DIONYSinS
12
DIONYSinS
countryman, who carried the news to a wedding-feast
he was attending. All instantly rose up and rushed to
release the bishop. The soldiers took to flight, leav-
ing their prisoners on their uncushioned litters. Dio-
nysius, believing his rescuers to be robbers, held out his
clothes to them, retaining only his tunic. They urged
him to rise and fly. He begged them to leave him, de-
claring that they might as well cut off his head at once,
as the soldiers would shortly do so. He let himself
down on the ground on his back ; but they seized him
by the hantls and feet and dragged him away, carrying
him out of the little town, and setting him on an ass
without a saddle. With two companions, Gains and
Peter, he remained in a desert place in Libya until the
persecution ceased in 251. The whole Christian world
was then thrown into confusion by the news that No-
vatian claimed the Bishopric of Rome in opposition to
Pope Cornelius. Dionysius at once took the side of
the latter, and it was largely by liis influence that the
whole East, after much disturbance, was brought in a
few months into unity and harmony. Novatian
wrote to him for support. His curt reply has been
preserved entire: Novatian can easily prove the truth
of his protestation that he was consecrated against his
will by voluntarily retiring ; he ought to have suffered
martyrdom rather than divide the Church of God;
indeed it would have been a particularly glorious mar-
tyrdom on behalf of the whole Church (such is the im-
portance attached by Dionysius to a schism at Rome) ;
if he can even now persuade his party to make peace,
the past will be forgotten; if not, let him save his own
soul. St. Dionysius also wrote many letters on this
question to Rome and to the East ; some of these were
treatises on penance. He took a somewhat milder
view than Cyprian, for he gave greater weight to the
"indulgences" granted by the martyrs, and refused
forgi\eness in the hour of death to none.
After the persecution the pestilence. Dionysius describes it more graphically than does St. Cyprian, and he reminds us of Thucyditles and Defoe. The heathen thrust away their sick, fled from their own relatives, threw bodies half dead into the streets; yet they suf- fered more than the Christians, whose heroic acts of mercy are recounted by their bishop. Many priests, deacons, and persons of merit died from succouring others, and this death, writes Dionysius, was in no way inferior to martyrdom. The baptismal contro- versy spread from Africa throughout the East. Dio- nysius was far from teaching, like Cyprian, that baptism by a heretic rather befouls than cleanses ; but he was impressed by the opinion of many bishops and some councils that repetition of such a baptism was neces- sary, and it appears that he besought Pope Stephen not to break off communion with the Churches of Asia on this account. He also wrote on the subject to Dionysius of Rome, who was not yet pope, and to a Roman named Philemon, both of whom had written to him. We know seven letters from him on the sub- ject, two being addressed to Pope Sixtus II. In one of these he asks adv'ice in the case of a man who had re- ceived baptism a long time before from heretics, and now declared that it hail been improperly performed. Dionysius had refused to renew the sacrament after the man had so many years received the Holy Eucha- rist ; he asks the pope's opinion. In this case it is clear that the ilifficulty was in the nature of the ceremonies used, not in the mere fact of their having been per- formed by heretics. We gather that Dionysius him- self followed the Roman custom, either by the tradi- tion of his Church, or else out of obedience to the de- cree of Stephen. In 253 Origen died ; he had not been at Alexandria for many years. But Dionysius had not forgotten his old master, and wrote a letter in his praise to Theotecnus of Cicsarea.
An Egyptian bishop, Xepos, taught the Chiliastic error that there would be a reign of Christ upon earth for a thousand years, a period of corporal delights; he
founded this doctrine upon the Apocalypse in a book
entitled "Refutation of the Allegorizers ". It was
only after the death of Nepos that Dionysius found
himself obliged to write two books "On the Promises"
to counteract this error. He treats Nepos with great
respect, but rejects his doctrine, as indeed the Church
has since done, though it was taught by Papias, Justin,
Irenffius, Victorinus of Pettau, and others. The dio-
cese proper to Alexandria was still very large (though
Heraclas is said to have instituted new bishoprics),
and the Arsinoite nome formed a part of it. Here the
error was very prevalent, and St. Dionysius went in
person to the villages, called together the priests and
teachers, and for three days instructed them, refuting
the arguments they drew from the book of Nepos. He
was much edified by the docile spirit and love of truth
which he found. At length Korakion, who had intro-
duced the book and the doctrine, declared himself con-
vuiced. The chief interest of the incident is not in the
picture it gives of ancient Church life and of the wis-
dom and gentleness of the bishop, but in the remark-
able disquisition, which Dionysius appends, on the
authenticity of the Apocalypse. It is a very striking
piece of " higher criticism ' ', and for clearness and mod-
eration, keenness and insight, is hardly to be surpassed.
Some of the brethren, he tells us, in their zeal against
Chiliastic error, repudiated the Apocalypse alto-
gether, and took it chapter by chapter to ridicule it,
attributing the authorship of it to Cerinthus (as we
know the Roman Gains did some years earlier). Dio-
nysius treats it with reverence, and declares it to be
full of hidden mysteries, and doubtless really by a man
called John. (In a passage now lost, he showed that
the book must be understood allegorically.) But he
found it hard to believe that the writer could be the
son of Zebedee, the author of the Gospel and of the
Catholic Epistle, on account of the great contrast of
character, style, and "what is called working out".
He shows that the one writer calls himself John,
whereas the other only refers to himself by some peri-
phrasis. He adds the famous remark, that "it is said
that there are two tombs in Ephesus, both of which
are called that of John". He demonstrates the close
hkeness between the Gospel and the Epistle, and
points out the wholly different vocabulary of the Apoc-
alj^pse; the latter is full of solecisms and barbarisms,
while the former are in good Greek. This acute criti-
cism was unfortunate, in that it was largely the cause
of the frequent rejection of the Apocalypse in the
Greek-speaking Chm'chcs, even as late as the iliddle
Ages. Dionysius's arguments appeared unanswer-
able to the liberal critics of the nineteenth century.
Lately the swing of the pendulum has brought many,
guided by Bousset, Harnack, and others, to be im-
pressed rather by the undeniable points of contact be-
tween the Gospel and the Apocalypse, than by the
differences of style (which can be explained by a differ-
ent scribe and interpreter, since the author of both
books was certainly a Jew^ so that even Loisy ad-
mits that the opinion of the numerous and learned
conservative scholars "no longer appears impossible".
But it should be noted that the modern critics have
added nothing to the judicious remarks of the third-
century patriarch.
The Emperor Valerian, whose accession was in 253, did not persecute until 257. In that year St. Cyprian was banished to Curubis, and St. Dionysius to Kephro in the Mareotis, after being tried, together with one priest and two deacons, before ^Emilianus, the prefect of Egypt. He himself relates the firm answers he made to the prefect, writing to defend himself against a certain Germanus, who had accused him of a dis- graceful flight. Cyprian suffered in 258, but Dio- nysius was spared, and returned to Alexandria directly toleration was decreed by Gallienus in 2G0. But not to peace, for in 261-2 the city was in a state of tumult little less dangerous than a persecution. The great
