Dedication of the Church of the Great Martyr George in Lydda

On 3 November the Church remembers the consecration of the church of the Great Martyr George in Lydda (Lod) in Palestine. George suffered in Diocletian's persecution; tradition holds that before his death he asked his servant to carry his body to Palestine, and the servant buried it at Ramla.

In the days of the emperor Constantine, according to the same tradition, his admirers built a church in his name at Lydda, and his relics were moved there from Ramla for its consecration on this day. A Syriac calendar of the year 1030 already marks 3 November as a feast. Later the great church fell into ruin, leaving only the altar and the tomb; it was rebuilt in the second half of the 19th century.