Greetings in that Divine and Most Precious Name of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
Not only is Saint Dioscorious commemorated within the Ethiopian Orthodox calendar as an honored Saint, he is also considered a revered Patristic Father in our history and tradition and was a favorite of many Ethiopian fathers over the millenia. This is in part because our own founding Saints, the so-called "Nine Saints" where Syrian priests who fled after the Chalcedon controversy and combined with the Alexandrian clerics already on mission in Ethiopia, a kind of fervent anti-Chalcedon mentality evolved in Ethiopian Orthodox, which is why Saints like St Dioscorus is so highly revered for his equally staunch resistance.
THE FIRST MONTH
Meskerem 03
(September 13)
IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER AND THE SON AND THE HOLY SPIRIT,
ONE GOD. AMEN.
On this day the General Council of Bishops took place in the city of Alexandria in the second year of the rule of the glorious father Abba Dionysius the archbishop. This assembly took place because of certain evil men who had appeared in the country of Arabia, and who believed that the soul dieth with the body, and that on the day of the Resurrection it shall be raised up with it. And they composed a discourse on the wicked belief and sent it to the men who were living in the city of Alexandria. And when the Abuna, the Archbishop Abba Dionysius heard this thing he was exceedingly sorry about it, and he admonished them and commanded them to turn from this evil affair, but they would not hearken unto him. Therefore the Council assembled to discuss them, and he debated the matter with them, and made manifest their error, but they neither repented nor turned away from their evil counsel; and the archbishop and the whole Council anathematized them and cursed them. And he wrote a discourse on them wherein he said, “the love of God for the children is exceedingly great and mighty.” And he explained in that discourse that the soul neither dieth, nor perisheth, nor decayeth, but that it abideth even as the angels abide, for it is a spiritual thing and is immutable and incorruptible. When it goeth forth from the body it is taken to the place for which it is suitable. And on the day of the Resurrection, when the trumpet soundeth, and dead bodies of men shall rise up by the command of their Creator. And all the souls of men shall go each into the body whereto it belongeth, and it shall rise with it, and according to its work it will either rejoice for ever, or suffer punishment for ever. And the two (i.e. soul and body) will remain in the state in which they have risen forever and forever and ever. May the prayer of this Council be with us. Amen.
And on this day also a great earthquake took place in the country of Egypt and in all its borders, and the church of Dasya fell down at the time of the third hour of the day. And this church was in the name of Michael the archangel. And it is said that a certain ungodly man asked the Christians to pay tax to him, but they would not give him anything; and when it was evening this man came with his followers and pulled down the church. This happened in the ninth year of Archbishop Abba Macarius, in the eight hundred and twenty-eighth year of the Holy Martyrs [A.D. 1112]. May their prayers and blessing be with us. Amen.
And on this day are commemorated Dioscoros the martyr, and Archbishop Dionysius, and the martyrs who were in Tensel Yakoton, and many martyrs in Persia. May their prayer and blessing, etc.
from the Ethiopian Synaxarium
Further, one of the basic/fundamental Anaphoras of our tradition is the Anaphor of Saint Dioscoros which is chanted many times and on any general occasion, where as aside from the Anaphora of the Apostles, the other 12 Ethiopian Anaphoras are reserved for specific days and celebrations. Within this Anaphora are outlines several key and pivotal Ethiopian Christological and Theological teachings, especially that the Godhead participated with the suffering of Christ on the Cross.
The Jews took hold of Him
and made Him stand in the court,
Him before whom the hosts of
angels stand in fear and trembling.
They crucified Him on the
tree, nailed Him with nails, beat
Him on the head with sticks,
pierced His side with a spear, to
Him who gave drink to the Israelites
from a rock they gave to drink
gall mixed with myrrh in His thirst.
The immortal died, died to
destroy death, died to quicken the
dead as He promised them with the
word of covenant.
People:- We proclaim your death,
Lord, and your holy resurrection;
we believe your ascension and your
second advent. We glorify Thee and
confess Thee, we offer our prayer
unto Thee and supplicate Thee O
our Lord and our God.
and also explains in better detail our own unique theology behind the Real Presence in the Holy Communion
Let none of us think when He
eats of this bread that He eats mere
flesh without blood and Spirit. Let
none of us think when He drinks of
this cup that He drinks mere blood
without body and Spirit, but one is
the body, blood and Spirit as His divinity
became one with His humanity,
world without end.
We then hold Saint Dioscoros in very high regard, in that we seek to commemorate him so often in our Liturgies and also in his name and honor expound some of the depths of our theology to the common people in our prayers.
stay blessed,
habte selassie
