St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of ArmaghBernard, of Clairvaux, Saint
History
St. Bernard of Clairvaux's Life of St. Malachy of Armagh
Bernard, of Clairvaux, Saint
Malachy, Saint, 1094?-1148
[482] _Memoria sanctorum._ Probably a reliquary. A reliquary preserved
at Clogher in 1300 was known as the _membra_, which, according to one
explanation, was the equivalent of _memoriale scrinium_, memorial
shrine. See _L.A.J._ iv. 245. Cp. Oengus, p. 345 (_s.v._ Memrae);
Lightfoot, _Clement of Rome_, vol. i. p. 91.
[483] Susanna, 56.
[484] Exod. xiv. 25.
[485] Deut. vii. 2 (vg.).
[486] Ps. ix. 6 (vg.).
[487] Ps. lxxiii. 19.
[488] See Additional Note B, p. 166.
[489] John xx. 30.
[490] This date is vague. But the period of three years must be
reckoned from the death of Murtough (September 17, 1134), or from the
subsequent ejection of Niall. Since stress is laid on the shortness,
rather than the length of the period, we may therefore conclude that
peace was established not long before October 1137, or, at any rate,
after the beginning of that year. And as St. Bernard believed that the
inauguration of Gelasius "immediately" followed the resignation of
Malachy, we may gather that both these events took place in 1137.
_A.F.M._ date Malachy's resignation in 1136; but the chronology of St.
Bernard is to be preferred. See Additional Note C, pp. 168, 169.
[491] Ps. xciv. 2.
[492] Gelasius--in Irish Gilla meic Liag, the servant of the son of
the poet--was born about 1087. His father was apparently the poet of a
Tyrone sept, named Dermot (O'Hanlon, _Saints_, iii. 965). About 1121
he was appointed abbot of Derry, and held that office till he became
archbishop of Armagh in 1137. He had a long episcopate and seems to
have been a vigorous prelate. His age and infirmity (says Giraldus)
prevented him from attending the Synod of Cashel in 1172. But he
subsequently visited Henry II. in Dublin. Thither he brought the white
cow, whose milk was his only food (Giraldus, _Expug._ i. 35). He died
March 27, 1174, in his eighty-seventh year. For a Life of Gelasius,
see Colgan, _A.S.H._ p. 772.
[493] See § 21.
[494] _I.e._ diocese.
[495] The two episcopal sees are evidently Connor and Down. But in
early time there were many more sees than two in that district (see
Reeves, p. 138), and there is no evidence that any one of them was the
seat of a diocesan bishop. But, even if it were so, St. Bernard's
statement that the two supposed dioceses were "welded into one" by
some ambitious prelate prior to Malachy is unhistorical. A bishop of
Connor and a bishop of Down both died in 1117, just seven years before
Malachy became bishop of the diocese which included these two places;
and there is no trace of a bishop in either of them in the interval.
The fact seems to be that the diocese of Connor or Down was
constituted for the first time at the Synod of Rathbreasail in 1110.
It remained on paper until Malachy was appointed its first bishop. For
the probable reason of Malachy's division of the diocese, see p. lvii.
f.
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