Venerable Martyr Eustratios of the Caves

Life

He was very wealthy, but moved by the love of Christ he distributed all his possessions for the sake of Christ, entered the Monastery of the Caves, and was tonsured a monk. When the Polovtsians invaded Kiev in 1097, they plundered the monastery, slew many Christians and monks, and sold Eustratios along with certain other faithful into slavery to a Jew in the city of Cherson. That Jew mocked the faith of Christ and forced the Christians to convert to the Jewish faith. Seeing that there was no other way out, they all resolved to starve themselves to death rather than renounce the true faith. Eustratios encouraged the Christians in this resolve. And they all died of hunger — some after three days, some after four, others after seven. Trained in fasting, Eustratios alone survived and endured fourteen days without food. The enraged Jew, wrathful that the money with which he had bought the slaves was lost, took vengeance on Eustratios by nailing him to a cross. But Eustratios from the cross gave thanks to God and prophesied to the Jew a bitter and speedy death. In his fury the Jew pierced him with a spear. And so the man of God gave up his soul to his Savior. His body was cast into the sea, but it floated up, and great miracles occurred over that martyric body. Soon afterward the Byzantine emperor ordered that the Jews in Cherson be punished for their wickedness toward the Christians. And that tormentor was hanged on a tree and received the reward of Judas.

From the Hymn of Praise

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