Holy Martyr Sozon (+c. 304)

The holy Martyr Sozon was a shepherd of Lycaonia. He diligently read Holy Scripture, and afterwards shared the knowledge he had gained with the shepherds gathered around him. Once, at night, as Sozon sat at the foot of an oak, the Lord called him to the labour of martyrdom by a miraculous revelation.

The lamb of Christ went to the Cilician city of Pompeiopolis, where at that time they were preparing for the feast of a pagan idol; he slipped into the temple, cut off the hand of the golden statue of the false god, broke it into pieces and gave them to the poor. The disappearance of the idol’s hand caused unrest and alarm in the city; suspects were arrested, taken for interrogation and tortured. Sozon did not wish to be the cause of the sufferings of the innocent; he appeared of his own accord before the Emperor Maximian (284–305; 307–310) and declared that it was he who had cut off the idol’s hand: “I wished to be convinced of the powerlessness of your god, and indeed, it offered me no resistance. Would that I had smashed it entirely, so that the people might stop worshipping their own handiwork.” The enraged emperor ordered the valiant confessor to be cruelly tortured. Saint Sozon commended his soul to the Lord in terrible torment (+c. 304). By the emperor’s order the servants lit a great pyre to burn the martyr’s body, but a sudden rain put out the fire. At night the Christians secretly carried away the martyr’s body and committed it to the earth with honour.