Martin: Difference between revisions

{{Church ages}}

Sulpitius Severus records:

Martin was named after Mars, the god of war.  He was a native of Sabaria, Pannonia (modern Szombathely, Hungary). His father was a senior officer (tribune) in the Imperial Horse Guard, a unit of the Roman army, and was stationed at Ticinum, Cisalpine Gaul (modern Pavia, Italy).  

While Martin was still a soldier at Amiens he experienced the vision that became the most-repeated story about his life. He was at the gates of the city of Amiens with his soldiers when he met a scantily dressed beggar. He impulsively cut his own military cloak in half and shared it with the beggar. That night he dreamed of Jesus wearing the half-cloak Martin had given away. He heard Jesus say to the angels: "Here is Martin, the Roman soldier who is not baptised; he has clad me.".   

In Tours, Martin became a disciple of Hilary of Poitiers, a chief proponent of Trinitarian Christianity, who opposed the Arianism of the Visigothic nobility. When Hilary was forced into exile from Poitiers, Martin returned to Italy, and, according to Sulpicius Severus, converting an Alpine brigand on the way and confronted the Devil himself. Returning from Illyria, he was confronted by the Arian archbishop of Milan Auxentius, who expelled him from the city. According to the early sources, he decided to seek shelter on the island then called Gallinaria, now Isola d'Albenga, in the Tyrrhenian Sea, where he lived the solitary life of a hermit.

Martin was happy with the life of a monk, and would have remained there except that in 371 the people of Tours lured him into the city, and, to the dismay of many of the local clergy, voted him as their bishop on his arrival.  As a Bishop, Martin continued to life a holy and simple life with a friendly demeanor, ministering, praying for the sick, helping the poor, and tearing down the temples of the heathen.   

His role in the matter of the followers of Priscillian was especially remarkable. Priscillian and his partisans, who had been condemned by the Council of Saragossa, had fled; furious charges were brought before Emperor Magnus Maximus by some bishops of Hispania, led by Bishop Ithacius. Martin hurried to the Imperial court of Trier on an errand of mercy to remove them from the secular jurisdiction of the emperor. Maximus at first acceded to his entreaty, but, when Martin had departed, yielded to the solicitations of Ithacius and ordered Priscillian and his followers to be beheaded (385).   

While St. Martin is one of the most recognizable Roman Catholic saints, his form of Christianity is not Catholic by modern standards, but rather apostolic.  Like [[Paul]], threads were taken from Martin's garments, and "wrought frequent miracles upon those who were sick."  Martin also prophecied to the Emperor Maximus that he would be successful in attacking Emperor Valentinianus, but would die shortly thereafter - which came to pass.  There is also no indication, other than a friendship with Hilary of Poitiers, that Martin was a Trinitarian, although persecution from the Arians showed that he was not an Arian either.  The only indication of Martin's view of the Godhead is that throughout his biography, Sulpicius Severus refers only to God, the Lord, the name of the Lord Jesus, and the name of Christ.  It appears from this that Martin held an apostolic (pre-trinitarian) view of the Godhead.