Zechariah

Venerable Zechariah was a cobbler in Constantinople in the seventh century, a simple man whose holy life was revealed to another devout man, John. The Synaxaristes of Saint Nikodemos the Hagiorite preserves their story.

John, a rich man and servant in the world who had despised the pleasures of life and spent his nights in prayer, went one night to the church of Hagia Sophia, found the doors closed and sat down in the narthex. Then he saw a light approach and, after it, a devout man. When the man reached the locked gates, he knelt, prayed, made the sign of the Cross, and the gates opened by themselves. He entered, shining, prayed in the church and came out, and the doors closed. John followed him to a small house near the stairs of the holy Martyr Julian and learned that he was Zechariah the cobbler, married but living in purity. Zechariah told him that all his wealth was three and a half silver coins, with which he bought hides for his trade; from the profit he gave one part, the more just one, to Christ, that is, to the poor, and spent the other on the needs of the house.

He is commemorated on 17 November (new style), together with John.