Lazarus of Mount Galesius
Our Venerable Father Lazarus the Wonderworker, who struggled on Mount Galesion
Venerable · Wonderworker · b. c. 981 — d. 1053
Commemorated 17 July, 7 November — Repose on Mount Galesion
Lazarus the Wonderworker (c. 981–1053) was a Byzantine monk and stylite who became the great ascetic of Mount Galesion, a barren height north of Ephesus. Born in Lydia, he was formed for a decade in the monastery of Saint Sabbas in Palestine and ordained priest by the Patriarch of Jerusalem before returning to Asia Minor, where a vision of a fiery pillar ringed with singing angels drew him to Galesion. There he built a church of the Resurrection, took up the life of the pillar in imitation of the earlier stylites, and gathered a monastery about his column. Renowned for miracles in life and after his repose, he is commemorated on November 7 and July 17.
Origins and early life
Lazarus was born about the year 981 in Lydia, in the city of Magnesia (the Magnesia on the Maeander, in western Asia Minor). An educated youth who loved God, he was drawn early to the monastic life and made his way to Palestine, where he entered the great Lavra of Saint Sabbas in the Judaean desert — the fountainhead of Palestinian cenobitic and hesychast piety. There he remained about ten years, winning the love and respect of the brotherhood by the intensity of his ascetic labours, and there he was ordained to the priesthood by the Patriarch of Jerusalem.
Ascetic struggle
Returning to his own country, Lazarus settled near Ephesus on the desolate Mount Galesion (Galesios). On the mountain he was granted a vision: a pillar of fire rising to heaven, encircled by angels who sang the paschal verse, "Let God arise, and let His enemies be scattered." On the spot where he had seen it he built a church in honour of the Resurrection of Christ and embraced the ascesis of the stylites, mounting a pillar to pray between earth and heaven as Symeon and Daniel had done centuries before. Monks gathered to him, hungry for the nourishment of his God-inspired word and the example of his life, and a monastery grew up around the column; in time Galesion became a lavra of several communities, for which Lazarus gave a rule. He was thus, at the close of the first Christian millennium, one of the last great representatives of a form of asceticism already ancient — the pillar-saint — and its foremost exponent on Byzantine soil in his age.
Repose
Having received a revelation of the day of his death, Lazarus announced it to the brethren; but at the tearful prayers of the whole community the Lord is said to have lengthened his life by a further fifteen years. He reposed at the age of seventy-two, in the year 1053, and the monks buried his body at the foot of the pillar on which he had struggled. Many miracles followed at his tomb, and he was glorified as a wonderworker.
Hymnographic and literary legacy
Lazarus is the subject of a substantial Greek Life written by his disciple Gregory the Cellarer (Gregorios Kellarites) not long after his death — one of the fuller monastic biographies of the middle Byzantine period, and the primary source for his career and for the history of the Galesion communities. The monastery he founded remained an important centre through the later Byzantine centuries.
Feast and commemoration
November 7 (church date; Old Calendar civil November 20) is his principal feast, the day of his repose, kept universally in the Byzantine rite; a second commemoration falls on July 17. The Greek Menaion for November 7 combines his service with that of the 33 Martyrs of Melitene, appointing him proper stichera, a kontakion, and an oikos.
Hymns
Troparion — Tone 8
With vigilant prayers and with flowing streams of tears thou didst bedew thy pillar, and from the depths, with thy sighing, thou didst bear fruit a hundredfold; thou becamest a shepherd, granting pardon unto all, O our venerable Father Lazarus. Intercede with Christ God, that our souls may be saved.
Original translation from the Slavonic
Kontakion — Tone 8
Thy toils and thy struggles surpassing nature, O wise one, the very Angels beheld and were amazed, and through them thou didst receive the crowns from God. Wherefore, as thou hast boldness before the Lord, save us from every kind of adversity, that we may cry to thee: Rejoice, O Father, our Shepherd.
Original translation from the Greek
Iconography
Lazarus is depicted in the settled type of the stylite saint: an aged monk in the monastic habit, sometimes in the great schema, shown from the waist up emerging from the capital of his pillar, his right hand raised in blessing or holding a scroll, and often a ladder set against the column — the same formula by which Symeon the Stylite is shown, distinguished only by the inscription of his name and, where the setting is given, the mountain of Galesion behind. No early panel or fresco of him has been secured for this collection in a verified, freely usable reproduction; the entry is marked for an icon.
Disputed questions
- Dates of birth and repose. The hagiographic tradition followed here (repose in 1053 at the age of seventy-two) implies a birth about 981. Some reference works give the birth as c. 967 and the repose as 8 November 1054; the year of death is variously reported, and the calendars keep the memory on November 7 regardless.
- Not to be confused with two other saints named Lazarus: Lazarus of the Four Days, the friend of Christ raised from the tomb and later bishop of Kition (commemorated on Lazarus Saturday and October 17); and Lazarus the Iconographer (the "Zographos"), the ninth-century confessor and painter who suffered under the iconoclast emperor Theophilus (November 17). This Lazarus is the eleventh-century stylite of Mount Galesion.