As Abba Milesius was passing through a certain place, he saw a monk being held as though he had committed murder. The elder approached and questioned the brother. When he learned that the accusation was false, he said to those holding him, “Where is the man who was killed?” They showed him. Milesius went to the dead man and told everyone to pray. Then he stretched out his hands to God, and the dead man rose.
Before everyone the elder said to him, “Tell us who killed you.” The man replied, “I went into the church and gave money to the priest. He got up, killed me, carried me away, and threw me into the Abba’s monastery. But I beg you, recover the money and give it to my children.” Then the elder said to him, “Go and sleep until the Lord comes and raises you.”
Abba Milesius once lived with two disciples on the border of Persia. Two brothers who were sons of the king went hunting and set nets over an area of about forty miles. Whatever they found inside the nets they killed. They found the elder there with his two disciples. Seeing him hairy and wild in appearance, they were astonished and asked, “Are you a man or a spirit?” He answered, “I am a sinful man. I came out to weep for my sins, and I worship Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God.” They said, “There is no god except the sun, the fire, and the water. Worship them and sacrifice to them.” He replied, “These are created things, and you are deceived. I beg you, turn and recognize the true God who created them and everything else.”
They said to him, “You say that the condemned and crucified man is the true God?” The elder replied, “I say that He who crucified sin and put death to death is the true God.” They tortured him together with the brothers, trying to force them to sacrifice. After many torments they beheaded the two disciples, but they kept the elder and tortured him for many days. At last they stood him between them and shot arrows at him, one from in front and one from behind. The elder said, “Since you have agreed together to shed innocent blood, tomorrow at this same hour your mother will be deprived of both of you, and with your own arrows you will shed one another’s blood.” They treated his words with contempt.
The next day they went out hunting. A deer escaped from their net, and both rode after it. They shot their arrows at it, but struck one another in the heart, and both died, according to the word the elder had spoken to them.