My beloved brothers and sisters in Christ Our Only True Lord, God, and Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
On the 26th of February, Our Holy Orthodox Church Commemorates
the holy and glorious Great-Martyr PHOTINE, the Samaritaness with
her five younger sisters.
Apolytikion (Dismissal) Hymn of Saint Photine. Third Tone
ALL illumined by the Holy Spirit, thou didst drink ith great and
ardent longing of the waters Christ Saviour gave unto thee; and
with the streams of salvation wast thou refreshed, which thou
abundantly gavest to those athirst. O Great Martyr and true
peer of Apostles, Photine, entreat Christ God to grant great
mercy unto us.
Kontakion Hymn of Saint Photine. Third Tone
PHOTINE the glorious, the crown and glory of Martyrs, hath this
day ascended to the shining mansions of Heaven, and she calleth
all together to sing her praises, that they might be recompensed
with her hallowed grace. Let us all with faith and longing exto her
gladly in hymns of triumph and joy.
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Saint Photine (Φωτεινή), the holy and great Martyr of Christ, was a Samaritan woman of the city of Sychar. The name of Photine in the Greek language means luminous, bright, or shining. The name becomes one who would shed the Light of Christ. We first meet her in the holy Gospel of Saint John. She was the woman with whom our Lord Jesus Christ conversed at the well of the Patriarch Jacob. The well is situated on the eastern edge of the valley which separates Mount Gerizim from Mount Ebal.
Jesus left Judaea and was traveling north toward Galilee. He deliberately chose the Samaritan Road, an unpopular road for a Jew to traverse. He had just come down from the brown hills of Ephraim into a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, near the plot of ground that Jacob gave his son Joseph, and where Jacob’s well was located. Christ, being weary, sat quietly on a hard stone step beside the well at about the sixth hour (noon) [John 4:3-6).
A woman, our Photine, of Samaria came to draw water. "Jesus saith to her, 'Give Me to drink'; for His Disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. Then the Samaritan woman said to Him, "How is it that Thou, being a Jew, asked to drink from me, who am a Samaritan woman?" [John 4:7-9]. "Jesus answered and said to her, If thou knowest that gift of God, and Who is the One Who saith to thee, ‘Give Me to drink,’ thou wouldest have asked Him, and He would have given to thee Living Water" [John 4:10].
"O Lord, Thou didst grant knowledge of Thy power
to the Samaritaness who asked water of Thee; thereupon,
she who praiseth Thee shall not thirst unto the ages."
SAINT PHOTINE AFTER THE DAY OF PENTECOST
After the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Descent of the Holy Spirit upon the divine Apostles on the Day of Pentecost, this blessed woman, Photine, together with her two sons and five sisters, received holy Baptism from the Apostles. Afterward, they all followed the holy Apostles being aflame with zeal for Christ the Savior; and they preached Christ in place after place and country after country. They converted many idolaters (pagans) from impiety to the Orthodox Faith in Christ.
During the reign of the godless Emperor or Rome, Nero [54-68 A.D.], a dire persecution was raised against the Christians after the martyrdoms of the chiefs of the Apostles between the year 64 and 67 A.D., Peter and Paul. Nero sought to expel all their Disciples and those that believed in Christ. The senseless ones, however, did not know that the more they pursued those that believed in Christ, more so were the Christians confirmed and multiplied; for Christ uttered, "THE GATES OF HADES SHALL NOT PREVAIL AGAINST HER (MY CHURCH) [Matthew 16:18].
At that time, Saint Photine, together with her youngest son, Joses, was in Carthage, where they were boldly preaching the Gospel of Christ. She brought many infidels to Christ. Meanwhile, Photine’s eldest son, Victor, was a soldier in the Roman army. He performed in a manly and upright manner in war, winning many campaigns against the Avars who were attempting to overrun Roman Provinces. When he was made a General by Nero, the Emperor did not know that Victor was a Christian. Nero ordered Victor to return to Italy to arrest and punish the Christians. Victor was advised by the military commander who knew that he and his brother and mother were Christians to save himself and do what the Emperor commanded him to do. General Victor answered, "I desire to do the will of my Heavenly King Christ, the True God. The command given me by Emperor Nero, to castigate the Christians, I cannot even bear to hear, much less carry it out!"
The Lord said to Victor, "From henceforth, thy name shall be Photinos (Φωτεινός], because , through thee, I desire that many be enlightened and believe in Me. Upon uttering these words of encouragement, the Lord ascended into the heavens. All of this and future events were revealed to the holy Photine. She then departed from Carthage, with a crowd of Christians,, for Rome. At that time, Photine’s eldest son was escorted to Rome by Nero’s soldiers. Photine, meanwhile, was apprehended and made to stand with her son Joses, and others before Nero. The Emperor cast a fierce glance at Christ’s witnesses, and then questioned the women, saying, "What are your names?" Photine was the first to surrender herself. "I was named Photine by Jesus Christ, my God. Here is my first sister whose name is Anatole. My second sister is Photo, the third is Photis; the fourth is Paraskeve; and the fifth is Kyriake. My son, the eldest, is Victor who was renamed Photinos by the Lord. My second son, who is with me, is Joses." Nero then said to them, "Are all of you in concert to suffer punishment for the Nazarite and to die for Him?" Saint Photine replied, "Yes, all of us rejoice and are glad to die for the love of our Lord!"
ANATOLE and PHOTO, were slain by the sword; PHOTIS, who was torn in half when she was bound to two treetops which were bent back and then released; and PARASKEVE and KYRIAKE, who were slain by the sword–as well as Saint Photine’s elder son, PHOTINOS (VICTOR), the General, who was slain by the sword, and her younger son, JOSES, who was slain by the sword, together with SEBASTIAN, the military commander, who was slain by the sword, and THEOKLETOS (Lambadios) the former magician who wa also slain by the sword.
The Martyrdoms and sufferings of the holy Martyrs with Saint Photine are diverse: they endured the crushing of their hands on an anvil, a fiery furnace for three days, swallowing poisons, severance of their sinews, boiling molten lead and sulphur on their backs, scourging, burning with torches, ash and vinegar poured into their nostrils, blinding, incarceration with venomous snakes, three years imprisonment, crucifixion for four days, flaying, mutilation, being torn in two, and decapitation.
Following this, they drew out the blessed Photine from the well, and, consequently, cast her into prison. As the sole survivor who triumphed over every form of torture, nonetheless, she sorrowed that she was not vouchsafed the crown of martyrdom together with the others. Desiring to emulate Christ in obedience and suffering, she supplicated God regarding her plight. He appeared to her and sealed her thrice with the sign of the honorable and Life-Giving Cross, and healed all her wounds. Then, after many days, while hymning and blessing God, Saint Photine surrendered her precious soul into His hands. Therefore, she and all her fellow contestants were translated to their much-desired God and received His Heavenly Kingdom which may we, too, be accounted worthy to obtain by their intercessions. Amen. [Source: The Great Synaxaristes of the Orthodox Church)
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"Glory Be To GOD
For
All Things!"
– Saint John Chrysostomos
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With sincere agape in His Divine and Glorious Diakonia (Ministry),
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+ Father George
The Eastern Orthodox Christian Ethos 