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Icons of St. Columba or
Columcille of Iona (also called Hii or Hi, pronounced Hee-ee or
Hee).
Feast Day: June 9, old style
Top Icon: available from Holy Transfiguration Monastery in Boston.
Next
Icon: by the hand of Maria Elchaninova-Struve, new scan Nov. 12, 2005
Next Icon: by the hand of
Aidan Hart, Oecumenical Patriarchate, UK.
Next Icon: by the hand of
Aidan Hart (a different scan of the above)
Next Icon: by the hand of
Aidan Hart, Oecumenical Patriarchate, UK.
Next Icon: by Fr. Protodeacon
Paul (Hommes) of the Monastery of the Mother of God, Joy of All Who
Sorrow, Diksmuide, Belgium, by permission of Abbot Thomas.
Next Icon: available from St.
George Orthodox Information Service. It appears to have been
painted by Archimandrite David of Walsingham (eternal memory!).
Next Icon: of unknown
provenance.
Next Icon: by the hand of Fr.
Gregory Abu-Asali, Buena Vista, Colorado
Next
Icon: part of large St. Aidan icon, by Aidan Hart, UK, Oecumenical
Patriarchate.
Final Icon (last but not
least!): from the website of St. Columba Western Rite Orthodox Church
in the environs of Denver, Colorado, with scenes of the Saint's
life.
Beneath the icon: The abbey of
Iona (2 pictures, thumbnails)
At the
bottom of the images: 8th c. reliquary containing a bone of St.
Columba, which has been since about 1200 at Moneymusk Priory in
Scotland.
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Ireland has many saints and three great
ones: Patrick, Brigid, and Columba. Columba outshines the others for
his pure Irishness. He loved Ireland with all his might and hated to
leave it for Scotland. But he did leave it and laid the groundwork for
the conversion of Britain. He had a quick temper but was very kind,
especially to animals and children. He was a poet and an artist who did
illumination, perhaps some of those in the Book of Kells itself. His
skill as a scribe can be seen in the Cathach of Columba at the Irish
Academy, which is the oldest surviving example of Irish majuscule
writing. It was latter enshrined in silver and bronze and venerated in
churches. About the time that Patrick was taken to Ireland as a slave,
Columba was born. He came from a race of kings who had ruled in Ireland
for six centuries, directly descended from Niall of the Nine Hostages,
and was himself in close succession to the throne. From an early age he
was destined for the priesthood; he was given in fosterage to a
priest.
After studying at Moville under Saint
Finnian and then at Clonard with another Saint Finnian, he surrendered
his princely claims, he became a monk at Glasnevin under Mobhi and was
ordained. He spent the next 15 years preaching and teaching in Ireland.
As was the custom in those days, he combined study and prayer with
manual labour. By his own natural gifts as well as by the good fortune
of his birth, he soon gained ascendancy as a monk of unusual
distinction. By the time he was 25, he had founded no less than 27
Irish monasteries, including those at Derry (546), Durrow (c. 556), and
probably Kells, as well as some 40
churches.
Columba was a poet, who had learned
Irish history and poetry from a bard named Gemman. He is believed to
have penned the Latin poem Altus Prosator and two other extant poems.
He also loved fine books and manuscripts. One of the famous books
associated with Columbia is the Psaltair, which was traditionally the
Battle Book of the O'Donnells, his kinsmen, who carried it into battle.
The Psaltair is the basis for one of the most famous legends of Saint
Columba.
It is said that on one occasion, so
anxious was Columba to have a copy of the Psalter that he shut himself
up for a whole night in the church that contained it, transcribing it
laboriously by hand. He was discovered by a monk who watched him
through the keyhole and reported it to his superior, Finnian of
Moville. The Scriptures were so scarce in those days that the abbot
claimed the copy, refusing to allow it to leave the monastery. Columba
refused to surrender it, until he was obliged to do so, under protest, on the abbot's appeal to the High King Diarmaid, who
said: "Le gach buin a laogh" or "To every cow her own calf," meaning to
every book its copy.
An unfortunate period followed, during
which, owing to Columba's protection of a refugee and his impassioned
denunciation of an injustice by King Diarmaid, war broke out between
the clans of Ireland, and Columba became an exile of his own accord.
Filled with remorse on account of those who had been slain in the
battle of Cooldrevne, and condemned by many of his own friends, he
experienced a profound conversion and an irresistible call to preach to
the heathen. Although there are questions regarding Columba's real
motivation, in 563, at the age of 42, he crossed the Irish Sea with 12
companions in a coracle and landed on a desert island now known as Iona
(Holy Island) on Whitsun Eve. Here on this desolate rock, only three
miles long and two miles wide, in the grey northern sea off the
southwest corner of Mull, he began his work; and, like Lindisfarne,
Iona became a centre of Christian enterprise. It was the heart of
Celtic Christianity and the most potent factor in the conversion of the
Picts, Scots, and Northern English.
Columba built a monastery consisting of
huts with roofs of branches set upon wooden props. It was a rough and
primitive settlement. For over 30 years he slept on the hard ground
with no pillow but a stone. But the work spread and soon the island was
too small to contain it. From Iona numerous other settlements were
founded, and Columba himself penetrated the wildest glens of Scotland
and the farthest Hebrides, and established the Caledonian Church. It is
reputed that he anointed King Aidan of Argyll upon the famous stone of
Scone, which is now in Westminster Abbey. The Pictish King Brude and
his people were also converted by Columba's many miracles, including
driving away a water "monster" from the River Ness with the Sign of the
Cross. Columba is said to have built two churches at Inverness.
Just one year before Columba's
migration to Iona, Saint Moluag established his mission at Lismore on
the west coast of Scotland. There are constant references to a rivalry
between the two saints over spheres of influence, which are probably
without foundation. Columba was primarily interested in Gaelic life in
Scotland, while Moluag was drawn to the conversion of the Picts.
While leading the Irish in Scotland,
Columba appears to have retained some sort of overlordship over his
monasteries in Ireland. About 580, he participated in the assembly of
Druim-Cetta in Ulster, where he mediated about the obligations of the
Irish in Scotland to those in Ireland. It was decided that they should
furnish a fleet, but not an army, for the Irish high-king. During the
same assembly, Columba, who was a bard himself, intervened to
effectively swing the nation away from its declared intention of
suppressing the Bardic Order. Columba persuaded them that the whole
future of Gaelic culture demanded that the scholarship of the bards be
preserved. His prestige was such that his views prevailed and assured
the presence of educated laity in Irish Christian society.
He is personally described as "A man
well-formed, with powerful frame; his skin was white, his face broad
and fair and radiant, lit up with large, gray, luminous eyes. . . ."
(Curtayne). Saint Adamnan, his biographer wrote of him: "He had the
face of an angel; he was of an excellent nature, polished in speech,
holy in deed, great in counsel . . . loving unto all." It is clear that
Columba's temperament changed dramatically during his life. In his
early years he was intemperate and probably inclined to violence. He
was extremely stern and harsh with his monks, but towards the end he
seems to have softened. Columba had great qualities and was gay and
loveable, but his chief virtue lay in the conquest of his own
passionate nature and in the love and sympathy that flowed from his
eager and radiant spirit.
On June 8, 597, Columba was copying out
the psalms once again. At the verse, "They that love the Lord shall
lack no good thing," he stopped, and said that his cousin, Saint
Baithin must do the rest. Columba died the next day at the foot of the
altar. He was first buried at Iona, but 200 years later the Danes
destroyed the monastery. His relics were translated to Dunkeld in 849,
where they were visited by pilgrims, including Anglo-Saxons of the 11th
century.
The year Columba died was the same year
in which Saint Gregory the Great sent Saint Augustine of Canterbury to
convert England. Perhaps because the Roman party gained ascendancy at
the Synod of Whitby, much of the credit that belongs to Saint Columba
and his followers for the conversion of Britain has been attributed to
Augustine. It should not be forgotten that both saints played important
roles.
Saint Columba left a series of
predictions about the future of Ireland. These were published in 1969
by Peter Blander under the title, The Prophecies of Saint Malachy and
Saint Columbkille (4th ed. 1979, Colin Smythe, Gerrards Cross
Buckshire). Unsurprisingly, devotion to Columba is especially strong in
Derry. On April 13, the king signed the Catholic Emancipation Act in
London. On that same day in Derry, the statue of a Protestant leader of
the siege of Derry, which stood on the city walls was smashed apart of
its own accord. The destruction of this symbol of dominion was
attributed to the intercession of Saint Columba (Anderson, Attwater,
Benedictines, Bentley, Encyclopaedia, Farmer, Gill, Menzies, Montague,
Simpson).
The following legends about Saint
Columba are the gentlest things recorded about the heroic and
tempestuous abbot who founded Iona. The countryside where he was
fathered is Gartan in Donegal, at the ingoing of the mountains and the
great lake; a gentle countryside, and more apt a birthplace for the
bird than the saint. The life written about 690 by Saint Adamnan,
himself an Irishman and an abbot of Iona, is a rugged piece of work:
but the deathdays of Saint Columba, and the crowding torches that
discovered him dying in the dark before the high altar at midnight on
June 9, are one of the tidemarks in medieval prose. The work itself
owes much to Adamnan's imagination and more to unreliable sources, but
it is a primarily a narrative of the miracles worked through Columba.
In the first story Columba bids his
brother monk to go in three days to a far hilltop and wait, "'For when
the third hour before sunset is past, there shall come flying from the
northern coasts of Ireland a stranger guest, a crane, wind tossed and
driven far from her course in the high air; tired out and weary she
will fall upon the beach at thy feet and lie there, her strength nigh
gone. Tenderly lift her and carry her to the steading near by; make her
welcome there and cherish her with all care for three days and nights;
and when the three days are ended, refreshed and loath to tarry longer
with us in our exile, she shall take flight again towards that old
sweet land of Ireland whence she came, in pride of strength once more.
And if I commend her so earnestly to thy charge, it is that in the
countryside where thou and I were reared, she too was nested.'" The
brother obeyed and all happened as Columba had foretold. "And on his
return that evening to the monastery the Saint spoke to him, not as one
questioning but as one speaks of a thing past. 'May God bless thee, my
son,' said he, 'for thy kind tending of this pilgrim guest; that shall
make no long stay in her exile, but when three suns have set shall turn
back to her own land.'" And so it happened (Adamnan; also in Curtayne).
The second story recalls how Columba's
heart would be touched when he saw a sad child. From time to time he
would leave Iona to preach to the Picts of Scotland. "Once he visited a
Pictish ruler who was also a druid, or pagan priest. When he was there
he noticed a thin little girl with a face like a ghost. He asked who
she was and was told that she was just a slave from Ireland. The way it
was said seemed to mean: 'Why do you ask such silly questions? Who
cares who she is, as long as she brushes and scrubs and does what she
is told?' "Columcille was troubled; he could see plainly that the
little girl was miserable. So he asked the druid to give her freedom
and he would get her home to Ireland. The druid refused. Columcille
went away with a picture of an unhappy little girl in his mind.
"Shortly afterward, the important druid
became ill; there was nobody near to tell him what to do to get well so
he sent for the Abbot of Iona, who had a great reputation for curing
people. Columcille did not leave Iona but sent a message back that he
would cure the druid if he let the little girl free. "The druid was
angry and again refused. 'What on earth is he troubling himself for
about that little bit of a good-for-nothing?' grumbled the druid as he
tossed about in bed. But the messenger had hardly left for Iona with
the refusal when the druid got worse; he had much pain and he thought
he would die. So he sent off another message to Columcille: 'Yes, you
can have the slave-girl, only come and do something for me. I am very
bad and will die if you don't come soon.'" Columcille, however, did not
trust the priest, so he sent two of his monks to bring the girl back.
When the girl was safe, Columcille set out for the druid's house and
cured him of his sickness (Curtayne).
When Padraic had banished and driven
away all the evil spirits from Cruachan Aigle that is today called
Cruach Padraic, there went a throng of them to the place that is now
called Senglenn Colmcille in the region of Conall Gulban to the north.
And they were in that place from the time of Padraic to the time of
Colmcille. And they raised a fog about them there, so that none might
see the part of the land that lay beneath the bog. And of the river
that forms a boundary to the north they made a fiery stream so that
none at all might go across it. And who should touch of that stream
little or much, he should die immediately. And the angels of God
revealed this thing to Colmcille. And he went with many others of the
saints to drive away the demons and banish them out of that place. And
they made a stay beside the fiery stream we have mentioned. And they
had not been long here when the Devil hurled a holly rod out of the fog
across the stream. And it killed An Cerc, Colmcille's servant, with
that cast, so that Srath na Circe is the name of that stream
thenceforth. At that Colmcille was exceedingly angry and he seized that
same javelin and hurled it across the stream. And the land was yielded
to him for the space the javelin went into the fog, for the fog fled
before that cast of Colmcille's. And that javelin grew in the place
where it struck the ground, so that today it is a fresh holly-tree, and
it has not withered from that time until now, and thus shall it be till
Doomsday. Then Colmcille blessed that stream, and its venom and
enchantment departed from it. And he crossed it. And an angel brought
him a round green stone, and bade him cast it at the demons, and they
should flee before it, and the fog also. And the angel bade him throw
his bell Dub Duaibsech at them in the same way. And Colmcille did as
the angel commanded him so that the whole land was yielded to him from
the fog. And the demons fled before him to a rock out in the great sea
opposite the western headland of that region. And Colmcille cast at
them that stone that the angel had given him, and his bell Dub
Duaibsech. And he bade the demons go into the sea through the rock
where they were, and be in the form of fish forever, and to do no
devilry against any thenceforth. And by reason of the word of Colmcille
they must needs do that. And a man having on his armour might go
through the hole they made in the stone when they went through it into
the sea. And lest folk should eat them, Colmcille left a mark on them
passing every other fish, that they should be blind in one eye and red.
And fishers oft take them today, and they do naught to them when they
perceive them, save to cast them again into the sea. Then Colmcille
required of God to give back to him his bell and stone from the sea.
And lo, he beheld them coming forward him in the likeness of a glow of
fire and they fell to the ground fast by him. And Colmcille blessed
that land whence he had banished the evil spirits. And he bestowed
thereon the right of sanctuary from that time. And he left the stone a
chief treasure to do marvels and miracles. And in the place where the
bell fell, it sank deep into the earth, and it left its clapper there.
And Colmcille said the bell was none the worse without the clapper. And
he charged them, if any man should do dishonour to the sanctuary, to
put the bell in the hole where it had left its clapper, as a token of a
curse upon him, and that man should not live out his year, and hath oft
been proved.
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The townland of Stranakirke (named
after Colmcille's servant, an Cearc) still contains a grassy mound that
is identified a Cearc's grave. Immediately opposite, on the western
bank of the river, where the legend says Colmcille threw his javelin, a
holly tree still sprouts. The current whereabouts of the blue stone are
untold. The bell *may* be in the National Museum of Ireland, I can't
remember for certain.
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"Let not the Old Glen be harmed,
The place of the slabs of heaven" ~Colmcille
--------------------------
Another story occurs in May, when
Columba set out in a cart to visit the brethren at their work. He found
them busy in the western fields and said, 'I had a great longing on me
this April just now past, in the high days of the Easter feast, to go
to the Lord Christ; and it was granted me by Him, if I so willed. But I
would not have the joy of your feast turned into mourning, and so I
willed to put off the day of my going from the world a little longer.'
The monks were saddened to hear this and Columba tried to cheer them.
He blessed the island and islanders and returned in his cart to the
monastery.
On that Saturday, the venerable old
saint and his faithful Diarmid went to bless a barn and two heaps of
grain stored therein. Then with a gesture of thanksgiving, he spoke,
'Truly, I give my brethren at home joy that this year, if so be I might
have to go somewhere away from you, you will have what provision will
last you the year.' Diarmid was grieved to hear this again and the
saint promised to share his secret. "'In the Holy Book this day is
called the Sabbath, which is, being interpreted, rest. And truly is
this day my Sabbath, for it is the last day for me of this present
toilsome life, when from all weariness of travail I shall take my rest,
and at midnight of this Lord's Day that draws nigh, I shall, as the
Scripture saith, go the way of my fathers. For now my Lord Jesus Christ
hath deigned to invite me; and to Him, I say, at this very midnight and
at His own desiring, I shall go. For so it was revealed to me by the
Lord Himself.' At this sad hearing his man began bitterly to weep, and
the Saint tried to comfort him as best he might. "And so the Saint left
the barn, and took the road back to the monastery; and halfway there
sat down to rest. Afterwards on that spot they set a cross, planted
upon a millstone, and it is to be seen by the roadside to this day. And
as the Saint sat there, a tired old man taking his rest awhile, up runs
the white horse, his faithful servitor that used to carry the milk
pails, and coming up to the Saint he leaned his head against his breast
and began to mourn, knowing as I believe from God Himself--for to God
every animal is wise in the instinct his Maker hath given him--that his
master was soon to go from him, and that he would see his face no more.
And his tears ran down as a man's might into the lap of the Saint, and
he foamed as he wept. "Seeing it, Diarmid would have driven the
sorrowing creature away, but the Saint prevented him, saying, 'Let be,
let be, suffer this lover of mine to shed on my breast the tears of his
most bitter weeping. Behold, you that are a man and have a reasonable
soul could in no way have known of my departing if I had not but now
told you; yet to this dumb and irrational beast, his Creator in such
fashion as pleased Him has revealed that his master is to go from him.'
And so saying, he blessed the sad horse that had served him, and it
turned again to its way" (Adamnan; also in Curtayne).
Troparion of St Colum Cille tone 5
By Thy God-inspired
life thou didst embody/ both the mission end the dispersion of the
Church,/ most glorious Father Colum Cille./ Using thy repentence and
voluntary exile,/ Christ our God raised thee up as a beacon of the True
Faith,/ an Apostle to the heathen and an indicator of the Way of
salvation./ Wherefore O holy one, cease not to intercede for us that
our souls may be saved.
THANKS to Fr. Hieromonk Ambrose
(Moone) for the Saint's story.
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