Leaves from St. John ChrysostomJohn Chrysostom, Saint
Religion
Leaves from St. John Chrysostom
John Chrysostom, Saint
Christian literature, Early; John Chrysostom, Saint, -407
But Arcadius went further, and condemned Chrysostom to a more distant
and ruder exile at Pityus, a seaport on the most desolate eastern coast
of the Euxine. In the utmost summer heat, with exhausted strength, the
deposed patriarch had to undertake this journey. He never reached the
end. His merciless guards pressed his weakness to the utmost. When at
Comana he thought his end was near; but the guards urged him on. For an
hour he could drag himself along; then his strength utterly failed. He
was taken into the small church of the Martyr Basiliscus, which was
near. His friend and biographer, the Bishop Palladius, thus describes
the last scene:
His Death
‘In that very night (that is, at Comana) the martyr of the place stood
before him, Basiliscus by name, who had been bishop of Comana, and died
by martyrdom in Nicomedia in the reign of Maximinus, together with
Lucian of Bithynia, who had been a priest of Antioch. And he said, “Be
of good heart, brother John, for to-morrow we shall be together”. It is
said that the martyr had already made the same announcement to the
priest of the place: “Prepare the place for brother John, for he is
coming”. And John, believing the divine oracle, upon the morrow besought
his guards to remain there until the fifth hour. They refused, and set
forward; but, when they had proceeded about thirty stadia, he was so ill
that they returned back to the martyr’s shrine whence they had started.
‘When he got there, he asked for white vestments suitable to the tenor
of his past life; and taking off his clothes of travel, he clad himself
in them from head to foot, being still fasting, and then gave away his
old ones to them about him. Then, having communicated in the symbols of
the Lord, he made the closing prayer “on present needs”. He said his
customary words, “Glory be to God for all things,” and having concluded
it with his last Amen, he stretched forth those feet of his which had
been so beautiful in their running, whether to convey salvation to the
penitent or reproof to the hardened in sin. And being gathered to his
fathers, and shaking off this mortal dust, he passed to Christ, as it is
written, “Thou shalt come to thy burial like full wheat that is
harvested in season, but the souls of transgressors shall die
prematurely”. But so great a crowd of virgins, ascetics, and those who
had the witness of sanctity in their life were present from Syria,
Cilicia, Pontus, and Armenia, that many thought they had come by
agreement. With these solemn rites, like a victorious athlete, he was
buried in the same shrine with Basiliscus.’[2]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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