ON ST. ATHENOGENES, MARTYR,
AT SEBASTE IN ARMENIA.
Perhaps under Diocletian.
CRITICAL COMMENTARY.
Athenogenes, Martyr, at Sebaste in Armenia (S.)
BY THE AUTHOR J. B. S.
§ I. When and on what day St. Athenogenes first began to be known in the sacred Latin Fasti.
That there was some illustrious Saint, Athenogenes by name, renowned for distinguished erudition and the glory of martyrdom, no one can teach us more surely than, of the Greek Fathers, the great bishop of Cæsarea in Cappadocia, St. Basil, From the words of St. Basil alone, whose distinguished testimony concerning St. Athenogenes is extant, related by Baronius in the Roman Martyrology at the XVIII of January, and a little more fully in the notes subjoined to the text of the same day. From the aforesaid Martyrology, Bolland, the first founder of the whole work, transferred him into our Acts at the said day, having nothing to add to the words of Baronius, since it is certain that no St. Athenogenes of any name was ever known to the Latin Fasti, Martyrologies, or other writers, except from the already mentioned passage of St. Basil alone, whence Baronius first received him and set him into the Martyrology, with this formula: "In the same place (in Pontus), of St. Athenogenes, the ancient theologian, who, about to consummate his martyrdom by fire, joyfully sang a hymn, which he also left written for his disciples." Now the words of St. Basil, from his book on the Holy Spirit to Amphilochius, chapter 29, are these: "But if anyone," he says, "knows the hymn of Athenogenes, which, as some other gift of farewell, he left to his disciples, now hastening to the consummation which is by fire, he knows also the opinion of the Martyrs concerning the Holy Spirit." Here you see the Saint praised, not as a merely private person, but as a man placed in some dignity, inasmuch as Basil adduces his authority as almost irrefragable.
[2] Whether rightly or wrongly Baronius judged that from the cited text of St. Basil, St. Athenogenes, until then plainly unknown to all the Martyrologies, St. Athenogenes was received by Baronius, should be added to the Roman, I do not here undertake to determine more laboriously; it is our business to set forth, with what effort and diligence we can, the entangled matters wherever they recur in the Lives of the Saints, Martyrologies, and ecclesiastical history, since no one will wonder that something should sometimes be found wanting in the most Eminent parent of the Ecclesiastical Annals, who has more attentively considered the immense mass of his work, attempted by none before him. Nor indeed was he free to borrow the name of Athenogenes from the Hieronymian codices, wholly unknown to him; which, even if he had known them, he could not have confused an obscure Martyr, inserted into them in the larger cohort of the XXIV of July, with the Athenogenes of St. Basil of the XVIII of January. Let his notation on the Roman Martyrology, on the already said XVIII of January, be heard, conceived in these words: "Of whom," he says, "there is extant a distinguished elogium of St. Basil in his book on the Holy Spirit to Amphilochius, chapter 29, who also cites him in testimony concerning the divinity of the Holy Spirit. There was also another of the same name, bishop of Sebaste, of whom in his place below." What he afterward conjectures about confusing Athenagoras with St. Athenogenes, neither does he himself dare to assert, nor did Bolland think it should be admitted. Let us examine Baronius' announcement.
[3] marked by him on the 18th of January, From it, first of all, it is most plainly clear that the Martyrologist himself had no Latin one whom he might show to have shone before him; not even the Greek Menology translated by Cardinal Sirleto, which elsewhere he used all too liberally, and uses also on the preceding day, the XVI of July, when he most expressly marks St. Athenogenes of Sebaste, as distinct from the former, in the same Roman, and strives to illustrate him with new notations. But neither was that St. Athenogenes ever known to the Latins for the XVI of July, except in Galesinius, sometimes the forerunner of Baronius, and at that time meriting the first palm in augmenting the Martyrologies, whether he summoned the Saints from his famous, so often shaken codex, or from elsewhere. So he reads on this day: "At Sebaste, of St. Athenogenes, bishop and martyr. He, in the reign of the Emperor Diocletian, seized on account of the cult of the faith by the governor Philomarchus, afflicted with a manifold kind of tortures, at last struck with the axe, attained to the palm of martyrdom." But thus in the notations he candidly confesses: "Of whom Metaphrastes writes; but we, what we have set into the Martyrology, we have drawn from the Greeks, who join to him ten fellow-martyrs, his disciples."
[4] an occasion being seized from the Pontic Martyrs; We have heard Galesinius, besides whom, concerning St. Athenogenes, on the same day, the XVI of July, only Molanus, in the later editions, augmented from the Greek Horologium, makes mention; but neither he nor any other, so far as I know, placed St. Athenogenes on the XVIII of January, except Baronius alone; the cause of which matter, if we inquire—namely why he announced that Saint on such a day—no other, at least probable, will occur, except that he supposed Basil to have spoken of some Saint belonging to Pontus, whence, an occasion being offered concerning the Pontic Saints Moseus and Ammonius on the aforesaid XVIII of January, he thought that the Basilian St. Athenogenes should be marked there rather than elsewhere, although for the rest St. Basil indicates, not even most remotely, neither the homeland, nor the age, nor the dignity, nor the arena of martyrdom of his Athenogenes. Sufficiently apposite is the observation of Castellani in his first Bimester of the Roman Martyrology edited with notes, at the XVIII of January, page 332, where, having premised the choice made by the people of Tortona (as he there himself will have it) of the day the XIX of January, that, an occasion being taken from Ammonius of Pontus, they might place some synonymous holy Bishop of their own, he subjoins that the Pontic province, in which Moseus and Ammonius had suffered, gave a handle to Baronius, to subjoin to them St. Athenogenes, who also suffered in the same place. The notation belonging to him will be found on his birthday, the XVII of July.
[5] That promised note, and the rest for the following months of the Roman Martyrology, although St. Basil made no mention of the homeland. Castellani, prevented by death, could not edit, nor could we gather from elsewhere what he thought more distinctly on that matter, since access to his manuscripts is not open to us: this much is certain enough, that he acknowledged only a single St. Athenogenes, and that he, as he briefly insinuated in his universal Martyrology, should be commemorated not on the preceding XVI, but on this XVII, whatever the Menology translated by Cardinal Sirleto, and some other Greeks, may have thought otherwise. For the identity of both, Tillemont also stands, in note 13 on the Persecution of Marcus Aurelius, tome 2, page 632, where he sets forth his doubts thus, so as to express his mind clearly enough, in almost this manner: "There is marked," he says, "on the XVI of July a certain St. Athenogenes, a Chorbishop, at Sebaste, beheaded with some others under Diocletian: and there are extant Acts of those Martyrs, ascribed to Metaphrastes, which bear no semblance of truth. Baronius asserts that this St. Athenogenes is not the one mentioned by St. Basil; which indeed he rightly says, if it is true that that man of Sebaste was not consumed by flames, but beheaded. But since that whole beheading is founded on authorities of very slight moment, it is more credible that there is but one and the same Saint, than that we should admit that a Martyr so illustrious, praised by St. Basil, remained altogether unknown to the universal Church."
[6] Besides Tillemont and Castellani, who touch the matter rather cursorily, Whether there were one or two synonymous Saints, I have found no one who has undertaken to examine that controversy even from afar, although it seems to deserve some inquiry, conducing at least to this, that, the weight of reasons and authorities being pondered, it may become a little clearer whether two Athenogenes are to be admitted, or rather they are to be confounded into one single one; while arguments do not occur which sufficiently persuade that one is to be admitted in Pontus, the other at Sebaste in Armenia, if we believe the Acts, a Chorbishop, with ten fellow-disciples. And to this will pertain especially three articles or propositions, which I do not think can solidly be called into doubt. And first, indeed, it seems undoubted that St. Basil, in his brief elogium of St. Athenogenes, does not indicate, even by a shadow, of what country he was, in what dignity established, where, at what time he lived, or under what tyrant he suffered. No less does it appear that neither could Baronius know anything pertaining to these things, so that consequently it is most uncertain whether St. Athenogenes ever saw Pontus, or made his martyrdom in it. As I take up the third article, it is evident to all who have even from the threshold saluted the Greek ecclesiastical tables, that some Athenogenes, as a Pontic by homeland, never came into their knowledge.
[7] The first proposition Baronius himself is compelled to admit, or rather a single one, is here inquired. when in tome 2 of the Annals, at the year 196, no. 7, he has thus: "Moreover, although the birthday of Athenogenes' martyrdom is held to be assigned as certain in the ecclesiastical tables, namely on the eighteenth day of January, yet at what time he underwent martyrdom is held unascertained." What, of what kind, and whence arose that certainty of the birthday of St. Athenogenes, we have already shown sufficiently; Baronius would have said more rightly that all things about the Saint are unascertained, except those alone which we said St. Basil to have proclaimed of him, from which this alone is held, that he was illustrious for Catholic doctrine and martyrdom. Equally certain is the second proposition, since besides St. Basil no one anywhere is cited who anywhere mentioned St. Athenogenes. The third, one must undergo the penalty of the book, as they say, and it will at once appear to the eye that all the Greek Synaxaria, Menæa, Menologies, and whatever among them is sacred, knew no other Athenogenes, except the one who was deformed from the Metaphrastic oration, from which this at least seems to be held, that on this day he received the crown of martyrdom, perhaps in the very city of Sebaste, or, if you will, at Pedachthoe, not far thence, about which I do not see that one must labor so greatly, provided that from so uncertain a Metaphrastic circumstance the Saint himself be not doubled. Now let us hear the Greeks.
§ II. Among the Greeks alone St. Athenogenes of Sebaste is marked on this or the preceding day.
This St. Athenogenes, It now follows that we consider whether from all the sacred tables of the Greeks a sufficient distinction is inferred, so that two holy Athenogenes should rather be reckoned, than one single one. We begin with Baronius, thus announcing the Saint from the Menology of Sirleto on the XVI of July: "At Sebaste in Armenia, of the holy martyrs Athenogenes the bishop, and his ten disciples, under the Emperor Diocletian." Then he thus observes in the subjoined notation: "The Greeks treat of the same on this day in the Menology; but Metaphrastes described their Acts, and reports them on the following day, and dissents from the rest, when he says that he rested in the Lord in peace, without the sword: whereas nevertheless, after many tortures, together with the rest, he is recorded as beheaded in the said Menology." What Baronius here records concerning the dissension of Metaphrastes, I fear indeed that, slipping in memory,
he either slipped, or read the text not entirely, at least less attentively: for the Legend in Lipomano, Surius, and in our Greek exemplar does indeed say that he rested "in much peace"; but it also most expressly everywhere affirms that he was struck with the sword. Here are the Greek words themselves, corresponding exactly to the Latin version: ἐκρούσθη τῷ ξίφει, καὶ οὕτως ἀπέδωκεν τὸ πνεῦμα αὐτοῦ ἐν πολλῇ εἰρήνῃ: "he was struck with the sword, and thus gave up his spirit in much peace." But let it suffice to have indicated these things in passing.
[9] in the Basilian Menology, To the question which we have in hand, the following words of the Baronian annotation pertain more: "This one is plainly different from that Athenogenes who, on the authority of St. Basil, it is agreed consummated his martyrdom by fire; of whom above." Doubtless the diversity of the martyrdom was the reason why Baronius thought that two synonymous Saints should be asserted, which whether it sufficiently proves the matter will then appear more clearly, when we shall have most faithfully set forth the Acts and elogia of the Greeks. Have first a brief compendium of the whole passion from the Menology of Basil, whose month of July, printed in Greek, you have at the end of the first tome of the said month, as we have often admonished elsewhere. Thus it is read there: "Athenogenes, the holy martyr of Christ, was by origin of Sebaste, in the reign of Diocletian. But when he had been seized by the governor together with his ten disciples, and had endured many tortures with them for the love of Christ, at last he received the end of life by the sword." In these and the following words the printed Menæa agree almost verbatim, yet in this more conformable to the Acts, that they express the name of the governor Philomarchus, so that it is clear enough that all flowed from the same very source; but let us pursue the other words of the Basilian elogium, in which the whole marrow of the Acts is contained. Thus plainly they have it:
[10] "But it is said that, before he was seized, having withdrawn to the monastery, related in the other Greek tables on this or the preceding day, he did not find his disciples, for they had already been taken before; but to a hind, which he had reared in the monastery, meeting him, he well prayed, and asked that neither it nor its fawns should be taken by hunters; but that every year, in memory of him, both it and the offspring that should be born from it should bring one fawn; which is also seen to have been done: for after the reading of the holy Gospels the hind is seen to enter the church, and to offer her fawn to the Saint, and again to go out: which those who are gathered there, slaying, keep a festive day to the glory and honor of the holy Martyr." Whether all these things can be admitted prudently and safely enough on the credit of Metaphrastes, or of any other paraphrast, I do not dispute at length; this is true, as I was already saying, that the chief marrow of the Acts of St. Athenogenes is comprised in these, in which I do not think it worth while to linger longer: now it is permitted to run through the other Greek tables, manuscript Menæa, Calendars, and Ephemerides, although I hold it clear that nothing more of substance can be drawn thence. Let us enumerate the chief ones in order, whether they treat of the Saint on this day, or on the preceding day.
[11] Of the printed Menæa and the common Menology enough has been said. everywhere the same is indicated, Of St. Athenogenes treat nearly all our manuscripts, the printed Typicon of St. Sabas, the Supplement to the Greek Menæa collected from the Synaxarion of Sirmond and the manuscript of Chifflet, and the Menæa of the Ambrosian Library, with the Greek Horologium cited above and Maximus, bishop of Cythera. Add the Syriac or Chaldaic Calendar printed at Rome in 1624, and translated at Rome for our Elders, likewise the Slavo-Russian, and the Greco-Muscovite Ephemerides before tome I of May, where in the figured Calendar he is said to be noted by initial letters only: in the metrical Calendar he is thus expressed:
Ὀξὺ Ἀθηνογένην ξίφος ἔταμην ἑξ δεκάτῃ τε. The sword slew Athenogenes on the sixteenth.
As here, so in all the rest, almost only the passion or the beheading is expressly announced, so that you may not at all doubt that from the aforesaid Acts, whether Metaphrastes or some more ancient one composed them, that received announcement among the Greeks proceeded, resting therefore on no greater authority than the source itself whence it is shown to have flowed.
[12] Moreover, in that whole Metaphrastic narration, however much most things displease, The bishop of Sebaste or chorbishop. this at least seems able to be tolerated, that St. Athenogenes, perhaps of Sebaste by origin, was there probably a bishop, or, as the Acts say, a chorbishop; that he had disciples, if you will, as he was a man most learned no less than most holy, and gloriously underwent martyrdom with them; of all which there is nothing that contradicts the words of St. Basil; so that thus far nothing at all hinders that the Basilian Athenogenes may be one and the same with the Metaphrastic, even if one should contend that all those stupendous, shall I say inept, miracles are to be admitted, which how much they are to be esteemed we shall weigh in the following paragraph; whither the examination of the Acts or passion leads us, from which what can be more probably concluded will be more easily understood, the fullest liberty of thinking otherwise being left to each: for that we in no way shrink from adopting synonymous Saints, even were they many, is clear from the whole work; this in this paragraph we have undertaken to prove, that only St. Athenogenes, bishop and martyr of Sebaste, is found marked in the published ecclesiastical tables of the Greeks; concerning whom we inquire, whether it is necessary to distinguish him from the Basilian.
§ III. From the Metaphrastic Acts, of no or of very slight credit, it is not proved that there were two.
The identity is not overthrown, There remains therefore the chief difficulty which can here be opposed, and in a manner decisive, that the already praised St. Athenogenes in the Greek tables, bishop or chorbishop of Sebaste, is most expressly everywhere said to have been beheaded, or struck with the sword, as we said is expressly read in Aloysius, tome 6, in Surius on the XVII of July, and also in that interpretation of the Greek Acts which we have prepared, which we do not esteem so highly as to judge it worthy to occupy a place here; it is enough to have rendered from the Greek in the preceding paragraph the disputed passage in which the knot of the question turns. But this striking with the sword fights almost diametrically with what the great Basil narrates of his Athenogenes in the place cited above, on the Holy Spirit to Amphilochius, chapter 29, of which I also exhibit these Greek words: ὁρμῶν ἤδη πρὸς τὴν διὰ πυρὸς τελείωσιν; the consequence therefore is what was inferred above, that the St. Athenogenes whom St. Basil so greatly celebrates, and whom we said was marked by Baronius on the XVIII of January, is different from him whom we have just shown all the Greeks to venerate with so great consensus, either on this XVII of July or on the preceding day.
[14] The Greek Acts here neglected, To the solution of this argument a brief analysis of the Acts, such as they are, will contribute, from which it may more openly appear that all things were fabricated for astonishment and for prodigies, wonderful to credulous men, in which the Greeks abound. We translated them into Latin, as has already begun to be said, from the Vatican codex marked no. 819, which also exist in the Turin Library, and we compared them with that interpretation which exists in Lipomano and in Surius, and thus we found them to agree, so that though they perhaps differ a little in words or phrase, in the matter itself they altogether agree. But since these have already been given to the press more than once, it can hardly be taken amiss that here they are neglected by us. The exordium, no more proper to those Acts than to any others whatever, is thus: "In the reign of Diocletian a great fury raged against the Christians, so that all who were zealous for piety came into danger. The whole world therefore was thrown into confusion by the terrible madness of the Emperor. Very many delivered one another to death, the father the son, the brother the brother, the friend the friend, for fear of the persecutor. Now a certain governor entered the city of Sebaste, by name Philimarchus, who ordered flute-players to play before him, and cymbals to be clashed, and the priests of the idols, bearing garlands, to perform sacrifices. Then, sitting on the tribunal, he said through a herald, etc."
[15] You would say that at that time all the governors were deputed by Diocletian not to the administration of provinces or cities, which are of no great credit, but to the mere butchery of the Christians. A certain time of the martyrdom is not drawn out from that whole composition, not even by a shadow. But if the combat of St. Athenogenes belongs to the last years of the Diocletianic persecution, martyrdoms a little more certain in Baronius at the year 311, no. 20, and in others, mark another governor of Armenia, so that if our Saint's passion is to be brought back to that, that governor Philimarchus or Philomarchus may deservedly be said to be either fictitious or summoned from elsewhere. Nor does the Cornicularius intruded a little after please more, by name Nicolaus, who comes on the scene as the accuser of St. Athenogenes. Of the Cornicularii Baronius treats in note 2 on the XXI of August, assigning to them a place which does not seem greatly to suit that Nicolaus. But whether the monastery of Pedachthoe, or the place which some will have to have been proper to archbishops, truly existed at Sebaste, it is not worth while to inquire here. The captivity of the companions, the master being absent, his laments, the meeting of the hind which kissed him, his wondrous blessing, the Saint's voluntary approach to the governor, and the ensuing dialogues between him and the Martyrs, are neither conceived nor arranged in such a way as to add anything of worth or esteem to that whole history.
[16] There follow tortures inflicted in various ways, up to the slaughter of all the companions, from those here adduced, which being accomplished, some things are subjoined, which I have judged worthy of more attentive observation. "The holy Martyr asked the governor, saying: I beg you, governor, order me to be led to the monastery and there to be consummated. And the governor so ordered. Then the Saint, led with a cheerful spirit, sang: 'The God of vengeance has acted freely.' But as he drew near the monastery, the hind met him, and kissed his feet. The Saint said to her: You are bereft of your brethren, behold you are bereft also of him who nourished you. May the God of all ages not permit that anyone lord it over you, nor that hunters take your seed, but may your seed bear offspring in memory of us, and be consummated in the praise of God. But the hind, weeping, fell at his feet: but the holy Martyr, signing her, said: Go in peace." How aptly these things are arranged also to produce belief, everyone sees: hear further what is recorded of the same hind below, plainly similar to those things which we related from the elogium of the Basilian Menology: "But the hind is present at the commemoration of the Holy martyrs, bringing as a gift to God a fawn, and, the Gospel being read, she approaches the altar, all beholding, and, her knees set down, she prays, and, the young one left behind, returns in peace to her place. The fawn, moreover, is consumed to the glory of God and to the honor of the Holy martyrs."
[17] by a few specimens, The same vein savors the Saint's prayer, poured out to God in these words: "Grant, O Lord God, that whoever shall keep our memory may obtain unceasing blessing. To all also who invoke thee through us, give grace, O Lord, that whether they be found in error, or in great
necessity, or in fearful judgment, or in evil dreams, and shall invoke thy holy name, O Lord, in the name of thy servant, show them thy mercy, O Lord, and fulfill their requests." As the Saint thus prayed, a heavenly voice was made to him, saying: "Rejoice, my athlete Athenogenes, my chosen one; today you shall be with me in paradise with your disciples. But concerning the grace which you asked of me, behold, I have granted you your petitions: whoever shall ask me in your name, and in whatever house your memory shall be kept, they shall be freed from all affliction and necessity, and all sins shall be given over to oblivion. You shall be my chosen ones, the protection of all widows, and the nourishment of orphans; the refuge of strangers, the dispensation of the poor, physicians of the sick, persecutors of evil spirits." And when this voice of the Lord had been made to him, he was struck with the sword, and thus gave up his spirit to God in much peace … But their memory is kept according to the Roman rite on the XVII of July. These are the words of the Legend, as they have been rendered by me into Latin.
[18] it is abundantly gathered. But from these specimens of the Acts, well weighed, it is sufficiently proved, I think, that that whole Legend is a drama artificially embellished, and painted with many marks of forgery, so that for rejecting the history nothing at all seems to be lacking; which being rightly weighed, no prudent, no sensible man would dare to call into doubt that the sole authority of St. Basil is to be esteemed more than the medley of Acts and elogia, confusedly and fabulously digested. Whence I do not fear to assert this last thing, that the true St. Athenogenes consummated his martyrdom by fire, whether he had companions or not; whether they were consumed by the same or by another kind of death: whether in the very city of Sebaste, or not far thence, I do not undertake to determine; certainly that there was but one, I think is sufficiently clear from what has already been alleged. And let these things said of him suffice. But as to what Baronius records, at the year 311 cited above, concerning the translation of the relics of St. Athenogenes, from the not a little suspect Acts of St. Gregory the Armenian, it in no way stands against the opinion proposed by us, from wherever they may have been brought; concerning which matter it can be treated when the aforesaid Legend of that holy Gregory shall be examined expressly at the XXX of September.