having secretly brought out Theophobos through Boukoleon, they saved him near Narsou, in what is now called 'of Theophobias', and they placed this there.

{THE REIGN OF MICHAEL WITH THEODORA HIS MOTHER.}

In the 6339th year of the world, and the 839th from the divine incarnation, Michael the son of Theophilos reigned with his mother Theo 811 dora for fifteen years; alone for ten years and with Basil for one year. who having succeeded to his father's kingdom, and having very genuinely cast off the God-hated new religion that had slipped into the church and cruelly run riot, proclaimed the ancient God-beloved and divinely-awarded, holy and most orthodox faith. And Theodora was so faithful and orthodox that even while her husband was still living she secretly honored and venerated the holy icons. She, by her own judgement, but on the suggestion and counsel of Theoktistos the kanikleios and logothete, drove out from the church and the city the patriarch John along with his followers, confining him in the Stenos at the place so-called Kleidon. And he is said to have been her godchild. And she brings in the sainted Methodios, who was a monk, and installs him as patriarch. And having united all the monks and bishops exiled by Theophilos, she confirmed the orthodox faith and brought peace to the church on the first Sunday of the holy fasts. For even if the emperor happened to be an infant, yet He who from the mouths of babes and infants has perfected praise Himself prepared this one also to sing the praise of and reveal the truth of the divine dogma, to the glory of the Word of God who for extreme compassion was incarnate and was seen by men on earth and conversed with them according to the sacred oracular 812 utterance. 2 For having gathered a synod of holy and God-inspired fathers in Constantinople, by whom the most wicked heresy of the evil and ill-named iconoclasts was precisely refuted and its abominable nonsense was explicitly overturned, the word of orthodoxy shone forth brightly, as if from some of the inmost and impassable labyrinths and dark pits and of the most accursed and depraved heresy. And so its leader and teacher along with his like-minded persecutors and insolent men, as opponents of the truth and champions of falsehood, as ravening wolves and of the abominable and demonic religion of the Manichaeans (from whom they took both their occasion and their origin), is driven out; but by common vote and divine appointment and grace, Methodios is brought in, the celebrated champion of right-teaching and orthodoxy, who indeed, so to speak, having excellently and most clearly refuted and overturned all the slanders and the destructive machination against the holy icons and the profane empty chatter of the heresiarchs and the disciples of their malevolence and madness, 813 if any other ever did; and for this reason he had previously endured many persecutions and dangers and many and evil afflictions, and exceedingly so from the God-smitten Theophilos. 3 For who can count the diverse and successive persecutions and trials and the unspeakable imprisonments and the dark pits and the want of necessities, the deprivations of friends and like-minded people, and the other misfortunes which he bore nobly and readily from the unholy ones, always carrying about clearly as a type and example of endurance for the long-suffering, and having manifestly become a speaking and silent exhortation. And so the divine one, having received the church by the good pleasure of God, and with the God-bearing fathers cooperating, the house of God, the system of the orthodox, went on and was clearly strengthened with divine might and excelled in deed and in word, but the assembly of the heretics and the truly Jewish cohort and company was utterly put to shame and was manifestly weakened, being muzzled

Θεοφόβου διὰ τοῦ Βουκολέοντος ἐξαγα γόντες λαθραίως διέσωσαν πλησίον τὰ Ναρσοῦ, ἐν τῇ νῦν λεγο μένῃ τῆς Θεοφοβίας, καὶ τοῦτο ἐκεῖσε κατέθηκαν.

{ΒΑΣΙΛΕΙΑ ΜΙΧΑΗΛ ΜΕΤΑ ΘΕΟ∆ΩΡΑΣ ΤΗΣ ΜΗΤΡΟΣ ΑΥΤΟΥ.}

Τῷ #22τλθʹ ἔτει τοῦ κόσμου, ἀπὸ δὲ τῆς θείας σαρκώσεως ωλθʹ, ἐβασίλευσε Μιχαὴλ ὁ υἱὸς Θεοφίλου σὺν τῇ μητρὶ αὐτοῦ Θεο 811 δώρᾳ, ἔτη δεκαπέντε, μόνος δὲ ἔτη δέκα καὶ σὺν Βασιλείῳ ἔτος ἕν. ὅστις τὴν πατρῴαν βασιλείαν διαδεξάμενος, τὴν δὲ θεοστυγῆ παρεισφρήσασαν τῇ ἐκκλησίᾳ καὶ δεινῶς ἐπικωμάσασαν νέαν θρη σκείαν εὖ μάλα γνησίως ἀποσεισάμενος, τὴν ἔκπαλαι Θεοφιλῆ καὶ θεοβράβευτον ἱεράν τε καὶ ὀρθοτάτην πίστιν ἀνεκήρυξεν. ἡ δὲ Θεοδώρα οὕτως ἦν πιστὴ καὶ ὀρθόδοξος ὡς καὶ τοῦ ἀνδρὸς αὐτῆς ἔτι περιόντος λάθρα τὰς ἁγίας εἰκόνας τιμᾶν καὶ προσκυνεῖν. ἥτις γνώμῃ μὲν ἑαυτῆς, ὑποθήκῃ δὲ καὶ παραινέσει Θεοκτίστου κανι κλείου καὶ λογοθέτου, ἐξελαύνει τε τῆς ἐκκλησίας καὶ τῆς πόλεως τὸν πατριάρχην Ἰωάννην σὺν τοῖς περὶ αὐτὸν ὄντας, περιορίσασα τοῦτον ἐν τῷ Στενῷ εἰς τὸ Κλειδίον οὕτως καλούμενον. λέγεται δὲ καὶ σύντεκνον αὐτῆς εἶναι. εἰσάγει δὲ τὸν ἐν ἁγίοις Μεθόδιον μοναχὸν ὄντα, καὶ πατριάρχην ἀποκαθιστᾷ. καὶ πάντας τοὺς ὑπὸ Θεοφίλου ἐξορίστους μοναχοὺς καὶ ἐπισκόπους ἑνώσασα τὴν ὀρθόδοξον ἐβεβαίωσε πίστιν καὶ τὴν ἐκκλησίαν εἰρήνευσεν τῇ πρώτῃ κυριακῇ τῶν ἁγίων νηστειῶν. εἰ γὰρ καὶ νήπιος ἐτύγχα νεν ὁ βασιλεύς, ἀλλ' ὁ ἐκ στόματος νηπίων καὶ θηλαζόντων καταρτησάμενος αἶνον αὐτὸς καὶ τοῦτον παρεσκεύασε τὴν ἀλήθειαν τοῦ θείου δόγματος ἀνυμνῆσαι καὶ φανερῶσαι πρὸς δόξαν τοῦ δι' ἄκραν εὐσπλαγχνίαν σαρκωθέντος θεοῦ λόγου καὶ τοῖς ἀνθρώποις ἐπὶ γῆς ὀφθέντος καὶ συναναστραφέντος κατὰ τὴν ἱερὰν χρησμο 812 λογίαν. 2 σύνοδον γὰρ ἁγίων καὶ θεηγόρων πατέρων ἐν Κων σταντινουπόλει συναθροίσας, ὑφ' ὧν ἡ τῶν κακῶν καὶ δυσωνύμων εἰκονομάχων κάκιστος αἵρεσις ἀκριβῶς ἐλεγχθεῖσα καὶ τὰ βδελυρὰ ταύτης ληρήματα διαρρήδην ἀνατραπέντα, φαιδρῶς ὁ τῆς ὀρθο δοξίας λόγος ἀνέτειλεν ὥσπερ ἔκ τινων μυχαιτάτων καὶ δυσδιεξο δεύτων λαβυρίνθων καὶ σκοτεινῶν βαράθρων καὶ τῆς ἐξαγίστου καὶ πεφαυλισμένης αἱρέσεως. καὶ οὕτως ὁ μὲν ταύτης ἔξαρχός τε καὶ διδάσκαλος σὺν τοῖς ὁμόφροσιν αὐτοῦ διώκταις καὶ ὑβρισταῖς, ὡς τῆς ἀληθείας ἀντίθετοι καὶ ψεύδους προστάται, ὡς λυσσώδεις λύκοι καὶ τῆς μυσαρᾶς καὶ δαιμωνιώδους τῶν Μανιχαίων θρη σκείας, ἀφ' ὧν καὶ τὴν ἀφορμὴν καὶ τὴν ἀρχὴν εἰλήφασιν, ἐκ διώκεται, ἀντεισάγεται δὲ κοινῇ ψήφῳ καὶ θείᾳ προβολῇ τε καὶ χάριτι Μεθόδιος ὁ ἀοίδιμος καὶ τῆς ὀρθοτομίας καὶ ὀρθοδοξίας πρόμαχος, ὅς γε πάσας ὡς ἔπος εἰπεῖν τὰς διαβολὰς καὶ τὴν ὀλέ θριον κατὰ τῶν ἱερῶν εἰκόνων μεθοδείαν καὶ τὴν βέβηλον κενο φωνίαν τῶν αἱρεσιαρχῶν καὶ φοιτητῶν τῆς ἐκείνων κακονοίας καὶ φρενοβλαβείας ἄριστα καὶ σαφέστατα διελέγξας καὶ ἀνατρέψας, 813 εἰ καί τις ἄλλος· καὶ διὰ τοῦτο πολλοὺς προϋπέστη διωγμοὺς καὶ κινδύνους καὶ θλίψεις πολλὰς καὶ κακάς, ἐξ ἐπιμέτρου δὲ σφόδρα ὑπὸ τοῦ θεηλάτου Θεοφίλου. 3 τίς γὰρ ἀριθμήσει τοὺς ποι κίλους καὶ ἀλλεπαλλήλους διωγμοὺς καὶ πειρασμοὺς καὶ τὰς ἀφεγ γεῖς κατακλείσεις καὶ τοὺς ζοφώδεις βόθρους καὶ τὰς τῶν ἀναγ καίων περιστάσεις, φίλων τε καὶ ὁμοφρόνων στερήσεις, καὶ τὰς ἄλλας συμφορὰς ἃς ἔτλη γενναίως καὶ προθύμως παρὰ τῶν ἀνο σίων, ἀεὶ περιφέρων ἐναργῶς εἰς τύπον καὶ ὑπογραμμὸν ὑπομονῆς τοῖς φερεπόνοις, καὶ φθεγγομένη καὶ σιωπῶσα παραίνεσις προδή λως γενόμενος. καὶ οὕτως ὁ θεσπέσιος τὴν ἐκκλησίαν εὐδοκίᾳ θεοῦ παραλαβών, καὶ συνεργούντων τῶν θεοφόρων πατέρων, ὁ μὲν οἶκος τοῦ θεοῦ, τὸ σύστημα τῶν ὀρθοδόξων ἐπορεύετο καὶ θείᾳ ῥώμῃ σαφῶς ἐκραταιοῦτο καὶ διέπρεπεν ἔργῳ καὶ λόγῳ, ὁ δὲ τῶν αἱρετιζόντων σύλλογος καὶ ἡ Ἰουδαϊκὴ τῷ ὄντι σπεῖρα καὶ συμμορία κατῃσχύνετο κομιδῇ καὶ ἠσθένει προφανῶς ἐπιστομιζο