 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
HE DESERT
SAINTS
of the early centuries were a wild and strange breed – and none were
bred wilder or stranger than the saints of Syria. Some of them stood and
prayed for years on end without sitting down. Others lived on top of pillars
in the desert where they preached, wrote epistles and drew crowds of pilgrims.
Numbered among these maverick saints is our patron, St Simeon the Holy
Fool.
Simeon's saintly career started out quite normally. It was the usual story: 29 years living on lentils in an isolated cave next to the Dead Sea, at first struggling against temptation and then advancing to an alarming degree of holiness. But Simeon's story took a dramatic turn when he left his cave one day and set out for the city of Emesa in Syria. Arriving at the city gate, he found a dead dog on a dungheap, tied its leg to the rope around his waist, and entered the city dragging the comatose canine behind him.
This was only the beginning. For Simeon had decided to play the fool in order to mock the idiocy of the world and also to conceal his own identity as a saint. His behaviour was eccentric and, of course, scandalous...
During the church services, he threw nuts at the clergy and blew out the candles. In the circus, he wrapped his arms around the dancing-girls and went skipping and dancing across the arena. In the streets, he tripped people up, developed a theatrical limp, and dragged himself around on his buttocks. In the bath-house, he ran naked into the crowded women's section. On solemn fasting days he feasted riotously, consuming vast amounts of beans – with predictable and hilarious results. In his lifetime, Simeon was regarded as a madman, as an unholy scandal.
T WAS ONLY AFTER his death
that the secret life of Simeon came to light.
People started to talk about his acts of kindness – and about his
strange and powerful miracles. There was the poor mule driver whose vinegar
Simeon turned into wine so that he could start a successful tavern. There
was the rich man who was saved from death when Simeon threw a lucky triple
six at dice. And there was the young man Simeon punched on the jaw to
save him from an affair with a married woman.
St Simeon the Holy Fool was a secret saint, his story was a holy farce, and his life shows how God chooses "the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; the weak things of the world to shame the strong" (1 Corinthians 1:27).
| Want to read more about St Simeon? Click to order your copy of Symeon the Holy Fool by Derek Krueger from the UK or US. Loose canons | SOF home © Ship of Fools 2005 |
 |
|
| |
|