Книга первая (398 – 401 гг.)

Events preceding the struggle of John Chrysostom with Empress Eudoxia. - The depravity of the imperial court. – Eudoxia wants her statue to be worshiped throughout the East. - The severity and strength of Chrysostom. - The court's machinations against him. – His sermon against women's clothing. - Marsa, Kastritsiya and Evgrafia. – Hostile alliance in Evgrafia’s house. – The solitary life of Chrysostom. – The vices of the Constantinople clergy. - Sisters Agapita. – Greed: Clerics lead the life of hangers-on. – Love of money: they rob the poor. – Chrysostom is taking action to eradicate these vices. – Those around the Archbishop in his Church; Serapion and Tigrius. – Deaconesses: Salvina, Ampructa, Pentadia and Olympias. – Origin and state of the Olympics; her devotion to John Chrysostom. At the time from which our story begins, Eudoxia, already an empress for four years, was still blooming with the splendor of youth. She had not yet lost the beauty that captivated the heart of Arkady on that distant day when the young Emperor saw her portrait on a wax tablet, deliberately planted by Eutropius, the first minister of the emperor, in his room, but many other changes took place in Eudoxia. The daughter of Frank Bauto was no longer the modest and reserved orphan whom Eutropius had found in a remote corner of Constantinople as a hidden treasure, and whom he had to tear away from the important philosophical lessons of Pansophius, her teacher, in order to elevate her to the imperial throne. The orphan, who had not known the world until then, became proud, bold, insatiable in pleasures and luxury; the poor young girl became a woman greedy for money. The habit of ruling the court, slavish and flattering, even developed in this seed of the Franks something rude and wild and, to use the expression of one contemporary, some kind of “barbaric cruelty” that flowed along with the blood in its veins. Dissatisfaction with her marriage, or rather with her husband, went hand in hand with her insatiable ambition. Of both sons of Theodosius, this great Sovereign, the eldest, Arkady, was more honest and less intelligent. Alien to the vices and cruelty of his brother Honorius, he did not have his energy, his life passed in some kind of painful half-sleep. It seemed that his body was created exclusively for subordination to the courtiers, ministers and wife, who thought and desired for him. Arcadia, who had barely reached the age of 30, was already showing signs of premature decrepitness - one could say that, having passed adulthood, he directly entered from one childhood into another. Two circumstances, however, brought him out of this stupor or tore him away from the innocent activities with which he was killing time (he was engaged in calligraphy). The first - if the honor of the Empress was affected, and the second - if there was a danger of a break with the Church. Then he indulged in terrible anger, as he had once in his youth, when he wanted to kill his teacher because he had punished him. With the exception of such antics, he lived withdrawn into himself and in complete indifference to everything that was happening in his home and empire. At the same time, gullible and secretive, he was quite a worthy pet of the eunuchs. With such a husband, in the midst of a depraved court, Eudoxia, without a leader, without experience, soon succumbed to the taste for pleasures, so new to her, she plunged into this pool with all the ardor of those feelings that her contemporaries called barbaric. Because of this, her fame suffered greatly, and only the death of Eutropius, perhaps, stopped the revelations in time, which would probably have destroyed her. Her favorite at this time was a certain Prince John, Arkady's confidant in the management of state affairs and, in all likelihood, the secret minister, with whose hands the Empress ruled both the Sovereign and the empire. Their relationship continued for several years and so clearly that when in 401 Eudoxia gave birth to a fourth son, later Theodosius II, popular hatred greeted the young prince with the title “son of Prince John,” and echoes of this shameful rumor were preserved in history. Not caring in this case about the Emperor himself, the people were excited by the dishonor inflicted on the house of Theodosius, and more than once during the riots that shook Constantinople they demanded the head of Prince John. One of the demands of Gainas during his famous uprising in 399, which brought the imperial city to the brink of destruction, was the extradition of three courtiers, among whom was this favorite of Eudoxia. The emperor, without thinking twice, handed him over. No one doubted that this was a surrender to death, but Gainas was content with one of those terrible “jokes” on the captive, which the leaders of the barbarians allowed themselves to do with the Romans in a cheerful moment. Having commanded Prince John to appear in his tent, where there was a soldier in the position of executioner, armed with a sword, and a few steps away from him there was a scaffold, in a menacing voice he ordered the prisoner to prepare for death. He silently knelt down and laid his head on the block. At this sign, in accordance with the order received in advance, the soldier with an effort lowered his hand, as if in order to cut off the head with one blow, but, touching the neck of the prisoner, he inflicted only a light scratch on him with the blade of his sword. After this, John, neither alive nor dead, was escorted from the tent and exiled to the far reaches of Thrace. After the death of Gainas, the empress's favorite returned to his place at court, again abused Arkady's blindness, and again aroused the people's anger. During a rebellion caused by residents and troops, his house was attacked to kill him. Warned of this in time, he fled and hid in someone else's house. The enemies of John Chrysostom claimed that the saint, who knew the place of his refuge, pointed it out to the soldiers. But this rumor was slander, because Prince John escaped this time too. The rumor reached the empress's ears and, unverified by her, as one can easily imagine, left in her heart an unquenchable thirst for revenge. Arkady's blindness could only be matched by the unbridled ambition of his wife. Using unlimited power in state affairs, Eudoxia wanted recognition of this power. On January 9, 400, she forced herself to be invested with the title of Augusta instead of the previous one: nobilissima. But even this seemed not enough to her: she wanted her statue to be displayed throughout the East, in the image of the statues of emperors, to give her honors from the people, and she ordered it to be transported from province to province with pomp and signs of autocracy. There was an ingrained prejudice against the power of women in the Roman world. Their significance and the honors given to them were recognized here only insofar as they stemmed from Caesar or the sacred chosen one, and were expressed in legal forms, but were by no means recognized as belonging to them personally. Augusta, the Emperor's wife, was considered only a reflection of the Emperor himself and could not attribute anything to herself personally in the signs of power and honors that were bestowed on her. Eudoxia's innovation alarmed everyone who bore the name of the Romans. They saw in him an intention to reign on the model of the barbarian queens of the East - Nicotris or Semiraida - and strong expressions of displeasure arose from all sides. They were heard especially loudly in the Western possessions, the morals of which were more strongly opposed to female power, so Honorius considered it his duty to express his displeasure to his brother, as well as to notify him of the complete unanimity of the Senate of the city of Rome and Italy. Eudoxia persisted, and Arkady neglected everything for her. The thirst for pleasure in Eudoxia was combined with the thirst for gold. Historians portray her as an insatiable passion for acquisition, fleecing the defenseless, pressuring fiscal officials to receive a share of the confiscations, and initiating criminal trials to increase her share. If she liked any house or piece of land, it immediately passed into her hands: so clever and merciless were the executors of her will. There was a lot of talk about the vineyard that she had taken from a poor widow because she liked her grapes. This is how Frank Bauto's daughter changed at this immoral and unjust court. But it is not only the judgment of history that exposes her shameless thefts: Eudoxia, during her lifetime, met face to face with John Chrysostom, and just as his denunciations had previously revealed the shame of her love affairs, so this time the widow’s vineyard became as famous in Constantinople as Naboth’s in Israel. It is easy to understand how many disasters and ruins were caused in all parts of the empire by the lawlessness produced by such examples. No matter how unconditional Eudoxia’s power over her husband was after the death of Eutropius, there was still room in his heart for another feeling - fear of the archbishop. Arkady, a sincerely pious man, feared most of all discord with the Church, and the character of John Chrysostom inspired him with respect. He saw him coming only on important and often threatening occasions, fully armed with church prohibitions, threats and almost anathema, with any demands in favor of the Church or the people, or against the debauchery and injustices of the court - and every time Arkady yielded to him. Moreover, everyone knew that John Chrysostom was the intercessor of the people during urban unrest and, one might say, their idol. With less ardor and less persistence, this man might have been the Emperor's lord, or at least he would have shaken the importance of the Empress in his eyes. She soon realized this and, with the instinct of a power-hungry woman, immediately began to seek a means of lowering him in the eyes of others as a person, in order to more accurately attack him as a clergyman. Taking advantage of the absence of Chrysostom, who was a rare guest at court and who gave many reasons for criticism due to the harshness of his character and peculiar behavior and habits, she attacked him daily before the Emperor, alternately using ridicule, slander, and slander. These vile methods did not remain without influence on the weak spirit, whose independence consisted solely in changing the yoke it wore. The example of the empress was the law for the courtiers. Anyone who wanted to please her, to gain her favor, to receive mercy from her, had to echo her hatred and ridicule of Archbishop John. In a word, an alliance was formed in the imperial palace against the archbishop, and its center was the empress. Behind the Empress, the front row of this diabolical union were three women, her intimate friends, to whom history must do the sad honor of allocating space on its pages: they deserved it with their atrocities. These women were Marsa, Kastrizia and Evgrafia. Besides their depravity, they had much more in common. All three were widows. Having been charming girls in their youth, they stubbornly wanted to remain so forever. Finally, all three received countless inheritances, which were constantly increased by thefts under the patronage of the empress. Their names alone terrified their families. The soul of this malefic triad was Mars, whose social position and connections gave great weight to everything related to social life. A distant relationship, probably through her mother Eudoxia, connected her with the empress. Marsa made a brilliant match in her youth, marrying the important Theodosian commander, Promotus, whom the praetorian prefect Rufinus later betrayed to the barbarians on one business trip in revenge for an insult. Always weak in relation to Rufinus, Theodosius mourned his commander without punishing the prefect, but, as if to reward the family of Promotus, he accepted his orphan sons into his family, who received the same education as the princes in the imperial palace. Such an honor inflamed the mother’s ambition, and when an unexpected marriage elevated her relative to the height of the throne, she became a significant person at court. Marsa spent her widowhood cheerfully between love affairs and the role of a kind of second empress, flaunting her importance, benevolent to some and persecuting others, selling places for cash, replacing pleasures with intrigues when pleasures tired of her. Enraged by such shameful behavior, Chrysostom did not spare her either in direct condemnation or in reproachful hints, and Marsa harbored a grudge against him - she was diligently preparing his death. The other, Kastrizia, was a similarity to Marsa, but did not differ in anything special, at least historians speak of her only as an influential woman, very greedy for money, a great intriguer, very depraved. Her late husband was the former consul Saturninus. The third of these women, Evgrafia, is depicted in history with sharper features, and her name is associated with the persecution of Chrysostom. It is not known who was her former husband, but she was a widow and had extensive connections in the world. She was powerful in intrigues, had extremely large wealth, ill-gotten, which she used for evil deeds. The Archbishop inflicted one of those insults on Evgrafia that women cannot forgive. Being no longer young, forced by tricks of dress to regain her lost beauty and attract a crowd of admirers, which over time, however, decreased significantly, she offended Christian society with this exhibition of her fake youth. She was seen in public and even in church only whitewashed and rouged, with her eyes lined with antimony, like an Egyptian idol. These elderly coquettes were an object of true disgust for the archbishop. He pursued them into the church, where he threatened them with excommunication and prohibition of entry into the sacred place if they did not distribute to the poor the money they spent on their disfigurement. “I warn you,” he told them in one of his sermons, “and I do this not as a simple admonition, but as my command to you: I warn you that if you do not correct yourself, I will expel you from here, then if I hear that, expelled from my church, you will find refuge with heretics, I will retreat from you, and those who will condemn me for this, I ask you not to defend me before the judgment seat of God, when I I will appear before Him." He pursued such women even in their homes. “Following the instructions of the Apostle Paul,” says Palladius, the saint’s biographer, his close friend and comrade in persecution, “Chrysostom entered private homes to teach an honest life to women who needed it, especially those who, being old, did everything to appear young.” At that time, it was the fashion for the ladies of Constantinople to comb their hair in front, curled into curls and cover their foreheads from one church to the other. From the lower classes of society, because this was the usual hairstyle of public women, this fashion passed to the higher classes: it was adopted by young matrons, and the first of them was Evgrafia, as a sign of her unchanging youth. This hairstyle, which left the hair open, offended the Christian sense of decency, as it was understood in the East, especially among widows and elderly women, who were required by custom to wear shawls or veils. The appearance of Evgrafia in this outfit brought Chrysostom out of patience. “Why,” he told her, “are you trying to make your body younger when this is impossible for it? You let your hair fall over your forehead like a harlot in order to deceive those who see you; believe me, this only makes your wrinkles more visible.” And he repeated the same speeches to her every time he met her with her hair done like that. Such admonitions, of course, did not really please coquettes like Evgrafia. One special circumstance gave the words of Chrysostom an exceptional character when he preached in the churches of Constantinople against the luxury and debauchery of court women. In the eastern basilicas, men and women were accommodated separately: the former occupied the lower tier, while the places for parishioners were in the upper choirs, rising on both sides of the arches of the naves, where they were present during the liturgy, as well as during the reading of the Holy Scriptures and at general prayer services after mass. At the end of the nave, on the steps of the choir, in front of the Royal Doors and the curtains that covered the altar, there stood a pulpit, usually made of expensive marble, decorated with sculptures and precious stones; it was reached from the choir by two staircases adjacent to its sides. From the solea, the readers and deacons performed the reading of the Apostle and the Gospel and delivered teachings; the officiating presbyter also ascended there to say special prayers or for any messages to the Orthodox. The bishop usually read sermons from the pulpit or at the Royal Doors. Chrysostom, who had a weak voice, being always besieged by a crowd eager to hear him, ordered his episcopal seat to be moved to the pulpit, from where his voice could more freely reach all parts of the basilica. From there, women's galleries opened up to his gaze, and when his word touched on indecent outfits, he had in front of him exactly those who wore them. Evgrafia and Augusta’s friends occupied places of honor in these galleries; it is clear that the slightest glance, the slightest movement of the preacher gave his moral teachings a direct application, which was immediately noticed by the listeners. Contemporaries reproached Chrysostom, and history repeated it, for provocative allusions, and this reproach partly depended on the place where he preached. So, Evgrafia was overcome by a passionate desire for revenge. And so, having a powerful influence in the city thanks to her untold wealth and enjoying the support of the empress, whom she pleased, she formed a terrible alliance against the archbishop. Her house became a gathering place for all the enemies of Chrysostom, everyone who could provide the means to defeat him, she attracted there - both laity and clergy, court officials, courtiers, and monks. Every dissatisfied clergyman (and there were many of them, because the severity of the archbishop was not at all to the taste of his clergy), every priest removed from office, every deacon dismissed for misconduct, every deaconess dismissed for debauchery or vanity - they all immediately resorted to Evgrafia in order to increase with their gossip this warehouse of slander and slander. Two deacons attracted attention here with the particular impudence of their attacks: one was a convicted adulterer and was therefore removed from office, the other was dismissed for murder: he beat his child servant to death. In such and such a gathering intrigues were forged against the archbishop, evil jokes and treacherous lies were formed. This hostile tribunal spared nothing; neither Chrysostom’s clothes, nor his thinness, nor his short stature, nor his habits. He was accused of robbing a church, of remaining alone with women, removing witnesses, of indulging in “cyclopean orgies” at night, of violence, sacrilege, etc. This vile slander, being skillfully spread, served as the subject of his accusation before the Council. What were these nightly feasts that bore this strange name of “Cyclopean orgies” and that caused so much noise during the trial of St. John? Young Chrysostom, barely leaving school, was overwhelmed by an uncontrollable desire to live in the desert. Having retired to a cave on Mount Casia, near Antioch, he led there the most severe and reclusive life, standing on his feet at night in order to overcome drowsiness, fasting until he was completely exhausted. This harsh life in a damp cave undermined his health, he acquired a kind of paralysis of the lower half of his body and upset his digestion. His stomach could not tolerate anything except certain types of food, and in very small quantities, and, having entered city life, Chrysostom had to abandon public life and social customs. If we add to these infirmities his mood, which favored loneliness, it is easy to understand why, upon his arrival in Constantinople, he became an object of surprise for the vain clergy and the depraved society, which spent a significant part of the day at the table, a society in which it was considered a sign of the best manners to be drunk in the morning. Saint John's predecessor, Nektarios, who had previously been prefect of the city, led the life of a secular man, without ceasing to be a good bishop and respected clergyman. Chrysostom announced from the very beginning that he would not dine with anyone and would not invite anyone to his place; he even refrained from accepting the Emperor’s invitations. Some saw in this monastic abstinence an indirect condemnation of their customs, and the clergy were especially offended by this, while others, on the contrary, saw in this a sign of the archpastor’s own immoderation. It was believed that he locked himself in the evenings in order to indulge in luxurious and endless feasts, “cyclopean orgies,” as his enemies put it. Meanwhile, if someone penetrated into his solitude, he could often find him, at a late hour in the evening, taking on an empty stomach some vegetables, which the deaconess Olympias ordered for him almost by force. This did not in the least prevent slander from doing its work, and it cost his friends no small effort to justify him in this voluntary seclusion. As soon as they told Evgrafiya some absurd fable, an insulting lie, or she recognized them somewhere on the side, she immediately ran to entertain the Empress with them. At the same time, Arkady came out of his stupor for a few minutes, laughed or was angry at the bishop, who inspired awe in him. Lies spread throughout the city, where Chrysostom’s enemies had ready force at hand for this: they were the so-called mendicant monks, lurking around all the nooks and crannies of Constantinople, strangely dressed, with long hair hanging from them, like the philosophers of the Cynic school, whom they resembled more than Christian monks. Chrysostom, who respected monastic life, revered it and sought to implement it even in his episcopal palace, wanted to see it strict, hardworking and hated these charlatans who, for a few obols, amused the common mob by mixing obscene jokes with church prayers. He wanted to abolish these monasteries with unsteady monks in his city or force them to a sedentary life and to engage in crafts, but they eluded the strict measures of the bishop, the abuses continued, despite all his efforts. Of course, they did not spare him in their ridicule. One of their abbots, Isaac, became a real bogeyman for the former bishops because of the satires with which he persecuted them before the people. He gained a terrible reputation for himself by vilifying the new archbishop and, leaving the despicable street scene for a higher sphere, appeared as an inexorable accuser of him at the Councils. This was the camp where the overthrow of Chrysostom, and perhaps his death, was planned, a camp that managed to find accomplices in the high society of Constantinople and in the clergy under the patronage of the empress. The archbishop's allies were in a completely different place. Saint John Chrysostom was 53 years old at this time, and the third year of his bishopric had barely expired. Elevated to the first see of the Christian East by the will of the Emperor and his minister, despite the opposition of the Orthodox clergy and the machinations of significant provincial bishops, from the very first days he encountered great difficulties, and, unfortunately, nothing was done to make these first steps easier for him. In explaining the episcopal life of such a person, a life so short and filled with suffering, to say that saints are always persecuted in the world and that God allows this to test the righteous would mean to say only general passages that are not denied or confirmed by history, as coming out of its sphere, moreover, it would be necessary at the same time to explain how the righteous bring upon themselves the trials to which the world subjects them. If the Church has every right to honor John Chrysostom among her holy martyrs, because he was persecuted more than anyone else, glory, in all fairness, considers him among her most famous sons, because he was an amazing preacher, then history “looks” first of all for man. On the day when the eunuch Eutropius, with the most laudable intention, snatched the eloquent priest of Antioch from his humble life in order to install him bishop of the second Rome, he made a mistake, of which he was soon convinced by personal experience. In the face of a depraved and luxurious court, which was engaged in church affairs between pleasures, he placed the most unyielding of monks, in the face of an extremely vain clergy - a hermit who revered only the desert, in the face of a society proud of its wealth and luxury - a man to whom wealth inspired horror and who, to the last extreme, was distinguished by the simplicity of life. As soon as the new chosen one took on the dignity, his struggle immediately began with those at the head of which he was placed. The solitude he had abandoned did not at all prepare him for caution with people, and any concession contrary to the unconditional good seemed to him a violation of duty and almost a crime. True to the ideal of holiness that he outlined for himself, he demanded its implementation from others, introducing into the actions of the highest authority the usual trait of all hermits thrown by circumstances into the vanity of the world: he was strict, unyielding in the face of any opposition, and convinced that the hostility he aroused was directed not against him personally, but against God. His admirers could not help but see that he was strict, persistent, and yet they revered him - there was so much virtue in him under this severity. They called him a saint - and this was fair, but his enemies called him angry, arrogant, hot-headed - and not without reason, from their point of view. The fact that a provincial priest was elevated to the archbishop's throne of the entire East, next to the throne of Caesar, Chrysostom perceived as the purpose of God's Providence - in order to bring about a universal change. Inspired by the books of the Old Testament, having internalized its stern and unyielding spirit, he accepted the position of Nathan before David, Elijah before Jezebel, and Isaiah before the priests of Baal before the powerful of his time, but the priests of Baal were numerous, and it was they who laid the foundation for his overthrow. In the fight against the whole world at once, he was successful, sad to say, only in the fight against the one to whom he owed his rise. Moreover, the transformation of the Church of Constantinople was not easy, and the contemporary of St. Palladius, who left us in the form of a dialogue the life of John Chrysostom, written for his justification, initiates us into this difficult feat, of which he was a close witness. In listing the vices of the clergy with which it was necessary to fight, first of all others - otherwise the first duty of the bishop would have been violated - Palladius notes three, which in themselves could already lead to the destruction of the Church: debauchery, gluttony and self-interest, this true “metropolis of all kinds of evils”, because it gives rise to and feeds them. The reproach made by Palladius to the Byzantine clergy for debauchery mainly related to the depravity of morals among the Agapit sisters (Agapetae - lat.). This evil took root quite later and spread everywhere, like weeds, with such force that it infected all of Christianity, both in the West and in the East, and threatened to penetrate church institutions. In vain did the Fathers of the Church rebel against this evil, and the Councils anathematized it, the civil laws themselves strictly persecuted this cohabitation of clergy and girls, which was as destructive for discipline as it was shameful for religion - the evil resisted all efforts and seemed to multiply its roots even under the blows of church excommunication. The clergy class, infected with this evil, formed a strong stronghold against which the efforts of more than one bishop and more than one father of the Church were defeated: Blessed Jerome, who was expelled from Rome for fighting against it, was a living testimony to this. This was not the first experience for Chrysostom in this dangerous struggle. While still a deacon in Antioch, he wrote two discourses that became famous: one addressed to the clergy, the other to the virgins mired in this false brotherhood. When, having become a bishop, he saw in the Church entrusted to him by God the same ulcer, even deeper and more infected, he, according to the ingenuous metaphor of his biographer, “armed himself with a razor” and began to cut with it without any pity or fear. The merciless doctor, the saint, first privately called on everyone he heard about to see that he was indulging in such a life; He drove some away, made threatening suggestions to others, then resumed his admonitions and condemnations openly. “If you have to choose between two evils,” he told them, “then I prefer clerics like you to pimps of open depravity. These unfortunates are deprived of healing, it is completely unknown to them, and their destructive craft condemns them to death, but you, you are at the very source of mental health, and yet you not only live in the abomination of depravity, but also sow it among the good.” He also said that even harlots are less criminal in his eyes than these false sisters, who covered up their debauchery with the name of virginity. Such were the energetic speeches with which, according to Palladius, he tried to shame the clergy in order to return them to an honest life. His writings give a more complete idea of ​​what these exhortations were, so salutary for the morals of the time and so curious for history. Chrysostom exposes the insignificance of the clergyman and the fall of a woman in the bonds of such debauchery, which entailed due punishment. With all the courage that is justified by the purpose of painting these pictures, he introduces the reader to the very home corner where the cleric cohabited with his sister Agapita, and alternately examines two sentences: the first - if the cohabitant is poor, and the second - if she is rich. “Let us enter,” he says, “into their home, and assume first that the sister is poor. If she is poor, she will have to work with her own hands. The priest is right next to her, they have a common room, common utensils. Tell me, what kind of spectacle will the home of a man, whose rank destined for solitary contemplation, present to you? Women's skirts, belts, headbands hang on the wall; in the room there is a shuttle, a spinning wheel, a spindle, a loom, baskets, in all corners there are stocks of wool and flax with reeds and combs - this is the decoration, the decoration of the priest’s home! Maids or neighbors come running there to work or chat with the hostess. There is laughter; the priest takes part in their gaiety, in their gossip, talks about wool, spindles and yarn, in a word, becomes a woman, living with women. And when the gossips start quarrels or the servant does not show enough respect to the mistress, the priest comes running to separate them! ABOUT! How does such a life correspond to the works of salvation!.. Let us now assume that the spiritual sister is rich. Then there will be a different situation for the priest, a new sight in his home, a new misfortune. If a sister is rich, it is necessary that she should not lack anything, because matrons of elegant and refined society are less demanding in terms of amenities than these sisters - and the priest must take care of everything. And how he works to please her! So he runs to the silversmith to find out whether the dishes or mirror are ready, whether an amphora for wine or a bottle for oil will be delivered on time. From the silversmith he goes to the perfumer, and this kind of virgin passionately loves all sorts of rubbings: they constantly need them - new and expensive. The priest explains to the seller exactly what his mistress likes. From a perfumer to a fabric seller, a fabric or carpet manufacturer. The priest walks around, returns, bargains, argues, and indulges in all sorts of tricks that are typical of a buyer. The same visit to the shoemaker - and now the clergyman’s day is spent running from shop to shop, the priest’s soul is far from the church - it is in the market place! But then the church opens. How many new desecrations and new shame awaits us here! The priest hangs about at the door, waiting for his lady, and when she appears, he walks ahead of her, like her eunuch or servant, clearing her way through the crowd and raising everyone's smiles along the way. It happens that instead of blushing at this, he boasts about it. When the terrible moment of the Sacrament approaches, the priest turns his head to the lady present here, he exchanges glances with her, and all this happens before the eyes of God and the faithful! Finally, these women have a passion to interfere in everything, decide church issues and sow discord everywhere. How many good deeds, how many holy inspirations have been destroyed thanks to them! Someone looks at them, and immediately the priest’s brow frowns, anger creeps into his heart. Oh, I beg you, brothers, I beg you on my knees, let us awaken from this shameful intoxication, let us come to our senses: after all, we are clergy! We recognize the high honor that God has shown us by making us executors of His will. The Apostle Paul said: “Do not be slaves of men,” I tell you: “Let us stop being slaves of women, who are dragging you with them to destruction.” Christ wants His army to consist of valiant warriors, strong fighters who do not fall in the fight - and He did not give us spiritual weapons so that we would live in the service of despised women among spindles and wool. No, our purpose, together with the heavenly authorities, is to fight against the invisible forces besieging us, to repel the armies of hellish spirits. For this struggle, the Lord girded our breasts with the armor of justice, our loins with the belt of righteousness, anointed our heads with the balm of salvation, shod our feet with the sandals of the apostles and said to us: Come, teach all languages.” Can you hear the trumpet? The enemy is approaching our city, and the trumpet calls the defenders to the breach of the wall. Everyone comes running to his call, with the exception of the warrior, who hid in his house and put his sword on the floor to sit at the woman’s feet. Will you really tolerate this? Will you not break down his doors so that you can pierce him with your sword? This is what I feel when I look at you. You must hurry, because the community of women pampers you. The most proud and ferocious lion, when they cut off his mane, pull out his teeth, trim his claws, is nothing more than a shameful and funny creature, a child can lead him, and only powerless growls are left to his lot. A priest, endowed with spiritual powers, living with women, becomes a woman himself. What will happen if a priest surrenders to the love of such a virgin, who is day and night before his eyes, day and night next to him, if he feels jealousy, if he suffers from a passion condemned by his duty? What happens if duty gives way to passion?” – the saint does not stop at any sentences in his paintings. Following his own expression, he tears apart all veils, removes all barriers, he even brings the midwife into this house of the priest and the virgin. This was generally the nature of Chrysostom’s teachings; his rich imagination was able to give flesh and blood to the most severe instructions; he brightly highlighted vice, completely exposing it, in order to present it as disgusting and worthy of ridicule. Another plague that corroded the Constantinople clergy was gluttony, voluptuousness, and passion for feasts; in a word, as the Latin language colorfully expresses it, gula - gluttony. The priests and deacons in this luxurious and pleasure-hungry city led the most pampered and luxurious lives; for the most part they resembled that Roman clergyman mentioned by Blessed Jerome, who, being born into a peasant family and fed in his village with simple porridge and millet, having put on a cassock, received the talent to recognize by taste the type of soybeans served at the table, to distinguish Colchian pheasant from Egyptian, fish from British Sea from the Caspian. The immoderate expenses required by gluttony were the cause of the third scourge - greed, because the difficulties of maintaining one's own table prompted the priest or deacon to visit the houses of the nobility to satisfy these sensual habits. Chrysostom depicts how they moved from one rich house to another in search of dinner, degrading the dignity of their clergy with low servility. In a fit of sacred anger, he likened them to lickers and rogues from a comedy, citing to them his own severe abstinence as an example. They answered him with slander, inventing their own “cyclopean orgies.” Theft was the fourth and most deadly plague of the depraved clergy. When legal income was not enough for the needs of the clergy and their spiritual cohabitation, then, as a rule, they put their hands into church property, which they abused and robbed of each other in rivalry. Churchmen and even bishops are accustomed to consider church property their property. The history of the Councils is replete with important accusations in this regard. The fraudulent use of church property is followed by other misappropriations: defrauding families of their inheritances, and finally, the theft of fees entrusted to priests for the benefit of the poor. The last of these crimes was especially unforgivable in the eyes of John Chrysostom; he looked at it as sacrilege, an attempt against God himself, because to rob the poor, in his words, means to rob Jesus Christ. Blessed Jerome, describing the same evil in the Roman clergy, exclaimed eloquently: “The laws of the faithful emperors have made it impossible for us to receive donations and inheritances. Priests of idols, prostitutes, and circus grooms can receive them. We, Christian clergy, are deprived of this opportunity. I’m not complaining about it, but I’m blushing because we deserve it.” Chrysostom went further: he advised the rich to give alms themselves, bypassing the hands of the clergy, and loudly condemned the rich deaconess Olympias, his “dear mistress and venerable daughter,” when she generously scattered her countless riches into the hands of clergy and bishops. This courageous act almost aroused a whole storm in the spiritual spheres, even among their dignitaries, and since it touched the root of all evil, the “metropolis of vices,” in the words of Palladius, all evil united for vengeance. The vengeance was as cruel as it was unexpected, and - who would have thought? - this stern man, such an eloquent preacher of selflessness and poverty, was himself accused of stinginess and predatoryness! As for the issue of inheriting the archbishop's throne in favor of brilliant dignitaries, such as Nektarios, for example, who brought here the habits and luxury of the mayors, Chrysostom saw it as a matter of his honor to destroy all this pomp from the very beginning. No more silk or gold brocade was visible on him, no scarlet clothes were visible on his retinue: the simplest fabrics on the retinue and the kind of monastic attire on the archbishop himself - this was the unexpected news that struck the whole of Constantinople. And immediately there were cries about the stingy stinginess of Chrysostom, that if he forbade the generosity of his spiritual daughter Olympias in relation to others, it was only in order to use it himself. And he wanted to give the decorations of churches the same simplicity that distinguished the clothes of both his own and his clergy. He ordered the sale of silk and gold jewelry that covered church altars upon his arrival, purple upholstery, and rich church vestments. The decoration of magnificent marble and solid columns prepared by Nektarios for the Church of St. Anastasias, lying on the ground awaiting the architect, were also sold at auction. There was nothing left, not excluding very valuable vessels - he wanted to keep only the simplest things. Finally, he also sold a small land property, the preservation of which as church property seemed to him difficult and unprofitable. Hand in hand with material changes in the Church there were changes in the personnel of the episcopal palace. Chrysostom dismissed the steward, explaining that these people only know how to steal and that, being priests, they devote the time needed for the work of God to kitchen bills. The Olympics took care of his table, there were no official receptions in his house, and yet this served as points of accusation against him for love of money and predation: “Where did he go with the church money received for holy cups, fabrics, carpets and jewelry, for all the items he removed from circulation? He, who preached the poverty of desert living, fed from the hands of Olympias, expelled from his episcopal home not only the furnishings necessary for a decent life for a bishop, but even hospitality itself, which is his indisputable duty in relation to his colleagues and flock - where does he use all this economy? He, of course, hid it in some corner of his house, where little by little he accumulates countless treasures...” These accusations stand ahead of others in the process that the clergy started against him before two Councils. Denunciations even from his priests, which had the guise of credibility, reached the palace and the secret gatherings of his enemies. Soon they learned very well, and especially those who could observe the archpastor closely, that no one in the world was as unselfish and simple as him. No bishop has ever been more charitable than John Chrysostom, and nothing base has ever touched his heart. He used the proceeds from those sales that were charged with a crime not only for alms, for which he considered himself to have the right not to account to anyone, but also for charitable institutions throughout the city. Using his episcopal income, he established a hospital in Constantinople for the citizens and another one for visitors. And in sermons, and in private addresses, and by his own example, he constantly encouraged the pious rich to establish charitable institutions. He wanted the whole of Constantinople to be one large hospitable house, and that everyone in his house would have a room intended for wanderers and beggars. His sermon has reached us, where he addresses his flock with the following touching words: “Christ is at your door, open to Him, you owe Him the best room, but He asks you only for a corner! Place Him wherever you want, in the back rooms with your servants, in the barns, in the stables with your donkeys and horses, but just accept Him.” The transformation of the clergy, in order to be complete, had to also affect the deaconesses who formed part of the clergy: a delicate matter, because these women had some power in the Church. Chrysostom fulfilled this duty with that usual determination, which sometimes harmed his best undertakings. Most of the deaconesses lived very vainly, trying as much as possible to combine the service of God and Baal, many desecrated the holy place with shameful behavior. Having collected information about each of them, the formidable judge called them to announce the verdict. First, he dismissed the most guilty, telling them: “I am returning your freedom: you will do well if you marry again.” We remember the same instruction in the words of the Apostle Paul (1 Cor. 7:9): “It is better to get married than to get inflamed.” On those who still deserved leniency, he imposed strict penance and prescribed completely monastic rules of discipline for them. It is unlikely that the latter were more grateful to him than the former. This was the position of John Chrysostom from the very first steps of his episcopate, and it worsened even more when bitterness found support in the empress, nourishing the hope of his deposition. What was the position of Chrysostom in relation to the population and, in particular, the Christian flock of the second Rome, which, in contrast to the flock of the first Rome, did not include a single noble family that did not profess the religion of the emperor? As for the pagans, they watched with curiosity the spectacle of this outbreak of war. Not very disposed towards Eudoxia, but even more unfriendly towards the archbishop, whose strict character offended them, they were always inclined to take the side hostile to him in matters that, moreover, were alien to them - and they fulfilled this in their reviews of him on the pages of history. Chrysostom, and this was the basis of his character, completely imbued with evangelical mercy, indulged in involuntary impulses of feeling, outraged by social inequality. He loved the people with the love of a true shepherd. While not condemning wealth, he, however, understood it only as a means given by God to replace Him in the distribution of the benefits He bestows. The rich man, insensitive to the sufferings of poverty, was in his eyes a wicked man, a blasphemer, robbing God himself, guilty of vanity with his pleasures, of the insolent arrogance of the haves over the have-nots and of violating the laws of Divine and human. He put vanity in wealth on the same level as hardness of heart and persecuted both with his caustic words. His biographer calls it “plunging a razor into the hearts of the rich in order to cut out the boil of pride.” He constantly returned in his sermons to the formidable question of the poor and the rich, at least the merciless rich man who denies Lazarus crumbs from his table. It was not only usury that he hated: he also cursed those useless expenses that were squandered at festivals, in palaces, in theaters and testify to the starvation of the poor. Since the time of Spurius Cassius, who denounced the extortion of the patricians before the Roman plebeians, and since the time of the Gracchi, who proclaimed the agrarian law, human ears have not been amazed by such speeches. One of the main features of Christians is their patronage of the poor and exhortation of the rich to mercy - the honor and glory of the Church that has made this a common place of its preaching. The sermons of John Chrysostom were more passionate and demanding than the usual prescriptions of gospel mercy. At least, this is how his contemporaries judged them, and even today many of his sermons amaze us with their boldness. Showing severity, sometimes immeasurable, against the upper classes of society, he perhaps overstepped the limits in expressing love for the lower classes. He not only loved the people, but admired them; he assumed in him all sorts of virtues, some special power. When the earthquake shook Constantinople to its foundations and then suddenly stopped, Chrysostom said in his sermon that “the sins of the rich brought on this disaster, arousing the wrath of God, but the prayers of the poor turned it away.” Another time he said: “The glory of my city is not that it has a Senate, consuls and other similar institutions, but that it has a faithful people.” “Enter the church, you will see our true greatness there - the poor, attentive to the word of God, guarding the holy place from midnight until morning, not driven out of here either by sleep or the needs of poverty.” He added about the rich: “I would like to know where now are those who troubled us recently, because their presence in this place disturbed and alarmed us. I would very much like to know what they are doing, and what better occupation they can choose than to come here, as others came. I am well aware that they have no occupation and that their absence is a consequence of their conceit and arrogance. Tell me, I ask you, what reason do you have to be so proud and think that you greatly oblige us when you come here to listen to the truths necessary for our salvation? Why show so much arrogance? Is it because you are rich and dressed in silk? But must you not judge that these fabrics are the work of the worms who spun them, and the invention of the barbarians who wove them? Shouldn't you consider that harlots, and dishonest people devoted to all sorts of abominations, and thieves, and grave robbers themselves, just like you, have silk clothes? Descend from the brilliant heights to which the arrogance of your heart has lifted you, and think about your baseness, about the insignificance of your nature. With all your pride, you are nothing more than slaves, slaves of your sins. You are like one who, being daily beaten at home by his servants, would boast, walking around the square, that he has a crowd of servants and power over his fellow citizens. I wish that your power over them would be only from God, and even that you would judiciously recognize some equality with those under your control.” It is enough to open the works of Chrysostom to see with what courage he sometimes attacked, regarding the merciless rich, this inequality of fortunes, which forms the basis of civil society. Once from the pulpit he told the following incident: “Our city,” he said, “was once struck by a great lack of rain; the sown seeds could not vegetate. Everyone prayed to God to avert the disaster and dispel the general grief, but the evil continued, and, according to the ancient prophecy of Moses, the copper heavens remained motionless over our heads. Famine was approaching, it was foreseen, expected, and with it the most cruel death threatened. The merciful God took pity on the city - the copper sky suddenly melted, clouds gathered and suddenly opened, and rain poured down so heavily that all hearts were filled with joy. Intoxicated with happiness, residents rushed into the streets as if they had escaped death. It was a general holiday, inexpressible delight. Among these rejoicings, only one man walked sad, despondent and as if oppressed by great grief. He was one of the richest residents of the city, and when he was asked why he was the only one sad in the midst of everyone’s joy, he could not hide in the depths of his soul the cause of his grief, and just as an internal illness breaks out with all its force, this man’s ulcer was revealed to everyone in all its abomination. “I have accumulated,” he said, “10 thousand measures of wheat - and now I don’t know where to go with it.” This was the cause of his sorrow! Tell me, I ask you: did this rich man’s happiness consist in the fact that he could make such speeches for which he was worthy of being stoned as a creature more inhuman than wild animals, and as a public enemy? What are you doing, you unfortunate thing? Do you mourn that people did not die and that you lost the opportunity to collect the gold for which you craved? Don't you know the words Solomon once said: “Whoever raises the price of grain will be cursed by the people”? You are passing through the hailstorm as an enemy of the fruits of the earth, as a wicked person who has rebelled against the bounties of God for all people, as a servant and slave of mammon! Shouldn't your destructive tongue be torn out, this heart that gives rise to such vile thoughts should be strangled? Oh, you see: wealth does not allow a person to remain a person, it turns him into a beast and the devil, for what could be more vile than a rich man asking God for hunger to increase his wealth? This passion for gold perverts all his desires. Instead of rejoicing in the abundance of bread, he finds in this very abundance the cause of sorrow. His very wealth upsets him!.. When you see a leader of robbers killing on the roads, setting traps for passers-by, stealing what he finds in the fields, hiding gold and silver in caves and pits, stealing herds, slaves, household utensils, would you call him happy, because of the wealth he has accumulated, or unhappy, because of the execution awaiting him? This is the lot of the rich and the stingy. These are thieves who tax the roads, rob passers-by, and collect in their fields, as in caves and pits, other people's property, which they have accumulated. A robber cannot avoid execution, escape from human hands - a rich man cannot escape the right hand of God. The rich man will be cast into Gehenna, Lazarus will lie down in Abraham's bosom. Holy Scripture teaches us that a thief is not only one who steals someone else’s property, but also one who does not distribute what he has.” Here is an image of an merciless rich man; “What could be more shameful and shameless, more like a dog, than the face of this outcast? The dog himself is more bashful than a miser who steals everyone's property. Can you imagine anything more shameful than these hands that pollute everything, these insatiable lips? The face and eyes of the merciless rich man are inhuman. He does not see people in people - he does not see the sky in the sky, he does not raise his gaze to God as the supreme ruler of all things, for him everything lies only in gold and silver. If a person’s gaze falls on a poor person given over to grief, his heart is embarrassed, tears flow from his eyes, he feels visible poverty in himself, but when such a rich man looks at the poor man, he only becomes more cruel, and his inhumanity increases. A person does not consider someone else’s property to be his own, he considers his own property to be someone else’s; he loses himself for the sake of the needy. A rich man has nothing unless he has everything, for he is not a man; his very face testifies to the brutality of his nature. But the animals themselves are less ruthless, their claws are less destructive. When a bear or wolf is satisfied, they stop chasing prey - the rich man is never satisfied. God gave us hands so that we would support our neighbor when he falls, and not so that we would set a trap for him and cause him to fall. If this is the use we make of our hands, it would be better if we did not have them at all, or if we had them cut off out of compassion. You feel sorry when you see a beast tormenting a sheep, but when you yourself torment one of your own kind, connected to you by the bonds of nature itself, then you do not see anything unworthy in this, and you still want to be considered human! Mercy distinguishes a person, and cruelty distinguishes a beast. A man helps - a beast torments, the mouth of a stingy man is fiercer than the mouth of a beast, because one of his words leads to death. The poor man, on the contrary, is as generous and valiant as the rich man is cowardly and cruel, there is peace in the soul of the poor man, his gaze is divine, the rich man is already consigned to hell on earth. The poor, free from the attachments that make the rich man a slave rather than a master, is like a lion spewing fire from its nostrils. There is nothing that he, raised above worldly concerns, would not undertake and accomplish for the good of the Church. Under extreme trials and persecution for Christ, what will prevent him from fulfilling his duty as a faithful Christian? He despised life. What other hardships can he still be afraid of? Wealth? - But he has nothing. Fatherland? - But the whole earth is his fatherland. Clients? Retinues? Pleasures? - He doesn't know any of this. His friendship is with Heaven, his sighs are about the bliss of another life. If it is necessary to lose this mortal existence, if blood must be shed, oh, let persecution come! He is ready, and this is what makes him more powerful than entire nations, all of humanity! So that you know that this speech of mine is unflattering, I will show you why only the poor are free. Let's turn to history. Here is the vile Herod. How many powerful and rich people were there in his time, but who dared to resist him? Who girded himself with courage to expose this despiser of moral laws, this violator of the commands of God? Rich? - No! Poor, destitute, having neither a bed, nor a table, nor a shelter where to lay his head, John, this glorious citizen of the desert, I will not say the first, but the only one who, approaching the tyrant in his palace, said to him: “You live in incest with this wife, and the Lord condemns you with my lips.” Before him, the great Elijah, whose entire property was in sheep's clothing, alone dared to condemn Ahab, that wicked and criminal king. And what, besides poverty, can give courage in danger, a holy determination that makes a person invincible before evil, for, having despised real life, he puts death itself at nothing? A person in such a valiant state, having nothing and not wanting to have anything, can provide more services to the Church than the rich, nobles and kings. Rich people and kings are nothing without their earthly power, but even this power is limited. For a decisive person who despises death, everything useful, extraordinary, great, whatever he desires, is possible, and since in his eyes gold is inferior in value to blood, then the person who judges this way is incomparably nobler and stronger than all the rich people together.” The meaning of such speeches was clear to everyone, the hints contained in them were clear. John scourging Herod, Elijah pronouncing judgment on the crimes of Ahab and the wickedness of Jezebel - this was Chrysostom himself, and he dared to do this because he was poor. It is easy to imagine the effect on crowds of such speeches coming from the lips of eloquent people. When the archbishop was about to preach, especially on such subjects, the church became crowded with the crowd of listeners, there was such a crush around his pulpit that one could suffocate there. This forced the pulpit to be moved, as mentioned above, from the elevated niche to the pulpit, from where his voice was heard everywhere - from the gallery to the nave. Many notaries and cursive writers wrote down these sermons, often interrupted by enthusiastic applause, and when John rejected these secular signs of approval, which turned the house of God into a theater, the cliques doubled in the midst of the countless crowd. Outside the church, the crowd accompanied him, took over his protection and more than once kept a guard at his door if they considered his life in danger. Chrysostom’s appeals to the people, when he wanted to thank them for this love, are filled with such expressions: “I love you just as you love me. Where would I be without you? You replace my father, mother, brothers, children, you are everything in the world to me. I have neither joy nor sorrow that is not yours, and when one of you perishes, I perish too.” However, it was not only these fiery people, intoxicated by his appearance and trembling at his speech, who flocked to listen to him. In this crowd, there were both simply curious people, spies, enemies, who were in a hurry to spread his slightest hints, poisonously reinterpreting them. The court looked at him as a rebel, and the opinion spread among the highest society of Constantinople that the archbishop wanted the extermination of the rich. No matter how far the distance of these scenes is from the times of Saturninus and the Gracchi, they are, in essence, the same scenes. Times change, centuries with changes in knowledge bring new formulas, but social needs change little: passions, duties, dangers remain the same. If the formula for a better distribution of material well-being between the various classes of society was no longer the same as in the times of the struggle between patricians and plebeians, in the times of Cassius and the Gracchi, then the needs and passions still did not fade away. Only it would not be easy for Cassius and the Gracchi to recognize here these masses of people, which they once excited and whose idols they were. The church now became a forum, the pulpit a tribune, the bishop a tribune, and the devotion of the people to this intercessor who appealed in the name of mercy was no less devotion to those who spoke in the name of equality of rights in the republic. In any case, this ardent, boundless devotion did not benefit the Christian tribune more than the proclaimers of agrarian laws. One of the indictments against Chrysostom at the Councils that condemned him was the incitement of the people to revolt - to this the court malice added the charge of insulting His Majesty. The testimony of a contemporary should not be taken literally that the entire clergy of Constantinople was against Chrysostom - there was more than one righteous man in Sodom, but most of the timid people were intimidated by general cries, and only the persecution brought against the archbishop revealed their valiant devotion. Among them, history mentions the deacon Heraclides, attached to the person of the archbishop; Proclus, whose duty it was to be admitted to the episcopal audience; the ascetic Philip, who, as they say, was a teacher, i.e. the ruler of the schools where the children of the clergy were educated; Presbyter Herman, his constant companion both in disasters and in joys; the very learned deacon Philip of Sides and many other persons of the Eastern Church. To them should be added a young man emerging from the Syrian monasteries, who was destined to become a great luminary in the West. It was Deacon Cassian, who arrived in Constantinople to hear Chrysostom, devoted himself to serving him and, raised by such a teacher, subsequently founded the famous monastery of St. Victor in Marseilles. These were true friends who shared with the archbishop his strict life and teaching and were no less ardently attached to him, although they certainly did not agree with him in everything. They sometimes tried to soften the situation around the saint, however, without much success, because ardent jealousy was in the nature of Chrysostom, who considered it unworthy to take precautions in matters that he considered his duty. Their wise advice was not always taken into account, and those whom he listened to were decisive advisers who approved of all his actions without exception. History names two such friends of his: the deacons Serapion and Tigrius, to whom it attributes a significant share of “guilt” in the misfortunes of this unyielding man. Serapion was an Egyptian. Thanks to the similarity in character, which gave him influence over the archbishop, Serapion became his only confidant in delicate circumstances. Chrysostom once presided over a meeting of his clergy in church, where some incendiary issue of reform was discussed. When the Vladyka’s speech was met with murmurs and anger appeared on his face, Serapion, rising from his place, approached him and said so that those around him could hear: “Why are you delaying, bishop? Arm yourself with the spiritual rod and crush these people with one blow.” This was Chrysostom’s most trusted advisor, who often spoke on his behalf before the clergy and even before his fellow bishops. Deacon Tigry was the same. The Council declared him one of the evil geniuses who outraged the Eastern Church, prompting the archbishop to make decisions that went beyond all measure. Let us contrast this somewhat sad picture of the people surrounding Chrysostom with another, more comforting one: these were his supporters, mostly noble women and deaconesses, who were for him both an unshakable support in persecution and accomplices in martyrdom. Four of them were distinguished by the special height of their merits and the strength of their devotion: these were Salvina, Ampructa, Pentadia and Olympias - names honored by the Church and respectfully recorded by history. To tell here briefly what is known about them means, perhaps, to clarify a curious historical question that concerns the class of deaconesses, which was of such importance in the 4th and 5th centuries of our era. Salvina, a Moorish woman by birth, descended from the ancient Numidian kings, was the daughter of that ferocious tyrant Gildon, who, having devastated Roman Africa, where Theodosius appointed him ruler, with robbery and murder, ended by breaking the ties of his citizenship and dissociating himself from the empire. Out of the precaution that Rome often took regarding its officials of barbarian origin, who gave rise to suspicion, Theodosius demanded Salvina, then still a minor, to keep her at court as a hostage, raise her as a Roman, marry her to a patrician and thereby strengthen the loyalty of her father. Indeed, for Theodosius, who had to endure great wars in the West, the preservation of Africa was very important, because, as you know, Africa was the breadbasket of Italy. So, Salvina received the education of a noble Roman woman at the eastern court, and when she reached the age of marriage, Theodosius chose her a husband in his family, his wife’s nephew. He thought that he had done enough to bind to himself the barbarian, whose fickleness he feared, but this alliance with the royal house, which ruled the whole world, did not make Gildon either more civilized or more faithful. The eyes of the great Emperor had barely closed when Gildon shed his disguise and, under the false pretext of transferring Africa from the power of the Western Empire to the power of the Eastern, according to the wishes of Arkady, ordered the slaughter of the Roman settlers and declared himself an enemy of the Empire. At the same time as he threw off the bonds of Roman citizenship, he betrayed the Church, turning to paganism, and indulged in all the excesses and cruelties of the savage nature of his tribe. In a strange contrast, the meek daughter of this pagan became a zealous Christian and a chaste wife at the court of the Eastern Empire, and when her husband, who did not live long, died, the heiress of Massinissa and Jugurtha did not dream of great honors, such as becoming a deaconess of Constantinople, taking a vow of eternal widowhood. Neither Chrysostom nor Jerome remained without influence on the success of this inclination, which attracted the attention of all Christianity. Jerome, from his Bethlehem cave, sent her an eloquent teaching, and Chrysostom composed for her a treatise entitled “To the Young Widow,” in which he proclaims both the glory of her union with the rulers of the universe, and the advantages of a calling to a peaceful happiness, which her relatives did not know. Salvina, being a deaconess, did not cease to be a very influential woman and became the patroness of the Eastern Churches at the court of Arkady. She was approached from all over the empire as a person of great power by the Emperor and Empress, but her attachment to Chrysostom put an end to all this. Ampructa and Pentadia occupied a place of honor among the matrons of the city. Pentadia's life was full of anxiety and grief. As the wife of consul Timasius, the noblest victim of the eunuch Eutropius, who exiled him to an Egyptian oasis on false charges of insulting the Emperor, she was implicated in her husband’s affair, was also sentenced to exile and was forced to hide in order to avoid an even more terrible fate. The walls and guards of this prison were a belt of hot, impenetrable sands that surrounded the oasis. The exile tried to escape with the help of a caravan of Arab merchants, and whether he fell into the nets laid out for him by the eunuch, or was swallowed up by the sandy ocean, which the desert winds stir up on its way, he disappeared, and no trace of him was ever found. His wife, surrounded by spies of Eutropius, changing one refuge after another and finally, seeing the danger of being open, hid in one of the churches of Constantinople - under the protection of the right of refuge, which was granted by law to places of Christian meeting, but the eunuch ordered the walls of the church to be taken by force, violating the privilege of the church. This was the beginning of a terrible tragedy, the denouement of which was the death of this minister of the Emperor. The Archbishop defended his Church: he stood up for Pentadia, demanded her extradition in the name of God's hospitality, and thus saved her life. Grateful Pentadia devoted herself to the church that served as her refuge, and to the bishop, her savior. With a change in circumstances, the patroness could become the patroness herself. Chrysostom wrote to her in the days of his own misfortunes: “You knew how to unite all the crowns on your forehead, you are the fortress of your fellow citizens in sorrow, a haven for the unfortunate among the waves of persecution.” We know Ampructa only by name; but the affection which Chrysostom seems to have had for her is sufficient evidence that she was a worthy friend of Pentadia. However, the glory of the class of deaconesses belonged not only to these pious and valiant women: according to everyone, it was also the lot of Olympias, who was equal to Pentadia in dedication, Salvina in social position and nobility of connections. Olympias was descended on her mother’s side from the famous Ablavius, prefect of the praetorium under Constantine. Destined in childhood to be the bride of Constant, the third son of this Emperor, the daughter Ablavia was elevated to the throne of Armenia by marrying King Arsas. Then, in her second marriage, she was married to a noble Roman - Prince Anisius, who was the father of Olympias - these are the family ties of the future deaconess. When, one blow after another, death snatched away all these loved ones, she suddenly found herself an orphan and the owner of untold wealth, and yet she was still almost a teenager. Amazing beauty, a friendly and gentle disposition, an exalted mind, a soul disposed to everything great, prompted many to seek her hand. The story details its merits. “Olympiad,” says biographer Palladius, who knew her closely, “had a truly generous heart, and whoever recognized her and saw the combination of such beauty and charm with courage and firm courage of spirit, despising the trifles of the world, all fear and danger, would hesitate to call her a woman.” Olympias's marriage lasted less than two years. After the death of her husband, Olympias decided to remain a widow. Roman emperors, especially in this era, arrogated to themselves some right to control the fate of noble and rich girls and widows, who owed their fortune to the favors of the sovereign or the service of their fathers and husbands. Theodosius, seeing Olympias as a widow in her prime, decided to marry her off to a relative, a Spaniard, named Elpidius. The Olympics refused. But Elpidius did not stop his search, either because he was really carried away by the young woman, or because he was only seeking her fortune. Insulted by this refusal, Theodosius wanted to use power, but also unsuccessfully. “If God had destined me to live in marriage,” Olympias wrote to him, “He would not have taken from me the one I loved. Having released us both from the yoke under which we voluntarily surrendered, the Lord showed me my true calling, which is to serve Him in widowhood.” The emperor explained to himself this decision, strange given the age of Olympias and her position, by the inspiration of the priests who coveted her fortune; he ordered her inheritance to be sequestered, placing it under the control of the prefect of Constantinople until the young widow reached the age of 30. This was one of those autocratic actions that the great Theodosius sometimes allowed himself and which he later repented of. Olympias was severely insulted not only by the confiscation of the estate, but also by the rudeness of the city prefect, who decided to help the cause of Elpidius. She opposed such arbitrariness and, calling upon the aid of all the strength of her spirit, with the dignity inherent in her character and position, wrote the following letter to the Emperor, which has reached us: “I thank you, most august monarch, that with wisdom and benevolence worthy not only of a sovereign, but also of a bishop, you deigned to take upon yourself the management of my estate and thereby eased the burden of earthly worries for me. Deign to crown your work by distributing this wealth to the poor and the churches, as I intended to do. Your authorized representatives will carry out this with great knowledge of the matter, and moreover, you will save me from the stings of criminal vanity, which very often accompany charity.” This letter, in which such a majestic calm hid a murderous irony, shamed the Emperor. He canceled the order, returned control of the hereditary estate to Olympias and granted her complete freedom - then she completely devoted herself to the exploits of Christian widowhood. Nektarios, who at that time occupied the episcopal throne in Constantinople, accepted her among the deaconesses and made her his adviser in all matters of the Church. “Nothing was done without her,” Palladium reports. Chrysostom, after Nektarios, showed her the same trust and even greater affection, because he had the opportunity to test the power of devotion of this noble woman. In turn, Olympias looked at him as her father, almost like God. She brought consolation to the life of this strict and self-centered man, filled with all sorts of difficulties. Her daily concern was to soften this severity of his character. She also took care of the needs of his material life and took care of his table, because Chrysostom, who was incapable of caring for himself and who carried his love of solitude to the highest degree, could easily upset his health, which had already been significantly damaged. The persecution brought against this great man was for Olympias the beginning of a whole series of trials that revealed all the treasures of her soul: suffice it to say here that her loyalty to this ascetic, whom she revered as a saint, did not waver either before exile or before the martyrdom. This was the situation in Constantinople at the end of 400 (a little more than a year after the fall of Eutropius). And so the absence of Archbishop John, recalled to Asia by the unrest in the Ephesian church, allowed his enemies to draw their weapons and begin the battle.