ON ST. PAUL THE DEACON, CONFESSOR, AT BENEVENTO,
IN THE 5TH CENTURY.
CommentaryPaul the deacon. (S.)
BY G. V. H.
In the Beneventan Pinacotheca of Giovanni de Nicastro, archdeacon of the Beneventan church Book II, chapter I, p. 75., St. Paul the deacon is venerated at Benevento. after Aemilius, the 20th bishop of Benevento, there is listed: St. Paul, canon deacon of the Beneventan church, went with the aforesaid St. Aemilius to Byzantium on account of the cause of the divine John Chrysostom. A man who shone with great holiness, and so worthy that the apostle Paul, appearing to him and to others, said: See that you walk cautiously, for the days are evil. This, the aforesaid Palladius and Theodore report, happened about the year of the Lord four hundred and four, in the dialogue on the life of the same Chrysostom, where they extol Paul's holiness with wonderful praises. His memory was consigned to immortality in the year four hundred and five by the aforesaid father of annals. Giovanni de Vita has the same [Treasury of Beneventan antiquities, vol. I, p. 119, note b; vol. II, pp. 3 and following.]. In the year 1880, on 5 July, when I had gone to Benevento for the sake of this Paul and other Beneventan saints, in the chapter hall of the cathedral church I saw a certain frame hanging on the wall, which in a list of the Holy Martyrs and confessors who came forth from the metropolitan chapter presented the following: St. Paul, deacon of the holy Beneventan church, flourished in the year of salvation brought forth 404; Palladius and Theodore celebrate his holiness with the greatest praises. In the same place, in a manuscript codex by Vipera, which is preserved in the archive of the archbishopric, St. Paul is enumerated among the saints whose feasts the Beneventan church does not celebrate. Then I anxiously asked some canons present whether this Paul enjoyed any veneration in the cathedral church. When all denied it, yet I did not at once rest; but I asked a certain old priest, who had passed a great part of his life in the cathedral church, that he would deign to explain all the statues, images, paintings and altarpieces, and tell me the names of the persons. So I walked through the whole temple with my companion, and at last we came to a certain altar erected in honor of the holy citizens of Benevento, on whose altarpiece I at once saw a certain deacon depicted with the other saints, and, a naming of each having been made, when the old man had come to the deacon, And this, he said, is Paul. I at once called some canons, in whose presence the old man affirmed that this was Paul the deacon. We went to the archive to examine the instruments of the consecrated altars; and when the document of the aforesaid altar was found, the name of St. Paul was found there with the others.
[2] His memory has been preserved in the Dialogue of Palladius and Theodore, Secure, then, as to the veneration paid to St. Paul the deacon by the Beneventan church, I come to his deeds. Would that they existed in writing! But all that has become known of the holy man reduces to a very few lines. The single spring from which the knowledge of St. Paul has flowed to posterity is the dialogue of Theodore and Palladius on the life of St. John Chrysostom, together with the tradition of the Beneventan church: from one or the other, or from both sources, have drawn as many as have written about the holy man. Come now, let us dig out from the dialogue the information about Paul the deacon, which is contained in two chapters, namely III and IV Migne, P. G., vol. XLVII, pp. 11–18.. St. John Chrysostom, grievously vexed, had recourse to Pope Innocent, who, not bearing the atrocious persecution of the holy bishop, and the calamities and laments of the pious that were brought daily to the Roman Church, at length sent to the emperor Honorius, adding what had been brought to him by letters.
Ἐν οἷς κινηθεῖσα αὐτοῦ (Honorius's) ἡ εὐσέβεια προστάσσει σύνοδον συγκροτηθῆναι τῶν Δυτικῶν, καὶ κοινῇ μίαν ἐξενεγκόντας ψῆφον ἀνενεγκεῖν ἐπὶ τὴν αὐτοῦ εὐσέβειαν. Οἳτινες ἐπίσκοποι τῆς Ἰταλίας συναχθέντες, παρακαλοῦσι τὸν βασιλέα γράψαι τῷ ἑαυτοῦ ἀδελφῷ καὶ συμβασιλεῖ Ἀρκαδίῳ προστάξαι ἐν Θεσσαλονίκῃ γενέσθαι σύνοδον, ὥστε δυνηθῆναι εὐκόλως ἀμφότερα συνδραμεῖν τὰ μέρη, Ἀνατολῆς τε καὶ Δύσεως, πρὸς τὸ τελείαν γενομένην σύνοδον, οὐκ ἐν ποιότητι ἀριθμοῦ, ἀλλ᾽ ἐν ποιότητι γνώμης, ἀναμφίλεκτον ἐξενεγκεῖν ψῆφον. Ἐξ ὧν πυρωθεῖσα αὐτοῦ ἡ εὐσέβεια, τῷ μὲν ἐπισκόπῳ Ῥώμης ἐπιστέλλει πέμψαι ἐπισκόπους μὲν πέντε, πρεσβυτέρους δὲ δύο Ῥώμης, διάκονον δὲ ἕνα, ὥστε διακομίσαι αὐτοῦ τὴν πρὸς τὸν ἀδελφὸν ἐπιστολὴν, ἥτις ἐπιστολὴ περιεῖχε τὴν δύναμιν ταύτην· Τρίτον γράφω πρὸς τὴν σὴν ἡμερότητα, ἀξιῶν ἵνα διορθώσεως τύχῃ τὰ κατὰ τὴν συσκευὴν τοῦ ἐπισκόπου Ἰωάννου τῆς Κωνσταντινουπολιτῶν, καὶ ὡς ἔοικεν οὐκ ἤνυσται. Ὅθεν πάλιν ἐπέστειλα διὰ τῶν ἐπισκόπων καὶ πρεσβυτέρων πάνυ φροντίζων τῆς ἐκκλησιαστικῆς εἰρήνης, δι᾽ ἧς καὶ ἡ ἡμων εἰρηνευεται βασιλεία, ἵνα καταξιώσῃς προστάξαι ἐν Θεσσαλονίκῃ συνελθεῖν τοὺς τῆς Ἑῴας ἐπισκόπους. Καὶ γὰρ οἰ ἡμετέρας Ἑσπερίας ἐπίσκοποι, ἐκλεξάμενοι ἄνδρας ἀκλινεῖς πρὸς κακίαν καὶ ψεῦδος, ἀπεστάλκασιν ἐπισκόπους μὲν πέντε, πρεσβυτέρους δὲ δύο, διάκονον δὲ ἕνα τῆς μεγίστης ἐκκλησίας Ῥωμαίων. Ὧν φροντίσαι παντοίαις τιμαῖς καταξίωσον, ἵν᾽, εἰ μὲν πεισθέντες ὅτιπερ δικαίως ἐκβέβληται ὁ ἐπίσκοπος Ἰωάννης, διδάξωσί με ἀποστῆναι τῆς αὐτοῦ κοινωνίας ἢ ἐλέγξαντες ἐθελοκακοῦντας τοὺς τῆς Ἀνατολῆς ἐπισκόπους, ἀποστρέψωσί σε τῆς αὐτῶν κοινωνίας.
Moved by these things, his (Honorius's) piety commands that a synod of the Westerners be gathered, and, when they had together pronounced a sentence as one, that they refer it to his piety. And the bishops of Italy, being assembled, beg the emperor to write to his brother and consort in the empire Arcadius, that he order a synod to be held at Thessalonica, so that both parties, of the East and of the West, could more easily come together into one, and that a synod, complete not in the number of bishops but in the weight of opinion, might pronounce a certain and undoubted judgment. Kindled by these things his piety writes to the bishop of the Roman Church: to send five bishops, two presbyters of the Roman Church and one deacon, to carry his letter to his brother, whose sense was this: I now write for the third time to your gentleness, asking that what has been done by compact against Bishop John be amended: and as it seems, it has not yet been accomplished. Therefore I have written anew through these bishops and presbyters, being much concerned about the peace of the Church, through which our empire also obtains peace, that you may deign to order the bishops of the East to convene at Thessalonica. For the bishops of our West, choosing men most firm against evil and lying, have sent five bishops, two presbyters, and one deacon of the great Roman Church. I would have you deign them with every honor: that, if they are persuaded that John was rightly expelled, they may teach me to withdraw from his communion; or, if they prove the bishops of the East to be willfully malignant, they may turn you from their communion Ibid., pp. 14.. So the praised dialogue, in the person of Theodore, Roman deacon. It is evident then that at the petition of the emperor Honorius there were sent to the emperor Arcadius five bishops, two presbyters, and one deacon, all three of the Roman Church.
[3] and he was either a legate or a companion of the legates to Arcadius, Who these bishops, presbyters and deacon were will be made clear from what follows. For having read through the letter, which we have broken off in the middle, Theodore continues thus:
Λαβόντες τοιγαροῦν οἱ περὶ τὸν ἅγιον ἐπίσκοπον Αἰμίλιον Βενεβενδοῦ καὶ Κυθήγιον καὶ Γαυδέντιον σὺν Οὐαλεντινιανῷ καὶ Βονιφατίῳ τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις τὰ γράμματα τοῦ τε Ἰννοκεντίου καὶ τῶν Ἰταλῶν ἐπισκόπων, Χρωματίου Ἀκυληΐας, καὶ Βενερίου Μεδιολάνων, καὶ τῶν λοιπῶν, καὶ ὑπομνηστικὸν τῆς συνόδου πάσης Δύσεως, δημοσίοις συνθήμασιν ἀπεστάλησαν εἰς τὴν Κωνσταντινούπολιν σὺν τοῖς περὶ Κυριακὸν καὶ Δημήτριον καὶ Παλλάδιον καὶ Εὐλύσιον τοὺς ἐπισκόπους.
When therefore St. Aemilius, bishop of Benevento, and Cythegius and Gaudentius, together with the presbyters Valentinian and Boniface, had received the letters of the emperor Honorius, of Innocent, and of the Italian bishops, Chromatius of Aquileia and Venerius of Milan and others, and also the memorandum of the synod of the whole West, they set out by public conveyance to Constantinople with the bishops Cyriacus, Demetrius, Palladius and Eulysius Ibid., p. 15.. Here are enumerated seven bishops, two presbyters, and
no deacon. The legates of Pope Innocent were Aemilius, bishop of Benevento, the bishops Cythegius and Gaudentius, and the presbyters Valentinian and Boniface: the remaining four were Eastern bishops, who, refugees from the East to Rome, had brought their complaints to Pope Innocent, namely Cyriacus of Synnada, Eulysius of Apamea in Bithynia, Palladius of Helenopolis, the same who in the dialogue plays the person of Palladius under his own name, and Demetrius, bishop of Pessinus, as Theodore had narrated in the same chapter. There remain to be sought therefore two bishops, who with Aemilius, Cythegius and Gaudentius fill out the fivefold number of legate bishops, together with the deacon whose name is still passed over in silence. For the four Eastern bishops carried out the embassy with five Western bishops, two presbyters and one deacon of Rome, as is clear from the same narrative of Theodore that we are reciting, who says a little later: Οὐκέτι δὲ ἡμῖν εὖρον εἰπεῖν ἐν τίσιν ὁ μακάριος ἐπίσκοπος Ἰωάννης, ἢ ποῦ νῦν οἱ ἐπίσκοποι οἱ περὶ Δημήτριον καὶ Κυριακὸν καὶ Εὐλύσιον καὶ Παλλάδιον, σὺν τοῖς ἡμετέροις ἐπισκόποις τὴν πρεσβείαν στειλάμενοι. Nor could they tell us further in what state the blessed Bishop John was, nor where Demetrius, Cyriacus, Eulysius and Palladius were, who had set out as legates with our bishops Ibid., p. 16..
[4] The deacon not of Aemilius but of Emmelius. The most distinguished Montfaucon Ibid., p. 250. says that the fourth bishop-legate of Innocent is indeed named in the dialogue, but the fifth is passed over in silence, which does not seem consonant with the truth. For the same Theodore, reviewing the calamities of the legates from their own report, narrates: Τελευταῖον ἦλθέ τις ἀφηγούμενος ἑνὸς ἀριθμοῦ, Οὐαλλεριανὸς ὀνόματι, Καππαδόκης, καὶ κλάσας τὸν ἀντίχειρα τοῦ ἐπισκόπου Μαριανοῦ ἀφεῖλεν ἐσφραγισμένην τὴν ἐπιστολὴν τοῦ βασιλέως σὺν ταῖς λοιπαῖς ἐπιστολαῖς. That is, that a certain man named Valerian, from Cappadocia, commander of one military unit, having broken the thumb of Bishop Marianus, took away the sealed letter of the emperor with the others Dialogue of Palladius, p. 15.. We have therefore a fourth bishop-legate: and if besides him he still mentions another bishop on the same ship, different from the four Romans and the four Easterners, we have, I think, the fifth legate of the Romans. Now Theodore, after relating the violence done to Marianus, and after the seductions tried by the adversaries' side, continues thus, reporting the words of the returned legates: Οἷς μὴ πεισθέντες, ἐμένομεν προσευχόμενοι, πρὸς τὸ μηδὲν εἰρηνικὸν ανύειν, ἀκινδύνως καταλαβεῖν ἡμῶν τὰς ἐκκλησίας, τὴν τοιαύτην ὁρῶντες ἀνημερότητα. Τοῦτο καὶ τοῦ Σωτῆρος Θεοῦ διαφόροις ἀποκαλύψεσιν αὐτοὺς φωτίσαντος, ὡς καὶ τῷ διακόνῳ τοῦ ἁγίου Ἐμμελίου Παύλῳ, ἀνδρὶ πραϋτάτῳ καὶ σώφρονι, ὀφθῆναι ἐν τῷ πλοίῳ τὸν μακάριον Παῦλον τὸν ἀπόστολον, λέγοντα αὐτῷ· Βλέπετε πῶς περιπατεῖτε· μὴ ὡς ἄσοφοι, ἀλλ᾽ ὡς σοφοὶ, εἰδότες ὅτι αἱ ἡμέραι πονηραί εἰσιν· αἰνιττομένου τοῦ ὀνείρου τὴν πολύτροπον αὐτῶν ἀπάτην, τήν τε διὰ δώρων καὶ κολακείας, ἐπὶ παραχαράξει τῆς ἀληθείας. Not assenting to these things, we persisted in praying, since nothing peaceable was being accomplished, that we might return without danger to our churches, having seen such inhumanity. This very thing God the Savior declared to us by various revelations, so that to Paul too, the deacon of holy Emmelius, a most gentle and prudent man, the blessed Paul the apostle appeared on the ship, saying to him: See how you walk: not as unwise, but as wise, seeing that the days are evil. By the dream he signified their manifold fraud, and that by gifts and flatteries for the adulteration of the truth Ibid., pp. 15, 16.. This man, then, I suspect to be the fifth bishop, by name Emmelius, who I think I may by my own right take to have been the fifth legate of the Romans.
[5] St. Paul the apostle appeared to him. And if I have touched the truth, it remains to seek the name of the legate deacon. Mention is made of only one deacon who was with the Roman legates, and that is Paul, the deacon of Emmelius, to whom St. Paul the apostle appeared. Have we therefore the name of the legate deacon? I think we have; yet I would not dare to go beyond opinion, since it may be that the several bishops set out each with at least one deacon, although Theodore seems to speak in the dialogue in such a way that it is credible that no cleric was present on the ship besides the legates themselves. However that may be, one thing is evident, namely that this Paul to whom St. Paul the apostle appeared on the ship is Paul the deacon, to whom the people of Benevento pay both the honor of their citizenship and the veneration of the citizens of heaven. But to be noted for error are Giovanni de Nicastro in the Beneventan Pinacotheca, cited above, who asserts that Paul, canon and deacon of the Beneventan church, set out for Byzantium together with St. Aemilius, and the author of that frame in the chapter hall of the cathedral of Benevento, who calls Paul, whose holiness Palladius and Theodore celebrate, a deacon of this church, and besides, if it please the gods, a canon of the cathedral chapter.
[6] What is to be determined about this Paul. About Paul, therefore, I determine thus from the dialogue, a monument of the highest authority. There was a certain Paul, deacon of Emmelius, sent with the legates of Pope Innocent to the emperor Arcadius. This Paul was a most gentle and prudent man, and worthy that St. Paul should appear to him. These things are certain. That this Paul was the same as that legate deacon of the holy Roman Church does not seem so certain. Yet in neither case, whether he was a legate or merely the companion of a bishop-legate, does it seem that at the time of the embassy he could be called deacon of St. Aemilius of Benevento. Moreover from the tradition of the Beneventan church it can be believed that this St. Paul the deacon was a citizen of Benevento. For he is venerated in the cathedral church of Benevento among the holy citizens of Benevento. The events reported by Theodore in the dialogue befell Paul in the year of Christ 406, in the 4th year of Innocent and the 5th, and in the 11th and 12th year of Arcadius and Honorius Compare Baronius at this year.. Beyond these things I have found nothing whatever handed down to memory about this St. Paul. Of the holy man's tomb or of his relics the people of Benevento taught me nothing, nor could I fish out anything elsewhere, either in monuments or in written books.
[7] Why Paul was held to be the deacon of St. Aemilius. It remains for us to examine the cause of the error by which St. Paul was called and believed to be the deacon of Aemilius of Benevento. Simeon Metaphrastes in the Life of St. John Chrysostom Migne, P. G., vol. CXIV, p. 1202. and Nicephorus Callistus Ibid., vol. CXLVI, p. 1036. write that the revelation of Paul the apostle was made, the former, to a certain deacon of Aemilius, the latter, to one of the deacons of Aemilius. George of Alexandria too Vol. VIII, p. 244, edition of Savile. says: To Paul, the deacon of St. Aemilius. So it may be suspected that George, Simeon and Callistus actually read Aemilius for Emmelius in their copy. But nevertheless it is certain that the archetypal Medicean copy of the dialogue has not Aemilius, but Emmelius. So read Ambrose the Camaldolese, who from this same codex, on the testimony of Émery Bigot Migne, P. G., vol. XLVII, p. XCIII., made a Latin version in the time of Eugene IV. So read in the same codex Bigot, who published it; I examined an apograph of the same codex at Paris in the national library, Greek supplement no. 536, made by Antonio Maria Salvini in the year 1678, where on p. 14 is read not Aemilius but Emmelius; likewise Emmelius in an apograph of the same Bigot from another codex of the Paris National Library, no. 3081. And if it should be granted that at that place not Emmelius but Aemilius is to be read, this alone follows, that two bishops of the same name carried out the embassy, of whom one and the chief was the bishop of Benevento, the other the bishop whose deacon Paul is called, whom the letter of Honorius and the narrative of Theodore utterly prohibit our joining with the Beneventan. And if anyone should cavil and object that in the dialogue itself the matter is not settled by the words of Theodore, since he asserts simply one deacon, without adding of Rome, which he had added to the two presbyters: I answer that the mind of Theodore is indeed evident, since he says: Two presbyters of Rome, but one deacon, and that the matter narrated is put beyond doubt by the subjoined copy of the letter, where it is read in the clearest words: the bishops of our West … have sent five bishops, two presbyters, and one deacon of the great Roman Church.
[8] With whom perhaps he went on to Benevento, It may finally be asked whether George, Simeon and Nicephorus Callistus, when they make Paul the deacon of Aemilius, depend on another author, and not on Palladius. Let the answer be brief: It is a very well-known matter, and evident to the eye of the reader, that George, in what concerns our subject, drew from the dialogue of Palladius, and the others from George. By these things it comes about that St. Paul is called deacon of Aemilius of Benevento on no sufficiently suitable argument. It may be, however, that after the embassy had been carried out, on account of the recognized holiness of the man, shown even from heaven, a close friendship grew up between Paul, citizen of Benevento, and Bishop Aemilius. Perhaps too Paul, following Aemilius, went on to live in his homeland, until he concluded the happy course of his life by a blessed death at Benevento. But let these things be opinion or conjecture, for nothing certain meets us, besides the man's diaconate, his presence on the ship with the legates, the holiness of his life, honored even by a heavenly apparition, and finally public veneration after his death in the city of Benevento.
[9] Earlier the deacon of Emmelius, who was perhaps living at Rome. In the last place I shall touch on the one difficulty that remains. For how did it come about that he who in the imperial letter is called deacon of the great Roman Church is afterward called deacon of Emmelius, when yet Innocent presided over the Roman Church, not Emmelius? Of the five legates the see of only one bishop is named, namely Aemilius of Benevento. Cythegius, Gaudentius, Marianus or Marinus, and Emmelius are bishops of unknown sees. If therefore it were established on the one side that Paul belonged to the Roman Church together with the two presbyters, as on the other side it is established that he was the deacon of Emmelius, I should suppose that Emmelius was one of those bishops who lived at the Roman Church after the ancient custom, set over one church or another for carrying out ecclesiastical duties, and that he had Paul, in the order of deacon, joined to him: for thus rightly and deservedly Paul could be called deacon of the Roman Church and deacon of Emmelius.