Saint Maximinus of Aix (French : Maximin d'Aix) was believed to have been the first bishop of Aix-en-Provence in the 1st century. Louis Duchesne indicates that this part of the legend only developed later in the eleventh century. [1] His feast day if June 8. [2]
According to his legend, he was the steward of the family at Bethany and one of the seventy-two disciples of Jesus. [3] Around the year 42 or 43, he is said to have been put on a ship without rudder and sails by anti-Christian Jews together with Lazarus, Martha and Mary. Other versions say that his traveling companions were "The three Marys", that is, Mary Magdalene and the holy Mary, the wife of Cleophas and Mary, the mother of James. They were put out to sea and left to their fate, but on their mythical journey from Palestine they came to Provençe. [2] (Mary of Bethany is routinely conflated with Mary Magdalen.)
Maximin established his headquarters in the Roman colony of Aquae Sextiæ Salluviorum, the present Aix-en-Provence. He began the evangelisation of the area together with Mary Magdalene. He was visited by Saint Alexander of Brescia and strengthened his faith. [2]
He is traditionally named as the builder of the first chapel on the site of the present Aix Cathedral. [4]
Mary Magdalene later withdrew to the solitude of a cave, which later became a Christian pilgrimage site Sainte-Baume. On the day she knew she was to die she descended into the plain so that Maximinus could give her communion and arrange her burial. Her sarcophagus is now at the Basilica of St Mary Magdalene at Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume, along with that of Marcella, Suzanne and Maximinus, after whom the place was subsequently named. [3]
He died on 8 June, now the day of his feast. Sidonius (Saint Sidoine) succeeded him as bishop of Aix. [3] In the 3rd or 4th century his remains were placed in a sarcophagus.
The Abbé Duchesne says that this saint, the object of a very ancient local cult, was not considered the first bishop of Aix, or connected with the life of St. Mary Magdalen, except in comparatively recent legends, devised towards the middle of the eleventh century by the monks of Vézelay. [1] Maximinus may have been a bishop of Aix in the 4th or 5th century, [5] but there is no mention of him in the list of bishops of Aix. Dom Basil Watkins says that the legend of Maximinus traveling to France with Mary Magdalen is "worthless". [6]
Maximin was canonized by the confirmation of his cult on 24 November 1900 (the group " Niketius of Besançon and his 10 Companions") by Pope Leo XIII (1878-1903). In art he is depicted as a bishop giving the last sacraments to Mary Magdalene. He is also depicted in a boat with Mary Magdalene, Martha and Lazarus, as an elderly bishop with miter and staff.
He has been confused with Saint Maximin of Trier.
Mary Magdalene was a woman who, according to the four canonical gospels, traveled with Jesus as one of his followers and was a witness to his crucifixion and resurrection. She is mentioned by name twelve times in the canonical gospels, more than most of the apostles and more than any other woman in the gospels, other than Jesus's family. Mary's epithet Magdalene may be a toponymic surname, meaning that she came from the town of Magdala, a fishing town on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee in Roman Judea.
Mary of Bethany is a biblical figure mentioned by name in the Gospel of John and probably the Gospel of Luke in the Christian New Testament. Together with her siblings Lazarus and Martha, she is described as living in the village of Bethany, a small village in Judaea to the south of the Mount of Olives near Jerusalem.
Martha is a biblical figure described in the Gospels of Luke and John. Together with her siblings Lazarus and Mary of Bethany, she is described as living in the village of Bethany near Jerusalem and witnessing Jesus resurrecting her brother, Lazarus.
Vézelay Abbey is a Benedictine and Cluniac monastery in Vézelay in the east-central French department of Yonne. It was constructed between 1120 and 1150. The Benedictine abbey church, now the Basilica of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine, with its complex program of imagery in sculpted capitals and portals, is one of the great masterpieces of Burgundian Romanesque art and architecture. Sacked by the Huguenots in 1569, the building suffered neglect in the 17th and the 18th centuries and some further damage during the period of the French Revolution.
Maximin was the sixth bishop of Trier. His feast is 29 May.
Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume is a commune in the southeastern French department of Var, in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Located 40 km (25 mi) east of Aix-en-Provence, the town lies at the foot of the Sainte-Baume mountains. Baume or bama is the Provençal equivalent of cave. The town's basilica is dedicated to Mary Magdalene.
Mary Magdalen in Ecstasy (1606) is a painting by the Italian baroque artist Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571-1610). What is believed to be the authentic version of the painting was discovered in a private collection in 2014; the painting was previously only known to art historians through a number of copies made by followers of the artist.
Lazarus of Bethany is a figure within the Christian Bible, mentioned in the New Testament in the Gospel of John, whose life is restored by Jesus four days after his death. This is seen by Christians as one of the miracles of Jesus. In the Eastern Orthodox Church, Lazarus is venerated as Righteous Lazarus, the Four-Days Dead. The Eastern Orthodox and Catholic traditions offer varying accounts of the later events of his life.
Vézelay is a commune in the department of Yonne in the north-central French region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté. It is a defensible hill town famous for Vézelay Abbey. The town and its 11th-century Romanesque Basilica of St Magdalene are designated UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Maximin or Maximinus or similar may refer to:
Aix Cathedral in Aix-en-Provence in southern France is a Roman Catholic church and the seat of the Archbishop of Aix-en-Provence and Arles. The cathedral is built on the site of the 1st-century Roman forum of Aix. Built and re-built from the 12th until the 19th century, it includes Romanesque, Gothic and Neo-Gothic elements, as well as Roman columns and parts of the baptistery from a 6th-century Christian church. It is a national monument of France.
The Sainte-Baume is a mountain ridge spreading between the departments of Bouches-du-Rhône and Var in Southern France. Its summit is 1147 metres high.
The Magdalen Reading is one of three surviving fragments of a large mid-15th-century oil-on-panel altarpiece by the Early Netherlandish painter Rogier van der Weyden. The panel, originally oak, was completed some time between 1435 and 1438 and has been in the National Gallery, London since 1860. It shows a woman with the pale skin, high cheek bones and oval eyelids typical of the idealised portraits of noble women of the period. She is identifiable as the Magdalen from the jar of ointment placed in the foreground, which is her traditional attribute in Christian art. She is presented as completely absorbed in her reading, a model of the contemplative life, repentant and absolved of past sins. In Catholic tradition the Magdalen was conflated with both Mary of Bethany who anointed the feet of Jesus with oil and the unnamed "sinner" of Luke 7:36–50. Iconography of the Magdalen commonly shows her with a book, in a moment of reflection, in tears, or with eyes averted.
Magdalene with the Smoking Flame is a c. 1640 oil-on-canvas depiction of Mary Magdalene by French Baroque painter Georges de La Tour. Two versions of this painting exist, one in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the other in the Louvre Museum.
Michel Serre (1658–1733) was a Catalan-born French painter.
Jean-Esprit Isnard (1707–1781) was a French pipe organ builder.
Auspicius of Apt also known as Auspice of Apt (96–102), was a Pre-Congregational saint, first bishop of Apt, France who was consecrated by Clement I and martyred under Trajan.
Jean-Baptiste Guesnay was a French Jesuit and author.
St. Sidonius is traditionally held to be St. Maximinus of Aix's successor as Archbishop of Aix. He is also traditionally held to be a blind man healed by Jesus. The incident is often held to be Jesus healing the man blind from birth in John 9, but the man healed in this incident is more commonly associated with St. Celidonius, Protobishop of Nîmes. The name Sidonius literally means "from Sidon", so he could have been part of the Syro-Phoenician crowd that followed Jesus in Matthew 15:21 and Mark 7:24.
Marcella, according to Catholic tradition, was a disciple of Jesus and a servant of the brothers of Bethany. She is known for being the companion of Saint Martha during the Christianization of the current French region of Provence.
