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| To the Clergy and People Abiding in Spain, Concerning Basilides and Martial.
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Epistle LXVII.2751
| 2751
Oxford ed.: Ep. lxvii. a.d.
257. |
To the Clergy and People Abiding in
Spain, Concerning Basilides and Martial.
Argument.—Basilides and Martial, Bishops, Having Lapsed and Become
Contaminated by the Certificates of Idolatry, Cyprian with His
Fellow-Bishops Praises the Clergy and People of Spain that They Had
Substituted in Their Place by a Legitimate Election, Sabinus and Felix;
Especially As, According to the Decision of Cornelius and His
Colleagues, Lapsed Bishops Might Indeed Be Received to Repentance, But
Were Prohibited from the Priestly Honour. Moreover, He Alludes by
the Way to Certain Matters About the Ancient Rite of Episcopal
Election. The Context Indicates that This Was Written During the
Episcopate of Stephen.
1. Cyprian, Cæcilius, Primus, Polycarp,
Nicomedes, Lucilianus, Successus, Sedatus, Fortunatus, Januarius,
Secundinus, Pomponius, Honoratus, Victor, Aurelius, Sattius, Petrus,
another Januarius, Saturninus, another Aurelius, Venantius, Quietus,
Rogatianus, Tenax, Felix, Faustinus, Quintus, another Saturninus,
Lucius, Vincentius, Libosus, Geminius, Marcellus, Iambus, Adelphius,
Victoricus, and Paulus, to Felix the presbyter, and to the peoples
abiding at Legio2752
and
Asturica,2753
also to
Lælius the deacon, and the people abiding at Emerita,2754
brethren in
the Lord, greeting. When we had come together, dearly beloved
brethren, we read your letters, which according to the integrity of
your faith and your fear of God you wrote to us by Felix and Sabinus
our fellow-bishops, signifying that Basilides and Martial, being
stained with the certificates of idolatry, and bound with the
consciousness of wicked crimes, ought not to hold the episcopate and
administer the priesthood of God; and you desired an answer to be
written to you again concerning these things, and your solicitude, no
less just than needful, to be relieved either by the comfort or by the
help of our judgment. Nevertheless to this your desire not so much
our counsels as the divine precepts reply, in which it is long since
bidden by the voice of Heaven and prescribed by the law of God, who and
what sort of persons ought to serve the altar and to celebrate the
divine sacrifices. For in Exodus God speaks to Moses, and warns
him, saying, “Let the priests which come near to the Lord God
sanctify themselves, lest the Lord forsake them.”2755
And
again: “And when they come near to the altar of the Holy
One to minister they shall not bring sin upon them, lest they
die.”2756
Also in
Leviticus the Lord commands and says, “Whosoever hath any spot or
blemish upon him, shall not approach to offer gifts to
God.”2757
2. Since these things are announced and are
made plain to us, it is necessary that our obedience should wait upon
the divine precepts; nor in matters of this kind can human indulgence
accept any man’s person, or yield anything to any one, when the
divine prescription has interfered, and establishes a law. For we
ought not to be forgetful what the Lord spoke to the Jews by Isaiah the
prophet, rebuking, and indignant that they had despised the divine
precepts and followed human doctrines. “This people,”
he says, honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is widely
removed from me; but in vain do they worship me, teaching the doctrines
and commandments of men.”2758
This also the Lord repeats in the
Gospel, and says, “Ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may
establish your own tradition.”2759
Having which things before our
eyes, and solicitously and religiously considering them, we ought in
the ordinations of priests to choose none but unstained and upright
ministers,2760
who, holily and
worthily offering sacrifices to God, may be heard in the prayers which
they make for the safety of the Lord’s people, since it is
written, “God heareth not a sinner; but if any man be a
worshipper of God, and doeth His will, him He heareth.”2761
On which
account it is fitting, that with full diligence and sincere
investigation those should be chosen for God’s priesthood whom it
is manifest God will hear.
3. Nor let the people flatter themselves
that they can be free from the contagion of sin, while communicating
with a priest who is a sinner, and yielding their consent to the unjust
and unlawful episcopacy of their overseer, when the divine reproof by
Hosea the prophet threatens, and says, “Their sacrifices shall be
as the bread of mourning; all that eat thereof shall be
polluted;”2762
teaching
manifestly and showing that all are absolutely bound to the sin who
have been contaminated by the sacrifice of a profane and unrighteous
priest. Which, moreover, we find to be manifested also in
Numbers, when Korah, and Dathan, and Abiram claimed for themselves the
power of sacrificing in opposition to Aaron the priest. There
also the Lord commanded by Moses that the people should be separated
from them, lest, being associated with the wicked, themselves also
should be bound closely in the same wickedness. “Separate
yourselves,” said He, “from the tents of these wicked and
hardened men, and touch not those things which belong to them, lest ye
perish together in their sins.”2763
On which account a people
obedient to the Lord’s precepts, and fearing God, ought to
separate themselves from a sinful prelate, and not to associate
themselves with the sacrifices of a sacrilegious priest, especially
since they themselves have the power either of choosing worthy priests,
or of rejecting unworthy ones.
4. Which very thing, too, we observe to come
from divine authority, that the priest should be chosen in the presence
of the people under the eyes of all, and should be approved worthy and
suitable by public judgment and testimony; as in the book of Numbers
the Lord commanded Moses, saying, “Take Aaron thy brother, and
Eleazar his son, and place them in the mount, in the presence of all
the assembly, and strip Aaron of his garments, and put them upon
Eleazar his son; and let Aaron die there, and be added to his
people.”2764
God
commands a priest to be appointed in the presence of all the assembly;
that is, He instructs and shows that the ordination of priests ought
not to be solemnized except with the knowledge of the people standing
near, that in the presence of the people either the crimes of the
wicked may be disclosed, or the merits of the good may be declared, and
the ordination, which shall have been examined by the suffrage and
judgment of all, may be just and legitimate.2765
| 2765
[See sec. 5, infra.] | And this is subsequently
observed, according to divine instruction, in the Acts of the Apostles,
when Peter speaks to the people of ordaining an apostle in the place of
Judas. “Peter,” it says, “stood up in the midst
of the disciples, and the multitude were in one place.”2766
| 2766
Acts i. 15. From some authorities, Baluzius
here interpolates, “the number of men was about a hundred and
twenty.” But this, says a modern editor, smacks of
“emendation.” | Neither
do we observe that this was regarded by the apostles only in the
ordinations of bishops and priests, but also in those of deacons, of
which matter itself also it is written in their Acts: “And
they twelve called
together,” it says, “the whole congregation of the
disciples, and said to them;”2767
which was done so diligently and
carefully, with the calling together of the whole of the people, surely
for this reason, that no unworthy person might creep into the ministry
of the altar, or to the office of a priest. For that unworthy
persons are sometimes ordained, not according to the will of God, but
according to human presumption, and that those things which do not come
of a legitimate and righteous ordination are displeasing to God, God
Himself manifests by Hosea the prophet, saying, “They have set up
for themselves a king, but not by me.”2768
5. For which reason you must diligently
observe and keep the practice delivered from divine tradition and
apostolic observance, which is also maintained among us, and almost
throughout all the provinces;2769
| 2769
[See Ep. xl. p. 319, supra.] | that for the proper celebration of
ordinations all the neighbouring bishops of the same province should
assemble with that people for which a prelate is ordained. And
the bishop should be chosen in the presence of the people, who have
most fully known the life of each one, and have looked into the doings
of each one as respects his habitual conduct. And this also, we
see, was done by you in the ordination of our colleague Sabinus; so
that, by the suffrage of the whole brotherhood,2770
and by the sentence of the bishops who
had assembled in their presence, and who had written letters to you
concerning him, the episcopate was conferred upon him, and hands were
imposed on him in the place of Basilides. Neither can it rescind
an ordination rightly perfected, that Basilides, after the detection of
his crimes, and the baring of his conscience even by his own
confession, went to Rome and deceived Stephen our colleague, placed at
a distance, and ignorant of what had been done, and of the truth, to
canvass that he might be replaced unjustly in the episcopate from which
he had been righteously deposed.2771
| 2771
[“Our colleague Stephen,” placed at a distance, ignorant of
facts and truth, and, in short, incompetent to meddle with the African
province in its own business: such was Cyprian’s idea of
the limits to which even this apostolic See was restricted.] | The result of this is, that the
sins of Basilides are not so much abolished as enhanced, inasmuch as to
his former sins he has also added the crime of deceit and
circumvention. For he is not so much to be blamed who has been
through heedlessness surprised by fraud, as he is to be execrated who
has fraudulently taken him by surprise. But if Basilides could
deceive men, he cannot deceive God, since it is written, “God is
not mocked.”2772
But neither can deceit advantage
Martialis, in such a way as that he who also is involved in great
crimes should hold his bishopric, since the apostle also warns, and
says, “A bishop must be blameless, as the steward of
God.”2773
6. Wherefore, since as ye have written,
dearly beloved brethren, and as Felix and Sabinus our colleagues
affirm, and as another Felix of Cæsar Augusta,2774
a maintainer of the faith and a
defender of the truth, signifies in his letter, Basilides and Martialis
have been contaminated by the abominable certificate of idolatry; and
Basilides, moreover, besides the stain of the certificate, when he was
prostrate in sickness, blasphemed against God, and confessed that he
blasphemed; and because of the wound to his own conscience, voluntarily
laying down his episcopate, turned himself to repentance, entreating
God, and considering himself sufficiently happy if it might be
permitted him to communicate even as a layman: Martialis also,
besides the long frequenting of the disgraceful and filthy banquets of
the Gentiles in their college, and placing his sons in the same
college, after the manner of foreign nations, among profane sepulchres,
and burying them together with strangers, has also affirmed, by acts
which are publicly taken before a ducenarian procurator,2775
| 2775 A
collector of taxes, so called from the amount of his salary. | that he had
yielded himself to idolatry, and had denied Christ; and as there are
many other and grave crimes in which Basilides and Martialis are held
to be implicated; such persons attempt to claim for themselves the
episcopate in vain; since it is evident that men of that kind may
neither rule over the Church of Christ, nor ought to offer sacrifices
to God, especially since Cornelius also, our colleague, a peaceable and
righteous priest, and moreover honoured by the condescension of the
Lord with martyrdom, has long ago decreed with us,2776
and with all the bishops appointed
throughout the whole world, that men of this sort might indeed be
admitted to repentance, but were prohibited from the ordination of the
clergy, and from the priestly honour.
7. Nor let it disturb you, dearest brethren,
if with some, in these last times, either an uncertain faith is
wavering, or a fear of God without religion is vacillating, or a
peaceable concord does not continue. These things have been
foretold as about to happen in the end of the world; and it was
predicted by the voice of the Lord, and by the testimony of the
apostles, that now that the world is failing, and the Antichrist is
drawing near, everything good shall fail, but evil and adverse things
shall prosper.2777
| 2777
[Surely a significant warning to our own times.] |
8. Yet although, in these last times, evangelic
rigour has not so failed in the Church of God, nor the strength of Christian virtue or faith
so languished, that there is not left a portion of the priests which in
no respect gives way under these ruins of things and wrecks of faith;
but, bold and stedfast, they maintain the honour of the divine majesty
and the priestly dignity, with full observance of fear. We
remember and keep in view that, although others succumbed and yielded,
Mattathias boldly vindicated God’s law; that Elias, when the Jews
gave way and departed from the divine religion, stood and nobly
contended; that Daniel, deterred neither by the loneliness of a foreign
country nor by the harassment of continual persecution, frequently and
gloriously suffered martyrdoms; also that the three youths, subdued
neither by their tender years2778
| 2778
Some read, “by the furnaces;” some “by
arms.” | nor by threats, stood up faithfully
against the Babylonian fires, and conquered the victor king even in
their very captivity itself. Let the number either of
prevaricators or of traitors see to it, who have now begun to rise in
the Church against the Church, and to corrupt as well the faith as the
truth. Among very many there still remains a sincere mind and a
substantial religion, and a spirit devoted to nothing but the Lord and
its God.2779
| 2779
[A noteworthy testimony to the Decian period, when to be a
Christian, indeed, was to be a confessor or martyr. Soc.,
H. E., bk. iv. c. 28.] | Nor
does the perfidy of others press down the Christian faith into ruin,
but rather stimulates and exalts it to glory, according to what the
blessed Apostle Paul exhorts, and says: “For what if some
of these have fallen from their faith: hath their unbelief made
the faith of God of none effect? God forbid. For God is
true, but every man a liar.”2780
But if every man is a liar, and
God only true, what else ought we, the servants, and especially the
priests, of God, to do, than forsake human errors and lies, and
continue in the truth of God, keeping the Lord’s
precepts?
9. Wherefore, although there have been found
some among our colleagues, dearest brethren, who think that the godly
discipline may be neglected, and who rashly hold communion with
Basilides and Martialis, such a thing as this ought not to trouble our
faith, since the Holy Spirit threatens such in the Psalms, saying,
“But thou hatest instruction, and castedst my words behind
thee: when thou sawest a thief, thou consentedst unto him, and
hast been partaker with adulterers.”2781
He shows that they become sharers
and partakers of other men’s sins who are associated with the
delinquents. And besides, Paul the apostle writes, and says the
same thing: “Whisperers, backbiters, haters of God,
injurious, proud, boasters of themselves, inventors of evil things,
who, although they knew the judgment of God, did not understand that
they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only they which
commit those things, but they also which consent unto those who do
these things.”2782
Since they, says he, who do such
things are worthy of death, he makes manifest and proves that not only
they are worthy of death, and come into punishment who do evil things,
but also those who consent unto those who do such things—who,
while they are mingled in unlawful communion with the evil and sinners,
and the unrepenting, are polluted by the contact of the guilty, and,
being joined in the fault, are thus not separated in its penalty.
For which reason we not only approve, but applaud, dearly beloved
brethren, the religious solicitude of your integrity and faith, and
exhort you as much as we can by our letters, not to mingle in
sacrilegious communion with profane and polluted priests, but maintain
the sound and sincere constancy of your faith with religious
fear. I bid you, dearest brethren, ever heartily
farewell.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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