"Once, God and St. Peter came down to earth and saw a devil arguing with an elderly woman. God ordered immediately to St. Peter to separate them. St. Peter obeyed the command of God and separated them, but when he returned to God he noticed that two began to quarrel again. God sent St. Peter again to stop the conflict between the devil and the old woman. But at this point St. Peter became angry and decided to behead the two enemies, and then returned to God, pretending that nothing wrong happened.
God asked St. Peter:
-How did you divide them?
The saint replied:
- I beheaded them!
Then God said:
- Peter, that’s wrong; go back and put their heads back!
St. Peter returned and put the devil’s head on the elderly’s woman body and the elderly’s woman head on the devil’s body, since there was no difference between them. Since that time, it is said that the old woman is the Devil."
In Romanian folk narratives, St. Paul and St. Peter appear accompanying God on his journeys on earth or even come down alone to see how things go and then relate to God what people do. Often God and St. Peter appear as two errant on earth, demanding for shelter, and they are rejected by the wealthy but greeted with hospitality by the poor man.
In the Orthodox calendar, the Lent of Apostles Peter and Paul begins this year on June 8 and ends on June 29. A Romanian superstition linked to the Apostles’s Lent advises women not to do any work at home in the first day of fasting, because the Beautifuls pass on that they, a kind of fairies, and who is working on that day could get a crooked body. Currently, if your name is Peter, Paul, or perhaps both names, on June 29 friends and family will celebrate you.
Several Romanian traditional songs are dedicated to men who have the names of the two apostles, or derivatives. Also, on this day, in some areas of Romania it is offering food in memory of the dead, a custom called "Moșii de Sânpetru".
Bibliography:
Pamfile Tudor, the Romanian people Mythology Bucharest: Vestala, 2006 traditii-superstitii.ro/sfintii-apostoli-petru-si-pavel-sau-sanpetru-traditii/ ; Photo: http://www.crestinortodox.ro/
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