Hermogenes of Alexandria

Holy Martyr Hermogenes of Alexandria suffered for faith in Christ in the time of the Emperor Maximinus (305-313), together with the Holy Martyrs Menas and Eugraphus.

Menas was sent by the emperor from Athens to Alexandria to quell the disturbances between Christians and pagans. Gifted with eloquence, he began openly to preach the Christian faith and brought many pagans to Christ. Learning of this, Maximinus sent the eparch Hermogenes to Alexandria to judge the saint and to purge the city of Christians. Hermogenes, though a pagan, was a pious man. Astonished at Menas' long patience in tortures and his wondrous healing after dreadful torments, he himself believed in the true God.

Then Maximinus came to Alexandria himself. But neither the amazing steadfastness of Menas and Hermogenes in tortures, nor the wonders that God worked in those days in the city softened the emperor, but hardened him all the more. With his own hand he cut Eugraphus, the secretary of Menas, to pieces, and ordered that the heads of Menas and Hermogenes be cut off.

The relics of the martyrs, thrown into the sea in an iron chest, were later found, on 17 February, and carried to Constantinople. The Emperor Justinian built a church in the name of the Holy Martyr Menas of Alexandria. Saint Joseph the Hymnographer composed a canon in honour of the martyrs.

The Synaxarion commemorates Menas, Hermogenes and Eugraphus on 23 December (new style).