ON SAINT THOMAS, PATRIARCH OF CONSTANTINOPLE.
THE YEAR 610.
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY.
Thomas, Patriarch of Constantinople (Saint)
[1] The chronology of the years during which this holy Patriarch presided over the Church of Constantinople is confused in some accounts. Baronius in the Annals assigns two years and seven months to his See, and places his creation in the year 606 The time of the See is confused in some accounts and his departure from this life in the year 608, as may be read under the said years. The Chronology of Nicephorus is cited, in which, however, these words are read in the Catalogue of the Bishops of Byzantium: "57th. Thomas, Deacon of the same Church and Sacellarius, 3 years, 5 months." Which are thus given in Latin in three editions: "LVII. Thomas, Deacon of the same Church and Sacellarius, 3 years, 5 months." That three years are assigned to his See by the other authors will be established with certainty from what follows. But five months are reckoned from the death of his predecessor Cyriacus, although the See was vacant for nearly three months. Some occasion for these five months was also provided in the Chronology of Theophanes under the fourth year of the Emperor Phocas, where these words are found: "When Patriarch Cyriacus had been taken from the living, Thomas, his Deacon and Sacellarius of the same Church, is ordained on the eleventh day of the month of October." But we do not doubt that this passage of Theophanes is disturbed, indeed that an entire year, which is to be established as the fifth of Phocas, is missing -- either omitted through some ignorance or afterwards expunged -- which was for Theophanes the year 599, according to our common Era the year 607. But we treat of this matter elsewhere.
[2] Concerning the death of Cyriacus and the substitution of Thomas, everything is clearly set forth by a more contemporary author in the Alexandrine Chronicle, and indeed under the fourth year of Phocas and the ninth Indiction these words are read: "This year Cyriacus, Patriarch of Constantinople, When Cyriacus died on October 29 of the year 606 died on the twenty-ninth day of the month of Hyperberetaeus, that is October among the Romans, a Saturday, and the funeral was conducted on the thirtieth of the same month, a Sunday, and the body was placed according to custom in the church of the Holy Apostles." The year then was 606, in which, with the solar cycle 27 and the dominical letter B, October 29 fell on a Saturday and the following day on a Sunday. Then in the same Chronicle, under the fifth year of Phocas, Indiction 10, these words are read: "This year, Saint Thomas is substituted on the twenty-third of January in the month of Audynaeus among the Romans, Thomas was created Patriarch of Constantinople, January 23 of the year 607 a Deacon of the Great Church and Sacellarius of the Patriarch and superintendent of the examination of ordinands." Afterwards, under the eighth year of the Emperor Phocas, Indiction 13, the death is thus indicated: "This year, in the month of Dystrus, which is March for the Romans, died March 20 of the year 610 on the twentieth day, which fell on a Friday, Thomas, Patriarch of Constantinople, dies, and on the twenty-second of the same month, a Sunday, he is committed to the earth." This year was 610, in which, with the solar cycle 3 and the dominical letter D, Friday corresponds to the twentieth day of March, and the following Sunday to the twenty-second of the same month. Saint Thomas therefore sat for three years and two months less two days, if both the day of consecration and of death are included, and thus up to his burial two months could be reckoned. Nicephorus Callistus, book 18 of the Ecclesiastical History, chapter 44, reports these things about Saint Thomas: "Cyriacus, Bishop of the city of Constantinople, he built a house in the Patriarchate having passed eleven years in his sacred ministry, left that See to Thomas, who, having discharged the office of Deacon and Sacellarius in the Church, ascended to the pontifical throne. He, having performed the sacred ministry for three years and no more than two months, yielded the See to the impious Sergius. This Thomas built a very great house in the episcopal buildings, which house, having received its name from its founder, retains it to the present day, and is called the Thomaitis." The same three years and two months of the See of Saint Thomas are given by the Greeks in their sacred calendars, of which we must now treat.
[3] He is praised in the Menologion of the Emperor Basil On this same March 20, on which the death of Saint Thomas is recorded in the Alexandrine Chronicle, his sacred commemoration is inscribed in the Menologion composed in the tenth century by order of the Emperor Basil the Younger, and this eulogy is read: "And the commemoration of our holy Father Thomas, Patriarch of Constantinople. This holy Father of ours, Thomas, on account of his excellent virtue and supreme prudence and piety, was ordained Deacon of the Great Church and Sacellarius by our holy Father, and the one greatest in working miracles, called John the Faster, during the reign of the celebrated and blessed Maurice. After the death of this John and his successor in the episcopate, Cyriacus, he was ordained Patriarch of Constantinople, and he held that episcopate for three years and two months. He fought very much against heresies and put the heretics themselves to shame with confusion; on account of his zeal for the orthodox faith he established the orthodox faith and doctrine, and administered his flock well and according to the good pleasure and precept of God. He instructed the pious Emperors admirably, and appeared venerable to the Senate and the entire priestly order. After these things, seized by adverse health, rejoicing and exulting, as was fitting, he passed to heaven." The same words, with a few omitted at the end, are read in the ancient manuscript Greek Synaxarion of the Clermont College of the Society of Jesus at Paris, and in the printed and manuscript Menaia, and in Maximus Cytheraeus in his Lives of the Saints, but in these under March 21, and in other Menaia but the nineteenth in the said Synaxarion, on which day in the Greek manuscript Menaia preserved in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, the Translation of the relics of Saint Thomas, Patriarch of Constantinople, is celebrated; but the twenty-second of this same month marks his death or falling asleep.
[4] The Patriarch John who is praised above, surnamed the Faster, is venerated by the Greeks on September 2 in the Menaia already cited, formerly created Deacon by Saint John the Faster the Synaxarion, and the Menologion of the Emperor Basil; in the portion of which published by Ughelli in volume 6 of Sacred Italy, he is praised as a man of the most singular example of all right conduct, and the various miracles for which he was renowned are indicated. He is said to have been ordained, according to Theophanes, on April 12 of the year 582, while the Emperor Tiberius was still living, and to have died in the year 594, when he had presided over the Church for thirteen years. Cyriacus was then substituted for him, whom we have shown above to have departed this life on October 29 of the year 606.
Under these Patriarchs, Saint Thomas was a Deacon of the Great Church, which was dedicated to Holy Sophia or Eternal Wisdom, and a Sacellarius, among whose other duties was this: to escort the one to be ordained to the priesthood, and Sacellarius and to stand at the side of the Grand Oeconomus -- as, regarding the first part, is indicated concerning Saint Thomas in the Alexandrine Chronicle in these words: "He became Sacellarius of the Patriarch and superintendent of ordinations," that is, Prefect of those to be ordained to the priesthood. Among the excerpts of Leo Allatius, "the Sacellarius presents the one about to be ordained to the priesthood." Concerning other offices of the Sacellarius, more may be read in Codinus Curopalates on the offices of Constantinople and his commentators Gretser and Goar; and we have spoken of various matters elsewhere, as on February 13 in the Life of Pope Saint Gregory II, number 3.
[5] In the same period there flourished Saint Theodore Syceotes, who from being a celebrated Archimandrite was elected Bishop of Anastasiopolis, whose Acts, composed by his disciple and praised in the seventh General Synod, Action 4, we shall present on April 22, first published by Lipomanus. From these we excerpt the following matters pertaining to the life of Saint Thomas. Thus the following concerning Saint Theodore begins: "When supplications were being made in the neighboring towns and the crosses that are customarily carried were shaking and moving by themselves in a horrible and pitiable spectacle, the divine man, being asked what this meant, responded: 'Appease God with prayers, O sons, for great calamities threaten the world.' he donates sacred relics to be placed on a Cross Now Domitius, a most illustrious Patrician, had promised that he would have a golden cross made for the purpose of supplication and adoration. And so the holy man sent Epiphanius the Deacon to him. When he had given the gold to the goldsmith, the Patrician asked the Deacon to tarry while the goldsmith completed the work. And the most holy Patriarch Thomas, who had succeeded Cyriacus of blessed memory in the Pontifical See of the Royal City, praising the piety of the glorious man, himself also gave a particle of the venerable wood of the Holy Cross, a particle of the holy sepulcher of our Savior God, and a particle of the veil of the most holy Mother of God, to be placed in the center of that Cross which was being fashioned from gold."
[6] "He then inquired of the Deacon himself whether that motion of the crosses, which was said to have occurred in the region of the Galatians, had been real. he invites Saint Theodore Syceotes to himself When the Deacon affirmed it, the most blessed Patriarch was greatly afraid, and full of anxiety wrote a letter to the servant of God, asking him to set out as quickly as possible to the Royal City ... Having therefore entered the Royal City, he was received by the most blessed Patriarch Thomas with honor and great joy. And when they had exchanged greetings, he presented to him his disciple John, and commending the holiness of his life and character, asked that he appoint him superintendent of the monasteries. The most holy Patriarch did this immediately, bestowed the pallium, and sent him ahead to the holy monasteries. The Emperor Phocas also took care to summon him, for he lay tortured by pains of the hands and feet. When the holy man had entered and laid his hands upon him and prayed, the Emperor, being relieved, asked him to pray for himself and his pious empire. Whereupon the holy man admonished him to restrain himself from afflicting men and shedding blood, if he wished his prayers to be heard by God. When he had taken leave of the Emperor, the most blessed Patriarch Thomas asked him, out of his goodwill toward him, to lodge with him, and to beseech God that they might be found together in the heavenly life. And he inquired of him whether that wondrous motion of the crosses in the supplications had been real. after suppliant prayers he understands the coming miseries When he understood that it had been true, he began to implore the holy man to indicate what that sign portended. Then the Saint refused, calling himself abject and humble, and saying he did not know what to answer to the questions. The Patriarch prostrated himself at his feet and declared he would not rise unless he complied with him in this matter. 'For I know,' he said, 'that not only this sign but many other things are known to you; for you have not neglected this matter up to this day. But if you had neglected it, it would still be revealed to you, if you ask God.' When the servant of Christ had promised to satisfy his desire, he compelled him to rise, and weeping said: 'I did not wish to afflict you, for it is not expedient that you know these things. But since you so wish, know that by that shaking of the crosses many grievous and troublesome things are foretold to us. For it signifies that very many will fall away from our religion, and that there will be incursions of barbarian nations, and a great shedding of blood, and immense destruction, and seditions throughout the whole world, and that the holy Churches will be deserted, and that the ruin of divine worship and of the empire approaches, and the coming of the adversary draws near. It remains for you, as the helmsman of the Church and pastor of the people, to supplicate God ceaselessly with all your strength, that he may forgive the people and in his mercy moderate all these things.'
[7] "Hearing these things, the most blessed Patriarch, seized with great fear and sorrow, he gives him a dwelling began with tears to ask the holy man to beseech God to take his soul before he should be overwhelmed by those calamities. When Saint Theodore wished to return to his homeland, since his time of rest and silence was approaching, the most blessed Patriarch did not permit it. For the rumor had grown that the city would be swallowed up not long after. Wherefore he wished him to spend the winter with him, for he said he needed his prayers before God for the people, so that at least the evils he threatened might be delayed. When the holy man requested a place of his own to dwell in, he ordered him to live in the dwelling of Saint Stephen, which is called 'of the Romans.' On the birthday of our Savior God, he enclosed himself there to observe his customary quiet and abstinence. At which time it happened that the most holy Patriarch fell ill. And so he sent a messenger to Blessed Theodore, asking him to pray to God sick, he asks for prayers for his death to grant him the end of life. But the servant of Christ replied that, although he himself, like the holy Apostle Paul of old, desired to be dissolved and to be with Christ, yet since it was more necessary that he remain in the body for the salvation of the people, he would rather pray that life and health be granted to him. But the most holy Patriarch sent a messenger again to the servant of God, saying: 'I adjure you by the Lord, Father, if you love me, that for the sake of our mutual and fraternal goodwill you beseech God to receive back the pledge deposited in my body and free me from the impending dangers; for I cannot bear to witness what you have foretold.' Then the servant of God, bending his knees and pouring forth prayers for him, he understands that he will die that day sent word to him through Epiphanius his minister that he had indeed wished for his life for the salvation of all, but since he had so earnestly requested that prayers be offered for him that he might be dissolved and be with Christ, he had complied with his wishes, and God would grant him what he desired, and his petition would be fulfilled on that very day. 'Wherefore, if you command me to come to you,' he said, 'I will do so immediately; but if not, we shall nevertheless see one another in turn in the presence of Christ the Lord.'
[8] "Hearing this, the most blessed Patriarch rejoiced with great joy and, praising God, visited by the Emperor, he dies joyfully warned his servant not to go out, nor to depart from his custom of quiet and abstinence; for he was content with his promise that they would see one another in turn in the presence of Christ. When the Emperor also learned of this, he visited the most holy Patriarch; who, having blessed all, before the evening hour, with admirable prudence and constancy, departed to the Lord."