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The Ceremonies of the Holy-Week at Rome by Charles Michael Baggs
page 94 of 154 (61%)
referring to Baronius, Calmet, Menochius, Gretser etc. who cite the
Rabbins in proof of this assertion. Now according to the ancient
historians, Eusebius, Sozomen and Socrates: the Emperor Adrian erected
a temple of Venus over the tomb of the God of purity, after he had
covered it with a great quantity of rubbish. Helen the saintly mother
of the emperor Costantine, after many searches (according to Eusebius
in his life of that emperor) at length discovered the sacred tomb, in
which was found, according to Sozomen, the inscription placed over the
cross by Pilate, "Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews"[106]. Near the
tomb in another part of the cave were found three crosses: but here a
difficulty arose on which of these three was our Saviour crucified?
At the suggestion of Macarius Bp. of Jerusalem, a woman at the point
of death, as Ruffinus, Socrates, Theodoret, Sozomen and Nicephorus
relate; or a dead man, according to Paulinus and Severus Sulpicius,
was brought to the spot, and restored to health or to life, when
placed on _one_ of the three crosses. If we consider, that it is
related in the 2nd book of Kings c, XIII, that when some persons "were
burying a man, they cast the body into the sepulchre of Eliseus.
And when it had touched the bones of Eliseus, the man came to life
and stood up on his feet," we may not be unwilling to admit the
possibility or probability, that such a miracle may have occurred at
the sepulchre of the God of Eliseus. Besides the authors whom I have
mentioned, this history is attested by S. Ambrose, S. Chrysostom, and
S. Cyril of Jerusalem. This great bishop and Eusebius lived at the
time when the event is said to have happened: the other writers lived
not long after, and Ruffinus and Theodoret passed part of their lives
in Syria. The same historians mention, that S. Helen divided the
Cross into three parts, one she left in Jerusalem, another she sent
to Costantine, according to the author of the life of Pope Sylvester
published by Pope Damasus towards the close of the 6th cent.; and the
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