By Fr. George Dorbarakis
Our Venerable Father Euthymios the Great lived in the time of the reign of Gratian, in Melitene, the metropolis of Armenia, and he was born of noble parents, Paul and Dionysia, like the great John the Forerunner — that is, from a barren and childless womb. For this reason he received the name Euthymios (‘Joyful’), according to the promise of God, when a voice was heard from heaven telling his parents to rejoice, as they were praying that God would grant them a child. After the death of his father, he was led by his mother to Eutroios, the great Bishop of Melitene, who enrolled him among the ranks of the clergy. Because he showed great progress in sacred learning and surpassed all his peers in asceticism and achievements in virtue, he was compelled to receive ordination to the priesthood and to accept responsibility for the holy hermitages and monasteries.
In the twenty-ninth year of his life, he arrived in Jerusalem and went to live with the Venerable Theoktistos in one of the caves of a mountain, where he freed many from grievous illnesses. It is said that he too, in the name of the Lord, fed four hundred people from very few small loaves, who were on their way to the monastery to meet him. Not only was he himself born by the power of God, loosening the barrenness of his mother, but he also made other barren women fruitful and able to bear children through his prayers. And like the great Prophet Elijah, he opened the gates of heaven and healed the land that was suffering from the barrenness of drought. The inner radiance of the Saint was revealed by the pillar of fire which those present saw descend from heaven when he was celebrating the bloodless sacrifice, remaining with him until the time of the sacrifice was completed. A sure sign of the complete purity of his heart and his chastity is the fact that the Saint perceived spiritually the disposition of those who approached to partake of Holy Communion — who among them came with a pure conscience and who with a defiled one. This blessed man, when he reached the age of ninety-seven, departed to the Lord during the reign of Leo the Great.
Saint Euthymios was comely in appearance, simple in manner, fair in complexion, well-proportioned and modest in stature, with white hair and a beard reaching to his thighs. It is also said of him that when a monk was about to depart this life — one who was thought by many to be sober-minded and self-controlled, but in fact was not, being instead licentious — the blessed Euthymios saw an angel wrench the man’s soul away with a trident and heard a voice revealing the monk’s hidden shame.
The first thing highlighted by the hymnography of Venerable Euthymios the Great — composed by two great hymnographers, Saint John of Damascus and Saint Theophanes — is his comparison with the Prophets Jeremiah, Samuel, and Saint John the Forerunner. This is because they too, like the Saint, were fruits of prayer and were sanctified from their mothers’ wombs. This signifies that God wished in this way to reveal the special grace they all possessed and their saving presence for many people through the guidance they provided toward finding God. As one of his hymns notes:
“Though yourself the fruit of barrenness, you appeared truly fruitful, for from your spiritual seed the desert that was once impassable has been filled with monks.”
“From the womb God sanctified you, venerable Father, like Jeremiah of old and Samuel, O God-bearer.”
“As of old a divine angel announced from a barren womb the birth of the Forerunner, so too did he proclaim your birth.”
The hymns of the Church focus especially on Saint John the Forerunner, whose life Venerable Euthymios sought to imitate. His imitation lay, on the one hand, in his sanctified way of life, to such an extent that he is called an “imprint,” an image of the Forerunner — “You became his living image, Euthymios, a baptizer nurtured in the mountains, without possessions, without a dwelling, shining with every gift.” On the other hand, he himself became a different kind of Baptist, regenerating people through his Orthodox teaching in the spiritual baptism of the Church, the baptism of adoption: “You refashioned them as sons of God through the baptism of adoption; for having imitated the life of the divine Forerunner, you were revealed as a Baptist, Euthymios.”
If one wished to characterize the life of Saint Euthymios in a single phrase, it would be what the Holy Hymnographer states: “Father Euthymios, your life is unsurpassed; your faith is truly Orthodox.” Orthodox faith, a life sanctified to the highest degree, orthodoxy and orthopraxy — this is the rule of life for every believer, or rather, for every person who has resolved to worship God in a perfect manner. “Your angelic life became a rule of virtue and a most exact pattern for those who choose to worship God in perfection.” It is therefore not by chance that Saint Theophanes the Hymnographer compares him, among others, to the Prophet Moses: just as Moses, by the God-given rod, split the Red Sea so that the Israelites might pass through to the promised land, so too the Saint, becoming an imitator of his virtue, rent the sea of the passions and passed unhindered into the promised land, the Kingdom of God.
The Hymnographers help us further by showing which virtues Venerable Euthymios practiced, by which he overcame the passions and, by the grace of God, gained His Kingdom. First of all, he longed for the Kingdom of God; then he clothed himself with humility, followed self-control, and pursued righteousness. Thus he was able to detach himself from the allure of this present life, for he shifted the center of his life to what abides and is eternal, out of love for the Lord. There is no other path for any human being. As long as we suppose that life is found in this present world, there is no possibility of truly living the life that is life indeed — the Lord and His grace.
“You despised the things of this life, Father Euthymios, because you longed for the heavenly citizenship; you abhorred wealth, having clothed yourself with humility; you hated pleasure and embraced self-control; you cast away injustice and pursued righteousness.”
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
