Память иже во святых отца нашего Кирилла архиепископа Иерусалимского

Saint Cyril of Jerusalem, descended from pious parents, received a strictly Orthodox upbringing; During the reign of Constantine the Great, he became a monk, and under his son Constantius, in 1997, after the death of Archbishop Maximus, he was elected to the see of Jerusalem. Zealous for the preservation of the purity of Christian teaching, Saint Cyril, as an archbishop, actively and tirelessly fought against the heresies of Arius 1998 and Macedonia 1999. By this he aroused strong enmity against himself on the part of the bishops who had fallen into the Arian heresy; among the latter was Metropolitan Akakios of Caesarea in Palestine 2000, who later became the main culprit in the first exile of Saint Cyril. One day in 2001, on the feast of Pentecost, at about three o'clock in the afternoon, the following miraculous sign was observed in Jerusalem: the outline of the Holy Cross appeared in the sky, shining with a dazzling light; starting from Golgotha ​​2002, it extended to the Mount of Olives 2003. Since Emperor Constantius, sharing the heresy of Arius, oppressed the Orthodox, helping the heretics in every possible way, Saint Cyril informed him of a miraculous sign, admonished him to leave the path of error and convert to Orthodoxy. Meanwhile, Metropolitan Akakios, taking advantage of the assistance of the emperor, to whom he was close, rebelled against Saint Cyril because he accused him of heresy and did not obey him, although Jerusalem at that time was subordinate to the Metropolitan of Caesarea; this occurred due to the decline of Jerusalem after the destruction by the Romans in 2004. Saint Cyril not only did not want to obey the heretic metropolitan, who was, in addition, deposed by the local Sardician council in 2005, but also denounced him for abusing church power that did not belong to him according to the rules; for these reasons, he did not consider it possible for himself to obey Metropolitan Akaki. In addition, Saint Cyril believed that, on the contrary, Caesarea Palestine should be subordinated to Jerusalem, for the Church of Jerusalem is the mother of all churches 2006; Moreover, the Sardician Council, which deposed Acacius, transferred its leadership to the predecessor of St. Cyril, Archbishop Maximus of Jerusalem. Imbued with a feeling of hostility towards Saint Cyril, Akaki found a reason to accuse him, thanks to the following circumstance. There was a severe famine in Jerusalem. The people, unable to find means to support life, turned to their archbishop for help. Saint Cyril, out of his mercy, took to heart the requests of his flock and spent all his property on them. But since the hunger did not stop, and there was nothing to help, Saint Cyril began to sell church things - gold, silver and valuable curtains, buying wheat for the hungry with the proceeds from the sale. At this time, a rumor appeared that some woman had been seen in the city, dancing in sacred vestments on the street. When asked where she got the sacred clothing from, the woman replied that she bought it from a merchant, and also named him. The merchant, who was asked in turn, said that the clothes for sale were given to him by the archbishop himself. It is unknown whether all this actually happened or not, but only the rumor reached Metropolitan Akaki, who considered it sufficient to accuse St. Cyril. At the council he convened, he proposed to depose Saint Cyril as having dishonored the sale of a sacred object, to which the council expressed its consent. Thus, with the assistance of heretical bishops, the deposed heretic metropolitan overthrew the Orthodox Archbishop of Jerusalem from the throne and forced him to leave the borders of Jerusalem by force. Saint Cyril first retired to Tarsus 2007, where he stayed with Bishop Silvanus. Seeing that the latter did not quite correctly understand some of the dogmas of the faith, Saint Cyril pointed out his deviation and confirmed him in Orthodoxy. Hearing about this, Akaki wrote a letter to Silvanus, notifying him of the overthrow of Saint Cyril and advising him to either stop communicating with Saint Cyril, or at least prohibit him from performing divine services in the ecclesiastical region under his control. But Silvanus did not listen to Akaki: he revered Saint Cyril as a pious man, who supported and instructed many Orthodox Christians with his teaching; Silvanus knew about the expulsion itself that it did not happen due to any fault on the part of Saint Cyril, but solely due to the envy and hatred of Akakios. After this, in Seleucia in 2008 there was a Local Council, which brought up to 150 bishops; Among them was Saint Cyril. Before the meeting of the council began, Akaki began to insist on the removal of Saint Cyril, who had been excommunicated by him. Many bishops did not agree to such an act. Then Akaki, leaving the cathedral, went to Constantinople. Here, before the emperor and Patriarch Eudoxius, also an Arian, he slandered the cathedral he had abandoned, calling it a crowd of evil people who had gathered not for the benefit, but to the detriment of the Church. Acacius was able to arouse especially strong indignation in the emperor against St. Kirill. He told him that St. Cyril sold the precious sacred clothing donated by Constantine the Great to Archbishop Macarius of Jerusalem to be worn during the sacrament of Baptism, and that later this clothing was seen on one person dancing at public entertainment gatherings. The emperor became so angry that he subjected Saint Cyril to imprisonment. After the death of Constantius, Julian the Apostate 2009 ascended the throne. In the first years of his reign, under the guise of piety, he abolished all the decrees of Constantius aimed at the harm of the Orthodox: by order of Julian, all Orthodox bishops previously expelled by Constantius were released from prison. At this time, Saint Cyril was returned to his see. Having established himself on the throne, Julian openly renounced Christ. He gave greater freedom to the Jews who opposed Christians; By the way, he not only allowed them to build a church on the site of the one destroyed by the Romans in 2010, but also allocated part of the state taxes for the construction. When this blasphemous business in 2011 had just begun, Saint Cyril predicted to his entourage that the words of Christ about the destruction of the very stones of the church: “the days will come in which from what you see here there will not be left one stone upon another; everything will be destroyed” (Luke 21:6) will undoubtedly be fulfilled. Saint Cyril prayed to the Lord Christ that He would not allow the enterprise that had begun to take place, but would destroy it along with the plans of the builders. The Lord heard the prayer of His servant and fulfilled what He predicted about the unfailing fulfillment of His words. One night there was a strong earthquake, so that even the surviving foundations of the ancient Solomon's Temple were moved, not to mention the stones just laid by the Jews; and all this - the remains of the ancient church and new buildings - was scattered like dust by the action of God's invisible power. When the day came, everyone was amazed at the miracle that had happened. When the Jews again wanted to get down to business, fire immediately fell from the sky and destroyed the working tools; great horror seized them. The next night, the sign of the cross appeared on the clothes of the Jews, which they could not destroy with anything. After this, Saint Cyril, whose prediction about the fulfillment of the words of Christ was so solemnly justified, was again subjected to exile. His deputy, as far as one can reasonably believe, was Saint Cyriacus. He was a Jew and bore the name of Judah; during the search by Queen Helena for the Precious Cross of the Lord, they were shown its hidden location; then he was baptized and received the name Cyriaca. However, after the expulsion of Saint Cyril, Saint Cyriacus did not occupy his place for long: he soon suffered a martyr’s death for confessing Christ from Julian. After the death of Julian, Saint Cyril again ascended the throne of Jerusalem, but due to the strengthening of the Arians during the reign of Valens, he was exiled for the third time for his piety and firm struggle against heretics. Finally, under Theodosius the Great in 2012, Saint Cyril was returned to Jerusalem with honor. For eight years, he ruled the Church with truly pastoral zeal and rested peacefully in the Lord, leaving his many useful writings as a legacy. With your tongue, wisely, with Divine inspirations, you have enlightened your people, one Trinity of honor, inseparable by Nature, and divided by Persons. In the same way, rejoicing, we celebrate your all-holy memory, who offered you a prayer book to God. Constantius, son of Constantine the Great, received the east, Asia and Egypt upon the death of his father; in 361, having defeated the murderer of his brother Constance, Magnetius, he united the entire Roman Empire under his rule. He destroyed pagan temples or gave them to Christians for conversion to the church; Several times he issued a law prohibiting pagan worship on pain of death. But with his sympathy for the heresy of Arius, Constantius greatly increased the religious discord of the time; he persecuted Orthodox bishops who did not share the errors of the Arians, demoted them from their cathedras and even imprisoned them; under him, the Arians occupied the highest places in the state. Constantius died in 361 during a campaign against his cousin Julian, who was proclaimed emperor by the troops in Gaul, where he himself appointed him commander-in-chief. Gregory of Nazianzus reports that before his death, Constantius repented of his persecution of the Orthodox. The founder of the Arian heresy was the presbyter of Alexandria Arius. He denied the consubstantiality of the Son of God with the Father, considered Jesus Christ to be a creation and did not recognize His Divine perfections - omnipotence, omniscience, etc. The heresy of Arius was decisively condemned at the first (326) and second (381) Ecumenical Councils, and the equality of the Son of God with the Father was established, which is what every Christian confesses in the second member of the Creed, which was compiled by the fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council. In the 5th century Arianism disappeared from the Roman Empire, but was revived in Germany among the Goths, Burgundians, Vandals and Longobards. Macedonius was Bishop of Constantinople during the time of Constantius and shared the heresy of Arius. Subsequently deposed for his cruelty even towards the Arians, he, wanting to be the head of a new teaching, developed in the sense of Arius the doctrine of the Holy Spirit: Macedonius considered the Holy Spirit to be essentially different from the first two Persons of the Holy Trinity, having no participation in the Divinity and glory of the Father and the Son. The Macedonian heresy was condemned at the Second Ecumenical Council (381) and the true teaching of the Church about the Holy Spirit was forever established in the eighth article of the Creed. The saints fought especially actively against the heresy of Macedonia. Church Fathers: Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa and Gregory the Theologian. Caesarea, a city located on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea, north of Jaffa, ancient Joppa. It was built by Herod on the ruins of the ancient Canaanite city of Straton in honor of Caesar Augustus. Under Emperor Vespasian (69–79) it was converted into a Roman colony. Even before the destruction of Jerusalem, Caesarea became the seat of Roman procurators (Acts 23:23–24). in the times of the apostles, this city was remarkable for the fact that here the first pagan, the centurion Cornelius, was converted to Christianity by the Apostle Peter (Acts 10:1–48); Ap lived here. Philip, one of the first deacons (Acts 8:40; Acts 21:8); Up came here. Paul remained in prison here for 2 years (Acts 9:30; Acts 18:22; Acts 21:8; Acts 23:23; Acts 24:1–27; Acts 25:1–27; Acts 26:1–32). After the destruction of Jerusalem, Caesarea was the main city of Palestine and the seat of the bishop. In 638, with the spread of Mohammedanism, Caesarea fell under the rule of the Turks, from whom it was liberated during the Crusades by Baldwin in 1102, but in 1265 it was again conquered by the Turks and completely destroyed, so that only ruins remained of the city. Golgotha, the mountain on which the Lord Jesus Christ was crucified: it was previously located outside of Jerusalem (Matthew 27:32–33; John 19:17–41; Heb. 13:12), lies on the northwestern side. Golgotha, from the Hebrew “skull”, Place of the Execution (Luke 23:33), probably got its name from its resemblance to a skull. According to legend, Adam was buried here. The Mount of Olives or Olivet is one of the mountains of Judah, lies east of Jerusalem (Ezek. 11:23); It got its name Olive because of the many olive trees that grew on it. The Lord, Jesus Christ, during His earthly life, often came to the mountain with His disciples (John 8:1; John 18:2). On the western slope of the Mount of Olives is the Garden of Gethsemane, where the Lord prayed on the night before suffering and where he was betrayed by Judas (Matthew 26:30–60; Mark 14:26–46; Luke 22:39). On the southeastern slope of the mountain was the village of Bethany, from where the Lord made a solemn entry into Jerusalem (Matthew 21:21; Luke 19:29). According to legend, the Lord ascended to heaven from the Mount of Olives (Acts 1:12). In the 4th century. The mother of Constantine the Great erected a Christian temple on the Mount of Olives, which was later converted into a mosque by the Turks. This destruction occurred several decades after the death of Christ the Savior, Who often predicted the sad fate awaiting Jerusalem (Matthew 24:1–51; Mark 13:1–37; Luke 19:41–44). During the reign of Nero (54–68), the Jews rebelled against the Romans. Nero sent an army against the rebels under the leadership of Vespasian, who soon took possession of Galilee and was preparing to besiege Jerusalem, but, having been chosen by the emperor to replace the deceased Nero, he left the end of the war to his son Titus. After a year-long siege, Titus took Jerusalem. The city suffered terrible destruction, so that only a few towers and buildings remained. Up to 1,100,000 (one million one hundred thousand) Jews died from hunger during the siege; about 97,000 were captured. Then, under Emperor Hadrian (117–138), the city suffered final destruction. But from the time of Constantine the Great, the Christian religion triumphed over paganism, and Jerusalem began to grow and beautify itself. Sardis is an ancient and rich city in the Asia Minor region of Lydia, the capital of the Lydian state; in 545 BC he moved to Pergamon, and from them to the Greeks, Alexander the Great and, finally, to the Romans. Under Emperor Tiberius (14–36), the city suffered from an earthquake; Tiberius restored it again. At the time of the Apostles, Sardis was still a significant city. Christianity arose here very early: already in the Apocalypse there is a mention of the Church of Sardis (Rev 3:1–5). Under Emperor Arcadius (395–408), the city was destroyed by the Goths; in the 10th century Tamerlane razed it to the ground. Currently, on the site of the once rich and glorious city is the small village of Oart The Church of Jerusalem is called the mother of all churches because from here, at the command of the Lord, the Apostles went out to preach the gospel, spreading the teachings of Christ to the ends of the earth (Acts 18:1–28) Tarsus, a city in the Asia Minor region of Cilicia, is remarkable for the fact that St. was born here. Ap. Paul (Acts 22:3); The Apostle in Tarsus prepared for the gospel of Christ and from here was called by Barnabas to preach the Gospel (Acts 9:11-30; Acts 11:25). Therefore, Christianity arose early in Tarsus (Acts 15:23–41). Seleucia, a city in Syria, on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea; in all likelihood it was founded by the Syrian king Seleucus Nikator around 300 BC; here Ap. Paul, during his first journey, stopped to preach and from here sailed to Cyprus (Acts 13:4). In the VI century. according to R.H. the city was destroyed. Julian the Apostate, nephew of Constantine the Great, son of his brother Julius Constantius, was born in 331. In 345, together with his brother Gall, he was exiled to Cappadocia by Constantius, where he spent six years under strict supervision. In 351, he left his place of exile and spent several years in Nicomedia, where he was fond of studying philosophy; in 355 he was appointed by Constantius commander of the troops in Gaul; here he knew how to attract the love of the army, which in 361 proclaimed him emperor. The study of philosophy under the guidance of a pagan teacher, discord among Christians due to Arian unrest, hatred of Constantius aroused in Julian hatred of the religion of his oppressor - Christianity. He set out to restore paganism and destroy Christianity. But all his attempts were a complete failure. Julian died in 363 in a campaign against the Persians. The church was originally built by Solomon on Mount Moriah in 488 after the exodus of the Jews from Egypt (1 Kings 6:37–38; 2 Chronicles 6–7); in 689 it was destroyed by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar. After a 70-year captivity, having received permission from Cyrus in 531 BC to return to Jerusalem and build a church, the Jews, returning to Palestine, founded the church in the second year and completed construction in 616. Herod the Great especially contributed to the decoration of the post-captivity church. During the capture of Jerusalem by Titus, one of the soldiers threw a burning brand out the window and the church became the prey of fire. Julian allowed the Jews to build the church, mocking the prophecy of Christ the Savior about its destruction (Luke 21:6). Theodosius the Great dealt a final blow to paganism: having become autocratic in 392, he issued a law according to which serving the gods was recognized as the same crime as lese majeste. Of the works he left behind, especially noteworthy are 23 catechetical teachings, of which 18 relate to those preparing for baptism and to the newly baptized; they contain a clear and simple statement of the articles of faith according to the members of the symbol. The “conversation about the paralytic” and excerpts from the “conversation about turning water into wine at Cana” have also been preserved. You might be interested in: