COLUMBA, SAINT
(Irish,
Colum
), Irish saint, was born on the
7th of December 521, in all probability at Gartan in Co. Donegal.
His father Feidlimid was a member of the reigning family in
Ireland and was closely allied to that of Dalriada (Argyll). His
mother Eithne was of Leinster extraction and was descended
from an illustrious provincial king. To these powerful connexions
as much as to his piety and ability, he owed the immense influence
he possessed. Later lives state that the saint was also called
Crimthann (fox), and Reeves suggests that he may have had
two names, the one baptismal, the other secular. He was
afterwards known as Columkille, or Columba of the Church,
to distinguish him from others of the same name. During his
early years the Irish Church was reformed by Gildas and Finian
of Clonard, and numerous monasteries were founded which
made Ireland renowned as a centre of learning. Columba
himself studied under two of the most distinguished Irishmen
of his day, Finian of Moville (at the head of Strangford Lough)
and Finian of Clonard. Almost as a matter of course, under
such circumstances, he embraced the monastic life. He was
ordained deacon while at Moville, and afterwards, when about
thirty years of age, was raised to the priesthood. During his
residence in Ireland he founded, in addition to a number of
churches, two famous monasteries, one named Daire Calgaich
(Derry) on the banks of Lough Foyle, the other Dair-magh
(Durrow) in King’s county.
In 563 he left his native land, accompanied by twelve disciples,
and went on a mission to northern Britain, perhaps on the
invitation of his kinsman Conall, king of Dalriada. Irish
accounts represent Columba as undertaking this mission in
consequence of the censure expressed against him by the clergy
after the battle of Cooldrevny; but this is probably a fabrication.
The saint’s labours in Scotland must be regarded as a manifestation
of the same spirit of missionary enterprise with which so
many of his countrymen were imbued. Columba established
himself on the island of Hy or Iona, where he erected a church
and a monastery. About the year 565 he applied himself to
the task of converting the heathen kingdom of the northern
Picts. Crossing over to the mainland he proceeded to the
residence, on the banks of the Ness, of Brude, king of the Picts.
By his preaching, his holy life, and, as his earliest biographers
assert, by the performance of miracles, he converted the king
and many of his subjects. The precise details, except in a few
cases, are unknown, or obscured by exaggeration and fiction;
but it is certain that the whole of northern Scotland was converted
by the labours of Columba, and his disciples and the
religious instruction of the people provided for by the erection
of numerous monasteries. The monastery of Iona was reverenced
as the mother house of all these foundations, and its abbots were
obeyed as the chief ecclesiastical rulers of the whole nation of
the northern Picts. There were then neither dioceses nor parishes
in Ireland and Celtic Scotland; and by the Columbite rule the
bishops themselves, although they ordained the clergy, were
subject to the jurisdiction of the abbots of Iona, who, like the
founder of the order, were only presbyters. In matters of
ritual they agreed with the Western Church on the continent,
save in a few particulars such as the precise time of keeping
Easter and manner of tonsure.
Columba was honoured by his countrymen, the Scots of
Britain and Ireland, as much as by his Pictish converts, and
in his character of chief ecclesiastical ruler he gave formal
benediction and inauguration to Aidan, the successor of Conall,
as king of the Scots. He accompanied that prince to Ireland
in 575, and took a leading part in a council held at Drumceat
in Ulster, which determined once and for all the position of the
ruler of Dalriada with regard to the king of Ireland. The last
years of Columba’s life appear to have been mainly spent at
Iona. There he was already revered as a saint, and whatever
credit may be given to some portions of the narratives of his
biographers, there can be no doubt as to the wonderful influence
which he exercised, as to the holiness of his life, and as to the
love which he uniformly manifested to God and to his neighbour.
In the summer of 597 he knew that his end was approaching.
On Saturday the 8th of June he was able, with the help of one
of his monks, to ascend a little hill above the monastery and
to give it his farewell blessing. Returning to his cell he continued
a labour in which he had been engaged, the transcription of the
Psalter. Having finished the verse of the 34th Psalm where it
is written, “They who seek the Lord shall want no manner of
thing that is good,” he said, “Here I must stop:?what follows
let Baithen write”; indicating, as was believed, his wish that
his cousin Baithen should succeed him as abbot. He was
present at evening in the church, and when the midnight bell
sounded for the nocturnal office early on Sunday morning he
again went thither unsupported, but sank down before the altar
and passed away as in a gentle sleep.
Several Irish poems are ascribed to Columba, but they are
manifestly compositions of a later age. Three Latin hymns may,
however, be attributed to the saint with some degree of certainty.
The original materials for a life of St Columba are unusually full.
The earliest biography was written by one of his successors, Cuminius,
who became abbot of Iona in 657. Much more important is the
enlargement of that work by Adamnan, who became abbot of Iona
in 679. These narratives are supplemented by the brief but most
valuable notices given by the Venerable Bede. See W. Reeves,
Life of St Columba, written by Adamnan
(Dublin, 1857); W. F.
Skene,
Celtic Scotland
, vol. ii. “Church and Culture” (Edinburgh,
1877).
(
E. C. Q.
)