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medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture We know about Benjamin (d. ca. 423), a reported victim of Persian anti-Christian persecution under Bahram (Vararanes) V, from an account of his suffering in Theodoret of Cyr(rh)us, _Historia ecclesiastica_, 5. 39. 12-24, and from a similar account in Armenian (BHO 7). According to Theodoret, who seems to have been drawing on a source in Syriac, this deacon was a prominent and eloquent preacher who, after having been beaten and then held in prison for a year, was released at the request of the Roman emperor of the East (this will have been Theodosius II, who had won a string of military victories against Bahram) on condition that he remain silent about matters of religion. But Benjamin returned immediately to his preaching, whereupon he was arrested. After a trial in which he defended himself by appealing to the concept of loyalty (in his case, to the god of the Christians) he was sentenced to have sharp reeds inserted under his nails and in other especially soft parts of his body. When that punishment had been visited upon him more than once Benjamin was finished off painfully by being disemboweled with a knotted stake (or, in another interpretation of this text, by being impaled upon one). Thus far Theodoret. Today is Benjamin's day of commemoration in the Roman Martyrology. In the Synaxary of Constantinople he appears twice: in the first celebration under today and in the third celebration under 5. September. In both of these entries he is treated as a companion in martyrdom at Susa of bishop St. Abdas (Abdias, Audas), whom Theodoret records (_Historia ecclesiastica_, 5. 38) as having fallen afoul of Yazdegerd II (Bahram V's father) in ca. 420. Byzantine-rite churches celebrate Abdas and Benjamin on 31. March and, sometimes, on 5. September (in some churches only Abdas is celebrated on this day). Some period-pertinent images of St. Benjamin the Deacon: a) as depicted (at right; at left, St. Niphon the Martyr) in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. ca. 1312 and 1321/1322) in the monastery church of the Theotokos at Gračanica in, depending upon one's view of the matter, either Serbia's province of Kosovo and Metohija or the Republic of Kosovo: http://tinyurl.com/bsywd4h b) as depicted in the earlier fourteenth-century frescoes (betw. 1313 and 1318; conservation work in 1968) by Michael Astrapas and Eutychios in the church of St. George at Staro Nagoričane in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia: http://tinyurl.com/z7tnwks c) as depicted (at right in the panel at lower left) in an earlier fourteenth-century pictorial menologion from Thessaloniki (betw. 1322 and 1340; Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Gr. th. f. 1, fol. 33v): http://image.ox.ac.uk/images/bodleian/msgrthf1/33v.jpg Best, John Dillon ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: subscribe medieval-religion YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: unsubscribe medieval-religion to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/medieval-religion