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The Cult of Saints in Late Antiquity


from its origins to circa AD 700, across the entire Christian world


Augustine of Hippo preaches a sermon at a feast of unnamed martyrs, possibly at Hippo Regius (Numidia, central North Africa). Exposition on Psalm 141, delivered in Latin, possibly in 397/405.

Evidence ID

E01782

Type of Evidence

Literary - Sermons/Homilies

Major author/Major anonymous work

Augustine of Hippo

Augustine of Hippo, Exposition on Psalm 141.1

Solemnitati martyrum, sicut deuotio celebritatis uestrae, ita nostrae seruitutis sermo debetur.

'Just as it is your duty to celebrate piously the festival of the martyrs, my obligation is to deliver a sermon.'

In what follows Augustine does not refer to any specific martyrs or their feast.


Text: Dekkers and Fraipont 1956.
Translation: Robert Wiśniewski.

Liturgical Activities

Sermon/homily

Festivals

Saint’s feast

Protagonists in Cult and Narratives

Ecclesiastics - bishops

Source

Augustine of Hippo was born in 354 in the north African city of Thagaste. He received an education in rhetoric at Carthage, and after a period teaching there moved to Rome, and then in 384 to a public professorship of rhetoric in Milan. In these early years of adulthood Augustine was a Manichaean, but then got disillusioned with this religion, and in Milan in 386, largely under the influence of Ambrose, bishop of the city, he converted to Christianity, and was baptised by Ambrose in 387. Returning to Africa in 388, he was ordained a priest in 391 at Hippo Regius (in the province of Numidia), and rapidly acquired a reputation as a preacher. In 395 he became bishop of Hippo, which he remained until his death in 430. Details of his early life were recorded by Augustine himself in his Confessions, and shortly after his death a pupil and long-time friend, Possidius, wrote his Life, focused on Augustine as an effective Christian writer, polemicist and bishop (E00073).

Amongst his many writings, the most informative on the cult of saints are his numerous
Sermons, the City of God, and a treatise On the Care of the Dead. The Sermons tell us which saints (primarily African, but with some from abroad) received attention in Hippo, Carthage and elsewhere, and provide occasional details of miracles and cult practices. The City of God records the distribution, and subsequent miracles, of the relics of saint Stephen, after they arrived in Africa from Palestine in around 420. On the Care of the Dead, discusses the possible advantages of burial ad sanctos (in other words, close to a saint), and theorises on the link between the saints who dwell in heaven and their corporeal remains buried in their graves. In these works, and others, Augustine reveals his own particular beliefs about the saints, their relics and their miracles.

The
Expositions on the Psalms are based on Augustine's homilies preached either in Hippo or other places in North Africa in the period from 392 to 417. According to la Bonnardière, 93-95, Sermons 140 (see E001779) and 141 were preached in Hippo between 397 and 405, that is between Augustine's episcopal ordination and the beginning of the violent confrontation with the Donatists to which Augustine does not make any allusion. Sermon 140 does not mention any feast directly, but we know that it was preached on the eve of a feast of martyrs, because in Sermon 141, delivered the day after, Augustine mentions explicitly the feast.


Bibliography

Edition:
Dekkers, E., and Fraipont, J., Enarrationes in psalmos (Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 38; Turnhout: Brepols, 1956).

Further reading:
La Bonnardière, M.A., "Les Enarrationes in Psalmos prêchées par saint Augustin à l'occasion de fêtes des martyrs." Recherches Augustiniennes 7 (1971), 73-104.


Record Created By

Robert Wiśniewski

Date of Entry

27/06/2016

Related Saint Records
IDNameName in SourceIdentity
S00060Martyrs, unnamed or name lostCertain


Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL:
Robert Wiśniewski, Cult of Saints, E01782 - http://csla.history.ox.ac.uk/record.php?recid=E01782