Saint Emilia of Caesarea icon. Venerable Emilia of Caesarea (Cappadocia) (305–377)
Emilia of Caesarea (Cappadocia) was born in Ke-sa-ria between 305 and 315 in a godly family, which is near-le- there are vast dominions in Asia Minor.
In her youth, Emilia was fascinated by the rare beauty, but, having a deep faith, she to be unmarried. However, she died early, her father suffered a painful death at the im-per-ra-to-re of Li-ki-nii. At that time, quite often a hundred single girls were wanted for forceful marriage. Fearing this, Emilia married lawyer Vasily, subsequently becoming a priest. Va-si-liy was known as an educated and good man.
The saint writes that their marriage is not so much in a carnal union as in a mutual desire le-nii to good-ro-de-te-li. They cared about the poor, from no countries, and spent a significant part of their property on charity. The Lord blessed Emilia with many children, she had 10 children.
She is thought of as a mother who raised five saints - the Episcopal Ke-sa-ria of Kap-pa-do-kiy, Peter, Episcopal Se-va-stiy-sko-go, the most kind Mak-ri-nu the Younger and the blessed Fe-o-se-viu.
Emilia's son Nav-kra-tiy at the age of 22 left his secular career, retired to the desert and lived in solitude for 5 years, in after which the blessed end came. Another son, Ni-ki-for, died at an early age. The names of Emilia's other children are unknown. They assume that some of them will subsequently be able to work.
After the death of her father, the eldest daughter Mak-ri-na helped Emilia run the household; When the children grew up, she convinced her mother to embrace her way of life. Together they retired to a remote estate on the banks of the Iris River, in modern Turkey, and settled there monastery Some of the slaves they sent away wanted to renounce the world with them and go to the mo-na- styr, and they had everything in common: one cell, one table, one clothes; They had everything they needed for life in equal measure; they served the Lord as a single soul, in humility, gentleness and love, and they had neither anger nor -vi-sti, neither hatred, nor contempt, nor anything that would not please God. But they had one thing in common - thought and prayer, and food and work for the needs of the body they consider it unimportant in deeds, and not in the deed itself.
Having lived to an advanced age, Emilia was approaching her end. Having learned that she was on her deathbed, her youngest son Peter came to her monastery and, together with Saint Mak-rina, began to hear live with mother during her illness. At the very moment of separation from the body, Mak-ri-na and Peter and on both sides are dying. -they called us by the names of the other brothers and sisters, and she, like a treasure, left her mother's blessing to everyone -word. Then, having lived with one hand on Mak-ri-nu and the other on Peter, she said, turning to the State do:
To you, Lord, I give you na-cha-tok and de-sya-ti-well from the fruits of my womb: na-cha-tok - this first a daughter born, de-sya-ti-na - this is the last son! You, in the Old Testament, commanded to give You a lot of fruits: may they bless You welcome the sacrifice and let Your holiness fall upon them!
With these words she died. She would have been 73 years old at the time.
At the very beginning of the 4th century, in the year approximately 305 after the Nativity of Christ, in a family where the parents were virtuous and pious Christians, a daughter was born who was named Emilia, which translated from Latin means “polite, diligent, diligent.” The family was wealthy and owned vast territories in several provinces adjacent to Caesarea, an ancient Roman city (Cappadocia in Greek) now called Kayseri, located in modern Turkey.The girl was born a true beauty, from her early youth many wooed her, but Emilia, brought up in love for God, wanted to completely devote herself to serving Him and was preparing to take a vow of celibacy.
At that time, the huge Roman Empire was already divided between the emperors Constantine the Great, who put an end to the tyranny of Maxentius, who oppressed Christians, and who, by the despotism of his rule, even turned against himself the Roman aristocracy and the Senate, and Valerius Licinian Licinius. Licinius compiled and agreed upon 1 Epistle in the Edict of Milan, in which Christians received unprecedented freedom of religion.
However, Emilia’s parents, who lived on lands subject to Licinius, somehow fell under the imperial wrath, and Emilia was not only orphaned early, but also found herself without a livelihood. To save herself from reproach and gain at least some protection, she had to get married. Her husband was lawyer, rhetoric teacher Vasily, a man known as pious, virtuous and educated. He had little income, since his parents were also subject to persecution of Christians at one time and became impoverished.
Nevertheless, the Lord gave Saint Emilia the opportunity to devote herself to serving Him, although in a different way, differently than the girl expected. St. Gregory the Theologian, speaking about this marriage, says that it was based, first of all, not on carnal relationships, but on the mutual desire to lead a pious life, where the joint desire of the spouses for virtue was manifested in an active way - in abstinence in everyday life, in their hospitality a poor house, the doors of which were open to strangers, in caring for the disadvantaged - the poor, the sick, in donations to churches. Emilia did all this with the consent and approval of her husband Vasily. After some time, Vasily himself left worldly pursuits and accepted the rank of priest.
But the name of Emilia of Caesarea has been preserved for centuries, and she was canonized, primarily because the birth of ten (according to others, nine) children and her upbringing of them in the same Christian spiritual and moral ideals led to the fact that five of them They were canonized as saints: three brothers - Saints Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, Peter of Sebaste, Venerable Macrina and Blessed Theozva (Theosevia).
When Saint Emilia carried her first daughter, Macrina, under her heart, a certain old man appeared to her in a dream. He approached the newborn and said three times over her: “Thekla. Thekla. Thekla." As soon as Emilia woke up, labor began, which went easily and quickly. Emilia remembered the dream and decided that it was a prediction about a daughter who would have to repeat the fate of the Great Martyr Thekla. They found a nurse for the girl, but she cried in someone else’s arms, and was calm only in her mother’s. Then Emilia said that she carried all the children only for the time prescribed by nature, and Macrina was always connected with her in the fullness of family ties, as if the umbilical cord connecting mother and daughter before birth had never been separated. Macrina became the model by which Emilia raised her other children, and when she grew up, she began to help her mother raise the younger ones, exerting a huge influence on them in the Christian growth of young souls. At the same time, a considerable part of the household chores lay on her shoulders - she helped her mother in everything; It became especially difficult in the family when, almost immediately after the birth of his last son, Peter, Vasily passed away.
The principles of raising children in the family of Vasily and Emilia were that they learned not from children's fairy tales, relying on the supposedly immature and inexperienced child's mind, but from the parables of Solomon and the Psalms of David. She chose those that glorified the Lord and His deeds on earth, those that sounded like a prayer appeal or that contained life wisdom. Everything that could instill something empty, immoral, and corrupt into the minds and souls of children, she removed from them. The children learned by heart the passages from Scripture that were important for the formation of a pure and devoted soul to God, which their mother chose for them, and grew up the same as their parents - pious, respectful, compassionate, and hardworking. From an early age, they were accustomed to domestic work, what is assigned to men and women in the house. The whole family often went to the temple, listened to prayers and chants.
Such upbringing brought magnificent results. Saint Basil the Great (Caesarean), archbishop and theologian, compiled the Divine Liturgy, which is still read in churches during Lent; he, as historians and theologians suggest, became the inventor of the iconostasis. Many of the sermons and letters that have survived to us in censuses belong to him. He was also a participant in the First Ecumenical Council, convened by Constantine the Great, where, as you know, the Arian heresy was disgraced. He fought against this and other heresies with the spirit and word of a Christian devoted to God all his life, which he spent in extreme asceticism and departed to God on January 1/14, 379, which is why we remember him on the same day as the name of his mother, Saint Emilia of Caesarea.
We remember Saint Gregory of Nyssa as a theologian, exegete - interpreter of the Holy Scriptures, philosopher, Christian bishop. Together with his brother Basil the Great and close friend Gregory the Theologian, he was part of the famous “Cappadocia triad”. Living at the same time and connected with each other by ties not only of blood, like Basil of Caesarea and Gregory of Nyssa, but above all of spiritual kinship in Christ, they were the first of the great theologians who conducted trinitarian - trinitarian disputes in the fight against the abundance of heresies, arose and diligently held on throughout the entire 4th century from the Nativity of Christ. History has not preserved the date of his death, but he left to his descendants many works on theology, philosophy and exegesis, more than fifty letters and sermons. Blessed Theozva became a deaconess and assistant to the brother saint, devoting herself to helping him in all matters.
Another son, Naucrates, being 22 years old, preferred a hermit’s life, lived in the desert for five years and went to God at a young age. Son Nikifor died at an early age. Nothing is known about the other three children of Saint Emilia, not even their names, but we believe that they were also worthy and pious people.
The children grew up, and the Monk Macrina suggested that her mother retire from crowded places in order to lead a monastic life. They left for Pontus, to the estate of Annis, which stood on the banks of the Iris River, now the territory of modern Northern Turkey. They let the maids go, but they, loving the family they served, and where they were not slaves, but rather friends, since everyone, young and old, did the housework, followed them. There, mother and daughter founded a monastery, where Saint Emilia spent the rest of her days in prayer for her wonderful children and where everything was like in a true Christian community - everyone had everything and everything belonged to everyone. There, no one had advantages over anyone, and only piety, meekness, prayers, and abstinence were considered good, while only the most minimally necessary time was given to carnal care.
During the last days of Emilia, her daughter Macrina, the eldest child, and Saint Peter, the youngest, were with her. There was a great symbolic meaning in this by the grace of God. The oldest and the youngest, they invisibly confirmed the presence of those who, for various reasons, could not now be at the bedside of their mother going to God. Therefore, her last words addressed to the Lord, to whom she strove all her earthly life, were words about her children, her lifelong offering to Him: “To you, Lord, I give the firstfruits and the tithe of the fruits of my womb: the firstfruits is this firstborn daughter, the tithe is this last son! In the Old Testament, You commanded that firstfruits and tithes of fruits be brought to You: may they be an acceptable sacrifice to You, and may Your holiness descend upon them!” With these words, Saint Emilia, having fully fulfilled her duty of great motherhood, left the world below for the world above.
The Monk Macrina, following her mother, began to lead the monastery and outlived her mother by about five years, dying quietly and piously in her cell. They buried her in the same grave with her parents.
What a miracle happened
The miracle is the birth of children. It is a miracle to educate them in such a way that five of them became saints in the eyes of the centuries-old history of mankind. A miracle is the dedication and power of love of a mother’s heart. The miracle is the joy with which, on the border between this and that worlds, the mother was able to utter the words before God that she gives him “the firstfruits and the tithe” of the main thing that she has done in life without shame, for it is children who are the mirror of their parents.
In the lives of the saints there are many miracles that we accept or doubt their truth (and this happens), believe or not believe, because for us a miracle is something that does not fit within the framework of ideas about the possible and the impossible or the superpossible. The way Saint Emilia lived her life and the kind of children she raised is truly a miracle. And this miracle is shown to us by all the mothers of our world, who consciously care not only about the quality of life of their children, about health, which, of course, is necessary. But at the same time, they show tireless care for the spiritual world and the best qualities of the soul of a future adult, reveal to the child true ideals and virtues, and, leaving this world, can tell God, just like Saint Emilia, that they entrust to Him the most important thing that has been created. in their life - a pure, honest, pious human soul - the soul of a child raised by them.
As for miracles in the popular belief, the Lord gave the gift of miracles to the Monk Macrina. The sisters of the monastery founded by Saint Emilia and her venerable daughter, after Macrina’s passing, told Saint Gregory of Nyssa about the case when she healed a girl with an eyesore. The monk kissed the sore eye, and the thorn disappeared. Also, according to the sisters, even in the most difficult lean years, their barn did not run out of wheat - there was only enough left to sustain life, for which Saint Macrina tirelessly prayed in such times.
Meaning of the icon
On the icon of Saint Emilia of Caesarea we see an image characteristic of the images of early Christian female saints - a veil flowing freely around a stern face; on some copies dark curly hair is depicted. What is the significance of the icon, what is the feat of this wonderful Roman Christian woman, that her name has been preserved for centuries?
Motherhood these days is not treated as respectfully and respectfully as it was before. Education itself has also changed over the centuries; in the overwhelming majority of cases, it is now finally directed towards the material sphere - to feed, put on shoes, clothe, put on one’s feet: that is, to give an education or help to find a path on which one can also base lasting material well-being.
All this is not bad, important and necessary, the time of the first Christians with their ascetic approach to worldly life is already in the deep past, but the advantage of caring for the soul, for the moral sphere was gradually lost, and restoring it to the necessary extent is, it seems, already beyond our strength work. Is it because today in society, not only here, but everywhere, there are so many social problems associated with spiritual decline, with a lack of moral education, that the cart is before the horse? Generation after generation, solving material problems associated with raising children became more and more a priority, giving way to spiritual education, and now we are reaping the bitter fruits of children's nihilism, crime, and disrespect for parents - “ancestors” - the trouble of almost half of families .
Therefore, looking at the icon of St. Emilia, remembering her maternal feat, her vigilant concern for the primacy of spiritual food over material wealth and the fruits that grew from such an upbringing, one can draw one conclusion - it was truly a FEAT. A daily feat of spiritual female labor, which would be worth following today.
Of course, we cannot follow it verbatim. And it's not necessary. Just shift the emphasis, without depriving our children of anything - simply remind them that all the blessings with which we lovingly shower them are given from one well-known Source, and from an early age teach them to pray, believe, trust in the One Whose We all come into this world by choice. And we ourselves can learn this from the examples that history has preserved for us in the lives of the saints.
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1 Edict of Milan - a joint message from the emperors Constantine and Licinius, proclaiming religious tolerance between Christians and supporters of the pagan faith within the Roman Empire; The approximate date of publication of the edict is 313.
Olga Kamrysh
14.01.11. A girl was born into a pious Christian family in Caesarea around 305, and they gave her the name Emilia (Emilia, Emmelia; Greek ᾿Εμμελία, ᾿Εμμέλιον). The parents of the newborn were rich people - they owned vast land holdings in a number of provinces in Asia Minor. In her youth, Emilia was distinguished by rare beauty, and many wanted to see her as their wife. But, being a deeply religious person, the girl prepared herself for celibacy. However, life took a different turn.
Having fallen under the wrath of Emperor Licinius, Emilia's parents were deprived of their property and life. Having been orphaned early, the girl was forced, in order to avoid possible kidnapping and attacks on her honor, to get married. Her chosen one was the lawyer and rhetoric teacher Vasily, who was known as an educated and pious man. The husband's parents were also persecuted for their Christian faith and deprived of almost their entire fortune. According to Gregory the Theologian, this marriage consisted not so much in a carnal union, but in a mutual desire for virtue, expressed in caring for the poor, in hospitality, in the purification of the soul through abstinence. The couple were rewarded for their good deeds - there was no one richer in that region than them. Emilia, with the consent of her husband, fed the poor, helped the sick, and made donations to churches.
But this is not what glorified Saint Emilia. She became a model mother who raised her children (there were 9 or 10 of them) in the spirit of Christian piety and virtue. I would like modern parents to follow this example.
While pregnant with her first daughter Macrina, Emilia saw in a dream a handsome old man who approached the seemingly already born girl and called her Thekla three times. The baby was born quickly and easily, immediately after the mother woke up. The dream was understood as a prediction about the future virtues of the daughter, equal to the virtues of the holy first martyr Thekla. A nurse was called into the house, but the child did not leave the mother’s arms and was at rest only next to her. “I carried other children only for a while,” Emilia recalled, “but I was never separated from Macrina.” So they went through life together. Emilia loved her daughter dearly and, understanding all the maternal responsibilities, took the upbringing of her child seriously. Subsequently, she took him as a model by which she raised other children. The educational books were not fairy tales and fables, but the psalms of David and the parables of Solomon. From them she chose some passages of prayer or praise, or with lessons of life wisdom, and forced them to learn them by heart. And everything that could leave traces of immorality and putrefaction in the young soul, the mother removed from the eyes and ears of the children. She also taught her daughters and sons housekeeping and needlework. After household chores, she took the children to the temple of God to listen to sacred songs and prayers. The result of such pious upbringing was that all Emilia’s children became the most worthy of people. Five of them are canonized: St. Basil the Great, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Peter of Sebaste, Blessed Theozva (Theosevia) and St. Macrina. The latter had a huge impact on the moral life of the entire family. When the youngest of the children, Peter, was born, Emilia’s husband, Vasily, passed away. Macrina helped her mother run the household and raise her younger brothers and sisters and had a huge influence on their further growth in the Christian faith.
The connection between mother and daughter was very close. They practically never separated. When the children grew up, the eldest daughter convinced her mother to retire to the Annis estate in Pontus on the banks of the Iris River (modern Northern Turkey) and lead a monastic life there. So they founded a monastery, where many of their former maids followed them, who became their friends. Emilia spent her last days on earth in prayer for her children. She was escorted on her last journey by her eldest daughter Macrina and her youngest son Peter. There is no consensus regarding the date of death of Saint Emilia. Archbishop Filaret (Gumilevsky) believes that she died on May 8 (May 21), 375. This date is also considered the saint's memorial day.
St. Basil the Great, Archbishop. Caesarea of Cappadocia (379). Prmch. Jeremiah (1918). Sschmchch. Plato, ep. Revelsky, and with him Mikhail and Nikolai presbyters (1919). Cshmchch. Alexandra, Archbishop Samara, and with him John, Alexander, John, Alexander, Trofim, Vyacheslav, Vasily and Jacob presbyters (1938). Mch. Vasily of Ankyra (c. 362). St. Emilia, mother of St. Basil the Great (IV).
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