Venerable Martyr Lucian, Presbyter of Antioch (+312)

The Venerable Martyr Lucian, a presbyter of Antioch, was born in the Syrian city of Samosata. He was twelve years old when he was orphaned. After this the blessed one gave away all his property to the poor and went to the city of Edessa, where under the guidance of Macarius the Confessor he diligently studied Holy Scripture and the ascetic life. For his piety, and for his zealous preaching of Christianity among Jews and pagans, Lucian was ordained presbyter. In Antioch he opened a school, gathered many disciples and trained them in the word of God. The saint rendered the Church a special service by correcting the text of Holy Scripture corrupted by copyists and heretics (the complete Greek text of the Bible established by Lucian, which had been walled up during his labours as a confessor, was discovered in the reign of Constantine the Great). When Diocletian (284–305) began the persecution of the Orthodox, the venerable father was seized and sent to the prison of Nicomedia, where he was kept locked up for nine years. Worn out by many kinds of torture and by hunger, the father died there. Before his death, on the feast of the Theophany, the hieromartyr, chained to his bed, celebrated the Divine Liturgy on his own breast, received communion, and gave communion of the Body and Blood of Christ to the Orthodox who were present. The body of the Lord’s chosen one was thrown into the sea, but thirty days later dolphins carried it to the shore. The faithful committed the holy remains to the earth with honour. At first the blessed Lucian was commemorated on the day of his repose, 7 January, but afterwards, because of the Synaxis of John the Baptist, his commemoration was moved to 15 October.