Story
The life of Abba Ampikos with Abba Petra represents true friendship and an inseparable communion. For we often find, in the midst of the communal order, certain ones who loved communion on the level of a pair or within the bounds of a small number, such as Saints Anba Abram and Anba Georgi, the two holy brothers Maximus and Domadius, Anba Job and his brethren, and so on.
These two saints lived as intimate friends. The monks used to urge them to go to the table of the fathers, and only with difficulty did Abba Petra agree to go to this table alone. After he had eaten, Ampikos said to him, "How did you dare to go to the table of the elders?" And he answered, "Had I sat among you, the brethren would have honored me as an aged elder and asked me to be the first to give the blessing, so that I would think within myself that I am better than you all. But when I go among the fathers, I am the least of all; I am crushed and I reckon myself as nothing."