Ode 7. Irmos

Of the Mother of God. Same Irmos.

Cross-Theotokion

The Children of Abraham in the Persian furnace, fired by love for true religion rather than by the flame, cried out: Blessed are you, O Lord, in the temple of your glory.

You were willingly crucified naked on a Cross, O Immortal who alone clothe the heavens with clouds, and who clothed with eternal shame the one that of old stripped our Forebears naked.

You were lifted up on a Cross and fallen Adam was raised; your side was pierced by a lance, Master, and the cunning one received a blow to the heart. Blessed is your might, O Lord.

Of the Martyrs

All-praised Athletes, most fairly united to the fair Word, bound and crushed you were wholly parted from the world, and you ever bind the enemy hand and foot.

The Athletes truly shattered the walls of error by the divine levering of godlike sufferings, and were revealed as a wall for believers and a fortress for those who devoutly call them blessed.

When you saw Christ God, who appeared as dew in the furnace and who in no way burned up your womb, hanged upon a Tree, O Maiden, you glorified his condescension beyond understanding.

O Maiden, divine Mountain from which was hewn the Stone that smashed the monuments of the demons, drive out the false images from my soul and the stony stubbornness of my heart.

You were not shaken as you received in womb, O Maiden, the One who by his glance shakes the earth and what is on it when he wishes; therefore establish me firmly, who am shaken by the assaults of the foe.

Destroy my fleshly thoughts, Mother of God, and make me wholly spiritual, adorning with virtues me whom the all-evil one has blackened with the disfigurement of pleasures.