ON ST. THEOCLETA THE WONDER-WORKER.
NINTH CENTURY.
Cultus from the Greek Fasti, elogium, time of life.
Theocleta the Wonder-worker (St.)
J. P.
The Menology of Sirletus announces this Saint at the XXI day of August in these words: She is announced in the Menology of Sirletus, and elsewhere; her elogium On the same day, the commemoration of St. Theoclita, worker of miracles. She lived under Theophilus, the hater of Christ, having been brought up from infancy in manners pleasing to God, in meditation upon the divine oracles and in the distribution of many alms to the poor, and laboring at daily work that she might minister to the necessities of the poor. She also foretold the day of her death. But how many and how great were the miracles wrought through her, it would be exceedingly difficult to comprise in a brief discourse. Our transcripts from the Ambrosian library, book N. 178, record the memory of Theocleta the Wonder-worker on the same day; but in the transcript of the Chifflet Menæum I read only Τῆς ἁγ. Θεοκλητοῦς, that is, Of St. Theoclete, the title of Wonder-worker being omitted; which nevertheless is also had in the great Menæa, which likewise record her on this XXI day. The elogium which stands in the same our Matthäus Rader translated from Greek into Latin. I have compared it with the Greek text, and have judged that it should be transcribed hither. Thus, then, it runs: She lived under the reign of Theophilus, the enemy of Christ, sprung by native place and stock from the order of the nobles. She had for father Constantine, for mother Anastasia. From her cradle she was brought up in holiness and religion; then she was joined to a husband most like herself in character, Zacharias, from whose companionship she received no harm. For she was then most lavish toward the poor, and intent on the meditation of the sacred Scriptures; whatever good she grasped, she carried out; and whatever exhortations to virtue she read in the sacred Scriptures, she diligently fulfilled.
[2] The whole day she was occupied, and relieved the necessities of the widows \ who flocked to her, and ministered to her household. is brought forward from the printed Menæa: But after the day of her departure from life drew near, having called together her household, she foretold the day of her death and the things which were to happen on that day. But what miracles occurred after her death cannot be committed to writing by us, who follow the abridgment of matters. One thing, however, on account of the greatness of the matter, must not be passed over in silence. Every year her thrice-holy body her kinsfolk are wont to raise, and to change its garments, others being brought, and to arrange her hoary hair, and to cut the nails from her hands and feet, and, the Trisagion having been said, to lay it back in its place. But the body remains incorrupt. The word Θρισάγιον is in Latin ter sanctum, "thrice holy," as is noted above; but here it signifies the formula of divine praise in which ἅγιος is thrice repeated, namely ἅγιος ὁ Θεὸς ἅγιος ἰσχυρὸς, ἅγιος ἀθάνατὸς ἐλέησον ἡμᾶς, that is: Holy God, Holy Mighty One, Holy Immortal One, have mercy on us. The Hierolexicon of the Macri may be consulted at the word Sanctus*.
[3] she lived in the ninth century. At what time St. Theoclete flourished is indicated above, when she is said to have lived under the emperor Theophilus, the enemy of Christ; who began to reign in his father's place in the year of Christ 829, and was the heir of his impiety against the sacred images, being taken from life in the year 842. It is to be lamented that the miracles of this Wonder-worker have either perished, or at least have not hitherto come into my hands; as also that there are not more things at hand for me to report concerning her. At the III day of this month there is had among the Prætermissi, from the printed Menæa, a St. Theocleta, in Greek Θεοκλητὼ, whom we said to be wholly unknown to us, unless perhaps she were the Saint of today; but that this one is different from her I suffer myself to be persuaded without difficulty, because to today's Saint the title of Wonder-worker is added, but not to her in the said Menæa. You have,
reader, what we have been permitted to learn and to teach concerning this Saint.
Annotations\ in the Greek πτωχοῖς, which signifies the poor*.