Letter 58
To the Bishops
Andronicus of Bernice let no man call a Christian-- for he was born,
nurtured, and grew up for the evil destiny of Pentapolis, having brought the rule of his
country for his own-- but accursed of God, let him with his whole household be turned out
of every church.
The reason for this is, not that he has been the deadliest plague of
Pentapolis, after an earthquake, an invasion of locusts, a pestilence, a conflagration of
war; not that he methodically sought out the remaining victims of these disasters and
introduced horrible kinds and fashions of punishment for the first time into the country
(And would that I could say that he alone has made use of them). Not because of his
instruments of torture to which I allude, that crush the fingers and feet, compress limbs,
tweak the nose, and deform the ears and lips, of which things those who had forestalled
the experience and the sight by perishing in the war, were adjudged happy by such as had
by ill fate survived. The reason for this condemnation is, that first among us, and alone
of our number, he blasphemed Christ both in word and deed. In deed, for that he nailed
upon the door of the church edicts of his own, in the which he denied to those whom he had
ill-used the right of sanctuary at the inviolate table, threatening the priests of God
with such things as even Phalaris the Agrigentine, and Cephren the Egyptian, and
Sennacherib the Babylonian would have feared to menace, and the last of these sent envoys
to Jerusalem to insult Hezekiah and God Himself. And this the sun looked down upon and men
read it aloud. No Tiberius Claudius was administering the State, by whom Pilate sent to
govern the Jews, but the sacred race of Theodosius was holding the sceptre of the Romans,
from which Andronicus had filched the ruling power for himself, animated by the same
spirit as Pilate. Those written words were a matter for laughter to the unbelieving
passers by, just as that which was written upon the Cross of Christ was to the Jews. And
yet the inscription on the Cross, although proceeding from an impious mind, was at all
events serious in its wording, since by it Christ was proclaimed 'King'. In this case,
however, the tongue was in accord with the mind. But as to those things which followed
after, they were even graver than those first placarded. For when he had found some
pretext for proceeding against an enemy (there was indeed an enmity between them because
the one was desirous of marriage which the other forbade), he sought to maltreat him with
those unnatural tortures of his. May these never be handed down by the passage of time,
but, as they begin with Andronicus, so may they disappear with him, and may these symbols
of this man's rule survive to our posterity as a mere rumour.
Now when a man of good birth, not an unjust one, but a man who has been
unfortunate only, was tortured by these means, and that too in the full midday sun, that
he might die with executioners only for witnesses, and when Andronicus himself became
aware that the Church was in sympathy with this man-- only because, the moment I heard of
the facts, I myself rushed out, as I was, that I might be on the spot and share in bearing
the trouble-- when he hears of this, he flies into a rage that a bishop has dared to pity
a man hated by himself. Then he indulges in all sorts of violent behaviour, the boldest of
his servants, Thoas, encouraging him, the tool he employs for this public outrages and
finally he lets out in madness that most godless voice of his, saying that he has placed
his hopes in the Church in vain, and that no one shall be torn from the hands of
Andronicus, not even should he be embracing the foot of Christ Himself.
We must be, both in mind and in body, pure before God. For these
reasons the church of Ptolemais enjoins her sister churches everywhere in these terms:
Let the precincts of no house of God be open to Andronicus and his
associates, or to Thoas and his associates. Let every holy sanctuary and enclosure be shut
in their faces. There is no part in Paradise for the Devil; even if he has secretly crept
in, he is cast out. I exhort, therefore, every private individual and ruler not to be
under the same roof with them, nor to be seated at the same time, particularly priests,
for these shall neither speak to them while living, nor join in their funeral processions,
when dead. Furthermore, if any one shall flout the authority of this church on the ground
that it represents a small town only, and shall receive those who have been excommunicated
by it, for that he need not obey that which is without wealth, let such a one know that he
is creating a schism in the Church which Christ wishes to be one. Such a man, whether he
be deacon, presbyter, or bishop, shall share the fate of Andronicus at our hands, and
neither shall we give him our right hand, no even eat at the same table with him, and far
be it from us to hold communion in the holy mysteries with those desiring to take part
with Andronicus and Thoas.