Cosmas, however, left the monastery in 743, when he was appointed Bishop of Maiuma, the port of ancient Gaza on the southern coast of Phoenicia. The Church observes his feast on October 12. As a learned prose-author Cosmas wrote comments on the poems of Gregory of Nazianzus; as a poet he is regarded by the Orthodox Church with great admiration. It considers Cosmas and St. John of Damascus the best representatives of the later Greek classical hymnology, the most characteristic examples of which are the artistic liturgical chants known as canons.