Synaxarion for the Sunday of All Saints

On the Sunday after Pentecost, we celebrate the feast of all the saints throughout the world — in Asia, Africa and Europe, in the north and the south.

Verses

I hymn all the friends of my Lord;
And if anyone desire, let him speak of them all.

Our godly fathers have ordained that we celebrate this feast after the descent of the most Holy Spirit, showing, as it were, in a certain way that the coming of the Holy Spirit made the apostles such; it sanctified, made wise those of our substance, to fulfill what had fallen away from the angelic rank; it ordained them and brought them to God through Christ — some through torment and blood, and others through a virtuous life and sojourn. And it accomplisheth things beyond nature. The Holy Spirit descendeth in the form of fire, which by nature hath a tendency toward what is higher; whereas dust hath by its nature a downward tendency, as doth the flesh of which we are composed, which before, for a short time, was assumed by God the Word, and hath been deified, and upborne, and seated at the right hand of the glory of the Father. And now, as a promise, it draweth all who desire unto God the Word, Who indicateth for us the works of reconciliation. And what is the intended purpose of His coming to us in the flesh and His providential economy, if not that He bringeth the ignorant people of the nations to the Gospel and into friendship with God, while human nature, those who had been well pleasing to Him in various ways, He offereth to God therein? This is the first reason why we celebrate the feast of all saints. The second is because, although many were well-pleasing to God in their high virtue, yet for some reason, perhaps even because of certain human circumstances, they have remained unknown among the people, though with God they enjoy great glory. Or, inasmuch as many lived the Christian life in India, Egypt, Arabia, Mesopotamia, Phrygia, and the northern reaches of the Black Sea, and likewise all throughout the West, as far as the British Isles — briefly put, in the West and in the East — and because of the countless multitude of them it is not easy to render them fitting veneration as is the accepted custom in the Church, thus, that the most godly fathers might win the mediation and help of all of them, they ordained that a feast be celebrated for all the saints (as many as the Holy Spirit, Who dwelt in them, had sanctified), rendering honor to all of them together, no matter the country wherein they were right pleasing to God — those who lived before, and even those yet to be revealed, those who have not been glorified or made manifest. The third reason that we should join together on a single day those celebrated individually, on particular days, is that it might be made clear that they all struggled for the one Christ, and that they all ran the race for the selfsame virtue. Thus, all of them, as servants of the one God, have been crowned as is meet; they together comprise the Church, filling the world on high and moving us to engage in contests equal to theirs, though such be various and multifarious, and to strive with all diligence according to the strength each one may possess. It is to all the saints of ages past that the renowned Leo the all-wise constructed and dedicated a large and beautiful church. It is located near the Church of the Holy Apostles, in the middle of Constantinople. At first Leo began to build it in honor, so to speak, of his first consort, Theophania, who had pleased God well to the highest degree (a thing particularly amazing in the midst of the imperial court). But when he declared to the Church of his intention, he did not find it conformable to his will, neither did it accept his reasoning, saying that it was not appropriate of a sudden to accord unto one who had but lately participated in the emperor’s plans and banquets so great an honor as to build such a magnificent and special church for her, no matter how pleasing to God she had been. Then, with the endorsement of the whole Church, the all-wise Leo dedicated the newly-erected church to all the saints of the whole world, saying thus: “If Theophania is a saint, she will be included with all the rest of them.” In my opinion, it is from that time that this feast began to be celebrated with greater solemnity, although it was celebrated earlier; and it is for this cause that it was included in the later Triodia, enclosing all the feasts like a garden wall. For the good order and structure of the Church, although it originated earlier, yet, gradually reaching a better and more fitting position, was fully established and defined only in the days of the emperor, in the structure and order wherein it now existeth. The Triodion, to put it briefly, includeth a harmonious account of what God hath in His ineffable judgments done for us: of the devil’s fall from heaven for the first act of disobedience, of the transgression and expulsion of Adam, of the whole dispensation of God the Word for our sake, and how we have been restored to heaven by the Holy Spirit and have come to fill out that fallen [angelic] rank which is recognized in all the saints. One should know that we are now celebrating all those ranks which the Holy Spirit hath sanctified by grace. I have in mind the exalted and hallowed intelligences, that is, the nine ranks: of the forefathers, the patriarchs, the prophets, the holy apostles, the martyrs, the martyred monastics, the venerable, the righteous, all the choirs of holy women, and all the others saints, whose names are unknown to us; and to these let us also add those who are to be revealed. Yet beyond all, in all, and with all of these we celebrate the saint of saints, the all-holy one, who is incomparably more exalted than the angelic ranks themselves: our Lady and Mistress the Theotokos and Ever-virgin Mary. Through the supplications of Thine all-pure Mother and of all Thy saints from ages past, O Christ God, have mercy and save us, in that Thou alone art good and lovest mankind.