Heortology : $b A history of the Christian festivals from their origin to the present dayKellner, K. A. Heinrich (Karl Adam Heinrich)
Religion
Heortology : $b A history of the Christian festivals from their origin to the present day
Kellner, K. A. Heinrich (Karl Adam Heinrich)
Church year; Fasts and feasts
We can deal with the festivals of these two saints together, for in the
year 357, on the 3rd March, their relics were solemnly translated at the
same time to the Church of the Apostles in Constantinople.[620] Until
this date the tomb of St Andrew was in Patras, where he had suffered
death. The previous burial place of St Luke is not specified, but it
may have been either in Patras or somewhere in the neighbourhood.
The possession of St Andrew’s relics was of great importance to
Constantinople, because he was regarded as the apostolic founder of
the Christian community there, and the catalogue of bishops, which,
historically speaking, only begins with Metrophanes (315-325), has
been carried back to him, inasmuch as it was maintained he had
ordained Stachys as first bishop of the See. More certain, from an
historical point of view, is his martyrdom at Patras, of which we have a
trustworthy account.[621] Besides this, there is a well-known encyclical
letter to the priests and deacons of Achaia, which in all essential
points agrees with the account of the martyrdom, although in some other
respects it is open to criticism.[622] The so-called martyrology of
Jerome on 5th February commemorates St Andrew’s ordination as Bishop of
Patras.
The date for St Luke’s death never varied and seems to be correct. Both
dates, the 18th October and the 30th November, appear in the oldest
Neapolitan Calendar, which contains no other festival of an apostle
except St James the Less (27th December). From the fact that the relics
of St Andrew and St Luke happened to be translated at the same time,
many ancient and modern writers drew the hasty conclusion that St Luke
had also died in Patras and been buried there. A document which, though
certainly late, can yet be traced back to Philostorgius,[623] gives the
true place of his death and burial as Thebes, which Paulinus of Nola
confirms. His relics may well have been translated thence at the same
time as those of St Andrew were brought from Patras. They were carried to
Constantinople at the command of the Emperor Constantius by the official
Artemius, who had also brought the relics of St Timothy to the capital.
(5) ST JAMES THE GREAT
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