The Monk Pherapont of Mozhaisk, Luzhetsk (Uncovering of Relics, 1514): Commemorated on December 27, May 27 The Monk Pherapont
(Therapont) of Mozhaisk (Belozersk), Wonderworker of Luzhetsk, in the world
Theodore (Feodor), was born in the year 1337 at Volokolamsk into a family of
the nobility, the Poskochini. From his childhood years he was raised in deep
faith and piety, which in graced form was reflected throughout all his
subsequent years of life as an holy ascetic. At age forty without preliminaries
he was tonsured a monk by the hegumen of the Moscow Simonov monastery, the Monk
Theodore (Feodor), a nephew of the Monk Sergei (afterwards Archbishop of
Rostov, Comm. 28 November). As a monk in this monastery Pherapont became close
with the Monk Kirill (Cyril) of Belozersk (Comm. 9 June). Together they passed
through their ascetic deeds of salvation in fasting and prayers, and they
hearkened to the spiritual guidances of the Monk Sergei of Radonezh (Comm. 25
September and 5 July), who visited the monastery to instruct the brethren. In
fulfilling an obedience, the Monk Pherapont set off to the North, to the
Belozersk frontier, on monastery matters. The harsh northern land caught the
attention of the ascetic, and he decided to remain there for his ascetic
efforts. After his return with the Monk Kirill – to whom the Mother of God had
appeared also ordering him to go to the North, the Monk Pherapont received the
blessing of the hegumen and set off to Beloozero (WhiteLake). For a certain
while the ascetics lived together in a cell that they had built, but later and
by mutual consent, the Monk Pherapont transferred over to a new place for his
ascetic deeds, 15 versts distant from Kirill, betwixt two lakes: Borodava and
Pava. Having cleared a not overly large plot for a garden and building a cell
in the deep forest at a water channel, the Monk Pherapont continued his ascetic
efforts as an hermit and in silence. At first he endured much deprivation and
tribulation in his solitude, and more than once he was set upon by robbers,
attempting to chase away or even kill the ascetic. But with time monks began to
gather to the saint, and the wilderness place was gradually transformed into a
monastery, afterwards called the Pherapontov. In the year 1398 the Monk
Pherapont built a wooden church in honour of the Nativity of the Most Holy
Mother of God, and the monastery was gradually set in order: the monks toiled
together with their saintly guide over the construction of cells, the copying
of books, and the adornment of the church.* (* At the end of the XV Century on
the place of the former wooden church there was built a stone cathedral, in
honour of the Nativity of the Most Holy Mother of God, painted in the years
1500-1501 by the reknown Russian iconographer Dionysii and his sons, Vladimir
and Theodosii. The frescoes are devoted to the Praise of the Most Holy Mother of
God. The unique frescoes (wall-paintings) of the Pherapontov monastery have
been preserved up to the present time and are an outstanding memorial of
Russian churchly art and painting, of world significance). © 1996-2001 by translator Fr. S. Janos. |
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