Presbyters Uniwersytet Warszawski
ID
ER 884
Restitutus, the presbyter of the diocese of Calama (North Africa) is cataleptic (resistent to any sensation and pain). Account of Augustine of Hippo, "The City of God", Book 14, AD 417/427.
Book 14
 
24. [...]  Presbyter fuit quidam Restitutus nomine in paroecia Calamensis ecclesiae. Quando ei placebat (rogabatur autem ut hoc faceret ab
eis, qui rem mirabilem coram scire cupiebant), ad imitatas quasi lamentantis cuiuslibet hominis uoces ita se auferebat a sensibus et iacebat simillimus mortuo, ut non solum uellicantes atque pungentes minime sentiret, sed aliquando etiam igne ureretur admoto sine ullo doloris sensu nisi postmodum ex uulnere. [...]
 
(ed. Dombart - Kalb 1955, 447-448)
Book 14
 
24. […] In the diocese of Calama there was a presbyter named Restitutus. Whenever he liked – and he was often asked to do this by people who wanted first-hand knowledge of the astonishing deed – he would withdraw himself from all sensation, while imitating the cries of a man lamenting, and would then lie motionless, exactly as if he were dead. Not only did he feel nothing at all when pinched or pricked, but sometimes he was even burned by the application of fire and still felt no pain, except afterwards, from the wound. […]
 
(trans. W. Babcock, slighltly altered)

Place of event:

Region
  • Latin North Africa
City
  • Calama

About the source:

Author: Augustine of Hippo
Title: The City of God, De civitate Dei, On The City of God
Origin: Hippo Regius (Latin North Africa)
Denomination: Catholic/Nicene/Chalcedonian
“The City of God” was meant by Augustine to provide the Christians with the arguments against the accusations, raised especially after the sack of Rome in 410 AD, that their religion was inferior to the pagan cults that protected the Roman state in a better way. The first ten books of the “City of God” are a critique of the Roman religion and philosophy. The next twelve discuss the relation between the eternal City of God and the Earthly City.
Augustine probably started writing this work in 412 AD. The books appeared gradually. Book 10 was finished by 417 AD, and the whole work by 426/427.
 
Edition:
B. Dombart, A. Kalb edd., Sancti Aurelii Augustini De Civitate Dei libri XI-XXII, Corpus Christianorum. Series Latina 48, Turnhout 1955.
 
Translation:
 
Saint Augustine, The City of God XI-XXII, trans. W. Babcock, New York 2013.

Categories:

Described by a title - Presbyter/πρεσβύτερος
Food/Clothes/Housing - Health & hygiene
Please quote this record referring to its author, database name, number, and, if possible, stable URL: S. Adamiak, Presbyters in the Late Antique West, ER884, http://presbytersproject.ihuw.pl/index.php?id=6&SourceID=884