The Presbyters Project

Sermo 26

DE ID QVOD SCRIPTVM EST: REDDITE QVAE DEI SVNT DEO, ET DE MILITANTIBVS.

1. Nonnulli fratres qui aut militiae cingulo detinentur aut in actu sunt publico constituti, cum peccant grauiter, hac solent a peccatis suis prima se uoce excusare quod militant; et ne bene aliquando faciant, occupatos se malis actibus conqueruntur, perinde quasi militia hominum et non uoluntas in culpa sit. Ita quod ipsi gerunt officiis suis adscribunt. [...] Illud autem quale est, quod cum ob errorem aliquem a senioribus arguuntur et inputatur alicui de illis, cur ebrius fuerit, cur res alienas peruaserit, caedem cur turbulentus admiserit, statim respondeat: "Quid habebam facere homo saecularis aut miles? Numquid monachum sum professus aut clericum?" Quasi omnis qui clericus non est aut monachus, possit ei licere quod non licet. [...]

Maximus comments on the Gospel and indicates how one should perform justly public office or military service.

4. Haec autem diuina sententia, quae ad milites loquitur, potest etiam ad clericos retorqueri, qui etiamsi non militare uidentur saeculo, tamen deo et domino militamus, sicut ait apostolus: Nemo militans deo obligat se negotiis saecularibus. Videmur, inquam, non militare remissis ac fluentibus tunicis, sed habemus militiae nostrae cingulum, quo castimoniae interiora constringimus. De quo cingulo dominus ait ad apostolos suos: Sint lumbi uestri accincti, et lucernae ardentes in manibus uestris. Milites igitur Christi sumus et stipendium ab ipso donum que percipimus, sicut dicit beatus apostolus: Qui dedit nobis pignus spiritum; hoc est qui spiritus sancti nos remuneratione ditauit. Si quis ergo christianorum hoc donatiuo contentus forte non fuerit et quaerit amplius, incipit hoc ipso carere quod meruit. Quod specialiter contingit haereticis Arrianis. Dum enim nescio quid amplius quaerunt, inuenientes erroris spiritum gratiam sancti spiritus perdiderunt. Nam et catholicus clericus hac sententia retinetur. Si enim non contentus stipendiis fuerit, quae de altario domino iubente consequitur, sed exercet mercimonia intercessiones uendit uiduarum munera libenter amplectitur, hic negotiator magis potest uideri quam clericus. Nec dicere possumus: "Nemo nos inuasores arguit, uiolentiae nullus accusat", quasi non interdum maiorem praedam auida blandimenta eliceant quam tormenta; nec interest apud deum, utrum ui an circumuentione quis res alienas occupet, dummodo quoquo pacto teneat alienum.

(ed. Mutzenbecher 1962: 101-103)

Sermon 26

On What is Written: "Give the Things That Are God's to God," and On Soldiers

1. Some of the brethern who are in military service or who occupy public office are accustomed to excuse their sins, when they sin gravely, by saying without further ado that they are in service. And if sometimes they do not act rightly they complain that they are involved in the evil occupation—as if it were the office and not the will that was at fault! Thus they ascribe what they themselves do to the positions that they hold. [...] But it happens that when a misdeed has occurred and some are accused by their seniors and one of them is confronted as to why he got drunk or why he broke into another's property or why he committed a violent act of murder immediately he responds: "What was I, a layman holding an office, supposed to do? Did I profess the monastic life or the clerical state?" As if everyone not a cleric or a monk were permitted to do what is impermissible! [...]

Maximus comments on the Gospel and indicates how one should justly perform public office or military service.

4. But this divine word, which is spoken to servicemen, can also be turned back on clerics who, although they do not seem to be in service in the world, are nonetheless servicemen of God and the Lord, as the Apostle says: No one soldiering for God involves himself in secular affairs. We seem, I say, not to be soldiers in our loose and flowing tunics, but we have our military belt, by which we are bound to an interior purity. About this belt the Lord says to His apostles: "Let your loins be grit and your lamps burning in your hands." We, then, are servicemen of Christ and we receive our pay and our reward from Him, as the blessed Apostle says: who has given us the Spirit as a pledge. That is to say that He has enriched us with the recompense of the Holy Spirit. But if any Christian is perhaps not satisfied with this gift and seeks something more, he begins to lack the very thing of which he was worthy. This has particular reference to the Arian heretics. For while they seek I know not what more, in discovering the spirit of error they have lost the grace of the Holy Spirit. A Catholic cleric should take warning from this, for if he is not satisfied with the pay that he receives from the altar, as the Lord has ordered, but practices trade, sells his intercession, and wilfully seizes the property of widows, he can be considered more a businessman than a cleric. Nor are we able to say: "No one accuses us of taking property forcibly, no one accuses us of violence," as if greedy flattering words could not entice forth more booty than tortures do. It does not matter to God whether a person usurps someone else's property by force or be deceit, so long as he holds on to that property in some way.

(trans. B. Ramsey 1989: 63-65, slightly changed; summary M. Szada)

Place of event:

Region

Italy north of Rome with Corsica and Sardinia

City

Turin

About the source:

Author: Maximus of Turin
Title: Sermons, Sermones, Collectio sermonum, Sermon 26
Origin: Turin (Italy north of Rome with Corsica and Sardinia)
Denomination: Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian

Maximus is the first known bishop of Turin. He held this see already in May 397 because he mentions the martyrdom of three clerics in Anaunia as the event from his episcopacy (Sermons 105–6). According to Gennadius of Marseille, Maximus died during the reign of Honorius and Theodosius II, that is between 408 and 423. He should not be confused with another Maximus of Turin attested in the middle of the fifth century (PCBE, Italie, v. 1, Maximus 10 and Maximus 14).

The collection of the sermons of Maximus of Turin were first edited by Bruno Bruni in 1784 (included in Patrologia Latina 57). Now, however, many sermons attributed by Bruni to Maximus are considered dubious or spurious. Most recent editor, Almut Mutzenbecher, decided to include in her edition 121 sermons. According to Mutzenbecher, 89 of those constituted the collection ascribed to Maximus already in the fifth century, though seven of those are spurious. Of the remaining sermons which are "out of order" (sermones extravagantes) she considers 30 to be genuine (Mutzenbecher 1962: xv–xxxvi).

Sermon 48 is genuine (Mutzenbecher 1961: 217–19; 1962: 186).

Edition:

Mutzenbecher Almut ed., Maximi Taurinensis Collectio sermonum antiqua nonnullis sermonibus extrauagantibus adiectis, Corpus Christianorum Series Latina 23, Turnhout 1962

Translation:

Boniface Ramsey trans., Sermons of Maximus of Turin, Ancient Christian Writers 50, New York 1989

Bibliography:

A. Mutzenbecher, "Bestimmung der echten Sermones des Maximus Taurinensis", Sacris Erudiri 12 (1961), 197-293.

Categories:

Religious grouping (other than Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian) - Arian

Described by a title - Clericus

Economic status and activity - Buying & selling

Intercession

Livelihood/income

Theoretical considerations - On priesthood

Conflict - Violence

Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL: M. Szada, Presbyters in the Late Antique West, ER1508, http://www.presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=1508