Hesychius of Melitene

Holy Martyr Hesychius of Melitene is commemorated on 20 November (new style) among the martyrs who suffered at Melitene with the Holy Martyr Hieron. The page says nothing about Hesychius in particular. It tells the suffering of Hieron and the others, of which we give here the account.

Hieron was born in the city of Tyana in the second (Great) Cappadocia, of a devout mother, Stratonike, in the time of the emperors Diocletian and Maximian. Learning that the people of Armenia and Cappadocia refused to worship idols, the emperors sent two cruel idol-⁠worshipping officials, Agricolaus to Armenia and Lysias to Cappadocia, to kill the Christians who would not worship and to enlist in the army strong men and young men. Lysias heard of Hieron, a sturdy man and very courageous. The soldiers sent to take him found him working in the field, but he, learning that he was being taken into the army, refused, considering it unfitting for a Christian to serve beside idol-⁠worshippers. He took a piece of wood that was at hand and beat them, and they fled. Seeing that they could not overcome him, they brought more soldiers. Then Hieron withdrew into a nearby cave with eighteen Christians and defended himself from there. In the end a friend of his, Cyriacus, advised the soldiers to withdraw, for Hieron could be taken only with gentleness, and he persuaded Hieron to come out of the cave and go to enlist. He took him to his mother, an old and blind widow, who wept aloud. Hieron took leave of his mother and neighbours and set out for Melitene, with his kinsmen Victor, Matronianus and Anthony.

That night a man in white appeared to him and announced that he would soon go to the heavenly King. Hieron rejoiced and told those with him that the only true wealth is that in heaven. At Melitene he was shut in prison with thirty-⁠three other Christians. There he advised his companions not to worship idols, but to offer a sacrifice of praise to the true God, and they answered him that they wished to die for Christ. The next day Lysias brought them to trial. Hieron admitted that he had beaten the soldiers, and Lysias ordered his hand cut off to the elbow, and the others he had beaten mercilessly. His kinsman Victor, afraid of the beatings, bribed an official and fled from the prison, but he soon died, losing his property, his life and the crown of martyrdom. Hieron wept for him.

Hieron left his kinsmen his testament: his property in Pisidia to his sister Theotimia, and the rest to his mother, with his cut-⁠off hand, to be laid in a place he named. On the fifth day Lysias again brought them to judgment, had them beaten with rods and condemned them to death by the sword. The martyrs went to the place of execution singing the psalm "Blessed are the undefiled in the way", knelt and prayed, and then their heads were cut off. Anthony and Matronianus asked for Hieron's body, but Lysias wanted as much gold as his head weighed. A wealthy man, Chrysaphius, paid the ransom and kept the head with honour, and later built a church on the place where the martyrs' heads were cut off. Hieron's hand was carried by his kinsmen to his mother Stratonike, who wept over it, kissed it and laid it in the place he had appointed.