The Holy Martyrs Jonah and Barachis and the Others with them
Commemorated on March 28
The Holy Martyrs
Jonah and Barachis and the Others with them: The brothers Jonah and
Barachis were Christians. They lived in the village of Yasa in Persia during the
time of the emperor Sapor (310-331), a fierce persecutor of Christians. Having
learned, that Christians were being tortured in the city of Baravokh, they set
out thence, and found there in prison the Martyrs Zanyphanes, Lazaros,
Maruphanes, Narsynes, Ilias, Marinos, Habib, Sybeiphines and Sava, – and they
encouraged them to hold on firmly to the Christian faith to the very end. The
holy brothers were arrested and brought to trial before the Persian princes
Masdrath, Siroth and Marmis, who began to urge them to bow down in worship to
the sun, and to fire and water. The holy martyrs firmly confessed their faith
in Christ in front of them and refused to fulfill the demands of the pagans,
for which reason they were subjected to fierce torments.
Saint Jonah suffered
first. They tied the martyr to a tree and for a long time they beat him, and
then they dragged him along the ice of a frozen lake, they cut off his fingers
and toes, they cut out his tongue, they peeled the skin from his head, and finally
they sawed his body in half and threw it in a ditch.
For the holy Martyr
Barachis they put red-hot shackles on his wrists, they poured molten tin in his
nose, ears and moth, and they tore at him, having tied him to a turning wheel.
The holy martyr gave up his spirit to God after they poured boiling tar in his
mouth. The bodies of the holy martyrs Jonah, Barachis and the other brave
passion-bearers were buried by a pious Christian by the name of Habdisotes.
© 1996-2001 by translator Fr. S. Janos.