Thus, the servile Greek hierarchy betrayed the icons and, by inertia, submitted to the will of their Caesar. However, the six-month duration of the council indirectly testifies to the hidden conflict of opinions behind the scenes of this council. Now Constantine believed that his hands were untied for the forcible implementation of the decisions of the "ecumenical council."

It began with the cleansing of churches from icons. Characteristically, the Council of 754 ended not in the Church of St. Sophia, which shone with mosaic icons and monumentally testified to the faith of the former Church, but in the Church of Blachernae, which had previously been painted with pictures of the Gospel history. These frescoes were ordered to be painted over and hastily painted on the new ground with arabesques and vignettes of birds and plants, so that, to the great chagrin of the Orthodox, the church became like "a green shop and a bird exhibition" (οπωροφυλακειον και ορνεοσκοπειον).

In various public buildings and palaces, sacred images were painted over, and, according to the life of St. Stephen the New, "satanic images of horsemen, hunting, theatrical scenes, horse races remained in high esteem and were preserved."

Some bishops were zealous, and churches were stripped bare and deprived of icons. Books decorated with icon miniatures were destroyed and mutilated. According to the catalog of the Sofia Library, two such books were burned. The illustrated lives of all the holy martyrs turned out to have cut out sheets. In other books, sheets with testimonies about icons were cut out. These specimens, mutilated by iconoclasts, still appear before us at Byzantine exhibitions. Much was completely destroyed. In the Ephesian district, for example, in the city of Phocia, more than 30 books were burned.

Although the council did not reject the relics, the extreme secular party and the emperor himself were opponents of the relics. Under all sorts of pretexts, they tried to eliminate them. Thus, Constantine ordered the revered church of St. Euphemia in Chalcedon (the site of the Fourth Ecumenical Council) to be closed and the relics of the martyress to be drowned in the sea, and the church to be turned into an arsenal.

* * *

The iconoclastic emperors met the main opposition in the matter of icon veneration among the monks, and therefore their special enmity and struggle were concentrated on monasticism. Constantine showered the monks with all sorts of abusive nicknames. He declared their very title politically unreliable and ostracized them, forbidding acquaintance with them. And the lackeys publicly persecuted, vilified the monks and threw stones at them. So in Constantinople "not even a trace of monastic clothing could be seen: everyone disappeared from sight." The obstinate were put on trial and turned out to be martyrs. The monk Andrew Kalivit, who called Constantine the new Valens and Julian, was whipped at the hippodrome (762). Hegumen John, who refused to trample on the icon of the Mother of God, was simply executed. But the executions of St. Stephen the New and his disciples made a particularly deep impression. It was they who made it necessary to compare the time of Copronymos with the time of Diocletian.

St. Stephen asceticized on Mount St. Auxentius, in sight of Constantinople, on the other side, ten miles from Chalcedon. In vain did the iconoclasts try to break his steadfastness. He was a rock for the entire Constantinople monasticism. He advised the monks not to succumb to provocation, to hide and passively resist. He recommended emigration as the main means of salvation: 1) to the outskirts, to the northern shore of the Euxine Pontus, to the Crimea, to Chersonesos, to the Caucasian coast, 2) to the possessions of the Arabs, starting from the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea (Cyprus, Lycia), and to the patriarchates of Antioch and Alexandria, where there was no persecution, 3) to Rome and Italy. And monasticism emigrated en masse on his advice.

Stephen did not sign the iconoclastic decrees and for this he was forcibly dragged out of his hermitage (from the cave) and locked up with other monks for six days without food. But he was released, because the emperor was distracted by the war with the Bulgarians. During this time, the patrician Callistus prepared two false witnesses to please the emperor. For bribery, one denounced Stephen's anathema against the emperor, the other about Stephen's criminal relationship with his spiritual daughter. False testimony failed. They came up with the idea of replacing them with a provocation. Since the emperor forbade new monastic tonsures, with the knowledge of the emperor, the young official of the court, George, came to Stephen and pretended to be thirsty for monasticism for some exceptional reasons. And he was tonsured.

Three days later, George fled to the emperor, and he raised the matter with a demagogic uproar. He himself made a speech in front of the crowd against the monks, who allegedly kidnapped the emperor's favorite servants, etc. Having aroused part of the crowd, the emperor appointed a public sacrilegious ceremony of the "tonsure" of George. The monastic clothes were taken off George and thrown to shreds by the mob to be torn to shreds. And George, dressed in an officer's attire and receiving a sword, shouted: "Today, Vladyka, I am dressed in the world!" — "Σημερον, Δεσποτα, το φως ενδεδυμαι."

Raising a crowd against the monks, the emperor sent an armed detachment to arrest Stephen. The monastery and the church were burned, Stephen's disciples were dispersed, and he himself was tortured. For 17 days he was kept in a monastery in Chrysopolis. Here the emperor sent the leaders of the heresy Theodosius of Ephesus, Constantine of Nicholas, Sisinius of Pisidia and Basil Tricocabus to persuade Stephen. But he answered them with the words of the prophet Elijah to King Ahab. The Life tells us that Stephen, brought to the emperor himself, took a coin out of his klobuk and asked: "What punishment will I be worthy of, if I throw this coin with the image of the emperor on the ground and begin to trample on it? From this you can see what punishment is deserved by those who insult Christ and His Holy Mother on icons." At the same time, Stephen threw a coin and stomped on it. Stephen was exiled to one of the islands of the Propontis. Here many monks and icon worshippers gathered around him. Two years later, Stephen was brought in chains to the capital and thrown into the prison of the praetorium, where 342 monks from various places were imprisoned, suffering for the icons. Many had their noses and ears cut off, others had their eyes gouged out and their hands cut off, and some had their beards and faces burned. Their prison turned into a monastery: they prayed, sang, thus attracting people and preaching the veneration of icons. Stephen converted even two imperial envoys to Orthodoxy. After that, his fate was decided. Stephen was given over to be torn to pieces by a specially stirred up crowd. On November 28, 767, soldiers came to the prison, seized St. Stephen, tied a rope to his leg and dragged him through the streets, subjecting him to beating and stoning. Even schoolchildren were exempted from lessons and released into the street to throw stones at some criminal. The body of the martyr thus killed was thrown into a common ditch, into which the corpses of executed criminals were thrown, without burial.

Stephen's indictment was silent about icons and motivated the execution by the fact that "he deceives many, teaching them to despise true glory, to neglect houses and relatives, to turn away from royal palaces and to enter the monastic life." In this way, monasticism was declared a crime!

Even earlier, on August 25, 766, 19 high-ranking officials were executed for one sympathy with Stephen. Constantine Copronymus tried to completely destroy monasticism, to ridicule it, to humiliate it before the people, and to wrest from the masses reverence and respect for asceticism. A blasphemous mockery was invented. The chronicler Theophanes reports about Copronymus: "August 21 (766) dishonored the monastic image, ordered each abba at the hippodrome to hold a woman by the hand (Nicephorus - "to lead a nun by the arm") and thus pass through the hippodrome, being subjected to spitting and mockery from all the people." After that, the monasteries in Constantinople were closed and confiscated in 768. The monastery of Dalmata, the first among the monasteries of Byzantium, was given to the soldiers for housing. And the so-called Kallistratova and the monastery of Dius and Maximinus, and other sacred houses of monastics and convents, he destroyed to the ground. Those who accepted monasticism, from among those who occupied prominent places in the army, or in the administration, and especially those close to it, were subjected to the death penalty. The ruler of the Thracian province, Michael Lahondracon (nicknamed simply "the Dragon"), distinguished himself with his frantic zeal in mocking the monastics. Lahondragon, in imitation of his teacher (i.e. the emperor), gathered all the monks and nuns who were in the Thracian Theme, gathered to Ephesus, and, coming out into the plain called Τςουκανηστήριν, said to them: "Whoever wishes to obey the king and us, let him put on bright clothes and marry immediately. And whoever does not do so will be blinded and exiled to Cyprus." And the chronicler ends: "... The word was completed in deed, και αμα τω λογω το εργον ετέλεσθη".

On that day, many became martyrs, and many, betraying their former vows, destroyed their souls. The Dragon brought these closer to himself." After that, the monasteries were selected with all the vessels, books, lands, live and dead inventory. All this was sold at auction, and the money, as a gift, was presented to the emperor.