'The lion sleeps in its lair with its eyes open'

According to tradition, the lion was believed to sleep in its lair with its eyes open, and thus was a type of Christ who "did not close the eye of His divinity as He slept in His tomb", according to Leontios of Constantinople (P. Allen and C. Datema, Leontius, Presbyter of Constantinople [Brisbane, 1991], 112, n. 59). On Holy Saturday morning, [in the Orthodox Church] we sing: "Come and let us look today on the Son of Judah as He sleeps. And with the prophet let us cry aloud to Him: Thou has crouched down, Thou has slept as a lion; who shall awaken Thee, O King?" (Lenten Triodion, 652).

- From The Way of the Spirit: Reflections on Life in God by Archimandrite Aimilianos of Simonopetra, tr. with an Introduction by m. Maximos Simonopetrites (Athens: Indiktos, June 2009), p. 152, n. 16.