The Holy Martyr Asclas.

Commemorated May 20 in the Orthodox Christian Menaion

From the Prologue

He suffered in Antionus, a town in Egypt, in the time of Diocletian. He was flogged, flayed and burned with torches, but remained to the end steadfast in the Faith. When the torturer, Arrianus, was crossing the Nile by boat, Asclas, by his prayers, stopped the boat and would not let it move again until Arrianus had put in writing that he believed in Christ as the one, almighty God. But, dismissing that wonder as magic, Arrianus the torturer forgot all that he had written and continuedto torture the man of God even more harshly. At last, Asclas had a stone tied around his neck and he was thrown into the Nile. But, on the third day, Christians found his body on the bank, with the stone still round his neck (as the martyr had foretold to them before his death), and gave him burial, in 287. The holy martyr Leonidas suffered together with him. Their torturer, Arrianus, repented later, came to believe in Christ with his whole heart and began to proclaim his faith publicly before the heathen. They then killed him also; and thus Arrianus, the sometime torturer of Christians, became worthy of the martyr's wreath for Christ.

From The Prologue From Ochrid by Bishop Nikolai Velimirovich
©1985 Lazarica Press, Birmingham UK