PHILOSOPHUS OF EGYPT

On the last day of spring in the orthodox menologion according to the Julian calendar, the Church honors the memory of the holy martyr Philosophus of Egypt. In the modern calendar, this day corresponds to June 13. The Saint suffered for Christ during the persecution of Emperor Decius (249–251). Unlike previous ones, this persecution was unexpected, systematic and extremely bloody. Very little information has been preserved about the saint. In his work “The Life of Paul the Hermit,” the famous Bible translator and Father of the Church, St. Jerome (347–420) wrote about the martyr.

Narrating about Paul’s youth, Jerome describes the persecution of Christians that broke out in Egypt. “Under the persecutors Decius and Valerian, when Cornelius in Rome and Cyprian in Carthage were condemned to a blessed bloody death, a fierce storm devastated many churches in Egypt and Thebaid.” According to Jerome, the “murderous executions” against Christians were designed in such a way as not only to kill as many believers as possible, but also to expose them to moral destruction through apostasy, sacrifice to idols, or sin that was obvious to the whole society. The pagans accused Christians of atheism and contempt for traditional Roman values.

According to Jerome, the future martyr was brought under guard “into a beautiful garden.” “There, with the sweet murmur of the stream and the quiet noise of tree leaves shaken by the wind,” the confessor was tightly tied to the “downy bed with silken bonds.” “When everyone had gone away, a beautiful harlot came” to seduce him. Jerome was a master of words and a great writer. It is better to simply quote it without retelling it in your own words. “The warrior of Christ did not know what to do and where to turn: lust defeated the one whom torment could not defeat. Finally, inspired from above, he bit off his tongue and spat in the face of the kissing harlot, and thus the excessive force of pain suppressed the feeling of lust.” The ascetic fathers knew very well the movements of passions, they knew human psychology well. They were truthful in their ascetic experience. The Martyr Philosopher, by the power of grace, defeated the strongest sinful attraction in a completely asymmetrical manner. Thus, he not only saved his soul from sin, but also saved many Christians and pagans from the danger of seeing the confessor defeated.

Unlike our times, when purely declarative affiliation with Orthodoxy is considered commendable in itself, for a pagan society, superstitious and cruel, but looking for ideals in philosophy, reputation and the correspondence of words and deeds were of decisive importance. Therefore, the feat of martyrs was a radical act, a powerful gospel of faith. Thus, it becomes clear that the name “Philosopher,” with which the saint is remembered in our monthly book, most likely was not a proper name. “Philosopher,” that is, literally, “Lovers of Wisdom,” was so named in the memory of the Church for his love for the Lord Jesus, true Wisdom, which he loved, overcoming the flesh and forgetting about themselves. “Life is Elsewhere,” as our contemporary Milan Kundera prophetically called one of his novels.

“At a time when such deeds were being committed in the Lower Thebaid, when the storm of persecution thundered,” Paul left his native village. Having learned that his sister’s husband decided to hand him over to the pagans for reasons of self-interest, he went into the desert. He saw firsthand how severe real persecution could be, in the torment of the body and the trials of the soul. Having settled in a cave, where, according to God’s providence, there was a pre-prepared cache of robbers with everything necessary for life, he spent the rest of his life there. He was destined to become the first hermit monk in history, ahead of Anthony the Great himself in this asceticism of bloodless martyrdom. Paul of Thebes (227–341) lived an incredibly long life, in memory of those who, like the Martyr Philosophus, died young in suffering. To this day, there is a great monastery on the site of Paul’s exploits. Such an amazing interweaving of human destinies that created the communion of saints in history of the Church and the World.