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130 Pages
Page 118
The last of the Panegyrical Homilies (XXIII.) is on Saint Mamas, commemorated on September 2 by the Greeks, and on August 17 by the Latins. He is said to have been a shepherd martyred at Caesarea in 274 in the persecution of Aurelian. Sozomen (v. 2) relates that when the young princes Julian and Gallus were at the castle of Macellum [693] they were engaged in building a church in the martyr's honour, and that Julian's share in the work never prospered. [694] The homily narrates no details concerning the saint, and none seem to be known. It does contain a more direct mention of a practice of invocation. There is a charge to all who have enjoyed the martyr in dreams to remember him; to all who have met with him in the church, and have found him a helper in their prayers; to all those whom he has aided in their doings, when called on by name. [695] The conclusion contains a summary of the Catholic doctrine concerning the Son. "You have been told before, and now you are being told again, In the beginning was the Word,' [696] to prevent your supposing that the Son was a being generated after the manner of men, [697] from His having come forth out of the non-existent. Word' is said to you, because of His impassibility. Was' is said because of His being beyond time. He says beginning' to conjoin the Begotten with His Father. You have seen how the obedient sheep hears a master's voice. In the beginning,' and was,' and Word.' Do not go on to say, How was He?' and If He was, He was not begotten;' and If He was begotten, He was not.' It is not a sheep who says these things. The skin is a sheep's; but the speaker within is a wolf. Let him be recognised as an enemy. My sheep hear my voice.' [698] You have heard the Son. Understand His likeness to His Father. I say likeness because of the weakness of the stronger bodies: In truth, and I am not afraid of approaching the truth, I am no ready deceiver: I say identity, always preserving the distinct existence of Son and Father. In the hypostasis of Son understand the Father's Form, that you may hold the exact doctrine of this Image,--that you may understand consistently with true religion the words, I am in the Father and the Father in me.' [699] Understand not confusion of essences, but identity of characters."
[693] cf. p. xv., n.
[694] cf. Greg. Naz., Or. iv. S: 25.
[695] hosois, onomati, kletheis, epi ton ergon pareste. On the reverence for relics cf. Letters cxcvii., cclii., and cclvii.
[696] John i. 1.
[697] gennema anthropinon.
[698] cf. John x. 16.
[699] John xiv. 10. cf. De Sp. Scto. S: 45, p. 28.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/basil/life-works.asp?pg=118
