"An object of dread to the demons" ~ A brief video bio of Saint Moses the Black

Saint Moses the Black ~ From the Ecclesiastical History of Sozomen, AD 445

Presenting a brief video biography of one of the most fascinating saints of antiquity, Moses the Black, as extracted from the 5th century work, The Ecclesiastical History of Sozomen.

Abba Moses is known by numerous other names including Moses the Strong, Moses the Ethiopian, Moses of Scetis, Moses of Abyssinia and Moses the Robber. He was an anchorite of the Egyptian desert and lived in the generation immediately after Saint Anthony the Abbot—that is, from about AD 330-400. He was famous among his peers for his legendary physical strength, and his even more amazing conversion from the depths of vice and wickedness, to the heights of self-denial, humility and sanctity.

Here is the video excerpt in text form:

Click for more info.

"Moses was originally, a slave, but was driven from his master's house on account of his perversity. He joined some robbers, and became leader of the band. After having perpetrated several murders and other crimes, he embraced a life of asceticism, and attained the highest point of philosophical perfection. 

As the healthful and vigorous habit of body which had been induced by his former avocations acted as a stimulus to his imagination and excited a desire for pleasure, he resorted to every possible means of macerating his body. Thus, he subsisted wholly upon bread, subjected himself to severe labor, and prayed fifty times daily. During six years, he spent all his nights in prayer. He prayed standing, without bending his knees or closing his eyes in sleep. He sometimes went, during the night, to the cells of the monks, and secretly filled their pitchers with water, although he had sometimes to go ten, sometimes twenty, and sometimes thirty stadia in quest of the water. Notwithstanding all his efforts to macerate his body, it was long before he could subdue his natural vigor of constitution. 

Four robbers once broke into the dwelling where he lived alone. He bound them, threw them across his shoulders, and bore them to the church, that the monks who were then assembled might deal with them as they thought fit, for he did not consider himself authorized to punish any one. 

So sudden a conversion from vice to virtue was never before witnessed, nor such rapid attainments in monastical philosophy. Hence God rendered him an object of dread to the demons, and he was ordained presbyter over the monks at Scetis. After a life spent in this manner, he died at the age of seventy-five, leaving behind him numerous eminent disciples."

This excerpt from Sozomen's Ecclesiastical History is a simple summary of the eventful life of Abba Moses. More details may be drawn from another early bio in the Lausaic History of Palladius. I transcribed this bio in another blogpost if you want to check it out: Moses the Strong ~ Powerful in Body, More Powerful in God's Grace.

Sozomen's History also includes capsule biographies of numerous other noteworthy monks and holy men and women from that period, particularly those in Egypt and Palestine and is well worth reading for anyone interested in early Church history or Roman history of the 4th and 5th centuries AD.

"Remain quiet and leave me to act as an emperor" ~ The accession of Valentinian I as Roman Emperor

The "Colossus of Barletta" which may
be a likeness of Valentinian I. 

February 26 in the year AD 364, Valentinian I succeeded the deceased Jovian as Roman Emperor. Valentinian was one of the last truly effective rulers of the Roman Empire in the West.

Jovian had died suddenly after a reign of merely eight months, having successfully extricated the beleaguered army of Julian the Apostate from Persia. Jovian's death was somewhat mysterious--some attributed it to over-eating, others to sleeping a damp room recently plastered with "unslaked lime."

Valentinian was proclaimed emperor by the army. A brief portrait of his life before ascending to the throne may be found in Sozomen's Ecclesiastical History, as follows:

He was a good man and capable of holding the reins of the empire. He had not long returned from banishment, for it is said that Julian, immediately on his accession to the empire, erased the name of Valentinian from the Jovian legions, as they were called, and condemned him to perpetual banishment, under the pretext that he had failed in his duty of leading out the soldiers under his command against the enemy.

The true reason of his condemnation, however, was the following: When Julian was in Gaul, he went one day to a temple to offer incense. Valentinian accompanied him, according to an ancient Roman law, which still prevails, and which enacted that the leader of the Jovians and the Herculeans (that is to say, the legions of soldiers who have received this appellation in honor of Jupiter and of Hercules) should always attend the emperor as his bodyguard. When they were about to enter the temple, the priest, in accordance with the pagan custom, sprinkled water upon them with the branch of a tree. A drop fell upon the robe of Valentinian. He scarcely could restrain himself, for he was a Christian, and he rebuked his asperser. It is even said that he cut off, in view of the emperor, the portion of the garment on which the water had fallen, and flung it from him.  

From that moment Julian entertained inimical feelings against him, and soon after banished him to Melitine in Armenia, under the plea of misconduct in military affairs, for he would not have religion regarded as the cause of the decree, lest Valentinian should be accounted a martyr or a confessor....

Click for more info.

As soon as Jovian succeeded to the throne, Valentinian was recalled from banishment to Nicæa, but the death of the emperor in the meantime took place, and Valentinian, by the unanimous consent of the troops and those who held the chief positions in the government, was appointed his successor. When he was invested with the symbols of imperial power, the soldiers cried out that it was necessary to elect some one to share the burden of government. To this proposition, Valentinian made the following reply:

"It depended on you alone, O soldiers, to proclaim me emperor; but now that you have elected me, it depends not upon you, but upon me, to perform what you demand. Remain quiet, as subjects ought to do, and leave me to act as an emperor in attending to the public affairs."

[Taken from the Ecclesiastical History of Sozomen, Book VI, Chapter 6.]

Valentinian would go on to have a successful reign, stabilizing the frontiers in the West, while devolving power in the East upon his brother, Valens. With Valentinian's death in AD 375, things began falling apart very rapidly for both halves of the empire.