Life of St. Martin of Tours Term Paper

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St. Martin of Tours

Sulpicius Severus, who wrote the work The Life of St. Martin of Tours, wrote the life story of St. Martin out of his great admiration for the man. In his preface he says to the one who urged him to write the story that he feared his skill with language would not be good enough for such an important task. He finally wrote the work because in his words, "because I thought it disgraceful that the excellences of so great a man should remain concealed." Sulpicius saw St. Martin's life as one others should try to emulate, and for that to happen, people would have to know something about how St. Martin had lived.

Martin was drawn to Christianity when he was 10 and immediately began studying his new religion. Following Christ's example, he gave all he could to those who needed it more, keeping back only what he needed to survive himself. Sulpicius tells of one bitterly cold day when Martin saw a man with no coat, freezing from the cold. But all Martin had was his own cloak. Using his sword, he divided his cloak in two and gave half to the shivering man. Sulpicius uses this story of an example of how Martin showed others how to truly help those in need, for others who had walked by the man had done nothing although they could have given him much more than Martin was able to give.

It was after this incident that Sulcipius reports Martin's first vision, which came to him as he was sleeping.

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He saw Christ wearing the half-cloak Martin had given to the stranger, and then heard Christ tell angels surrounding the scene that it was He, Christ, who had been the poor man at the gate, and that Martin had given half his cloak to Jesus himself. It was after this vision that Martin was baptized. Sulcipius reports that Martin did not take pride in giving his cloak to Jesus but remembered His words, least of these, ye have done them unto me." (Chapter III)

While Sulcipius is clearly moved by this story, it also demonstrates the difficulty the writer faces while recounting Martin's many great deeds, because many of them occurred out of the sight of others. It seems unlikely that Sulcipius simply believed every person who claimed to have a vision of Christ. Rather, Sulcipius looked at the man and saw great piety, and saw a life lived in a way that would have pleased Christ, and believed the accounts he heard from others of Martin's many miracles.

Nevertheless, some of Sulcipius' claims of Martin's miracles would not stand scrutiny as possible miracles today. In Chapter IV,….....

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