Early Church Fathers
39 The Syriac name whence comes "Messaliani" or "Massaliani" means praying people ylc/mv y )l/c;
Dan. vi. 1 Epiphanius rendered the name euxomenoi, but they were soon generally known in Greek as euxhtai or euxitai.
40 The form enqousiasthj is ecclesiastical, and late Greek, but the verb enqousiazein occurs at least as early as Aeschylus. (Fr. 64 a.)
41 Compare John vi. 54 and John vi. 51; the citation as before is inexact.
42 Melitine (Malatia). metropolis of lesser Armenia; the scene of the defeat of Chosroes Nushirvan by the Romans a.d. 577.
43 Archbishop of Iconium, the friend of Basil and first cousin of Gregory of Nazianzus, B. probably about 344. He is not mentioned after the beginning of the 5th century.
44 cf. ii. 19, and iv. 22. He was not consecrated bishop until 381.
45 Valens was baptized in 368.
46 Albia Dominica.
47 The use of the word baptized for submerged is significant. Polyb. 1: 51. 6 uses it of sinking a ship. It first appears with the technical sense of baptized in the Evangelists.
48 Present at Antioch in 363; banished to Arabia in 367. Present at Constantinople in 381.
49 Samosata, the capital of Commagene on the Euphrates, is of interest as the birthplace of Lucian (c. 120) as well as the see of this Eusebius, the valued friend of Basil and of Gregory of Nazianzus. We shall find him mentioned again v. 4.
50 Zeugma was on the right bank of the Euphrates, nearly opposite the ancient Apamea and Seleucia and the modern Biredjik. The name is derived from the "Zeugma" or Bridge of Boats built here by Alexander. Strabo xvi. 2. 3.
51 Titus, iii. 1.
52 Jovinus was a friend of Basil (Ep. 118) as well as of Eusebius of Samosata.
Perrha, a town of Euphratensis, is more likely to have been his see than the Perga of the commoner reading.
53 An island off the coast of Phoenicia; now Ruad. The town on the opposite mainland was Antaradus.
54 Oxyrynchus on the Nile, at or near the modern Behnese (?) was so called because the inhabitants worshipped the "sharpsnout," or pike. Strabo xvii. 1. 40.
55 Antinoopolis, now Enseneh on the right bank of the Nile.
56 The manuscripts here vary considerably.
57 Eulogius was at Rome in 369, at Antioch in 379, and Constantinople in 381.
58 Charrae, now Harran, in Mesopotamia, on the point of divergence of the main caravan routes, is the Haran to which Terah travelled from Orfah. It was afterwards made famous by the defeat of the Romans in b.c. 53, when
"miserando funere Crassus,
"Assyrias Latio maculavit sanguine Carras."
Lucan. 1. 104.
59 Caesarea Ad Argaeum (now Kasaria) at the foot of Mount Argaeus, was made a Roman province by Tiberius a.d. 18. The progress of Valens had hitherto been successful, and the Catholic cause was endangered. Bithynia had been coerced, and the mobile Galatians had given in. "The fate of Cappadocia depended on Basil." cf. Dict. Ch. Biog. i. 289.
60 Galates. cf. Soc. iv. 26.
61 Dominica. cf. Soc. iv. 26.
62 If this Demosthenes "is the same person with the Demosthenes who four years later held the office of vicar of Pontus we have in him one of the many examples presented by the history of the Eastern empire of the manner in which base arts raised the meanest persons to the highest dignities." Dict. Chris. Biog. s. v. But the chief cook may have been a high functionary like the chief baker at the court of the Pharaohs or the Lord High Steward at that of St. James's. Of the elevation of a menial to power many parallels may be found. Demosthenes of Pontus afterwards became a partisan of the Semi-arians and accused Basil's brother, Gregory of Nyssa, of dishonesty. Basil. Epist. 264, 385, 405.
63 stoixeion is a simple sound of the voice as distinguished from gramma, a letter.
64 "The discussions about the year of his death may be considered as practically closed; the Festal Index, although its chronology is sometimes faulty, confirming the date of 373, given in the Maffeian fragment. The exact day, we may believe, was Thursdays May 2, on which day of the month Athanasius is venerated in the Western Church. He had sat on the Alexandrian throne forty-six complete years. He died tranquilly in his own house." Canon Bright in Dict. Christ. Biog. S. V.
65 The church Theonas, where Syrianus nearly seized Athanasius in 356.
66 There are traces of some confusion about the saints and solitaries of this name at this period. "There were two hermits or monks of this name both of the 4th c., both living in Egypt, whose character and deeds are almost indistinguishable." "One of them is said to have been the disciple of Anthony, and the master of Evagrius." "The name of Macarius, like a double star, shines as a central light in the monkish history, and is enshrined alike in the Roman martyrologies, and in the legends of the Greek church. Macarius is a favourite saint in Russia." (Canon Fremantle, Dict. Christ. Biog. iii. 774.) cf. Soc. iv. 23. In iv. 21 Soc. describes both the Macarii as banished to the island "which had not a single Christian inhabitant." Sozomen (vi. 20) has the same story.
There was an Isidorus, bishop of Cyrus in 378, mentioned by Theodoretus in his Religious History (1143), and an Isidorus, bishop of Athribis in Egypt. cf. Dict. Christ. Biog. s.v. But the Isidorus of the text appears to have been a monk.
67 Acts xvi. 16, where the reading pneuma puqwna recommended on the overwhelming authority of )
ABCD is adopted by the R. V., and rendered in the margin "a spirit, a python." In the text it is to pneuma tou puqwnoj.
68 eqnikoj, "foreigner" a "gentile." Another common term for "heathen" in ecclesiastical Greek is Ellh!, but neither "Gentile" nor "Greek" expresses the required sense so well as "Heathen," which, like the cognate "Pagan," simply denotes a countryman and villager, and marks the age when Christianity was found to be mainly in towns.
69 Vide note on page 120.
70 Eph. v. xii.
71 Romans ix. 22.
72 Joel i. 2.
73 I adopt the reading stibh for stimmi. cf. Ez. xxiii. 40 (Sept.). estibizon touj ofqalmouj sou.
74 cf. Greg. Naz. Orat. xxv. 12. p. 464 Ed. Migne.
75 cf. Soc. 21.
76 Observe the pun.
77 On the subject of episcopal election, vide Dict. Christ. Biog. lv. 335.
78 o twn komhtathsiwn de largitionwn komhj. Valesius says, "thesauri principis, qui vulgo sacrae largitiones dicebantur, alii erant per singulas dioeceses quibus proeerant comites. Alii erant in comitatu una cum principe, qui comitatenses largitiones dice-bantur. His praeerat comes largitionum comitatensium."
79 Beyrout, between the ancient Byblus and Sidon. Near here St. George killed the dragon, according to the legend. Our patron saint's dragon does not seem to have been, as may possibly have been the case in some similar stories a surviving Saurian, but simply a materialization of some picture of George vanquishing the old dragon, the Devil.
80 Ps. xiv. 1. The Sept. reads Eipen afrwn en kardia autou ouk esti Qeoj, which admits of the translation "He is not God."