Jerome answers Vigilantius of Calagurris' criticism of the cult of relics, using mostly scriptural arguments and attacking his opponent. Jerome, Letter 109, written in Latin in Bethlehem (Palestine) in 404.
E08347
Literary - Letters
Jerome of Stridon
Jerome, Letter 109, to Riparius
1. Acceptis litteris tuis primitus non respondere superbiae est, respondere temeritatis. De his enim rebus interrogas, quae et proferre et audire sacrilegium est. Ais uigilantium, qui κατὰ ἀντίφρασιν hoc uocatur nomine - nam dormitantius rectius diceretur - os fetidum rursus aperire et putorem spurcissimum contra sanctorum martyrum proferre reliquias et nos, qui eas suscipimus, appellare cinerarios et idolatras, qui mortuorum hominum ossa ueneremur. O infelicem hominem et omni lacrimarum fonte plangendum, qui haec dicens non se intellegit esse samaritam et iudaeum, qui corpora mortuorum pro inmundis habent et etiam uasa, quae in eadem domo fuerint, pollui suspicantur sequentes occidentem litteram et non spiritum uiuificantem. Nos autem non dico martyrum reliquias, sed ne solem quidem et lunam, non angelos, non archangelos, non seraphim, non cherubim et omne nomen, quod nominatur et in praesenti saeculo et in futuro, colimus et adoramus, ne seruiamus creaturae potius quam creatori, qui est benedictus in saecula. Honoramus autem reliquias martyrum, ut eum, cuius sunt martyres, adoremus, honoramus seruos, ut honor seruorum redundet ad dominum, qui ait: qui uos suscipit, me suscipit. Ergo Petri et Pauli inmundae sunt reliquiae? ergo Moysi corpusculum immundum erit, quod iuxta hebraicam ueritatem ab ipso sepultum est domino? Et quotienscumque apostolorum et prophetarum et omnium martyrum basilicas ingredimur, totiens idolorum templa ueneramur accensi que ante tumulos eorum cerei idolatriae insignia sunt? Plus aliquid dicam, quod redundet in auctoris caput et insanum cerebrum uel sanet aliquando uel deleat, ne tantis sacrilegiis simplicum animae subuertantur. Ergo et domini corpus in sepulchro positum inmundum fuit et angeli, qui candidis uestibus utebantur, mortuo cadaueri atque polluto praebebant excubias, ut post multa saecula dormitantius somniaret, immo eructuaret inmundissimam crapulam et cum Iuliano, persecutore sanctorum, basilicas aut destrueret aut in templa conuerteret?
2. Miror sanctum episcopum, in cuius parrochia esse presbyter dicitur, adquiescere furori eius et non uirga apostolica uirga que ferrea confringere uas inutile et tradere in interitum carnis, ut spiritus saluus fiat...
'1. Now that I have received a letter from you, if I do not answer it I shall be guilty of pride, and if I do I shall be guilty of rashness. For the matters concerning which you ask my opinion are such that they cannot either be spoken of or listened to without profanity. You tell me that Vigilantius (whose very name Wakeful is a contradiction: he ought rather to be described as Sleepy) has again opened his fetid lips and is pouring forth a torrent of filthy venom upon the relics of the holy martyrs; and that he calls us who cherish them ashmongers and idolaters (cinerarios et idolatras) who pay homage to dead men's bones. Unhappy wretch! To be wept over by all Christian men, who sees not that in speaking thus he makes himself one with the Samaritans and the Jews who hold dead bodies unclean and regard as defiled even vessels which have been in the same house with them, following the letter that kills and not the spirit that gives life. We, it is true, refuse to worship or adore, I say not the relics of the martyrs, but even the sun and moon, the angels and archangels, the Cherubim and Seraphim and every name that is named, not only in this world but also in that which is to come. For we may not serve the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Still we honour the relics of the martyrs, that we may adore Him whose martyrs they are. We honour the servants that their honour may be reflected upon their Lord who Himself says:— he that receives you receives me. I ask Vigilantius, Are the relics of Peter and of Paul unclean? Was the body of Moses unclean, of which we are told (according to the correct Hebrew text) that it was buried by the Lord Himself? And do we, every time that we enter the basilicas of apostles and prophets and martyrs, pay homage to the shrines of idols? Are the tapers which burn before their tombs only the tokens of idolatry? I will go farther still and ask a question which will make this theory recoil upon the head of its inventor and which will either kill or cure that frenzied brain of his, so that simple souls shall be no more subverted by his sacrilegious reasonings. Let him answer me this, Was the Lord's body unclean when it was placed in the sepulchre? And did the angels clothed in white raiment merely watch over a corpse dead and defiled, that ages afterwards this sleepy fellow might indulge in dreams and vomit forth his filthy surfeit, so as, like the persecutor Julian, either to destroy the basilicas of the saints or to convert them into heathen temples?
2. I am surprised that the reverend bishop in whose diocese he is said to be a presbyter acquiesces in this his mad preaching, and that he does not rather with apostolic rod, nay with a rod of iron, shatter this useless vessel and deliver him for the destruction of the flesh that the spirit may be saved...'
Jerome emphasises his indignation and attacks Vigilantius, calling him a madman and a fool.
3. Iterum dicam: ergo martyrum inmundae sunt reliquiae? et quid passi sunt apostoli, ut inmundum stephani corpus tanta funeris ambitione praecederent et facerent ei planctum magnum, ut illorum luctus in nostrum gaudium uerteretur?
'3. ...Once more I ask, Are the relics of the martyrs unclean? If so, why did the apostles allow themselves to walk in that funeral procession before the body — the unclean body — of Stephen? Why did they make great lamentation over him, that their grief might be turned into our joy?'
In what follows Jerome defends the custom of celebrating vigils (without specific reference to the vigils held in the honour of the martyrs) and promises to write an ampler refutation if Riparius sends him Vigilantius' writings.
Text: Hilberg 1912, 352-4.
Translation: Fremantle, 1893.
Summary: Robert Wiśniewski.
Cult building - independent (church)
RelicsBodily relic - unspecified
Protagonists in Cult and NarrativesEcclesiastics - bishops
Ecclesiastics - Popes
Cult Related ObjectsOil lamps/candles
Theorising on SanctityConsiderations about the veneration of saints
Source
Letter 109 is the first act of Jerome's polemic against Vigilantius over the cult of relics. When he wrote it, Jerome was already a famous biblical scholar and redoubtable polemicist. Vigilantius may have been a minor personage in the history of late antique literature, but was well connected with a few authors and clerics who played an essential role in the development of the cult of saints in the West.We meet Vigilantius for the first time in 395, when he arrived at Jerome's monastery in Bethlehem with a letter of recommendation from Paulinus of Nola. He spent there less time than his host had expected (Jerome, Letter 58.11) and parted company with him over a disagreement whose details are uncertain, but nothing suggests that it concerned his attitude toward the veneration of relics.
Soon after his return to Italy, Vigilantius set off again, this time carrying a letter of Paulinus to Gaul, to Sulpicius Severus (Paulinus, Letter 5, E05092). He reached his destination in 396, most probably the same year in which Victricius of Rouen wrote In Praise of the Saints (E00717) and Sulpicius Severus the Life of St Martin (E00692), two manifestos of a new, ascetic religiosity, hostile to the clerical establishment. It is highly probable that the publication of these texts and bad memories of his stay with Jerome, one of the most zealous promoters of virginity and the monastic life, then conflict with his bishop, and finally a visit to Sulpicius Severus, who also was in conflict with several Gallic bishops, made Vigilantius speak out against the views and practices of the milieu which he had hitherto belonged to.
However, these are only conjectures. For after his return to Gaul, Vigilantius disappears from our sources for a few years. We next learn of him, from this letter of Jerome, written in 404, to the priest Riparius of Toulouse, who had reported to Jerome Vigilantius' rejection of the cult of relics, and that he was living in Calagurris in Gaul (today's Saint-Martory, and not Calagurris in the Iberian Peninsula), about 70 km south-west of Toulouse.
When writing to Riparius, Jerome did not have the text of Vigilantius' treatise and it is not certain when exactly Vigilantius wrote it. Perhaps it was directly triggered by the solemn transfer of the body of the bishop and martyr Saturninus to the newly built church in Toulouse, in 402 or 403. But this connection could have worked in two ways. It is possible that Vigilantius reacted to an event that he had witnessed, but he also could have had already begun to voice his criticisms earlier, thus making Bishop Exsuperius of Toulouse, the organiser of the ceremony, anxious of possible reactions: we know Exsuperius sought permission from the emperor to transfer Saturninus’ body and this caution may indicate that he had already encountered some criticism of the cult of relics, perhaps from Vigilantius (Hunter, pp. 408-9).
Be that as it may, in 404 Jerome was only aware of the main thesis of Vigilantius' teaching from the letter of Riparius of Toulouse. Two years later, the same Riparius sent him Vigilantius' treatise to which Jerome responded in his Against Vigilantius (EE08325). The treatise has not survived and we know it only from the discussion and quotations in Jerome's pamphlet against it. According to Jerome, Vigilantius criticised several new religious customs: the promotion of virginity, especially among the clergy; the veneration of relics and the belief in miracles performed by them; night vigils and the singing of alleluias outside the period of Easter; and the sending of financial aid to monasteries in the Holy Land. These practices developed partly independently, but were all popular in the same milieu that Jerome, Paulinus of Nola, and Sulpicius Severus belonged to.
Vigilantius argued that the custom of kissing relics, enclosing them in precious vessels and ceremoniously carrying them from one place to another are forms of idolatry, consisting in the worship of material objects. He believed that the martyrs, whose sanctity he acknowledged, lived with God in heaven, and had no link whatsoever with their mortal remains. Here, in Letter 109, Jerome also reproached Vigilantius for considering the remains of the saints to be impure. In the Against Vigilantius, written two years later, however, Jerome does not mention this. This suggests that in 404 Jerome wrongly attributed to Vigilantius the same views which were characteristic of pagan criticism of the cult of relics. When he finally received Vigilantius' treatise, however, he found no such views in it.
Bibliography
TextHilberg, I., Hieronymus, Epistulae 71-120 (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum 55; Vienna 1912).
Translation
Fremantle, W.H., Against Vigilantius, in The Principal Works of St. Jerome, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, vol. 6 (Buffalo, NY, 1893).
Robert Wiśniewski
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S00008 | Paul, the Apostle | Certain | S00036 | Peter, the Apostle | Certain | S00060 | Martyrs, unnamed or name lost | Certain | S00139 | Prophets, unnamed or name lost | Certain | S00241 | Moses, Old Testament prophet and lawgiver | Certain |
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