Tens of thousands have died and millions have become homeless in southern Turkey and northern Syria after the massive 7.8 earthquake that struck on Feb. 6, 2023. But the ancient Turkish city of Antakya, known in Roman and medieval times as Antioch, has been here before.
In the late fourth-century Roman world, two days after a powerful earthquake shook the border of Turkey and Syria, the Christian preacher John Chrysostom delivered a sermon to the frightened congregation in his shaken city of Antioch, much as survivors today struggle to understand the destruction. “Your nights are sleepless,” he acknowledged, and possessions “were torn asunder more easily than a spider’s web. … For a short time you became angels instead of humans.”
