Exodus 16:8

Now it becomes you also not to despise the age of your bishop, but to yield him all reverence, according to the will of God the Father, as I have known even holy presbyters do, not having regard to the manifest youth [of their bishop], but to his knowledge in God; inasmuch as “not the ancient are [necessarily] wise, nor do the aged understand prudence; but there is a spirit in men.” For Daniel the wise, at twelve years of age, became possessed of the divine Spirit, and convicted the elders, who in vain carried their grey hairs, of being false accusers, and of lusting after the beauty of another man’s wife. Samuel also, when he was but a little child, reproved Eli, who was ninety years old, for giving honour to his sons rather than to God. …

XXXII . If therefore, O deacon, thou knowest any one to be in distress, put the bishop in mind of him, and so give to him; but do nothing in a clandestine way, so as may tend to his reproach, lest thou raise a murmur against him; for the murmur will not be against him, but against the Lord God: and the deacon, with the rest, will hear what Aaron and Miriam heard, when they spake against Moses : “How is it that ye were not afraid to speak against my servant Moses ?” And again, Moses says to those who rose up against him: “Your murmuring is not against us, but against the Lord our God.” For if he that calls one of the laity Raka, or fool, shall not be unpunished, as doing injury to the name of Christ, how dare any man speak against his bishop, by whom the Lord gave the Holy Spirit among you upon the laying on of his hands, by whom ye have learned the sacred doctrines, and have known God, a …

Subjects are to be admonished that they judge not rashly the lives of their superiors, if perchance they see them act blamably in anything, lest whence they rightly find fault with evil they thence be sunk by the impulse of elation to lower depths. They are to be admonished that, when they consider the faults of their superiors, they grow not too bold against them, but, if any of their deeds are exceedingly bad, so judge of them within themselves that, constrained by the fear of God , they still refuse not to bear the yoke of reverence under them. Which thing we shall shew the better if we bring forward what David did ( 1 Sam. xxiv. 4 seq. ). For when Saul the persecutor had entered into a cave to ease himself, David, who had so long suffered under his persecution, was within it with his men. …

But with regard to vexation of bishops, about which you wish to consult us, we know that the life of prelates ought to be perturbed by no excesses, since it is very unfit that those who are called thrones of God should be disturbed by any motion from kings or subjects. For, if David who was the most righteous of kings presumed not to lay his hand on Saul who was evidently already rejected of God, how much more should heed be taken that none lay the hand of detraction or vituperation or indiscreetness or dishonour on the Lord’s Anointed, or on the preachers of holy Church, since vexation or detraction of them touches Christ, in whose stead they fill the office of legates in the Church! Hence all the faithful should be exceedingly cautious not either secretly or publicly, by detractions or vituperations rend their bishop, that is, the Lord’s Anointed, considering that example of Mary [i.e. …