Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 4.djvu/670

 CYRIL

592

CYRIL

Synesius; the latter, a convert to Christianit}', died Bishop of Ptolemais. Lequicn (II, 621) mentions six bishops of CjTene, and according to Byzantine legend the first was St. Lucius (Acts, xiii, 1); St. Theodorus suffered martjTdom under Diocletian; about 370 Philo dared to consecrate by liimself a bishop for Hydra, and was succeeded by his own nephew, Philo; Rufus sided with Dioscorus at the Robber Synod (Latrocinium) of Ephesus in 449; Leontius lived about 600. Lequien (III, 1151) mentions also six Latin bishops, from 1477 to 1557. The Latin titular see was suppressed by a papal decree of 1894. The old city, ruined by the Arab invasion in the seventh century, is not inhabited, but its site is still called Qrennah (Cyrene). Its necropolis is one of the largest and best preserved in the world, and the tombs, most- ly rock-hewni, are of Dorian style.

Smith and Porcher, Discoveries of r'i,i-, ,;,- 'TimhImh, T^ni); Theige, Res Cyrenensium. (Copenh.iL. -: > '^ !: ;i..,.

Quwslianes de rebus Cyrenamm prov. !"!■ - < /, y-nc

(Leipzig, 1890); Borsari, Geoffra/ia. ., ' / ,■ r ■,-

naica e Fezzan (Turin, 1888); Smith, Dl,i. vj c,r«A-un<( h,mian Geog. (London, 1878), I, 734-36.

S. PETRlDijS.

Cyril and Methodius (or Constantine and Meth- ODIU.S), Saints, the Apostles of the Slavs, were brothers, born in Thessalonica, in 827 and 826 re- spectively. Though belonging to a senatorial family they renounced secular honours and became priests. They were living in a monastery on the Bosphorus, when the Ivliazars sent to Constantinople for a Chris- tian teacher. Cyril was selected and was accom- panied by his brother. They learned the Khazur language and converted many of the people. Soon after the Khazar mission there was a request from the Moravians for a preacher of the Gospel. German missionaries had already laboured among them, but without success. The Moravians wished a teacher who could instruct them and conduct Divine service in the Slavonic tongue. On account of their acquaint- ance with the language, Cyril and Methodius were chosen for the work. In preparation for it Cyril invented an alphabet and, with the help of Meth- odius, translated the Gospels and the necessary litur- gical books into Slavonic. They went to Moravia in 863, and laboured for four and a half years. De- spite their success, they were regarded by the Ger- mans with distrust, first because they had come from Constantinople where schism was rife, and again because they held the Church services in the Slavonic language. On this accoimt the brothers were sum- moned to Rome by Nicholas I, who died, however, before their arrival. His successor, Adrian II, re- ceived them kindly. Convinced of their orthodoxy, he commended their missionary activity, sanctioned the Slavonic Liturgy, and ordained Cyril and Meth- odius bishops. Cyril, however, was not to return to Moravia. He died in Rome, 4 Feb., 869.

At the request of the Moravian princes, Rastislav and Svatopluk, and the Slav Prince Kocel of Pannonia, Adrian II formed an Archdiocese of Moravia and Pannonia, made it independent of the German Church, and appointed Methodius archbishop. In 870 King Louis and the German bishops summoned Methodius to a. synod at Ratisbon. Here he was deposed and condemned to )irison. After three years he was liberated at tlic ciinunaiid of Pope John VIII and reinstated as .\rchl)ishop of Moravia. He zeal- ously endeavoured to sjiread the Faith among the Bohemians, and also among the Poles in Northern Moravia. Soon, however, he WiUs summoned to Rome again in conseejuence of the allegations of the German priest Wiching, wlio impugned his ortliodoxy, and objected to the us(! of .Slavonic in the liturgy. But John VIII, after an inquiry, sanc'tioned the .Slavonic Liturgy, decreeing, liowever, tli;it in the M:iss the Gospel should be read first in Latin and then in .Sla-

vonic. Wiching, in the meantime, had been nomi- nated one of the suffragan bishops of Methodius. He continued to oppose his metropolitan, going so far as to produce spurious papal letters. The pope, how- ever, assured Methodius that they were false. Meth- odius went to Constantinople about this time, and, with the assistance of several priests, he completed the translation of the Holy .Scripture, with the excep- tion of the Books of Machabees. He translated also the "Nomocanon", i. e. the Greek ecclesiastico-civil law. The enemies of Methodius did not cease to antagonize him. His health was worn out from the long struggle, and he died 6 April, 885, recommending as his suc- cessor Gorazd, a Moravian Slav who had been his disciple.

Formerly the feast of Saints Cyril and Methodius was celebrated in Bohemia and Moravia on 9 March; but Pius IX changed the date to 5 July. Leo XIII, by his Encyclical ''Grande Munus" of 30 September, 1880, extended the feast to the universal Church. (See Moravia; Slavonic Liturgy; Bohemia; Poland; John VIII.)

Acta SS., March, II, 13-20; Ginzel, Geschichte der Sloven- apostel Cyrill und Method und der stavischen Liturgie (Vienna, 1861); Leger, Cyrillc et Methode, elude historique sur la con- version des Slaves au Christianisme (Poitiers-Paris, 186S); Jagic, Die neuesten Forschringen itber die stavischen Apostel drill und Methodius in Arcfnr f. ■.■Int-i^rhe Philologie (1879). IV; Bartolini, Memorie sl">-n ,.-<■>■, n.-h. 'irrheologiche dei Sanii Cirillo e Metodio (Rome, ISM : i m,: :, ' > ■ .^rhichte der Slavena- postel Konstantinus (Kyrilli, ./ M •li.j.iim (Gotha, 1897); Pastrnek, D^jiny slovan^kyj^ apu..!ulu Cyrilta a Methoda (Prague, 1902); Bruckner. Cyryl i Melody (Cracow, 1903); POTKANSKI, Konstantyn i Metodyusz (Cracow, 1905); Cheva- lier. Bio-Bibl. s. V.

L. Abraham.

Cyril of Alexandria, Saint, Doctor of the Church, has Ids feast in the Western Church on the 28th of January; in the Greek Menaea it is found on the 9th of June, and (together with .St. Athanasios) on the 18th of January.

He seems to have been of an Alexandrian family, and was the son of the brother of Theophilus, Patri- arch of Alexandria; if he is the CyrU addressed by Isidore of Pelusium in Ep. xx\- of Bk. I, he was for a time a monk. He accompanied Theophilus to Con- stantinople when that bishop held the " SjTiod of the Oak" in 403 and deposed St. John Chrysostom. Theophilus died 15 Oct., 412, and on the 18th Cyril was consecrated his uncle's successor, but only after a riot between liis supporters and those of his rival, Tiinotheus. Socrates complains bitterly that one of his first acts was to plunder and shut the churches of the Novatians. He also drove out of Alexandria all the Jews, who had formed a flourishing community there since Alexander the Great. But they had caused tumults and had massacred the Christians, to defend whom Cyril himself assembled a mob. This may have been the only possible defence, since the Prefect of Egypt, Orestes, who was very angry at the expulsion of the Jews, was also jealous of the power of Cyril, which certainly rivalled his own. Five hun- dred monks came down from Nitria to defend the patriarch. In a disturbance which arose, Orestes was wounded in the head by a stone thrown by a monk named .\mmonius. The prefect had Am- monius tortured to death, and the young and fiery patriarch honoured his remains for a time as those of a martyr. The .VIexandrians were always riotous, as we learn from Sdcratcs (^'I1, vii) and from St. Cyril himself (Horn, for Easter, 419). In one of these riots, in 422, the prefect Callistus was killed, :ind in another was coiiiinittrd the imu'der of the female ]>hilo.sopher Hypatia, :i highly-n-spiTted teacher of neo-Platonism, of advanced age and i it is saiil) of many virtues. She was a friend of Onstes, and many believed that she prevented a iveoiu'iliation between (irefect and patri- arch. A niol) led by a lector, n:imed Peter, dragged her to a church and tore her ilesh with potsherds