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.



April 24, 2019

Holy New Martyr Nicholas at Magnesia (+ 1776)

St. Nicholas who was martyred in Magnesia (Feast Day - April 24)

Verses

Seeking Nicholas found marriage,
Finding one incorrupt in the heavens by his beating.

The Holy New Martyr Nicholas lived with his father Hatzi-Kanellos in Yayakoy, who was an overseer and superintendent of the country estates and flocks of Agha Kara-Osmanoglu, and was very much honored by the Turks. When Nicholas was twenty-two, he was betrothed to an upright woman, and their wedding date was set for Thomas Sunday in the year 1776.

It came about that Nicholas had to travel to Magnesia for business purposes, and being invested with the authority of the Turkish agha, he donned a red fez, which Turks did not allow Christians to wear in that part of Anatolia. Christians were only permitted to wear the white fez. For this reason he was brought before the Turkish judge in Magnesia.

When the judge asked Nicholas why he wore the Turkish fez not permitted to Christians, and if by doing so he was interested in embracing Islam, Nicholas responded: "God forbid, may it never be that I deny my faith. I wear this fez with your permission, because my father works in your own service." For this response, the judge ordered his attendants to strike Nicholas with a few slight corrective blows, not wanting them to strike hard, in order to persuade him to embrace Islam.

Nicholas gladly received the beating, standing firm in his Orthodox faith. Continuing to affirm his faith in Christ, the judge ordered his attendants to beat Nicholas harder and harder. Even promises of many gifts and high rank would not persuade him, nor thoughts of leaving behind loving relatives and his beloved fiance deterred him. Instead he stood valiantly, urging the judge to kill him if he must, but by no means would he renounce his Christian faith.

This enraged the judge, and he ordered Nicholas to be severely beaten, and he was thrown in prison half-dead. After three days the blessed Nicholas surrendered his soul to the Lord, and received the radiant crown of martyrdom on April 24, 1776. (It should be noted, other sources say he was martyred in 1769 or 1796, but both of these are wrong, as well as the error of St. Nikodemos the Hagiorite in his New Martyrology for calling Nicholas by the name George.)



Labels: ,

BECOME A PATREON OR PAYPAL SUBSCRIBER


Patreon!