the well-known decree of Pope Urban VIII concerning the cultus of the Saints, ordered these proper Offices to be published, we are of opinion, with the highest probability, that that office of St. Cedonius or Sidonius was taken from more ancient Breviaries and was celebrated from immemorial time in the church of Aix: for it is in no way probable that St. Sidonius then first began to be honored by the people of Aix against the new and express decree of Urban VIII, by which it was forbidden that anyone should exhibit the accustomed honors of the Saints to those who had not a public cultus, or evident signs of a sanctity formerly acknowledged, from immemorial time, that is, before a hundred years reckoned from the publishing of the decree. We seem therefore to proceed not rashly when we insert into our Work St. Cedonius or Sidonius, whoever at last he was, concerning which we shall presently discourse below.
[5] This judgment of ours is confirmed from Pietro de' Natali, as is confirmed from Pietro de' Natali. who now three hundred years ago and more, in the Catalogue of the Saints, book 5, chapter 102, makes mention of St. Cedonius the bishop, and there reports the tradition of the people of Aix in these words: Cedonius the bishop, or Sidonius, was that man blind from birth whom the Lord, making clay of spittle and anointing his eyes, enlightened, as is had in John x; who also is said by some to have been one of the seventy-two disciples of Christ. But whether he was of their number or not, it is held plain from the chronicles and the deeds of the disciples that he was a disciple of Christ, and that after the ascension of the Lord, having been baptized by the Apostles, he clung especially to St. Maximinus. Whence also, as has been said, he was, with the same and with Lazarus and his sisters, put into a little boat and driven out from the borders of the Jews. But after the aforesaid saints had converted to Christ the province of Provence, to which under God's guidance they had come, and after blessed Lazarus had been ordained bishop at Marseilles, and blessed Maximinus at Aix, he himself remained in the ministry of Maximinus bishop of the city of Aix, and was the helper of his preaching; where also, after many days, he rested in peace, and lay laid up beside his master, as has been treated above. Since Pietro de' Natali in the title of the cited chapter surnames Cidonius saint, we are made more certain of the immemorial cultus of this Saint, although the authority of de' Natali does not suffice for us that we should straightway give sure credit to his whole narration.
[6] Noël Alexandre, in the Ecclesiastical History of the Old and New Testament, To the common tradition of the people of Aix, which was reprinted at Paris in the year 1714, in volume 3 of that Work, pages 176 and 177, brings forward in favor of the tradition of the people of Aix a more ancient testimony from an old codex of Toulon, which is said to have been written in the year 572, and in which the following is read: Clement was one of the seventy-two disciples of Christ, to whom blessed Peter the Apostle especially commended blessed Mary Magdalene, as the Mother of Christ had been commended to John. When therefore, after the stoning of St. Stephen, the persecution of the Jews boiled over against the disciples, the Jews put Mary Magdalene, Martha with Marcella her attendant, Lazarus, Maximinus, Cidonius, who was blind from birth, and many others into a little boat, and exposed them to the sea without an oarsman, that so they might be slain by the waves. Who, under God's guidance, all landed safe at Marseilles, where by preaching they converted all Provence. This instrument would favor the tradition of the people of Aix not a little, were it not held suspect of forgery or interpolation by certain learned Frenchmen.
[7] Such without doubt it seemed to the latest editors of Gallia Christiana, which is circulated concerning that Saint, who in volume 1 of that Work, column 299, write thus of our Saint: St. Sedonius, whom others call Chelidonius, is by all given as successor to St. Maximinus in the see of Aix, and they hand down that he was that man blind from birth, whose eyes Christ the Lord opened and endowed with light; and that, to abolish the memory of so great a miracle, the Jews committed him to the sea to certain shipwreck with Lazarus and his sisters. But these things have so often been blown away by learned men and lovers of truth that it is wearisome to handle them again. After Sedonius, Bouche adduces fourteen other bishops altogether unknown, whom, as thrust in and brought forward without proof, we reject. Nor do we think Tripherius is to be spared, who after those fourteen
is enumerated in the catalogue of bishops sent to us. There was indeed present at the Council of Turin in the year CCCXCVII a certain bishop by name Tripherius; but to what see he is to be ascribed is unknown: for concerning his see there is deep silence in this synod of the bishops of the Gauls, who are nearly all called by their bare name, no mention being made of their see. Yet I in no wise doubt that from the third century at least Aix had its own bishops; since we have ascertained that nearly all the neighboring cities had already been made episcopal sees, as we shall afterwards show. But who ruled the see of Aix in the third or fourth century escapes us.
[8] we oppose the judgment of certain learned men, Our predecessors, in the problematic Commentary on St. Maximinus, who is commonly set down as the first bishop of Aix, on the eighth day of June, that is, in volume 2 of that month, page 53 and following, confess a like ignorance of the time or of the see. Let the people of Aix therefore choose whether they prefer to call St. Cedonius their bishop, or only an inhabitant who came thither in the first ages of the Christian Church and there died holily. If they will have it that he was the prelate of their city, let them defer his age even to the third or fourth century, in which he might have presided over that church among the other unknown prelates of the city of Aix. But if they prefer that St. Cedonius was one of the seventy-two disciples of Christ, and came to their city in the first century, let them omit the title of archbishop of Aix, which at such a time we shall with difficulty grant him: for it might easily have come to pass that someone of the disciples of Christ or of the Apostles, fleeing into Gaul on account of urgent persecutions or for other causes, came in the first or second century to Aix, taught the Christian faith, and, illustrious for virtues and miracles, departed there from this life; but that he was bishop of the city of Aix we shall not admit unless induced by solid arguments.
[9] and the contrary tradition of the people of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, But if the people of Aix, on account of their tradition, hold tooth and nail that St. Cedonius was that man mentioned, blind from birth, whose eyes Christ opened, a suit must be brought against the people of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, who honor that blind man under the name of St. Restitutus on the VII day of November, and set him down as the first prelate of their church, as is plain from the proper Lessons of the diocese of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, which the most illustrious and most reverend Dom Antoine Du Cros caused to be published at Avignon in the year 1627, and in which, among other things to be discussed on the VII day of November, the following is recited concerning that blind man: Straightway the Lord Jesus made clay with earth from His spittle, anointed the place of his eyes, and said to him: Go to the pool of Siloe, and wash thine eyes. And the young man did as Jesus commanded him. He washed and saw. Being filled with the Holy Spirit, and confirmed in the faith of Christ (his name was called Restitutus), glorifying and praising God, he followed the Lord. After these things he grew up, being made a cleric, full of all goodness, simplicity, and justice. From this fragment of the Lessons it is clear that the people of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux think that they honor yearly the same man blind from birth, as the first bishop of their city, under the name of St. Restitutus.
[10] although this is more recent. But this tradition of the people of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux is not ancient, as the latest editors of Gallia Christiana, volume 1, column 705, indicate in these words: Louis-Antoine Boyer, praised by us, following tradition, as he says, teaches that the first bishop of the city of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux was Restitutus, whom they say to have been the man born blind and endowed with light by Christ. But he sincerely confesses that the first who asserted this was Étienne Genevès, who in the year MCDLXV translated the relics of the same Saint. Certainly so recent an opinion can in no wise be put forth as tradition. Let us therefore grant only that St. Restitutus was the first who announced Christ to the people of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, or was ordained pastor and bishop for a people already made Christian. But at what time this was done, we know not. The relics of St. Restitutus were preserved in the town of his name until the year MDLXI, in which the Calvinists burned them. The most illustrious Antoine Godeau, bishop of Vence, conjectures that the disciples of St. Polycarp landed in Provence about the year CLXIX, and founded the churches of Cimiez, Antibes, Fréjus, Toulon, and others as far as Lyons. These Acts of St. Restitutus we remit to be examined on the VII day of November, and meanwhile we give the people of Aix time to assail the people of Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux and to prove or correct their own tradition.