Holy Martyr Thomais of Alexandria

After the usual beginning, the following are said:

KONTAKIA and OIKOI:

Kontakion 1

Many flowers has the True Faith brought forth, and all of mystery, but like Thomais, the wife equal to nuns, the very young defender of virginity, the purified golden vessel of all wisdom, the Tree under which we are cooled who are inflamed by the heat of fornication, the Bath in which the blood of the Martyr washes us all before going to the Marriage of the Lamb, you cannot find. Therefore let us also sing filled with Hope and divine Love: Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Oikos 1

Egypt, the land of the punished but also of those delivered from the claw of satan, the desert fruitful in Holy Life, grew in Alexandria your Mystical Body, a Boundary and a Stone of stumbling for every unbeliever and a bottomless pit for the destruction of the spirits of fornication:

• Rejoice, child of Right-Believing Alexandrian Christians;
• Rejoice, Hiding Place of the Image of Martyrdom;
• Rejoice, Palace of deified minds;
• Rejoice, Flower from which we shall secretly feed, we the Bees following CHRIST;
• Rejoice, for your heart remained an immaculate Church of the Image of the Saviour;
• Rejoice, for uniting with a husband, in an incomprehensible way you remained untouched by the corruption of the passion of fornication;
• Rejoice, Light from the Light of CHRIST;
• Rejoice, Radiance without shadow or change;
• Rejoice, Lamp full of the Oil of the Commandments of GOD;
• Rejoice, Little Ship in which we find salvation who are drowned in the ocean of sins;
• Rejoice, Healer of those whom the leprosy of fornication has left without the true Image;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 2

Who is this Mystical Creature, the virginal wife, girded with truth, clothed with the breastplate of righteousness, preacher of the gospel of peace in the very face of hideous death, covered with the shield of Faith, having the helmet of salvation on her head and with the Sword of the Spirit eternally crushing the dominion of the Evil-One, for which the Angelic hosts together with those of the Saints sing to the Holy Trinity: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 2

An undefiled virginal mind, an angelic soul, a Heart pledged to the divine commandments, in a woman's body you kept yourself, O Thomais, to be for us, who are troubled by the mists of fornication, a Guide to atonement and a Way of Salvation:

• Rejoice, for you knew the Mystery of Marriage;
• Rejoice, for to your husband and master according to the flesh you were faithful unto death;
• Rejoice, for you fully understood the calling of the Christian Woman;
• Rejoice, for all worldly things, like to nuns, seemed foreign to you;
• Rejoice, for your inner eyes were kept from the deceitful waters of bodily pleasures;
• Rejoice, for the abominations of demonic lusts you destroyed with childlike purity;
• Rejoice, for all the provocations of your fornicating father-in-law you turned to nothing;
• Rejoice, for in you and for you there was room for nothing but the Light of CHRIST;
• Rejoice, you who did not defile your Holy Baptism;
• Rejoice, defender of Christian Families and of those desiring purity;
• Rejoice, Guiding Star towards Paradise;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 3

The serpent of human perdition also lay in wait for your soul, but the forbidden fruit stretched out to you for eating was its ruin, for you followed your Lord CHRIST on the Cross and in death, thus conquering death for the eternal Song: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 3

Only he who is grown old in curses and evils does not enter through the Door CHRIST, but passes stealthily over the boundaries established by the Lord as a defense of Christian Life, but he found you as a whole Army guarding Obedience, Purity, Undefiled Love – the Way, the Truth and the Life – desired by all of sound mind:

• Rejoice, you who are like the great Men of the Holy Trinity;
• Rejoice, tenderness stronger than all the swords of the world;
• Rejoice, body of flesh in which, unknown and uncomprehended by many, the rottenness of sins did not creep;
• Rejoice, land in which those pursued by bodily passions find refuge;
• Rejoice, for as your body was split open by your filthy father-in-law, for us the land of promise of dispassion was opened;
• Rejoice, for your mortal wounds bring us, who are dead to bodily pleasures, healing from the demon of fornication;
• Rejoice, for you did not fear the terrible death by the sword;
• Rejoice, for you feared the Lord and the wisdom of His Judgments;
• Rejoice, for the 7 deadly sins, with the mortal wounds inflicted on you, you hurled into hell;
• Rejoice, Love that conquered Passion;
• Rejoice, Youth without abominations and Life without death;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 4

A determination of an abbess resolved in valiant deeds like the Angelic Hosts, unceasing Vigil, hermitic abstinence from the sweets of life, gentleness and kindness of a Holy Little Mother, you, a 15-year-old girl, O Thomais, kept and guarded in your Heart, for which you will eternally hear and sing in heaven and on earth: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 4

CHRIST Himself seeing your valor, wisdom and resolve chose you to follow Him through the frightful thorns of torments, so that coming forth victorious from the trials of death, you might heal us also:

• Rejoice, chosen among women as a Bride;
• Rejoice, like the Pearl in the field;
• Rejoice, wife uncorrupted by union;
• Rejoice, for CHRIST Himself purchased you;
• Rejoice, for you were stronger than any diamond;
• Rejoice, for the Lord saw in you the one sought to seal the prisons of debauchery;
• Rejoice, Treasury of His Mysteries;
• Rejoice, for you acquired CHRIST'S Manhood;
• Rejoice, for goodness and gentleness you did not abandon;
• Rejoice, Fire that burns passions and demonic lusts;
• Rejoice, for you also renounced this passing life for Life Eternal;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 5

Unceasingly, uncleanness desires our perdition, but the Grace obtained by Christians through the Holy Mysteries has both Power and wisdom that conquer our sinful nature, passing us unknowingly over the Fearful Boundary back to Paradise, perfectly singing: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 5

How much you loved your husband blessed to you by GOD, in the glory and Service of the heavenly Master, since you were ready to defend the Mystery of Marriage and of Perfect Love from the Holy Mysteries, with your very life as a child:

• Rejoice, like all the Martyr-women;
• Rejoice, good example for all married women;
• Rejoice, Guiding Star also for all virgins;
• Rejoice, for the fear of death did not darken you;
• Rejoice, for you put death to shame;
• Rejoice, New Road carved in flesh and blood;
• Rejoice, for you proved the Power of the SPIRIT;
• Rejoice, daughter of Eve washed from sins;
• Rejoice, Paradise regained;
• Rejoice, New Christian Jerusalem;
• Rejoice, Gift made Altar of the Holy Trinity;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 6

To be a Monk means to Love CHRIST on the Cross, to be a Monk means to Love perfectly and purely, to be a Monk requires the renunciation of all pleasures and joys of the world, to be a Monk presupposes the supernatural Obedience to the Commandments that kill the body of sin into which man has fallen. To be a Nun in mind you also chose, Holy Martyr Thomais, and therefore you will unceasingly and blamelessly sing the divine: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 6

The Venerable Father Daniel the Scete understood all your wisdom that made you choose life-bearing Death and thus, not being a Nun by order, you showed yourself a Nun in mind and by your good deed:

• Rejoice, for you united wedlock with Purity;
• Rejoice, wife enrolled among the ranks of virgins;
• Rejoice, for the coming of sudden death did not make you forget CHRIST;
• Rejoice, for you suffered to be cut in two by the fornicator, in order to unite with CHRIST all those split apart by fornication;
• Rejoice, you called Venerable even by the Venerable Ones of the Holy Monastery of Octodecat;
• Rejoice, Mystical Call of Venerableness;
• Rejoice, Mind with Heavenly Light;
• Rejoice, Heart with the Divine SPIRIT;
• Rejoice, Understanding beyond the orders of the world;
• Rejoice, Comprehension that overwhelms nature;
• Rejoice, equal to Mary of Egypt, Saint John the Vlach, Moses the Hungarian or Xenia the wise;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 7

We honor you worthily with tears and joy, but the understanding of your life is beyond our power. For the turmoil of the marriage bed destroys the brilliance of all wisdom, but you united opposites through the Overshadowing of Grace and the Myrrh of your blood, showing the world that he who clothes himself in CHRIST can come to reconcile the ravages of the fall from Paradise: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 7

Only the Mother of GOD kept herself a Virgin in childbirth, and you followed her in mind, remaining blameless through the mystical understanding of the purpose of Christian Life:

• Rejoice, Paradise Image of Eve;
• Rejoice, Image of Venerableness;
• Rejoice, Image of the Recovery of the adulterous woman;
• Rejoice, Image of all repentant fornicators;
• Rejoice, for all the passionate, calling upon you, are healed;
• Rejoice, Heavenly transformation of the Earth;
• Rejoice, Bloody Sacrifice of Adam's Rib;
• Rejoice, Union of things below with Things Above;
• Rejoice, you weak by nature, Acquisition of the Strong-Eternal through choice;
• Rejoice, Shelter of families tried by passions;
• Rejoice, Union of Man and Woman in perfect Purity;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 8

The HOLY TRINITY made Man after Its Image and Likeness, but disobedience and the spirit of fornication drove him out of Paradise, and through the Incarnation and Crucifixion of the Word of GOD, the creature of clay and flesh again acquired the HOLY SPIRIT and the possibility to fit wholly and purely into the glory of GOD the FATHER: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 8

Just as the sun's ray does not in any way change its nature, passing through fire and through water, so also you, Bride of GOD, remained in mind, being a woman in body, O, Your wonders, O CHRIST, O, Your goodness, O, Your love for mankind incomprehensible except by all Christian wisdom:

• Rejoice, Martyr, for all things were permitted to you, but you were mastered only by the Love of CHRIST;
• Rejoice, for you kept your body not for fornication, but through sword and suffering, Pure you gave it to

CHRIST;

• Rejoice, for you were One Flesh with your husband only in order to be, O Mystery of GOD, One Member

in the BODY OF CHRIST;

• Rejoice, Temple of the HOLY SPIRIT even in union with the lowly;
• Rejoice, for the petty master did not separate you in any way from the True and only Lord, JESUS

CHRIST;

• Rejoice, wife temporarily separated from your husband only by sword and death;
• Rejoice, for through Faith, Purity and Sacrifice you became the Healer of all fornicators;
• Rejoice, Defender of the Christian Family;
• Rejoice, Destructive Fire of the spirits of fornication;
• Rejoice, Holy Enclosure of Men and women Baptized in the Lord;
• Rejoice, for you defend from all uncleanness all those who call upon you in CHRIST;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 9

Terrible is the Wrath of GOD against those who persist in fornication, forgetting the Punishments with which all lovers of passions in the body were burned to death and given over to satan, for which with humble fear we sing to the Mighty One: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 9

CHRIST was your Image and not Eve, and He made you like the sea in a storm, the drop eroding the rock, and you with your martyric blood shattered the strongholds of fornication:

• Rejoice, Pure Blood, poured out for our healing;
• Rejoice, Healer, but also Judge of those who have exchanged the Grace of GOD for

fornication;

• Rejoice, Comforter of the humble and desirous of Forgiveness;
• Rejoice, terrible Sword against those who dreaming, defile the body, reject Lordship and blaspheme

the Heavenly Glories;

• Rejoice, Piercer of those who walk in the way of Cain;
• Rejoice, Fire that burns Sodomites and Gomorrah-men;
• Rejoice, for you petrify in eternal darkness onanists and all fornicators;
• Rejoice, for you can turn all these, with the Grace given you by our Lord JESUS CHRIST, back to

Life, if they repent;

• Rejoice, Bath of our Most Holy Faith;
• Rejoice, Good Eye of those blinded by passions;
• Rejoice, Way of Salvation for all the erring who desire in CHRIST Healing;
• Rejoice, Hand by which we Support ourselves on the Cross of the Saviour;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 10

The Mountains of human Virtues are covered with the Glory of GOD, and the highest peak has an impregnable Fortress – Love, for the Lord is Love and out of His Love He was crucified for us and to perfectly fulfill the Desire of GOD the FATHER: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 10

An outpouring of endless Gifts does the Lord give to those who follow Him, above all being however the Gift of Love for GOD and love for neighbor, of which you became a most rich Treasury:

• Rejoice, Thomais – Love that is long-suffering;
• Rejoice, Thomais – Love that does not behave unseemly;
• Rejoice, Thomais – Love that is not inflamed with self-justification;
• Rejoice, Thomais – Love that fulfills our good desires;
• Rejoice, Thomais – Melter of pride and self-love;
• Rejoice, Thomais, Ark of Truth;
• Rejoice, Thomais, Bond of Perfection;
• Rejoice, Thomais, Receiver of the Inheritance of CHRIST;
• Rejoice, for Judith killed the fornicator Holofernes, but died;
• Rejoice, for you, O Thomais, let yourself be killed by the fornicator and live eternally;
• Rejoice, for you are also for us, the passionate, a Mysterious Defender;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 11

Hard to understand, and even harder to live by us sinners, are the Lord's Commandments that bring the Gifts of Humility and Perfection in the Spirit, which you however fulfilled abundantly from Holy Baptism, ceaselessly offering the Thrice-Holy Hymn: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 11

Your death was trumpeted by angels and Lightened the darkness of our life like a Lightning, thus the Seers in the Spirit were informed of the Birth of the Healer of fornication, the wise Thomais:

• Rejoice, wife with an angelic Image bestowed, through the covering with the heavy Garment of Martyrdom;
• Rejoice, laywoman considered by the Holy Fathers as equal to them;
• Rejoice, for you were even carried to a Monastery of Monks;
• Rejoice, you who together with our Abbess, the Most Pure Mother of GOD, guard the Holy Monasteries from the spirit of self-justification;
• Rejoice, for your Holy Relics immediately Worked;
• Rejoice, for your Holy Relics healed from fornication him who asked for your help;
• Rejoice, Wonder which we do not understand, but to which we Pray;
• Rejoice, for the drops of your blood fill with life the desert of our sins;
• Rejoice, for you became a Mother to all forsaken by Virtues;
• Rejoice, for the Lord JESUS, the Bridegroom for whom you let yourself be cut to pieces, has made you whole for us;
• Rejoice, for your cut body cuts off cursed desires;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 12

Without you, Saints of the HOLY TRINITY, we would never reach the Treasure of Eternal Life, for we wander in the thickets of our sins vaster than all the oceans and seas of the world, bottomless black holes, from which only you, through ascetic struggles and death, lift us up, that together we may sing: ALLELUIA!

Oikos 12

Seeing our inability to defend ourselves from the sweets of the forbidden fruit and our weak will, the Lord sent the child-wife with the soul of a nun to protect us and making a path through her, a path to Salvation is for us:

• Rejoice, Mystery of the Image of Holiness of Creation;
• Rejoice, Mystery of the Innocent and Pure Image;
• Rejoice, Daughter of the World and Gift of the Son of the Heavenly Father;
• Rejoice, Virtue of those who love GOD;
• Rejoice, Valor that surpasses all satan's warriors;
• Rejoice, Strength of Heaven on Earth;
• Rejoice, Child-Wife-Nun, Mother of the powerless;
• Rejoice, Holy Work over the wickedness of the world;
• Rejoice, Holy Work over the demonic wiles;
• Rejoice, Humility with Mysterious Glory;
• Rejoice, Merciful One, supporter and healer of the poor in virtues;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

Kontakion 13

O, Holy Mystery of GOD's Love for His Image of dust, Work through which CHRIST is crucified in each of His Saints, raising them up and placing them as Workers in the field sown with tears, Holy Venerable and Martyr Thomais, look, look quickly upon the wandering of my mind and give me your Holy Will, that resisting the enemy entirely, I may quench the scorching fire of my bodily passions with the flow of your immaculate blood, in which being rebaptized, I who have fallen from holy things, may become again an Image of the Heavenly Father, a Son returned to the first things and grateful to you, that together with all I may sing to the HOLY TRINITY: ALLELUIA! (this kontakion is said three times)

Then again Oikos the first is said

Egypt, the land of the punished but also of those delivered from the claw of satan, the desert fruitful in Holy Life, grew in Alexandria your Mystical Body, a Boundary and a Stone of stumbling for every unbeliever and a bottomless pit for the destruction of the spirits of fornication:

• Rejoice, child of Right-Believing Alexandrian Christians;
• Rejoice, Hiding Place of the Image of Martyrdom;
• Rejoice, Palace of deified minds;
• Rejoice, Flower from which we shall secretly feed, we the Bees following CHRIST;
• Rejoice, for your heart remained an immaculate Church of the Image of the Saviour;
• Rejoice, for uniting with a husband, in an incomprehensible way you remained untouched by the corruption of the passion of fornication;
• Rejoice, Light from the Light of CHRIST;
• Rejoice, Radiance without shadow or change;
• Rejoice, Lamp full of the Oil of the Commandments of GOD;
• Rejoice, Little Ship in which we find salvation who are drowned in the ocean of sins;
• Rejoice, Healer of those whom the leprosy of fornication has left without the true Image;
• Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

And Kontakion the first Many flowers has the True Faith brought forth, and all of mystery, but like Thomais, the wife equal to nuns, the very young defender of virginity, the purified golden vessel of all wisdom, the Tree under which we are cooled who are inflamed by the heat of fornication, the Bath in which the blood of the Martyr washes us all before going to the Marriage of the Lamb, you cannot find. Therefore let us also sing filled with Hope and divine Love: Rejoice, Holy Venerable Martyr Thomais, Vessel of all Christian Wisdom!

After this is said this:

PRAYER

Holy Martyr Thomais, enlightener of those in the darkness of self-justifications, look also upon my wretched prayer, for I have cast myself before your holy Icon, which I, blinded by the sins of fornication, do not see. Hearken therefore to the cry of my heart, for I no longer hear you, the Saints, being wholly deafened by the noises of merriment and the shouts of demons, look you upon me as the Saviour of the world looked and by His mercy and love for mankind I have come to pray, I who no longer have a voice, but have likened myself to the swine and all beasts in speech and conduct and have become speechless, I who once in Paradise gave them names and purposes through naming. Look intently upon me and with your prayers that are heard by the Master and Maker of things seen and unseen, calm me for at least one day in the war of fornication and excessive fornication into which I, alone, of my own free will, have cast myself! Pray for me a sinner, who have far surpassed in many and various nameless wickednesses those of Sodom and Gomorrah, for me who await nothing but the wrath of GOD, for "in iniquities was I conceived and in sins did my mother bear me", raised in the apocalyptic vortex, swaddled in sadness, suckled with the satanic milk of the abominations of television, weaned with anger and hate, being wholly deprived of all Christian wisdom. You, who have known neither the slobber of sin nor demonic fear nor shame, quickly wield over me the sword of the Holy Spirit and split me in two and cast out from me the stinking spirit of debauchery, of sadness, of desolation, of fornication and adultery, of all bodily sins that even the demons no longer know how to invent, of defilement with foul lusts before my CHRIST. Cut away from me the spirit of ignorance, of unmercifulness, of hardness of heart, of drunkenness, of gluttony, of love of money, of slandering my neighbor, of not loving brothers or enemies, of inclination towards evil and things displeasing to the Lord, of insolence which is called "boldness", and every thought without answer and unworthy of the Image of Divine Love, but worthy of all torment and condemnation and gehenna and every punishment, with which the Holy Trinity condemns demonic rebellion and disobedience towards which I (name) have bowed down, wholly consenting. Have mercy on me, you who were cut in body but whole in wisdom, and Entreat the Good God to grant me forgiveness and strength, to grant me respite to wash in your blood, poured out for me, and then in His Blood with which He saved the world, the countless multitude of lawless deeds. I am exhausted by the onslaught of this living in sins. See me and all my brothers in wretchedness. Stop me at the mysterious Boundary of repentance and humility, mark me with fasting, in order to pour out in confession, without fear and shame, my sins. I want to confess first to you, as to a fervent Supplicant and Swift intercessor, then, with the help of my spiritual Father, to the Only and Lover of mankind God. Help me I beseech you with the humility with which the Canaanite woman asked help for her daughter. I am both mother and daughter, for I am a host of the sins of self-justification and I have conceived abominations with which I have filled the world. I see the Cross as the only Haven and I ask for it. I Beseech You, (behold, I Beseech!) and I desire – the narrow Path and the narrow entrance into the Fold of the Saved Sheep. I believe and I want to confess my Right Faith through the Good Works of the Orthodox Christian. But I am wholly powerless. I beseech you, Holy Venerable and Martyr Thomais, Pray earnestly, that my Lord and my GOD JESUS CHRIST may also command me: "Arise, take up your bed and walk". You are my Pool who are the good and healing example of the Sheep. Through your prayers may I also be healed and, being healed, may I return to Life in order to be able to Serve also, according to the Commandment, the Holy Trinity, the Most Pure Mother and Ever-Virgin Mary and you, all the Saints to whom I have fled for the healing of soul and body. Amen!

PRAYER

O GOD, through the prayers of the Holy Martyr Thomais, help me and deliver me from the sin of fornication. And hope, O my soul, in GOD, for you will be freed from the demonic temptation. Amen! Troparion Your Lamb, O Jesus, Thomais, cries with a loud voice: You, my Bridegroom, I love, and seeking You I suffer and am crucified with You, and am buried with Your Baptism; and I suffer for You, that I may reign in You; and I die for You, that I may live in You; but as a spotless sacrifice, receive me who with love am sacrificed to You. Through her prayers, as Merciful One, save our souls.