Sts Koura and Marana Disciples of St Maron, Confessors

[walaa farouk]

Sts Koura and Marana Disciples of St Maron, Confessors


Saint Maron did not only have disciples who emulated his ascetic path, but also virgin students who dispensed with the company of people and consecrated themselves to worship and austerity, in a life of seclusion and silence.

Among these virgin hermits were Marana, Cyra and Domnina. Theodoret writes: "After recording the way of life of the heroic men, I think it useful to treat also of women who have contended no less if not more; for they are worthy of still greater praise, when, despite having a weaker nature, they display the same zeal as the men and free their sex from its ancestral disgrace".

Like the male hermits, Domnina's zeal attracted many people who emulated her life as well. About two hundred and fifty women formed her community of disciples.

Women's asceticism was prospering in Egypt, Palestine, Asia and other places when Theodoret wrote about the lives of Marana, Cyra and Domnina.

Theodoret recorded the biographies of 33 hermits, thirty of whom where men and three were women. It is noteworthy that the only women referred to in Theodoret's book were all students of Saint Maron.

... At this point I shall treat of Marana and Cyra, who have defeated all the others in the contests of endurance. Their fatherland was Beroea, their stock the glory of their fatherland, and their upbringing appropriate for their stock. But despising all these, they acquired a small place in front of the town, and entering within it, walled up the door with clay and stones. For their maidservants who were eager to share this life with them they built a small dwelling outside this enclosure, and in this they told them to live. Through a small window they keep a watch on what they are doing, and repeatedly rouse them to prayer and inflame them with divine love. They themselves, with neither house nor hut, embrace the open-air life.

In place of a door a small window has been constructed for them, through which they take in the food they need and talk with the women who come to see them. For this intercourse the season of Pentecost has been laid down; during the rest of the time they embrace the quiet life. And it is Marana also who talks to visitors; no one has ever heard the other one speak.

They wear iron, and carry such a weight that Cyra, with her weaker body, is bent down to the ground and is quire unable to straighten her body. They wear mantles so big as to trail along behind and literally cover their feet and in front to fall down right to the belt, literally hiding at the same time face, neck, chest, and hands....

In this mode of life they have completed not merely five or ten or fifteen years, but forty-two; and despite having contended for so long a time, they love their exertion as if they had only just entered on the contests. For contemplating the beauty of the Bridegroom, they bear the labor of the course with ease and facility, and press on to reach the goal of the contests, where they see the Beloved standing and pointing to the crown of victory. Because of this, in suffering the assaults of rain and snow and sun they feel neither pain nor distress but from apparent afflictions reap joy of heart.... Since by such a way of life they have adorned the female sex, becoming as models for other women, they will be crowned by the Master with the wreaths of victory...."