The Venerable Simeon Stylites (the Younger) of the Wonderful Mountain (592)
This wonderful saint was born in Antioch in the year 522 during the reign of Emperor Justin the Elder. His father perished in an earthquake and he was left alone with his mother Martha. At age six he withdrew to the desert to a spiritual father named John, under whose guidance he submitted himself to a life of austere fasting and prayerful asceticism, to the astonishment of all who saw him. Enduring horrible demonic temptations, he received great comfort and grace from the Lord and His angels.
The Lord Christ appeared to him in the form of a handsome youth. After this vision, a great love for Christ burned in Simeon’s heart. He spent many years on a pillar praying to God and chanting Psalms. Under God’s guidance, he withdrew to a mountain called “Wonderful” by the Lord Himself. Because of the name of this mountain, Simeon was surnamed “of the Wonderful Mountain.” Because of his love for God, he was endowed with a rare gift of grace, by which he healed every infirmity, tamed wild beasts, beheld distant parts of the world, and saw into the hearts of men. He left his body and gazed at the heavens and conversed with angels; he frightened and cast out demons; he prophesied; at times he lived without sleep for thirty days; and at times he lived even longer without food, receiving nourishment from the hands of angels. The words of the Lord were completely fulfilled in him:
He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do
(John 14:12). In the year of our Lord 596, in the seventy-fifth year of his life, St. Simeon presented himself to the Lord, to delight eternally in the vision of the face of God together with the angels.
