St. George’s day.
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The patron saint (George of Cappadocia) of England and Russia wasn’t even an orthodox Christian, so, by the rules of every established Church today, he cannot be a saint. He was an Arian “heretic” of the most extreme, anti-orthodox kind, as was that other saint, St. Constantine, baptised by a heretic, and therefore, under Church law, not in fact baptised!đ
But that was weeks ago. Has this got something to do with current events in Georgia where the crowds seem to be English supporters?
No, but that was how things kicked off in Ukraine in 2014, wasn’t it? So maybe that’s the next flashpoint.
I was just reading about George and saw he was a follower of Arius. So by Church law he’s a heretic, so can’t be a saint. The same with Constantine. Yet they are venerated as saints. That’s like the Vatican canonising Billy Graham.
What is the evidence he was a follower of Arius? In fact what is the evidence that he even existed (any more than the dragon he is supposed to have slain did)?
Anyway, whatâs all this got to do with anything?
Just pointing out religious inconsistencies.
George of Cappadocia is known as an historical figure. After all, we are talking about the late 4th century, not a biblical legend.But i should have put this in Off Topic. Sorry.
Yes, but what if this isnât a religious inconsistency? Your argument is undermined. As is your credibility. A mere parish priest might refer you to the Wikipedia entry on St. George, which says:
âEdward Gibbon argued that George, or at least the legend from which the above is distilled, is based on George of Cappadocia, a notorious 4th-century Arian bishop who was Athanasius of Alexandria’s most bitter rival, and that it was he who in time became George of England. This identification is seen as highly improbable. Bishop George was slain by Gentile Greeks for exacting onerous taxes, especially inheritance taxes. J. B. Bury, who edited the 1906 edition of Gibbon’s The Decline and Fall, wrote âthis theory of Gibbon’s has nothing to be said for itâ.â
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_George
I know you like to rely on 18th century authors but you seem to have got stuck there.
But you still havenât said how you are going to stop your local parish priest getting you by pointing out that their St. George is not the same as Bishop George of Cappadocia who was not made a saint.
He seems to have been a nasty piece of work who suffered a fitting end:
Maybe they invented George of Lydda so as to save face over George of Cappadocia?đ I think Gibbon is the best authority, still. (Unless you are saying, with the in-crowd, that we can chuck our books now ‘cos we have Wikipedia?) And let’s face it, Christians hate him.
I’m not under a parish priest because i’m not a Christian.
Actually, I use Wikipedia nearly every day. It is a very useful source of information. Of course you donât have to believe everything you read there but at least it gives a lead where to look if you want to check anything.
In the pre-Wikipedia days you had to have your own encyclopaedia or go to the local references library to look up the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Speaking of which:
âThe 2010 version of the 15th edition, which spans 32 volumes and 32,640 pages, was the last printed edition. Since 2016, it has been published exclusively as an online encyclopaedia.â
At least this is what its entry in Wikipedia says. I have no reason to think that this is not true.
Have you room in your bedside for the 32 printed volumes?
I have nothing agsinst Gibbon. His Deckline and Fall of the Roman Empire is a good read. Iâve got the book but itâs also available online, here for instance:
https://gutenberg.org/cache/epub/25717/pg25717-images.html
The internet has made available for free all sorts of interesting texts to thousands who could afford to buy the books. Surely that canât be bad, can it?
I make use of Gutenberg too, to email works to others, but i wouldn’t wish to read a work on it myself when i have books, which i can read at leisure and enjoy the physical object.
32 volumes! … Please, my home library passed that number before i was in long trousers!
(Not very William Morris-like are you, with his love of beautiful books and objects? A totally screen-based culture is very bleak to me, if that’s how you see our future. I think Morris would be on my side here.)
No, thatâs not my view but your and my preferences and tastes are of no significance or relevance.
But to return to the subject, in your opening posting you claimed that the patron saint of England was âGeorge of Cappodiciaâ, that this historical figure had been made a saint by the Catholic church and that thus contradicted their own dogmas since he had been labelled a heretic.
The Catholic Church denies that the George they made a saint was this historical figure but was someone else. So, for them, they didnât made a heretic a saint.
Your claim then gets downgraded to the claim that the mythical figure called George who was made a saint (and for who the church concocted a life story) arose from some cult around George of Cappodicia.
Even if true this would still not justify a claim that the church had made George of Cappodicia, a designated heretic, a saint.
The alternative theory that âSaintâ George never existed but is just a mythical figure (a bit like JC himself) seems more plausible.
George of Cappadocia was, however, real.
And he could have been “sainted” when the Arians were in charge and then that just stuck; with Gibbon’s claim being refuted by them later re-inventing “St. George” as George of Lydda, a mythical person.Gelasius canonised George in the late fifth century, barely a century after the bishop’s assassination, whereas George of Lydda had supposedly died a further century before that.
And when you say Catholic Church, the R.C. Church as we know it didn’t exist as its own entity until six centuries later. The bishop of Rome was no more than that, and no higher than any other bishop.
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