Abo of
Tiflis was an
Arab, born in
Baghdad. He became a
perfumer as a
youth and entered the service of
Nerses, a prince of
Kartla based in Tiflis (or
Tblisi or
Tbilela), in modern
Georgia. That's the Georgia that used to be part of
the Soviet Union, not the Georgia from which
vidalia onions come. Abo began serving Nerses while Nerses was imprisoned in Baghdad because he had been slandered in front of the
caliph, and then traveled with Nerses back to Tiflis when a new caliph came to power and released Nerses. While there, Abo became convinced of the truth of the
Christian faith, but he was afraid to be openly Christian because of the fact that Georgia was under Islamic rule at the time. It should be noted that Islam was generally quite
tolerant of both Christians and
Jews during this period, giving them special license to practice their own religion and giving them special
status as "
People of the Book" since they followed religions that were tied to
Islam in several important ways. The thing that Abo feared was the Muslim
rage toward those who turn away from Islam. By turning away from Islam, Abo was committing a sin that would bring the
wrath of the entire community down on him. When the
prince that Abo served was forced to seek
asylum with the
Khazars that lived north of
the Caspian Sea because he was once again slandered in front of the caliph, Abo went with him. Abo felt that he would be safe if he proclaimed himself to be Christian while there. Abo was
baptized while still among the Khazars and began to be openly Christian while wandering with Nerses in the
region of
Abkhazia, although it later turned out to be a bad move,
self-preservation-wise, since the prince and his
entourage returned to Georgia in
782. By this time, Abo was known both by the
Bishop of Abkhazia and by Nerses as being deeply Christian and both of them urged him to remain in Abkhazia so as not to be killed upon return to Georgia. The
region was still being ruled by an Islamic government, and when in
786 they tried him for being a renegade against Islam, he admitted quite openly that he was. He was imprisoned for about ten days before being brought to be executed on January 6,
786. When they put his head on the
chopping block, they sought to make him
recant by hitting him with the flat side of the sword in order to scare him, but he still would not give in. His head was chopped off and his body smeared with
naphtha and set on fire, after which his bones were thrown off a bridge into the river
Kura. When people kill
martyrs, they make really, really, really sure they're dead for some reason.
Because he was a martyr, Abo was automatically canonized by the Orthodox Church. Saint Abo's feastday is January 8. He is much more popular in Georgia than elsewhere.
Sources:
http://users.erols.com/saintpat/ss/0108.htm, http://www.oca.org/pages/orth_chri/Feasts-and-Saints/January/Jan-08.html