Other Names:
Симеона Столпника, Simon
Commemorated September 1 (New Calendar) September 14 (Old Calendar)
The Latin Church keeps him on January 5. Older Latin books also keep July 27.
Simeon was born in Sisan in Cappadocia to the Christians Susotion and Martha. At thirteen he heard the Beatitudes in church and left home for the monastery of the igumen Timothy. He was tonsured at eighteen. After a rope of palm cut into his body, he was sent away, lived in a dry well, then in a rock cell near Talannissa, then on a mountain, and at last on a pillar. He was the first stylite. He died in the year 459 near his pillar. His disciple Anthony found him stooped in prayer. Patriarch Martyrius of Antioch buried him by the pillar.
The words of the saint
“You have now become for me father and mother, a teacher of good works and a guide to my salvation.” (To the elder who explained the Beatitudes to him in church.)
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“No, father, I am not of that kind. I have done no one any harm. I desire to serve God with all my zeal. Have mercy on me, a sinner: command me to enter the monastery and be a servant to all.” (At the monastery gate, when the igumen asked who he was.)
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“Let me go, as a stinking dog: I have deserved these sufferings for my sins.” (When the brethren stripped him and found the palm rope cut into his flesh.)
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“Father! The prophet has said: I was conceived in iniquity, and in sin did my mother bear me.” (When the igumen said he was only eighteen, and asked what his sins could be.)
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“Then set for me, father, only bread and water, so that if it proves necessary I may a little strengthen my body with food.” (Asking Bishop Bass to shut him in his cell for forty days.)
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“Leave me, holy fathers, only for a little time, until I give up my spirit: my soul has grown faint, for I have angered the Lord.” (From the dry well, when the igumen called him.)
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“Glorify the Lord, who granted you healing, and do not dare to say that Simeon healed you—lest a greater misfortune come upon you.” (To those who received healing through his prayer.)
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“Lord! Me, a sinner—do You want to take me to heaven?” (When the devil appeared as a bright angel with a fiery chariot.)
The words of others in the reading
“Dig deeper.” (The voice in the dream, while he dug a trench for a building.)
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“Stop. Now, if you want to build the building, build, but labor earnestly, for without labor you will succeed in nothing.” (The same voice, after he had been told three times to dig deeper.)
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“Teach him the monastic life and the rules and statutes of the monastery.” (Igumen Timothy, leading the boy in by the hand.)
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“Where is Simeon, the servant of God? Show us the one who is so pleasing to God and to the angels. If you do not show him to us, we will burn you and all your monastery.” (The armed crowd in the igumen’s night vision.)
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“It is not fitting for a man to kill himself by immoderate fasting: for this is rather sin than virtue.” (Bishop Bass, when Simeon asked to be shut in for forty days with no food.)
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“A man can master himself even without fetters; one can bind oneself to one place not by iron, but only by reason and will.” (Blessed Meletius of Antioch, seeing him chained to the mountain.)
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“Why do you not go by the way of our fathers, but have invented another—a new one? Come down from the pillar and follow the life of the ancient desert-dwellers.” (The message of the desert fathers sent to test him.)
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“No, do not come down, holy father, but remain on the pillar: now we know that the work you have begun is from God. May He be your helper to the end.” (The same messengers, when he at once set his foot on the ladder to come down.)
Who stood with them
Susotion and Martha were his parents. His father died of grief while they searched for him. Martha later came to the pillar and died at its foot.
Timothy was his first igumen. Bishop Bass shut the rock cell. Blessed Meletius of Antioch told him to drop the chain. Patriarch Domnus of Antioch served the Liturgy and communed with him. Anthony, his disciple, found him dead on the pillar. Patriarch Martyrius buried him.
The desert fathers tested the new way and then blessed it.
He heard the Beatitudes as a boy who kept sheep, and he did not come down when the Church asked him to come down in obedience.
We ask his prayers when we must stay in one hard place, and when praise tries to make the work our own.
Pray for us
Troparion — Tone 1
You were a pillar of patient endurance, having imitated the forefathers, O Venerable One: Job in suffering, and Joseph in temptations. You lived like the bodiless ones while yet in the flesh, O Simeon, our Father. Beseech Christ God that our souls may be saved.
Kontakion — Tone 2
Seeking the things of the Highest, and having made your pillar a fiery chariot, you were joined to the heights. Therefore, you have become a companion to the angels, O Venerable One, and with them you are praying incessantly to Christ God for us all.
Saint Simeon, pray for us.
Sources
St. Demetrius of Rostov, Lives of the Saints, September 1.
https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Dmitrij_Rostovskij/zhitija-svjatykh/727
Orthodox Church in America, Saint Simeon Stylites, the Elder.
https://www.oca.org/saints/lives/2026/09/01/102448-saint-simeon-stylites-the-elder
Orthodox Encyclopedia, Симеон Столпник (Старший).
https://www.pravenc.ru/text/2663180.html
Orthodox Encyclopedia, Калъат-Симъан.
https://www.pravenc.ru/text/1320169.html
Orthodox Encyclopedia calendar, 14 сентября (1 сентября).
https://www.pravenc.ru/calendar/2024/09/14.html
Also in the Latin books
Catholic Encyclopedia (New Advent), St. Simeon Stylites the Elder.
https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/13795a.htm
Acta Sanctorum, January 5 (Butler and the Bollandists keep him on that day).
This site is a lamp, not a parish. Listen to the life. Then find a living Orthodox church and ask a priest to pastor you.
https://pieceofhumanity.com/find-a-parish/
Updated 9/20/2026