ON ST. ONESIMUS AND HIS COMPANIONS, MARTYRS.
AT POZZUOLI IN CAMPANIA.
From the proper Office.
CommentaryOnesimus, Martyr, at Pozzuoli (St.)
His Companions, Martyrs, at Pozzuoli.
J. B. S.
We cite the Office, which alone could be cited, since we are entirely destitute of other monuments: the Office, I say, which was first granted to the people of Lentini in Sicily by Pope Paul V in the year 1608, and in the immediately following year 1609 extended also to the people of Pozzuoli, Saints previously unknown but published at Rome at the press of Jacopo Mascardi in the year 1612, as is clear from the instrument itself, communicated to our Elders by Fr. Antonio Beatillo, of which this is the first face: The Office of Sts. Onesimus, Erasmus, and their companions, martyrs, approved by our most holy Lord Paul V, supreme Pontiff, and to be celebrated in the city of Pozzuoli and its diocese by clerics both secular and regular. And these things are read on the opposite face: To the most illustrious Lords, the Chapter and clergy of the church of Pozzuoli: for entering upon and preserving goodwill between the cities of Pozzuoli and Lentini, which are numbered under the patronage of the same Saints; Agathinus Castilionius, apostolic protonotary and canon of Lentini, gave this as a gift at Rome, 1612. There follows the Office itself for the 31st of July, of double rite. Behold now the lessons in the second nocturn.
[2] Lesson IV. Onesimus, seized in the persecution of Decius together with Alphius, we produce them from the Lessons published at Rome in 1612 Philadelphus, Cyrinus, Erasmus, and thirteen other disciples in Vasconia, where he was scattering the seed of evangelical salvation, is brought to the prefect Nigellio: in whose presence, intrepidly asserting that Jesus Christ is to be adored with divine worship, he is battered on the jaws with a stone. Then the rest, roused by his example, cry out: We too are Christians; do not dismiss the disciples unpunished while you torture the master: come, join us to the same contest, whose judgment is the same. I will join you, says Nigellio, to your wicked teacher. Wherefore he tortures them the whole day, suspended by their hair.
[3] Lesson V. On the next day, with their hands bound behind their backs, whose text here sent to Rome to Decius, they are handed over to Licinius Valerianus, who first ordered the Saints, their hands and feet fettered with a very heavy log, to be held in custody: where by the holy Apostles Peter and Paul (their chains loosed in their very sight) they are inflamed to endure the torments. After some days, called to interrogation, they reprove the whole senate for the vain superstition of idols. Then Valerianus, thinking he must proceed by blandishments, promises honors and riches if they will bring themselves to fall away from Christ. But when he perceived that no room was given to his promises, having had them sharply beaten with scourges, he dismisses them to Diomedes, prefect of Pozzuoli.
[4] Lesson VI. Then Diomedes to Onesimus: Have you, he says, deceived the simple minds of the young men with depraved doctrines? it seemed good to report, I, he answered, did not deceive them, but, rescuing them from ignorance, led them into the way of truth. Enkindled by these words, the prefect orders Onesimus to be crushed with a huge stone. Wherefore the holy teacher, commending his most holy soul to the Lord, triumphed over the tyrant. And Erasmus and the thirteen fellow-disciples are beheaded outside the city about the Kalends of August. Whose bodies were buried by the Christians: but the body of Erasmus, pointed out beforehand by divine admonition, was carried off by St. Neophytus the bishop to Lentini, and honorably laid in the tomb of the holy brothers. Both the approbation and grant of the sacred Congregation of Rites—both to the people of Lentini on the 15th of March 1608, and to the people of Pozzuoli on the 27th of July 1609—you have at the foot, subscribed by Domenico, bishop of Ostia, Cardinal Pinelli, and by Giovanni Paolo Mucanzio, Secretary.
[5] liable to many difficulties. Ferrarius transcribed that whole history almost word for word in his Catalogue of the Saints of Italy, citing the already-mentioned Office of the church of Lentini, which he again names in his general Catalogue on this very day, on which we are compelled to confess plainly unknown both Onesimus, and Erasmus and his companions, in all Martyrologies or sacred Calendars whatsoever—at least those which are found in our whole Museum: how rare a thing this is, there is no need for me to pursue at length. We confess besides that the lessons already set forth agree neither in places, nor in times, nor in the deeds recounted. The Martyrs, seized in Vasconia (a region well enough known, near the Pyrenean mountains), all marked with Greek names, are on the next day sent to Rome to Decius, and handed over to Licinius Valerianus: thence, transmitted to Pozzuoli, Diomedes tortures them, who, after Onesimus the master had been crushed with a huge stone, beheads also Erasmus and the thirteen fellow-disciples outside the city, so that you cannot at all understand whither Alphius, Philadelphus, and Cyrinus vanished. For the rest, those adjuncts, of whatever sort, being left aside in the middle, so that the substance of the matter may be saved,
[6] The distinction of the Onesimuses not sufficiently obvious A chief question may be raised, whether this holy Onesimus is to be confused with him or with those of whom treatment was made on the 16th of February, where it is left doubtful enough whether Onesimus the slave of Philemon, of whom the Apostle writes, is the same as the bishop of Ephesus of the same name—a matter on which it will be possible to dispute at that day, when this month shall be supplemented and enlarged, as has already been said more than once in this work. As for what pertains here, Henschenius sufficiently observed it, and now it seems most certain that today's Onesimus, whoever he was, is to be distinguished from both; of whom we know no Acts to be found, at least such as could be safely admitted; not those which Henschenius examined in the cited place and which are extant in Surius from the Metaphrast; nor those which Papebroch most laboriously discussed on the 10th of May concerning Sts. Alphius, Philadelphus, and Cyrinus; where you will find the things which most grievously offend in our Lessons explained a little more tolerably.
[7] nor a way of restoring the Acts. More tolerably, I say, for after applying whatever effort, Papebroch left this written in his own hand concerning St. Onesimus: See the notes in May on the Life of Sts. Alphius etc. I should prefer to apply here the Acts placed on the 16th of February from Lipomanus and Surius, the things that must be withdrawn being withdrawn; and to reject these as fictitious. Which of the two are to be preferred, I would not for my part venture to define. If anything from the Metaphrastic oration can be fitted to this our St. Onesimus, it will at last be reduced to this, that he suffered at Rome, and completed his martyrdom with his companions at Pozzuoli, three others—if we believe their Acts—having obtained the same crown in Sicily at Lentini: If you desire to read more of these things, consult the already-mentioned Acts, and Surius, whose long oration, deservedly passed over by Henschenius and in some manner rejected to this place, we have not judged should be reprinted, since besides commonplaces far too common to the Metaphrast, it has nothing much of substance that is more proper to our holy Onesimus or his companions than to almost all the rest of the holy Martyrs: quite many things are said, very unskillfully connected and stitched together, in the Lessons, so that here it seems safer to abstain from other things equally obscure and uncertain.