ON SAINT MELETIUS THE GREAT, BISHOP OF ANTIOCH, CONFESSOR
Year of Christ 381.
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.
Meletius the Great, Bishop of Antioch, Confessor (Saint)
Author: I. B.
Section I. The episcopate of Saint Meletius at Sebaste, then at Antioch.
[1] Most celebrated for his learning, for his defense of the Catholic faith, and for enduring exile and many afflictions, Saint Meletius praised by Saint Epiphanius, was Bishop Meletius, inscribed in the lists of Saints by Greeks and Latins alike. Of him, while he was still living, Saint Epiphanius declares in his work against heresies, book 3, volume 1, heresy 73: "That man is of great account to us, on account of the fame that has spread widely concerning him. For his life is otherwise grave and honorable, his character excellent; and he is, moreover, most beloved by the people, on account of the integrity of his life, which all everywhere extol with divine praises."
[2] Yet his beginnings bore a doubtful reputation. For, as Nicephorus Callistus writes in book 9, chapter 48, he had been created Bishop of Sebaste by the votes of the Arians, and thence again been translated by the same to Beroea in Syria; and at Seleucia, at the council, he had subscribed to the formula of faith proposed by Acacius. Moreover, he had been present at the synod of Constantinople, and had acted and decreed together with them those things which pleased them, Familiar with the Arians, and had been elevated by them to the See of Antioch. This Acacius, of whom mention is made here and again later, was Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine, a disciple and successor of Eusebius Pamphili, so possessed by Arian madness that he declared the Son to be like the Father by will alone, and in no way by substance -- much less Consubstantial, which the canon of orthodox faith holds. The synods here mentioned were held: the one at Seleucia in the consulship of Eusebius and Hypatius, in the year of Christ 359, in the month of September; the one at Constantinople toward the end of the same year and the beginning of the next. What Nicephorus here relates is taken from Socrates, book 2, chapter 34, Made Bishop of Sebaste by them; where he writes thus of Meletius: "For he had been ordained Bishop of Sebaste in Armenia when Eustathius was deposed, as I said a little before; then he was translated from Sebaste to Beroea in Syria. And when he had been present at the Council of Seleucia, and had subscribed to the formula of faith proposed by the faction of Acacius, Then of Beroea, he returned forthwith to Beroea. Presently, when a council was convoked at Constantinople, the Antiochenes, having learned for certain that Eudoxius had despised their Church and betaken himself to Constantinople for the sake of its riches, summoned Meletius from Beroea and installed him in the episcopal See of the Church of Antioch."
[3] Baronius at the year 360, number 48, judges that Meletius was rather translated from Beroea to Sebaste Or rather, this one came first, than from Sebaste to Beroea -- which must certainly be admitted, if indeed he was ever Bishop of Beroea, and if what Socrates relates is true, Or indeed, perhaps never here at all, that he returned to Beroea from Seleucia. For at the time of the Council of Seleucia, Eustathius still held the See of Sebaste; he was deposed from it afterwards in the Council of Constantinople, and only then was Meletius substituted for him -- and this last point Socrates himself relates in book 2, chapter 33, and Nicephorus in book 9, chapter 46. Sozomen in book 4, chapter 27, asserts that he was translated from Sebaste to Antioch. Saint Jerome likewise in his Chronicle makes no mention of Beroea, writing thus: "Meletius, Bishop of Sebaste in Armenia, is transferred to Antioch by Acacius and George, Arian Bishops." Certainly translated from Sebaste to Antioch, Jerome himself, being devoted to Paulinus, the rival of Meletius, disguises the fact that Meletius was also elected or desired by the orthodox, as will be shown below, although the Acacians played the leading role, and Acacius himself, who by promoting him seemed to gratify the orthodox, hoping thus to draw him over to their side. So Saint Epiphanius in heresy 73, section 28: "For Meletius," he says, "was ordained Bishop of Antioch by Acacius. The same Arians being the agents, For this was thereafter the aim of Acacius: to deflect somewhat from their (the Arians') nefarious dogma, and to make himself out as one of the orthodox, by this very act of confirming Meletius in that ordination. For this Meletius, having been appointed by the Acacian party, was believed to be of their opinion." But he was found to be otherwise, as most people relate of him. It therefore seems that Meletius had up to that time dissembled his view on the divinity, or disputed so ambiguously that, because he adhered to Acacius, They supposed him to agree with them, he was believed to hold the same opinions. And indeed Epiphanius himself in section 27, listing the three chief factions of the Arians, places Meletius in the third, which was that of Acacius. But in section 26, enumerating those who subscribed at the Council of Seleucia, he does not include the name of Meletius -- whence Nicephorus, who asserted that before, is refuted. What if Meletius was not even a bishop at that time? Then, of course, there was less need for him to make his opinion publicly known. (Since he did not openly reveal his mind, yet he was somewhat deceived by them.) That he was nonetheless at some point deceived by the heretics is shown by Saint Gregory the Theologian in his poem on his own life, where, while praising Meletius, he nevertheless admits this:
Even if he was once somewhat stolen away by an alien hand --
whether the fault remained within mere communion with the heretics, or whether, taken in by their fraudulent arguments, he embraced false doctrines for true. Yet he soon came to his senses, taught better things, perhaps by Saint Eusebius of Samosata himself, who for that reason, together with other orthodox, consented to his election; and Eusebius himself was present in the assemblies of the heterodox, in order to raise up those whom he could, especially those who had fallen through error, not malice.
[14] What the final outcome of this matter was, Sozomen likewise indicates: "Since he could not be led away from his correct opinion," he says, "the Emperor ordered him to be driven from the Church and sent into exile." Socrates and Nicephorus say the same. Theodoret, however, writes thus: "Against this doctrine, those whose minds were infected with the Arian taint began to wag their tongues, He is banished to Armenia: and to weave a calumny, proclaiming that the divine Meletius was a Sabellian; and accordingly they persuade the Emperor, who, like a sort of Euripus, was easily carried this way and that, to order him banished to his own homeland. And to fill his place they choose Euzoius, an outstanding defender of Arian doctrines -- one whom the great Alexander had deposed from the honor of the diaconate, together with Arius himself. He is led out by night;"
[15] That Meletius was led away from Antioch by night is attested by Saint Epiphanius, heresy 73, section 34. "They stir up the Emperor against the man by their accusation," he says, "because he refused to profess that the Son was a perfect creature, and at last they drive him from his See. And so, banished by night into exile, he has dwelt in his homeland up to the present time, a man to be regarded with singular honor and goodwill, both on other accounts and especially The Antiochenes persevering in the faith, for those things which we have now learned were nobly done by him, and because the Antiochenes, whose Bishop he is, profess the sincere faith at this time: they no longer admit even in the slightest degree the appellation of 'creature,' but confess that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are consubstantial -- three hypostases, one essence, one Divinity; which indeed the true faith also affirms."
[16] When, moreover, the Arians wished to annul the decree they had previously made concerning the election of Meletius, which they had entrusted to Saint Eusebius of Samosata for safekeeping, they were again brilliantly frustrated in that attempt. For, as Theodoret writes in book 2, chapter 32, "That admirable Eusebius, Saint Eusebius refusing to return the decree of election, mentioned before, to whom the joint decree concerning Meletius had been committed, when he saw the agreements being violated, departed to the city entrusted to him. But the Arians, fearing that they would be convicted by the testimony of that written decree, persuade Constantius to send someone to retrieve the decree. He dispatches a certain courier, accustomed to travel with the utmost speed by changing horses along the route and to carry back replies. When this man, having overtaken Eusebius, had delivered the Emperor's commands, that admirable man replied: 'I cannot hand over the joint decree unless all who entrusted it to me assemble together at the same time.' The messenger carried this reply back to the Emperor. He, burning with anger, sends to him again demanding the decree, and adds in the letter that if he does not hand it over, he has commanded that his right hand be cut off -- And generously scorning the threats of Constantius. though this he had written solely to strike terror into him. For he had forbidden the bearer of the letter from carrying out what was threatened. But when that divine man, having opened the letter, read what punishment the Emperor threatened, he extended not only his right hand but his left as well, and urged him to cut off both. 'For I shall not return the decree,' he said, 'which manifestly convicts the wickedness of the Arians.' The Emperor both greatly admired the man's constancy at the time and afterwards did not cease to proclaim it. For even enemies admire the noble deeds of their adversaries, compelled by the very magnitude of the events." Thus Theodoret.
[17] Since such were the circumstances, one might justly wonder that Saint Jerome in his Chronicle should write thus: "Meletius, Bishop of Sebaste in Armenia, is transferred to Antioch by Acacius and George, Arian Bishops; and after no great interval of time, since he had received Presbyters who had been deposed by his predecessor Eudoxius, he eluded the most just cause for exile by a sudden change of faith." Saint Jerome gives another cause for his ejection. Why did he not add to Acacius and George also Eusebius and the other orthodox who supported the election? Moreover, since the Arian Eudoxius had seized the See of Antioch by a remarkable imposture, what wonder if his successor rescinded some of his acts? Or what Presbyters is he to be believed to have deposed, unless perhaps those who asserted the sound doctrine which Eudoxius was endeavoring to undermine? Still more bitter is what the Alexandrian Chronicle casts at Meletius, under Indiction 5, year 1 of Julian, in the consulship of Mamertinus and Nevitta: "And so Meletius," it says, "condemned for impiety and other misdeeds, returned to Antioch and seized his former See."
[18] That these and other charges against Meletius were fabricated by the Arians, and perhaps also by the orthodox Paulinians (from whom Saint Jerome may have drawn them, having been ordained Presbyter by Paulinus), may be gathered from Saint Epiphanius, heresy 73, section 35, who writes thus: Fabricated by adversaries, as Saint Epiphanius indicates. "But some persons nonetheless -- whether moved by hatred against him, or driven by envy, or finally in order to extol their own party -- have spread certain reports of no favorable character about him: namely, that it was not on account of the Catholic faith that these commotions were stirred up against him, but on account of certain ecclesiastical affairs and quarrels that arose between him and his clergy; and also because he had received certain persons whom he had formerly rejected and condemned with anathema. But we do not wholly assent to these things, especially because in the assembly of those who adhere to him, there has always thereafter, as was said before, flourished the profession of the right faith." So says Epiphanius. But how could he be said, within thirty days, to have "formerly" excluded certain persons from communion and then received them back? For that word palai -- "formerly," "long ago" -- seems to require a greater span of time. And even if it were so, what sin would there be in it, if he himself had thus excluded some from participation in the sacraments, and then, upon receiving satisfaction, had restored them?
Section III. The return of Saint Meletius from exile. The schism at Antioch among the Catholics.
[19] When Meletius had been banished, as has been related, those who favored him, says Socrates in book 2, chapter 34, "having entirely abandoned the Arian faction, began to hold their assemblies separately, since those who had from the beginning professed the Son to be consubstantial with the Father refused to communicate with them, on the ground that Meletius had been elected to the episcopate by the votes of the Arians, The Meletians and Eustathians dissent, though both are Catholic. and that his followers had received baptism from those same Arians. And so in the Church of Antioch even those who agreed in the doctrine of faith were divided into two factions." Sozomen says the same, book 2 recte 5, chapter 27. Nicephorus Callistus, book 9, chapter 48, and Theodoret, book 2, chapter 31, who says the Meletians assembled at the Apostolic church, located in the quarter called Palaia, or "the Old," outside the city walls.
[20] In the year 361, Constantius came again to Antioch from his Persian expedition in the autumn, having sent part of his forces ahead against Julian, who, supported by the favor of the soldiers, had seized power in Europe. But Constantius, as Socrates writes in book 2, chapter 37, having at last been baptized by Euzoius, the Arian Bishop of that city, set out for war against the same Julian. When, however, he had come to the springs of the river Mopsus, The Emperor Constantius having died on November 3, 361. which are between Cilicia and Cappadocia, he fell into apoplexy from excessive anxiety and died, in the consulship of Taurus and Florentius, on the third day before the Nones of November. Theodoret, book 2, chapter 32, writes that he grievously and bitterly lamented that he had changed his faith and had not preserved intact the inheritance of his father's piety. Ammianus Marcellinus, book 21, chapter 29, writes that when he had come to Tarsus, touched by a slight fever ... he had sought by difficult roads Mopsucrena, the last staging post in Cilicia for those traveling in that direction, situated at the foot of the Taurus mountain ... and there he departed from life on the third day before the Nones of October. Not October 5. Idatius and the others state that he died on the third day before the Nones of November. And Ammianus himself seems to contradict himself when he says that Constantius set out from Antioch in the waning autumn -- unless perhaps he means autumn to wane before October, at the very beginning of itself.
[21] Upon the death of Constantius, Julian Augustus entered Constantinople on the third day before the Ides of December, as Idatius notes, and Ammianus in book 22, chapter 2. He, in order to win the goodwill of all, as Theodoret writes in book 3, chapter 4, ordered the Bishops who had been ejected from their Churches by Constantius Julian restores the exiled Bishops, and deported to the remotest regions of the earth, to return to their Churches. With what design the wicked Apostate determined this, his eulogist Ammianus declares in book 22, chapter 7, in these words: "When, having abolished what he feared, he perceived that a free time was at hand for doing what he wished, he laid open the secrets of his heart; and by plain and absolute decrees he ordered the temples to be opened, victims brought to the altars, and the worship of the gods restored. And in order to strengthen the effect of his dispositions, he admitted the dissenting Bishops of the Christians, together with the divided populace, into the palace, and admonished them that, civil discords being put to rest, each should serve his own religion without fear, none forbidding him. This he did resolutely, So that dissensions might be fostered, so that as license increased dissensions, he would not have to fear the people acting in unanimity afterwards -- since he had found no beasts so hostile to men as most of the Christians are to one another." So the impious writer concerning the most impious tyrant. But Divine Providence frustrated the hope of both. And although under Julian, as Saint Jerome writes in his Chronicle, there was "a caressing persecution, enticing rather than compelling to sacrifice, in which many of our own people fell of their own will," yet the mildness which he simulated was neither lasting nor constant. For many were stripped of their goods on various pretexts, And sets in motion a caressing persecution. harassed, tortured, and slaughtered, as may be seen in Theodoret and Socrates. Sozomen writes that the Bishops were recalled both so that the Church might be shaken by mutual dissensions, as Ammianus also judged, and so that the reputation of Constantius might be undermined by the rescission of his acts.
[22] When that edict of Julian was promulgated, therefore, the divine Meletius returned to Antioch, as Theodoret writes in book 3, chapter 4. But before he himself was there, the kindling of a long dissension among the orthodox themselves had been lit in that Church. The course of events is narrated by the same Theodoret as follows: "Recalled also were the Bishops Eusebius and Hilary of Italy, and Lucifer, Pastor of the island of Sardinia, who had been dwelling in the Thebaid, a region bordering on Egypt, having been banished thither by Constantius." Hilary was Bishop of Gaul, not of Italy; he had been exiled not in the Thebaid but in Phrygia, and had been sent back to his Church by Constantius himself two years earlier, in the consulship of Eusebius and Hypatius. Another Hilary joined Lucifer -- a Deacon of the Roman Church, sent with him by Pope Liberius to Constantius -- who, after enduring beatings, chains, prison, and exile for the Catholic faith, was perhaps puffed up by the glory of his confession; and despising those who had fallen, he fell into schism and then heresy, as you may find in Saint Jerome as cited by Baronius at the year 362, number 224. But concerning Lucifer and Eusebius, Theodoret continues: "These, assembling together with other defenders of the same doctrine, judged that effort must be made to recall the Churches to concord; Saint Eusebius of Vercelli and Lucifer of Cagliari return from exile. since it was evident that they were not only besieged by the patrons of the opposing doctrine, but were themselves torn apart by mutual dissension. For at Antioch the body of the Church that followed the sound doctrine had been split into two parts: since both those who from the beginning had followed the most celebrated Bishop Eustathius had separated themselves from the others and held their assemblies apart, and those who, adhering to the admirable Meletius, had withdrawn from the Arian faction, were performing the divine liturgies in the Palaia (for so the place was called). And yet the confession of faith of both groups was one and the same. Here at Antioch the Eustathians repelling the Meletians, though Catholic, For each assembly championed the doctrine set forth at the Council of Nicaea. Only rivalry separated them, and zeal for their own leaders. Nor could the death of either put the discord to rest. For since Eustathius had died even before the election of Meletius, and the worshippers of piety, after the proscription of Meletius and the ordination of Euzoius, had separated themselves from the communion of the impious and held their assemblies apart, those who were called Eustathians could by no means be induced to allow the others to unite with them in one assembly."
[23] Eusebius and Lucifer, however, and those who were with them, diligently sought a way to bring them to concord. And Eusebius entreated Lucifer to go with him to Alexandria and consult with the great Athanasius on this matter, who would be willing to collaborate in achieving this settlement. Chapter 5 But Lucifer did not go to Alexandria; instead he proceeded straight to Antioch. He gives them Paulinus as Bishop: And after many words on both sides concerning concord, when he perceived that the Eustathian assembly, over which the Presbyter Paulinus presided, was resisting, he consecrated the same Paulinus as their Bishop -- assuredly not with prudent deliberation. For this act made the dissension far more enduring; for it lasted eighty-five years, until the episcopate of Alexander, a man worthy of all praise, who, holding the helm of that Church, did not cease to explore every avenue and to employ every zeal and industry to establish concord and unite the separated member with the rest of the body of the Church. Lucifer, therefore, having lingered long at Antioch, increased the discord.
[24] Eusebius, however, when he had come to Antioch and saw that the disease had been made incurable by the bad remedy applied, Eusebius not approving of this, sailed to Italy. But Lucifer returned to Sardinia and added certain doctrines to Ecclesiastical teaching. Those who embraced these drew their name from his, being called Luciferians for a long span of time. But that doctrine was at last extinguished and consigned to oblivion. What Theodoret here relates -- that Lucifer added certain doctrines to Ecclesiastical teaching -- is refuted by Socrates, book 3, chapter 7, where he says of him: "Agreeing with the Church, he returned to his See in Sardinia." He returns to Cagliari, offended. But "those whose spirits were embittered, as were his own, still remain segregated from the Church." Sozomen likewise, book 5, chapter 12, says that Lucifer, though offended in spirit, But always Catholic: had nonetheless, through the Deacon sent together with Eusebius, professed that he would approve what the Synod of Alexandria had decreed; and, being in agreement with the Catholic Church, had returned to Sardinia.
[25] Nicephorus Callistus, following Sozomen as usual, book 10, chapter 17, says that Lucifer retained the teaching of the Church, laid aside his resentment, and returned to his See in Sardinia. But those who had been offended together with him, being left behind in the East, Heretics called Luciferians after him in the East. established their own heresy and long attacked the Church. The heresy, or schism (as Saint Augustine, volume 6, On Heresies, chapter 81, seems to prefer calling it), therefore flourished not at Cagliari or otherwise in Sardinia. But Gabriel Prateolus, book 10 of the Elenchus of Heresies, chapter 9, cites him incorrectly in these words: "The Luciferians were named after a certain Lucifer, Bishop of Caracala in Sardinia, who, as Augustine attests in On Heresies, chapter 81, moved solely by ambition, thrust his heresy upon the people." These words are not written in this manner by Augustine, as one may see in his text. As for what we said about the Luciferians being left behind in the East, so John Langus translated Nicephorus, with the approval of Fronto Ducaeus. The Greek has only perileiphthentes, "left behind." But since immediately before, Lucifer is mentioned as having returned from the East to his See, those who were "left behind" are indicated as being there. On the Luciferians and Lucifer, Baronius has more from the writings of other Fathers, volume 4, at the year 362, numbers 220 and following. But what he reports concerning Lucifer's unhappy end seems less convincing to us, since from all past memory he is said to be celebrated with public devotion by the people of Cagliari, as we shall show on the twentieth day of May. Of Saint Eusebius of Vercelli we shall treat on August 1. But let us return to Meletius.
[26] Sozomen, book 5, chapter 11, reports that when Paulinus was consecrated Bishop by Lucifer, Meletius had not yet returned from exile. But in chapter 12 he writes thus: "When the Synod of Alexandria was dismissed, Eusebius proceeded to Antioch and found the people torn apart by dissension; for those who favored Meletius refused to unite with Paulinus in one assembly, but held their meetings separately." While Eusebius was still at Antioch, And he was indeed grieved that Paulinus, contrary to what was proper, had been ordained Bishop without the consent of all;
yet he did not openly reprove what had been done, lest he seem to detract from the honor of Lucifer. But abstaining from the communion of both parties, he promised that whatever was amiss on either side he would correct through a convened council. And while he was striving to lead the people to concord, Meletius, having returned from exile, and finding those who adhered to him separated from the others, Meletius returns thither, established the practice of holding assemblies with them separately outside the city. Paulinus, however, conducted the sacred rites within the city with his own followers; for Euzoius, the Arian Bishop, out of reverence for him as a man of gentle character and venerable by reason of his age and manner of life, had by no means excluded him from the city, but had assigned him one church.
[27] Baronius at the year 362, number 218, judges that Meletius did not return to Antioch until the beginning of the reign of Valens, on the ground that Saint Chrysostom in his encomium of Meletius attests that after his return from exile it was not permitted him to remain at Antioch for more than thirty days, Year 362, year 1 of Julian. but that, the heretics urging on the Emperor Valens, he was forced to change his abode again. But Saint Chrysostom seems clearly to affirm that after his first arrival to take up the See of Antioch, he remained there for only thirty days; for presently, by the order of Constantius, through the machinations of the Arians, he was cast into exile. And therefore he marvels that the instruction delivered by him in so short a time had such power in the hearts of the citizens that afterwards, when innumerable hostile forces assailed them (that is, the onset of the persecutions of Constantius, Julian, and Valens, and the fury of raging Arians and pagans), that doctrine remained unshaken and unwavering. Baronius himself also afterwards acknowledges that Meletius was at Antioch in the time of Julian.
Section IV. Saint Basil was not ordained Deacon by Saint Meletius.
[28] The Life of Saint Basil the Great which is commonly in circulation, and is said to have been written by Saint Amphilochius, his contemporary, many learned men judge to be either spurious or at least interpolated by someone, since there are in it certain things not entirely consonant with the writings of the ancient Fathers, and in particular of Gregory the Theologian, who was most closely united with Basil. Of this kind is what is narrated in the edition of our Rosweyde, book 1 of the Lives of the Fathers, chapter 4: It is not correctly said that Saint Basil that Basil was initiated into the diaconate by Saint Meletius. For the text reads thus: "And when Basil and Eubulus had come to Jerusalem and had surveyed with faith and love every sacred place and had worshipped in them the God who is above all, they made themselves known to the Bishop of the city, named Maximinus." Was baptized by Saint Maximus, Bishop of Jerusalem, "And prostrating themselves before him, they requested to receive the divine regeneration in the river Jordan. And this holy man, full of the grace of God, fulfilled their request ... And remaining there for a year, they came by common counsel to Antioch; and Basil, promoted by Meletius, Bishop of that city, to the order of the diaconate, And the following year made Deacon by Saint Meletius, and having interpreted the book of Proverbs, was advanced with great admiration. After no long time had passed, he hastened together with Eubulus to the region of the Cappadocians; and as they were on the very point of entering the city of Caesarea, the arrival of these men was revealed in a vision of the night to the Bishop of that city, named Eusebius, and that Basil was to be his successor." Then, after narrating that they were honorably received by the clergy at Eusebius's command, the same Life adds: "The Bishop, summoning Basil together with Eubulus, Kindly received at Caesarea by Bishop Eusebius: began to search the sacred Scriptures with them; and marveling at the ocean of wisdom that was in them, and judging them fit assistants, after not much time he died. The Bishops, therefore, assembling in synod, with the working of the Holy Spirit elected Basil to the episcopal throne." These are the points that must be examined one by one.
[29] He who is here called Maximinus, Bishop of Jerusalem, is in fact Maximus, Since Saint Maximus died in the year 351, successor of Saint Macarius (who was present at the Council of Nicaea) and predecessor of Saint Cyril. But Maximus died not in the twelfth year of Constantius (which was the year of Christ 348), as is erroneously written in the Chronicle of Saint Jerome, but rather in the year of Christ 351, as Baronius proves from the synod of Jerusalem, held by him in the presence of Saint Athanasius, after the slaying of the Emperor Constans, which occurred in the consulship of Sergius and Nigrinianus, in the year of Christ 350. Now Meletius, as we proved above, was translated from Sebaste to Antioch toward the end of the year 360. Saint Meletius became Bishop in 360. How then could Saint Basil, having been baptized by Maximus, have been ordained Deacon the following year by Meletius, who was not yet a Bishop? Even if this had happened, it would not be referable to those earliest days of Meletius, when he remained in the city for only thirty days; Nor could he have ordained him before 362; for at that time Basil would not have wished to be initiated by a man whose faith was not yet sufficiently proven in the eyes of many. Moreover, before Meletius returned from exile, Basil was already renowned at Caesarea for his great reputation in learning and piety, and in the very first year of Julian the Apostate was sought for the episcopate of that city. In which year Basil was sought for the episcopate. When he had escaped that burden by withdrawal and retirement, Eusebius was elected; and in that very year Eusebius nobly resisted the Emperor, who, before coming to Antioch, had turned aside to Caesarea and gravely afflicted it, stripping it of the name Caesarea and striking it from the list of cities, as is narrated by Sozomen in book 5, chapter 4; and he tried in vain to rescind the election of Eusebius, Together with Eusebius, as Gregory the Theologian attests on January 1 in the funeral oration of his father, Gregory, Bishop of Nazianzus, number 33.
[30] Nor indeed was Basil received so amicably by Eusebius as is asserted in the cited Life. Gregory testifies in Oration 20, which is the funeral eulogy of Basil: "He who presided over the Church before him had a certain quarrel with Basil" (for what reasons and in what manner Afterwards hateful to him, it is better to pass over in silence; but the quarrel existed) -- "a man otherwise courageous and endowed with admirable piety, as the persecution of that time and the fierce contest waged against him clearly showed; but who nevertheless suffered something human in regard to Basil." For this reason Basil withdrew into Pontus; but when a new persecution was afterwards stirred up against the Church by Valens, he returned to Caesarea and was reconciled with Eusebius, and with faithful service assisted him, a man not entirely skilled in sacred matters. Gregory the Presbyter confirms this in his Life of Gregory the Theologian, writing as follows: "Gregory, not long afterwards, when the host of heretics was ravaging Caesarea, while Eusebius still held the helm of the metropolis -- a holy man indeed, but Then reconciled at enmity with the great Basil, who was a Presbyter and was philosophizing in Pontus -- fearing the concerted arms and assault of the heretics, since the Bishop could not lead an army into the field (for although he excelled in integrity of life, On account of the danger to the faith, he was unversed and unskilled in theology), writes to Basil -- that illustrious luminary, I say -- and implores him not to consider personal enmities, but rather to weigh in his mind the danger to souls, and to come to the aid of the metropolitan Church without any delay; and professes that he himself will be present alongside him and will enter into an alliance of war with him. By this appeal he impels the outstanding commander to take up the war."
[31] Nicephorus Callistus, book 11, chapter 18, treats of the same discord between Eusebius and Basil, but would have Basil at that time still only a Deacon. For he writes thus: "Between Eusebius, who held the helm of the Church of Caesarea before Basil, A Deacon before the year 362. and the same Basil while still a Deacon, a certain discord arose." Sozomen, book 5, chapter 15, records the same events, but does not specify whether Basil was then a Priest or a Deacon. Yet it is sufficiently clear that Basil could not have been consecrated Deacon by Meletius (who did not return to Antioch immediately upon the issuance of Julian's edict at the beginning of the year 362, but only when Lucifer, himself also returned from a rather distant exile, had already ordained Paulinus as Bishop at Antioch), then travel to Caesarea, become so well known to the citizens that they would strive to advance him to the episcopal dignity, and for that reason flee into Pontus, all before Julian came to Caesarea -- who then, toward the end of summer, proceeded through Cilicia to Antioch. It is likewise manifest that Eusebius showed Basil no honor or goodwill when first he came to him, having been made Deacon at Antioch, even if we were to grant that he was initiated into that order there, since Eusebius is said to have been hostile to him while he was still a Deacon.
[32] But we prefer to agree with Gregory the Presbyter rather than with the much later Nicephorus, especially since the Theologian himself seems in the cited Oration 20 to affirm that Basil, before being destined for the pontifical office, had been initiated into the priesthood, when he writes thus: "But the manifold goodness of God, and His care and dispensation toward our race, having tested him Indeed a Priest, through many previous gifts, and finding him daily more illustrious, places him in the sacred seats of the presbyterate, and sets him forth as a splendid and celebrated torch of the Church, and through the single city of Caesarea holds out fire as from a watchtower to the whole world. And in what manner? Namely, in such a way that He did not elevate him suddenly to this rank, nor at the same time both cleanse him and instruct him in wisdom, as is the case with many of those who now seek the episcopal dignity; but rather by order and by the law of spiritual advancement He adorned him with this honor." And to say nothing of by what right he could have been ordained by Meletius, Bishop of Antioch, when he himself belonged to the Church of Neo-Caesarea: for what reason is he recorded as having been made Deacon after baptism, with no mention of the lesser orders, he who was nevertheless promoted to the dignity of the episcopate "by order and by the law of spiritual advancement"? Previously promoted through all grades of orders, The same Gregory the Theologian attests that he first discharged the office of Lector, then of Deacon, and then was ordained Priest -- and this in the Church of Caesarea, to which he appears to have been attached. For he speaks thus: "Having first read the sacred books aloud to the people, then having expounded them, and not having deemed this grade of the priesthood unworthy of himself, so at last in the chair of Presbyters and afterwards of Bishops he praises the Lord."
[33] By which Bishop Basil was consecrated Priest it is not pertinent to inquire here. Baronius at the year 362, number 56, writes that he was made Presbyter by Hermogenes, Eusebius's predecessor. Neither does it seem to us to be the case either that Eusebius immediately succeeded Hermogenes, or that Basil was consecrated by him. Yet he was not consecrated Priest by Hermogenes, Eusebius became Bishop in the year 362, as we have already shown. Hermogenes had died at least twenty-two years earlier. This is clear from Saint Basil's Epistle 74, to the Bishops of the West, where he speaks thus: "There is therefore one of those who excite the greatest disturbances, Eustathius of Sebaste in Lesser Armenia. He was formerly taught by Arius, when the latter, flourishing at Alexandria, was composing his impious blasphemies against the Only-begotten of God; and he was reckoned as his follower and among his most select disciples. But after he returned to his homeland, he offered to the most Blessed Hermogenes, Bishop of Caesarea, who wished to condemn him for his impious opinion, a confession of the sound faith, and so obtained the imposition of hands from him. He died before the year 341. But when Hermogenes had fallen asleep, he immediately betook himself to Eusebius of Constantinople, who preached the doctrine of Arius no less than he." Here Basil, most knowledgeable in the affairs of Caesarea, clearly states that Hermogenes died while Eusebius of Constantinople was still living. But Eusebius died, as Socrates attests in book 2, chapter 9, shortly after the pseudo-synod of Antioch, held at the dedication of the Dominicum Aureum, Another Basil was made Deacon by Saint Meletius. as Saint Jerome in his Chronicle calls the church which was begun by Constantine the Great and completed and dedicated ten years later, in the fifth year of Constantius, the year of Christ 341, in the consulship of Probinus and Marcellinus, as Socrates has it in the same work, chapter 5. At the beginning of the following year, then, Eusebius of Constantinople died, formerly Bishop of Nicomedia, to whom Eustathius had betaken himself after the death of Hermogenes of Caesarea. Hermogenes himself, therefore, had died some time before. Who then held his See until the year of Christ 362, the first of Julian, whether one or more bishops, I do not know. In that year, finally, Eusebius was elevated to it, as we said before. Therefore Saint Basil was not ordained Deacon by Saint Meletius, although he was afterwards joined to him by a singular friendship. But this was supposed by some because Basil, the companion of Saint Chrysostom, was ordained Deacon by Meletius; and Socrates, book 6, chapter 3, thought that this was Basil the Great, Bishop of Caesarea -- although Basil the Great died at about the same time that the other Basil, still a young man, was made Bishop somewhere in Syria.
Section V. The second exile of Saint Meletius under Julian. The Council of Antioch under the Emperor Jovian. The favor of Saint Meletius with him.
[34] What was done at Antioch in the same year of Christ 362, when Julian came there, is narrated by Theodoret in his Ecclesiastical History, book 3, chapters 9 and following, whence we excerpted some things on January 24 when treating of the relics of Saint Babylas. Pertaining to Saint Meletius is what the same author records in chapter 13, in these words: "At that time a certain young man, the son of a pagan priest, raised in the impious superstition, was added to the number of the pious. There was a woman, distinguished for her piety and having attained the rank of Deaconess, who was well acquainted with this young man's mother. A young man, son of a pagan priest, She kindly received him when, as a small boy, he used to visit her together with his mother, and exhorted him to embrace the true religion. Even after his mother's death, the young man continued to visit the same woman and to drink in the customary instruction; and firmly fixing in his mind the counsels of his teacher, he at last asked her Is instructed in the faith by a certain Deaconess: by what way he might escape his father's superstition and become a sharer in the truth which she preached. She replied: 'You must leave your father and prefer to him the one who was the author of life for both you and him, and withdraw to some other city where you may hide for a time and escape the hands of the impious Emperor.' And she promised that she would look after this matter. Then the young man said: 'I shall come to you later and entrust my soul to you.'"
[35] A few days later, Julian proceeded to the temple of Apollo at Daphne Having abandoned the rites of Julian, to celebrate a public banquet; the father of this young man also went there, being a priest and accustomed to accompanying the Emperor. The young man was present alongside his father together with his brother, for they performed the office of temple-keepers, purifying the Emperor's food with lustral water. That festival at Daphne usually lasted seven days. On the first day, therefore, when he had stood beside the Emperor's couch and had sprinkled the dishes in the customary manner, He comes to her: thereby defiling them with sacrificial impiety, he swiftly ran back to Antioch and came to the excellent woman I have mentioned. "I am here, as I promised," he said. "You take care of my salvation of body and soul, He is led to Saint Meletius, and carry out what you pledged." She immediately rose and led the young man to the man of God, Meletius. He ordered the youth to remain for the time being in the upper part of the dwelling in which he lived.
[36] The father, seeking him, searched all of Daphne, and returning to the city, went through all the streets and lanes, casting his eyes about on every side He is found by his father and severely punished. and diligently tracking him. When he had come to that part of the city where the dwelling of the divine Meletius stood, looking up he saw the boy gazing out from the upper story. Running to him, he dragged him away and led him home, where first he beat him with many stripes, then drove burning skewers into his hands, feet, and back; and finally shut him up in a room, He is enclosed; having affixed a bolt from the outside, and so returned to Daphne. "I heard the son himself, now an old man, tell these things; He smashes his father's idols: and he added that, filled by a certain impulse and replete with divine grace, he had smashed all his father's idols and mocked their feebleness. But afterwards, considering in his mind what he had done, he feared his father's arrival and prayed to Christ the Lord to help him, break his father's bolts, and open the doors. He is divinely led forth thence: 'For your sake,' he said, 'I have both suffered these things and done these things.' And when I had said these words, he said, the bolts fell away and the door was opened. And I ran again to my teacher, [He is commended by Saint Meletius to Saint Cyril of Jerusalem: he later converts his father.] who dressed me in women's clothing and bade me sit with her in a covered carriage, and led me once more to the divine Meletius. He commended me to the Bishop of Jerusalem (this was Cyril), and so we set out on our journey to Palestine by night. After the death of Julian, moreover, this young man also led his own father to the true religion.
For he himself told us these and other things. And in this way they came to the knowledge of God and obtained salvation."
[37] Baronius at the year 362, numbers 124 and 125, narrates the same events from Theodoret. Theodoret narrates these things. But afterwards, at number 218, he again affirms that Meletius did not return to Antioch until the beginning of the reign of Valens, and that Theodoret is mistaken in that narrative. But who would believe this, since Theodoret, having lived at Antioch for a very long time, testifies that he received what he writes from the man himself? Indeed, it is credible that on account of this young man's flight, the burning of the temple at Daphne falsely imputed to the Christians, and many other affronts either wittily cast at Julian or portents divinely sent, Julian, raging with incredible hatred against various persons, inflicted upon Meletius the penalty of exile. Meletius was proscribed on account of these and other things, And Baronius himself, at the year 370, number 64, forgetting what he had said before, writes thus of Meletius: "Having been not long before expelled by Julian, after long journeys undertaken on behalf of the Eastern Churches, he had returned to Antioch. For since Gregory of Nyssa affirms that he was exiled three times, it seems necessary to say that he was condemned to the same sentence of exile first under Constantius, secondly under Julian, and thirdly under Valens."
[38] The words of Gregory of Nyssa in his oration on the great Meletius are: "You surely remember how the discourse delivered to you before this one of ours set forth the labors and contests of this man: how, while he honored the Holy Trinity in all things, For he was exiled three times: he preserved the honor even in the number of his contests, in that he fought through three onsets of temptations. You heard the continuation, the sequence, and the series of his labors -- what they were in the first, what in the middle, and what in the last." And a little later: "Again a return, again an exile -- and this for a third time; until, the heretical darkness being dispersed and the ray of peace being sent forth, the Lord gave some hope that we might be able to rest from our long labors." So he says.
[39] Then Julian perished in battle with the Persians on June 26, in the year 363. On the following day, Jovian was acclaimed Emperor by the soldiers' vote, Under the pious Emperor Jovian, a man of outstanding character, orthodox faith, and piety toward God. He, having prudently arranged affairs, returned from Persia to Antioch, professing that he would always adhere to the religion that confesses the Son to be consubstantial with the Father, and that he abhorred all contentions; and he enacted many measures for the restoration of the orthodox faith, and ordered the shrines of the idols to be closed, and forbade the offering of sacrifices.
[40] Then certain Arian Bishops, fearing that, just as they themselves had previously expelled the Catholics from their Churches, they would suffer the same from them, began to conform themselves to the Emperor's views and ways, and at a council held at Antioch professed the Nicene faith. He holds a Synod at Antioch. Their leader was Acacius, Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine, mentioned above. Of that Council Socrates writes thus in book 3, chapter 21: "Moreover, at the same time the ambitious character of the Acacians was revealed, and how they adapted themselves to the will of the Emperors was clearly understood. For, coming to Antioch in Syria, they conferred with Meletius, who had shortly before separated himself from their communion, having professed the faith that acknowledges the Word as Consubstantial. This they did because they perceived that Meletius was held in great honor by the Emperor, who was then present there. He stood in favor with him. They therefore by common consent composed a document in which they confessed the homoousios, or Consubstantial, and decreed the Nicene faith to be ratified; and this document they presented to the Emperor." Socrates recites the document itself in the same place; Sozomen in book 6, chapter 4; Baronius at the year 363, number 141; Binius in volume 1 of the Councils; Nicephorus Callistus, book 10, chapter 40, who writes that when the Acacians saw that Meletius, Bishop of Antioch, was held in great honor by the Emperor, who was then present there, they conferred with him and brought it about that a synod should be held at Antioch. The first to subscribe to the document were two Bishops celebrated for their orthodox faith: "Meletius, Bishop of Antioch, approve what has been written above. Eusebius, Bishop of Samosata," etc.
[41] What is read concerning this Synod in the Chronicle of Saint Jerome, he either did not write, or received from the followers of Paulinus, and believed too easily. For the Chronicle reads thus: "A Synod was held at Antioch by Meletius and his party, in which, having rejected the homoousios and the anomoios, they upheld the homoiousios, the middle Macedonian dogma." What is erroneously written about that Synod in the Chronicle of Saint Jerome. Baronius at the year 363, number 144, says the text of the Chronicle is corrupted, and restores it thus: "A Synod was held at Antioch by Meletius and his party, in which, having rejected the homiusios and the homeusios, they received as a middle term between these the homoousios, and rejected the Macedonian dogma." But since homiusios and homeusios, or rather homoiousios, both represent the same word rendered in Latin, meaning "of like substance," how can the homoousios or homousios, meaning "Consubstantial," be considered the middle term between things that are the same? Let Saint Jerome be excused, however, as far as possible, if he is the author of the Chronicle.
[42] Since Socrates and Nicephorus write that Meletius was held in honor by Jovian, with no mention made of Paulinus, it seems certain that the Emperor gave a new church to Meletius's followers, not to those of Paulinus. A new church given to Meletius by the Emperor. This was, as I believe, the church which we previously said was called the Dominicum Aureum by Saint Jerome. Theodoret, book 3 of his Ecclesiastical History, chapter 11, writes thus concerning Julian: "The tyrant ordered the sacred vessels to be carried into the Royal Treasury, and the doors of the great church that Constantine had built to be barred, so that access to it would be denied to those who were accustomed to holding their assemblies there." The Arians, however, occupied it at that time. But in book 4, chapter 22, the same Theodoret says: "To the defenders of the Apostolic teaching, the ever-to-be-praised Jovian had given also the newly built church." He explains in the same place who these were, since he says that those who were afterwards ejected from that church by Valens assembled at the foot of a mountain, then at the banks of a river, under the leadership of Flavian and Diodorus, when Meletius was proscribed -- to whom it is established that they adhered; while on the other hand, the same Valens inflicted no harm upon Paulinus the Bishop, as Socrates attests in book 4, chapter 2, and Sozomen.
Section VI. The persecution of the Emperor Valens. Many taught piety by Meletius, especially Chrysostom.
[43] Having administered the Empire for scarcely eight months, the most Christian Emperor Jovian Augustus died, as Idatius records in the Fasti, on the eleventh day before the Kalends of March, in the year 364, Jovian having died in the year 364. at Dadastana, a place which, as Ammianus attests in book 25, chapter 34, separates Bithynia from Galatia. Then, as Idatius continues, Valentinian was elevated as Augustus at Nicaea on the fifth day before the Kalends of March. In that same year Valens was elevated as Augustus at Constantinople, at the seventh milestone, on the tribunal, by his brother Valentinian, on the fourth day before the Kalends of April. Valentinian and Valens rule, What is said about the seventh milestone, others more correctly call the suburb known as the Hebdomum, or the Seventh. Both of these Emperors were distinguished for military valor and orthodox religion. For, as Socrates writes in book 4, chapter 1, while serving as soldiers under Julian -- Valentinian as a military Tribune, Valens as a Domestic of the Emperor -- Having bravely professed the faith, they declared how ardently they were inflamed with zeal for religion. For when they were pressed to offer sacrifice, they preferred to lay down their military belts rather than to desert Christ.
[44] There exists in the name of both Emperors a letter to the Bishops of the diocese of Asia, Phrygia, etc., concerning the acts and judgment of the Council held in Illyricum, in which they manifestly confessed, as Theodoret writes in book 4, chapter 7, [For which they issued an edict, the decrees of the Illyrian Council being promulgated as Catholic,] "the Trinity, consubstantial, of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit." Of that letter the same Theodoret says at the end of chapter 6: "I shall also recite the law which both clearly displays the piety of Valentinian and the sound doctrine of Valens at that time concerning the divine religion." Baronius at the year 365, number 25, judges the letter to belong rather to Valens than to Valentinian, since the latter was far away in Gaul, and Illyricum pertained to Valens, and therefore Valens's name is placed first in the volumes of the Councils. Cedrenus defers the matter to the tenth year of Valentinian's reign, where he writes thus: "When the whole of the West professed the consubstantial Trinity, Valentinian, being asked, convened a council in Illyricum and confirmed the Nicene faith therein. He also sent an edict to the Bishops of Asia, Phrygia, and all the East, commanding them to abide by the decrees of the council, associating with himself in the edict Valens his brother and Gratian his son." Thus indeed it reads in Theodoret: "The Greatest Emperors, Ever-August, Victors, Augusti, Valentinian and Valens and Gratian." But Theodoret clearly held that when the council was held, Valens was still orthodox, as we have already shown. Perhaps Valens had sent the Acts of the council to his brother in Gaul before dispatching them to Asia; or, knowing his brother's views, he prefixed his name and that of his son Gratian to his own edict as a mark of honor.
[45] By what process Valens then fell away from his devotion to the orthodox religion, Valens about to march against the Goths, the same Theodoret explains in chapter 11: "Valens," he says, "upon obtaining the Empire, was at first adorned with the ornaments of the Apostolic doctrine. But when the Goths had crossed the Danube and were committing depredations throughout Thrace, he resolved to gather forces against them and to wage war upon them. He did not, however, think it advisable to undertake the expedition stripped of divine grace, He is baptized by a heretical Bishop, but that he ought to be armed with the armor of most holy Baptism -- and this indeed was an excellent and very wise intention. But then he displayed excessive softness of spirit, and began to betray the truth; and the same thing happened to the wretched man as to the first parent Adam. For, beguiled by the words of his wife, he was reduced to servitude, and became not only a captive but obedient to the deceits of a woman's words. Seduced by the enticements of his wife, For she, having been previously ensnared in the toils of the Arian error, entangled her husband in the same and dragged him down with herself into the abyss of blasphemy. And both of them were not merely led into error but, as it were, devoted to it by Eudoxius, who still held the helm of the Church of Constantinople, not so as to steer it aright, but as if to submerge a ship beneath the waves." Anastasius likewise writes from Theophanes: "Certain people indeed say that Dominica, the wife of Valens, persuaded him to follow so vigorously the opinion of Arius." The Alexandrian Chronicle calls her Domnika; Raderus translates it as Domnina.
[46] Theodoret continues in chapter 12: "At the very time therefore when Valens was initiated by baptism, the wretch was bound by an oath by the same Eudoxius, And he swears to expel the Catholic Bishops, both to persevere in that impious dogma and to drive from their Churches everywhere all who held contrary opinions. So he, abandoning the Apostolic doctrine, went over to the party of the adversaries; and after no great interval of time carried out the rest of what he had sworn. For he expelled the great Meletius from Antioch, the divine Eusebius from Samosata, Among them Meletius. and deprived Laodicea of its admirable pastor Pelagius." Of Saint Pelagius we shall treat on March 25, and of Saint Eusebius on June 21. Meletius does not appear to have departed from Antioch until Valens himself came there. So Sozomen indicates in book 6, chapter 7, although he errs in the chronology. "Valens," he says, "having accompanied his brother, who was setting out for Old Rome, for part of the journey ... made for Syria, for he feared that the Persians might break the thirty-year truce made with Jovian. But since they were attempting nothing new, he stayed at Antioch. At that time he condemned Bishop Meletius to exile ... and he ordered those who repudiated communion with Euzoius to be driven from the churches, fined, beaten, and otherwise afflicted." Socrates, book 4, chapter 2, and Nicephorus, book 11, chapter 13, and others, have much the same.
[47] But Valens did not reach Antioch at the beginning of his reign; nor did he persecute the orthodox until after he received baptism from Eudoxius, when he was on the point of setting out for the Gothic war, which was by no means waged at the start of his reign. This is clear from Ammianus Marcellinus, who writes in book 26, chapter 11: "The Emperors therefore, residing in the cities mentioned -- Valentinian at Milan, Valens at Constantinople -- first assumed the consular robes," namely in the year 365. In 365, having arranged defenses against the Goths, Then in chapter 16: "When winter was over, Valens, hastening toward Syria and now having entered the borders of Bithynia, was informed by the reports of his generals that the Gothic nation, untouched at that time and therefore most savage, was conspiring together and preparing to invade the frontier regions of Thrace. Learning this, so that he himself might proceed unhindered to where he was heading, he ordered sufficient reinforcements of cavalry and infantry to be sent to those places where barbarian incursions were feared." He then narrates the rebellion of Procopius, which Idatius briefly summarizes in the Fasti as follows: "In the same year, a night-time brigand and public enemy appeared within the city of Constantinople on the fourth day before the Kalends of October." How the news was reported to Valens is told by Ammianus in chapter 18: "Sophronius, then a notary, afterwards Prefect of Constantinople, traveling in advance with the greatest speed, About to go from Caesarea to Antioch, turned Valens back -- who was already on the point of departing from Caesarea in Cappadocia, so as to hasten to the residence of Antioch now that the scorching heat of Cilicia had abated -- and by narrating the course of events diverted him, in doubtful hope, as in such matters, stunned and astonished, to Galatia, He learns of the rebellion of Procopius: to take charge of affairs still in turmoil." That same disturbance of Procopius also alarmed Valentinian himself, when it was reported to him near the Kalends of November as he was coming to Paris, as the same author states in the same book, chapter 11.
[48] "But the magistracy having been transferred," says the same author in chapter 26, "to Gratian, still a private citizen (that is, not yet Emperor), and Dagalaifus, in the year 366, with spring now open and his forces roused, Valens moved against Procopius and crushed him." Idatius indicates the day and place: "In the same year the same public enemy and robber was crushed and destroyed within Phrygia Salutaris, He crushes him on May 27, 366, on the plains of Nacolea, by the Augustus Valens on the sixth day before the Kalends of June." The head was sent to Valentinian and brought to Paris, at the time when Jovinus returned there after conquering the Germans and was designated Consul for the following year (Ammianus, book 27, chapter 3). But in chapter 10, concerning the Gothic war, the same author writes: "After Procopius was overcome in Phrygia and the material of internal dissensions was put to rest, Victor, Master of Cavalry, was sent to the Goths He sends an envoy to the Goths who had aided the enemy, to learn openly for what reason a nation friendly to the Romans and bound by treaties of genuine peace had given military assistance to one waging war against the legitimate Emperors ... Valens, disdaining their most frivolous excuse, moved his standards against them, who were already aware of the advancing forces; In 367, he himself marches against them: and in the early spring, having gathered his army together, he encamped near a fortification named Daphne, and having bridged the Danube by planking together ships, crossed the river with none resisting."
[49] Valens was therefore baptized by the Arian Eudoxius before this expedition, undertaken in the consulship of Lupicinus and Jovinus, in the year of Christ 367, the fourth of his reign. Saint Jerome writes in his Chronicle at the third year of Valentinian and Valens: "Valens, baptized by Eudoxius, Bishop of the Arians, Therefore baptized toward the end of 366 or beginning of 367, persecutes our people." This seems to have occurred toward the end of the year 366 or the beginning of the next, when the third year of the reign of Valens was not yet completed -- although the year numbers in that Chronicle are not accurately marked, since in the same place he immediately appends to the things already recounted, in the same year: "Gratian, son of Valentinian, was made Emperor at Amiens." But in the following year he writes: "So great a storm arose at Constantinople that hailstones of remarkable size fell and killed some people." Idatius refers both events to the consulship of Lupicinus and Jovinus, that is, the year 367, and indeed the latter event occurred before the former: "Under these consuls," he says, "in the city of Constantinople, God rained hail in the manner of stones on the fourth day before the Nones of July. And in the same year Gratian was elevated as Augustus in Gaul at Amiens, on the tribunal, by his father the Augustus Valentinian, on the ninth day before the Kalends of September."
[50] "In the following year," says Ammianus, book 27, chapter 11, namely 368, "Valens, attempting to enter enemy territory with equal eagerness, was prevented by the Danube's waters spreading in broad flood, and remained stationary near the village of Carpi, In 368, he wages war, with his camp established until autumn." Whence, since nothing could be accomplished, the extent of the flood waters preventing it, he withdrew to Marcianopolis for winter quarters. "With similar persistence in the third year as well," the year of Christ 369, And 369,
"through Novidunum, with ships linked together for crossing the river, he broke through the barbarian territory ... and he himself returned with all his forces to Marcianopolis to spend the winter, Then he makes peace: as suitable for those regions. After the various fortunes of the three-year period, timely opportunities for ending the war presented themselves ... and, having received hostages, Valens returned to Constantinople." Finally, he set out for Antioch in the year 370. In 370, he goes to Antioch, or 371. Cedrenus writes that he arrived there the following year, in these words: "In the eighth year of Valentinian, Valens, coming to Antioch in Syria, inflicted terrible injuries upon the orthodox," etc.
[51] Up to that time we conjecture that Meletius had remained in that city, even though the edict concerning his exile and that of other orthodox Bishops had been issued three years before. And then he appears to have expelled Saint Meletius for the first time; We previously cited Sozomen reporting this: "Valens stayed at Antioch, AND AT THAT TIME he condemned Bishop Meletius to distant exile." Socrates also, book 4, chapter 2, and Nicephorus Callistus, book 11, chapter 20, report that Valens was at Antioch when he decreed these things -- although these writers too state that it was done at the beginning of his reign and that Valens arrived at Antioch then.
[52] That Meletius accomplished great and illustrious things at Antioch from the beginning of Jovian's reign to the year 370 may be gathered from his singular learning and his zeal for defending the truth. Some outstanding men are recorded as having been partly formed under his discipline and partly established by his counsels. For to omit Theodore of Mopsuestia and Vitalis, Who trained many excellent men at Antioch in piety, who afterwards fell into heresies and obscured the reputation for piety and learning they had previously accumulated: Acacius, afterwards Bishop of Beroea, Diodorus of Tarsus, Flavian of Antioch, and many holy anchorites closely adhered to him. Elpidius, Saint Pelagius's successor in the See of Laodicea, had been a member of the great Meletius's household, as Theodoret writes in book 5, chapter 27, and he reproduced Meletius's manner of life more accurately than wax reproduces the forms stamped upon it by signet rings. But the most illustrious of all his disciples was John Chrysostom; and by Chrysostom's writings Basil is celebrated -- not the Basil of Caesarea, the friend of Gregory the Theologian, as Socrates and others supposed, but another, much younger, Among them Chrysostom with the younger Basil, born at Antioch, of humble fortune, as Baronius shows from Chrysostom, whereas the other Basil was of Neo-Caesarea, from a very wealthy family, and drawn to the episcopate at a mature age. This Syrian Basil was, however (as Baronius observes at the year 382, number 67), very distinguished in learning and character, and not so unequal to Chrysostom, since both, when they had scarcely passed the threshold of youth, were sought for the episcopate; and while the former was detained, Chrysostom, taking flight, composed in his own defense that most celebrated treatise On the Priesthood. Where, however, this Basil, Chrysostom's companion and Meletius's disciple, was made Bishop, we have not yet discovered.
[53] Let us now see what instruction Chrysostom drew from Meletius. Palladius writes thus in his Dialogue on the Life of Chrysostom: "Then, when he was in his eighteenth year, devoting himself to oratory, he avoided the slippery path of youth through perpetual exercise. But when he had put on a manly disposition, he was seized with love for sacred literature. Now at that time the man of all holiness, Meletius the Confessor, Armenian by race, was governing the Church of Antioch. He won Chrysostom over and instructed him, He, being a shrewd observer, discerning the young man's character, took him to himself and permitted him to be constantly in his company and to adhere closely to him. For he loved the beauty of his heart, foreseeing with prophetic eyes to what end so great a nature would develop. And when he had diligently instructed him, as he sat beside him, in the faith and in sacred doctrines, after nearly three years he purified him with the regeneration of baptism and ordained him Lector."
[54] Concerning Chrysostom's baptism, George of Alexandria writes thus in his Life: "He was raised most humanely by his parents, as the conspicuous honor and distinction of his nobility required. But they were all pagans. Meletius, however, the Confessor, who then held the See of the Church of Antioch, The same Chrysostom he baptized, first brought the Blessed John to baptism, and afterwards regenerated his parents also with the font of baptism. For God did not permit the parents of that splendid luminary and Doctor of the Church to be without faith in Him and knowledge of Him, and this through the grace of baptism." On the same matter the Metaphrast says in his Life: "Then he received divine baptism while his body was still very tender and soft. For it was fitting that one whose life inclined toward Christ should no longer remain unsealed with the seal of Christ. And the one who baptized him was Meletius, who most excellently administered the See of Antioch, being by his virtue far loftier than his throne. And afterwards he also committed his parents to the divine washing." And his mother Anthusa. "For it was not fitting that, when the son had come to the light of grace, those who had caused him to be brought into the light should not share in the same splendor as their son."
[55] But these accounts of the baptism of both parents after the son do not entirely agree with what Chrysostom himself writes in his first letter to a younger widow: "For I too at one time," he says, "when I was younger, observed that my mother had excited great admiration in my teacher (and he was the most superstitious of all men) beyond many others. For when he had asked those who sat with him, Praised by Libanius for twenty years of widowhood: as was his custom, who I was, and someone answered that I was the son of a widow, he inquired of me about my mother's age and the duration of her widowhood. When I told him that she was forty years old and that twenty of those years had passed since she had lost my father, he was astonished, and turning to those who were present, he exclaimed in a loud voice: 'Behold what women there are among the Christians!' So great is the praise and admiration of widowhood not only among us but even among the pagans." That teacher of his, whom in Greek he calls "my sophist, the most superstitious of all men," was Libanius. From this passage it seems to be established that Secundus, Chrysostom's father, was by no means baptized by Meletius the Confessor. For even if we were to grant that he died shortly after receiving baptism, Chrysostom's father was not baptized by Meletius, still, if Anthusa is said to have remained a widow for twenty years, as her son asserts, Libanius's remark about her would have to be placed in the year 382, when Libanius was no longer alive, nor indeed could Chrysostom reasonably be considered still "young." Not even during those thirty days when Meletius first held that See, before being banished by Constantius, can that baptism of Secundus be said to have occurred -- unless we wish to have Anthusa living until the year 380 and her son still studying under the sophist Libanius at the age of twenty-six or twenty-seven. If, therefore, Secundus was initiated by baptism, But perhaps by another: he received it from some other person, and departed this life around the year 356.
[56] Another distinguished benefit besides baptism was conferred upon John by Meletius: that he drew him from the profane school to the church, from Libanius to hearing himself, from secular lawsuits to ecclesiastical discourses. "For," says George, "when he had perceived that this young man was endowed with a distinguished and very keen intellect, he charged him to attend him frequently and to come to the church, The same Chrysostom Meletius transferred from profane study to sacred things, because he loved the beauty of his heart; for with a prophetic eye, as through a mirror, he had clearly discerned the likeness of that Blessed One impressed within him. And in order that he might devote himself with unceasing zeal to the Church, he persuaded Theodore and Maximus, who had been his fellow students under the sophist Libanius, to abandon their profit-seeking way of life and to take up a frugal and simple life." It seems, however, that Chrysostom did not entirely leave Libanius until Meletius had already been driven into exile by Valens, on account of what has already been recounted from his letter to the widow. George says that when Chrysostom was in his eighteenth year, he began to throw off the reins and to refuse the harsh authority of the sophist over his rhetorical exercises. And gradually from the school of Libanius, Yet he did not entirely break with him before his mother had reached her twentieth year of widowhood.
[57] How highly Libanius esteemed him in any case may be conjectured from what Sozomen writes in book 8, chapter 2: "There was at Antioch," he says, Who judged him fit to be his own successor, "which is situated on the Orontes, a Presbyter named John, of patrician birth, of blameless life, powerful in speech and persuasion, and preeminent among the orators of his time -- as even Libanius the Syrian sophist testified; who, when he was about to die, being asked by his friends whom he wished to be his successor, is said to have replied, 'John, if the
Christians had not sacrilegiously stolen him away.'" The prey that the most vain sophist laments was stolen from him, the Church owes to the industry of our Meletius.
Section VII. The third exile of Saint Meletius. The death of the Emperor Valens. Bishops recalled by Gratian, churches restored to the Catholics.
[58] I would believe that in this third proscription of Saint Meletius, the event occurred which Saint Chrysostom recounts below in his eulogy, number 5: namely that Meletius, by spreading the cover of his own garment, shielded the Prefect of the city, Saint Meletius defends the Governor from stoning, who was seated with him in the carriage by which he was being conveyed into exile, from being stoned. Under Constantius, certainly, when he was first banished, having remained in the city for scarcely thirty days, this did not happen, for he was led out of the city by night. I would not deny, however, that it could have occurred under Julian; but Chrysostom seems rather to have been looking back to the time of Valens, adding this: "Having taken the entire city with him, he set out for Armenia." For Theodoret, book 4, chapter 4, reports that Pelagius of Laodicea was banished by Valens to Arabia, He is banished to Armenia: Eusebius of Samosata to Thrace, and the divine Meletius to Armenia. While Saint Meletius was in exile there, Saint Basil the Great, having gone to Armenia on business, came to Getasa, to the estate of the most beloved Bishop Meletius, where he indicates that he also conversed with him, in Epistle 187, to Count Terentius.
[59] What other evils Valens inflicted upon the Antiochenes at that time, the same Theodoret recounts in chapter 22. "Valens," he says, "dwelling at Antioch for a very long period of time, Liberty given to all sects, granted liberty to all: to pagans, to Jews, and to others who, having assumed the Christian name, preached a doctrine repugnant to the Gospel. For those who were held by idol-mania performed the rites of paganism, and the superstition which had been extinguished by Jovian after Julian's death, he allowed to flourish anew. And the festivals of Jupiter, the Dionysia, and the rites of Ceres were celebrated not in secret, as under pious Emperors, but through the midst of the forum the frenzied revelers ran about. Taken from the Catholics alone: Only against those who defended the Apostolic doctrine did Valens declare himself an enemy." For indeed this is the custom of heretics even in our own age: that they allow superstitions of whatever kind, however impure, to be practiced by men of every sect -- even Jews and Muslims -- while they strip Catholics alone of all freedom of worship. But let us return to Valens. "He," says the same author, "first drove the orthodox from the sacred buildings. For the ever-to-be-praised Emperor Jovian had given them a new church. Now, assembling at the foot of a mountain, Their assemblies were disrupted, even out of doors: they began to celebrate the Lord with hymns and to enjoy the divine discourses, enduring all the inclemencies of the weather -- sometimes afflicted by rain, snow, and frost, at other times by the most intense heat. But he did not even suffer them to enjoy this advantage, so laborious as it was; instead, sending soldiers for the purpose, he dispersed them."
[60] Theodoret continues in chapter 23 with the other things Valens did to disrupt the assemblies of the pious, and how, besides Flavian and Diodorus, Holy hermits bring them consolation. holy anchorites, inspired by the divine Spirit, came to Antioch and resisted his efforts and confirmed the Catholics. The chief among these were Saint Aphraates, who is venerated on April 7, and Saint Julian, surnamed Sabas, or Presbytes (that is, "the Elder"), who is venerated on October 18. In the Life of the latter, the same Theodoret writes as follows concerning that persecution of Valens, in chapter 2 of the Philotheus, or book 8 On the Lives of the Fathers: "When Valens ... having abandoned the truth of the Evangelical doctrines, had accepted the imposture of Arius's error, then a greater storm arose against the Church, when the helmsmen were being driven out on all sides, and certain robbers and enemies were being put in their places. But so as not to recount that entire tragedy at present, I shall now pass over other matters and mention one thing only, which clearly shows the grace of the divine Spirit flourishing in this old man. From the Church of Antioch, the great Meletius, to whom the God of all had entrusted it to be pastured, had been expelled; and from the sacred temples had been expelled, together with the people who shared their views, all who had been enrolled in the clergy and who worshipped the one essence of the divine Trinity. And now, going to some cave of the mountain, they celebrated the sacred assemblies there; now, they made the bank of the river their oratory; and sometimes the military exercise ground, which is situated before the northern gate; for those who waged war upon them did not permit the pious to remain in one place." He narrates similar events in chapter 8, in the Life of Saint Aphraates, where he says expressly of the orthodox harassed by Valens: "For this reason he not only expelled them from every church, but also from the side of the mountain, from the bank of the river, and from the military exercise ground. For they continually changed these places, so that the armed band might rage against them as it passed by." Mention of the proscription of the Blessed Meletius is also made in the Menaea on October 18, where Saint Julian is treated.
[61] At last the divine Power checked the unbridled cruelty of Valens by sending the Goths into Thrace, who devastated it far and wide. In the year of Christ 378, therefore, in the consulship of Valens VI and the younger Valentinian II, as Idatius records, "The Augustus Valens entered Constantinople from the East on the third day before the Kalends of June. And in the same year the Augustus Valens set out from the city to the encampment on the third day before the Ides of June; In 378, the Goths devastating Thrace, Valens marches against them, and a great battle was fought between the Romans and the Goths twelve miles from Adrianople, on the fifth day before the Ides of August. From that day, the Augustus Valens was nowhere to be seen. And throughout the whole year, throughout the diocese of Thrace and Scythia and Moesia, the Goths dwelt and plundered those provinces; and afterwards they came even to the gates of the city of Constantinople." Saint Jerome describes the death of Valens thus in his Chronicle: "A lamentable war in Thrace, in which the Roman legions, deserted by the cavalry, were surrounded by the Goths and cut down to utter destruction. And when his army was destroyed, he perishes miserably. The Emperor Valens himself, wounded by an arrow and fleeing, and frequently falling from his horse on account of excessive pain, was carried to the cottage of a certain small estate, where the barbarians, pursuing him and setting fire to the house, he was deprived even of burial." Nearly the same things are recorded by other authors, especially Ammianus Marcellinus, book 31.
[62] What the same Chronicle states immediately before the words cited does not fully agree with other writers: "Valens," it says, "compelled to leave Antioch, by a late repentance recalls our people from exile." It seems indeed that, urged on by the monk Saint Isaac, who promised him victory if he did so, Obstinate in heresy. he deliberated about opening the churches of the orthodox when setting out from Constantinople for the war; but soon after he hardened his mind against it. So says the Metaphrast on March 27, in the Life of Isaac. Theodoret narrates the same somewhat more briefly in book 4, chapter 30, where he writes that Isaac demanded not so much that the Emperor open the churches of the orthodox, but that he restore their best pastors to the flocks. Nicephorus Callistus, book 11, chapter 50, says that Isaac spoke these words: "Restore to those who hold the right opinion and sincerely preserve the definition of faith declared at Nicaea the churches you took from them, and you will win the victory without difficulty." He then reports the various opinions of writers concerning the death of Valens. But since that subject will have to be treated more often in the acts of other Saints, let these suffice here for now.
[63] When Valens was dead, Gratian, son of Valentinian, who had long been successfully administering the West, also took up the governance of the East; and immediately, The Emperor Gratian restores the exiled Bishops, as Theodoret writes in book 5, chapter 2, he made more illustrious the piety that he cultivated, and offered the first fruits of his Empire to the Emperor of all. For he drew up a law by which he ordered the banished Bishops to return and be restored to their flocks, and the holy churches to be handed over to those who embraced the communion of Damasus. This Damasus was the Bishop of Rome who had assumed the administration of that Church after Liberius -- a man truly distinguished for the ornaments of his exemplary life, who strove to do and say all things according to the Apostolic doctrine. He also sent with that law Sapor the general, a man most celebrated in that age, And takes the churches from the heretics, to whom he commanded that the heralds of the Arian blasphemy should be driven from the sheepfolds like beasts, and the best pastors restored to the divine flocks. Anastasius, drawing from Theophanes, says briefly of this matter: "Moreover, Gratian and Valentinian (the younger, that is) by a law recalled the Bishops from exile and
persecuted the Arians, with the cooperation of Pope Damasus of Rome."
[64] What Socrates, book 5, chapter 2, and Sozomen, book 7, chapter 1, write -- that Gratian, together with his brother, enacted by law that every sect might freely and without any distinction hold assemblies in the churches, with the sole exception of the Eunomians, Photinians, and Manicheans -- And although at first he seemed to show some indulgence, this appears to be the rescript mentioned in the Theodosian Code, book 16, title 5, On Heretics, law 5, issued in the consulship of Ausonius and Olybrius, that is, the year 379, in these words: "Finally, the rescript that recently appeared at Sirmium being annulled, let only those provisions concerning the Catholic observance remain which our father of eternal memory, and we ourselves, have commanded by an equally numerous decree that shall endure forever." In the same book, under various titles, there exist very many edicts issued by him and Theodosius against the assemblies of heretics. Such is the one under the same title, law 6, issued in the consulship of Eucherius, in the year 381: "Let the crowds of all heretics be barred from their unlawful congregations; let the name of the one and supreme God be celebrated everywhere. Let the observance of the Nicene faith, long ago handed down by our ancestors and confirmed by the testimony and assertion of divine religion, be held as forever enduring. Let the contamination of the Photinian plague, the poison of the Arian sacrilege, the crime of the Eunomian perfidy, and the unspeakable portents of sects with monstrous names be abolished even from their very entrance." And law 11, issued in the consulship of Merobaudes II and Saturninus, in the year 383: "Absolutely all whom the error of various heresies agitates -- that is, He forbids all their assemblies. Eunomians, Arians, Macedonians ... let them not gather in any circles, let them assemble no crowd, let them draw no populace to themselves, nor in imitation of churches display what are in fact private assemblies," etc.
Section VIII. The discord of the Antiochenes resolved. The notable deeds of Saint Meletius after his return.
[65] What in other cities brought salvation through the return of orthodox Bishops, at Antioch it stirred up commotions and nearly a sedition. Discord at Antioch on account of two Catholic Bishops. The Catholic populace was, as we said before, split into two factions: one followed Meletius, who had been elected and ordained by Arian and Catholic Bishops alike, but had been proscribed three times for the cause of the Catholic faith, and was endowed with a singular ability for winning over to the Church those who were ensnared by the deceits of heretics or still blinded by pagan errors. The other faction, likewise Catholic, adhered to Paulinus, whom Lucifer of Cagliari had formerly ordained, considering Meletius either legitimately deposed by the Arians, or perhaps himself a heretic, as his adversaries seem to have persuaded even Saint Jerome. Indeed, all the orthodox in the East embraced the communion of Meletius: Saint Athanasius, Saint Eusebius of Samosata, Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, Many favoring each side: Saint Gregory of Nyssa, Saint Basil the Great, Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, Saint Pelagius of Laodicea, Saint Amphilochius of Iconium, and others. Yet they did not dare condemn Paulinus, whom they knew to be orthodox and pious, since they were aware he had been ordained by a Legate of the Apostolic See, although for a See that was not vacant. Paulinus had the favor of Pope Damasus. "But it should be known," says Baronius in his notes on the Martyrology, "that it is established by the testimony of Saint Basil that Saint Damasus (as often happens) had been deceived by certain false reports," etc.
[66] Meletius had long wished to see that contention laid to rest, and for that purpose had implored the aid of the Roman Pontiff himself and of the Western Bishops, sending a legate to them with letters. Above all, Saint Basil the Great labored with every effort Meletius and Basil the Great labor for concord: to reconcile the parties to one another, and repeatedly asked the great Athanasius to cooperate in this endeavor. It is not our intention in this place to unfold the entire controversy. Cardinal Baronius may be consulted, who treats this question at great length, especially at the year 370, numbers 85 and following; at 371, number 7 and onwards; at 372, numbers 11, 50, etc. -- though he is more favorable to Paulinus than to Meletius. But Saint Basil is wholly on the side of Meletius, and shows how much he esteemed him in his letters to him and to others.
[67] Moreover, what Basil had long tried in vain to accomplish while he lived, he obtained from God in heaven, so that the Catholics of Antioch might at last be reconciled to one another. For when he had died on the Kalends of January in the year 379, five months after the death of Valens, in the following September or the beginning of October, a Council of Bishops was held at Antioch to settle that dispute (as Baronius, Binius, and others judge). Gregory of Nyssa mentions this Council in the Life of his sister Macrina, found in Surius on July 19, chapter 12. "It was," he says, Established in the year 379, after this loss -- namely the death of Basil -- "the ninth month or a little more, when a Council of Bishops was convened at Antioch, in which we participated." Some refer this Council and Basil's death to the preceding year, so that Basil would be said to have died while Valens was still alive, that is, in the consulship of Valens VI and the younger Valentinian II; and so that less than two months after the death of Valens, the Bishops would have assembled for this council. But Saint Jerome expressly writes in On Ecclesiastical Writers, chapter 116, Basil having previously died, that Basil died during the reign of Gratian, that is, after the death of his uncle, before Theodosius was admitted as a colleague; nor can the Bishops, recalled by imperial edict from remote places a few weeks after the tyrant's death, be supposed to have regained their Churches, settled affairs there, and then come to Antioch. Certainly Socrates, in book 5 of his Ecclesiastical History, shows that before either this or another assembly met to resolve the controversy, Theodosius had been proclaimed Emperor by Gratian, writing thus in chapter 2: "He therefore declared Theodosius Emperor at Sirmium, a city of Illyricum, in the consulship of Ausonius and Olybrius, on January 16" -- or, as Christophorson translates, "the seventeenth day before the Kalends of February." Idatius writes that it occurred on the fourteenth day before the Kalends of February.
[68] Concerning the Antiochene controversy, the same Socrates says this in chapter 3: "The Church of Antioch was divided three ways: for certain churches were governed by Dorotheus the Arian, after Euzoius; the rest were governed partly by Paulinus, partly by Meletius, who had been recalled from exile." The author errs when he writes in chapter 4 that the Macedonians assembled at Antioch in Syria. Sozomen, book 7, chapter 2, has them "assembling at Antioch in Caria." But let us hear Socrates further as he pursues what pertains to Meletius. In chapter 5 he writes thus: "At Antioch in Syria, a contention arose on account of Meletius, of this kind: Paulinus, Bishop of Antioch, as we said before, on account of his extraordinary piety, had by no means been driven into exile. But Meletius, recalled under Julian, and again expelled by Valens, and once more brought back by Gratian, Paulinus was unwilling to accept Meletius as a colleague on the throne, upon returning to Antioch found Paulinus now nearly worn out by old age. Immediately therefore all who favored him endeavored to have him made a sharer of the episcopal throne with Paulinus. But when Paulinus said it was contrary to the canons of the Church for one consecrated by Arians to be admitted to a share of the episcopal See, the people attempted to extort this by force. Accordingly, an episcopal throne was set up for him in a church situated in the suburbs, which done, an enormous contention was excited."
[69] "But afterwards the people were brought back to concord on these conditions. Gathering together those who seemed most fit to aspire to the episcopate [The chief clergy were compelled to swear that, upon the death of one, no one would seek the episcopate,] (six in all were found, among whom was also Flavian), they bound them by oath that none should assume the episcopate when one of the two who were already Bishops should depart this life, but should allow the survivor to obtain the throne of the deceased. When the agreements were thus confirmed by oath, the people were reconciled to one another, and all ill will was dispelled. But the Luciferians made a secession on the ground that Meletius, having been initiated by the Arians, had been elevated to the episcopate." Sozomen has the same in book 7, chapter 3, where, however, the translator rendered the last part incorrectly: "Nearly the whole populace returned to concord, a few, among whom was Lucifer, still resisting, on the ground that Meletius had been ordained by the adherents of the opposing sect." The Greek reads thus: The Luciferians, who had previously stood with Paulinus, objecting. "Nearly the whole multitude was of one mind. But a few of the Luciferians disagreed," etc. Those who are here called "a few of the Luciferians" are in Socrates called "the Luciferians," and in Nicephorus, book 12, chapter 3, "very few Luciferians." For we said above that this sect existed in the East. They appear to have been among the most rigid and severe followers of Paulinus.
[70] That the way to concord was first proposed by Meletius himself, Theodoret reports. For when the general Sapor had come to Antioch (of whom we treated in the preceding section, number 63), before him Flavian the Presbyter first refuted Apollinaris, who falsely boasted of having communion with Pope Damasus; then he also branded Paulinus with the stigma of Sabellianism -- a calumny that Paulinus had already refuted before Saint Epiphanius as having been hurled at him by Vitalis the Apollinarist, as Epiphanius attests in heresy 77; whether Theodoret was unaware of this or dissembled for another reason, I do not inquire. Meanwhile Meletius, the most gentle of all mortals, [Meletius, a man of the greatest gentleness, had voluntarily proposed these terms:] addressed Paulinus in a very courteous and kind manner with these words: "Since the Lord of these sheep has committed their care to me as well, and you have taken up the care of others, and the sheep themselves agree with one another in the communion of piety, let us unite the flocks, O friend, and put an end to the contention over primacy; and while we pasture the sheep in common, let us apply a common care to governing them properly. But if the throne placed in the midst breeds ill will, I shall endeavor to remove this too. For I shall place upon it the divine Gospel, and I shall propose that we sit on either side. And if I first reach the end of life, you alone, friend, shall govern the flock; but if that lot falls to you, I shall care for the sheep to the best of my ability." When Paulinus rejected the terms, the Churches were handed over to Meletius: When these proposals had been kindly and gently put forward by the divine Meletius, Paulinus by no means assented. The general, therefore, being appointed judge of what had been said on both sides, handed the Churches over to the great Meletius. Paulinus, however, remained pastor of the sheep whom he had from the beginning separated from the rest.
[71] I do not think Sapor settled this dispute without first referring the matter to Gratian, and perhaps also to Theodosius. The same Theodoret, book 5, chapter 23, writes that when Paulinus wished to seize the administration of the entire Church after the death of Meletius, the clergy resisted him, on the ground that Paulinus himself had rejected the counsel proposed by Meletius. Baronius criticizes Theodoret as being too devoted to Flavian, and therefore suppressing the council mentioned by Gregory of Nyssa and attributing everything to Sapor. But it is not entirely certain (though we shall not deny that it may seem plausible) that the Council was convened for that reason. Nor does Gregory of Nyssa indicate this; nor do Socrates and Sozomen, who record that the six leading members of the clergy were bound by oath, say this was done in an assembly of Bishops, and indeed of Pontus. Nor was it objected to Flavian that he had violated the pacts made between Meletius and Paulinus, but that he had not kept his own oath. Nicephorus Callistus, book 12, chapter 4, reports the same things as Theodoret: proposed by Meletius, rejected by Paulinus, confirmed by Sapor. Then he adds: "Afterwards, as we said above, the oath was received from the designated candidates for the episcopate, and the people were brought back to concord." He treats of the oath in chapter 3, where he says it was an admirable device by which the matter was reduced to concord by such agreements ... but that a few Luciferians fostered the dissension. Then in chapter 4 he writes thus concerning Meletius and his counsel: "Many other Bishops, returning from the exile to which they had been condemned under the rule of Valens, Others followed Meletius in restoring concord: followed the decision of Meletius: contending nothing about the prerogative and preeminence of the episcopal See, but striving above all to procure the concord of the multitude."
[72] Thus far concerning that controversy. Of Saint Meletius, the same Nicephorus reports in chapter 5 from Theodoret: "The divine Meletius, having established the concord of the multitude, appointed that Diodorus of whom we spoke a little before -- who, in the guise and garb of a layman, together with Flavian, had nobly steered the bark of the Church through that savage storm -- as Pastor of Tarsus, He himself appointed Bishops in various places: and committed the Cilician nation to him. The episcopate of Apamea he entrusted to John, a man distinguished both for the nobility of his birth and for many splendid ornaments of character; moreover, sanctity of life and learning, combined in him, made him even more illustrious. He too, like Flavian and Diodorus, during the time of the fierce storm, holding the people to their duty by his steadfastness of mind, strengthened them with his teaching. He had, moreover, as his helper the celebrated Stephen, whom Meletius likewise dispatched to the contest; for he gave him as an excellent physician to the city of Germanicia, which was most dangerously ill with the disease of Eudoxius. For he had devoted himself to every kind of liberal learning in both sacred and profane disciplines. Nor did he disappoint the hopes conceived of him; for using his spiritual instrument, he converted even the wolves into sheep. In the same manner as Meletius, the illustrious Eusebius also acted when he returned from exile to Samosata."
[73] Baronius writes at the year 378, number 55, that at this time the following was also done by Meletius: "When he was visiting his diocese, restoring churches, and also visiting the monks in Syria who were subject to him, he found that Simeon Stylites had established his dwelling upon a column and had taken up a manner of life unheard of until then; [Not Meletius himself, but another Meletius, a Chorepiscopus, visited Simeon Stylites.] and when he had also observed him bound in iron, he ordered a smith to be summoned to loosen the iron bonds, adding this: 'For a man who loves God, the mind is a sufficient chain.' In all other respects he did not wish to deter him from his chosen way of life." Baronius insists on this point elsewhere, and concludes from it that Simeon, since he died in the fourth year of the Emperor Leo, in the year of Christ 460, must have been more than a hundred years old. The Metaphrast likewise in the Life of Saint Simeon (which, however, Baronius had not seen, for we were the first to publish it on January 5) considers that the Meletius who ordered Simeon to be freed from his iron chain was this very one of whom we treat, who, he says, "held the helm of the patriarchal throne of Antioch." But we, in the preliminary commentary to that Life, refuted that error and others in section 3, from more ancient writers. Theodoret certainly, whom Baronius cites, and from whom the Metaphrast described the earlier deeds of Simeon, though in a metaphrastic manner, says in chapter 26 of the Philotheus, in the Life of Simeon: "The admirable Meletius, appointed at that time to oversee the city of Antioch" --
"the admirable Meletius, appointed at that time to oversee the region of the city of Antioch, a man shining with prudence and understanding and adorned with keenness of intellect." From these words it seems manifestly established that this Meletius was not the Patriarch, but a Chorepiscopus. This matter is treated more fully in the cited place. And indeed, that many were given the name Meletius by their parents out of piety toward the great Meletius, Saint Chrysostom attests; one of these was perhaps this Chorepiscopus.
Section IX. Saint Meletius summoned to Constantinople for the Council by Theodosius. The episcopate confirmed to Saint Gregory the Theologian.
[74] While the events already described were taking place at Antioch, the virtue of Meletius was made manifest to Theodosius the Great in a remarkable way. For when Gratian had observed, as it is stated in the epitome of Aurelius Victor, that with the Goths, Taifali, and the Huns and Alans -- more atrocious than any plague -- possessing Thrace and Dacia as their native lands, the Roman name was in extreme peril, Theodosius, made commander of the army, defeats the Goths, he summoned Theodosius, a man most renowned for the nobility of his birth and his valor, and created him Master of Soldiers, and sent him with an army against the barbarians. Theodosius routed them successfully and, having wrought great slaughter, drove them to the Danube and beyond; and distributing his forces among the neighboring cities, he hastened to Gratian with the greatest speed, himself the messenger of his own victory. The matter seemed incredible to the Emperor; certain persons dared to insinuate a suspicion that he had lost his army and taken to flight. With incredible speed: Theodosius demanded that those who contradicted send messengers and learn how great a multitude of barbarians had been killed. The Emperor, assenting to his proposal, sent men to investigate the matter and report to him. So relates, in essence, Theodoret, book 5, chapter 5; Nicephorus, book 12, chapter 1; and Paul the Deacon in the Miscella, book 12, chapter 20.
[75] "And to this same excellent commander," says Theodoret in chapter 6, "while staying with Gratian, a certain divine
vision was presented by the very ruler of all things, God. He seemed to see the divine Meletius, Bishop of the Church of Antioch, He sees in a dream that he is crowned by Saint Meletius: investing him with the imperial cloak and placing upon his head a crown befitting that honor. Having seen this in the quiet of sleep by night, at first light he indicated it to one of his intimates. The man said the dream was clear and contained nothing obscure or ambiguous." This occurred in the month of January of the year 379, at about which time Sapor was at Antioch negotiating the settlement of the controversy among the orthodox, as may be conjectured from what has been said, or had perhaps already written to the Emperor about the disposition he had found in each party. "But only very few days had passed after that dream," as the same Theodoret says, "when those returned who had been sent to investigate the deeds accomplished by Theodosius, A few days later he becomes Emperor: and they reported that many thousands of barbarians had been slain. And so the Emperor, now fully persuaded that he had chosen that commander to the great advantage of the Republic, also designates him Emperor and, committing to him those parts of the Empire that Valens had governed, himself sets out for Italy." This was done at Sirmium, on January 16, as was said before from Socrates, or the 15th, as the Miscella has it; Idatius and Marcellinus say the 19th.
[76] Baronius at the year 379, number 4, says Theodoret errs in writing that Theodosius was created Emperor after obtaining a victory over the Goths; for it is established from Marcellinus that the Goths were defeated by Theodosius in many battles after he had been made Emperor. Yet Theodoret does not deny this, but asserts that in one battle beforehand the insolence of the enemy was checked -- the enemy who had otherwise devastated all Thrace and struck terror even into the royal city itself -- and that they were then forced to retreat to places near the Danube. And indeed, had this not occurred, would Gratian have securely returned to Italy, leaving Theodosius with no very great forces to face so enormous a burden of war -- he who had previously come from the West with an army to help Valens, who was supported by much greater forces? He defeats the Goths again and repeatedly, But once the enemy had been beaten, Gratian believed their strength and spirit would be less, even if they rebelled, and that Theodosius could safely be set against them. And the enemy did rebel, summoning the aid of other Scythian peoples; for in that same year 379 and the following, many victories were reported, as Idatius records. Therefore Nicephorus Callistus, book 12, chapter 6, after narrating the victory of Gratian (who had returned to the West) over the Alamanni, adds this: "Theodosius, having again engaged the barbarians near the Danube, defeated them in battle; And compels them to surrender: and those who survived that conflict, promising with prayers that they would henceforth be allies of the Romans, accepted the terms of peace, and having given hostages, came into the power of Theodosius. Having thus accomplished these glorious deeds, he came to Thessalonica on his way to Constantinople, where, entangled in a difficult illness, he seems to have stayed for a considerable time, He falls ill at Thessalonica, since he did not enter Constantinople until the year 380, on the eighteenth day before the Kalends of December, according to Idatius, or the eighth day before the Kalends according to some others."
[77] Now, the occasion by which Theodosius afterwards summoned Meletius to Constantinople must be traced back somewhat further. Constantinople was very deeply infected by the Arian heresy for forty years, and was now, as Saint Gregory of Nazianzus says in his poem on his own life, dead from a lamentable division of unbelief -- although the breath of life still retained some seed: Saint Gregory of Nazianzus goes to Constantinople, much infected by heresy, namely minds intact in faith, a small people indeed, but great in God's eyes (who counts not the multitude but hearts), faithful plants, honorable remnants. To these the same Gregory writes that he was sent by the grace of the divine Spirit, to help them and to bear arms for the faith, With many inviting him, many Pastors and many from the people calling him; and that he did not set out entirely of his own will, but was compelled by force. Baronius thinks, on the authority of the Synod of Antioch, With the approval of Saint Basil: held in September of the year 379 as we said, that he was sent there. Gregory the Presbyter, in his Life, says he was impelled by the divine Spirit to that expedition, so that he might fight there for the Spirit Himself; and that he immediately sought out the great Basil as an encourager, who anointed him, as it were, for spiritual combats, and that many Bishops and citizens of the royal city earnestly requested this of him. If this is true, it occurred long before that Synod of Antioch, which was not held until the ninth month after Basil's death.
[78] What he accomplished or suffered at Constantinople, both he himself in the same poem and Gregory the Presbyter in his Life relate. He was stoned by the populace, dragged before the tribunal of the Governor as a murderer; Having first suffered much. at length he bore such fruits of his patience and divine eloquence that he led an immense multitude of people back to the right faith. This being so, says the biographer, "Peter, Bishop of the great city of Alexandria, He converted very many, successor of that illustrious Athanasius in the pastoral office, sent a delegation to confirm for him the episcopate of Constantinople." Therefore designated Bishop by Peter of Alexandria: Gregory himself writes thus of Peter: "That Peter, arbiter of Pastors, first by most distinguished letters, free of all pretense, as the letters themselves will attest, clearly raises us to the throne and honors us with the very badge of the See."
[79] The same Peter soon after, whether moved by envy, or by some false report, or rather corrupted by gold, By whom Maximus the Cynic is presently opposed to him, sends certain men to Constantinople to ordain Maximus, recently converted from a Cynic philosopher to a Christian, as Bishop. When they attempted the deed, the people and clergy resisted. Wherefore, entering the house of a certain flute-player, they performed the ordination there. Then Maximus, says the biographer, "leading with him the company of Egyptian Bishops by whom he had been ordained, Afterwards rejected by the Emperor, went to the Emperor at Thessalonica and sought the episcopate of the imperial city from him ... But they are expelled thence, the Emperor pursuing them with anger and threats ... Then Maximus took ship for Alexandria, and having used the same arts to bribe some of Peter's friends with gold, he assails Peter himself with equal effrontery: 'Assert my right to the episcopate of the royal city,' he says, 'or I shall not refrain from attacking yours.' Driven from Alexandria. And indeed the man's audacious deed would have ended in clear disaster had not the Prefect of Alexandria, fearing sedition and bloodshed, driven Maximus from the city." Gregory of Nazianzus himself narrates the same events.
[80] "When matters were in this state," says the same author, "suddenly the Emperor came from Macedonia to Constantinople, having conquered the barbarians, and," as the biographer says, Theodosius comes to Constantinople in 380, "received Gregory the Bishop with the honor that was befitting his labors, and by a lengthy address declared his goodwill toward him, and said at last: 'O Father, God commits the Church to you and to your labors through me. Behold, I deliver to you the sacred temple and the throne.'" The same Emperor, having attempted to persuade the Arian Bishop Demophilus He receives Gregory kindly: to embrace the Nicene faith and bring his people back to concord, when the latter by no means acquiesced, expelled him from the city on November 26, as Socrates writes in book 5, chapter 7. He expels the heretical Bishop from the city: Then he magnificently conducted Gregory to the church and, against his will as Gregory himself later professed before him, placed him upon the throne, not without the applause of the Catholic people. "To the very end," says Gregory the Presbyter, "he could not resist being placed upon the throne. For a multitude of Bishops installed him in the archiepiscopal See, though he was unwilling and strenuously refusing." But this happened somewhat later.
[81] For since the Emperor desired that a firm peace be established among the Churches, so that not only heresies might be uprooted, He summons Bishops to the Council, but the orthodox Bishops and peoples themselves might cultivate mutual concord, and fearing lest what Maximus had already attempted through the Egyptians might at some point burst into a new conflagration, he wished to seek the judgments of many Bishops. And perhaps he was moved especially by the objection he heard raised by adversaries, that by the decrees of Ecclesiastical canons Gregory could not be translated from the See of Sasima to that of Byzantium. He therefore summoned
to a Synod the Bishops of his entire Empire -- but not the Egyptians, lest anything be disturbed by them; they were, however, afterwards called in to treat matters of faith. "At that time," says Gregory the Presbyter, "from the entire Roman Empire, except from Egypt and the Western parts, a holy Synod of one hundred and fifty Bishops was assembled, both to appoint a pious Bishop for the imperial city, and so that the heresies that had sprung up while the Arians were in power might be expelled from the Church by a decree of a General Council."
[82] Concerning that Council, Gregory himself says in his often-cited poem: "All the Bishops of the East, Especially Meletius, save Egypt,
as far as the New Rome, from the innermost recesses of land and sea, impelled by I know not what divine movement, assemble to confirm my throne." And the leader of all these was Meletius, of whom he says: "One of them," he says, An excellent man, "was the most devout Bishop, simple, of open character, full of God, of placid countenance, strong yet modest, presenting to those who beheld him a certain harvest of the Spirit. But who does not know whom our discourse designates? The head of the Church of Antioch, in whom the name matched the reality and the reality the name; for both his name and his character were honeyed." In Greek: "For both his character and his name were of honey."
[83] Socrates and Sozomen seem to indicate that Meletius was already at Constantinople before this. For Socrates says that after Demophilus was expelled, the Emperor did not delay in convening a Synod of Bishops who held the same views as himself concerning the faith, For he was not there before: both to confirm the doctrines of the Nicene Council and to consecrate a Bishop of Constantinople. Sozomen, book 7, chapter 7, writes that the Synod was assembled for the same reasons, "as quickly as possible." Then the same author adds that Meletius had already come to Constantinople before Gregory's consecration. Socrates has the same in book 5, chapter 5. Meletius came indeed before the Egyptians, but together with very many Bishops of Asia and Syria.
[84] Then there occurred what Theodoret narrates in book 5, chapter 7: "When the Bishops had arrived at Constantinople," he says, "the Emperor gave orders that no one should tell him which one was the great Meletius. He is recognized by Theodosius from his vision, For he wished to recognize him from the vision that had once been presented to him in his sleep. And so, when that entire assembly of Bishops entered the palace, leaving all the others behind he ran to the great Meletius; and like a most loving son, having after a long interval enjoyed the sight of his father's face, he embraced him and kissed his eyes, lips, breast, head, and the right hand that had placed the crown upon him. He is received most warmly, above all the others: Then he also related the vision that had once been presented to him while sleeping. Afterwards he received all the rest kindly, and as a son addressing his Fathers, asked them to take counsel on the matters proposed."
[85] "The Holy Synod," says Gregory the Presbyter, "installed Gregory upon the episcopal throne, having as the leader and standard-bearer of its judgment that great Pastor of the Antiochenes, Meletius, a man renowned for piety and faith, By him and the others the episcopate is confirmed to Gregory: who, while the Arians held power, had been expelled from his Church and, having suffered many hardships, had been punished with a long exile. What need is there to speak of his character? For he was gentle and fit for the conduct of affairs, temperate, just, strong, wise, and polished with every ornament of virtue. By his counsel and exhortation, the episcopate of the imperial city was confirmed to Gregory by a decree of the Council." Theodoret, book 5, chapter 8, seems to attribute this to Meletius alone: "When the divine Meletius had seen Gregory," he says, "and had considered the purpose of those who composed the canon -- namely that they had forbidden anyone to be transferred from one episcopate to another, in order to cut off occasions for ambition -- For the canons did not stand in the way. he confirmed for the most divine man the episcopate of the city of Constantinople." Nicephorus Callistus, book 12, chapter 10, writes that some objected this canon, but that Saint Meletius, whom he calls theoleptus (divinely inspired), judged that if ambition were absent, nothing whatever stood in the way of one who excelled others in both life and learning, or in either of these ornaments, being transferred to another Church, or if great public benefit was thought likely to result from it. Gregory himself, as it is said in his Life, though his spirit was averse to the episcopate, nevertheless, from love of the flock and because he expected that, if he held the imperial city, he might extinguish the contentions arising throughout the world as from a watchtower and bring the divided Churches to concord with both hands, did not refuse to accept the episcopate. But more on Gregory will be said in his Life on May 9.
Section X. The death of Saint Meletius, his funeral, translation, and annual celebration.
[86] After the See was confirmed to Gregory the Theologian, "a short time later," says Theodoret, "the divine Meletius departed to the life free from pain." Concerning his death, Gregory says in his poem on his own life: Saint Meletius dies: "The Bishop of the city of Antioch, whom I praised before, full of years -- both those measured by time and those exceeding all measure -- having (as I hear) exhorted his people to concord with many words, as he was frequently wont to do before, was snatched hence to the assembly of the Angels, and with great pomp and the concourse of the city, which, as report has it, bore that blow grievously, was conveyed back to his own Church, an immense treasure to those who recognized that good." Concerning his funeral, Gregory the Presbyter writes in the Life of the Theologian: "Saint Meletius, having died at Constantinople, Is honorably buried: was carried forth with so celebrated and honorable a funeral that the entire city poured itself out for it and shed a great flood of tears, and then especially could one perceive how great was the multitude in the city."
[87] "All who had any power of speaking," says Theodoret, "praised him in funeral orations." Only that of Saint Gregory of Nyssa survives, with this beginning: "The new Apostle has increased for us the number of the Apostles, he who has been enrolled in the order of the Apostles. For the Saints have drawn to themselves one similar in character -- He is praised in a funeral oration by Saint Gregory of Nyssa, athlete to athlete, crowned to crowned, pure of soul to pure of heart, herald of the word to ministers of the word. But our Father is to be counted blessed in the name of Apostolic fellowship and of his being dissolved unto Christ; while we are pitiable. For the premature bereavement does not permit us to proclaim the felicity of our Father. For him, indeed, it was better to be dissolved and be with Christ; but for us it is hard and painful to be deprived of our Father's protection. For behold, it is a time for counsel, and he who was wont to give counsel is silent. War surrounds us, heretical war; and there is none to serve as leader. The common body of the Church labors under infirmities, and we find no physician. See in what state our affairs stand."
[88] The same Gregory of Nyssa heaps up other encomiums of the same kind upon him in the same place. Indeed, even before him, another of the Fathers (perhaps the most eloquent Amphilochius, And others before him: says Baronius) had celebrated his praises in a sermon. Gregory of Nyssa himself attests this in these words: "You surely remember how the discourse delivered to you before this one of ours set forth the contests of this man: how, while he honored the Holy Trinity in all things, he preserved the honor even in the number of his contests, in that he fought through three onsets of temptations. I consider a repetition of what was well said to be superfluous. But perhaps it may not be untimely to say this: When the well-ordered and modest Church first saw this man, Endowed with the greatest and most illustrious virtues, it saw a face truly formed after the image of God; it saw charity welling up like a fountain; it saw grace poured about his lips; the highest degree of humility, beyond which nothing more can be conceived; it saw gentleness such as was in David; understanding and prudence such as was in Solomon; goodness such as was in Moses; perfection such as was in Samuel; chastity such as was in Joseph; wisdom such as was in Daniel; zeal for the faith such as the great Elijah possessed; bodily integrity such as adorned the sublime John; invincible love such as Paul possessed. It saw so many goods converging in a single soul. It was wounded by a blessed love; with a chaste and good love it loved its bridegroom. Therefore constantly beloved by the Church of Antioch. But before it could satisfy its longing, still burning with the force of love, it was left alone, as temptations called the athlete to the contests. And he indeed labored in the contests undertaken for piety; while she persevered in chastity, keeping faith with him. Already much time had elapsed, when a certain one, meditating adultery, assailed the conjugal bed; but the bride could not be corrupted. And again a return, again
exile." He adds other things, which have been recounted above in section 5, number 38. "But after they saw each other again, and the chaste love and spiritual delights of the soul were renewed, and the desire was again kindled, immediately this final journey abroad interrupted the enjoyment. He came to adorn us, as it were, a bride; nor did he undertake that in vain. Upon the splendid marriage he placed the crowns of blessing; he imitated the Lord: as the Lord at Cana of Galilee, so also did this imitator of Christ. For the Judaic water-jars, filled with the heretical water, he made full of pure wine, changing the nature by the power of faith. Often he set before you the sober bowl, lavishly pouring forth grace with his sweet voice; often he prepared for you a banquet of rational foods of every kind." These and many more things like them Gregory of Nyssa says in praise of Saint Meletius.
[89] Saint Meletius died in the year 381, on the twelfth of February or not long after. For after his death and translation, the matter of a successor was taken up, with Gregory the Theologian striving most vigorously He died on February 12, in the year 381. that Paulinus alone should preside over the Church of Antioch; for this, he argued, would conduce to the peace of the Church and to the establishment of concord with the Western Bishops, especially the Roman Pontiff. He himself narrates this in his celebrated poem, and the arguments he adduced for the purpose. He accomplished nothing, however, as very many consented to the election of Flavian. And when Gregory himself had begun to treat of resigning his episcopate, "shortly," he says, "God gave the issue. Before the Egyptian Bishops came to the Council: For there come, there suddenly come, those who had been summoned to be present for the establishment of concord" -- the Egyptian Bishops, with Timothy of Alexandria -- who principally brought it about that Gregory himself should yield the episcopate, whether willingly or under compulsion. Since, therefore, as Socrates attests in book 5, chapter 8, in the consulship of Eucharides and Evagrius (or Syagrius and Eucherius), in the year 381, in the month of May, the Bishops assembled, and among them the Egyptians who had arrived after the death of Meletius, along with the contentions over a successor, it is manifest that Meletius had died some time before.
[90] Whence one may refute what Marcellinus Comes writes in his Chronicle: that at Constantinople, through Timothy of Alexandria, Meletius of Antioch, He did not elect Nectarius as Bishop of Constantinople. and Cyril of Jerusalem, Bishops, Nectarius, having been baptized from a pagan and immediately ordained Bishop in the aforesaid synod. For how could Gregory as Bishop have treated of the succession to the already deceased Meletius in the assembly of Bishops, and thereby provoked the hatred of others against himself, if Meletius was still alive after Gregory had resigned his mitre, and himself ordained Meletius's successor? Sozomen indeed, book 7, chapter 8, reports that when Theodosius had ordered the Bishops each to write on paper the names of those they considered fit for the episcopate of the royal city and deliver them to him, the head of the Church of Antioch, having proposed others, added Nectarius in the last place, who had been commended to him by Diodorus of Tarsus -- and that the Emperor, moved by this endorsement, chose him as Bishop. But the one whom Sozomen calls "the Bishop of Antioch" and then "the head of the Church of the Antiochenes," he nowhere says was Meletius, But Flavian, though he had mentioned Meletius so many times before -- just as Nicephorus Callistus, book 12, chapter 12, calls him "the Bishop of Antioch," then "the head of Antioch." This was Flavian, as Baronius also judges at the year 381, number 70.
[91] The pomp of Meletius's funeral, which we said above from Gregory the Presbyter was numerous and magnificent, is thus described by Saint Gregory of Nyssa at the end of his funeral oration, addressing those who were to carry the body to Antioch: "Having this consolation, Brethren, you who transport the bones of Joseph to the land of blessing, hear the words of Paul's precept: 'Be not sorrowful, even as others who have no hope' 1 Thessalonians 4:12. Tell the people there, set forth the good tidings. The funeral of Saint Meletius was most thronged, Tell them of the miracle, well-nigh incredible: how, condensed like a sea, the populace of innumerable people formed one continuous body, all surging like water around the pomp of the tabernacle. How the glorious David, distributing himself in manifold and many ways into innumerable ranks, danced around the tabernacle among men of both different and the same language. How on either side fiery rivers, flowing in an unbroken stream with an uninterrupted succession of torches, With innumerable torches, extended as far as the eyes could see into the greatest distance. Recount the zeal of the whole people, the fellowship of the Apostles. How the napkins of his face were torn into pieces as a protection and safeguard for the faithful. Let the Emperor be added to the narrative, mourning on account of the calamity Many seeking relics, while the Emperor mourned. and rising from his throne; and the whole city passing together with the pomp of the Saint."
[92] Socrates briefly mentions the translation of Saint Meletius in book 5, chapter 9: "The kinsmen of Meletius transported his body to Antioch." More fully, Sozomen, book 7, chapter 10: "About the same time the relics of Meletius were translated to Antioch and deposited beside the tomb of Saint Babylas. They are said to have been, by order of the Emperor, brought within the walls into the cities along the entire imperial road, The relics were honorably translated to Antioch, contrary to the custom observed by the Romans; and to have been honored with alternating chants of psalms at every place, until they were carried all the way to Antioch." Nicephorus Callistus, book 12, chapter 14, has the same, and adds: "So great a longing for the man was impressed upon the minds of people, that they had his likeness formed on walls and panels and on the bezels of rings."
[93] These last details are drawn from the oration of Saint John Chrysostom, which he delivered at Antioch in the fifth year after the death of Meletius. We shall give it below, as it was long ago published by Lipomanus and Surius, but corrected according to the edition of our Fronto Ducaeus, The oration of Saint Chrysostom delivered five years later: who had collated it with two Greek manuscripts. From that oration, in the Second Council of Nicaea, or Seventh Ecumenical, testimony was recited in Act 4 by the Deacon Demetrius and the Armamentarius of the holy great Church of Constantinople, in support of the veneration of sacred images. The same had been previously cited by Saint John Damascene in his second oration On Images, near the end, in this manner: "The same John Chrysostom, in the oration in which he praised Meletius, Bishop of Antioch and Martyr, Saint Meletius called a Martyr by Saint John Damascene. and the zeal of those who had assembled, the beginning of which is: 'Casting my eyes over every part of this sacred flock,' etc." He calls him a Martyr because, although he was not killed, he nevertheless suffered very many things from the Arians, and much also from the Macedonians, who attacked the divinity of the Holy Spirit. Thus Gregory the Theologian hints of him:
"Who suffered much for the sake of the divine Spirit."
[94] We had obtained a Greek Life of Saint Meletius from the library of the Most Christian King, with this beginning: His Greek Life derived from Theodoret. "A brief Life of our holy Father Meletius, Archbishop of Antioch." But since it was excerpted from the history of Theodoret, in his very words, we did not think it should be given separately, since it seemed preferable to gather his acts not from that one writer alone but also from other more ancient sources.
[95] There exists this eulogy of Saint Meletius in the Greek Menaea on the twelfth day of February: "This man, on account of his extraordinary virtue Eulogy from the Greek Menaea; and his pure love for Christ, had won for himself the love of so many that even at the very beginning, when he first came to the city, and when the Lord's Day appointed for his consecration arrived, each person, led by eagerness for him, invited him into his own home, deeming their dwellings would be sanctified by his entrance. He had been at Antioch for thirty days, and not even complete ones, when he was expelled by the enemies of truth, the Emperor yielding to their perverse counsels, and God permitting it. But when that wicked persecution subsided, he returned and spent more than two years at Constantinople. Then again the Emperor's letters summoned him to Thrace, just as other Bishops from various provinces were converging there, they too having been summoned by imperial edicts, so that the Churches, breathing again after a long tempest, might at last find the beginning of peace and tranquility. Then, therefore, this great man, while he was held in the highest admiration by all, gave his soul back to God and rested in peace in a foreign land. The venerable Chrysostom and Gregory, Bishop of Nyssa, celebrated this blessed man with encomiums." The same is found in the Greek Anthologion of Antonius Arcudius Corrected: and in the Life of the Saints of Maximus of Cythera. But the statement that he spent more than two years at Constantinople is undoubtedly an error. For since he did not return to Antioch until after the death of Valens, perhaps in the autumn of the year 378, and since from that time to February of the year 381 only two years and some months intervened, what time would remain for the controversies we mentioned as agitated and decided at Antioch, and for the other things he is recorded as having done? And what did he do for so long at Constantinople? Why did Theodosius not find him there in November of the year 380? Or why would he have departed from Constantinople then, when an orthodox Emperor was arriving, under whose patronage he could have done much for religion? It seems, therefore, that he rather remained at Antioch after his return from exile for two years and a little more, and then, having gone to Constantinople, departed this life after less than two full months.
[96] On the same day as in the Menaea, his memory is celebrated in the Roman Martyrology, His name in the Martyrologies on February 12; February 14; June 10; and in Galesin, Molanus, and Canisius. Although Molanus in his first edition had placed him on February 14, as also Ferrarius. The manuscript Florarium has this on June 10: "At Antioch, of Meletius, Bishop and Confessor. He flourished in the year of Salvation 381." But Maurolycus on December 4, where he listed Saint Meletius as Bishop of Pontus, adds: "Likewise of another Meletius, Bishop of Antioch, December 4, who from Sebaste in Armenia was illustrious not only for his learning, but also was great for the sincerity of his life."
ORATION OF SAINT JOHN CHRYSOSTOM IN PRAISE OF SAINT MELETIUS.
Meletius the Great, Bishop of Antioch, Confessor (Saint)
Author: Saint John Chrysostom.
CHAPTER I
The devotion of the Antiochenes toward Saint Meletius.
[1] Casting my eyes about everywhere over this venerable and sacred flock, and beholding the entire city present here, I know not whom I should pronounce blessed first: Saint Meletius, that he enjoys such great honor even after death, or your charity, that you display such great goodwill toward your Pastors even after their departure. The Antiochenes are devoted toward Saint Meletius. For blessed is he who was able to instill so great a love in all of you; and blessed are you also, because having received the deposit of love, you have preserved it intact for him who deposited it continuously until now. For the fifth year has now passed since he departed to that Jesus whom he desired; and just as if you had seen him yesterday or the day before, with so fervent a love have you come to him today. Therefore he is today to be judged blessed, because he begot such sons. And blessed are you also to be judged, because it was your lot to have such a father. Excellent is the root and admirable; but the fruits too are not unworthy of this root. For just as some admirable root, hidden in the bosom of the earth, does not itself appear, but through its fruits displays the power of its virtue, so also the Blessed Meletius, laid in this casket, is not himself seen by us with the eyes of the body; but through you, who are his fruits, he displays the power of his grace. And even if we should keep silence, the feast day and the fervor of your devotion suffice to proclaim, louder than a trumpet, the love of Saint Meletius toward you as toward his children. For he so kindled your minds to love of him that you grow warm at the very name and are stirred at the very appellation.
[2] For this reason I too now, not carelessly but deliberately and by design, Even while he lived, they gave his name everywhere to their children, weave that name continually into my words; and just as one who plaits a golden crown and then inserts pearls, making the diadem more splendid with the profusion of gems, so I too, weaving a crown of praises for his blessed head, intertwine with my speech, like the profusion of so many pearls, the constant repetition of his name, hoping thereby to make it more pleasing and more resplendent. For lovers are wont to embrace even the bare names of those they love, and to grow warm at the very appellations. And this has happened to you also in regard to this Blessed one. For when you first received him on his entrance into the city, each person named his son after his name, each one thinking that by the name he was introducing that Saint into his own house; and passing over fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers, and mothers, they bestowed the name of the Blessed Meletius upon the children they had borne. For the love of piety conquered nature; and thenceforth those who were born were dear to their parents not only from natural affection, but also from their attachment to that name. For they considered the very name to be an ornament of their kinship, a guardian of their house, salvation for those so called, and a consolation of love. And just as those sitting in darkness, when one lamp has been lit, each lighting many lanterns carries one into his own house, so too, when that name fell upon the city like a light, each person, as it were lighting a lantern, introduced into his own house the name of the Blessed one, carrying it like a treasure of innumerable goods through his appellation. And what was done was a lesson of great love and piety. For since they were constantly compelled to remember that name and to embrace that Saint in their minds, they held this name as certain arms by which every irrational affection and thought was put to flight; and it was so common that everywhere -- at the crossroads, in the marketplace, in the fields, and on the roads -- this name resounded on every side.
[3] Nor were you thus affected merely toward the name, but also toward the very likeness of his body. And they vied in reproducing his image. For what you did with names, you also did with his image. For on the bezels of rings, and on cups, and on goblets, and on the walls of bedchambers, and everywhere, many have depicted that sacred image, so that they might not only hear the holy name but also everywhere see the figure of his body, and have a twofold consolation for his absence.
CHAPTER II
The exile and return of Saint Meletius.
[4] For as soon as he had entered the city, he was expelled from it, the enemies of truth driving him out. But God permitted this, wishing at the same time to display both his virtue and your fortitude. For when, having entered like Moses into Egypt, he had freed the city from the error of heresy, and having amputated the putrid and incurable members from the rest of the body, had restored perfect health to the multitude of the Church, the enemies of truth, not enduring the correction, The faith of the citizens having been confirmed, stirred up him who then ruled and expelled him from this city, expecting that they would prevail over the truth and overturn the correction of what had been done. But the opposite of what they expected came to pass: your zeal became more evident, After thirty days he is expelled by the heretics: and the demonstration of his knowledge, suited for teaching, shone forth the more brightly. His, because in thirty days, and not even complete ones, he accomplished so much that afterwards, when innumerable hostile forces assailed you, that doctrine remained unshaken and unwavering. And your fervor showed itself openly, because in thirty days, and not even complete ones, you received so carefully the seeds that had been cast by him that you sent roots down to the depth of the mind, and never thereafter yielded to any temptation whatsoever.
[5] It is worthwhile, moreover, not even to pass over what happened at the time of his persecution. He defends the Governor from stoning: For when the Governor of the city, riding in his carriage, was going out through the middle of the forum, and had made that Saint sit near him, stones thicker than snow were hurled from every side at the head of the Governor, the city by no means enduring the separation, but
rather wishing to be deprived of the present life than to see that Saint torn away. What then did that Blessed one do? When he saw the volleys of stones, he embraced and covered the Governor's head with his garments, at once putting his enemies to shame by his extraordinary gentleness, and teaching his own disciples how much patience one ought to show toward those who do injury -- and that one should not only do them no harm, but also, if danger threatens them from others, one should repel it with all zeal. Who then was not astonished, seeing both the passionate love of the city and the supreme philosophy, mildness, and gentleness of Meletius? For the events that then occurred were astonishing. The shepherd was being driven away, and the sheep were not scattered. The helmsman was being expelled, and the boat was not sinking. The farmer was being put to flight, and the vine was bearing more fruit. Since you were bound together by the bond of love, neither the temptations inflicted, nor the dangers threatening, nor the length of the journey, nor the passage of time, nor anything else could sever you from the companionship of your blessed pastor Meletius.
[6] But he was being expelled so as to be far from his children; He is sent as an exile to Armenia, his homeland: yet the opposite came to pass. For he was bound to you more tightly by the chains of love; and having taken the entire city with him, he set out for Armenia. And while his body was placed in his homeland, his mind and thought, raised aloft as if by certain wings by the grace of the Spirit, and perpetually dwelling among you, carried this whole people in his heart. And the same thing happened to you also. For while you sat here and were confined within the city, daily flying in spirit to Armenia, beholding the holy face and hearing the most pleasant and blessed voice, thus you returned. And for this reason God permitted him to be immediately expelled from the city: so that, as I said, God might show to the enemies who were waging war against you your firmness of faith, and his skill in teaching. And this is clear from the following.
[7] For after the first persecution he returned, and remained here not only thirty days, but months -- one year and two and more. For when you had given sufficient proof of your firmness in the faith, God gave you the ability to enjoy your Father pleasantly and securely; for it was the greatest delight to enjoy that holy countenance. Having returned, he is received with the utmost zeal of the people: For not only when teaching or speaking, but even if he were merely seen, it was sufficient to introduce all the teaching of virtue into the soul of those who beheld him. For when he came to you, and the entire city had gone forth to meet him, some indeed drew near and clasped his feet and kissed his hands and heard his voice; but others, prevented by the crowd, merely seeing him, as if they had received a sufficient blessing from his appearance and had not less than those who had been near, withdrew content. And what happened with the Apostles also happened with him. Acts 5:15 For just as with the Apostles, those who could not advance and come closer, when their shadow was extended and touched those who were far away, drew the same grace and withdrew healed in like manner; so also now, those who could not approach, as if sensing a certain spiritual glory emitted from that holy head and reaching those who were farthest away, all departed from him filled with every blessing from his mere appearance alone.
CHAPTER III
The death and translation of Saint Meletius.
[8] When it seemed good to the common God of all to call him from the present life and to take him up into the choir of Angels, not even this was done without purpose. Rather, the Emperor's letters summon him, since God had moved the Emperor; and they summon him not to a nearby place, but to Thrace itself. Why? So that the Galatians and Bithynians and Cilicians and Cappadocians, and all who inhabit the regions neighboring Thrace, might learn of our blessings; so that the Bishops who were everywhere throughout the world, He is summoned to Constantinople by Theodosius, looking upon his holiness as upon an archetypal model, and receiving from him an open example, might have the most certain and clearest rule of their duty in this office -- namely, how one ought to administer and govern Churches. For on account of the greatness of the city, and because the Emperor resided there, many from many places of the world were then flocking thither. And the Bishops of the Churches, since the Churches, breathing again after a long war and tempest, were receiving the beginning of peace and tranquility, To the ecumenical council. were all summoned thither by the Emperor's letters. Then therefore this Saint also went there. Daniel 3 Just as it happened with the three youths, when they were to be publicly proclaimed and crowned, the force of the fire having been extinguished, the pride of the tyrant trampled upon, and every form of impiety confuted, spectators had been gathered for them from the whole world. For the satraps, consuls, and governors who were everywhere throughout the world had indeed been summoned for another purpose, but they beheld those athletes; so it happened then too: a glorious theater was made for the Blessed Meletius. Bishops summoned for another purpose, who administered Churches everywhere throughout the world, came together and beheld that Saint.
[9] But after they had looked upon him and had accurately learned his piety, wisdom, and zeal for the faith, He dies. since he possessed in himself every virtue, perfect and complete, that befits a priest, then the Lord called him to Himself. And this too happened so that our city might bear it more lightly. For if he had breathed his last here, the weight of the calamity would have been intolerable. For who would have endured seeing that Blessed one breathe out his last breath? Who would have endured seeing those eyelids close, and his mouth shut, and him uttering his last commands? Who, beholding these things, would not have been beside himself from the magnitude of the calamity? Lest this should happen, therefore, God provided that he should breathe out his soul in a foreign land, The body is brought back to Antioch, so that in the intervening time, having prepared in advance for this greatest calamity, when we saw the body being brought in, we might not be thrown into consternation, since the mind had already been accustomed to mourning. And this is what happened. For when the city received that venerable body, it mourned indeed and lamented greatly; but it quickly checked its grief, both for the reason we have stated and for the one that is to be stated.
[10] For the gracious and merciful God, taking pity on our sorrow, quickly gave us another Pastor who beautifully reproduced and preserved the form of all that virtue. When he had ascended the throne, Flavian succeeds him, welcome to the people. he immediately divested us of our humble and mournful garment and extinguished our grief; and he renewed the more the memory of the Blessed Meletius. And the grief indeed grew slack, but the love was kindled more vehemently, and the sickness of soul was altogether removed. Although in the loss of those who are most dear, this is not what usually happens. Rather, when someone has lost a most dear son, or a woman her venerable husband, as long as she preserves a fervent memory of him, a more vehement grief is nourished in the soul; but when succeeding time has softened the grief, together with the vehemence of pain the memory too, which had flourished, is extinguished. But in the case of this Blessed Meletius, the opposite occurred. For the sickness of soul was entirely cast out, but the recollection did not depart together with the pain; rather, it increased more vehemently.
[11] You yourselves are witnesses, who after so long a time, The tomb devoutly frequented by the people. hover around the body of the Blessed Meletius like bees around a honeycomb. The reason was that the love toward him did not arise from nature, but from the reasoning of right discernment. Therefore the memory of Saint Meletius was not extinguished by death, nor did it wither with time; but it grows and receives greater increase, not only among those who saw him, but also among those who
did not see him. For this too is admirable: that those who were younger in his lifetime are also kindled with the same longing. And you elders surpass those who did not see him in this alone, that you associated with him and enjoyed the fruit of his holy companionship. But those who did not see him surpass you, in that though they did not behold the man, they show no less longing for him.
[12] Let us therefore all pray -- both magistrates and private citizens, both women and men, both old and young, both slaves and free -- taking the Blessed Meletius as a partner in these prayers (for he now has greater confidence, and a more fervent love for you), that this love may be increased for us, and that we may all obtain that, just as we are here near this casket, so there too we may be near his blessed and eternal tabernacle, and attain the eternal goods that are laid up in store. May it be granted to all of us to attain them, by the grace and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom be glory and power together with the holy and life-giving Spirit, now and always and unto the ages of ages. Amen.