Letter 533: Theodore Studite, Letter 533; Greek heading: Πέτρῳ Νικαίασ.

Your sacred hearing has surely heard of the affliction that has befallen our blessed and common father, the metropolitan of Synnada [a city in Phrygia], and your holy soul has lamented over him as was fitting, since it will not yet cease from groaning nor leave off the pain that has come, as it were, from being cut in two. But come now, O thrice-longed-for one, and be more fully instructed by us as well, so that we too may pay the debt we owe, and that you yourself, learning the events concerning him in a more circumstantial manner, may gain some relief from the telling. Oh, oh, how could we bear without tears the mournful report? The father was in good health, performing the customary works of his unfeigned love and of his welcome toward the brothers and fathers. For who embraced hospitality more than he, and tended those he loved, whom the unbroken presence and persistence of those who came to visit did not wear down so much as the scarcity of them and their swift return distressed him? And what need is there to set out the matter by way of example to you who know it well? He was, then, as has been said, occupied in these things. But when the day of the festival of the Second [Day] after Pentecost arrived, having risen from the meal he was seized with the pains of a catarrh [a flowing rheum], which descended from the head upon the vertebra and the regions of the upper back. Stirred by this, we lowly ones found him truly suffering and explaining the causes of his collapse. Then, after we had returned home, coming again on the following day we found him still being struck with sharper pains and a burning fever, scarcely able to address us quietly and hinting at his despair of living in the flesh. What followed? On the third day there was a complete binding of the tongue, and not long afterward, bitter death. But for us, because of the loss of the holy man, let it be called bitter; for him, however, it was even very sweet, because of his being released and being with Christ [cf. Philippians 1:23]: than which what could be more blessed? The blessed one lay, then (for it is good to describe this too), like some strange spectacle, venerable to look upon, angelic in form, as if the soul that had departed to the Lord had imprinted certain sun-like characters upon the sacred body, with which and in which it had served the Holy Trinity. Suddenly a throng gathered, of monastics together with laypeople, very great indeed, and it poured around him, gazing upon him as upon a sacred treasure, or, to say it more fittingly, as upon one breathing and able to speak. Tears were shed, by the modest ones noiselessly, but by his attendants more openly. Thus, then, with the appropriate psalmody and hierarchical invocations he was committed to the tomb, in the very place where the blessed one was accustomed to minister to the Lord; and indeed the father was added to the fathers, the confessor to the confessors, the teacher to the teachers, the interpreter to the interpreters; and we would add these things also: the temperate to the temperate, the chaste to the lovers of chastity, the hospitable to the hospitable, the moderate to the moderate-minded, the one who had become all things to all men [cf. 1 Corinthians 9:22] so far as was possible, that he might gain all or the greater number, supported by apostolic accomplishments. And now we lowly ones, like orphans, bewail him who was truly both a lover of his father[-flock] and a lover of his brothers; while the church under him, that is, the little flock [cf. Luke 12:32], is utterly at a loss and calls back its shepherd and father, as is natural for nestlings who have lost those who begot them and twitter constantly and wander distraught and have no one able to feed them, both spiritually and perceptibly. For these things his friends must give such care as they can. But you, O blessed one, what do you say to this? Do you remain in the flesh, or do you judge it more necessary to depart from things here? Since we have just now learned again that you are greatly worn out. Or is it rather better that we who have grown old and are of no use to life-indeed, who draw down sins upon sins-should withdraw from this wretched little body of flesh, but that you and those like you, since you are radiant both in life and in word, should still dwell as citizens among men? Make answer to us in turn on these matters, O longed-for one; nay rather, let the sacred children of your brother and fellow-contestant and kindred-souled one also hear your consoling voice; for thus we both would become more at ease, rendering to God our thank-offerings and prayers with joyful sorrow.