Category: theotokos

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4 December – St Barbara of Nicomedia (235)

Saint Barbara[1]

Saint Barbara is celebrated on 4 December.  She is known in Greek as Αγία Βαρβάρα, and in Spanish as Santa Barbara.  She was martyred for her faith on 4 December 235.

Saint Barbara is widely celebrated and considered the patron saint of artillerymen, military engineers, miners and others who work with explosives and also the patron saint of mathematicians.  However, as is the case with the lives of the saints it is not clear how much of her story is based on fact.  For this reason Saint Barbara was removed from the Roman Catholic liturgical calendar in 1969 by Pope Paul VI’s motu proprio Mysterii Paschalis.   But Saint Barbara is still celebrated in the Eastern Church and as recently as 4 December 2018[2] The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in Fener, Istanbul sent Bodrum Metropoliton Alikarnasos Andrianos to Izmit to lead a service to celebrate the life of St Barabara.

It is not clear where Saint Barbara comes from – it is variously suggested that she lived in Phonecian Heliopolis (Baalbek, Lebanon) or Nicomedia, present day Izmit, Turkey.   Her story is included in this collection of Christian women because she is a Christian woman who is celebrated and known about[3].

The extent documentation suggests that Saint Barbara was brought up by her father Dioscorus after her mother died.  Dioscorus wanted to protect his daughter so he locked her in a high tower[4].  Only her father and her pagan teachers came to visit her.  Barbara spent a lot of time looking out of the tower on the surrounding hills and admiring God’s creation.  She doubted that the beautiful world she saw was created by the pagan gods that her father and her teachers worshipped and believed in.  Eventually Dioscorus allowed Barbara to leave her tower, he hoped that having some freedom would change her and that she would agree to marry one of the suitors he had found for her.  She used her new found freedom to meet with Christians and become a Christian.

Her father,Dioscorus, had a bath house built for Barbara.  The original architectural plans was for 2 windows but when her father was absent Barbara had the plans altered and asked the builders to put in three windows so that there would be a Trinity of light in the bath house.  When Dioscorus returned from his travels Barbara told him that she had become a Christian.  Full of rage he grabbed his sword ready to kill her, but she ran off.  Dioscorus followed her but was prevented from reaching her when a hill blocked his way.

The hill opened up and Barbara was hidden in a crevice.  Her father asked two local shepherds if they had seen his daughter.  The first denied he had seen her but the second betrayed her hiding place.

Dioscorus beat his daughter, locked her up, starved her then handed her over to Martianus, the prefect of the city.  Despite continued ill treatment by both Dioscorus and Martianus Barbara stood firm in her faith.  She was joined by another woman, Juliana.  They were both subject to various tortures and Barbara was condemned to death by beheading by her father.

Barbara was beheaded on 4 December.  Legend has it that both Dioscorus and Martianus, the prefect, were then struck dead by lightning.

In the 6th century relics of St Barbara were taken to Constantinople.  Six hundred years later, they were taken to Kiev  by the daughter of the Byzantine Emperor Alexius Comnenos[5] where they remain.

The Order of Saint Barbara is an honorary society within the United States Army Field Artillery Associated and the United States Army Air Defense Artillery Association.

Cities such as Santa Barbara, California are named after this saint.  There are in total 45 cities that are named after Saint Barbara of Nicomedia[6].

The service to celebrate Saint Barbara’s life was held in an ancient building in İzmit Şehitler Korusu[7].  This place is associated with Saint Barbara maybe where she was imprisoned before her martyrdom.

Izmit was known in ancient times as Nicomedia[8].  There has been a settlement in the Izmit area since 1200-800 BC.  The city took the name of Nicomedia during the reign of King Nicomedes (279-250BC).  During the reign of King Nicomedes III (94-74BC) the province of Bithynia became part of the Roman Empire.  Nicomedia was the major city in the province of Bithynia.  Bithynia is immortalised in the writings of Pliny the Younger (AD 61-113) who was governor of Bithynia and died in Birthynia.

During Emperor Diocletian’s reign (284-305) Nicomedia became the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire.  Because the Roman Empire had become so large Diocletian introduced the Tetrachy system of ruling with two Agustus and two Ceasars.  Emperor Diocletian and Caesar Galerius ruled the East from Nicomedia while Emperor Maximian and Caesar Constantius ruled the west.  After 284 Diocletian rebuilt Nicomedia as his new capital.   During this time a hippodrome, palace, temple, bathhouse, mint, a shipyard and various official buildings were built.  Nicomedia became the fourth city in the Roman Empire after Rome, Antioch (Antakya) and Alexandria.

Saint Barbara is portrayed as determined woman who while imprisoned in the tower had begun to question pagan belief because of her observations of natural beauty that she was able to observe from the tower within which her father imprisoned her.  We don’t know for sure whether St Barbara was locked up in a tower.  But Jungian psychologists believe that being locked in a tower can symbolise living too much in one’s head and not being grounded in everyday reality.  The person who is locked in the tower is set free through love, through learning to feel, to be in touch with their feelings (some would see this as exercising the right brain function rather than the more cerebral left brain functions).  Being let out of the tower can also symbolize the Jungian process of individuation[9].

The story seems to suggest that St Barbara exercised her personal choice by becoming a Christian, by symbolising her new found faith with three windows in her bath house.  Three windows, representing the Christian concept of a Trinitarian God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  She suffered greatly for her choices and ended life as a martyr beheaded[10] by her own father.

 

[1] http://www.visitizmit.org/santa-barbara-tower

http://m.ozgurkocaeli.com.tr/santa-barbara-izmit-adini-dunyada-45-kente-vermistir-251695h.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Barbara

http://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=166

http://www.saintbarbarafw.org/who-was-saint-barbara/

[2] https://www.haberturk.com/kocaeli-haberleri/17065045-azize-santa-barbara-izmitte-anildi

[3] DS one of my former students attended a service in Izmit on 4 December 2015 and told me about her experience.  It is that account that has led me to research and add Saint Barbara’s story to this collection.

[4] Locking up in a tower to protect a daughter is also known about in Istanbul.  In that case the daughter was locked up in Leander’s tower, a well known landmark in the Bosphorus between Uskudar and Sirkeci.

[5] Also known as Komnene.  Barbara, daughter of Isaac (or Alexius) Comnenos and Irene of Alnia was born in about 1070.

[6] Present day Izmit.

[7] Martyr’s Park, Izmit.

[8]http://artnicomedia.org.tr/index.php/74-tanitim-katagorisi/izmit-tarihi-tarihi-ve-turistik-yerleri/23-izmit-tarihi.html

[9] To develop the ability to act independently, to be an individual rather than controlled by another.

[10] Losing one’s head is not always a bad thing, if one is too much of a thinking type! The beheading may also be a symbol of that. 

Copyright©2019 Rev Ros Wilkinson

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15 August – The Dormition of The Blessed Virgin Mary

 

15 August – Dormition of the Blessed Virgin Mary
This is the day when Christians throughout the world celebrate the life of Mary the Mother of Jesus – the Theotokos[1].  Today’s festival is referred to as the Dormition or Assumption of Mary.  The mosaic shows her having ‘fallen asleep’ – which means she died.  Her Son, Jesus Christ is depicted as holding her soul, which will be taken by him up into heaven[2]. 
The bible says very little about the life of Mary.  The references to Mary in the New Testament are those parts of her life which are also about the life of Jesus.   The table at the end gives all the references to Mary in the New Testament. 
The Hebrew Scriptures seem to predict that Jesus, also known as Immanuel[3], will be born of a virgin.  This is not to suggest that Mary the Mother of Jesus was perpetually a virgin as some of the bible references above seem to suggest that Jesus had siblings[4]. 
‘Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign. Look, the young woman is with child and shall bear a son, and shall name him Immanuel[5]’
‘Hippolytus of Thebes[6], a 7th- or 8th-century author, claims in his partially preserved chronology to the New Testament that Mary lived for 11 years after the death of Jesus, dying in AD 41’.   
In Turkey there is a tradition that Mary the Mother of Jesus came to live with the Apostle John in Ephesus and that she lived in a house in the hills near Ephesus that is called ‘Meryemana’.  The site of the house was revealed in a dream to Catherine Emmerich (1775-1824) who was an invalid German nun who never left her native land.  From her description the Lazarist Fathers in Izmir managed to locate an old stone dwelling in the hills above Ephesus.  There is no proof that this structure dates from the first century when Mary the Mother of Jesus might have lived in Asia Minor.   The House of the Virgin has been designated a place of pilgrimage by the Roman Catholic Church and is visited by many Turkish and foreign visitors each year.  Mary is called Meryem by Muslims and is part of their tradition as well.  The tradition that Mary the Mother of Jesus lived in Ephesus is not in the Bible but probably arose because the Apostle John[7]was given the charge by Jesus, as he died on the cross to look after Mary, his mother[8].   Because John the Apostle travelled to Ephesus it is assumed that Mary the Mother of Jesus would have come as well and possibly also in the company of Mary of Magdalene. 
Even if Mary the Mother of Jesus never came to Asia Minor she is represented in many of the ancient churches that are found in modern day Turkey.   One of the pictures that I am including with this account is a selection of mosaic pictures of Mary that are to be found in Istanbul.  Kariye Museum, Istanbul has a wonderful mosaic series on the Life Cycle of the Blessed Virgin[9] that illustrates the life of Mary from conception to the birth of Jesus.  The mosaics are based on the Apocryphal Gospel of St James[10]. 
Mary is most closely associated with ‘The Magnificat’ the proclamation that Mary is said to have made when she met Elizabeth, her cousin[11].   And Mary said:
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
            and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
        for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
        for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
        His mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
        He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
        He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
        he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
        He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy,
        according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
to Abraham and to his descendants forever.” [12]
The Magnificat is said or sung at Evening prayer in many Christian traditions.  It is a song of praise, hope and redemption that has a vibrancy and relevance to all of us no matter what our age, gender or historic period we live in.  Mary was a woman of courage to have said yes when the angel announced to her that she was to bear the Messiah and give birth even though she was unmarried and a virgin[13].  She was a woman who committed her life to serving her God[14].    Through the faithful commitment of Mary, who was a young girl when she became pregnant with Jesus, came forth a new expression and understanding of the love of God for all nations, not just Israel.  The Christian faith is a door way to all to come to know the living God in their lives.  To receive and believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the chosen one of God, for all peoples.   
Collect for 15 August.
Almighty God,
who looked upon the lowliness of the Blessed Virgin Mary
and chose her to be the mother of your only Son:
grant that we who are redeemed by his blood
may share with her in the glory of your eternal kingdom;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.  Amen
Mary’s life
Matthew
Mark
Luke
John
Genealogy
1:26
Annunciation
1:26-38
Meeting Elisabeth
1:39-56
Birth of Jesus
1:18-2:23
2:1-40
Rev 12
Jesus’ presentation in the Temple
1:22-38
Mary troubled
1:48
Mary tries to rescue Jesus
12:46-49
3:31-35
8:19-21
13:54-58
6:3
Woman blesses Mary
11:27-28
Mary at the cross
27:55-56
15:40-41
23:49
19:25-27
Mary at the Burial
27:61
15:47
23:55
Resurrection
28:1
16:1
24:1-12, 36-49
Ascension
24:50-53
Pentecost
Acts 1:14

[1] Theotokos means God Bearer although some translate it as Mother of God. 
[2]There are some who would say that she didn’t die but she was taken up to heaven on the point of death or before death. 
[3]Immanuel means ‘God with us’ – an indication of the incarnation.
[4] Matt 13:55-56
[5] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Is 7:14). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
[7]Also referred to as John the Theologian
[8]See John 19:25-27
[10]Also known as the Protoevangelium.  This document can be found on the internet and is as least as old as the second century. 
[11]Luke 1:39-56
[12] The Holy Bible: New Revised Standard Version. 1989 (Lk 1:46–55). Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers.
[13]Luke 1:26-38. 
[14]Luke 1:38
[15]Only Mary Magdalene is mentioned as having gone to the tomb but she could have been with other women, not alone as John’s gospel seems to suggest. 

 

 

Copyright © 2018 Rev Ros Wilkinson

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10 September Empress Aelia Pulcheria 19 Jan 399 – 18 Feb 453,

 

St Pulcheria’s parents were the Byzantine Emperor Arcadius and Empress Aelia Eudoxia, who had five children.  Flacilla (397) died young.  The younger siblings were Arcadia (400), Theodosius II (401), the future Emperor and Marina (401). 
Empress Eudoxia died in 404 and Emperor Arcadius in 408.  Theodosius II had been proclaimed nominal co-Emperor in 402 and was now Emperor.  Anthemius, his Praetorian Prefect, was Emperor Theodosius’ guardian and the effective Regent of the Eastern Empire.  In 414 he disappears from view and Pulcheria is proclaimed Augusta and ruled as regent for her brother.   Theodosius “was, vacillating and easily led.[1]”  Pulcheria, “by contrast, was strong and determined, with a love of power for its own sake; but she was also excessively, extravagantly pious, taking a particular pleasure in the rebuilding of the ruined Haghia Sophia…her two younger sisters Arcadia and Marina developed similar inclinations…the prevailing mood in the imperial palace, it was said was more that of a cloister than a court,…”[2] 
“When Arcadius himself died in 408, he left Theodosius in a precarious situation, with the danger that as Pulcheria and her sisters approached marriageable age an ambitious politician might arrange a union which would destroy the independence of the dynasty. Thus in her fourteenth year (412-13) Pulcheria devoted herself to virginity and persuaded her sisters to do likewise. According to Sozomen, a contemporary author who presumably knew the truth, she acted “in order that she might not bring another male into the palace and might remove every opportunity for competition and plotting.”[3]
Pulcheria’s choice of remaining a virgin, like the Virgin Mary, came out of religious conviction but also political expediency.  She proved herself to be a strong, astute woman in her dealings with the political and religious administrators that she as Augusta found herself encountering.  She was a stronger ruler than her brother who was more like their father Arcadius.  However, unlike Eudoxia, their mother, another strong woman, Pulcheria was overtly Christian and evoked the ire of the religious authorities in different ways to what Eudoxia had done by her flagarant disrespect of the Church.  Eudoxia had been censored by St John Chrysostom, the Bishop of Constantinople, because of the golden statue of herself that Eudoxia had erected outside Haghia Sophia.  Pulcherie and Nestorius had a serious confrontation a few days after Nestorious was appointed Bishop of Constantinople. 
“On an Easter Sunday, probably April 15, 428, only five days after Nestorius was ordained bishop of Constantinople, Pulcheria appeared at the gate to the sanctuary of the Great Church,[4]expecting to take communion within in the presence of the priests and her brother, the emperor.  The archdeacon Peter informed Nestorius of her custom, and the bishop hurried to bar the way, to prevent the sacrilege of a lay person and woman in the Holy of Holies.  Pulcheria demanded entrance, but Nestorius insisted that “only priests may walk here.”  She asked “Why?  Have I not given birth to God?”  He replied: “You?  You have given birth to Satan!”  And then Nestorius drove the empress from the sanctuary…In (Nestorius’) view Pulcheria could not claim Marial dignity – that she had (mystically) “given birth to God” – to justify ceremonial equality with her brother.  Like any woman, Pulcheria was a daughter of Eve, through whom sin had come into the world.[5]”
This illustrates the way that Pulcheria identified[6]with Mary, the Mother of Jesus.   As explained above, her commitment to remaining a virgin was probably an astute move to protect herself and her sisters from marriage to men who might come into the palace circle and exploit the situation for their own dynastic ambitions.  This move also enable her to take power and exercise that power over her brother and the Eastern Empire for many years.  Nestorius’ accusation that “you have given birth to Satan!” comes from a belief that sin came into the world only through Eve, the woman, succumbing to temptation whereas Genesis 3[7]seems to state that both Adam and Eve succumbed to Satan’s temptation and through both of them sin came into the world. 
Prior to the confrontation with Nestorius on Easter Sunday 428 Pulcheria’s robe had been used as an altar cover during communion and Pulcheria’s portrait was above the altar of the Great Church.  Nestorius got ride of the robe and also effaced Pulcheria’s portrait above the altar of the Great Church[8]. 
Using the title of ‘Theotokos’ (Mother of God) or ‘Christotokos’ (Mother of Christ) was an indicator of the user’s belief about the nature of Christ.  In Constantinople Pulcheria strongly supported those who referred to the Virgin Mary as ‘Theotokos’ such as Proclus[9]and Cyril of Alexandria.  The ensuing controversy led to the Council of Ephesus (431) which was held in the Church dedicated to St Mary.  This council was primarily to discuss the nature of Christ although one of the decisions of the council was to give the Blessed Virgin Mary the title of ‘Theotokos’.  But that wasn’t the prime purpose of the council. 
Pulcheria adopted the 433 Formula of Union as the key to the Christological riddle: “For there has been a union of the two natures; wherefore we confess one Christ, one Son, one Lord.”[10]
Theodosius, Pulcheria’s brother died in 450 as a result of a hunting accident.  She was barred from continuing as Augusta after her brother died so she married Marcian, an elderly soldier.   Marcion was Emperor in the east from 450 to 457.  
Pulcheria’s actions and plotting are well documented in records written at the time or soon after.  She was a powerful woman who took action in affairs of religion and state in order to achieve the ends she believed in.  She also had a hand in the Council of Chalcedon which met in 451.  Chalcedon is just across the Bosphorus from Constantinople in the Asian Side suburb of Kadıköy.  The Council was supposed to convene in Nicea[11] but in order that Marcian, the Emperor and Pulcheria’s husband could attend it’s meeting place was transferred to Chalcedon.  There is evidence that suggests Pulcheria used her influence to ensure that only compliant Bishops and Clergy attended[12].
During the course of the deliberations the Bishops called out their acclamations of Pulcheria and Marcion: “The Emperor believes thus!  The Augusta believes thus!  Thus we all believe!”  They greeted Emperor Marcian as the “New Constantine, New Paul, New David” and praised Pulcheria because she had restored harmony:
“Many years to the Augusta!  You are the light of orthodoxy! Because of this there will be peace everywhere!  Lord protect those who bring the light of peace, those who lighten the world!”[13]
The assembled clergy identified Pulcheria with the famous mother of Constantine the Great:
“Marcian is the New Constantine, Pulcheria the New Helena!  You have shown the faith of Helena!  You have shown the zeal of Helena!  Your life is the security of all!  Your faith is the glory of the churches!
But all is not good:
“From the inception of the Eutychian crisis, this woman had acted in the manner of her grandfather Theodosius, convinced that the Christological formula she had adopted was correct, and that to restore harmony she had to impose it on her subjects.  For this reason she had returned from ascetic retreat and had married after her brother’s death, that she might prolong her dynasty sufficiently and secure the necessary military backing.  During the year of Chalcedon she directed preparations from the palace, and the council unfolded according to her plan.  The Fathers of Chalcedon admitted as much in the warmth of their acclamations, but they did not declare this to be Pulcheria’s council or recognize in it the ultimate dynastic victory of the Theodosian house.”[14]
Holum’s damming inditement shows Pulcheria’s involvement as political, motivated by the desire for power to achieve her own pre-conceived ends.   A Christian becomes so by a personal commitment to faith, faith involves personal choice, personal commitment not being told by the Augusta, the Empress, what to believe.  It is easy at first glance to think that Pulcheria is of pure motive and pure faith in her commitment to staying a virgin.  Yes, probably an astute move to protect her and her sisters from unwanted sexual advances but neither she nor others had the right to dictate a particular belief, even though it was an orthodox belief.  No right to bully or harass those who thought otherwise. 
History leaves us with the perception of Pulcheria being a person consumed with a love for power rather than motivated the power of God’s love. 

 

[1] Image from: https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2016/09/saint-pulcheria-empress-of-romans.html
John Julius Norwich, Byzantium: the earlier centuries,(London: Penguin Books, 1990), p. 140
[2] ibid p.140
[3] K Holum, Pulcheria’s Crusade and the Ideology of Imperial Victory, Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 18(1977) 153-172
[4]Haghia Sophia, the Cathedral Church of Istanbul.
[5] Holum K Theodosian Empresses (University of California Press, USA, 1982) p 153-4.
[6]Some might of course say she was deluded.
[7]It’s no accident that the entry of sin into the world is referred to as ‘The Fall’ – ie The Fall from Grace.
[8]Holum K op cit p. 153
[9] He had been ordained Bishop of Cyzicus by Sisinnius but was unable to enter his see because the local clergy and people elevated their own candidate.See Holum p.155
[10] ibid p 199
[11]Modern day Iznik.
[12]Holum op cit  p.213
[13]Ibid p.215
[14] Holum op cit p.216

 

Copyright © 2018 Rev Ros Wilkinson

 

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