But if, once received, he is unwilling to return when invited, both the receiver and he who is received shall lie under excommunication. VI: That bishops and clerics who are strangers be content with the gift of hospitality offered to them; and let it be lawful for none of them to perform any priestly office without the permission of the bishop in whose diocese he is known to be. VII: That a synod be gathered twice in the year. But because various causes hinder it, it has pleased all in common that we assemble once in the year on the Kalends of August, in a place which is called Clovesho. VIII: That no bishop prefer himself to another through ambition; but let all acknowledge the time and order of their consecration. The ninth chapter was treated in common:
That more bishops should be added as the number of the faithful increased; but concerning this matter we kept silence for the present. The tenth chapter concerning marriages: That it be lawful for none to have any but a lawful wedlock. Let no one commit incest, let no one forsake his own wife, except—as the holy Gospel teaches—for the cause of fornication. But if anyone shall have driven out his own wife, joined to him in lawful matrimony, if he wishes rightly to be a Christian, let him be coupled to no other; but let him so remain, or be reconciled to his own wife.
These chapters, therefore, having been treated and defined in common, in order that henceforth no scandal of contention might arise from any one of us, or that one set of things be published in place of another, it has pleased us that each one of us confirm by the subscription of his own hand whatsoever things have been defined. This sentence of our definition I dictated to be written by Titillus the notary. Done in the month and indiction written above. Whosoever, therefore, in any way shall attempt to come against this sentence—confirmed according to the decrees of the canons, with our consent also and the subscription of our hand—and to infringe it, let him know that he is separated from every priestly office and from our fellowship.
May the divine grace keep us unharmed, living in the unity of His holy church. Now this synod was held in the year 673 from the incarnation of the Lord, in which year Ecgberht, king of the Kentishmen, had died in the month of July, his brother Hlothhere succeeding to the kingdom, which he himself held for eleven years and seven months. But Bisi, bishop of the East Angles, who is reported to have been at the aforesaid synod, was himself the successor of Boniface, whom we have mentioned above, a man of much sanctity and religion. For, Boniface having died after seventeen years of his episcopate, he himself was made bishop in his place, Theodore ordaining him.
While he was still surviving, but prevented by a most grievous infirmity from administering the bishopric, two men—Æcci and Baduwine—were elected and consecrated bishops in his place; from which time to this day that province is wont to have two bishops. Not long after these things, when some time had elapsed, Theodore the archbishop, being offended by Wynfrith, bishop of the Mercians, on account of the desert of a certain disobedience, deposed him from the bishopric after not many years of his having received the episcopate; and in his place he ordained as bishop Sexwulf, who was the builder and abbot of the monastery which is called Medeshamstede, in the region of the Gyrwe. But the deposed Wynfrith returned to his monastery, which is called Barrow, and there ended his life in the best manner of conduct.
Then also, for the East Saxons, over whom at that time Sebbi and Sigheri presided, whom we have mentioned above, he appointed Earconwald bishop in the city of London; of which man indeed, both during his episcopate and before his episcopate, the life and conduct are reported to have been most holy, as even now the signs of heavenly virtues are a proof. For to this day his horse-litter, in which he was wont to be carried when sick, kept by his disciples, ceases not to heal many who are fevered, or wearied by any other ailment. And not only are the sick who are placed beneath that litter, or set beside it, cured, but even chips cut from it, and carried to the sick, are wont to bring them a swift remedy.
Indeed, before he had been made bishop, he had built two illustrious monasteries—one for himself, the other for his sister Æthelburh—both of which he had excellently instituted with regular disciplines: for himself, in the region of Surrey, beside the river Thames, in a place which is called Chertsey, that is, the island of Cerot; but for his sister, in the province of the East Saxons, in a place which is called Barking, in which she might prove to be the mother and nurse of women devoted to God. She, having undertaken the rule of the monastery, showed herself in all things worthy of her brother the bishop, both by herself living rightly, and by directing those subject to her in a regular and pious manner; as the heavenly miracles also bore witness.
For in this monastery many signs of virtues were wrought, which—for the memory and edification of those who came after—are recorded by many from those who knew them; of which we too have taken care to insert some into our ecclesiastical history. When the tempest of the often-mentioned plague, widely depopulating all things, had invaded also that part of this monastery in which the men were kept, and day by day they were being snatched away here and there to the Lord;
the anxious mother of the congregation began to inquire more frequently in the assembly of the sisters at what hour that same plague would touch also that part of the monastery in which the company of God's handmaids was secluded from the dwelling of the men, and in what place in the monastery they wished their bodies to be laid and a cemetery to be made, when it should befall them to be snatched from the world by the same destruction as the rest. And when she had received no certain answer from the sisters, although she inquired often, she herself, together with all, received a most certain answer of the provision from above.
For when on a certain night, the psalmody of matins having been completed, the handmaids of Christ went out from the oratory to the tombs of the brethren who had gone before them out of this light, to sing the accustomed praises to the Lord, behold, suddenly a light sent from heaven, like a great linen cloth, came over them all, and struck them with such amazement that they even broke off, trembling, the song which they were singing. But the very splendour of that emitted light—in comparison with which the midday sun might seem dark—not long after, lifted from that place, withdrew to the south of the monastery, that is, to the west of the oratory, and there, having tarried a while and covering those places, so, while all looked on, it drew itself up into the heights of heaven;
so that to none was there any doubt but that the very light, which was to lead or to receive the souls of the handmaids of Christ in heaven, was also pointing out to their bodies the place in which they should rest and await the day of resurrection. So great was the radiance of this light that a certain elder of the brethren, who had been stationed at that very hour in their oratory with another younger one, related in the morning that the rays of light which entered through the chinks of the doors or windows seemed to surpass all the brightness of the daylight. There was in the same monastery a boy of about three years and no more, named Æsica, who, on account of his still infantile age, was wont to be reared in the cell of the virgins dedicated to God, and there to be schooled.
This boy, being touched by the aforesaid pestilence, when he came to his last moments, cried out three times to one of the virgins consecrated to Christ, addressing her by her own name as though she were present: 'Eadgyth, Eadgyth, Eadgyth'; and thus ending his temporal life, he entered the eternal. But that virgin whom he called as he was dying, soon, in the place where she was, being touched by the same sickness, was withdrawn from this light on the very day on which she had been called, and followed him who had called her to the heavenly kingdom. Likewise a certain one of these same handmaids of God, being touched by the aforesaid disease and brought to her last moments, began suddenly, about the middle of the night, to cry out to those who were ministering to her, asking that they extinguish the lamp which was lit there.
When she repeated this with frequent voice, and yet no one obeyed her, at last she said: 'I know that you think I am speaking these things with a disordered mind; but know now that it is not so; for truly I tell you that I perceive this house to be filled with so great a light that that lamp of yours seems to me in every way to be dark.' And when, even to one speaking such things, no one as yet answered or gave assent, she said again: 'Light that lamp, then, as long as you wish; nevertheless know that it is not mine; for my light, at the break of dawn, is to come to me.' And she began to relate that a certain man of God had appeared to her, who had died in that same year, saying that, at the coming of daybreak, she was to go forth to the everlasting light.
The truth of which vision was proved by the maiden's death, swiftly, about the rising of the day. Now when the pious mother herself, too, of the congregation devoted to God, Æthelburh, was to be snatched from the world, a wondrous vision appeared to one of the sisters whose name was Torhtgyth, who, having now dwelt many years in the same monastery, herself also always strove in all humility and sincerity to serve God, and took care to be a helper of the regular discipline to that same mother, by teaching or correcting the younger ones. That her virtue might be perfected in weakness, according to the apostle, she was suddenly touched by a most grievous bodily sickness, and for nine years was greatly wearied by the pious provision of our Redeemer;
That is to say, so that whatever defilement of sin remained among her virtues through ignorance or carelessness, the furnace of long-lasting tribulation might wholly burn it away. Therefore, one night at the onset of dusk, having gone out of the chamber where she was staying, she saw plainly something like the body of a man, which was brighter than the sun, wrapped in a linen cloth and borne aloft, lifted up, namely, from the house in which the sisters were accustomed to rest. And when she gazed more attentively to see by what means this thing she was contemplating, this form of a glorious body, was being raised upward, she saw it being lifted into the heights as though by cords brighter than gold, until, the heavens opening, it was brought within and could no longer be seen by her.
Nor did any doubt remain to her as she pondered the vision that someone from that community would soon die, whose soul, by the good works she had done, was to be lifted up to the heavens as though by golden cords; and so indeed it came to pass. For not many days later, the mother of that very community, beloved of God, was led forth from the prison of the flesh; and it is well established that her life was such that no one who knew her ought to doubt that, as she departed this life, the entrance into the heavenly homeland lay open to her. In that same monastery there was also a certain nun, noble in the dignity of this present world, and nobler still in the love of the world to come;
who for many years already had been deprived of all use of her body, so that she could not move even a single limb. When she learned that the body of the venerable abbess had been carried into the church, there to remain until it should be given to burial, she begged to be carried thither and laid down beside it in the posture of those who pray. And while this was being done, she addressed the body as though it were living, and asked that she might obtain, before the mercy of the loving Creator, to be released from torments so great and so prolonged. Nor was she heard much later; for after twelve days she too was led forth from the flesh, and exchanged her temporal afflictions for an eternal reward.
But when the aforesaid handmaid of Christ, Torctgyd, was kept in this life for three years after her mistress's death, she was so worn down by the infirmity we have mentioned that she scarcely clung to her bones; and at last, as the time of her dissolution drew near, she lost the power of movement not only in her other limbs but also in her tongue. And when this had continued for three days and as many nights, suddenly, restored by a spiritual vision, she opened her mouth and her eyes; and looking up to heaven, she began to speak thus to the vision she was beholding: 'Most welcome to me is your coming, and you have come in good time.' And having said this she fell silent a little while, as though awaiting the answer of the one whom she saw and to whom she spoke. And again, as if slightly displeased, she added:
'By no means can I bear this with gladness.' And again falling silent a little, she said a third time: 'If it cannot in any way be today, I beseech you, let the interval in between not be long.' She spoke, and, as before, after a brief silence, she concluded her words thus: 'If it is altogether thus determined, and this decree may not be changed, I beseech you, let no more than only this next coming night intervene.' When she had said these things, and was asked by those sitting around her with whom she was speaking, she said: 'With my dearest mother Aethelburg.' From this they understood that she had come to announce to her that the time of her own passing over was near. For just as she asked, after one day and night had passed, she was loosed at once from the bonds both of the flesh and of her infirmity, and entered into the joys of eternal salvation.
[10] Now there succeeded Aethelburg in the office of abbess a handmaid devoted to God, named Hildilid, and for many years, that is, until extreme old age, she presided over the same monastery most vigorously, both in the observance of the discipline of the Rule and in providing for those things that pertain to common use. When, because of the narrowness of the place in which the monastery was built, it had pleased her that the bones of the menservants and maidservants of Christ which had been buried there should be taken up and all transferred into the church of the blessed Mother of God, and laid together in one place;
how often the brightness of a heavenly light, and how great a fragrance of a wondrous odour, often appeared there, what other signs were shown—whoever shall read in that very book from which we have excerpted these things, will find them. Indeed, I think a miracle of healing that the same little book reports as having occurred at that very cemetery of the community dedicated to God ought by no means to be passed over. For there was nearby a certain nobleman, whose wife, a sudden darkness coming upon her eyes, was so burdened by the same affliction increasing daily that she could not see even the smallest particle of any light.
While she remained for some time shut up in this night of blindness, it suddenly came into her mind that, if she should be carried to the monastery of the holy nuns and seek out the relics of the saints, she might be able to recover the light she had lost. Nor did she delay to carry out at once what she had conceived in her mind. For being led by her maidservants to the monastery, since it was nearby, where she professed that she had full faith in her own healing, she was brought into the cemetery; and when she had prayed there a good while on bended knees, no later she deserved to be heard. For rising from prayer, before she went out of the place, she received the grace of the light she had sought; and she who had been led there by the hands of her maidservants, herself returned home joyful with the free movement of her own feet;
as though she had lost the temporal light for this purpose alone: that by her own healing she might show how great a light Christ's saints possess in heaven, and what grace of power. [11] At that time there ruled over the kingdom of the East Saxons, as the same little book also relates, a man much devoted to God, named Sebbi, of whom we have made mention above. For he was greatly intent upon religious deeds, frequent prayers, and the pious fruits of almsgiving; preferring a private and monastic life to all the riches and honours of the kingdom, a life which he would long since have undertaken, leaving his kingdom, had not the obstinate mind of his wife refused the divorce. Whence it seemed to many, and was often said, that a man of such a disposition ought rather to be ordained a bishop than a king.
And when he had spent thirty years in the kingdom as a soldier of the heavenly kingdom, he was seized by a most grievous bodily infirmity, of which he also died; and he urged his wife that even then they should together dedicate themselves to the divine service, since they could no longer together embrace the world, or rather serve the world. When he had obtained this from her with difficulty, he came to the bishop of the city of London, called Waldhere, who had succeeded Earconwald; and through his blessing he received the habit of religion which he had long desired. He also brought to him a sum of money, not small, to be distributed to the poor, reserving nothing at all for himself; but desiring rather to remain poor in spirit for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.
When, the aforesaid sickness growing worse, he felt that the day of his death was drawing near, this man of royal spirit began to fear lest, coming to death and afflicted by such great pain, he might utter something unworthy of his person with his mouth, or display it by some unseemly movement of his limbs. Therefore, summoning to himself the aforesaid bishop of the city of London, in which he himself was then staying, he asked that, when he died, no more should be present than the bishop himself and two of his attendants. When the bishop most willingly promised that he would do this, not long after the same man of God, while he had given his limbs to sleep, saw a consoling vision, which took away from him all the anxiety of the aforesaid care, and moreover showed on what day he was to end this life.
For he saw, as he himself afterwards related, three men come to him, clothed in bright apparel; one of whom, sitting before his little bed, while those who had come with him as companions stood by and asked about the condition of him whom they had come to visit in his sickness, said that his soul would go forth from the body both without any pain and with a great splendour of light; and he also intimated the third day thereafter, on which he would die. And both of these were fulfilled just as he had learned from the vision. For on the third day thereafter, the ninth hour being completed, suddenly, as though gently falling asleep, without any sense of pain, he gave up the spirit. For the burial of his body they had prepared a stone sarcophagus;
but when they began to place the body in it, they found it to be longer than the sarcophagus by the measure of a palm. Therefore, chiselling the stone as much as they could, they added to the length of the sarcophagus about the measure of two fingers. But not even so did it hold the body. Whence, the difficulty of burial having arisen, they were thinking either to seek another coffin, or, if they could, to shorten the body itself by bending it at the knees, until it should be contained by that coffin. But a wondrous thing, and one done by no other than heavenly means, prevented any of these things from having to be done.
For suddenly, with the bishop standing by, and the son of the same king, Sigheard, who afterwards reigned with his brother Suefred, also a monk, and with no small crowd of people present, that sarcophagus was found to be of a length suited to the measure of the body, so that at the head part a pillow could even be placed in addition; while at the foot part the body fell short of the sarcophagus by the measure of four fingers. He was buried in the church of the blessed Doctor of the Gentiles, by whose admonitions, having been instructed, he had learned to hope for heavenly things. [12] The fourth bishop of the West Saxons was Leutherius. For the first was Birinus, the second Agilberct, the third was Wine.
And when Coinwalh had died, in whose reign the same Leutherius was made bishop, the under-kings took over the rule of the nation, and held it divided among themselves for about ten years; and while they were reigning, he died, and Haeddi exercised the bishopric in his place, consecrated by Theodore in the city of London. In the time of his bishopric, the under-kings being defeated and removed, Caedwalla took up the sovereignty, and, when he had held it for two years, at length, pricked by love of the kingdom above, he gave it up, the same prelate still governing the church; and going to Rome, there he ended his life, as is to be told more fully in what follows.
Now in the year of the Lord's incarnation 676, when Aethelred, king of the Mercians, having led in a malign army, was laying waste Kent and defiling churches and monasteries without regard for piety or fear of God, he also consumed in the common destruction the city of Rochester, in which was the bishop Putta, although at that time he was absent. When Putta learned of this—namely that his church had been despoiled, all its goods carried off—he turned aside to Saxwulf, bishop of the Mercians, and having received from him the possession of a certain church and a not large field, he there ended his life in peace, doing nothing at all about restoring his bishopric; because, as we have also said above, he was more industrious in ecclesiastical than in worldly matters;
but serving God in that church alone, and going about, wherever he was asked, to teach the chants of the church. In his place Theodore consecrated Cuichelm as bishop in the city of Rochester. But when, not long after, Cuichelm withdrew from the bishopric on account of lack of resources, and retired to other places, Theodore substituted Gebmund as bishop in his stead. In the year of the Lord's incarnation 678, which is the eighth year of the reign of King Ecgfrith, there appeared in the month of August a star which is called a comet; and remaining for three months, it rose in the morning hours, displaying a lofty column, as it were, of radiant flame.
In that same year, a dissension having arisen between the king Ecgfrith himself and the most reverend bishop Wilfrid, the same bishop was driven from the seat of his bishopric, and two bishops were substituted in his place to preside over the nation of the Northumbrians; namely Bosa, to govern the province of the Deirans, and Eata, that of the Bernicians; the latter having his episcopal chair in the city of York, the former in the church of Hexham or of Lindisfarne, both of them taken from the company of monks into the rank of the episcopate. Together with whom Eadhaed also was ordained bishop in the province of Lindsey, which King Ecgfrith had very recently obtained, having overcome and put to flight Wulfhere in war.
And this province first received him as its own prelate, the second being Aethelwine, the third Eadgar, the fourth Cynibert, whom it has at present. For before Eadhaed it had as bishop Saxwulf, who was at the same time bishop also of the Mercians and of the Middle Angles; whence also, when expelled from Lindsey, he remained in the governance of those provinces. Now Eadhaed, Bosa, and Eata were ordained at York by Archbishop Theodore; who also, three years after Wilfrid's departure, added two more bishops to their number: Tunbert to the church of Hexham, Eata remaining at Lindisfarne, and Trumwine to the province of the Picts, which at that time was subject to the rule of the English.
Eadhaed, returning from Lindsey because Aethelred had recovered the province, he set over the church of Ripon. [13] Now Wilfrid was driven from his bishopric, and after wandering long through many places, went to Rome, and returned to Britain; and although, because of the enmities of the aforesaid king, he could not be received in his own country or diocese, yet he could not be hindered from the ministry of evangelising; since, turning aside to the province of the South Saxons, which after the men of Kent extends southward and westward as far as the West Saxons, having a land of seven thousand families, and which even at that time was in bondage to pagan worship, to this he ministered the word of faith and the laver of salvation.
那民族的王名叫愛瑟瓦赫（Aethelwalh），不久前在麥西亞人的省受洗，是在伍爾夫赫王面前並經他建議而受的洗，並且他從洗禮盆中出來時，被伍爾夫赫收為義子；為這收養的記號，伍爾夫赫把兩個省賜給他，就是懷特島（Isle of Wight）和西撒克遜人地界內的梅昂瓦雷（Meonware）省。於是主教在王應允、甚至大大喜悅之下，用神聖的洗禮盆給那省的首領與將士施洗；而祭司伊阿帕（Eappa）、帕達（Padda）、布爾格赫姆（Burghelm）、奧伊迪（Oiddi）則或在當時、或在隨後給其餘的平民施洗。至於王后，名叫伊阿貝（Eabae），她已在自己的省，就是惠克（Hwicce）省受了洗。
Now the king of that nation was Aethelwalh, baptized not long before in the province of the Mercians, in the presence and at the suggestion of King Wulfhere, by whom also, as he came forth from the font, he was received as a son; and in token of this adoption he gave him two provinces, namely the Isle of Wight, and the province of the Meonware in the nation of the West Saxons. And so the bishop, the king consenting, nay rather greatly rejoicing, washed in the sacred font the chief leaders and soldiers of the province; while the priests Eappa, and Padda, and Burghelm, and Oiddi baptized the rest of the common people, either then or in the time following. Moreover the queen, named Eabae, had been baptized in her own province, that is, of the Hwicce.
Now she was the daughter of Eanfrith, the brother of Aenheri, who both with their people had been Christians. But the whole province of the South Saxons was ignorant of the divine name and of the faith. There was, however, in that place a certain monk of the nation of the Scots, named Dicul, having a very small little monastery in a place called Bosham, surrounded by woods and sea, and in it five or six brothers, serving the Lord in a humble and poor life. But none of the provincials cared either to imitate their life, or to hear their preaching. Now the bishop Wilfrid, in evangelising that nation, not only delivered it from the misery of perpetual damnation, but also from an unspeakable disaster of temporal destruction.
For three years before his coming into the province no rain had fallen in those places, whence also a most bitter famine, invading the people, laid them low with an impious slaughter. Indeed they say that often forty or fifty men together, wasted by hunger, would go forth to some precipice or to the shore of the sea, and joining their hands together in their misery, would all alike fall down, either to perish by the fall or to be swallowed by the waves. But on the very day on which that nation received the baptism of the faith, there descended a serene yet copious rain, the earth flourished again, the year returned glad and fruitful with greening fields. And thus, the old superstition cast off and idolatry blown away, the heart of all and the flesh of all rejoiced in the living God;
understanding that He who is the true God had enriched them with heavenly grace both in inward and in outward goods. For the bishop also, when he had come into the province, and saw there so great a punishment of famine, taught them to seek food by fishing. For the sea and their rivers abounded with fish; but the people had no skill in fishing, except only for eels. Therefore, nets for eels having been collected from everywhere, the bishop's men cast them into the sea, and, the divine grace helping them, soon caught three hundred fish of various kinds. These being divided into three parts, they gave a hundred to the poor, a hundred to those from whom they had received the nets, and kept a hundred for their own use.