Stephen the Deacon of Constantinople

all ought to approach the pontiffs themselves, and disclose to them their hidden transgressions; and thus either receive a dismissal or an acquittal. I do not know, however, how it happens that these things are less observed; although I deem that the pontiffs, exhausted by the weariness of business and the frequent turbulence of the multitude, have transmitted that duty to the monks—namely, to those who are truly proven and are able to be useful to others: for they have permitted nothing of this kind to be handled by the inexperienced and unlearned. Indeed, in an adverse state of bodily health, we seek out a physician, and we demand one who is able to cure the one who is suffering, both in deed and in word. And so we will not look to this person or that, who has nothing of the physician except the name; but to him who, as is expedient, will be able to prove himself a physician. Furthermore, if anyone be experienced and frugal, and besides this, exercises the priesthood, he should be approached first of all: for he will be able to profit the one who is in need, and to cure more diligently one who approaches him, and also to reconcile and correct him. I believe, however, that no one who leads his life piously and cautiously in this troublesome time should be removed from this order. Furthermore, whoever approaches such a man, let him entirely direct and instruct him, so that he may be rightly directed. And he, the more learned he is in the divine and sacred canons, the more abundantly he will instruct. Conversely, he who is ignorant of the force of the canons and the penalty for each respective offense, he will never be of use in any matter. For this reason, for someone who ought to be forgiven the brother sinning against him seven times in one and the same day, how can he reject and cast away those who have sinned often and gravely; rather, he will admonish them with spiritual rebukes, he will soundly advise them concerning the future life, and call eternal punishments to mind? He will guard against one thing: that he does not grant absolution too indulgently and without any reproof, and become a participant in the crimes of others. Now, if those who have sinned melt in tears, and continually meditate upon the alienation of their evils; although they may fall back again, you shall nevertheless bring them to be received, and shall designate a suitable place. For the power is in your hands, as you know, to apply the measure of punishment. But as for those who depart from this life, do not bind them if they are held fast in any sin; but make them partakers of the divine and pure sacraments. Let those who are cleansed without a formal pact give thanks to our God, because they have been delivered from the jaws of the devil. It is of little value to prescribe the length of time for their punishment. For it is not ours to define, but the will of those who obey the commands: even if the time be long, it is nevertheless no longer than correction requires; perhaps a shorter correction might bring no benefit at all. However, we have seen even in a short time many have wiped away and amended many things. Otherwise, even if the measure of time to which he is subjected be set, he who has obeyed the commands will eventually show whether he was worthily admitted or rejected.

ANNO DOMINI DCCCVIII. STEPHANUS CONSTANTINOPOLITANUS DIACONUS.

NOTITIA.

PREFACE OF THE BENEDICTINES.

it will not be out of place to mention that the author of this Life has excerpted several modes of expression and entire sentences from the Life of Saint Euthymius composed by Cyril. In this Life, furthermore, many things pertaining to the history of the Iconoclasts, whom the author of this work calls "Iconoclasts," are clearly narrated. Here, too, one can clearly see how rightly the Catholics of that time thought concerning the cult of holy images. Indeed, it is expressly declared there that we do not worship the material itself when we outwardly venerate the images composed of it, but that the causes themselves, or prototypes (to use the author's words), are reached by the mind; it is proved in the same work that this is done piously and cannot be denied. For if it is permitted to show outward reverence to the images of emperors and kings, to such an extent that whoever dares to trample them underfoot or break them out of contempt is held guilty of laesae majestatis—because, just as the honor we pay to the images of kings and emperors is referred to the kings and emperors themselves, so the contempt and injury offered to their images passes to them—it is surely far more equitable and holy to deem the images of Christ, the King of kings, and of the saints who reign with Him in heaven, worthy of some veneration, since this very veneration is directed to Christ and the saints; nor shall he go unpunished who has offered contumely to these same images, since by this contumely Christ Himself and the saints, whose God He is, are provoked. In this place, we cannot but testify that we owe much here to that most obliging man, Stephanus Baluzius, whom we have already praised. For he had long since arranged for this Life of his patron to be transcribed at his own expense from the Royal manuscript, along with that which Metaphrastes composed, so that he might bring them to light when leisure allowed. But when he saw us occupied with searching for Greek pamphlets, he bestowed them upon us with his customary kindness.

THE LIFE OF SAINT STEPHEN THE YOUNGER, MONK AND MARTYR.

BY STEPHEN, DEACON OF THE CHURCH OF CONSTANTINOPLE: TRANSLATED BY DOM JACQUES LOPPIN, BENEDICTINE MONK OF THE CONGREGATION OF SAINT MAUR.

^A Of Stephen, Deacon of the Church of Constantinople, on the Life and martyrdom of the most blessed and holy martyr Stephen the Younger, who underwent martyrdom under the impious Iconoclast emperor Constantine Copronymus.

It is a right and just thing, and approved by all who profess piety, according to the divine voice of the great herald Paul, to commune with the memories of the saints; and as that Davidic song says: "The memory of the just is with praises," ^B and: "Praise is becoming to the upright." But it is also agreeable and desirable for everyone to have the excellent contests and noble deeds of those same men expressed in images for perpetual memory, even as it is holy and pious for the same to be set forth in writings. For while they are perceived by sight and hearing, they raise us up to the virtue of the prototypes and divine emulation, by which that S-

^A sacred thing is fulfilled which says: "Show me thy face, and let me hear thy voice." For the one is seen through an image, and hears through the word of Scripture. And the vision of the image is the natural province of those who are in some way skilled in that very art; but the word of hearing belongs to those who have been initiated into divine things in the Holy Spirit and through the discipline of knowledge. I myself, then, being devoid of both, am cast down by fear, and I am not bold enough to open my mouth or set my hand to the undertaking, lest in speaking I incur the intolerable vice of temerity. For "a powerful snare to a man are his own lips," as says the Proverb, and as it is written: "And everyone is taken by the words of his own mouth; but a reward of his lips shall be given to him." For great and beloved is the prince of this spiritual gathering, the holy martyr Stephen; and very great is the poverty and smallness of my meagre wit. And from whence shall I bring him a crown of praises for his life? Or how shall I express the brilliant and laborious manner of his conduct, or how tell of his noble boldness in undergoing martyrdom? For the wonders which were accomplished by him through the aid of grace from above contain a narrative so admirable that they disturb my mind, move it from its seat and station, and force it to pass beyond its own bounds. Nevertheless, as far as I am able in my talent, I shall not shrink from speaking. For it is not, not to praise according to his worth that is worthy of condemnation, but not to speak according to one's power, that is blameable. ^C Wherefore, having a mind commensurate with the task of speaking, I, who have never before attempted any such work, having been urged by others, have dedicated myself with all my power to this work. For I turned over in my mind the ancestral disobedient condemnation of Eve, and that evil servant who hid his talent in the earth. I also feared lest, by long neglect, this life of our venerable Father should fall into oblivion; for just as clouds are accustomed to hide the sun, so time is accustomed to obscure those things which are not celebrated in words, although forty-two years have passed since the most blessed Father of ours, Stephen, underwent his sacred death by martyrdom, up to the present day. Provoked ^D by this, I have gathered, from truthful men and from his own disciples, running here and there, the most pleasing and admirable accounts of his life, from his very swaddling clothes to his old age, and his birth and his passing; and I have retrieved them from the long passage of time and from oblivion, as if from some deep, emulating the industrious bee, which gathers from many flowers those things which are necessary for the making of honey. But may Christ our true God be with us, who "lighteth every man that cometh into the world."

^A For He is the only intellect of those who piously understand and are understood, and the Word of those who speak and are spoken about, and is and becomes all things to all men, He who bestows the illumination of instruction for the sake of knowledge, when it is time to speak a word; for "the declaration of Thy words shall give light and understanding unto the simple." And let this suffice for now. That we may not lengthen our discourse with further episodes, I shall now take hold of the starting-gate that lies before us, and proceed to provide a preface for this God-pleasing life. Only do you also contend alongside me with your prayers, rending God propitious toward my worthless life, and asking for the opening of my mouth, so that I may not be judged as having laid hands upon a task beyond my worth, and having brought nothing valuable or worthy of the Word; for this does not at all befit my weakness, even though no form of negligence hangs over me. Assisted therefore by the grace from above, which distributes to each individual what is fitting, from whom "Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above," descending into those who are worthy of the Spirit, I shall proceed to the beginning of the life itself, having found, as I said, a most excellent and swift ally in the help of prayers from both sides.

Do you, however, O holy assembly of the Orthodox, as many as have tasted even with the tip of the finger of the philosophy according to Christ, strive fervently to set the ears of your mind upon the true faith. For in these present matters, the narrative concerns spiritual constitution, and not carnal celebrity or progress, as it is among the Gentiles. ^B Therefore, this rich and joyous host of this holy banquet and of all you who are guests for the hearing, he who is of the same name, deed, and manner as the Protomartyr, is no stranger to the Byzantines, nor an alien to those who inhabit the imperial city. For he is one of us, a native, a foster-child, and a sacrifice, known to our fathers, and an eyewitness holocaust that they saw with their own eyes. For in the times of Artemius, who is also Anastasius, the Augustus, in the first year of his reign, and in the year six thousand two hundred and twenty-two from the creation of the world [A.D. 715], there was a certain man living in Constantinople, not among those who are conspicuous through eminent rank, nor one renowned through riches acquired by impiety, but one of those who lived in sufficiency, to use the Apostle’s word, and was nourished by the work of his own hands, from which he shared with the needy as far as he was able. ^C He lived at a downward slope of the royal public thoroughfare, where the Cross is set up, by which name it is also distinguished, from which place towards the lower part are large houses called the houses of Constas. Living here, the God-fearing man, with a wife of similar character—both having been reared in piety—in the passage of time had two daughters, who, when they had progressed in age,

^A their honorable parents reared this fruitful pair of daughters in letters and piety, just as they themselves had been. When their most pious mother saw that time was slipping away and regarded herself as approaching that age when sterility is wont to beset women, she began to grieve and lament that she had no male child. Impelled, however, by the firmest faith, and pondering in her mind Sarah, Anna, and Elizabeth, and reflecting upon that saying of Scripture: "He who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it shall be opened," she imitated her namesake, Anna—for she, too, bore the name of Anna. Just as the former had done in the tabernacle of the Law, so she did not cease to frequent the venerable houses of the all-holy Mother of God, especially ^B haunting her most august temple located in the Blachernae every day, and most assiduously attending the nocturnal vigils that are wont to be celebrated on the eve of Preparation, that is, on Friday; and she offered prayers and vows. Standing before that holy image in which she was represented bearing her Son and God in her bosom, she shed tears and would address Him, as the common salvation and help of our race, saying: "O Theotokos, shelter of all who flee to thee, and anchor and patroness of those seeking thee in their sorrow; most secure harbor for those who are plunged into the sea of this life through sadness; most present help of all who implore thee as an aid in their desperation; glory of mothers and ornament of daughters; thou who didst change the shameful condemnation of our first mother Eve for the whole female sex into joyful confidence through thy divine-human childbirth, have mercy on me and hear me. Break my bond, as it happened for thy mother Anna when she gave birth to thee. Make me, through thy intercession, to bear a son, that I may offer him as a gift to thy Son and God." The woman did this two or three times, and having knelt ^C in her customary manner during one of these prayers, she was overcome by sleep. But the Mother of God, who is most prompt to bend the clemency of her Son in a maternal manner for the aid of our race, converted the woman's sadness into maternal joy in this way: for at that very hour, she appeared to her in a dream, in a form exactly like the aforementioned image, and having touched her side, she awakened her, saying: "Go in joy, woman; for thou hast a son." Arising, and finding that the vigils were finished, she returned home with hymns and conceived a son. ^D At the time of this conception, Germanus, that orthodox interpreter of the dogmas of the Church and our common Father, was entrusted by the vote of God with the rudder of the imperial city. Having been brought from Cyzicus, he was placed like a most radiant lamp, not under a bushel, but upon a lampstand, so that throughout the whole world, as if...

^A to the very throne ^B of the sun, all sorts of people flocked together—people of every age, old men and elders, youths and younger ones, adolescents, and even infants still at the breast, all of them having run together; or, to say something further, even the angels themselves descended to that joyful gathering. Together with them there came those two fertile branches of a pious couple. But when they saw the infinite multitude of the people, the venerable Anna intended to turn back because of the crushing pressure and the jostling of the people against one another, fearing lest the embryo, through such constraint, might be cast out and die before its time. Her most honorable husband did not consent to this; but, being a very brave man and stronger in physical power than others, he urged her to grasp his sides with her hands, and pushing forward and being pushed back, he could with difficulty reach the vestibule of the great temple of the Wisdom of God. Thence they easily entered the portico which is situated before the atria of the temple; and there, having climbed onto a bench, they awaited the entrance of the high priest Germanus. For so great and many were his true praises that the mere desire to see him drew everyone. Afterward, as the high priest made his entrance, the woman, divinely stirred (as those who reported this to me affirmed with oaths), saw him as a flame of fire, and at that very moment she cried out: “Bless, O most holy one, the son whom I carry in my womb.” ^C But he, being all radiant, having turned his gaze mildly and directed his eyes toward the woman, and moved by the fire of the Holy Spirit, said: “May the Lord, O woman, bless the fruit of your womb according to your faith, through the intercessions of the Theotokos and the Protomartyr Stephen.” Truly a better compensation for a good faith! For just as the Canaanite woman of old heard from the Savior Christ: “O woman, great is your faith; let it be done for you as you desire” (Matt. xv, 28), so also did this woman receive from that divine Father, who bore the whole Christ within himself, receiving beyond what she asked for, the name also for the one about to be born.

The customary mystery having been celebrated, and all having partaken of the divine and immaculate mysteries of Christ, and all having departed home in peace, after a few days that most God-loving woman—that new Anna, as she truly was—her time having been fulfilled, gave birth to a new Samuel in spirit. As soon as he was born, they gave him the name of the Protomartyr Stephen, according to the prediction of our venerable Father Germanus. The space of eight days having elapsed as if in the interim, the child was brought into the temple of God, and there received the preordained appellation. Likewise, on the fortieth day, the mother, carrying him with her own hands (as of old the most celebrated Anna ^D...

did the child Samuel who was ^A sacred from infancy), reached the venerable temple of the Theotokos in Blachernae together with her husband. There she offered a prayer and obtained her petition; and standing again before that divine image, she said with joyful tears, giving thanks: "Rejoice, O all-pure one, who hast loosed the barrenness of my child-bearing! Rejoice, O all-undefiled one, who hast turned my sorrow into joy! Rejoice, most ready salvation of those who seek thee! For I, the wretched one, having sought, have found thee, and have received more than I asked. Not only a son, but also his very name, have I received from thy worshiper and now our shepherd." Having stretched out her hands toward the heights, and having reverently placed the infant at the feet of that holy image, she cried out again: "Receive, O Lady, the fruit of thy maternal intercession! Receive, O thou who art the answerer of prayers, the child who was assigned to thee by me before his conception! Receive, O creditor, the interest due from the debtors!" Her God-fearing husband, however, was struck dumb and astonished by the long-lasting prayer and the outpouring of tears ^B of his wife. She, taking hold of his hand and pointing with her finger to the divine likeness, said: "This, O sweetest husband, is the sponsor, the patroness, and the helper of Stephen’s birth." Then both, bowing their heads and venerating that holy ground, went home, having given thanks to the sponsor and patroness of all Christians. Truly, the noble mother prophetically foreshadowed through this thanksgiving that he would one day undergo martyrdom for the sake of the image of Christ and His Mother, as will afterward be made manifest.

When the holy and life-giving resurrection of the Savior arrived, the parents took the child, who was sacred from his cradle, to the Baptistery ^C of the most holy Great Church of God on the evening of holy Saturday. When they had presented him to the bath of regeneration, Germanus, that most blessed luminary, baptized him in the name of the life-giving Trinity. After the anointing with divine ointment, the mother fell at the feet of the God-bearing chief shepherd and cried out: "Pour out prayers, reverend Father, for him whose name you indicated while he was still carried in the womb!" But the reverend Germanus, not considering that any other prayer was needed after the anointing with the ointment, holding the progenitor's head with one hand and pointing with his finger to the infant with the other, said: "May God, who ^D lightens every man that cometh into this world (John 1, 9), render this child similar in character to him whose name he has received." And so, with a blessing, they returned home.

Such are the beginnings of our God-bearing Father Stephen. Such are the true and most delightful accounts of his conception, vocation, and baptism.

Let our speech now proceed to his later actions, granted by God. For if the vestibules are of such a kind, the inner chambers are much more so. ^A For after our common mother, the venerable font, regenerated this holy one through a spiritual birth, she fed him with milk as if from a mystical breast; and thereafter she set before him, as if it were solid food, the knowledge of divine concepts, which those who have their senses trained to the discernment of good and evil were commanded to eat. She, as we have said, reared him like a mother and nourished him, and taught him to be vigilant in divine meditations. She made his life splendid, adorned his soul, and raised it to the heights. She made him a friend of God and prepared him to look down upon present things; and, to express it in one word, she received him when he came into this world from non-existence, and she shall receive him once more when he departs from these places; and she awaits the moment to be the witness of his excellence, ^B when the Judge shall render to each the rewards according to his merits.

But I have heedlessly wandered into these words and, abandoning what should have been said first, I am no better off than those who foolishly attempt to construct the roof of a house before the foundations. Therefore, I lead the course of my speech back to what is before us. So, when the parents of this most sacred boy perceived that he had passed the period of childhood and had reached the age of six, and that he ought now to be occupied with disciplines, they handed him over to masters for the preliminary learning of the Holy Scriptures. And as he delighted in his studies as if they were pleasures, he surpassed everyone, ^C applying himself not only to his lessons, but also to every virtue. For he never ceased to go out at night with his holy mother to the vigils customarily celebrated at the memorials of the saints. The honorable youth had received such a grace that, at the time when the reading was taking place—at which time it is the custom to sit—he would stand before the holy chancel, attending to the reader, and from mere listening he would learn what was being read and carry it in his mouth, whether it were a martyrdom, or a life, or a discourse of some Father, and especially that of the honey-flowing Father Chrysostom. For he used to say that he desired his divine discourses more fervently. And thus, truly holy from infancy, and a companion of the most celebrated Timothy, following the common Master and acting cautiously in all things, forgetting the things which are behind ^D and reaching forward to those things which are before, he did not cease, to speak with David, to meditate day and night in the law of the Lord, like a tree planted by the rivers of water. For he knew that he would not long after, in his own time, give the hundredfold fruit of his labors. Thus the honorable Stephen, schooled in the highest piety, [remained] with many of his contemporaries.

in a short time through the fervor and love of learning he had in his soul. For his zeal was beyond his age, so that his parents, struck with wonder, said that he was truly a son of prayer. In these things, then, the holy youth was trained and fashioned in the most excellent and purest fashioning—which, as the penetrating and most theological mind says, the divine David rightly calls "the daylight" in opposition to the night. As he learned the holy Scriptures, he desired to become an emulator of those divine men appearing in them; and by imitating them, he did not even remember diverse foods, nor did he seek empty glory, nor did his mouth ever cease from glorification.

In the time of his studies, Leo, who was born in Syria, a new Doeg and an Idumean from the regions of the East, rose up ^B against the Emperor Theodosius by a rebellious and tyrannical deed. Theodosius, thinking it an unworthy thing for Christians to wage war against Christians, embraced a most tranquil manner of life, and allowed the impious man to enjoy his greed and dignity. Soon, therefore, the tyrant hurried into the palace, like a dog into the holy places, and a swine among the pearls. Yet, putting on the skin of a fox, and behaving cunningly at first out of reverence for the great prelate Germanus, he promised to be a cultivator of piety. But after the tenth year of his reign, this new Balthasar breathed into the Church a Manichaean heresy, one perhaps even comparable, if I may say so, to that of the Aphthartodocetae. And having gathered the people subject to him, that inhuman beast, ^C distinguished by the name of Leo, roaring leoninely in the midst of all, spewed out from his wrathful heart, as if from Mount Etna, fire and brimstone; and he uttered that miserable voice, saying: "Since the fabrication of images is an idolatrous art, one ought not to worship them." But when, upon such a voice, the religious and orthodox populace was troubled and groaned, that lost man immediately remained silent about what followed and turned his speech to a different sentiment. Truly, "their throat is an open sepulcher," and his heart is a whitened wall.

But when the herald of piety, Germanus, had learned of this, opposing himself ^D to the rebellious mind of the tyrant, he declared to him: "Emperor, since Christ the Lord and our Savior God was made flesh from the most pure blood of the holy Theotokos, and having been seen, perfect and circumscribed and like unto us, all idolatrous worship has been removed from the midst, and all likenesses of idols have been consigned to fire and darkness. And from the time when He walked among us, and His apostles brought salvation to the world by their doctrine, until this present day, there are seven hundred and thirty-six years; and as many as..."

^A in the time between these, righteous Fathers have passed, who never conceived of such a thing concerning the holy and venerable icons. For from the beginning, after the assumption of Christ into the heavens, the visual representation of icons was formed. For the icon of the Savior was delineated both by the woman with the issue of blood in memory of the miracle wrought upon her, and by that icon not made by human hands preserved in the city of Edessa, as well as by the icon of the most pure Theotokos painted by Luke the Evangelist, which was delivered from Jerusalem to Theophilus, as tradition records. Moreover, the six holy ecumenical synods, having found these, ordained that they be venerated and not turned away from. But know this, Emperor, that if you seek to prevail in this matter, I am ready to die for the sake of the holy and venerable icons. For the icon of Christ bears His holy name, insofar as He was seen in the flesh and walked among men. And it is just and holy to die for the sake of His name. For he who dishonors His icon redirects the insult toward the One depicted in it.” ^B Having heard these things, the lawless emperor, roaring like the lion whose name he bore, sent satraps armed with swords to the patriarchal house, and commanded them to cast the holy man out from there with blows and insults. When he had been cast out and made to share in the monastic life, it was possible to see the entire city, deprived of the honey-flowing doctrine of the Father, emitting no small amount of lamenting and wailing; so that that day was not a day, but darkness, and mourning upon mourning, and woe upon woe, as the prophet says.

In those wretched days, the impious ^C Anastasius seized the high priesthood with the hand of impiety, by the force of soldiers, and not by the suffrage of divine piety; and he delivered all things pertaining to the Church to the royal palaces. Then the tyrant, having received free authority to broadcast his heresy, attempted immediately to cast down and deliver to the fire the holy and Dominical icon of Christ our God, which was established above the imperial gates, and which on account of its image was called the holy Chalke—and this he indeed accomplished. But during its removal, certain honorable women, strengthened by divine zeal, rushed forward boldly, and having seized the ladder, they cast the spatharios—who was removing the icon—to the ground, and having torn him apart, they delivered him to death. ^D After this, they immediately hastened to the patriarchal house and pelted the impious Anastasius with stones, saying: “O most impure head, and enemy of the truth, did you therefore seize the priesthood, so that holy and sacred dedications might be overturned?” The unholy man, not bearing this defeat of his own, fled from the sight of the pious women; and taking refuge with the tyrant, he persuaded him that those holy women should be put to death by the sword. Which is exactly what happened; and having contended for the icon of Christ, they received the prize of victory from Christ Himself, rejoicing in the kingdom of heaven with all the victorious saints.

^A Constantinople, therefore, remained for a long time shrouded in that night of darkness, following the heresy. Many of those who lived therein righteously and in orthodoxy were afflicted with no small sadness, and not a few, abandoning their homeland, migrated to orthodox villages. The parents of the blessed Stephen, falling into these calamities, were also looking to their own salvation. Yet they were held back by the promise of their son, which they intended to fulfill. But when they considered that he could not dwell in the monasteries of Byzantium because of the prevailing tyranny and turmoil, they were moved by God and led by an angel, just as of old the God-bearing Joseph had fled with the Theotokos into Egypt from the face of the infant-slaying Herod. So they too, taking the god-minded child Stephen and departing from their native land, sailed to the harbor of Chalcedon and took the road that leads to the mountain of our holy and God-bearing Father Auxentius. ^B For the great and miracle-working Father Auxentius once dwelt upon this mountain, and from there he sent forth the rays of his miracles throughout the whole world, and he shed light upon the faith, having acquitted himself most excellently and courageously against the impious Dioscorus and Eutyches at the fourth holy ecumenical synod gathered at Chalcedon.

That mountain is situated toward the navigable gulf of Nicomedia, opposite the province of the Bithynian regions. ^C It is a most delightful place for those who wish to be saved, higher than all the surrounding hills, cold and dry, and—to speak briefly—it touches the heavens. For if anyone were to call it the mountain of God, or Mount Horeb, Mount Carmel, or Mount Sinai, or Tabor, or Lebanon, or the holy city, as if it were the city of Jerusalem situated upon a mountain, he would not be straying from what is fitting. For where a place of salvation draws one’s character toward the salvation of the soul, there truly is the real Jerusalem. ^D Therefore, upon this holy mountain—to which the name of the holy Auxentius was given for the present and for all time—the Fathers took hold by succession, where, being enclosed in the holy cave, they found the paradise of death's migration. For after the passing of our divine Father Auxentius, Sergius his disciple dwelt in that same cave; and after him, the third was the miracle-working and in every way virtuous and radiant Vindemianus. The fourth who followed him was Gregory, renowned for his temperance and filled with sacred white hair; and after him the fifth was the venerable John, a new Abraham, and a partaker of the gift of discernment. To this holy John, therefore, Gregory and Anna, that pious pair, brought their revered son Stephen at that time as a sacrifice, and they offered up prayers, requesting that he be accepted and deemed worthy of the holy and angelic habit, stating that he was a son of prayer and that even before his emergence from the womb, he had been dedicated to the monastic life. That honored old man, discerning...

^A by the gift of knowledge, as has been mentioned before, was full of it; and having closely observed the excellent character of the youth, his way of walking, the cheerfulness of his countenance, the modest formation of his eyes, and in short, all the divine grace that was in him, he said: “May God bless you, my child, and make you a vessel of election.” And to his parents he said with a gentle voice: “Truly the Spirit of God has rested upon this youth.” ^B And when the customary ministry was accomplished, and the dawn vigil or morning office was at hand, after the usual completion of the Canon, our God-bearing Father John, having taken him before the holy cave (for he himself did not go out from there), taught him with these many words: “Blessed are you, my son Stephen, because you receive today the second pool and the stronghold of the first, having put on a new light added to the former. Blessed are you, my son, because this day you fulfill the voice of Christ in an evangelical manner, and you leave father, and mother, and sisters, and all other things which indeed today are, but tomorrow are no more; and you carry His cross upon your shoulders so that you may be able to be an heir to the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you, my son, because you have prophetically chosen to be cast out in the house of God rather than to dwell in the tabernacles and city of the heretics who slander the Christians. ^C Behold, my son, the calling of the monastic dignity: ‘For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places’ (Eph. VI, 12), as Paul, the vessel of election, says. Behold, my son, to whom you are dedicating yourself; do not be gripped again by a greater desire for your parents than for God. For He indeed both created and saves; whereas those whom they love, they destroy and deliver to punishments, as the interpreter of the illuminating Ladder teaches. Behold, my son, do not turn back. For it is also written: ‘No man having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God’ (Luc. IX, 62).” Having instructed him with these and many other such words, and having requested and received the shears from his hands, he tonsured him in the sixteenth year of his age, and clothed him in the angelic habit. And when all things had been performed according to the customary rite, the holy youth’s parents departed from the mountain and, giving praise and glory to God, returned to their own home.

The venerable Stephen prepared himself for the struggles, ^D devoting himself to those things which lead to virtue. For every season he offered the proper fruit to God. Whenever the thought of gluttony arose, the fruit for him was abstinence; and when thoughts of any bodily pleasure arose in him, chastity would germinate in him in return. He controlled his temper and anger so...

^A much that he could be addressed in the words of the Prophet: *A deaf man who does not hear, and a mute who does not open his mouth* (Ps. XXXVII, 14). The fruits which he bore were charity and patience. In this way he overcame everyone, and so completely defeated the fantastical waves of his thoughts that the God-bearing John, marveling at his virtue in all things, would say to him: "My child, show some indulgence regarding your intense abstinence, because of the mountain’s extremely freezing cold and the violent blowing of the winds, lest you become too weak to perform your duties." For he was serving the holy man with necessities, and was carrying water from a great distance. For on the southern side of the mountain, where it is sloping and flat, is situated the cemetery of our holy Father Auxentius, which he himself had built while he was still alive and living on the mountain; and he had also established a monastery of holy women there, giving it the name Trichinaria, either because of the roughness and difficulty of access to the place, or because of the thorny, hard, and most rough clothing of the garments, which holy monastery is preserved to this day, and is made illustrious by the way of life and the prayers of the holy Fathers. From this difficult place, as has been said, the most blessed Stephen would carry water and all necessities during the time of summer and winter; and in this task he never flagged in spirit, nor did he abandon his customary rule: but rather, beginning each day with fervor, he was ready and unassailable by passions or demons. Following in the footsteps of his venerable teacher John, he never ceased to learn from him how to be diligent in the things of salvation.

^C For such a man was this wise John, that he would even call four-footed animals by name with a human voice, and they would bring him what was necessary and deliver his replies. And let what I am about to say seem incredible to no one, for you know, holy brothers, that if anyone preserves that "image and likeness" (Gen. I, 26), not only are ferocious beasts to be subjected to such a man, but the elements themselves as well; of which fact the witnesses are, in fire, the three youths; in water, Moses, Jesus, Elijah, and Elisha; in the midst of wild beasts, Daniel and Jonah. But why do I mention many examples? In a similar way, this divine Father John also kept a small dog on the mountain; and if it happened that the holy Stephen was not present on the hill, but was occupied in some ministry, and meanwhile some monks from the neighboring mountains came to him—(for there were many monasteries at that time in those very mountains, ^D which the impious and new Babylonian, in the manner of a tyrant, leveled to the ground)—the pious Father would call the little dog by name, and having written on a small tablet whatever was needed for the sake of the brothers who had arrived, he would tie it to the animal’s neck, and as those brothers listened, he himself would say—

^A “Go down to the monastery, and bring this tablet to the abbess, and return quickly.” Immediately, ^B the little dog carried out the order according to the Father's command, reaching the monastery and barking at the cell of the abbess to fulfill the task. For those who were in the monastery knew the animal’s ministry, and they would immediately bring it to the abbess and comply with what was written. And after the little dog did these things, it would go back up to the mountain. Truly, to speak with the prophet, *God is wondrous in his saints.*

^B At another time, having returned to the mountain from some ministry, the most honorable Stephen found the bearer-of-God, John, leaning his holy head against the small window of his cave, weeping bitterly. ^C When he entered and offered the customary prostration, he did not receive a blessing, because the Father was grieving not a little; lying beneath him, he pondered who that lament of the Father might be. But that gentle Father, having known the thoughts of the saint by divine revelation, raised him up and said to him: “My lament is for your sake, O most honorable son. For I have known that because of you this place will increase, and afterwards will be overturned by the heresy of the iconoclasts, which is already even now heating up.” ^D The venerable Stephen, groaning painfully from the heart, said: “Must I, too, Father, perish with their impiety, and not be saved?” The holy John says: “Not at all, my son; but look. For it is written: *He who perseveres to the end, he will be saved.*” And he foretold to him everything that was going to happen to him.

At that same time, the father of the venerable Stephen ended his life; for this reason, he traveled to the city and was present for his father’s funeral. And after his burial, together with his mother and one of his sisters (for the other had been tonsured in another convent in Byzantium), he sold everything they possessed in Constantinople. This being done, they left their homeland and betook themselves to the mountain. The venerable Stephen, after the holy elder John had bestowed his blessing upon his mother and sister at his urging and had taught them the word of truth, brought them down to the women’s monastery, and placing them among that holy convent, he himself became the spiritual father of his own carnal mother through the holy habit, and likewise of his sister. And after the completion of the ceremonies of the holy habit, he himself ascended to the mountain and returned to his former manner of life.

The bearer-of-God, John, having excelled in every sort of work acceptable to God, fell asleep in peace.

^A after he had departed this life auspiciously, having instructed Saint Stephen in many things, and having said to him at the last: "Attain salvation, my son, and observe the end of the danger which is coming upon you." Saint Stephen, of God-like mind, was not at all troubled by these words; but rather, being of good cheer, he gave the signal and thereby made the Father’s falling-asleep manifest. Then one could see a choir of ascetics from the surrounding mountains, hills, plains, and woods, like deer laboring with thirst, running toward the mountain of the bearer-of-God, Auxentius, to give the bearer-of-God, John, the final kiss and to perform his funeral rites. And thus his precious and holy body was laid to rest in the cemetery of the fathers; but his honorable soul was carried up by the angels of God to the heavens, to enjoy eternal joys.

And from glory to glory, and from saint to saint, it is fitting to pass. For the number of God’s servants does not fail. Since, when Moses had died, Joshua the son of Nun was present; and when Elijah was taken up, Elisha was immediately recognized as the heir of his mantle and his grace in double measure. In a similar way, when the bearer-of-God, John, departed from this life, the honorable Stephen was recognized as his heir in both his manner of life and his grace, and in double measure, and even more abundantly. For it was fitting that he, who had been the heir of his primary teaching, should also be nearly equal to the blessed Father in his pious works, which indeed he demonstrated. For just as a son [reproduces the manners] of his own parent, so did he express the footprints of his own master’s virtue. ^B He, therefore, the builder of the heavenly metropolis, the perfect number among the units, became the sixth in order to inhabit that divine and soul-saving cave; a new Jared, called the sixth from Adam, and recognized as a father like Enoch in a life pleasing to God. For he, too, is recognized as the sixth from the all-blessed Auxentius, who, having conceived the fear of God within himself like a son, according to the prophet, brought forth a testimony pleasing to God, as a new Enoch, the leader of a life pleasing to God. ^C But being affected by grief and sadness at the departure of his instructor, he meditated, like an excellent disciple, on completing the combat of his master. And just as those who are accustomed to crossing the seas and undertaking long journeys—since the nature of the waters has no fixed paths, and does not receive the prints of feet or the lines of carriages on account of its fluid and soft substance—attend to the position of the stars and run the course set before them, and by clearly inferring the path below from the courses above, travel without error a path nowhere worn; and just as those who ^D choose to dwell on the mainland, when they wish to visit one another, do not entrust themselves to unknown paths for fear of wandering or falling into the snares of brigands, but complete their journey along the public road with great security; in like manner our most blessed Father Stephen,

^A since he desired to cross the sea of a difficult life and hastened to journey to the city above, Jerusalem—regarding as stars guiding him from above the masters of a life pleasing to God, the five holy Fathers who lived in succession in the holy cave, from Auxentius down to John—and as he sought in his mind to trace out a royal and public path, the dwelling worn by their footsteps, and strove to enter upon it, he approached the narrow cell and shut himself up in the subterranean rock in the thirty-first year of his age, exchanging the fifth lot for the sixth, and matching, if one may say so, the number of the six stars with an equal splendor. And being trained in the love of silence, he remained there, possessing absolutely nothing of this world. For like a bee in some hive, this wondrous Stephen, having shut himself up in the cave of the mountain, diligently crafted the sweet and unplowed honey of virtue, offering it to God, the sovereign King of all. And having thus exercised his senses fearlessly, so that it became a habit to discern the good from the worse, he also learned the apostolic task of sewing and weaving nets, and the art of calligraphy, so as not to be a burden or a nuisance to anyone, but rather to give from his own labors to those in need. Having freed himself from all earthly anxiety, he had one care: how to please God ^B through prayers and fastings. Nor was he busy only with this; but as a most excellent farmer, taking care of every virtue, he cut out from the roots the thorns of the passions, casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, fulfilling that prophetic voice which says: Break up your fallow ground, and sow not upon thorns.

While this most blessed man was exercising himself in these things pleasing to God, he became known to all from that time forward. For it is true that a city set on a mountain cannot be hidden. And what resulted from his most excellent way of life? Many, inflamed with divine zeal for Christ, came running and begged to be allowed to dwell with him, and asked him to become the guide of their life according to God. And though it was with difficulty, they nevertheless persuaded him. For he was compelled by the necessity of becoming all things to all men, and teaching each one not to look only to his own interests, ^D but also to seek the things of his neighbor, that they might be saved; and from there, brethren to the number of twelve came to him, whom, being commanded as by the Gospel that "Him who comes to me I will not cast out," he received most gladly; like a skilled trainer of athletes, he anointed them for the contests of asceticism. And

^A he first received Marinus, a man of good and fair character; then John; and after him Zacharias, a man, to speak the truth, instructed in the spiritual way. Among them were also Christopher and the pair bitten in secret by Satan (I speak of Sergius and Stephen, those made slaves of the Tyrant from being God’s servants, of whom I shall relate later); and others to the number of six, whose names are written in the book of life. By these, the mountain was made like a city, and it received the form and holiness of a wonderful monastery. For with all the necessities, so to speak, abundantly prepared by the liberality of God and the prayers of the holy man—namely, a cemetery, and other necessary buildings and items of which there was need—a very religious monastery was established, distinguished by the name of the holy Auxentius. ^B This, indeed, the impious tyrant, being hostilely disposed toward the saint, having overthrown the monastery, named the "Hill of Auxentius," a name which is still spoken by his fellow-mystics to this day. When, therefore, the monastery was becomingly established, our holy Father Stephen holding the anchor of his discourse, and, from the God-built cave, illuminating the brotherhood, exhorted them, saying: "Little children, pay attention to yourselves and your souls; and having cast off the fear which arises from the soul-corrupting demons, or sloth, love God greatly. For not the difference of material, nor a perverse fear, but the greatness of affection commends our love for Him, which declares the magnificence of the soul even in the small gifts of your exercise. Similarly, having banished sadness and grief far away, approach God with a cheerful heart, constantly keeping in mind that song of the Prophet: ^C 'But for me, it is good to cleave to God, to put my hope in the Lord.' For hope, even if indicated by a dream, nourishes no less than the truth, driving away complete despair by expectation, and raising up the languor of the faculty with the hand of hope. But sadness and grief compel even those who strive to be wise in calamities toward blasphemy; yet the passion has forgiveness—acting tyrannically, and perhaps forcing the sufferer, vanquished by the magnitude of accidents, to speak many things contrary to his mind. Since, therefore, the kingdom of heaven is for the violent, according to the voice of the Lord, 'and the violent take it by force,' in the same way let us also, brothers, according to the great and divine preacher Paul, ^D being destitute, afflicted, tormented, naked, laboring while hungry and thirsty, wandering in deserts, and mountains, and dens, and caves of the earth, religiously pass through this brief sojourn of our wretched life, so that, having become heirs of that future life, we may say to the incorrupt Judge: 'Look upon my humility and my labor, and forgive all my sins.'" With these and many other exhortations, the most blessed Father Stephen did not cease to illuminate the sons whom he was bringing forth in Christ every day, promoting them toward the acquisition of salvation.

my labor, and forgive all my sins." With these and many other words of encouragement, our all-blessed Father Stephen, enlightening those whom he was bringing forth as children in the Lord, did not cease to exhort them daily, building them up toward the restoration of their salvation.

^A When the number of his disciples had reached twenty, he entrusted Marinus, a man protected by God, with the administration of all the affairs of the monastery. He himself, however, assumed a stricter manner of life, intending to enclose himself even more narrowly than the constraints of the cave allowed. For since the summit of the mountain terminates in an immense rock, having a hollow ravine toward the southern side, in which the monastery and the divinely-established cave are situated, sheltered and kept windless from the winter winds—specifically the North wind and the South-West wind [(4)]—because, as has been said, they are covered by the overarching rock, our all-blessed Father Stephen, having explored this summit, built upon it a cell very small in length, breadth, height, and depth, across from the cave; it was about one and a half cubits in width and about two in length. Toward the east, he fashioned a small niche for prayer, of such height that he could stand in it only by stooping, which remains to this day. But he wished all the rest of the space to be covered by the hand-made roof of heaven, leaving it open to the air, so as to have light. He made this place so narrow and fearsome that those who beheld it would say it was barely a monument for the burial of this wretched body, let alone a dwelling for the rest of a monk. And let no one take up the opinion of the complaining heretics, that he thought himself wiser than the Fathers who preceded him. For it is recorded in the God-pleasing life of the progenitor Auxentius that a cave [(5)] of his discipline exists on this very summit, where this new Elisha pitched a tabernacle more narrow than the sheepskin of the ancient Elijah, as if on Mount Carmel. In the same way, he wished to be made equal to the God-bearing Auxentius, and to surpass the ^B other Fathers who were in between, because he was of a younger age than they; for he was in his forty-second year when he moved to the summit of the mountain.

Since his disciples did not know the reason why such a structure had been made, at an obscure time, around the midnight hour, the Father called only Marinus, the man supported by God, and having revealed his purpose to him, as to a beloved son, he departed with him from the cave and entered that fearsome, tomb-like dwelling. In the morning, after the matins, ^C when all the brothers had made their customary prostration before the vestibule of the cave and were asking for the blessing of the holy Father, the gentle voice of the Father's prayer, which was usually heard every day, did not sound in their attentive ears. Troubled by this, they rose after a long time. ^D

and leapt into the cave, but the one they sought was not there. ^A And as they were divided in mind, thinking that they had lost their Father, and then reasoning among themselves, pressing their hands to their mouths, and pointing with their fingers, they said: "Could it be that the shepherd has somehow been separated from all his sheep?" Having inquisitively set out on the path leading to the downward slope of the mountain, they went away weeping, beating their breasts with their fists, as if they had lost the father. But the Father, perceiving their painful grief and the speed with which they were rushing downward, called them with a mild and gentle voice. And they, like fish hooked by bait at the dropping of the line, were instantly turned by his voice and ran back to him. Still carrying the traces of tears on their cheeks, they said to him with no small wailing and with short, panting breath: "Why have you surrendered yourself to these harsher and death-dealing dwellings, Father, so as to quickly make us orphans?" To them the venerable Father answered with that Gospel saying: "For, my children, narrow and hemmed in is the way that leads to life, and few are those who find it." ^B Having heard this word, the brothers were immediately silenced, asking only that he at least allow a roof to be placed upon the shelter of his cell; but he replied that it was enough to be covered by the vault of the clouds of heaven. And so he remained, exposed to heat in summer and cold in winter. ^C Furthermore, for clothing, he had his body encased in iron in the shape of a cross, with a belt of iron encircling his body from his shoulders to his loins, fastened with nails on both sides, and another iron belt worn under his armpits, in which were fixed the middle parts of the iron that descended from his shoulders. He wore only a leather tunic, as well as the holy cowl, the cross-bearing *analabos*, and the sacred *epomis* of the monastic habit. For resting, he had only a straw mat, after the pattern of the God-bearing John who had been his instructor.

In these illustrious practices, therefore, as the Father lived a blameless life, it could not be, as has been said before, that he—being a city founded upon a very great and religious mountain—should be hidden. ^D For this reason, he was revealed as a lighthouse renowned to all, especially to the orthodox and pious citizens who dwelt in the imperial city. And many used to visit him on the mountain for the sake of profit, returning home edified by merely seeing him, praising and glorifying God. Among them a certain woman of the religious

^A spirit and dignity, having become a widow, heard daily from everyone about the divine manner of life of our venerable Father Stephen. Forgetting the timidity of women, and having made repeated inquiries, she followed on foot the path up to this most holy shepherd and master; and when she had approached near his cell, she begged him to pray for her. And so, when the holy Father had finished his customary prayer, she rose and, with tears streaming, declared to the saint everything regarding herself—both her widowhood and her childlessness, and that, longing to attain the monastic life, she sought to be saved. The God-loving Father, after having catechized her at length with spiritual words and ordained what was necessary for her salvation, dismissed her, saying: "See, woman, to whom you have pledged yourself; do not let death seize you before you have fulfilled the promise." That honorable woman, having inscribed the word of the God-bearing Father upon her soul as if it were a seal pressed into wax, bore it uncorrupted. Upon reaching the harbor of Chalcedon, she sailed away to the city that had borne her; and, having sold all her possessions and property in Constantinople, and having distributed the majority to the poor—fearing the death of her soul, according to the word of the venerable Father—she hastened to fulfill her promise. And at last, having departed from her own town, she left behind, according to the Gospel, parents, acquaintances, friends, kinsmen, neighbors, and, taking up the cross of Christ, having crossed the Propontis ^B of the city, she came to the wondrous mountain, carrying gold to the saint, that it might be well distributed by him. When she had made her customary prostration before his cell and said, "Bless, holy Father," the saint answered her with severity, as the Savior plainly cries out through the Gospel: "Whoever does not renounce all that he possesses cannot be my disciple" (Luke xiv, 33). "Why, even now, do you carry around the remnants of the world after having renounced the world?" The woman, having become struck with astonishment at the Father's gift of discernment and his severe rebuke, answered him with the modesty becoming to women: "It is not because I am overcome by a destructive desire for it, honorable Father, that I offer this gold, but that it might be rightly distributed for my darkened soul through your holy hands." But the God-loving Father, not wishing to do this, said: "I cannot cover the sparks of other people's sins with my own hands as if with ashes, lest perhaps, through my negligence, one of them smoldering should kindle a great conflagration in my soul, as some have suffered on account of this. But it is for those who sow also to reap." And when the woman asked, "And what do you command me, Father?" that most compassionate man, ^C because of this, ^D and because of her dignity, having become a widow, hearing daily from all the divine manner of the venerable Father Stephen, and forgetting the timidity of women, through repeated inquiries, followed the path to this most holy shepherd and teacher; and when she had arrived near the cell of the holy man, she begged to obtain his prayers. And when the Father had performed his customary prayer, she rose 437 and, shedding tears, declared to the holy man all that concerned her, and her widowhood and childlessness, and that longing to attain the solitary life, she sought to be saved. And the God-loving Father, having catechized her with many spiritual words and having set in order the things necessary for salvation, dismissed her, saying: "See, woman, to whom you have pledged yourself, lest death seize you before you have fulfilled the promise." Honorata, truly that woman, with the words of the God-bearing Father inscribed upon her soul, just as though pressing an image into wax, bore them uncorrupted, and having sought the Chalcedonian naval station, she sailed to her homeland. Then, having sold all her goods, and whatever she possessed in Constantinople, and having for the most part distributed them to the poor, fearing the death of the soul, in accordance with the word of the venerable Father, she hastened to fulfill her promise. Finally, having left behind, according to the Gospel, parents, acquaintances, friends, kinsmen, and neighbors, she departed from her own city; and taking up the cross of Christ, having crossed the Propontis, she betook herself to that famous mountain with the money which she carried to the holy man, that he might distribute it well. But when, with the customary inclination, she had stepped before the cell and said: "Bless, holy Father," the holy man himself harshly responded: "Since the Savior clearly cries out through the Gospel: *Whoever does not renounce all that he possesses cannot be my disciple*, why do you still carry around the remnants of the world after the world?" But the woman, whom the Father's gift of discernment and harsh rebuke had rendered astonished, responded to him with the modesty fitting for women: "I do not offer this gold, honorable Father, overcome by a ruinous desire, but that it might be rightly distributed for my darkened soul through your holy hands." But when he rejected it, the Father said: "I cannot hide the sparks of the sins of others with my hands as if with ashes, lest by chance, through my negligence, some (spark) being singed might bring a great fire upon my soul, which some have suffered for the sake of this matter. Moreover, it is for those who sow to reap." But when the woman asked, "What do you command me to do, Father?" that humanest of men did not at all give her permission to return to her homeland, since, as was said above, she had utterly dismissed her own goods: but he commanded that, together with Marinus, who was protected by God, she should with her own hands distribute the gold in the neighboring and nearby places: and when in this way she had stripped herself of the filth of the dung of this life, he gave her the holy habit, changing her name to that of Anna 439

^A. And he becomes her Father and sponsor in the Lord. And immediately he sends her away to the lower monastery, having entrusted her to the holy and venerable mother who presided over the monastery, having exhorted that honorable personage very much to assist her in the things pertaining to the salvation of her soul.

^B Now truly the time invites me to bring into the open the athletic labors of this man. However, although my conscience urges me, I endeavor to impose silence upon myself, inasmuch as I am not sufficient to pursue the gravity of the matter, being as I am poor in speech and action. For the majesty of things is accustomed to be imperiled in words. Since, according to their infirmity or strength, those who are accustomed to judge of things are those who do not wish to attend to the truth, but to the elegance of words, as the profane do with fables. Nevertheless, I have restrained myself, and I have yielded to those who incited me to this work, hoping by the aid of this divine martyr, and by the prayers of those who urged me to this, that I might obtain an easy course. Let it be permitted to me, therefore, against the heresy of the New-innovators calumniating Christians ^C and the Iconoclasts, to adduce that Davidic song: *Often have they warred against me from my youth*, the Prophet says somewhere, predicting the seditions that would always be against the Church, the invincible strength of which in battles he foretells, and again adds: *Let Israel now say: Often have they warred against me from my youth, and yet they have not prevailed against me*. These things, however, can in no way apply to the carnal Israel, whom the Egyptians reduced to servitude, the foreigners conquered many times, the Babylonians took into servitude and captivity, the Macedonians cruelly and bitterly destroyed, and the Romans finally delivered to total destruction—rendering them wanderers, fugitives, and exiles throughout the world, making their dwelling a desert, and, according to the prophet, ^D always bowing down their backs. But the Israel newly chosen by God, who truly sees God and with open face contemplates the glory of the Lord—that new, I say, people, the flock purchased by the blood of Christ, whose figure is Jacob, who having his name changed was called Israel, who repelled the older as reprobate, and received the firstborn rights and the ancestral blessing—he, I say, rightly and justly might have said: *Often have they warred against me from my youth, and yet they have not prevailed against me*. For immediately from his earliest age, innumerable throngs of enemies rose up against him: they did not, however, prevail. Indeed, they revealed his invincible powers and exposed their own infirmity. First, indeed, the Jews waged war against the flock of our Savior, but they—

were defeated by their own weapon; for the Good Shepherd, using the cross which they had planted, as it were a club, drove them away in a shepherdly fashion, just as wolves from the sheep. After these came the worshippers of idols, who were confounded by the defenders of the truth; and after them, Simon and his disciples Menander and Cerdonas; then Marcion and Valentinus; and again, originating from them, Cerinthus, Saturninus, Basilides and Carpocrates, Marcus and Tatianus, Montanus and Bardisanes, Artemon and Navatus, Sabellius and Nepon, Paul and Manichaeus, Photinus and Marcellus, and those who came from them: Arius, Aetius, Eunomius, Macedonius, Maximus, Nestorius, and that multi-headed hydra Eutyches and Dioscorus; Zosimus, Apollinarius, Origen, Peter the wretched, Theodosius, Jacobus, Julianus, Zeno, Sergius, Pyrrhus, Cyrus, Macarius, Honorius, and the impious Mahomet; and if any other has escaped my notice, as is human. For the day would fail me if I were to enumerate the names of the defenders and authors of impiety, whose very memory time has rightly blotted out. All these, therefore, with one mind, so to speak, having waged war against the apostolic preachings, were deservedly rejected from the memory of God and from the Church. The Church herself, however, although always harassed by arms, maintained her peaceful state with even greater victories. ^B

For this reason, the devil, the father of wickedness and the inventor of evil, who never ceases to wage war at every moment against man created in the image of God, seeing that the Lord's flock was easily superior to its open enemies, that I might return to what has already been written, decided to kindle the flame of war from within. And having found an instrument worthy of his own work, a man who, having derived both his origin and his character from Syria, was believed to perform many prodigies by magical incantations and was able to deceive those men who are accustomed to admire such things. This beast, then, namesake of the lion, first, as has been written before, he set aflame against the mental adoration of holy images. Although he had indeed been declared a manifest heretic by Germanus, the champion of the truth, as has been stated before, not even so did the common enemy of mankind cease from the things he had undertaken. But, that man having been removed from the midst and having become fodder for the undying worm and the eternal fire, he raised up in his place that impure offspring of his (I mean Constantine), as if one said, out of Achaz, Achab, and out of Archelaus a worse Herod, that slave of adultery and murderer of the Forerunner. This tree, therefore, of that evil root, sprouting worse fruits, with poisonous matters of every kind heaped up in his soul, [all the holy images...]

^A destroys, he subverts, he burns. When the observers of the monastic religion opposed him, he declared war upon them.

The monk's habit called the habit of darkness by one in darkness

From this impure pair, therefore, bound together as an impious chain, edicts were sent through all the provinces that the prefects of the regions, together with the bishops, should repair to the imperial city to celebrate a synod against the holy and venerable images. Then, throughout every place and city, it was possible for the pious to see grief upon grief and woe upon woe; but among the impious, sacred things were trampled, vessels were transformed, churches were dug up, and with ash...

^A they were besmeared, because they contained sacred icons. And wherever there were venerable icons of Christ, or of the Theotokos, or of the saints, they were given over to fire, or to being dug out, or to being whitewashed. But if there were trees, or birds, or brute animals, and most especially Satanic equestrians, hunts, theaters, and chariot-races painted, these were held in honor and made to shine. Truly, it was then possible to say: Woe is me, for the holy has perished from the earth, and there is none upright among men. For with an axe and a chisel they shattered the doors of the Church of God, and burned His sanctuary with fire.

An icon is called a "door," which opens our mind, created according to the image of God, to the interior likeness of the prototype. For just as certain doors, bearing keys and seals, make known the interior things through the security of the seals to those outside, so also the iconic representation, showing forth ^B the outlines as seals and the expressions as keys, hints at intelligible things through material ones. And we do not worship the matter, adoring it—far be it!—but through things that stir up the senses we mentally reach toward the causes themselves; in which manner we also conduct ourselves regarding the Cross, the holy scepter, the relics of saints, and everything that is adored in the Church, fulfilling in this the royal voice of the heaven-manifesting Basil: that the honor of the image passes to the prototype. But let us return to the matter at hand.

^C In these painful circumstances, the Church of Christ being rent asunder, the elite of the monks who held fast to piety, from the regions of Europe, and from Byzantium, and from Thynia and the province of Bithynia, and those dwelling in the caves and mountains toward the regions of Prusias, all together set out for the mountain of the God-bearing Auxentius, and fled to the all-blessed Stephen as to a guide and salutary watchman, beseeching him to become a counselor of salvation. They found him ^D overwhelmed by despondency and tears because of the heresy of the innovators, and they say to him: "Speak, Father, what is fitting; for our mind is weary, and we are submerged in perplexity, lest human fear should betray the piety of the soul. For it is the property of the soul to fear death."

The all-blessed Father, observing the crowd and the herd of Fathers, and having greeted that angelic hoary head, said: "O venerable fathers and brothers, nothing is stronger than a mind that professes piety, and nothing is more powerful than a soul that refuses to serve wickedness; and I am persuaded that your paternity has been secured from both these sides. Therefore, you should rather aid me with counsel and prayers. For my eyes have failed with tears over the contrition of the daughter of my people, as I am compelled to cry out with Jeremiah, who 448 wrote and acted in this way. I see

^A indeed, and bitterly besieged, the bride of the Lord by the wicked, murderous, and war-loving demon, who worked together to bring about these events upon the Church of God in relation to His image in human form; he who, right from the creation, immediately attacked our nature, inasmuch as he envied us our dwelling in Paradise and became the cause for us of rejecting the divine law. And now again, he attempts to corrupt the venerable body of the Church, stirs up dissensions among the members against one another, and has roused an implacable and undeclared war against them. For he has divided even feet against feet, hands, and eyes, by means of the faction that has stirred up the mob. And it is possible to see one of the eyes struggling to lead toward a precipice, while the other pulls in the opposite direction and indicates the straight path; and of the feet, one follows the eye that is looking at what is crooked, while the other fights against this, bravely resisting the one who leads badly and not turning away from the right path. Such a battle among the members of the Church does that enemy, the sower of tares, kindle; and he rejoices and dances, seeing his own artifice prevailing in this tyrant emperor. He is insolently delighted by our calamities, gathering material from all sides for the flame of this war; and having excited his own forces at the same time (I mean the companies of Gentiles, Jews, Syrians, and heretics), he surrounds us on every side with a vast theater, and procures for himself pleasure and delight from our evils. ^B Hence, one may see those who sit in the gates speaking against us, and those who drink wine singing about us. For in their banquets and taverns, in the manner of pimps and harpists, by the command of the lion’s whelp, they plot against us, divining with mockery. Therefore, the glorious sons of Zion, those lifted above gold, have been reckoned as earthen vessels, the work of the hands of potters. We have become a laughingstock to all the people, their song all the day. For in his wrath the Lord has covered the daughter of Sion with darkness, and has cast down from heaven to earth the glory of Israel, and has not remembered the footstool of his feet in the day of his wrath. For Jerusalem has sinned; therefore she has become a shaking. Therefore my eyes draw down water, because the one who comforted me has been removed far from me. And I cry out to the One who strikes and heals: Have mercy on us, O Lord, have mercy ^C on us, for we have been filled to a great degree with contempt; our soul has been filled to the excess. Remove the reproach, and give it to the enemies who now prosper, and the contempt to the proud calumniators of the Christians. ^D For they have heaped reproaches upon the flock signed with your name, calling us idolaters, and saying that your Church is a temple of idols. Truly, renew us as the morning dawn. May your faith be spread in the morning hours, for our groanings are many, and our heart has failed.

for you have broken down our hedge, and all who pass by the way pluck us. The boar from the forest has laid us waste. This lion’s cub, this young beast, has devoured us like a wild creature. O Lord, God of hosts, turn and visit this vine, and perfect it which your right hand has planted, and over the Son of man whom you have strengthened for yourself. But as I wept, and lamented, and groaned because of the fog lying over the shepherds and the flock, by which safety was afforded both to wolves and to thieves; and as I besought my God to dissolve the darkness and restore the former ray of orthodoxy and the mental adoration of the holy and venerable icons, I forgot my promise and prolonged my mourning. But now at last I have barely remembered, having found in prayer the Son of man whom you have strengthened for yourself. And you have accomplished our salvation through him, O Creator of all things, whose divine image of the flesh these whisperers have consigned to flames and destruction. But may the Lord consume them with fire, and may their memory perish from the earth with all who trust in them, for he is a God of vengeance, and he will not pass over the destruction of his Church in silence.

^C Having spoken these things to that holy assembly of monks, our thrice-blessed Father Stephen, while they all wept and beat their breasts, sighed from the depths and said: “Since there are three parts remaining to us of those who have not shared in this loathsome heresy, I advise you to flee to them. For there is no other place remaining that is under the power of the dragon which has not obeyed his empty babbling.” And when they asked, “What are these parts, Father?” he immediately continued: “Those toward the uphill side of the Euxine Sea, situated upon the province of Zechia, from Bosporus, Cherson, Nicopsis, and those reaching toward the Gothic Hollow; then also those situated toward the Parthenic Sea, in which is sailed the southern gulf, as toward the slope of the elder Rome, both the metropolis of the Nicopolitans, and Neapolis, and the regions extending to the River Tiber of Rome, and sometimes those descending from the province of the Lycians, from Sileum and Syce, and those sailed along the Propontis itself, and the island of Cyprus, and those across from it, as far as Tripoli, Tyre, and Joppa. But what need is there to speak of the prelates of Rome, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria, who not only detested and anathematized the loathsome dogma of the Iconoclasts, but also never ceased to inveigh against the impious emperor and his supporter in scathing letters?”

^A Among these, the most honorable and wise John Damascene, the presbyter (whom this tyrant called Mansur, but whom we call holy and God-bearing), did not cease to write to him and call him a caviler, a Mahomet, an Iconoclast, and an enemy of the saints; and he called the bishops subject to him "darkened," "slaves of the belly," and "gluttons." In particular, he called the lovers of the circus and spectacles—Pastilas, Tricacabus, Nicolaitas, and that friend of demons, Atzypius—new Oreb, Zeb, Zebee, Salmana, and Dathan; and the people subject to them, he called the "congregation of Abiron."

After these things had been spoken in this way by the most blessed Stephen, along with many other things useful for the soul, the Fathers offered up mournful prayers and, after bidding the holy man a final farewell, they departed for the safest places for their flight, not out of fear of martyrdom, but fearing the treachery of the tyrant and the fact that they themselves had not yet been tested. For that which has not been tested is not proven, but that which has been explored by the facts themselves is more proven, like gold that has tested the furnace. ^B Then one could see Byzantium stripped and, as it were, led into captivity, [lacking] the monastic order and the Nazaritic habit. One was sailing the Euxine Sea, another was seizing Cyprus, another was contemplating departing for Rome; and thus, having left their own monasteries, they became known as strangers and sojourners.

Meanwhile, the tyrant overturned the august temple of the undefiled Theotokos at Blachernae, which indeed had previously been adorned with murals, where the descent of God to us was expressed in paintings, as well as His various miracles and deeds, up to His Assumption and the coming of the Holy Spirit; and in this way, having removed all the mysteries of Christ, he turned the Church into a fruit-watcher’s hut and an aviary. ^C For by adorning it with trees, various birds and beasts, and other [creatures] among ivy leaves, along with circles of cranes, crows, and peacocks, he truly rendered it unadorned. And if any of those of the same opinion as him suspect that I am bringing a calumny against him, let them go to that very temple, and being then persuaded that these things are true, let them say with the sacred singer David: *O God, the nations have come into your inheritance; they have defiled your holy temple; they have set your mystical Jerusalem, your Church, as a fruit-watcher’s hut; [they have cast] the flesh of your holy martyrs and the venerable relics of your monks to the beasts of the earth, to the fire, and to the depth of the sea.* ^D In this very most sacred temple, therefore, that wicked man presided, together with the one who bore the same name as the traitor to Christ’s flock, and with the other bishops, those slaves of the belly subject to him, and celebrated an abominable and God-hated synod, in which...

they called the ^A venerable icons idolatrous images. My bones tremble, and the kidneys of my heart feel, as Eliphas says, to whom there was an intelligent and faithful audience, when I even call to mind the things that were done at that time. Subsequently, those who were alienated from God anathematized Germanus, the divine and orthodox president of the Church, and called him a wood-worshipper. O the blindness of the enemy! O the blasphemy! O the perversion! How, my Christ, can I conceive of thy limitless long-suffering at that time? For after they had uttered very many blasphemies, and had raged against the saints and the immaculate Theotokos—as if, after death, she were unable to bring help—lastly, and primarily, and worst of all, those vile and unholy men, those lawless Babylonians who destroyed Christ's vineyard, concerning whom it is written: "Iniquity has gone out from the priests of Babylon," and "many shepherds have destroyed my vineyard and trampled upon my portion" (Jerem. XII, 10); who wandered, according to the proverb, outside the axles of their own field, and gathered barrenness ^B with their hands; who did not distinguish between the holy and the profane, but brought grief and woe into the very altar; these men, I say, rising up from the place where they were sitting, together with all the people, and raising their hands to the heights, shrieked that miserable cry and said: "Today there is salvation for the world, because you, O Emperor, have redeemed us from idols." O painful voice, which, when it was sent forth, darkened heaven, shook the earth, polluted the air, and made all who sent it forth aliens to God! For if that prince of impiety is the same as the author of the overthrow of the idols, then in vain did Christ become man, and vain is the teaching of the apostles. And if, as you maintain, he is the redeemer who has set you free from the worship of created things and the curse of idols (whom you also call the thirteenth apostle), and not Christ, according to the voice of the divine herald Paul; then you are not baptized into the Trinity, but—to say something ridiculous against your arrogant stupidity—into Pastilas, Tricacabus, and Cabalus, his teachers and yours, whose memory, dogma, and names the most radiant and august Trinity has utterly erased from Her Church. But leaving aside these futilities, it is time that we move on. Let us return, therefore, to our propose ^C point, and let us speak of the most blessed Stephen.

When these things had been thus accomplished, and everyone had subscribed with their hand and confessed with their mouth, the tyrant, to whom the fame of this our holy Father Stephen had reached, summoned one of his own preeminent grandees, a man most eloquent and apt for speaking and listening, Callistus by name, honored with the rank of patrician, and thoroughly instructed in this same heresy, to whom...

^A he gave these commands: "Go to the hill of Auxentius, and there persuade Stephen, who is lurking in the company of the wicked, to subscribe to the synod." Furthermore, use these words: "Our pious and orthodox emperors Constantine and Leo, moved by the greatest benevolence toward your piety, command you to subscribe to the definition of our orthodox synod." Offer him also palm dates and dried figs, or other things that are accustomed to be food for an ascetic. For the tyrant himself knew well his strict manner of life, which was very close to God. ^B Therefore, he went quickly to the mountain; and when he had reached the summit of the hill, he brought the emperor’s command by word of mouth to the holy Father, and that most wicked man urged him to subscribe to the emperors' definition and to assent to it. But the venerable Stephen, not inferior to his predecessor, as if always seeing God at his right hand, and being agitated by no heretical suspicion, replied to the patrician: "Attend, lord patrician. Since the definition of this false synod contains a heretical opinion, I, Stephen, neither subscribe, nor do I call bitter sweet, lest I draw upon myself the woe of the prophet. Moreover, I am most willingly about to undergo death for the adoration of the holy icons, and I have no regard for the heresiarch emperor who dares to reject them." Then, showing the palm of his hand hollowed out by pressing his fingers together in order, he said: "Even if I had but a little vital blood, let it be poured out for the image of Christ. ^C But return the foods which he sent. For let not the oil of the sinner anoint my head, nor let the throat of a heretic make my food sweet." Having heard these things, that prefect returned to the emperor's palace, and made known everything to the one by whom he had been sent. Then he, suddenly roaring in anger like a lion, and having emitted a great cry from his irascible soul, without delay ordered the arch-satraps and the robust soldiers to go to the mountain with the patrician Callistus, whom he had sent earlier, and to carry off the saint ferociously from his cell and guard him in the lower monastery, until he himself should deliberate about him. So they, having set out to the mountain, when they reached the monastery, like ^D rushing wild beasts, kicked at the thresholds. Afterward, having entered the holy cave in a truculent manner, they brought out the saint, and dragged him outside as if from some spiritual bridal chamber. For since, because of his extreme abstinence and very cramped dwelling, his shins were adhered to his thighs, he was unable to stand or walk. But those armed men, having perceived the admirable excellence of the Father, used much mercy toward him because of the stupendous things which they were beholding with their own eyes. Accordingly, two of them, joining together and placing the saint’s hands upon their shoulders, and supporting his knees with their own hands in this manner, arrived at the Cemetery of Saint Auxentius, where, being with the holy man and God...

-strengthened assembly of monks that followed him, they remained seated before the doors, awaiting the emperor’s decision. ^A But the thrice-blessed man, even while inside with his own assembly, did not cease, but sang clearly with them: "We worship thy spotless image, O Good One," and the rest; and after that, the "Glory": "Having fallen among the thieves of my thoughts, I am despoiled, wretch that I am, in my mind," and the rest of the hymn. The guards who were before the doors, hearing this being sung by them, shook their heads and lamented to one another, saying: "Woe to us, for by men who are monks—who are harmed and suffer unjustly—we are rightly called thieves." Six days passed, and those enclosed around the holy man remained without food. On the seventh day, another official came from the tyrant emperor to restore the holy man to his own monastery, as war against the Scythians was imminent.

^B That most wicked man, Callistus by name—well-named though it means "the best"—took aside one of the holy man’s disciples, and having given him gold and promised to give him more, persuaded that wretched man to become a second Judas and to arm himself against his master. Sergius was the name of this disciple. That army, having requested a prayer from the holy man, set out for the royal city, and together with the emperor campaigned in Europe against the Scythians. ^C But that son of iniquity, Sergius, the second Iscariot and heir to the noose, having completely put on Satan through that deceitful gold, from that time forth did not cease to lie in wait and scheme secretly against the venerable Father. But when he saw that he could not achieve what he desired, he separated himself from that holy fold and fled to the tax-collector of the Gulf of Nicomedia, Aulicalamus by name, and took him as a companion and partner in his own perdition. ^D And having written some false slanders against the holy Stephen in a document, they included the following: That first and foremost, as if of a heretic, he anathematizes your memory; he calls you a Syrian and a Vitalis; he is digging pits against you while sitting on the mountain; and many other things slandering him, which it is not worthy to remember or commit to writing. And they added: "He himself seduced a certain noble woman and tonsured her, and keeps her in the lower monastery, and by night she goes up to him on the hill for the sake of lustful and shameful intercourse." This, my most faithful listeners, is the very one I mentioned previously, who, having rightly distributed all her own goods, became a spiritual daughter of holy Stephen through the holy habit.

^A They seduced her maid, having promised her freedom and marriage with someone from the palace. Thus they taught her to speak against the holy man and her mistress whatever they desired. Having therefore composed such a malicious, falsely titled document, that pair of the devil sent it by a swift courier into Scythia to the emperor, who, having read it and wrongly condemned her, as if having seized a convenient opportunity, without delay sent post-horses ^B to Anthemios, who was adorned with the rank of patrician and was acting in his place in the city, to whom he sent these commands by letter: "Since we have often been made certain by the facts themselves that you are well-disposed and grateful toward our commands, we have therefore entrusted the dignity of our person to you. ^C For you keep your eyes sleepless like the stars for the sake of our tranquility; and deservedly so, as a faithful friend and grateful servant. Hence, since we consider you suitable for us on both counts, we command you to go as quickly as possible to the monastery which is situated at the foot of Mount Auxentius, where harlot-women, pretending to be pious, inhabit the order of the unmentionable. Take one of them by name Anna, and send her to us by these post-horses, and have her arrive in the camp as soon as possible. Farewell." ^D That servant, more wicked than his wicked emperor, with the reading of the letters not even fully completed, immediately betook himself to the monastery with a multitude of soldiers after the manner of barbarians.

At that time, when he arrived, those holy women were performing the office of the third hour to God. Those men, however, rushing in like lascivious horses, terrified the virgins of Christ, unsheathing their swords after the manner of robbers and brandishing them with a glint through the air. Therefore, immediately after the tumult was raised and the divine praises interrupted, it was possible to see those women of God lamenting. ^A One fled inside the holy chancel to the altar; another, tearing the holy veil, hid herself beneath the holy table; another, flying toward the mountain, quickly escaped the hands of the impious. But the venerable old woman, the prefect of the monastery (for she was resting in her cell), upon learning of this wicked irruption, went to meet them with an intrepid soul and said: "O Christians, if you have any hope in God, why are you pursuing the customs of the impious barbarians who celebrate their triumphs?" ^B Consternated by the boldness of that holy woman, and having learned that she was the prefect, they laid aside their ferocity and placidly answered: "Hand over to us Anna, the beloved of Stephen; for the emperor has need of her at the camp." Then she called Anna by name, and another with her called Theophano, to whom she said: "Proceed to the emperor, honorable daughters, and prudently satisfy his questionings, lest you be plundered by chance. Go in peace, go, [may] with you..." ^{C D}

Those honorable women, having taken up their cloaks, having made the customary obeisance, and having received a commendation [(12)] from that honorable superior, departed from the monastery and were dragged away to the emperor in the camp. O obedient disposition of subordinates, and O most pure prayer of a faithful mother!

And when they had been led into the camp and the facts about them had been made known to the emperor, he ordered them to be separated from one another. And having summoned the spiritual daughter of the holy Stephen who was being sought, he said to her: "I am convinced that the things said about you to us are true. For I know the frailty of the female mind. Tell me, therefore, how did this deceiver persuade you to abandon the splendor of your parents and to adopt this gloomy habit? Or, as I have heard, was it surely because he wished to fornicate with you? What then was the beauty of that man that deceived you?" ^B That honorable woman, having heard these shameful words, like a true second chaste Susanna, having forgotten female weakness, prudently and steadfastly answered him: "Emperor, my body is laid out before you; punish, slaughter, do whatever you wish and desire to me. For you will hear nothing from Anna except that which is true. For I do not know the man as you say; but as I know him, I will declare him to you: I know him to be holy and righteous, and a teacher profitable to souls, and the guide of my salvation." The tyrant, having become struck dumb at the woman's boldness, biting the fingertips of one hand and waving the other hand through the air, hissing, and sitting with a clouded brow, remained speechless. For this was a common manner of that ^C impure emperor. Then he ordered her to be kept in custody, and the sister who was with her to be sent back to her own monastery, even though she was unwilling. When she arrived there, she made known all that had been done to the holy superior and the sisters. Moreover, she also entreated the holy and divine Father himself, our Stephen, to pray, especially since her struggle was for his sake.

The emperor, having moved the camp and returned to the imperial city, ordered the spiritual daughter of the holy man to be kept in the most obscure prison of the Phiale [(13)], bound in shackles, intending to conduct his interrogation of her on the following day. Wherefore, through a certain eunuch, whom the order calls a cubiculary, at the evening hour he sends her this message: "Spare yourself, woman, and this dark-

-^Aened garment, and tomorrow speak the truth regarding Stephen before all the people. For behold, your own maidservant convicts you of the truth. But if you are unwilling to do this, and persist in your stony-hearted disobedience, deluding yourself, I shall have your flesh torn to pieces before your very eyes; but if, on the other hand, you show me what I desire, and confess his adulteries and fornications, you shall be deemed worthy of many honors and gifts from me." The venerable woman, having heard these things, and heaving a deep groan from the bottom of her heart, and shaking her head, said to him: "Depart from me, man, depart; let the will of the Lord be done."

The emperor, in the morning, having gathered a multitude of people before the city's Phiale, or Fountain, thinking to bend her will, commanded that she be made to stand naked in the sight of all. And having cast a bundle of ox-tendons before her eyes, he said: "I shall exhaust all these upon your back and belly, unless you bring to light the vile fornications Stephen committed with you." Since the venerable woman answered nothing, the tyrant, raging with anger, called her a harlot and ordered her to be scourged. Forthwith, eight robust men seized her by both hands, and stretching her in the air in the shape of a cross, one struck her belly and another her back with all their might, while she said nothing other than: "I do not know the man, as you say," and, "Lord, have mercy." The tyrant also placed her deceitful servant before her face, to convict her in the presence of all, just as he himself had instructed her; and she, swearing [falsely], accused her mistress, raising her hands against her and bespattering the face of her lady with spittle. ^B Finally, even the fellow-initiates of the impiety kept clamoring in her ears, that she might say what the emperor most desired, and thus live; but she gave the same answer as before. When the tyrant saw that she had already fallen speechless from the cruel scourging, and thinking her to be dead, he withdrew, suffused with shame, to the palace, having ordered that she be cast into one of the monasteries of Byzantium without any care being administered to her. He himself, meanwhile, did not cease meditating on how he might utterly destroy the holy man.

For this reason, on the following day he summoned one of his youths in the flower of his age (whom he affirmed with an oath that he loved most of all), George by name, known as the Syncletus, and said to him privately (as he himself confessed at the time of his death to those from whom I received this account): "How great, George, is your love toward me?" And he said: "It is infinite, master, and greater than any estimation." The emperor said to him again: "And are you readily prepared to suffer death for love of me?" But he, inclining his head to the ground and crossing his hands over his breast, swore with all eagerness that he would die for his sake. ^C Then the emperor, embracing him, said: "Behold, a new Isaac"; and

he says to him: "I do not ask you to die for my sake, nor even that one member of your body be removed. This one thing I entreat of you, as a father: that you make your way to the hill of Auxentius ^A and persuade the one who lurks there unnoticed to admit you into their number and fellowship; and if you should succeed in this, return to us as quickly as possible." That son and minister of iniquity, having gladly received these instructions and being schooled in manifold schemes of craftiness, hastened to the food of the dragon. Accordingly, he ascended the mountain, where, having hidden himself in a woody place of wild thickets, he emerged from these ambushes about the midnight hour, reached the monastery, and, standing at the doors, uttered such mournful cries as these: "Have pity on me, O Christians who inhabit this place, that I may not become prey for wild beasts or be cast down a precipice. For I have wandered from the road," and other such supplicatory and lamentable words which he poured forth diabolically. ^B This tearful and mournful voice having been heard, our most blessed Father Stephen called the aforementioned divinely protected Marinus and ordered him to bring the mourner in to him. And when he had entered, and had prostrated himself to the ground, and said, "Bless, Father," the saint blessed him and bade him rise. But upon observing him by his garments and his countenance, and indeed by his beard—for it had been shorn down to the skin of his face, in accordance with the command of that very tyrant. For although God had commanded Moses to tell the people: "You shall not trim the hair of your beards, nor shall you round off your hair" (Lev. xix. 27), he, opposing God's command and Moses, this new Jebusite and Amalekite, decreed the contrary, namely, that everyone—old men and hoary, seniors and juniors—should shave the beard down to the skin of the face, so that they might always be flourishing and vigorous, like lascivious horses. Furthermore, even today some among us—though they are not of us, since they only enter our sheepfold in habit, not in morals—who have advanced to the age of seventy, tend their beards in this same way; may the Lord correct them and deliver them from the memory and faith of that tyrant, and confirm them in the truth, before they suffer both bodily and spiritual death. But I must return to the point from which I have digressed a little. Thus, our most blessed Father Stephen, pressed by necessity, seeing George in such a state, ^C said: "Are you not, brother, truly from the emperor's palace?" To whom he replied, "Yes, Father. But because of the impiety of the ungodly reigning emperor, we all follow the Jewish rites, and we have turned aside toward the peril of our souls. But I, having with difficulty at last emerged from such most evil customs, behold, by God's guidance I have come to these places. Do not, therefore, O venerable Father, drive me away from your salutary assembly; but I beseech you, let me obtain the angelic habit." To whom the venerable Stephen said: "I cannot, ^D I say, due to the impending danger from the tyrant: lest by chance, having become certain of this matter, he should destroy your soul...

^A from salvation and entangle you in his ancient snares." But he, falling down again, implored him, saying: "You shall render an account for me to God if you delay in tonsuring me." The saint replied to him again: "If it were indeed free from danger, I would fulfill the evangelical word: *Him that cometh to me I will not cast out* (John VI, 37). But since, as you say, you approach with your whole heart, I shall fulfill this. Only take heed that temptation does not overtake you." Having said these things, he stripped him of his worldly garment and clothed him in the habit of obedience; and in this way he spent three days.

Interim ^B the tyrant, having collected the populace in the theater of the hippodrome, at the steps which are called those of the Red faction, standing himself in the upper part, burst forth into these words: "I have no part of life with the hateful troop that is abhorred by God." And when the people wailed and clamored tumultuously: "Not even a trace of their habit appears in your city, master," he himself cried out in a rage: "I can no longer endure their snares. For they have led away all my subjects and surrendered them to darkness, and not content with these things, behold, they have even snatched away from my side George, who was most dear to my soul, the Syncletus, and have made him an abbot or monk. O the violence of their snares! But let us cast our anxiety upon the Lord: and he will quickly reveal him. Let us only offer prayers." Then all said: "Truly your heart is in the hand of God; and the Lord will surely hear you as you pray."

After ^C three days had passed, the venerable Stephen, having exhorted George—who was gifted with perverse cunning—with many words, tonsured him and clothed him in the holy habit. But that minister of iniquity, keeping nothing of those things which are of God (for, as it is written, *Wisdom will not enter into a malevolent soul* (Sap. I, 4)), after three other days had left the mountain and fled to the emperor's court; whom the emperor received most affectionately, inasmuch as he had brought to effect the fraud which he himself had devised; and he kissed him, not for the sake of the habit, but for the sake of the transgression, and as an excuse found to inflict death upon the saint. Therefore, having seized an opportune ^D moment, in the morning he commanded the whole age—old men, the elderly, youths, adolescents, newborn infants, men and women alike—to assemble in silence in the theater of the hippodrome: all

having gathered, so to speak, and an uncountable multitude having piled up, so that they were suffocating one another, the tyrant, standing once again on the same steps, shouted out these words: "Fortune has favored me, and God has heeded my prayers." As the people cried out, "And when, indeed, has God ever refused to listen to you?" he, elated with joy and bursting into great laughter, said: "The Lord has revealed to me the man I was seeking, and if you wish, I will show him to you." As the multitude roared with a great clamor, "Punish him, slay him, burn him with fire as a transgressor of your command!" the emperor brought him forward for the sight of all. When that infinite multitude saw him wearing the monastic habit, they broke out into that piteous cry, just as the Jews once had: "Away with him, away with him, crucify the Son of God!"—so too did these: "It is fitting for evil men to see evil things; let him be slain, let him be slain." ^B Then, by order of the tyrant, they stripped him of his sacred epomis, and tossed it to the people, and it was trampled underfoot, as was his sacred cowl. When they likewise dragged out the wooden cross-shaped symbol to be tossed aside, the emperor took it into his own hands, turning it this way and that, and asked, "What is your will that should be done with it?" Then one of the wicked prefects, not unlike the ways of Satan, whose name I will gladly suppress (since it is the name of the Dragon), shouted out: "Throw this, too, to be trampled upon, O Emperor; it is the rope of a satanic noose." So it was thrown down, and the people trampled both it and the cord. Then four men, stooping to the ground, caught hold of the transgressor’s garments, stripped him, and as if a hide had been flayed, they stood him naked in the midst of everyone. Bringing a jar filled with water, they poured it over him from head to toe, for the repudiation, if I may so call it, of his baptism. ^C Then, having placed a helmet on him and donned him in military garb, the tyrant himself, with his own hands, hung a sword upon his shoulders and commanded him to ascend the steps, ranking him in the office of the strators. Immediately afterward, he ordered an uncountable multitude of soldiers to take the hill of Saint Auxentios. When they had reached it by the direct path, they dispersed the disciples of the saint and ravaged the monastery and the church with fire, reducing them even to the very pavement. Having snatched the saint from his cave, they dragged him down toward the sea’s descent.

What speech or lamentation could truly recount the athletic torments that the saint endured along that path? For some beat his sides with rods, others pushed him toward the ^D steeper parts of the ravine; others

^A lacerated his legs with thorny brambles, and some splashed their spittle upon that holy face; and some, tearing off the more flexible and flaccid of the branches to make a noise, struck his head with them, abusing him as if he were a buffoon or a laughingstock. Others, carrying laurel branches, danced before him as far as the sea, not without mockery, calling him an apostate, an impious man, one covered in darkness, and hurling other foul curses at him. Finally, having harassed him with every sort of torture, they arrived at the shore. There they cast the holy man into a boat, since, as was said above, he was unable to walk due to the excessive confinement of the cave and his austere fasting. They then traveled along the seacoast and arrived at the holy monastery of Philippicus, which is situated by the sea of the city of Chrysopolis. ^B And when they had locked the holy man in there, they informed the emperor of what had taken place. Indeed, the emperor, after he learned of the shameful and ignominious manner in which they had dragged him like a captive, and the total destruction of the monastery, issued an edict of this kind: that if anyone were caught approaching the Mount of Auxentius, he was to be punished by the sword. Afterward, he summoned the heresiarchs—if I may use that term—and those endowed with similar characters: namely, Theodosius, the false bishop of Ephesus; the innovator Constantine of Nicomedia; another Constantine, the bishop of Nacolia; together with Sisinnios Pastilas, Basil Tricacabus, and the most eloquent men of the palace, Callistus, mentioned above, Comboconon the master of the scrinia, and Masura, a Saracen in his sect. ^C He sent them all to the archbishop, who was most similar to him in name and character, so that they might all set out together for the aforementioned Chrysopolitan monastery. But that hireling shepherd and traitor, who had experienced the knowledge and true faith of our holy and most blessed Father Stephen, refused to accompany them. "Go in peace," he said, "go. For there is a great difference between Constantine and Stephen, as far as the power of speech is concerned. For to me there are words only, but with him, along with the words, there is the power of the divine Spirit. See, moreover, what you are about to hear from him." ^D Therefore, they, having taken the definition of the false synod with them, departed from the patriarchate and went to the aforementioned monastery; and when they had entered its holy church for the sake of prayer and had withdrawn to the laver, they sat upon the steps placed there, and immediately ordered the saint to be brought to them.

^A The saint was indeed brought, supported by two men, because, as we have mentioned before, he was unable to walk and had his feet fettered with iron shackles. When those God-hated men saw this, they wept. Then Theodosius, the bishop of Ephesus, said to him: "By what reasoning, man of God, have you brought yourself to think us heretics, and to hold yourself higher than the emperors, the archbishops, the bishops, and all the Christians? Or is it that we are all laboring for the loss of our own souls?" To which the saint replied in a gentle voice to them: "Observe what is written in the prophet Elijah to Ahab: 'I do not turn [things] upside down, but you and the house of your father' (III Reg. xviii, 18). For indeed, it is not I who turn [things] upside down, but you yourselves, who have violated the ancient teaching of the Fathers and have introduced new vain babblings into the Church. For if that which is distinguished by antiquity is worthy of reverence, as some wise man said, then all those things which have been innovated by you are to be despised and are alien to God and the Church, ^B or rather, they are falsehoods of the Church (25). But yet, it is possible to say prophetically: 'The kings of the earth and the rulers have gathered together with the shepherds and the betrayers of the flock against the Church of Christ, meditating on vain and empty things' (Ps. ii, 2). When these things had been said by the saint, Constantine, the bishop of Nicomedia, who was vigorous in body and swollen in spirit (for he was just in his thirtieth year of age), leaped up and wished to kick the saint, who was sitting on the ground, in the face, just as Antiochus once did to the holy Eleazar. And so, one of those bitter and cruel guards jumped up and struck the holy man in the abdomen with his boots, so that he might rise up while lying down. But the venerable Stephen, obeying the evangelical precept, prepared himself to receive blows not only on one cheek, but also on the other. ^C However, those of the senate, Callistus and Comboconon, imposed silence on the profane Constantine; and they themselves said to the saint: "Of the two things which we propose, one must be chosen by you: either to yield and subscribe [to our decree]; or if you refuse this, to be handed over to death, as one who opposes the law of the Fathers and the emperors, whom God himself has instructed." To these words the saint replied: "Pay attention, Lord Patrician; 'for me to live is Christ, and to die for his holy image is profit and glory' (Phil. i, 21). For indeed, I have told you once and twice, as I have been kicked by the combatant: if there were even a little of my vital blood [remaining], let it be poured out for such a cause as this. ^D Nevertheless, let the definition of your synod be read, so that I may perceive what right [reason] it contains for the overthrowing of the divine and venerable icons."

^A Straightway Constantine of Nacolia, having opened the codicil, read as follows: "The definition of the holy and ecumenical seventh synod." Then the saint, having signaled him with his hand to be silent, exclaimed: "O madness! Since you began with a lie, and have used it throughout your entire new-fangled and vain-speaking discourse as a defense, you have ended in the same, you accusers of the Christians. For how is that synod holy which has defiled holy things? Have not holy things been trampled by you? Was there not, at that very synod of yours, a charge brought against a bishop by Christ-loving men, because he had trampled the holy paten of the incorruptible mysteries of God, for the reason that it bore the venerable images of Christ and of His Mother and of the Forerunner? But you, preferring the crime of the trampling of the icons, approved him to function in the priesthood, while those Christ-loving men you separated from your communion, calling them avengers of idols. What is more wicked than this? Did you not tear the sacred veils and utterly destroy them? How, therefore, shall your synod be called holy? Have you not erased the name 'holy' from all the saints, the just, the apostles, and the martyrs, and ^B established a dogma by saying: 'Whither goest thou? To the apostles. Whence comest thou? From the forty martyrs. Where art thou? At the martyr Theodore and at the martyr Acacius and those like them.' Is this not your doctrine? How, therefore, you who have profaned holy things, have you constituted a holy thing? O, the foolishness! And by what reasoning do you call your synod ecumenical, which neither the Roman Pope has approved (although it is prescribed by canon that ecclesiastical matters ought not be settled without the Pope of Rome), nor the Alexandrian, to speak the truth, nor the Antiochene, nor the Hierosolymite? For where are the letters of those, that your false assembly might be proclaimed an ecumenical synod? Furthermore, how do you call it the seventh, which did not follow the six prior to it? For every seventh follows after the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth; and in consecutive order, after the sixth, comes the seventh. But you, who have abolished the traditions of the six synods, under what title you name your synod the seventh, I know not."

And Tricacabus asking: "What, therefore, have we abrogated from the six holy ecumenical synods?" the saint answered: "Were not the six holy synods gathered in sacred temples? The first at Nicaea, in the temple of Holy Sophia; the second at Constantinople, in the temple of Holy Irene; the third at Ephesus, in the temple of the Theologian; the fourth in our metropolis of Chalcedon, in the temple of the most celebrated Euphemia; the fifth again at Constantinople; and the sixth, the one in the temple of Holy Sophia, the other in the sacred palace, in that part which is called the Trullus, which we call Daton? And were not icons depicted in all those temples, which the Fathers approved ^D and adored? Tell me, Bishop." And when he said that it was so, the just man fixed his gaze toward heaven.

^A shedding a great sigh from his heart, and stretching out his hands, he said, "If anyone does not adore our Lord Jesus Christ circumscribed in an icon according to his humanity, let him be anathema, and let him be reckoned with those who cried out, 'Away with him, away with him, crucify him!'" Those whisperers, struck with amazement at the saint's boldness—for he wished to continue his speech—arose, and ordering only that he be locked away, returned in shame to the palace. When the Emperor asked, "What then have you accomplished?" while the bishops still wished to hide the defeat, Callistus and his companions replied, "We have been defeated, Emperor, defeated. For the man is far too lofty in power, in speech, and in his confidence toward death." The Emperor, flaring up with rage, immediately commanded that he be exiled to the ridges of the Hellespont, to the island called Proconnesus.

The saint remained for seventeen days in the monastery of Chrysopolis, continuing to fast, although the Emperor sent him many provisions for his sustenance; he, however, sent them back again to him, using the same words which we have brought forward above. During those days, the superior of the monastery fell ill beyond measure, ^B to such an extent that the physicians, because of the burning heat of the fever, despaired of his life. Seeing himself entirely failing, he sent the chief elders of the monastery to the saint at the place where he was locked away, and begged him either to come to him or at least to pray for him, saying, "Bodily, we are separated from one another, but nevertheless come, venerable Father, or at least that my wretched self might embrace you. For my strength can scarcely keep my soul within me until the ninth hour." When the saint heard this, he was eager to go. Having met the sick man and taken hold of his tendon, he said, "May the physician of our souls and bodies, who took away our infirmities and bore our diseases, visit you with his healing power and restore you to health." And immediately the fever subsided. ^C The saint then said, "Do you not desire to take some undiluted wine?" And when the superior replied, "Yes, Father," the venerable Stephen filled his own flask with undiluted wine and gave it to the superior to drink. Having drunk it, he was immediately drenched in copious sweat and returned to a healthy state of mind. The saint, having taken his leave, said to him, "Pray for me, and make remembrance of my lowliness, if it should ever be necessary for you to approach the hill." And so, departing from there, he set his course toward the sea, and having boarded a ship, reached the aforementioned island of his exile. Cast out upon it, he traveled through its more deserted regions and came to a certain precipitous and formidable place along the sea, and there, ^D because of his love for solitude, he walked along the maritime cliffs…

^A and, as if guided by God, found a cave-like dwelling, quite pleasant and wonderful, situated on the southern precipice of the island, called Cissuda, in which a most venerable temple of Anna, the grandmother of God, had been built. The blessed man, filled with joy, as though God had prepared this place for him, remained there, feeding on the herbs that he found.

The disciples of the holy man, who had been expelled from the mountain, having heard of their teacher's exile, all together reached Proconnesus and ran to the holy man, just as sheep gather at the whistling of their shepherd. Only two from that holy community, having been taken prisoner, had resumed the secular habit: Sergius, mentioned above, who in fact had written that vituperative letter against the holy man and sent it to the emperor at the camp; and Stephanus, the most wretched of soul, who, having become the minister or priest of the often-mentioned Callistus, had received the holy habit from the saint, and had been appointed a monk and presbyter of the monastery on the mountain. This miserable Stephanus, then, having been kidnapped along with that Sergius, separated himself from God and the holy habit. When he had been clothed by the emperor in a secular garment, he returned like a dog to its own vomit and said: "Today, master, through you I have been snatched from the jaws of Satan and have put on light." The tyrant, delighted by this wretched utterance, and welcoming him because of his gluttony and his transgression against God and the habit, appointed him a minister or priest in that same palace where he was accustomed to celebrate his impure pomps, which they call the Sophian, and he nicknamed him "Papa" ^B of joy. With these two alone having fallen away, just as Judas once fell away from among the twelve apostles, and as that one who was separated from the forty martyrs as a reprobate, all the rest of the brethren once again, shepherded by him, established a monastery in Proconnesus. The mother of the saint ^C also, having abandoned the monastery of the Trichinaraeans along with his sister, reached the island and came to the holy man. The saint, for his part, built a small, pillar-like enclosure, which is preserved to this day, and in the forty-ninth year of his age he withdrew into it, continuing therein his former manner of a constrained life.

But now it is time for me, as far as it is in me, to unfold the discourse concerning the meadow of miracles which he performed on the island, so that, in this, joined in celebration with the lovers of God and lovers of feasts, we may say: "God is truly marvelous in his saints." ^D (Ps. LXVII, 36).

^A And let no one, brothers, be faithless, especially since the Lord says: "He who believes in me, the works that I do he will also do, and greater works than these he will do," not pouring forth the benefit from himself as from a fountain by his own power, but by my name and by my invitation. "For I am He who works all things in all men by my sovereign authority." In this, therefore, our great Father Stephen, truly a man of God, honorable in soul and body, who longed for the life of poverty and kept only the image of Christ and his Mother as a protective charm, he who grew rich in God and was deemed worthy of the lavish grace—he, I say, having immediately received the power to tread upon serpents and scorpions and over all the power of the wicked enemy, and to heal every disease and every infirmity, showed us the marvelous things of the wonder-working God: the abundant grace, the gushing fountain, the honey-flowing streams.

For a certain blind man, like him who was blind from birth (John IX, 1), once fell at the knees of the blessed Stephen on that island, crying: "Servant of the most high God, Stephen, heal my eyes, open my blindness, and enlighten me who am covered in darkness, so that through you, having beheld the harmony and composition of the things that are seen, and having admired their excellence, I may praise the Creator through created things."

When the blessed Stephen saw him obscured by a heavy blindness, yet possessing faith that moves mountains, he answered him: ^B "Why, young man, do you approach me, seeking that I give you things that are above me? What virtue have you seen in me, O man, that you ask of me that healing which only the Creator and God of all distributes where and how and to whom He wills? Why have you not run to Him? Why, having dismissed the Creator, have you come to the creature? Why, having left behind the Master, have you resorted to the servant? Do you not know that we all in common are in need of His assistance? Do you not know that I also am a man, just as you are? Why then do you seek what I have no power to possess? Why do you wish me to be the healer of a disease of which He alone has the power to grant the cure, He who also healed the blind man of old?"

While the holy Stephen was gently repelling the youth with these words and, as it were, driving him away with mild discourse, he persisted again, and imitating that blind man of old, he shouted loudly, suppliant and crying: ^C "Have mercy on me, O genuine servant of God, Stephen; for He has granted this grace to you, and through you the true light will grant the brightness of light to my eyes. But do not blunt my boldness with hesitation, O blessed one, nor delay the gift with procrastination, nor hide the sun with a cloud; but having looked upon my affliction, provide the healing. Having weighed my faith, grant the grace. By weighing my love in the balance, heal my suffering."

What then did the venerable Stephen do? "Do you have," he said, "faith? Do you honor the images of Christ and of his Mother and of the saints? Do you believe that God heals even through images, as..."

once that venerable Mary of Egypt—having believed and having received the promise from the image—approached repentance and was saved?" And he again said, "I believe, Lord, and believing I approach and worship." The saint said to him, "In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, who healed the blind man, in whom you have come here believing, and whom you have confessed to worship as circumscribed in the flesh within an image, be seeing the sun, hindered by nothing." Immediately, then, his eyes were opened, and the young man became whole, as if he had never been deprived of the pupils of his eyes nor had experienced such an affliction. ^A Indeed, he departed from this miraculous healing that had occurred for him, rejoicing and exulting, praising God and glorifying Him who grants such gifts against diseases to His saints. This was the first miracle the saint performed on the island; these are the first fruits of his labors, for which we, having worthily celebrated Christ the Giver and the holy man, let us pass to another of his miracles.

A certain woman of no ignoble birth, living in Cyzicus, had a son possessed by a demon for nearly nine years. Having heard of the saint, she betook herself to the island with her child. But as soon as she saw the boy from afar—tossed by the demon—the boy was shaken without any intermission, so that he was lifted into the air and stretched out, and hurled again suddenly to the ground. He emitted frequent and inarticulate sounds toward the saint, as is wont to happen when the demon, having changed the one possessed, speaks entirely through him, using the body of the sufferer as its own instrument. ^B The mother, more sorrowful than the sufferer, pouring forth tears and beating her breast, and taking hold of him with her hand, uttered these words: "Have mercy on me, O saint, the most wretched woman. One son alone remains for me in the living, whom you now see possessed by a demon. If I seek his death from God, childlessness wounds me; and again, I cannot bear to have him possessed by a demon. For day and night, in his madness, he racks my soul. Have pity on two souls, O saint: heal this one from the demon, and me from my grief, and the other sad things which are wont to happen to mothers when a beloved child suffers something." ^C But as the boy was being agitated more and more, his mother, catching sight of the saint’s mother, ran to her, and having embraced her feet, said with tears, "You alone are conscious of my pain, who have undergone a similar law regarding children. Do you, therefore, weigh my miseries, and beseech your son to pray for my unhappy child. For it is because of the mother’s sins that the boy is most grievously tormented." By these mournful words, the woman moved not only the saint's mother but also all who were present to weeping. Wherefore, blessed Stephen, moved by compunction, ^D commanded one of the monks to sign the boy’s entire body with the sign of the cross. He himself...

meanwhile, poured forth prayers from his cell with tears. But when the boy, after the prayer, was agitated with great violence, he called him by name and bade him adore the image of Christ: which being done, he dismissed him, whole, together with his mother, to their own home. In which matter, that saying of David was seen to be manifestly fulfilled in them: "a mother rejoicing over [her] children" as she departs.

^A Another woman, a person of great nobility, had been afflicted for seven years with an issue of blood, pining away and suffering not without shame and distress, and was greatly troubled, not knowing what she should do, having by this time despaired of health due to the duration of the malady. She lived near the shore at Heraclea in Thrace, and having heard from those sailing by about the miracles of the holy man, she began to inquire, pleading and imploring: "Where, I pray, does the friend of God and my physician reside?" ^B And when they pointed with their fingers to the island opposite and indicated the place, she, setting aside all concern, at once boarded a boat and sailed swiftly to the island. Running with haste to the office of the holy physician, she explained her malady and the length of time she had suffered from it, and begged him with groans and tears to grant her healing. Accordingly, the holy Father, having poured forth prayers, rendered her whole with the seal of Christ and the adoration of His image. ^C The woman, having become robust in body, on the third day recognized that her substance was perfected and truly vigorous, neither being diminished nor drained by the disease in any part.

But the narrative, drawing me from one thing to another, does not allow me to be silent, even if I wish, although I had already admitted above that the poverty of my talent was in no way sufficient to recount everything. For how many travelers has he provided himself as a companion in prayer? How many, sailing the sea, has he served as a pilot, especially in time of a violent storm? For when he saw the savage swells of the sea ^D rising and their roaring reaching his ears, he would then urge the brethren to offer up long-suffering prayer for those at sea, and to chant that prophetic verse: "Was Thy wrath against the rivers, O Lord, or was Thy anger in the rivers, or Thy indignation in the sea?" And then it was to see, after the sea was calmed, some coming and reporting their deliverance through the holy man. And they said, "In the time of need, you were seen sailing with us, guiding the ship, and standing at the stern, and steering most fittingly." And thus all glorified God.

While our venerable Father Stephen was performing these illustrious deeds on the island, in the second year of his dwelling and exile there, a truly pious woman, fond of her children and of the line of Abraham, a new Sarah, and not...

much inferior to the ancient one, the mother of the thrice-blessed Stephen, departed to God, having said to her daughter: “Do not weep, Theodota; for you shall journey with me.” And after seven days, the sister of the saint also fell asleep in peace.

In those same days, a certain Stephen, a soldier of the Armenian battalion, having become half-paralyzed from the regions of Europe, was leaning forward, bent completely down toward the ground. He sailed to the island, and having prostrated himself as a suppliant before the saint, and after worshipping the image of Christ and of His Mother with firm faith, he returned upright and whole, by the prayers of the holy man, to his own military unit. When the soldiers asked him in what manner and by whom that incurable disease was healed, he revealed all to them in these words: “There is a monk imprisoned and in exile on Proconnesus, called Stephen. He prayed over me and made me worship two images, one inscribed ‘Christ,’ and the other of a woman, which they said was the Theotokos. Having kissed these, I immediately obtained healing.” ^B Hearing this, those wicked men raised a clamor, saying: “Woe to you, Stephen, you have become an idolater!” Then they accused him before the prefect of Thrace, who, having learned the facts about him, sent him in haste to the emperor. The tyrant, receiving him and having heard the things concerning him, said: “Do you still persist in worshipping such idols, as you were taught by that unmentionable man?” But he, rather than anathematizing and bowing in repentance as if he had been deceived, was without delay honored by the lost emperor with the rank of centurion, for having treated the image of Christ with insult.

Truly, God, who judges justly and cries out through the prophet: “But those who glorify me I will glorify, and those who despise me shall be dishonored,” did not overlook the judgment of this unjust verdict. For that transgressor, after receiving his rank and returning home from the imperial palace, was thrown headlong from his horse, and having his bones shattered by its feet, became a sacrifice to the horse, miserably yielding up his soul in his wickedness. And in this way, the deceitful dragon ordered the saint to sail back from Proconnesus very quickly, saying that even in exile he did not cease teaching the people to worship idols.

^C Having brought him back from Proconnesus, he ordered him to be guarded in the dark prison of the Phiale, bound in handcuffs, and with his feet secured in the stocks. Some days later, while sitting privately in a solar of the Pharos between two of his officials, he conducted the interrogation with them. But when the saint was about to be brought in to the emperor, he asked for and received a coin from a certain pious man, which he carried inside his cowl. Upon the very entry and mere sight of the holy man, the dragon, in name and deed, incensed with rage, cried out, saying: “O violence! By what unmentionable person is my reign testified against?” To this, the saint replied nothing, but with his body bowed to the ground, the tyrant in anger… ^D

^A looked upon him, rolling his bloodshot eyes, and waving his hand through the air, and hissing loudly like a dragon, said: “Do you not answer me, most defiled head?” The saint said to him: “O Emperor, if you intend to condemn me, inflict punishment upon me. But if it pleases you to question me, let meekness temper your anger. For the laws command judges to judge in this manner.” The Emperor said: “Tell me, by what decrees or precepts of the Fathers are we not compliant, that we are considered heretical by you?” The saint replied: “Because those images, which from the beginning had been approved and venerated by all the Fathers in a continuous series, you have wickedly exterminated and cut out from the churches.” And the Emperor said: “Do not call these, O unholy head, images, but idols. For what justice is there between idols and saints? Or what communion has light with darkness?” ^B To which the saint replied: “Emperor, Christians have never decreed that the material in an image should be worshiped. But we adore the name of the reality presented to us through the image, ascending in our mind to the authors themselves and the prototypes. For through this visual representation, we desire to build a nest, in the high and lofty tabernacles of the heavens, for the ruling faculty, which is expanded by dogma and the goal of religion, as much as allowed by the greatness of such things. For it is as it were a nest for the soul, a confession of the same [reality] around that which it seeks, which bids the unstable restlessness of the mind, like a wandering flight, to find rest in itself.” The Emperor again said: “Is it right, then, that things infinite and celebrated by men, difficult to contemplate and not even comprehensible by the mind, should be expressed in a way that falls under the senses and be worshiped through matter, when nothing of this kind comes into knowledge, except for infinite [being] alone, as the Theologian Gregory says?” ^C The saint replied: “And truly, who that is of sound mind, in worshiping the things that are in the church, whether it be stone, or gold, or silver, exhibits worship to a created thing, since they have been transformed by their calling into holy things? But you, not distinguishing between the holy and the profane, in your arrogance have not shuddered to call the images of Christ and the Theotokos ‘idols,’ like Apollo and Artemis, and to trample them underfoot and burn them.” And the Emperor said: “O blinded in mind, and more impious than the impious, have we, by trampling the images, trampled Christ? Far be it!” Then the sign-bearing Stephen, who always carried Christ within himself and was entirely taught by Him, having withdrawn his hand to his breast and inserted it into his holy cowl, brought forth a coin which bore the likeness and name of the wicked Emperor, and showing it to him, just as Christ once did to the Jewish synagogue, said: “Whose is this image, O Emperor, and this inscription?” The tyrant, struck with amazement, replied: “The Emperor’s.” And the saint ^D

sighing deeply, said: “If this is your argument, then what miserable punishment will he undergo who has trampled and burned the name of Christ and His Mother upon an image? Will he not be delivered entirely to the fire that never dies and is eternal, and to the worm that never sleeps?” He then threw down the coin and trampled it. Immediately, those standing by the Emperor, like some wild beasts rushing upon the saint, wished to cast him headlong from the terrace. But the Emperor, in his craftiness (for he knew how to dissemble his form like a serpent), prevented them from doing so. He immediately had the saint bound by the neck, his hands tied behind his back, and sent to the public prison of Byzantium, which is called the holy Praetorium, so that he might undergo trial according to the laws, on the grounds that he had unlawfully trampled upon the Emperor’s image. O stupidity! They who have openly transgressed the law of God and trampled upon His image, do they make the law their defender in their own image? Who, I ask, would not laugh at their madness?

The blessed Stephen is brought to the Praetorium

Therefore, our most blessed Father Stephen was led to the Praetorium; as soon as he entered its vestibule, his heart kindled within him—to use the words of the Prophet—and with the fire of his meditation enkindled, he spoke with his tongue regarding the end of his life, saying: “This is the resting place of my life, and here I shall dwell until my final breath, for I have chosen it for the sake of the Christ-named image.” There he found select men of the holy monastic order, three hundred and forty-two in number, imprisoned from various places; some had their noses cut off, others had their eyes gouged out, and others had their hands cut off because they had refused to subscribe against the holy images. Others lacked ears. Others bore the marks of intolerable scourgings. Others showed themselves shorn of hair, having been shaved by the impious Iconoclasts; and the greater part had their venerable beards anointed with pitch and burned. When the saint saw these bitter and diverse tortures of the mystics of piety, he gave thanks to God, who had granted them such patience. But he himself was deeply pained and saddened that he had not yet experienced any torture or loss of a limb for the sake of the same cause. However, all those Fathers received him as a chief shepherd and saving teacher; they were instructed by him and referred their thoughts to him. Finally, the Praetorium was turned into a monastery, as the monastic canon was observed therein. Furthermore, the guards of the prison and all those to whom the fame of the holy man had reached long ago, when

they saw that he truly preserved the image of God inviolate, were struck with awe, seeing in him a true angel upon earth, so that a certain guard said to his own wife in secret, just as Manoah of old once did: "We are undone, O woman, because of this tyranny of the king; for I have seen, as it were, God in the person of Stephen of Auxentius, who is currently held in prison." But that honorable woman, a new Sarephthite and Shunammite, a true Phoebe—if I may say so—and a Tryphaena, having questioned her husband further, stole away by hearing from him the whole manner of life of the blessed man. Having secretly entered the prison, she cast herself at the feet of the holy man, asking for his prayers on her behalf, and beseeching him to allow her to minister to him at this time with ^B the things he needed. She used words of this kind: "Do not reject me, Father, most wretched as I am, who desire to bring you as a consolation the things you need; do not turn away from me, the sinner. For from such a service I hope that I, too, shall receive a reward from God. Therefore, do not cast me aside because of my unworthiness." But when the venerable Father, after having prayed for her, was unwilling to accept anything at all, the woman addressed him again: "Reverend Father, why do you reject my faith toward you? Even if my unworthiness drives me away, your piety knows how to show mercy. For just as the widow of Sareptha once offered her flour to Elijah, and the Shunammite offered the bedchamber to Elisha, and the widow celebrated in the Gospels cast her two ^C mites, which were all she had, into the treasury, and the Samaritan woman drew forth the comforting water from the deepest well for Christ Himself to slake His thirst, so I, acting in the hope of faith, do not wish, I pray you, to be turned away, humbled and put to shame." The saint said to her: "Depart, woman, depart, for I cannot accept anything from you. It is not because I shun nature or unworthiness. God forbid! For I am myself entirely miserable and unworthy. But I am prevented by Him who commands me to have no communion with heretics. For I do not know myself ever to have communicated with the heretical slanderers of Christians and Iconoclasts, or to have received anything from their hands." That woman, who loved Christ and loved the saints, truly a guardian of the afflicted, having heard these things from the saint, cast herself upon the ground, crying out: "Far be it from me, O holy Father Stephen, ever to insult an image of Christ, or of His Mother, or of the saints. For I know what punishment they shall receive who have dared to do such things. For our holy Father Germanus has compared the destroyers of the holy images to those who cried out:

"Take, take, crucify the Son of God." ^A Wherefore, reverend Father, I ask but this one thing, that this deed be kept hidden from my husband and the other guards; and I myself shall, by my actions, give proof to your holiness. Having said this, she returned to her own room and, opening the chest, she drew out three hidden icons: one of the all-holy Mother of God carrying her Son and God in her bosom, and others of the chief apostles Peter and Paul. Having faithfully adored them in the presence of the holy man, she gave them to him, saying: "Let these be before your face, holy one, while you pray, so that you may have memory of me, a sinner." In this God-pleasing manner, the holy man consented to her request; ^B and from that time on, on Saturday and Sunday, she brought him a small amount of bread, about six ounces, and three vessels of water. For this was the food and drink for the blessed man for the eleven months which he spent in the praetorium.

When, on a certain day, the holy man was sitting with the other imprisoned Fathers, a discussion arose regarding the tortures of the persecution which the emperor’s prefects had applied in various places. Thus, Antonius from the island of Crete came forward and, speaking of the victim sacrificed to God, said: "How could I bring the noble struggles of the abbot Paul into your presence without tears, venerable Fathers? That noble man was seized by Theophanes, archisatrap of the island, surnamed Lardotyros, and brought for examination to the so-called praetorium of Heraclius. ^C There lay upon the ground an icon of Christ, showing Him crucified for us, and that instrument of torture which the Greeks call the *catapeltae*. The prefect said to him: 'Paul, one of two things is proposed to you: either to live by trampling upon this icon, or to be sent to your execution.' But the holy man cried out with a loud voice: 'Far be it from me, Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, to trample upon Your divine icon of bodily form, which is a tabernacle of Your fearful name.' And falling prone to the ground, he offered the fitting adoration to the holy icon. When this enraged the prefect, he ordered him to be stripped of his garments and thus stretched upon the *catapeltae*. ^D Therefore, the ministers bound the holy man between two boards from his head to his ankles, fastened his limbs with iron nails, hung him head-downwards, and having lit an immense pyre around him, the prefect, who was more wicked than the lawless emperor, thus made the holy man a whole burnt-offering by fire."

While he was still speaking, and all the Fathers were shedding tears, Theocteristus, a presbyter and elder of the holy monastery of Pelecete, whose nose the impious Iconoclasts had cut off, and whose beard they had [smeared] with pitch and naphtha...

[Translation of the beginning of the page, continuing from the previous page:] ^A had anointed and scorched, and having brought him into the midst, said: "No one, reverend Stephen, can endure to speak of or even call to mind that night and the cruelty of the prefect of the Asian region, whom they call Lachanodracon." To which the holy Stephen said: "Speak, Father, speak for the sake of the Lord, and do not hide it. For you will make us more eager, if indeed it be God's will that we also should struggle."

^B Then Theocteristus continued: "When the holy Quadragesima had passed and the holy Pascha was at hand, on the evening of the holy fifth feria, on which Christ our God was betrayed to the Jews, while the divine mysteries were being celebrated, that prefect who bears the name of the dragon, by order of the Emperor, rushing in with a band of soldiers, suddenly interrupted the celebration of the mysteries. Having seized chosen monks, thirty-eight in number, he bound their hands and necks with wooden stocks: the rest he partly cruelly lacerated, and partly burned. Others he burned by smearing their beards with pitch, and he cut off their noses—of which number I myself am one. But that impious man, not yet content with these things, laid waste the entire monastery with fire from the horse stables to the churches, and reduced it to dust down to the very foundations. Afterwards, having taken those thirty-eight Fathers with him, he enclosed them in a certain vaulted chamber of an ancient bath near the borders of Ephesus, and having opened an entrance, he buried them under the debris dug from the adjacent mountain; and thus by an intolerable violence they were perfected in the Lord."

^C When these mournful and many other grievous things had been told, no one could contain their tears. They then asked the holy Stephen, just as before on the mountain, to console them now with his words. Then that most blessed man, groaning as if from the pain of his soul, said: "Let us give thanks, Fathers and brothers, let us give thanks for all these things that have happened. For patience combined with thanksgiving ^D even to the end bears the crown. For whether fire, or sword, or sea, or finally death is set before us by the impious, let us endure it patiently: let us imitate those holy Fathers who finished their lives among us by martyrdom. I speak of that holy Peter who was enclosed in the Blachernae, who, being beaten before the face of the Emperor with intolerable bull-hide whips for the sake of the image of Christ, freely calling him a Dacian and a transgressor, and raising his eyes to God, saying, 'I give thanks to you, O Lord,' expired in the midst of the torments of the stripes. Him followed John, that divine prefect of the pleasant monastery of Monagria, whom the tyrant Emperor seized tyrannically, because he refused to trample underfoot the image of Christ and of His Mother, and having enclosed him in a sack and bound him to a huge stone, drowned him in the depths of the sea. What is more bitter than a death of this kind? But it provides for him a more glorious crown. And these...

things are but so much. For who shall suffice to recount everything in every province ^A devised by the tyrant's cruel prefects and the enemies of the truth, and these terrible torments? For many are the trophies of their impiety, which we, spurning, shall emulate the death of the Master. For the sufferings of the present time are not worthy to be compared with the future glory which shall be revealed in us, as says the vessel of election, Paul.

The time now calls me, O faithful and orthodox audience, to bring into the open the death which our venerable Father Stephen endured for the sake of piety. But as I have often excused myself, both my own unworthiness and my total ignorance of the art of speaking hold me back. But since the saint himself ^B shows himself kind and gentle toward my own lowliness, and you similarly show much humanity in listening to me, I shall pursue my speech according to my strength, about to say nothing alien to the truth. God, who uncovers His own mysteries to His servants the prophets and brings things to light before they come to pass, He did not hide from our venerable Father Stephen the time of his migration from these places. For as it has been said above, the venerable Stephen was a participant in the gift of foresight. Therefore, this honorable and holy man, forty days before his contest, summoned that all-blessed and hospitable woman, the new Isdandul, the minister of the saints ^C held in prisons, and said to her: "May the Lord, O woman, repay you the reward of your service toward me. But I wish and desire to spend this forty-day period in silence, abstinence, and prayer. Therefore, cease to bring me bread and water." That honorable woman replied: "Why, Father, do you intend to lead a more severe life? Is not all the time of your life fasting, prayer, and continuous austerity?" And the saint says: "I have known in few days that the end of my life is at hand." And having in this way moved the hospitable woman to his desire, he sent her away in peace. And thus the saint did not cease throughout the days of that Great Lent to speak and teach the fellow-prisoner Fathers not to grow weary in afflictions, ^D performing all-night hymnody, so that some of the pious men of the city would disguise themselves in tattered clothing and enter the prison, and be blessed and taught by him. But when the days had passed and the thirty-eighth day had arrived, early in the morning after the matutinal praises and the dismissal of the first hour, he again summoned that woman, who is celebrated by us in many ways as our procurator, and in the presence of the Fathers said: "Come, venerable and blessed woman. May God see and repay your tireless care toward me. May He repay you the fruit of your labors a hundredfold, just as it is written in the Gospel. For you are a true disciple of Him who said: Inasmuch as you did it to one of these least, [you did it to me]."

And, He who receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man, shall receive a righteous man’s reward. Therefore, may the Lord grant you a hundredfold, enrolling you with those faithful Marys and wise women, along with Cleopas, Jose, Joseph, Joachim, and Martha. ^B Having prayed for these things and more, he took the divine icon of the bodily form of the Savior and of His disciples Peter and Paul, and gave these icons to that woman, saying: "Let these icons be a protection for you throughout your life, and a pledge of the Orthodox faith." Afterward, he uttered a great groan and said: "Tomorrow I shall depart from these places, and set out for another world and Judge." The woman, lamenting not a little, took the icons she had recently offered to the holy man, wrapped them in a cloth for fear of the impious Iconoclasts, and, once more leaving the prison, took to her home. The holy Father, for his part, having gathered all who were being kept in prison with him, commanded that divine praises be celebrated throughout the entire night.

Interim, a man who was a dragon in reality and in name, and a tyrannical emperor, who was accustomed to celebrate all the libations of the gentiles in the most impious manner, was celebrating the Brumalia, or rather a demonic feast, in which he lauded Dionysus and Brumus as the creators of seeds and wine. ^C On that day, in the morning, sitting at the porticoes of the Schools with his like-minded cithara-players, he was engaged in an obscure and God-hated study regarding the present libation, in which the element of the fifth letter had also appeared, bearing the name of Eudocia, his third harlot-wife. It was reported to him by some who were hateful toward Christ that Stephen, the leader of the godless—he of Auxentius—had turned the praetorium into a monastery, was performing all-night praises therein, and that all the citizens were running to him being taught to commit idolatry. Upon hearing these things, the tyrant, burning with rage, summoned one of his satellites, a man distinguished by the rank of *Proximus*, and upon passing sentence, commanded him to take the holy Stephen ^D outside the city to that place where the august temple of the holy and triumphant martyr Maura was situated—which he, that enemy of the saints, had razed to the ground and turned into a place of slaughter, giving it the name of Maura. Here he also entered into pacts with demons, as is testified by the young boy of Suphlamium who was given as a victim, of whom there is not time to speak now. Immediately thereafter, he ordered interrogations and searches to be conducted in the city. Whoever had a relative, or friend, or neighbor belonging to the monastic order, or even someone who wore a dark garment, was beaten most cruelly with lashes and sent into exile. Then one could see the joy of the enemies, who betrayed whomsoever they wished. Even servants were denouncing their own masters. Finally

a weep^Aing and a wailing not small occupied Byzantium, even more grievous than that which had formerly existed in the days of the impious Julian and Valens.

That Proximus, having taken the holy man from the praetorium and having bound his neck and hands with wood, hastened to execute his orders. But the tyrant, having gone out from the palace, went to that place of the public thoroughfare which they call the Milion (26). For in this public place, from ancient times and from those who had piously reigned of old, the six holy ecumenical synods had been depicted and were plainly visible, preaching the orthodox faith to rustics, strangers, and private individuals. Yet the Babylonian tyrant in those days, having smeared over and blotted out these, ordered the Satanic circus and the demon-loving charioteer to be depicted in their place, whom the one unworthy of heaven and earth named "Uranicos" [Heavenly], as being most dear to himself. Thus he set him before the holy Fathers. Who, I ask, would not be struck with horror and amazement, and who would not laugh at, nay rather, lament his audacity? O my Savior, ^B of Thy infinite patience and gentleness at that time! For as he presided there in this place of the Milion, while all were applauding him and celebrating his praises, he himself says: "There is no comfort for my soul, because those who corrupted it remain unpunished." But one of his fellow conspirators, answering, cried out: "And where, I ask, O Master, is there any trace or memorial of those men in thy city or elsewhere, since they have all been utterly destroyed? For behold, I have seen the very enemy of the truth, Stephen of Auxentius (having met him today), being led to be given over to the sword for a punishment worthy of his evils."

And that multiform Dragon said to him: "And what, I ask, could be sweeter to Stephen than to undergo capital punishment? For I am certain that he, by whom he was cast into prison, is held by this desire. But it is not fitting for him to undergo such a death, but one more bitter and more exquisite. ^C For the Empress herself would not be a little angry with us if we were to celebrate the feast of her Brumalia with a slaughter." Immediately, this new Herod and slave of a woman ordered the holy Stephen to be led back and be shut up in prison. Therefore, the holy Father again, with his fellow captives, sang Davidically in the praetorium: *He that dwelleth in the help of the Most High* (Ps. xc, 1), and the rest of the psalm.

In the meantime, the tyrant, having performed that ceremony hateful to God that evening with shouting and the sound of lyres, reclined for a banquet. And having summoned two brothers, born of the same father and the same mother, eminent in dignity, beautiful ^D both in body and soul, and altogether worthy of admiration, whom lately with envious zeal...

^A he had killed. These, I say, he summoned and said: "Go to the praetorium and say these things to Stephen of Auxentius: The Emperor declares this to you: You see how much I care for you, and that after I snatched you from the jaws of death, I granted you your life, so that at least in your final hours you might agree to do what is most pleasing to me. I know well his unyielding and hard-hearted mind, and he will certainly turn to insults against us; but if you can persuade him with persuasive speech, it will be well. But if not, strike him with such lashes, both upon his mouth and upon his back, that when you return from there, he may depart this life miserably." That venerable pair of brothers, having reached the praetorium and come to the saint, delivered to him the words of the Emperor, but they did not harm the saint in the slightest, but rather strengthened him in the orthodox faith. Having kissed his footprints and been fortified by his prayer, they returned to him who had sent them, and said to him: "Emperor, because he remained in his previous opinion and continued to utter anathemas, we struck him with lashes so severely that we left him lying there without a voice. And we believe he will not live until tomorrow." The prideful man, delighted by these words, laughed greatly, and ^B the slave of his belly gave himself over to the gluttony of that Herodian feast.

Now at the morning hours, the saint arose and, having met the group of Fathers, said until daybreak: "Farewell, Fathers and brothers, farewell, and pray for me, so that an evil angel may not be found to meet my spirit because of the multitude of my debts." And as all began to weep not a little, he commanded that the epomis, the analabos, and the lorum be removed from him. But when he also wished to take off his cowl, the Fathers resisted, saying: "Do not do that, Father, O saint. It is right that you be perfected wearing your holy vestments." The saint answered them: "Fathers and brothers, he who wrestles, wrestles naked. I consider it wrong that this holy habit should be held up to mockery by the mob that barks like dogs." Having persuaded the Fathers in these matters, he sat with them, wearing only his leather tunic, and spoke of salvation.

^D The arrogant Emperor, having learned through the night-raven demon what had occurred in the prison regarding the saint and those pious brothers, arose from his sleep at the second hour of the day, and roaring like a lion, leapt into the imperial vestibules and cried out with a violent howl: "O violence! Is there no one to help me? What have I to do with these impious men?" And meeting his gluttons, who were hastening of their own accord to feast, he asked: "Where are you going, and whom do you seek?" They replied to him: "To you, our most excellent master, so that on this feast day, which in honor of the Emperor...

But he again cried out: "I am not the emperor. Your emperor is another, at whose feet you prostrate yourselves and, adoring his footprints, seek your petitions. No one conspires with me to kill him, so that I might obtain quiet in life." But as they doubted and inquired, "Who then, other than you, O master, is emperor on earth?—do not be angry with us"—he replied: "Stephen of Auxentius, the leader of the godless ^B." Hardly had this name been uttered when suddenly one could see, like the crash of thunder, the motion and tumult of those men rushing toward the praetorium. When they had arrived there, they rushed into the prison like fierce beasts and shouted with bloodthirsty voices to the guards: "Give us here Stephen of Auxentius." But that man, distinguished in holiness, fearlessly meeting them, said to those wishing to slaughter him as if he were a sheep: "I am he whom you seek." Immediately, therefore, they threw him to the ground like wild beasts, and, having bound ropes to the chains by which his feet were fettered, they dragged him into the public street, beating his head and entire body with heels, stones, and clubs. ^C But as he was being dragged away in this manner, upon exiting the first gate of the praetorium and reaching the vestibule of the venerable oratory of the holy great martyr Theodore that was situated there, he turned his hands back to the ground, supporting his head a little; and with eyes raised toward heaven, he adored the martyr in a final salutation. When one of those impious men noticed that the holy man was doing this—having become entirely clothed in Satan—he said with a roar: "Look, the godless one desires to die like a martyr." Then he ran to the fire-extinguishing apparatus, which they call siphons, found in that place; and having snatched from one of them a huge piece of wood, which they call an *antion*, he brandished it angrily and ran ahead to the holy man, who was being dragged by the multitude. Striking him upon the head like a dog ^D, he killed him instantly. That executioner bore the name Philomates, who immediately fell down, and, possessed by a demon and seen gnashing his teeth, he was thus tormented by the demon until his own death.

What speech could describe, or what ear could hear, the tortures and intolerable pains that the holy martyr suffered while he was being dragged through the public street? For what member of his was seen to be exempt from martyrdom and the crown during those excessive stonings? Indeed, while he was being dragged along the ground and striking from pavement to pavement, his hands were severed, his fingers with their nails fell off, his ribs were shattered, and his fractured veins stained the ground with an effusion of much blood. Finally, with the connection of his fibers torn apart, all his limbs were laid bare. Moreover, a certain man, with an immense stone...

^B thrown cruelly into his belly, split it into two parts; and from this one could see the whole structure of his viscera, along with his intestines, exposed to the eyes of all, being dragged savagely along the ground. Certainly, there never was any death more grievous than such a one, even among the Gentiles. For even after he had expired, they kept striking the lifeless corpse with stones and clubs. Nor indeed did only men, but even women and boys, having left their schools by order of the tyrant, run with stones. Indeed, if anyone by chance encountered this holocaust offered to God, unless he cast stones at it, he was held guilty as if he were a friend of that man and an enemy to the emperors. ^B Meanwhile, after those who were dragging the holy martyr reached the Place of the Ox, a certain tavern-keeper, who was roasting fish in a frying pan, seeing the saint being dragged along the public way and thinking him to be still alive, seized a brand from the fire and struck the saint’s head; by this very wound he separated and shattered the back part of the head, which they call the hemicranium, and the subtle substance of the brain was poured out upon the ground. A certain religious man, however, by the name of Theodore, who was following behind with concealed intent, pretending to slip and bowing himself down to the ground, took up those holy relics and wrapped them in a shroud, and having hidden them within his own garments, hurried to follow, with the desire of seeing into what place they would cast the holy martyr as food for the dogs. But that wicked mob, while dragging the saint, came to the monastery of Monocionium, where the saint’s sister was living, so that they might force her to stone her brother and martyr with her own hands. But that venerable woman, truly a sister to the saint both by nature and by disposition, having perceived their approach, had enclosed herself in a dark tomb, by which means she eluded their attempt. The impious men, therefore, being frustrated, as they did not find her, dragged the saint from there again and cast him into the pit of the pagans and the condemned, where, in truth, the temple of the holy martyr Pelagius once stood, which the enemy of the saints, the tyrant, found in a ruined state and ^C made into a sepulcher for the condemned, and marked with the title of Pelagius. Then that saying of the prophet appeared clearly: *And he was reckoned with the wicked* (Isa. LIII, 12) the just man. From there those brigands returned to the emperor, as if they had behaved themselves gallantly in some war, and they were received by him most affectionately; sitting with them at a sumptuous table, the tyrant, listening to the manifold death of the saint, disgraced himself by laughing vehemently. ^D

Furthermore, the holy martyr of God, Stephen, died in the fifty-third year of his age, in the month of November, on the twenty-eighth day, on which the element of the letter...

E is celebrated with pomp by those who are worshippers of demons, the Brumalistai. ^A It is not right, therefore, beloved, to consign to silence, even after his death, the wonderful deeds which the God of all things performed for the praise and glory of His servant. For He Himself cries out according to the Scripture: *But those who glorify Me I will glorify, and those who despise Me shall be brought into contempt.*

For while the saint was being dragged to that bitter and merciless death, although the air from the early morning had been very serene and had shone with the sun’s rays until the third hour, suddenly a certain fiery cloud arose around the eastern part of Constantinople toward the summit of the mountain from which the saint had set out. This cloud, having eventually occupied the highest parts of the city, became black throughout the whole atmosphere. Then it was possible to see day, and yet not day, and darkness, and yet not night. Moreover, a violent storm having been stirred up, such a mass of hail was poured out upon the city alone that many were endangered by the powerful force with which it fell, and the green crops of the city were not a little damaged. Meanwhile, the religious people who remained, together with the most faithful women, groaned silently within themselves and strove to render God propitious, that He might allow the very grave danger to cease; and indeed God, who is accustomed to hear the prayer of those who fear Him, did so for the greater ignominy and reproach of the impious emperor, unworthy ^B of the purple.

That religious man, Theodorus, whom I mentioned above, who had collected the broken relics of the head and hidden them in his bosom—he, after the holy martyr was cast away, returned and approached the most holy monastery of our holy father Dius; its superior, in a secret place, he told the whole matter, and whatever had happened concerning the saint on that day. ^C When the abbot heard these things, he mourned not a little, and having given a great groan, he took piously with him Theodorus, brought him into the right-hand oratory of the monastery dedicated to the holy protomartyr Stephen, and, having brought out a small chest, he enclosed the sacred relics of the holy martyr within it, with a certain little boy, a Stephanite of that monastery, also present. When both had venerated these relics, they deposited them inside the altar and the sacred enclosures, keeping the memory of this deed to themselves alone.

But after a short time had passed, the pious man Theodorus was slandered to the emperor ^D by certain enemies of Christ as being a worshipper of images. For which reason that infernal dragon ordered the man to be taken into exile with his wife and children to the island of Sicily, which indeed was carried out without delay. But after the pious man had spent very many years in exile and had been forgotten, I am now about to tell how God, who is a just judge, restored him to his own land through the intercession of the holy martyr Stephen.

^A That aforementioned young man, Stephen, having reached an appropriate age, asked his abbot to allow him to receive the order of deacon. But when the abbot deferred this, because the youth was still young and was very well known to him—having been raised in his hands from a tender age—he, frustrated in his request and having threatened the abbot, stole the reliquary [which contained the relic of the saint] and dashed off to the imperial palace to report the deed to the tyrant. "My abbot, O Emperor," he said, "is adoring the bones of enemies whom you ordered to be put to death, and calls them saints; and as for you, he proclaims you a tyrant and a new Julian, along with Theodore of the Dalmatus, whom you have relegated to Sicily." The tyrant, burning with rage, immediately ordered the abbot to be bound with manacles and shut up in prison, and that Theodore be brought back quickly from Sicily to pay the penalty for his boldness. He ordered the man who had delivered these items to guard the reliquary carefully until both men could be cross-examined in his own sight. Later, when the man had returned and reached the imperial city, the Emperor took the traitor alone, and after instructing him on what was to be done against the just men, he sent him off bearing the reliquary before his face.

^B The next day, when the three of them stood in the tyrant’s sight, the traitor accused the abbot and the pious man Theodore before everyone, and insisted that he would reveal the hour, the day, and the blood-stained cloth accompanying the relic, if they did not confess. When those religious men refused to confess, and feigned that none of the things being said were true, the Emperor shouted at the traitor to bring out the reliquary to convict them—the very one which he had been ordered to hide for this purpose. ^C But it was a wondrous spectacle: in an instant it disappeared, and has not been found to this day. Filled with great shame at this, the wily Emperor, fearing lest such a miracle become manifest to the Byzantines (for he was called and known as a saint by many), relegated that enemy and traitor, after beating him most severely, to a foreign land; but those honorable men, though unwillingly, he restored to their own place, as they praised God in all things, who through his saint had miraculously saved them without danger.

^D It is also not right to pass over in silence what an unhappy and bitter death that wily maidservant died, of whom it was written above, who, taught by the impious, had invented slanders and crimes against her mistress and the holy Stephen, in the hope of obtaining freedom and contracting a marriage with someone from the palace, just as they had covenanted with her. Therefore, when after the triumphant death of her mistress from intolerable beatings, and the martyrdom and consummation of the holy Stephen, she had obtained nothing of what she had been promised...

she set out against the aforementioned Callistus and ^A the tax-collector Aulicalamus with these words: "Unless you fulfill what you promised me, I will proclaim in the midst of the city your frauds and the insults that you have contrived against the saint." Placed in difficulty by these events, they held a council and joined her in marriage to a certain notary of the same tax-collector of Nicomedia. But when the time of delivery arrived, that new viper brought forth two sons. After some time had passed, having been widowed, as she slept alone in the middle of her children, in the middle of the night, driven by some unknown impulse, the infants arose and, seizing the two breasts of their mother, devoured them. And so, when day had broken, the mother was found dead with the children, who were still gripping the bloody flesh of her breasts with their teeth. By this miserable punishment, that deceitful maid and accuser of the saint brought her life to a most wretched end and was cast into eternal torment. And in this, God was not unjust, who, to speak with David, quickly destroys deceitful lips and a boastful tongue; but those who glorify Him, He glorifies even after death.

These are the true histories of this my least work, which I truly collected from those near to the saint, from his acquaintances, kinsmen, associates, companions, and disciples, and also from the fellow-worshippers of the tyrant, who are still alive in this life. But you, O ^C venerable Father, successor of that hill, of that cave, and of that manner of life, most holy Epiphanius, who, having no regard for my ignorance and the slowness of my wit, were the author and encourager to my insignificance to undertake this work—receive, I pray, these few things which I have gathered from the many, without any delay, aided by the power of your prayers, which are most pleasing to God.

What, indeed, shall I say to you, O Father and holy martyr, victor far more excellent than other victors, O Stephen, in reality and in name ^D (which means "crown")? For your martyrdom is above human strength. Since, therefore, the praises of those whose singular deeds are beyond human capacity also exceed human faculty, for this reason, with the obstacles of my poverty broken down in part by your intercession, I illustrate and celebrate your deeds, and offering them to you myself, I adorn with hymns your head, which was crowned by God Himself. But, in truth, while I offer these gifts to you, I seek liberation from the evils by which my unfortunate and sinful soul is weighed down. Therefore, O martyr of God, you who alone have imitated Christ the Lord by suffering for His image and by shedding your blood: O new guardian and intercessor of our race: O exterminator of demons, uprooter of the error of idols, and worshipper of holy images: O physician of the sick and chaser away of all manner of diseases: O you who...

^A O defender of the afflicted, and most tranquil harbor for those in danger amidst the waves: O administrator for the poor, and never-failing consolation of strangers: O guide of those who wander, and support of those who have already believed in orthodoxy: O world-enlightening star, illuminating souls obscured by heresy: O companion of angels, and fellow-dancer of the archangels: O servant of the holy Trinity, and minister of human souls: O prayer offerable to God, acceptable on behalf of those who in true faith receive and glorify your martyrdom: O extinguisher, by God's power, of those who still persist in the heresy of the calumniators of Christians, and who, like a deaf adder, close their ears, refusing to hear or believe in your athletic wrestling matches. And to speak briefly, O you who excel in every good name and every superior action, ornament of ascetics, gathering of holy men, bond and strength of monks, lamp of those who lead, emulation of those under obedience, and fellow-crowned one of martyrs, holy Stephen, ^B receive now the word from me as a true servant of the Word of God; imitate in this, too, Christ, who praised the widow's two mites above the costly offerings of others. Do not turn away the alabaster jar of my words, just as the Master Christ did not turn away the harlot's, even if I do not bring the sweet fragrance through good works. Make your dwelling in my humble soul, as Christ did in the house of Zacchaeus. Perform the tax-collector's duty in examining the devil who has collected taxes from me; draw me up from the abyss, me who have been baptized in passions; bring to life by your prayers me who am dead through transgressions. Lead to Christ him who has been distanced from Him by my sins; mix wine with oil, as a compassionate physician; and heal the infirmities of my sinful body, so that I, the unworthy one, may through you attain both the healing of soul and body. And as in this life, O supremely blessed Stephen, I have become your namesake in the naming of my calling, ^C so may I appear as your fellow-sharer in the placement at the right hand, along with all this orthodox congregation which faithfully celebrates you as a holy martyr with the martyrs, through the maternal intercessions of the all-holy Theotokos and of all the saints, and together with your holy prayers that are acceptable to God, sending up glory in all things to Christ, who has crowned you in accordance with your name, our all-sovereign God, to whom belongs honor and worship with His unoriginate Father and with the life-giving and holy Spirit, now and always and unto the ages of ages. Amen. ^D