SAINT ANDREW OF CONSTANTINOPLE

Saint Andrew of Constantinople could well be recognized as the true archetype, embodiment, and apotheosis of the holy fool in Christ. It is incredibly irrational that he stands at the origins of the most important theological holiday in honor of the Most Holy Mother of God in the entire Orthodox liturgical calendar. If we try to translate his image into the language of modern mass culture, it becomes clear that Andrew possessed an almost “Rammstein-esque” degree of provocative otherness.

1 The day after the Intercession of the Theotokos, the Russian Church and other Local Orthodox Churches, that celebrate this feast, commemorate St. Andrew of Constantinople. This commemoration serves as a “Synaxis in honor of the saint, which is a special liturgical service usually performed on the second day of major holidays and dedicated to the founder or participant of the sacred celebration. In other words, just as the Synaxis of the Most Holy Mother of God is celebrated the day after Christmas, the Synaxis of John the Baptist is celebrated the day after Epiphany, the commemoration of St. Andrew the Fool for Christ is celebrated the day after the Intercession. Since the Intercession is not one of the twelve great feasts, but a major holiday, this commemoration of St. Andrew is a great exception, evidence of his special veneration in Orthodoxy.

2 The feast in honor of the Protection of the Theotokos is due to the threefold rescue of Constantinople from enemy invasions. All three rescues relate to the main historical dangers that Byzantium faced in the first millennium of Christian history. The first was the Persians. The second was the Arabs. The third was the Slavs. The Persians retreated, and at the beginning of the seventh century, the Persian Empire was defeated by Byzantium. The Arab Caliphate completed the destruction of Persia and soon laid siege to Constantinople. They failed to take the city and retreated. The Slavs were not an empire; they wanted to take it away from the Byzantines. They failed and also retreated from the city.

3 Theotokos was considered the patron saint of Constantinople. The crescent moon and stars were Her apocalyptic symbol, therefore a symbol of the Byzantine capital. This is where the churches with the cross above the crescent moon originated, and, paradoxically, the EU flag: the blue color of Mary in the liturgy and her stars. In Byzantium, Mary was not the mother of sorrow, as in the West, but the supreme commander of the armies of the Empire.

4 Let us recall that the Great Canon of Andrew of Crete calls Constantinople “Your City,” that is, the city of Mary, and the kontakion of the Akathist Hymn to the Theotokos literally calls her “Military General”!

5 It is theology, history, and politics all at once. But the mystical Orthodox Byzantine tradition linked the emergence of the Feast of the Protection of the Theotokos with Saint Andrew the Fool for Christ. He is the most apocalyptic, prophetic, and asymmetrical saint of the Byzantine history. We don’t even know when he lived. But the memory of him is extremely significant and enormous. Tradition says that it was he who, at the moment of the enemy siege, saw Theotokos and her Protection over Constantinople.

6 In ancient Russia, little was known about these circumstances. The Life of Andrew said that he was originally a slave. Slavery would have prevented him from living only for God. Therefore, he pretended to be insane, and his master simply drove him away. The similarity between the Latin words for “slave” and “Slav” to the ancient Russian ear turned Andrew into a Slav by origin. Thus, the Protection became a “Russian holiday.” Even the service of the Protection in our liturgical books is initially written in ancient Russia in ancient time. This holiday did not survive in Byzantium. Perhaps it never existed there.