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IN this manner the honorable life of Usthazanes was terminated, and
when the intelligence was brought to Symeon in the prison, he offered
thanksgiving to God on his account. The following day, which
happened to be the sixth day of the week, and likewise the day on
which, as immediately preceding the festival of the resurrection, the
annual memorial of the passion of the Saviour is celebrated, the king
issued orders for the decapitation of Symeon; for he had again been
conducted to the palace from the prison, had reasoned most nobly with
Sapor on points of doctrine, and had expressed a determination never
to worship either the king or the sun. On the same day a hundred other
prisoners were ordered to be slain. Symeon beheld their execution,
and last of all he was put to death. Amongst these victims were
bishops, presbyters, and other clergy of different grades. As they
were being led out to execution, the chief of the Magi approached
them, and asked them whether they would preserve their lives by
conforming to the religion of the king and by worshiping the sun. As
none of them would comply with this condition, they were conducted to
the place of execution, and the executioners applied themselves to the
task of slaying these martyrs. Symeon, standing by those who were to
be slain, exhorted them to constancy, and reasoned concerning death,
and the resurrection, and piety, and showed them from the sacred
Scriptures that a death like theirs is true life; whereas to live,
and through fear to deny God, is as truly death. He told them,
too, that even if no one were to slay them, death would inevitably
overtake them; for our death is a natural consequence of our birth.
The things after those of this life are perpetual, and do not happen
alike to all men; but as if measured by some rule, they must give an
accurate account of the course of life here. Each one who did well,
will receive immortal rewards and will escape the punishments of those
who did the opposite. He likewise told them that the greatest and
happiest of all good actions is to die for the cause of God. While
Symeon was pursuing such themes, and like a household attendant, was
exhorting them about the manner in which they were to go into the
conflicts, each one listened and spiritedly went to the slaughter.
After the executioner had despatched a hundred, Symeon himself was
slain; and Abedechalaas and Anannias, two aged presbyters of his own
church, who had been his fellow-prisoners, suffered with him.
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