Saint Pierre d'Alexandrie
Évêque et Martyr
(† 310)
Saint Pierre d’Alexandrie nous est peu connu jusqu’à son élévation sur le siège épiscopal de cette ville.
Son zèle pour la Foi, à une époque de persécutions continuelles, l’obligea de fuir ; mais il consola et fortifia les Chrétiens dans les différentes contrées qu’il parcourut, et il n’oublia pas son cher troupeau. Par d’éloquentes lettres pastorales, il rappelait à ses brebis les grands devoirs de la vie chrétienne et la nécessité de la persévérance.
La paix ayant reparu, saint Pierre revint dans son Église, où il fut bientôt dénoncé par l’hérétique Arius et jeté dans les fers. Il ne cessait, dans sa prison, d’encourager les nombreuses victimes enfermées avec lui, de prier et de chanter les louanges de Dieu.
Un jour qu’il priait avec plus de ferveur, Notre-Seigneur lui apparut sous la forme d’un enfant tout éclatant de lumière, et vêtu d’une belle tunique blanche fendue de haut en bas, et il en tenait les bords comme pour cacher sa nudité. Saint Pierre, saisi de frayeur, Lui dit :
« —Seigneur, qui Vous a mis dans cet état ?
« —C’est Arius, répondit Jésus, qui a divisé Mon Église et M’a ravi une partie des âmes que J’ai rachetées de Mon sang. »
Peu de jours après, plusieurs prêtres vinrent demander à l’évêque la grâce du misérable hérésiarque, le croyant plein d’un repentir sincère : « Cessez, leur dit saint Pierre averti par le Sauveur de l’hypocrisie d’Arius, cessez de plaider la cause de ce misérable ; Dieu l’a maudit ; ses sentiments affectés cachent l’impénitence et l’impiété ». Les prêtres cessèrent dès lors de se faire illusion.
« Le temps de mon supplice est proche, ajouta-t-il, je vous parle pour la dernière fois ; soyez fermes dans la défense de la vérité et ne dégénérez pas de la vertu des Saints ». L’empereur, en effet, porta contre lui une sentence de mort ; mais les fidèles, à cette nouvelle, accoururent à la prison pour le défendre, de sorte que le tribun n’osa se présenter pour exécuter la sentence. Saint Pierre, s’apercevant que ses chères ouailles retardaient son bonheur, donna aux gardiens l’idée de faire un trou dans la muraille de la prison, du côté où il n’y avait personne, et de le faire sortir par là. Son conseil fut mis à exécution, et après avoir prié, demandant à Dieu la fin des persécutions, il livra sa tête au bourreau le 26 novembre 310, saint Eusèbe étant pape et Maximin empereur.
Au moment de son supplice, une jeune Chrétienne entendit une voix céleste qui disait : « Pierre le premier des Apôtres ; Pierre le derniers des évêques martyrs d’Alexandrie ». Les Chrétiens recueillirent son corps et lui rendirent des honneurs solennels, de sorte que la sépulture de ce vaillant pontife devint un vrai triomphe pour lui et pour la religion chrétienne.
Martyr à Alexandrie le 24 novembre 311, Fête à Rome au XIIème siècle, mais dès le IXème en Italie du sud sous influence byzantine.
Lecons des Matines
Leçon des Matines (avant 1960)
Neuvième leçon. Pierre, Évêque d’Alexandrie, après Théonas, homme d’une éminente sainteté, fut, par l’éclat de ses vertus et de sa doctrine, non seulement la lumière de l’Égypte, mais encore celle de toute l’Église de Dieu. Pendant la persécution de Maximin Galère, il supporta la rigueur de ces temps-là avec tant de courage, que beaucoup de Chrétiens, témoins de son admirable patience, firent de grands progrès dans la pratique des vertus. Il fut le premier à séparer de la communion des fidèles, Arius, Diacre d’Alexandrie, parce qu’il favorisait le schisme de Mélèce. Lorsque Pierre eut été condamné par Maximin à la peine capitale, les Prêtres Achillas et Alexandre allèrent le trouver dans sa prison, pour intercéder auprès de lui en faveur d’Arius ; mais il leur répondit que, pendant la nuit, Jésus lui était apparu, portant une tunique déchirée, et que, lui en ayant demandé la cause, le Sauveur lui avait dit : « C’est Arius qui a déchiré ainsi mon vêtement, qui est l’Église. » Puis leur ayant prédit qu’ils lui succéderaient dans l’épiscopat, il leur défendit de recevoir dans leur communion Arius, qu’il savait mort devant Dieu. Les événements ne tardèrent pas à montrer que cette révélation était vraiment de Dieu. Enfin, la douzième année de son épiscopat, le sixième jour des calendes de décembre, ayant eu la tête tranchée, il alla recevoir la couronne du martyre.
Dom Guéranger, l’Année Liturgique
Pierre, évêque d’Alexandrie après saint Théonas, fut par sa science et sa sainteté la gloire de l’Égypte et la lumière de toute l’Église de Dieu. Son courage fut tel dans l’atroce persécution excitée par Maximien Galère, que le spectacle d’une si admirable patience fortifia la vertu d’un grand nombre de chrétiens. Ce fut lui qui sépara le premier de la communion des fidèles Arius, diacre d’Alexandrie, à cause de l’appui qu’il donnait au schisme des Mélétiens. . Honorons et prions le grand évêque dont l’Église fait mémoire en ce jour. On le nomma longtemps, comme par excellence, Pierre le Martyr ; jusqu’à ce qu’au XIIIe siècle, un autre Pierre Martyr, illustre lui-même entre tous, fit qu’on appela désormais son glorieux homonyme Saint Pierre d’Alexandrie.
Bhx Cardinal Schuster, Liber Sacramentorum
Saint pierre, le dernier martyr, celui qui scella la persécution de Dioclétien à Alexandrie (+ 311), ainsi que les Grecs le saluent d’un titre d’honneur : sceau et terme de la persécution, est mentionné pour la première fois dans le martyrologe syriaque et, par la suite, par tous les Orientaux, le 24 novembre. Le martyrologe hiéronymien le commémore au contraire aujourd’hui. Son culte, dans l’antiquité, rencontra une grande faveur, si bien qu’il était très populaire même à Antioche. Une si grande célébrité est due, en partie, à la place très importante qu’occupait ce martyr comme patriarche d’Alexandrie, en partie à ses qualités personnelles, et comme directeur du didascaleion d’Alexandrie, et comme auteur sacré. Il est certain que Pierre fut « un splendide exemplaire d’évêque » selon l’attestation d’Eusèbe [1].
Les Syriens ont tiré des Actes mêmes de saint Pierre un titre glorieux qu’ils lui attribuent ; ils l’appellent : celui qui passa à travers le mur percé. Les Actes racontent en effet que le peuple d’Alexandrie montait la garde autour de la prison afin qu’aucun des soldats païens ne se hasardât à exécuter la sentence capitale prononcée contre le Patriarche. Que faire ? Il y avait à redouter que la milice se vengeât du peuple soulevé ; alors le saint Pasteur, pour sauver son troupeau, résolut de s’offrir spontanément à la cruauté des bourreaux. Il fit donc savoir secrètement au tribun qu’au cours de la nuit suivante il indiquerait, par des coups, le point où il fallait percer la muraille pour ouvrir un passage à l’intérieur de la prison. Cette nuit-là, par bonheur, un orage avec éclairs, tonnerre et une forte averse, détourna l’attention des sentinelles chrétiennes, de telle sorte que les soldats du tribun purent, sans être dérangés, pratiquer une brèche dans la muraille de la prison. Le saint Patriarche passa donc à travers le mur entr’ouvert et se laissa conduire par les soldats au lieu même que la tradition indiquait comme celui du martyre de saint Marc. Là enfin il fut décapité, et les fidèles ensevelirent son cadavre.
La messe Státuit est du Commun.
[1] Hist.Eccl., IX, 6, 2.
Dom Pius Parsch, le Guide dans l’année liturgique
Saint Pierre, évêque d’Alexandrie, martyr en 311. — Comme il était en prison, des prêtres vinrent intercéder auprès de lui pour Arius, l’hérétique qu’il avait condamné, et le fondateur d’une des sectes les plus importantes dans l’histoire de l’Église. Mais saint Pierre leur répondit que, pendant la nuit, Jésus lui était apparu portant une robe déchirée ; et comme il lui en demandait la raison, le Seigneur lui avait dit : “Arius a déchiré mon vêtement, qui est mon Église.” Pratique : Nous pouvons nous appliquer cette parole : si l’Église est le vêtement du Christ, nous sommes les parties de ce vêtement ; l’hérétique déchire, le pécheur souille le vêtement du Christ. Nous voulons, par une vie riche en vertus, orner le vêtement du Christ de perles et de pierres précieuses.
St. Peter of Alexandria
Became Bishop of Alexandria in 300; martyred Nov., 311. According to Philip of Sidetes he was at one time head of the famous catechetical school at Alexandria. His theological importance lies in the
fact that he marked, very probably initiated, the reaction at Alexandria against extreme Origenism.
When
during the Diocletian persecution Peter left Alexandria for concealment, the Meletian schism broke out. There are
three different accounts of this schism: (1) According to three Latin documents (translation from lostGreek originals) published by Maffei, Meletius (or Melitius), Bishop of Lycopolis, took advantage of St.
Peter'sabsence to usurp his patriarchal functions, and contravened the canons by consecrating bishops to sees notvacant, their occupants being
in prison for the Faith. Four of them remonstrated, but Meletius took no heed of them and actually went
to Alexandria, where, at the
instigation of one Isidore, and Arius the future heresiarch, he set aside
those left in charge by Peter and appointed others. Upon this Peter excommunicated him. (2) St. Athanasius accuses Meletius not only of turbulent and schismatical conduct, but of sacrificing, and denouncingPeter to the emperor. There is no
incompatibility between the Latin documents and St. Athanasius, but the statement that Meletius sacrificed must be received with caution; it was
probably based upon rumour arising out of the immunity which he appeared to enjoy. At all
events nothing was heard about the charge at the Council of Nicæa. (3) According to St. Epiphanius (Haer., 68), Meletius and St.
Peter quarrelled over the
reconciliation of the lapsi, the former inclining to sterner
views. Epiphanius probably derived his information from
a Meletiansource, and his story
is full of historical blunders. Thus, to take one example, Peter is made a fellow-prisoner ofMeletius and is martyred in prison. According to Eusebius his martyrdom was unexpected, and therefore not preceded by a term of imprisonment.
There
are extant a collection of fourteen canons issued by Peter in the third year of the persecution dealing chiefly with the lapsi, excerpted probably from
an Easter Festal Epistle. The fact that they were
ratified by theCouncil of Trullo, and thus became part of the canon law of the Eastern Church, probably accounts for their preservation. Many manuscripts contain a fifteenth canon taken from writing on the Passover. The cases of different kinds of lapsi were decided upon in
these canons.
The Acts of
the martyrdom of St. Peter are too late to have any historical value. In them is the story of Christappearing to St. Peter with His garment rent, foretelling the Arian schism. Three passages from "On the
Godhead", apparently written against Origen's subordinationist views, were quoted by St.
Cyril at the Council of Ephesus. Two further
passages (in Syriac) claiming to
be from the same book, were printed by Pitra in "Analecta Sacra", IV,
188; their genuineness is doubtful. Leontius of Byzantium quotes a passage affirming the two Naturesof Christ from a work on "The Coming of
Christ", and two passages from the first book of a treatise against the
view that the soul had existed and sinned before it was united to
the body. This treatise must have been written against Origen. Very important are seven fragments preserved in Syriac (Pitra, op. cit., IV, 189-93) from
another work on the Resurrection, in which the identity of the risen with the earthly body is maintained
against Origen.
Five Armenian fragments were also
published by Pitra (op. cit., IV, 430 sq.). Two of these
correspond with one of the doubtful Syriac fragments. The
remaining three are probably Monophysite forgeries (Harnack,
"Altchrist. Lit.", 447). A fragment quoted by the Emperor Justinian in his Letter to the Patriarch Mennas, purporting to be taken from a Mystagogia
of St. Peter's, is probably
spurious (see Routh, "Reliq.
Sac.", III, 372; Harnack, op. cit., 448). The "Chronicon
Paschale" gives a long extract from a supposed writing of Peter on the Passover. This is condemned as spurious by a reference to St. Athanasius (which editors often suppress) unless,
indeed, the reference is an interpolation. A fragment first printed by Routh from a Treatise "On
Blasphemy" is generally regarded as spurious. A Coptic fragment on the keeping of Sunday, published by Schmidt (Texte
und Untersuchung., IV) has been ruled spurious by Delehaye, in whose verdict critics seem to acquiesce. Other Copticfragments have been edited with
a translation by Crum in the "Journal of Theological Studies" (IV,
287 sqq.). Most of these come from the same manuscript as the fragment edited by Schmidt. Their editor says: "It would be
difficult to maintain the genuineness of these texts after Delehaye's
criticisms (Anal. Bolland., XX, 101), thoughcertain of the passages, which I have
published may indicate interpolated, rather than wholly apocryphalcompositions."
Sources
ROUTH, Reliq. Sac., III, 319-72, gives most of the passages attributed to St. Peter. A translation of many of these, as well as of the martyrdom, will be found in CLARKE, Ante-Nicene Christ. Library, in vol. containing works of METHODIUS. For the Meletian schism: HEFELE, Hist. of Councils, tr. I, 341 sq. The best editions of the Canons is LAGARDE, Reliq. Juris Eccles., 63-73. The latest edition of the martyrdom is VITEAU, Passions des saints Ecaterine et Pierre d'Alexandrie, Barbara et Amysia (Paris, 1897). See HARNACK, Altchrist. Lit., 443-49; and Chronologie, 71-75. BARDENHEWER, Gesch. d. altkirch. Lit., II, 203 sq. RADFORD, Three Teachers of Alexandria: Theognostus, Pierius and Peter (Cambridge, 1908).
Bacchus, Francis Joseph. "St. Peter of Alexandria." The Catholic
Encyclopedia. Vol. 11. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911. 26 Nov. 2016 <http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11771a.htm>.
Transcription. This article was transcribed for
New Advent by WGKofron. With thanks to Fr. John Hilkert and St. Mary's Church, Akron,
Ohio.
Ecclesiastical approbation. Nihil Obstat. February 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of
New York.
Peter Martyr of Alexandria BM (RM)
Born at Alexandria, Egypt; died 311. Peter was a young 'confessor' during the Decian persecution. Later he became known for his extraordinary virtue, skill in the sciences, and learning and knowledge of Scripture. Peter was named head of the catechetical school in Alexandria, and in 300 was elected patriarch of the city to succeed Saint Theonas.
St. Peter, Bishop of Alexandria, Martyr
From Eusebius, Theodoret, &c. See Tillemont, t. 5. Ceillier, t. 4, p. 17. Orsi, t. 4, l. 10.
A.D. 311
EUSEBIUS 1 calls this great prelate the excellent doctor of the Christian religion, and the chief and divine ornament of bishops; and tells us that he was admirable both for his extraordinary virtue, and for his skill in the sciences, and profound knowledge of the holy scriptures. In the year 300 he succeeded Theonas in the see of Alexandria, being the sixteenth archbishop from St. Mark; he governed that church with the highest commendation, says the same historian, during the space of twelve years, for the nine last of which he sustained the fury of the most violent persecutions carried on by Dioclesian and his successors. Virtue is tried and made perfect by sufferings; and Eusebius observes that the fervour of our saint’s piety and the rigour of his penance increased with the calamities of the church. That violent storm which affrighted and disheartened several bishops and inferior ministers of the church, did but awake his attention, inflame his charity, and inspire him with fresh vigour. He never ceased begging of God for himself and his flock necessary grace and courage, and exhorting them to die daily to their passions, that they might be prepared to die for Christ. The confessors he comforted and encouraged by word and example, and was the father of many martyrs who sealed their faith with their blood. His watchfulness and care were extended to all the churches of Egypt, Thebais or Upper Egypt, and Lybia, which were under his immediate inspection. Notwithstanding the activity of St. Peter’s charity and zeal, several in whom the love of this world prevailed, basely betrayed their faith, to escape torments and death. Some, who had entered the combat with excellent resolutions, and had endured severe torments, had been weak enough to yield at last. Others bore the loss of their liberty and the hardships of imprisonment, who yet shrank at the sight of torments, and deserted their colours when they were called to battle. A third sort prevented the inquiries of the persecutors, and ran over to the enemy before they had suffered any thing for the faith. Some seeking false cloaks to palliate their apostacy, sent heathens to sacrifice in their name, or accepted of attestations from the magistrates, setting forth that they had complied with the imperial edict, though in reality they had not. These different degrees of apostacy were distinctly considered by the holy bishop, who prescribed a suitable term of public penance for each in his canonical epistle. 2
Among those who fell during this storm, none was more considerable than Meletius, bishop of Lycopolis in Thebais. That bishop was charged with several crimes; but apostacy was the main article alleged against him. St. Peter called a council, in which Meletius was convicted of having sacrificed to idols, and of other crimes, and sentence of deposition was passed against him. The apostate had not humility enough to submit, or to seek the remedy of his deep wounds by condign repentance, but put himself at the head of a discontented party which appeared ready to follow him to any lengths. To justify his disobedience, and to impose upon men by pretending a holy zeal for discipline, he published many calumnies against St. Peter and his council; and had the assurance to tell the world that he had left the archbishop’s communion, because he was too indulgent to the lapsed in receiving them too soon and too easily to communion. Thus he formed a pernicious schism which took its name from him, and subsisted a hundred and fifty years. The author laid several snares for St. Peter’s life, and though, by an overruling providence, these were rendered ineffectual, he succeeded in disturbing the whole church of Egypt with his factions and violent proceedings: for he infringed the saint’s patriarchal authority, ordained bishops within his jurisdiction, and even placed one in his metropolitical see. Sozomen tells us, these usurpations were carried on with less opposition during a certain time when St. Peter was obliged to retire, to avoid the fury of the persecution. Arius, who was then among the clergy of Alexandria, gave signs of his pride and turbulent spirit by espousing Meletius’s cause as soon as the breach was open, but soon after quitted that party, and was ordained deacon by St. Peter. It was not long before he relapsed again to the Meletians, and blamed St. Peter for excommunicating the schismatics, and forbidding them to baptize. The holy bishop, by his knowledge of mankind, was by this time convinced that pride, the source of uneasiness and inconstancy, had taken deep root in the heart of this unhappy man; and that so long as this evil was not radically cured, the wound of his soul was only skinned over by a pretended conversion, and would break out again with greater violence than ever. He, therefore, excommunicated him, and could never be prevailed with to revoke that sentence. St. Peter wrote a book on the Divinity, out of which some quotations are preserved in the councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon. 3 Also a paschal treatise of which some fragments are extant. 4 From St. Epiphanius 5 it appears that St. Peter was in prison for the faith in the reign of Dioclesian, or rather of Galerius Maximian; but after some time recovered his liberty. Maximin Daia, Cæsar in the East, renewed the persecution in 311, which had been considerably abated by a letter written the same year by the emperor Galerius in favour of the Christians. Eusebius informs us, that Maximin coming himself to Alexandria, St. Peter was immediately seized, when no one expected such a storm, and, without any form of trial, by the sole order of the tyrant, hurried to execution. With him were beheaded three of his priests, Faustus, Dio, and Ammonius. This Faustus seems, by what Eusebius writes, to be the same person of that name who, sixty years before, was deacon to St. Dionysius, and the companion of his exile. 6
The canons of the church are holy laws framed by the wisest and most experienced pastors and saints for the regulation of the manners of the faithful, according to the most pure maxims of our divine religion and the law of nature, many intricate rules of which are frequently explained, and many articles of faith expounded in them. Every clergyman is bound to be thoroughly acquainted with the great obligations of his state and profession: for it is one of the general and most just rules of the canon law, and even of the law of nature, that “no man is excused from a fault by his ignorance in things which, by his office, he is bound to know.” 7 That any one amongst the clergy should be a stranger to those decrees of the universal church and statutes of his own diocess, which regard the conduct and reformation of the clergy, is a neglect and an affected ignorance which aggravates the guilt of every transgression of which it is the cause, according to a well-known maxim of morality. After the knowledge of the holy scriptures, of th� articles of faith, and the rules of a sound Christian morality, every one who is charged with the direction of others, is obliged to have a competent tincture of those parts of the canon law which may fall in the way of his practice: bishops and their assistants stand in need of a more profound and universal skill both in what regards their own office, (in which Barbosa 8 may be a manuduction) and others.
Note 1. Eus. Hist. l. 9. c. 6. p. 444. [back]
Note 2. Ap. Beveridge inter Canones Eccl. Græcæ. Item. Labbe, Conc. t. 1. [back]
Note 3. Conc. Ephes. Act. 1, p. 508. Act. 7, p. 836. (Conc. t. 3.) Conc. Chalced. Act. 1, p. 286. [back]
Note 4. Ap. Du Fresne, Lord Du Cange Pref. in Chron. Pasch. n. 7, p. 4. 5. [back]
Note 5. S. Epiph. hær. 68. [back]
Note 6. We have two sorts of acts of St. Peter’s martyrdom, the one published by Surius, the other from Metaphrastes, published by Combefis; both of no credit; and inconsistent both with themselves, and with Eusebius and Theodoret. [back]
Note 7. The canon law is founded upon, and presupposes in some cases the decisions of the civil or Roman law. But for this, Corvinus’s Abstract, or Vinnius upon the Institutes, or some parts of Syntagma Juris Universi per Petr. Gregorinm; or the French advocate, John Domat’s immortal work, entitled, Les Loix Civiles dans leur Ordre Naturel, will be a sufficient introduction. The canon law may be begun by Fleury’s Institutions au Droit Ecclésiastique. The decrees of the general councils should follow, and those of our own country, by Spelman or Wilkins, &c. or Cabassutius’s Epitome of the Councils, the second edition, in folio: then Antonii Augustini Epitome Juris Pontificii, and his excellent book De Emendatione Gratiani, with the additions of Baluze. At least some good commentator on the Decretals must be carefully studied as Fagnanus, Gonzales, Reiffenstuel, or Smaltzgruben; for the new ecclesiastical law, the decrees of the council of Trent, and some other late councils, those especially of Milan: the important parts of the latest bullaries of Clement XII. and Benedict XIV. with Barbosæ Collectanea Bullarii. Van Espen is excellent for showing the origin of each point of discipline; but is to be read with caution in some few places. The French advocate, Lewis d’Hericourt’s Droit Ecclésiastique François is esteemed; but the author sometimes waded out of his depth. This may serve for a general plan to those clergymen who have an hour a day to bestow on this study, and are only deterred from it by wanting an assistant to direct them in it. Those who have not this leisure or opportunity of books, may content themselves with studying some good author who has reduced this study into a regular method, or short collection. Cabassutius’s Theoria et Praxis Juris Canonici is accurate; that of Pichler, in five small volumes, is full, clear, and more engaging: but his relaxed principles concerning usury (which, by order of Pope Benedict XIV. were confuted by Concina, a Dominican friar) must be guarded against. With such helps any one may easily make himself master of those parts which are necessary in his circumstances. How scandalous it is to see a minister of God ready enough to study the extent of the laws concerning parish dues, and strain them in favour of his avarice, yet supinely careless in learning the duties of his ministry and his grievous obligations to God and his flock? The fatal neglect of those wholesome laws which were framed to set a bar to vice and human passions, to fence the ecclesiastical order against the spirit of the world breaking in upon it, and to check a relaxation of manners which tends utterly to extirpate the spirit of Christ among the laity, will excuse, it is hoped, this short note upon a subject which deserves so much to be strongly inculcated. [back]
Note 8. Barboaa, De Officio Episcopi. Item De Officio Parochi. [back]
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume XI: November. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
SOURCE : http://www.bartleby.com/210/11/261.html
Voir aussi : http://stmaterne.blogspot.ca/2008/11/saint-pierre-pape-dalexandrie-et-martyr.html
http://ocafs.oca.org/FeastSaintsViewer.asp?SID=4&ID=1&FSID=103394
Born at Alexandria, Egypt; died 311. Peter was a young 'confessor' during the Decian persecution. Later he became known for his extraordinary virtue, skill in the sciences, and learning and knowledge of Scripture. Peter was named head of the catechetical school in Alexandria, and in 300 was elected patriarch of the city to succeed Saint Theonas.
As bishop Saint
Peter fought Arianism and extreme Origenism and spent the last nine years of
his episcopate encouraging his flock to stand fast against the persecution of
Christians launched by Emperor Diocletian. As the fury of the persecutions
increased, Peter, according to Eusebius, heightened the rigor of his penances.
He perceived the need for some rules that would lovingly, but sternly, welcome
back into the Christian fold those who--under persecution and even torture--had
lapsed from the faith and then wanted to return. These rules were eventually
accepted throughout the Eastern Church; but others criticized Peter of
Alexandria for being far too lenient.
One of those who
apostatized was Bishop Meletius of Lycopolis in the Thebaid. Meletius was
convicted by a council of having sacrificed to idols and other crimes. The
sentence was deposition.
About that time
Peter was forced into hiding; whereupon Meletius installed himself at the head
of a discontent party. He began to usurp Peter's authority as metropolitan and,
in order to justify his disobedience, he accused Peter in writing of treating
the lapsi too leniently. Peter excommunicated Meletius, but still hoped to
reconcile him. His letter of excommunication reads: "Now take heed to this
and hold no communion with Meletius until I meet him, in company with some wise
and discreet men, to find out what he has been plotting." Nevertheless,
this led to a schism in the Egyptian church that lasted for several
generations.
Peter continued
administering his see from hiding and returned to Alexandria when the
persecutions were temporarily suspended. In 311, Emperor Maximinus Daia
unexpectedly renewed the persecution. Peter was arrested and then executed--the
last Christian martyr put to death in Alexandria by the authorities. Martyred
with him were three of his priests: Dio, Ammonius, and Faustus, who appears to
have been the companion of Saint Dionysius during his exile 60 years earlier.
The Coptic Church calls him 'the seal and complement of the martyrs,' because
he was the last Christian to die for the faith before Constantine granted
religious toleration throughout the empire.
Eusebius calls him
'an inspired Christian teacher . . . a worthy example of a bishop, both for the
goodness of his life and his knowledge of the Scriptures.' Among Peter's
fragmentary writings are some regulations of great interest, drawn up in 306;
they deal with the treatment of those Christians who in varying degrees had
failed under persecution. Portions of a book he wrote on the Divinity are
preserved in the councils of Ephesus (Act. 1 and 7) and Chalcedon (Act. 1).
Several related items of interest are available on the Internet: The Genuine Acts
of Peter, The Canonical Epistle, and a document entitled Peter, Archbishop of
Alexandria (Attwater, Attwater2, Benedictines, Bentley, Coulson, Delaney,
Husenbeth).
Saint Peter is
depicted as a bishop enthroned between angels in Sienese paintings. Sometimes
he is shown (1) holding the city of Siena while wearing a tiara rather than a
mitre; (2) with Christ appearing to him as a child in rags; or (3) embracing
his executioner. He is the patron of Siena, Italy (Roeder).
St. Peter, Bishop of Alexandria, Martyr
From Eusebius, Theodoret, &c. See Tillemont, t. 5. Ceillier, t. 4, p. 17. Orsi, t. 4, l. 10.
A.D. 311
EUSEBIUS 1 calls this great prelate the excellent doctor of the Christian religion, and the chief and divine ornament of bishops; and tells us that he was admirable both for his extraordinary virtue, and for his skill in the sciences, and profound knowledge of the holy scriptures. In the year 300 he succeeded Theonas in the see of Alexandria, being the sixteenth archbishop from St. Mark; he governed that church with the highest commendation, says the same historian, during the space of twelve years, for the nine last of which he sustained the fury of the most violent persecutions carried on by Dioclesian and his successors. Virtue is tried and made perfect by sufferings; and Eusebius observes that the fervour of our saint’s piety and the rigour of his penance increased with the calamities of the church. That violent storm which affrighted and disheartened several bishops and inferior ministers of the church, did but awake his attention, inflame his charity, and inspire him with fresh vigour. He never ceased begging of God for himself and his flock necessary grace and courage, and exhorting them to die daily to their passions, that they might be prepared to die for Christ. The confessors he comforted and encouraged by word and example, and was the father of many martyrs who sealed their faith with their blood. His watchfulness and care were extended to all the churches of Egypt, Thebais or Upper Egypt, and Lybia, which were under his immediate inspection. Notwithstanding the activity of St. Peter’s charity and zeal, several in whom the love of this world prevailed, basely betrayed their faith, to escape torments and death. Some, who had entered the combat with excellent resolutions, and had endured severe torments, had been weak enough to yield at last. Others bore the loss of their liberty and the hardships of imprisonment, who yet shrank at the sight of torments, and deserted their colours when they were called to battle. A third sort prevented the inquiries of the persecutors, and ran over to the enemy before they had suffered any thing for the faith. Some seeking false cloaks to palliate their apostacy, sent heathens to sacrifice in their name, or accepted of attestations from the magistrates, setting forth that they had complied with the imperial edict, though in reality they had not. These different degrees of apostacy were distinctly considered by the holy bishop, who prescribed a suitable term of public penance for each in his canonical epistle. 2
Among those who fell during this storm, none was more considerable than Meletius, bishop of Lycopolis in Thebais. That bishop was charged with several crimes; but apostacy was the main article alleged against him. St. Peter called a council, in which Meletius was convicted of having sacrificed to idols, and of other crimes, and sentence of deposition was passed against him. The apostate had not humility enough to submit, or to seek the remedy of his deep wounds by condign repentance, but put himself at the head of a discontented party which appeared ready to follow him to any lengths. To justify his disobedience, and to impose upon men by pretending a holy zeal for discipline, he published many calumnies against St. Peter and his council; and had the assurance to tell the world that he had left the archbishop’s communion, because he was too indulgent to the lapsed in receiving them too soon and too easily to communion. Thus he formed a pernicious schism which took its name from him, and subsisted a hundred and fifty years. The author laid several snares for St. Peter’s life, and though, by an overruling providence, these were rendered ineffectual, he succeeded in disturbing the whole church of Egypt with his factions and violent proceedings: for he infringed the saint’s patriarchal authority, ordained bishops within his jurisdiction, and even placed one in his metropolitical see. Sozomen tells us, these usurpations were carried on with less opposition during a certain time when St. Peter was obliged to retire, to avoid the fury of the persecution. Arius, who was then among the clergy of Alexandria, gave signs of his pride and turbulent spirit by espousing Meletius’s cause as soon as the breach was open, but soon after quitted that party, and was ordained deacon by St. Peter. It was not long before he relapsed again to the Meletians, and blamed St. Peter for excommunicating the schismatics, and forbidding them to baptize. The holy bishop, by his knowledge of mankind, was by this time convinced that pride, the source of uneasiness and inconstancy, had taken deep root in the heart of this unhappy man; and that so long as this evil was not radically cured, the wound of his soul was only skinned over by a pretended conversion, and would break out again with greater violence than ever. He, therefore, excommunicated him, and could never be prevailed with to revoke that sentence. St. Peter wrote a book on the Divinity, out of which some quotations are preserved in the councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon. 3 Also a paschal treatise of which some fragments are extant. 4 From St. Epiphanius 5 it appears that St. Peter was in prison for the faith in the reign of Dioclesian, or rather of Galerius Maximian; but after some time recovered his liberty. Maximin Daia, Cæsar in the East, renewed the persecution in 311, which had been considerably abated by a letter written the same year by the emperor Galerius in favour of the Christians. Eusebius informs us, that Maximin coming himself to Alexandria, St. Peter was immediately seized, when no one expected such a storm, and, without any form of trial, by the sole order of the tyrant, hurried to execution. With him were beheaded three of his priests, Faustus, Dio, and Ammonius. This Faustus seems, by what Eusebius writes, to be the same person of that name who, sixty years before, was deacon to St. Dionysius, and the companion of his exile. 6
The canons of the church are holy laws framed by the wisest and most experienced pastors and saints for the regulation of the manners of the faithful, according to the most pure maxims of our divine religion and the law of nature, many intricate rules of which are frequently explained, and many articles of faith expounded in them. Every clergyman is bound to be thoroughly acquainted with the great obligations of his state and profession: for it is one of the general and most just rules of the canon law, and even of the law of nature, that “no man is excused from a fault by his ignorance in things which, by his office, he is bound to know.” 7 That any one amongst the clergy should be a stranger to those decrees of the universal church and statutes of his own diocess, which regard the conduct and reformation of the clergy, is a neglect and an affected ignorance which aggravates the guilt of every transgression of which it is the cause, according to a well-known maxim of morality. After the knowledge of the holy scriptures, of th� articles of faith, and the rules of a sound Christian morality, every one who is charged with the direction of others, is obliged to have a competent tincture of those parts of the canon law which may fall in the way of his practice: bishops and their assistants stand in need of a more profound and universal skill both in what regards their own office, (in which Barbosa 8 may be a manuduction) and others.
Note 1. Eus. Hist. l. 9. c. 6. p. 444. [back]
Note 2. Ap. Beveridge inter Canones Eccl. Græcæ. Item. Labbe, Conc. t. 1. [back]
Note 3. Conc. Ephes. Act. 1, p. 508. Act. 7, p. 836. (Conc. t. 3.) Conc. Chalced. Act. 1, p. 286. [back]
Note 4. Ap. Du Fresne, Lord Du Cange Pref. in Chron. Pasch. n. 7, p. 4. 5. [back]
Note 5. S. Epiph. hær. 68. [back]
Note 6. We have two sorts of acts of St. Peter’s martyrdom, the one published by Surius, the other from Metaphrastes, published by Combefis; both of no credit; and inconsistent both with themselves, and with Eusebius and Theodoret. [back]
Note 7. The canon law is founded upon, and presupposes in some cases the decisions of the civil or Roman law. But for this, Corvinus’s Abstract, or Vinnius upon the Institutes, or some parts of Syntagma Juris Universi per Petr. Gregorinm; or the French advocate, John Domat’s immortal work, entitled, Les Loix Civiles dans leur Ordre Naturel, will be a sufficient introduction. The canon law may be begun by Fleury’s Institutions au Droit Ecclésiastique. The decrees of the general councils should follow, and those of our own country, by Spelman or Wilkins, &c. or Cabassutius’s Epitome of the Councils, the second edition, in folio: then Antonii Augustini Epitome Juris Pontificii, and his excellent book De Emendatione Gratiani, with the additions of Baluze. At least some good commentator on the Decretals must be carefully studied as Fagnanus, Gonzales, Reiffenstuel, or Smaltzgruben; for the new ecclesiastical law, the decrees of the council of Trent, and some other late councils, those especially of Milan: the important parts of the latest bullaries of Clement XII. and Benedict XIV. with Barbosæ Collectanea Bullarii. Van Espen is excellent for showing the origin of each point of discipline; but is to be read with caution in some few places. The French advocate, Lewis d’Hericourt’s Droit Ecclésiastique François is esteemed; but the author sometimes waded out of his depth. This may serve for a general plan to those clergymen who have an hour a day to bestow on this study, and are only deterred from it by wanting an assistant to direct them in it. Those who have not this leisure or opportunity of books, may content themselves with studying some good author who has reduced this study into a regular method, or short collection. Cabassutius’s Theoria et Praxis Juris Canonici is accurate; that of Pichler, in five small volumes, is full, clear, and more engaging: but his relaxed principles concerning usury (which, by order of Pope Benedict XIV. were confuted by Concina, a Dominican friar) must be guarded against. With such helps any one may easily make himself master of those parts which are necessary in his circumstances. How scandalous it is to see a minister of God ready enough to study the extent of the laws concerning parish dues, and strain them in favour of his avarice, yet supinely careless in learning the duties of his ministry and his grievous obligations to God and his flock? The fatal neglect of those wholesome laws which were framed to set a bar to vice and human passions, to fence the ecclesiastical order against the spirit of the world breaking in upon it, and to check a relaxation of manners which tends utterly to extirpate the spirit of Christ among the laity, will excuse, it is hoped, this short note upon a subject which deserves so much to be strongly inculcated. [back]
Note 8. Barboaa, De Officio Episcopi. Item De Officio Parochi. [back]
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume XI: November. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
SOURCE : http://www.bartleby.com/210/11/261.html
Voir aussi : http://stmaterne.blogspot.ca/2008/11/saint-pierre-pape-dalexandrie-et-martyr.html
http://ocafs.oca.org/FeastSaintsViewer.asp?SID=4&ID=1&FSID=103394