Righteous Basil of Mangazeia
Commemorated on March 23, May 10
The Holy Martyr
Vasilii (Basil), Mangazeia Wonderworker, – was the first saint glorified
in the Siberian land. He accepted a martyr's death on 4 April 1600, and from
the mid-XVII Century he is deeply venerated for manifold manifestations of
grace in help of infirmities, in sorrow and in desperate straits.
Blessed Vasilii was
the son of a not-rich inhabitant of Yaroslavl', Feodor by name, and was taken
by a certain rich Yaroslavl' merchant to a place for the selling of his wares
in sub-polar Mangazeia – one of the first Russian cities in Siberia.
Vasilii strictly
fulfilled the Christian commandments. From his early years his integrity was
obvious to all. Meekness and humility were his finery, and his heart was filled
with faith in God and by piety. Love for prayer impelled him during time of
Divine-services to leave off with mundane concerns and to go to the holy
church.
The devout youth just
barely turned age 19, when the All-Supreme, "looking out for his virtue,
did intend to summon him to eternal blessedness, the which to attain from this
temporal life is impossible otherwise, than by the narrow and afflicted path of
an external testing".
As the Church
tradition testifies, one time, when Blessed Vasilii was at prayer in church
during the Paschal matins, thieves plundered the wares of his master. An
explanation was demanded of Vasilii. Despite the many shouts of his master,
Righteous Vasilii remained in church until the end of the Divine-services. His
money-loving master, at the instigation of the devil, suspected Vasilii of
being an accomplice in the crime and upon his return from the church he was
subjected to insults and beatings. The guiltless youth answered his tormentor:
"I have in truth taken none of thine goods". Then the master led
Vasilii off to the city military-commander, who subjected the sufferer to new
cruel torments. The merchant, enraged at the patient silence of Vasilii, in
anger struck him with a ring of ware-house keys, and from this blow Blessed
Vasilii died.
The body of the
innocent martyr was put in a grave and without Christian burial was committed
to the earth, "where it is duly moist from water". But the All-Mighty
Lord after the passage of 47 years willed for it to appear from the bosom of
the earth and to be glorified by many miracles.
Saint Vasilii many a
time helped lost and danger-threatened travelers and fur-hunters; he healed
palsy, blindness, and various other maladies; through the prayers of mothers he
healed children, and preserved the despondent from suicide. There have been preserved
copies of the Life of Saint Vasilii (XVII-XIX Cent.) that testify about the
abundant manifestations of grace through prayers to the Mangazeia wonderworker.
In 1659 with the
blessing of the Tobolsk metropolitan, Simeon, there was made an inspection of
the relics of the saint, and from that time there began to spread veneration of
him as one truly God-pleasing. In 1670 with the construction of the Turokhansk
monastery of the Holy Trinity, priestmonk Tikhon transferred the relics of
Righteous Vasilii into the monastery founded by him. In 1719 this monastery was
visited by the great Siberian missionary – the Tobolsk metropolitan, Philothei
(Leschinsky), and he venerated the relics of the saint and compiled a canon to
him. Towards the end of the first third of the XVIII Century there were
compiled three services and several discourses on the day of memory of
Righteous Vasilii.
The veneration of the
God-pleasing saint contributed not a little to the conversion from paganism to
Orthodoxy of the Tungus, Evenki and Yurak peoples. The peoples of the North
turn to Saint Vasilii as a patron saint for the fur-hunter tradesmen.
One of the first
icons of Saint Vasilii was written by a novice of the Tobolsk metropolitan
Pavel – the painter Luke, on the occasion of his miraculous deliverance from
death. On the holy icons Saint Vasilii is depicted "with a boyish face,
and small of stature", "in image of reverence, eyes having a sparkle,
gazing intently, and the hair of his head dark blond". On several of the
icons of the saint the Trinity Turukhansk monastery is depicted, and over it on
a mount is Vasilii praying – in but a shirt and without footwear. Sometimes
also on the icons was depicted the suffering of the saint at the hands of the
merchant and military-commander. Depictions of Saint Vasilii of Mangazeia are
known of at the Vladimir cathedral in Kiev, at Novgorod, and at Moscow.
One of the first days
of memory of the saint was on 22 March, when Holy Church remembers a saint of
same name with him – the PriestMartyr Basil of Ancyra. Afterwards, at the
Turukhansk Trinity monastery his memory began to be celebrated on 10 May, in honour
of remembrance of the transfer of his relics from Mangazeia to Turukhan. An
earlier commemoration of Righteous Vasilii of Manganzeia was done under 6 June,
on the day of appearance of his relics.
© 1996-2001 by translator Fr. S. Janos.