THE EPISTLES OF CYPRIAN: EPISTLE LXIII.--TO EPICTETUS AND TO THE CONGREGATION
OF ASSURAE, CONCERNING FORTUNATIANUS, FORMERLY THEIR BISHOP
EPISTLE LXIII.(2)
TO EPICTETUS AND TO THE CONGREGATION OF ASSURAE, CONCERNING FORTUNATIANUS,
FORMERLY THEIR BISHOP.
ARGUMENT.--HE WARNS EPICTETUS AND THE CONGREGATION OF THE ASSURITANS NOT TO
ALLOW FORTUNATIANUS, A LAPSER, BUT THEIR FORMER BISHOP, TO RETURN TO HIS
EPISCOPATE, AS WELL FOR OTHER REASONS AS BECAUSE IT HAD BEEN DECREED THAT LAPSED
BISHOPS SHOULD NOT BE ADMITTED TO THEIR FORMER RANK.
1. Cyprian to Epictetus his brother, and to the people established at
Assurae, greeting. I was gravely and grievously disturbed, dearest brethren, at
learning that Fortunatianus, formerly bishop among you, after the sad lapse of his
fall, was now wishing to act as if he were sound, and beginning to claim for
himself the episcopate. Which thing distressed me; in the first place, on his
own account, who, wretched man that he is, being either wholly blinded in the
darkness of the devil, or deceived by the sacrilegious persuasion of certain
persons; when he ought to be making atonement, and to give himself to the work of
entreating the Lord night and day, by tears, and supplications, and prayers,
dares still to claim to himself the priesthood which he has betrayed, as if it were
right, from the altars of the devil, to approach to the altar of God. Or as if
he would not provoke a greater wrath and indignation of the Lord against
himself in the day of judgment, who, not being able to be a guide to the brethren in
faith and virtue, stands forth as a teacher in perfidy, in boldness, and in
temerity; and he who has not taught the brethren to stand bravely in the battle,
teaches those who are conquered and prostrate not even to ask for pardon;
although the Lord says, "To them have ye poured a drink-offering, and to them have
ye offered a meat-offering. Shall I not be angry for these things? saith the
Lord."(3) And in another place, "He that sacrificeth to any god, save unto the
Lord only, shall be destroyed."(4) Moreover, the Lord again speaks, and says,
"They have worshipped those whom their own fingers have made: and the mean man
boweth down, and the great man humbleth himself: and I will not forgive them."(5)
In the Apocalypse also, we read the anger of the Lord threatening, and saying,
"If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his
forehead or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God mixed
in the cup of His anger; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in
the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: and the smoke
of their torments shall ascend up for ever and ever; neither shall they have
rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image."(6)
2. Since, therefore, the Lord threatens these torments, these punishments
in the day of judgment, to those who obey the devil and sacrifice to idols, how
does he think that he can act as a priest of God who has obeyed and served the
priests of the devil; or how does he think that his hand can be transferred to
the sacrifice of God and the prayer of the Lord which has been captive to
sacrilege and to crime, when in the sacred Scriptures God forbids the priests to
approach to sacrifice even if they have been in lighter guilt; and says in
Leviticus: "The man in whom there shall be any blemish or stain shall not approach to
offer gifts to God?"(7) Also in Exodus: "And let the priests which come near
to the Lord God sanctify themselves, lest perchance the Lord forsake them."(8)
And again: "And when they come near to minister at the altar of the Holy One,
they shall not bring sin upon them, lest they die."(9) Those, therefore, who have
brought grievous sins upon themselves, that is, who, by sacrificing to idols,
have offered sacrilegious sacrifices, cannot claim to themselves the priesthood
of God, nor make any prayer for their brethren in His sight; since it is
written in the Gospel, "God heareth not a sinner; but if any man be a worshipper of
God, and doeth His will, him He heareth."(10) Nevertheless the profound gloom
of the falling darkness has so blinded the hearts of some, that they receive no
light from the wholesome precepts, but, once turned away from the direct path
of the true way, they are hurried headlong and suddenly by the night and error
of their sins.(11)
3. Nor is it wonderful if now those reject our counsels, or the Lord's
precepts, who have denied the Lord. They desire gifts, and offerings, and gain,
for which formerly they watched insatiably. They still long also for suppers and
banquets, whose debauch they belched forth in the indigestion lately left to
the day, most manifestly proving now that they did not before serve religion, but
rather their belly and gain, with profane cupidity. Whence also we perceive
and believe that this rebuke has come from God's searching out, that they might
not continue to stand at the altar; and any further, as unchaste persons, to
have to do with modesty; as perfidious, to have to do with faith; as profane, with
religion; as earthly, with things divine; as sacrilegious, with things sacred.
That such persons may not return again to the profanation of the altar, and to
the contagion of the brethren, we must keep watch with all our powers, and
strive with all our strength, that, as far as in us lies, we may keep them back
from this audacity of their wickedness, that they attempt not any longer to act
in the character of priest; who, cast down to the lowest pit of death, have gone
headlong with the weight of a greater destruction beyond the lapses of the
laity.
4. But if, among these insane persons, their incurable madness shall
continue, and, with the withdrawal of the Holy Spirit, the blindness which has begun
shall remain in its deep night, our counsel will be to separate individual
brethren from their deceitfulness; and, lest any one should run into the toils of
their error, to separate them from their contagion. Since neither can the
oblation be consecrated where the Holy Spirit is not; nor can the Lord avail to any
one by the prayers and supplications of one who himself has done despite to the
Lord. But if Fortunatianus, either by the blindness induced by the devil
forgetful of his crime, or become a minister and servant of the devil for deceiving
the brotherhood, shall persevere in this his madness, do you, as far as in you
lies, strive, and in this darkness of the rage of the devil, recall the minds
of the brethren from error, that they may not easily consent to the madness of
another; that they may not make themselves partakers in the crimes of abandoned
men; but being sound, let them maintain the constant tenor of their salvation,
and of the integrity preserved and guarded by them.(1)
5. Let the lapsed, however, who acknowledge the greatness of their sin,
not depart from entreating the Lord, nor forsake the Catholic Church, which has
been appointed one and alone by the Lord; but, continuing in their atonements
and entreating the Lord's mercy, let them knock at the door of the Church, that
they may be received there where once they were, and may return to Christ from
whom they have departed, and not listen to those who deceive them with a
fallacious and deadly seduction; since it is written, "Let no man deceive you with
vain words, for because of these things cometh the wrath of God upon the children
of disobedience; be not ye therefore partakers with them."(2) Therefore let no
one associate himself with the contumacious, and those who do not fear God,
and those who entirely with draw from the Church. But if any one should be
impatient of entreating the Lord who is offended, and should be unwilling to obey us,
but should follow desperate and abandoned men, he must take the blame to
himself when the day of judgment shall come. For how shall he be able in that day
to entreat the Lord, who has both before this denied Christ, and now also the
Church of Christ, and not obeying bishops sound and wholesome and living, has
made himself an associate and a partaker with the dying? I bid you, dearest
brethren and longed-for, ever heartily farewell.