Venerable Hilarion the Great (+371–372)

The Venerable Hilarion the Great was born in 291 in the village of Tabatha near the Palestinian city of Gaza. He was sent to Alexandria to study the sciences, where he came close to the Christians and was baptised. When he heard of the angelic life of the Venerable Anthony the Great (commemorated 17 January), the saint hurried to him. Soon Hilarion returned to his homeland, but found his parents dead. He gave away all his property to his relatives and the poor, and settled to labour in the desert near the city of Maiuma. The venerable father struggled unceasingly against the impure thoughts and desires that troubled his mind and inflamed his body, and tried to subdue them by hard work, fasting and prayer. The demons wished to frighten the Lord’s chosen one with phantoms and apparitions: during his prayer he would hear children crying, women sobbing, and lions and other beasts roaring. The blessed one understood that the devils were trying by such terrors to drive him out of the desert, and overcame his fear by earnest prayer.

Once robbers attacked the Venerable Hilarion, but by his grace-filled words he persuaded them to give up their sinful life.

All Palestine came to know of the holy ascetic. The Lord granted him the gift of casting out unclean spirits. The saint healed those afflicted with illnesses of soul and body. The blessed father could tell by which passion this or that person was held. Many came to the Venerable Hilarion wishing to labour under his guidance. Monasteries built with the saint’s blessing multiplied in Palestine, while he himself went from one house to another, strengthening a strict ascetic way of life among the brethren. The saint was the same kind of teacher in his own country as Anthony the Great was in Egypt. Seven years before his death the Venerable Hilarion settled on the island of Cyprus, and laboured there in a desolate place until the Lord called him to Himself (+371–372).