Primitive Christian Worship Part 21

[Footnote 110: The author visited that convent whilst this edition of the Chronicon of Eusebius was going through the press, and can testify to the apparent anxiety of the monks to make it worthy of the patronage of Christians.]

The next authority, to which we are referred, is a letter[111] said to have been written by Sophronius the {305} presbyter, about the commencement of the fifth century. The letter used to be ascribed to Jerome; Erasmus referred it to Sophronius; but Baronius says it was written "by an egregious forger of lies," ("egregius mendaciorum concinnator,") who lived after the heresies of Nestorius and Eutyches had been condemned. I am not at all anxious to enter upon that point of criticism; that the letter is of very ancient origin cannot be doubted.

This doc.u.ment would lead us to conclude, that so far from the tradition regarding the Virgin's a.s.sumption being general in the Church, it was a point of grave doubt and discussion among the faithful, many of whom thought it an act of pious forbearance to abstain altogether from p.r.o.nouncing any opinion on the subject. Whoever penned the letter, and whether we look to the sensible and pious sentiments contained in it, or to its undisputed antiquity, the following extract cannot fail to be interesting[112].

[Footnote 111: The letter is ent.i.tled "Ad Paulam et Eustochium de a.s.sumptione B.M. Virginis." It is found in the fifth volume of Jerome's works, p. 82. Edit. Jo. Martian.]

[Footnote 112: Baronius shows great anxiety (Cologne, 1609, vol.

i. p. 408) to detract from the value of this author's testimony, whoever he was; sharply criticising him because he a.s.serts, that the faithful in his time still expressed doubts as to the matter of fact of Mary's a.s.sumption. By a.s.signing, however, to the letter a still later date than the works of Sophronius, Baronius adds strength to the arguments for the comparatively recent origin of the tradition of her a.s.sumption. See Fabricius (Hamburgh, 1804), vol. ix. p. 160.]

"Many of our people doubt whether Mary was taken up together with her body, or went away, leaving the body. But how, or at what time, or by what persons her most holy body was taken hence, or whither removed, or whether it rose again, is not known; although some will maintain that she is already revived, and is clothed with a blessed immortality with Christ in heavenly places, which very many affirm also of the blessed {306} John, the Evangelist, his servant, to whom being a virgin, the virgin was intrusted by Christ, because in his sepulchre, as it is reported, nothing is found but manna, which also is seen to flow forth.

Nevertheless which of these opinions should be thought the more true we doubt. Yet it is better to commit all to G.o.d, to whom nothing is impossible, than to wish to define rashly[113] by our own authority any thing, which we do not approve of.... Because nothing is impossible with G.o.d, we do not deny that something of the kind was done with regard to the blessed Virgin Mary; although for caution's sake (salva fide) preserving our faith, we ought rather with pious desire to think, than inconsiderately to define, what without danger may remain unknown." This letter, at the earliest, was not written until the beginning of the fifth century.

[Footnote 113: These last words, stamping the author's own opinion, "Which we do not approve of," are left out in the quotation of Coccius.]

Subsequent writers were not wanting to fill up what this letter declares to have been at its own date unknown, as to the manner and time of Mary's a.s.sumption, and the persons employed in effecting it. The first authority appealed to in defence of the tradition relating to the a.s.sumption of the Virgin[114], is usually cited as a well-known work written by Euthymius, who was contemporary with Juvenal, Archbishop of Jerusalem. And the testimony simply quoted as his, offers to us the following account of the miraculous transaction[115]:--

[Footnote 114: Coccius heads the extract merely with these words: "Euthumius Eremita Historiae Ecclesiasticae, lib. iii. c.

40;" a.s.signing the date A.D. 549.]

[Footnote 115: This version by Coccius differs in some points from the original. Jo. Dam. vol. ii. p. 879.]

"It has been above said, that the holy Pulcheria {307} built many churches to Christ at Constantinople. Of these, however, there is one which was built in Blachernae, in the beginning of Marcian I's _reign_ of divine memory. These, therefore, namely, Marcian and Pulcheria, when they had built a venerable temple to the greatly to be celebrated and most holy mother of G.o.d and ever Virgin Mary, and had decked it with all ornaments, sought her most holy body, which had conceived G.o.d. And having sent for Juvenal, Archbishop of Jerusalem, and the bishops of Palestine, who were living in the royal city on account of the synod then held at Chalcedon, they say to them, 'We hear that there is in Jerusalem the first and famous Church of Mary, mother of G.o.d and ever Virgin, in the garden called Gethsemane, where her body which bore the Life was deposited in a coffin. We wish, therefore, her relics to be brought here for the protection of this royal city. But Juvenal answered, 'In the holy and divinely inspired Scripture, indeed, nothing is recorded of the departure of holy Mary, mother of G.o.d. But from an ancient and most true tradition we have received, that at the time of her glorious falling asleep, all the holy Apostles who were going through the world for the salvation of the nations, in a moment of time borne aloft, came together at Jerusalem. And when they were near her, they had a vision of angels, and divine melody of the highest powers was heard: and thus with divine and more than heavenly glory, she delivered her holy soul into the hands of G.o.d in an unspeakable manner. But that which had conceived G.o.d being borne with angelic and apostolic psalmody, with funeral rites, was deposited in a coffin in Gethsemane. In this place the chorus and singing of the angels continued for three whole days. But {308} after three days, on the angelic music ceasing, since one of the Apostles had been absent, and came after the third day, and wished to adore the body which had conceived G.o.d, the Apostles, who were present, opened the coffin; but the body, pure and every way to be praised, they could not at all find. And when they found only those things in which it had been laid out and placed there, and were filled with an ineffable fragrancy proceeding from those things, they shut the coffin. Being astounded at the miraculous mystery, they could form no other thought, but that He, who in his own person had vouchsafed to be clothed with flesh, and to be made man of the most holy Virgin, and to be born in the flesh, G.o.d the Word, and Lord of Glory, and who after birth had preserved her virginity immaculate, had seen it good after she had departed from among the living, to honour her uncontaminated and unpolluted body by a translation before the common and universal resurrection."

Such is the pa.s.sage offered to us in its insulated form, as an extract from Euthymius. To be enabled, however, to estimate its worth, the inquirer must submit to the labour of considerable research. He will not have pursued his investigation far, before he will find, that a thick cloud of uncertainty and doubt hangs over this page of ecclesiastical history. Not that the evidence alleged in support of the reputed miracle can leave us in doubt as to the credibility of the tradition; for that tradition can scarcely be now countenanced by the most zealous and uncompromising maintainers of the a.s.sumption of the Virgin. What I would say is, that the question as to the genuineness and authenticity of the works by which the tradition is said to have been preserved, is far more difficult and complicated, than {309} those writers must have believed, who appeal to such testimony without any doubt or qualification. The result of my own inquiries I submit to your candid acceptance.

The earliest author in whose reputed writings I have found the tradition, is John Damascenus, a monk of Jerusalem, who flourished somewhat before the middle of the eighth century. The pa.s.sage is found in the second of three homilies on the "Sleep of the Virgin," a term generally used by the Greeks as an equivalent for the Latin word "a.s.sumptio." The original publication of these homilies in Greek and Latin is comparatively of a late date. Lambecius, whose work is dated 1665, says he was not aware that any one had so published them before his time[116]. But not to raise the question of their genuineness, the preacher's introduction of this pa.s.sage into his homily is preceded by a very remarkable section, affording a striking example of the manner in which Christian orators used to indulge in addresses and appeals not only to the spirits of departed men, but even to things which never had life. The speaker here in his sermon addresses the tomb of Mary, as though it had ears to hear, and an understanding to comprehend; and then represents the tomb as having a tongue to answer, and as calling forth from the preacher and his congregation an address of admiration and reverence. Such apostrophes as these cannot be too steadily borne in mind, or too carefully weighed, when any argument is sought to be drawn from similar salutations offered by ancient Christian orators to saint, or angel, or the Virgin.

[Footnote 116: Vol. viii. p. 281. Le Quien, who published them in 1712, refers to earlier homilies on the Dormitio Virginis.

Jo. Damas. Paris, 1712. vol. ii. p. 857.] {310}

The following are among the expressions in which the preacher, in the pa.s.sage under consideration, addresses the Virgin's tomb: "Thou, O Tomb, of holy things most holy (for I will address thee as a living being), where is the much desired and much beloved body of the mother of G.o.d?"

[Vol. ii. p. 875.] The answer of the tomb begins thus, "Why seek ye her in a tomb, who has been taken up on high to the heavenly tabernacles?"

In reply to this, the preacher first deliberating with his hearers what answer he should make, thus addresses the tomb: "Thy grace indeed is never-failing and eternal," &c. [P. 881.] By the maintainers of the invocation of saints, many a pa.s.sage far less unequivocal and less cogent than this has been adduced to show, that saints and martyrs were invoked by primitive wors.h.i.+ppers.

We find John Damascenus thus introducing the pa.s.sage of Euthymius, "Ye see, beloved fathers and brethren, what answer the all-glorious tomb makes to us; and that these things are so, in the EUTHYMIAC HISTORY, the third book and fortieth chapter, is thus written word for word." [P.

877.]

Lambecius maintains, that the history here quoted by John Damascenus was not an ecclesiastical history, written by Euthymius, who died in A.D.

472, but a biographical history concerning Euthymius himself, written by an ecclesiastic, whom he supposes to be Cyril, the monk, who died in A.D. 531. This opinion of Lambecius is combated by Cotelerius; the discussion only adding to the denseness of the cloud which involves the whole tradition. But whether the work quoted had Euthymius for its author or its subject, the work itself is lost; and an epitome only of such a work has come down to {311} our time. In that abridgment the pa.s.sage quoted by Damascenus is not found.

The editor of John Damascenus, Le Quien, in his annotations on this portion of his work, offers to us some very interesting remarks, which bear immediately on the agitated question as to the first observance of the feast of the a.s.sumption, as well as on the tradition itself. Le Quien infers, from the words of Modestus, patriarch of Jerusalem, that scarcely any preachers before him had addressed their congregations on the departure of the Virgin out of this life; he thinks, moreover, that the Feast of the a.s.sumption was at the commencement of the seventh century only recently inst.i.tuted. Though all later writers affirm that the Virgin was buried in the valley of Jehoshaphat, in the garden of Gethsemane, the same editor says, that this could not have been known to Jerome, who pa.s.sed a great part of his life in Bethlehem, and yet observes a total silence on the subject; though in his "Epitaph on Paula," [Jerome, Paris, 1706. Vol. iv. p. 670-688, ep. 86.] he enumerates all the places in Palestine consecrated by any remarkable event. Neither, he adds, could it have been known to Epiphanius, who, though he lived long in Palestine, yet declares that nothing was known as to the death or burial of the Virgin. [Vol. ii, p. 858.]

Again, in his remarks upon the writings falsely attributed to Melito, the same editor says, that since this Pseudo-Melito speaks many jejune things of the Virgin Mary, (such for example as at the approach of death her exceeding fear of being exposed to the wiles of Satan,) he concludes, from that circ.u.mstance, that the work was written before the Council of Ephesus; alleging this very remarkable reason, that "after that {312} time there BEGAN TO BE ENTERTAINED, as was right, not only in the East, but also in the West, a far better estimate of the parent of G.o.d." [P. 880.]

Many of the remarks of this editor would appear to savour of prejudice had they come from the pen of one who denied the reality of the a.s.sumption, or oppugned the honour and wors.h.i.+p now paid by members of the Church of Rome to the Virgin. Nor could the suspicion of such prejudice be otherwise than increased by the insinuation which the same editor throws out against the honesty of Archbishop Juvenal, and on the possibility of his having invented the whole story, and so for sinister purposes deceived Marcian and Pulcheria; just as he fabricated the writings which he forged for the purpose of securing the primacy of Palestine; a crime laid to the charge of Juvenal by Leo the Great, in his letter to Maximus, Bishop of Antioch. [P. 879. See Leo. vol. i. p.

1215. Epist. cxix.]

It is moreover much to be regretted that in making the extract from John Damascenus those who employ it as evidence of primitive belief, have not presented it to their readers whole and entire. In the present case the system of quoting garbled extracts is particularly to be lamented, because the paragraphs omitted in the quotation carry in themselves clear proof that Juvenal's answer, as it now appears in John Damascenus, could not have been made by Juvenal to Marcian and Pulcheria. For in it is quoted from Dionysius the Areopagite by name, a pa.s.sage still found in the works ascribed to him; whereas by the judgment of the most learned Roman Catholic writers, those spurious works did not make their appearance in Christendom till the beginning of the sixth century, fifty years after the Council of Chalcedon, to a.s.sist at which {313} Juvenal is said to have been present in Constantinople when the emperor and empress held the alleged conversation with him.

The remainder of the pa.s.sage from the history of Euthymius, rehea.r.s.ed in this oration of John Damascenus, is as follows: "There were present with the Apostles at that time both the most honoured Timothy the Apostle, and first bishop of the Ephesians, and Dionysius the Areopagite, himself, as the great Dionysius testifies in the laboured words concerning the blessed Hierotheus, himself also then being present, to the above-named apostle Timothy, saying thus, Since with the inspired hierarchs themselves, when we also as thou knowest, and yourself, and many of our holy brethren had come together to the sight of the body which gave the principle of life; and there was present too James the brother of the Lord ([Greek: adelphotheos]), and Peter the chief and the most revered head of the apostles ([Greek: theologon]); then it seemed right, after the spectacle, that all the hierarchs (as each was able) should sing of the boundless goodness of the divine power. After the apostles, as you know, he surpa.s.sed all the other sacred persons, wholly carried away, and altogether in an ecstasy, and feeling an entire sympathy with what was sung; and by all by whom he was heard, and seen, and known (and he[117] knew it not), he was considered to be an inspired and divine hymnologist. And why should I speak to you about the things there divinely said, for unless I have even forgotten myself, I know that I have often heard from you some portions also of those inspired canticles? And the royal personages having heard this, requested of Juvenal the archbishop, that the holy coffin, with the {314} clothes of the glorious and all-holy Mary, mother of G.o.d, sealed up, might be sent to them. And this, when sent, they deposited in the venerable temple of the Mother of G.o.d, built in Blachernae; and these things were so."

[Footnote 117: This seems confused in the original ([Greek: kai eginosketo, kai ouk eginoske]). The whole pa.s.sage is involved in great obscurity.]

It is a fact no less lamentable than remarkable, that out of the lessons appointed by the Church of Rome for the feast of the a.s.sumption, to be read to believers a.s.sembled in G.o.d's house of prayer, three of those lessons are selected and taken entirely from this very oration of John Damascenus[118].

[Footnote 118:

The Fourth Lesson begins "Hodie sacra et animata arca."

The Fifth " " "Hodie virgo immaculata."

The Sixth " " "Eva quae serpentis," &c.--ae. 603.

These contain the pa.s.sages to which we have before referred as fixing the belief of the Church of Rome to be in the CORPOREAL a.s.sumption of Mary. "Quomodo corruptio invaderet CORPUS ILLUD in quo vita suscepta est? [Greek: pos diaphthora tou zoodochon katatolmaeseie somatos.]"]

This, then, is the account nearest to the time of the supposed event; and yet can any thing be more vague, and by way of testimony, more worthless? A writer near the middle of the sixth century refers to a conversation, said to have taken place in the middle of the fifth century; in this reported conversation at Constantinople, the Bishop of Jerusalem is represented to have informed the Emperor and Empress of an ancient tradition, which was believed, concerning a miraculous event, said to have taken place nearly four hundred years before, that the body was taken out of a coffin without the knowledge of those who had deposited it there: Whilst the primitive and inspired account, recording most minutely the journeys and proceedings of some of those very persons, and the letters of others, makes no mention at all of any transaction of the kind; and of {315} all the intermediate historians and ecclesiastical writers not one gives the slightest intimation that any rumour of it had reached them[119].

[Footnote 119: Baronius appears not to have referred to this history of Euthymius, but he refers to Nicephorus, and also to a work ascribed to Melito, c. 4, 5. Nicephorus, Paris, 1630. vol.

i. p. 168. lib. ii. c. 21. Baronius also refers to lib. 15. c.

14. This Nicephorus was Patriarch of Constantinople. He lived during the reign of our Edward the First, or Edward the Second, and cannot, therefore, be cited in any sense of the word as an ancient author writing on the events of the primitive ages; though the manner in which his testimony is appealed to would imply, that he was a man to whose authority on early ecclesiastical affairs we were now expected to defer.]

Another authority to which the writers on the a.s.sumption of the Virgin appeal, is that of Nicephorus Callistus, who, at the end of the thirteenth or the beginning of the fourteenth century, dedicated his work to Andronicus Palaeologus. The account given by Nicephorus is this:

In the fifth year of Claudius, the Virgin at the age of fifty-nine, was made acquainted with her approaching death. Christ himself then descended from heaven with a countless mult.i.tude of angels, to take up the soul of his mother; He summoned his disciples by thunder and storm from all parts of the world. The Virgin then bade Peter first, and afterwards the rest of the Apostles, to come with burning torches[120].

The Apostles surrounded her bed, and "an outpouring of miracles flowed forth." The blind beheld the sun, the deaf heard, the lame walked, and every disease fled away. The Apostles and others sang, as the coffin was borne from Sion to Gethsemane, angels preceding, surrounding, and following it. {316} A wonderful thing then took place. The Jews were indignant and enraged, and one more desperately bold than the rest rushed forward, intending to throw down the holy corpse to the ground.

Vengeance was not tardy; for his hands were cut off from his arms[121].

The procession stopped; and at the command of Peter, on the man shedding tears of penitence, his hands were joined on again and restored whole.

At Gethsemane she was put into a tomb, but her Son transferred her to the divine habitation.

[Footnote 120: This author here quotes the forged work ascribed to Dionysius the Areopagite, to which we have before referred.]

[Footnote 121: This tradition seems to have been much referred to at a time just preceding our Reformation. In a volume called "The Hours of the most blessed Mary, according to the legitimate rite of the Church of Salisbury," printed in Paris in 1526, from which we have made many extracts in the second part of this work, the frontispiece gives an exact representation of the story at the moment of the Jew's hands being cut off. They are severed at the wrist, and are lying on the coffin, on which his arms also are resting. In the sky the Virgin appears between the Father and the Son, the Holy Dove being seen above her. The same print occurs also in another part of the volume.]

Nicephorus then refers to Juvenal, Archbishop of Jerusalem, as the authority on which the tradition was received, that the Apostles opened the coffin to enable St. Thomas (the one stated to have been absent) to embrace the body; and then he proceeds to describe the personal appearance of the Virgin. [Vol. i. p. 171.]

I am unwilling to trespa.s.s upon the patience of my readers by any comment upon such evidence as this. Is it within the verge of credibility that had such an event as Mary's a.s.sumption taken place under the extraordinary circ.u.mstances which now invest the tradition, or under any circ.u.mstances whatever, there would have been a total silence respecting it in the Holy Scriptures? {317} That the writers of the first four centuries should never have referred to such a fact? That the first writer who alludes to it, should have lived in the middle of the fifth century, or later; and that he should have declared in a letter to his contemporaries that the subject was one on which many doubted; and that he himself would not deny it, not because it rested upon probable evidence, but because nothing was impossible with G.o.d; and that nothing was known as to the time, the manner, or the persons concerned, even had the a.s.sumption taken place? Can we place any confidence in the relation of a writer in the middle of the sixth century, as to a tradition of what an archbishop of Jerusalem attending the council of Chalcedon, had told the sovereigns at Constantinople of a tradition, as to what was said to have happened nearly four hundred years before, whilst in the "Acts" of that Council, not the faintest trace is found of any allusion to the supposed fact or the alleged tradition, though the transactions of that Council in many of its most minute circ.u.mstances are recorded, and though the discussions of that Council brought the name and circ.u.mstances of the Virgin Mary continually before the minds of all who attended it?

This, however, is a point of too great importance to be dismissed summarily; and seems to require us to examine, however briefly, into the circ.u.mstances of that Council. {318}

CHAPTER IV.--COUNCILS OF CONSTANTINOPLE, EPHESUS, AND THE GENERAL COUNCIL OF CHALCEDON

The legend on which the doctrine of the a.s.sumption of the Virgin Mary is founded professes to trace the tradition to Juvenal, Archbishop of Jerusalem, when he was sojourning in Constantinople for the purpose of attending the General Council of Chalcedon. To the Emperor and Empress, who presided at that council, Juvenal is said to have communicated the tradition, as received in Palestine, of the miraculous taking up of Mary's body into heaven. This circ.u.mstance seems, as we have already intimated, of itself, to require us to examine the records of that Council, with the view of ascertaining whether any traces may be found confirmatory of the tradition, or otherwise; and since that Council cannot be regarded as an insulated a.s.sembly, but as a continuation rather or resumption of the preceding minor Councils of Constantinople and Ephesus, we must briefly refer to the occasion and nature generally of that succession of Christian synods. I am not aware that in the previous Councils any thing had transpired {319} which could be brought as evidence on the subject of our inquiry. The questions which had disturbed the peace of Christendom, and which were agitated in these Councils, inseparable from a repeated mention of the Virgin Mary's name, afforded an opportunity at every turn for an expression of the sentiments of those who composed the Councils, and of all connected with them, including the Bishop of Rome himself, towards her. It would be altogether foreign from the purpose of this address to enter in any way at large upon the character and history of those or the preceding Councils, yet a few words seem necessary, to enable us to judge of the nature and weight of the evidence borne by them on the question immediately before us.

The source of all the disputes which then rent the Church of HIM who had bequeathed peace as his last and best gift to his followers, was the anxiety to define and explain the nature of the great Christian mystery, the Incarnation of the Son of G.o.d; a point on which it were well for all Christians to follow only so far as the Holy Scriptures lead them by the hand. All parties appealed to the Nicene Council; though there seems to have been, to say the least, much misunderstanding and unnecessary violence and party spirit on all sides. The celebrated Eutyches of Constantinople was charged with having espoused heterodox doctrine, by maintaining that in Christ was only one nature, the incarnate Word. On this charge he was accused before a Council held at Constantinople in A.D. 448. His doctrine was considered to involve a denial of the human nature of the Son of G.o.d. The Council condemned him of heresy, deposed, and excommunicated him. From this proceeding Eutyches appealed to a General Council. A council (the authority of which, however, {320} has been solemnly, but with what adequate reason we need not stop to examine, repudiated), was convened at Ephesus in the following year, by the Emperor Theodosius. The proceedings of this a.s.sembly were accompanied by lamentable unfairness and violence. Eutyches was acquitted, and restored by this council[122]; and his accusers were condemned and persecuted; Flavia.n.u.s, Archbishop of Constantinople, who had summoned the preceding council, being even scourged and exiled. In his distress that patriarch sought the good offices of Leo, Bishop of Rome, who espoused his cause, but who failed nevertheless of inducing Theodosius to convene a General Council. His successor Marcian, however, consented; and in the year 451 the Council of Chalcedon was convened, first meeting at Nice, and by adjournment being removed to Chalcedon. In this council all the proceedings as well of the Council of Constantinople as of Ephesus, were rehea.r.s.ed at length; and from a close examination of the proceedings of those three councils, only one inference seems deducible, namely, that the invocation and wors.h.i.+p of saints and of the Virgin Mary had not then obtained that place in the Christian {321} Church, which the Church of Rome now a.s.signs to it; a place, however, which the Church of England, among other branches of the Catholic Church, maintains that it has usurped, and cannot, without a sacrifice of the only sound principle of religious wors.h.i.+p, be suffered to retain.