By Fr. George Dorbarakis
1. Saint Cyprian was from Antioch of Syria, during the reign of the emperor Decius. He was noble and wealthy, a philosopher and a great magician. But he was led to the faith of Christ by Justina, a virgin and Christian, who was also from Antioch and who dissolved like a spider’s web all his demonic efforts against her. For a certain pagan named Aglaias, having fallen in love with her because of her beauty and being unable to achieve his purpose, went to Cyprian. But when he sent demons against the girl three times without accomplishing anything, he realized that his art was powerless. Therefore, he converted to the faith of Christ, was baptized, and burned all his magical books. Finally, he also became a bishop of the Church. And after leading many to Christianity, he was arrested together with Justina by the Count of Damascus, and they endured cruel tortures: their sides were flayed, they were placed in an iron pan, and finally, after being sent to Nicomedia, they were beheaded.
2. From the nadir to the zenith, from the lowest depth to the highest height, would be the title of Saint Cyprian’s life, if we wanted to characterize it in a single phrase, as the Church’s service also guides us to do: “You descended to the deepest depths of wickedness; yet again, O Father, you ascended wondrously to the height of the highest virtue.” The reason for this is that the Saint, from the madness and frenzy of magic — that is, from his complete submission to the wicked devil — came to dwell with the highest spiritual angelic powers. “Having come to your senses, O God-proclaiming one, from your former madness, you utterly triumphed over demonic deception and soul-destroying delusion.” There is something analogous in his life to what we also see in the life of the Holy Apostle Paul: he too, having been a persecutor of Christianity, and indeed the worst of all, came to serve the Lord Jesus, to such an extent that he is characterized as the greatest of the Apostles. Therefore, it is not by chance that our Church calls Saint Cyprian “a companion of Paul and a sharer in his works.”
We characterize the magic that Saint Cyprian practiced before converting to the faith of Christ as madness and frenzy. For how else can the alteration of man’s natural state be characterized, when instead of living in harmony with God the Creator, he not only rejects this relationship but also wages war against it, standing as a soldier in the camp of God’s adversary, Satan the devil? And we say this because it is one thing for someone not to know God and consequently to do, in ignorance, things contrary to His holy will — even though a well-intentioned person, even a pagan, following the law of his conscience, however darkened, will also perform good deeds, as, for example, the centurion Cornelius, whose prayers and almsgiving ascended like incense before God — and quite another thing to have consciously joined the Evil One and to serve his commands to the detriment of others.
And yet! Such a person, so bound by the devil, needed nothing more than a young girl, Saint Justina, in order to break free. The young girl did not use arguments, nor did she perform miracles, but simply kept the holy will of God. That is, obedience to the will of God alone is capable of driving out the devil and transforming his servant into an apostle of Christ. Most astonishing of all: this happened without Justina herself knowing it. The Saint, simply struggling to preserve her purity, without knowing anything, was dissolving every spider’s web that the devil was weaving for her through his instrument. And what happened then happens always, today as well. Although the devil appears all-powerful, in reality he has been vanquished and rendered powerless by the Lord. We have said it before: only the person who gives him rights over himself sees him as the conqueror of his life. And we give him such rights when we sin and become lax in our spiritual life. Then, yes, the devil makes us his instruments and his playthings. And so we receive the corresponding price: sorrow, melancholy, hatred, and hell beginning already in this life. This case recalls an incident from the Gerontikon: a holy ascetic, who went to a man’s house in order to collect payment for some baskets he had sold him, encountered the man’s demon-possessed daughter. Without saying anything, and without offering any prayer for the demon to depart, the ascetic saw it disappear as though it were being burned, because the ascetic did not react when the girl slapped him. His lack of reaction, because of his obedience to the Lord’s command, “Do not resist the evil person,” brought about precisely this miracle: the demon departed.
Unfortunately, the devil exists and acts wherever he finds an opening. And even more unfortunately, there are suffering fellow human beings who turn to magic, that is, to the snares of their enemy, in order to find “healing.” Our greatest contribution toward overcoming this tragedy is our obedience to the will of God. The more those of us who have some awareness of our faith remain faithful to that faith, the more we will sanctify ourselves; consequently, the devil will encounter a “void” before us, while at the same time we will help, perhaps without even realizing it, our negligent fellow human beings as well.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
