SAINT JOHN DAMASCENE and SAINT JOHN OF EGYPT

SAINT JOHN DAMASCENE
Doctor of the Church
(676-780)

Saint John was born in the late 7^th century, and is the most remarkable of the Greek writers of the 8^th century. His father was a civil authority who was Christian amid the Saracens of Damascus, whose caliph made him his minister. This enlightened man found in the public square one day, amid a group of sad Christian captives, a priest of Italian origin who had been condemned to slavery; he ransomed him and assigned him to his young son to be his tutor. Young John made extraordinary progress in grammar, dialectic, mathematics, music, poetry, astronomy, but above all in theology, the discipline imparting knowledge of God. John became famous for his encyclopedic knowledge and theological method, later a source of inspiration to Saint Thomas Aquinas.

When his father died, the caliph made of him his principal counselor, his Grand Vizier. Thus it was through Saint John Damascene that the advanced sciences made their apparition among the Arab Moslems, who had burnt the library of Alexandria in Egypt; it was not the Moslems who instructed the Christians, as was believed for some time in Europe. Saint John vigorously opposed the ferocious Iconoclast persecution instigated by the Emperor of Constantinople, Leo the Isaurian. He distinguished himself, with Saint Germain, Patriarch of Constantinople, in the defense of the veneration of sacred images.

The Emperor, irritated, himself conjured up a plot against him. A letter was forged, signed with Saint John’s name, and addressed to himself, the Emperor of Constantinople, offering to deliver up the city of Damascus to him. That letter was then transmitted by the Emperor to the Caliph of Damascus, advising him as a “good neighbor” should do, that he had a traitor for minister. Although Saint John vigorously defended himself against the charge, he was condemned by the Caliph to have his right hand cut off. The severed hand, by order of the Caliph, was attached to a post in a public square. But Saint John obtained the hand afterwards, and invoked the Blessed Virgin in a prayer which has been preserved; he prayed to be able to continue to write the praises of Her Son and Herself. The next morning when he awoke, he found his hand joined again to the arm, leaving no trace of pain, but only a fine red line like a bracelet, marking the site of the miracle.

The Saint was reinstated afterwards to the favor of the local prince, but he believed that heaven had made it clear he was destined to serve the Church by his writings. He therefore distributed his property and retired soon thereafter to the monastery of Saint Sabas near Jerusalem, where he spent most of his remaining years in apologetic writings and prayer. Occasionally he left to console the Christians of Syria and Palestine and strengthen them, even going to Constantinople in the hope of obtaining martyrdom there. However, he was able to return to his monastery. There he died in peace at the age of 104, and was buried near the door of the monastery church, in the year 780.

Sources: Les Petits Bollandistes: Vies des Saints, by Msgr. Paul Guérin (Bloud et Barral: Paris, 1882), Vol. 5; The Catholic Encyclopedia, edited by C. G. Herbermann with numerous collaborators (Appleton Company: New York, 1908).

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SAINT JOHN OF EGYPT
Solitary
(†394)

Until he was twenty-five, John worked as a carpenter with his father. Then, experiencing a call from God, he left the world and committed himself to a holy solitary in the desert. His master tested him by many unreasonable commands, bidding him roll hard rocks, tend dead trees, and the like. John distinguished himself by his perfect obedience, for he executed all commands with the simplicity of a child.

The monk Palladius, who later became a bishop, visited him one day. Saint John foretold he would some day become a bishop. He laughed, saying he was only in charge of a kitchen, but Saint John smiled and said, “You will have, in that future office, many labors and afflictions to endure. If you want to avoid them, remain in your solitude, for as long as you stay there, no one can consecrate you a bishop!” Palladius, when he fell ill, was sent to Alexandria, then advised to go for his health to Palestine and Bithynia, in northeastern Asia Minor, where he was indeed made Bishop of Helenopolis. He was included in the persecution against Saint John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Constantinople, and had to conceal himself for eleven months in a dark room; there he recalled the words of the great prophet and spiritual teacher, Saint John of Egypt.

After a careful training of sixteen years, Saint John had withdrawn to the top of a steep cliff, to think only of God and his soul. The more he knew of himself, the more he distrusted himself. The result of his vigilance and purity was threefold — a holy joy and cheerfulness which consoled all who conversed with him, perfect obedience to superiors, and, in return for this, authority over creatures, whom he had forsaken for the Creator. He had the gift of reading in souls; once when a deacon visited him with six other persons, Saint John recognized him as a cleric, though the young man had kept it a secret until then, and denied it. Saint John kissed his hand after identifying him as a deacon before all present, saying, “One must never lie, even under the pretext of doing good. Beware of disavowing the grace God has given you; for falsehood comes not from God, but from an evil source, as Our Saviour teaches us.”

Devils assailed Saint John continually, but he never ceased his prayer. After his long communing with God, he turned to humans with gifts of healing and prophecy. Twice each week he spoke through a window with those who came to him, blessing oil for the sick and predicting things to come. To the Emperor Theodosius he foretold his future victories and the time of his death. Rufinus, biographer of the Desert Fathers, recorded a long instruction offered himself and other visitors from Jerusalem. Saint John warned in particular against vanity: “Vanity is such a great and dangerous sin that it can make souls fall from the very heights of perfection; and that is why I exhort you to avoid it more than any other.”

The last three days of his life he gave wholly to God; on the third he was found on his knees as in prayer, but his soul was with the blessed. He died in 394.

Reflection. The Saints examine themselves by the perfections of God, and do penance. We judge our conduct by the standard of other men, and rest satisfied with it. Yet it is by the divine graces we ourselves have received and either profited from or repulsed, that we shall be judged when we die.