A SELECT LIBRARY

OF THE

NICENE AND

POST-NICENE FATHERS

THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

EDITED BY

IN CONNECTION WITH A NUMBER OF PATRISTIC SCHOLARS OF EUROPE AND AMERICA.

VOLUME IX

SAINT CHRYSOSTOM:

ON THE PRIESTHOOD; ASCETIC TREATISES; SELECT HOMILIES AND LETTERS; HOMILIES ON THE STATUES

T&T CLARK

EDINBURGH

WM. B. EERDMANS PUBLISHING COMPANY

GRAND RAPIDS, MICHIGAN

PREFACE.

With this volume, we begin the Works of St. Chrysostom. It contains a sketch of his life and labors, the book on the priesthood, the letters to Theodore, the catechetical instructions, and a selection of ascetic treatises, special homilies, letters to Olympias and Innocent, and the twenty-one Homilies on the Statues.

The translations are entirely new, or thoroughly revised, by the Rev. W. R. W. Stephens, whose services I was so fortunate as to secure. He has written the best biography of St. Chrysostom and is thoroughly at home in his writings. He has taken great pains, with the aid of two friends, the Rev. T. P. Brandram and Rev. R. Blackburn, and is responsible for the whole volume, with the exception of the Prolegomena, which I wrote myself, to correspond with the Prolegomena to the works of St. Augustin.

The other volumes of St. Chrysostom in this series will be devoted to his exegetical Homilies on the greater part of the New Testament.

Philip Schaff.

New York, March, 1889.

Prolegomena.

The Life and Work of

St. John Chrysostom.

By Philip Schaff.

Literature.

i. editions of chrysostom's works.

S. Joannis Chrysostomi, archiepiscopi Constantinopolitani, Opera omnia quae exstant vel quae ejus nomine circumferuntur, ad mss. codices Gallicos, Vaticanos, Anglicos, Germanicosque castigata, etc. Opera et studio D.Bernardi de Montfaucon, monachi ordinis S. Benedicti e congregatione S. Mauri, opem ferentibus aliis ex codem sodalitio, monachis. Greek and Latin, Paris, 1718-'38, in 13 vols., fol. This is the best edition, and the result of about twenty years of the patient labor of Montfaucon (d. Dec. 21, 1741, 86 years old), and several assistants of the brotherhood of St. Maur. More than three hundred mss. were made use of, but the eight principal mss., as Field has shown, were not very carefully collated. Montfaucon, who at the date of the completion of his edition was 83 years old, prepared valuable prefaces to every treatise and set of homilies, arranged the works in chronological order, and added in vol. XIII. learned dissertations on the life, doctrine, discipline and heresies of the age of Chrysostom.

The Benedictine edition was reprinted at Venice, 1734-'41, in 13 vols. fol.; at Paris, ed. by F. de Sinner (Gaume), 1834-'39, in 13 vols. (an elegant edition, with some additions); and, with various improvements and corrections, by J. P. Migne, Petit-Montrouge, 1859-'63, in 13 vols. The last is the most complete edition, but inferior in paper and type to that of Gaume. Migne uses the critical text of Field in Matthew and the Pauline Epp. He had previously edited a Latin Version, 1842, in 9 vols.

The edition of Sir Henry Savile (Provost of Eton), Etonae, 1612, in 8 vols. fol., is less complete than the Benedictine edition, but gives a more correct Greek text (as was shown by F. Dübner from a collation of manuscripts) and valuable notes. Savile personally examined the libraries of Europe and spent £8,000 on his edition. His wife was so jealous of his devotion to Chrysostom that she threatened to burn his manuscripts.

The edition of Fronton le Duc, a French Jesuit, and the two brothers, Frederick and Claude Morel, was published at Paris, 1636, in 12 vols. fol., Greek and Latin.

A selection of Chrysostom's works (Opera praestantissima) in Greek and Latin, was edited by T. G. Lomler, Rudolphopoli (Rudolstadt), 1840 (unfinished).

The best edition of the Greek text of the Homilies on Matthew, and all the Pauline Epistles is by Dr. Frederick Field, of the Church of England (d. 1883), in the "Bibliotheca Patrum Ecclesiae Orientalis qui ante Orientis et Occidentis schisma floruerunt." The Homilies on Matthew appeared at Cambridge, 1839, 3 vols.; the Homilies on the Epistles of Paul and the Hebrews, Oxford, 1839-'62, in 7 vols.

The treatise De Sacerdotio (peri hierosunes) was separately edited by Erasmus in Greek (Basel, 1525, from the press of Frobenius), by J. Hughes, in Greek and Latin (Cambridge, 1710), and by J. A. Bengel, the commentator, in Greek (Stuttgart, 1725, and repeatedly reprinted since at Leipzig, 1825, 1834, 1872, by C. Tauchnitz). Lomler (Chrys. Opera, pp. viii. and ix.) enumerates twenty-three separate editions and translations of the treatise on the Priesthood.

ii. translations.--(a) german translations.

The treatise on the Priesthood has been translated by Hasselbach, 1820; Ritter, 1821, and others. The Bibliothek der Kirchenväter (Rom. Cath.), published at Kempten in Bavaria, devotes ten small volumes to St. Chrysostom, including the Priesthood, ascetic Treatises, and Homilies, translated by Joh. Chrysostomus Mitterrutzner, 1869-'84. German translations of selected Homilies by J. A. Cramer (Leipzig, 1748-'51, 10 vols.); Feder (Augsburg, 1786); Ph. Mayer (Nürnberg, 1830); W. Arnoldi (Trier, 1835); Augusti (Predigten der Kirchenväter, vols. I. and II., Leipzig, 1839); Jos. Lutz (Tübingen, 2d ed. 1859); Gust. Leonhardi (Leipzig, 1888, selected sermons and orations, in vol I. of Klassikerbibliothek der Christl. Predigtliteratur).

(b) english translations.

The work on the Priesthood was translated by Hollier (London, 1728); Bunce (London, 1759); Hohler (Cambridge, 1837); Marsh (London, 1844); Harris Cowper (London, 1866); and Stephens (N. York, 1888, prepared for this "Library").

The Homilies on the Statues and on the New Testament were translated by several scholars for the "Oxford Library of the Fathers," 1839-'77, 16 vols. The earlier parts (on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, and on the Statues) are based on the text of Montfaucon and Savile, the later parts on the improved text of Field. The Oxford translation has been revised and annotated by American scholars for this "Library," and new translations of other works of St. Chrysostom have been added, namely, the treatise on the Priesthood, the Exhortation to the fallen Theodore, Letters, Tracts, and Special Homilies (in this first volume).

iii. biographies and essays.

Palladius (a friend of Chrysostom and bishop of Helenopolis in

Bithynia, author of the Historia Lausiaca; according to others a

different person): Dialogus historicus de vita et conversatione beati

Joannis Chrysostomi cum Theodoro ecclesiae Romanae diacono (in the Bened.

edition of the Opera, tom. xiii. pp. 1-89; in Migne's ed., tom. i.,

Pars prior, 5-84, in Greek and Latin). Hieronymus: De viris

illustribus, c. 129 (a very brief notice, mentioning only the work De

Sacerdotio). Socrates: Hist. Eccl. VI., 3-21. Sozomen: Hist. Eccl.

VIII. 2-23. Theodoret: Hist. Eccl. V. 27-36. B. de Montfaucon: Vita

Joannis Chrysost. (in his edition of the Opera, tom. xiii. 91-178; in

Migne, I.I. 84-264): Testimonia Veterum de S. Joann. Chrys. scriptis,

ibid. tom. xiii. 256-292. Tillemont: Mémoires, vol. XI. pp. 1-405,

547-626 (exceedingly minute and accurate from the works of Chrys.). F.

Stilting: Acta Sanctorum, Sept. 14 (the day of Chrysostom's death),

tom. iv. pp. 401-709; comp. Stilting's Compendium chronologicum

gestorum et scriptorum S. Joh. Chrys., in Migne, tom. i. 264-272. Alban

Butler: Lives of Saints, sub. Jan. 27 (the day of the translation of

the remains of Chrys.). W. Cave: Lives of the Fathers, vol. III. p. 237

sqq. J. A. Fabricius: Biblioth Gr., tom. viii. 454 sqq. Schröckh:

Kirchengeschichte, vol. X. p. 309 sqq. Gibbon: Decline and Fall, ch.

xxxii. (a brilliant and appreciative sketch). Neander: Der heilige

Chrysostomus, 1821-'22, in 3 vols., second ed. 1832, third ed. Berlin,

1848, in 2 vols. (English translation of the same by J. C. Stapleton,

vol. I., London, 1838, unfinished). The best monograph in the German

language. Neander represents Chrysostom as a type of the Johannean

tendency among the Fathers, as distinct from Augustin, the strongest

type of the Pauline tendency. He gives a full account of the opinions

and religious life of Chrysostom, but without a clear picture of his

personality. (Hase says: "Neander hat uns das Lebensbild des Chrys.

aufgestellt als ein Herzensverwandter, doch nicht ohne einige

Abschwächung seiner Kraft und seines Gegensatzes zur Regierung." K.

Gesch. I. 511.) J. Pettersson: Chrys. homileta, Lund, 1833. C. Datt: S.

Jean Chrys. comme prédicateur, Strassb., 1837. A. F. Villemain: Tableau

de l'éloquence chrétienne au quatrième siècle, Paris, 1849, new ed.

1857. Perthes: Life of Chrysostom, Boston, 1854. P. Albert: St. Jean

Chrysostome considéré comme orateur populaire, Paris, 1858. Abbé E.

Martin: Saint Jean Chrysostome, ses oeuvres et son siècle, Montpellier

and Paris, 1861, 3 vols. Abbé Rochet: Histoire de S. Jean Chrysostome,

Paris, 1866, 2 vols. Amédée Thierry: St. Chrysostome et l'imperatrice

Eudoxie, 2d ed., Paris, 1874 (originally in the "Revue des deux

Mondes"). Böhringer: Johann Chrysostomus und Olympias, in

"Kirchengesch. in Biogr.," vol. IX. new ed. 1876. Th. Förster:

Chrysostomus in seinem Verhältniss zur Antiochenischen Schule, Gotha,

1869. W. Maggilory: John of the Golden Mouth, Lond. 1871. W. R. W.

Stephens: St. John Chrysostom, his Life and Times, London, 1872, 2d ed.

1880, 3rd ed. 1883 (the best biography of Chr.). R. W. Bush, Life and

Times of Chrysostom, London, Rel. Tract Soc., 1885.

Canon E. Venables: in "Smith and Wace," I. 518-535 (a very good sketch). C. Burk: in Herzog, 2d ed., III. 225-231. E. Dandiran: in Lightenberger's "Encyclopédie," etc., III. 165-176. Schaff: Church Hist. III. 702 sqq., 933 sqq., 1036 sq. Hase: Kirchengesch. (Vorlesungen, 1885), I. 510 sqq. F. W. Farrar: Lives of the Fathers, London, 1889. Vol. II. 460-527.

Chrysostom's Youth and Training, a.d. 347-370.

"Almighty God, who hast given us grace at this time with one accord to make our common supplications unto Thee; and doest promise, that when two or three are gathered together in Thy name Thou wilt grant their requests: fulfil now, O Lord, the desires and petitions of Thy servants, as may be most expedient for them; granting us in this world knowledge of Thy truth, and in the world to come life everlasting, Amen." [1]

This beautiful and comprehensive prayer, which is translated from the Liturgy of St. Chrysostom, has made his name a household word wherever the Anglican Liturgy is known and used.

John, surnamed Chrysostom ('Io?nnes Chrusostomos) is the greatest pulpit orator and commentator of the Greek Church, and still deservedly enjoys the highest honor in the whole Christian world. No one of the Oriental Fathers has left a more spotless reputation; no one is so much read and so often quoted by modern preachers and commentators. An admiring posterity, since the close of the fifth century, has given him the surname Chrysostom (the Golden Mouth), which has entirely superseded his personal name John, and which best expresses the general estimate of his merits.

His life may be divided into five periods: (1) His youth and training till his conversion and baptism, A.D. 347-370. (2) His ascetic and monastic life, 370-381. (3) His public life as priest and preacher at Antioch, 381-398. (4) His episcopate at Constantinople, 398-404. (5) His exile to his death, 404-407.

John (the name by which alone he is known among contemporary writers and his first biographers) was born in 347, at Antioch, the capital of Syria, and the home of the mother church of Gentile Christianity, where the disciples of Jesus were first called "Christians."

His father, Secundus, was a distinguished military officer (magister militum) in the imperial army of Syria, and died during the infancy of John, without professing Christianity, as far as we know. His mother, Anthusa, was a rare woman. Left a widow at the age of twenty, she refused all offers of marriage, and devoted herself exclusively to the education of her only son and his older sister. She was probably from principle averse to a second marriage, according to a prevailing view of the Fathers. She shines, with Nonna and Monica, among the most pious mothers of the fourth century, who prove the ennobling influence of Christianity on the character of woman, and through her on all the family relations. Anthusa gained general esteem by her exemplary life. The famous advocate of heathenism, Libanius, on hearing of her consistency and devotion, felt constrained to exclaim: "Bless me! what wonderful women there are among the Christians." [3]

She gave her son an admirable education, and early planted in his soul the germs of piety, which afterwards bore the richest fruits for himself and the church. By her admonitions and the teachings of the Bible, he was secured against the seductions of heathenism.

Yet he was not baptized till he had reached the age of maturity. In that age of transition from heathenism to Christianity, the number of adult baptisms far exceeded that of infant baptisms. Hence the large baptisteries for the baptism of crowds of converts; hence the many sermons and lectures of Chrysostom, Cyril of Jerusalem and other preachers to catechumens, and their careful instruction before baptism and admission to the Missa Fidelium or the holy communion. Even Christian parents, as the father and mother of Gregory Nazianzen, the mother of Chrysostom, and the mother of Augustin, put off the baptism of their offspring, partly no doubt from a very high conception of baptism as the sacrament of regeneration, and the superstitious fear that early baptism involved the risk of a forfeiture of baptismal grace. This was the argument which Tertullian in the second century urged against infant baptism, and this was the reason why many professing Christians put off their baptism till the latest hour; just as now so many from the same motive delay repentance and conversion to their death-bed. Chrysostom often rebukes that custom. The Emperor Constantine who favored Christianity as early as 312, and convened the Council of Nicaea in 325, postponed baptism till 337, shortly before his death. The orthodox Emperor Theodosius the Great was not baptized till the first year of his reign, when attacked by a serious illness.

Chrysostom received his literary training chiefly from Libanius, the admirer and friend of Julian the Apostate, and the first classical scholar and rhetorician of his age, who after a long career as public teacher at Athens and Constantinople, returned to his native Antioch and had the misfortune to outlive the revival of heathenism under Julian and to lament the triumph of Christianity under his successors. He was introduced by him into a knowledge of the Greek classics and the arts of rhetoric, which served him a good purpose for his future labors in the church. He was his best scholar, and when Libanius, shortly before his death (about 393), was asked whom he wished for his successor, he replied: "John, if only the Christians had not stolen him from us." [4]

After the completion of his studies Chrysostom became a rhetorician, and began the profitable practice of law, which opened to him a brilliant political career. The amount of litigation was enormous. The display of talent in the law-courts was the high-road to the dignities of vice-prefect, prefect, and consul. Some of his speeches at the bar excited admiration and were highly commended by Libanius. For some time, as he says, he was "a never-failing attendant at the courts of law, and passionately fond of the theatre." But he was not satisfied. The temptations of a secular profession in a corrupt state of society discouraged him. To accept a fee for making the worse cause appear the better cause, seemed to him to be taking Satan's wages.

See the Greek original of this collect in Chrysostom's Liturgy, in Migne's edition, Tom. xii. 908; Daniel's Codex Liturgicus, tom. iv.; Fasc. II. p. 343 (comp. the foot-note in tom. iii. 358); and Fr. Procter's History of the Book of Common Prayer (11th ed. 1874), p. 245 sq. The precise origin of this prayer is uncertain. It does not occur in the oldest mss. of Chrysostom's Liturgy, but in those of the Liturgy of St. Basil. It precedes the third anthem in the communion service, and was used since the ninth century or earlier in the exarchate of Caesarea and the patriarchate of Constantinople. In the Oriental churches the prayer is said silently by the priest. See Bjerring, The Offices of the Oriental Church, p. 43. In the Anglican Church, it was placed at the end of the Litany (by Cranmer), in 1544, and at the close of the daily Morning and Evening Prayer in 1661. In the English Homilies (Hom. I.), Chrysostom is called "that godly clerk and great preacher."

So Montfaucon, Tillemont, Neander, Stephens, Venables, and others. Baur (Vorlesungen über die Dogmengeschichte, Bd. I. Abthlg. II., p. 50) and others erroneously state the year 354 or 355, Villemain assigns the year 344 as that of his birth.

Babai, hoiai para christianois gunaik?s eisi. Chrysostom himself relates this of his heathen teacher (by whom, undoubtedly, we are to understand Libanius), though, it is true, with immediate reference only to the twenty years' widowhood of his mother, and adds: "Such is the praise and admiration of widowhood not only with us, but even with the heathen." Ad viduam juniorem (Opera, Bened. ed. Tom. i. 340; in Migne's ed. Tom. i., P. II., 601).

Sozomen, Ch. Hist., VIII. 2.

His Conversion and Ascetic Life.

The quiet study of the Scriptures, the example of his pious mother, the acquaintance with Bishop Meletius, and the influence of his intimate friend Basil, who was of the same age and devoted to ascetic life, combined to produce a gradual change in his character. [5]

He entered the class of catechumens, and after the usual period of three years of instruction and probation, he was baptized by Meletius in his twenty-third year (369 or 370). From this time on, says Palladius, "he neither swore, nor defamed any one, nor spoke falsely, nor cursed, nor even tolerated facetious jokes." His baptism was, as in the case of St. Augustin, the turning point in his life, an entire renunciation of this world and dedication to the service of Christ. The change was radical and permanent.

Meletius, who foresaw the future greatness of the young lawyer, wished to secure him for the active service of the church, and ordained him to the subordinate office of rector (anagnostes, reader), about A.D. 370. The rectors had to read the Scripture lessons in the first part of divine service (the "Missa Catechumenorum"), and to call upon the people to pray, but could not preach nor distribute the sacraments.

The first inclination of Chrysostom after baptism was to adopt the monastic life as the safest mode, according to the prevailing notions of the church in that age, to escape the temptations and corruptions of the world, to cultivate holiness and to secure the salvation of the soul. But the earnest entreaties of his mother prevailed on him to delay the gratification of his desire. He relates the scene with dramatic power. She took him to her chamber, and by the bed where she had given him birth, she adjured him with tears not to forsake her. "My son," she said in substance, "my only comfort in the midst of the miseries of this earthly life is to see thee constantly, and to behold in thy features the faithful image of my beloved husband who is no more. This comfort commenced with your infancy before you could speak. I ask only one favor from you: do not make me a widow a second time; wait at least till I die; perhaps I shall soon leave this world. When you have buried me and joined my ashes with those of your father, nothing will then prevent you from retiring into monastic life. But as long as I breathe, support me by your presence, and do not draw down upon you the wrath of God by bringing such evils upon me who have given you no offense." [6]

These tender, simple and impressive words suggest many heart-rending scenes caused by the ascetic enthusiasm for separation from the sacred ties of the family. It is honorable to Chrysostom that he yielded to the reasonable wishes of his devoted mother. He remained at home, but turned his home into a monastery. He secluded himself from the world and practiced a rigid asceticism. He ate little and seldom, and only the plainest food, slept on the bare floor and frequently rose to prayer. He kept almost unbroken silence to prevent a relapse into the habit of slander.

His former associates at the bar called him unsociable and morose. But two of his fellow-pupils under Libanius joined him in his ascetic life, Maximus (afterwards bishop of Seleucia), and Theodore of Mopsuestia. They studied the Scriptures under the direction of Diodorus (afterwards bishop of Tarsus), the founder of the Antiochian school of theology, of which Chrysostom and Theodore became the chief ornaments. [7]

Theodore was warmly attached to a young lady named Hermione, and resolved to marry and to leave the ascetic brotherhood. This gave rise to the earliest treatise of Chrysostom--namely, an exhortation to Theodore, in two letters. He plied all his oratorical arts of sad sympathy, tender entreaty, bitter reproach, and terrible warning, to reclaim his friend to what he thought the surest and safest way to heaven. To sin, he says, is human, but to persist in sin is devilish; to fall is not ruinous to the soul, but to remain on the ground is. The appeal had its desired effect; Theodore resumed his monastic life and became afterwards bishop of Mopsuestia in Cilicia and one of the first biblical scholars. The arguments which Chrysostom used, would condemn all who broke their monastic vows. They retain moral force only if we substitute apostasy from faith for apostasy from monasticism, which must be regarded as a temporary and abnormal or exceptional form of Christian life.

Socrates and Kurtz (in the 10th edition of his Kirchengeschichte, I. 223), confound this Basil with Basil the Great of Cappadocia, who was eighteen years older than Chrysostom and died in 379. Chrysostom's friend was probably (as Baronius and Montfaucon conjecture) identical with Basil, bishop of Raphanea in Syria, near Antioch, who attended the Council of Constantinople in 381. Comp. Stephens, l. c. p. 14; and Venables in Smith & Wace, I. 297.

De Sacerd. I. 5.

Socrates and Sozomenus represent Diodor and Karterius as abbots under whom Chrysostom lived as monk, but Neander (in the 3d ed. I. 29) thinks it more likely that Chrysostom was previously instructed by Diodor at Antioch.

Paraenesis ad Theodorum Lapsum, in Migne's ed. I., Pars I. 277-319. The second letter is milder than the first, and was written earlier. It is somewhat doubtful whether the first refers to the same case. Neander (I. 38 sq.) conjectures that the second only is addressed to Theodore.

Chrysostom Evades Election to a Bishopric, and Writes His Work on the Priesthood.

About this time several bishoprics were vacant in Syria, and frequent depositions took place with the changing fortunes of orthodoxy and Arianism, and the interference of the court. The attention of the clergy and the people turned to Chrysostom and his friend Basil as suitable candidates for the episcopal office, although they had not the canonical age of thirty. Chrysostom shrunk from the responsibilities and avoided an election by a pious fraud. He apparently assented to an agreement with Basil that both should either accept, or resist the burden of the episcopate, but instead of that he concealed himself and put forward his friend whom he accounted much more worthy of the honor. Basil, under the impression that Chrysostom had already been consecrated, reluctantly submitted to the election. When he discovered the cheat, he upbraided his friend with the breach of compact, but Chrysostom laughed and rejoiced at the success of his plot. This conduct, which every sound Christian conscience must condemn, caused no offense among the Christians of that age, still less among the heathen, and was regarded as good management or "economy." The moral character of the deception was supposed to depend altogether on the motive, which made it good or bad. Chrysostom appealed in justification of laudable deception to the stratagems of war, the conduct of physicians in dealing with refractory patients, to several examples of the Old Testament (Abraham, Jacob, David), and to the conduct of the Apostle Paul in circumcising Timothy for the sake of the Jews (Acts xvi. 3) and in observing the ceremonial law in Jerusalem at the advice of James (Acts xxi. 26).

The Jesuitical maxim, "the end justifies the means," is much older than Jesuitism, and runs through the whole apocryphal, pseudo-prophetic, pseudo-apostolic, pseudo-Clementine and pseudo-Isidorian literature of the early centuries. Several of the best Fathers show a surprising want of a strict sense of veracity. They introduce a sort of cheat even into their strange theory of redemption, by supposing that the Devil caused the crucifixion under the delusion that Christ was a mere man, and thus lost his claim upon the fallen race. Origen, Chrysostom, and Jerome explain the offense of the collision between Paul and Peter at Antioch (Gal. ii. 11 sqq.) away by turning it into a theatrical and hypocritical farce, which was shrewdly arranged by the two apostles for the purpose of convincing the Jewish Christians that circumcision was not necessary. Against such wretched exegesis the superior moral sense of Augustin rightly protested, and Jerome changed his view on this particular passage. Here is a point where the modern standard of ethics is far superior to that of the Fathers, and more fully accords with the spirit of the New Testament, which inculcates the strictest veracity as a fundamental virtue. [9]