Mamas, a Shepherd, Thrust Through with a Three Pronged Spear, in the Year 274

Mamas, a shepherd, who pastured his sheep on the mountains and in the wildernesses of Cappadocia, lived very poorly, without a hut, living under the blue heavens, and living on the milk and cheese of his flock, as Basilius testifies. Nazianzenus adds that the deer also let themselves be milked by him daily, and that he was fed by them in this way.

Basilius says that from the course of the heavenly bodies he learned to know the wonderful works of God, his Creator, and so His eternal power and wisdom. However, the accounts written about him state that he had the Word of God with him in the desert, and that he read in it daily.

It is quite probable, writes Mellinus, that this Mamas, to escape the persecution in the time of Decius and Valerian, went into the wilderness and stayed there until Aurelian's time. His proconsul of Cappadocia, Alexander, had him brought out of the wilderness to appear before him at Caesarea, the capital of Cappadocia.

The proconsul called him a sorcerer or conjurer, because the wild animals of the wilderness submitted to him so tamely.

Mamas answered: "I am a servant of Christ, and know nothing about sorcery; but I would rather live among the wild animals than among you, for they feel the power of their Creator in and through me; but you will not know God. I cannot wonder enough that you, who have reached gray hairs, are still in such gross darkness of ignorance that you forsake the true and living God, and give divine honor to deaf and dumb idols."

When he was asked to say at least with his lips that he would sacrifice to the gods, so as to escape punishment, Mamas replied: "I will never deny the true God and King, Jesus Christ, either with my lips or with my heart. So far am I from seeking to escape suffering for the name of Christ, that I consider it, on the contrary, the highest honor, the greatest gain, and the utmost benefit which you can confer on me."

Upon this confession, the proconsul had him placed on the rack, cruelly scourged, tormented with pincers, burned on his sides with lamps and torches, and tortured in various other ways. But seeing that he remained steadfast under all these and other torments, he finally had him thrust through with a three pronged spear; and so Mamas became a faithful martyr for his Savior, under Emperor Aurelian, at Caesarea in Cappadocia. A. Mell., 1st book, folio 89, columns 2, 3, ex Basilii Concio, in Mart. Mamant. Nazianz. Orat. 43. Act. per Metaphrast. [n220-1]