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Simeon Stylites or Symeon the Stylite (Greek: Συμεών ό Στυλίτης; Syriac: ܫܡܥܘܢ ܕܐܣܛܘܢܐ, romanized: Šimʕun dʼAstˁonā; Arabic: سمعان العمودي, romanized: Simʿān al-ʿAmūdī c.

390 – 2 September 459) was a Syrian Christian ascetic who achieved notability by living 36 years on top of a pillar near Aleppo (in modern Syria). Several other stylites later followed his model (the Greek word style means "pillar"). Simeon is venerated as a saint in the Catholic Church, Oriental Orthodox Churches, and the Eastern Orthodox Church. He is known formally as Simeon Stylites the Elder to distinguish him from Simeon Stylites the Younger, Simeon Stylites III and Symeon Stylites of Lesbos.

The son of a shepherd, Simeon was born and raised in Sis, which was then a part of the Eastern Roman province of Cilicia. According to Theodoret, Simeon developed a zeal for Christianity at the age of 13, following a reading of the Beatitudes. Simeon shut himself up in a hut for one and a half years, where he passed the whole of Lent without eating or drinking. After one and a half years in his hut, Simeon sought a rocky eminence on the slopes of what is now the Sheik Barakat Mountain, part of Mount Simeon.

In order to get away from the ever-increasing number of people who came to him for prayers and advice, leaving him little if any time for his private austerities, Simeon discovered a pillar which had survived among ruins in nearby Telanissa (modern-day Taladah in Syria). When the monastic Elders living in the desert heard about Simeon, who had chosen a new and strange form of asceticism, they wanted to test him to determine whether his extreme feats were founded in humility or pride. They decided to order Simeon under obedience to come down from the pillar. Simeon displayed complete obedience and humility, and the monks told him to stay where he was. The first pillar that Simeon occupied was little more than 3 meters (10 ft).

Reports of Simeon reached the church hierarchy and the imperial court. The Emperor Theodosius II and his wife Aelia Eudocia greatly respected Simeon and listened to his counsels, while the Emperor Leo I paid respectful attention to a letter he sent in favour of the Council of Chalcedon. Evagrius Scholasticus records an instance in which Simeon denounced the emperor's prefect Asclepiodotus to Emperor Theodosius for supposedly encouraging pagans and Jews and undermining Christians. Once when Simeon was ill, Theodosius sent three bishops to beg him to come down and allow himself to be attended by physicians, but Simeon preferred to leave his cure in the hands of God, and before long he recovered. When she died, Simeon asked that her coffin be brought to him, and he reverently bade farewell to his dead mother. Accounts differ with regard to how long Simeon lived upon the pillar, with estimates ranging from 35 to 42 years.

For the next century, ascetics living on pillars, stylites, were a common sight throughout the Christian Levant. He is commemorated 1 September by the Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic Churches, and 5 January in the Roman Catholic Church. Pilgrim tokens for Simeon Stylites have been found across the Byzantine Empire, attesting to the popularity of his veneration. The ruins of the vast edifice erected in his honour and known in Arabic as the Qalaat Semaan ("the Fortress of Simeon") can still be seen. In the centre of the court stands the base of the style or column on which Simeon stood. On 12 May 2016, the pillar within the church reportedly took a hit from a missile, fired from what appeared to be Russian jets backing the Syrian government.

The life of Simeon Stylites inspired an 1842 poem by Alfred Tennyson, "St.

Quick Facts

• He is known formally as Simeon Stylites the Elder to distinguish him from Simeon Stylites the Younger, Simeon Stylites III and Symeon Stylites of Lesbos.
• Simeon is venerated as a saint in the Catholic Church, Oriental Orthodox Churches, and the Eastern Orthodox Church.
• Several other stylites later followed his model (the Greek word style means "pillar").
• 390 – 2 September 459) was a Syrian Christian ascetic who achieved notability by living 36 years on top of a pillar near Aleppo (in modern Syria).
• After one and a half years in his hut, Simeon sought a rocky eminence on the slopes of what is now the Sheik Barakat Mountain, part of Mount Simeon.

Source material: Wikipedia - "Simeon Stylites". Adapted and summarized for DiscoverScroll. Original contributors are credited through the linked Wikipedia article. Read original on Wikipedia. CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes were made from the original.