IV
Purpose and Places

When the Amidan ascetics were expelled, some journeyed widely. John himself traveled through Palestine, down into Egypt, across the Anatolian provinces, and on to Constantinople; his journeys provided much of the material for his Lives of the Eastern Saints . John's accounts of the ascetics who stayed in and around Amida are combined with his narratives of the Mesopotamian ascetics working in larger arenas of Christendom, especially in Egypt and in Constantinople. The combination provides a powerful medium for his ascetic vision, a vision as unified as his subjects and locations are diverse.

Egypt: The Community Witness

Following the lead of Severus of Antioch, Monophysite bishops by choice began to gather in Egypt even before the order of banishment reached their sees; for others, it was the nearest point of refuge.^[1] It was not surprising that exiled ascetics should arrive also, drawn as much by the tradition of Egypt's deserts as by the hope for safety.^[2] The first arrivals set the tone: a community was formed, noted for its discipline in faith and in practice. When John of Ephesus set out for Egypt in the early 530s, it was to visit this exiled community.^[3]

The community that interested John was from Palestine, but its roots were Syrian and its fame in John's time rested largely on its identity as a Syrian group. Its founder was the holy woman Susan, by birth from

the Persian territory of Arzanene, an area with strong ties to Syriac Christianity.^[4] Susan had turned to asceticism as a child. At the age of eight she left home, first in pilgrimage to Jerusalem and then to enter a convent in Palestine between Ascalon and Gaza. Some ten years later the persecutions began. Palestine was a major target, and Susan's convent, "since it was large and celebrated," was soon attacked. Facing the alternatives of confrontation or flight, Susan decided to leave for the desert outside Alexandria. Her choice distressed the sisters, who held her in high regard; five chose to follow her, despite her admonitions to the contrary.

From Alexandria the women soon found a suitable place to settle: an area in the desert, not far from the village of Mendis, with an abandoned fortress for shelter.^[5] Removed from the pressure of harassment and with Susan as spiritual guide, the nuns resumed their routine of prayer and labor. The village provided handiwork by which they could earn their keep and also looked after their general welfare.

Susan, however, had longed for solitude, and a nearby cave offered seclusion.^[6] But her testing of her vocation as a hermit brought panic to the sisters, for the nuns looked to her for leadership: "Don't you know that we came out to the desert trusting in you after our Lord? . . . Don't you know that without you we cannot exist?"^[7] At last a compromise had to be reached, and Susan agreed to a split routine, divided between solitude and interludes with her nuns. Susan's contemplative labors provided the embryonic community with a testimony to spiritual authority that did not go unnoticed; the community began to grow. At the same time, its reputation spread. The nuns' story reached a small community of monks, also of Mesopotamian origin, who had lived near to their convent in Palestine but were now suffering pursuit by the Chalcedonian authorities. Hearing of "the quietude and sweetness of that desert," the men soon found their way to the nuns and established themselves in the same area. Numbers in both communities increased as the persecutions elsewhere wore on. Still, the safety of Egypt did not provide an escape from the responsibilities of the religious crisis. Susan desired the anchoretic life, but the congregation outside Mendis required strong leadership because of the circumstances that had brought them together. In the eyes of both the men and the women, Susan alone was capable of this role. For her part, Susan understood that times of crisis demand critical action; although unhappy to assume the role of director for the community of men and women, Susan did so—and she did so very well.^[8]

But Susan's community and others like it were more than resettlement camps for refugees. They were places in which the Monophysite

faith was nourished and practiced, providing a steady witness in the midst of persecution. Their impact was strengthened by the parallel activity of Severus himself,^[9] a situation John of Ephesus emphasizes specifically in his Lives of the Eastern Saints .^[10] Fleeing Antioch in 518, Severus had gone first to Alexandria and the hospitality of the patriarch Timothy IV.^[11] From there he went on to the desert, where he "carried out to the full" the monastic vocation of his youth.^[12] As in the case of others with similar experience, Severus' standing as church leader had been reinforced by his early ascetic training at the hands of Peter the Iberian in the monastery of Maïouma outside Gaza.^[13] The return to the ascetic life enhanced his status in the broader world, all the more since withdrawal did not lighten his workload. Severus continued to conduct affairs internal and external for the Monophysite body.^[14] There were, however, some who took the patriarch's retreat as an excuse to slacken their ecclesiastical discipline.^[15] Severus' fear, unhappily prophetic, was that internal problems were diverting the believers' energy from the real battle at hand.^[16] By the nature of his presence and activity in Egypt, Severus enacted the model that John of Ephesus propagated: under persecution the Monophysites witnessed the soundness of their faith, and that witness was grounded in an ascetic practice responsive to times of crisis. John himself praised the religious vehicle Egypt had become in its position as Monophysite base. His account of Thomas the Armenian, for example, relates how this ascetic, while founding a monastic community in his homeland, came to Alexandria both to obtain books and to converse with the leaders and the religious who were gathered there.^[17]

Elsewhere John offers praise for the Egyptian Monophysite body itself.^[18] But in his Lives he hints that Egypt's spiritual authority was heightened by the presence of those who brought to it the particular witness of his own ascetic roots; so it is that John includes the story of the two deacons Thomas and Stephen.^[19] When the persecutions reached Mesopotamia, Amida's episcopal throne suffered from a crisis in leadership. The bishop Thomas, who had guided Amida since 504/5, died upon the arrival of an imperial order for his banishment in 519. He was succeeded by Nonnus, who survived only three months. The distinguished Mare was then consecrated and expelled, probably in 521. Finally the seat was taken over by the Chalcedonian Abraham bar Kaili, who held it for the next thirty years.^[20]

Mare was banished to Petra; with him there went a small retinue that included the deacons Thomas and Stephen.^[21] Petra proved a harsh place for the Amidans. In desperation, Mare sent Stephen to Constantinople for help.^[22] There Stephen encountered the future empress Theo-

dora, at the time a newly married patrician. In the peculiar pattern that later became their standard, the royal couple intervened: the place of exile was changed to Alexandria.^[23] Soon after, when Mare and his followers were resettled in Egypt, they heard of other Amidans in the region and of Susan's community in the desert of Mendis.^[24] It did not take long for Thomas and Stephen to find their way there. Thomas in particular was inspired and longed to partake of their spiritual discipline. In a "pit" not far from the community—possibly the "cave" that Susan herself had used for solitary practice—the deacon undertook the hermit's vocation.

But Thomas' story is joined to that of his comrade Stephen, and their partnership, as John writes it, is essential.^[25] Stephen himself was no less fervent than Thomas, but chronic infirmity had modified his own asceticism. At the time of Thomas' decision, Stephen, showing a sentiment near to John's, begged his friend not to seek so rigorous a practice: "For ourselves, this is too great a thing to live in the desert on account of our feebleness; but, my brother, let us look after our soul, and gain a desert by our manner of life and our heart, and always entreat the Lord to cause his grace to shine upon us."^[26] Thomas was undeterred; after one brief trip home to sort out his affairs, he labored in his pit for many years until his death. But John leaves no doubt in the reader's mind as to Stephen's own excellence: the gentler deacon went on to achieve great works as a leader in the refugee community of Constantinople and as an adviser to the empress Theodora, so touched by her first meeting with the Amidan. As elsewhere in John's Lives, these two men and their respective works are shown as two halves of the same whole; each completed the other.

However, it was the likes of Thomas that made Monophysite Egypt more than a cauldron of discontent, a point that John does not fail to underscore. Eventually Egypt had to be dealt with as the haven it had become. A Chalcedonian government could not allow the continued nourishment of a dissenting church. Justinian's efforts towards Chalcedonian restoration in Egypt began in 536, following the final breakdown that year of religious negotiations in Constantinople. His measures led to bloodshed that was to last decades and in Alexandria in particular was to flare up at every excuse.^[27] It was not until John the Almsgiver assumed the patriarchal seat in 611 that serious attempts were made to win over the Egyptian Monophysites, rather than to force submission.^[28] In fact, John's eight years on the throne were spent pacifying memories of Chalcedonian atrocities committed at a level "unknown even among the pagans."^[29]

Still, Egypt's deserts were vast, its ascetic communities numerous and remote. Imperial officials could not compete with the loyal monastic networks; Egypt continued to offer escape for the persecuted. In the Lives of the Eastern Saints , John of Ephesus speaks of Severus' exile after his final banishment by imperial decree in 536; at the same time, he points to the nature of the authority that the Monophysites gained by practice in Egypt, such as that of Thomas or, indeed, such as that found in Susan's community.^[30] Working for the Monophysite faithful—and in irreproachable company—Severus completed his days. But the kind of refuge Egypt now offered gradually transformed the haven into a house prison.

Constantinople: Individuals in Community

Monophysite refugees had one other base at which to gather during Justinian's reign: the imperial city itself.^[31] Severus had paved the way by his presence there during the early years of the sixth century, under sponsorship of the emperor Anastasius. As the story of Thomas and Stephen indicates, another powerful source of influence was now had in the empress Theodora. Through her, favors could be sought and, in Constantinople, safe shelter found.

The curious bipartisan religious loyalties of Justinian and Theodora played a fundamental role during their reign. Justinian's commitment to Chalcedonian faith and Theodora's to the Monophysites seemed odder for the fact that theirs was truly an imperial partnership.^[32]

Traditionally, the key to their religious differences has been sought in the writings of Procopius.^[33] Procopius insists that the antithetical loyalties of the pair were in fact an illusion, that they purposely cultivated this appearance as part of a larger policy to divide and rule. "They set the Christians at variance with one another, and by pretending to go opposite ways from each other in the matters under dispute, they succeeded in rending them all asunder."^[34] A similar view is offered by Evagrius Scholasticus,^[35] a more cautious historian, who claims that the ecclesiastical policy of Justinian and Theodora was one that allowed them to divide the empire between themselves: by dividing their religious loyalties they gave way to neither, while ensuring that both sides were cared for financially as well as politically. But Evagrius indicates the complexity of the situation by adding that in matters of faith, fathers were opposed to sons, sons to parents, wives to husbands, and husbands to wives.^[36]

Monophysite sources offer ample tribute to Theodora and her works on their behalf. It was Theodora who brought relief from the persecutions, whether by influencing Justinian to relent even briefly or by providing safe refuge; it was she, too, who sheltered and protected the Monophysite patriarchs while they visited the royal city, and she who gave money for the relief of the ascetic refugees; and it was her death that marked the end to Monophysite hopes, according to some sources.^[37] Syrian tradition went so far as to rewrite altogether the history of the empress's notorious youth. The child of a circus family who grew up on stage as a sexual acrobat became the chaste daughter of a Monophysite priest in the eastern provinces, with whom the young Justinian fell in love while on a military campaign. Her parents, this story went, were alarmed by Justinian's Chalcedonian views and agreed to a betrothal only on the grounds that he would leave her faith unchanged.^[38]

Theodora was undoubtedly as loyal to the Monophysite cause as she appeared. Her conversion to this theological stance apparently happened while she was in Egypt, long before her marriage to Justinian,^[39] and Chalcedonian sources also attest the money and effort she expended on their opponents.^[40] Less clear is the exact nature of Justinian's religious convictions. Monophysite sources present a confused memory of the matter. Even some of the sources that record the persecutions offer praise for Justinian's religious activities.^[41]

In fact, our subtlest picture of Justinian, and of the perhaps more elusive Theodora, emerges from the pen of John of Ephesus, who knew the royal family well. It is apparent in the Lives of the Eastern Saints that John holds a heartfelt respect for both, regardless of official imperial policies—a situation the more profound for its circumstances.^[42]

In the Lives , John praises Theodora's works and mentions her activities apart from Monophysite affairs; he neither shuns nor exploits her rise from prostitution to the imperial throne.^[43] Yet, John also indicates that the empress's efforts on behalf of the Monophysites were successful only to a certain degree: she was able to intercede for mercy on behalf of her supplicants and to sponsor the maintenance of the many refugees who came to Constantinople. Nonetheless, these measures amounted to little more than providing immediate comfort for those in need. Constantinople, like Egypt, became a convenient house prison by which the government could curtail the activities of its dissidents; similarly, Theodora's protection for the vulnerable Monophysite patriarchs, though allowing for their safe concealment, did not permit them freedom of movement.

It is in relation to Theodora that John offers information on Justinian's nature. Not only did the empress act with the emperor's knowledge, but he himself sometimes patronized the Monophysites in the capital.^[44] He accompanied her on visits to the Monophysite holy men for religious instruction and, even after her death, continued to show concern for the welfare of the Monophysite community, especially in Constantinople, because of his love for her and devotion to her memory.^[45]

Then, too, this Chalcedonian emperor chose John to perform extensive missionary work against pagans and heretics (primarily Montanists) in Asia, Phrygia, Caria, and Lydia.^[46] Few have doubted that John used the opportunity to spread Monophysitism; although Michael the Syrian reports that John propagated Chalcedonian faith because he was acting at the emperor's behest, and that he judged it a lesser evil than paganism or Montanism.^[47] John clearly had the privilege of forthright speech with Justinian.^[48]

But the emperor's position was understandably affected by diverse concerns.^[49] His aspirations to regain the lost western provinces necessitated courting the papacy by advancing an official pro-Chalcedonian policy. At the same time, he took this crisis seriously as a theological problem. He rejected what he saw as the too easily categorized pro- and anti-Chalcedonian positions and sought a solution that could reconcile the language of Chalcedon with that of Cyril of Alexandria. He marked this idea with "conversations" he sponsored between Chalcedonians and Monophysites. Over the course of his reign his own theological writings progressed significantly towards this goal. Ironically, his final lapse into aphthartodocetic heresy gave witness to deeply Monophysite leanings in his personal theology.^[50]

The imperial conversations were sporadically convened from the time of Justinian's accession but were regarded by the Monophysite leaders, at least, as less than serious efforts. Nonetheless, the failure of these dialogues to reach satisfactory results did not daunt the spirit of the Monophysite community for a surprisingly long time but instead seemed to spark their optimism. Perhaps the simple fact that these dialogues took place sustained their confidence as to their own strength.

However, the designated spokesmen for the conversations did not share such a view. Severus of Antioch, for one, was convinced from the start that a peaceful resolution was impossible.^[51] For a time he continued to refuse numerous imperial summonses, so the first large-scale attempt at discussions held in 532 took place without him.^[52] Even so the Monophysite cause was impressively represented by John of Tella, John of Beith-Aphthonia, and others. The three-way interchange, between Jus-

tinian, the pro-Chalcedonian bishops, and the Monophysites was exhausting and hazardous. It did not work, and the telling point was its failure on what amounted to practical rather than theological grounds: although Justinian granted generous theological concessions, he would not suspend the policy that bishops had to sign a document accepting the Chalcedonian definition in order to hold their sees.^[53] In other words, while gaining their right to dissent, the Monophysites would not be allowed to resume their ecclesiastical positions without actually accepting the Chalcedonian definition they had rejected. Politics ruled the event. Severus' absence bothered Justinian, as it should have.^[54] The gathering dissolved without achieving a compromise.

Repeated summonses to Severus, prompted by Theodora, produced no result, for he argued that if he came to Constantinople, public opinion would be dangerously provoked.^[55] Finally, in 534/5 Severus conceded, pressured from all sides about the urgency of what was taking place in the capital.^[56] For a year and a half after that, efforts were made on all parts to reach an understanding. Alarmed, the Roman papacy intervened, a move that culminated in a renewed proclamation of Chalcedon and a final condemnation in 536 of Severus and the other Monophysite bishops.^[57] When Theodora died in 548, a lukewarm attempt was made to bully the Monophysites, now without their imperial advocate, into an agreement. It showed itself as markedly ill judged: the extreme measures had served only to harden the Monophysites' convictions.^[58] The General Synod of Constantinople in 553 with its condemnation of the "Three Chapters," and the renewed initiative in 571 of Justinian's successor, Justin II, to seek theologial resolution through imperially sponsored dialogues, proved futile.^[59] John of Ephesus wrote of these times, describing the Monophysite spokesmen who came repeatedly to the imperial city, "seething, burning with zeal for unity" on each occasion, each time leaving with nothing at all accomplished.^[60]

In his Lives John of Ephesus indicates that the Monophysite community in Constantinople grew up during the early years of Justinian's reign for two basic reasons. First, some came to the imperial city out of anger to protest against the anti-Monophysite policies. This was not a foolhardy act. When Constantine I convened the Council of Nicea in 325, he sanctioned imperial accountability on religious issues. Matters of dispute could be, and frequently were, brought before an imperial audience by holy men or women whose spiritual authority superseded their often unimpressive civil statuses.^[61] Second, some of the Monophysite body were drawn to the capital by the patronage of Theodora, whose thirst for spiritual direction was great. Despite the violence of popular

opinion against Monophysite thought in Constantinople,^[62] it was a natural gathering place: the sheer concentration of life in the New Rome somehow gave space for all who came.^[63] While Egypt offered a stabilizing center for the persecuted Monophysite movement, in the overall circumstances attention inevitably shifted to Constantinople once Justinian and Theodora ascended the throne. Dependent on those who stayed behind to care for the faithful, the Monophysite community in the imperial city presented a pattern of activity that profoundly substantiated the moral force of their position.

John of Ephesus presents the Constantinopolitan community during the years of Justinian's reign with a particular tone of confidence. Here his stories are heroic, filled with forceful acts by the Monophysites and cowering humility by the Chalcedonians. John's tone in these stories is distinct, presenting a picture of far greater impact than can possibly have been the case. But since the solution to the religious conflict within the Byzantine Empire lay in the hands of the imperial court, these stories suggested to the wider Monophysite audience that their position with the authorities remained strong. The stories offer, too, the comforting picture of the Monophysite holy men interceding effectively on their behalf in the presence of their earthly rulers no less than with those above.

The stylite Z'ura was one of the first to come.^[64] Forced down from his pillar near Amida by Chalcedonian zealots, he had set off at once for Constantinople in order to protest the state of religious affairs, accompanied by a band of trusted disciples, perhaps in the year 535.^[65] But Z'ura was more than a disgruntled stylite; he was a holy man whose career had set him in a position of authority for the eastern Monophysites. His impact on the imperial city is attested elsewhere than in John's account,^[66] a point that lends weight to John's claim that Chalcedonian informers had warned Justinian to watch out for Z'ura's arrival.^[67]

In John's story, Justinian prepared himself for the encounter. But Z'ura arrived with such presence and spoke so bluntly that Justinian's only response was a temper tantrum. John tells us that Z'ura left the court "in violent rage" and returned to his holy works, now in the confines of the royal city. John portrays the entire sequence as one continuous and valiant action: Z'ura's ascetic practice, his labors on the pillar, and his foray into Constantinople and perhaps into the palace itself, all in fulfillment of the holy man's vows. There was neither hesitation in the stylite's actions nor faltering in his ascetic practice, despite the dangers of persecution.^[68]

In earlier days, Daniel the Stylite had prefigured this action, also with extravagant drama, when he descended his pillar during the brief reign of the usurper Basiliscus; but in Daniel's case, the stylite had acted in support of the opposing cause of Chalcedonian faith and (by default) that of the emperor Zeno.^[69] In Z'ura's case, John describes a scene of sharp positions, tinged with a biblical flavor that recalls the meetings between Moses and the Pharaoh of Egypt. Divine intervention led, John tells us, to Justinian falling seriously ill, as if in chastisement for his treatment of the little holy man. Theodora, "who was very cunning," concealed the emperor's condition but summoned Z'ura who, John claims, effected a cure immediately. "And thenceforth the dread of the blessed man fell upon Justinian."^[70] Since Justinian suffered near-fatal illness more than once during his reign, John may well be conflating a group of events in attributing one of these occasions to Z'ura's encounter with the emperor.^[71] But more importantly for John, the story enables him to present a chastened emperor, whether because Theodora had put pressure on him or because Z'ura himself had proved so commanding. According to John, Justinian recanted and paid due homage to the stylite, "but only the state of the church he did not set right."^[72]

But John could turn even this ambivalent victory to Z'ura's advantage. He tells us that the stylite and his disciples proceeded to undertake a ministry within Constantinople, working with the poor and strangers and becoming very popular as a result. Theodora herself provided his place of residence, a villa at Sycae across the Golden Horn.

John further relates that Z'ura's reputation had reached Rome, worrying the pope who later humiliated himself in a vain effort to confront the stylite.^[73] Eventually, Z'ura's standing in the public eye grew large enough to warrant a response from the palace. The empress sent him to a camp in Thrace that she provided for Monophysites, lest he bring about "sedition and evil in the city [of Constantinople]."^[74] By this time, Theodosius, the patriarch of Alexandria, had also settled there in exile, and John tells us, "thereafter the blessed men dwelt there together, while that camp thundered praise."^[75]

John portrays the Monophysite ascetics who came to Constantinople, whether to protest or to seek shelter, as persons of serious consequence to the life of the city and to the imperial couple. For example, he tells the story of Mare the Solitary, an Amidan ascetic who had pursued his vocation in Egypt. When the persecutions struck there, he too responded by hastening to Constantinople and forcing his way into the court.^[76] Mare's behavior was so extreme that even John was shocked,

and while praising his motives, he could not bring himself to present the details of Mare's encounter with Justinian and Theodora.^[77]

Mare settled in Constantinople's environs, though his desire for solitude led him also to Sycae across the water. John presents Mare's ascetic discipline as if it were as forceful a weapon as his assault on the imperial court. People marveled, Justinian and Theodora no less than others. Indeed, John claims that Theodora pursued the solitary, begging his personal guidance; but when she flooded him with messages, gifts, money, and requests, the Amidan holy man scorned them all.^[78] Instead, after some time as a recluse, Mare used money earned from his own labors to found a monastery that served as a hospice for the poor. Thus, Mare's days were passed "practicing mighty spiritual labours . . . and stoutly always reproving the king and queen with great freedom and without fear, and everyone marvelled at his teaching and at his deeds and at his words."^[79]

Ascetics like Z'ura and Mare continued the Syrian tradition of religious vocation as an individual action beyond the confines of church or monastic institution. John understood the import of their presence in Constantinople in specific terms. When the Great Plague struck the city, Mare was to be one of its victims. John offers the story of Mare's life in much the same way as the solitary offered himself in sacrifice during the scourge. Thus, while the populace suffered the dreadful destruction, Mare "passed his time in affliction and great sorrow, and occupied himself with constant prayer and petition to God . . . kneeling and praying on behalf of the whole world."^[80] At his death, John claims, Justinian and Theodora commanded a magnificent procession in honor of the blessed man. The words John speaks for another ascetic are also meaningful here: Mare died, "nothing whatever having been found to weaken him, or to make him remit what he had originally undertaken, not sickness nor persecutions nor any other distresses."^[81]

Constantinople: The Community Witness

In contrast to the negotiations and the theological dialogues, and as if to provide a practical defense for Monophysite theology, Theodora took the occasion of the persecutions to gather an impressive flock of ascetics to the imperial city.^[82] Thus when John narrated the "Lives of Thomas and Stephen,"^[83] he specified Theodora's reasons for bringing Stephen to the imperial city: "because of his eloquence and his conversa-

tion and his wisdom, and moreover because he also lived a pure life and after the manner of a solitary."^[84]

In John's view, the ascetics brought at the empress's request were no less worthy than those, such as Z'ura or Mare, who came of their own volition. For his part, Stephen had not been happy to receive the imperial summons to a far more public life than he would have wished, but he chose to accept it. Like John's other subjects, Stephen pursued his ascetic practices in Constantinople with the same humility that he had shown elsewhere. John found him there,

a great harbour of rest for all the afflicted who used to repair to him from all quarters . . . so that even the king and queen themselves stood in awe of his venerable mode of life.^[85]

Comprised of such figures, the Constantinopolitan community appeared to the Monophysite body as a witness to their faith in the midst of the very city that produced their trials. So John paid homage to those "gathered together in the royal city by the believing queen," where

the congregation of persecuted saints was so widely extended that it shone with many who had under the constraint of the persecution come down from columns and been ejected from places of seclusion, and been expelled from districts, and their congregation was rendered illustrious by great and distinguished heads of convents from all quarters of the east and of the west, and Syria and Armenia, Cappadocia and Cilicia, Isauria and Lycaonia, and Asia and Alexandria and Byzantium, countries which beyond others burned with zeal for the faith.^[86]

This company settled in the city under the empress's aegis at the palace of Hormisdas; some, such as Stephen, settled in the imperial residence itself.^[87] With Theodora's generosity, they transformed their quarters into monastic dwellings. One could enter Hormisdas "as into a great and marvellous desert of solitaries and marvel at their numbers, and wonder at their venerable appearance."^[88] Their impact on the imperial city was, John tells us, disconcerting:

Many of the supporters of the synod of Chalcedon . . . when they saw this marvellous community, and learned the causes of the persecution of it, had their mind filled with affliction and contrition, and renounced the Chalcedonian communion, and asked for communion with them.^[89]

To this body Theodora came frequently, "going round among them and making obeisance to them and being regularly blessed by each one of them." Justinian, too, "who was ranged against them on account of the synod of Chalcedon," came and "was attached to many of them and trusted them, and was constantly received and blessed by them."^[90] One

can allow for considerable exaggeration by John with regard to the actual impact of the Monophysite community on the Constantinopolitans, but the spirit he portrays among the Monophysites themselves must lie close to the mark, for it was this spirit that provided the strength to build their own independent tradition. John would have it that the exiled community had turned a "foreign" land into their own; they had transformed a place of persecution into one of worship.

John heightened his emphasis on the role of the Constantinopolitan community by placing his account of it alongside a brief chapter commemorating the Monophysite patriarchs "who distinguished themselves in exile in the time of persecution."^[91] This chapter primarily praises the leadership team of Severus of Antioch, Theodosius of Alexandria, and Anthimus of Constantinople, who became the main target for the final banishment orders in 536. Anthimus, formerly bishop of Trebizond, had participated in the imperial conversations of 532 as a Chalcedonian delegate. But he had been deeply moved by the Monophysite arguments and came to develop a close friendship with Severus when the latter arrived at the imperial city. His consecration to Constantinople in 535, like that of Theodosius to Alexandria in the same year, owed much to Theodora's efforts. Once he had been won over to the Monophysite cause, Anthimus remained steadfast despite the hardships involved.^[92] Severus, Anthimus, and Theodosius together and individually served the Monophysite movement with spirit and skill during the persecutions, almost entirely while suffering their own hardships in exile.^[93] Their concerted energies were crucial for stabilizing the Monophysite movement as a whole; the lack of such unified effort by their successors contributed to the disintegration of the Monophysites into bickering factions toward the end of the sixth century.^[94]

The Monophysite refugees in Constantinople made their impact largely because the Monophysite leadership was articulate and cohesive in providing a theological basis for their witness of faith. In turn, the leadership was strengthened by having this disciplined ascetic following prominently in view.^[95] But John did not allow his readers to forget the realities of the situation. Thus he includes the "Life of Tribunus," a layman who accompanied the expelled Amidan monks to Constantinople and whose story offers a different shading to John's portrait of life in the refugee community.^[96]

Tribunus was from Sophanene, near Amida, born of a wealthy and well-educated family. He became a frequent visitor at the monastery where Habib and Z'ura dwelt, and he continued to follow Z'ura's guidance when the holy man ascended his pillar after Habib's death. When

the persecutions forced the stylite down, Z'ura chose Tribunus to accompany him to the imperial city, "as an interpreter of the Greek tongue." But the pious layman did more than that; he settled in Constantinople with Z'ura and his disciples, "imitating their practices and occupied in spiritual employment." Soon he asked permission to take monastic vows. Suddenly, vision and necessity collided.

For the blessed men would not allow him, saying "It is better both for you and for us that you should go in and out of the city and the palace as a layman, and carry communications for us." . . . And so he performed the service . . . insomuch that he gained easier entry and more freedom, and they even thrust the office of a count on him under constraint by [Z'ura's] command saying, "This will be no impediment to your practices; and when you wish, it is easy for you to give up the office."^[97]

"Count" Tribunus obeyed (though, as a secular appointment, the office had to have come from Justinian), acquiring the worldly title and means he had always scorned when pushed in that direction by his family. Finally, Z'ura died; the layman was now free to answer his calling. He did so, "accomplishing the labor of his practices on a great scale, having also added to his spiritual labours the extra labour of hospitality and the relief of the poor, living and delighting also in voluntary poverty."^[98]

As an ascetic, Tribunus fit precisely the model John praised. His withdrawal from the temporal world was in no way the abandonment of those who were in the world; his turning to the spiritual life was a turn to the life of service. Yet Tribunus was for many years denied his full vocation by those who were its greatest exponents, this for reasons of simple expediency.

John's account of Tribunus makes two points. First, whatever triumphs might be claimed for the exiles, their position remained insoluble. Tribunus, "who in habit was a layman and a count, but in the performance of excellence complete and perfect,"^[99] was proof that when the Monophysite ascetics were forced into the methods of the temporal world, their faith was not necessarily belied. But second, and perhaps more decisively as John again puts forth his view, holy presence, or divine agency, cannot be confined to a space separated from the temporal realm and its needs. Rather, a layman, as much as a stylite, might be the occasion of God's presence in the world. Thus, John tells us, the gathering grew, gradually gaining its own reputation for ascetic excellence.^[100]

But John does not imply that the imperial city was devoid of its own authoritative witness. A telling example is his account of Theodore, who was chamberlain and castrensis in the imperial court.^[101] Theodore con-

ducted his work in the royal palace while "living in fasting and constant prayers, and sorrow and tears and works of charity." In fact, he had found a model for this double-edged career in an old man who had served the court before him as praepositus sacri cubiculi .^[102] But after a time, Theodore longed for undistracted pursuit of the divine. He asked permission from Justinian to leave "the turmoil of the palace" and to "devote himself to the practice of religion only."^[103]

The emperor granted the request and Theodore turned to serving the city's poor and needy; the wealth he brought with him was rapidly spent. John describes Theodore, whom he often saw, as "intoxicated with the fervour of divine love," but many in the ascetic community felt concerned because he had soon reduced himself to destitution. Unexpectedly, John says, Justinian himself intervened, granting the ascetic a substantial annual stipend, enough both for Theodore and for much work with the poor.^[104]

John presents the Constantinopolitan Monophysite community honestly. The witness displayed by its members did not conceal the reality that this shelter from persecution was little more than a house prison for dissidents. The community was compelled to make compromises even to maintain its own ascetic integrity, as in the case of Tribunus, in order to remain active; indeed, the more prominent leaders had to be kept virtual prisoners by the empress, so great was the care required to keep them safe.^[105] Moreover, as Theodore's story implies, much of the Monophysites' freedom in the capital was possible because of Justinian's beneficence rather than Theodora's activities. The emperor was sensitive to expressions of genuine faith, and he found among the Monophysites an element of religious spirit that truly did move him, despite his official policies against Monophysites elsewhere and despite his harsh treatment of heretics, pagans, and Jews.^[106]

But if John was honest in describing the life of the exiled community in the capital, his enthusiasm was unimpaired. The refugees arrived, he tells us, to find the means for resuming their vocations. Here too there was work to be done. So it was for John's compatriot Hala, who reached the imperial city ill from the hardships endured en route.^[107] But the sight of the ascetic gathering in the palace of Hormisdas, and of the many suffering people of the city itself, was for him like manna from heaven:

Like a poor man who loses one of his great possessions, and decides in his mind that it will never be found again, and suddenly sees it and is astonished and glad, so it was with this blessed man also . . . and so he perfectly carried out all the ministry to the needy. . . . [And he] sought that one object, to relieve persons in trouble, till everyone was astonished at him and they gave thanks to God.^[108]

In the face of so many individuals carrying out such activities, it was no surprise that Justinian's successor, Justin II, felt it necessary to persecute the Monophysite gathering in the capital with a severity previously reserved for the provinces.^[109]

The accounts John offers of ascetics in Egypt and Constantinople are not separable from his narrations of the Amidan community. The Lives tell us why the Monophysite ascetics of the East played such a critically complementary role to that of the movement's leaders, solidifying the cause at a popular level. In Amida's villages, in Egypt's deserts, and in the imperial city itself, Monophysite spiritual life was pursued in the midst of temporal turmoil and in the midst of secular society.

Epilogue. Amida and Constantinople: Holy Presence

Private contemplation of the divine and personal ascetic pursuits do have their place in John's presentation, but their purpose is specifically allotted and not portrayed as self-justifying. John does not disapprove of those who follow such practices, but the infrequency and the brevity of his accounts on such subjects indicate their secondary position in his scheme; they are congruous with his overall portrait only when their wider context is established. So, for example, with Thomas and Stephen, the single-minded seclusion of the first and the selfless labors of the second are juxtaposed in such a way that each is validated by the other. But an impressive statement of John's perspective on solitary practice can be found in his two accounts of holy fools.

The holy fool represented an ultimate severance from the temporal world, one so complete as to be completely internalized. Consequently, it was displayed by disguised immersion in the most debauched and cruel aspects of urban society.^[110] Where the ascetic ideal focused on life in a space apart from urban society—in desert, wilderness, monastery, or convent—the holy fool achieved the ideal condition wherever he or she might be in utter estrangement. Dead to the world, no worldly space existed for them: they inhabited only the realm of divine contemplation.

John's most elaborate account is of two holy fools, a man and a woman living in spiritual marriage, who stayed for a time in Amida.^[111] Their story is unique in the Lives for it is told secondhand, although John does claim to have seen the couple in Tella.^[112] The literary incongruity of the story has led to the view that it may be fiction, a story within a story, which John included in his Lives for its edifying value.^[113] Such a piece is

wholly uncharacteristic of John in this collection; however, the chapter's function in light of John's views remains the same in either case.

The couple masqueraded by day as mime actors, hence as harlot and pimp; they received daily abuse and humiliation. Yet by night they could not be found by those who wished to buy the woman's favors. While they were in Amida, a monk had noticed the strange matter and followed the couple secretly, only to discover that under shield of darkness their profession was not what it had seemed. By night, they prayed in a remote spot on the city walls until dawn threatened their privacy; the air around them shone with radiance. Distressed at having been discovered, and unable to convince the monk that he must publicly abuse them as the crowds did each day, they left for another city to retain their anonymous practice.

The story's actual setting and the couple's perfection offset one another. The couple had been drawn in particular to Amida: "We like being in this city which is a city of Christians."^[114] Further, their religious practices were exercised on Amida's city walls.^[115] But as John himself had recounted elsewhere, Amida's experience of tragedy in the sixth century had been overwhelming.^[116] Its walls had been the scene of treachery and slaughter; its citizens had endured a religious war within their own ranks. Yet this couple had found the city good, "a city of Christians," and had blessed by their acts of prayer the very walls that once had brought destruction.

True or not, the story provides John with a moving statement of redemption and divine favor for the city and its people, themes that are most often his central focus. The Amidan ascetics are affirmed and legitimized here by this outside witness: divine grace was thus made manifest in Amida. The ascetics' own authority could only be strengthened by such testimony.

John recounts one other appearance of a holy fool, this one taking place in Constantinople.^[117] In contrast to the romantic tones surrounding the couple in Amida, this encounter is clearly genuine; but the contextual parallels are striking. John himself had observed a certain beggar who fearfully fled any offer of charity. Thinking this poor man must in reality be "a spiritual person," John sent one of the monks from his monastery at Sycae to follow him. The monk discovered the man in the act of prayer and, finding the spectacle so powerful, fell into a state of hysteria lasting the entire day despite John's efforts to calm him. When they finally achieved a dialogue with the beggar, he expressed the same loathing of public recognition that the couple in Amida had.

He told John's monk that he was one of seven men leading a life of poverty, anonymity, and ascetic labor in Constantinople; and that the group of them met once each week for the Eucharist and for encouragement. He, too, begged to be left alone and nameless in his labors.

I have given you the information; see that you do not make yourself the cause of my moving from this city, in which I have much peacefulness, and especially the fact that I am reckoned a madman by them, and there is no one who speaks with me. And beg the abbot [John of Ephesus] that though these things are known to him, he will leave me as I am, and not show any difference toward me.^[118]

As discussed earlier, like Amida, Constantinople was caught in the hardships of war, political unrest, and Bubonic Plague. Themselves refugees from the tragedy of the Byzantine East, John and the Monophysite community labored among Constantinople's populace just as they and their comrades had done in the city of Amida. The encounter with the holy fool once again served to offer hope for salvation; grace was present even in Constantinople despite the times. Once more, John's ascetics are granted authority by contact with a practice of single-minded contemplation of God; likewise, this man could pursue his solitary practice with integrity because of its complement in the labors of John's ascetics.

In the course of his Lives , John presents several portraits of virtuous solitaries, set in the various locales of his stories. Thus he reminds his readers that he is writing in praise of lives devoted to the divine. They serve to emphasize that spiritual authority and its temporal extension are grounded in a vision of holy presence and divine grace in society's world. And nowhere does John say this more clearly than in his tributes to these holy fools.