On this day, June 2 according to the Julian Calendar (June 15 civil calendar), the Georgian Orthodox Church commemorates the Holy Great Martyr John the New of Suceava (+c. 1330–1340).
The Holy Great Martyr John the New of Suceava lived in Trebizond in the fourteenth century. He was a wealthy merchant distinguished by his piety, his faithfulness to Orthodoxy, his compassion, and his love for the poor.
Once the future martyr had to travel by ship on business. The captain of the ship was not an Orthodox Christian. He entered into a religious dispute with John, was defeated, and harbored a grudge in his heart. When the ship docked at Belgrade on the Bosphorus, the captain went to the city’s fire-worshipping ruler and told him: “There is a learned man on my ship who wishes to accept your faith.”
The city’s ruler received John with honor, expecting him to join the fire-worshippers. The astonished John instead preached the true God to the fire-worshippers and convincingly proved the emptiness of their false belief.
For boldly confessing Orthodoxy, the saint was cruelly tormented: they flayed his body and tore the flesh from him piece by piece. Yet John gave thanks to the Lord, who had deemed him worthy to endure torments and shed his blood for His sake. At last he was thrown back into prison. The next morning the city’s ruler ordered that he be tortured again. John appeared before him with a bright and joyful countenance, confessed Christ with the same steadfastness as before, and called the ruler a weapon of Satan. The saint was subjected to new torments; from the beating all his inner organs were laid bare and fell out. The people could not endure this horrifying spectacle and with cries of indignation rebuked the city’s ruler, who was dealing so inhumanly with an innocent man. The ruler then pretended to stop the torture and ordered that the great martyr be tied to an unbroken horse and dragged through the streets of the city. The inhabitants of the Jewish quarter mocked and ridiculed the saint; at last one of them cut off the head of the martyr, who was exhausted from his sufferings.
The severed head of Saint John lay in the street until evening. That night, above the holy body, a pillar of light and a multitude of shining lamps appeared. Three radiant youths chanted psalms and censed the martyr. A Jew thought that Christians had come to take away the relics of the saint and reached for his bow and arrow — but, bound by an invisible divine power, he suddenly froze in place. In the morning the vision disappeared, but the archer still stood motionless. He was released from the invisible bonds only when he told the gathered townspeople about the wondrous vision and the punishment that had come upon him. When the city’s ruler learned what had happened, he gave the Christians permission to bury the great martyr. The holy body was buried in the city’s church. This occurred between 1330 and 1340.
The captain who had handed John over to the ungodly repented and decided to bring his body back to his homeland, but the saint appeared in a dream to the church priest and prevented this plan from being carried out. Seventy years later, the incorrupt relics were transferred to Suceava, the capital of Moldavia-Wallachia, and were laid to rest in the cathedral church there.
May the intercessions of the Holy Great Martyr John the New of Suceava be with us all.