The Greek Miracles of *Menas (12), ascribed to Timothy of Alexandria, recounts how Menas (soldier and martyr buried at Abu Mena, S00073) healed a young man possessed by a demon, taking him by force to his shrine. Written in Greek in Alexandria, probably in the 5th/6th c.
E07452
Literary - Hagiographical - Collections of miracles
Timothy of Alexandria, Miracles of Menas (CPG 2527, BHG 1256-1269)
Miracle 12. The demoniac (BHG 1268)
Summary:
A man who had been possessed by a demon since childhood is brought to the shrine by his parents, in order to be healed. After spending a long time there, they see no difference and leave. During their journey, the saint appears to them in the form of a man and advises them to return to the shrine, but they claim that they are unable to control and force the demoniac. The saint grabs him by the hair, takes him to the shrine, and disappears. The demoniac is lifted up in the air, shouting, and soon falls down as if dead. The people place him by the saint’s sarcophagus (theke) and he is anointed with oil from the lamp of the tomb. A voice is heard from the tomb ordering the demon to leave the man; the saint wished to humiliate the demon in front of the whole crowd. The demon leaves the man in the form of fire coming out of his mouth. The demoniac’s parents dedicate the portion of their fortune destined to be inherited by their son, and have him tonsured as a monk at the shrine. Some time later, he dies there.
Text: Pomialovskii 1900.
Summary: E. Rizos.
Burial site of a saint - sarcophagus/coffin
Non Liturgical ActivityConsecrating a child, or oneself, to a saint
Demoniacs at the site
MiraclesMiracle after death
Exorcism
Source
The collection is preserved, not always intact, in 69 manuscripts, on which see:https://pinakes.irht.cnrs.fr/notices/oeuvre/9359/
Discussion
For the context of this story, see E07440. This story is Miracle 15 in the Coptic collection of Menas' miracles (see E01222).Bibliography
Text:Pomialovskii, I., Житие преподобного Паисия Великого и Тимофея патриарха Александрийского повествование о чудесах св. великомученика Мины (Zhitie prepodobnago Paisiia velikago, i Timofeeia patriarkha Aleksandriiskago Povestovanie o chudesakh sv. Velikomuchenika Miny), (St Petersburg, 1900), 61-89.
Further reading:
Delehaye, H., "Les recueils antiques de miracles des saints," Analecta Bollandiana 43 (1925), 5-85, 305-325.
Efthymiadis, S., "Collections of Miracles (Fifth-Fifteenth Centuries)," in: S. Efthymiadis (ed.), The Ashgate Research Companion to Byzantine Hagiography II: Genres and Contexts (Farnham: Ashgate, 2014), 106.
Efthymios Rizos
08/04/2019
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S00073 | Menas, soldier and martyr buried at Abu Mena | Μηνᾶς | Certain |
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