Church History 1 part 26/28

Meanwhile, Theophilus sent certain men to Constantinople, both to prepare slanders against them beforehand, and, should they have need of the emperor concerning anything, to work against them.

Learning of this, Ammonius and those with him sailed to Constantinople, and Isidore together with them.

And together they sought to have the plots against them examined before the emperor as judge and before John the bishop.

For they thought that he, being devoted to just outspokenness, would be able to help them in what was just.

He received the men kindly and held them in honor, and did not prevent them from praying in church, but did not think it right to admit them to communion of the mysteries, considering it not lawful to do this before a judicial decision.

And he wrote to Theophilus that he should restore communion to them, since they held right views concerning God.

But if the matters concerning them needed to be judged by trial, he should send whomever he thought fit to conduct the judgment.

When much time had passed, as the emperor's wife was proceeding in state, Ammonius and his companions approached, complaining of the plots devised against them by Theophilus.

She perceived that they had been plotted against, and out of respect for them, she halted.

And leaning out from the royal carriage, she nodded her head, and said, "Bless, and pray for the emperor and for me and for our children and for the empire."

"And I shall shortly attend to the matter of a council and to the arrival of Theophilus." And thus she busied herself with these things.

Concealing these things in his mind and contriving, he wrote to the bishops throughout the cities, denouncing the books of Origen.

And reckoning that it would be of the greatest advantage to him if he should take on a partner in the matters he was pursuing, he made a friend of Epiphanius of Salamis, bishop in Cyprus, a man most eminent in his time for the reverence of his life, though he had formerly reproached him as one who held God to be of human form.

As though Epiphanius, through a change of mind, had come to recognize the correct opinion, he wrote that he was of the same mind as him, and he stirred up accusations against the books of Origen as being the cause of such doctrines.

Epiphanius, having long since turned away from the writings of Origen, readily assented to the letter of Theophilus.

And having convened together with the bishops in Cyprus, he forbade the reading of the writings of Origen.

And having written of their decisions both to others and to the bishop of Constantinople, he urged them to hold councils and to vote the same decrees.

But Theophilus, perceiving that there was no danger in following Epiphanius, who had many admirers and who, on account of the virtue of his life, was admired for whatever opinion he held, voted for measures similar to his, together with the bishops under him.

John, however, considered the zeal shown in these matters not worthy of mention, and regarded the letters of Epiphanius and Theophilus as of secondary importance.

Those among the powerful and the clergy who were ill-disposed toward him, learning that Theophilus was eager for his deposition, cooperated with him zealously, and prepared for a very great synod to be held in Constantinople.

And Theophilus, learning of this, hastened all the more, and ordered the bishops from Egypt to sail forth, while he wrote to Epiphanius and to others throughout the East, urging them to gather together with zeal.

He himself made the journey on foot.

Not long after, Epiphanius was the first to set sail from Cyprus, and put in at the place called the Hebdomon, before Constantinople.

And having prayed in the church there, he came into the city.

John honored him upon his entrance with the entire clergy going out to meet him.

But Epiphanius was clearly shown to have yielded to the slanders raised against John.

For when urged to lodge in the buildings of the church, he would not consent.

And he refused to come together with John in the same place.

But calling together privately the bishops who happened to be residing in Constantinople, he showed them the decrees passed against the writings of Origen, and persuaded some of them to vote in agreement.

But the majority declined.

And Theotimus, bishop of Scythia, openly rebuked Epiphanius to his face.

For he said it was not righteous to insult one who had died long ago, nor was it free of blasphemy to slander the judgment of the ancients and to set aside what had been approved by them.

These, he said, were insults against the very one whose writings were in question. John, however, still held Epiphanius in reverence, and urged him to attend the church services and to lodge together with him.

And these men were zealously pursuing these designs.

For they thought that in this way they would bring him into conflict with the populace.

On the following day, Epiphanius, having set out for this purpose, was already near the church.

But Serapion, sent by John (for he had learned what had been plotted the day before), met him and solemnly declared that it would be neither just nor advantageous to himself, if, should turmoil or sedition be stirred up among the crowd, he himself should be endangered as having become the cause of it.

And thus he was checked in his impulse toward this design.

Meanwhile it happened that the emperor's child fell ill.

The mother, being greatly afraid lest something should happen to it, sent to Epiphanius and asked him to pray on its behalf.

But the empress said, "As for my own child, if it seems good to God to take him, so let it be;"

"for the Lord who gave also takes away again;"

"but as for you yourself, if you were able to raise the dead, your own archdeacon would not have died." For it happened that Crispion had died not long before—he who, being the brother of Phuscon and Salamanes, the monks mentioned in the time of Valens, had been kept by Epiphanius as a fellow-resident, and had been appointed by him his own archdeacon.

And Ammonius and his companions (for this seemed good to the empress herself) went to Epiphanius.

When he inquired who they were, Ammonius took up the question and said, "We are the Tall Brothers, O father;"

"but if you had ever encountered our disciples or our writings, I would gladly learn of it." And when he denied it, Ammonius asked again:

"On what grounds, then, have you judged us to be heretics, having no proof at all of our opinions?" And when Epiphanius said he had heard it reported, Ammonius said, "But we have experienced quite the opposite;"

"for we have often encountered your disciples and your writings;"

"among which is that one entitled the 'Ancoratus';"

"and when many wished to revile you and slander you as a heretic, we contended most vigorously in your defense, as befits sons toward a father, and pleaded on your behalf every way we could."

"You ought not, therefore, to have condemned in absentia on mere hearsay those of whose guilt you yourself had not been persuaded, nor to have rendered such a recompense to those who spoke well of you." Epiphanius then, having conversed with them in a somewhat more moderate manner, dismissed the men.

Not long after, he sailed away to Cyprus, either having repented of his journey to Constantinople, or because God, as seems likely, had given him an oracle foretelling his own death as well.

For while sailing, before he reached Cyprus, he died.

It is said, at any rate, that as he was about to board the ship, he said to those who had accompanied him to the sea:

"I leave to you the city, and the palace, and the hypocrisy; but I am departing;"

"for I am in haste, very much in haste." And I have learned that this other account also, which even now is current among many, tells how John foretold to Epiphanius his death at sea, while Epiphanius foretold to John the deposition from his bishopric.

For while they were at variance with one another, the one declared to John:

"I hope that you will not die as a bishop." And John declared in return:

"Nor shall you ever again set foot in your own city." Now after Epiphanius had sailed away, John, preaching in church, delivered a general censure against women.

And the populace took this to have been composed enigmatically against the wife of the emperor.

And those hostile to the bishop, seizing upon the very speech, conveyed it to the empress.

She urgently pressed for him to be present and to hold a synod.

And Severian of Gabala also cooperated and helped to contrive these things, not yet having been relieved of his former grievance.

But whether John was led to make this speech simply by chance, or, as some say, because he suspected that the empress had persuaded Epiphanius to plot against him, I cannot say precisely.

Not long after, Theophilus also arrived at Chalcedon in Bithynia, together with bishops from many other cities, some having been urged on by Theophilus, others summoned by imperial decree.

Those who gathered with the greatest eagerness were those who had been deprived of their episcopate in Asia by John, and all others elsewhere who for various reasons were hostile to him.

And by now the ships from Egypt as well, which Theophilus had been awaiting, arrived at Chalcedon.

When all had assembled together there and were deliberating how the undertaking against John might proceed according to their design, Cyrinus, who then presided over the church at Chalcedon—perhaps favoring Theophilus on account of kinship, for he was Egyptian, and being besides at odds with John on his own account—reviled him most abundantly.

But swift punishment seemed to overtake him for these insults.

For Marutha, who was from Mesopotamia, while present among the bishops, unintentionally trod upon one of his feet.

Being in pain from this, he no longer crossed over to Constantinople with the other clergy, although he was thought to be indispensable for the plots against John.

After this, being in a grave condition, his leg was repeatedly sawn off by the physicians;

for a gangrene set in and spread over his whole body, so that the other foot also suffered the same thing, through the spreading of the affliction.

But he, not long after, ended his life in agony.

But when Theophilus crossed over, none of the clergy in Constantinople came out to meet him;

for he was already clearly hostile to the bishop.

But the Alexandrian seamen, who happened to be residing there both from the other ships and especially from the grain-transports, gathered together and received him, acclaiming him eagerly.

But bypassing the church, he went to an imperial residence, in which lodging had been prepared for him.

This is a suburb of Chalcedon, now named after Rufinus the consular, in which there is a palace and a very great church, which Rufinus himself built in honor of the apostles Peter and Paul, and named after them 'the Apostoleion';

and nearby he settled monks, who filled the clerical office of the church.

There Theophilus, assembling together with the other bishops, made no mention at all of the books of Origen, but called the monks from Scetis to repentance, promising neither to bear a grudge nor to do them any harm.

And when Theophilus's partisans loudly urged them to ask for pardon, and pretended that the synod was interceding on their behalf, the monks, being troubled and thinking it necessary to comply, since so many bishops were presiding—this indeed being their customary saying even when wronged—said, "Forgive us."

And when Theophilus readily made peace and restored communion to them, the inquiry into the wrongs concerning Scetis was dissolved.

For the one who had already died before was buried in the church named after the martyr Mocius.

But Ammonius, just as the synod was being made ready, fell ill in body;

and by the neighboring monks, in the place where he now lies, he was granted a splendid burial.

But Theophilus, when he heard of it, is said to have wept, and to have declared to all that there was no monk of his time like Ammonius, even though he had become for him a cause of turmoil.

Nevertheless, this too proceeded according to his wish.

...the clergy of Constantinople, threatening deposition against those who refused to obey.

She also summoned John to make his defense;

and she ordered that Serapion, and Tigrius the presbyter, and Paul the reader, be present along with him.

He said he was ready to make his defense before a larger synod, if he might first learn who his accusers were and examine the written charge;

for he said he would not choose to endure anything unreasonable, being manifestly the victim of open enmity.

On that very day, a courier and a stenographer arrived from the palace; the one urged him to go before the bishops, while the others urged that there be no delay in reaching the verdict.

But since, having been summoned four times, he had appealed to an ecumenical synod, they, alleging no other charge than that, having been summoned, he had not obeyed, deposed him.

When the populace in Constantinople learned of this, about late evening, they were roused to sedition;

and running together to the church at dawn, they cried out many things, including that a larger synod ought to deal with his case.

And though those appointed by the emperor were pressing to lead him away into exile, the people would not permit it.

But he, fearing that some other charge might be fabricated against him, as one disobeying the emperor or stirring up the populace, on the third day after his deposition, when the crowd had dispersed about midday, secretly left the church.

Now while he was already being led away, the people rioted violently, and reviled the emperor and the synod, and especially Theophilus and Severian;

for both of them were the ringleaders of the plot.

Severian, moreover, teaching in church at that time, praised John's deposition as having been carried out against an arrogant man, even if there had been no other charge;

'For other sins,' he said, 'the Divine forgives men, but sets itself against the proud.' At this the multitude was indignant, and their anger flared up again, and they rioted without restraint, and would not remain quiet either in the churches or in the marketplaces;

and with wailing and lamentation they advanced even to the palace itself, begging for John's recall.

The empress, yielding to the entreaties of the people, persuaded her husband to consent;

and quickly sending Brison, a trusted eunuch of her household, she recalled John from Praenetus in Bithynia, declaring that he was innocent of the schemes devised against him, and that out of reverence she held him as a priest and as the spiritual guide of her children.

On his return, he stayed at a suburb belonging to the empress, near Anaplus;

and before the judgment of a larger synod—so that it might be clear that he had been unjustly deprived of his bishopric—he for the time declined to enter the city.

But when the people again grew indignant and reviled the authorities, he was compelled and entered.

The populace met him with hymns composed for the occasion (most of them carrying lighted candles), and they conducted him to the church.

Though he declined, and repeatedly insisted that those who had voted against him must first reverse their vote, they compelled him, as is lawful for priests, to pronounce the peace upon the people and to take his seat upon the episcopal throne.

And being compelled, he delivered an impromptu discourse.

Taking his starting point from a most graceful image, he intimated that Theophilus had attempted to outrage the church under him, just as the king of the Egyptians had attempted the wife of the patriarch Abraham, as the books of the Hebrews relate;

and having, as was fitting, praised the people for their zeal and the authorities for their goodwill toward him, he moved the crowd to such applause and acclamation of the emperor and his wife that he even left his discourse unfinished.

being eager to openly denounce John as one who had unlawfully assumed priestly office after his deposition.

for he knew that he would offend the authorities, who, because of the uprising of the populace, had compelled him to return though he had declined.

He set up a tribunal to try the accusers of Heraclides in his absence, thinking that from this he would somehow find a more plausible ground for John's deposition.

But when his adherents objected that it was neither lawful nor in accordance with church order for a man to be judged in his absence, while the party of Theophilus maintained the contrary, the rest of the Alexandrian and Egyptian populace, together with the people of Constantinople, seized upon the dispute and fell upon one another, so that many were wounded, and some even lost their lives.

Fearing this, Severian and the other bishops, except those who were devoted to John, fled and left Constantinople.

Theophilus too, without any delay, though winter was already beginning, fled and sailed away to Alexandria together with Isaac the monk.

and as it happened, coming in from the open sea, he put in at Gera, a small town about fifty stadia distant from Pelusium.

As the bishop of that place had just died, the citizens, as I have learned, voted that Nilammon should preside over their church—a good man who had attained the very summit of monastic philosophy.

He was living outside the town, having shut himself up in a dwelling and blocked the door with stones.

As he was fleeing from the priesthood, Theophilus came to him and urged him to accept ordination at his hands.

But though he repeatedly declined, and could not be persuaded, he said, 'Do it tomorrow, father, if it please you, so that today I may put my own affairs in order.' And when, on the following day, he came as agreed and ordered the door to be opened, Nilammon said, 'Come now, let us first pray.' And Theophilus, approving, prayed;

But Nilammon, while praying, departed from this present life.

At first this was unknown to Theophilus and those with him standing outside.

But as the day was now spent, and though they repeatedly called out, more loudly each time, he did not answer, they cast down the stones at the door and found the man dead;

and having laid him out as was fitting, they accorded him a public burial;

and the local people built a house of prayer around his tomb, and to this very day they still observe the day of his death with the greatest solemnity.

Thus Nilammon died—if indeed one ought to call it death—since he had prayed to undergo it rather than be entrusted with the priesthood, of which, on account of the modesty of his character, he judged himself unworthy.

John, having returned to Constantinople, appeared to be even more beloved by the people than before.

It was at this time that he also appointed Serapion bishop of Heraclea in Thrace.

Not long after, when a silver statue of the emperor's wife was set up on a porphyry column—which still stands to this day on the south side of the church, before the building of the great senate, upon a high pedestal—there were held there applause and popular spectacles of dancers and mimes, as was then the custom at the dedication of imperial images.

John, in a homily to the people, denounced these things as having been done to the insult of the church.

The empress, the memory of the earlier grievances still fresh, as though she herself had been insulted, was again filled with anger, and was eager that a synod should once more be convened.

But he would not yield; rather, reviling her still more openly in church, he inflamed her to greater anger;

it was then that he delivered that celebrated discourse, beginning as follows:

'Again Herodias rages, again she dances, again she is eager to receive the head of John upon a platter.' Not long after, other bishops arrived, including Leontius of Ancyra and Acacius of Beroea.

When the birthday of Christ arrived, the emperor, as had become his custom, did not come to church;

and he declared to John that he would not commune with him until he should be shown free of the charges.

But since John said he was ready to defend himself, while his accusers, fearing to press their charges, did not have the courage to do so, and it seemed to the judges that one who had in any way already been deposed ought not to be brought to a second trial, they examined none of the other charges;

they required John to defend himself only on this one point: that after being deposed, and before a synod had authorized it, he had taken his seat upon the episcopal throne.

...they did not accept his defense, but deposed him—though he [John] maintained that this was a law of the heterodox.

For when those of the Arian heresy, having falsely accused Athanasius, took from him the church of the Alexandrians, they enacted this law out of fear that circumstances might change, being eager that the decisions made against him should remain forever unexamined.

John, having been deposed, no longer attended church, but remained quietly in the episcopal residence.

Now, as Lent was already drawing to its close, on that very sacred night on which the annual feast is celebrated in commemoration of the resurrection of Christ, those who shared his views were driven out of the church, soldiers and his enemies falling upon them while they were still administering the sacred mysteries.

As this happened without warning, a great tumult arose around the baptistery: women were thrown into confusion with wailing, children wept, and priests and deacons were struck and driven out by force, just as they were, in whatever attire they happened to be wearing.

As for the other things likely to have occurred amid such disorder, those who have been initiated are not ignorant of them; but I shall of necessity remain silent, lest some uninitiated person should happen upon this writing.

And when the rest of the populace perceived the plot, on the following day they left the church and celebrated Pascha in a very spacious public bath named after the emperor Constantius, under the direction of bishops and presbyters and the others whose office it is to administer the affairs of the church;

these were the ones who kept company with the people, holding John's views.

Being driven from there, they gathered outside the city in a certain place which the emperor Constantine, before he had yet settled the city, had cleared and enclosed with a wooden wall for the spectacle of the hippodrome;

and from that time, sometimes here, sometimes elsewhere, wherever it was possible, they held their own separate assemblies, and were called Johannites.

About this time a certain man, either possessed by a demon or thought to be so, carrying a dagger as though prepared to slay John, though he had not yet made any attempt, was caught;

and having been seized by the crowd as one hired for the plot, he was led before the prefect.

But John, sending some of the bishops around him, rescued him before he could be tortured.

Later still, a runaway slave belonging to the presbyter Elpidius, who happened to be an open enemy of John, burst into the episcopal residence.

But one of those present recognized him and stopped him, asking the reason for his running.

But he, answering nothing, immediately struck the man with a dagger, and after him another who had cried out at the blow dealt the first.

And besides these he stabbed also a third.

When those present raised an uproar with shouting, he turned back and made his escape.

While his pursuers called on those farther off to seize the fugitive, a certain man returning from bathing at the baths ran up and laid hold of him, and having been struck a mortal blow, lay dead.

But when he had been surrounded and, with difficulty, overpowered by the crowd, they led him to the palace.

And bearing witness that this was the plot of those who were hostile to John, they cried out that the murderer and those who had incited him to it should be punished.

But the prefect, taking him into custody as though he would proceed against him at law, thereby dispersed the anger of the populace.

By turns they kept watch, day after day, encamped around the bishop's residence.

The bishops who had assembled against him, charging him with throwing the ecclesiastical laws into confusion, declared that they had, most justly, taken upon themselves the judgment concerning him, and they ordered him to leave the city;

for otherwise, they said, not even the populace would be quieted.

But when the emperor's envoy arrived and commanded, with threats, that this be done, he slipped past the guards set by the people and departed, complaining only of this: that he was being driven out unlawfully by force, without being granted the trial which the laws accord even to murderers, sorcerers, and adulterers.

And boarding a small boat, he crossed at once to Bithynia, and from there immediately set out upon the road.

But some of those plotting against him, foreseeing that if the people should perceive it they would pursue him and force him to return once more, hurried ahead and shut the doors of the church.

But when those throughout the streets learned of it, some rushed headlong toward the sea as though to overtake him, while others, seized with terror, were driven to flight, since amid such tumult and disorder sedition and the emperor's wrath were to be expected.

But those within the church blocked the exits still more, streaming toward them and pushing against one another.

With difficulty and by force they burst open the doors, some smashing them with stones, others hauling them toward themselves and thrusting back the crowd pressing from behind.

Meanwhile fire suddenly began to feed upon the church from every side;

and running through the whole building, it consumed it, and also the very great senate-house adjoining it on the south.

For this they laid the blame on one another: those who were plotting against John accused his partisans of having done it in anger at the synod's verdict, while the others insisted they were being falsely accused and that this deed was in fact turned back upon them by their opponents, who had planned to burn them along with the church.

While the fire, spreading from evening until dawn, advanced still further and crept toward the timbered structures that yet remained standing, some pursued John and conducted him to Cucusus in Armenia, he having been sentenced by imperial letters to reside there;

while others, seizing the bishops and clergy who had gone out with him, confined them at Chalcedon.

Still others, going about through the city, arrested those denounced as holding his views, kept them under guard, and forced them to anathematize him.

Not long afterward, Arsacius was ordained bishop of Constantinople, the brother of Nectarius who had held this see before John — a gentle man and reverent toward things divine.

But certain clergy damaged the reputation he held among the presbytery, doing what they themselves wished and laying it to his account;

and what happened afterward concerning the admirers of John also discredited him most of all.

For since they no longer deemed it tolerable to commune or pray together with him and those associated with him, seeing that John's adversaries were intermingled among them, but instead, as has been said, gathered by themselves at the outskirts of the city and held church there, this matter was reported to the emperor.

A tribune, having been authorized to fall upon them as they were assembled, together with soldiers, put the crowd to flight by beating them with clubs and stones, and placed under guard those who more conspicuously and zealously championed John's cause.

On that occasion, as is wont to happen when soldiers are permitted to indulge in youthful license, women were forcibly stripped of their adornments — some soldiers plundering necklaces, golden girdles, chains, and torques, others, along with these, tearing out earrings together with the earlobes.

Though the greatest confusion and lamentation occurred throughout the city, not even so did they abandon their affection for John.

They no longer assembled publicly, and many neither went to the marketplace nor to the baths; for some, even remaining at home was not without danger, and so, imposing exile upon themselves, they departed from the city — many other earnest men and virtuous women among them.

...of a distinguished family among the patricians of Nicomedia, renowned for her lifelong virginity and virtuous manner of life.

I have known her to be the least conceited of all the earnest women we know, ordered in character, speech, and manner of life, and preferring things divine to human affairs even unto death; capable, through courage and prudence, of withstanding the reversals of difficult circumstances, so that, though she had been unjustly deprived of much of her ancestral estate, she did not grow indignant, but, left with a small remainder through excellent management, even in her advanced old age had what was needful for her own household and abundantly supplied others besides.

Being a lover of what is good, out of a benevolent zeal, she prepared all manner of remedies for the needs of the sick poor;

with these she often aided many of her acquaintances who had derived no benefit from the physicians they habitually consulted.

For by some divine favor, whatever she undertook came to a good end;

and, to speak comprehensively, among the earnest women of our own time I have known no other who attained to such a degree of character, dignity, and virtue in general.

Yet, being such as she was, she remained unknown to most people;