The life of the Fathers Slain at St Sabbas Monastery
Days later, on Great Thursday, a larger raiding party returned. They drove the monks into the church and tortured them to learn where treasure might be hidden. A young monk named John, known for his care of the poor, was savagely beaten and mutilated. Sergius, keeper of the sacred vessels, hid them and tried to escape but was caught and beheaded.
Several monks who had hidden themselves in a cave were discovered; one of them, Patrick, went out alone to face the raiders so his brothers might be spared, and told their captors falsely that he was alone. Unable to pay the ransom demanded of them, the surviving monks were shut inside a cave within the monastery walls, where a fire was lit to suffocate them with smoke. In all, twenty monks died in this attack, their bodies later recovered and buried by brothers who had escaped into the surrounding hills. A separate massacre at the same Lavra two centuries earlier, under the Persian invasion, is remembered on its own day in May.
