Hypatius of Bithynia

Saint Hypatius of Bithynia (Hypatius of Rufinianae, Hypatius the Phrygian) the venerable was a Byzantine monk of the fifth century, abbot of the community at Rufinianae in Bithynia near Chalcedon, who died between 443 and 450. His Life was written by his disciple Callinicus and is a precious source on the life of provincial monks in Byzantium at the beginning of the fifth century. He is commemorated on 17 June (and on 31 March).

His life

Hypatius was the son of a lawyer of Phrygian stock, who had moved to Constantinople and lived in luxury. Instead of continuing his father's work, already in youth he left the study of grammar and joined a monastery in a rural suburb of the capital, in Thrace (according to the English source, he had become a hermit at nineteen in Thrace). The abbot was the Armenian Jonah, formerly in the imperial guard. The region of the monastery had suffered greatly from the invasions of the Goths and Huns in the early 380s, and through the care of Jonah, who had connections among the aristocracy of the capital, the monastery received refugees from the surrounding villages. Not all villages were Christian, and it is said that Jonah, together with the monks, burned sacred trees and other objects of cult. Later Hypatius acted in the same way in Bithynia. Then he travelled to Constantinople and Chalcedon with another hermit, Jason.

On 3 April 400 Hypatius took over the deserted monastery of Rufinianae, founded by the prefect Rufinus on his Bithynian estates. After Rufinus's execution in 395, the monastery had passed to another owner, who was not interested in keeping the monastic community. By the time Hypatius arrived it was believed that demons had settled there. It was believed that the monastery held relics of the apostles Peter and Paul. During the years of abandonment the buildings had been badly damaged. Through Hypatius's efforts, who organized the making and selling of baskets and garden tools, and with the support of a wealthy Christian matron, the monastery rose and flourished. By 406 thirty monks lived there. A certain Aetius, whom Hypatius had cured of madness, paid for the repair of the buildings and the building of a new chapel. The monastery had an aqueduct, which was used until a cistern of its own was built. At the height of its flourishing the number of monks at Rufinianae reached fifty.

Miracles and the struggle against paganism

After several years, says the Serbian source, Hypatius went to Thrace, to the monastery where he had struggled before; the monks of Rufinianae found him there and begged him to be their abbot. He agreed, and from that time began to do great labours. For them he was granted by God the gift of working miracles and performed many healings: of the possessed, the blind, the withered, women with flows of blood. For many barren women he obtained from God the ability to bear children, and for nursing mothers he restored their milk. Many times he drew water by prayer, multiplied bread and other food in time of scarcity, and drove sickness from people and from domestic animals by prayer. His food was boiled seeds, vegetables and a little bread, which he took late in the evening.

The Life of Hypatius contains information on the spread of Christianity in Phrygia at the beginning of the fifth century and in Bithynia in the first half of the same century. Callinicus's account of the festival of Artemis in the mountain part of Bithynia, from the last years of Hypatius's life, is very detailed. The struggle against the cult of Artemis in Asia Minor, begun by Hypatius, was continued by his disciples, especially Callinicus. Besides the struggle against pagan cults in the countryside, in 431 Hypatius intervened in the affairs of Chalcedon, where the Olympic celebrations had been revived. The programme of this local festival, forbidden in the time of Constantine the Great, is not known, but it probably included athletic, literary and musical contests. In response, Hypatius gathered a band of twenty monks and went to Chalcedon to prevent the festival. Receiving no support from Archbishop Eulalius, Hypatius appealed to the local archimandrites to join him in the struggle against the "festival of Satan". Callinicus says that many pagans from other cities came to Hypatius to be baptized. He is also remembered as an opponent of Nestorianism: he sheltered Alexander the Akoimetos and others whose safety was threatened by the Nestorians.

The disciple and the Life

Callinicus himself had become a Christian at the beginning of the fifth century; before monasticism he had been a notary. Because of his not very high education he wrote simply, in a simplified church Greek, rejecting the language of "some former lawyers" who "philosophize the ordinary communication of Hellenic learning". The Life of Hypatius is written in the rich and precise language of everyday life, at the latest in 450.