In the history of Christianity,
martyrs played a main role. Martyrs are the one who gave their whole life for
the development of the Christianity they lived a life as a witness to Christ,
they are even willing to give their life
for Christ. That much faith is filled within them. This is the context where
many martyrs gave their life for the Christ, let us discuss about the life of
Ephraim or Ehprem briefly.
Deacon
confessor and doctor of the church
St. Ephrem lived around (306 to 373)
in Iraq. He is famously known as the Deacon confessor and doctor of the
church. Ephrem was a native of Nisibis
in Mesopotamia, the son of a pagan priest, and while stilla youth was driven
from his home when his sympathy for the chirstian faith was discovered.
St. James, the noted bishop of
Nisbis, saw to his spiritual instruction; it is believed that the then spent
eight years with the monks in the Egyptian desert, and that st Basil the great
ordained him a Deacon. He consistently
declined the priesthood, however, and years later also the episcopate.
The Roman Empire was losing its
eastern provinces in its wars with the Persians, and in 363 the city of Nisbis
had to be returned to Persia. That was a
hard blow for the Christian colony, given the fierce persecutionof their faith
being carried on in all Persian territory.
The faithful thus fled the city in great numbers. Ephrem too went and settled in Edessa, the
capital of Osrhoene, where he spent the last ten years of his life as hermit
and strict ascetic.
Edessa
was at that time a hotbed of heresy, there existing no less than ten heretical
sects. Ephrem took issue with them all,
both by preaching and by writing. He was apparently one of the chief founders
of the famous theological “school of the Persians”, where Persian masters
instructed the refugees from Nisbis.
Declared
Doctor of the church by pope Benedict XV in 1920, st Ephrem is referred to as
the “sun of the syrians” and the “Harp of the Holy spirit” because he was the
most prolific writer of Bible commentaries in the Syrian church and composed a
large number of liturgical hymns. The
latter were particularly aimed at refusing the errors of the Gnostics, which
were being successfully propagated by verse and song. In fact, his influence among both the Syrians
and the Persians was so great that 20 years after his death St. Jerome had this
to say of him “Ephrem a Deacon of the church at Edessa, wrote many works in
Syriac and became so famous that in osme churches his writings are read out publicly after the sacred scriptures”.
One
of the famous quote by Ephrem was “virginity will serve as a chriot, lifting
heavenward all those who guard it, as did Elias”.
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