Friday, 17 October 2025

Friday of the 19th week after Pentecost

180 days after Pascha · Tone 1 · Liturgy · Fast

Saints commemorated

Holy Prophet Hosea

The holy Prophet Hosea, the first of the twelve minor prophets in the order of the Old Testament canon, was the son of Beeri and was reckoned in tradition to the tribe of Issachar, although he prophesied chiefly to the northern kingdom of Israel. He laboured in the eighth century before Christ, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah of Judah and of Jeroboam the son of Joash king of Israel, and was a contemporary of the prophets Isaiah, Amos and Micah. By the command of God he took to wife a woman of unfaithful life, that his marriage might serve as a living parable of the apostasy of the people from their Lord, and through his preaching he sought to turn his countrymen from idolatry and injustice back to the faith of their fathers. He foretold the captivity of Israel by the Assyrians, the cessation of the Levitical sacrifices, the calling of the Gentiles, the resurrection of Christ on the third day, in the words "after two days he will revive us, on the third day he will raise us up", and the destruction of death itself, in the saying which the Apostle quotes, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" Having served as a prophet for some sixty years, he reposed in great old age and was buried in his own land.

Holy Unmercenary Martyrs Cosmas and Damian of Cilicia and their brothers

287

The holy and wonderworking Cosmas and Damian, called the Arabian to distinguish them from the homonymous unmercenaries of Asia and of Rome, were brothers born in Arabia and instructed in the Christian faith and the art of medicine from their youth. Together with their three brothers Leontius, Anthimus and Eutropius, they travelled through the cities and villages of Cilicia, healing the sick of every disease and casting out unclean spirits, accepting nothing in return but only requiring of the healed an unfeigned faith in Christ; for which cause the Church names them Unmercenaries. In the persecution under the emperor Diocletian, in the year 287, they were arrested at Aegeae in Cilicia by the prefect Lysias and brought before his tribunal; and when neither flatteries, threats, nor torments could move them from the confession of Christ, they were stripped, bound and cast first into the sea, then into a great fire, and at last shot through with arrows; but the Lord delivered them from these torments, the waters bearing them up and the fire and the arrows turning aside from them. Beholding these wonders the prefect ordered them to be beheaded, and so the five holy brothers received the crown of martyrdom together. Their relics, working healings without number, have been honoured by the faithful from the earliest times, and the Church keeps their memory upon the seventeenth of October.

Holy Venerable Martyr Andrew of Crete

767

Saint Andrew, called the Cretan to distinguish him from the more famous archbishop and hymnographer of the same island, was born in Crete and from his youth embraced the monastic life upon that island. When the iconoclast emperor Constantine Copronymus renewed the persecution against the holy icons and many monks were tortured, exiled or put to death for their veneration, Andrew left his solitude and travelled to Constantinople in order to admonish the emperor to his face. Finding Constantine in the church of the holy martyr Mamas, he stood forth boldly before the imperial throne and rebuked him, declaring that whoever suffered for the holy icons suffered for Christ, while he that reviled the icon offered insult to Christ Himself. The enraged emperor commanded that he be cruelly tortured and dragged through the streets of the city; on the way to the place of execution a fanatic of the heretical party cut off his foot with an axe, and the saint, weakened by his wounds, gave up his soul to God in the year 767. The faithful gathered his body in secret and buried it in honour at the place called Krisis, and his memory was celebrated with great solemnity throughout the city after the restoration of the holy icons.

Translation of the relics of Saint Lazarus the Four-Days-Dead

898

The righteous Lazarus, the friend of Christ and brother of Martha and Mary of Bethany, after his raising from the dead by the Lord on the fourth day of his being in the tomb, was forced by the hatred of the Jewish leaders to flee from Judaea, and came at last to the island of Cyprus. There the holy apostles Barnabas and Paul ordained him bishop of Kition, the modern Larnaca, where he laboured for the salvation of his flock for thirty years and finally reposed in peace, being received a second time into the eternal kingdom. His body was preserved at Kition until the year 890, when in the reign of the emperor Leo the Wise his sepulchre was discovered, bearing the inscription "Lazarus, four days dead, friend of Christ". The pious emperor caused the sacred relics to be translated with great honour to Constantinople in the year 898 and laid them in the church of the Righteous Lazarus which he had built for that purpose, sending in exchange to Cyprus a marble sarcophagus and an icon of the saint. The Church commemorates this translation upon the seventeenth of October, while the raising of Lazarus itself is kept upon the Saturday before Palm Sunday.

Holy Martyrs Cosmas and Damian, the Unmercenaries of Cilicia

4th c.

The Church commemorates three pairs of brothers named Cosmas and Damian, all counted among the Unmercenary Physicians. The first reposed in peace and are commemorated on November 1; the second were stoned to death in Rome, and are commemorated on July 1; the third pair, commemorated today, were Arab doctors. They embraced the Christian faith together and thereafter cared for the sick in the name of the Lord Jesus, performing many miraculous healings. They were handed over to the governor Lysias by jealous pagans. When the governor accused them of healing by sorcery, they replied ‘We have no sort of magic, nor use any, but we have the power of Christ to save us and all who call upon His holy Name.’ The governor first attempted to bribe them to deny Christ then, when this was useless, subjected them to many tortures. Finally they were beheaded. Their holy relics continued to perform many miracles of healing.

Daily readings

Epistle

weekly cycle

Philippians — Philippians 1.27-2.4

²⁷Only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ: that, whether I come and see you or be absent, I may hear of your state, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one soul striving for the faith of the gospel; ²⁷Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ: that whether I come and see you, or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel; ²⁸and in nothing affrighted by the adversaries: which is for them an evident token of perdition, but of your salvation, and that from God; ²⁸And in nothing terrified by your adversaries: which is to them an evident token of perdition, but to you of salvation, and that of God. ²⁹because to you it hath been granted in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer in his behalf: ²⁹For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake; ³⁰having the same conflict which ye saw in me, and now hear to be in me. ³⁰Having the same conflict which ye saw in me, and now hear to be in me.

¹If there is therefore any exhortation in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any tender mercies and compassions,

¹If there be therefore any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any bowels and mercies, ²make full my joy, that ye be of the same mind, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind; ²Fulfil ye my joy, that ye be likeminded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. ³Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves. ³doing nothing through faction or through vainglory, but in lowliness of mind each counting other better than himself; ⁴not looking each of you to his own things, but each of you also to the things of others. ⁴Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.

Gospel

weekly cycle

Luke — Luke 9.12-18

¹²And when the day began to wear away, then came the twelve, and said unto him, Send the multitude away, that they may go into the towns and country round about, and lodge, and get victuals: for we are here in a desert place. ¹²And the day began to wear away; and the twelve came, and said unto him, Send the multitude away, that they may go into the villages and country round about, and lodge, and get provisions: for we are here in a desert place. ¹³But he said unto them, Give ye them to eat. And they said, We have no more but five loaves and two fishes; except we should go and buy meat for all this people. ¹³But he said unto them, Give ye them to eat. And they said, We have no more than five loaves and two fishes; except we should go and buy food for all this people. ¹⁴For they were about five thousand men. And he said to his disciples, Make them sit down by fifties in a company. ¹⁴For they were about five thousand men. And he said unto his disciples, Make them sit down in companies, about fifty each. ¹⁵And they did so, and made them all sit down. ¹⁵And they did so, and made them all sit down. ¹⁶Then he took the five loaves and the two fishes, and looking up to heaven, he blessed them, and brake, and gave to the disciples to set before the multitude. ¹⁶And he took the five loaves and the two fishes, and looking up to heaven, he blessed them, and brake; and gave to the disciples to set before the multitude. ¹⁷And they did eat, and were all filled: and there was taken up of fragments that remained to them twelve baskets. ¹⁷And they ate, and were all filled: and there was taken up that which remained over to them of broken pieces, twelve baskets.

¹⁸And it came to pass, as he was alone praying, his disciples were with him: and he asked them, saying, Whom say the people that I am?

¹⁸And it came to pass, as he was praying apart, the disciples were with him: and he asked them, saying, Who do the multitudes say that I am?