Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Vol. 8 (Augustine: Exposition on Psalms)

be approximately fixed as early 356.¹ Basil began his life's work equipped with the most liberal education that the age could provide. He had studied Greek literature, rhetoric, and philosophy under the most famous teachers. He had been brought into contact with every class of mind. His training was not a narrow, hothouse forcing of theological opinion or ecclesiastical sentiment. The world he was to renounce, confront, and influence was not a world unknown to him.² He had seen heathendom in all the autumn grace of its decline, and he emerged victorious from temptations that proved fatal to other young men with Christian backgrounds. Athens no doubt contributed its share of influence to the apostasy of Julian; Basil, happily, was rooted more firmly in the faith.³

III. — Life at Caesarea; Baptism; and Adoption of Monastic Life.

When Basil overcame his companions' efforts to detain him at Athens, Gregory was persuaded to remain for a while longer. Basil, therefore, made his rapid journey homeward alone. In his Letter to Eustathius,⁴ he alleges that his main reason for his hurried departure was the desire to profit by the instruction of that teacher. This may be the language of compliment. In the same letter, he speaks of his fortitude in resisting all temptation to stop in the city on the Hellespont. I hesitate to identify this city with Constantinople, as Maran does. There may have been inducements for Basil to stop at Lampsacus, and it is more probable that it was Lampsacus he avoided.⁵ At Caesarea, he was welcomed as one of her most distinguished sons,⁶ and for a time, he taught rhetoric there with conspicuous success.⁷ A deputation came from Neocaesarea to request him to undertake educational work in that city,⁸ but they failed to detain him despite their lavish promises.⁹ According to his friend Gregory, Basil had already determined to renounce the world by devoting himself to an ascetic and philosophical life.¹⁰ His brother Gregory, however,¹¹ describes him at this period as still under more worldly influences, showing some of the self-confidence and conceit occasionally seen in young men who have just completed a university career. He suggests that Basil was largely indebted to the persuasion and example of his sister Macrina for the resolution with which he finally committed himself to a life of self-denial. Basil’s baptism can probably be attributed to this same period. The sacrament was administered by Dianius.¹² It would be quite consistent with the feelings of the time for pious parents—like the elder Basil and Emmelia—to shrink from admitting their son to holy baptism before he had encountered the temptations of school and university life.¹³

¹ "He did not arrive earlier than the end of 355 or the beginning of 356, if indeed Basil saw Julian there, who arrived in the city already halfway through 355; nor could it be later, because the multitude of Basil's activities does not allow the time between his literary studies and his priesthood to be compressed too much." — Maran.
² On the education of Basil, Eug. Fialon remarks (Étude Historique et Littéraire, p. 15): "Saint Gregory, on the patriarchal throne of Constantinople, declared he did not know the language of Rome. It was the same for Saint Basil. At least, one would look in vain in his works for any trace of Latin poets or prose writers. If passages of the Hexameron seem taken from Cicero or Pliny, do not be deceived. These were commonplaces found in Plutarch and Aelian—they had borrowed them from some old author, Aristotle, for example, and it is from this primary source that both Greeks and Latins drew. The Greeks even pushed their ignorance of Latin so far that one of their grammarians does not seem to know that there are languages without articles, and Gregory of Nyssa, having to say how the word 'heaven' is expressed in Latin, writes it almost as he heard the Romans pronounce it, Kéloum, without concerning himself with the quantity or etymology... Greek literature was thus the sole foundation of studies in the East, and it certainly could, by itself, satisfy noble intelligences... It was in Homer that young Greeks learned to read. Throughout their studies, they explained his poems... His verses fill the correspondence of the Church Fathers, and more than one profane comparison passes from his poems into their homilies. After Homer came Hesiod and the tragedians, Herodotus and Thucydides, Demosthenes, Isocrates, and Lysias. Thus poets, historians, and orators formed the mind, directed the heart, and elevated the soul of the children. But these authors were the leaders of paganism, and more than one passage in their books offended the strict morality of Christianity. No doubt a religious master, a saint, like Basil’s father, must have often lamented the blindness of such beautiful genius regarding Homer’s gods... Until now, Basil's studies correspond roughly to our secondary instruction. Then, as today, these initial studies were only a pathway to more serious work. Armed with this literary baggage, a young man who was rich and wanted to shine in the world would go to the great centers—Antioch, Alexandria, Constantinople, and especially Athens—to study eloquence and philosophy."
³ cf. C. Ullman, Life of Gregory of Naz. chap. ii., and Greg. Naz., Or. xliii. 21. original: “βλαβεραὶ μὲν τοῖς ἄλλοις Ἀθῆναι τὰ εἰς ψυχήν.” (Athens is harmful to others regarding the soul.)
⁴ Ep. i.
⁵ What these inducements could have been it seems futile to conjecture. cf. Ep. i. and note.
⁶ Greg. Naz., Or. xliii.
⁷ Rufinus xi. 9.
⁸ Ep. ccx. § 2. The time assigned by Maran for the incident narrated here is undoubtedly the right one. However, the deputation need have traveled no further than Annesi if, as is fairly certain, Basil visited his relatives and the family estate upon his return from Athens.
⁹ The word kataschein (to detain) would be natural if they sought to keep him in Pontus; it is hardly natural if their object was to bring him from Caesarea.
¹⁰ Or. xliii.
¹¹ Vit. Mac. (Life of Macrina)
¹² cf. De Sp. Scto. xxix., where the description of the bishop who both baptized and ordained Basil, and spent a long life in the ministry, can only apply to Dianius. cf. Maran, Vit. Bas. iii.
¹³ According to the legendary life of St. Basil, attributed to St. Amphilochius, he was baptized at Jerusalem. Nor is it right to omit the argument of Wall (Infant Baptism, ch. x.), founded on a coincidence between two passages in the writings of Gregory of Nazianzus. In Or. xl. ad init., he speaks of baptism as "a birth for the day, free and liberating from passions, cutting off every covering from birth, and leading back to the life above." In Or. xliii., he says of Basil that "the first stages of his life were swaddled and formed under his father... with the best and purest molding, which the divine David rightly calls 'for the day' and the opposite of 'for the night.'" As they stand alone, there is something to be said for the conclusion Wall deduces from these.