
The century in which Yeghishe Vardapet lived and the Armenian Church’s uprising against paganism, as described by him, is the century of the fall of the universal Roman Empire—the fifth century. The fateful verses of Horace:
Barbarus, heu! cineres insistet victor, et Urbem Eques sonante verberabit ungula; Quaeque carent ventis et solibus, ossa Quirini, Nefas videre! dissipabit insolens.
called forth by the contemporary Roman society, were fully realized over the eternal city in the fifth century. Barbarians from outside, social evil from within, gradually crushed the empire that had long ruled the world. The foundation of Rome was war. This foundation produced great commanders; it was the beginning of its worldwide glory and its downfall.
Rome quickly transitioned from war to war, from glory to glory, from slavery to slavery, and ended in terrible desolation around itself. Due to the excessive taxes, people abandoned their fields and roamed in large crowds to ravage the provinces of Rome.
Look at this desperate struggle of the treasury with the impoverished people—a struggle described by Lactantius: “The number of those who received, compared to the number of people obliged to pay these excessive taxes, was so great that the farmers lost their strength: the fields turned into steppes, the plowed lands into forests.
I do not know how many officials and officeholders, magistrates, rationales, vicars, prefects suddenly descended upon each province, each city. All these people knew only how to pronounce death sentences and exiles and to produce only collections, not occasional but continuous, and with collections—unbearable insults. But the people’s disaster, the general sorrow came when the scourge of the census was thrown into the provinces and cities, when the census takers flooded everything, overthrew everything.
You would say: an enemy invasion, a city taken by storm. They measured the land in patches, counted the trees and the knees of the vines, recorded every animal, counted the people. Only the blows of whips were heard; only the cries of tortures were heard; the faithful slave was tortured to betray his master, the wife against the husband, the son against the father, and for lack of witnesses, they forced testimonies against the same tortured, and when the victims yielded, overcome by suffering, they wrote against them what they did not say.
No mercy—neither for old age nor infirmity: they brought even the infirm and paralyzed. They respected the age of each: they added years to children, took them away from the elderly. Everything was filled with sorrow and numbness. They did not trust these first agents and sent others to collect even more, and the duties were doubled.
The latter, finding nothing more, added at random, so as not to seem useless. Meanwhile, the animals became fewer, people died; but nevertheless, they had to pay for the dead.” The deserted views of the fields abandoned by the people terrified the Caesars; they called the people to the fields, gave them privileges; granted the people the right to independent popular assemblies, but their privileges were in vain;—the people no longer accepted this benefaction from the Caesars.
The cities locked themselves within their walls, everything threatened the Empire with collapse. And since the greatness, power, and strength of it were precisely the cities; now, when they withdrew, the fall became inevitable. The ancient society was dying out; man had no other way out of it than the complete destruction of this very society; he abandoned it and went over to the enemies.
Listen to what the contemporary historian of the fifth century, Salvian, says: “They prefer to live under the guise of captivity freely, rather than under the guise of freedom as captives. Our brothers not only do not wish to flee to us from them (the barbarians), but rather leave us and flee to them; and still wonder why not all the poor do the same; perhaps only one thing stops them, that they cannot carry their tiny shelters and families with them.”
The ancient society was dying without a future, if not for the emergence of another society from within it, based on different principles, inspired by different feelings; a society that was to bring the word of life and love into the barbaric, pagan world. This new society, which revived the ancient one, is the society of Christians—the Church.
Christianity recreated the ancient world, gave humanity a new beginning, a new civilization, which is and should be a substantial, living proof of infinite morality, a gradual, peaceful application of Christian ideas to life; consequently, the expulsion of pagan ideas from the world. The Church saved man, saved the world!
Even the barbarians, who were ready to destroy everything in their path, were defeated by the cross of the Savior and became obedient instruments of Christianity. Here is what Leo the Great wrote in the fifth century: “Even the weapons that destroy peace favor the actions of the Gospel’s grace. How many people, who in peaceful times postponed their baptism; now, driven by the fear of impending dangers, asked for it?
How many weak and negligent souls, struck by sudden horror, hurried to fulfill what peaceful exhortations could never incline them to. We saw the children of the Church, who, having fallen under the power of enemies, brought their captors to the Gospel as captives, became their guides in faith, and ruled those whom they should have served as slaves by the right of war. Barbarians serving in the auxiliary troops of the Empire were taught in our lands what they could not learn at home and returned to their dwellings with the knowledge of the Gospel.
Thus, nothing can resist divine grace; nothing can prevent it from fulfilling its purpose; it turns discord into the restoration of harmony, transforms wounds into means of healing, and with the dangers threatening the Church, brings it prosperity.” Thus, the Church prevented the ancient society from being enslaved by the material force that dominated the world in the fifth century.
It saved Armenia from the terrible slavery that threatened it—spiritual slavery, the paganism of the Persian rulers. The Church alone had moral influence on society, amidst the flood of material force that then inundated the world. It alone professed and preached the true faith for the salvation of humanity;—the faith that is a law surpassing all human laws—the Will of the Creator, His Word: the Gospel, which alone could comfort and bless the sufferings of humanity,—give the world a new life, humanity a new world.
Armenia, which for many years had been the subject of discord between the Parthians and the Romans, was conquered by the Romans in 75 AD under Emperor Vespasian and became their province. The universal empire, weakened in the fifth century by the barbarians, withdrew all its troops from the provinces, which had cost the Romans so much money and blood, and could not provide assistance to Armenia, which sought it in vain in Constantinople. Theodosius the Younger, frightened by the invasion of the Persian ruler Yazdegerd into Greece, sought by all means to conclude a truce with him and sent Anatolius to the Persian court, who slavishly fulfilled all the demands of the boastful Yazdegerd.
Armenia, a constant ally of Greece, was now left completely helpless. Alone, with its own forces, it was forced to fight for the holy Church against the strong and mighty Yazdegerd. But its terrible power did not frighten it. It alone rose to defend the holy Church: it believed, it knew that: “Heaven and earth will pass away, but the word of the Lord will never pass away.
Armenia was truly a constant martyr for the holy Church. First, paganism troubled and tormented her, then Islamism tyrannized her for her faith in Jesus Christ. For centuries, she was persecuted by the sword of powerful rulers of the East; but their swords broke against the Armenians’ faithfulness to the Church.
The rulers of the East took everything from them, took fathers, mothers, wives, children, homeland, and even life itself: but their faith in the Savior was unshakable, like the word of God, which elevated them above all that is transient on earth and gave them the strength to endure the terrible torments from the persecutors of the Church. The rulers of Persia evicted Armenians from their homeland by entire provinces and populated their state with them, where travelers now meet them as monuments of the terrible religious storm endured by Armenia.
These colonies of Christ, left by Christianity in its march from East to West, have stood for centuries and perhaps another century will pass before the Christian world takes them under its love-illuminated banner, to spread the latest civilization in the lands from which ancient civilization emerged. Religious martyrdom, as a result of centuries of persecution, constitutes the main element of the historical, social, and private life of the Armenian nation.
The best pages of its history are marked by the blood of those who suffered for the faith and are imprinted in the memory of everyone bearing the name Armenian. They form the favorite story of their social life, and there is no Armenian family that did not have its share in the sufferings for the Church. Martyrdom is, so to speak, the hereditary property of Armenians: in the traditions of each family, the memory of some member who fell for the Church of Christ is preserved.
Even in the fourth century, the rulers of Persia secretly and cunningly persecuted Armenia. Moses of Chorene, a historian of the fifth century, tells that the Persian king Shapur gave his army under the command of Meruzhan, an apostate from Christ, and sent him to Armenia. “Meruzhan,” writes Chorene, “tried by all means to destroy Christianity in Armenia.
Under the pretext of tribute, he sent bishops and priests burdened with chains to Persia, burned all the writings he could find; forbade teaching the Greek language, and ordered to teach only Persian, so that no one, he said, would dare to speak or translate in Greek. And this Meruzhan ordered under the pretext of breaking all acquaintance and friendship with the Greeks; but in essence, he did this to completely destroy and eliminate Christian education; because the Armenians did not yet have their own script and conducted church services in Greek.
“In another place, Chorene writes: ‘Among the captives was the priest Zuita from Artashat. The apostates from Christ, Meruzhan and Vaan, slandered Zuita before King Shapur; they claimed that he had deliberately surrendered to captivity to persuade them to remain faithful to Christianity. Shapur ordered Zuita to be tortured if he did not renounce Christianity. Zuita rejected their offer and was subjected to a cruel death.’
Finally, in the fifth century, a terrible era began for the Armenians. It was necessary to decide the question: does she want to sacrifice her faith for the happiness and joys of temporal life, or does she want to preserve her faith in Christ at the cost of happiness, peace, and life itself? It was enough to present this question for all of Armenia, carried away by holy enthusiasm, to rise unanimously against paganism.
The Magi, whose eyes had long been hurt by the light of the Gospel, urged Yazdegerd to go to war against Armenia and destroy Christianity. This war of paganism against Christianity is conveyed to us by Yeghishe Vardapet in his fascinating history. The historian will find in it interesting descriptions of the customs and manners of the Persians and Armenians of the fifth century, from which so few historical monuments remain, and a clear critical exposition of the teachings of Zoroaster and the dogmas of Christianity.
You, modern women, who have forgotten the virtue of love amid the sensual, contemporary life, these women of the fifth century, humble executors of the holy duty to faith and homeland, will remind you of your high calling: to rule the world with the scepter of love. You will understand, reading the history of Yeghishe, your holy vocation—to serve the Gospel, which has freed you from slavery and given you power over the human heart, so that you may rule humanity.
The history of Yeghishe has long been known to the scholarly world of Europe. The famous orientalist Saint-Martin introduced it to France in his beautiful excerpts; and later, in the forties, the priest in Paris, Gregory Kabaradji Karapet, presented the French public with its complete translation. The translator of Moses of Chorene, the priest in Venice Cappelletti, translated it into Italian. Neumann, a professor of the Armenian language in Munich, introduced the English public to the historical part of Yeghishe’s work.
The difficulties inevitable in translating Eastern writers into European languages become insurmountable when translating Yeghishe. For fourteen centuries, it passed from hand to hand of many copyists, who did not handle it without some arbitrariness; hence it is somewhat obscure in places and often completely incomprehensible.
Encountering the difficult expressions of our author, in my translation, I adhered to the explanations of Gregory Kabaradji Karapet, who is well acquainted with the historical development of the Armenian language and with many texts of the original, which are still preserved in manuscripts. The text of Yeghishe’s history requires many corrections; for lack of a better one, I took for my translation the text published by the Mkhitarist Brotherhood, to whom the Armenians owe the preservation and processing of their literary language.
I consider it necessary to share these few pieces of information that remain about the life of Yeghishe himself. He was born at the beginning of the fifth century in Armenia. Under the patronage of the illustrious men, St. Isaac and St. Mesrop, to whom the Armenians and Georgians owe the invention of their letters, Yeghishe was sent for education to the famous schools of Greece, and having received a complete and perfect education there, returned to his homeland, to the full satisfaction of his compatriots and the justification of the hopes of his high patrons.
Upon returning to his homeland, his first thought was the enlightenment of his fellow countrymen, and to have the right to teach them, he wished to enter the clergy. His deep knowledge and impeccable purity of life drew universal attention to him. He was named Vardapet and elevated to the dignity of bishop of the Amatuni princes’ region. Subsequently, he was the spiritual father and first secretary of his illustrious relative, Prince Vartan Mamikonian, the hero of the history he described.
Yeghishe, by his position and high education received in the schools of Athens and Alexandria, was placed in a rare favorable position for a historian. He knew the entire soul of the hero of his history, possessed the scholarship of the age, and was an eyewitness to the sufferings endured by his nation, which could not but resonate in his beautiful soul filled with love, truly Christian.
It seems that Providence itself, having endowed him with all the gifts necessary for a historian, wished to preserve in the memory of humanity this high epic of the Armenian Church, which has been preserved in the immortal history of Yeghishe. His narrative is natural and captivating, but as a son of the East, he is not alien to the figurative expressions that adorn Eastern creations.
Many years after the uprising of Armenia, when Yeghishe, at the request of his comrade and friend, David Mamikonian, known for his holiness and love for enlightenment, undertook to write this history. Literature in this era had very limited significance. The writers of the Middle Ages were not familiar with the needs of modern times; they did not write for the pleasure of expressing their ideas. They were compelled to write either by some important event in the Christian world or by the request of a friend.
Thus, the literature of the Middle Ages was formed; its dominant form was the form of letters to a friend and to the Church. This is why the letters of these centuries had a completely different significance than in modern times; they preserve the most curious monuments of the society of that time. Yeghishe divided his history into seven sections, which in my text, published by the Mkhitarist Brotherhood in 1838, are divided into eight chapters; since some chapters included several sections, I preferred, for greater clarity, to divide them into eleven chapters. Where and when Yeghishe wrote his history is unknown; it is only known that he died in 480.
Yeghishe Vardapet to Archbishop David Mamikonian
You entrusted me, my valiant friend, to write the history of the war of Armenia—I have completed it. I have recounted, according to your desire, the battles of the Armenians, in which many crowned themselves with the glory of immortality and very few covered themselves with disgrace.
I divided this work into eleven chapters:
- The era of events.
- Events in the eastern kingdom.
- The assembly of the members of the holy clergy.
- The deposition of Prince Syunik and his impious companions.
- The invasion of the eastern peoples.
- The Armenians resist the Persian king a second time.
- The heroism and virtue of the Armenians, the impiety of Vasak becomes more and more apparent.
- The continuation of the same and the death of the holy priests.
- About the disciples of the holy martyrs who confessed Jesus Christ.
- The names of the princes who suffered captivity at the Persian court out of love for Jesus Christ.
- The remembrance of the wives of the captives and the warriors who perished in the great battle.
I have included in these chapters, with extraordinary precision, the beginning, middle, and end of the events, so that you can read daily and delve into the valiant deeds of the brave and the shame of those who distanced themselves from the union.
Not because you need to satisfy your extensive earthly knowledge; but you will marvel at the divine Providence, distributing in this world to two opposing sides the reward, each according to their merits, the visible teaches us to know the invisible.
You, great in divine science, what useful work could you command that I would not hasten to fulfill.
It is evident to me and you and to all who devote themselves to the study of philosophy that our curiosity is like an image of peaceful heavenly love, not a desire for earthly glory.
According to the illustrious historians of antiquity: unity is the mother of blessings, while division is the source of misfortunes.
Thus, I saw this holy love in your command and, despite the weakness of my abilities, I did not hesitate to undertake the task, knowing that your holiness can correct its shortcomings, just as your prayers can be beneficial for the public good.
As soon as I heard your command, I immediately began writing this history; it is a consolation for the loving, a hope for the expectant, an encouragement for warriors to virtuous contempt of death, to stand under the banner of Jesus Christ, always victorious.
He fulfills with invincible power those who resort to Him and allows, without distinction, anyone who wishes to stand under the banner of heroic virtues. Since these virtues are countless and varied in their names, the rewards bestowed by His grace are also countless.
The greatest and most precious of them is holy love, free from any earthly thought. This holy love, which is a gift from heaven, I noticed in you, and the thought of my natural weakness completely faded from my mind.
We ascend together to the heavenly country and fly above the worldly turmoil, to breathe freely the pure and divine air, to find the science of salvation for ourselves and for the glory of the triumphant Church, so that its holy ministers may fulfill their duties with vigilance to the glory of the common Father, and thus, the Holy Trinity may rejoice in its immutable and eternal glory.
Sources:
Перевести на качественный английский язык: [Исторический раздел] | [Егише – Оглавление] | [Библиотека «Вѣхи»] © 2007, Библиотека «Вѣхи» [1] Вардапет: слово армянское. Оно значит: право-учитель. Этим словом переводится в новом завете Еврейское — Раввин, для наименования Спасителя и Апостолов. У Армян оно имело высокое значение и давалось высшим сановникам духовенства, Епископам и тем, которые святостью жизни и ученостью равнялись с ними. В начале, немногие Епископы принимали это наименование, как превышающее их достоинство; но впоследствии стали его давать всему черному духовенству, члены которого и поныне именуются Вардапетами.
Sure, here’s a high-quality English translation of the text:
[Historical Section] | [Yeghishe – Table of Contents] | [Library “Vekhi”]
© 2007, Library “Vekhi”
[1] Vardapet: an Armenian word. It means “teacher of the law.” This word is used in the New Testament to translate the Hebrew “Rabbi,” referring to the Savior and the Apostles. Among Armenians, it had a high significance and was given to the highest dignitaries of the clergy, bishops, and those who equaled them in holiness of life and scholarship. Initially, few bishops accepted this title, as it exceeded their dignity; but later, it began to be given to the entire black clergy, members of which are still called Vardapets.
[2] Horat. Epodon lib. carm. XVI.
[3] Gracius in 382 issued a law: “either all the provinces, united, deliberate together, or each province deliberates separately, so that no authority hinders or delays these deliberations, which the public good requires.” Emperor Honorius, in 418, granted the right to have independent popular assemblies.
See more: L. sive integita 9; Cod. Theod., 1, XII t.12. — Raynouard, Histoire du Droit municipat en France, 1, Стр.192, 199. — Michelet, Histoire de France.
[4] Malunt enim sub specie captivitatis vivere liberi, cum sub specie libertatis esse captivi… Non solum transfugere in eis ad nos fratres nostri omnino nolunt, sed ut ad eos con giant, nos relinquunt; et quidom mirari satis non possunt, quod hoс non omnes omnino faciunt tributarii pauperes… nisi quod una causa tantun est, qua non faciunt, quia transferre illuc… habitatiunculas familiasque non possunt… См. Sulvian, de gubernatione Dei. Michelet, Histoire de France.
[5] Les armes meme, qui detruisent le monde, no font que favoriser les operations de la grace evangelique. Combien de personnes qui, au sein de la paix, renvoyaient le moment de leur bapteme, l’ont maintenant demende, pousses par la crainte des dangers actueles. Combien d’ames languissantes et tiedes n’ont pas ete partees par un effroi subit a faire ce que des exortations paisibles n’avaient jamais pu obtenir d’elles. On a vu des enfans de l’eglise tomber au pouvoir de l’ennemi, ammener leur maitres captifs a l’Evangile et se devenir leur guides en la foi, diriger et conduire ceux, qui d’apres le sort de la guerre, ils devaient servir comme esclaves. Des barbares, qui servaient dans les troupes auxiliaires de l’empire, apprirent dans nos contrees ce qu’ils ne pouvaient apprendre chez eux, et retournerent dans leurs demeures avec la connaissance de I’Evangile. Ainsi, rien ne peut rerister a la grace divine, rien ne peut l’empecher d’accomplir ses decrets; elle fait servir la division au retablissement de la concorde, elle convertit les blessures en moyen de guerison, et par les dangers qui menacent l’eglise, elle procure sa prosperite. — См. Memoires pour servir a l’histoire du christianisme, par Aug. Neandre, traduit de l’allem, par Alph. Diacon.
[6] See the source of M. Khorenatsi, book III, ch. XXXVI.
[7] See there, book III, ch. XXXV.
[8] Its first edition was published in Amsterdam at the beginning of the 18th century. It is the first book printed in Armenian in Amsterdam.
[9] Mesrob, having come to the country of the Iberians (Georgia), invented letters for them, a gift sent to him from above, together with Dzhagai, the translator of the Greek and Armenian languages. Their king Bakur and bishop Moses favored him in this. Mesrob gathered the children, placed them in two classes, and left them two teachers from among his students, Ter-Khordzenatsi and Mushe-Toronetsi. See the source of M. Khorenatsi, book III, ch. LIV.
An excerpt from the book by Yeghishe Vardapet: The Struggle of Christianity with the Teachings of Zoroaster in the Fifth Century, in Armenia.