ON THE HOLY CONFESSOR BISHOPS
IN EGYPT, LIBYA AND PENTAPOLIS.
UNDER CONSTANTIUS.
HISTORICAL COMMENTARY
Their exile from St. Athanasius: the names of each illustrated.
The Confessor Bishops in Egypt, Libya and Pentapolis, under Constantius (SS.)
BY THE AUTHOR D. P.
[1] After the memory of St. Secundus the Presbyter and of the citizens and virgins of Alexandria, who suffered under the impious George, inserted into the Roman Martyrology, Cardinal Baronius wished to make likewise mention of the holy Bishops and Presbyters, who banished into exile by the Arians, merited to be associated with the holy Confessors. St. Athanasius in the Epistle to the Solitaries written after the year 356, By the edict of Constantius prolixly describing the persecution stirred up by the Arians, abusing the power and authority of Constantius at their pleasure, and comparing him to Antichrist; Behold, he says, now again at Alexandria and in Egypt and throughout all Libya he has troubled the Churches, and openly proclaimed, that the pious and Catholic Bishops should be cast out, and all those churches delivered to the followers of the Arian opinion. But this the Duke of the army began to do: and now the Bishops bound, commanding the orthodox Bishops to be expelled, the Arians substituted, Presbyters likewise and monks fettered with iron, and beaten with strokes even to death, were banished, and all things everywhere thrown into confusion, and Egypt and all Libya is in peril; the peoples being indignant on account of the edict set forth, by which they see the way prepared for Antichrist, and their own things snatched from them and delivered to heretics…
[2] Be it that against Athanasius, and the other Bishops whom they singly banished, and that universally and indeed with inexcusable fury, they invented certain false occasions; in what manner at last do they excuse this new invention, or what pretext have they against all Egypt, Libya and Pentapolis? For they did not begin separately to lie in wait for individuals, that they might be able to bring some cause, however false, against them: but suddenly they assailed all together; so that they ought to appear ridiculous, if they should wish to feign anything. Their mind therefore here malice blinded, that they should simply demand all the Bishops to be eliminated, no one's excuse being admitted… But the Duke Sebastian wrote in every direction to the Prefects and military Magistrates: even the old and the sick are deported into exile: and now those who truly were Bishops were put to flight, and for them were substituted those impiously thinking. Thus were banished those who had grown old in the Clergy, Bishops of very many years, even from the time of Alexander; Ammonius into the upper Oasis, Muïs, Psenosiris, Nilammon, Plenes, Marcus and Athenodorus into the Ammoniac, with no other end, than that by wandering through desert places they should be worn out. For neither did they pity the sick; but they seized those grievously laboring; so that they had also to be carried in litters, and the funeral instruments had to follow. Although neither were these of use: for when one of them had died, they did not permit the friends to have for themselves the corpse.
[3] To the same end they banished also Dracontius the Bishop into the deserts that are about Clysma, but Philo into Babylon, and Adelphius to Phinabla of the Thebaid; others are driven into flight, but Hierax and Dioscorus the Presbyters into Soïna, and also Ammonius, Agathus, Agathodaemon, Apollonius, Eulogius, Apollo, Paphnutius, Gaius, Flavius, old Bishops. Into flight also they drove Dioscorus, Ammonius, Heraclides and Psaïs, likewise Bishops: and some indeed they condemned to the digging of stones, others, when they wished to slay them, they pursued; but very many they despoiled. Thus there: but in the Apology concerning his flight, written at least one year earlier and immediately after the begun persecution of the Bishops, the Saint in few words thus touches the same things. some dying along the way. Out of Egypt and Libya they drove into exile Ammonius, Muïus, Gaïus, Philo, Hermes, Plenius, Psenosiris, Pelammon, Agathus, Anagamphus, Marcus, Ammonius, and another Marcus, Dracontius, Adelphius, Athenodorus, Bishops; and Hierax and Dioscorus the Presbyters; whom with so great bitterness they dragged, that some of them along the very way, others in exile met death: but more than thirty Bishops they compelled to flight.
[4] A little after, writing his Apology to Constantius, he extends the number of the harassed Bishops, Of ninety harassed in all, sixteen banished, and distinctly noted those who had been banished, in these words: A dreadful report concerning Egypt and Libya was brought to us, that about ninety Bishops were suffering persecution, of whom sixteen indeed were driven into exile, but of the rest part driven into flight, part compelled to dissemble. But from the Epistle to the Africans we have, that those who were subject to the Alexandrian Metropolitan in Egypt and Libya, were reckoned ninety only: of whom about half part was compelled to dissimulation. Athanasius complains moreover in the said Apology, and indeed to desert places. that whereas the humanity of the Emperor (for he reverently addresses him as present) only ordered the Bishops to be cast out beyond the cities and the province; those admirable men, daring something beyond the mandate, beyond the provinces, into desert places, uncultivated and horrible, cast out men old, and aged Bishops: for those who were from Libya, he says, were deported into the great Oasis; but those from the Thebaid, into the Ammoniac of Libya. But whether all who either underwent exile, or entered upon flight, Why they are not singly enrolled among the Saints, held constancy, and how holily each one died, because we cannot define, we have not dared to propose in the title, as of Saints, the names indicated by Athanasius, and expressed by Baronius in the Notes to the Martyrology; about to proceed less timidly in those, who along the way or in exile signed a good confession by their death, if the Saint had distinguished them by name.
[5] Most of those here named, in the year 362 still surviving under Julian the Apostate, and by his permission returned to their Sees, were present at the Council celebrated by St. Athanasius then at Alexandria, whom however it is not possible to designate individually, since the names of all present lie hidden, and only of a few are notes had; namely of those who, the rest having departed into the Provinces, remained at Alexandria, and subscribed with him to the epistle given to the Antiochenes. Ammonius. Among these is Ammonius, Bishop of Pachnemunis and Elearchia for the remaining part: for another part of it was subject to the Bishop of Phragonis, attached to the second Egypt. The name of Ammonius is also found among those who in the year 347 subscribed to the Epistle of the Council of Sardica. But he himself perhaps is the same who is simply called Ammon, among those who stood by Athanasius at Tyre, and protested for him in the year 335: and so the name written in the Coptic calendar, which is found at Rome among the Maronites, whose sound perhaps is Ammonius, is to be read twice with the title of Saint, namely on August XXXI and March XV, without any other note of distinction. But three Ammonios in all the epistle to the Solitaries names as exiled Bishops: of whom the first banished into the Oasis, would have to be said to have been from Libya, according to the complaint of Athanasius to Constantius: another, of two perhaps is called Ammonianus among the Bishops protesting at Tyre and Ammonanus among those subscribing to the epistle of Sardica.
[6] Gaius from Paraetonium next to Libya, likewise present at the Alexandrian Council, restored to his See, subscribed to the epistle; and it behooves him to have been very old then, if he is the same who under this name was present at Tyre to Athanasius and approved the Sardican epistle by signing it: I rather suspect these things to fit the Bishop of Thmuis, also Gaius, Gaius, Muïs, who was present at the Council of Nicaea. Muïs or Muïus, Bishop in the upper Thebaid, as is established from the epistle of St. Athanasius to Dracontius, also subscribed in both places; not so at Alexandria; so that he may be numbered among the elders, and presumed to have died in exile and afflictions, but presumed only: for, as I have said, only a few out of many who were present subscribed to the epistle. The same on account of like subscriptions on the same occasions, may likewise be presumed of Apollo, Dioscorus, and nine others Heraclides and Psaïs, for neither are the names of these found among those subscribing at Alexandria, as neither the names of Psenosiris, Nilammon, Apollonius, Anagamphus: who however all confirmed the aforesaid Sardican Synodical; under which we wonder is not also found the name of Flavius, since among the old Bishops Athanasius names him, and for this cause he may seem to have died in exile.
[7] Both the Marcuses, nowhere before named, and now first placed among the exiles or fugitives, you have below in the Alexandrian Synodical; the former indeed, as of Zygri next to Libya; the other, as Bishop of Philae, the two Marcuses and three others. surely in the second Thebaid. Hermes also was present at Alexandria, if he is the one who among the Alexandrians is called Hermion, Bishop of Tanis: but this is equally uncertain, as that he is the one who is subscribed to the Sardican as Hermias. Concerning Agathodaemon the exile you would more probably conjecture, that he is numbered among the Alexandrians, with the title of Schedia and Menelaïtes, which are two cities near to one another, and not far from Alexandria. The same is to be held of Agathus, who is noted to have been there Bishop of Phragonis and Elearchia, for that part which pertains to the second Egypt, as we have said.
[8] Dracontius, Bishop of the little Hermopolis pertaining to the first Egypt, likewise Dracontius, is subscribed to the Synodical to the Antiochenes. This man had been Hegumen of certain monks, and by their persuasion wished to renounce the election made of him: but Athanasius prohibited it, having written to him that famous epistle concerning not refusing the Episcopate, which is extant among the Saint's works, and was written before the Easter of the year 352.
[9] Adelphius, There is extant likewise of the same Saint an Epistle to Adelphius, here named among the earlier exiles: whom the subscription of the Synodical to the Antiochenes indicates to have been Bishop of Onuphis, called Lychnon, in the same first Egypt, which, penetrating into the very Egyptian Delta, encloses the Onuphite nome, as it were the navel of all Egypt. This epistle contains a notable doctrine concerning the Incarnation of the divine Word; and is a reply to a former one of Adelphius, signifying by what reasoning he had confuted certain Arians, arguing that the Son of God could not be adored, who it was established had had flesh, without a creature being adored. But the Saint at the very exordium glorifies God, who bestowed on Adelphius that grace, that he has a right mind, and is not ignorant of diabolical snares; but concluding he permits that he offer the same epistle to be read to Hierax the Presbyter; Hierax the Presbyter, Eulogius, whom we can also believe to be named here among the Confessors. But Adelphius himself, as neither Eulogius, do we find anywhere else named among the Bishops by Athanasius.
[10] Paphnutius, Paphnutius enrolled in this place among the fugitives, nothing forbids to think him to be he, who afterward was present at the Alexandrian Synod as Bishop of Saïs, pertaining to the first Egypt within the very Delta; and the same seems to have added his name to the subscriptions of the Sardican Epistle. He is not however to be confounded with him who was present at Tyre to Athanasius, and is venerated on September XI, long since adorned with a notable confession. For this one, if he had also sustained the present persecution under Constantius, would have been commemorated with greater encomium by Athanasius; as he does when elsewhere he mentions Potammon and Serapammon, glorious by a like confession under Diocletian.
[11] But all hitherto mentioned have nothing which can make the end of any of them suspect, but that it was good, Philo. Concerning Philo the Bishop of Libya alone Jerome casts a scruple, lest at last he should have gone over into the Luciferian hardness; who with Lucifer of Cagliari and Gregory Bishop of the Spains is praised in the Chronicle, that he never mixed himself with the Arian depravity, which was the boasting not good of the Luciferians, unwilling to communicate with the penitent; against which afterward St. Jerome himself had need to fight it out. But St. Athanasius himself diminishes the scruple: who (as Synesius, Bishop of Cyrene in Libya, narrates, epist. 67) did not hesitate to make Siderius, whom Philo, himself also Bishop of Cyrene, had consecrated Bishop, and that not canonically enough elected, he alone, Metropolitan of Ptolemais, since it behooved the spark of right faith, which there was still small, to be cherished and more amply kindled: which the Saint does not seem about to have done, if he had judged Philo the ordainer of Siderius alien from his communion; and obstinate in the schism, which then had been formed. Synesius himself also did not hesitate to call Philo Blessed; and although he reverently confesses that in commanding and obeying he was more confident than observant of the laws; yet in the rest he says he was such, as a disciple of Christ is wont to be: but Christ willed the chief mark of this to be love toward one another: there is not therefore why we should wholly deny that this was present to him.