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The book opens like a mystery novel. The year is 2006. An Irish farmer, digging for peat, notices an odd shape in his bucket. Looking carefully, he discovers that it is a very old book. Bringing it to experts, he learns that it is a psalter, more than a thousand years old, written on papyrus, bound in leather. “To find a book made the same way, conservators had to go to the binding of the Nag Haamadi codices in Egypt, fourth-century Gnostic Gospels that had been discovered in 1945.”
What was an ancient Egyptian psalter doing in a peat bog in Tipperay? In Monastery and High Cross: The Forgotten Eastern Roots of Irish Christianity, Connie Marshner gives a surprising answer: The psalter was brought to Ireland by monks who had settled as early as the 4th century— before the time of St. Patrick.
St. Patrick, undoubtedly one of the greatest evangelizers in the history of the Church, brought the Gospel message to Ireland in the 5th century. The evidence of his success in that mission is astonishing; within just a few generations, while Christendom was sinking into what is commonly called the Dark Ages, Ireland was the great bastion of Christian learning, where monks preserved the treasures of the faith while barbarians ravaged most of Europe.
The details of St. Patrick’s mission are lost to history. His own Confession reveals much about his zeal and his prayer, but offers none of the names, dates, and places that would provide a clear picture. Other accounts of his life came only much later, and were obviously embellished so that the myths obscure the man. (To take one popular example, St. Patrick could not have driven the snakes out of Ireland, because there never were snakes there.)
But a few of the available facts buttress Marshner’s theory:
Continued below.
www.catholicculture.org
What was an ancient Egyptian psalter doing in a peat bog in Tipperay? In Monastery and High Cross: The Forgotten Eastern Roots of Irish Christianity, Connie Marshner gives a surprising answer: The psalter was brought to Ireland by monks who had settled as early as the 4th century— before the time of St. Patrick.
St. Patrick, undoubtedly one of the greatest evangelizers in the history of the Church, brought the Gospel message to Ireland in the 5th century. The evidence of his success in that mission is astonishing; within just a few generations, while Christendom was sinking into what is commonly called the Dark Ages, Ireland was the great bastion of Christian learning, where monks preserved the treasures of the faith while barbarians ravaged most of Europe.
The details of St. Patrick’s mission are lost to history. His own Confession reveals much about his zeal and his prayer, but offers none of the names, dates, and places that would provide a clear picture. Other accounts of his life came only much later, and were obviously embellished so that the myths obscure the man. (To take one popular example, St. Patrick could not have driven the snakes out of Ireland, because there never were snakes there.)
But a few of the available facts buttress Marshner’s theory:
Continued below.
Did Egyptian monks pave the way for St. Patrick?
During its early years of explosive growth, the Church in Ireland was marked by strong indications of Eastern influence.
www.catholicculture.org
