Historical Context
Snandulia belonged to the Christian community of Arbela, the capital of the tributary state of Adiabene. The local population had gradually converted to Christianity between the first and fourth centuries, and Arbela became a major centre of eastern Syriac Christianity that endured until late in the Middle Ages.
Under Shapur II (reigned 309-379), Christians throughout the Persian Empire faced systematic persecution. The Sassanid court increasingly regarded its Christian subjects as potential agents of Rome after Constantine the Great made Christianity the favoured religion of the Roman Empire. Sozomen, cited in later sources, reckoned the named men and women martyrs of this persecution at upwards of sixteen thousand; among those who suffered were Joseph, Aethalas, and Akepsimas.
Ministry to the Confessors
According to the synaxarion account, on learning that the priest Joseph and the deacon Aethalas had been imprisoned and severely tortured, Snandulia went to the prison by night with her servants and bribed the guards with gold. The guards permitted her to carry the injured saints to her home until dawn, where she nursed them, tending their wounds and, it is related, kissing their shattered hands and feet.
When Joseph regained consciousness and saw her weeping, he counselled her that the tortures endured for the sake of Christ are followed by eternal joy. Snandulia is said to have replied that when one is moved by compassion, it is natural to weep. At dawn the saints were returned to prison.
Refusal at the Execution
The judge Zerothus eventually ordered that Joseph and Aethalas be executed by stoning, and compelled local Christians to take part in the stoning. Snandulia was among those forced to participate.
By tradition she refused to cast stones at the aged priest Joseph. When offered a lance instead, she declared that she would sooner drive the lance into her own heart than wound the saint. For her steadfast confession and her mercy toward the imprisoned she is venerated as a righteous confessor.
