CONCERNING S. ARTEMON, BISHOP OF SELEUCIA IN PISIDIA.
FIRST CENTURY.
CommentaryArtemon, Bishop of Seleucia in Pisidia (S.)
[1] There were formerly several episcopal cities called Seleucia, of which the first may be reckoned Seleucia in Syria Prima, not far from Antioch, to which, as is read in the Acts of the Apostles, chapter 13, Saul and Barnabas, sent by the Holy Spirit, departed from Antioch and thence sailed to Cyprus. A second Seleucia is also in Syria Secunda under the metropolis of Apamea: the third is the metropolis of Isauria; the fourth is Seleucia of Pisidia, whose Bishop Eutychius attended the First Council of Nicaea. The journey of S. Paul through Pisidia: The Apostle Paul gave to this Seleucia its first Bishop, S. Artemon: for Paul and Barnabas, as is read in the said chapter 13, when they had sailed from Cyprus to Pamphylia, passing through Perga, came to Antioch of Pisidia, a city neighboring Seleucia, so that on that occasion S. Artemon could have been established as Bishop. The Greeks celebrate him on this day in the printed Menaea and in the Mazarine and Milanese manuscripts, in the codex O 148 of the Ambrosian Library and number 378, as well as in the manuscript Parisian Synaxarion of the Clermont College and in Maximus Cytheraeus, with approximately this eulogy throughout.
[2] S. Artemon ordained Bishop by him. "Commemoration of our holy Father Artemon, Bishop of Seleucia in Pisidia. This blessed man had Seleucia as his homeland and city, born and raised therein. When the blessed Apostle Paul approached this city, it was impossible that a lamp hidden under a bushel should remain concealed. Indeed, the holy Apostle appointed Artemon as Pastor and Teacher of his people, who therefore directed his flock with virtue and piety: He excels in pastoral care, and proved to be a saving harbor for all who required his aid, and a patron of widows, orphans, and beggars, and a physician of bodies and souls alike; and when he had lived illustriously in these exercises, he departed this life in a ripe old age." In the Menaea, the following distich is added, by which he seems to be indicated as having been translated to Constantinople:
"Artemon is sent to this city, retaining nothing Of the earth, who cast off his body like a garment."
Another from this S. Artemon is S. Artemas, of whom the same Apostle Paul writes thus to Titus, chapter 3: Another S. Artemas "When I shall send Artemas to you, or Tychicus, make haste to come to me at Nicopolis, for there I have determined to winter." The Greeks celebrate him on October 30, from the 70 disciples and consider him to have been of the number of the seventy disciples of Christ, Bishop of Lystra, whom S. Dorotheus in his Synopsis asserts was Bishop of Lystra, which is otherwise a city in Lycaonia, a province neighboring Pisidia.
Commemoration of the former in Syria. We have received from Rome, through the effort of Father Athanasius Kircher, an Arabic-Egyptian Martyrology rendered into Latin by Gratia Simonius, a student of the Maronite College, in which for this day is written: "The commemoration of the holy Father Artemon, Bishop of Thessalonica" -- whom we scarcely doubt to be the aforementioned Bishop of Seleucia, although the erring pen of the scribe or translator caused Thessalonica to be read, following the usage of the modern language, in place of what would otherwise be called Thessalonica.