Symeon the Metaphrast

{{short description|10th-century Byzantine historian and hagiographer}}

{{Infobox saint

|honorific_prefix = Saint

|name=Symeon the Metaphrast

|image=Symeon Metafrast.jpg

|titles=Venerable, Hagiographer, Logothete

|birth_date=886-912 (900)

|birth_place=Constantinople
(modern-day Istanbul, Turkey)

|residence=Constantinople

|death_date=November 28, 987

|death_place=Constantinople

|feast_day=November 9/November 28

|honored_in=Eastern Orthodox Church

|canonized_date=11th century

|canonized_place=Constantinople

|canonized_by=Eastern Orthodox Church

|attributes=Pen, Scroll, Religious habit

|major_works=Menologium

}}

Symeon or Simeon (died {{c.|1000}}), distinguished as Symeon Metaphrastes (Latin) or Symeon the Metaphrast ({{Langx|grc|Συμεών ὁ Μεταφραστής}}, Symeṓn ho Metaphrastḗs), was a Byzantine writer and official regarded as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church. His feast day is celebrated on 9 or 28 November.{{ODB |first1=Alexander |last1=Kazhdan |first2=Nancy Patterson |last2=Ševčenko |title=Symeon Metaphrastes |url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780195046526.001.0001/acref-9780195046526-e-5220}}{{cite encyclopedia |editor-link1=F. L. Cross |editor-link2=E. A. Livingstone |editor-first1=F. L. |editor-first2=E. A. |editor-last1=Cross |editor-last2=Livingstone |title=Simeon Metaphrastes, St (fl. c. 960) |encyclopedia=The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church |edition=3rd rev. |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2009 |orig-year=2005 |url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780192802903.001.0001/acref-9780192802903-e-6349}}

He is best known for his 10-volume Greek menologion, a collection of saints' lives.{{cite book |author= James Carleton Paget |title= Jews, Christians and Jewish Christians in Antiquity |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=AFLJ682D9QUC&pg=PA212 |access-date=13 November 2012 |date=2010 |publisher= Mohr Siebeck |isbn= 978-3-16-150312-2 |pages= 212ff}}

Life

About Symeon's life few details are known. He lived in the second half of the 10th century. Ephrem Mtsire puts him at the peak of his career in the sixth year of Basil II (982). Yahya of Antioch also makes him a contemporary of Basil II and Patriarch Nicholas II of Constantinople (984–991).Per Kazhdan and Ševčenko, his dates have generated some controversy. Mark Eugenikos places his birth in the reign of Leo VI the Wise, which would give him an improbably long life. Some modern scholars have moved his life forward to the 11th century, but this contradicts both Ephrem and Yahya. In the 15th century, Mark Eugenikos wrongly called Symeon a megas logothetes. The hagiographer actually lived a generation later than the historian Symeon Logothete.

Works

Symeon wrote mainly hymnody and hagiography. He composed kanones, stichera and a hymn to the Trinity. He also compiled excerpts of the Church Fathers, particularly Basil the Great. His most important work by far, however, is the menologion, which Albert Ehrhard labelled "a revolution in the field of hagiography". According to tradition, it was commissioned by Basil II.

Symeon's menologion is a product of the encyclopedism characteristic of the Macedonian Renaissance. He did not merely collect and arrange pre-existing saint's lives, but also reworked them, standardizing their language and embellishing their rhetorical style to bring them in line with the Atticism of the day. His nickname comes from this act of metaphrasis. The content of the lives was not altered, however, and historical errors were left intact. Symeon arranged them according to their feast days in the Eastern Orthodox liturgical calendar. There are about 150 distinct lives.{{CathEncy|wstitle=Symeon Metaphrastes}}

For his menologion, Symeon received praise from Nikephoros Ouranos and Michael Psellos addressed to him an encomium. It was widely read in monasteries. The standard edition came in ten volumes. Numerous illuminated copies were produced in the 11th century. Working independently, Father Delehaye and Albert Ehrhard compiled works attributed to Symeon. They were at a loss for the provenance of some of his materials and their relation to other standard hagiographies. In particular, Delehaye found that Symeon or his immediate sources sparsely added materials of their own drawn from other places.Delehaye, Preface to the "Synaxarium Eccles. Cp.", Propylæum to the Acta Sanctorum for November, lix-lxvi.

Some orthodox prayers of preparation before Holy Communion{{Cite web |title=Каноны и молитвы для подготовки к Таинствам Исповеди и Святого Причащения - Молитвослов |url=https://azbyka.ru/molitvoslov/1/kanony-i-molitvy-dlya-podgotovki-k-tainstvam-ispovedi-i-svyatogo-prichastiya |access-date=2022-04-15 |website=azbyka.ru |language=ru-RU}} and prayers of thanksgiving after Holy Communion were composed by him.{{Cite web |date=2014-05-17 |title=Благодарственные молитвы по Святом Причащении - Молитвослов |url=https://azbyka.ru/molitvoslov/blagodarstvennye-molitvy-po-svyatom-prichashhenii.html |access-date=2022-04-15 |website=azbyka.ru |language=ru-RU}}

Veneration

Venerable Symeon the Metaphrast is venerated in the Eastern Orthodox Church.{{Cite web |title=Преподобный Симео́н Метафраст |url=https://azbyka.ru/days/sv-simeon-metafrast |access-date=2022-04-15 |website=Православный Церковный календарь |language=ru}} Michael Psellos compiled Symeon's biography ({{circa}} 1050) and he composed a liturgical office for him.{{Cite web |title=СИМЕОН МЕТАФРАСТ - Древо |url=http://drevo-info.ru/articles/11622.html |access-date=2022-04-15 |website=drevo-info.ru |language=ru}}

References

External links

[http://www.documentacatholicaomnia.eu/30_20_0950-1050-_Symeon_Metaphrastes.html Greek Opera Omnia by Migne Patrologia Graeca with analytical indexes]

Category:10th-century births

Category:Year of death missing

Category:Greek religious writers

Category:Christian hagiographers

Category:Byzantine saints of the Eastern Orthodox Church

Category:10th-century Christian saints

Category:10th-century Byzantine writers

Category:Catholic monks

Category:Logothetes

Category:Philokalia