A Mother's Martydom

In civitate vero Culusitana non valeo quae gesta sunt nuntiare, quia et ipsam quantitatem martyrum vel etiam confessorum impossibile est homini supputtare. Ubi quaedam matrona, auctrix sui nominis Victoria, dum in conspectu vulgi continuato suspendio cremaretur, a marito jam perdito filiis praesentibus taliter rogabatur: Quid pateris conjunx? Si me despicis, vel horum miserere quos genuisti, impia, parvulorum. Quare oblivisceris uteri tui, et pro nihilo ducis quos cum gemitu peperisti? Ubi sunt foedera conjugalis amoris? ubi societatis vincula, quae inter nos dudum honestatis jure tabulae conscriptae fecerunt? Respice, quaeso, filios ac maritum, et regiae jussionis implere festina praeceptum, ut et imminentia adhuc tormenta lucreris, simul et mihi doneris et liberis nostris. Sed illa nec filiorum fletus, nec serpentis audiens blandimenta, affectum multo altius elevans a terra, mundum cum suis desideriis contemnebat. Quam cum jam continuatione suspendi avulsis humeris, etiam qui cruciabant conspicerent mortuam, deposuerunt prorsus omni parte exanimatam. Quae postea retulit quamdam sibi virginem astitisse, atque tetigisse membra singula, et illico fuisse sanatam. Victor Vitensis, Historia Persecutionis Africae Provinciae, Liber V Source: Migne PL 58.243b-244a

However I cannot tell all that happened in the city of Culusitana, because it is impossible for any man to recount even the amount of martyrs or confessors. But I shall say that there was a certain woman, a mother by the name of Victoria, who having been hung up to burn in the presence of the crowd, was asked by her husband, a man who was already ruined, with their children present: 'Why do you suffer, O wife? If you scorn me, at least have mercy on these to whom you have given birth, wicked woman. Why have no care for the fruit of your womb and reckon as nothing these whom you bore amid groans? Where are the bonds of conjugal love? Where that bond of association between us that the honourable written tablets once rightly made? I beseech you, look on your children and your husband, and make haste to fulfill the command of the king, 1 so that you may yet acquire relief from your imminent torment and give a gift to me and your children.' But that woman wept not for her children, nor listened to the charms of the serpent, but with as much passion as she hung above the earth, so she condemned the world and its desires. Then when her shoulder bones had been wrenched out by continual suspension, and those who were torturing her suspected she had expired, they took her down and found that she was indeed dead. It is told that afterwards a certain virgin was brought near and healed by touching every member of her body. Victor Vitensis, History of the Persecution of the African Province, Book 5 1 King Huneric, who commanded adoption of Arianism

The Contemplative And The Warrior

Homo formidoloso et corde pavido non egredietur ad bellum. Vadat et revertatur ad domum suam, ne pavere faciat corda fratrum suorum, sicut et ipse timore perterritus est. Quibus verbis edocet non posse eos professionem contemplatinois vel spiritualis militiae arripere exercitium, qui adhuc nudari terrenis operibus pertimescunt. Ne rursus infirmitate mentis revertantur, suoque exemplo alios a perfectione evangelica revocent, et infideli terrore infirment; jubentur itaque tales, ut, discedentes a pugna, revertantur in domum suam, quia non possunt duplici corde bella Domini praeliari. Vir enim duplex animo, inconstants in omnibus viis suis. Tales quippe oportet ut ne initium quidem renuntiationis arripiant. Quibus melius est ut un activa vita consistant, quam trepidi contemplationem exsequentes, majori discrimine semetipsos involvant. Melius est enim non vovere, quam vovere et non reddere. Similiter et ille a tali militia prohibetur, qui uxorem duxerit, qui plantaverit vineam, velt propaginem filiorum, non enim potest servire divinae militiae servus uxoris, secundum Apostoli: Qui cum uxore est, sollicitus est quomodo placeat uxori, et divisus est.  Nec potest inesse quis studio contemplationis, qui adhuc in delectatione defigitur carnis. Nemo, inquit Apostolus, militans Deo, implicat se negotiis saecularibus, ut ei placeat cui se probavit. Sanctus Isidorus Hispalensis,Mysticorum Expositiones Sacramentorum Seu Quaestiones In Vetus Testamentum, In Deutronomium, Caput XV Migne PL 83.365-366

A man fearful and timid in heart should not go out to war. Let him begone and return to his house lest he causes fear in the hearts of his brothers, with his own fear unnerving them. 1 By which words is taught that they are not able to take up the exercise of contemplation or spiritual warfare who yet fear to strip themselves of worldly works, lest again they fall back into weakness of soul and their example calls others away from the perfection of the Gospel, and by faithless fear others are made infirm. Such men are thus ordered to withdraw from combat and return to their own houses because they who have divided hearts are not able to fight the wars of the Lord; a man with a divided soul is inconstant in all his ways. And certainly they should not even start on the beginning of renunciation; it is better for them is to be established in the active life, those who with fear would follow the contemplative, with greater discrimination occupying themselves. Better it is not to take a vow than to take a vow and not fulfill it. And likewise he is prohibited from such warfare who takes a wife, who plants vines and who propagates children, 2 for he is not able to serve in the Divine army who is the servant of a wife, as the Apostle says, 'He who has a wife has his care in how to please her, and he is divided in himself.' 3 And the contemplative zeal is not able to inhere in him who is yet fixed in the pleasures of the flesh. 'No one,' says the Apostle, 'is a soldier of God who is involved in worldly business, but he who is would please him who has approved him.' 4 Saint Isidore of Seville, Expositions of Sacred Mysteries or Questions on the Old Testament, On Exodus, Chap 27 1 Deut 20.8 2 Deut 20. 5-7  3 1 Cor 7.33 4 2 Tim 2.4

Acting Like Angels

Qui uxorem suam diligit, seipsum diligit. Nemo enim unquam suam carnem odit, sed nutrit et fovet eam, sicut et Christus Ecclesiam. Dicamus quod illam carnem quae visura sit Salutare Dei anima diligat et nutriat, et foveat eam disciplinis erudiens, et coelesti saginans pane, et Christi sanguine irrigans, ut refecta et nitida possit libero cursu virum sequi, et nullo debilitatis pondere praegravari. Pulchre etiam in similitudinem Christi nutrientis et foventis Ecclesiam, et dicentis ad Jerusalem: Quoties volui congregare filios tuos, ut gallina congregat pullos suos sub alas suas, et noluisti? Animae quoque fovent corpora sua, ut corruptivum hoc induat incorruptionem et alarum levitate suspensum, in aerem facilius sublevetur. Foveamus igitur et viri uxores nostras, et animae nostrae corpora, ut et uxores in viros, et corpora redigantur in animas, et nequaquam sit sexum ulla diversitas: sed quomodo apud angelos non est vir et mulier, ita et nos, qui similes angelis futuri sumus, jam nunc incipiamus esse quod nobis in coelestibus repromissum est. Origenes, ex Libro Tertio In Epistolam Ad Ephesios

He who loves his own wife, loves himself. For no one hates his own flesh but he nurtures and cherishes it,  like Christ the Church.  1 Let us say that this flesh that it might see the salvation of God the soul loves and nurtures, and cherishing it it instructs it with discipline and feasts it with celestial bread and waters it with the blood of Christ, that refreshed and shining it be able to follow unencumbered the course of men and not suffer from any infirmity weighing it down. Beautiful indeed is that likeness of Christ nourishing and caring for the Church, He who said to Jerusalem, 'How many times I wished to gather your sons, as a hen gathers her young under her wings, and you were unwilling?' 2 And souls also cherish the body that the corruptible put on incorruption 3 and suspended on wings in their lightness they are lifted easily into the air. Let us then be men cherishing our wives, as souls our bodies, that even wives be as husbands, as bodies are restored by souls, and let there be no difference of sex, but as among angels there is no male and female, so even with us, who shall be like angels, so let us begin now what is promised to us in heaven. Origen, Fragment from the Third Book on The Letter to the Ephesians 1 Ephes 5.28-29 2 Mt 23.37 3 1 Cor 15.53

A Little Woman

Σκώπτεις τὴν Ἀλυπιανὴν ἡμῖν, ὡς μικρὰν, καὶ τῆς σῆς μεγαλειότητος ἀναξίαν, ὦ μακρὲ σὺ, καὶ ἀμέτρητε, καὶ πελώριε, τό τε εἶδος καὶ τὴν ἀλκήν. Νῦν γὰρ ἔγνων ὅτι ψυχὴ μετρεῖται, καὶ ἀρετὴ ταλαντεύεται, καὶ τιμιώτεραι τῶν μαργάρων αἱ πέτραι, καὶ κόρακες ἀηδόνων αἰδεσιμώτεροι. Σὺ μὲν οὖν ἀπόλαυε τοῦ μεγέθους καὶ τῶν πηχῶν, καὶ μηδὲν λείπου τῶν Ἀλωάδων ἐκείνων. Ἵππον γὰρ ἄγεις, καὶ τινάσσεις αἰχμὴν, καὶ θῆρες σοι μέλουσι. Τῇ δὲ οὐδὲν ἔργον, οὐδὲ πολλῆς τῆς ἰσχύος κερκίδα φέρειν, καὶ ἡλακάτην μεταχειρίζεσθαι, καὶ ἰστῷ προσκαθέζεσθαι. Τὸ γὰρ γέρας ἐστὶ γυναικῶν. Εἰ δὲ καὶ τοῦτο προσθείης, ὅτι γῇ προσπέφυκε δι' εὐχὴν, καὶ Θεῷ σύνεστιν ἀεὶ τοῖς μεγάλοις τοῦ νοῠ κινήμασι, τί σοι ἐνταῦθα τὸ ὑψος, ἢ τὰ μέτρα τοῦ σώματος; Ἴδε καίριον σιωπὴν, φθεγγομένης ἄκουσον· τὸ ἀκαλλώπιστον κατανόνσον, τὸ ὡς γυναιξὶν ἀνδρικὸν, τὴν οἰκωφέλειαν, τὴν φιλανδρίαν. Καὶ τότε φήσεις τὸ τοῦ Λάκωνος· Ὄντως οὐ μετρεῖται ψυχὴ, καὶ δεῖ τὸν ἐκτὸς ἐόντα, πρὸς τὸν ἐντὸς βλέπειν ἄνθρωπον. Ἄν οὔτω ταῦτα σκοπῇς, παύσῃ τοῦ παίζειν, καὶ καταπαίζειν αὐτῆς ὡς μικρᾶς, καὶ σαυτοῦ μακαρίσεις τὴν συζυγίαν.  Ἅγιος Γρηγόριος ὁ Ναζιανζηνός, Ἐπιστολή ΙΒ', Νικοβουλῳ  Source: Migne PG 37.44c-45a

You joke with me about Alypiana being little and unworthy of your grandness, you great, boundless, monstrous fellow, both in form and strength. For now I know that soul is a thing to be measured and virtue to be put in scales, and that rocks are more valuable than pearls, and crows more valuable than nightingales. You then rejoice in your magnitude and your cubits, and be in nothing inferior to the sons of Aloeus. 1 You ride a horse, and shake a spear, and concern yourself with wild beasts. But she has no work like that. Little strength one needs to carry a comb, to handle a distaff, to sit by a loom. This is the glory of woman. And if you add this also, that she has become fixed to the earth on account of prayer, and has continual communion with God by the great movement of her mind, then what is there here to boast of in the dimensions of your body? Keep a seasonable silence, listen to her voice, consider her unadornment, her womanly virility, her usefulness in the home, her love of her husband. Then you will say with the Laconian, that truly the soul is not a measurable thing and that one must pass from exterior things to inner things to see the person. If you see things this way, you will be done with play and mocking her as little, and you will bless your marriage. Saint Gregory Nazianzus, Letter 12, to Nicobulus 1 The Aloadae, Otos and Ephialtes

Epitaph for Ursinianus

Ursiniano subdiacono sub hoc tumulo ossa quiescunt, qui meruit sanctorum sociari sepulcrum, quem nec Tartarus furens nec poena saeva nocebit. hunc titulum posuit Ludula dulcissima coniux  Epitaphios Ursiniano

The bones of the subdeacon Ursinianus rest beneath this tumulus, He who merited a tomb with the saints, Whom neither furious Tartarus nor cruel punishment shall harm. Ludula, his sweet wife, this inscription composed. Epitaph for Ursinianus

Epitaph for Mandrosa

Mandrosa hic nomine, omnium gratia plena, fidelis in Christo, eius mandata reservans, martyrum obsequiis devota transegi falsi seculi vitam, unius viri consortio ter quinus coniuncta per annos reddidi nunc domino rerum debitum communem omnibus olim. Epitaphios Mandrosae

Here is one named Mandrosa, in all things pleasing, Faithful in Christ, guarding his commandments, To martyrs' service devoted I passed my life in a false age. A wife of one man, fifteen years married, I return now to the Lord of all the common debt. Epitaph for Mandrosa

Epitaph For Sofroniola

Castitas fides caritas pietas obsequium et quaecumque deus faeminis inesse praecepit, his ornata bonis Sofroniola in pace quiescit.  Martinianus iugalis eius titulum ex more dicabit. Epitaphios Sofroniola

Chaste, faithful, loving, pious, peaceable, And whatever God commands to inhere in woman, With these adorned Sofroniola rests in peace. Martinianus, her yoke fellow, according to the custom, composed this. Epitaph for Sofroniola