Life
The Holy Great Martyr Prokopios (Procopius) was the first martyr to die in Palestine under the persecution of Emperor Diocletian, distinguished by great courage, an unusual destiny, and miraculous circumstances surrounding his martyrdom. The Church commemorates him on July 8 by the Julian calendar.
Prokopios was born in Jerusalem in the second half of the third century, in the family of a Christian named Christopher and a pagan woman named Theodosia. He grew up in Caesarea in Palestine, where he received an excellent Greek education. After his father’s death, his mother tried to keep him in the pagan tradition, but Prokopios’s heart was drawn to Christ from his earliest years. He lived in chastity and piety, devoted himself to prayer and fasting, and read the Holy Scriptures.
In 303 Emperor Diocletian began his great persecution of Christians, which in Palestine especially was conducted with terrible severity by the proconsul Flavianus and then by Urbanus. Prokopios was one of the first to be arrested, at Caesarea. Before his martyrdom he worked as a reader in the church and translator of Scripture into the Syriac language — this was a valuable service for the Christian communities in Palestine where many people still spoke Aramaic and Syriac.
During his arrest, and subsequently during interrogations and tortures, Prokopios gave a radiant testimony of faith. When the governor demanded that he offer sacrifice to the pagan gods or else to the four emperors (Diocletian, Maximian, Constantius, and Galerius), Prokopios replied with words from the Scripture about the One God and one Lord, and added — with an audacity that astonished the judge — a line from Homer about a single ruler in the world being better than many rulers. The governor took this as an insult to the emperors and intensified the torments.
During the torments, miracles repeatedly occurred: when Prokopios was cast into prison, forty-eight women — some of them distinguished and of high birth — who had witnessed his martyrdom were so moved by the courage of this young Christian that they openly confessed their faith in Christ and demanded to be martyred alongside him. All forty-eight women were also martyred, and Prokopios’s mother Theodosia — who until then had remained a pagan — seeing her son’s courage in suffering, also renounced the pagan gods and accepted martyrdom. Thus the entire family was united in Christ through martyrdom.
After prolonged imprisonment, Prokopios was finally beheaded in Caesarea in 303. The Church recognized him as the first martyr of Diocletian’s persecution in Palestine — “protomartyr” of that particular geographical and temporal persecution — and glorified him as a Great Martyr.
Tropar (Tone 4)
Thy martyr Prokopios, O Lord, in his suffering received an imperishable crown from Thee, our God; for having Thy strength, he laid low his tormentors, and crushed the powerless audacity of demons. By his prayers, O Christ God, save our souls.
Kontakion (Tone 2)
Having gladly gone before thy martyrdom, O greatly-suffering Prokopios, thou didst turn to God in the power of thy spirit and didst offer thyself as a sacrifice to the Master of all. By thy prayers, O martyr, drive away the attacks of the enemy upon all who honor thee with faith.