9. Moreover, others in large numbers were torn asunder by the heathen throughout the cities and villages. Of one of these I shall give some account, as an example. Ischyrion served one of the rulers in the capacity of steward for stated wages. His employer ordered this man to offer sacrifice; and on his refusal to do so, he abused him. When he persisted in his non-compliance, his master treated him with contumely; and when he still held out, he took a huge stick and thrust it through his bowels and heart, and slew him. Why should I mention the multitudes of those who had to wander about in desert places and upon the mountains, and who were cut off by hunger, and thirst, and cold, and sickness, and robbers, and wild beasts? The survivors of such are the witnesses of their election and their victory. One circumstance, however, I shall subjoin as an illustration of these things. There was a certain very aged person of the name of Chæremon, bishop of the place called the city of the Nile. [813] He fled along with his partner to the Arabian mountain, [814] and never returned. The brethren, too, were unable to discover anything of them, although they made frequent search; and they never could find either the men themselves, or their bodies. Many were also carried off as slaves by the barbarous Saracens [815] to that same Arabian mount. Some of these were ransomed with difficulty, and only by paying a great sum of money; others of them have not been ransomed to this day. And these facts I have related, brother, not without a purpose, but in order that you may know how many and how terrible are the ills that have befallen us; which troubles also will be best understood by those who have had most experience of them.
10. Those sainted martyrs, accordingly, who were once with us, and who now are seated with Christ, [816] and are sharers in His kingdom, and partakers with Him in His judgment [817] and who act as His judicial assessors, [818] received there certain of the brethren who had fallen away, and who had become chargeable with sacrificing to the idols. And as they saw that the conversion and repentance of such might be acceptable to Him who desires not at all the death of the sinner, [819] but rather his repentance, they proved their sincerity, and received them, and brought them together again, and assembled with them, and had fellowship with them in their prayers and at their festivals. [820] What advice then, brethren, do you give us as regards these? What should we do? Are we to stand forth and act with the decision and judgment which those (martyrs) formed, and to observe the same graciousness with them, and to deal so kindly with those toward whom they showed such compassion? or are we to treat their decision as an unrighteous one, [821] and to constitute ourselves judges of their opinion on such subjects, and to throw clemency into tears, and to overturn the established order? [822]
11. But I shall give a more particular account of one case here which occurred among us: [823] There was with us a certain Serapion, an aged believer. He had spent his long life blamelessly, but had fallen in the time of trial (the persecution). Often did this man pray (for absolution), and no one gave heed to him; [824] for he had sacrificed to the idols. Falling sick, he continued three successive days dumb and senseless. Recovering a little on the fourth day, he called to him his grandchild, and said, "My son, how long do you detain me? Hasten, I entreat you, and absolve me quickly. Summon one of the presbyters to me." And when he had said this, he became speechless again. The boy ran for the presbyter; but it was night, and the man was sick, and was consequently unable to come. But as an injunction had been issued by me, [825] that persons at the point of death, if they requested it then, and especially if they had earnestly sought it before, should be absolved, [826] in order that they might depart this life in cheerful hope, he gave the boy a small portion of the Eucharist, [827] telling him to steep it in water [828] and drop it into the old man's mouth. The boy returned bearing the portion; and as he came near, and before he had yet entered, Serapion again recovered, and said, "You have come, my child, and the presbyter was unable to come; but do quickly what you were instructed to do, and so let me depart." The boy steeped the morsel in water, and at once dropped it into the (old man's) mouth; and after he had swallowed a little of it, he forthwith gave up the ghost. Was he not then manifestly preserved? and did he not continue in life just until he could be absolved, and until through the wiping away of his sins he could be acknowledged [829] for the many good acts he had done?
[787] Eusebius, Hist. Eccles., vi. 41, 42, 44. Certain codices read Fabianus for Fabius, and that form is adopted also by Rufinus. Eusebius introduces this epistle thus: "The same author, in an epistle written to Fabius bishop of Antioch, gives the following account of the conflicts of those who suffered martyrdom at Alexandria."
[788] kai phthasas ho kakon, etc. Pearson, Annales Cyprian. ad ann., 249 § 1, renders it rather thus: "et prævertens malorum huic urbi vates et auctor, quisquis ille fuit, commovit," etc.
[789] eusebeian ten threskeian daimonon. Valesius thinks the last three words in the text ( = service to their demons) an interpolation by some scholiast. [Note threskeian = cultus, James i. 27.]
[790] Heb. x. 30.
[791] [To this day St. Apollonia is invoked all over Europe; and votive offerings are to be seen hung up at her shrines, in the form of teeth, by those afflicted with toothache.]
[792] ta tes asebeias kerugmata. What these precisely were, it is not easy to say. Dionysius speaks of them also as dusphema rhemata in this epistle, and as atheoi phonai in that to Germanus. Gallandi thinks the reference is to the practice, of which we read also in the Acts of Polycarp, ch. 9, where the proconsul addresses the martyr with the order: loidoreson ton Christon--Revile Christ. And that the test usually put to reputed Christians by the early persecutors was this cursing of Christ, we learn from Pliny, book x. epist. 97. [Vol. i. p. 41.]
[793] Or, shrink from.
[794] ephestion, for which Nicephorus reads badly, 'Ephesion.
[795] epipolu.
[796] athlious. But Pearson suggests athlous, ="when insurrection and civil war took the place of these persecutions." This would agree better with the common usage of diadechomai.
[797] ascholian tou pros emas thumou labonton. The Latin version gives "dum illorum cessaret furor." W. Lowth renders, "dum non vacaret ipsis furorem suum in nos exercere."
[798] This refers to the death of the Emperor Philip, who showed a very righteous and kindly disposition toward the Christians. Accordingly the matters here recounted by Dionysius took place in the last year of the Emperor Philip. This is also indicated by Dionysius in the beginning of this epistle, where he says that the persecution began at Alexandria a whole year before the edict of the Emperor Decius. But Christophorsonus, not observing this, interprets the metabolen tes basileias as signifying a change in the emperor's mind toward the Christians, in which error he is followed by Baronius, ch. 102.--Vales.
[799] In this sentence the Codex Regius reads, to prorrhethen hupo tou Kuriou hemon parabrachu to phoberotaton, etc., ="the one intimated beforetime by our Lord, very nearly the most terrible one." In Georgius Syncellus it is given as e para brachu. But the reading in the text, apophainon, "setting forth," is found in the Codices Maz., Med., Fuk., and Savilii; and it seems the best, the idea being that this edict of Decius was so terrible as in a certain measure to represent the most fearful of all times, viz., those of Antichrist.--Vales.
[800] apenton dediotes.
[801] hoi de demosieuontes hupo ton praxeon egonto. This is rendered by Christophorsonus, "alii ex privatis ædibus in publicum raptati ad delubra ducuntur a magistratibus." But demosieuontes is the same as ta demosia prattontes, i.e., decurions and magistrates. For when the edict of Decius was conveyed to them, commanding all to sacrifice to the immortal gods, these officials had to convene themselves in the court-house as usual, and stand and listen while the decree was there publicly recited. Thus they were in a position officially which led them to be the first to sacrifice. The word praxeis occurs often in the sense of the acts and administration of magistrates: thus, in Eusebius, viii. 11; in Aristides, in the funeral oration on Alexander, ta d' eis praxeis te kai politeias, etc. There are similar passage also in Plutarch's Politika parangelmata, and in Severianus's sixth oration on the Hexameron. So Chrysostom, in his eighty-third homily on Matthew, calls the decurions tous ta politika prattontas. The word demosieuontes, however, may also be explained of those employed in the departments of law or finance; so that the clause might be rendered, with Valesius: "alii, qui in publico versabantur, rebus ipsis et reliquorum exemplo, ad sacrificandum ducebantur." See the note in Migne.
[802] ischurizomenoi here for diischurizomenoi .--Vales.
[803] pros to hexes apeipon. It may also mean, "renounced the faith in the prospect of what was before them."
[804] A blessed one. Alluding to Matt. v. 10, 12.
[805] meta polun. But Codices Med., Maz., Fuk., and Savilii, as well as Georgius Syncellus, read met' ou polun, "after a short time."
[806] xusteras.
[807] Here Valesius adds from Rufinus the words kai 'Ammonarion hetera, "and a second Ammonarium," as there are four women mentioned.
[808] In Georgius Syncellus and Nicephorus it is given as Aster. Rufinus makes the name Arsinus. And in the old Roman martyrology, taken largely from Rufinus, we find the form Arsenius.--Vales.
[809] In his Bibliotheca, cod. cxix., Photius states that Isidorus was full brother to Pierius, the celebrated head of the Alexandrian school, and his colleague in martyrdom. He also intimates, however, that although some have reported that Pierius ended his career by martyrdom, others say that he spent the closing period of his life in Rome after the persecution abated.--Ruinart.
[810] suntagma stratiotikon. Rufinus and Christophorsonus make it turmam militum. Valesius prefers manipulum or contubernium. These may have been the apparitors or officers of the præfectus Augustalis. Valesius thinks rather that they were legionaries, from the legion which had to guard the city of Alexandria, and which was under the authority of the præfectus Augustalis. For at that time the præfectus Augustalis had charge of military affairs as well as civil.
[811] bathron. Valesius supposes that what is intended is the seat on which the accused sat when under interrogation by the judge.
[812] thriambeuontos autous. Rufinus makes it, "God thus triumphing in them;" from which it would seem that he had read di' autous. But thriambeuein is probably put here for thriambeuein poiein, as basileuein is also used by Gregory Nazianzenus.
[813] That is, Nilopolis or Niloupolis. Eusebius, bishop of the same seat, subscribed the Council of Ephesus.--Reading.
[814] to 'Arabion oros. There is a Mons Arabicusmentioned by Herodotus (ii. 8), which Ptolemy and others call Mons Troïcus.--Vales.
[815] This passage is notable from the fact that it makes mention of the Saracens. For of the writers whose works have come down to us there is none more ancient than Dionysius of Alexandria that has named the Saracens. Ammianus Marcellinus, however, writes in his fourteenth book that he has made mention of the Saracens in the Acts of Marcus. Spartianus also mentions the Saracens in his Niger, and says that the Roman soldiers were beaten by them.--Vales. ["The barbarous Saracens:" what a nominis umbra projected by "coming events," in this blissfully ignorant reference of our author! Compare Robertson, Researches, on the conquest of Jerusalem.]
[816] As to the martyrs' immediate departure to the Lord, and their abode with Him, see Tertullian, On the Resurrection of the Flesh, ch. xliii., and On the Soul, v. 55. [Vol. iii. p. 576; Ib., p. 231.]
[817] That the martyrs were to be Christ's assessors, judging the world with Him, was a common opinion among the fathers. So, after Dionysius, Eulogius, bishop of Alexandria, in his fifth book, Against the Novatians. Photius, in his Bibliotheca, following Chrysostom, objects to this, and explains Paul's words in 1 Cor. vi. 2 as having the same intention as Christ's words touching the men of Nineveh and the queen of the south who should rise up in the judgment and condemn that generation.
[818] sundikazontes. See a noble passage in Bossuet, Préface sur l'Apocal , § 28.
[819] Ezek. xxxiii. 11.
[820] Dionysius is dealing here not with public communion, such as was the bishop's prerogative to confer anew on the penitent, but with private fellowship among Christian people.--Vales.
[821] adikon poiesometha is the reading of Codices Maz., Med., Fuk., and Savil., and also of Georgius Syncellus. Others read adekton poiesometha, "we shall treat it as inadmissible."