(9TH CENT.)
[Roman Martyrology. S. Cyril by the Greeks on Feb. 14th, and S.
Methodius on May 11th. Authorities:--The Life of S. Clement, a pupil
of Methodius, pub. by Pampereus, Vienna, 1802; the Pannonian Life
of Methodius; notices in the Life of S. Ludmilla; the Chronicle of
Nestor; Cosmas of Prague, &c. The chronology in this article is from
the treatise on Cyril and Methodius by Philaret, B. of Rigá, Milan,
1847.]
Cyril and Methodius, the apostles of the Sclaves, were brothers, the
sons of a man of rank in Thessalonica. Constantine, who afterwards in
religion assumed the name of Cyril, the younger, was educated at the
court of Constantinople, along with the youthful emperor Michael, from
the year 842, by the illustrious Photius, who instructed him in logic,
philosophy, mathematics, and languages. His talents and accomplishments
afforded him every prospect of a brilliant career in the world, but
he chose to lay them at the foot of the cross, and, receiving sacred
orders, was appointed librarian to the palace. Soon after, he retired
to a little monastery, but was drawn from it again to give lectures on
philosophy.
Methodius, his elder brother, as soon as his education was
accomplished, entered the army, and was appointed to the government of
the Græco-Sclavonic province, which, according to the Pannonian legend,
he held for ten years.
In the year 851, Cyril retired to Mount Olympus, along with his
brother, who had also resolved to desert the world, and lived in
seclusion and the practice of self-discipline. In 858, some dignitaries
of the Chazars, a Hunnish race, besought the emperor to send them a
learned man to instruct them in the true faith, and Cyril and Methodius
were chosen for this purpose.
How long they spent on this mission is not known exactly. They
tarried till they could organise the church among the Chazars, and
then retired to the Crimea where they worked together at making a
Sclavonic translation of the Holy Gospels. It was whilst there that
they discovered what they believed to be the relics of S. Clement of
Rome, lying together with the anchor, which had been attached to his
neck, where the faithful had reverently laid him. They raised the holy
remains, and translated them to Constantinople.
In 862, the Sclavonic princes of Pannonia, Rostislaw, Swaetopolk, and
Kotel requested the emperor Michael and the patriarch Photius, to send
them teachers, "because they were without true instructors for the
people," and they desired to have instruction and divine worship in
their own language. It appears that missionaries of the Latin Church
had already penetrated amongst them, but probably had been unable to
master the Sclavonic tongue; at any rate, the Pannonians refused to
accept them, and turned instead to the East.
None were better calculated to execute this mission than the brothers
Methodius and Cyril, the former of whom had for some years governed
a Sclavonic province, and both had been born at Thessalonica, on the
confines of Sclavonic peoples, and where the language was familiar
to the natives. The emperor and the patriarch felt this, and sent
for them, and laid before them the desire of these heathen princes
for the Gospel. The brothers at once undertook the mission, and set
forth. On their way, Methodius was the means of converting the king of
the Bulgarians. Boris had a sister, who was a Christian, having been
brought up at Constantinople, whither she had been carried captive. The
prince, who was passionately fond of hunting, desired the emperor to
procure him a picture, which should illustrate his favourite pursuit,
and adorn the hall of a new palace he had erected. Methodius was
commissioned by the emperor to execute this task, and he appeared
before king Boris, not as a missionary, but as a painter. "Let it be
a good picture," said the prince, "large and terrible." "So shall it
be," answered Methodius, "but one thing I demand,--that I may be left
undisturbed here to complete my picture, that no one may see it till
it is finished." The king reluctantly gave his consent, and day after
day passed, and the painter was not seen. He remained closely shut up
within the palace. Weeks rolled by, and Boris chafed with impatience
and curiosity. At length the doors were thrown open, and the king
entered. Methodius had painted the Last Judgment on the wall of the new
hall. Above sat Christ on the great white throne, and below were men
receiving sentence, and the angels dividing them. An awe and wonder
fell on the king's heart as he contemplated the picture. "What meaneth
this?" he asked. And Methodius seized the opportunity of preaching to
him righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come. He explained to
the king the whole doctrine of the final judgment of men, their fate
depending on their works in this world, and the king trembled. He went
on to speak of the glories prepared for the baptized who keep the
faith. Great and purifying thoughts swelled the bosom of the prince,
and going up to the painter, he said, with his head bowed, "Take me,
and teach me, that I too may pass to the beautiful side of the picture."
And when Cyril and Methodius had preached the Word of God among the
Bulgarians, they journeyed on, bearing the bones of S. Clement,
and their Sclavonic translation of the Holy Gospels, into Moravia,
where they laboured about four and a half years with great success.
The bishops of the neighbouring German provinces, however, viewed
the mission of these Easterns with jealousy, and complained to pope
Nicolas I. of their performing the liturgy in the Sclavonic language.
The unsuccessful war waged by Rostislaw with the Germans, and the
deposition of Photius at Constantinople, who had commissioned the two
apostles, gave Nicolas the opportunity of summoning the two Greek
missionaries to Rome. On their journey (in 868) they were subjected
to vexatious treatment at Venice, on account of their cause, but
pope Adrian II., who had succeeded Nicolas, dreading to lose Moravia
and Pannonia, received them with great cordiality, permitted them
to celebrate the divine mysteries in Sclavonic at the grave of the
Apostles, ordained their disciples, Formosus and Gonderik,[38] bishops,
three others priests, and two lectors. He also sanctioned the use of
the Sclavonic liturgy. The following account from the Lections of the
Olmutz Breviary will not prove uninteresting. "The blessed Cyril, by
the grace of God, after he had converted the Moravians, invented new
alphabetical letters, and translated the Old and New Testaments, and
many other things from Greek or Latin, into the Sclavonic tongue;
and he appointed to be sung Mass, and the other canonical hours in
the church. And to this day they are thus sung in Sclavonic parts,
especially in Bulgaria, and thereby many souls are drawn to Christ
the Lord. And when after some time the said Cyril went to Rome out
of devotion, he was rebuked by the sovereign pontiff and the other
rulers of the church, because, contrary to the canons, he had appointed
the holy Mass to be sung in the Sclavonic tongue. But he, humbly
endeavouring to satisfy them, but not able to convince them wholly,
snatched up the Psalter, and read the words of the Psalmist, 'Let
everything that hath breath praise the Lord.' _Omnis spiritus laudet
Dominum._ And he said, 'If every one that hath breath is to praise
the Lord, why, my fathers, do ye forbid me to perform the Mass in the
Sclavonic tongue, or to translate other things from Latin and Greek
into the vernacular? Finding the people simple and ignorant of the ways
of the Lord, I, by the inspiration of God, found this means of drawing
many to God. Therefore, pardon me, my fathers, and, following the
example of S. Paul, the doctor of the Gentiles,--Forbid not to speak
with tongues. (I Cor. xiv. 39.)' And they, hearing him, and wondering
at his sanctity and faith, gave him authority in those parts to say
Mass, and sing the Canonical Hours, in the aforesaid tongue."
[38] Gonderik, bishop of Viliterni, was the author of the Life of S.
Clement, which contains much information on the life and acts of SS.
Cyril and Methodius.
Cyril died in Rome shortly after, Feb. 14th, 869, in a monastery into
which he had retired; but Methodius, according to the entreaty of his
dying brother, returned to Moravia, to find that the hostility of the
German prelates and clergy was not allayed. Political disturbances,
fomented by the Germans, broke out between 869 and 901, and Rostislaw
was reduced to ruin. Methodius held himself aloof from these contests,
and in 870 went with his disciples into Pannonia, where the court
received him and gave up to him the castle of Salava in Mosburg, as
a residence. Kotel now besought the pope to consecrate Methodius
archbishop of Pannonia, and his request was complied with. But the
German clergy, especially the archbishops of Salzburg and Mainz, who
unfortunately were ambitious rather of extending their authority than
of preaching the Gospel to the people, were exasperated by this to the
highest pitch, and they stirred up against him the German emperor and
the Moravian prince Swaetopolk, and brought matters so far that he was
driven into banishment for a year and a half or two years. Pope John
VIII. restored to him his see in 874. At last the Moravian Sclaves saw
through the ambition of the bishops his opponents, and expelled them
the country, at the same time writing to the pope to request him to
appoint Methodius archbishop of Moravia. This John VIII. consented to,
and "from this time," says the contemporary writer of the Pannonian
history of S. Methodius, "the divine doctrine began to grow and
spread rapidly, and heathenism and superstition to disappear." But
the archbishops of Salzburg and Mainz, who claimed jurisdiction over
the Sclavonic races, though not converted by them, could not forgive
Methodius the loss of their power and position in the country. They
hastened to Rome, and complained that Methodius was heretical on the
subject of the Double Procession, that he taught the independence of
the Moravian Church, and that he celebrated the Liturgy in the vulgar
tongue. Pope John thereupon, in 878, forbade the performance of the
Liturgy in Sclavonic, and in the following year summoned Methodius to
appear before him in Rome. The German-Latin prelates triumphed; they
appeared in Moravia, and declared that Methodius was deposed, and that
his authority had been transferred to them. But pope John, on the
appearance of the apostle before him, was satisfied of his orthodoxy,
and confirmed him in his position and authority over the Moravian
Church. Disappointed in their hope of ruining Methodius at Rome, the
German prelates now spread the report that the archbishop had incurred
the displeasure of the emperor by his submission to the pope. Methodius
was therefore obliged to make a journey to Constantinople, where he
was cordially received by the emperor Basil, and then dismissed with
many presents. As soon as it was proved that the report of the anger
of the imperial court was false, the enemies of Methodius endeavoured
to dispose Swaetopolk, the prince, against him; and this they were the
more able to effect, because the prince was a man of immoral life, and
had incurred the reprimand of the archbishop on more than one occasion.
Gradually, influenced by these treacherous apostles of Mammon, rather
than of Jesus Christ, Swaetopolk became alienated from Methodius; but
in spite of all their efforts, and the coldness of the prince, all the
Sclavonic races, from Croatia and Dalmatia to the confines of Poland,
heard in their own tongue the celebration of the Divine mysteries,
and looked to Methodius as their archbishop. Moreover he effected the
conversion of the Bohemian Duke Borivoi, and introduced Christianity
into his lands. He founded at Prague the church of Our Lady, and
another dedicated to SS. Peter and Paul; and died on April 6th, 885.
Relics of S. Cyril at Rome in S. Clemente, and at Brunn, in Moravia. In
Art S. Cyril is represented in a philosopher's long habit, and bearded.
S. Methodius as an archbishop with the pallium, holding in one hand a
picture of the Last Judgment.