سابا الشهيد

[walaa farouk]

سابا الشهيد



كان سابا من أمّة الغطط الأشرار. ومنذ صباه، اعتنق الإيمان المسيحيّ
ورغب في الفضيلة سالكًا طريق الكمال الإنجيليّ. كان سريع الطّاعة،
متواضعًا فصيح اللّسان، شجاعًا، لا يهاب أعداء الدّين.
وكان الغُطط يكرهون المسيحيّين ويضطّهدونهم ويلزمونهم بأكل الذبائح المقدّمة للأوثان
. فحملت الغيرة هذا القدّيس على أن يصيح علانية:
إنّ كلّ من يأكل من تلك الذبائح لا يُعدّ مسيحيًّا. فانصاع لكلامه كثيرون من المسيحيِّين.
واستمرّوا ثابتين على إيمانهم صابرين على أشدّ العذابات.
ولمّا استؤنف الإضطهاد وأتى الحكام إلى قرية سابا يسألون هل فيها مسيحيّون،
وقف سابا أمامهم مجاهرًا بكلّ شجاعة: إنّه مسيحيّ. فأمروه بأن يأكل من ذبائح الأوثان.
فأبى بكلّ جرأة. حينئذ شدّوا وثاقه. وأوسعوه إهانات وجراحًا.
وهو ثابت على إيمانه، فحملوه إلى النهر حيث خنقوه وطرحوه في الماء.
فنال إكليل الشّهادة في 12 نيسان سنة 372.

St. Sabas the Goth
Also Sabbas the Goth, a martyr in the area of modern Romania. He was a Goth converted to Christianity in his youth and became a lector in Targoviste, Romania, to a priest named Sansala. He survived several persecutions of the local Church under the pagan Goths, but finally was seized with Sansala by a group of Gothic soldiers and ordered to eat meat which had been sacrificed to idols. Brutally tortured with several other Christians, Sabas was finally drowned in the Mussovo River, near Targoviste. About fifty others were put to death with him.
Sabbas the Goth (Romanian: Sava Gotul, Greek: Σάββας ο Γότθος; died 12 April 372) was a Christian martyr venerated as a saint.
Sabbas (also Saba) was born in 334[2] in a village in the Buzău river valley and lived in what is now the Wallachia region in Romania[3] and converted to Christianity as a youth.[4] His hagiography states that he was a Goth by race and may have been a cantor or a reader to the religious community there.[5]
In circa 369 the Tervingi king Athanaric began a persecution of the Christians in his territory.[6] First, a Gothic nobleman began the suppression of Christianity in Sabbas' area. When his agents came to the village where Sabbas lived they forced the villagers to eat pagan sacrificial meat. According to the tale, non-Christian villagers wanting to help their Christian neighbours tricked the authorities by exchanging the sacrificial meat for meat that had not been sacrificed. However, Sabbas made a conspicuous show of rejecting the meat altogether. His fellow villagers exiled him but after a while, he was allowed to return.
Sometime after, the Gothic noble returned and asked if there were any Christians in the village. Sabbas stepped forward and proclaimed, "Let no-one swear an oath on my behalf. I am a Christian." Sabbas' neighbours then said that he was a poor man of no account. The leader dismissed him, saying, "This one can do us neither good nor harm."
In the year 372, Sabbas celebrated Easter with the priest Sansalas. Three days after Easter Atharid, the son of Athanaric's sub-king Rothesteus, arrived in the village to arrest Sansalas. Saba was dragged naked through thorn bushes, then racked, alongside the priest Sansalas, to a wagon wheel, and whipped. The next day he was offered pagan sacrificed meat again. He was, however, still steadfast, and suggested they tell Atharid to kill him. Sabbas also so angered one of Atharid's retinue by insulting the prince that he hurled a pestle as if it were a javelin at Sabbas so hard that those nearby were sure he was dead, but it left no mark.