Having entered the Christmas season, we ask those who find the work of the Mystagogy Resource Center beneficial to them to help us continue our work with a generous financial gift as you are able. As an incentive, we are offering the following booklet.

In 1909 the German philosopher Arthur Drews wrote a book called "The Myth of Christ", which New Testament scholar Bart D. Ehrman has called "arguably the most influential mythicist book ever produced," arguing that Jesus Christ never existed and was simply a myth influenced by more ancient myths. The reason this book was so influential was because Vladimir Lenin read it and was convinced that Jesus never existed, thus justifying his actions in promoting atheism and suppressing the Orthodox Church in the Soviet Union. Moreover, the ideologues of the Third Reich would go on to implement the views of Drews to create a new "Aryan religion," viewing Jesus as an Aryan figure fighting against Jewish materialism. 

Due to the tremendous influence of this book in his time, George Florovsky viewed the arguments presented therein as very weak and easily refutable, which led him to write a refutation of this text which was published in Russian by the YMCA Press in Paris in 1929. This apologetic brochure titled "Did Christ Live? Historical Evidence of Christ" was one of the first texts of his published to promote his Neopatristic Synthesis, bringing the patristic heritage to modern historical and cultural conditions. With the revival of these views among some in our time, this text is as relevant today as it was when it was written. 

Never before published in English, it is now available for anyone who donates at least $20 to the Mystagogy Resource Center upon request (please specify in your donation that you want the book). Thank you.



December 5, 2016

Holy Martyr Anastasios the Fuller at Salona in Dalmatia

St. Anastasios the Fuller (Feast Day - October 25)

Verses

For October 25th
What shall I write on your behalf, Anastasios?
Hastening towards Christ's grace you were killed by the sword.

For December 5
Anastasios received fire from God the Word,
Before enemies gave him a speedy death.

Saint Anastasios was born in Aquileia of a good family during the reign of Diocletian (284-311), and becoming a fuller he practiced his trade at Salona in Dalmatia. There he was inspired with divine zeal in his heart, after seeing the Holy Martyrs of Christ and their limbs torn from their bodies for their faith and confession of Christ. Being a Christian, this reminded him of all the good things that awaited them. This inflamed his heart with a desire for martyrdom, so that one day he covered his body with the image of the sign of the honorable Cross and voluntarily presented himself to be martyred. Anastasios, boldly and without fear, cried aloud in the judgment hall before all the pagans the words of the Prophet Isaiah: "I became manifest to them that asked not for me; I was found by those that sought me not" (65:1).


As they all gazed upon him, the Martyr addressed them saying: "Listen, all you ministers of the devil, I am a Christian, and I believe in our Lord Jesus Christ. Your idols and those who fall down and worship them, I turn away from and anathematize." Seeing his boldness, the pagans were astonished. Then they immediately undressed him and mightily flogged him. They then said to him: "We are dispensing this punishment on account of your shamelessness and impertinence. Since you believe in Christ, we will cut off your head, and cast your body to the fish and reptiles to be eaten." Therefore the beastly men took the Saint, and beheaded him. And taking a ship a short distance from the shore, they cast his body into the sea.

A righteous Christian of the city, the rich matron Asclepia, promised to free any of her slaves that recovered the body. They came upon some dark-skinned people who had found the body in the water, and they surrendered it to Asclepia's men, who brought it back to their mistress. After reverently wrapping his body with sheets and myrrh, she buried it in her garden, which became a Christian cemetery with a basilica dedicated to Saint Anastasios. The relics of the Holy Martyr were glorified by many miracles.

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