Our Righteous Father Cosmas of the Holy City, Hymnographer and Bishop of Maïuma.
Saint Cosmas was from the Holy City, Jerusalem, and was a contemporary and peer of Saint John of Damascus (Dec. 4), with whom also he was reared when, because of his orphanhood, he was adopted by Sergius, Saint John’s father, and with whom he had the same instructor. About the year 743, he was elected Bishop of Maïuma, a coastal city of Palestine, aforetime under the jurisdiction of Gaza, with the name Port Gaza. During the reign of Saint Constantine the Great, it became a separate township and at that time was renamed Constantia, after Constantine, the son of the Emperor (see Sozomen, Eccl. Hist., V:3). Cosmas became an excellent hymnographer, from whence he is called “the Composer and Melodist.” Among his many compositions are the Canon of the Cross (Sept. 14) and the Canon for the Nativity of Christ, “Christ is born, give ye glory . . . .”
The above account is taken from the Great Horologion,
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