Great Lent, day 9 · 40 days until Pascha
Saints commemorated
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Saint of the day
Seven Hieromartyrs of Cherson
The Hieromartyrs of Cherson — Basil, Ephraim, Capiton, Eugene, Aetherius, Agathodorus and Elpidius — were seven bishops who, across the fourth century, carried the Gospel to Cherson (Chersonesus in the Tauric Crimea) and the lands of the northern Black Sea, and most of whom sealed their preaching with their blood. Sent out from Jerusalem in the last age of the pagan persecutions, Basil raised to life the dead son of a leading citizen and was clubbed to death for it; Ephraim was beheaded among the peoples of the Danube; Eugene, Elpidius and Agathodorus were stoned; Aetherius governed the church in the peace won by Constantine; and Capiton, challenged for a sign, walked unharmed into a burning lime-kiln in his vestments and converted the city — a wonder reported to the First Ecumenical Council. They are the seedbed of Crimean Christianity, on the very ground where, six centuries later, Prince Vladimir of Kiev would be baptised and Rus' receive the faith. The Church keeps all seven together on March 7.
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Emilian of Rome
Emilian of Rome — a Roman by birth, called Victorinus in the world — is remembered as a striking icon of repentance in old age. Having lived, the tradition says, a long and sinful life into his later years, he was seized at last by godly sorrow, renounced the world, and entered a monastery, where he took the name Emilian and gave himself to such humble obedience and strict fasting that he became the wonder of the brethren. When the abbot once found him praying in a cave, bathed in a heavenly light, a voice from on high was heard to declare his sins forgiven — a sign, made public for the encouragement of all, of God's mercy toward the repentant sinner. He ended his days in spiritual joy and reposed in peace. He is commemorated on March 7.
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Paul the Confessor of Plousias
Paul the Confessor (died c. 850) was bishop of Plousias, a city of Bithynia in Asia Minor, and a defender of the holy icons in the second iconoclast persecution of the ninth century. His stand for the images, the tradition notes, was grounded above all in Holy Scripture. For it he was harassed, driven from his see, and — together with the confessor Theophylact, bishop of Nicomedia — sent into exile, where he ended his life as a confessor of the faith, never having yielded the veneration of the icons of Christ and the saints. He is commemorated on March 7.
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Paul the Simple
Paul the Simple (†c. 339) was an Egyptian farmer who at about sixty years of age, on discovering his wife's adultery, walked into the desert and asked Anthony the Great to make him a monk. Tested by the great ascetic with a harshness meant to send an old man home, he obeyed everything without a murmur, and his guileless obedience — the "simplicity" of his name — made him within a few years a wonderworker whom Anthony himself held up as the pattern of the monastic beginner, sending to Paul the demoniacs whom he could not himself cure.
British Isles and Ireland
- St. Enodoc (c.520)
- St. Deifer, founder abbot of Bodfari (6th C)
- St. Eosterwine, abbot of Wearmouth (686)
Troparia & kontakia
Troparion — Tone 8 (from the common of a venerable)
With the streams of thy tears thou didst make the barren desert bloom, and with sighs from the depths thou didst bring forth fruit a hundredfold in thy labours; and thou becamest a beacon to the whole world, shining with wonders. O Emilian our venerable father, intercede with Christ God that our souls may be saved.
Troparion — Tone 4
Thy Martyrs, O Lord, in their courageous contest have received from thee, our God, crowns incorruptible; for possessing thy strength, they cast down the tyrants and shattered the feeble insolence of the demons. By their prayers, O Christ our God, save our souls.
Troparion — Tone 4
O God of our Fathers, who dealest ever with us according to thy gentleness, take not thy mercy from us, but by the prayers of thy hierarch Paul guide our life in peace.
Troparion — Tone 8 (from the common of a venerable)
With the streams of thy tears thou didst make the barren desert bloom, and with sighs from the depths thou didst bring forth fruit a hundredfold in thy labours; and thou becamest a beacon to the whole world, shining with wonders. O Paul our venerable father, intercede with Christ God that our souls may be saved.
Readings
6th Hour
Isaiah 5.7-16
7For the vineyard of the LORD of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry. 8Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth! 9In mine ears said the LORD of hosts, Of a truth many houses shall be desolate, even great and fair, without inhabitant. 10Yea, ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and the seed of an homer shall yield an ephah. 11Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them! 12And the harp, and the viol, the tabret, and pipe, and wine, are in their feasts: but they regard not the work of the LORD, neither consider the operation of his hands. 13Therefore my people are gone into captivity, because they have no knowledge: and their honourable men are famished, and their multitude dried up with thirst. 14Therefore hell hath enlarged herself, and opened her mouth without measure: and their glory, and their multitude, and their pomp, and he that rejoiceth, shall descend into it. 15And the mean man shall be brought down, and the mighty man shall be humbled, and the eyes of the lofty shall be humbled: 16But the LORD of hosts shall be exalted in judgment, and God that is holy shall be sanctified in righteousness.
Vespers
Genesis 4.8-15
8And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him. 9And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother’s keeper? 10And he said, What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother’s blood crieth unto me from the ground. 11And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand; 12When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth. 13And Cain said unto the LORD, My punishment is greater than I can bear. 14Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall slay me. 15And the LORD said unto him, Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the LORD set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him.
Proverbs 5.1-15
1My son, attend unto my wisdom, and bow thine ear to my understanding: 2That thou mayest regard discretion, and that thy lips may keep knowledge. 3For the lips of a strange woman drop as an honeycomb, and her mouth is smoother than oil: 4But her end is bitter as wormwood, sharp as a twoedged sword. 5Her feet go down to death; her steps take hold on hell. 6Lest thou shouldest ponder the path of life, her ways are moveable, that thou canst not know them. 7Hear me now therefore, O ye children, and depart not from the words of my mouth. 8Remove thy way far from her, and come not nigh the door of her house: 9Lest thou give thine honour unto others, and thy years unto the cruel: 10Lest strangers be filled with thy wealth; and thy labours be in the house of a stranger; 11And thou mourn at the last, when thy flesh and thy body are consumed, 12And say, How have I hated instruction, and my heart despised reproof; 13And have not obeyed the voice of my teachers, nor inclined mine ear to them that instructed me! 14I was almost in all evil in the midst of the congregation and assembly. 15Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well.