Hypatius of Sinai

Holy Venerable Martyr Hypatius of Sinai is one of the fathers slain at Sinai and Raithu, ascetics of the monasteries and caves of Mount Sinai and of the nearby desert of Raithu, on the shore of the Red Sea. He is commemorated in the service of the venerable fathers, in the Synaxis of the Saints of Sinai, on 27 January and on 5 May (a movable day), in new style.

These fathers struggled on the mountain where God gave Moses the ten commandments and in the nearby desert, and they suffered at the hands of the Saracens and the Blemmyes, nomadic Arab tribes. The first slaughter took place around the year 312 and was described by Ammonius, an Egyptian monk and eyewitness to the death of forty fathers of Sinai. At that time the Arabs also killed thirty-⁠nine fathers at Raithu. The second slaughter occurred more than a hundred years later and was also described by an eyewitness who escaped by a miracle, Venerable Nilus the Faster.

The ascetics of Sinai and Raithu led a strict life. All week they remained in their cells in silence, on Saturday they gathered for the vigil, and on Sunday they received the Holy Mysteries. They ate only dates and water. Many of the hermits became known for the gift of working miracles, among them the elders Moses and Joseph. The service for the venerable fathers names Isaiah, Sabbas, Moses, the disciple of Moses, Jeremiah, Paul, Adam, Sergius, Domnus, Proclus, Hypatius, Isaac, Macarius, Mark, Benjamin, Eusebius and Elias.