Hieromartyrs Acepsimas, Bishop of Naeson, the priest Joseph, and the deacon Aeithalas, of Persia (376)
The eighty-year-old Acepsimas, filled with every Christian virtue, was sitting one day in his home with guests. Just then a child, filled with the Spirit of God, ran up to the aged bishop, kissed him on the head and said: “Blessed is this head, for it will receive suffering for Christ.” This prophecy was soon fulfilled. King Sapor raised a bitter persecution of Christians throughout Persia, and St. Acepsimas was apprehended. He was brought before a prince who was also a pagan priest. As the bishop was arrested and bound, a member of his household asked him what should be done with his home if he were martyred. The saint replied: “It is no longer my home. I am going to a home on high and will not return.” After prolonged interrogation he was thrown into prison. The following day Joseph, a seventy-year-old presbyter, and Aeithalas, a deacon, were also imprisoned. After three years of imprisonment and many tortures, Acepsimas was beheaded. Joseph and Aithalas were buried up to their waists in the ground, and the soulless pagans forced Chris- tians to stone them. That night, by God’s providence, Joseph’s body disappeared, and a myrtle tree grew over Aeithalas’s body that healed every kind of disease and pain of men. This tree stood for The Hieromartyr Acepsimas (Menologion of Basil II, 11th c.) five years before the wicked and envious pa- gans cut it down. These soldiers of Christ suffered in Persia in the fourth century, dur- ing the time of the pagan King Sapor.
