Sainte Théodosie
Martyre
à Césarée de Palestine (✝ 307)
ou Théodora.
Originaire de Tyr, elle aidait les prisonniers qui avaient confessé le Nom du
Christ et attendaient enchaînés de comparaître devant le tribunal. Elle fut
arrêtée à son tour, torturée puis jetée à la mer. Tous ceux qu'elle avait
soutenus furent condamnés aux implacables mines de cuivre de Phaeno, un long et
douloureux martyre.
À Césarée de Palestine, en 307, la passion de sainte Théodora, vierge de
Tyr. Pendant la même persécution, elle salua publiquement les confesseurs de la
foi debout devant le tribunal et les pria de se souvenir d’elle devant le
Seigneur. Les soldats l’arrêtèrent et la menèrent devant le préfet Urbain. Sur
son ordre, elle eut le corps déchiré, puis fut jetée à la mer.
Martyrologe
romain
Ste Théodosie, vierge, martyre à Tyr
Cette sainte naquit à Tyr. On dit d'elle qu'un jour ayant rencontré des
Chrétiens enchaînés qu'on menait au supplice, elle s'approcha d'eux et les pria
de se souvenir d'elle, quand ils seraient devant le Seigneur. Trahie par cette
démarche elle fut amenée devant le juge et après avoir supportée vaillamment
les tortures, elle fut jetée à la mer sous le règne de Maximin (307). C'est le
jour de la Sainte Théodosie, que les Turcs en 1453 ont pénétré en
Constantinople et que le dernier empereur Constantin XI périt dans le combat.
SOURCE : http://fr.ecumenicalcalendar.org.ua/2011/11/29/apostle/ste-theodosie-vierge-martyre-a-tyr
Overheard by the officials, she was seized, tortured on the rack, flayed, hanged by the hair, and pierced with nails. She endured all this cheerfully. Nothing could shake her inmost calm. To the judge she sweetly said: "By your torture you procure for me that great happiness which it was my grief to see deferred. I rejoice to see myself called to this crown, and return hearty thanks to God for vouchsafing me such a favor." Enraged that she could not disturb her, the governor finally ordered her to be cast into the sea. The other confessors he condemned to work the mines in Palestine.
Saint Theodosia is honored in both the East and the West, but she is particularly venerated in Venice, Italy. The historian Eusebius, an eyewitness, records her martyrdom in his History of the Martyrs of Palestine, c. 7 (Benedictines, Husenbeth).
Saint Theodosia is portrayed in art as a maiden holding a stone. She may also be shown (1) being thrown into water with a stone around her neck; (2) as the angel brings her ashore; or (3) nailed through her feet to a cypress tree and hanged by her hair (Roeder).
SOURCE : http://www.saintpatrickdc.org/ss/0402.shtml
Saint Theodosia of Tyre lived during the third and fourth centuries. Once, during a persecution against Christians, which had already lasted for five years, the seventeen-year-old Theodosia went up to condemned Christian prisoners in the Praetorium in Caesarea, Palestine. It was the day of Holy Pascha, and the martyrs spoke about the Kingdom of God. St Theodosia asked them to remember her before the Lord, when they should come to stand before Him.
heodosia of Tyre VM (RM)
Born in Tyre; died in Caesarea, Palestine, in 308. At age 18, the consecrated virgin, Saint Theodosia, travelled to Caesarea in Palestine, where she saw some Christian martyrs on their way to execution on Easter Sunday. She congratulated them on their happiness, asked them to pray for her, and exhorted them to patience and perseverance.
Overheard by the officials, she was seized, tortured on the rack, flayed, hanged by the hair, and pierced with nails. She endured all this cheerfully. Nothing could shake her inmost calm. To the judge she sweetly said: "By your torture you procure for me that great happiness which it was my grief to see deferred. I rejoice to see myself called to this crown, and return hearty thanks to God for vouchsafing me such a favor." Enraged that she could not disturb her, the governor finally ordered her to be cast into the sea. The other confessors he condemned to work the mines in Palestine.
Saint Theodosia is honored in both the East and the West, but she is particularly venerated in Venice, Italy. The historian Eusebius, an eyewitness, records her martyrdom in his History of the Martyrs of Palestine, c. 7 (Benedictines, Husenbeth).
Saint Theodosia is portrayed in art as a maiden holding a stone. She may also be shown (1) being thrown into water with a stone around her neck; (2) as the angel brings her ashore; or (3) nailed through her feet to a cypress tree and hanged by her hair (Roeder).
April 2
St. Theodosia, Virgin and Martyr
SHE was a native of Tyre. Having been educated in the Christian faith, she had, by vow, consecrated her virginity to God. She was not eighteen years of age when, in 308, being at Cæsarea, and beholding there the cruelties exercised by the barbarous governor upon the servants of God, her zeal prompted her to address the confessors who stood bound in the square before the governor’s court to be interrogated. She congratulated them on their happiness, and besought them to remember her in their prayers when they should be with God, and earnestly exhorted them to patience and perseverance. The guards apprehended her as if guilty of a crime on account of this action, and presented her to the governor, who for three years and a half had sought in vain, by every invention of cruelty, to extirpate the Christian name out of his province; but finding the blood of martyrs to be a seed which served to further the propagation of Christianity, he was no longer master of his fury. Seeing the undaunted air with which this tender virgin appeared before him, he took it for an insult of his power, and caused her to be stretched on the rack in the most cruel manner; and her sides and breasts to be torn with iron hooks and pincers, and at length her breasts to be cut off with the utmost barbarity. Nothing could draw from her the least complaint or sigh: but she suffered these tortures with an amiable cheerfulness painted on her face, and sweetly said to the judge: “By your cruelty you procure me that great happiness which it was my grief to see deferred. I rejoice to see myself called to this crown, and return hearty thanks to God for vouchsafing me such a favour.” She was yet alive when the governor, finding it impossible to add to his cruelty, ordered her to be thrown into the sea. The other confessors he condemned to the mines in Palestine; but was himself shortly after beheaded by his master for his crimes. St. Theodosia received her crown on the 2nd of April, on which day her name occurs in the Roman, Greek, Russian, and other calendars. Her memory is honoured with particular devotion at Venice, and in many other places. Concerning her martyrdom, see Eusebius, an eye-witness, in his History of the martyrs of Palestine, c. 7. and her Acts published from the Chaldaic by Assemani, t. 2, p. 204. 1
Rev. Alban Butler (1711–73). Volume IV: April. The Lives of the Saints. 1866.
Virginmartyr Theodosia of Tyre
Soldiers saw that the maiden bowed to the prisoners, and they seized her and led her before the governor, Urban. The governor advised the maiden to offer sacrifice to the idols but she refused, confessing her faith in Christ. Then they subjected the saint to cruel tortures, raking her body with iron claws until her bones were exposed.
The martyr was silent and endured the sufferings with a happy face, and to a second suggestion by the governor to offer sacrifice to the idols she answered, “You fool, I have been granted to join the martyrs!” They threw the maiden with a stone about her neck into the sea, but angels drew her out from the depths. Then they threw the martyr to the wild beasts to be eaten by them. Seeing that the beasts would not touch her, they cut off her head.
By night St Theodosia appeared to her parents, who had tried to talk their daughter into not going to the sufferings. She was in bright garb with a crown upon her head and a luminous gold cross in her hand, and she said, “Behold the great glory of which you wanted to deprive me!”
The Holy Martyr Theodosia of Tyre suffered for Christ in the year 307 or 308. On May 29 we commemorate the transfer of her relics to Constantinople and Venice. She is also commemorated on April 3.
THE CONFESSION OF THEODOSIA, A VIRGIN OF GOD,
IN THE FIFTH YEAR OF THE PERSECUTION WHICH TOOK PLACE IN OUR DAYS.
THE persecution
in our days had been prolonged to the fifth year. And it was the month Nisan,
and the second day of the same month, when a godly virgin, and holy in all
things, one of the virgins of the Son of God in the city of Tyre, who was not
yet eighteen years old, out of pure love for those, who on account of their
confession of God were set before the tribunal of the governor, [p. 24] drew
near and saluted them, and entreated them to remember her in their prayers: and
because of these words which she had spoken to them, the wicked men were filled
with anger, as if she had been doing something unjust and improper; and the
officers seized her forthwith, and took her before the governor Urbanus, for he
still held the power in Palestine. And I know not what happened to him, but
immediately, like one much excited by this young woman, he was filled with rage
and fury against her, and commanded the girl to offer sacrifice: and because he
found, that although she was but a girl, she withstood the imperial orders like
a heroine, then did this savage governor the more inflict tortures on her sides
and on her breast with the cruel combs; and she was torn on the ribs until her
bowels were seen. And because this girl had endured this severe punishment and
the combs without a word, and still survived, he again commanded her to offer
sacrifice. She then raised her lips and opened her eyes, and looking around
with a joyful countenance in that time of her suffering, (for she was charming
in beauty and in the appearance of her figure), with a loud voice she addressed
the governor: Why, oh man, dost thou deceive thyself, and not perceive that I
have found the thing which I prayed to obtain at thy hands? for I rejoice
greatly in having been deemed worthy to be admitted to the participation of the
sufferings of God's martyrs: for indeed, for this very cause, I stood up and |23 spake with them, in
order that by some means or other they might make me a sharer in their
sufferings, so that I also might obtain a portion in the kingdom of heaven
together with them, because so long as I had no share in their sufferings, I
could not be a partaker with them in their salvation. Behold therefore now,
how, on account of the future recompense, I stand at present before thee with
great exultation, because I have obtained the means of drawing near to my God,
even before those just men, whom but a little while ago I entreated to
intercede for me. Then that wicked judge [p. 25], seeing that he became a
laughingstock, and that his haughty threats were manifestly humbled before all
those who were standing in his presence, did not venture to assail the girl
again with great tortures like the former, but condemned her by the sentence
which he passed to be thrown into the depths of the sea.
And when he
passed on from the condemnation of this pure girl, he proceeded to the rest of
those confessors, on whose account this blessed maiden had been called to this
grace, and they were all delivered over to the copper mines in Palestine,
without his saying a word to them, or inflicting upon them any sufferings or
torture; for this holy girl prevented all those confessors by her courageous
conduct against error, and received in her own body, as it were on a shield,
all the inflictions and tortures which were intended for them, having rebuked
in her own person the enemy that opposed them; and subdued by her valour and
patience the furious and cruel judge, and rendered that fierce governor like a
coward with respect to the other confessors. It was on the first day of the
week that these confessors were condemned in Caesarea; and in the month above
written and in the year noted by us was this act accomplished.
St. Theodosia of
Tyre, Virgin Martyr
Commemorated on April
3
During the persecution
against Christians, which had already lasted for five years, seventeen-year-old
Theodosia visited the condemned Christian prisoners in the Praetorium in
Caesarea, Palestine. It was the day of Holy Pascha, and the martyrs spoke of the
Kingdom of God. St. Theodosia asked them to remember her before the Lord, when
they should come to stand before Him.
Soldiers seized her and led
her before the governor Urban after seeing the maiden bow to the prisoners. The
governor ordered that she offer sacrifice to the idols but she refused,
confessing her faith in Christ. They then subjected the saint to cruel
tortures, raking her body with iron claws until her bones were exposed.
The martyr was silent and
endured her sufferings with a happy face. When the governor ordered her again
to offer sacrifice to the idols she answered, “You fool! I have been granted to
join the martyrs!” They threw the maiden with a stone about her neck into the
sea, but angels rescued her. They then threw her to the wild beasts to be
eaten. Seeing that the beasts would not touch her, they cut off her head.
That night St. Theodosia
appeared to her parents, who had tried to talk their daughter out of her
intention to suffer for Christ. In a bright garb with a crown upon her head and
a luminous gold cross in her hand, she said, “Behold the great glory of which
you wanted to deprive me!”
The Holy Martyr Theodosia
of Tyre suffered in the year 307. She is also commemorated on May 29 (the
transfer of her relics to Constantinople, and later to Venice).
By permission of the
Orthodox Church in America (www.oca.org)
SOURCE : http://www.antiochian.org/node/18210
