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Bede,
The Ecclesiastical History
of the English People, Book 3, Chapter 23. This is
Bede's
account of the foundation of Lastingham church.
The reference to 'in the place where dragons lay...'
is a quote from Isaiah chapter 35 (see right hand
column). |
Chapter 23
Bishop Cedd, having a place
given him by King Ethelwald, consecrates it to our
Lord with prayer and fasting. His death.
Cedd, whilst he was bishop among the East
Saxons, also used often to visit his own
country, Northumberland, to preach there. Ethelwald,
the son of King Oswald, who reigned among the Deiri,
finding him a holy, wise, and good man, asked him to
accept some land on which to build a monastery, to which the
King
himself might frequently resort, to offer his prayers and
hear the word, and be buried in it when he died; for he
believed that he should receive much benefit by the
prayers of those who were to serve God in that place.
The
king had before with him a brother of the same bishop,
called Celin, a man no less devoted to God, who, being a
priest, used to administer to him the word and the
sacraments of the Faith; by whose means he chiefly came to
know and love the bishop. That prelate, therefore,
complying with the king's desires, chose himself a place
to build a monastery among some steep and remote hills,
which looked more like lurking-places for robbers, and
retreats for wild beasts, than habitations for men; to the
end that, according to the prophecy of Isaiah, "In the
habitations where before dragons dwelt, might be grass
with reeds and rushes;" that is, that the fruits of good
work should spring up, where before beasts used to
dwell - or men who lived after the manner of beasts.
The man
of God, desiring first to cleanse the place for the
monastery from former crimes, by prayer and fasting, that
it might become acceptable to our Lord, and so to lay the
foundations, requested of the king that he would give him
leave to reside there all the approaching time of Lent to
pray. All which days, except Sundays, be fasted till the
evening, according to custom, and then took no other
sustenance than a little bread, one hen's egg, and a
little milk mixed with water. This, he said, was the
custom of those of whom he had learned the rule of regular
discipline; first, to consecrate to our Lord, by prayer
and fasting, the places which they had newly received for
building a monastery or a church. When there were ten days
of Lent still remaining; there came a messenger to call
him to the king; and he, that the religious work might not
be intermitted, on account of the king's affairs,
entreated his priest Cynebil, who was also his own
brother, to complete that which had been so piously begun.
Cynebil readily complied, and when the time of fasting and
prayer was over, he there built the monastery, which is
now called Lastingham, and established therein the
religious customs of Lindisfarne, where they had been
educated.
Cedd for
many years having charge of the bishopric in the aforesaid
province, and of this monastery, over which he had placed
superiors, it happened that he came thither at a time when
there was a mortality, and fell sick and died. He was
first buried in the open air; but in the process of time a
church was built of stone in the monastery, in honor of
the Mother of God, and his body interred in the same, on
the right hand of the altar.
The
bishop left the monastery to be governed after him by his
brother Chad, who was afterwards made bishop, as shall be
said in its place. For the four brothers we have
mentioned, Cedd and Cynebil, Celia and Ceadda [Chad],
which is a rare thing to be met with, were all celebrated
priests of our Lord, and two of them also came to be
bishops. When the brethren who were in his monastery, in
the province of the East Saxons, heard that the bishop was
dead in the province of the Northumbrians, about thirty
men of that monastery came thither, being desirous either
to live near the body of their father, if it should please
God, or to die there and be buried. Being lovingly
received by their brethren and fellow soldiers in Christ,
all of them died there by the aforesaid pestilence, except
one little boy, who was delivered from death by his
father's prayers. For when he bad lived there a long time
after, and applied himself to the reading of sacred writ,
he was informed that he had not been regenerated by the
water of baptism, and being then washed in the laver of
salvation, he was afterwards promoted to the order of
priesthood, and proved very useful to many in the church.
I do not doubt that he was delivered at the point of
death, as I have said, by the intercession of his father,
whilst he was embracing his beloved corpse, that so he
might himself avoid eternal death, and by teaching,
exhibit the ministry of life and salvation to others of
the brethren. |