Rhipsimè’s rare beauty had captivated the Roman emperor, and she had sought to escape from his passion by flight, but a crueller fate awaited her in Armenia, for king Terdat in his turn smitten by the exquisite beauty of her face offered to make her his queen, and her refusal to accept his throne and his love so exasperated the king that he ordered her beautiful head to be cut off. Thus Rhipsimè with Caiana and their young companions were cruelly martyred. Rhipsimè and Caiana were later beatified as saints in the Armenian church.
The king however did not escape the Nemesis of his diabolical crime, the memory of the beautiful Rhipsimè haunted him; remorse took the place of the ferocious anger that had doomed his hapless victim to her cruel death and the king lost his reason. The king having become incapacitated, Gregory was released from his underground prison by the king’s sister Khosrovidookt, and as the malady of the king was mental, remorse for his own crime having overturned his reason, it became the peculiar office of Gregory to minister to the king, and by his spiritual ministrations to effect the restoration of the royal mind.
Terdat recovered his reason and as a broken-hearted penitent accepted the religion of Gregory and the beautiful Rhipsimè.
Gregory now freely preached Christianity in Armenia. It was a grand Revival; the temples of Anahid were turned into the churches of Christ, and the whole nation accepted Christianity, which became the established religion in the country.[18] The name of Gregory has been handed down to posterity as Soorb Gregore Loosavoritch (Saint Gregory the Illuminator). “Illuminator” is the generally accepted English translation of the Armenian term “Loosavoritch,” but it is true nevertheless that neither the term “Illuminator” nor “Enlightener” suitably conveys the definition of its meaning; sometimes modes of expression are so difficult to translate from one language into another, and it can be said that the term “Illuminator” is used for want of a better word in English. The Armenians call their religion “loois havat;” the word “loois” means “light” and “havat” means “faith” or “religion,” but if I translated the two words as “enlightened faith” or “enlightened religion” the translation would not suitably convey the meaning of the original.