On the 11th day of May
From the «Lives of the Saints» of St. Demetrius (Dimitri) of Rostov
Birth at Thessalonica: Methodius and Constantine
In the years of the Greek iconoclast emperors Leo the Armenian and, after him, Michael the Stammerer, who was called Balbus, and then also of Michael’s son Theophilus, there was in Thessalonica, the city of the Thessalonians, a well-born and wealthy man named Leo, a soldier by rank, a centurion by office, whose wife was named Mary. These two bore those two lamps of the world and enlighteners of the Slav lands, Methodius and Constantine, who was later called Cyril in the holy schema. For Methodius, the elder by birth, came of age and served in a military regiment, and the emperor knew him and made him a military governor, and sent him into the lands that bordered on the Slavs. And this was by the Providence of God, that he might learn the Slav tongue, for he was later to be their spiritual teacher and shepherd. He remained in the office of military governor some ten years; and because he had seen the vanity of worldly life, and also because he was wearied by the persecution which the iconoclast emperor Theophilus had raised against the Orthodox, he left the governorship and all the beauty of this world, and went to Mount Olympus, where he was tonsured into the monastic order and laboured for the King of Heaven in the angelic habit, warring against the invisible enemies — the evil spirits. The blessed Constantine was born after Methodius, and from his swaddling-clothes showed something wondrous in himself. For when, after the birth, his mother gave him to a wet-nurse to suckle at her breasts, he would by no means take food from another woman’s breast, but only from his own mother’s — that the child of good parents might not be nourished with a stranger’s milk. And those who had begotten him marvelled.
The Dream of Sophia, the Wisdom of God, and His Studies
When he was a boy of seven years and was beginning to learn his letters, he saw a strange dream, and told it to his father and mother, saying: “A certain military governor gathered together all the maidens of our city and said to me: ‘Choose for yourself from among them whichever you wish as your companion, that she may be your helper in all the days of your life.’ And I, looking over them, chose one who was fairer than all the rest, whose face shone and who was adorned with every precious ornament, and her name was Sophia.” His parents pondered what he had seen, and understood that the maiden Sophia — the Wisdom of God — was to be given to the boy by God; and they rejoiced in spirit, and taught him diligently and always, not only the reading of books but also good and God-pleasing habits, directing him to spiritual wisdom and speaking to him in Solomon’s words: “My son, honour God and you shall be strengthened; keep the commandments and you shall live, and write His words upon the tablets of your heart. Call wisdom your sister, and make understanding your close friend,” “for she is more beautiful than the sun and than all that is in the world.” The boy studied books, and surpassed all his fellows in memory and understanding, and had great love for St. Gregory the Theologian, whose books he always read and from which he learned many sayings by heart. He also wrote a praise of the saint: having depicted a cross upon the wall, he wrote beneath the cross these words: “O holy Hierarch of God, Gregory the Theologian! In body you are a man, in life an angel, for your lips, like the seraphim, have glorified God with praises, and your Orthodox teachings have enlightened the universe. I ask you, receive me also, for I fall down before you with faith and love, and be my teacher and enlightener.”
The Logothete, and His Studies in Constantinople
In those days the emperor Theophilus died, and after him his son Michael came to reign, together with his mother, the pious empress Theodora. That emperor was still a young boy, and there were appointed over him three tutors, great nobles: Manuel the Domestic, Theoctistus the Patrician, and the Logothete of the Drome. That Logothete knew the parents of Methodius and Constantine. And the Logothete, having heard of the keen mind of the boy Constantine, sent for him that he might study together with the young Michael, who was learning books: that, looking upon Constantine’s quick wit, the emperor might himself strive and learn quickly. The boy rejoiced greatly at this, and on the way prayed to God with the prayer of Solomon, saying: “O God of my fathers and Lord of mercy, who made man, grant me the Wisdom that stands before Your throne, and do not reject me from among Your children, for I am Your servant and the son of Your handmaid. Grant that I may understand what is pleasing to You, and labour for You, the Lord my God, in all the days of my life.” And when he was brought to Constantinople and given over to the imperial teachers, he soon learned all outward wisdom — grammar and Homer’s verses, rhetoric and philosophy, arithmetic and astronomy, music and all the subtleties of the Greeks. And he was a marvel to his teachers, because of such a quick mind of his. And he was later called the Philosopher, because he made greater progress in the love of wisdom than others. Nor was he wise only in the Greek tongue, but in other tongues as well; for he learned the Roman writings well, and the Syriac speech, and other foreign languages. And the Logothete loved him greatly, both for his wisdom and for the virtue of his good conduct, with which the young man, having come of age, was filled: the grace of God dwelt in his pure heart and directed him to every good work. Seeing this in him, the lord Logothete honoured him greatly, and Constantine was the first domestic in the Logothete’s household, holding authority over all. And he was given the right to enter the imperial palace boldly and without hindrance whenever he wished, for authority was given him, since he was beloved of the emperor as well.
Flight from Marriage, and Librarian of Hagia Sophia
The Logothete had a spiritual daughter, received by him from the font of holy baptism, a maiden very fair and of high family, whom he had in his care by her parents. Therefore the Logothete wished to give her in marriage to Constantine, striving in every way, persuading him to wed with many words and promising honour and a high office from the emperor together with wealth. But the blessed Constantine, avoiding the world and all worldly things, went secretly to the Narrow Sea and there entered a certain monastery and took upon himself the monastic habit. Not only the Logothete searched for him, but the emperor as well; and after six months they barely found him, hidden like a treasure in the monastic habit, and with difficulty took him from the monastery and brought him back to Constantinople, that the lamp might not be hidden under a bushel but set on a lampstand, and persuaded him to accept the priestly rank. The Patriarch at that time was the most holy Methodius, and the iconoclast heresy had already been rooted out of the Church. Then Constantine was appointed librarian of the cathedral church of Holy Wisdom and teacher of philosophy. After some year, the Hagarenes who held Syria — who in the reign of the previous emperor Theophilus had defeated the Greek army (by God’s permission, for sins) and destroyed the fair city of Amorium, as is written at length on the sixth day of March in the Passion of the holy martyrs of Amorium — boasting of their strength and mocking the Christians, sent to Constantinople an insult upon the Most Holy Trinity, saying: “You Christians say that there is one God, and you divide Him into three, confessing Father, Son and Spirit. If you can show that openly, send us also such men as will be able to discourse with us about your faith and convince us.” And the emperor, taking counsel with the most holy patriarch, sent Constantine the Philosopher to the Saracens, giving him two prudent assessors. And the blessed man went there, following Christ after the apostolic manner and desiring to suffer for Him.
The Mission to the Saracens: Samara on the Euphrates
And he came to the Saracen prince’s city called Samara, which stands on the river Euphrates, in which the Saracen prince Amir-Mu’min dwelt. There were Christians there also, living among the Saracens, and there were painted on the outside of their doors demonic images, by command of the Saracen authority: for those men loathed the Christians as though they were demons, and insulted them and mocked them, and ordered that a demon be depicted on the door of every Christian. And the Saracens said to Constantine the Christian philosopher: “Can you understand, philosopher, what this sign means?” He answered: “I see demonic images painted, and I think that Christians live within there; for demons cannot live within together with Christians — they flee from them and remain outside. But where there are no such demonic images outside, it is known that they dwell within there with the men, having made them their own.” And when Constantine was at dinner in the prince’s hall, the Saracen sages said to him: “Do you see, philosopher, this wondrous thing — that the prophet Muhammad brought us a good teaching from God and turned many people? And we all keep his law firmly, without departing from it in the least. But you Christians keep the law of Christ sometimes this way and sometimes that, each believing and doing as he pleases. So many are there among you who disagree, differing in faith and in life, each of whom believes and teaches otherwise and sets up life otherwise: as they say ‘monk’ of those who wear black — and yet all are called Christians.”
Faith as an Unfathomable Sea
The blessed Constantine answered: “You have set two things before me: concerning the Christian faith in God, and concerning the law of Christ as it is kept in practice — that those who are called Christians do not believe and live alike. To the first of these I answer concerning faith. Our God is like a sea of boundless breadth and depth, unfathomable to the human mind and unutterable by human words, as the holy prophet Isaiah says of Him: ‘Who shall declare His generation?’ In like manner our teacher, the holy Apostle Paul, cried out, saying: ‘O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God, for His judgements are past finding out and His ways past tracing out.’ Into those depths many enter, striving to find God; and those who are strong in mind and have obtained the help of the Lord Himself swim safely across the sea of God’s unfathomableness and find the riches of understanding and of salvation. But those who are weak in mind and have lost God’s help through their pride, sailing as it were in rotten ships, try to cross that abyss; and being unable, some are drowned, falling into heresies and error, while others barely breathe with labour, troubled by unbelief and doubt. For that reason many Christians (as you say) differ in faith. So much concerning faith.
The Law of Christ and the Freedom of the Will
But concerning works I say this: the law of Christ is not another law, but the very same that God gave to Moses on Sinai — not to kill, not to steal, not to commit adultery, not to covet, and the rest; for our Lord says: ‘I have not come to destroy the law, but to fulfil it.’ Leading us on to perfection, He gave counsel of a pure and unmarried life, of the keeping of virginity and of other fair works for the better pleasing of God — which is a narrow and most sorrowful way, leading to life. Yet He does not compel to this, and it shall not be so: for God made man between heaven and earth, between angels and beasts, separating him from cattle by mind and understanding, and from angels by anger and desire, and gave him free will, that he might do as he wishes and be joined to that towards which he inclines — either joining himself to the angels by obeying God, as his mind enlightened by Him teaches, or to the unreasoning beast by obeying bodily desires without restraint. And because God made man his own master, therefore by our own will and not by compulsion He wishes us to be saved, and says: ‘Whoever wishes to come after Me, let him take up his cross and follow Me,’ ‘and let him who can receive it, receive it.’ Those Christians who believe in Him — some, by the easier way, that is, by the law of nature, live chastely in honourable marriage and direct themselves to Him with understanding; but others strive to become more ardent for Him and more perfect servants of Him, and touch even the supra-natural life, like the angels, and pass along the narrow way. For that reason Christians differ among themselves in manner of life. But your faith and your law have no such easiness — neither as a sea, nor as a little brook which anyone, great or small, can leap across without great labour. For there is in your faith and your law nothing divine and God-inspired, but only human customs and carnal reasoning, which you can easily perform. And your lawgiver Muhammad gave you no commandment which is hard to keep, since he did not turn you away from anger and from disorderly desire, but rather permitted you all things. Therefore you all keep his law with one mind — a law given you according to your desires. But our Saviour Christ did not act so: for being Himself most pure and the source of all purity, He wishes His servants to live purely, guarding themselves from every desire and joining themselves to the Pure One by purity, for nothing unclean shall enter into His Kingdom.”
The Sun as an Image of the Holy Trinity
Again the Saracen sages said: “How is it that you Christians divide God, who is one, into three gods: for you call Him Father, and Son, and Spirit. But if God can have a Son, then give Him a wife also, that many gods may be multiplied from Him.” The Christian philosopher answered: “Do not blaspheme the Most Divine Trinity, whom we have learned to confess from the ancient holy prophets, whom you also, as those who keep circumcision, do not altogether reject. Father, Son and Spirit are three hypostases, but the essence is one. Just as the sun visible in heaven God created in the image of the Holy Trinity — for there are three things in it: the disc, the rays of light, and the heat — so also in the Holy Trinity there are Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And the solar disc is the likeness of God the Father, for the disc has neither end nor beginning — so God also is without beginning and without end. And as from the solar disc the rays of light and the solar heat go forth, so from God the Father the Son is begotten and the Holy Spirit proceeds. The rays that go forth from the sun and enlighten all the world under heaven are the likeness of God the Son, begotten of the Father and revealed to the world under heaven. And the solar heat, which goes forth from that disc together with the rays, is the likeness of God the Holy Spirit, who from that same Father proceeds eternally together with the Son, though in time He is sent upon men from the Son also, as He was sent upon the apostles in the form of fiery tongues. And as the sun is composed of three things — the disc, the rays and the heat — yet is not divided into three suns, though each thing has its own property (for one thing is the solar disc, another its rays, and another its heat, yet we do not speak of three suns but of one sun) — so the Most Holy Trinity, though it has three Persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, is not divided in Godhead into three gods, but there is one God.
The Oak of Mamre, and Birth from the Virgin
For to the forefather Abraham also, whose circumcision you keep, when God appeared by the oak of Mamre — do you remember the writing which tells how He appeared? He appeared in three Persons. For he looked up with his eyes and saw that three men stood before him. And he bowed to the ground and said: ‘Lord, if I have found grace before Your face, do not pass by Your servant.’ Behold: he sees three men, yet speaks as to one, saying, ‘Lord, if I have found grace before Your face.’ For that holy forefather knew the one God in three Persons.” The Saracen sages did not know what to answer against this, and were silent; then they said: “How is it that you Christians say that God was born of a woman? Can God be born from a woman’s womb?” The philosopher answered: “Not of a common woman, but of the unwedded Most Pure Virgin, was God the Son born, by the working of the Holy Spirit, who in her most pure and most holy virginal womb ineffably founded flesh for Christ God and supernaturally accomplished for the Father’s Word incarnation and birth; for, conceiving Him of the Holy Spirit, the Virgin — as she was a Virgin before the birth — so in the birth and after the birth remained a Virgin Most Pure. Such was the will of God, and to His will and desire every created nature is subject: for where God wills, there the laws of nature depart. And that Christ was born of a pure Virgin by the Holy Spirit, your prophet Muhammad himself bears witness, writing: ‘The Holy Spirit was sent to the pure Virgin, that she might consent to bear Him a Son.’
Is Christ a Mere Man?
Again the Saracens said: “We do not deny that Christ was born of a pure Virgin, but we do not say that He is God.” The blessed man answered: “If Christ were a mere man and not God as well, what need would there have been for the Holy Spirit to work the conception of an ordinary man in the Most Pure Virgin’s womb? For an ordinary man is born of a married woman, not of a virgin who knows no marriage, and is conceived naturally of a man, not by a particular sending and working of the Holy Spirit.” The Saracens said: “If Christ is your God, then why do you not do what He commands you? For He commands you to pray for your enemies, to do good to those who hate and persecute you, to turn the cheek to those who strike you. But you do not do so — you do the opposite: you sharpen weapons against those who do such things to you, you go out to war, you kill.” The blessed Constantine said: “If in some law two commandments were written and given to men to keep, which man would be a true keeper of the law: he who keeps one commandment, or he who keeps both?” They answered: “He is the better who keeps both commandments.” The Philosopher said: “Christ our God, having commanded us to pray for those who wrong us and to do them good, also said this: ‘Greater love has no man than that he lay down his life for his friends.’ We endure the injuries done to us privately, in the commonwealth — but we stand up one for another, laying down our lives, so that you, when you take our brothers captive, may not take captive their souls along with their bodies, persuading them to God-opposing evil deeds.”
The Tribute to Caesar, the Poison, and the Return to Constantinople
Again the Saracens said: “Your Christ paid tribute for Himself and for others, so why do you not do His works and refuse to pay tribute? And if you stand up one for another, then give tribute for your brothers to our great and mighty Ishmaelite people.” The philosopher said: “If someone follows in his teacher’s footsteps and wishes to go on following him, and another, meeting him, turns him aside and does not permit him to go after his teacher but to go elsewhere — is that man his friend or his enemy?” They answered: “His enemy.” The Philosopher said: “When Christ paid tribute, which kingdom was it then — the Ishmaelite or the Roman?” They said: “The Roman.” The Philosopher said: “Therefore we, imitating our Teacher Christ the Lord, pay tribute to the emperor who sits in New Rome and holds Old Rome. But you seek tribute from us, turn us away from imitating Christ, and are our enemies.” Of this kind, and of other matters more, were the many days of Constantine’s contest with the Saracen sages, and the Christian Philosopher was unconquerable, for the grace of God helped him. And the Saracens were put to shame by him in all their objections and reasonings. Then, unable to overcome the unconquerable with words, they secretly gave him deadly poison to drink. But the Lord, who said, “If any man drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt him,” preserved His servant whole and unharmed. And He brought him back in health, dismissed with honour and gifts by the Saracen prince. The blessed Constantine returned to Constantinople, and having received praise from the emperor and from the most holy patriarch for his God-pleasing labour, settled in a solitary place and, attending to his own salvation, had his sustenance from the providence of God, on which he relied. And whatever God sent him through men who love Christ, of that he kept nothing until morning, but after his customary taking of food gave all to the poor: for he hoped in God, who cares for all daily, that He would open His hand and satisfy every living thing with His good pleasure. Once, when a feast-day came, his servant was sorrowful that they had nothing for that honourable day. The blessed Constantine said to him: “He who once fed the Israelites in the desert for many years — will He not feed us on this day? Go, summon without doubt at least five poor men to our table, and let us rely on God’s mercy, which will not forsake us.” And when the hour of dinner came, a certain man brought him a sack of all manner of food and ten gold pieces. And he, receiving this, gave praise to God his Helper.
The Khazar Embassy and the Journey to Cherson
Then he went to Olympus to his elder brother Methodius and began to live with him, passing his time in fasting and monastic labours, exercising himself always in prayer and in the reading of books. In that time ambassadors came to the emperor Michael from the Khazars, saying: “From the beginning we have known one God, who is over all, and to Him we pray, worshipping towards the east, but we keep certain pagan customs. The Jews press us to accept their faith, and many of us have already gone over to the Jewish faith. The Saracens also incline us to their faith, saying, ‘Our faith is better than that of all the nations.’ Therefore from you, with whom we keep an old friendship and love, we seek counsel for our profit, and we ask that you send to us some man learned in books, who will be able to overcome the Jews and the Saracens; and if he overcomes them, we will accept your faith.” Then the emperor Michael, with the most holy Patriarch Ignatius who came after St. Methodius, seeking out Constantine the Philosopher, summoned him from Mount Olympus and wished him to go to the Khazars to preach Christ. And he, desiring even to die for Christ, agreed to that journey with all his heart, and asked his brother, the blessed Methodius — as one who partly knew the Slav tongue — to go with him on the apostolic obedience, to enlighten the unbelievers with the light of the holy faith. Methodius did not refuse to go with him for Christ’s sake, and the two set out together on the journey, that one with theological words and the other with God-acceptable prayer might, by the help of God’s grace, be able to save perishing souls. When they reached the city of Cherson, which bordered on the Khazars, they remained there a good while, until they had learned the Khazar tongue well. Now the Khazars spoke the Slav tongue. There they learned the Hebrew tongue also, and brought a certain Samaritan with his son to the holy faith and to baptism. And having heard of the relics of the holy hieromartyr Clement, Pope of Rome, which lay in the sea, they stirred up the Bishop of Cherson to seek those honoured relics. And the account of them is this. When the holy Clement was exiled from Rome to Cherson and had turned many people to Christ, the prefect Aufidian, by the command of the Caesar Trajan, drowned him in the sea, having bound an anchor to his neck, so that the Christians might not find his body. And the faithful stood on the shore, watching the drowning of the saint, and wept. After that, his two most faithful disciples, Cornelius and Thebes, said to the Christians: “Let us all pray with one accord, that the Lord may reveal to us the honoured body of His martyr.”
The Sea Withdraws: the Marble Shrine with the Relics
And as the Christian people prayed to God, the sea withdrew into its depths for three furlongs. The people, as once the Israelites in the Red Sea, went over dry land and found a marble chamber like a church, prepared by God — there lay the body of the saint, and the anchor with which he had been drowned lay near him.” And when the faithful wished to take that honoured body from there, there was a revelation to his aforesaid disciples that they should leave the saint’s body there, for every year on his memorial the sea was to withdraw in this way for seven days, giving a way to those who wished to come and worship. And so it was for seven hundred years — from the reign of Trajan until the reign of Nicephorus, emperor of the Greeks. Then, for the sins of men, the sea ceased to withdraw, in the reign of Nicephorus, and the Christians were grieved. When fifty years and more had passed after that, Constantine and Methodius came to Cherson and strove to find the honoured relics of Clement. And they stirred up to this the blessed George, Bishop of Cherson, who first went to Constantinople to the emperor and the patriarch, informing them of the matter and receiving counsel from them, and brought from there the whole clergy of Holy Wisdom. Then, having come to Cherson, he went with these blessed teachers Methodius and Constantine and with all the people, with psalms and hymns, to the seashore, wishing to obtain what was desired; but the water did not part. When the sun had set, they went aboard a ship, and at midnight a light shone from the sea, and first the head appeared, and then all the relics of St. Clement came up out of the water. Taking them, they laid them in the ship and carried them honourably into the city, and laid them in the apostolic church. Of these the blessed Constantine and Methodius took a certain part, which they always kept with them, until they carried it to Rome.
Among the Khazars: the Dispute over the Choosing of an Emperor
After that they went into the land of the Khazars, and were received with honour by the khagan — the Khazar prince — for they had also a letter from the Greek emperor to the khagan. And there was a great disputation there of the blessed Constantine with the Khazars, and with the Jews, and with the Saracens, for Constantine was more learned than Methodius, since Methodius had spent his younger years in the army and not in book-learning, and he had been in military authority, occupied with affairs of the people rather than with the reading of books, whereas Constantine had been brought up from his youth in book-learning and in the pursuit of the love of wisdom, and was very experienced in the Divine Scriptures and strong in words, ready to answer any question. Therefore Constantine disputed with the unbelievers about everything, while Methodius helped Constantine with his God-pleasing prayer. And a certain Khazar said to them: “You Greeks have a bad custom, for you set up for yourselves a new emperor in place of the former one, from another family — from a common family and not a royal one. As for example: after Nicephorus you made Michael Curopalates, one of the nobles, emperor. Then, setting him aside, you set up Leo the Armenian, who was of a common family. And having killed him, you set up Michael the Stammerer, who was by birth from Amorium. But with us it is not so: we have our khagans (that is, emperors) from the house and family of the khagan. And otherwise no one shall reign among us, unless he be of the royal family.” The blessed Constantine answered this in short words: “Did God do evil when He cast down Saul, the emperor displeasing to Him, and chose David, a man after His own heart, from the flocks of shepherds?” And the Khazar was silent on that point.
Wisdom without Books, and the Khagan’s Cup
After that, again a Khazar spoke: “You, holding books in your hands, tell parables from them. But we do not do so: we bring forth all wisdom from our own breasts, not boasting concerning writing as you boast, for within us we have wisdom drawn in.” Constantine said: “If you met a naked man who said, ‘I have much clothing, and gold, and estates’ — would you believe him, seeing him naked and having nothing in his hands?” The Khazar answered: “No; if he had anything, he would not go about naked.” Constantine said: “If you have swallowed all wisdom, as you boast, then tell me how many generations have passed from Adam to Moses, and which generation had its portion in which part of the earth.” The Khazar could not answer anything against this, and fell silent. And Constantine said: “Neither do I believe you that you have swallowed all wisdom and are wise without books.” And when they were at dinner with the khagan, the khagan took a cup and said: “We drink in the name of the one God who created all creation.” The Christian philosopher Constantine, taking the cup, said: “I drink in the name of the one God, and of His Word, by whom He established heaven, and of the Life-giving Spirit, by whom all the strength of created things is sustained.” The khagan said: “We understand alike concerning the God who created all creation; we differ only in this, that you glorify the Trinity, while we glorify the one God, as the Jewish books also teach.”
The Trinity from the Jewish Books
The Philosopher said: “If from the Jewish books you learn to know one God, then from those same books know also the Holy Trinity; for the Jewish books proclaim in the prophecies the Word and the Spirit, as the prophet and king David says: ‘By the word of the Lord the heavens were established, and all their host by the spirit of His mouth.’ Behold, here three in unity are plain: the Lord, and His Word, and the Spirit. The Lord is God the Father, the Word is God the Son, and the Spirit of the Lord’s mouth is God the Holy Spirit. Yet there are not three lords, but one Lord with His Word and His Spirit. So there are not three Gods in the Godhead, but one God worshipped. Look also from this side: if someone does you honour, but does not honour your word and the spirit of your mouth, holding them in dishonourable contempt, while another holds all of this in honour — both you, and your word, and the spirit of your mouth — which of these two is a true honourer of your royal person?” He answered: “He who holds all three equally in honour.” The Philosopher said: “Therefore we also are more truthful and better worshippers of God than you, honouring the Holy Trinity — Father, Son and Holy Spirit equally. And this we have learned from the Prophetic Books, for the holy prophet Isaiah also speaks of God the Son, saying: ‘Hear Me, O Jacob, and Israel whom I call: I am the first, and I am for ever, and now the Lord has sent Me and His Spirit.’ The sayings of His written Scripture our ancient fathers plainly set forth: for who is the One Sent, if not the Son? And by whom is He sent, if not by the Father and the Father’s Holy Spirit?”
The Most Worthy Creature, and the Incarnation of the Word
There stood before the khagans many Jews, and they said to the blessed Constantine: “Tell us, Christian philosopher, how can a woman contain God in her womb, upon whom one cannot even look, let alone give birth to Him?” The Philosopher, pointing to the khagan and to his first counsellor, said: “If someone were to say that this first counsellor cannot receive the khagan in his house and entertain him, but his last servant can receive him and entertain him — how should I call the man who says this: foolish or wise?” The Jews said: “Such a man is very foolish.” The Philosopher asked them again: “What is the most worthy thing under heaven of all visible creation?” The Jews said: “Man is the most worthy of all visible creation, for he is honoured with a rational soul created after the image of God.” Then the philosopher said: “Therefore they are unreasonable who call it an impossible thing that God should be contained in the womb of human nature, when they know that He was contained in Moses’ bush. Is the bush — a creature without sense and soul — more honourable than a creature endowed with soul and reason, honoured with a God-like soul? God is contained in storm and cloud, in smoke and in fire, when He appears to Job, to Moses and to Elijah — and what is strange in this, that He was contained in a more honourable, living creature, wishing to appear on earth and to dwell with men and to heal them of the deadly wound inflicted on the human race by Adam’s sin? For to such a most honoured creature — that is, to the human race, which has fallen into sinful and mortal corruption — from whom should healing and renewal be given, if not from the Creator Himself? Tell me.
The Bush, the Plaster, and the Prayer of Moses
Did not David prophesy: ‘He sent His Word and healed them’? For the Father’s Word — the Son — came and healed human nature. And how was that Father’s Word to heal man, unless it had been applied to man like a plaster, through union with humanity? Does some physician, wishing to cure a wounded man, apply the plaster to a tree or to a stone, and not to the sick man? Therefore God applied His only-begotten Word not to a tree — though even among trees the unconsumed bush may be seen — nor to a stone — though even on the stony mountains of Sinai and Horeb Moses and Elijah beheld Him — but to man, seized by the sickness of sin even unto death, as a healing plaster He applied and firmly joined Him, being well pleased that He should dwell, by the working of His Holy Spirit, in an honoured virginal, and not merely female, womb, and be incarnate and born of her; as Isaiah prophesied: ‘Behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb and shall bear a Son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, which means God with us.’ That prophet says plainly that God the Son shall be born on earth of a pure unwedded virgin. And that it was necessary for God to dwell in her for our salvation, remember what was written in your books: Akhila, your rabbi, says that Moses on the stony mountain and amid the sound of the trumpet stretched out his hands in his prayer and said to God: ‘Appear to us no more, O bountiful Lord, but dwell in our womb, taking away our sins.’ And if Moses prayed that God would dwell in our wombs, why do you contradict us when we confess that God dwelt in a woman’s womb — and not merely a woman’s, but a virginal, pure, undefiled womb unacquainted with marriage? He dwells in our wombs also, when we Christians partake of Him in the mystical Sacrifice. And that ancient prayer of Moses, written in your books according to the testimony of Akhila your rabbi, has already received its fulfilment: ‘Dwell,’ he says, ‘in our wombs, taking away our sins.’
Which Law Did God Give First: Circumcision, or the Covenant with Noah?
And when dinner was finished, they parted, naming the day on which they were again to discourse of all these things. And when that day came, they assembled, and the khagan sat in his place, and commanded the Christian teachers Constantine and Methodius also to sit. And the Jews said to them: “Tell us which law God gave first: the law of Moses, or that which you Christians keep?” The blessed Constantine the Philosopher asked them in turn, saying: “Do you ask which law is first, in order to say that the first is the better?” The Jews answered: “Yes, for that purpose, because one ought always to obey the first law, for the first must be the more principal and the better.” The philosopher said: “If you wish to keep the first law, then renounce vain circumcision.” The Jews said: “Why do you say this?” The Philosopher said: “Tell me truly: was the first law given in circumcision, or not in circumcision?” The Jews answered: “We think, in circumcision.” The philosopher said: “Did not God first give a law to Noah, before circumcision, after the commandments that were given to Adam in Paradise and after his fall? For He commanded Noah that human blood should not be shed, and that whoever sheds his brother’s blood shall receive punishment, and his blood shall be shed instead of the blood shed by his hands. He gave also a covenant concerning the eating of herbs, grass, beasts, cattle, birds and fish. And He said to Noah: ‘Behold, I establish My covenant with you and with your seed after you.’” The Jews said: “But a covenant is not a law; God did not say to Noah ‘My law’, but ‘I will establish My covenant with you’, and we keep the law.” The Philosopher said: “But how do you keep your circumcision: as a law, or otherwise?” They said: “We keep it as a law.” The Philosopher said: “But God did not call circumcision a law, only a covenant; for He said to Abraham: ‘Keep My covenant, you and your seed with you, throughout your generations: let every male be circumcised, and it shall be for a sign of the covenant between Me and you.’ And again: ‘My covenant shall be upon your flesh for an everlasting covenant.’ Behold, you see that He never once called circumcision a law, but only a covenant; therefore you ought to cast off circumcision as unlawful. But if you hold the covenant of circumcision to be a law, then you must also hold the covenant given to Noah to be a law, and call it the first law, which God gave first of all to the human race, cast out of Paradise and preserved from the waters of the flood.”
The Law of Moses, and the Laws that Followed One Another
The Jews said: “No; but the law given to Moses is a law, and we keep it.” The philosopher said: “If the covenant given to Noah is not a law but only a covenant, since God did not call it a law but a covenant, then the law given to Moses is also not a law, since that same God, in the eleventh chapter of the prophet Jeremiah, does not call it a law but only a covenant; for it is written there: ‘Hear the words of this covenant, says the Lord God of Israel. Cursed is the man who does not hear the words of this covenant, which I commanded your fathers in the day when I brought them out of the land of Egypt.’ But if that covenant is a law to you, then the covenant given to Noah is truly a law also — and the first law, given before circumcision, which you ought even now to keep as the first, not heeding those other laws which came after it, the law of Abraham and that of Moses. For you yourselves said earlier that the first law is the better and ought to be obeyed.” The Jews, turning away from this to another matter, said: “Those who kept the law of Moses all pleased God, and we, keeping it, hope also to be pleasing to God. But you, having invented another new law for yourselves, keep your own and trample the old law of God.” The Philosopher answered: “We do well in this; for Abraham also, if he had not received circumcision but had kept only the covenant of Noah, would not have been called the friend of God. In like manner Moses after Abraham wrote another law, and was not content with the laws previously received, those of Noah and of Abraham. And therefore we act according to this example.
Prophecies of the New Covenant
But just as those lawgivers one after another did not reject the earlier laws — for Abraham did not reject Noah’s, nor did Moses slight both of them, but rather, supplying what was lacking, they set forth the full will of the Lord in fuller law-writings, that the commandment of the Lord might be firm — so we also reject nothing from the Old Testament, which Moses wrote on the tablets, but keep all of it: to know one God, the Creator of all creation, not to kill, not to steal, and the rest. But we reject what is not written on the tablets of Moses and what had in any case to be cast off, such as circumcision, the offering of unreasoning sacrifices, and other like things, which were a shadow and a likeness of the New Law that was to come after. And when it came, we cast off the old: for what need is there to guard the shadow when you have the thing itself in your hand?” The Jews said: “If, as you say, the ordinances and covenants in our Old Law (apart from the tablets of Moses) were a shadow and likeness of your New Law, then the ancient lawgivers would have known of your New Covenant which was to come after, for a shadow and an image must outline the face of the one they hoped to see with their eyes. But since they did not expect your law, therefore the ordinances and covenants of our Old Testament (apart from the tablets of Moses) are not an image and a shadow but the very truth, which you ought to keep as truth, just as what is written on the tablets of Moses.” The Philosopher answered this: “If the ancient lawgivers who lived under the Old Testament had not known that a New Law was to come after them and had not expected it, I would have said to you this: ‘When at first, as we said before, God gave His covenant to Noah, did He inform him that He would give a second one to the second one who was to come after him, His friend Abraham?’ He did not inform him, but even confirmed that first covenant of His, that it should be for everlasting generations. Also, when giving the covenant to Abraham, did He inform him that later He would give another law to Moses? Yet concerning our New Covenant He gave notice in every way through His holy prophets. Hear Jeremiah, who proclaims: ‘Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I shall make a New Covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt; for they broke My covenant, and I did not keep them.’ Behold, you see a plain prophecy concerning our New Covenant. And again Isaiah prophesied of it, saying in the Name of the Lord: ‘Do not remember the former things, and do not think of the old. Behold, I make new things; now they shall spring forth, and you shall know them.’ So the ancient men of the Old Testament knew of our law of new grace and waited for it, prophesying; therefore your ordinances and covenants of the Old Testament were a shadow and image of our expected Law, and not the very truth, and it is right to cast them off as of no further use.
The Blessing of the Nations in the Seed of Abraham
The Jews did not know what to answer against this, and began to speak of another thing — that the time of the Messiah’s appearing in the world had not yet come. The Philosopher said: “What more do you still await? For behold, the authority of your kingdom and principality, which according to the prophecy of the forefather Jacob was to last only until the coming of the Messiah, has already ended. Jerusalem is destroyed, your sacrifices are rejected, and the glory of the Lord has passed over from you to the nations, as the prophet Malachi plainly prophesied concerning this, saying: ‘I have no will in you, says the Lord Almighty, and I will not accept a sacrifice from your hands, because from the rising of the sun to its setting My Name is glorified among the nations, and in every place incense is offered to My Name and a pure sacrifice, because My Name is great among the nations, says the Lord Almighty.’” The Jews said: “You say this, wishing, as we see, to call the nations blessed also, as we, the seed of Abraham, are blessed.” Constantine answered: “In Him the seed of Abraham is blessed, and in Him we also, the nations, shall be blessed — in the Messiah, who came from the root of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, and of Jesse, and of David. God said to Abraham: ‘All the kindreds of the earth shall be blessed in you.’ And to Isaac: ‘All the nations of the earth shall be blessed in your seed.’ And likewise to Jacob. And David says: ‘All the tribes of the earth shall be blessed in Him, all the nations shall glorify Him.’ For just as for the sake of Abraham’s race, so also for the sake of the nations, the Messiah had to come. For Jacob once said, blessing Judah: ‘A prince shall not fail from Judah, nor a ruler from his loins, until He comes who is to be sent, and He is the expectation of the nations.’ Also the prophet Zechariah, announcing to the daughter of Sion — to Jerusalem — the coming of a meek king who sits upon an ass and a colt, says: ‘He shall destroy the chariot from Ephraim and the horse from Jerusalem, and the war bow shall be broken, and He shall proclaim peace to the nations.’ Behold, you see that the Messiah came not only through you Jews, but also for the sake of the nations. And it seems to me that He came rather for the sake of the nations than for your sake, for you did not receive Him, but the nations received Him. You killed Him, but the nations believed in Him; you rejected Him, but the nations loved Him. Therefore He also has rejected you, but chosen the nations, and in them He is glorified.
Daniel’s Weeks, and the Iron Kingdom
And that the expected Messiah has truly come already, you may be assured from the holy prophet Daniel. For to that prophet, in Babylon, in the first year of the reign of Darius, the angel of the Lord Gabriel appeared, and from the time when he appeared he reckoned in weeks of years — each week being seventy years — until the coming of the Messiah into the world. And all those weeks of years, gathered together into one, make the number of four hundred and ninety years, as your own Talmud also reckons. How long ago those years have passed, look for yourselves: will you not find more than eight hundred years that have elapsed since the end of the weeks of which the angel spoke to Daniel? And I ask you: what is that iron kingdom which Daniel interpreted, speaking of the great image that Nebuchadnezzar saw in a dream?” The Jews said: “The iron kingdom is the Roman kingdom.” The Philosopher asked them again: “And who is that stone which was cut out of the mountain without the help of a human hand, and which crushed that image you saw?” They answered: “The stone is the Messiah.” The Philosopher said: “Do you not see the truth, that the Roman kingdom, which served idols, has already passed away, the Messiah has come into the world, and in place of the idol-worshipping Roman kingdom the God of Heaven has established another, for ever undissolvable — the Christian kingdom, so called by a new name, according to the prophecy of the holy Isaiah, who once said to you: ‘Your name shall be left for the satisfaction of the elect, and the Lord shall destroy you. And to those who submit to Him a new name shall be given, which shall be blessed upon the earth, for they shall bless the true God.’” The Jews said: “We are the blessed seed of Shem, blessed by our father Noah, but you are not blessed.” The Philosopher answered them: “Noah’s blessing of Shem is nothing else than the glorification of God, for he says: ‘Blessed is the Lord God of Shem.’ Therefore the Lord God is blessed by the mouth of Noah through the well-doing Shem, and of that blessing nothing has come down to you. But to Japheth, from whom we are, Noah said: ‘Let the Lord enlarge Japheth, and let him dwell in the tents of Shem.’ And you yourselves see that Christianity has spread by the grace of God, while you diminish. And there where you once dwelt, in Jerusalem, the name of our Lord Jesus Christ is now blessed and glorified by the Christians.”
The Conversion of the Khagan, and Thanks to the Emperor
Such was the disputation of the blessed Constantine the Philosopher with the Jews concerning the Christian faith, and it went on a long while, for he remained with his brother among the Khazars a sufficient time, meeting and disputing daily with the unbelieving Jews before the khagan. That disputation of his, the blessed Methodius his brother, our Slav teacher, later set out in eight discourses; here only a little of the much is mentioned. For he disputed not only with the Jews, but also not a little with the Saracens, and overcame all by the grace of our Lord, who promised His servants to give them wisdom in their mouths, which all who withstand them shall neither be able to resist nor to answer. And the khagan (the Khazar prince) believed in Christ, and his nobles, and many of the people, and they received holy baptism — though not all, but a certain part. Then the venerable teachers Constantine and Methodius, having well planted the holy faith among the Khazars, wished to return home, leaving in the Khazar land in their place priests who had come from Cherson. Therefore the khagan wrote a letter of thanks to the Greek emperor, saying: “You have sent us, master, such learned men, who have plainly explained that the Christian faith is true, and have taught it to us. Therefore we have been enlightened by holy baptism, and we have commanded in our realm that everyone who wishes may be baptized, and we hope that all our land also will come to Christian perfection, and we are favourably disposed to your kingdom and ready to serve you whenever you have need.” And when dismissing those blessed teachers Constantine and Methodius, the khagan gave them many gifts, but they did not accept them, saying: “Give us as many Greek captives as you have here, for that is more to us than all gifts.” And they gathered up to two hundred captives and gave them to them, and they went on their way rejoicing and giving thanks to God.
The Sweet Lake in the Desert, and the Death of the Bishop of Cherson
And as they travelled with the released captives through desert and waterless places, all were exhausted with thirst. And they found somewhere a salt lake from which salt is taken, and could not taste that water, for it was very salt and bitter as gall. They all scattered over the desert seeking sweet water, and Constantine said to Methodius his brother: “I cannot endure the thirst any longer; therefore draw some of this water, for I believe that He who once changed bitter water into sweet for the Israelites will sweeten for us also, who are thirsty, the bitterness of this water.” And when he had drawn and they tasted, they saw that it was sweet as honey and cold as in winter; and drinking, all were refreshed and glorified God. And in Cherson, when they were at supper with the bishop, Constantine said to the bishop after supper: “Let us pray, master, and bless me, as a father blesses his child with his last blessing.” And those who heard this thought that Constantine wished in the morning to set out from Cherson on his journey. But he said privately to certain men that “the bishop is leaving us, for tomorrow he goes to God.” And so it was: the next day the bishop departed this life. When they came to Constantinople, the emperor and the patriarch and the whole synod received them with great honour and joy, as apostles of Christ preaching among the nations, and wished to raise them to the episcopal rank — but they wholly renounced such an office. Methodius was persuaded to become abbot of the monastery called Polychron, and Constantine remained at the church of the Holy Apostles.
Moravia: the Slav Alphabet and the Translations
After that, other princes of the Slav people — Rastislav and Svatopluk of Moravia, who had already partly received the Christian faith but had not yet understood its mysteries, hearing that the Khazar land had been baptized, taught by two teachers who had come from the Greeks — sent to Constantinople to the emperor Michael, saying: “Our people has renounced idolatry and wishes to keep the Christian law, but we have no such teacher as would perfectly instruct us in that holy faith and guide us to the law of piety in our own tongue. Therefore we ask you, master, take thought for our salvation and send us such a bishop and teacher. For from you the good law goes out to all lands.” And the emperor, taking counsel with the patriarch and the whole consecrated synod, again summoned the blessed Constantine with Methodius, and asked them to go into the Slav lands for teaching, as they had gone to the Khazars. And the holy Constantine was persuaded, though he did not wish it, to accept the episcopal rank. But first he fasted forty days, and the grace of the Holy Spirit helped him, and he devised the Slav alphabet, which had in it thirty-eight letters, in order to translate the Greek books into the Slav tongue; in which, with God’s help, the blessed Methodius also helped him. And first of all they began to translate the holy Gospel according to John — “In the beginning was the Word” and the rest. And they showed this to the emperor, and to the patriarch, and to the whole synod. And all glorified God with joy for it. Then they set out on the journey, and had an abundant satisfaction of all their needs from the imperial bounty. And when they reached the Slav lands, princes and common people received them everywhere with honourable welcomes. And above all, in Moravia, Prince Rastislav, where he at once commanded many children to be gathered and taught the alphabet and the newly translated books: the Horologion, and the Psalter, and others. They remained there four years and more, and baptized all the Slav lands, and established them in the pious faith.
The Liturgy in Slavonic, the Opposition of the Three Languages, and Rome
And they translated all the books necessary for the rule of the Church from Greek into Slavonic reading, such as the Gospel, and the Apostle, and the Liturgiarion, and others. And they began to celebrate the Divine Liturgy in the Slav tongue, and all the church hymns. But many bishops and priests heard of this, and above all those of the West, of the Roman tongue, and began to make a tumult, that he celebrated the Liturgy for the newly baptized in a strange tongue. For they said that the Divine Liturgy ought to be celebrated only in the three tongues in which the inscription on the Cross was written: in Hebrew, in Greek and in Latin. But the holy Slav teachers answered such men: “God gives rain equally on all, and gives the sun to shine.” And David says: “Let every breath praise the Lord.” And again: “Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth; sing to the Lord a new song.” Since the Lord came to save all the nations, therefore let all the nations glorify the Lord with their own voices.” And the Pope of Old Rome, Nicholas, also heard of them. He wrote to them with love, calling them to Rome. And, submitting to his wish, they went to him. But before they reached Rome, Pope Nicholas departed this life, and in his place Hadrian came; yet he also was glad of them, for he had heard that they were approaching the city of Rome, and moreover that they carried with them a portion of the relics of the holy hieromartyr Clement, Pope of Rome (as was said above). He met them with honours and glorified their apostle-like labours. And making them a courteous entertainment, he gave them rest. He approved the translation of the books into the Slav tongue, and confirmed the celebration of the Liturgy in the Slav tongue, laying anathema on the adversaries who should dare to contradict or to reproach Slavonic reading, and singing, and the celebration of the Liturgy. And these holy teachers, Methodius and Constantine, celebrated the holy Liturgy in Slavonic in the midst of Rome, to the glory of Christ God, who is preached and glorified in all tongues. And when they had remained some while in Rome, the holy Constantine fell ill, and received from God a revelation, which was given him in a vision, and notice of his own departure; and he rejoiced in spirit all that day, singing thus: “They said to me, we shall go into the houses of the Lord; my spirit shall rejoice, my heart is glad.” And the next day he took upon himself the holy schema and was renamed Cyril, and lay sick fifty days. Then, committing his episcopate to his elder brother Methodius, he gave up his spirit to the Lord — and was buried with glory in the church of St. Clement, in which the portion of St. Clement’s relics which they had brought was also laid.
The Repose of Cyril, and the Episcopate of Methodius
After the death of the holy Cyril, the venerable Methodius was appointed Bishop of Moravia, and went there, having his see in the city of Pannonia, in the place of the holy apostle Andronicus, the disciple and kinsman of Paul, who had once been bishop there. Following him, this hierarch and teacher Methodius showed many labours and toils, spreading the holy faith, disputing with the Jews and with the heretics, enduring troubles and banishments, and moreover translating many books from the Greek tongue into the Slavonic, and he ruled his flock well for many years. Then he passed over to the Lord, for whom with his brother the holy Cyril he had laboured apostolically with all his heart; and both together stood before Him in the life everlasting, glorifying Him with all the saints unto endless ages. Amen.
Concerning the Khazars: a Scythian People
Concerning the Khazars. The Khazars, whom the Greeks called Chazars and the Romans Chazars, were a Scythian people, of the Slav or Ruthenian tongue, and their land was near the Maeotian lake, which is also called the Dead Sea, into which the river Don, which separates Asia from Europe, falls. In that land there first dwelt the tribe of Japheth’s first son Temar, who were earlier called Hemeri. Then the Greeks named them Cimmerians, and in the Ruthenian tongue they were called Cimbri; and they also named the mouth of the Maeotian lake, which falls into the Euxine Pontus, the Cimmerian Bosporus, that is, the strait of the Cimmerian sea. And when those Cimbri scattered from there through the northern lands and later were changed into other peoples, such as the Lithuanians, the Samogitians, the Goths and others, then in that land of the Maeotian lake and the Cimmerian Bosporus one tribe, called Scythian, from the Alaunic mountains — afterwards called Alans — and from the river called Cozara — the Khazars — settled, and over a long time multiplied greatly and spread on both sides of the Don, and in Asia as far as the Volga, which falls into the Caspian, or Khvalyn, sea, and in Europe as far as the Dnieper, which enters the Black Sea. Of these a considerable part, crossing the Dnieper above the Black Sea, which is also called the Euxine Pontus, settled where Ochakov and Belgorod are today and further still, for they reached even Pannonia, but there they were already called by other names: now Avars, now Huns, and they were changed into other peoples. They were rough and savage in temper, ugly in appearance, and their customs were such as the Tatars do not renounce today; more of them lived in the steppe than in towns, without houses, in pavilions and tents, moving from place to place for the pasturage of their cattle. They fed on herbs and meat rather than on bread, and on half-raw meat. And in wars they were very brave and terrible to all.
The Khagan, Their Valour, and the Marriage with the Imperial House
Their elder was the khagan (foreign chroniclers call him Chasan or Chayan). And that name “khagan” is not a man’s proper name, but a title of seniority, as with us emperor or prince. Concerning the valour of that people much may be found in the ancient Greek and Roman chroniclers. And above all they were grievous to Constantinople: they came by sea against that city, and beneath it were miraculously defeated in the reign of Heraclius, when Sergius was patriarch, by the unconquerable power of the Most Pure Mother of God, who defended her city from those pagan Khazars, as also from the Persians, who were in league with them and together pressed upon the city, as is written at length in the synaxaria of the Akathist, read on the Fifth Saturday of Great Lent at the Unseated Office. After that, not soon — some hundred years and more — Leo the Isaurian, emperor of the Greeks, wishing to reconcile that Khazar people to himself, took for his son Constantine (called Copronymus) the daughter of the khagan, the Khazar prince, and having baptized her in Constantinople, named her Irene (this is not that Irene who afterwards brought about Orthodoxy, but another, earlier one). She bore to Copronymus a son Leo, who from his mother was called “the Khazar” or “Chazaris”, because he was born of a Khazar mother (that Leo the Khazar had a wife, also named Irene, like his mother; and that second Irene, with her small son Constantine, after the death of her husband Leo the Khazar was left a widow, and brought about Orthodoxy, rejecting the iconoclast heresy by the Seventh Great Ecumenical Council). And from the time of the taking of the khagan’s daughter in marriage to Copronymus, the Khazars lived with the Greeks as it were in peace, though other Slav Ruthenian peoples afterwards troubled the Greeks. The Khazars began little by little to learn the Christian faith from their neighbours the Chersonites, and when by the teaching of the holy Slav teachers Constantine and Methodius a considerable part of them had received the faith of Christ, they made friendship with the Chersonites, learned from them good customs and an honourable life fitting for Christians, and settled with the Greeks in Taurica and Cherson; for which reason some cosmographers have called the land of Taurica and Cherson Chazaria or Cozaria, because the Khazars mingled there with the Greeks.
Their Rule over Kyiv: Askold, Dir and Oleg
Before their baptism the Khazars had from of old dominion over Kyiv and over certain other Ruthenian lands, and took tribute from them — squirrel pelts from every house, and a shelyag from every plough. But later Askold and Dir, coming from Great Novgorod from Prince Rurik, sat in Kyiv and gave no tribute to the Khazars; then, after Askold and Dir, Oleg, reigning in Kyiv, took the Severyans and the Radimichians from the Khazars. After Oleg, Igor Rurikovich reigned; after him, Sviatoslav Igorevich, the father of the great Vladimir. That Sviatoslav (as St. Nestor writes of him) went against the river Oka and the Volga and saw that the Vyatichians were paying tribute to the Khazars — and took them from the Khazars. After that he went with all his military force against the Khazars; and the Khazars also, with their prince the khagan, arrayed themselves and came out against him, and they fought fiercely, and Sviatoslav overcame the Khazars, and took their city Belaya Vezha, and laid tribute upon them. Yet Sviatoslav subdued to himself only those Khazars who were in Europe, on this side of the Don. But on the other side of the Don, in Asia, there were Khazars, Christians by faith, who had their own dominion, until another people, called the Polovtsians, which came out of the Gothic people (and the Goths came out of the Cimbri), mingling with the Pechenegs, also of their own kin, first settled above the Euxine Pontus, or Black Sea, having driven out the peoples who were there.
The Pechenegs, the Polovtsians and the Tatars
Then they went against the Khazars, and fought with them many years, and destroyed the Khazars, and took their places themselves. The Pechenegs settled where the Nogai Tatars are today, and the Polovtsians sat in Taurica (having driven out the Christians from there), and came together with the Pechenegs against Rus’, doing much harm to those lands. Then another people, Scythian, called the Tatars, which had once dwelt beyond the Caspian Sea in the Caucasian rocks, when with their king Batu it crossed the river Volga at the place where it falls into the Caspian (also called the Khvalyn) sea, came into this land with a heavy force, first against the Polovtsians, and fighting fiercely with them destroyed them, and with them the Pechenegs to the last, and took those lands into its own dominion. Then the Tatars also came upon all the Ruthenian lands and conquered them. Therefore the memory of the Polovtsians and the Pechenegs has perished utterly, but the name of the Khazars has remained in the Little Russian army of today — strong, resembling that one, and very little changed in its designation.
Concerning Methodius: the Icon-Painter and Prince Boris
Concerning Methodius. The ancient Greek historiographer John Curopalates writes of a certain Methodius — whether this one or another is unknown, for in the days of that same Greek emperor Michael, who reigned with his mother Theodora, there was a certain monk and icon-painter named Methodius. And when the Bulgarian prince Boris (or, as others call him, Bogaris), already beginning partly to incline to the Christian faith but still holding to paganism, was building himself a new palace and wished to adorn it with icon-painting, he summoned the skilful icon-painter Methodius the monk and commanded him to depict on the walls various huntings: beasts, birds, reptiles, and whatever could be devised that is fearful and terrible, such that a man, looking on it with his eyes, would be frightened in his heart. But the monk Methodius, knowing nothing more fearful than the Second Coming of Christ and gehenna, depicted on one great and spacious wall in the palace the Dread Judgement and the various torments of gehenna. And when the prince came to look at that painting, he asked the icon-painter: “What is this?” He began to tell him that those who stand at the right hand of the Judge, the righteous, the holy angels crown with royal crowns and lead up to heaven; but on the left stand the sinners, whom they seize fiercely and cast into the torments of gehenna. And the prince, seeing this and hearing the account from the icon-painter’s mouth, was greatly frightened in soul and, sending to Constantinople to Michael and Theodora, asked that they send him a bishop to baptize him. And so it was.
Concerning Cyril the Philosopher and Vladimir
Concerning Cyril the Philosopher. Certain chroniclers write that in the reign of Basil and Constantine, emperors of the Greeks, Cyril the Philosopher came from Constantinople, sent to Vladimir, with great imperial gifts, among which there was also a certain veil bearing an image of the Dread Judgement of Christ. Seeing this, Vladimir sighed and said: “It is well with those who are at God’s right hand, but woe to those who are at His left.” And the rest. But let no one consider that Cyril the Philosopher to be one of the Slav teachers — Constantine the Philosopher, named Cyril in the holy schema — for the latter preceded Vladimir’s baptism by a hundred years and more, while that second Cyril came to Vladimir. Some call him not Cyril but Cyrus. But St. Nestor, the chronicler of the Caves, gives no name at all to that Philosopher who came to Vladimir, calling him only a philosopher. “They sent,” he says, “to Vladimir a Philosopher from the Greeks.” And he does not name him.
On the Same Day: the Renewal of Constantinople, and the Venerable Martyr Theodosia
On that same day there is the commemoration of the renewal of Constantinople, which the great emperor Constantine made for the city of Byzantium, greatly enlarging it and renaming it Constantinople after his own name. To it he also transferred his throne from Old Rome, and commanded it to be called New Rome, and committed it to the protection of the Most Pure Virgin Mother of God, that she might guard it for ever as her own city. On that same day the Prologue places the memory of the holy venerable martyr Theodosia, but she will be in that same Prologue on the 18th day of this same month. And in the Great Reading Menaion her passion is placed on the 29th day of this month; there, if God helps, we shall also write of them.