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Re: Helen and the True Cross
2006.06.30 11:46
Thank you, Jan Willem.
I will continue, however, to hold up the extreme case, i.e., that the legend of Helena and the True Cross did happen, and at its earliest possible date, 14 September 325. Additionally, a law of silence specifically regarding Helena-and-the-True-Cross was put into place soon after 25 July 326.
[It just occurred to me now that, besides keeping imperial control of the situation, there is another reason the law of silence may have come into place. If the event was a fabrication of Helena, Eutropia and/or Constantine, then the deaths of Crispus, Helena and Fausta may have been seen by Constantine and Eutropia (and perhaps even by Helena on her death bed) as signs that they did something very wrong, and thus a law of silence was the best way to 'enforce' that the event never really happened. Nonetheless, news of the (possibly fabricated) event was already in circulation for 10 months.]
Laws of silence are strangely powerful because the better they work, the less history gets to know what the silence was about. It appears, however, that breaking an imperial law of silence is not punishable by death, rather by exile--see St. Martin I, pope and martyr, died c. 656.
Between 25 July 326 and 25 February 395 (during which time the law of silence regarding Helena and the Cross was enforced) Bishop Athanasius and Bishop Cyril were committed to exile several times, and, before Athanasius and Cyril, Bishop Eustathius lost his see.
"Last night, in reviewing the case of the 'downfall' of Eustathius, bishop of Antioch, and its seeming connection to his having said something about Helena, it is mentioned that Eustathius was anti-Arian while Helena seems to have been pro-Arian, and thus maybe Eustathius said something along these lines. [The fall of Eustathius occurred sometime 326-328, and is one of the factors that leads modern scholars to believe that Helena was in the Holy Land/East during that period. I think that Eustathius did fall because he said something about Helena, but that his real crime was that he said something about Helena after her death in Rome July 326. In other words, Eustathius broke the 'silence' regarding Helena and the Cross that was somehow enforced by Constantine, and Eustathius' losing his see is a clear example to those living then under Constantine of what will happen if you too break the 'silence'. Interestingly, it is Athanasius of Alexandria that first tells us of the Eustathius/Helena connection, and he was also a supported of Eustathius. Athanasius was exiled to Trier (where he might not be heard so well?) during the latter years of Constantine's life.]"
--Stephen Lauf, "re-reading VITA CONSTANTINI Book III" at lt-antiq listserv, 2001.08.18 [the feast of St. Helena]
Laws of silence are not only effectually beneficial for imperials, however. If you knew that one of your adversaries had broken a law of silence, a charge against your adversary could then be quickly brought to court. I now seriously wonder/speculate that the law of silence regarding Helena and the True Cross was also occasionally utilized as a powerful tool within the ongoing Arian controversy.
Last night, while reading of St. Cyril of Jerusalem in Butler's Lives of the Saints, the following passage struck me:
"Acacius thereupon, making his way to Constantinople, persuaded the Emperor Constantius to summon another council. Fresh accusations were made in addition to the old ones, and what particularly incensed the emperor was the information that a gold-brocaded vestment presented by his father Constantine to Marcarius for administering baptism had been sold, and had been seen and recognized on a comedian performing on the boards of a theatre. Acacius triumphed and obtained a second decree of exile against Cyril within a year of his vindication."
If such a charge against Cyril was really brought before Constantius, did Cyril really sell such an important vestment, especially since he himself was so closely involved with the baptisms that occurred at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre? It didn't take me long to think that the charge as recorded might be code for Cyril having done the worst, the unspeakable, i.e., that he spoke of that which by law he should be silent.
If Cyril did indeed speak of Helena and the True Cross, it may well have already happened before he was bishop of Jerusalem.
"He seems to have been ordained priest by the bishop of Jerusalem, St. Maximus, who thought so highly of his abilities that he charged him with the important duty of instructing the catechumens. His catechetical lectures were delivered for several years--those to the illuminandi, or candidates for baptism, taking place in Constantine's basilica of the Holy Cross, usually called the Martyrion, and those to the newly-baptized being given during Easter week in the circular Anastasis or church of the Resurrection. They were delivered without book... We find in them also interesting allusions to the discovery of the cross..."
--Butler's Lives of the Saints
Cyril's lectures occurred within the first decade of the publication of Eusebius's Vita Constantini. As a (probable) native of Jerusalem who was about 10 years old 14 September 325, did it bother Cyril that Eusebius omitted all mention of Helena with regard to the building of the Holy Sepulchre? Was Cyril, in his catechetical lectures, making sure that the newly-baptized Christians were aware of the full "real" story?
Is Gelasius of Caesarea's Ecclesiastical History (c. 390) "now lost" because it contained information that was illegal to publish at the time?
As to Santa Croce in Jerusalemme, the basilica and its Constantinian date are still important to the discussion of relics (and pilgrimage).
Stephen Lauf
ps
I'm curious as to why Steve Mulburger excluded a passage from me when he demonstrated the 4th century "as even more eccentric" than he thought. Don't tell me there is a law of silence forbidding discussion of a law of silence.
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