Pierre of Alexandria

Pierre of Alexandria , Father of the Church of the 4th century. It directed celebrates it theological school of Alexandria before becoming bishop. At the time of the persecution of 303, he preferred to hide to continue to serve the Church; what was reproached to him by one of its priests who created a schismatic Church thus from where the heresy left later Arius. In 311, it was stopped and condemned to be decapitated.

The November 24th is celebrated (local festival).

Biography

He became bishop of Alexandria into 300 and was martyrisé in November 311. According to Philippe de Sidètes it was one moment with the head of the famous catachetic school of Alexandria. Its theological importance comes owing to the fact that it marked, and most probably started, the reaction to Alexandria against the original extremist.

When, during the persecution of Dioclétien, Pierre Alexandria left to hide, the schism mélénien burst. We have three accounts different from this schism: According to three Latin documents (translated originals Greek lost) and published by Maffei, Mélétius (or Melitius), bishop of Lycopolis, benefitted from the absence of Pierre to usurp his patriarchal functions and enfreignit the guns by devoting bishops to seats which were not vacant, their occupants being in prison for the faith. Four of them protested, but Mélétius did not pay any attention to them and went indeed to Alexandria, where, with the incentive of a certain Isidore and from Arius, the hérésiarque future, it drew aside those which Pierre had installed in their stations and named others of them. On this Pierre excommunicated it. Athanase not only shows Mélétius to be led in a turbulent and schismatic way, but to have sacrificed to the idols and to have denounced Pierre with the emperor. There is no incompatibility between the Latin documents and testimony of Athanase, but the assertion according to which Mélétius would have sacrificed must be received with prudence; it is probably based on a rumor coming from the immunity which it seemed to enjoy. In any event one understood nothing such a charge to the Council of Nicée. According to Épiphane ( Haer . , 68), Mélétius and Pierre quarreled about the reconciliation of the lapsi , the first leaning one for more severe ideas. Épiphane probably drew its information from source mélétienne and its history is full with historical errors. Thus, to take an example, Pierre was a companion of captivity of Mélétius and was martyrisé in its prison. According to Eusèbe its martyrdom was unexpected and thus was thus not preceded by a imprisonment.

Works

One has a collection of fourteen guns published by Pierre in the third year of persecution treating mainly lapsi, probably extracted from a Pascale epistle. The fact that they were ratified by the Council of Trullo and thus became part of the canon law of the Eastern Church, probably explains their conservation. Many manuscripts contain one fifteenth gun drawn from a writing over Passover. It is in these guns that the cases of the various kinds of lapsi were distinct.

The acts of the martyrdom of Pierre are too late to have an unspecified historical value. One sees the history of Christ there appearing to him with his torn clothing, thus predicting the schism of Arius. Three passages “On the Divinity”, apparently written against the sights subordinationnists of Origène, were quoted by saint Cyrille with the Concile of Éphèse. Two other passages (into syriaque) claiming to be same book were printed by Pitra in Analecta Sacra, IV, 188; their authenticity is doubtful. Leonce de Byzance quotes a passage affirming two natures of Christ drawn from a work, La come from Christ, and two passages of the first book of a treaty against the idea that the heart before being plain with the body would have existed and would have sinned. This treaty must be written against Origène. Very important are seven fragments preserved into syriaque (Pitra, COp cit., IV, 189-93) of another work on the Resurrection, in which the identity of the body assembled to the sky with the terrestrial body is maintained against Origène

Five Armenian fragments were also published by Pitra (COp cit., IV, 430 sq.). Two of them correspond to one of the doubtful fragments syriaques. The three others are probably falsifications due to the monophysites (Harnack, Altchrist. Lit., 447). A fragment quoted by the emperor Justinien in his Letter with the Patriarch Carried out, allegedly drawn from Mystagogie of Pierre saint is probably a forgery (see Routh, Reliq. Bag . , III, 372; Harnack, COp cit., 448). The Chronicon Paschale gives a long extract of a text supposed of Peter over Passover. He denounces himself as a forgery because of a reference to Athanase (that the editors often remove) unless indeed it is only about one interpolation. A fragment, initially printed by Routh, of a Treaty Sur Blasphème is generally regarded as a forgery. A fragment copte on the observation of Sunday, published by Schmidt (Texte und Untersuchung, IV) were recognized like forgery by Delehaye, with the verdict of which criticisms seem to agree. Other fragments coptes were revised using a translation of Crum in the Journal off Theological Studies (IV, 287 sqq.). The majority of them come from the same manuscript as the fragment revised by Schmidt. Their written editor: “It would be difficult to maintain the authenticity of these texts after criticisms of Delehaye (Anal. Bolland., XX, 101), although some of the passages, that I published can indicate that the compositions were rather interpolated that entirely apocryphal books. ”

Sources

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