Dialogue on the Life of John Chrysostom 13–15

Deacon: What you have said, you have said truly and learnedly, and so it is. For woe to him who calls sweet bitter and bitter sweet; woe to him who puts darkness for light and light for darkness! But someone will say: ‘Nor do we say that he should have given himself over to such tables. For immoderate lavishness is an occasion of love of pleasure, and excessive exclusion is a proof of sluggishness and meanness. He could at least have invited bishops only, and of these especially the more devout; or if not these, at least his own clergy, imitating the Master, who ate with the twelve apostles.’

Bishop: [That would be well said, most truthful] of men, if indeed the clergy would have put up with dining with John, eating out of hours or on the wrong day; but they wanted extravagance, as quickly as possible and with much preparation. It would have been absurd to spend the food of the sick or the poor on the intemperance of the healthy. And what law is this, that the pupils should legislate for the teacher, or the sick for the doctor, or the passengers for the helmsman, when it is always the doctor who cures the sick, the teacher who corrects the pupils, and the helmsman who seeks the advantage of those aboard? Those under a doctor or a helmsman obey them and, for love of life, bear every pain and burden, though even success is uncertain with them; but [they resist] the teacher of better things, [who tries] to drive away their diseases and weaknesses, and confound everything with unwashed feet. And if he had given himself over to tables, how could he have kept up the drinking parties for the men of rank, living in so great a city, where each person wanted to eat with him, either for a blessing, or from poverty, or from gluttony? Where would there have been leisure for the contemplation of God, the care of the people, the study of the Scriptures, the protection of widows, the consolation of virgins, the nursing of the sick, the help of the oppressed, the conversion of the erring, the care of the broken, the visiting of those in prison? How would he have escaped God's reproach, with which he reproaches in Ezekiel: ‘O shepherds who feed yourselves and do not feed the sheep! The strayed you have not brought back, the lost you have not sought, the weak you have not visited, the broken you have not bound up; you slaughter the fat ones and eat them’? Of such Paul writes: ‘For you bear it if someone enslaves you, if someone devours you, if someone takes from you’; and, ‘You clothe yourselves with the wool, but do not feed the sheep.’ And in Jeremiah he says of shepherds who feed in idleness: ‘Many shepherds have destroyed my vineyard.’

Deacon: He could have looked after these too from time to time, and cared for the affairs of the Church, so as not to seem ill spoken of, great as he was in other respects.

Bishop: That is just what is in question: that he should not be ill spoken of … so that he might supply richly the word, the eagerness, the zeal and the rest of a priest's goodwill. Or do you not know, most honoured Theodore, that a blessing for unreasonable accusation was appointed by the Lord along with the other beatitudes, when he said: ‘Blessed are you when they reproach you and say every evil word against you. But woe to you when all men speak well of you; for so their fathers did to the prophets’? And how could a mouth trained in the divine oracles, and ears [used] to hearing divine pronouncements, bear the chatter of the table, when the Master says, ‘No one can serve two masters’, and then, ‘You cannot serve God and mammon’? Let us inquire, then, what mammon is, lest we be found serving not the two masters but mammon alone. For here he calls mammon not the devil, but the vain labour of this world, from which the Word drew his disciples away.

Deacon: Go back, most holy Father, to the rest of the events, since the argument about the table has been sufficiently proved. And do not be angry with me for my objections; for I questioned your great learning more searchingly because I wished to learn something more.

Bishop: Let me tell you this more plainly, most studious Theodore (for I was once one of those eager to please crowds by a table): a bishop, especially of a great city, who abandons the ministry of the word, who does not have the tablets of the law in his hands night and day, and who carries out the care of the poor not himself but through others, will be far from those who said, ‘Look, we have left everything and followed you’; and perhaps he will be numbered with those who said, ‘Lord, did we not do this and that in your name?’, and will hear with them, ‘Depart from me, you cursed; I do not know where you are from.’ For the Word does not recognize workers without reason, since his eye is too pure to look on evil. For many of the so-called bishops, [to cover] the well-deserved hatred with which they are hated for their own ways, and their lack of zeal for spiritual things, through greed and vainglory, with one hand do wrong unsparingly for shameful gain, and with the other contrive dinners and raise the pillars of lofty buildings, so that, seeming good and diligent on this account, they may reap honour instead of dishonour. They do not remember the Preacher, who both built and hated, and clearly renounced such things when he wrote, ‘I made myself houses and gardens’, and so on, ‘and behold, all is vanity; and I hated all my labour with which I labour under the sun.’ He did not say ‘above the sun’, so as not to insult the labours of the mind. I say this not to include those who [build] with good reason and for [necessity], but because of those who spend the goods of the poor on hanging [galleries] … and indecent baths for effeminate men in hidden places, or on amassing more silver, or else on being loved by playthings, repaying the favour of their zeal by this very thing, by yielding to sinners in everything for the sake of pleasure. But may it never be my lot, Theodore of great name, to please the wicked; for I could please them by nothing except what does not please Christ.

Deacon: [Since this has been] well said and admits no reply, if you have any knowledge of what was arranged in Asia by the holy John, about whom we are now speaking, share it with us.

Bishop: Certainly.

Deacon: Did you know it from being present yourself, or did you learn it from another?

Bishop: There was no part of the trial from which I was absent.

Deacon: Then set out for me in detail what happened, what end it had, and where it began; especially since Theophilus, in his treatise, eager to dignify or to cover up his own rashness, said that the blessed John, moved by the passion of ambition, deposed sixteen bishops and ordained his own men in their place.

Bishop: The wonderful man did nothing out of keeping with his own ways in writing against John, and in writing falsehoods. For by the very means by which he thinks to cover his own disgrace, he exposes it the more, and against his will dignifies John's innocence, like that Balaam. For if he had deposed him, there would be no need of a treatise or of exile, the deposition being enough … the virtuous man stands, holding victory in defeat; while envy remains [feeling] the defeat of its irrational victory, puffed up like a bubble and shattered on itself, writing and writing down [against itself] the saying of the prophet Isaiah: ‘Woe to him who draws [sin as with a long rope]’ … to do and say and write nothing but falsehoods: ‘For woe,’ he says, ‘to those who write; for they write wickedness.’ As for those deposed in Asia, they were not sixteen but six bishops, and I will speak as before the divine judgement, neither taking anything from their number nor adding anything to the nature of the facts, but reporting to you just as it happened.

In the thirteenth indiction, those from Asia came to Constantinople on some necessary business, and stayed with us, together with other bishops who were present, from Scythia (I mean Theotimus), from Thrace Ammon the Egyptian, and from Galatia [Arabianus], all aged metropolitans, amounting to twenty-two bishops. When all were meeting and in communion, a certain Eusebius of [Valentino]polis, watching for his opportunity, appeared before the assembled synod on the first … [and presented a petition against Antoni]nus, the bishop of the Ephesians, setting out seven charges: first, that he had melted down church treasures and made silver for his son; second, that he had taken the marble from the entrance of the baptistery and added it to his own bath; next, that he had set up in his own dining room church columns that had lain unused for many years; fourth, that his servant had committed a murder and he kept him in his service without bringing charges; fifth, that lands left to the Church by Basilina, the mother of the emperor Julian, [he had sold, keeping the price]; sixth, that having [separated] from his own wife, he had come together with her again and had children by her; seventh, that he held it as a law and a doctrine to sell ordinations of bishops in proportion to their revenues. ‘And those who gave and were ordained are present, and the man who took the money; and I have the proofs of these things.’

Deacon: I beg you, Father, shorten this story; for those present are harmed when bishops tell such things, let alone do them.

Bishop: Alas, wretch that I am, to have been kept alive to these days, in which the priesthood is sold for silver, if indeed it is priesthood! I have become a fool in telling it; but those who slander John have brought us to this. Yet bear with me patiently, so that from this too you may admire John's moderation. He put his zeal to sleep for the time being and said to Eusebius: ‘Brother Eusebius, since charges made out of grievance often lack easy proofs, I beg you to stop accusing brother Antoninus in writing; … [we will settle] the causes of [your grievance].’ He … used harsh words, raging wholly against Antoninus and persisting in his accusation. John asks Paul of Heraclea (for he seemed to favour Antoninus) to bring them together in friendship. Then, rising, he went into the church with the bishops, for it was the time of the liturgy; and having given the people the customary greeting of peace, he sat down with the other bishops. The accuser Eusebius slipped in unnoticed and, before all the people and the bishops, delivers another petition containing the same things, adjuring John with dreadful oaths, in which he involved even the safety of the emperors, with much commotion; so that the people thought [he was in danger of his life and] was begging John to petition the emperor. John, seeing the man's insistence, and concerned for the calm of the people, accepted the document; and after the readings from the divine oracles, he asked Pansophius of Pisidia to bring forward the gifts, while he himself went out with the other bishops; for he declined to celebrate while a charge was pending, according to the Gospel: ‘When you offer your gift’, and so on. After deliberating, and after the dismissal of the people, he sat down in the baptistery with the other bishops, summoned the accuser, and said to him before them all: ‘I tell you the same again: many people, out of grievance or anger, say and write many things, and then fail in the proofs. If, then, you clearly know about the things of which you wish to accuse him (for we neither push away one who is able to prove, nor drag in one who is not), choose what is to your advantage before the petition is read. For once it is read and has come to everyone's ears, and minutes are being taken, it will no longer be open to you, as a bishop, to seek to withdraw.’ At this he persisted in his insistence again. Upon this they order the document to be read; the charges I have mentioned were read. When the elders among the bishops had heard the substance of the document, they said to John: ‘Even if every one of these charges is impious and forbidden everywhere by the sacred laws, yet, so that we may not seem to spend all our time on what has been brought forward, let the examination begin with the most dreadful. For if that is found true, there is no dispute about the other charges, since the root of that charge bears every kind of wickedness as its fruit, as he said who said, “The love of money is the root of all evils.” For he who took gifts against the innocent and thought to sell the distribution of the Holy Spirit for silver, how will he spare the treasures or stones or estates of the Church?’

Then John begins the examination, saying to Antoninus: ‘What do you say to this, brother Antoninus?’ He denied it, of necessity; for how could he confess his own shame at the very outset? Those who had given were questioned; they too denied. Upon this the examination was carried on diligently until the eighth hour, and from certain indications the case began to take shape. At last it came down, as was to be expected, to witnesses, before whom they gave and he took. The witnesses were not present; they had to be produced. John, considering how difficult it would be to produce them, was eager, both to cleanse the Church and to spare the witnesses, to go to Asia himself and complete the examination. When Antoninus saw John's diligence and incorruptibility, being conscious of his guilt, he crept up to one of the powerful men, whose estates in Asia he looked after, and begs him to have John stopped from going to Asia, promising to produce the witnesses. This man at once arranged for the following to be conveyed from the palace to Bishop John: ‘It is an absurd thing that you, our bishop and protector of our souls, should in so great [a crisis leave us and undertake] the journey to Asia, when the witnesses can easily be brought here.’ The expected disturbance was Gainas the barbarian. And (why should I speak at length?) he is persuaded to stay, caring both for the trial and for the [hardship] of the witnesses. But delay over the witnesses was a windfall for the accused, since he could make them flee by silver or by power. Foreseeing this, John deliberates with the synod present about sending some of the bishops there to Asia to question the witnesses. At once three were appointed: [Syncletius] of [Trajano]polis, Hesychius of Parium, and Palladius of Helenopolis; and the synod declared in the minutes that whoever did not appear within two months and stand by his case in [Hypaepa], a city of Asia (since both the accused and the rest of the bishops lived nearby), should be excommunicated. Upon this [Syncletius and Palladius] went down [to Smyrna]; for Hesychius, being a friend of Antoninus, pretended to be ill. At once they wrote, notifying both parties of their arrival, so that they might gather in the appointed city and fulfil their promises. But the two parties came to terms, the one with gold, the other with an oath, and became friends before the judges arrived. They gathered for form's sake at Hypaepa, thinking to mock the judges by again putting off the witnesses, on the plea that they were away on various business. At this the judges ask the accuser: ‘Within how many days [will you produce] them? We will wait.’ Thinking that they would leave, burdened by the oppressive air (for it was the height of summer), he promised in writing either to bring the witnesses within forty days or to undergo the penalty of the canons. So he was released to look for the witnesses, and, abandoning the matter, [went off to Constantinople and stayed there] in hiding. The judges waited the forty days, as was proper; and when he did not appear anywhere, they write to the bishops all over Asia, declaring him excommunicate, either as a deserter or as a slanderer. After this they persevered another thirty days, and when he did not appear anywhere, they withdrew and came to Constantinople; and meeting him there, they charged him with what he had dared. But he again [pleaded ill]ness [and promised the witnesses; and so things dragged on until] Antoninus, with whom Eusebius had the lawsuit, [died].

Then a decree comes from Asia, partly from the clergy of the Church of the Ephesians, partly from the bishops, to John, containing a request with a dreadful oath: ‘Since in former times both the ordinances and we ourselves have been shepherded in confusion, we ask your honour to come down and impose a God-sent order on the Church of the Ephesians, which for a long time has been oppressed, partly by those who think as Arius does, partly by those who boast of our faith with greed and self-love; especially since there are many lying in wait like savage wolves, eager to seize the throne with money.’ John, in such bodily ill-health and in the winter season, putting nothing grievous before his eyes, but braced by eagerness for the settlement above all of the ailing affairs of the whole Asian diocese, which suffered from the inexperience or absence of shepherds, went on board a ship and set out from the city. A violent north wind arose, and the sailors, fearing [to be driven onto] Pro[connesus], ran under the cape of Triton; and there they cast anchor and waited for a south wind, so that [they might reach Apamea; and having lain two days] fasting and tossed about on the ship, on the third day they landed at Apamea, where Paul [and Cyrinus and Palladius] were waiting; [and taking] the road on foot, they enter Ephesus. Gathering the bishops of Lydia [and Asia and Caria, seventy] men, they perform the ordination, many having come of their own free eagerness, especially Phrygians, to enjoy the mouth of wisdom, according to the saying, ‘Wisdom is hymned in the outlets’, that is, in those who speak; ‘and in the streets she has freedom of speech’, that is, in hearts broadened by manifold afflictions, according to the saying, ‘In affliction you have enlarged me.’ For wisdom is cramped in those who cultivate tares, and …

[Bishop:] While matters stood thus, Eusebius, the cause of our long story, the accuser of the six other bishops, came to all the bishops asking to be received into communion. Some of the bishops objected that he ought not to be received, being a slanderer. At this he pleaded, saying: ‘Since the case has been tormented for the greatest part of two years, and the delay has arisen over the witnesses, I beg your God-loving [assembly] to let me produce the witnesses today, at once. For even if Bishop Antoninus, who took the gold and performed the ordinations, has died, [those who gave it and were ordained remain].’ And the present synod judged that the matter should be investigated. The hearing begins with the reading of the minutes made earlier. The witnesses came in; the six who had given money and been ordained came in too. At first they denied it; but when the witnesses persisted (some laymen, some presbyters, in whom they seemed to have confided, and some women), naming the kinds of pledges, the places, the times and the amounts, then, since their conscience was not at all easy, they confessed without much compulsion: ‘We gave money, it is admitted, and became [bishops], thinking this was the proper procedure, so that we might be freed from the city council. And now we ask, if it is lawful, to remain in the ministry of the Church; or else [let us recover] the gold we gave; for some of us gave our wives' plate.’ To this John promised the synod: ‘With God's help I will free them from the council … [and have] them receive what they gave from the heirs of Antoninus.’ The synod decreed that they should receive the gold from Antoninus's heirs and communicate inside the sanctuary, but be removed from the priesthood, lest, if these were pardoned, a Jewish or Egyptian custom should arise of selling and buying the priesthood. For they say that the destructive and falsely named patriarch of the Jews changes the rulers of the synagogues every year or every other year to collect money; and likewise his zealous imitator, the patriarch of the Egyptians; so that the prophetic word is fulfilled: ‘Her priests answered for gifts, and her prophets divined for silver.’ For all this both the minutes and the judges are there. And the examination did not take place in one day, as Theophilus falsely said, but over two years. Those deposed were content, being freed from the judgement to come, so that one of them became a defender of [civic] affairs; and in their places others were brought in, men celibate from childhood, adorned in life and word. And those noble and contentious men, after John's exile, taking what they [took] (for wickedness has no name, as it has no substance), [brought back] the former [bishops and thrust out those lawfully enthroned], for the scattering of the sheep of Christ.

Yet the most laughable thing of all, or rather the thing most worthy of lament, if you hear it, most studious Theodore, ‘both your ears will ring’, as the prophet says; and, as one who loves God, you will lament over the raging bishops who defile the gifts of Christ with darkened hands. For the ordinations which Peter and John and their company performed with fasting and prayer and lawful examination and testing of the clergy, and with fear, these men perform on the contrary with drunkenness and carousing and pitiful bribes, [ordaining] the abortions of humanity, not worthy even of irrational swine or dogs, as Job prophesied about them in the person of the Saviour: ‘Whom I did not count worthy of the dogs of my flocks, who lived under the brushwood.’ These, with mimes and Jews, as friends of the Saviour, are entrusted by the wise men with the secrets of the priesthood; because of them the people of the orthodox flee the houses of prayer. For the novel and most frivolous [act] of their daring has reached even us, in the Church at Ephesus; how could it not, since the city is on the sea and easily ferries rumours across? For into the place, or rather into the [throne] of John who wrote the Gospel, who leaned faithfully on the breast of Wisdom, of whom it is written, ‘whom Jesus loved’; [the throne] of Timothy, Paul's disciple, to whom the two Letters of the Apostle are addressed, there succeeds the abomination of desolation. Having ordained [a eunuch] …, and keeping the man enthroned by seventy bishops wasting away in prison to this day, a man who had been a monk in the desert, trained in general learning, versed in the divine Scriptures, and who had served three years as deacon. And would that the eunuch who was ordained had been known for a holy life; then the evil would be half an evil. But as it is, an earthworm, a slave of the belly, …, servile, money-loving, [a jail-bird] from his very birth, …, who, as I have often heard, [carried] the theatre girls [on his shoulders at drinking parties], his head crowned, and the cup of Dionysus in his hand. And all this he did not before his initiation into Christ, but after his baptism; by these things he hints that he does not even believe in the resurrection. For when he has rotted the foundation of the resurrection, how does he still believe in it? And one who does not believe in the resurrection, how can he become a herald of the resurrection, as he said who said, ‘How shall they preach, unless they believe?’ This man is chaste without reward, by the knife, and mad without fruit, by his own shamelessness.

These are the things that happened in Asia, about which you asked because of Theophilus, who wrote of sixteen bishops [deposed; I testify] before the truth that they are six. The minutes of these proceedings are preserved with us, with the signatures of the twenty-two bishops who heard the beginning, and of the seventy who deposed them and [concluded] the case.