Abo Tbileli
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Abo Tbileli, or Habo Tbileli (Abo/Habo of Tbilisi; in Georgian: აბო თბილელი, ჰაბო ტფილელი) (ca. 756-786) is the Patron Saint of the city of Tbilisi, Georgia.
Arab by descent, he grew up Muslim in Baghdad. At the age of seventeen or eighteen, he found himself in Tbilisi, having followed Georgian Prince Nerses, the ruler of Kartli. Nerses, having been slandered before the Caliph, spent three years in confinement; freed by a new Caliph, he took Abo with him.
He became convinced of Christianity, but was afraid to convert openly as Georgia was under Arab rule. For political reasons, his prince had to seek shelter in Khazaria north of the Caspian Sea, an area free of Muslim control; Abo accompanied him, and was baptized there. The prince and his party returned to Tbilisi in 782, and for a few years Abo lived quietly as a "closet" Christian. However, in 786 he was exposed as a Christian, and tried for being a renegade from Islam. He confessed his faith at trial, was imprisoned, and martyred on January 6, 786.
Ioane Sabanisdze, Georgian religious writer and St. Abo's contemporary, compiled the martyr's life in his hagiographic novel "The Martyrdom of Saint Abo".
