The Monk Pakhomii of Nerekhtsk

Commemorated on May 15, March 23

The Monk Pakhomii of Nerekhtsk, in the world Yakov, was born into the family of a priest at Vladimir on the Klyaz'ma. At age 7 he was sent for schooling, since from childhood he well knew the Holy Scriptures. Finding burdensome the bustle of the perishing world, he accepted tonsure at the Vladimir Nativity monastery and without murmur at the monastery he progressed through the various obediences. Yearning for solitary wilderness life, the ascetic secretly left the monastery and withdrew to the outskirts of Nerekhta. Here, at the River Gridenka, he found a suitable place for monastic life – a raised semi-island in the deep forest. The monk recoursed to the people about Nerekhta to establish and build a monastery in the vicinity of Sypanovo, on the Kostroma frontier. The Nerekhta people happily consented and took a significant part in the construction of the monastery. The Monk Pakhomii wrote an icon in the image of the Holy Trinity, and with the singing of a molieben he carried it to that place, whereat he was to erect the church in the Name of the Holy Trinity. Finishing with the construction of the temple, Saint Pakhomii concerned himself about the organising of the new monastery, where gradually monks were settling. At the newly-formed monastery the monks had to cultivate the land themselves and feed themselves by the toil of their own hands, a matter in which the saint was first to set the brethren an example. The monk died in the year 1384, well up in age, and he was buried in the Trinity church built by him. One of his disciples, Irinarkh, wrote an icon of the saint, and later there was built a crypt for his holy relics. The primary days of memory of the Monk Pakhomii are on 15 May, the day of "tezoimenstvo" ("name-in-common"), and on 23 March – the day of his repose.