The life and sufferings of St. Eusebius, Bishop of Samosat

Saint Eusebius was the bishop of the city of Samosata [Samosata - the main city of the Syrian province of Commagene; was located on the west bank of the Euphrates River, now - Samsat.] under the rule of the Patriarch of Antioch.

He was a faithful, pious, zealous husband of God, steadfast and unwavering in the Orthodox faith at a time when the heresy of Arius was growing.

The heresy of Arius was strongly condemned at the first (325) and second (381) Ecumenical Councils. The heresy caused great harm and the greatly troubled Church of God wavered like a ship in the midst of the sea in a storm.

In his reign, however, the Orthodox suffered great persecution from the Arians, from whom St. Eusebius suffered greatly for his zeal for the Orthodox faith.

When Evdoxius, Patriarch of Antioch, an Arian, ascended to the throne of Constantinople because of his wealth [Evdoxius was Patriarch of Antioch from 357 to 358; in Constantinople from 360 to 370], then on this occasion a council of all Syrian bishops was convened in Antioch to elect a patriarch in place of Evdoxius.

Since not only the Christian people but also the bishops had few Orthodox, and many followed the wicked king as Arians, the doctrine of the newly elected patriarch must have been of great importance to the Orthodox Church.

Knowing well the bishop of Sevastopol, in Armenia, Meletius, as an orthodox and firmly held symbol of the first ecumenical Council of Nicaea, Eusebius advised everyone to elect this bishop to the patriarchate.

And when they had received the king's consent to this election, the bishops sent word of the election to Meletius, and he was brought to Antioch, where he was received with great joy.

St. Meletius, in the rank of patriarch, began to teach his flock first of all good and virtuous life: with this he tried to smooth the way to Orthodoxy for stubborn hearts.

After a short time, the people wanted to see what confession their new patriarch held, and they began to ask the patriarch. On this occasion, St. Meletius preached a sermon to the people in the church, in which he praised the Orthodox faith, which was established at the first Ecumenical Council in Nicaea, and confessed the Son to be the inherent and natural Father, the uncreated and Creator of all creation.

After this public preaching, the Arians were puzzled and greatly angered, and the Orthodox rejoiced to see such an Orthodox bishop on the apostolic throne.

The Arians furiously expelled the patriarch from the church on the 30th day of his accession to the patriarchate and began to malign him everywhere, calling him a follower of the heretic Savelli [Savelli, a third-century heretic, claimed, distorting the Orthodox doctrine of the Holy Trinity, that God has One Person: as the Father, He is present in heaven, as the Son - on earth and as the Holy Spirit - in creation.]

Then, at their request, Meletius was condemned by the king to captivity and was banished from Antioch at night. Instead of him, Eusebius, an Arian, was elected to Antioch. St. Eusebius of Samosata, seeing the uproar caused by the heretics in the Antioch church, and seeing also the unmerited insult that the Arian had inflicted on the new archbishop Meletius, left Antioch without telling anyone and went to his city.

When the Arians heard that Eusebius had deposited the decree of his election, which had been signed by the bishops, they were greatly disturbed, and they asked the king, who was then in Antioch, to send a letter to Eusebius asking him to return the decree.

The king sent for the sentence to Eusebius, and the messenger, when he came to the bishop, gave him the king's order, to which St. Eusebius replied: "I will not give the general sentence entrusted to me until all those who entrusted me with this sentence have gathered together (to the cathedral).

And the king's messenger came back, and brought nothing; and the king was very angry, and sent him again, and wrote a stern commandment, saying, If the bishop will not give sentence, cut off his right hand.

And the king heard the answer of the holy bishop, and marveled greatly at his boldness and steadfastness, wherefore he praised Eusebius before many.

After a few years the wicked king Constantius died, and Julian the Apostate began to reign. This king first restored St. Meletius from captivity to the throne of Antioch, but then banished him again.

The persecution of the Arians, which was a source of confusion to all the faithful throughout the world, was accompanied by the persecution of idolaters.

These persecutions led to the fact that many Orthodox churches (at that time) were left without their ministers, the holy thrones - without the archbishops, some of whom were killed, and others were dispersed either by Arians - in the reign of Constantius, or by idolaters - in the reign of Julian.

In such a ferocious time, St. Eusebius, hiding his saintly rank, dressed in military clothes and in this form began to go around Syria, Phoenicia and Palestine, affirming Christians in the Orthodox faith.

After the disgraceful death of Julian, the pious and Christ-loving king Iovian reigned, during which time St. Meletius was restored to his throne.

At this time, St. Eusebius and other Orthodox bishops began to govern their flock with boldness, not fearing pagans. On the advice of St. Eusebius, Meletius assembled a local council in Antioch, which had 27 bishops; among them the first after Meletius was Eusebius.

And when he was brought into the court, he persuaded his bride to keep her chastity, and he was a virtuous man.

At the above-mentioned local council of Antioch, the holy fathers commanded all to confess and hold the one Son with the Father, as well as the doctrine that was confirmed at the first Ecumenical Council.

The Arians joined this definition and signed it, although they did so hypocritically, for a time, to please the Orthodox king, and mainly out of fear of the Orthodox hierarchs, saints Meletius, Eusebius and Pelagius, who had great respect for the king.

The pious king loved these pillars of the church very much for their orthodoxy and holy life and listened to them in everything, which is why they were feared by heretics who joined the Church out of fear of them.

The Orthodox Church was again persecuted, and its bishops were exiled. St. Meletius was banished to Armenia, St. Pelagius to Arabia, St. Eusebius was sentenced to imprisonment in Thrace.

And when the king's messenger came to him, he said, Be silent this day, and tell no man the reason of thy coming, lest the people know, and be angry, and slay thee: and I will be guilty of thy death.

And when they were come to the river Euphrates, which is by the walls of the city, they took a boat, and sailed to Zeugma; and the priest commanded the oarsmen to row, and they worked all night, and brought them to Zeugma the next day.

When the people of Samosata heard that the holy priest had left them, they wept and wept bitterly and asked each other, "Does anyone know where the priest has gone?"

And they wept before him with a great weeping, and sought to persuade him that he should return to their city, but he refused; and after that they prayed, and said no more, and fell at his feet, and watered themselves with tears, that he should return to his throne.

(Romans 13:1-2) In quoting the apostle's words, St. Eusebius reminded them: "Let every soul be in subjection to the superior authorities, for there is no authority except by God; the existing authorities stand established by God.

And when they saw that they could not persuade the king to come again, they gave him gold, and silver, and clothing, and servants, as if he would go a long way; and he took very little of the offerings of Eusebius.

At the farewell, the saint taught to adhere to the Orthodox faith and apostolic dogmas, prayed to God for all and, blessing all, set out on the way to Thrace, where he was condemned to exile.

When St. Eusebius was in Istria, the news came that the Goths had invaded Thrace and were devastating it greatly, so the saint did not go further, but remained in Istria until the death of the evil king Valens.

When Eunomius entered the city of Samosata to govern the flock, none of the inhabitants of the city - rich or poor, artist or farmer, man or woman, old or young - came out to meet him: the whole city, being Orthodox, did not want to honor the heretical bishop, nor to receive his blessing, nor even to see him.

The people did not go to that church, nor to the house of the archbishop, because they did not like the archbishop-heretic. Because of this, Eunomius was always alone, except for those who came with him.

And when he had gone in to take a bath, the servants shut the doors behind him, as was the custom of the country, and when they saw that there were many standing at the door to take a bath, he commanded the servants to open the doors, and let all those come in who desired to take a bath with him.

The bishop offered to let them enter the same bathhouse where he was, but they refused. When the bishop realized that the visitors were standing because of him and did not want to wash, he was very sad and left the bathhouse and withdrew from the bath, not wanting to be honored.

The rest immediately poured out the water from the bath, as if it had been defiled by a heretic's washing, and the bath itself was thoroughly washed, disgusted with the presence of the heretic in it, and only then, having heated the new water, arranged a bath for themselves.

When Eunomius was removed, the Arians placed in Samosata Bishop Lucius, a manifest wolf and enemy of Christ's sheep. The citizens of the city and this bishop, like the first (Eunomius), did not show honor and he lived in communication only with those who came with him, because no one from the Orthodox went to the bishop.

One day, many boys were playing a ball in the street, throwing it from one to the other, and the ball fell under the bishop's horses and chariot.

The children, seeing this, began to shout loudly: "the ball is defiled with heresy, the ball is defiled with heresy"... Hearing the cries, the bishop left one of his servants to find out what the children were doing and why they were shouting so loudly.

Not only adults, but even small children were disgusted by the bishop's heresy, which was like an abomination of desolation in a holy place (cf. Dan 9:27).

He exiled Eusebius' nephew, blessed Antiochus, a worthy priest, God-pleasing and God-inspired, skilled in book wisdom, to Armenia; the most famous among the Lord's servants, the deacon Evolky, he banished to the Oasimian desert.

He immediately freed all the archbishops and other holy persons who had been banished for their Orthodox faith, and ordered them to return to their former thrones. Then returned: St. Meletius - to Antioch, St. Pelagius - to Laodicea, St. Eusebius - to Samosata.

For the Orthodox this was a great joy, but for the ungodly it was a great shame. Upon returning to his former place, Eusebius, together with the other bishops and especially one with St. Meletius, began to take care of the church's improvement.

Consecrating the following bishops, the saint appointed the honorable Akakius to Viria, the virtuous Feodotus to Hierapolis, the eponymous Eusebius to Chalcis, Isidore to Cyrus, and, according to the representation of the holy archbishop of Warsaw, he installed the confessor Eulogy on the throne.

With the god-pleasing bishop Marin, who had been elected to the Arian city of Dolichina, Saint Eusebius went alone (to the city mentioned), where he wanted to cleanse the church of heresy and put on the throne a newly elected Orthodox bishop.

In this case, the saint imitated his Lord, who prayed for those who crucified him, saying: "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing" (Luke 23:34); and also to St. Stephen, who prayed for those who stoned him.

Thus died a martyr from the Arians, having suffered for the Son of God, the Father of all that is natural and co-natural. His holy body was returned to the city of Samosata, where it was honorably buried, with the tears and tears of all the Christian people.

The Church of Samosata flourished in Orthodoxy, piously glorifying the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, the One God in the Trinity, to Him be honor, glory, thanksgiving and worship, now and forever. Amen.

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