What Happened on Account of Chrysostom

At this point in my history I do not know what to feel. I want to tell of the wrong done to Chrysostom, and yet in other respects I hold in regard the high character of those who wronged him. So I will do my best to hide even their names. These men had different reasons for their hostility, and they were unwilling to look on his brilliant virtue. They found some wretches to accuse him, and, seeing how plainly false the slander was, they held a meeting at a distance from the city and pronounced their sentence. [a] The emperor, who trusted the clergy, ordered him banished. So Chrysostom, without hearing the charges against him or making his defense, was forced to leave Constantinople as though he had been convicted on the accusations brought against him. He went to Hieron, at the mouth of the Black Sea, for that is the name of the naval station. [c]

During the night there was a great earthquake, and the empress was struck with terror. So at daybreak envoys were sent to the banished bishop, begging him to come back to Constantinople without delay and turn the danger away from the city. After them another party was sent, and still others after those, until the Bosporus was crowded with messengers. When the faithful people learned what was happening, they covered the mouth of the Propontis with their boats, and the whole population lit wax torches and came out to meet him. For the time being his enemies, who had banded together against him, were scattered. [d]

But after a few months they tried to punish him, not on the forged indictment, but for taking part in divine service after he had been deposed. The bishop pointed out that he had not pleaded, that he had not heard the indictment, that he had made no defense, and that he had been condemned in his absence; that the emperor had banished him, and the emperor had recalled him. Then another synod met. His opponents did not ask for a trial, but persuaded the emperor that the sentence was lawful and right. Then Chrysostom was not merely banished but sent away to Cucusus, a small and lonely town in Armenia. Even from there he was removed and deported to Pityus, a place at the far end of the Black Sea, on the frontier of the Roman Empire, close to the wildest savages. But the loving Lord did not allow his victorious athlete to be carried off to this little island. When he had reached Comana, he was taken away to the life that knows neither age nor pain. [f] The body that had struggled so bravely was buried beside the coffin of the martyr Basiliscus, for the martyr had ordered this in a dream. [h]

I think it needless to lengthen my account by telling how many bishops were driven from the church on Chrysostom’s account and sent to live at the ends of the earth, or how many ascetic philosophers were caught up in the same disasters. All the more so because I think it right to cut short these hideous details and to draw a veil over the evil deeds of men who share our own faith. Yet punishment did fall on most of the guilty, and their sufferings became a means of good for the rest. This great wrong was held in special horror by the bishops of Europe, who broke off communion with those who were guilty of it, and all the bishops of Illyria joined them in this. In the East most of the cities shrank from taking part in the wrong, but they did not tear the body of the church apart. After the death of the great teacher of the world, the bishops of the West refused to enter into communion with the bishops of Egypt, of the East, of the Bosporus and of Thrace until the name of that holy man had been entered among those of the departed bishops. They refused to recognize Arsacius, his immediate successor. But Atticus, the successor of Arsacius, asked again and again for the gift of peace, and after a time, once he had entered the name on the roll, he was received. [i]