ON SAINT ELIZABETH
VIRGIN, WONDER-WORKER, AMONG THE GREEKS.
CommentaryElizabeth, Virgin, Wonder-worker, among the Greeks (St.)
By G. H.
The memory of this most holy Wonder-working Virgin is very solemn among the Greeks, in practically all their ritual books, Menologies, Anthologies and Menaia. Of these the oldest is held to be the Menologion set forth by command of the Emperor Basil Porphyrogenitus in the tenth Christian century, in which these things are contained, undoubtedly taken from Acts written long ago, which we have not yet been able to see: Eulogy from the Menologion of the Emperor Basil. "On the same day, April 24, the memory of Saint Elizabeth the Wonder-worker. Holy and Wonder-working, that is, worker of miracles, Elizabeth, having from her very infancy followed the doctrine of the Holy Fathers, gave herself up to the contemplation of divine things. From which time, having received the power of healing, she cured diseases of every kind. She also befriended the poor, helped widows, provided food for orphans, and freed those suffering injuries from those who afflicted them with insults. Throughout every season of the year, clothed in a single garment only, she endured many hardships from cold, while meanwhile she glowed with the divine spirit. Throughout her whole life she never washed her body with water; and as the great Moses of old, she fasted for forty days, tasting nothing at all. For the space of three years she gazed upon God in heaven with the keenness of mind, but did not look upon heaven with her bodily eyes. She did not eat bread, and sometimes did not even take oil: and thus, when she had lived and had wrought innumerable miracles, she fell asleep in the Lord." So it is there.
[2] Other things not unlike these are contained in the Menaia written by hand and printed, and from other Greek sources, in the manuscript Synaxarion of the Paris College of Clermont, in the Anthologion published with the approbation of Pope Clement VIII by Antonius Arcudius, and in the Lives of the Saints written in Greek by Maximus, Bishop of Cythera. And these things are handed down in the said books: "April 24. Of our holy Mother Elizabeth the Wonder-worker. She, in a tender little body, subjected herself to the discipline and labors of religion, and received from Christ the grace of healing others; whence she also cured diseases of every kind. Her birth was foretold by divine revelation, and it was announced beforehand that she would be a vessel of election. She lived clothed in a single garment, trembling at the rigor of cold and ice: throughout the whole period of her life she never washed her body with water. She passed altogether forty days fasting: for three years, with her mind fixed on God, she never contemplated heaven or its beauty or greatness with her bodily eyes. By prayer she killed a most great and terrible serpent. For many years she did not take bread, and did not taste even the least bit of oil, and did not shoe her feet with sandals. With these virtues, most pleasing to God, she shone forth, and at last rested in the Lord. Even to this day
day she shines by many miracles, whenever she bestows the grace of healings on those who approach her relics with faith. For the dust taken from her tomb drives away all diseases." Thus far that eulogy. In the Menaia, the divine office is performed in hymns and odes concerning her holy virtues and miracles, of which we excerpt these few things.
[3] Virtues expressed in Odes and hymns. A divine revelation was made to her mother before her conception, that she was going to bear a daughter, dear to the divine Spirit by the exercise of virtues. She herself, shining with maidenly gifts of graces, espoused to the most pure eternal Word, sought the heavenly bridal-chambers, a chosen bride of the Almighty, and by her virginity made a temple of God. She had in her soul an upright conscience, humility and divine meekness, a sincere faith without pretense, and divine charity along with hope: accustomed to approach God in nightly prayers, and therefore illumined with the most vehement splendor, she had with her religious women imitating her virtues — herself the venerable Mother. She cured diseases of souls and bodies, dried up the rivers of sins by the effusion of her tears; and by singular grace caused a chronic flow of blood to cease. She expelled demons and crushed all their machinations by divine power. She killed a terrible serpent by her prayers, and gave it to wild beasts and birds to be devoured. Wonderful in fasting and all abstinence. Wonderful also after her burial, since even the dust of her relics restored sight to the blind, and she shone by very many miracles. Thus it is there. We grieve that the time of her life and the arena of her virtues are nowhere expressed; it seems to have been some monastery of Constantinople.
[4] Among the Latins, this Saint Elizabeth the Wonder-worker is celebrated by Molanus in his additions to Usuard, Cult among the Latins and Egyptians. Ferrarius in the General Catalogue, Arturus du Monstier in the Sacred Gynaeceum, and on the following day by Laherius in the Menology of Virgins. There is also celebrated in the Arabic-Egyptian Martyrology translated by Grace Simonius the memory of Mother Elizabeth the Wonder-worker.