The Monk Akakios the New

Commemorated on April 12

      The Monk Akakios the New took monastic vows at the Holy Trinity monastery of Saint Dionysios of Olympos (Comm. 24 January) at Zagorakhos. Having gone off to Holy Mount Athos, the monk on the advice of his father-confessor, Father Galaktion, settled in the skete monastery of Saint Maximos the Hut-Burner ("Kausokalibites", Comm. 13 January), who repeatedly appeared to the ascetic. The exploits of the Monk Akakios were extremely severe: in place of bread he ate dry grass, broken up by pounding with a piece of marble. To the question of how much a monk ought to sleep, he answered, that for a true monk half an hour even was sufficient. And he himself in spite of age and illness gave example of this.
      About the humility of the monk there is the following instance. One time, when the Monk Akakios had come on Sunday to the skete church, the arch-hegumen Neogrites handed him his own cane and said: "Father, take the staff, and we wilt lead the gathered brethren". Having kissed the hand of the arch-hegumen, the Monk Akakios accepted the staff without any contradiction. But, in order to humble his mind, he from that time not only never took the lead staff in his hand, but also refrained from the particular staff usual for old age.
      For his exalted exploits the Monk Akakios was granted the gifts of unceasing mental prayer and Divine revelations. He expired to the Lord on 12 April 1730, being almost an hundred years old.