The Miracles of *Therapon (bishop and martyr of Cyprus, E01751) describes 15 miracles of healing and exorcism at the saint's shrine at Constantinople. Written in Greek at Constantinople in the late 7th c.
E08569
Literary - Hagiographical - Collections of miracles
Miracula Therapontis (BHG 1798)
Summary:
1. [Deubner 126-127 (§12)] An Italian named Florinus was pursued by a legion of demons and was about to throw himself to the ground from the top of the Blachernai walls. But he was restrained by some others who, alerted by the disturbance, realised what was happening and so kept watch over him. After a period of three hours or so, he thought he was cleansed of the demons and his suffering had reached its peak, and coming to his senses late in the day he spoke to those restraining him and, released from confinement, he lay down quietly and fell asleep. Around midnight a vision appeared to him and said, “Go to the chapel of the Mother of God, known as ‘of the olive’, and there you will be cured of your illness”. The next day he recounted his dream and those who heard him carried him to the church, but no sooner had he entered the crypt than his whole body became twisted around and he suffered a violent confusion. Then he uttered an inarticulate shriek and struggling greatly against those restraining him, finally threw himself head-first to the ground and remained speechless for several days. As soon as he fell, those polluted demons were driven out. And so the man possessed by demons was completely cured of his suffering, praising Him who through the saint had worked his recovery. He remained a few more days to confirm the certainty of the cure and returned rejoicing to his family.
2. [Deubner 127-128 (§15)] A certain Anastasios who lived in Vizye had had a withered arm for many years, completely immobile, his fingers and palm hanging down uselessly from his forearm. This man, kindling the beginnings of hope in the saint, came to this harbour of healing and on the ninth day, calming his spirit, his body became complete and perfect; as though through divine gift, both hands could function: for he filled the basin by himself with water, taking the pitcher with the formerly paralysed hand and lifting it onto his shoulders with the greatest ease, the other hand supporting it stoutly. For thus God remakes even ruined bodies.
3. [Deubner 128 (§16. 1-10)] Another person, a dekarch serving in a military unit (his name was George) twisted his head backwards and for whatever reason overstretched the tendons and became himself paralysed. Not only this, but he also injured one of his eyes. This poor fellow spent seventeen days, able neither to eat nor drink. Later, having considered what had happened, he went off to the saint, and staying (there) for some days he heard an unseen voice commanding him as follows: “While under my roof anoint yourself with oil (elaion)”. This he did, and immediately recovered his health and departed.
4. [Deubner 128 (§16. 11-17)] Another paralytic named Theodore (for I do not wish to omit any of the names) rested here for thirty days and beheld the miracle-worker actually giving him bread and a glass filled with unwatered wine; seeming to sit up in order to receive it, in fact he leapt up, calling out and praising God. Father Therapon, your cures are the quickest, and I rejoice with your praise!
5. [Deubner 128 (§17. 1-8)] A tiny girl was brought to holy Therapon. She had a physical malformation in that her heels were impaled into her backside and stuck as though with glue and she was a most pitiable sight, quite foreign to our nature, like an aborted foetus or some sort of monster. But the great and true doctor readily delivered what was needed and the infant was healed.
6. [Deubner 128-129 (§17. 9-13)] At that time another person, named Maria, was suffering from a cancer; hurrying to the chapel she held fast in hopes of a cure. She spent forty days there fasting and sleeping on the ground and could easily have borne more but was healed without a word.
7. [Deubner 129 (§18. 8-16)] A woman who had suffered from a haemorrhagic illness for seven years, being driven to despair by the flow of blood, was ashamed and at a loss for what to do, and eventually despaired of a cure. But when she was informed of the miracles that took place here she hurried to the saint’s relics (leipsana). And being healed by them and becoming firm in body on the third day she realised that her body was whole once more and from whatever source complete in form, not reduced or affected in any way by the illness. For thus both men as well as women who come here find in equal measure a cure ungrudgingly bestowed.
8. [Deubner 129 (§19. 1-4)] A certain Stephen, a soldier in the Armenian corps, became semi-paralysed, completely bent over and stooped towards the ground. But he went away upright and whole again after staying a short while under the care of the martyr.
9. [Deubner 129 (§19. 5-8)] Again, another young man [or: recruit], a serving exkoubitor by the name of Theodore, was suffering from the same illness. But he did not need to remain long, for almost as soon as he arrived he was shown mercy, and departed once more a healthy man.
10. [Deubner 130 (§20. 1-7)] A woman with dropsy was placed here, but she awoke upon seeing the saint opening up the tips of her toes with a knife, for she was lying down when she was operated on by the martyr. As soon as she woke up she looked at her feet and beheld liquid mixed with puss and blood pouring down from her feet. And when this had all emptied out she stood up, unharmed, and the dropsy left from inside the woman.
11. [Deubner 130 (§20. 17-21)] Another, enlisted among the scholarioi, had a festering wound to the chest. And he observed the shepherd – for thus we should call him who cleaves to the flock so well – he perceived the shepherd Therapon simply healing the wound with wax, which really happened. After a few days he found himself sound and uninjured, so that not even a scar was to be seen.
12. [Deubner 130 (§21. 2-5)] Another person, a consul (hypatos), consumed either by pains and irregularities of the stomach or suffering an inflammation of the spleen and belly pain, did not even notice his rapid cure and recovery through the mercy of the martyr.
13. [Deubner 130 (§21. 6-10)] Yet another person, named Marinos, deprived of speech and any natural movement, came to this divine object of worship. Then, during the sleep imposed by the saint, he had a vision in which he was anointed with the healing oil from the relics (leipsana). And so, sensing this and becoming completely well, he glorified God, who works such wonders through the saints, in both heart and word.
14. [Deubner 131 (§22. 4-22)] A certain woman, by no means undistinguished, came alone to this holy shrine in order to pray. And it so happened that at the same time she found a small and very agitated child, constantly shaken by an evil spirit, suspended in the air, his body stretched out, and then suddenly cast down again. He uttered frequent and not at all seemly words at the saint, as happens when a demon transforms the person it occupies and speaks entirely using the mouth of the possessed as its own instrument. Now the woman, making light and thinking the whole thing a jest, mocked, set at nought and derided him, and finally treating it as a game made a joke of the sight. But he who, unseen, awakens and torments evil spirits with blows, not able to bear the woman to be so misguided, instead of the unseemly and inappropriate laughter, covered her in the dark of a moonless night, and all at once falling backwards she cried out loud “Help! I’ve just become possessed by a demon and I am going mad!” Those standing around her carried her to Saint Therapon as she publicly confessed her error. She remained there for another five days, and then, free of any illness, returned home.
15. [Deubner 131-132 (§24. 2-14)] (Here is another most remarkable thing that I happened to witness recently with my own eyes). Some foremen enlisted in the public works units, in ancient Egypt called “superintendents of works”, as they say, intending to treat an elderly man spitefully, pestered him for a while, boiling over with extraordinary anger at his slowness, and eventually they seized hold of the man and struck him with stout wooden clubs, thrashing him and beating him to a jelly, and threw him aside half-dead. When evening came some people carried him to the saint. All those who either saw the man or who heard what had taken place despaired of saving him. But during the night the martyr healed him and at daybreak released him to leave in sound health, so that those of us who beheld him greatly marvelled at what happened.
Text: Deubner 1900, 126-132.
Summary: John Haldon .
Saint’s feast
Cult PlacesBurial site of a saint - tomb/grave
Burial site of a saint - crypt/ crypt with relics
Non Liturgical ActivityIncubation
Visiting graves and shrines
MiraclesMiracle after death
Healing diseases and disabilities
Apparition, vision, dream, revelation
Exorcism
RelicsBodily relic - entire body
Contact relic - oil
Transfer/presence of relics from distant countries
Contact relic - wax
Protagonists in Cult and NarrativesWomen
Children
Soldiers
Demons
Officials
Cult Related ObjectsOil lamps/candles
Source
The collection of the miracles of Therapon, whose incubation cult developed in Constantinople after the middle of the 7th century, has remained largely unnoticed – perhaps because Therapon himself is hardly attested outside this collection. The Synaxarion of Constantinople, for instance, records that his body was brought to Constantinople by migrants from Cyprus, but notes that nothing was known about the date and manner of his martyrdom, because all accounts (hypomnenata) of this had been lost; it also states that, while images of Therapon showed him as a monk, oral tradition described him as a bishop (Delehaye 1902, 710-711).The collection consists of an introductory encomium which sketches the saint’s background very briefly, followed by a continuous narrative in which a total of 15 specific miracles are described, interspersed with laudatory passages challenging the reader or listener to identify a more impressive worker of miracles, emphasising the superiority of the wonder-working remains of Therapon in comparison with those of the pagan healing cults, or referring to numbers of other miraculous cures which the saint’s relics worked.
The laudatio was clearly written to be delivered to a congregation, and the author refers on several occasions, by name or indirectly, to the Constantinopolitan church of the Virgin called τῆς Ἐλαίας in which the relics of the saint were kept, in which the encomium was pronounced on the day of the saint’s commemoration, and where the author claims to have been an eye-witness of many of the wonders (§10. 17, §11. 5-9, §12. 9-13, §20. 9-12, §24. 1-3, §25. 18-21). This church was in or near the region of Blachernai (Deubner 1900, 106-107; Auzépy 1995, 1-12; Janin 1964, 456; Janin 1969, 109). Subsequently the saint's relics were moved to a church, dedicated to him, in the same region (Janin 1969, 247).
The collection survives in two manuscripts, Laurentianus plut. 9, 14 (11th century), on the basis of which the edition in the Acta sanctorum is based; and cod. Messanensis 29 (12th century). There are few differences between the two, except insofar as the later manuscript introduces a number of stylistic additions or clarifications, and includes also as a preface a short summary of what is known of Therapon’s life (very little), the second part of which is a summary of information given in paragraphs 6-10 of the laudatio in the main text (Deubner 1900, 113-114). The text appears to be a single unitary work, with some minor interpolations (Deubner 1900, 114-117).
The text in its extant form was available to a Constantinopolitan reader in the early ninth century, since one of the supposed interpolations re-appears in the Vita Stephani iunioris, which makes use of some of the miracles from the laudatio Therapontis (Auzépy 1995, p. 10 n. 66 - cf. §18. 16-17; see Deubner 1900, 116).
Deubner dated the collection on the basis of style and structure to the year 626, partly on the grounds of a similarity to the collection of miracles of *Kyros and Ioannes (Cyrus and John, physician and soldier, martyrs of Egypt, S00406), written in the early seventh century and attributed to Sophronius of Jerusalem (E08545), and adducing in particular the mention in the text of the Christian people besieged on all sides by enemies (at §10. 11ff.) as a reference to the great siege of Constantinople in that year (Deubner 1900, 118).
In fact, it must have been compiled after the Arab invasions – there is a clear reference to the transfer of the martyr’s relics from Cyprus to Constantinople (§7. 1-17), which would make no sense in 626, and would therefore have to be understood as a later interpolation, although there is no evidence that this was the case. The most likely date for such a transfer is after the second Arab attack on the island in 650 (Auzépy 1995, 9), and a late seventh- or early eighth-century date for the text is supported by other evidence. Some of the miracle tales themselves, as well as other passages, find parallels or are found in other hagiographical texts of this period, while some of the titles of those who were healed at the saint’s shrine support a seventh or eighth-century date, a period which also suits the motif of a city encircled by enemies (Haldon 2007). The general view, therefore, is that this is a later seventh-century composition (Delehaye 1925, 38-40; Beck 1959, 466 and n. 1), perhaps compiled after the peace between Justinian II and Abd al-Malik in 688.
Authorship of the collection is generally ascribed to Andrew of Crete (Halkin 1957, no. 1798; Geerard 1979, no. 8196; Geerard and Noret 1998, 470; Auzépy 1995, 1-12), although this question remains open (see Krumbacher 1897, 165 for doubts over this attribution).
For a detailed discussion of the collection, see Haldon 2007.
Discussion
Although in many of the stories we are not told how the miracle came about, there are enough references to sleeping and to visions to make it clear that those seeking cures at Therapon's shrine engaged in incubation.[Auzépy (1995) discusses the possibility that Therapon may originally have been an Egyptian, or been associated with Egypt, since an Egyptian martyr named Tarabo, known from both Coptic and Arabic Lives, was a healer of those suffering from rabies: see Galtier 1905. There is no reference to a saint Tarabo in Papaconstantinou 2001. An eleventh-century calendar mentions a female martyr, Tarbu, for the 4th April, but is unclear whether there is any connection at all with Therapon (my gratitude to Arietta Papaconstantinou for this information).]
Bibliography
Editions:Acta sanctorum mai. VI, 682-692.
Deubner, L. (ed.), Encomium in miracula s. hieromartyris Therapontis, in Deubner, De Incubatione capita quattuor (Leipzig, 1900), 120-134. [cf. Halkin, F., Bibliotheca Hagiographica Graeca (Subsidia hagiographica 8a. 3rd ed., Brussels, 1957), no. 1798.]
Further reading:
Auzépy, M.-F., 'La carrière d'André de Crète', Byzantinische Zeitschrift 88 (1995), 1-12.
Beck, H.-G., Kirche und theologische Literatur im byzantinischen Reich (Handbuch der Altertumswissenschaft xii, 2.1 = Byzantinisches Handbuch 2.1. Munich, 1959).
Delehaye, H., Synaxarium ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae e codice Sirmondiano nunc Berolinensi adiectis synaxariis selectis (Propylaeum ad Acta Sanctorum Novembris. Brussels, 1902), at 710-711.
Delehaye, H., ‘Les recueils antiques de miracles des saints’, Analecta Bollandiana 43 (1925), 5–85 and 305–25, at 38-40.
Galtier, E., ‘Contribution à l’étude de la littérature arabo-copte’, Bulletin de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale 4 (1905), 8-23
Geerard, M., Clavis Patrum Graecorum, III (Turnhout, 1979).
Geerard, M. and Noret, J. (ed.), Clavis Patrum Graecorum, Supplementum (Turnhout 1998).
Haldon, J.F., ‘ “Tortured by my conscience”. The Laudatio Therapontis. A neglected source of the later seventh or early eighth century’, in From Rome to Constantinople. Studies in honour of Averil Cameron, ed. H. Amirav and B. ter h. Romeney (Leiden 2007), 263-278.
Halkin, F., Bibliotheca Hagiographica Graeca (Subsidia hagiographica 8a. 3rd ed., Brussels, 1957).
Janin, R., Constantinople byzantine: développement urbain et répertoire topographique (Archives de l'Orient Chrétien 4A, Paris, 1964).
Janin, R., La géographie ecclésiastique de l’empire byzantin, 1: Le siège de Constantinople et le patriarcat oecuménique. III: Les églises et les monastères (Paris, 2nd ed., 1969).
Krumbacher, K., Geschichte der byzantinischen Litteratur von Justinian bis zum Ende des oströmischen Reiches (527-1453) (Handbuch der klassischen Altertums-Wissenschaft ix/1, Munich, 1897).
Papaconstantinou, A., Le culte des saints en Égypte des Byzantins aux Abbasides. L’apport des inscriptions et des papyrus grecs et coptes (Paris, 2001).
John Haldon
22/11/2024
| ID | Name | Name in Source | Identity | S01751 | Therapon, bishop and martyr of Cyprus | Certain |
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