Caput VIII
The Merciful Bishop and His True Lords
John the Merciful identifies the poor as his true lords, practices open accessibility, and is rewarded with a vision of Mercy herself, while Ambrose warns priests against partiality.
John the Merciful, soon after he was ordained, ordered all his own lords who were in Alexandria to be registered individually, so that he might give them a sufficient stipend according to their number. To him the attendants said: "Who, pray, are your lords, O patriarch?" But he said: "Those whom you call beggars." He also used to sit at a set time, day by day, in the vestibule of the house, so that anyone who wished could bring his own case before him without hindrance. For he used to say that just as we listen to our own petitioners, so God listens to us when we petition him. A certain man from among the taxpayers shamefully provoked his grandson; and though the grandson was demanding vengeance against him, the patriarch kissed the young man's chest and said: "My son, if you are my grandson, imitate me." And he ordered that the debt for the whole year be remitted to him.1 For to this same John, Mercy appeared in the form of a most beautiful woman; and from then on he was so greatly devoted to alms that on this account he was called Eleymonos — that is, "the Merciful." Saint Ambrose says that faith is burdened by no excess so much as when a priest accuses an innocent poor man and lets a wealthy guilty man off the hook.
The Law of Nature and the Duty of Charity
Drawing on the Pauline body metaphor and the law of nature, the text argues that failing to aid a needy fellow believer is worse than the behavior of wild beasts, and that fraternal correction, though painful, is an act of true friendship.
And whoever fails to defend the helpless, when they're able, is no different from the one doing the harm. Likewise: Let us show favor to those from whom we hope for something in return, but it is more fitting to care for the weak, for whom Christ is the rewarder. Likewise in the same source: It is a great fault if, without your knowing it, a fellow believer is in need, because this is the law of nature — that one person should contribute to another as one part of the body contributes to another part. Whoever does not give to a brother is not even to be compared with wild beasts, who give to their own young. Nothing is so contrary to nature as harming another for your own sake — yet if faith were to weigh carefully whether the cause is God's, it would see that it is.2 In your own cause, you are permitted to stay silent; but in the cause of God, to conceal a sin is no trivial matter. If, however, you recognize some vice in a brother, rebuke him; and if he thinks himself hurt — even if the rebuke wounds his spirit — do not be afraid, because as it is written: 'The wounds of a friend are better than the kisses of flatterers' (Prov.✦3 27, 6).
Holy Bishops as Models of Humility and Detachment
The chapter closes with counsels on accepting rebuke from inferiors, choosing wise companions, maintaining purity of speech, and the examples of Paulinus and Augustine, encouraging contemporary bishops to find consolation in the sufferings of their holy predecessors.
So even if your friend is lower in status, when the situation calls for it, let him rebuke you and be heard as an equal and a peer. And this is his rule about personal attendants: It is fitting, he says, that we be joined to the most approved men and to the elders, whose experience is safer. For nothing is more beautiful than to have men of good testimony as witnesses. Whoever walks with the wise will be wise, but on the contrary, a person's own household members will become his enemies.✦ He would purify these servants in such a way that neither their more modest members nor the use of them would be called by the names that country people commonly use. Blessed Paulinus too, bishop of the city of Nola, when he had feared being tortured by barbarians for revealing a treasure, was asking the Lord, saying: O Lord, let me not be tormented for gold, because I do not love gold. Blessed Augustine acknowledges this in the book On the City of God. Let these things be said about the holy bishops, so that nothing recent or new may seem to belong to a bishop of our time if he has endured such things, or certainly much lighter ones.
Read the original Latin
Joannes Eleymonos mox ut ordinatus est, omnes dominos suos qui erant in Alexandria viritim jussit describi, quatenus eis sufficienter stipem pro numero daret. Cui ministri: Quinam sunt, inquiunt, o patriarcha, domini tui? At ille: Illi, inquit, quos vos mendicos appellatis. Qui etiam certo tempore per singulos dies in vestibulo domus residebat, ut quisquis vellet ad eum sine prohibitione causam suam perferre posset. Dicebat enim quia sicut nos petitores nostros, sic Deus nos petentes exaudit. Quidam ex tributariis nepotem ejus turpiter lacessivit; qui cum de eo vindictam expeteret, ille pectus ejus deosculans dixit: Fili, si nepos meus es, me imitare; jussitque ut ei totius anni debitum relaxaretur. Eidem namque Joanni Misericordia in specie pulcherrimae mulieris apparuit, qui dehinc eleemosynis tantopere deditus est, ut ob hoc Eleymonos, id est misericors, vocitetur. Sanctus Ambrosius nullo excessu fidem sic dicit gravari, quam si innocentem pauperem sacerdos arguat, et divitem reum excuset.
Et qui non defendit inopem, si valet, similis est laedenti. Item: His, inquit, favemus a quibus vicem speramus; sed infirmis consulere magis convenit, pro quibus Christus remunerator est. Item in eodem: Grandis culpa est, si, te nesciente, fidelis egeat, quia haec est lex naturae ut alter alteri tanquam pars corporis partem conferat. Qui non tribuit fratri, nec feris comparandus est, quae suis fetibus tribuunt. Nihil tam contra naturam quam laedere alterum tui causa, quod tamen si causa Dei est fides perpenderet. In tua causa silere tibi licet, in causa Dei dissimulare peccatum est non leve. Si quid autem vitii in fratre cognoveris, corripe; et si se laedi putet, etsi animum ejus correptio vulneret, tu tamen ne verearis; quia, ut scriptum est: Meliora sunt amici vulnera quam adulantium oscula (Prov. XXVII, 6).
Licet ergo inferior sit amicus, tamen si res poposcerit, ut objurget, audiatur quasi par et aequalis. De cubiculariis vero sic: Decorum, inquit, illud est, ut adjungamur probatissimis quibusque, et senioribus, quorum usus tutior est. Nihil enim pulchrius quam boni testimonii viros testes habere. Qui cum sapientibus graditur, sapiens erit: et econtra inimici hominis domestici ejus. Quos videlicet ministros ita castificabat, ut nec verecundiora membra nec eorum usus his quibus a rusticis appellari solent nominibus nuncuparentur. Beatus quoque Paulinus, Nolanae civitatis episcopus, cum a barbaris propter thesaurum insinuandum extimuisset tormentari, rogabat Dominum, dicens: O Domine, non crucier propter aurum, quia non diligo aurum. Hoc beatus Augustinus in libro de Civitate Dei fatetur. Haec de sanctis pontificibus dicta sint, ut non recens quid vel novum nostri temporis episcopo videatur, si talia sive certe multo leviora pertulerit.
Scripture echoes
Notes
- 1 ↩nepos can mean either 'grandson' or 'nephew'; context favors 'grandson' but the direct address 'Fili' and 'nepos meus' suggests a familial relationship that could also be rendered 'nephew.' Chose 'grandson' as the more natural reading of the narrative.
- 2 ↩The Latin is syntactically compressed: 'quod tamen si causa Dei est fides perpenderet' — literally 'which yet, if the cause is God's, faith would weigh carefully.' The rendering unpacks the conditional so that 'faith' becomes the subject weighing the cause, preserving the sense that faith should discern whether a given situation is truly for God's sake.
- 3 ↩The quotation is from Proverbs 27:6. The Latin 'Meliora sunt amici vulnera quam adulantium oscula' preserves the Vulgate word order.
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