Part 50 (1/2)
FEBRUARY XX.
SS. TYRANNIO, BISHOP OF TYRE,
ZEn.o.bIUS, AND OTHERS, MARTYRS IN PHOENICIA, ETC.
From Eusebius, Hist l. 8, c.7, 13, 25. St. Jerom in Chron. Euseb.
A.D. 304, 310.
EUSEBIUS, the parent of church history, and an eye-witness of what he relates concerning these martyrs, gives the following account of them.
”Several Christians of Egypt, whereof some had settled in Palestine, others at Tyre, gave astonis.h.i.+ng proofs of their patience and constancy in the faith. After innumerable stripes and blows, which they cheerfully underwent, they were exposed to wild beasts, such as leopards, wild bears, boars, and bulls. I myself was present when these savage creatures, accustomed to human blood, being let out upon them, instead of devouring them, or tearing them to pieces, as it was natural to expect, stood off, refusing even to touch or approach them, at the same time that they fell foul on their keepers, and others that came in their way.[1] The soldiers of Christ were the only persons they refused, though these martyrs, pursuant to the order given them, tossed about their arms, which was thought a ready way to provoke the beasts, and stir them up against them. Sometimes, indeed, they were perceived to rush towards them with their usual impetuosity, but, withheld by a divine power, they suddenly withdrew; and this many times, to the great admiration of all present. The first having done no execution, others were a second and a third time let out upon them, but in vain; the martyrs standing all the while unshaken, though many of them very young.
Among them was a youth of not yet twenty, who had his eyes lifted up to heaven, and his arms extended in the form of a cross, not in the least daunted, nor trembling, nor s.h.i.+fting his place, while the bears and leopards, with their jaws wide open, threatening immediate death, seemed just ready, to tear him to pieces; but, by a miracle, not being suffered to touch him, they speedily withdrew. Others were exposed to a furious bull, which had already gored and tossed into the air several infidels who had ventured too near, and left them half dead: only the martyrs he could not approach; he stopped, and stood sc.r.a.ping the dust with his feet, and though he seemed to endeavor it with his utmost might, b.u.t.ting with his horns on every side, and pawing the ground with his feet, being also urged on by red-hot iron goads, it was all to no purpose. After repeated trials of this kind with other wild beasts, with as little success as the former, the saints were slain by the sword, and their bodies cast into the sea. Others who refused to sacrifice were beaten {434} to death, or burned, or executed divers other ways.” This happened in the year 304, under Veturius, a Roman general, in the reign of Dioclesian.
The church on this day commemorates the other holy martyrs, whose crown was deferred till 310. The princ.i.p.al of these was St. Tyrannio, bishop of Tyre, who had been present at the glorious triumph of the former, and encouraged them in their conflict. He had not the comfort to follow them till six years after; when, being conducted from Tyre to Antioch, with St. Zen.o.bius, a holy priest and physician of Sidon, after many torments he was thrown into the sea, or rather into the river Orontes, upon which Antioch stands, at twelve miles distance front the sea. Zen.o.bius expired on the rack, while his sides and body were furrowed and laid open with iron hooks and nails. St. Sylva.n.u.s, bishop of Emisa, in Phoenicia, was, some time after, under Maximinus, devoured by wild beasts in the midst of his own city, with two companions, after having governed that church forty years. Peleus and Nilus, two other Egyptian priests, in Palestine, were consumed by fire with some others. St. Sylva.n.u.s, bishop of Gaza, was condemned to the copper mines of Phoenon, near Petra, in Arabia, and afterwards beheaded there with thirty-nine others.
St. Tyrannio is commemorated on the 20th of February, in the Roman Martyrology, with those who suffered under Veturius, at Tyre, in 304.
St. Zen.o.bius, the priest and physician of Sidon, who suffered with him at Antioch, on the 29th of October: St. Sylva.n.u.s of Emisa, to whom the Menology gives many companions, on the 6th of February: St. Sylva.n.u.s of Gaza, on the 29th of May.
The love of Christ triumphed in the hearts of so many glorious martyrs, upon racks, in the midst of boiling furnaces, or flames, and in the claws or teeth of furious wild beasts. How many inflamed with his love have forsaken all things to follow him, despising honors, riches, pleasures, and the endearments of worldly friends, to take up their crosses, and walk with constancy in the narrow paths of a most austere penitential life! We also pretend to love him: but what effect has this love upon us? what fruit does it produce in our lives? If we examine our own hearts, we shall be obliged to confess that we have great reason to fear that we deceive ourselves. What pains do we take to rescue our souls from the slavery of the world, and the tyranny of self-love, to purge our affections of vice, or to undertake any thing for the divine honor, and the sanctification of our souls? Let us earnestly entreat our most merciful Redeemer, by the power of this his holy love, to triumph over all his enemies, which are our unruly pa.s.sions, in our souls, and perfectly to subdue our stubborn hearts to its empire. Let it be our resolution, from this moment, to renounce the love of the world, and all self-love, to seek and obey him alone.
Footnotes: 1. Rufinus adds, that these beasts killed several of the keepers and spectators. It is in this sense that some have translated this pa.s.sage with Nicephorus. See Vales. In Annot. p. 165. But it seems improbable that the spectators, who were separated from the arena by iron rails, and seated on stone benches gradually ascending ten or twenty men deep all round, should be killed or injured by the beasts, unless some were so rash as to venture within the rails with the keepers; which we see several do in the combats of wild beasts.
This, therefore, we are to restrain to the keepers and those who kept them company.
S. SADOTH, BISHOP OF SELEUCIA AND CTESIPHON,
WITH 128 COMPANIONS, MARTYRS.
From his genuine acts in Metaphrastes, Bollandus, and Ruinart; but more correctly in the original Chaldaic given us by a.s.semani, t. 1, p. 83.
Orsi, Hist. t. 5, l. 13. See Le Quien, Oriens Christ. t. 2, p. 1108.
A.D. 342.
SADOTH, as he is called by the Greeks and Latins, is named in the original Persian language, Schiadustes, which signifies ”friend of the king,” from _schiah_, king, and _dust_, friend. His unspotted purity of heart, his ardent zeal, and the practice of all Christian virtues, prepared him, from his {435} youth, for the episcopal dignity, and the crown of martyrdom. St. Simeon, bishop of Selec, or Seleucia, and Ctesiphon, then the two capital cities of Persia, situate on the river Tigris, being translated to glory by martyrdom, in the beginning of the persecution raised by Sapor II., in 341, St. Sadoth was chosen three months after to fill his see, the most important in that empire, but the most exposed to the storm. This grew more violent on the publication of a new edict against the Christians, which made it capital to confess Christ. To wait with patience the manifestation of the divine will, St.
Sadoth, with part of his clergy, lay hid for some time; which did not however hinder him from affording his distressed flock all proper a.s.sistance and encouragement, but rather enabled him to do it with the greater fruit. During this retreat he had a vision which seemed to indicate that the time was come for the holy bishop to seal his faith with his blood. This he related to his priests and deacons, whom he a.s.sembled for that purpose. ”I saw,” said he, ”in my sleep, a ladder environed with light and reaching from earth to the heavens. St. Simeon was at the top of it, and in great glory. He beheld me at the bottom, and said to me, with a smiling countenance: 'Mount up, Sadoth, fear not.
I mounted yesterday, and it is your turn to-day:' which means, that as he was slain last year, so I am to follow him this.” He was not wanting on this occasion to exhort his clergy, with great zeal and fervor, to make a provision of good works, and employ well their time, till they should be called on in like manner, that they might be in readiness to take possession of their inheritance. ”A man that is guided by the Spirit,” says St. Maruthas, author of these acts, ”fears not death; he loves G.o.d, and goes to him with an incredible ardor; but he who lives according to the desires of the flesh, trembles, and is in despair at its approach: he loves the world, and it is with grief that he leaves it.”
The second year of the persecution, king Sapor coming to Seleucia, Sadoth was apprehended, with several of his clergy, some ecclesiastics of the neighborhood, end certain monks and nuns belonging to his church, to the amount of one hundred and twenty-eight persons. They were thrown into dungeons, where, during five months' confinement, they suffered incredible misery and torments. They were thrice called out, and put to the rack or question; their legs were straight bound with cords, which were drawn with so much violence, that their bones breaking, were heard to crack like sticks in a f.a.got. Amidst these tortures the officers cried out to them: ”Adore the sun, and obey the king, if you would save your lives.” Sadoth answered in the name of all, that the sun was but a creature, the work of G.o.d, made for the use of mankind; that they would pay supreme adoration to none but the Creator of heaven and earth, and never be unfaithful to him; that it was indeed in their power to take away their lives, but that this would be the greatest favor they could do them; wherefore he conjured them not to spare them, or delay their execution. The officers said: ”Obey! or know that your death is certain, and immediate.” The martyrs all cried out with one voice: ”We shall not die, but live and reign eternally with G.o.d and his Son Jesus Christ.
Wherefore inflict death as soon as you please; for we repeat it to you that we will not adore the sun, nor obey the unjust edicts.” Then sentence of death was p.r.o.nounced upon them all by the king; for which they thanked G.o.d, and mutually encouraged each other. They were chained two and two together, and led out of the city to execution, singing psalms and canticles of joy as they went. Being arrived at the place of their martyrdom, they raised their voices still higher, blessing and thanking G.o.d for his mercy in bringing them thither, and begging the grace of perseverance, and that by this baptism of their blood they might enter into his glory. These prayers and praises of G.o.d did not cease but with {436} the life of the last of this blessed company. St.
Sadoth, by the king's orders, was separated from them, and sent into the province of the Huzites, where he was beheaded. He thus rejoined his happy flock in the kingdom of glory. Ancient Chaldaic writers quoted by a.s.semani say, St. Schiadustes, or Sadoth, was nephew to Simeon Barsaboe, being son to his sister. He governed his church only eight months, and finished his martyrdom after five months imprisonment, in the year 342, and of king Sapor II. the thirty-third. These martyrs are honored in the Roman Martyrology on this day.
ST. ELEUTHERIUS, MARTYR,
BISHOP OF TOURNAY.
A.D. 532.
HE was born at Tournay, of Christian parents, whose family had been converted to Christ by St. Piat, one hundred and fifty years before. The faith had declined at Tournay ever since St. Piat's martyrdom, by reason of its commerce with the heathen islands of Taxandria, now Zealand, and by means of the heathen French kings, who resided some time at Tournay.
Eleutherius was chosen bishop of that city in 486; ten years after which king Clovis was baptized at Rheims. Eleutherius converted the greatest part of the Franks in that country to the faith, and opposed most zealously certain heretics who denied the mystery of the Incarnation, by whom he was wounded on the head with a sword, and died of the wound five weeks after, on the first of July, in 532. The most ancient monuments, relating to this saint, seem to have perished in a great fire which consumed his church, and many other buildings at Tournay, in 1092, with his relics. See Miraeus, and his life written in the ninth century, extant in Bollandus, p. 187.[1] Of the sermons ascribed to St.