Day 2: Our Father among the Saints, Martin, Bishop of Tours (†397): “St. Martin and the Pine”

John Mason Neale, an English priest, scholar, and hymnwriter gives us another account, in which the Lord demonstrates his power before the pagans through the faith of St. Martin:

There was a heathen temple, dedicated, I believe, to Diana, in a forest near Tours. This forest was as lovely a place as you can imagine. In the long summer evenings, the oaks and ashes seemed to overflow with the still golden light. The little birds sang one to another, and the wind played with the trees, and the thin yellow grass waved to and fro, and the bright clouds might be seen here and there through the glades, till you almost forgot that so sweet a spot was accursed by being dedicated to an idol. Near the temple was a steep bank covered with the softest turf, and halfway up its side grew a tall pine. This pine, springing out of the side of a hill, did not rise straight up into the air, but overhung the lower part of  the valley. It was sacred to Diana and was considered by the poor spiritually blind pagans as especially holy. Women, about to become mothers loved to come here and pray for deliverance in the hour of their need and kneeling at a place where three paths met, called three times on “the goddess," as they called her, “of three forms." And sometimes a boar pig was offered up in sacrifice.

Now when holy Martin saw these abominations, his spirit was stirred within him; and he determined, with God's help, to put a stop to them. So, on a day when there was a great sacrifice to Diana, he went down to the place and demanded to speak to the people. He told them of the folly of bowing to the stocks and stones; he besought them to turn from dumb idols to serve the living God. He taught them how feeble were the gods they served, who could neither do good nor evil.

Then said the pagan priest, who was doing the sacrifice, “Great is Diana of the holy forest of Tours, and he who speaks against her shall not do it unharmed."

Martin answered, “Lo, as you all hear, I have spoken against her and do speak against her still. Has any harm befallen me? But would she be angry if any were to cut down her pine?"

“She would be greatly angry," answered the priest, "and she and her brother would shoot him with their certain bows."

I am ready to cut it down," returned the Saint. If any ill happens unto me, we shall know that Diana is a goddess; if not, then own that Christ is Lord and God."

“We will do this," answered the priest, if you have courage to try. The pine much overhangs the lower part of the hill; cause one of your Christians to cut it down. You sit in the place where it must fall, and if it hurts you not, I myself will become a Christian; if it slays you, then you will have paid the fit punishment of your blasphemy.”

“I am content," replied Martın, "and you, Tertius," he added to a deacon, shall cut down the tree.”

The people had earnestly listened to this conversation; and now, as with one voice, they cried out, "It is well spoken; fetch the axe!” Then the priest fixed the place where St. Martin should sit, and they brought a block of wood and set it up there for a chair.

“Oh my father," said Tertius, so that Martin only could hear, what will become of me and of you? I am more afraid to cut down the tree, than you are to be exposed to its fall.”

“Leave the matter to God, my son,” returned the bishop. “You shall see today His right hand marvelously stretched out. Fear not for me, lest your want of faith should be visited on us both: but do your office lustily."

“Here is the axe," said the priest. Take it, O Nazarene, and do you, grave sir, sit down on this block.”

Tertius took the axe, and Martin, having seated himself, said to the multitude, "I pray you, good people, stand away from the other side of the tree, on the brow of the hill," and the crowd parted accordingly. Old grey-headed men, soldiers who had served in the Eastern wars, women with their children all looked on earnestly as the deacon, raising the axe, gave the first blow near the root of the tree. Martin was earnest in prayer, keeping at the same time his eyes fixed on the pine.

"He fears not," said old Julius, the soldier, to his neighbor. “Now had I rather be fighting unarmed with the Persians, than sit where that bishop does."

"It is taking a wolf by the ears," said the husbandman whom he addressed. I think the young man is more afraid than he."

You think he uses magic?" asked Terentia, a young mother who stood by with her little son, as if afraid that witchcraft would be employed against him.

I would if I knew of such," answered Julius; it would have saved many a brave man of mine acquaintance from crossing in Charon's boat.”

And now the tree was beginning to totter under the somewhat unskillful blows of the deacon. At every stroke of the axe, the uppermost branches quivered, and still St. Martin continued immovable.

“What did he mean," asked the husbandman, "by causing a space to be left on the opposite side?"

The great gods know," replied Julius. "I cannot guess.”

Two or three more strokes will have it down," said the other as the pine, with a slight crack, inclined still more over St. Martin. “His God must be strong indeed to save him now.”

At that moment the tough pinewood yielded to the strain, and the tree was falling on the bishop. St. Martin, looking steadfastly at it, made the sign of the cross and said, "In the Name of Jesus of Nazareth;" and at the same moment, the pine, in the act of descending, wheeled round and fell up the hill in the space which Martin had before ordered to be kept clear.

Then there arose a confused cry among the people. Some said, It is magic!" Some cried, “The Nazarene has conquered!"

Some fell on their knees and praised the God Who had wrought this wonder.

But the priest, coming forward, said, “O holy bishop, I renounce worship of the gods and demand to be admitted as a candidate for baptism."

We all demand it," shouted the multitude, and the band of idolaters became a band of catechumens.

~ John Mason Neale based on Sulpicius Severus’ Life of St. Martin

While I know of nothing connecting St. Martin’s pine tree to the trees we often see heralding in the Christmas season, I cannot help but look on our evergreens decorated with lights, topped with the Star of Bethlehem, and ponder how the Christ child born in a cave would one day harrow Hades and slay death and demons. For neither the gates of Hades nor pagan pines can prevail against Christ and His Church. If we hearken back to September, and its Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, we remember that there is something about a tree that simultaneously evokes both death and life.

Paul the Silentiary, a Greek Byzantine poet and courtier to the emperor Justinian at Constantinople, seems equally struck by the decorated evergreens he saw adorning the front of the altar area of the Hagia Sophia. About his visit in 562, during the second consecration of the church on December 24, he writes:

There is also on the silver columns, above their capitals, a narrow path of access for the lamplighters, a path full of light, glittering with bright clusters; these one might compare to the mountain-reared pine tree or to the cypress of tender foliage. Pointed at the summit, they are ringed by circles that gradually widen down to the lowest curve that surrounds the base of the trunk; and upon them have grown fiery flowers. Instead of a root, bows of silver have been affixed beneath these trees of flaming vegetation. And in the center of this beauteous grove, the form of the divine cross, studded with bright nails, blazes with light for mortal eyes.

As we near closer to this season of Advent, let us think on the ways we can take up our cross and follow our Lord, knowing that only through Him can it become a Tree of Life. 

Optional Resources:

Snow on Martinmas (Heather Sleightholm) – Picture book [~6-10 years old]

More of the life of St. Martin

Resources for Martinmas for children

Sources:

Paul the Silentiary, A description of Hagia Sophia written in 563.

 Neale, John Mason. A History of the Church, from the day of Pentecost to the Council of Chalcedon. United Kingdom, n.p, 1903.