DIONYSIUS OF ALEXANDRIA

On October 18 (5), the Church honors the memory of St. Dionysius of Alexandria (+265). The saint was the fourteenth bishop of Alexandria. We owe detailed information about Dionysius to the “Church History” of Eusebius of Caesarea (+339). The author, who is called the “Father of Church History,” dedicated part of the sixth and the entire seventh book of his immortal work to Dionysius.

Dionysius was born at the end of the second century into a pagan family. His very name testifies to this. The ancient Church did not change the names of people coming to Christ, but, on the contrary, considered it necessary that every name given to a person at birth should be part of the Communion of Saints in baptism.

Before his conversion, Dionysius lived a secular pagan life, and turned to Christ after reading Christian books and communicating with Origen. After his baptism, already being a presbyter, in 231-32 Dionysius headed the famous Alexandrian Theological School. “At the same time, Bishop Zebinnus of Antioch passed into another life; Babylas became his successor; in Alexandria, after Demetrius, Heracles carried out his duties; the management of the Catechumenical School passed to Dionysius, also one of Origen’s disciples,” Eusebius testifies (VI, 29).

In 247, Dionysius was elected bishop of Alexandria. “It was the third year of Philip’s reign when, after sixteen years of episcopacy in Alexandria, Heracles died; Dionysius succeeded him” (VI, 35). During his extremely long pontificate at that time, which lasted 17 years, the saint experienced three severe persecutions: 1. The first, at the end of the reign of Philip the Arabian (d.249) in 248 in Alexandria, which eventually turned into a civil war; 2. The second, the Persecution of Decius (d.251) in 249-251, which was extremely bloody and swept throughout the Empire; 3. And finally, the third, It began in 257, under Valerian (ruled in 253-260), who initially favored Christians, but then, under the influence of magicians, began a brutal persecution of Christians.

The result of Decius’ persecution was a multitude of renunciations of the faith. But the number of martyrs and confessors was also great. Prefect Sabinus ordered the bishop to be searched everywhere, being sure that he had fled the city. “I stayed at home for four days, waiting for the soldiers to come, and they circled all over the neighborhood, tracking me along roads, rivers, and fields, where they suspected I was hiding,” Eusebius quotes Dionysius himself in one of the Epistles (VI, 40, 2). Eventually finding him in the city Roman soldiers led him to massacre. But on the way, he was unexpectedly released by the surrounding peasants. Like his great contemporary, Cyprian of Carthage (+258), Dionysius remained in exile until the death of Decius.

In the third persecution, under Valerian, the saint was exiled to Libya. But, contrary to the plan of the pagans, who believed that lynching and massacre of the local population awaited the saint in places of exile, he preached the Gospel. “At first they chased us and threw stones at us, but then many pagans left the idols and turned to God. Then for the first time the word was sown there: they had not heard it before” (VII, 11, 13). After the persecutor Valerian was captured and killed by the Persians in 260, Dionysius returned to the City, but, due to the outbreak of the civil war, he was deprived of access to his flock and addressed it in mournful and, at the same time, comforting letters.

And finally, Dionysius introduced into the life of the Church a new, now unfortunately forgotten, image of holiness. Around 260, when civil war broke out in Alexandria after the death of the persecutor Emperor, followed by a terrible epidemic and plague, all the pagans fled in fear. “They drove those who fell ill out of the house, abandoned their closest ones, threw the half–dead into the street, left the corpses without burial - they were afraid of death” (VII, 22,10).

Unlike pagans who considered themselves religious, Christians, whom the same pagans considered godless and atheists, cared for the sick, strengthened them and comforted them, stayed with them until their death. They themselves died, while those who were the subject of their care often recovered and remained alive. “Very many of our brothers, out of an abundance of mercy and brotherly love, without sparing themselves, fearlessly served the sick, caring for them for Christ’s sake. Filled with the suffering of others, they became infected from the sick and willingly took on their sufferings, joyfully died together (VII, 22, 7).

“They took the bodies of the saints with outstretched arms and pressed them to their chests, carried them on their shoulders and could not, hugging them, tear themselves away from them” (IX, 22,7). “Such a death, possible only through great piety and strong faith, was considered equal to martyrdom,” Dionysius writes in his Epistle (IX, 22,7).

The memory of the “Alexandrian Martyrs” who served their neighbors even before their death became a celebration in the Ancient Church. So, in the Roman Martyrology, on the 28th day of the month of February, the following memory was preserved: “The memory of the holy presbyters, deacons and many others who, in the time of Emperor Valerian, when a very terrible epidemic raged in Alexandria in Egypt, taking care of those suffering from the disease, gladly met death - the faith of the pious reveres them as Martyrs.”

“Such a death is equal to martyrdom” — this comparison given by Dionysius is not accidental at all and is extremely important. The fact is that, unlike us, Orthodox Christians of the XXI century, who know many ways of holiness – martyrs, saints, venerable, righteous, fools in Christ, new martyrs, passion–bearers, unmercenaries - the Ancient Church, with the exception of the biblical holiness of the forefathers, patriarchs and prophets, and the New Testament apostolic holiness, knew and confessed only holiness of martyrs. The days of their death were called “Birthdays”, and the liturgy was celebrated on martyr tombs or relics.

An important evidence of this perception of holiness in our worship, preserved unchanged through many centuries, remains the troparion to All Saints, the initial words of which read: “Through the blood of Your martyrs who have suffered throughout the world, the Church cries out to You, O Christ God.”

“Those whom the whole world was not worthy of wandered through deserts and mountains, caves and gorges of the earth,” says the Epistle to the Hebrews (Hebrews 11:38). It is important to understand that we are talking here about Old Testament holiness. It meant non-participation in the pagan world, communion with the People of God, separation, flight, departure. The original sanctity of the Ancient Church had a completely different orientation, it meant witnessing about Christ in front of everyone, preaching, confession, and willingness to suffer for faith in Him.

The sanctity of the martyrs is sanctity as the blood innocently shed for the faith. This is also “death equal to martyrdom” … In fact, Saint Dionysius, by the power of grace given to him, and, most importantly, by his own example of serving others during a time of distress, revealed a new New Testament, boundless dimension of holiness - the Holiness of the Ocean of Tears.

The fact that he himself, like Bishop Cyprian of Carthage (200-258) at about the same time, also participated in the work of ministering to the sick in the epidemic, Dionysius humbly chose to keep silent. All his life he longed for martyrdom. As a result, having led him through three persecutions, the Lord kept him alive so that he could help the hopeless sick by word and example. By the way, it was Dionysius who was the first Christian bishop and saint in history to go down in history with the name “The Great”.