03 — The Unmercenary Healer
The heart of Panteleimon’s identity in Orthodox devotion: the Anargyroi or Unmercenary ideal — healing freely in the name of Christ, “freely you have received, freely give” (Matthew 10:8), set against the paid physicians of the age — and the change of name from Pantoleon (“in all a lion”) to Panteleimon (“the all-merciful”), the name by which the Church knows him.
Tradition: Pan-Orthodox (Great Martyr; Unmercenary Healer)
This section treats what makes Panteleimon not merely a martyr but a healer-martyr and one of the great Unmercenaries. The first file sets the unmercenary practice in its theological and social frame: the converted physician who treats and cures without payment, working his cures in the name of Christ rather than by the art alone, and so standing in deliberate contrast to the fee-taking medicine of the Greco-Roman world. The second file handles the name — the Passio‘s account of the change from Pantoleon to Panteleimon, “all-merciful,” and what that name has come to mean in the cult. Both files keep the distinction between the early cult (which already venerated a healer) and the developed narrative’s elaborations.
Files in This Section
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| Healing Without Payment | The Anargyroi/Unmercenary ideal — healing freely in Christ’s name (Matthew 10:8); the contrast with the paid physicians; the Passio‘s portrait of Panteleimon’s free cures and the social and theological meaning of unmercenary medicine. |
| The Name Panteleimon | The change from Pantoleon (“in all a lion”) to Panteleimon (“all-merciful”); the Passio and menologion on the renaming; the theology the name carries and how the early cult attests the name. |
See Also
- Conversion by Hermolaos — the conversion that grounds the unmercenary practice
- The Unmercenaries as a Type — the Holy Unmercenaries as a category and the theology of free healing
- Patron of Physicians and the Sick — the unmercenary ideal in Orthodox medical ethics
- The Healer of the Orthodox World — the cult of the healer
- Bioethics and Contemporary Questions — Orthodox medical ethics
References
- The Greek Passio of St. Panteleimon (BHG 1412z–1418). In Bibliotheca Hagiographica Graeca, 3rd ed., ed. François Halkin. Brussels, 1957.
- Symeon Metaphrastes. Vita et passio S. Panteleemonis, in Patrologia Graeca 115, where verified.
- Delehaye, Hippolyte. Les légendes hagiographiques. Brussels: Société des Bollandistes, 1905.
- Crislip, Andrew T. From Monastery to Hospital: Christian Monasticism and the Transformation of Health Care in Late Antiquity. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2005.