Saint Bartholomew the Apostle by Father Francis Xavier Weninger, 1876 The Gospel gives us no other account of St. Bartholomew, than that he was joined by our Saviour to those men whom He called as Apostles, and chose to convert mankind. Hence, with the others, he followed the Divine Teacher, and learned from Him the doctrine which he afterwards preached to the nations. The life of this saint, after the ascension of Christ, is described by authentic writers as follows. When the Holy Apostles, after the Holy Ghost had descended upon them, dispersed to preach the gospel to the whole world, St. Bartholomew was sent into East India and the neighboring countries. He repaired thither, not without great hardship, and wandering through cities and villages, he everywhere converted great numbers of the heathen. Having provided all these places with priests, he journeyed to Greater Armenia. Arriving at the capital of this state, he repaired first to the grand temple of the idol Asteroth, where he found a great many blind, deaf, lame, and otherwise disabled persons, who were praying to this god to restore their health. Some were helped, others not. The devil, as he afterwards confessed, at the command of St. Bartholomew, had first, by witchcraft or other means, made these persons blind, deaf, or lame, and when they sought help in his temple, he destroyed the spell cast upon them, or used natural means to restore their health, while they believed that their god had helped them. Satan used also to speak by the image of this idol, and reply to those who questioned him. From the moment, however, when the Holy Apostle entered the temple, the devil had become silent, and answered not a word. To the Armenians, this silence was incomprehensible; hence they asked the idol of another temple the reason of it. Satan, by the mouth of the image, said that Bartholomew, an Apostle of the true God, was the cause of it, and that the same would happen to him as soon as this Apostle should come into his temple. The idolatrous priest desired to know who this Apostle was, and by what means they could recognize him. Satan described him most minutely, adding that he prayed a hundred times during the day and as many times during the night. They immediately sought for St. Bartholomew, and found him just after he had delivered a man possessed of the devil; for Satan cried with a loud voice, that he was tormented by the prayers of St. Bartholomew, and forced to give way. After the idolaters had thus become acquainted with the Saint, they began to deliberate what they should do with him. Meanwhile, Polymius, the king, whose daughter was also possessed by the Evil One, and who had heard of the deliverance of the one mentioned above, sent to the Apostle, humbly requesting him to come and free his daughter in a like manner. Bartholomew said a short prayer, after which he commanded Satan, in the name of Jesus Christ, to leave the body of the possessed, which was instantly done. The joy of the king and the whole court, and the astonishment of the people of the city, were indescribably great. The king, to show his gratitude to the Saint, offered him a large sum of money and many other presents. St. Bartholomew accepted nothing, saying: I am not here to seek gold and silver, but to convert the people, and lead souls to the knowledge of the true faith and to heaven. After this he began to speak to the king and courtiers of the only true God, and explained to them how the only-begotten Son of God, by His sufferings and death, had redeemed the world. He told them fearlessly, that the gods which they all worshipped were false gods, nay, nothing but spirits of hell, and to prove this he proposed to force the devil himself, who until now had spoken to them through the idol, publicly to confess the same. The king, went on the following day, with all his courtiers, to the temple. St. Bartholomew came also, and asked the idol Asteroth, in the name of Jesus Christ, to say who he was. The devil began to lament and to howl, but at last, forced by the divine power, confessed that he was one of the spirits of hell, who had, until then, wickedly deceived the king and the people. He said further, that there was only one true God, Who was He whom St. Bartholomew, His Apostle, preached and adored. All present looked at each other and knew not what to think or what to say. The holy Apostle then commanded the devil to leave the idols, and destroy them all, without exception, throughout the whole city. The devil obeyed, and the idols of the city fell from their altars and were dashed to pieces. This sufficed to convince the king that St. Bartholomew was a proclaimer of the truth, and after being instructed in the Christian faith, he and his wife and children were baptized. The example of the king was followed by the whole court, and by most of the inhabitants of the capital; and not long after the twelve principal cities of the state became converted to Christianity. To preserve so large a number of faithful in the church, St. Bartholomew ordained many priests, and appointed them to take charge of the new converts. This glorious victory of the gospel left only the idolatrous priests stubborn in their error, and as, after the downfall of their idols, they were despised and derided, they thought of means to revenge themselves on the holy Apostle. And when many plans had failed, they turned their eyes upon Astyages, a brother of King Polymius, who reigned over the other part of Armenia, and accused St. Bartholomew before him as an enemy and disturber of the land, who had even succeeded in seducing the king and the whole court, and who was intent upon entirely exterminating the ancient worship of the gods. Astyages, in whose weak mind idolatry had taken deep root, resolved to avenge the wrong which had been done to the gods. He called the holy Apostle to his court under the pretext of hearing his instructions. No sooner, however, had the holy man made his appearance, than the tyrant threatened him with the most cruel torments and the most terrible death, if he did not immediately sacrifice to the gods. Martyrdom of St. Bartholomew St. Bartholomew endeavored to convince him of the nothingness of his gods, but the tyrant would not listen, and commanded the executioners to seize the Saint, and tear the skin from his whole body, and thus slowly put him to death. The order was executed, and the holy Apostle was flayed alive. During this inhuman torture the Saint ceased not to praise God and to proclaim the true faith. God preserved his life miraculously until the skin was torn from his whole body, and as he still continued to declare the true God, the tyrant had him beheaded. The Almighty, however, visibly punished the king and the idolatrous priests, who had instigated this fearful cruelty. They all became possessed of the Evil One, and after having been tormented by him for thirty days, they were strangled. The holy body of the Martyr was placed by the Christians in a leaden coffin, and was buried with all due honors. In the course of time the pagans cast the leaden coffin with the relics of St. Bartholomew into the sea; but the waves miraculously supported it and carried it to the island of Lipari, the Christian inhabitants of which received the sacred deposit with joy, and placed it in a church erected for the purpose. Thence this sacred treasure was brought to Benevento, and finally, in the reign of Otho II., it was transported to Rome, where it is kept at this day in great honor.
Posted on: Sun, 24 Aug 2014 09:49:10 +0000
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