ON ST. JOHN THE EGYPTIAN, MARTYR,
IN PALESTINE.
From the calendars of the Greeks and from Eusebius.
The year 310.
CommentaryJohn the Egyptian, martyr, in Palestine. (S.)
BY J. S.
Of the many martyrs who were condemned to labor in the mines, their bodies being first mutilated and disabled, John, today announced by name in the Menæa, and after the labor of some years at length crowned by a glorious death, we have already treated in various places in this Work. At the preceding day
of them I gave Peleus and Nilus, Egyptian bishops, together with Patermuthius and another, named Elias in the calendars, delivered to the flames, to whom the calendars of the Greeks and Latins join a huge number of anonymous ones. Today the Greek Menæa bring forward John the Egyptian, to whom they add also forty companions. The Greek words by which John is announced, rendered into Latin, I transfer hither: And the memory of John the Egyptian, greatest among the confessors. Then a brief elogium is subjoined, composed in these words: Οὕτινος τὴν παῤῥησίαν μὴ ἐνεγκὼν ὁ παρανόμος Μαξιμιανὸς, ἐκέλευσεν ἀναιρεθῆναι αὐτὸν μετὰ καὶ ἄλλων τεσσαράκοντα. Not bearing his freedom of speech, the impious Maximian ordered him to be killed together with forty others. Almost the same words are read in the Synaxary of the Parisian College of the Society of Jesus, as our Henschen long since saw, when at the 4th day of May he treated of St. Silvanus, bishop of Gaza, and of his thirty-nine or forty Companions, as may be seen in volume 1 of May, page 468.
[2] elsewhere in most calendars he is with St. Silvanus among the anonymous ones. Henschen could in that place have treated of John at the same time: for the same Companions who are now attributed to St. John were the companions of St. Silvanus, as St. John himself also was. For according to Eusebius thirty-nine Martyrs were killed on one day, whose chief was Silvanus the bishop, and among whom St. John the Egyptian was eminent for excellent gifts. Henschen preferred, however, to defer the particular elogium of St. John to this day, because he saw St. John inserted by name today in the calendars of the Greeks. Moreover, although I find the name of St. John expressed only in the calendars praised above, he is nevertheless announced repeatedly among the anonymous ones in the chief Martyrologies of the Greeks and Latins. Certainly, as often as St. Silvanus with forty martyrs is announced, St. John the Egyptian is comprehended among them. And those forty are announced with St. Silvanus in the Hieronymian Epternach codex and in several others agreeing with it, in the Martyrologies of Ado, Usuard, Notker, and others more recent, as also in today's Roman one. Likewise among the Greeks those forty, or rather thirty-nine, are recorded in various places, among whom St. John was outstanding for his illustrious confession, as may be seen in the aforesaid collection of Henschen on St. Silvanus and his Companions at the 4th of May. Here I add from the martyrologists only Castellanus, who announces John with his Companions today thus: On the same day, the martyrdom of St. John the Egyptian and of forty others with him under Maximinus Daza.
[3] Eusebius, On the Martyrs of Palestine, chapter 13, after he had observed The virtues of St. John and his remarkable that the eighth year of the persecution, that is, the year 310, had begun, narrates the martyrdom of SS. Peleus, Nilus, and their Companions, of whom we have treated on the preceding day. Presently he passes to St. Silvanus of Gaza and his companions, of whom, for our purpose, he writes this: There were together with him (Silvanus) several Egyptians: among whom was a certain John, who excelled all the men of our age in memory. And he indeed had already before been deprived of his eyes. Nevertheless in the contests of confession, in which he chiefly shone, when, like the rest, one of his feet had been disabled with white-hot iron, his eyes too, though deprived of light, were burned out with a cautery; the cruelty and inhumanity of the executioners having proceeded to such a pitch of savagery and dreadfulness. Moreover, of this Man it is not needful to proclaim his character and philosophic manner of life, especially since for this cause he obtained not so much admiration as from the excellence of his memory. For he had the whole books of divine Scripture written, not on tablets of stone, as the divine Apostle says, nor on the membranes of animals or on papers which are consumed by worms and by length of time, but on the fleshy tablets of the heart, namely in a shining soul and in the most pure light of the mind. So much so that as often as he wished, he would bring forth from memory, as from some literary storehouse, now the books of the Mosaic law, now those of the Prophets; sometimes passages of the sacred History; at other times the Evangelical and Apostolic writings.
[4] I confess indeed that I was astounded when I first saw him standing in the midst of a very crowded assembly of the church, force of memory Eusebius extols, and reciting certain passages of divine Scripture. For as long as it was given me to hear only the man's voice, I thought that he was reading something, as is the custom in an ecclesiastical assembly. But when, coming nearer, I perceived how the matter stood — that the rest who stood round about were strong with the whole keenness of their eyes, but he, endowed with the eyes of the understanding alone, uttered oracles like some Prophet, and far excelled the rest who were stronger in body — I could not at all forbear to extol and proclaim God with the highest praises. And I seemed in fact to see a clear and most certain proof by which it might be established that man is truly not he who appears in the outward appearance of the body, but rather he who resides in the mind and understanding. For although mutilated in body, he nonetheless put forth the greater force and power of his faculty. Thus far concerning the outstanding gifts of St. John.
[5] who also narrates his martyrdom with the rest. Then Eusebius returns to them all, subjoining this: Moreover the aforesaid Men, who, living apart, applied themselves after their usual manner to prayers and fastings and exercises of this kind, God was already preparing to endow with a blessed and saving end, stretching out to them a helping hand. And a little after: Thus therefore thirty-nine men were beheaded on one and the same day by the order of the most wicked Maximinus. That these Martyrs lived apart from the others who labored in the mines, he had said a little before, because on account of old age, or weakness of limbs, or various diseases of the body, they were exempt from doing the work. Certainly blindness alone could excuse St. John and hinder him from working. The place in Palestine in which John with the rest was beheaded is not expressed by Eusebius, nor the day on which they suffered. And so we know only that they suffered in Palestine in the year 310. But that they were killed by the order of Maximinus, to whom Palestine was then subject, Eusebius clearly declares. Wherefore the Menæa must be corrected, in which they are said to have been killed by the order of Maximian. Their martyrdom can nevertheless in some measure be set under Maximian Galerius, because he then held the first place among the emperors. For the rest, I briefly observe that among us at the 19th of May there was treated of a St. John, a martyr, whose body was translated from Constantinople to Venice. Of him treats Flaminio Corner, a Venetian senator, in the excellent Latin Work which he lately published On the Churches of Venice, volume 4, page 168, under the Monastery of St. Daniel the prophet, where the body of that John is still preserved entire. But I have not been able to find sufficiently certain indications from which to judge that the body which is preserved there is that of today's St. John; as neither Papebroch nor Corner found any. No more can it be proved to be that of another John.