Житие святого отца нашего Мелетия, архиепископа Антиохийского

Saint Meletius was first bishop of Sebaste in Armenia in 1330, but then was subsequently elevated to the archbishopric throne in Antioch. Archbishop of Antioch Eudoxius 1331, a follower of the Arian error, seduced by the wealth of the throne of Constantinople, wanted to go there, since the evil heretic Macedonius 1332, who had previously occupied the place of archpastor in Constantinople, was deposed, and into the kingdom of Constantius 1333, the son of Constantine the Great, the church The Church of Constantinople abounded in many treasures and was much richer than the Antioch and other churches; Therefore, Eudoxius, neglecting the throne of Antioch, began to covet the throne of Constantinople. Having learned about the machinations of their archbishop, the inhabitants of Antioch were greatly offended by Eudoxius, indignant at him for despising his church, and therefore expelled him. Having gone to Constantinople, Eudoxius received the throne there in 1334; and the inhabitants of Antioch, having assembled a council, consulted together about whom to choose to replace Eudoxius; At this council, most of those present were Arians, who were then in great power; the number of Orthodox Christians was small; Moreover, they were despised and called Eustathians, named after Saint Eustathius, who, when he was Archbishop of Antioch, suffered exile for the Orthodox faith. On the lips of all those present at that council was the name of Saint Meletius; everyone wanted to have him as their archbishop, but the Arians especially wanted it: for they considered him their like-minded person and hoped that he would persuade the Eustathians to their wisdom and teach the whole of Antioch the Arian error. So, at the council, by a general vote, Meletius was elected to the archbishop's see; They all confirmed the conciliar decree with their signatures and gave it for safekeeping to Saint Eusebius, Bishop of Samosata, an Orthodox man who was at that council. Then they sent their request to Saint Meletius along with the royal letter, and with great honor, in front of a large crowd of people, they brought him to Antioch; Bishop Theodoret 1335 describes the arrival of this holy man in the city as follows: “When the great Meletius, called by the king, approached Antioch, everyone who held the priesthood, clergy and all citizens came out to meet him: there were both Jews and unbelievers, everyone wanted one thing - to see the most glorious Meletius.” This is how Theodoret describes this event. So, Saint Meletius was elevated to the archbishop's throne in Antioch, for he was a worthy man, wise and filled with holiness; Saint Epiphanius, who lived at the same time, also testifies to him. Heaping praise on him, he writes about him this way: “We hold that man (Saint Meletios) in great esteem; everywhere there is good fame about him; in his life he is constant, honest, his customs are praiseworthy; the people love him for his immaculate life; everyone is very surprised at him.” This is how Saint Epiphanius speaks of Meletia. How much the people loved him is evident from the fact that at his dedication everyone tried to invite him to their home, wanting the arrival of the saint to give him a blessing. Having ascended the throne of Antioch, Saint Meletios began to zealously teach people a virtuous life and good morals, preparing in their hearts the path to true orthodoxy; for the saint believed that with great success he could sow the seeds of Orthodoxy into the souls of his flock if he first corrected the evil morals of people, plucking thorns and thistles from the field of their hearts. Then Meletius appointed the great Basil, who had come to Jerusalem from Antioch, as a deacon. Another famous man of that time, Saint John Chrysostom, was still a small youth at that time; he received baptism from the saint, was among the people who met Meletius, and during Basil’s stay in Antioch he underwent book teaching; Subsequently, in his eulogy to Saint Meletios, he described the thirty-day excommunication he suffered from the Church to which the heretics subjected the saint. It happened like this. The whole people wanted to know exactly what confession their new archbishop adhered to; when Meletius was asked about this, he turned to the people in the church with a sermon of the word of God, in which he glorified the Orthodox faith, established at the first Ecumenical Council, which took place in Nicaea, he also confessed that the Son of God is co-essential, co-natural, equal with God the Father, that He is not created, that He is the Creator of all creation. Thus the saint taught the people in a loud voice; Hearing this, the archdeacon of the Antiochian Church, who shared the wicked teaching of Arius, approached his archbishop and boldly closed the saint’s mouth with his hand so that he could neither profess the true faith nor teach Orthodoxy. Although the archdeacon’s hand prevented Meletius from speaking, he, stretching out his hand to the people, confessed the Holy Trinity with his fingers even more clearly than with his tongue: first he showed three fingers, thus depicting the Three Faces of the Divine; bending down two, he left one, thus showing the One Deity in Three Persons. Seeing this, the archdeacon, releasing the saint’s lips, grabbed him by the hand, which so clearly depicted the Trinity. Having freed himself, the saint began to confess and glorify the One Trinity with his tongue, exhorting the people who listened to him to firmly and persistently adhere to the confession approved at the Council of Nicea: “Anyone,” he said, “who rejects the dogmas of the Council of Nicaea, stands far from the truth.” And this went on for a long time: the said archdeacon either blocked the saint’s mouth, preventing him from speaking in this way, or held his hand, preventing him from depicting the Trinity with his fingers, and the saint, either with his lips or with his fingers, clearly preached the Orthodox faith to the people. Then the Orthodox, called “Eustathians” by the heretics, rejoiced with great joy, seeing such a pious bishop on the apostolic throne, and exclaimed in jubilation, supporting the true confession of their shepherd; The former Arians were greatly saddened. They expelled God's bishop from the church and began to blaspheme him everywhere, claiming that he was a heretic, a follower of the teachings of Sabellius 1336: they also inspired King Constantius to condemn Meletius and send him to imprisonment in his homeland of Armenia. At night the saint was taken out of Antioch and sent to Armenia, and in his place a certain Euzoos, a follower of Arius, who was still a deacon at the time of the election of Meletius, was elected. Saint Eusebius, Bishop of Samosata, seeing that such unrest was occurring in the Antiochian Church from heretics who had expelled their innocent bishop Saint Meletius, regretted this very much. Getting up, he left Antioch, without informing anyone, and went to his city. Having learned about the departure of Eusebius, the Arians remembered that he had in his possession a document for the archbishopric of Saint Meletius, drawn up and signed by the entire council: they were afraid that Saint Eusebius would ever denounce them at the council, that they had unanimously chosen an archbishop for themselves, and then they themselves expelled him: therefore they begged the king, who was then in Antioch, to he ordered to send for Eusebius and take the letter from him. The king immediately sent a horseman for Eusebius so that he could overtake the bishop as quickly as possible. When the messenger overtook Eusebius and conveyed to him the royal command, the holy bishop answered: “I cannot now give the letter, but I will give it only when all those who entrusted it to me gather together again.” So the messenger returned to the king without achieving anything. Then the king became very angry and, having written a message, sent it to Saint Eusebius; in this message it was said that if Eusebius did not give the letters, his right hand would be cut off. The king wrote this only to frighten the saint, but he forbade the messenger to carry out his threat. When the royal ambassador arrived for the second time to the holy bishop and handed him a formidable message, Eusebius, having read it, extended both his hands with the words: “You can cut off not only one right hand, but even the left, but I will not give the letter, for it clearly exposes the malice and lawlessness of the Arians.” Again the ambassador had to return with nothing. Hearing such an answer from the saint, the king was greatly surprised at Eusebius’s undaunted courage and unfailing constancy, and subsequently spoke of him with great praise before many. After the overthrow of Saint Meletius from the archbishop's throne, the Orthodox separated from the Arians; They took themselves one church, which stood outside the city walls in a place called Palea, and in that church Presbyter Paulinus performed services for them according to the rite of the Orthodox Church. A few years later, King Constantius died, and Julian the Apostate took his place in 1337. At the beginning of his reign, Julian hypocritically showed himself to be pious, freed all the bishops who were in exile and ordered them to return to their thrones. Then, by virtue of the royal command, Saint Meletios returned from his imprisonment to Antioch. He found that in this city the Orthodox Church was divided into two parts: some expected the return of him, Saint Meletius, to the archbishop's throne, while others, without waiting for him, elected the aforementioned presbyter Paulinus as bishop; the latter were then called Paulinians, and the former Meletians: the reason for the division was also that the Paulinians did not accept into communion with them those of the followers of the teachings of Arius who returned to Orthodoxy through the teachings of Saint Meletius, and they did not accept them for two reasons: firstly, these persons received baptism from the Arians, and secondly, because Saint Meletius himself was elected to the archbishopric Antioch and the Arians, of whom there were more Orthodox at the council: both of these parts equally adhered to Orthodox dogmas, but only the circumstances described served as the reason for separation. Having returned, the saint began to zealously seek to unite the divided flock of Christ again. The meek and humble-hearted archbishop did not deny the bishopric of Paulinus, but recognized him, and he himself shepherded a new flock - namely those who converted from Arianism to Orthodoxy, whom the Paulinians did not accept into communion at that time. When the lawless Julian, having established himself on the throne, clearly rejected Christ and began to worship idols, then again Saint Meletius was expelled from Antioch. Throughout Julian's vast kingdom, persecution was instituted against Christians, which was especially strong in Antioch. The lawless king, setting out on a campaign with his entire army in Persia, arrived in Antioch: here he made many sacrifices to the idol of Apollo, which stood in a place called Daphne: this place was located in the outskirts of Antioch: the relics of the holy martyr Babyla with three babies were also placed here. One day the king asked his deceitful god Apollo, who once gave people answers, whether he would defeat the Persians? The idol did not answer him, for from the time the relics of Saint Babyla were transferred to that place, the demon ran away from there: from that time on, the idol, which had previously predicted many things, stopped giving answers, for this demon prophesied through the idol. The king was saddened that the idol would stop giving predictions: having learned from the local priests that the relics of Babyla were the reason for the silence of the idol of Apollo, he ordered the Galileans - as he called the Christians - to take those relics from there. As soon as they were taken, fire fell from heaven onto the church of Apollo and burned the church along with the idol: this greatly saddened and shamed the wicked priests, and they decided to take revenge on the Christians. To do this, they began to tell the king that the Galileans, out of hatred, set fire to the church of Apollo at night. Then the king was filled with rage at the Christians: he ordered to pursue and drive them, and then the holy Archbishop Meletios was expelled from the city; other Christians, having voluntarily fled from Antioch, hid in secret shelters. Then the two holy presbyters of Antioch, Eugene and Macarius, and Saint Artemius, were also subjected to torture. When this God-hating king Julian died a terrible death, the pious and Christ-loving Jovian ascended the royal throne in 1338. Then again Saint Meletios became a shepherd and teacher of Orthodoxy in Antioch, and King Jovian revered the saint and loved him greatly. Therefore, the Arians began to fear the saint. Some of their bishops even began to hypocritically patronize the Orthodox confession, thereby wanting to please the king and the Antiochian Archbishop Meletius. At that time, a Local Council met in Antioch, assembled by Saints Meletius and Eusebius of Samosata. On it, the Arians confessed that the Son is One with the Father and recognized as right the faith approved at the First Ecumenical Council in Nicaea; but this confession of theirs was insincere and false, for when soon after this King Jovian died and Valens 1339 ascended the throne, the heretics clearly proved that they had not abandoned their evil faith; They even converted the king into their error through his wife Domnicia. Then they again began to persecute the Orthodox Church, again they began to expel its shepherds: this wicked king Valens spent a long time in Antioch, establishing there and spreading the Arian heresy; Instigated by the heretics, he also expelled the most holy Archbishop Meletius; and the saint remained in exile until the death of Valens. After Valens, the pious king Gratian ascended the throne in 1340; then the Orthodox bishops were again returned from captivity by royal command and took their thrones without hindrance. Then Saint Meletius returned to Antioch for the third time to his throne, but the disagreement between the faithful over the two bishops - Paulinus and Meletius - still continued: some still considered one bishop, others the other, and both sides were alien to each other; The saint made every effort to reconcile both. Then the pious and Christ-loving king Gratian issued a decree for his entire region, by virtue of which all churches should be taken away from the Arians and returned to the Orthodox. With such a royal command, a certain prince named Sapor arrived in Antioch. Before the royal envoy, Saint Meletius turned to Bishop Paulinus with the following words: “Since the Lord entrusted me with the care of this flock and you took some of them from me under your leadership, while the sheep themselves are no different from each other in religion, then let us unite the flock, my brother, we will stop any dispute over primacy, we will graze the verbal sheep together, we will take care of them together. If the possession of the archpastoral throne produces discord between us, then I will try to destroy it: I will place the Divine Gospel on this throne, and we will do this: we will both sit on both sides of the Gospel, and if I am the first to finish my career in life, then you alone will shepherd the flock: if you are the first to give your soul to God, then according to my strength I will take care of the flock.” This was proposed by Saint Meletius, who was distinguished by his extraordinary meekness, but Peacock did not agree to such a proposal. Then Prince Sapor announced this to the king and, having received a response message from him, took the cathedral church along with other churches from the Arians and gave it to His Holiness Meletius, and Peacock continued to graze those sheep that he had once taken from Meletius. So, the holy archbishop accepted the throne to which he had been unanimously elected by a council resolution. Zealously and wisely, he began to rule his flock in peace and silence until his very blessed death. The Arians could no longer rise up and cause oppression to the Church of Christ and its good shepherds: in particular, they could no longer persecute Saint Meletius, who shone like the sun, illuminating the Church and driving away the darkness of heresies. Following his teachings, many Antiochians succeeded in virtues and the Orthodox faith and, like him, became perfect luminaries of the Church. Such was Flavian 1341, who after Meletius ascended his throne, Acacius, who was later bishop of Veria, Diodorus of Tarsus, Elpidius, the domestic of Meletius, who later occupied the episcopal see in Laodicea. Particularly well known are Saint John, later named Chrysostom, who was ordained a deacon by Saint Meletius, and John’s friend, Basil, not of Caesarea, but another, equal to the latter, but only younger, a native of Antioch, who grew up with Saint John. These and many others later decorated and enlightened the Church of Christ, each in its own place, like candles in a candlestick. At that time, in the country of Syria, where Antioch was located, Saint Simeon 1342 began his feat, who then entered the pillar, and first bound himself with an iron chain on a high hill, as is told in his life. Hearing about this, blessed Meletius came to him and, seeing him in chains, said: “A man can control himself without shackles, not with an iron chain, but with his will and mind to tie himself to one place.” Hearing these words, the Monk Simeon accepted this advice; he took off his chains and bound himself with his free will to be a voluntary prisoner of Jesus Christ. Shortly before the blessed death of Saint Meletius, the pious Theodosius reigned in 1343, who was at first a famous commander under King Gratian and enjoyed great honor for his courage, for he often defeated barbarian regiments with glory. This Theodosius, even before his accession to the royal throne, once saw in a dream the Archbishop of Antioch, Saint Meletius; He had never seen him in reality before, but had only heard about him. In a dream, Theodosius saw that Meletius stood next to him and placed on him the royal mantle and the royal crown. Waking up, Theodosius told one of his household about his vision and was amazed at what it could mean; Soon after this, the vision actually came true. King Gratian, convinced that it was impossible for him alone to rule the east and west due to the vastness of the empire, and seeing that barbarians threatened from everywhere, chose the governor Theodosius as an assistant to govern the state, as a virtuous, brave and Orthodox man: he entrusted him with the entire eastern half of the empire, which King Valens first possessed, and he took the western part for himself. Having taken the eastern half and defeated the Goths advancing on Thrace, Theodosius arrived in Constantinople and wished to see Saint Meletius, who, as he imagined in a dream vision, crowned him king. At that time, with the consent of the holy great fathers, Orthodox bishops, and by the will of the pious kings Gratian and Theodosius, the Second Ecumenical Council of 1344 began to gather in Constantinople. Bishops from all over the world were called to this council by royal messages. Then the most holy Archbishop Meletios of Antioch arrived in Constantinople. Tsar Theodosius ordered the boyars and his household that no one should point out Saint Meletius to him: he himself wanted to recognize him, judging by the face that he saw in a dream, and to finally be convinced that it was indeed Meletius, and not some other bishop, who crowned him king in his vision. When the large council of bishops entered the royal chamber, the king, looking at them, immediately saw and recognized Saint Meletius. Leaving everyone and approaching, he fell at the feet of Meletius and began to kiss the hands, chest, eyes, lips, head of the saint, as if the most respectful son was meeting his father, whom he had long wanted to see. In front of everyone, the king told how this saint appeared to him in a vision, putting a royal crown and purple on him, and showed him preference over all the bishops. At that council, Saint Meletius surprised everyone with the following miraculous sign. When the Arians philosophized unorthodoxly about the Holy Trinity and corrupted the pious faith with their evil teaching, then this Divine man stood up and showed the people who asked for his teaching three fingers as a sign of the Three Persons of the Holy Trinity: then, joining two fingers and bending one, he blessed the people. At that time, fire struck him like lightning, and the saint loudly exclaimed: “We mean Three Hypostases and talk about One Being.” So Saint Meletios surprised everyone, put the heretics to shame, and strengthened the Orthodox in the Orthodox faith: he also confirmed Saint Gregory the Theologian on the patriarchal throne of Constantinople. Soon after this, when the council had not yet taken place and not all the bishops had yet arrived in Constantinople, Saint Meletius fell ill for a little while and peacefully surrendered his soul to the Lord 1345, plunging the tsar, the bishops and the entire Orthodox people into great sorrow. Everyone buried this glorious archpastor with honor and transferred him to Antioch: here his honorable body was laid near the holy martyr Babyla to defend the city for the glory of Christ our God, glorified with the Father and the Holy Spirit forever. Amen. Fearing your spiritual boldness, the apostate flees Macedonius: your servants perform the prayer service, we flow with love, like an interlocutor angel, Meletios, the fiery sword of Christ our God, quenched all the godless: we sing praise to you, the lamp that enlightened everything. Sebastia of Armenia - in the northeast of Asia Minor. Eudoxius occupied the patriarchal see in Antioch from 357 to 358. Macedonius I, Patriarch of Constantinople, occupied the patriarchal see in 341; then, as a heretic, he was overthrown, but several times seized patriarchal power into his own hands until 360. Macedonius wickedly taught about the Holy Spirit that He is a servant creature, having no participation in the Divinity and glory of the Father and the Son. Emperor Constantius reigned from 337 to 361. Eudoxius was patriarch of Constantinople from 360 to 370. Theodoret, Bishop of Cyprus, is one of the most remarkable teachers of the Church and a famous church historian of the 5th century. The above event is described by him in his church history. Sabellius incorrectly taught about the sacrament of the Most Holy Trinity, claiming that God is one Person: as the Father He is in heaven, as the Son on earth, as the Holy Spirit in creatures. Julian the Apostate reigned from 361 to 363. Jovian reigned from 363 to 364. Valens reigned from 364 to 378. Gratian reigned from 383 to 392. Flavian was patriarch from 381 to 404. Of course, Saint Simeon, the first stylite, whose memory is celebrated by the Church on September 1. Theodosius the Great reigned in 379 and reigned until 395. In 381, the heresy of Macedonius was condemned at this council, and the Nicene Creed was supplemented and completed by new five members of the Creed. Saint Meletius, Patriarch of Antioch, died in 381 during the Second Ecumenical Council. Saint Gregory of Nyssa, in front of the council, honored the memory of Saint Meletius with a word of praise, and Saint Chrysostom did the same upon his entry into the priesthood. A conversation has been preserved from Saint Meletius, treating mainly of the consubstantiality of the Son of God with God the Father, and a letter to Emperor Jovian, representing his confession of the Holy Trinity. The relics of Saint Meletius were transferred from Constantinople to Antioch. You might be interested in: