CANON TO ST. NEKTARIOS OF AEGINA

 Ode 1.  Tone 8.

Irmos.  Crossing the sea as if it were dry ground and escaping the wickedness of Egypt, the Israelite cried out:  Let us sing to our redeemer and God.

Father Nektarios, I, a miserable sinner, approach you to beg you to heal me by your prayerful entreaties, for I am stricken in body and soul by the blows of misfortunes.

My heart has truly become hardened while the strength of my body has become utterly weak, but grant me now good health in both, O Father, and save me.

As the speediest physician of the sick and the protector and defender of the afflicted, O Hierarch, with your divine assent, heal the wounds of my soul.

In good season the Word came forth from your virginal womb as God in mortal form, saving the world from the folly of the passions, all-immaculate Mother of God.

 

Ode 3

Irmos.  You covered the vault of the sky with a roof, O Lord, and built the church; confirm me in your love, O summit of desires, support of the faithful and only merciful Lord.

I lie in the tomb of insensibility, painfully made dead by my wickedness.  Alas!  What will become of me?  Nevertheless, I take heart, for I know that you will not reject me, Father; therefore, do not despise me though I am utterly lost.

Steer me to the harbor of salvation and relieve me of the pain of my torments, for I suffer severely from the burning heat of bodily agonies, and I am surrounded by attacks of griefs.

Storm-tossed by the rolling swell of sins, I beg you to guide me, O saint, by the sail of your intercessions straight to the waveless haven of true repentance, so that I may bless you, Father Nektarios.

Having become leprous by the counsels of the enemy, immaculate Virgin, I have extinguished the beauty of my soul and have degraded the loveliness of her original comeliness.  Restore her beauty as I now repent.

 

Prayer between Odes 3 and 4:

Preserve your supplicants from dangers, O Hierarch, for all men run to your intercession, and rescue us from manifold afflictions.

 

Ode 4

Irmos.  I have heard, O Lord, of the mystery of your dispensation; I have meditated on your works and glorified your divinity.

The chest of your relics ends sicknesses of bodies and agitations of souls by the operation of the divine Spirit, O Father.

Obtain divine strength for those who groan amid various diseases and drive off troublesome demons from your servants.

Cause the gifts of healings to gush like divinely copious streams, extinguish the coals of the passions and dry up the filthy mud of my soul.

As you have borne the law-giver and Lord beyond the law of nature, O Maiden, calm the storm of my lawlessness with the cool breeze, the law of the Spirit.

 

Ode 5

Irmos.  Illumine us with your commandments, O Lord, and with your lofty arm grant us your peace, O merciful God.

Grant to those who honor you a quiet and undisturbed life, renowned Nektarios, and one that is superior to the snares of the world.

With the whip of your entreaties, Nektarios, drive away the multitude of demons, for they torment my heart painfully.

Be the unsleeping guard, protector, defender and helper, Nektarios, of those who run to your reliquary.

Though I have been a worthless receptacle, make me a pure vessel of the Spirit of God, for you are the tabernacle of God the Word, all-immaculate Virgin.

 

Ode 6

Irmos.  I will pour out my supplication to the Lord and to him will I declare my afflictions, for my soul has been filled with troubles and my life has approached Hades, so like Jonah I pray:  Raise me up from death, O God.

Do not cease watching over your spiritual harbor or constantly guarding your holy monastery, O God-bearer, for it has acquired as a great treasure the reliquary of your holy remains, wonder-working Nektarios.

I, the wretched one, have submitted to corruption, as I have touched the fruit of deceit; having separated myself from Christ, I now exact for myself chastisements for my ignorance; but Father, sympathetically, as a true shepherd, recover me.

Now that you have brought up your immaterial service to the Word in the highest, O saint, lift up to the noble heights of the virtues those who have been entangled in the nets of matter and have fallen into the pits of evil, Nektarios.

Immaculate Virgin, the Master anciently descended and came forth as a baby from your womb to redeem men.  The Creator of the ages and their Lord also deified our existence, for he alone is merciful.

 

Ode 7

Irmos.  The youths from Judea, having come to Babylon of old, by their faith in the Trinity trampled down the flame of the furnace, chanting, O God of our fathers, blessed are you.

As a hostile lion, the deceiver daily goes howling round about my soul and tries to make your supplicant his food.  Therefore, O saint, shatter his teeth from Heaven.

Obtain strength for our bodies and good health for our souls, Father Nektarios; dissipate the despondency and all factious ambition of those who cry, O God of our fathers, blessed are you.

All-blessed Nektarios, preserve those who honor you faithfully and raise them above manifold pains, deadly trials, difficult situations, malice, wickedness and all envy.

You became the divine mercy-seat when you bore him who redeemed us from condemnation by giving himself voluntarily to his Father as a ransom for many, O virgin Mother of God.

 

Ode 8

Irmos.  The king of Heaven whom the hosts of angels hymn, hymn and exalt above all forever.

With your divine surgery, all-blessed saint, heal our incurable pains, weakness of limbs and joints, and wounds inflicted by blows.

Knowing you to be a luminous meadow of immortality, Nektarios, we beg you to deliver us from the stench of eternal death.

The swarms of demons shudder at the invocation of your divine name as at a destructive fire, therefore they are driven speedily from men.

He who was immutably begotten of the Father before the ages was born of you, as it is written, and saves, O Mother of God, those who greatly exalt you.

 

Ode 9. 

Irmos.  O Mother of God, we who have been saved through you fittingly confess you, and with the incorporeal choirs we magnify
you, pure Virgin.

With raindrops of your divine kindness, O Hierarch, irrigate my dry, barren heart, so that it may bear acceptable fruit for Christ.

From on high, Nektarios, sympathetically grant tranquility, peace and your paternal blessing to your monastery of Thelectus.

Remove the tyrannical passions from my soul; subject the powers of my mind to the commandments of Christ, Father Nektarios.

Unwedded Virgin, with Nektarios, earnestly entreat your Son and God on behalf of those who in faith honor your mighty works.

ENDNOTES FOR THE CIRCUMSPECT

The text may be found at https://proseuxi.gr/paraklitikos-kanon-agiou-nektariou/.  The hymnographer is not identified.

I thank Zoilus for proofing the Greek and I thank eagle-eyed Aeteia, my lawfully-wedded, for proofing the English.  Any errors surviving their ministrations are purely my own.

Ode VI.

"Immaterial service."  This phrase reminds me of a Late Antique inscription, which says of the deceased priest that "having received ecclesiastical office here (on earth), he now ministers among the saints as the innocent one . . . guided by the angels" (https://portal.sds.ox.ac.uk/articles/online_resource/E00935_Greek_epitaph_for_a_local_priest_whose_name_is_lost_perhaps_a_martyr_Found_near_Savatra_Lycaonia_central_Asia_Minor_Probably_late_antique_/13802660).

Ode IX. 

"Unwedded" (μήτρανδρε).  The word is a corruption via haplology of μητράνανδρε (mater sine viro facta [Stephanos]).  We cannot in our day and age say unmarried mother.  We might say [one who became a] mother without a man, which is wordy.  Since that woman who has become a mother without the help of a man is by definition unwedded, I have settled on unwedded.