Letter 186: Theodore Studite, Letter 186; Greek heading: Ναυκρατίῳ τέκνῳ.

News upon news, word upon word: what shall I say and what shall I speak? How shall I, wretched man, be disposed toward what has happened? Joy is mine and grief, praise and lamentation. I have come to be caught in the no-man's-land between two passions, and I do not know which of the two I shall choose to speak. Yet he conquers who has conquered Satan and the rulers and tormentors of this present age. For the sake of Christ there has been put to death the lamb of Christ, scourged: Thaddaeus, my own young shoot, my own inward part [my own heart], the son of obedience, the trunk of piety, the namesake of the apostle [Thaddaeus, one of the Twelve]. The joy is unbearable, the gladness unsurpassable, not for me alone in my lowliness, but for angels and men as well. How magnified are your works, O Lord, that even now in this lowly generation you have brought forth a witness [martyr] of your truth who cannot be struck from the record, and that you have done so not from among the wise and well-born of this world, but from among those of contrary condition, so that the word of the apostle might be fulfilled, that he chose the base things and the despised things and the things that are not, so that he might bring to nothing the things that are. Where have you departed from me, O blessed child? Where have you so swiftly been exalted on high, having been numbered together with the martyrs? Oh, your success! Oh, your nobility! Oh, your good counsel! In a single day you have gained countless ages; amid torturing afflictions you have acquired the joys that cannot be uttered; in a hundred and thirty stripes you have received the perfect wage of your labor, together with the martyrs, from the Holy Trinity, inasmuch as the one is the number corresponding to perfection and the other to the Trinity, so that even from your very chastisement God might display your greatness of nature. Your blood is myrrh; your relic imparts sanctification to those who touch it. I beseech you, holy one of God, Thaddaeus, intercede on behalf of me, your unworthy servant; for I do not dare to call you child. See, my brothers, what has come to pass, what a treasure and what a member we had possessed. Thaddaeus, the martyr of Christ, suffices both for the glory of God and for our boast, and likewise for the joy of the whole Church. What of the rest? They shall be, he says, the first last and the last first; this I say with regard to Jacob [James] and Lucian, the one having striven [in the contest] (and may he go on striving to the end) together with Dorotheus and Bessarion, while the other has been shipwrecked, according to my sins, together with those of like manner. Oh, how have the most pitiable ones fallen in the midst of the luminaries! They forgot, then, the one who said: Do not be afraid of those who kill the body. For did not the only Sovereign, who gives strength to the weak, measure out what is possible? And the martyrs are near at hand. For does he not of necessity deliver those who as yet have no strength in their nature, not in their resolve? And the martyr Thaddaeus is faithful in heaven. Let us not then, my brothers, be terrified, nor become full of fear at the fall of those who have been defeated, as though we too shall not endure the blows. We shall endure them by the power of God, and we shall pass through, whether fire, whether sword; God is the one who goes before us and calls us to enter into the kingdom that has been promised to us, as he led Israel into the land of promise. Do you not know what those suffered who at that time stirred up the people to revolt, saying, "We shall not be able to cross over, because there are cities walled up to heaven, and giants, among whom is Anak"? And what came to pass? Was it not for this reason that they themselves were burned with fire, while the whole murmuring people perished, whose limbs fell in the wilderness? Let no one be such a stirrer of revolt, let no one be negligent, let no one be despairing of hope. We shall cross over, then, brothers, we shall cross over like Caleb, I say, and Joshua the son of Nun, the heirs of the promise. The walls that are spiritual shall be shaken down for us, as at that time the walls of Jericho were, by the trumpet of thanksgiving which the blessed Thaddaeus sounded, having sung his psalm from the starting-line of his punishments: This is the day which the Lord has made. Thus I exhort, thus I implore: for on behalf of Christ, he says, we are ambassadors, as though God were entreating through us. We beg you not to play the coward with respect to the death that is on his behalf and with him, if it should be necessary. The letter is addressed to all, even though it is to your person, good child; therefore I greet all and rejoice together with all in their sufferings. And who is worthy to fill up in turn what is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in his flesh? And woe to him who denies and who has turned aside, even if it be death, because eternal death shall shepherd him, and the upright shall have dominion over him in the morning. Peace of Christ be to you, might, strength, consolation, as you pray concerning all the brothers and on behalf of me, that I may appear, by the mercy of God, a fulfiller of the things of which I admonish. The brothers who are with me send their greetings.