Elias

ON ST. ELIAS, BISHOP AND CONFESSOR,

AT SYRACUSE IN SICILY,

From Ferrari and Ottavio Gaetani.

IN THE YEAR DCLXIV.

Elias, bishop and confessor, at Syracuse in Sicily (St.)

BY J. P.

Syracuse, an ancient and exceedingly well-known city of Sicily, of which mention was long since made in our work on the XXX day of March on occasion of St. Zosimus, bishop of that same city, The Saint's cult: numbers among the Citizens of heaven of today St. Elias its bishop. Ferrari in the Catalogue of the Saints who are not in the Roman Martyrology announces him on this day from the Records, as he says in his notes, of the church of Syracuse. Our Gaetani also relates him in these terms: At Syracuse, of St. Elias, bishop and confessor, under the emperors Heraclius and Constans, and in the margin he likewise alleges the Records of Syracuse. But in the Animadversions upon the Lives of the Sicilian Saints in the same Gaetani, volume 1, page 184, the cult of this Bishop is again asserted in this manner: St. Elias the bishop is honored at Syracuse on the XXVI day of August. Upon the credit, therefore, of these testimonies concerning his public veneration, we too give him a place here, that he may remain in possession of the cult which he is asserted to have.

[2] For the rest, of his deeds we know so few things that scarcely anything occurs to be added

beyond the small compendium in a wonderful manner to the bishopric which is extracted from the Life of St. Zosimus praised above, in Gaetani, in the volume cited, page 232, in these words: Elias the bishop, from being archdeacon of the church of Syracuse — which see being vacant, blessed Peter the bishop having died, there was great strife between the clergy and the people of Syracuse concerning a successor: the better part called for Zosimus, a most holy man, abbot of the monastery of saint Lucy; the worse for Venerius as bishop, a man unworthy and tyrannical; as the zeal of the people was divided, so were the characters of the designated bishops different. Venerius canvassed, sought immoderately, thrust himself in with gold, and carried the matter by force. On the contrary Zosimus resisted and fled from it out of lowliness of mind and love of quiet. At length the contention and party zeal were referred to Theodore, the Roman Pontiff. Then blessed Elias, by the prompting of the divine spirit, begs and adjures Zosimus — who refused the burden of ruling, and with tears protested that it would be to his own great loss — by God and by St. Peter, that he would not yield to Venerius who was canvassing the priesthood destined for him by God, nor dissent from the will of God, nor grieve the Holy Spirit and his Church.

[3] he was promoted, and piously died: At length by burning prayers he brought the pious man to promise that he would by no means resist the will of the divine power, but would obey. Therefore, Zosimus being set over the bishopric by Pope Theodore, blessed Elias as deacon ministered at the holy and unbloody altar with the highest praise of piety; then he received his sacred priesthood to be ruled by divine appointment. For when that divine man Zosimus foresaw his death at hand, with that swan-like voice, I say,\ he declared Elias the deacon, whom he had foreknown in spirit, prelate and chief priest of the people of Syracuse; and it came to pass as was foretold by St. Zosimus. And Elias, being appointed bishop by St. Vitalian, Pope, when he had piously governed his flock, rested with a holy end. He is honored at Syracuse on the XXVI day of August.*

[4] the time of his life, In the edition of this compendium there is marked in the margin this note of time, namely, the year of Christ DCLXIV, the XXVI day of August, by which is indicated the year of our holy Prelate's death, and is also joined with the day of his cult. But although Gaetani in the Idea of his Work, page 75, has set the year 660, we have nevertheless above noted from him the year 664. But in the Animadversions already designated, upon that which is contained in the Compendium, Elias appointed bishop by saint Vitalian, Pope, it is said that this is plainly concluded from the time of the episcopate of saint Zosimus, which he entered upon being ordained by Pope Theodore. He began his pontificate in the year DCXLI, on the XXV of November; he completed it in the year DCXLIX on the day before the Ides of May. Zosimus therefore held the see in this stretch of years from the year DCXLII to the year DCXLVIII; but he sat XIII years. Let us grant that he began in the year DCXLII, and departed this life XIII years later; we shall find that his departure befell in the year DCLV, in which year Vitalian was made Pontiff on the day before the Kalends of September, and presided over the Church down to the year DCLXIX, in which he departed this life on the VI of the Kalends of February.

[5] But although we should grant that Zosimus began his see in the year DCXLVIII, and of his bishopric. and died XIII years later, that is, in the year DCLXI, still the ordination of St. Elias falls within the times of Pope Vitalian, and indeed his death also. For in the year DCLXVIII there was at Syracuse a bishop George, to whom in that year letters of Pope Vitalian were sent. Before George, Theodore had sat nearly two years, from the catalogue of the bishops of Syracuse. Therefore St. Elias was certainly ordained bishop by Pope Vitalian, and under the same Pontiff passed into heaven. Thus far there. The Acts of St. Zosimus we illustrated on the day which we said above, the XXX of March, from page 837, where his death is affixed to about the year 660. But that St. Vitalian died in the year 671 we noted on the XXVII day of January, on which it was treated of him. Rocco Pirri in the second Notice of the church of Syracuse weaves a catalogue of the prelates of that church, and at page 137 writes that St. Elias was a Benedictine monk; and he affirms that it is handed down by Gaetani that his body was buried at Syracuse; but we do not know where he says this. We have nothing more to say of this Saint.

\ Perhaps, I say,*.