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Simeon xetaphrastes Simler THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG It is certain that Simeon created no new legends; he was, as the epithet given him implies, a meta phrast, reproducing the old legends in the style de manded by the literary taste of his time, and at the same time occasionally making alterations in the matter and connecting traditions which originally were distinct. The legends which he incorporated in his collection, and for the credibility of which he was in no way responsible, were themselves later revampings of the original acts of martyrs; and many offenses against good taste must be ascribed to his sources and to the requirements of his age rather than to Simeon himself, who was evidently a man of culture, taste, and talent. It should be noted, at the same time, that he did not stand en tirely alone. A number of his contemporaries were working in the same spirit; men like Nikephoros Chumnos followed his example in the style of the thirteenth century, and in the fourteenth Konstan tinos Akropolites gained the title of " the new Metaphrastes." In comparison with these imita tors Simeon distinctly gains, and he was, so far as a tenth-century Byzantine could be, natural and simple in diction. (E. vorr Dosscllfi'rz.)
BIBLIOGRAPHY: The collected works are in MPG, cxiv.cxvi. Cf. also Analeda BoUandiana, viii. 308-316, and Delehaye, in Griffin and Nau's Patrologia orientalis, ii. 4, pp. 546-557, Paris, 1907. Consult: L. Allatius, De Sgmeonum Scriptis diatriba, Paris; 1664; C. Oudin, Commentariu8 de acriptoribus ecclesiee antiquis, ii. 1300-83, Frankfort, 1722; Fabricius-Harles, Bibliotheca Grieco, viii. 29, x. 180-345, xi. 295-334, Hamburg, 1802-08; E. E. Kunik, in P. Krug's Forschungen in der alteren Geachichte Russlanda, ii. 785-807, St. Petersburg, 1848; A. Rambaud, L'Empire grec au x. siMe, pp. 92-104, Paris, 1870; F. Hirsch, Byzantinische Studien, pp. 52 sqq., 303355, Leipsie, 1876; R. Nicolai, Geschichte der griwhischen Literatur, iii. 70, 100, 104, 107-109, Magdeburg, 1878; H. Delehaye, in Revue des questions historiques, x (1893), 49-85; Analecta Bollandiana, xvi (1897), 312-329, xvii (1898), 448-452; C. de Boor, in Byzantinische Zeitschrift, vi (1897), 233-284, x (1901), 70-90; A. Ehrhard, in Festschrift zum elfhundertyahrigen Jubilhum des deutschen Campo Santo in Rom, pp. 4682, Rome, 1897; N. Kondatoff, in ZWT, xlvi (1903), 434 sqq.; Krumbacher, Geschichte, pp. 178 eqq., 200 eqq., 358 sqq., 718-719, et passim.
SIMEON THE NEW THEOLOGIAN: Mystic of the Eastern Church; b. in the village of Galate in Paphlagonia c. 965; d. in a monastery not far from Chrysopolis, near Chalcedon in Bithynia, Asia Minor, between 1032 and 1041. He was sent to Constantinople for his education, but showed no interest in the rhetorical and philosophical studies which were to fit him for the service of the State for which he was intended, nor in the life at court which he tasted as a page. Simeon the Studite (q.v.) had already confirmed his desire for a religious life, and became his spiritual guide after he entered the monastery of Studion, where his mystical bent developed. Being expelled for maintaining an exclusive friendship with his teacher, a thing forbidden by the rules, he went to the monastery of Mamas, near by, of which he became the head and received priesthood. He raised the monastery out of its demoralized condition and established his fame as theologian by his extensive literary activity. During this period Simeon does not seem to have been molested because of his individual views. It was only after he had laid down his office (c. 1017), in
order to live in retirement, that. he was involved in a conflict with the highest spiritual authority. Stephanos, the syncellus of the patriarch, a Canonist of fame and an acute dogmatician, attacked Simeon because he had permitted his namesake Simeon the Studite to be adored after his death in the monastery of Mamas. The syncellus demanded the abolition of this worship; since Simeon persistently refused to give up the worship of his spiritual father, he was banished from Constantinople by a synodical decree to the neighborhood of Chrysopolis. The adherents of Simeon compelled the patriarch to rehabilitate him formally, but he remained in exile and built a new monastery, where he died.
The theology of Simeon connects itself with a development of practical mysticism which may be traced to the end of the fourth century. Its characteristic element was the belief that in certain specially elevated moments there was possible a vision of the divinity as a supernatural light. Simeon was guided and taught by his confessor to consider the vision of the light as the aim of religious struggle. There is nothing novel in the religious experience around which the thoughts of Simeon moved, but the power with which he invested his experiences earned for him the title " new theologian." The vision of the light which was granted to him, Simeon understood as a revelation of God through which he was assured of grace and had personal intercourse with God. These experiences became for him the key for the interpretation of the New Testament, which he read with other eyes since he himself had come in contact with the realities of which the Scriptures testify. As the greatness of the Christian ideal in the New Testament became plainer to him, the more clearly he seemed to see that personal relation with divinity is the indispensable condition for an earnest Christian life, since only from a personally experienced grace flows the power for a life in the spirit. Simeon recognized that it is grace alone that elevates and renews man; no Greek has repeated so often and so emphatically the Pauline antithesis-from grace, not from works. Such principles involved a polemic against the spirit of his church; this inevitably raised opposition to him, but the opposition could not prevent the formation of a school around him or the penetration of his principles into monasticism. The Hesychasts (q.v.) stood entirely upon his shoulders. In the line of Greek mysticism that from Clement and Origen, by way of Gregory of Nyssa and Dionysius the Areopagite, finally leads to the Hesychasts, Simeon represents the culminating point. (K. HoLL.)
BIBLIOGRAPHY: The " Works " are in MPG, ex=:., and an edition in modern Greek by Dionysios Zagoraios appeared Venice, 1790. A Vita by Simeon's Pupil Nicetas Stethatos is still in manuscript, but its publication by L. Petit is soon to be expected. Consult: K. Holl, Enthusiasmvs and Bussgervalt. Eine Studie zu Symeon dem neuen TheoWen, Leipsic, 1898; Krumbacher, Geschichte, pp. 152-154; Fabrieius-Harles, Bibliotheca Gra;ca, xi. 302 sqq., Hamburg, 1808; KL, xi. 1070.
SIMEON THE STUDITE: Monk in the monastery of Studion at Constantinople, and teacher of Simeon the New Theologian (q.v.); flourished about 975. Exact knowledge of his life is lacking, what is known coming from Nicetas Stethatos, a