Synaxarion for Cheesefare Saturday

Synaxarion for the Saturday of Cheesefare Week: All the Venerable Fathers Who Shone Forth in Ascetic Struggles

The God-bearing fathers, through the preceding feasts, gradually instruct us and prepare us for the path ahead. They turn us away from pleasure and overeating, instill in us the fear of the coming Judgment, and at the same time purify us fittingly through Cheesefare Week. They timely appoint two one-day fasts, so as to encourage us little by little toward the Great Fast itself. And here they present all those who lived piously, who endured many illnesses and labors—both men and women—hoping that by the remembrance of them and their struggles we may be strengthened. May we, having their life as an example and guide, be fortified for the course that lies before us, and with their assistance and help take up the spiritual contests, remembering that they too were of the same nature as we.

Just as generals, when the army is already arrayed and drawn up in battle order, kindle their soldiers’ courage with speeches, examples, and recollections of ancient heroes who fought valiantly and displayed bravery—and those soldiers, strengthened by hope of victory, prepare themselves with all their soul for battle—so now do our God-bearing fathers act most wisely. For through the example of those who lived ascetically, who strengthened both the male and female nature for spiritual struggles, they lead both to the arena of fasting. Thus, by contemplating their life free from negligence as a prototype, we may exercise ourselves as much as possible in the manifold and varied virtues—most especially in love and prudent abstinence from unseemly deeds and actions, and indeed in fasting itself, which is not merely abstaining from food but also bridling the tongue, anger, and the eyes; in short, a renunciation and alienation from every evil.

For this reason the holy fathers established this present commemoration of all the saints here, setting before our attention those who pleased God through fasting and also through other good and virtuous deeds, urging us to enter the arena of virtues after their pattern and to arm ourselves boldly against the passions and demons. They thereby suggest to our minds that if we too show equal zeal, there will be no obstacle to our accomplishing the same as they did and being accounted worthy of the same reward, for they too were partakers of our nature.

Concerning Cheesefare Week itself, some say that it was introduced by Heraclius; before that it was a meat-eating week. After warring for six years against King Chosroes and the Persians, he made a vow to God that if he gained the upper hand over them, he would change that week and appoint it as an intermediate one between abundance of food and the fast—and so he did.

Yet even if this is how it happened, I believe that the fathers also devised it as a kind of preliminary purification, so that we, being suddenly withdrawn from meat and overeating to the utmost restraint, would not be vexed, nor harm our bodily condition, but gradually and little by little, withdrawing from what fattens and delights, might accept the bridle of fasting—like unruly horses when their feed is slowly reduced.

For just as the fathers influenced the soul through parables, so too for the body they devised what was necessary, gradually cutting away every hindrance to fasting.

By the prayers of all the venerable fathers, Christ our God, have mercy on us. Amen.