Letters

⁸ Again he avers that my brother is the cause of the disagreement which has arisen, a man who is content to stay in a monastic cell and who regards the clerical office as onerous rather than honourable. And although up to this very day he has spoon-fed us with insincere protestations of peace, he has caused commotion in the minds of the western bishops by telling them that a mere youth, hardly more than a boy, has been ordained presbyter of Bethlehem in his own diocese.

If this is the truth, all the bishops of Palestine must be aware of it. For the monastery of the reverend pope Epiphanius— called the old monastery— where my brother was ordained presbyter is situated in the district of Eleutheropolis and not in that of Ælia. Furthermore his age is well known to your Holiness; and as he has now attained to thirty years I apprehend that no blame can attach to him on that score. Indeed this particular age is stamped as full and complete by the mystery of Christ's assumed manhood.

Let him call to mind the ancient law, and he will see that after his twenty-fifth year a Levite might be chosen to the priesthood; or if in this passage he prefers to follow the Hebrew he will find that candidates for the priesthood must be thirty years old. And that he may not venture to say that “old things are passed away; and, behold, all things have become new,” let him hear the apostle's words to Timothy, “Let no man despise your youth.” Certainly when my opponent was himself ordained bishop, he was not much older than my brother is now.

And if he argues that youth is no hindrance to a bishop but that it is to a presbyter because a young elder is a contradiction in terms, I ask him this question: Why has he himself ordained a presbyter of this age or younger still, and that too to minister in another man's church? But if he cannot be at peace with my brother unless he consents to submit and to renounce the bishop who has ordained him, he shows plainly that his object is not peace but revenge, and that he will not rest satisfied with the quietude of repose and peace unless he is able to inflict to the full every penalty that he now threatens.

Had he himself ordained my brother, it would have made no difference to this latter. So dearly does he love seclusion that he would even then have continued to live quietly and would not have exercised his office. And should the bishop have seen fit to rend the church on that score, he would then have owed him nothing save the respect which is due to all who offer sacrifice.