Veneration and the Feast

The Church venerates the Apostle Paul as one of her two chief apostles, keeping his memory in a great summer feast he shares with Peter on June 29, preceded by the Apostles’ Fast and followed by the Synaxis of the Twelve. This file sets out that liturgical veneration — the feast and its fast, the Synaxis of June 30, the relics and the great Roman basilica raised over his tomb, the hymnography, and the enduring place of “the chief Apostle Paul” in Orthodox piety.

Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Apostle)

The Feast of June 29

The principal commemoration of the apostle is the Feast of the Holy, Glorious, and All-Praised Chief Apostles Peter and Paul, celebrated throughout the Orthodox Church on June 29 (for the churches following the Julian calendar, June 29 falls on July 12 of the civil calendar). The feast honors the two coryphaei together — Peter the apostle to the circumcision and Paul the apostle to the nations — and is among the most solemn of the fixed feasts of the summer season, a feast of high rank with its own vigil, hymnography, and (in many places) patronal celebrations of churches dedicated to the apostles (see The Two Chief Apostles). The dating of the feast to June 29 is ancient: it corresponds to the early Roman commemoration of the apostles on this day (attested in the fourth-century Depositio Martyrum of the Chronograph of 354), and was received across the Christian world.

The Apostles’ Fast

The feast of June 29 is preceded by a period of fasting — the Fast of the Holy Apostles (the “Apostles’ Fast” or “Peter and Paul Fast”). Unlike the fixed fasts, it is of variable length, because it begins on the Monday after the Sunday of All Saints (the first Sunday after Pentecost) and runs until the eve of the feast on June 28; since Pascha and therefore Pentecost move from year to year, the fast may be long or short. Its origin is ancient, attested in the early centuries as a fast following the Pentecost season, and it prepares the faithful for the celebration of the chief apostles. The Apostles’ Fast is one of the four canonical fasting seasons of the Orthodox year, and its keeping is part of the veneration the Church pays to Peter and Paul (on the liturgical and fasting life, see Divine Liturgy).

The Synaxis of the Twelve Apostles

The day after the feast of the two chief apostles, on June 30, the Church keeps the Synaxis of the Holy, Glorious, and All-Praised Twelve Apostles — a gathering-commemoration of all the apostles together. That Peter and Paul are honored on their own great feast on the 29th, and the whole apostolic college on the 30th, expresses liturgically the unique standing of the two coryphaei within and at the head of the apostolic band. Paul, though not one of the original Twelve, is numbered among the apostles in this veneration as the chosen vessel and equal of the chief apostles, “not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles” (2 Cor. 12:11) in his own words.

The Relics and the Roman Basilica

The tradition of Paul’s burial on the Ostian Way outside Rome — the road along which he was led to execution — is early: Gaius, c. 200, already pointed to the apostle’s “trophy” (memorial) there (Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 2.25; see The Roman Martyrdom). Over the traditional tomb the emperor Constantine raised a basilica in the fourth century, rebuilt and enlarged into the great Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls (San Paolo fuori le Mura), which remains one of the principal shrines of the apostle. Beneath its high altar a sarcophagus venerated as Paul’s has been the object of ancient and continuing pilgrimage. The veneration of the apostle’s relics belongs to the broader Orthodox theology of the honor due to the saints and their relics, who are “members of Christ” and temples of the Spirit, venerated (not worshipped, which is due to God alone) as friends of God and intercessors (cf. John of Damascus, On the Divine Images and Exact Exposition 4.15; see St. John of Damascus).

The Hymnography

The Orthodox services of June 29 are rich with praise of the two apostles, and of Paul in particular. The kontakion of the feast hails them as “the firm and divinely-inspired preachers, the chief of Thine Apostles, O Lord,” whom God has received “into the enjoyment of Thy blessings and repose.” The troparion addresses them as “first among the Apostles and teachers of the world.” The canons and stichera of the feast dwell on Paul’s conversion from persecutor to apostle, his labors and sufferings, his letters that taught the world, and his death as a witness — gathering the whole of his story into the praise of the Church. In the hymnody Paul is “the trumpet of the Church,” “the lyre of the Spirit,” “the vessel of election,” titles drawn from Acts 9:15 and elaborated by the Fathers, above all Chrysostom (see Chrysostom and the Apostle). The Church also reads from the Pauline epistles at nearly every Divine Liturgy through the year, so that the apostle’s voice is continually present in her worship.

Paul in Orthodox Piety

Beyond the feast, the Apostle Paul holds a singular place in Orthodox piety. His letters are the constant matter of the Epistle readings of the liturgical year; his image — the high domed forehead, the dark pointed beard, holding a book or a sword — is among the most recognizable in the iconographic tradition, often paired with Peter in the icon of the two apostles embracing. Countless churches and monasteries bear his name with Peter’s. He is invoked as the apostle of grace, the teacher of the nations, the model of zeal transfigured, and the supreme instance of mercy shown to a sinner — “for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe” (1 Tim. 1:16; see Persecutor to Apostle). In the Orthodox memory Paul is, with Peter, forever one of the two pillars on which, under Christ, the apostolic Church was built.

See Also

• The Two Chief Apostles — the joint veneration of Peter and Paul
• The Roman Martyrdom — the death and burial the feast commemorates
• Chrysostom and the Apostle — the hymnic titles drawn from the Fathers
• St. John of Damascus — the theology of the veneration of saints and relics
• Divine Liturgy — the liturgical life in which Paul is commemorated

References

• The Festal Menaion and the service of June 29 (the Feast of the Holy Chief Apostles Peter and Paul): troparion, kontakion, and stichera. (Liturgical texts of the Orthodox Church.)
• Eusebius of Caesarea. The Ecclesiastical History 2.25 (Gaius on the apostles’ tombs). Trans. in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series II, Vol. 1.
• John of Damascus. An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith 4.15 (on the veneration of the saints and relics). Trans. in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series II, Vol. 9.
• The Chronograph of 354 (Depositio Martyrum), on the early Roman commemoration of the apostles on June 29.
• The Holy Bible, King James Version. Second Corinthians 12; First Timothy 1; the Acts of the Apostles 9.