ANASTASIA THE PATRICIAN

“Anastasia” literally translates from Greek as “resurrection” and is one of the few names that is distinctly Christian in origin. This explains the significant number of saints named Anastasia or Anastasios—since the name exists in both masculine and feminine forms—in the Orthodox calendar of saints. The Life of Saint Anastasia the Patrician—or, in the Greek or Church Slavonic version, Anastasia Patrikia—is one of the most historically accurate and instructive monastic biographies.

The Early Church and Orthodox calendars commemorate three of the most revered saints bearing this name. These include Anastasia of Rome, or Anastasia the Elder, who suffered for Christ in the mid-third century and was a virgin consecrated to God. Her feast day is November 12. Anastasia the Pharmakolytria or Anastasia the Younger, or Anastasia of Sirmium, or the Great Martyr Anastasia, was a married woman who helped prisoners in the name of Jesus. She suffered during the Great Persecution of Diocletian in the early fourth century. The feast day of Anastasia the Pharmakolytria is celebrated on January 4. Finally, the third great Anastasia among the ancient Orthodox saints is Anastasia the Patrician, or Anastasia Patrikia. Her feast day is March 23 (10), the day after the feast of the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste.

Anastasia the Patrician was born around 510 and passed away around 576. “Because of your love of God you forsook a bed for rest, O Mother Anastasia, you illumined your soul with fasting, thoroughly vanquishing your enemies, but by your intercessions destroy the evil designs of our adversaries,” says the troparion to the saints, which is sung at the second voice. Unlike the first two ancient Anastasias, martyrs of the Early Church, Anastasia Patricia—or Anastasia of Alexandria—is glorified as a saint ascetic. Her life is intertwined both with the history of the Byzantine court of Constantinople under Justinian the Great (482–565) and with the life of one of the last ancient Orthodox Egyptian saints, Daniel of Sketis the Younger (c. 576), which is titled: “The Life of Abba Daniel and the Saints He Knew.”

According to one account of her life, Anastasia was the wife of a high-ranking official at the court of Emperor Justinian; according to another, she was a lady-in-waiting to Empress Theodora (500–548). Pursued by the excessive attention of the former and the unwarranted jealousy of the latter, she withdrew to Alexandria, where, in the vicinity of one of the monastic centers, five miles from the capital—which in Greek was called “Pempton”—she began to live a monastic life. A monastery soon arose on this site, which went down in history bearing her name: “Patricia’s Monastery”. In 548, Theodora, still relatively young, passed away, which led Anastasia to fear that Justinian would seek her return to Constantinople. Whether these fears were well-founded, we do not know. In any case, she left the monastery and withdrew to the Skete Desert to the then-famous ascetic Daniel the Younger of Skete, who sent her 27 kilometers away so that she could live there in asceticism disguised as a male monk. Daniel himself secretly visited her once a week and also instructed one of the brothers to bring her water. In 576, 28 years after her arrival at the Skete, Anastasia sent Daniel an ostracon—a fragment of ceramic or roof tile —with the inscription: “Bring spades and come here.” In this way, she indicated her imminent passing and her desire to receive Communion as a final blessing. Daniel arrived accompanied by a disciple, administered Holy Communion to the ascetic, witnessed her final moments, listened to her last words, and then buried her. Afterward, he revealed to his disciple the secret that a female ascetic had been hiding in the guise of a monk. Just as in the two stages of her life—the royal and the monastic—something ascetically heroic and sincerely tragic is revealed in the image of her holiness. Unlike the other two great saints named Anastasia—Anastasia of Rome and Anastasia of Sirmium—Anastasia was not killed for her faith in Christ, yet she became a true martyr, for she suffered at the hands of injustice and human intrigue.