Timothy

ON ST. TIMOTHY.

Timothy, Confessor (St.)

I. B.

[1] Several persons of this name are inscribed in the sacred registers. Who this one was, we have no means of establishing with certainty. The Menaea say of him: "On the same day, St. Timothy rests in peace.

Timothy becomes a partaker of the honor above, Who here below preferred nothing to the honor of God." Encomium of St. Timothy.

There is an allusion to the name, which is derived from time Theou, "the honor of God."

[2] Raderus considers this Timothy to have been the Abbot of the monastery perhaps the master of St. Simeon Stylites which is called the Monastery of St. Timothy, into which Simeon, later the Stylite, was first received as a boy of thirteen. Concerning him, in the Life of St. Simeon from Latin manuscripts, January 5, chapter 1, number 4, where the Abbot Timothy is called "a man of magnificence." But in the other Life by Metaphrastes, chapter 1, number 5, he is called Heliodorus, whom others call Heliodorus? as also in Theodoret, chapter 26, who adds: "I often saw him and admired the simplicity of his character and embraced with wonderful affection the purity of his mind." Who can suspect that Theodoret was mistaken about the name of so great a man?

[3] Two other Timothys now come to mind, either of whom could be the one venerated on this day. Or an Egyptian hermit? One is an Egyptian anchorite who, as is related in book 5 of the Lives of the Fathers, chapter 16, upon hearing a negligent brother, gave counsel to the inquiring Abbot that he should expel him. When therefore the man was expelled, temptation fell upon Timothy. Too severe? And when he implored God and said: "I have sinned, have mercy on me," a voice came to him, saying: "Timothy, this has happened to you because you despised your brother in the time of his temptation." The same story is told in book 3, number 140.

[4] Another Timothy, whose memory is perhaps consecrated here, was a Studite monk, concerning whom on February 4, in the Life of St. Nicholas the Studite, the following is read: Or a Studite monk under St. Theodore? "For at that time it was in truth a school of all virtues and a kind of Paradise adorned with various flowers. For there was present, moreover, a kinsman of our most wise Father, Joseph, who a short while later was proclaimed Archbishop of the most celebrated and most noble city of Thessalonica. For why should I here enumerate Timothy, Athanasius, Naucratios, and the many others whom I now deliberately pass over, inhabitants of this earthly heaven?" Joseph, who is mentioned here, is venerated by the Greeks on July 15; he died under the Emperor Theophilus, who succeeded Michael Balbus in the year of Christ 829 and in 841 left the empire to Michael III. Joseph was succeeded by Leo the Philosopher; when Leo was reduced to the ranks for having attacked the sacred images, St. Basil was appointed in his place, of whom we shall treat on this very day.