By Fr. George Dorbarakis
It is not by chance that, while all the saints are saints precisely because they were people of God, the only one who remained in history with this specific appellation is Saint Alexios, the Man of God. The remark of the Holy Hymnographer Joseph is clear: “You alone on earth were called the Man of God” (verse of the Synaxarion). The explanation he gives is convincing: First, because “we have known you to be a man of God not only from your calling but also from your deeds” (sticheron of Vespers). The life of Saint Alexios, according to the Hymnographer, was a continual confirmation of his obedience to the will of God, an embracing of immeasurable poverty, of the narrow and sorrowful way to which the Lord called every believer. For this reason he was filled with virtues, while he was given by God the gift of wonderworking. “You passed along a most narrow way, because from your youth you followed a blameless and holy life” (Ode 1).
That upon which the Hymnographer Joseph insists — because beyond its exceptional difficulty it was also the principal element that led Alexios to sanctity — was the fact that, being a nobleman’s son, with all the glory and riches of his family, he not only despised them, but also endured patiently the dishonor of exile in front of his own house. We know that exile, as a virtue practiced by many of our saints, is indeed very difficult, since one is forced to struggle against what is most natural springing from human existence: the need for acceptance and recognition, the need for love from others or at least not to be despised; but in Saint Alexios (and in certain other saints, it is true) this virtue “took flight,” as it is commonly said, since he practiced it in his very own house. To be in your own home, to know that everything is yours, to have the power of authority over others, and yet to remain hidden and unknown, accepting mockery even from the servants — this surpasses natural life and moves on the charismatic level of what is beyond nature. It reveals the wealth of humility and the violence against human passions of which the Lord spoke, therefore the entrance from this life into the Kingdom of God.
“The Kingdom of God suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.”
“God gives grace to the humble.”
“You put to death the mind of your flesh when you saw your parents. And as they did not recognize you, you endured the violence of nature and the contempt and scorn of your countless servants who afflicted you” (Ode 7).
“A great wonder! How you remained poor, O Alexios, amid the wealth of boundless humility” (Ode 7).
And it was not only the violence he exercised upon himself from the ignorance of his parents, but also the violence and iron resolve that he displayed as he saw and heard the bitter lamentations both of them and of his own wife!
“What a great wonder! How like a diamond you remained at the gates of your parents all the years, without bending, exercising violence upon your nature, from the bitter lamentations of your parents and of your wife, O Alexios” (Exapostilarion of Matins).
In essence — and this is the second point of the Hymnographer’s explanation — Saint Alexios lived precisely the life of Christ. The humility of Christ, the Son of God who “emptied Himself,” emptied Himself of the riches of His divinity in order to become a simple man, undergoing the most dreadful things from His own creatures — this is what the Hymnographer reads as he observes the supernatural life of Alexios as well.
“You left the worldly tumults and the burden of wealth and became a stranger from your homeland, Father Alexios, imitating the poverty of Christ” (Ode 3).
An imitator of Christ is Saint Alexios; therefore, he is the definition of the genuine Christian. “A Christian is an imitator of Christ, as far as is possible for a human being” (Saint John of the Ladder). And even more: Saint Joseph, seeing the entire course of the Saint together with his end, feels that he also “mirrors” in this respect the whole course of Christ. He, being God, descends, lives, suffers, and ascends in glory. Saint Alexios, being rich, abandons everything, passes through a life of humility and constriction, suffers, and in the end is revealed in glory by the Lord Himself.
“You were an ornament by your sacred way of life, O glorious one; therefore Christ again gives you to your homeland against your will, while you avoided temporary glory” (Ode 6).
“The Lord with a great voice reveals you to all Rome, you who were the hidden treasure found in the form of a beggar” (Ode 8).
In the whole sanctified course of Alexios, the Hymnographer Joseph points out its basic motive. What was it that made Alexios proceed to these “paradoxical” actions, as they are considered, like the Apostle Paul who declared, “I count all things as refuse that I may gain Christ”? Two things chiefly, says Joseph: first, the divine love that continually stirred his heart, making him desire only the heavenly wealth (Ode 4); second, his deep love for the Mother of the Lord, the Most Holy Theotokos. The Panagia was the delight of the Saint, since he always wished to sit in her temple, a fact which drew her love toward him, culminating in his being revealed by her and in his glory within his hiding place.
“Seeking to make your heart a temple of God, you loved, O glorious one, always to sit in the house of the Mother of God and to behold the heavenly beauties” (Ode 4).
“You who became a living temple of God, the dwelling-place of God, the Ever-Virgin Lady, reveals you while you were hidden, and glorifies you while you sought to remain unknown” (Ode 6).
For this reason, finally, the Holy Hymnographer considers, beyond what we have said, that Saint Alexios “attained” the heavenly things: because he lived the bodiless life of the angels of God and because through his sufferings he proved himself a second Lazarus of the well-known parable of the Lord.
“You were shown to imitate on earth the bodiless way of life” (Ode 5).
“You endured poverty, having become a beggar, like the poor Lazarus” (Ode 4).
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
