SYLVESTER, CONSTANTINE, AND THE LORD'S DAY.
By J. H. W.
WHAT about the statement of Nicephorus, that Constantine also ordered that the day of the sun should be called the Lord's day? I am free to say that I never attached much importance to this statement, even before I had instituted any examination of the claims of Nicephorus to be considered a reliable historian. I had studied the life and character of Constantine sufficiently to cause me to doubt the correctness of the statement, let it come from whom it might. All the evidence goes to show that Constantine was never a devoted worshiper of the Lord; that he held Apollo, the sun-god, in reverence during his whole life. His edict in behalf of the venerable day of the sun was in honor of Apollo, as the highest Christian authorities testify. To the time of his death he held the office of high priest of the pagan rites. His veneration for Sunday was in regard to its dedication to the worship of the sun, and that only. There is absolutely nothing in the history of Constantine to justify the belief that the statement quoted from Nicephorus is true. It was Nicephorus who first ascribed the words of Leo the Philosopher, in which he reversed the law of Constantine in regard to Sunday labor, to Leo I., of Thrace. These were the words that Justin Edwards gave to Pope Leo the Great. I say Nicephorus was first to make this statement, because he is the first authority for that statement of whom I have any knowledge, and I have no knowledge that anyone made the statement again until several centuries after his time. This mistake in regard to the decrees of the Leos, is inexcusable in Nicephorus, because he had the means at hand to verify his assertions, namely, the Code of Justinian, in which the decree of Leo I. was to be found. In this I am taking for granted that Nicephorus did make the statement. Elliott (Horæ Apocalypticæ) quotes a Doctor Maitland who says that Nicephorus said so; but as no reference is given to book, chapter, or page, I have been unable to verify it. I examined Nicephorus by the table of contents under every word where I thought possible to find it, as Constantine, Sylvester, Dominicum, diem, etc., but could not find it. I also examined considerable that he wrote about Constantine, but did not find the remark in question. I accept, however, the assertion that Nicephorus did say so, and proceed to inquire as to the probability of its correctness. First, we must guard against confounding this Nicephorus with Nicephorus, patriarch of Constantinople, about the beginning of the ninth century. He also wrote a brief church history, embracing only the period from A. D. 602, the time of the death of Maurice, to A. D. 769. Calistus Nicephorus is supposed to have lived about the beginning of the fourteenth century, but the actual time is unknown. The "Encyclopedia Britannica" says:— "For the first four centuries the author is largely dependent upon his predecessors, Eusebius, Socrates, Sozomen, Theodoret, and Evagrius, his additions showing very little critical faculty; in the later period, his labors, based on documents now no longer extant, to which he had free access, though he used them also with small discrimination, are much more valuable." Inasmuch as the works to which he had access are not now extant, and he used them without discrimination, as others also testify, how are we to determine that his later writings are much more valuable? Of this we can better judge when we more fully understand his character as a writer. The above quotation says he depended upon preceding historians for the events of the first four centuries. But I think it is not difficult to show that he drew169as largely from imagination and from monkish legends as from the historians named. Certainly he did not draw the statement in question from either of these. It was derived from some other source; and what? who can tell? The "Real Encyclopedia" of Herzog says:— "Nicephorus has, as is well known, made no great name for himself by his church history. Good language and dextrous representation have won for him the name of an ecclesiastical Thucydides, during the time when a collection of fables and impossibilities stood just as high" (as a church history). It goes on to say that Nicephorus spoke slightly of his predecessors, and promised to improve on them by strict adherence to truth; but that the expectation raised by these promises was not at all met by the work itself. The work of Dowling, already referred to, "Critical Study of Ecclesiastical History," says:— "Though he amply partook of the superstition of the age in which he lived, and paraphrased the writers from whom he derived his information in the affected and extravagant style characteristic of the later Greeks, he has transmitted some important facts of which we should without him have remained in ignorance. He was eloquent, diligent, and inquisitive, though destitute of judgment and discrimination." Pp. 92, 93. And still the query will arise, How are we to know that they are facts, seeing that no writer but himself has left them on record, and seeing that he was destitute of judgment and discrimination, and dealt largely in fables and legends? The Cyclopedia of McClintock and Strong speaks thus of him:— "The last of the Greek church historians, and the only one their church produced in the middle ages. He is frequently denominated the ecclesiastical Thucydides, because of the elegance of his style, and the theological Pliny, because of the superstition and credulity which are betrayed in his writings. . . . His work is of great interest, as it is the only contribution to church history which appeared in the East, from the sixth to the fourteenth century. It is, however, generally condemned in modern times as a compilation of fables and absurdities." The authors of the "Magdeburg Centuries" have shown their appreciation of Nicephorus in the following manner. Speaking of the wonderful things ascribed to Sylvester, such as the baptism of Constantine for the cure of his leprosy, for which the emperor donated to him the city of Rome with lands surrounding, they add: "We will mention nothing here of the wonderful conversion of the Jews, by means of a bullock, to be sure; the restoration to life of one killed by a Jewish sleight-of-hand performer; we wish that boasting style of narration to be sought by those who delight in it, in Nicephorus."—P. 139. The reader can hardly fail to be interested in the following as a specimen of history. It is from the account by Nicephorus of the baptism of Constantine, the healing of his leprosy, the donation, etc., etc., all of which is to the glory of the Roman bishop:— "For in this very night, in the enjoyment of his rest, he received a vision, for Peter and Paul, the chief of the apostles, appeared to him and said: O Constantine, we are Peter and Paul, sent to you by the Lord God, that we exhibit to you a sign and indication of healing. They exhorted him that he should inquire for Sylvester, the head of the saints of that city, with whom is a fish-pond, in which if he should bathe, very soon all his disease should cease; and from that grace he should have children innocent and free from the corruption of that disease. "When sleep left him he called for his physician, who for a long time had stood a long way off, and told him he had no longer need of human help, for help had come by a most high hand. Then when he came to Sylvester he told him that he wished him to consider with reverence and veneration, that the gods, under the name of Peter and Paul, had visited him. And Sylvester said, O emperor, there are not many gods, but one, and Peter and Paul are not gods, but indeed servants and apostles of God, who, because of their faith and devotion, had been in great favor, holding the first place among the saints."—Book 7, chap. 33, p. 286, edition Basel, 1553. He then proceeds to recount at length those things which all know to be only fables. According to this, Constantine was baptized at the time of his first knowledge of the Christian religion; whereas it is well known that he was baptized in Nicomedia, near the very close of his life. To the chronicler of these fables and legends of the Dark Ages, we are indebted for the statement that Constantine ordered that Sunday should be called the Lord's day. These stories, told by Metaphrastes and Nicephorus, served an excellent purpose to give honor to the day of the sun, when the words of Sylvester and Constantine had such weight among the benighted and credulous church people. And were it possible to separate the truth from fables in the whole field of church history, who can tell how many statements, now passing for historical truth, would be shown to be fabulous and fraudulent? And yet professed Protestants, of this age of light and Bible privileges, too often leave the word of God, and find their duty in following the customs and traditions of those ages of darkness and mysticism! How necessary at this time to listen to the word of inspiration: "To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." Isa. 8:20. The word is a lamp to our feet, and a light to our path. Ps. 119:105. It is sufficient for our every need, for it is given that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. 2 Tim. 3:17. He who adds to it or takes from it, does so at the risk of eternal life. Rev. 22:18, 19. Now in regard to this, we may conclude as we did in the case of Sylvester. Seeing that "Christian princes" were fully agreed with councils and popes to do honor to this day, we can but think that if Constantine had made an order that the title of the venerable day of the sun should be exchanged for that of the Lord's day, his successors in the throne of the empire would have paid some respect to, or taken some notice of, that order. Some of them would doubtless have given the day that title in their edicts. But they did not. This fact is well stated by Doctor Heylyn, thus:— "So for the after ages, in the edicts of Constantine, Valentinian, Valens, Gratian, Honorius, Arcadius, Theodosius, Christian princes all, it hath no other name than Sunday, or dies solis; and many fair years after them, the synod held at Dingulosium, in the lower Bavaria, Anno 772, calls it plainly Sunday."—History of the Sabbath, Part 2, chap. 2, sec. 12. Here I leave the whole subject with the reader, believing that all who want proof for the basis of their belief, will reject as spurious both the statement of Metaphrastes and that of Nicephorus, in regard to orders by Sylvester and Constantine requiring that Sunday be called the Lord's day. Probably no such orders were ever given by any authority in either Church or State. The practice of calling it so grew up gradually, and it was never recognized as being by any authority, either divine or human. Had there ever been any recognition of such authority, there would have been more uniformity in the practice. But, for many centuries, the edicts of emperors and kings uniformly called it the day of the sun; while councils called it indifferently both Sunday and Lord's day. The title Sunday, however, would be more correctly written Sun's day, as this agrees with the Latin from which it is rendered.