Krikor was the son of Anak, brother to the Armenian king who, during the Perso-Byzantine struggle for control of Armenia, was responsible for the assasination of his brother and the royal family, except for the young prince Drtad and his sister, Khosrovitookht. Anak and his family were killed in return, with the exception of his son Krikor who was secretly taken to Caesarea in Cappadocia (some say the city of Sebastia).

The young King Drtad was sent to Rome for his formal education where he became very renowned for his extraordinary strength and valor. Passing through Caesarea on his return to Armenia to claim his throne, King Drtad took with him from Caesarea a young scribe named Krikor. When the King later found that Gregory was a Christian and that he had refused to worship the gods and godesses of the court, Drtad had Gregory punished and thrown into a deep pit in Khorvirab. Later, Gregory’s true identity was discovered and he had to spend fourteen years in the pit. Gregory’s imprisonment and delivery from the pit are celebrated feast days of the Armenian Church. According to some church historians, Gregory was sustained through heavenly intervention; according to others, through the aid of the King’s sister who was a devout Christian.

During Gregory’s imprisonment, the King martyred the Hripsimeyan nuns, an act so brutal that it caused him to lose his sanity. Through the intervention of the King’s sister, Gregory was called from the pit in order to cure the king whom no one dared approach. With his saintly power, Gregory cured the king and converted him to Christianity. Upon the king’s recovery, the whole of the royal court was baptized and Christianity was declared the national religion in the year 301 A.D. Thus Armenia was the first Christian nation.

After the great conversion, Gregory was ordained priest and Bishop by Leontius of Caesarea in 302, and then Catholicos , becoming the First Catholicos of the Armenian Church.. He called from hiding the bishops and priests of the Armenian church who had suffered much persecution. St. Gregory started to preach throughout Armenia, putting aside paganism and spreading the holy light of Christianity. St. Gregory built churches over the relics of the Hripsimeyan nuns and, while in the province of Vaspouragan, had a vision that the "Only Begotten" had decended with a golden hammer, showing St. Gregory where to build His great cathederal. Thus, in the year 303 A.D. , St. Gregory built Holy Echmiadzin which is the Mother Cathederal of the Armenian Church to this day. St. Gregory established the first canon laws, and wrote many prayers, and put order to many of the church services.

St. Gregory retired for his final years to the mountains where he died. Sheperds found his mortal remains and he was then buried with great ceremony as the "father of the Armenian Church, its greatest saint and patron".

It is believed that the Great Illuminator was born in 256 A.D., ordained 302 A.D. and died 326 A.D.

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