November XXX

St. Andrew, Apostle

The acts of this apostle’s martyrdom, though rejected by Tillemont, &c., are maintained to be genuine by Nat. Alexander, Hist. t. 1, and by Mr. Woog, professor of history and antiquities at Leipsic, in learned dissertations published in 1748 and 1751. The authority of this piece being contested, little stress is laid upon it; and the following account is gathered from the sacred writings, and those of the fathers.

St. Andrew was a native of Bethsaida, a town in Galilee, upon the banks of the lake of Genesareth. He was the son of Jonas or John a fisherman of that town, and brother to Simon Peter, but whether elder or vounger the holy scriptures have not acquainted us. They had afterwards a house at Capharnaum, where Jesus lodged when he preached in that city. It is no small proof of the piety and good inclinations of St. Andrew, that when St. John Baptist began to preach penance in the desert, he was not content with going to hear him as others did, but became his disciple, passed much of his time in hearing his instructions, and studied punctually to practise all his lessons and copy his example; but he often returned home to his fishing trade. He was with his master when St. John Baptist seeing Jesus pass by the day after he had been baptized by him, said: Behold the Lamb of God.¹ Andrew, by the ardor and purity of his desires, and his fidelity in every religious practice, deserved to be so far enlightened as to comprehend this mysterious saying, and, without delay, he and another disciple of the Baptist went after Jesus, who drew them secretly by the invisible bands of his grace, and saw them with the eyes of his spirit before he beheld them with his corporal eyes. Turning back as he walked, and seeing them follow him, he said, What seek ye? They said, they desired to know where he dwelt: and he bade them come and see. There remained but two hours of that day, which they spent with him, and according to several fathers, the whole night following. “O how happy a day, how happy a night did they pass!” cries out St. Austin.² “Who will tell us what things they then learned from the mouth of their Saviour. Let us build ourselves a dwelling for him in our hearts, to which he may come, and where he may converse with us” For this happiness is enjoyed by a soul which opens her affections to God, and receives the rays of his divine light in heavenly contemplation. The joy and comfort which St. Andrew felt in that conversation are not to be expressed by words. By it he clearly learned that Jesus was the Messias and the Redeemer of the world, and resolved from that moment to follow him: he was the first of his disciples, and therefore is styled by the Greeks the Protoclet or First Called.

Andrew, who loved affectionately his brother Simon, called afterwards Peter, could not rest till he had imparted to him the infinite treasure which he had discovered, and brought him to Christ, that he might also know him. Simon was no sooner come to Jesus, but the Saviour of the world admitted him as a disciple, and gave him the name of Peter. The brothers carried one day with him to hear his divine doctrine and the next day returned home again. From this time they became Jesus’s disciples, not constantly attending upon him, as they afterwards did, but hearing him frequently, as their business would permit, and returning to their trade and family affairs again Jesus, in order to prove the truth of his divine doctrine by his works wrought his first miracle at the marriage at Cana in Galilee, and was pleased that these two brothers should be present at it with his holy mother. Jesus, going up to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover, stayed some days in Juda and baptized in the Jordan. Peter and Andrew also baptized by his authority, and in his name. Our Saviour being come back into Lower Galilee in autumn, and meeting one day Peter and Andrew fishing in the lake, before the end of the same year, he called them to a constant attendance upon the ministry of the gospel, saying, that he would make them fishers of men. Whereupon, they immediately left their nets to follow him, and never went from him again. The year following the Son of God formed the college of his apostles, in which our two brothers are named by the evangelists at the head of the rest. Not long after, Jesus went down to Capharnaum, and lodged at the house of Peter and Andrew, and, at the request of them both, cured Peter’s wife’s mother of a fever, by taking her by the hand, and rebuking the fever, by which it left her. When Christ would not send away the multitude of five thousand persons who had followed him into the desert, till they were refreshed with some food, St. Philip said two hundred pennyworth of bread would not suffice. But Andrew seemed to express a stronger faith, saying, there was a boy who had five barley loaves and two small fishes: which, indeed, were nothing among so many: but Christ could, if he pleased, exert his power, seeing he was greater than Eliseus who, with twenty loaves, fed a hundred men.³ When Christ was at Bethania, at the house of Lazarus, a little before his Sacred Passion, certain Greeks who came to worship God at the festival, addressed themselves to Philip, begging him to introduce them to Jesus. Philip did not undertake to do it alone; but spoke to St. Andrew, and they both together spoke to their divine master, and procured these strangers that happiness. This shows the great credit St. Andrew had with Christ; on which account St. Bede calls him the Introductor to Christ, and says he had this honor, because he brought St. Peter to him. Christ having foretold the destruction of the temple, Peter, John, James, and Andrew, asked him privately when that should come to pass, that they might forewarn their brethren to escape the danger.

After Christ’s resurrection and the descent of the Holy Ghost, St. Andrew preached the gospel in Scythia, as Origen testifies.⁴ Sophronius, who wrote soon after St. Jerom, and translated his catalogue of illustrious men, and some other works into Greek, adds Sogdiana and Colchis. Theodoret tells us,⁵ that he passed into Greece; St. Gregory Nazianzen mentions particularly Epirus,⁶ and St. Jerom Achaia.⁷ St. Paulinus says,⁸ this divine fisherman, preaching at Argos, put all the philosophers there to silence. St. Philastrius tells us,⁹ that he came out of Pontus into Greece, and that in his time people at Sinope were persuaded that they had his true picture, and the pulpit in which he had preached in that city. The Muscovites have long gloried that St. Andrew carried the gospel into their country as far as the mouth of the Borysthenes, and to the mountains where the city of Kiow now stands, and to the frontiers of Poland.¹⁰ If the ancients mean European Scythia, when they speak of the theatre of his labors, this authority is favorable to the pretensions of the Muscovites. The Greeks¹¹ understand it of Scythia, beyond Sebastopolis in Colchis, and perhaps also of the European: for they say he planted the faith in Thrace, and particularly at Byzantium, afterwards called Constantinople. But of this we meet with no traces in antiquity. Several Calendars commemorate the feast of the chair of St. Andrew at Patr in Achaia. It is agreed that he laid down his life there for Christ. St. Paulinus says,¹² that having taken many people in the nets of Christ, he confirmed the faith which he had preached by his blood at Patr. St. Sophronius, St. Gaudentius, and St. Austin assure us, that he was crucified: St. Peter Chrysologus says,¹³ on a tree: Pseudo-Hippolytus adds, on an olive-tree. In the hymn of pope Damasus it is barely mentioned that he was crucified. When the apostle saw his cross at a distance, he is said to have cried out;¹⁴ “Hail precious cross, that hast been consecrated by the body of my Lord, and adorned with his limbs as with rich jewels.—I come to thee exulting and glad; receive me with joy into thy arms. O good cross, that hast received beauty from our Lord’s limbs: I have ardently loved thee; long have I desired and sought thee: now thou art found by me, and art made ready for my longing soul: receive me into thy arms, taking me from among men, and present me to my master, that he who redeemed me on thee, may receive me by thee.” Upon these ardent breathings St. Bernard writes:¹⁵ “When he saw at a distance the cross prepared for him, his countenance did not change, nor did his blood freeze in his veins, not did his hair stand on end, nor did he lose his voice, nor did his body tremble, nor was his soul troubled, nor did his senses fail him, as it happens to human frailty: but the flame of charity which burned in his breast, cast forth sparks through his mouth.” The saint goes on, showing that fervor and love will make penance and labor sweet, seeing it can sweeten death itself, and, by the unction of the Holy Ghost, make even its torments desirable. The body of St. Andrew was translated from Patr to Constantinople in 357, together with those of St. Luke and St. Timothy, and deposited in the church of the apostles, which Constantine the Great had built a little before, St. Paulinus and St. Jerom mention miracles wrought on that occasion. The churches of Milan, Nola, Brescia, and some other places were, at the same time, enriched with small portions of these relics, as we are informed by St. Ambrose, St. Gaudentius, St. Paulinus, &c.

When the city of Constantinople was taken by the French, cardinal Peter of Capua brought the relies of St. Andrew thence into Italy in 1210, and deposited them in the cathedral of Amalphi, where they still remain.¹⁶ Thomas the Despot, when the Turks had made themselves masters of Constantinople, going from Greece into Italy, and carrying with him the head of St. Andrew, presented it to pope Plus II. in the year 1461, who allotted him a monastery for his dwelling, with a competent revenue, as is related by George Phranza, the last of the Byzantine historians, who wrote in four books the history of the Greek emperors after the Latins had lost Constantinople, with a curious account of the siege and plunder of that city by the Turks, in which tragical scene he had a great share, being Protovestiarinus, one of the chief officers in the emperor’s court and army.¹⁷ It is the common opinion that the cross of St. Andrew was in the form of the letter X, styled a cross decussate, composed of two pieces of number crossing each other obliquely in the middle. That such crosses were sometimes used is certain:¹⁸ yet no clear proofs are produced as to the form of St. Andrew’s cross. It is mentioned in the records of the duchy of Burgundy, that the cross of St. Andrew was brought out of Achara, and placed in the nunnery of Weaune near Marseilles. It was thence removed into the abbey of St. Victor in Marseilles, before the year 1250, and is still shown there. A part thereof, enclosed in a silver case gilt, was carried to Brussels by Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy and Brabant, who, in honor of it, instituted the Knights of the Golden Fleece, who, for the badge of their order, wear a figure of this cross, called St. Andrew’s cross, or the cross of Burgundy.* The Scots honor St. Andrew as principal patron of their country, and their historians tell us, that a certain abbot called Regulus, brought thither from Patr, in 369, or rather from Constantinople some years later, certain relics of this apostle which he reposited in a church which he built in his honor, with a monastery called Abernethy, where now the city of St. Andrew’s stands.¹⁹ Usher proves that many pilgrims resorted to this church from foreign countries, and that the Scottish monks of that place were the first who were called Culdees.²⁰ Hungus, king of the Picts, soon after the year 800, in thanksgiving for a great victory which he had gained over the Northumbrians, gave to this church the tenth part of all the land of his dominions. Kenneth II., king of the Scots, having overcome the Picts, and entirely extinguished their kingdom in North Britain in 845, repaired and richly endowed the church of St. Regulus or Rueil, in which the arm of St. Andrew was reverently kept.^† The Muscovites say he preached the faith among them, and honor him as the principal titular saint of their empire. Peter the Great instituted under his name the first and most noble order of knighthood, or of the blue riband: leaving the project of a second order of St. Alexander Newski, or of the red riband, to be carried into execution by his widow.

St. Andrew, by conversing with Christ, extinguished in his breast ali earthly passions and desires, and attained to the happiness of his pure divine love. We often say to ourselves, that we also desire to purchase holy love, the most valuable of all treasures, and the summit of dignity and happiness. But these desires are fruitless and mere mockery, unless we earnestly set about the means. In the first place, we must be at the expense (if that can be called an expense, which is the first step to true liberty and happiness) of laying a deep foundation of humility, meekness, and self-denial. We must first with the apostle leave all things; that is to say, we must sincerely and in spirit forsake the world, (though we live in it,) and must also renounce and die to ourselves before we can be admitted to the familiar converse of our Redeemer and God, or before he receives us to his chaste spiritual embraces, and opens to us the treasure of his choicest graces. This preparation and disposition of soul, it must be our constant care always to improve; for, in the same proportion that the world and self love are banished from our hearts, shall we advance in divine love. But this great virtue, the queen, the form, and the soul of all perfect virtue, is learned, exercised, and improved, by conversing much with God in holy meditation, reading, and assiduous fervent prayer and recollection; also by its external acts, in all manner of good works, especially those of fraternal charity and spiritual mercy.²¹

St. Narses, Bishop, and Companions, MM.

In the fourth year of the great persecution raised by Sapor II., were apprehended Narses, bishop of Schiahareadat, (the capital of Beth-Germa, a province in the heart of Persia,) and Joseph, his disciple, while the king happened to be in that city. When they were brought before him he said to Narses: “Your venerable gray hairs, and the comeliness and bloom of your pupil’s youth, strongly incline me in your favor. Consult your own safety and advantage; receive the sacred rites of the sun, and I will confer on you most ample rewards and honors; for I am exceedingly taken with your persons.” The blessed Narses answered: “Your flattery is very disagreeable to us, because ensnaring, and tending to draw us over to a treacherous world. Even you who enjoy whatever the world can give, and who promise it to others, will find it fleeting from you like a dream, and falling away like the morning dew. As for my part, I am now above four score years old, and have served God from my infancy. I pray him again and again, that I may be preserved from so grievous an evil, and may never betray the fidelity which I owe him by adoring the sun, the work of his hands.” The king angrily said: “If you obey not without more ado, you shall this instant be led to execution.” Narses replied: “If you had power, O king, to put us to death seven times over, we should never yield to your desire.” The king then pronounced sentence, and the martyrs were immediately put into the hands of the executioners. The king was there in a manzal or chan, that is, a resting-place on his journey. The martyrs were led out of the tents, and followed by an incredible multitude of people. At the place of execution Narses cast his eyes round about him on the crowd, and Joseph said to him: “See how the people gaze at you. They are waiting that you dismiss them and go to your own home.” The bishop embracing him replied: “You are most happy, my blessed Joseph who have broken the snares of the world, and have entered with joy, the narrow path of the kingdom of heaven.” Joseph presented his head first to the executioner, which was struck off. They suffered on the 10th day of the moon of November, in 343.

In the same acts, the martyrdom of several others about the same time as recorded. John, bishop of Beth-Seleucia, was put to death in the castle of Beth-Hascita, by order of Ardascirus prince of Persia, probably a son of Sapor. Isaac, priest of the town Hulsar, was stoned to death without the walls of Beth-Seleucia, by the command of the president of Adargusnasaphus. Papa, priest of Herminum, was put to death in the castle of Gabal. by prince Ardascirus, when he was viceroy of Hadiabus. Uhanam, a young clergyman, was stoned to death by certain apostate gentlewomen of Beth-Seleucia, by order of the same prince. Guhsciatazades, a eunuch in the palace of Ardascirus, refused to sacrifice to the sun; whereupon that prince commanded Vartranes, an apostate priest who had shrunk a his trial and renounced his faith, to kill him with his own hand. The wretch advanced; but at first sight of the holy martyr trembled, and stopped short, not daring for a considerable time to give a thrust. The martyr said to him: “Do you who are a priest come to kill me? I certainly mistake when I call you a priest. Accomplish your design, but remember the apostacy and end of Judas.” At last the impious Vartranes made a trembling push, and stabbed the holy eunuch. The martyrs whose names follow, were of the laity: Sasannes, Mares, Timus, and Zaron, sealed their faith with their blood in the province of the Huzites. Bahutha, a most noble lady of Beth-Seleucia, was put to death for the same by order of the president. Tecla and Danacla, virgins of the same city, suffered death soon after her, under the same judge. Tatona, Mama, Mazachia, and Anne, virgins and citizens of Beth-Seleucia, suffered martyrdom without the walls of the city of Burcatha. The virgins Abiatha, Hathes, and Mamlacha, of the province of Beth-Germa, were massacred by order of king Sapor, when he made a progress through that country. See their genuine Chaldaic acts published by Steph. Assemani, Act. Mart. Orient. t. 1, p. 97.

SS. Sapor and Isaac, BB., Mahanes, Abraham, and Simeon, MM.

In the thirtieth year of Sapor II., the magians accused the Christians to the king, with loud complaints, saying: “No longer are we able to worship the sun, nor the air, nor the water, nor the earth, for the Christians despise and insult them.” Sapor, incensed by their discourse against the servants of God, laid aside his intended journey to Aspharesa, and published a severe edict commanding the Christians everywhere to be taken into custody. Mahanes, Abraham, and Simeon, were the first who fell into the hands of his messengers. The next day the magians laid a new information before the king, saying: “Sapor, bishop of Beth-Nictor, and Isaac, bishop of Beth-Seleucia, build churches, and seduce many.”* The king answered in great wrath: “It is my command that strict search be made to discover the criminals throughout my dominions, and that they be brought to their trials within three days.” The king’s horsemen immediately flew day and night in swift journeys over the kingdom, and brought up the prisoners whom the magians had particularly accused, and they were thrown into the same prison with the aforesaid confessors. The day after the arrival of this new company of holy champions, Sapor, Isaac, Mahanes, Abraham, and Simeon, were presented to the king, who said to them: “Have not you heard that I derive my pedigree from the gods? yet I sacrifice to the sun, and pay divine honors to the moon. And who are you who resist my laws, and despise the sun and fire?” The martyrs with one voice answered: “We acknowledge one God, and Him alone we worship.” Sapor said: “What God is better than Hormisdatas, or stronger than the angry Armanes? and who is ignorant that the sun is to be worshipped.”^† The holy bishop Sapor replied: “We confess one only God, who made all things, and Jesus Christ born of him.” The king commanded that he should be beaten on the mouth; which order was executed with such cruelty that all his teeth were knocked out. Then the tyrant ordered him to be beaten with clubs, till his whole body was bruised and his bones broken. After this he was loaded with chains. Isaac appeared next. The king reproached him bitterly for having presumed to build churches; but the martyr maintained the cause of Christ with inflexible constancy. By the king’s command, several of the chief men of the city who had embraced the faith, and abandoned it for fear of torments, were sent for, and by threats engaged to carry off the servant of God, and stone him to death. At the news of his happy martyrdom, St. Sapor exulted with holy joy, and expired himself two days after in prison, of his wounds. The barbarous king, nevertheless, to be sure of his death, caused his head to be cut off, and brought to him. The other three were then called by him to the bar; and the tyrant finding them no less invincible than those who were gone before them, caused the skin of Mahanes to be flayed from the top of his head to the navel; under which torment he expired. Abraham’s eyes were bored out with a hot iron, in such a manner that he died of his wounds two days after. Simeon was buried in the earth up to his breast, and shot to death with arrows. The Christians privately interred their bodies. The glorious triumph of these martyrs happened in the year 339 See their genuine Chaldaic acts in Steph. Evod. Assemani, Acta Mart Orient. t. 1, p. 226.