Columba
Saint Columba was an Irish abbot and missionary Evangelist credited with spreading Christianity in what is today Scotland at the start of the Hiberno-Scottish mission. He founded the important abbey on Iona, which became a dominant religious and political institution in the region for centuries, he is the Patron Saint of Derry. He was regarded by both the Gaels of Dál Riata and the Picts, is remembered today as a Catholic saint and one of the Twelve Apostles of Ireland. Colmcille studied under some of Ireland's most prominent church figures and founded several monasteries in the country. Around 563 he and his twelve companions crossed to Dunaverty near Southend, Argyll, in Kintyre before settling in Iona in Scotland part of the Ulster kingdom of Dál Riata, where they founded a new abbey as a base for spreading Celtic Christianity among the northern Pictish kingdoms who were pagan, he remained active in Irish politics. Three surviving early medieval Latin hymns may be attributed to him. Colmcille was born to Fedlimid and Eithne of the Cenel Conaill in Gartan, a district beside Lough Gartan, in Tír Chonaill in the north of Ireland.
On his father's side, he was great-great-grandson of Niall of the Nine Hostages, an Irish high king of the 5th century. He was baptised in Temple-Douglas, in the County Donegal parish of Conwal, by his teacher and foster-uncle Saint Crunathan, it is not known for sure if his name at birth was Colmcille or if he adopted this name in life. In the Irish language his name means'dove', the same name as the Prophet Jonah, which Adomnán of Iona as well as other early Irish writers were aware of, although it is not clear if he was deliberately named after Jonah or not; when sufficiently advanced in letters he entered the monastic school of Movilla, at Newtownards, under St. Finnian who had studied at St. Ninian's "Magnum Monasterium" on the shores of Galloway, he was about twenty, a deacon when, having completed his training at Movilla, he travelled southwards into Leinster, where he became a pupil of an aged bard named Gemman. On leaving him, Colmcille entered the monastery of Clonard, governed at that time by Finnian, noted for sanctity and learning.
Here he imbibed the traditions of the Welsh Church, for Finnian had been trained in the schools of St. David. In early Christian Ireland the druidic tradition collapsed due to the spread of the new Christian faith; the study of Latin learning and Christian theology in monasteries flourished. Colmcille became a pupil at the monastic school at Clonard Abbey, situated on the River Boyne in modern County Meath. During the sixth century, some of the most significant names in the history of Celtic Christianity studied at the Clonard monastery, it is said that the average number of scholars under instruction at Clonard was 3,000. Colmcille was one of twelve students of St. Finnian who became known as the Twelve Apostles of Ireland, he became a monk and was ordained a priest. Another preceptor of Colmcille was St. Mobhi, whose monastery at Glasnevin was frequented by such famous men as St. Canice, St. Comgall, St. Ciarán. A pestilence which devastated Ireland in 544 caused the dispersion of Mobhi's disciples, Colmcille returned to Ulster, the land of his kindred.
He was a striking figure of great stature and powerful build, with a loud, melodious voice which could be heard from one hilltop to another. The following years were marked by the foundation of several important monasteries: Derry, at the southern edge of Inishowen. While at Derry it is said that he planned a pilgrimage to Rome and Jerusalem, but did not proceed farther than Tours. Thence he brought a copy of those gospels that had lain on the bosom of St. Martin for the space of 100 years; this relic was deposited in Derry. Tradition asserts that, sometime around 560, he became involved in a quarrel with Saint Finnian of Movilla Abbey over a psalter. Colmcille copied the manuscript at the scriptorium under Saint Finnian. Saint Finnian disputed his right to keep the copy; the dispute led to the pitched Battle of Cúl Dreimhne in Cairbre Drom Cliabh in 561, during which many men were killed. A second grievance that led him to induce the clan Neill to rise and engage in battle against King Diarmait at Cooldrevny in 561 was the king's violation of the right of sanctuary belonging to Colmcille's person as a monk on the occasion of the murder of Prince Curnan, the saint's kinsman.
Prince Curnan of Connaught, who had fatally injured a rival in a hurling match and had taken refuge with Colmcille, was dragged from his protector's arms and slain by Diarmaid's men, in defiance of the rights of sanctuary. A synod of clerics and scholars threatened to excommunicate him for these deaths, but St. Brendan of Birr spoke on his behalf with the result that he was allowed to go into exile instead. Colmcille's own conscience was uneasy, on the advice of an aged hermit, Molaise, he resolved to expiate his offence by going into exile and win for Christ as many souls as had perished in the terrible battle of Cúl Dreimhne, he left Ireland, to return only many years later. Colmcille's copy of the psalter has been traditionally associated with the Cathach of St. Colmcille. In 563, he travelled to Scotland with twelve companions in a wicker currach covered with leather. According to legend he first landed o
Columbanus
Columbanus known as St. Columban, was an Irish missionary notable for founding a number of monasteries from around 590 in the Frankish and Lombard kingdoms, most notably Luxeuil Abbey in present-day France and Bobbio Abbey in present-day Italy, he is remembered as a key figure in the Hiberno-Scottish mission, or Irish missionary activity in early medieval Europe. In recent years, however, as Columbanus's deeds and legacy have come to be re-examined by historians, the traditional narrative of his career has been challenged and doubts have been raised regarding his actual involvement in missionary work and the extent to which he was driven by purely religious motives or by a concern for playing an active part in politics and church politics in Francia. Columbanus taught an Irish monastic rule and penitential practices for those repenting of sins, which emphasised private confession to a priest, followed by penances levied by the priest in reparation for the sins. Columbanus is one of the earliest identifiable Hiberno-Latin writers.
Most of what we know about Columbanus is based on Columbanus' own works and Jonas of Bobbio's Vita Columbani, written between 639 and 641. Jonas entered Bobbio after Columbanus' death but relied on reports of monks who still knew Columbanus. A description of miracles of Columbanus written by an anonymous monk of Bobbio is of much date. In the second volume of his Acta Sanctorum O. S. B. Mabillon gives the life in full, together with an appendix on the miracles of the saint, written by an anonymous member of the Bobbio community. Columbanus was born in the Kingdom of Meath, now part of Leinster, in Ireland in 543, the year Saint Benedict died at Monte Cassino. Prior to his birth, his mother was said to have had visions of bearing a child who, in the judgment of those interpreting the visions, would become a "remarkable genius". Columbanus was well-educated in the areas of grammar, rhetoric and the Holy Scriptures. Columbanus left home to study under Abbot of Cluaninis in Lough Erne. Under Sinell's instruction, Columbanus composed a commentary on the Psalms.
He moved to Bangor Abbey on the coast of Down, where Saint Comgall was serving as the abbot. He stayed at Bangor until his fortieth year, when he received Comgall's permission to travel to the continent. Columbanus gathered twelve companions for his journey—Saint Attala, Columbanus the Younger, Domgal, Eunan, Saint Gall, Libran, Lua and Waldoleno—and together they set sail for the continent. After a brief stop in Britain, most on the Scottish coast, they crossed the channel and landed in Brittany in 585. At Saint-Malo in Brittany, there is a granite cross bearing the saint's name to which people once came to pray for rain in times of drought; the nearby village of Saint-Coulomb commemorates him in name. Columbanus and his companions were received with favour by King Gontram of Burgundy, soon they made their way to Annegray, where they founded a monastery in an abandoned Roman fortress. Despite its remote location in the Vosges Mountains, the community became a popular pilgrimage site that attracted so many monastic vocations that two new monasteries had to be formed to accommodate them.
In 590, Columbanus obtained from King Gontram the Gallo-Roman castle called Luxovium in present-day Luxeuil-les-Bains, some eight miles from Annegray. The castle, soon transformed into a monastery, was located in a wild region, thickly covered with pine forests and brushwood. Columbanus erected a third monastery called Ad-fontanas at present-day Fontaine-lès-Luxeuil, named for its numerous springs; these monastic communities remained under Columbanus' authority, their rules of life reflected the Irish tradition in which he had been formed. As these communities expanded and drew more pilgrims, Columbanus sought greater solitude, spending periods of time in a hermitage and communicating with the monks through an intermediary, he would withdraw to a cave seven miles away, with a single companion who acted as messenger between himself and his companions. During his twenty years in Gaul, Columbanus became involved in a dispute with the Frankish bishops who may have feared his growing influence. During the first half of the sixth century, the councils of Gaul had given to bishops absolute authority over religious communities.
As heirs to the Irish monastic tradition and his monks used the Irish Easter calculation, a version of Bishop Augustalis's 84-year computus for determining the date of Easter, whereas the Franks had adopted the Victorian cycle of 532 years. The bishops objected to the newcomers' continued observance of their own dating, which—among other issues—caused the end of Lent to differ, they complained about the distinct Irish tonsure. In 602, the bishops assembled to judge Columbanus. Instead, he sent a letter to the prelates—a strange mixture of freedom and charity—admonishing them to hold synods more and advising them to pay more attention to matters of equal importance to that of the date of Easter. In defence of his following his traditional paschal cycle, he wrote: I am not the author of this divergence. I came as a poor stranger into these parts for the cause of Our Saviour. One thing alone I ask of you, holy Fathers, permit me to live in silence in these forests, near the bones of seventeen of my brethren now dead.
When the bishops refused to abandon the matter, following Saint Patrick's canon, appealed directly to Pope Gregory I. In the third and only surviving letter, he asks "the holy Pope, his
Saint Mungo
Kentigern, known as Mungo, was an apostle of the Scottish Kingdom of Strathclyde in the late 6th century, the founder and patron saint of the city of Glasgow. In Wales and England, this saint is known by his birth and baptismal name Kentigern; this name comes from the British *Cuno-tigernos, composed of the elements *cun, a hound, *tigerno, a lord, prince, or king. The evidence is based on the Old Welsh record Conthigirn. Other etymologies have been suggested, including British *Kintu-tigernos'chief prince' based on the English form Kentigern, but the Old Welsh form above and Old English Cundiʒeorn do not appear to support this. In Scotland, he is known by the pet name Mungo derived from the Cumbric equivalent of the Welsh: fy nghu'my dear'.. The Mungo pet name or hypocorism has a Gaelic parallel in the form Mo Choe or Mo Cha, under which guise Kentigern appears in Kirkmahoe, for example, in Dumfriesshire, which appears as'ecclesia Sancti Kentigerni' in the Arbroath Liber in 1321. An ancient church in Bromfield is named after him, as are Crosthwaite Parish Church and some other churches in the northern part of Cumberland.
The Life of Saint Mungo was written by the monastic hagiographer Jocelyn of Furness in about 1185. Jocelin states that he rewrote the ` life' from an Old Irish document. There are two other medieval lives: the earlier partial life in the Cottonian manuscript now in the British Library, the Life, based on Jocelyn, by John of Tynemouth. Mungo's mother Teneu was a princess, the daughter of King Lleuddun who ruled a territory around what is now Lothian in Scotland the kingdom of Gododdin in the Old North, she became pregnant after being raped by Owain mab Urien according to the British Library manuscript. However, other historic accounts claim Owain and Teneu had a love affair whilst he was still married to his wife Penarwen and that her father, King Lot, separated the pair after she became pregnant. After Penarwen died, Tenue/Thaney returned to King Owain and the pair were able to marry before King Owain met his death battling Bernicia in 597 AD, her furious father had her thrown from the heights of Traprain Law.
Surviving, she was abandoned in a coracle in which she drifted across the River Forth to Culross in Fife. There Mungo was born. Mungo was brought up by Saint Serf, ministering to the Picts in that area, it was Serf. At the age of twenty-five, Mungo began his missionary labours on the Clyde, on the site of modern Glasgow, he built his church across the water from an extinct volcano, next to the Molendinar Burn, where the present medieval cathedral now stands. For some thirteen years, he laboured in the district, living a most austere life in a small cell and making many converts by his holy example and his preaching. A strong anti-Christian movement in Strathclyde, headed by a certain King Morken, compelled Mungo to leave the district, he retired to Wales, via Cumbria, staying for a time with Saint David at St David's, afterwards moving on to Gwynedd where he founded a cathedral at Llanelwy. While there, he undertook a pilgrimage to Rome. However, the new King of Strathclyde, Riderch Hael, invited Mungo to return to his kingdom.
He appointed Saint Asaph/Asaff as Bishop of Llanelwy in his place. For some years, Mungo fixed his Episcopal seat at Hoddom in Dumfriesshire, evangelising thence the district of Galloway, he returned to Glasgow where a large community grew up around him. It was nearby, in Kilmacolm, that he was visited by Saint Columba, at that time labouring in Strathtay; the two saints embraced, held long converse, exchanged their pastoral staves. In old age, Mungo became feeble and his chin had to be set in place with a bandage, he is said to have died on Sunday 13 January. In the Life of Saint Mungo, he performed four miracles in Glasgow; the following verse is used to remember Mungo's four miracles: The verses refer to the following: The Bird: Mungo restored life to a robin, killed by some of his classmates. The Tree: Mungo had been left in charge of a fire in Saint Serf's monastery, he fell asleep and the fire went out. Taking a hazel branch, he restarted the fire; the Bell: the bell is thought to have been brought by Mungo from Rome.
It was said to mourn the deceased. The original bell no longer exists, a replacement, created in the 1640s, is now on display in Glasgow; the Fish: refers to the story about Queen Languoreth of Strathclyde, suspected of infidelity by her husband. King Riderch demanded to see her ring. In reality the King had thrown it into the River Clyde. Faced with execution she appealed for help to Mungo, who ordered a messenger to catch a fish in the river. On opening the fish, the ring was miraculously found inside, which allowed the Queen to clear her name. Mungo's ancestry is recorded in the Bonedd y Saint, his father, Owain was a King of Rheged. His maternal grandfather, was a King of the Gododdin. There seems little reason to doubt that Mungo was one of the first evangelists of Strathclyde, under the patronage of King Rhiderch Hael, became the first Bishop of Glasgow. Jocelin seems to have altered parts of the original life; some new parts
Saint David
Saint David was a Welsh bishop of Mynyw during the 6th century. He is the patron saint of Wales. David was a native of Wales. A large amount of information is known about his life, his birth date, however, is uncertain: suggestions range from 462 to 512. He is traditionally believed to be the son of Saint Non and the grandson of Ceredig ap Cunedda, king of Ceredigion; the Welsh annals placed his death 569 years after the birth of Christ, but Phillimore's dating revised this to 601. Many of the traditional tales about David are found in the Buchedd Dewi, a hagiography written by Rhygyfarch in the late 11th century. Rhygyfarch claimed. Modern historians are sceptical of some of its claims: one of Rhygyfarch's aims was to establish some independence for the Welsh church, which had refused the Roman rite until the 8th century and now sought a metropolitan status equal to that of Canterbury.. The tradition that he was born at Henfynyw in Ceredigion is not improbable, he became renowned as a teacher and preacher, founding monastic settlements and churches in Wales and Brittany.
St David's Cathedral stands on the site of the monastery he founded in the Glyn Rhosyn valley of Pembrokeshire. Around 550, he attended the Synod of Brefi, where his eloquence in opposing Pelagianism caused his fellow monks to elect him primate of the region; as such he presided over the synod of Caerleon around 569. His best-known miracle is said to have taken place when he was preaching in the middle of a large crowd at the Synod of Brefi: the village of Llanddewi Brefi stands on the spot where the ground on which he stood is reputed to have risen up to form a small hill. A white dove, which became his emblem, was seen settling on his shoulder. John Davies notes that one can scarcely "conceive of any miracle more superfluous" in that part of Wales than the creation of a new hill. David is said to have denounced Pelagianism during this incident and he was declared archbishop by popular acclaim according to Rhygyfarch, bringing about the retirement of Dubricius. St David's metropolitan status as an archbishopric was supported by Bernard, Bishop of St David's, Geoffrey of Monmouth and Gerald of Wales.
The Monastic Rule of David prescribed that monks had to pull the plough themselves without draught animals, must drink only water and eat only bread with salt and herbs, spend the evenings in prayer and writing. No personal possessions were allowed: to say "my book" was considered an offence, he lived a simple life and practised asceticism, teaching his followers to refrain from eating meat and drinking beer. His symbol the symbol of Wales, is the leek: Fluellen: "If your Majesty is remembered of it, the Welshmen did good service in a garden where leeks did grow, wearing leeks in their Monmouth caps, which your Majesty knows, to this hour is an honourable badge of the service, I do believe, your Majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek upon Saint Tavy's day". King Henry: "I wear it for a memorable honour. Rhigyfarch counted Glastonbury Abbey among the churches David founded. Around forty years William of Malmesbury, believing the Abbey older, said that David visited Glastonbury only to rededicate the Abbey and to donate a travelling altar including a great sapphire.
He had had a vision of Jesus who said that "the church had been dedicated long ago by Himself in honour of His Mother, it was not seemly that it should be re-dedicated by human hands". So David instead commissioned an extension to be built to the abbey, east of the Old Church.. One manuscript indicates that a sapphire altar was among the items Henry VIII of England confiscated from the abbey during the Dissolution of the Monasteries a thousand years later. Though the exact date of his death is not certain, tradition holds that it was on 1 March, the date now marked as Saint David's Day; the two most common years given for his death are 601 and 589. The monastery is said to have been "filled with angels as Christ received his soul." His last words to his followers were in a sermon on the previous Sunday. The Welsh Life of St David gives these as, "Arglwydi, vrodyr, a chwioryd, Bydwch lawen a chedwch ych ffyd a'ch cret, a gwnewch y petheu bychein a glywyssawch ac a welsawch gennyf i. A mynheu a gerdaf y fford yd aeth an tadeu idi", which translates as, "Lords and sisters, Be joyful, keep your faith and your creed, do the little things that you have seen me do and heard about.
And as for me, I will walk the path that our fathers have trod before us." "Do ye the little things in life" is today a well known phrase in Welsh. The same passage states that he died on a Tuesday, from which attempts have been made to calculate the year of his death. David was buried at St David's Cathedral at St Davids, where his shrine was a popular place of pilgrimage throughout the Middle Ages. During the 10th and 11th centuries the Cathedral was raided by Vikings, who removed the shrine from the church and stripped off the precious metal adornments. In 1275 a new shrine was constructed, the ruined base of which remains to this day, surmounted by an ornamental wooden canopy with murals of David and Denis; the relics of David and Justinian of Ramsey Island were kept in a porta
Dissolution of the Monasteries
The Dissolution of the Monasteries, sometimes referred to as the Suppression of the Monasteries, was the set of administrative and legal processes between 1536 and 1541 by which Henry VIII disbanded monasteries, priories and friaries in England and Ireland, appropriated their income, disposed of their assets, provided for their former personnel and functions. Although the policy was envisaged as increasing the regular income of the Crown, much former monastic property was sold off to fund Henry's military campaigns in the 1540s, he was given the authority to do this in England and Wales by the Act of Supremacy, passed by Parliament in 1534, which made him Supreme Head of the Church in England, thus separating England from Papal authority, by the First Suppression Act and the Second Suppression Act. Professor George W. Bernard argues: The dissolution of the monasteries in the late 1530s was one of the most revolutionary events in English history. There were nearly 900 religious houses in England, around 260 for monks, 300 for regular canons, 142 nunneries and 183 friaries.
If the adult male population was 500,000, that meant that one adult man in fifty was in religious orders. At the time of their suppression, a small number of English and Welsh religious houses could trace their origins to Anglo-Saxon or Celtic foundations before the Norman Conquest, but the overwhelming majority of the 625 monastic communities dissolved by Henry VIII had developed in the wave of monastic enthusiasm that had swept western Christendom in the 11th and 12th centuries. Few English houses had been founded than the end of the 13th century. 11th- and 12th-century founders had endowed monastic houses with both'temporal' income in the form of revenues from landed estates, and'spiritual' income in the form of tithes appropriated from parish churches under the founder's patronage. In consequence of this, religious houses in the 16th century controlled appointment to about two-fifths of all parish benefices in England, disposed of about half of all ecclesiastical income, owned around a quarter of the nation's landed wealth.
An English medieval proverb said that if the Abbot of Glastonbury married the Abbess of Shaftesbury, the heir would have more land than the King of England. The 200 houses of friars in England and Wales constituted a second distinct wave of foundations all occurring in the 13th century. Friaries, for the most part, were concentrated in urban areas. Unlike monasteries, friaries had eschewed income-bearing endowments; the Dissolution of the Monasteries in England and Ireland took place in the political context of other attacks on the ecclesiastical institutions of Western Roman Catholicism, under way for some time. Many of these were related to the Protestant Reformation in Continental Europe. By the end of the 16th century, monasticism had entirely disappeared from those European states whose rulers had adopted Lutheran or Reformed confessions of faith, they continued, albeit in reduced numbers and radically changed forms, in those states that remained Catholic. But, the religious and political changes in England under Henry VIII and Edward VI were of a different nature from those taking place in Germany, France and Geneva.
Across much of continental Europe, the seizure of monastic property was associated with mass discontent among the common people and the lower level of clergy and civil society against powerful and wealthy ecclesiastical institutions. Such popular hostility against the church was rare in England before 1558; these changes were met with widespread popular suspicion. Dissatisfaction with the general state of regular religious life, with the gross extent of monastic wealth, was near to universal amongst late medieval secular and ecclesiastical rulers in the Latin West. Bernard says there was widespread concern in the 15th and early 16th centuries about the condition of the monasteries. A leading figure here is the scholar and theologian Desiderius Erasmus who satirized monasteries as lax, as comfortably worldly, as wasteful of scarce resources, as superstitious. At that time, quite a few bishops across Europe had come to believe that resources expensively deployed on an unceasing round of services by men and women in theory set apart from the world be better spent on endowing grammar schools and university colleges to train men who would serve the laity as parish priests, on reforming the antiquated structures of over-large dioceses such as that of Lincoln.
Pastoral care was seen as much more important and vital than the monastic focus on contemplation and performance of the daily office. Erasmus had made a threefold criticism of the monks and nuns of his day, saying that: in withdrawing from the world into their own communal life, they elevated man-made monastic vows of poverty and obedience above the God-given vows of sacramental
God
In monotheistic thought, God is conceived of as the supreme being, creator deity, principal object of faith. The conceptions of God, as described by theologians include the attributes of omniscience, omnipresence, as having an eternal and necessary existence. Depending on one's kind of theism, these attributes are used either in way of analogy, or in a literal sense as distinct properties. God is most held to be incorporeal. Incorporeality and corporeality of God are related to conceptions of transcendence and immanence of God, with positions of synthesis such as the "immanent transcendence". Psychoanalyst Carl Jung equated religious ideas of God with transcendental aspects of consciousness in his interpretation; some religions describe God without reference to gender, while others or their translations use sex-specific terminology. Judaism attributes only a grammatical gender to God, using terms such as "Him" or "Father" for convenience. God has been conceived as either impersonal. In theism, God is the creator and sustainer of the universe, while in deism, God is the creator, but not the sustainer, of the universe.
In pantheism, God is the universe itself. In atheism, there is an absence of belief in God. In agnosticism, the existence of God is deemed unknowable. God has been conceived as the source of all moral obligation, the "greatest conceivable existent". Many notable philosophers have developed arguments against the existence of God. Monotheists refer to their gods using names prescribed by their respective religions, with some of these names referring to certain cultural ideas about their god's identity and attributes. In the ancient Egyptian era of Atenism the earliest recorded monotheistic religion, this deity was called Aten, premised on being the one "true" Supreme Being and creator of the universe. In the Hebrew Bible and Judaism, Adonai, YHWH and other names are used as the names of God. Yahweh and Jehovah, possible vocalizations of YHWH, are used in Christianity. In the Christian doctrine of the Trinity, coexisting in three "persons", is called the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit. In Islam, the name Allah is used, while Muslims have a multitude of titular names for God.
In Hinduism, Brahman is considered a monistic concept of God. In Chinese religion, Shangdi is conceived as the progenitor of the universe, intrinsic to it and bringing order to it. Other religions have names for the concept, for instance, Baha in the Bahá'í Faith, Waheguru in Sikhism, Sang Hyang Widhi Wasa in Balinese Hinduism, Ahura Mazda in Zoroastrianism; the many different conceptions of God, competing claims as to God's characteristics and actions, have led to the development of ideas of omnitheism, pandeism, or a perennial philosophy, which postulates that there is one underlying theological truth, of which all religions express a partial understanding, as to which "the devout in the various great world religions are in fact worshipping that one God, but through different, overlapping concepts". The earliest written form of the Germanic word God comes from the 6th-century Christian Codex Argenteus; the English word itself is derived from the Proto-Germanic * ǥuđan. The reconstructed Proto-Indo-European form * ǵhu-tó-m was based on the root * ǵhau-, which meant either "to call" or "to invoke".
The Germanic words for God were neuter—applying to both genders—but during the process of the Christianization of the Germanic peoples from their indigenous Germanic paganism, the words became a masculine syntactic form. In the English language, capitalization is used for names by which a god is known, including'God'; the capitalized form of god is not used for multiple gods or when used to refer to the generic idea of a deity. The English word God and its counterparts in other languages are used for any and all conceptions and, in spite of significant differences between religions, the term remains an English translation common to all; the same holds for Hebrew El, but in Judaism, God is given a proper name, the tetragrammaton YHWH, in origin the name of an Edomite or Midianite deity, Yahweh. In many translations of the Bible, when the word LORD is in all capitals, it signifies that the word represents the tetragrammaton. Allāh is the Arabic term with no plural used by Muslims and Arabic speaking Christians and Jews meaning "The God", while "ʾilāh" is the term used for a deity or a god in general.
God may be given a proper name in monotheistic currents of Hinduism which emphasize the personal nature of God, with early references to his name as Krishna-Vasudeva in Bhagavata or Vishnu and Hari. Ahura Mazda is the name for God used in Zoroastrianism. "Mazda", or rather the Avestan stem-form Mazdā-, nominative Mazdå, reflects Proto-Iranian *Mazdāh. It is taken to be the proper name of the spirit, like its Sanskrit cognate medhā, means "intelligence" or "wisdom". Both the Avestan and Sanskrit words reflect Proto-Indo-Iranian *mazdhā-, from Proto-Indo-European mn̩sdʰeh1 meaning "placing one's mind", hence "wise". Waheguru is a term most used in Sikhism to refer to God, it means "Wonderful Teacher" in the Punjabi language. Vāhi means "wonderful" and guru is a term denoting "teacher". Waheguru is described by some as an experience of ecstasy, beyond all descriptions; the most common usage of the word "Waheguru" is in the greeting Sikhs use with each other: Baha, the "greates
Saint Patrick
Saint Patrick was a fifth-century Romano-British Christian missionary and bishop in Ireland. Known as the "Apostle of Ireland", he is the primary patron saint of Ireland, the other patron saints being Brigit of Kildare and Columba, he is venerated in the Catholic Church, the Anglican Communion, the Lutheran Churches, the Old Catholic Church, in the Eastern Orthodox Church as equal-to-the-apostles and Enlightener of Ireland. The dates of Patrick's life cannot be fixed with certainty, but there is broad agreement that he was active as a missionary in Ireland during the fifth century; as the most recent biography on Patrick shows, a late fourth-century date for the saint is not impossible. Early medieval tradition credits him with being the first bishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland, they regard him as the founder of Christianity in Ireland, converting a society practising a form of Celtic polytheism, he has been so regarded since, despite evidence of some earlier Christian presence in Ireland.
According to the autobiographical Confessio of Patrick, when he was about 16, he was captured by Irish pirates from his home in Britain and taken as a slave to Ireland, looking after animals. After becoming a cleric, he returned to western Ireland. In life, he served as a bishop, but little is known about the places where he worked. By the seventh century, he had come to be revered as the patron saint of Ireland. Saint Patrick's Day is observed on the supposed date of his death, it is celebrated outside Ireland as a religious and cultural holiday. In the dioceses of Ireland, it is a holy day of obligation. Two Latin works survive which are accepted as having been written by St. Patrick; these are the Declaration and the Letter to the soldiers of Coroticus, from which come the only accepted details of his life. The Declaration is the more biographical of the two. In it, Patrick gives a short account of his mission. Most available details of his life are from subsequent hagiographies and annals, which have considerable value but lack the empiricism scholars depend on today.
The only name that Patrick uses for himself in his own writings is Pātricius, which gives Old Irish Pátraic and Modern Irish Pádraig. Hagiography records other names. Tírechán's seventh-century Collectanea gives: "Magonus, famous. "Magonus" appears in the ninth century Historia Brittonum as Maun, descending from British *Magunos, meaning "servant-lad". "Succetus", which appears in Muirchú moccu Machtheni's seventh century Life as Sochet, is identified by Mac Neill as "a word of British origin meaning swineherd". Cothirthiacus appears as Cothraige in the 8th century biographical poem known as Fiacc's Hymn and a variety of other spellings elsewhere, is taken to represent a Primitive Irish *Qatrikias, although this is disputed. Harvey argues that Cothraige "has the form of a classic Old Irish tribal name", noting that Ail Coithrigi is a name for the Rock of Cashel, the place-names Cothrugu and Catrige are attested in Counties Antrim and Carlow; the dates of Patrick's life are uncertain. His own writings provide no evidence for any dating more precise than the 5th century generally.
His Biblical quotations are a mixture of the Old Latin version and the Vulgate, completed in the early 5th century, suggesting he was writing "at the point of transition from Old Latin to Vulgate", although it is possible the Vulgate readings may have been added replacing earlier readings. The Letter to Coroticus implies that the Franks were still pagans at the time of writing: their conversion to Christianity is dated to the period 496–508; the Irish annals for the fifth century date Patrick's arrival in Ireland at 432, but they were compiled in the mid 6th century at the earliest. The date 432 was chosen to minimise the contribution of Palladius, known to have been sent to Ireland in 431, maximise that of Patrick. A variety of dates are given for his death. In 457 "the elder Patrick" is said to have died: this may refer to the death of Palladius, who according to the Book of Armagh was called Patrick. In 461/2 the annals say that "Here some record the repose of Patrick". While some modern historians accept the earlier date of c. 460 for Patrick's death, scholars of early Irish history tend to prefer a date, c.
493. Supporting the date, the annals record that in 553 "the relics of Patrick were placed sixty years after his death in a shrine by Colum Cille"; the death of Patrick's disciple Mochta is dated in the annals to 535 or 537, the early hagiographies "all bring Patrick into contact with persons whose obits occur at the end of the fifth century or the beginning of the sixth". However, E. A. Thompson argues that none of the dates given for Patrick's death in the Annals are reliable. A recent biography argues. Irish academic T. F. O'Rahilly proposed the "Two Patricks" theory, which suggests that many of the traditions attached to Saint Patrick act
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Culdees". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.