Two Letters of Athanasius to Lucifer of Cagliari

And although I believe that news has reached your holiness also concerning the persecution which the enemies of Christ have even now attempted to carry out against the brotherhood, seeking our blood, yet our dearest ones can also report to your religiousness: for they have dared to extend their fury through soldiers to such a degree that they not only put to flight the clergy of the city, but even went out to the hermits, and sent their deadly hands against the monks. Hence it came about that I too withdrew myself further away, lest even those who had received us should suffer trouble on their account. For whom indeed will the Arians spare, who have not spared even their own souls? But how can they withdraw from their unspeakable deeds, while they persist in denying the Lord Christ, the only Son of God?

This is the root of their perversity; upon this sandy foundation of theirs they build their crooked ways, as we find it written in the thirteenth psalm: The fool has said in his heart, There is no God. And it follows soon after: They are corrupted, and have become abominable in their doings. From this same source the Jews, denying the Son of God, were deemed worthy to hear: Woe, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed, children without law. Why without law? Precisely because you have forsaken the Lord. Hence the most blessed Paul, when he began not only to believe in the Son of God, but also to preach His deity, wrote: I am conscious of no evil in myself. So also we, in accordance with your confession, desire, holding the apostolic tradition, to live according to the commandments of the divine law, that we may be found together with you in that choir in which now the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and martyrs exult.

Although, therefore, Arian madness, together with foreign power, so stirred itself that not even the brethren were allowed, so greatly did they rage, freely to look upon the open air, yet, according to your prayers, by God's favor, though with labor and danger, I was able to see the brother who is accustomed to bring both necessary things and letters, both of your holiness and of others. We have received, then, the letters and books of your most religious and most wise soul, in which we have beheld the apostolic image, the prophetic confidence, the mastery of truth, the doctrine of the true faith, the heavenly way, the glory of martyrdom, triumphs against the Arian heresy, the whole tradition of our fathers, the right rule of ecclesiastical order. O truly Lucifer Light-bearer, who, in accordance with your name, bearing the light of truth, have set it upon a lampstand that it may shine for all! For who, except the Arians, does not clearly perceive from your teaching the true faith, and the stain of the Arians?

Wonderfully and admirably, as light is separated from darkness, so have you separated truth from the cunning and hypocrisy of the heretics; you have defended the catholic Church, you have proved the words of the Arians to be nothing, but mere fantasy, you have taught that the gnashings of the devil are to be trampled underfoot. How good and pleasant are your exhortations to martyrdom, how greatly to be desired have you shown death for Christ the Son of God to be, how you have manifested the love of the age to come and of the heavenly life!

You seem to be the very temple of the Savior, who, dwelling in you, Himself speaks these things through you—He who has bestowed such grace upon your words, seeing that you were before beloved by all; yet now such is the love of affection for you placed in the hearts of all, that they call you Elijah in our times: and no wonder; for if those who are seen to please God are called sons of God, how much more fitting is it to call confessors, sharers with the prophets, and especially you, by such a name. Believe me, Lucifer, it is not you alone who have spoken these things, but the Holy Spirit with you. Whence else this so great remembrance of the Scriptures, whence the whole and unbroken understanding and sense of them? Whence such an ordered composition of speech? Whence such exhortations toward the heavenly way? Whence such confidence against the devil and proofs against the heretics, unless the Holy Spirit had been placed within you?

Rejoice, therefore, perceiving yourself already to be in that place where your predecessors, the martyrs, now also are—that is, in the choir of angels. We too rejoice, having in you an example of virtue, and patience, and freedom. For as to those things which you have written concerning my name, I blush to say anything, lest I seem a flatterer; but I know and believe that the Lord Himself, who has revealed all this knowledge to your holy and religious soul, will render to you, for this labor too, a reward in the kingdom of heaven.

Since, therefore, you are such a one, we ask that you be an intercessor for us in your prayers to the Lord, that He may now deign, as He is merciful, to look upon the catholic Church, and snatch all His servants out of the hands of the persecutors, so that all those also who through temporal fear have fallen may at last be able to raise themselves up, and return to the way of righteousness, from which, being led astray, they wander, not knowing, poor souls, in what pit they lie. I ask especially, if anything has been said by me amiss, that you would deign to pardon it: for from so great a fountain, what my inexperience was able to draw was scarcely anything. As for our brothers, if I have not been able to see them, again I ask you to pardon me.

For truth itself is witness that I wished and desired to obtain this, and had such great grief that I could not, that neither have tears ceased from my eyes, nor groaning from my soul, because we are not permitted even to see our brothers. The Lord is witness that I have not even been able to see the parents I have, from the time that they began to persecute us. For what do the Arians not do? They watch the roads, they take pains concerning those setting out and those leaving the city, they search ships, they range about the hermitages, they disturb houses, they shake the brethren, they contrive troubles for each one: but thanks be to God; while they do these things, they are all the more and more execrated by all, and are truly recognized, as your holiness says, to be the slaves of Antichrist; and these wretched men, while they are held in hatred, persist in their malice, until they too are condemned by the death of their grandfather Pharaoh.

Those who are with me greet your religiousness; deign to greet those who are with you. May the divine grace of God ever keep you safe, blessed, and mindful of us, deservedly man of God, servant of Christ, sharer with the apostles, solace of the brotherhood, teacher of truth, and in all things most longed-for.