Optina elder nectar. Elders of the Optina Desert

WITH Among the great Optina elders, the last of them, Elder Nektary [Tikhonov], enjoyed special love. He was born in the city of Yelets in 1858 to poor parents Vasily and Elena Tikhonov and received the name Nikolai at baptism. His father worked at a mill and died early. Nicholas had the deepest spiritual intimacy with his mother. She was strict with him, but acted more with meekness and knew how to touch his heart. But her mother also died early. Nikolai remained an orphan at a young age.

In 1876, he came to Optina Hermitage, carrying only the Gospel in a knapsack behind his shoulders. "God! What beauty is here, the sun has been here since dawn, and what flowers! Like in paradise!” - so the monk recalled his first impression of Optina. Nicholas was received by Elder Ambrose himself. A conversation with this great seer made such an impression on Nikolai that he remained forever in Optina. His spiritual leaders were the elders Anthony (Zertsalov) and Ambrose.

The first obedience of Nektariy was to take care of the flowers, then he was appointed to the sexton obedience. The door of his cell went straight towards the church. Here he lived for 25 years. Because of the obediences imposed on him, he was often late for services and came to church with red, swollen, as if sleepy eyes. The brothers complained about him to Elder Ambrose, and he answered, as was his custom, in rhyme: “Wait, Nikolka will oversleep - it will come in handy for everyone.”

Obedience was given great importance. “The highest and first virtue is obedience. Christ came to us for the sake of obedience to His Father, and the life of man on earth is obedience to God.” Already in his mature years, Father Nektary himself said more than once: “Without the obedience of a person, an impulse, burning, and then relaxation and cooling come. And in obedience, at first it is difficult, and then all obstacles are smoothed out.”

During these years, Father Nektary read a lot and was engaged in self-education. He read not only spiritual literature, but also scientific, studied mathematics, history, geography, Russian and foreign classical literature, studied languages ​​- Latin and French. In 1894 Father Nektariy was ordained a hierodeacon, and four years later Archbishop Macarius of Kaluga ordained him a hieromonk. About his ordination, Father Nektarios said the following:

“When Vladyka Macarius consecrated me as a hieromonk, then, seeing my spiritual disorder, after the ordination he said a short and strong word to me. And this word was so powerful that I still remember it - how many years have already passed - and I will not forget until the end of my days. And how much did you say to me? He called me to the altar and said: "Nectarios, when you are sad and despondent, and when a heavy temptation comes upon you, you repeat only one thing: "Lord! Have mercy, save and have mercy on me Thy servant.” The Vladyka only told me everything! But this advice saved me many times and still saves me, for it was spoken with authority.”

What kind of misfortune this word saved him from, remained unknown, but the elder once told about several of his temptations. One was in the first years of his obedience. In his youth, he had a beautiful voice, and his ear for music was preserved into old age. In the first years of his life in Optina, he sang in the skete church on the right kliros and even had to sing “The Prudent Robber.” But there was a custom in the skete: once a year during Great Lent, the monastery regent came to the skete and selected the best voices for the monastery choir. Brother Nikolai was also threatened with a transition from the skete to the monastery, but he did not want this. But singing "The Robber" was comforting and flattering. And yet, in the presence of the regent, he began to mercilessly falsify - so much so that he was transferred to the left kliros, and, of course, the question of his transfer was not raised again.

Another temptation befell him when, being a hieromonk, he became a semi-recluse. He almost stopped going out and sealed the windows of his cell with paper. He did this in order to strengthen his feat of prayer and self-education. Constant reading gave him, who had just graduated from a rural school, such versatile knowledge that he could freely talk about general cultural and special topics, and not just spiritual ones. He could talk about Pushkin and Shakespeare, Milton and Krylov, Spengler and Haggart, Blok, Dante, Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. In the hour of rest after dinner, he asked to read aloud to him Pushkin or some folk tales - Russians or the Brothers Grimm.

And so, having drawn from books the breadth and diversity of the world, he passionately wanted to travel in order to see with his own eyes what he was reading about. At this time, an order came to Optina from the Holy Synod to recommend one of the hieromonks to the fleet on a ship assigned to circumnavigate the world. Father Archimandrite proposed this appointment to Hieromonk Nectarius. He was so delighted and excited that, having come from the archimandrite, he began to collect things, forgetting for the first time that nothing is done in Optina without the elder's blessing. Only after a while he came to his senses and went for a blessing to Elder Joseph. But he did not bless him for this journey, and Father Nectarius resigned himself.

In order not to become proud, Father Nektariy began to play the fool little by little. For example, over a cassock, he wore colored sweaters; the food served in the refectory, he poured into one pot, all together - both sour, and sweet, and salty; he walked around the skete with a felt boot on one foot and a shoe on the other. He began to embarrass the monks even more during his eldership, when he acquired various toy cars, steamboats, trains and airplanes.

The transition from a secluded cell to public service was not easy for him. In 1913, at the insistence of Father Benedict, the abbot of Borovsky and the dean of the monasteries, the Optina brethren gathered to elect a new elder. First, eldership was offered to Archimandrite Agapit, who lived in Optina in retirement. He was a man of vast knowledge and lofty spirit, the author of an excellent biography of Elder Ambrose, who resolutely evaded the hierarchship that had been offered to him more than once. He also categorically refused eldership. Father Agapit kept only a few close students. One of them was Hieromonk Nectarios.

When the brethren began to ask Father Agapit to point out a worthy candidate, he named Father Nektary. The same one, in his humility, was not even present at the meeting. The brethren chose Fr. Nektariy as an elder in absentia and sent Fr. Averky after him. He comes and says: “Father, you are asked to attend the meeting.” But Father Nektary refuses: “They will choose who they need without me.” - "Father Archimandrite sent me for you and asks you to come," Father Averky insisted. Then Father Nektary dutifully put on a cassock and, as he was - one foot in a shoe, the other in a felt boot - went to the meeting. “Father, you have been chosen as the confessor of our monastery and an elder,” they meet him. “No, fathers and brothers! I am a poor-witted person and cannot bear such a burden,” objected Father Nektariy. But the archimandrite tells him resolutely: “Father Nectarios, accept obedience.” And then he obeyed.

During this period, Elder Nektary became close to Konstantin Leontiev, who, while living in Optina, read his works in manuscript to him. He studied painting with academician Bolotov, who became a monk, and until the last days of his life he followed it, was interested in the latest trends in art and made sketches of icons. For example, he made a sketch of the Annunciation in the last year of his life in Optina.

Painting, for which Elder Nectarios had an ability, was especially close to him. “Now the art of painting is in decline,” he said. - Previously, the artist was preparing to paint a picture - both internally and externally. Before sitting down to work, he prepared everything he needed: a canvas, paints, brushes, etc., and he painted a picture not for several days, but for years, sometimes all his life, as, for example, the artist Ivanov his “Appearance of Christ to the people.” And then great works were created. And now artists paint in a hurry, without thinking through, without feeling… For example, when you paint a spiritual picture, you need the light not to fall on the Angel, but to flow from it.”

The elder really wanted a picture of the Nativity of Christ to be created. “The world needs to remember this greatest event, because it happened only once in history! … Shepherds in short, tattered garments stand facing the light, with their backs to the viewer. And the light is not white, but slightly golden, without any shadows and not in rays or sheaves, but all the time, only in the farthest edge of the picture is slightly dusk to remind that it is night. The light is all of angelic outlines, gentle, barely perceptible, and so that it is clear that this beauty is not earthly - heavenly, so that it is not human! - added the father with special force. And in another case, the elder said to one girl: “Why did the shepherds deign to see angels that night? “Because they were awake.”

Once the elder was shown the icon of the Transfiguration of the Lord, where the brightness of the Tabor light was achieved by contrast with the black knotted trees in the foreground. The elder ordered them to be erased, explaining that where the Light of Tabor is, there is no place for any blackness ... When this light lights up, each crack begins to glow.”

Valuable memories of Elder Nectarios can be found in Father Vasily Shustin, who, together with his wife, visited him. “Batiushka tells me,” says Fr. Vasily - Shake out the samovar first, then pour water. The water is standing right there, in the corner, in a copper jug, take it and pour it.” The jug was massive, two buckets. I tried to move it, no - there is no power. And the father says to me: “You take a jug and pour water into the samovar.” - “Why, father, it is too heavy, I cannot move it from its place.” Then the priest went up to the jug, crossed it and said: “Take it.” I raised. The pitcher seemed quite light to me.

After the evening prayer, the skete brethren came to Elder Nectarius to receive the blessing before going to bed. This was done every day, morning and evening. The monks all approached the blessing, bowed, and at the same time, some openly confessed their thoughts and doubts. Batiushka consoled some, encouraged them, and after confession, remitted their sins to others, resolved their doubts, and lovingly let go of all those who were at peace. It was a touching sight. During the blessing, the priest had an extremely serious and concentrated look, and in every word he spoke care and love for every restless soul. Then the priest retired to his cell and prayed for about an hour. After a long absence, the priest returned to us and cleared everything from the table.

On one of my visits to Optina Pustyn, - Father Vasily recalls, - I saw Father Nektariy reading sealed letters. He came to me with the received letters, of which there were about 50, and, without opening them, began to sort them out. Some he put aside with the words: “Here you need to give an answer, but these thanks can be left unanswered.” He, without reading, saw their content. He blessed some of them, and even kissed some of them, and he gave two letters, as if by chance, to my wife and said: “Here, read them aloud, it will be useful.”

In 1914 my older brother [brother Fr. Basil] entered the Optina Skete as a novice and sometimes served as a cell-attendant to Elder Nectarius. He often asked his father to send money to buy books of spiritual content and built his own library there. I was always indignant at this and said: “Once you left the world according to your calling, then break with your passions.” And he had a passion for buying books. On this occasion, I wrote a letter to Father Nectariy with my indignation. The father did not answer. The brother continued. I wrote an even harsher letter to the priest, accusing him of not holding back his brother's passions. The father again did not answer. In 1917 I managed to go from the front with my wife to Optina. Batiushka greets us with a low bow and says: “Thank you for your sincerity. I knew that after the letters you would come yourself, I am always glad to see you. Always write such letters, and then come yourself for an answer. Now I will say that soon there will be a spiritual book famine. You won't get spiritual books. It is good that he is collecting this spiritual treasure, it will be very useful. The hard times are coming now. The number six has passed in the world and the number seven is coming, the age of silence. Shut up, shut up, - says the priest, and tears flow from his eyes. The humiliated sovereign suffers for his mistakes. In 1918 it will be even harder. - The sovereign and the whole family will be killed, tortured. One pious girl had a dream: Jesus Christ is sitting on the throne, and around him are 12 apostles, and terrible groans are heard from the earth. And the apostle Peter asks Christ: When, O Lord, will these torments end? - And Jesus Christ answers him: “I give the term until 1922. If people do not repent, do not come to their senses, then everyone will perish like this.” Right there, before the Throne of God, our Sovereign in the crown of the great martyr will stand. Yes, this Sovereign will be a great martyr. Recently, he redeemed his life, and if people do not turn to God, then not only Russia, but all of Europe will fail.

From the very beginning, Father Nektary did not want to become an elder and was weary of this obedience. Most of the time he lived closed in the cell of the elder Ambrose. Out of humility Father Nectarios said of himself: “Well, what kind of an elder am I, and how can I be the heir of the former elders? … They had whole loaves of grace, but I only have a slice.” On the table in his waiting room there was usually a book of some kind, open to a particular page. The visitor, in a long wait, began to read this book, not suspecting that this was one of the methods of Father Nektariy to give a warning, an indication or an answer to a question asked through an open book in order to hide his insight. The elder blessed the visitors with a wide sign of the cross. Slow in his movements and concentrated, he seemed to be carrying a bowl filled to the brim with precious moisture, as if afraid to spill it.

With the revolution, a period of severe trials began for Elder Nectarios. With the disintegration of the Optina Hermitage, Elder Nektary wanted to completely abandon the spiritual guidance of others and end his life as a wanderer. But then, in a dream, the Optina elders, who had died earlier, appeared to him and said: “If you want to be with us, then do not leave your children.” Elder Nectarios resigned himself to the cross laid upon him.

Optina Hermitage lasted until 1923, when all its churches were closed. Very little is known about the events of the post-revolutionary period. One eyewitness said that as the neighboring nunneries were liquidated, the nuns, like birds from the ruined nests, flocked to Optina. They had nowhere to go, and they immediately huddled. Crowds of laity also carried their grief here. They asked how to pray for loved ones who had not returned: the horrors of the revolution, the civil war inflicted losses on almost every family.

After the expulsion of Elder Nektary from Optina, the Bolsheviks brought an occultist to his cell in order to find, as they hoped, the treasures hidden here. It was night, and a kerosene lamp was burning in the elder's cell. The occult sorcerer began his sorcery, and although the lamp continued to burn, darkness fell in the room. There was a nun in the next room. She took the rosary of Fr. Nectarios and used it to draw the sign of the cross in the direction of the elder's cell. It immediately became light in his room, and the sorcerer struggled on the ground in convulsions of an epileptic fit.

The main features of Elder Nectarios were humility and wisdom. He approached each person personally, individually, with a special measure. He said, "You can't ask a fly to do the work of a bee." Outwardly, the monk was short, with a somewhat rounded face; long sparse strands of half-gray hair were knocked out from under the skuffi; in the hands of a pomegranate rosary. When confessing, he put on a red velvet stole with galloon crosses. His face, as it were, had no age: now senile, stern, now young and expressive, now childishly pure and calm. During the years of eldership, he was bent, with a small, wedge-shaped beard, thin, with constantly crying eyes. Therefore, he always had a handkerchief in his hands, which he applied to his eyes. He liked to keep himself in the background, to be hardly noticeable. There are almost no photographs of him, because he did not allow himself to be photographed. This is very characteristic of him.

Elder Nectarios died on April 29, 1928, in the village of Kholmishchi, Bryansk Region. They buried him in the local cemetery. He himself said during his lifetime that there would be no grave for him. Indeed, there was a war in those places. But the memory of Elder Nectarios was preserved by believers.

Despite all the upheavals of the revolution and the changes that took place during the years of communism, the grave of Elder Nectarios was nevertheless found. In 1992, the brethren of the restored Optina Monastery arrived at the burial place of the elder and began to dig. First, at a depth of 1.5 meters, they found the coffin of schema-nun Nectaria Kontsevich, the mother of Bishop Nectarius of Seattlia and the novice of Elder Nectarius, and then lower and a little to the side, a coffin with the relics of Elder Nectarius. When the coffin of the elder was opened, everyone felt the fragrance; his mantle was incorruptible. On Sunday, July 16, the solemn transfer of the relics of Elder Nectarius from the cemetery of the village of Kholmishchi to the Vvedensky Cathedral of Optina Hermitage took place.

Thus, one of the most comforting predictions of Elder Nektariy began to come true: “Russia will rise and be not rich materially, but it will be rich in spirit, and there will be 7 more lamps, 7 pillars in Optina.”

From the instructions of Elder Nektariy

WITH Tarets Nectarios said that in his youth he liked to observe nature and insects. “God not only permits, but requires, that man grow in knowledge. There is no stop in Divine creativity, everything moves, and the angels do not stay in one rank, but ascend from step to step, receiving new revelations. And even if a person has studied for a hundred years, he must continue to acquire new knowledge ... And you work. Years will pass unnoticed in the work.” During the conversation, the elder's face became unusually bright, so that it was difficult to look at him.

Elder Nectarios was characterized by an interest in life. Until his last years, he got acquainted with literature, asked to bring him new books, asked about the organization of education in schools, learned about everything that interested the intelligentsia. And he directed all this diverse knowledge to the service of God and the benefit of people. Once, even before the revolution, seminarians came to Fr. Nektariy with their teachers and asked him to say something to their benefit. “Youths! - the elder addressed them, - if you live and study in such a way that your learning does not spoil morality, but the morality of learning, you will receive complete success in your life.

Once one of his spiritual daughters was talking to her friend in the father's waiting room: “I don't know, maybe education is not needed at all and only harm from it. Is it possible to combine it with Orthodoxy?” Coming out of the cell, the elder said to her: “One day a man came to me who could not believe that there had been a global flood. I told him that people find shells on Mount Ararat and that even on the highest mountains, geologists find signs of a seabed. Then the young man admitted that he still had much to learn in order to better understand the Bible.” The elder used to say about himself: “I am getting closer to the scientific.” About history, he commented: “It shows us how God leads the nations and gives moral lessons to the universe.”

The elder instructed about external work: “The external belongs to us, but the internal belongs to the grace of God. Therefore, do the external, and when it is in good order, then the internal will also be formed. No need to wish or look for miracles. We have one miracle - the Divine Liturgy. She is the greatest miracle to which one must dig with all one’s soul.”

He taught about mindfulness in thought: “Stop thinking, start thinking. To think is to blur with thought, not to have purposefulness. Drop dreaming, engage in thinking. Napoleon, for example, had a thought, but there was no state thinking. And Kutuzov had an idea. Thoughts are higher than thoughts.”

About life he said: “Life is defined in three senses: measure, time, weight. The kindest and most beautiful deed, if it is above measure or not on time, does not make sense. By studying mathematics, a person comprehends a sense of proportion. Remember these three meanings. They define life.”

“The father invited us together to the confessional,” says Father Vasily Shustin, “he planted and began to give my wife various artificial flowers as a keepsake, and at the same time he says: When you walk through the field of life, then collect flowers, and you will receive fruits later ... Flowers - these are sorrows and sorrows. And they need to be collected so that you get a beautiful bouquet with which you will appear on the day of judgment, and then you will receive fruits - joys. In married life, - he continued, - there are always two periods: one happy and the other sad and bitter. It is better when the bitter period comes earlier, at the beginning of married life, then happiness will come after it.”

About art and literature, the elder expressed the following thoughts: “You can engage in art, like any other business, for example: carpentry or grazing cows. But everything must be done as if before the eyes of God. There is great art and small art. This is how small things happen: there are sounds and light. An artist is a person who can perceive these subtle colors, shades and inaudible sounds. He translates his impressions onto canvas or paper. Pictures, notes or poetry turn out. Here sounds and light seem to be killed. Light leaves color. A book, sheet music or a painting is a kind of tomb of light and sound. A reader or spectator comes, and if he manages to take a creative look, read, then the meaning is resurrected. And then the circle of art ends. Light flashes before the soul of the viewer and reader, sound becomes available to his hearing. Therefore, the artist or poet has nothing to be particularly proud of. He only does his part of the job. In vain does he imagine himself the creator of his works - there is only one Creator, and people only kill the words and images of the Creator, and then revive them with the strength of the spirit received from Him. But there is also a greater art - a word that revives and inspires (for example, the psalms of David). The path to this art lies through the personal feat of the artist - this is the path of sacrifice, and only one of many reaches the goal ... All the poems in the world are not worth one line of Psalms ... Pushkin was the smartest person, but he did not manage to live his own life correctly.

These and other remarks of Father Nectarios were the fruit of his inner spiritual experience. Having become an elder, he began to share with visitors what he had acquired through reading and reflection.

The elder loved to quote from Hamlet: “There are many things in the world, friend Horace, that our wise men never dreamed of.” He spoke of the need for a writer to think through each word: “Before you begin to write, dip your pen seven times in the inkwell.”

Recognizing the importance of the theater as a means of public education and advising the actors to observe proportionality in the game, Elder Nektary, however, did not bless one girl who dreamed of the theater to go on stage. When asked why, the elder replied: “She will not overcome temptation and will become corrupted… Shyness is a great virtue; it is nothing but the virtue of chastity. If one preserves chastity (which is easily lost by intellectuals), then a person will preserve everything!”

Once people who came to Elder Nectarius were heavily robbed. They took away all their winter clothes and dresses. Father Nectarios told them that when they rob, they should not grieve, but imagine that they had given alms, and the Lord would return ten times more. So no need to be sad.

When asked by a friend how to love Christ, he answered: “Learn a lesson from Christ Himself, Who said: Love And those of each other, just as I have loved you. First of all, you must try to love your neighbor, and from your neighbor, love will pass to Christ. But one must love one's neighbor sincerely, and not with calculation - only then can there be success.”

Elder Nektarios rarely gave instructions on how to live, obviously so as not to impose a yoke and so that the questioners would not suffer from the responsibility for not fulfilling what he ordered. But he always answered direct questions. To one lady who complained of bad thoughts, he advised: “Repeat Lord have mercy and you will see how everything earthly departs.” On another occasion, he advised: “Pay no attention to bad thoughts.” And by the grace of God, thoughts ceased to disturb people.

Even the elder said that it is very good if the Lord “does not listen” to prayers for a long time. You just need to continue to pray and not lose heart: “Prayer is a capital that brings more interest over time. The Lord sends His mercy when it pleases Him; when it is good for us to accept. If we urgently need something, then we should pray two or three times, and we should thank God for the fulfillment of the request. Sometimes after a year the Lord fulfills the petition. Take an example from Joachim and Anna. They prayed all their lives and did not lose heart, but they all hoped. And what a consolation the Lord sent them!”

In case of any failure, the elder ordered to say: “Lord, I believe that I endure what is due and get what I deserve, but You, Lord, by Your mercy, forgive and have mercy on me,” and repeat this several times until you feel peace in your soul .

Pray that the Lord will reign in your heart - then it will be filled with great joy, and no sorrow will be able to disturb you. For this purpose, the elder advised to pray like this: Lord, open the doors of Your mercy.

From the conversation of Elder Nektariy with a spiritualist. Spiritualism is a terrible and disastrous hobby. At seances, posing as the soul of some dead person, Satan himself appears to a person. With his flattery of the ancient serpent, he leads a person into such potholes and wilds, from which there is not only no strength to get out, but even to understand that you are in great danger. Through this God-cursed occupation, the devil takes possession of the human mind and heart to such an extent that those deeds that are declared a crime by all sane people, poisoned by the poison of spiritualism, perceive as completely normal and natural.

If you look closely at a person engaged in spiritualism, you will certainly notice a special imprint on him, according to which it is clear that he is talking to tables. Spiritualists suffer from terrible satanic pride and become embittered against all who contradict them.

Engaged in spiritualism, a person gradually, without noticing it himself, departs from God and from the Church. And so that he does not see the danger that threatens him, the spirit of darkness, through his demons, sends him to the temples of God to serve memorial services, prayers, akathists, partake of the Holy Mysteries of Christ, etc. However, in parallel with this, Satan more and more insistently inspires him that he could do all these good deeds himself in his home environment, and even with great zeal and productivity.

And as the naive person gets more and more entangled in the complex labyrinths of the spirit of darkness, God's blessing recedes from him. Then failures begin to haunt him, well-being is shaken. If the spiritualist had not been so strongly entangled by Satan, then he would have to see his misfortune and resort to God's help, to the saints of God, to the holy Apostolic Church, to the clergy, and they would have helped him with their holy advice and prayers. But instead, the spiritualist with his sorrows turns to the same demons, and these confuse him even more and suck him into the mire of damnation.

And in the end, God's blessing completely departs from the spiritualist. The gangrene of sin spreads to his entire family, and he begins an unusual, unmotivated, family breakdown. Even the people closest and dearest to him are leaving him!

Finally, when an unfortunate person, through the efforts of Satan, reaches the last degree of deceit, he either completely loses his mind and becomes insane, or he commits suicide. And although spiritualists claim that there are no suicides among them, this is not true. The first spirit caller, King Saul, committed suicide. This is because he “did not keep the word of the Lord and turned to a sorceress.”

In a word, with people who call up spirits - who prophesy in the name of God, while the Lord does not send him - what happens that the prophet Jeremiah predicted: “These prophets will be destroyed by sword and famine; and the people to whom they prophesy will be scattered through the streets of the city from famine and sword ... And I will pour out their evil on them”(Jer. 14:15-17).

Memoirs of Metropolitan Veniamin (Fedchenkov) Toptin Pustyn and Elder Nektary

ABOUT ptina ... This is how the pilgrims usually called this monastery in abbreviated form. Similarly, the Sarov Monastery was simply called “Sarov.” Sometimes the word “desert” was also added to Optina, although there was nothing desert there, but by this they probably wanted to note the special holiness of this monastery.

Optina is located in the Kaluga province, in the Kozelsky district, a verst from the city, across the Zhizdra River, among a pine forest.

The very word Optina is interpreted differently. But we, from a spiritual point of view, prefer the legend that this desert got its name from some of its founders, the robber Opta. Whether it was really so or otherwise, but the visitors and the monks like this explanation more because the pilgrims also came there with sins and sought the salvation of their souls: and the monastic life, in its essence, is primarily penitential asceticism.

Optina became famous for her “elders.” Their first father was Lev - or Leonid - a student of the famous elder, Paisius Velichkovsky, who labored in the Neamtsky monastery in Moldova. After Father Leo, the eldership passed to his successor, hieromonk Fr. Macarius (Ivanov), who came from the nobility. The Metropolitan of Moscow Filaret himself once said about him: “Macariy is a saint.” Under his leadership, the “wise” Ambrose, who first studied at the seminary, was brought up and matured. Then there were the elders - two Anatoly, Barsanuphius - from the military environment and Fr. Nectary. The last, as well as the second, Anatoly, I saw personally and talked with them. But besides these especially prominent monks and the abbot, many monks were also distinguished by their lofty holy life. However, the whole of Optina was famous in Russia precisely for the spiritual asceticism of the brethren, which was most of all connected with eldership and, in turn, brought up experienced elders.

An elder is an experienced spiritual leader. He is not necessarily in holy orders, but certainly wise in spiritual life, pure in soul and capable of instructing others. For the sake of this, not only their monks came to them for advice, but also the laity with sorrows, bewilderment, sins ... The glory of the Optina elders in one second half a century spread hundreds and thousands of miles from Optina, and seekers of consolation and guidance were drawn here from different directions . Sometimes a continuous line of visitors waited to be received by the elder from morning to evening. Most of them were ordinary people. Among them sometimes stood out a priest or novice of the monastery. Not often, but there were also intelligent people there: Tolstoy, and Dostoevsky, and the Grand Duke I. Konstantinovich, and Leontiev, and b. Protestant Zederholm; the famous writer S.A. Nilus lived for a long time at the monastery; a former naval officer, later Bishop Micah, took monastic vows; at about. Makariy's monastery was connected with the Kireevsky family, who greatly contributed to the publishing house of the monastery of patristic books; spiritual threads stretched from here between the monastery and N.V. Gogol; the well-known ascetic and spiritual writer, Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov, also fed on the spirit of this desert. And besides these faces, the spirit of inner asceticism and eldership imperceptibly spread throughout various monasteries. And one of my acquaintances, M.A.N. Let's move on to the records of our memories.

Of course, they do not cover all aspects of monastic life; they do not talk about the ascetic suffering of the monks, which was known only to them alone, their confessors, but to God Himself. I will speak only about the most outstanding persons and bright phenomena of Optina. Of course, such a description would be one-sided. And my friend and colleague from St. Petersburg once noticed correctly. D. Academy, later Archimandrite John (Raev), who died early from consumption, - that with such a description I am misleading readers, and above all listeners. He then gave such a comparison. If you look at a meadow or a flower garden from above, then how beautiful it will seem with its flowers and bright greenery. And go down with your gaze lower, there you will see a naked stem with twigs. But here, too, there is not yet a source of life, but below, in the earth, where gnarled and winding roots in complete darkness seek food for beautiful leaves and flowers. There is nothing beautiful to look at here, on the contrary, it is both unsightly and dirty ... And then different worms crawl and even gnaw and destroy the roots, and leaves and flowers wither and die with them.

So is monasticism, Fr. John, - only on the heights and outside - it's beautiful; but the feat of monasticism itself is difficult and goes through impurity, and in most of the monastic life it is a crucifixion with sinful passions. And this is what you, - said a friend, - and you do not show in your stories.

All of this is absolutely true, I say. But after all, even in the Lives of the Saints, for the most part, bright phenomena from their lives and special deeds are described. And the sinful struggle is usually mentioned briefly and in passing. And almost never talks about it in detail. The only exception is the life of St. Mary of Egypt, who later descended from stinking sins to angel-like purity and perfection. But even then the descriptors make the reservation that they do it by force, in order to console and strengthen weak and desponding ascetics in the world and in monasteries by the example of such a change in the sinner. So we will not dwell much on our dark sides at all; it's not instructive. Yes, they are unknown to me in other people; what would I talk about? However, where it follows there will be mentioned and about it. It is really necessary and useful for the reader not to forget that the height and holiness of the saints of God are both preceded and accompanied by a spiritual struggle; sometimes - very difficult and ugly ...

Incidentally, the aforementioned Fr. John must rightly be numbered among the ascetics; he lived little; died as an inspector of the Poltava Seminary.

Name of God

I happened to visit Optina twice. I have known about it since the academy. And as a student, in one village he met the spiritual children of Elder Ambrose and listened to their stories about him. But he himself did not think about visiting the desert; neither in seminaries nor in academies did they instill in us interest and love either for monasteries, or for ascetics, or for such luminaries of the Church as even Fr. John of Kronstadt or Bishop Feofan, the recluse Vyshensky, are already our contemporaries. Studies, books - that was our interest. Therefore, after the academy, almost none of them thought about visiting the cloisters at all.

Being the rector of the Tauride Seminary, I decided to visit Optina by the end of the summer holidays. The next year or two, I visited there for the second time, being the rector of the Tver Seminary. He did not live long - no more than two weeks. Of course, in such a short time, I noticed only a few of the rich hidden treasures of the holy monastery. Both memories are salt together.

The first time I arrived in a cab to the monastery during the day and stayed at the so-called “black” hotel, where “ordinary” pilgrims stayed; I did not want to stand out from them and draw attention to myself. I remember the head monk, with thick dark hair; I didn't know anyone. We drank tea with him. There was nothing special. But one day he invited an Athos monk to tea, who had been removed from the Holy Mountain for belonging to a group of “imebozhnikov,” and now living in Optina. At first everything was peaceful. But then a dispute began between the monks about the Name of God. Optinets adhered to the decision of the Holy Synod, which condemned this new teaching that “the name of God is God Himself.” Athos defended his own. The fathers argued for a long time. I was silent, little interested then in this question. Optinets turned out to be wittier; and, after long and bitter arguments, he seemed to feel himself victorious. The Athonite, although he did not give up, was forced to shut up. And suddenly, to my deep surprise, the victor, as if responding to some of his secret feelings, strikes the table with his fist and, contrary to his previous proofs, declares with energy: “And yet the name God is God Himself!” The dispute never resurfaced. I thought in surprise: what prompted the winner to agree with the vanquished?! This was incomprehensible to me. Only one thing was clear, that the “Name of God” was extremely dear to both monks. Probably, and from their experience, doing the Jesus Prayer according to the monastic custom (“Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner”), they both knew the power, and the benefit and sweetness of invoking the name of God; but only in their theology they could not cope with the difficulties of teaching theological formulations.

Then, visiting some of the Optina monks, I noticed in their cells, mostly near the icons, sheets of paper on which these holy words were written in Slavic letters: “Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner.” Apparently, these monks to some extent sympathized with the defense of the name of God. But not daring and not having the strength to do it with words. They expressed their reverence for the name of God with a sign on paper.

“God,” I thought, “in the world, godlessness was growing, lack of faith, indifference, and here people are still getting excited and arguing about the meaning and power of even the name of God! It means that they somehow live life in God.”

Father Anatoly

After 2-3 days of my life, the news spread to the monastery: the miraculous icon of the Kaluga Mother of God was arriving (Comm. 2 September). By the time indicated, many monks and pilgrims went out to meet the holy icon along the forest road and, accepting it, went back to the monastery singing prayers.

Suddenly I see how some of our crowd are separated from the procession and hurriedly hurry to the right side. A few moments later, a dense crowd of people had already gathered there. A dense ring of someone or something surrounding. Out of simple curiosity, I also went there: what's the matter? To leave the icon of the Virgin, some special reason was needed for this. Squeezing a little to the center of the crowd, I saw that everyone was looking with tender love and happy smiles at some little monk in a klobuk, with a little gray uncombed beard. And he also smiled a little at everyone. The crowd tried to get a blessing from him. And I saw how everything around this little old man seemed to glow and rejoice. This is how cute children meet their mother.

Who is this? I ask my neighbor.

Yes, Father Anatoly! he answered kindly, surprised, however, at my ignorance.

I have heard of him, but have yet to meet him in person; Yes, and there was no special need for this, I had no questions for him. And now the question arose about himself: what kind of miracle? People even left the icon and rushed to the man. Why, and the answer appeared by itself: a holy man is also a miracle of God, like an icon, only an obvious miracle. The saint is only the “image” of God incarnated in man. As in the icon, so in the holy people God himself lives by His grace. And here and there God Himself draws us to Himself with His gifts of joy, consolation, mercy, spiritual light. As the Savior with Moses and Elijah appeared on Tabor in the blessed uncreated light to the disciples, and then Peter exclaimed with delight: “Lord! It is good for us to be here” (Luke 9:33). So it is through holy people that the same Transfiguration grace both shines and warms. And sometimes - as it happened more than once with Fr. Seraphim of Sarov, - it manifests itself in the visible, although in the supernatural light. So it was now: through the “father” (what an affectionate and reverent word!) the Sun of truth shone. Christ our God. And people basked and consoled themselves in this light.

I also remembered the words of the Apostle Paul about Christians: "Don't you know that you are the temple of God, and the spirit of God lives in you"(I Corinthians 6:19).

And - another of his sayings, that every Christian should grow into a perfect image, to the extent of the age of the fullness of Christ (Eph. 4:13) ... This is the height given to the Christian - the God-Man Himself, Christ! And this is not the audacity of stealing the impossible (Phil. 2:6), but the commandment of the Savior, given at His last conversation: “If anyone does my commandments, he will be loved by my Father; and we will come to him and make our abode in him”(John 14:23). This is the goal and goal of the Christian life: fellowship with God through the grace of the Holy Spirit. And then the blessed people will begin to pour out their own, i.e. God's light on others.

God, how great in themselves and how extremely important to others these holy men! There is no one above them!

I also had to meet in my life the so-called “great” people, but I never felt their greatness: a person is like an ordinary person. But when one had to stand in front of the saint, then one could clearly feel their real greatness ... These are extraordinary people! And sometimes it became scary in their presence - how vividly I had to experience this when serving with Fr. John of Kronstadt.

And then it becomes clear why we glorify the saints, paint their icons, bow to them in the ground, kiss them. They truly deserve it! It will also become clear that we incense in churches not only the icons of the Savior, the Mother of God and saints, but in general - all Christians: we incense in them, worship and honor God Himself, manifested in his images: both in icons and in people .

After all, every Christian must be the image of God. Once I had to ask a certain old man:

How should one treat a person in general?

Respectfully, he replied.

I was surprised by his words:

Man is the image of God, he said.

And when this image is restored in a person, then people also honor him; Even the beasts obeyed Adam in Paradise. This is also evidenced by the lives of Gerasim of Jordan and Seraphim of Sarov; and even the demons tremble at them. But the celestials rejoice at them. When the Mother of God appeared with the Apostles Peter and John, St. Seraphim, She said to them:

This one is from our kind!

Father Fr. was from the same family. Anatoly. How much joy, love and affection poured out from his face on all those who looked at him in the Optina Forest, on a sunny clearing!

Husband and wife

And here is his instruction, the elder's advice. I received a letter from my friend and comrade at the academy, the priest Fr. Alexandra B. from the Samara province, about the discord with his wife ... Oh, how he loved her as a bride! Our entire course knew about her, how good and beautiful she is. And so they got married. He receives a parish in the working-class district of the city. We need to build a temple. A young and ideological priest sets to work with love and energy. The building is progressing rapidly. It would seem that everything is fine. But here is the grief for the mother: her father is late for dinner. Mother is unhappy with this: either the food has cooled down, or it has been overcooked and overcooked. Yes, and time is wasted in vain, and there are other chores around the house ... And the children appeared ... And the distressed hostess begins to grumble and complain about such a disorder and disorder of life. And more importantly, instead of her former love, she is already starting to get angry with her husband: the family is decomposing. The father justifies himself to her:

Why, I was not somewhere, but at the construction of the temple!

But this does not calm her down. A family dispute begins, always painful and harmful. Finally, the mother one day declares resolutely to her husband:

If you don't change your life, then I'll go to my parents.

And at such and such a moment we exchanged with Fr. Alexander letters. When he learned that I was going to Optina, he described all his difficulties and asked me to go to Fr. Anatoly and ask his senile advice: how should he be, Whom to prefer - a temple or a wife,

I went into the cell of the father. He received predominantly the worldly; and the monks went to another elder - Fr. Nectarios. In the cell of Fr. Anatolia had about ten or fifteen visitors. Among them, I asked a question. Batiushka, having listened with lowered eyes to the story of my comrade, began to shake his head contritely.

Oh, what a misfortune, what a misfortune! - Then, without hesitation, he carefully began to speak so that the father would obey his mother in this: - Otherwise, it will be bad, bad!

And then he recalled to me a case from his spiritual practice, how the family fell apart due to a similar reason. And now I remember the name of my husband: his name was George.

Of course, said Fr. Anatoly, - and building a temple is a great thing; but to keep family peace is also a holy command of God. The husband must, according to the apostle Paul, love his wife as himself; and the apostle compared the wife to the church (Eph. 5:25-33). That's how great marriage is! It is necessary to combine both the temple and the family world. Otherwise, God will not be pleased with the structure of the temple. And the cunning enemy, the devil, under the guise of good, wants to do evil: we need to understand his intrigues. Yes, - so write it off, let him come on time for dinner. Everything has its time. So write it down!

I wrote it down. And things got better.

Noble

On my second visit, I arrived at night. For some reason, a cab driver from Kozelsk drove me not to a "black" hotel, but to a "noble" one, where honored or wealthy guests were received. I didn't object. It was already about one in the morning, if not two. I must say that at that time of my life I was accompanied by the Iberian Icon of the Mother of God. I used to give one to someone - I will soon receive another, And I got used to this shrine so soon that, wherever I came, I first looked for: is there Iverskaya here too: So it was here. I enter the first room - in the front corner hangs the icon of the Savior. I regret already - not Iverskaya. I enter the bedroom: and in the corner - Iverskaya: thank God!

I'm going to bed... I barely had time to doze off, I hear the ringing in the morning! It would be nice to get up and go to the temple. But laziness. Tired. And fell asleep again... I woke up early, about five o'clock. It was a beautiful August morning. The sky is clear. The sun is bright. Green trees. I opened the window. And suddenly a dove flies to me on the windowsill, completely without fear. I took the bread left from the path and began to crumble it. How gratifying it was to me: he was not afraid of people! But then a second dove arrives. I separate the crumbs for him too. But the first has already become jealous: why do I give to the other?! And he starts pecking at the new guest. My joy disappeared immediately.

Lord, Lord! So pigeons are at enmity and fighting. And, it would seem, what peaceful birds they are! Even the Savior points to them as an example to the apostles: “Be meek as doves” (Matthew 10:16). And it was sad in my heart. And what to demand from us, people. With our selfishness?! Some say: there will be no wars sometime... It is not true: there will always be, until the end of the world. And they cannot but be; since each of us carries within himself the source of wars: envy, malice, irritation, love of money... It was not for nothing that one of the writers said before his death: when his son asked him if wars would stop, as long as a man remains a man, there will be wars!

The Son of God himself predicted that the world would not see progress, but the deterioration of human relations. And by the end of the world there will be especially terrible wars: people will rise against people (and not just armies against armies), kingdom against kingdom. Evil lies within ourselves, in our hearts; therefore, the whole history of this world and of man in general is a tragedy, and not an easy and cheerful walk. The world is corrupted and we are all sinners.

So my pigeons did not reconcile - both flew away.

On the same day, having visited Fr. hegumen, asked him for permission to live in a skete for me: there is more solitude and spiritual rest than at a monastery. And in the evening I went there.

A skete is a branch of a monastery where the monks live more rigorously and more prayerfully. Outsiders are usually not allowed in at all, and women are not allowed to enter at all.

Optina Skete, in the name of St. John the Baptist, is located about half a verst from the monastery. Around slender tall pines. Among them, a quadrangular space surrounded by a wall was carved. Inside - a temple and small separate houses for the brethren. But what is especially striking inside it is the multitude of diluted flowers. I happened to hear that such an order was established even under the elder Fr. Macarius. He had in mind to comfort the solitary brethren even with the beauty of the flowers. And this custom was kept very firmly.

At first I was assigned a place in the right half of the Zolotukhinsky wing; in the left lived a student of the Kazan Theological Academy o.A. Entering the new premises, I rushed to the corner with the icons: is there Iverskaya, but there was a rather large icon with the inscription “Portatissa.” I regretted it... But then I asked the accompanying monk what "Portatissa," "The doorkeeper," he replied, "or otherwise, Iverskaya." Her icon appeared to the Iberian Monastery on Athos (Iveria - Georgia); and a temple was built for her over the gates of the monastery; because the Mother of God said in a vision: “I don’t want to be kept by you, but I myself will be your Guardian.” - I rejoiced. And I lived in this skete for about two weeks.

He escorted me here - a tall, stately monk with light-white hair and a thick beard. His name I am no longer now. But I remembered that he was one of the seminarians. Why did he - so personable, educated and with a good bass - leave the world and go to the desert? I do not know, but it was indelicate to ask.

I also remember that for some reason he told the temptation of an Egyptian monk, who was wrestled with carnal passions; how he did not lose heart from his fall, but fled back to the monastery, despite the fact that the demon whispered to him to return to the world and get married ... When the monk came to his elder, he fell at his feet with the words: “Abba, I fell !” The elder saw crowns of light above him, as a symbol of the fact that the devil several times wanted to bring him to despondency and [persuaded] to leave the monastery; and the prudent monk rejected these tempting thoughts just as many times and did not even confess his sin until he fell into the knees of an old man.

Elders

Before leaving for the skete, either on the advice of the abbot of the monastery or one of the monks, I wished to serve a memorial service for the departed elders. Behind the main temple, near the wall of the altar, there were two graves - Fr. Macarius and Fr. Ambrose. I was given as a chorister - a choir tenor monk. In a greasy cassock, with a rather large belly, he made an unfavorable impression on me. It doesn't look like the illustrious saints of Optina, I thought...

While singing a memorial service, I noticed a dimple under the tombstone. The monk explained to me that the worshipers of the elders take sand from here with faith for healing from illnesses. And I remember the words of the Psalmist about the Jerusalem temple, that those who believe in the Lord love not only the temple itself, but also favor its stones; and “the dust (dust) will lick it.” And what's so wonderful if even now Russian emigrants, returning to their homeland, take a handful of earth and kiss it; while others fall to her face and kiss her too. Let them not condemn us, believers, if we take sand from holy graves. The Russian people, with all their simplicity, quite correctly and wisely understood sacred things. And miracles could only be created from this. We know from Acts that it was not only the headdresses of the Apostles that poured out healing; but even their shadows worked wonders (19:12; 5:15). And from about. Seraphim of Sarov, the remaining things - a mantle, hair: a stone on which he prayed for a thousand days and nights, water from his well, and so on. - worked wonders.

"Great art thou, O Lord; and marvelous are thy works!"(Ps. 8:5, 10).

I will continue, however, the story of the “bad monks.” To do this, I'll jump ahead a bit. On the eve of the feast of the Assumption of Our Lady, I stood among the pilgrims; the monks stood there in the left part of the temple, which was specially marked out. Ahead, on the pulpit, a canonarch novice went from kliros to kliros and proclaimed the stichera to the chanters. He did his business well. But what caught my eye was the white collar of the shirt, which extended over the collar of the cassock. And it seemed to me that this monk was not far from the laity, vainglorious with their clothes. “What kind of Optina is he?!” - so I condemned these two monks. And I thought that I was right in my thoughts.

But the next day, at the liturgy, I delivered a sermon (more on that below). and what, when I came down from the temple porch, two monks ran up to me and, in front of all the people, bowed at my feet with gratitude, asking for blessings. Who were these two monks? .. One of them is a full singer at the graves, and the other is this canonarch with a white collar. I was stunned by the fact that it was those two whom I condemned as bad monks who showed humility... The Lord, as it were, rebuked me for wrongly judging people. Yes, the heart of man is known only to God. And we cannot be judged by outward appearance... We make many mistakes in our judgments and gossip...

Together with these monks, I also remembered the father hegumen of the monastery. I have now forgotten his holy name - perhaps his name was Xenophon. It was already a gray-haired old man with delicate, thin features of a pale face. More than 70 years ... My attention was drawn to the special severity of his face, even almost severity. And when he left the church through the side southern doors, pilgrims, especially women, rushed towards him from different directions. But he walked hurriedly forward to his rector's house, almost without looking back at those who came up and quickly blessing them ... I was filled with reverent respect for him. This experienced monk knew how to deal with anyone. And I remember the saying of St. Macarius the Great that the Lord has different saints: one comes to Him with joy; the other is in severity; and God receives both with love.

I remember another abbot, named Isaac. He always confessed to his confessor before serving the liturgy on holidays. One learned monk, later a well-known metropolitan, asked him: why is he doing this and what should he repent of? What sins can he have? Father hegumen answered this with a comparison:

Here, leave this table for a week in a room with closed windows and a locked door. Then come and run your finger over it. And a clean stripe will remain on the table, and dust on the finger, which you don’t even notice in the air. So are sins: large or small, but they accumulate continuously. And they should be cleansed by repentance and confession.

In connection with these “small” sins, the well-known incident with two women, which took place in Optina Hermitage, is recalled here. To the old man Ambrose was visited by two women. One of them had a great sin on her soul and was therefore extremely depressed. The other one was cheerful, because there were no “big” sins behind her. Father Ambrose, having listened to their revelations, sent both of them to the river Zhizdra. First, he ordered to find and bring a huge stone, which only she was able to lift; and the other was to collect small stones in the hem of her dress. They did what they were ordered to do. Then the elder ordered both of them to take the stones to their old places. The first one easily found the place of the large stone, while the second could not remember all the places of her small stones and returned with all of them to the old man. He explained to them that the former always remembered the great sin and repented, and now she could remove it from her soul; the second did not pay attention to petty sins, and there were many such, and she, not remembering them, could not be cleansed of them by repentance.

Here we note that in monasteries, usually only the abbot of the monastery is called - “father” - like one uterus in a bee hive. And other monks - both cassocks, and manatees (tonsed in the mantle) and hieromonks - are called - "fathers," with the addition of their monastic name. The only exceptions are “old men,” people usually call them “father” too; and the monks even here distinguish them from the abbots, calling them “elder” such and such, by name.

Skitniki

I will record a conversation with me about. Theodosius, rector of the monastery, about my monasticism.

Why did you become a monk, he asked me.

For the greater convenience of the salvation of the soul and for the love of God,” I replied.

This is good. Right. But now they are accepting him to be bishops “to serve their neighbors,” as they say. Such a view is “wrong and unhumble. In our opinion, in the Orthodox way, monasticism is a spiritual, inner life; and above all - a life of repentance, precisely for the sake of the salvation of one's own soul. Well, if someone perfects himself in this, he will be able to serve others for salvation. Otherwise, there will be no benefit to him or others.

Morning services were performed for a short time, but on the other hand, the skete monks generally spent a significant part of the day in free prayers, in their cells. And this side of their life was known only to them and to God... It is known that all sorts of “rules” and statutes about prayer are needed most of all for us, the new beginnings, who have not yet brought up the prayerful fervor of “unceasing” prayer and “standing before God.” For those who have perfected this, external rules are not obligatory, and sometimes even they distract from inner prayer.

I didn’t know what this side of life was like among the ascetics and Elder Nectarios, but I didn’t dare to ask, and I didn’t really care about it, being myself a beggar in prayer. Only I had already noticed before that, for example, Fr. Nectarios' eyes were inflamed: were they not from prayerful tears? Someone told me that he also had sick, swollen legs: clearly, from long standing and bowing ...

In prayerfulness lies the main life of true monks, the path to grace-filled perfection, and even the means to receive the special gifts of God: senile wisdom, clairvoyance, miracles, and holiness. But this side of life is hidden among ascetics. However, we must never forget about it, as the most important, if we want to understand the life of saints in general even with the mind.

I had to get up at about three in the morning. We were awakened in the cells by a rather young novice, Fr. Nestor. Very sweet and affectionate, always with a smile on his clean face, with a small beard. They said about him that he liked to sleep; therefore he was given the obedience to wake others; to do this, he was compelled involuntarily to get up earlier in order to go around the entire skete. But even after, they say, he was drawn to sleep.

O. Macarius, in contrast to Fr. Nestor, was a stern-looking man. A huge red beard, compressed lips, silent, he reminded me of Fr. Ferapont from "The Brothers Karamazov" by Dostoevsky. He held the position of housekeeper in the skete. In general, people are appointed to this position more severely, so that they don’t waste it in vain, but protect the monastery’s goods. I met him on the following occasion. Once I was with a cohabitant in the Zolotukhinsky “corps” of Fr. Athanasius, went to the liturgy; and forgetting inside the key to the house, they slammed the door of it. What to do? Well, we think, after we ask about. economy help us; he has a lot of keys. So they did. Father Macarius silently went with us. In a cassock and a hood - majestically. And our castle was a screw. O. the housekeeper took out one similar key from the bundle, but its heart was smaller than the hole in the lock. Then he picked up a thin twig from the ground, put it in the hole, and silently began to turn the key again. Didn't help. Then I advised him:

O. Macarius, you should put in a thicker twig! And this one is thin; don't open it.

No, not from that. Started without prayer! he replied sternly.

And then he crossed himself, reading the Jesus Prayer: “Lord, Jesus Christ, our God, have mercy on me a sinner!” And again he began to turn the key with the same twig. And the castle immediately opened. Father Macarius, without another word, went to his room, and we went to our rooms.

On this occasion, and in connection with it, I recall another incident. Ten years later, already an immigrant in Europe, I was at the student conference of the “Christian Association of Young People” in Germany in Falkenberg. According to custom, we set up a temporary temple and held services daily; and at the end of the weekly conference, everyone fasted and took communion.

A friend, a student of A.A. Several icons were to be hung on the altar side. The young man began to drive nails into the wall, but they fell on the stones and bent. Seeing this and remembering Macarius, I said: “And first you cross yourself and say a prayer, and then choose a place for a nail.”

He obediently did so. He prayed and pointed the nail in a different place, hit with a hammer, and he fell into the groove between the stones. The same thing happened with the second nail and with the others.

There was a similar case with Fr. John of Kronstadt. Getting up early in the morning, at about 3 o'clock, he, according to custom, had to read the morning rule for Communion. But I couldn't find this book. Having unsuccessfully reviewed everything, he suddenly stopped and thought: “Forgive me, Lord, that now, because of the search for a creature (book), I forgot You, the Creator of all!” - and immediately remembered the place where he had put the book yesterday.

Then in my life I told many people about these cases. And he himself often tested the truth of the words of the “severe” Father Macarius: “I began without prayer.”

O. Kuksha. A strange name, never heard of before. The memory of this saint is August 27. He lived in the Kyiv Lavra at the end of the 11th and the beginning of the 12th century. He was a missionary among the Vyatichi; worked wonders. Together with his disciple Nikon, he was killed by a pagan. Their relics still lie in the Anthony caves. The fasting Pimen, who lived at that time in the Lavra, exclaimed in the midst of the Church:

Our brother Kuksha has been killed! - and he died immediately (1113).

In memory of this holy martyr, the name of the monk of Optina was given at the tonsure.

I got to know him better because the monastery authorities found it necessary to transfer me from the Zolotukhin house to another, to a cell next to Fr. Kuksha. It was an elderly monk, about 65 years old, and maybe more; small in stature, with a light beard and unusually simple and cheerful. He made tea for me in a small samovar that could hold 4-5 cups. This is where we met with him. Both in the skete and in the monastery there was no custom and no permission to go to other people's cells without special obedience and need. And I didn't go. And once he came at the same invitation to one monk, but later received from Fr. Theodosius a light note:

We do not go to cells.

Probably, the one who invited me received a reprimand. Although our conversation with him was not about bad topics, but about the holy fathers and their creations, but once - without blessing, then good is not good ...

And to about. I did not go to Kuksha, and did not even see his cell, although we lived nearby in the house. Yes, and he came to see me exclusively on business and our conversations were random and short. Once, with surprising childlike simplicity, he told me about eldership and elders:

And why this is, I don’t know ... I don’t know! Everything is so clear what needs to be done for salvation! And what is there to ask?

Probably, his pure soul, guided by the grace of the Holy Spirit, really did not need to ask anything: he lived holy and without questions. Gentle, spiritually cheerful, always peaceful, obedient - Father Kuksha was like a child of God, about whom the Savior Himself said: “If you are not like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven”(Matthew 18:3). But one day a temptation happened to us. I wanted to serve the liturgy in the morning. And Father Kuksha was in charge of the church side of the skete and the sacristy. That's why I told him the day before about my desire. In sheer simplicity, he happily agreed, and I served.

And in the skete there was a custom - to perform evening prayers in the house of Fr. the head of the skete. After that, we all bowed to Fr. Theodosius at his feet, asking for forgiveness and prayers, and gradually went to his place. And if he needed to talk to someone special, then he left them for this after all. But this time about. Theodosius left everyone. There were few brethren in the skete. After "forgiveness" he turns to Fr. Kukshe and rather sternly asks:

Who blessed you to allow Father Archimandrite (i.e. me) to serve the Liturgy now?

Father Kuksha realized his guilt and, without any excuse, fell humbly at the feet of the skete chief with the words: “Forgive me, a sinner! Sorry!"

Well on. the archimandrite does not know our orders. And you must know! Fr. continued sternly. Theodosius.

O. Kuksha again throws himself at his feet and again says in front of all of us:

Forgive me, sinner, forgive me!

So he never said a single word in his defense. And I also stood as if guilty, but did not say anything ... Then, with the blessing of the chief, we all left ... Both I and all the brethren were given a lesson about obedience ... Is it really Fr. Theodosius got angry, or was he simply reprimanding the humble Fr. Kukshe wanted to teach others a lesson, but most of all, me, I don't know. But the next day in the morning I see through the window that he, in a klobuk and even in a mantle, is coming to our house. He entered my cell, prayed in front of the icons, and, handing me the prosphora consecrated during the service, said:

Forgive me, oh archimandrite, yesterday I got angry and allowed myself to reprimand Fr. Kukshe.

I don't remember now whether I answered him that or not.

But soon another case came up. A new bishop arrived in the Kaluga diocese: Bishop George. He was a strict and even extremely domineering man. The day was sunny. The morning is clear. I see oh Theodosius is sent from Fr. Kuksha to the church of St. John the Baptist. I bowed. Batiushka tells me that now he is with Fr. he goes to Kaluga as abbot of the monastery to introduce himself to the new Vladyka.

First, you need to serve a prayer service.

And I thought to myself: the monks go to the common Father of the diocese and their own, but they are afraid that some temptation might happen during the reception ... Strange ...

At this time, Father Kuksha had already unlocked the temple and we moved there. On the way about Theodosius tells me:

You know? Father Kuksha is a great prayer book of grace. When he prays, his prayer is like a pillar of fire flying towards the throne of God!

I was silent. And he remembered the reprimand to this pillar: it was evident that both he and all of us needed it.

The gray-haired Fr. Athanasius. Imagine a deep old man with white hair, with a wide white beard that covered almost his entire chest. On the head is a soft monastic kamilavka. The eyes are lowered down and spiritually turned into the soul - as if they do not see anyone. If anyone remembers Nesterov's painting "The Hermit", then Fr. Athanasius does not look like him, only his hair is whiter. The first time I turned my attention to him was in the skete refectory. In a clean dining room, there were 20-25 people, there was a table in the middle, and benches along the walls. The first person to come here, having made the sign of the cross three times as usual, sat down to the right in the first place from the door. another monk who entered after him, after the sign of the cross, bowed to the one who had come earlier and occupied a neighboring place. Others did the same, until everyone came to a strictly defined time. And nobody said anything. Bending their faces down, each one either thought that, or, more accurately, secretly prayed. This time I had to sit next to Fr. Athanasius. In silent silence, I heard a very quiet whisper from my neighbor. Involuntarily I turned my face and noticed how Fr. Athanasius moves his senile lips and whispers the Jesus Prayer... Apparently, it has become an unceasing habit and need for him.

After dinner, I asked one of the nomads: what special - besides prayer - is the elder's obedience? It turned out that from the skete he was bringing the monks' dirty linen to the "animal farm" for washing. This courtyard is located somewhere in the forest, away from the monastery, and there are several women working there, for God's sake. That's where they send an old man, whitened with gray hair.

Father Joel. I have already mentioned him as an eyewitness to Leo Tolstoy's visit to Fr. Ambrose. Now I will add his story about cooperation with this holy elder. Batiushka began and led the construction of the Shamorda women's monastery more with faith than with the money that the people and benefactors gave him for this work. And more than once, at the end of the week, the workers had nothing to pay. Father Joel was a contractor at this construction site, on behalf of Fr. Ambrose. The time of calculation comes, but there is no money ... The people are all poor. Proceed to the contractor: “Pay!” - “Nothing!” Wait and be patient. And the workers - at least drop the case. And about. Joel feels sorry for them, and the building cannot be stopped.

So I once decided to refuse obedience: I am unbearable, - he himself said. - I came to Batiushka, fell at his feet and said: - Let go, I have no strength to endure human grief.

Father Ambrose persuades:

Don't refuse, ask them to wait.

And I myself cry, but there is no strength.

Well, wait, wait! - says Father.

And he went to his cell. Well, I think, will he find money somewhere in his desk? And he comes out with an icon of the Kazan Mother of God and says:

Oh Joel! The Queen of Heaven herself asks you: do not refuse!

I fell at his feet. And went back to work

Father Isaac. It seems that this was the name of one of the old skete hieromonks. We met with him in the inner garden. It was an old man, about 70 years old, but still vigorous. Long, streaked beard. He was a confessor in this very Shamorda monastery, visiting there from time to time. Unfortunately, from our small casual conversation, very little remains in my memory. But he consoled me, urging me not to lose heart. Moreover, he drew my attention to the fact that educated monks also do a holy work in the world, they also perform church obedience in schools, seminaries, to the glory of God. And at the same time, his eyes shone with caress and quiet encouragement.

Elder Nectarios

Through the gate under the bell tower I entered the courtyard of the skete. I was pleasantly surprised by the multitude of flowers that were cared for. To the left, a narrow path led to the head of the skete, Fr. Theodosius. He was the “master” here, but he was subordinate to the father hegumen of the monastery, like everyone else. He was a tall man, with gray hair already, and rather thick. We met. And I immediately asked him for his blessing to go to confession with the elder Fr. Nectaria.

I will describe the room in which I met him and where Dostoevsky and L. Tolstoy, and prof. VS Solovyov and other visitors. This house was called “hut.” It was small, about five by eight arshins. Two windows, along the walls of the bench. In the corner is an icon and a picture of holy places. The lamp was lit. Under the icons is a table on which lay leaflets of religious content. A door led from the reception room to the elder's own room. And another door from it led to a similar room adjacent to ours; both men and women were accepted there, the entrance to it was directly from the forest, from the outside of the skete; I haven't been there.

Another elder, Father Fr. Anatoly, lived in the monastery itself and received people there, mostly laity, and the monks were advised to contact Fr. Nectarios.

When I entered the waiting room, there were already four people sitting there: one novice and some merchant with two boys 9-10 years old. like children, they were all talking cheerfully about something and chirping softly; and sitting on a bench, dangling legs. When their conversation became already loud, the father ordered them to be silent. We adults were also silent: like in a church, there was a reverent atmosphere here, next to it was the holy elder ... But the children could not bear it, and they slid down from the bench and began to examine the red corner with icons. Next to them hung a picture of some city. It was on her that the special attention of the rascals stopped. One of them says to the other: “This is our Yelets.” And the other objected: “No, this is Tula.” - “No, Yelets.” - “No, Tula!” And the conversation again took a heated turn. Then the father came up to them; and gave both of them a click from above. The children fell silent and turned back to their father on the bench. And I, sitting almost under the picture, then asked: what did the kids suffer for? For Tula or for Yelets? It turned out that under the picture was the inscription: “The Holy City of Jerusalem.”

Why the father came and brought his children, I don’t know, but it seemed a sin to ask: we were all waiting for the elder to come out, like a church confession. But in church they don't talk and don't ask about confession... Each of us thought about ourselves.

Father Joel, an old monk, told me a little episode from the life of L. Tolstoy, who was in the skete. For a long time he spoke with Fr. Ambrose. When he left, his face was gloomy. The old man followed him. The monks, knowing that Father Ambrose, a famous writer, gathered near the door of the hut. When Tolstoy went to the gates of the skete, the elder said firmly, pointing to him: “Never turn to Christ! Proud-unya!”

As you know, he left his home before his death. And, by the way, he visited his sister Maria Nikolaevna, a nun of the Shamorda monastery, created by Fr. Ambrose, 12 versts from Optina. And then he again had a desire to turn to the elders. But he was afraid that they would refuse to accept him now, since he had already been excommunicated by the Church for his struggle against the Christian teaching: about St. Trinity, about the incarnation of the Son of God, about the sacraments (of which he even spoke blasphemously). His sister persuaded him not to be embarrassed, but to go boldly, assuring that he would be met with love ... And he agreed ... I heard that he seemed to have approached the door of the hut and took hold of the handle; but... changed his mind and went back. Then he went by rail; and, ill, was forced to stop at st. Astapovo, Tula province, where he died in severe mental anguish. The Church sent Bishop Parthenius of Tula and Elder Barsanuphius of Optina to him; but the people around him (Chertkov and others) did not allow them to reach the dying man.

I will also recall what I heard about him in France. At one time I lived on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean. The wife of one of L. Tolstoy's sons and her granddaughter Seryozha also lived in the same house at that time. And she sometimes told something about him and also repeated that he was “proud ...” But she felt sorry for him ... The grandson was also extremely capricious: if something was not for him, then he threw himself on the floor and pounded the back of his head against him, screaming and crying. And at other times he was affectionate to everyone ... Afterwards, his father, a Czech, stole him from his grandmother; he had already divorced Tolstoy's granddaughter.

We waited in the room for about ten minutes in silence: probably the elder was busy with someone in the other half of the house. Then, inaudibly, the door from his quarters to the reception room opened, and he entered... No, he didn't "enter," but, as it were, floated quietly... In a dark cassock, girded with a wide belt, in a soft kamilavka, oh. Nektarios cautiously walked straight to the front corner with the icons. And slowly, slowly and earnestly, he was baptized ... it seemed to me as if he was carrying some kind of holy cup filled with a precious liquid and was extremely afraid: not a single drop would be spilled from it? And the thought also came to me: the saints keep within themselves the grace of God; and they are afraid to violate it by any irreverent spiritual movement: haste, false human affection, etc. Father Nektary looked inward all the time, standing before God with his heart. So advises and Ep. Theophan the Recluse: whether sitting or doing something, be unceasingly before the face of God. His face was clean and rosy; a small beard with gray hair. Stan is thin, thin. His head was slightly inclined to the bottom, His eyes were half closed.

We all stood up... He crossed himself three more times in front of the icons and went up to the novice. He bowed at his feet; but he did not fall on both knees, but only on one, probably out of vanity he was ashamed to do this in front of outside witnesses. Even this was not hidden from the old man: and he calmly but firmly said to him:

And get on the second knee!

He obeyed... And they were quietly talking about something... Then, having received a blessing, the novice left.

Father Nektary approached his father with the children, blessed them and also talked... About what, I don't know. And I didn't listen; it would be a sin to eavesdrop. I thought about myself... All the behavior of the elder made a reverent impression on me, as it happens in the church in front of the shrines, in front of the icon, before confession, before Communion.

Having dismissed the laity, the priest approached me, the last one. Or I introduced myself to him here as the rector of the seminary; or previously said this through a cell attendant, but he knew that I was an archimandrite. I immediately asked him to take me to confession.

No, I can't confess you, he replied. - You are a scientist. Here, go to our father, the head of the skete, Father Theodosius, he is educated.

It was bitter for me to hear this: it means that I am not worthy to confess to the holy elder. I began to defend myself that our education is not important. But Father Nektariy remained firmly at his side and again repeated the advice - go through the path to the left to Fr. Theodosius. It was useless to argue, and with great sadness I said goodbye to the elder and went out the door.

Arriving at the head of the skete, I informed him of Father Nektary's refusal to confess me and of the elder's advice to follow this to the educated Fr. Theodosius.

Well, how educated am I?! he calmly answered me. - Finished only second-class school. And what kind of priest am I?! True, when the elders have a lot of people, I also accept others. Why, what am I telling them, More from the books of our own elders or from the holy fathers, I will subtract something from there and say. Well, Father Nectarius is an elder by grace and from his experience. No, you go to him and tell him that I bless him to confess you.

I said goodbye to him and went back to the hut. The cell-attendant, from my words, reported everything to the priest; and he asked me to come to his cell.

Well, that's good, thank God! - said the old man quite calmly, as if he had not refused before. Obedience to the elders in the monastery is also obligatory for the elders; and perhaps even in the first place, as a holy cause and as an example for others.

And the confession began ... Unfortunately, now I definitely don’t remember anything about her ... Only one thing remained in my soul that after that we became exactly kindred spirits. As a memento, the priest gave me a small icon made of cypress wood with a crucifix carved inside.

The feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God has arrived. The day before, about 11 o'clock, Dean Father Fedot comes to me from the monastery. Somewhat full, with gray hair. in dark hair and beard, calm, friendly; he brought silence with him. After praying and greeting me, he first inquired about my health and well-being; then he rejoiced - “what a fine weather it is now,” - it was a quiet, cloudless day. I thought: the approach is like a mine, between secular people ... I wait further: in vain the monks do not go around the cells, - as it was written before. And indeed, the Reverend Father soon got down to business:

Your Reverence! Father hegumen asks you to say tomorrow, at the late liturgy, a lesson...

This proposal was completely unexpected for me: I gave quite a lot of sermons, speeches, lessons in the world. And spiritually weary of verbosity; therefore, while living in a monastery, I already wanted to take a break from teaching in silence, solitude and silence. And he actually rested. And suddenly - preach here too?

No no! my soul protested. - I can't, father!

And a long argument began between us.

Why, Your Eminence?!

Well, what will I teach you in the monastery?! You are true monks; and living in the world, what kind of monks are we? No, and don't ask in vain.

But it was not easy to force the father of the dean to refuse the assignment given to him by the abbot.

And how did other learned monks live with us, - he began to list their names, and preached?

It's none of my business, I dismissed his objection. “I say to myself that I cannot teach you monks. And what else can I tell you? In your services, according to the charter, both the lives of the saints from the Prologue and the teachings of the holy fathers are read. What is better?

So something like that; but it is also useful for us to listen to a living spoken word, - insisted Fr. Fedot.

The holy fathers are always alive, - I objected, - no, father, don’t ask! It's hard for me. So explain to Father Abbot.

Yes, oh. hegumen and blessed me to ask you to preach.

Seeing that no persuasion had any effect on the messenger, I remembered Elder Nectarios. “Here is someone who can help me out of an unexpected misfortune,” I thought, “I confessed to him, he knows my sinful soul and will sooner understand my refusal due to the consciousness of my unworthiness, and the word of the elder is strong in the monastery.”

I'll ask my father, oh. Nectaria, I said.

Good good! agreed immediately. Fedot.

And with these words, he began to say goodbye to me. Yes, there was time: a small bell rang in the monastery for dinner. The Reverend left, and I went to the elder's "hut". There was no one in the waiting room I knew. At my knock, Fr. Melchizedek: small in stature, in an ordinary soft kamilavka, with a sparse young beard, with an affectionate face.

I don’t even need to disturb the priest himself, he is busy with others. You just ask him for advice. And tell him that I ask him to bless me not to preach.

And I believed in this answer of the elder: it seemed to me that I was doing well, humbly. The cell attendant, after listening to me, went out the door. And almost immediately returned:

Father asks you to come to him.

I enter. We kiss each other's hands. He invited me to sit down and, without asking anything more, he said the following words, which were burned into my memory to death:

Father,” he turned to me quietly, but extremely firmly, authoritatively, “take advice for the rest of your life: if your bosses or elders offer you something, then no matter how difficult or even lofty it may seem to you, don’t refuse. God for obedience will help!

Then he turned to the window and, pointing to nature, said:

Look how beautiful it is: the sun, the sky, the stars, the trees, the flowers... But there was nothing before! Nothing! - slowly repeated the priest, stretching his hand from left to right. - And God created such beauty out of nothing. So is a man: when he sincerely comes to the realization that he is nothing, then God will begin to create great things out of him.

I began to cry. Then about. Nektarios commanded me to pray like this: “Lord, grant me Thy grace!” - And now a cloud is coming at you, and you are praying: “Give me grace!” And the Lord will carry this cloud past.” And he extended his hand from left to right. Fr. Nectarios, continuing his speech, for some reason told me a story from the life of Patriarch Nikon, when he, a convict, lived in exile and mourned himself. Now I don’t remember these details about Patriarch Nikon, but I try to fulfill the “advice for life”. And now I obey the orders of the Supreme Church authority. And, thank God, he never repented of it. And when he did something according to his will, he always had to suffer afterwards.

The issue of preaching was resolved: one should listen to Fr. hegumen and tomorrow - to speak. I calmed down and left. Usually for me the question of the subject and presentation of the teaching did not present any difficulties; but this time I could not find the right topic until the very night vigil. And by the end of the reading of the canon at Matins, the words addressed to the Mother of God stopped in my mind and heart: “Do not forget Your kinship, Lady!” We, the people, are related to Her in the flesh, She is from our human race. And although She became the Mother of the Son of God, the Mother of God, we, as Her relatives, nevertheless remained close to Her. Therefore, we dare to hope for Her protection before God, even if we were poor, sinful relatives of Her... And thoughts flowed, flowed like a stream... I also remembered an example from the life of St. Tikhon of Zadonsky about the sinful rector of this monastery, how he was pardoned and even resurrected by the Lord: “For the prayers of My Mother, he returns to life for repentance,” did he hear the voice of the Savior when his soul descended to earth? And this rector, being at times obsessed with drunkenness, had the custom on other days to read an akathist to the Mother of God.

On the day of the Assumption, I served an early service in another church ... And suddenly a desire to give a lesson was kindled in me. But since it would be self-willed, I abstained.

What wicked temptations there are!

At the late liturgy, I delivered the prepared sermon. She was really lucky. In the temple, in addition to the monks, there were many lay pilgrims. Everyone listened with deep understanding.

At the end of the service, I went down the steps from the porch. Suddenly, those two monks, whom I condemned in my soul, hurriedly ran up to me, and in front of all the people joyfully bowed at their feet, thanking for the sermon ... Unfortunately, I did not remember their holy names: and they would have deserved it for their humility.

But my “glory” did not end there. When I returned to the skete, I was met on the porch of our house by the reverend Fr. Kuksha:

Here, well said, well! Bishop Macarius was with us in Kaluga: he also delivered good sermons!

I said nothing. This is where the conversation ended.

After some time, a whole group of novices came from the monastery and began to ask me:

Father, let's go for a walk in the forest and talk: you gave us such a good sermon.

"Oh," I thought to myself. - And I rejected the request of those who came.

By the way: in general, monks are not allowed to walk in the forest, and only on holidays were they allowed to do this, and then - in groups for comfort. But only a few used this: while others sat in cells, according to the commandment of the ancient fathers: “Sit in a cell and the cell will save you.”

The next day I had to leave the monastery for a service at the Tver Seminary; and I went to say goodbye first to Fr. Nectarios. When he met me, he said with quiet approval:

You see, father: you obeyed, and God gave you the grace to utter a good word.

Obviously, someone had already told him about this, since the elder did not go to the monastery.

For God's sake, - I answered, - do not even praise me, the demon of vanity already torments me for the second day already.

The elder understood this and immediately fell silent. We said goodbye.

From him I went across the path to the head of the skete, Fr. Theodosius. He asked me how I feel, in what mood I leave.

And a heavy feeling of unworthiness remained in my heart.

It seemed to me that I spoke sincerely and spoke well, and the consciousness of unworthiness seemed to me humility. But Father Theodosius looked differently:

How how? - he asked. - Repeat, repeat!

I repeated. He became serious and replied:

This is not humility. Your reverence, this is the temptation of the enemy, despondency. From us, by the grace of God, they leave with joy; and you - with gravity? No, this is wrong, wrong. The enemy wants to spoil the fruits of your stay here. Drive him away. And thank God. Ride in peace. The grace of God be with you.

I said goodbye. My heart became peaceful.

How spiritually experienced you are! And we, the so-called “learned monks,” cannot understand ourselves correctly... It is not in vain that our people come not to us, but to them... “simple,” but from the wise and trained by the grace of the Holy Spirit. And the apostles were from the fishermen, but they conquered the whole world and defeated the “scientists.” Truly it is said in the akathist: “Vitias many-talked”, - i.e., learned speakers, - “we see like a dumb fish,” in comparison with the Christian sermon of these fishermen.

And now our “scholarship” has been put to shame once again.

When I arrived at the station in Kozelsk, I was sitting at the table waiting for the train. Opposite me was a short peasant with a pointed beard. After a short silence, he turned to me rather seriously:

Father, did you deliver a sermon in the monastery yesterday?

Save you, Lord! Do you know, I thought that the grace from you, scientists, completely flew away?

Why is that?

Yes, you see: I became an atheist for a while; but suffered. And I began to turn to you, scientists: I spoke with the bishops - they did not help. And then I came here, and these simpletons turned me on the path. Save them, Lord! But now I see that in you, scientists, there is still a living spirit, as the Savior Himself said: "The spirit breathes where it wants"(John 3:8).

The train came soon. Two intelligent women climbed the stairs in front of me into the second-class carriage. I followed them too. They very delicately turned to me with words of gratitude for yesterday's word. It turned out that they were two noblewomen who came from afar on a pilgrimage to Optina and heard my sermon. And it seems that these “scientists” are no worse, and even better, more humble than the former atheist ... Yes, truly the spirit of God does not look at learning, or at “simplicity,” or at wealth or poverty, but only on the human heart, and if it is suitable, then He lives and breathes there...

The revolution has begun. And this is the legend that came to me abroad. Father Nektary seemed to meet those who came with children's toys and an electric flashlight, completely calm. And in front of them he lit, then stopped the light of the lantern. Surprised by this behavior of the old man, and perhaps expecting some kind of rebuke for their ugliness from the “saint”, the young people immediately went from their usual anger into a complacently cheerful mood and said:

What you? Child, right?

I am a child, - the old man answered mysteriously calmly.

If this was indeed the case, then it is worth seriously thinking about the meaning of his behavior and the cryptic word about “child.”

And he could call himself a child, because the ideal Christian becomes really like a child in spirit. The Lord Himself said to the disciples while blessing the children: "Unless you are like children, you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven"(Mark 10:15).

Achieve love: be zealous for spiritual gifts,
especially about prophesying.
And whoever prophesies speaks to people
for edification, exhortation and consolation.

(I Cor. XIV, 1, 3).

Definition of the concept of "seniority".

The Apostle Paul, regardless of the hierarchy, lists three ministries in the Church: apostolic, prophetic and teaching.

Directly behind the apostles are the prophets (Eph. IV, II; 1 Cor. XIII, 28). Their ministry consists mainly in edification, exhortation and comfort (1 Cor. XIV, 3). For this very purpose, and also for indication or warning, future events are foretold by the prophets.

The will of God is directly revealed through the prophet, and therefore his authority is unlimited.

Prophetic ministry is a special gift of grace, the gift of the Holy Spirit (charisma). The prophet has a special spiritual vision - clairvoyance. For him, the boundaries of space and time seem to be moving apart, with his spiritual gaze he sees not only ongoing events, but also future ones, sees their spiritual meaning, sees the soul of a person, his past and future.

Such a high calling cannot but be associated with a high moral level, with purity of heart, with personal holiness. The sanctity of life was required from the prophet from the very first times of Christianity: “He must have the “disposition of the Lord.” A false prophet and a (true) prophet can be known from temper, ”says the oldest Christian monument -“ The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles ”.

Services listed in ap. Paul, have been preserved in the Church at all times. The apostolic, prophetic and teaching ministries, being independent, can be combined with the rank of bishop or presbyter.

The prophetic ministry, associated with personal holiness, flourished with the rise of the spiritual life of the Church and dwindled during periods of decline. It manifests itself most clearly in monastic eldership. Representing a direct continuation of the prophetic ministry, it appears with this name and in this form only in the 4th century, together with the emergence of monasticism, as a leading principle in it.

Let's dwell on this in a little more detail.

Prof. Smirnov, in his master's thesis "The Spiritual Father in the Ancient Eastern Church", points out that "the charismatic phenomena of the first centuries of Christianity were repeated among ancient monasticism, that the elders were the bearers of these charisms - special gifts of the Holy Spirit, given to a person directly from God on personal merit ". “Spiritual writers set an extremely high point of view on monasticism. Ideally, an ascetic is a god-bearing, spirit-bearing being, a god. As such, he receives spiritual gifts, the outpourings of which distinguished the early days of Christianity. The gifts of prophecy, casting out demons, healing sickness, and raising the dead are not exclusive. They reveal only the normal degree of the spiritual age of the monk.” Secret confession and spiritual healing were also considered as a gift of grace, the gift of “spiritual reasoning. (1 Cor. XII, 10). He was not associated with the hierarchical degree of bishop and presbyter, but was acquired by tonsure into the schema.

In the first quarter of the 9th century in the Patriarchate of Constantinople, even simple monks, or the so-called "spiritual fathers", were officially recognized by the Orthodox Patriarch as bearers of the apostolic "authority of the keys", along with bishops and presbyters. And although it was a temporary measure, forced by circumstances, until the next council, but, as far as is known, this last was not canceled (S. I. Smirnov. Spiritual father in the ancient Eastern church. Part I. Sergiev Posad. 1906).

The monks-disciples were required to be completely obedient to the elders-teachers: “If someone has faith in another, and gives himself into submission to him, he does not need to heed the commandments of God, but must betray his will to his father, and will not remain guilty before God” .

Those who have given themselves wholly to the guidance of a true elder experience a special feeling of joy and freedom in the Lord. This is personally experienced by the writer of these lines. The elder is the direct conductor of the will of God. Communion with God is always associated with a feeling of spiritual freedom, joy and indescribable peace in the soul. On the contrary, the false elder obscures God by himself, putting his own will in the place of the will of God, which is associated with a feeling of slavery, oppression and, almost always, despondency. Moreover, the student's total admiration for the false elder "corrodes the personality in him, buries his will", perverts the sense of justice and truth and, thus, wean "his consciousness from responsibility for his actions."

About false eldership, Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov says this: “It is a terrible thing to accept duties (elderhood) that can be fulfilled only at the command of the Holy Spirit, while communion with Satan has not yet been broken and the vessel does not cease to be defiled by the action of Satan (i.e., dispassion has not yet been achieved). Such hypocrisy and hypocrisy is terrible. It is disastrous for oneself and for one's neighbors, it is criminal before God, blasphemous" (Ignatiy Brianchaninov. Vol. IV. St. Petersburg. 1860. p. 92).

The influence of the eldership extended far beyond the walls of the monastery. The elders spiritually nourished not only the monks, but also the laity. Possessing the gift of clairvoyance, they edified, exhorted and comforted everyone (1 Cor. XIV, 3), healed from diseases of the soul and body, warned against dangers, pointed out the path of life, revealing the will of God (See the chapter on eldership in my book “Acquisition of the Holy Spirit in the ways of Ancient Rus'", Paris, 1952, pp. 30-40).

Recently, in Russia, eldership has flourished especially in Optina Pustyn.

Living images of the Optina elders are given to us in their biographies. But the biographies of the last of them - the elder Fr. Nectarios is still missing, although this year marks the 25th anniversary of his death. Wishing to celebrate this anniversary year, we are trying to recreate its appearance.

Lives of the predecessors of Fr. Nectarios were compiled immediately after their death by their relatives and their students, in a peaceful environment, when everything was fresh in the memory of contemporaries, when it was easy to get any information. We are in different conditions, far from our homeland, and we have few sources, fragmentary information.

Let this work serve as material for the future compiler of the life of this great elder.

In addition, proceeding to the biography of Father Nektariy's Father, we warn the reader: whoever has not seen the Father personally, he, according to the stories, will not be able to clearly imagine his image. It will be difficult for him to judge the character, the qualities of the Father: humility, meekness, modesty.

According to some stories, one who has not seen the Father can endure the wrong impression of him as a merry fellow and a joker, which in reality did not exist, and could not be: rare cases of his “gaiety” were very peculiar and difficult to convey; they can only be reproduced relatively, since neither the intonation of the voice, nor the look of his watery eyes, nor the modest smile or other grace-filled expression of his face, peculiar only to him, our dear Father, cannot be conveyed on paper.

It is impossible to convey his marvelous qualities: embodied humility, extraordinary meekness and modesty, love and all the indescribable charm of his grace-filled personality.

THE YOUNG YEARS OF Fr. NEKTARIUS AND THE PERIOD BEFORE OLD AGE.

Direct indications of the year of birth of Fr. There is no nectar. It can be assumed that he was born around 1856. Fr. Nectary on April 29 (May 12), 1928 in the village of Kholmishchi, reaching the age of 72.

His parents, Vasily and Elena Tikhonov, were residents of the city of Livna, Oryol province. The future elder was also born there. His father was a clerk; according to another version, a worker at a mill. He died early; himself o. Nectarios said about himself: “It was in my childhood, when I lived at home alone, a friend with my mother. After all, there were only two of us with my mother in this world, and even the cat lived with us ... We were of low rank and, moreover, poor: who needs such and such?

After burying his mother at a young age and remaining an orphan, Nikolai (that was the name of Father Nectaria in the world) reached out to Optina Pustyn, which was relatively close to his native places and then already glorious in all parts of Russia. He set out on a journey in 1876 at the age of 20, carrying with him only the Gospel in a knapsack behind his shoulders.

Here the young Nikolai Tikhonov is approaching the Optina Monastery, located on the right bank of the beautiful Zhizdra River, at the edge of a centuries-old forest. One view of the monastery calms, pacifies the soul, tears it away from the bustle of worldly life. Even more impressive is the skete, where you have to walk along a forest path among centuries-old pines. In the skete, Nicholas will meet with the elder Ambrose, who at that time was at the zenith of his glory.

Let us cite here the words of E. Poselyanin, even though he visited the Optina Skete much later, but he still found Elder Ambrose, and therefore conveys a semblance of what Nikolai Tikhonov should have seen and felt at the moment we are describing.

In the skete fence you will be met by the stern faces of the great reverend hermits, holding unfolded charters with some saying from their ascetic creations in their hands ... You are walking along the flagstone path to the wooden skete church. On both sides of you, carefully grown flowers bloom, flaunt, fragrant on high stems.

To the right and left of the entrance, interspersed in the fence, there are two almost identical houses, each with two porches, both on the inside of the skete and on the outside. The great elder Ambrose lived in one of them, and Anatoly, the head of the skete, lived in the other.

The skete is a spacious delightful garden with sheltered there, closer to the fence, wooden, mostly white plastered houses of cells.

It’s good to be here in the skete on a busy summer afternoon, when the flowers are reaching for the sun and the flowers are more fragrant, and a hasty bee solicitously hovering over them, and the warmth of the sun pours, pours in waves on a quiet skete.

It’s good on a moonlit night, when the stars from the sky definitely speak inaudibly with the skete, sending him a message about God. And the skete silently answers them with a sigh to heaven, the eternal, promised dwelling.

It is also good on a clear winter day, when everything is shining with immaculate snow, and on this snow the green of unwilted coniferous trees is cut out so brightly ...

I recall the distant happy years, the summer evening of the first meeting with Elder Ambrose.

Here, the bent one wanders, leaning on a crutch, the people quickly come up to him. Short explanations:

- Father, I want to go to Odessa, I have relatives there, the work is very well paid.

- Not the road to you in Odessa. Don't go there.

- Father, yes, I have already fully gathered myself.

- Do not go to Odessa, but to Kyiv, or Kharkov.

And it's all over. If a person obeys, his life is directed.

There are some distant men.

- Who you are? the old man asks in his weak, gentle voice.

- To you, father, with a gift, they answer, bowing: we from Kostroma heard that your legs hurt, so we wove soft bast shoes for you ...

With what a joyful, enthusiastic feeling you used to enter a cramped cell, hung with images, portraits of clergy and lamps, and see Father Ambrose lying on a hard bed, covered with a white cloth blanket. He affectionately nods his head, smiles, tells some joke, and something miraculous happens in the soul from one of his glances. It is as if you have some kind of living powerful sun in front of you, which warms you, the rays of which have climbed into the depths of your soul, into the secret evil corners of your being, and drive everything dark and dirty from there, and ruin everything good and pure in you. And often in some, as if casually spoken word, you feel how deeply he comprehended your whole nature. And often later, after many years, you remember the warning wise word of the elder. And how he knew how to look, how without words he knew how to look into the whole being with one glance ... He worked miracles invisibly, inaudibly. He sent the sick to some healing well, or ordered a prayer service to be served to some saint, and they recovered ... And he is remembered, quiet, clear, simple and joyful in his unremitting suffering, as if putting off the rays of his holiness, so as not to embarrass us who came to him with his burdens and sins. After all, in those days he stood at such a height that he appeared to people in visions hundreds of miles away, calling them to him, that at times, when he listened to the service, looking at the icons, and they accidentally approached him with some urgent question, there were blinded by the blessed light that shone on his face.

And such a person tried to be only an affectionate, friendly grandfather, ingenuously talking with you about your big questions and small deeds! ...

This is how the newly arrived young man Nikolai was supposed to perceive the holiness and spiritual beauty of the elder Ambrose. As a whole and direct nature, he gave himself to him with all his being. The whole world for him was concentrated in Father Ambrose.

We can only say very little about the first steps of the young novice Nicholas from the words of the nun Nektaria, whose records we have.

“Nicholas came to the skete with only one Gospel in his hands, a 20-year-old boy, distinguished by his beauty; he had a beautiful bright red mouth. For humility, the elder began to call him "Guboslap". He lived in the skete for about 50 years (from 1876 to 1923). He carried out various obediences, including on the kliros. “He had a wonderful voice, and when one day he had to sing “The Prudent Robber”, he sang so beautifully that he himself was surprised whether he sings it (The elder himself told the nuns). Good singers from the skete were transferred to the monastery - so he, having sung the Robber, got scared and began to play out of tune. He was first transferred from the right kliros to the left, then he was completely removed and given another obedience.

“He was very shy: when he was appointed to manage the flowers, and the elder sent him along with the nuns to weave wreaths on the icons, he blushed very much and did not look at them. He had a small weakness: he loved sweets. The elder allowed him to come to his cell and take from the closet sweets specially laid out for him. One day the cell-attendant hid the elder's dinner in this appointed place. The elder demanded his lunch, but the cupboard was empty! “It was Guboshlep who ate my dinner,” the elder explained to the astonished cell-attendant. Once a young novice felt sad that all the monks received parcels from their relatives, but he had no one to send them to. The nuns found out about this, made jam, bought sweets and sent him a parcel by mail, Nikolai was extremely happy, grabbed the summons and ran around the cells in delight, showing everyone that he also had a parcel.

Two years later, after Nicholas entered the skete, an order was issued by the authorities to expel from the monastery all unspecified novices subject to military conscription. “And to me,” says Fr. Nektarios: “Together with others, the monastery clerk announced that I was being expelled from the skete. But fortunately for me, through the holy prayers of the Elder (Fr. Ambrose), this danger has passed. The clerk soon announced to me that I had only retired from military service for twenty-five days. I come to the Father and thank him for his prayerful help; and he told me: “If you live like a monk, then no one will disturb you in the future, and you will stay in the monastery forever.” And the old man's words came true.

"When Fr. Nektarios was in obedience to the sexton, he had a cell that opened the door to the church. He lived in this cell for 25 years without talking to any of the monks: he only runs to the elder or to his confessor and back. He conducted his business perfectly, no matter what obedience he was: everything was always in order with him. At night, he constantly saw the light: he read, or prayed. And during the day he was often found sleeping, and the opinion about him was made up as drowsy, slow. This, of course, he did out of humility.”

So oh. Nectarios spent 25 years in a feat of almost total silence. Who was his direct elder? Is the father Ambrose, or, as the late archpriest claims. S. Chetverikov ("Optina Pustyn" *) - Fr. Anatoly Zertsalov? This question is answered by Fr. Nectary. His attitude towards these great people is drawn from the following words: Fr. He calls Anatoly “spiritual father”, and “Elder” is exclusively Fr. Ambrose. - “I entered the skete in 1876. A year after that, Father Fr. Ambrose blessed me to address, as a spiritual father, to the head of the skete, Hieromonk Anatoly, which continued until the very death of this latter in 1894. I addressed the elder Ambrose only in rare and exceptional cases. With all this, I had great love and faith for him. It happened that you would come to him, and after a few words of mine, he would reveal all my heart's depth, resolve all perplexities, pacify and console. The care and love for me unworthy on the part of the Elder amazed me, for I realized that I was unworthy of them. To my question about this, my spiritual father Hieromonk Anatoly answered that the reason for this is my faith and love for the Elder; and that if he treats others not with the same love as he treats me, then this comes from their lack of faith and love for the Elder, and that such is the general law: as one treats the Elder, so the Elder treats him exactly ”(Biography Optina Elder Hieroschemamonk Ambrose, Moscow, 1900, p. 134).

The elder and his actions are not subject to the judgment of the disciple. His instructions must be accepted without any consideration. Therefore, even the defense of the elder is forbidden, because in a sense this is already a discussion or judgment. Due to his inexperience, Fr. Nectarios defended his elder in disputes, Fr. Ambrose, from the attacks of some foolish and impudent brethren. After one of these disputes, his perspicacious confessor, Fr. Anatoly (during his lifetime) said menacingly: “No one has the right to discuss the actions of the Elder, guided by his thoughtlessness and insolence; the elder will give an account to God for his actions; we do not comprehend their meaning ”(Memoirs of Archimandrite Pimen, Rector of the Nikolaev Monastery, on Ugresh. Moscow, 1877. p. 57).

Let us say a few words about the head of the skete, Fr. Anatolia. According to Fr. Pimen, rector of the Nikolo-Ugresh monastery (who left behind valuable notes), Fr. Anatoly Zertsalov shared during the life of Fr. Ambrose, his works on eldership. He was one of the seminary students who worked in the translation of patristic books under Fr. Macarius, together with Fr. Ambrose and Fr. Clement Zederholm. “Since 1874, Fr. Anatoly was the confessor of the entire brotherhood and the head of the skete. Almost all the visitors who were blessed by Elder Ambrose also came to Fr. Anatoly; he was an elder and some brothers of the Hermitage and a skete, and most of the sisters of the Shamorda Community,” Fr. Pimen. And he adds: “He was so devoted to mental prayer that he left all worries about the material, although he carried the title of a skete chief.” After the death of Fr. Ambrose (1891), Fr. Anatoly was the elder of the whole brotherhood. He died on January 25, 1894, at the age of seventy-two.

A direct student of Fr. Anatoly was an elder Fr. Varsonofy, (+ 1913), a colonel in the world, who arrived in Optina when Fr. Ambrose was already in the coffin. Elder Barsanuphius possessed high spiritual gifts and spent many years in seclusion.

Upon the introduction of Barsanuphius to Optina in 1891, Fr. Anatoly appointed him cell-attendant to Fr. Nectarios, then a hieromonk. Under the leadership of the latter for ten years, Fr. Barsanuphius studied theoretically and practically St. Fathers and passed all monastic degrees up to hieromonasticism.

But back to Fr. Nectarios, who, after spending two and a half decades in solitude and silence, finally loosened his shutter. The diary of S. A. Nilus "On the Bank of God's River" (1909) gives us the appearance of a future elder when he began to occasionally appear among people. We see o. Nectarios, speaking in parables, riddles, with a touch of foolishness, often not without insight. "Our infant friend," Nilus calls him. This manner of Nectaria was a form of his great secrecy, because of the fear of exposing his fertile gifts (S. A. Nilus. On the Bank of God's River. Sergiev Posad. 1916.).

Many pages of this Optina diary (1909) contain records of the author's communication with the future elder.

From these records, the living image of Fr. Nectarius, his views and views are revealed, and there are also many of his personal stories about his childhood. Therefore, his notes are valuable as biographical material.

Eldership of Father Nektarius in Optina Pustin
(1911-1923)

Since 1905, Elder Joseph, the successor of Fr. Ambrose, began to get sick often and apparently weakened. In the month of May, after a serious illness, he resigned from his position as head of the skete, and St. The synod appointed Fr. Barsanuphius for this position, connected, according to the Optina customs, with eldership. Father Barsanuphius, a strong-willed, bright personality, was also the bearer of the special grace of God.

Fr. Nectarios, always striving to live inconspicuously, yielded to him - his disciple in reality - the primacy.

Five or six years later, as a result of intrigue and slander, Elder Barsanuphius was transferred from Optina Hermitage as rector of the Golutvinsky monastery, which was in complete decline. A year later, Schema-Archimandrite Fr. Barsanuphius reposed (1913).

It fulfilled the words of the Apostle Paul that at all times, as in ancient times, so now, “those born according to the flesh” persecute those “born according to the Spirit” (Galat. V. 25).

With the departure from Optina about. Barsanuphius, Fr. Nektarios could not evade eldership and, willy-nilly, had to accept it. He, presumably, tried to achieve that he was freed from this obedience. Here is how the nun Nektaria tells about it, according to eyewitnesses:

“When he was appointed an elder, he was so buffoonish (foolish) that they even wanted to remove him, but one monk of high spiritual life said: “You leave him, he is prophesying.”

“Now everything is coming true that he then foreshadowed. For example, he puts on a dressing gown over his naked body, and when he finds his bare legs sparkle: in 20-22, even our students, female students and office workers went to work barefoot, without underwear, or coats with torn underwear. He collected all sorts of rubbish: pebbles, glass, clay, etc., arranged a tiny cabinet and showed it to everyone, saying: this is my museum. Now there is a museum. He took an electric flashlight, hid it under his cassock, walked around the room and from time to time sparkled with it: “I grabbed a piece of lightning from the sky and hid it under my cassock” - “Yes, this is not lightning, but just a lantern!”, They told him. "Ah, you guessed it!" And now, from time to time, he makes his heavenly revelations to us, but due to his great humility, very rarely and out of great need.

On the first steps of eldership, Fr. Nectarios was recorded by the nun Taisia ​​from the words of E. A Nilus, who lived for several years in Optina Pustyn and knew Fr. Nectaria.

"Father o. Nectarios was the spiritual son of the elder Fr. Joseph, successor of Father Fr. Ambrose and his own, - Fr. Joseph, confessor.

“He received his dead elders in a hut oo. Ambrose and Joseph, where he began to live himself. But out of his deep humility, he did not consider himself an elder, but said that visitors actually come to Fr. Ambrose to his cell, and let his cell itself speak to them instead of him. Himself about. Nectarios spoke little and rarely, and often allegorically, as if half-foolish. Often he would give something and leave, leaving the visitor alone with his thoughts. But this silent reception in the grace-filled cell of the greatest of the Optina elders, where his personal presence was so vividly felt, as if alive, these few words of his humble deputy, who inherited with the gift of eldership and his gift of clairvoyance and love for the human soul, this is lonely reading and reflection leave an indelible impression on the soul of the visitor.

“There was a case when I visited Fr. Nectariy one archpriest academician. “What could I tell him? He's a scientist, after all." - the old man himself said later. - “I left him alone in the father's cell. Let the father himself teach him.” The archpriest, in turn, warmly thanked the elder for his reception. He said that, left alone, he thought over his whole past life and understood and experienced a lot in a new way in this quiet senile cell.

“But not everyone was received by the elder in this way. With some he talked a lot and very animatedly, striking his interlocutor with his many and comprehensive knowledge. In these cases, he left his manner a little foolishness. After one of these conversations, his interlocutor, also an archpriest with an academic education, asked: “Which father of the Academy?” Another time about. Nektarios had a conversation with a student about astronomy. “Where did the elder graduate from the University?” - this last one was curious.

The entry of nun M, the spiritual daughter of Metropolitan Macarius, to whom she was sent by the Optina elders, dates back to the beginning of eldership. The Metropolitan sent her manuscript to the editors of the Trinity Word (1917) (Troitsk Slovo. No. 354 and 355. January 22 and 29, 1917).

Let's play this recording.

Fate threw me from side to side. Reasons cannot be described: but I led a merry, distracted life. I didn't get what I wanted; my soul always ached about this, and in order to find self-forgetfulness, I was looking for a noisy, cheerful company where I could drown out this pain of the soul. Finally, it turned into a habit, and so it remained until, finally, due to some circumstances, I had to lead a life in a family - a year before I went to Optina Pustyn. During this year I had lost the habit of revelry and trips to places of pleasure, but I could not get used to the family situation, but I had to decide on something and finally lead my life along one path. I was at a crossroads - I did not know which way to choose a lifestyle.

I had a good friend, a religious young lady; and then one day she told me that she had come across the book “A Quiet Haven for the Rest of a Suffering Soul” by Vl. P. Bykov. It talks about Optina Pustyn, Kaluga Province; what wonderful elders there are - spiritual leaders, how they take advice from everyone who wants to talk about something with them, and how they themselves represent an example of Christian life.

We became interested in this desert and decided to both go there. My friend is the first to go to the oil week and some special one returns from there. - She tells me that she could not imagine anything like what she saw and heard there. She talks to me about the elders. The first one she got to was Fr. Nectarius, who lived in the skete. He receives few people a day, but keeps everyone at his place for a long time. He himself says little, but gives more to read, although the answers often do not correspond to the questions; but the reader, having thoroughly understood what he has read, will find in himself what he was forced to read, and sees that this is really, perhaps, more important than what he insistently asked. But there are also cases with him when both the elder and the visitor sit in silence for a long time, and, without saying a word to each other, the elder appoints him to come to him at another time.

Another elder, Fr. Anatoly with other tricks. This one manages to receive sometimes several hundred people a day. He speaks very quickly, he does not keep himself for a long time, but in a few minutes he says what is especially important for the questioner. He also often goes out for general blessings, and at this time quickly answers some questions, and sometimes just makes comments to someone. She was with him for no more than 5 minutes. But he pointed out to her her main spiritual flaws, which, as she says, no one knew - she was amazed. She would have liked to see him again, to talk with him longer, but she could not, since she had already hired a coachman, and she had to go home. This is the impression my friend made and told me. Of course, according to her stories, I liked Fr. Anatoly, it seemed to me better to talk about my life with him. I wanted to go there as soon as possible. But it is useless to go by fast, since at this time in Optina it is difficult for a new person to get a conversation with an elder, so I postponed it until Pascha. - Finally, on Good Friday I left, and on Saturday early in the morning I arrived in Kozelsk. She hired a coachman and an hour later drove up to the "fertile corner of Russia." I stayed at a hotel near the holy gates at Fr. Alexey. She put herself in order, drank a cup of tea hastily and quickly ran to Fr. Anatoly. Dear me, someone pointed out the grave of the revered father Fr. Ambrose, I fell to the cold marble slab and asked him to arrange this trip for my benefit. Here I enter the porch of the temple. They point me to the door to the right,

- at the reception. Anatolia. I go in there and see that there is a bunch of people, surrounding someone, but who is standing in the center of it - you can’t see. I had just wanted to cross myself and had not yet had time to make the sign of the cross, when suddenly someone parted the crowd, and a little old man with a sweet smile and kind, kind eyes suddenly shouted to me: “Come, come here quickly, how long has it been ? I run up to him for a blessing and answer: “Just now, father, I have arrived, and I’m in a hurry to come here to you.”

“You have relatives here, don’t you?” - asks about. Anatoly.

“No, father, I don’t have relatives anywhere, not only here,” I answer. - What are you, what are you, well, let's go here to me, - and oh. Anatoly, taking me by the hand, led me to his cell. His cell was unusually bright, the sun flooded it all with its bright light. Here the priest sat down on a chair near the icons, and I knelt before him and began to tell him about my life. I talked for a long time, and at that time the priest either held my head with his hands, or got up and walked around the room, or went into another room, as if looking for something, and all the time quietly sang: “Most Holy Theotokos, save us.” When I finished my story, the priest did not say anything definite about what I should do next, and when I asked when he could confess to me, he said that right now. Immediately there was a confession, first according to the book, and then like this. But what a confession! I had never imagined anything like this before. After all, I have not confessed and have not received communion for 8 years. Now, out of my ignorance, I did not think that it was necessary to speak in such detail, I was amazed when the elder himself asked me questions, forcing me to answer them, and thereby utter sins with my own lips.

- The confession is over. He read the permissive prayer, but ordered me to go and think if I had forgotten something else, and at 2 o'clock come to him again for confession. At the same time, he gave me a few books and let me go. I came to my room, as they say: not my own, and began to remember everything from the very beginning. And just then I thought how strangely Fr. Anatoly, as if we had known each other for a long time.

At 12 o'clock. there was lunch. Having defended it, I again went to Fr. Anatoly. She told him some of what she remembered; but he again ordered to think and in the evening after vespers to come to confession. It was evident that he knew something that I did not say, but even in the evening I did not remember and did not say what was needed. From about. Anatoly, I went to the skete to Fr. Nectarios to receive only a blessing. But as soon as I saw him, I immediately felt that he was closer to me, closer. Quiet movements, a meek voice with a blessing: "In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit" - everything is so sacred with him. Keleinik Fr. Stefan led me to the cell to the priest. I could not resist telling him about my life and the purpose of my trip here. Batiushka sat with his eyes closed all the time. Before I had even finished my story, his cell-attendant knocked on the door of the priest and said that the brethren had come to the priest for confession. Batiushka got up and said to me: “You will come tomorrow at 6 o’clock and I can talk with you for two hours. Tomorrow I'll be freer." I accepted the blessing and left.

At 12 o'clock. midnight began midnight and matins. I stood it all. After matins, the rule was read to those who were fasting. Lunch should be at 5 o'clock. After the rule, I went to my room to rest a bit, as I was very tired, firstly, from a sleepless night on the trip, and secondly, from all the excitement experienced during the day. I didn’t hear a ringing for mass, or a knock on the door of the wake-up caller, and when I woke up and ran to the church, they just took communion there at that time and carried the Holy Gifts to the altar. Oh! how frightened I felt at that moment, and I, standing on the porch, wept bitterly. It was only then that I remembered that I had come to fast without proper preparation for this... Then I felt that the Lord Himself showed in the Deed that one should not approach this great sacrament carelessly, without purifying oneself both spiritually and bodily. I cried all day, despite the fact that it was the day of the Holy Resurrection of Christ. In the afternoon I went to Fr. Anatoly with her grief and asked if it was possible to take communion on the second or third day of the holiday? But oh. Anatoly did not allow, but advised me to go to Moscow on St. Thomas' week. To my questions about later life, Fr. Anatoly answered evasively: either he said that it was good to become a good mother to other people's children, or he said that it was better not to do this and live alone, otherwise it would be very difficult. Then the priest advised me with my questions to turn in Moscow to the elder Metropolitan Macarius, whom he had indicated, and to fulfill everything that he advised. So that was the end of the conversation. In the evening I went to Fr. Nectarios. There, three reception rooms were occupied by people. Exactly at 6 o'clock the priest came out for a blessing. I was standing in the front corner in the second room. Father, with the blessing of everyone, returning from the third waiting room, blessed me a second time and immediately turning to the others said: “Forgive me, today I can’t receive anyone,” and he himself went to his cell. I follow him. The people began to disperse. - I talked with my father for a long time. The father said to me: “If you had the whole world in your power, you would still not have peace and you would feel unhappy. Your soul rushes about, suffers, and you think that it can be satisfied with external things, or external self-forgetfulness. No! All this is not right, she will never calm down from this ... You need to leave everything "...

After that, the priest sat for a long time, bowing his head to his chest, then he said: - I see the grace of God near you; you will be in the monastery...

- What are you, father?! Am I in a monastery? Yes, I don't fit in there! Yes, I can't live there.

- I do not know when it will be, maybe soon, or maybe in ten years, but you will definitely be in the monastery.

Here I said that Anatoly advised me to go to Moscow to the said elder Metropolitan Macarius for advice. “Well, why go to him, and everything, everything, fulfill what Father Fr. Anatoly told you and what the elder would say,” and then the priest again began to talk about the monastery and how I would have to behave there. At nine o'clock in the evening I left the father. Something extraordinary happened to me. What seemed to me so important until now, now I considered it to be trifles. I felt that something must be done apart from me, and now I have no reason to ask about my future life. The gold that was on me burned my hands, fingers, and ears, and, having come to the room, I took everything off myself. I was ashamed of myself. Father o. Nektarios made such an impression on me that I was ready to stay here for the rest of my life near him and not return to Moscow, ready to endure all hardships, but just to be here. But it was impossible to do it right away. The city with its noise, the family, which a few hours ago was dear to me - all this has now become distant, alien ... On the third day of the holiday, on Tuesday, with the blessing of Fr. Nectaria, I went to see the Shamorda women's hermitage, located 12 miles from Optina. I met mother abbess Valentina. I looked at the cell of Father Fr. Ambrose. Here everything is in the same form as it was under the priest. On the table is a pack of leaflets for distribution, publications of their Shamardinskaya hermitage. - The nun, who showed me all this, told me that those who honor the father sometimes put this bundle of sheets under his pillow, then they pray and, taking one sheet from under the pillow, accept it as if from the father. I did the same, and took out a piece of paper: “0. Ambrose the leader of the monastics. The nun looked at the sheet and said to me: “You must be in the monastery?” - I answer: “I don’t know, hardly?” - you will see what you will - such a sheet came out. I did not pay attention to this, but I hid the leaf anyway. - I liked everything in Shamordin. Returning to Optina that same day, she told the priest about her impression and said that I would ask the elder Metropolitan Macarius for blessings to enter Shamordin so that I could be closer to the priest.

On Thursday evening, completely changed, as if resurrected spiritually, I went home. Then I remembered the explanation of one lady - the spiritual daughter of Fr. Anatoly, that the icon of the Resurrection of Christ hangs in the holy gates of Optina at the exit, as if a sign that everyone who has been to Optina leaves from there, as if resurrected.

Two weeks after my arrival from Optina, I made up my mind to go to the said elder. Before that, I prayed and said: “Lord, tell me Your will through the mouth of this elder.” And then I heard something from him that I could not have imagined. He said that it would be difficult for me in the Shamorda desert, but it would be better for me to go to Altai and I would be needed there for the mission. Since earlier I decided to do everything he told me, I answered him here that I agreed.

I began to prepare for departure and liquidate my affairs. Two weeks later, I was already ready to leave, but the elder delayed the trip, he wanted to give me a companion. - At this time, I once again managed to visit the dear Optina Hermitage.

Father o. Nektarios was very happy about my decision and the change that had taken place in me, but Fr. At first, Anatoly didn’t even recognize: I had changed so much in my face and clothes.

Father Anatoly answered my questions about bad thoughts that could come to me while living in a monastery: “Thoughts are salvation for you, if you realize that they are bad and fight them and not bring them to fruition.”

Father Nektarios said: “At all times, no matter what you do: whether you are sitting, walking, or working, read with your heart: “Lord have mercy.” Living in a monastery, you will see and know the whole meaning of life. In relation to everyone, modesty and the middle should be observed. When there will be sorrows and you are unable to endure them, then with all your heart turn to the Lord, the Mother of God, St. Nicholas and your Angel, whose name you bear from St. baptism, and in time and patience the affliction will be lightened.”

To the question: is it possible not to let anyone into your soul? The priest replied: “It is impossible not to have any relationship, for then there will be a lack of simplicity in your soul, but it is said: have peace and sanctuary with everyone, except for them, no one will see the Lord. Holiness is simplicity, judiciously presented before people. Reasoning is above all virtues. Seriousness and friendliness can be combined, with the exception of certain circumstances, which themselves are announced in due time and force one to be either more serious or more friendly.

In difficult moments, when an easy worldly life is clearly remembered, it is better to remember the holy name of God more often and ask for help, and what is sinful is therefore dangerous for the soul. It is better, though mentally, to try not to go back.

According to the inscrutable destinies of God, it is not useful for everyone to live in the world. And whoever overcomes his inclinations, having retired to the monastery, for it is easier to be saved there, he hears the voice of the revelation of God: to him who overcomes I will give to sit on My throne.

This trip to Optina strengthened me even more.

A few days later I left for the Altai and entered the monastery indicated to me by the elder Metropolitan Macarius.

This is how wonderfully the words spoken by Father Fr. Nektarios: "I see the grace of God around you, you will be in the monastery." - I was surprised then and did not believe it, and two months after this conversation, I really already put on monastic clothes. I thank the Lord, who instructed me to go to this fertile corner - Optina Pustyn. If I hadn't gone there, I still wouldn't have been in the monastery and would still be rushing about in the stormy waves of the sea of ​​life. Thank God for everything.

By the very beginning of the period of eldership, Fr. Nectarius also includes the record of Archpriest Fr. Vasily Shustin (now in Algeria), published when he was in Serbia in 1929 (O. V. Sh. Record about Father John of Kronstadt and the Optina Elders. Belaya Tserkov, 1929)

These are personal memories of Father John of Kronstadt, of the elders Barsanuphius and Nectarios, to whom Fr. Vasily, and then Vasily Vasilyevich, a student at the Institute of Technology, was unusually close.

Father Barsanuphius introduced him to a girl who was going to a monastery and ordered her to marry him. For Vasily Vasilyevich, this was also a complete surprise. Shortly thereafter, Fr. Barsanuphius died. Having got married, the young people went to Optina on the same day to make the first wedding visit, according to the will of the elder, to his grave. Here is the full story of this trip.

Arriving in Optina, we served a memorial service, wept, grieved, and we asked the serving hieromonk: who is the elder now? "ABOUT. Nectarius," he answers. It was then that I realized why. Barsanuphius, leaving the skete, sent me to Father Nectarius: so that I could get to know him better: - he had already indicated to me in advance who should lead me after his death. We decided to visit him after dinner. Everyone looked at us with curiosity, as the news of our special wedding spread throughout Optina. After all, it was the dying blessing of the priest. So, at three o'clock, we went along the familiar path to the skete. 0. Nectarios occupied the premises of Father Joseph, on the right side of the gate. I separated from my wife. She went to the porch outside the skete walls, and I went inside the skete. The cell attendant recognized me when he saw me. He used to be a cell-attendant at Elder Joseph. He immediately reported to the father. Batiushka came out in 10 minutes, with a cheerful smile.

Father Nectarius, in contrast to Father Barsanuphius, was small, bent, with a small, wedge-shaped beard, thin with constantly crying eyes. Therefore, he always had a handkerchief in his hands, which he folded into a corner and applied to his eyes. Father blessed me and invited me to follow him. He took me to the confessional room, and there I already saw my wife, she got up and came up to me, and the priest bowed to us from the waist and said: - Here is joy, here is joy. I was sad and sad, and now I am joyful (and his face shone with a childish smile). Well, how can I accept you now. Here, sit side by side on the sofa, and the priest sat opposite ... After all, the great elder blessed you ... The elder Barsanuphius is so great that I can’t stand even the tip of a fingernail on my little finger. From a brilliant military man, in one night, with the blessing of God, he became a great old man. Now only, after death, I can tell this marvelous conversion of his, which he kept secret. And about. Nectarios told the story of the conversion of Fr. Barsanophia. That's how great was the elder Barsanuphius! And the priest was surprisingly humble and obedient. Somehow, being a novice, he walked past my porch, and I told him jokingly: “You have exactly twenty years left to live.” I told him jokingly, and he obeyed, and exactly twenty years later, on the same day, April 4, he died. That's what great obedience he was. Before such a force, Fr. Nectaria shuddered involuntarily. And he continued. And in your prayers, remember "Blessed Schema-Archimandrite Barsanuphius." But only for three years commemorate him blessed, and then directly "schema-archimandrite Barsanuphius." Now he is among the blessed... Look for great meaning in everything. All the events that take place around us and with us have their own meaning. Nothing happens without a reason ... Here is a great joy for me - this is your visit. I was sad and despondent. All people come with sorrows and sufferings, and you have only joys. This is the visitation of an angel... Now I have many visitors, I cannot receive you properly. Go home now and come back at six o'clock in the evening, when the vigil begins and all the monks go to church. I will also send my cell attendant away, and you come, let others pray, and we will spend time here. He blessed us, and we parted again: I went through the skete, and my wife through the outer porch.

When they called back for Vespers, my wife and I went to the skete. The door to the old man's house was locked. I knocked and Fr opened it for me. Nectary. Then he let his wife in and seated us together again in the Confessional Room. - Young people came to me and I, as the owner, should meet you according to your custom. Sit here for a while. Having said this, the old man left. After a while, he carries two glasses of dark liquid on a tray. He raised it, stopped and, bowing to us, said: I congratulate you on your marriage, I suggest you drink to your health. We looked at the old man in bewilderment. Then they took glasses, clinked glasses and began to drink. But after taking a sip, I immediately stopped and my wife did the same. It turned out that there was a terrible bitterness in the glasses. I say “bitterly” to the priest, and my wife also turned away. And suddenly this very word, spoken by me bitterly, stunned me and I imagined how at wedding dinners they shout “bitterly” and I laughed. And the father read my thoughts and laughs. But, he says, although it is bitter, you must drink. Everything I do, you notice, it has a hidden meaning that you must comprehend, and now drink. And with grimaces, pushing each other, we drank this liquid. And the priest already brings an open box of sardines and orders to empty it all. After the bitter we tasted sardines, and the priest took everything away. He comes again, sits down opposite us and says: And I caught the lightning. Manage ka and you catch her, if you want I'll show you. He goes to the closet, takes out an electric flashlight wrapped in red paper, and starts to light it briefly, flickering with fire. Isn't that lightning? Just like lightning! and he, smiling, put the flashlight in the cupboard and took out a wooden fungus from there, put it on the table, took off the lid, and poured out gold five-rouble notes and said: Look how they shine! I cleaned them out. There are 20 of them for 100 rubles. Well? looked at how gold glitters, well, that's enough for you. Looked and will. He collected the coins again and hid them. And my father said something else. Then he went out again. We look, he again brings us two large glasses, this Ras with a light yellow liquid, and, with the same ceremony and bow, brings us. We took the glasses, looked at them and did not dare to drink for a long time. The old man smiled as he looked at us. We tried. To our joy, it was a pleasant, sweet, fragrant drink, we drank it with pleasure. This drink was even a little intoxicating. For an appetizer, he gave chocolate a mignon, very fatty and very much, and ordered to eat everything. We were horrified. But he himself sat down to us and began to eat. I looked at the priest and thought: how is he eating chocolate, but according to the skete charter, dairy is prohibited. And he looks at me, eats and offers me. So I remained perplexed. He told us to finish eating this chocolate, and he went to put the samovar on... At 11 o'clock, Fr. Nektarios accompanied us to the outer porch and gave us a kerosene lantern so that we would not get lost in the forest, but would walk along the path. At parting, he invited me the next day at 6 o'clock. All around, in the forest, there was silence, and horror enveloped. We tried to get to the hotel as soon as possible. The Bogomoltsy were walking from the vigil, and together with them, imperceptibly, we entered the hotel.

The next day we again, at 6 pm, came to the priest. This time the cell attendant was at home, but the priest did not order him to leave his cell. Father again invited us together to the confessional, planted and began to give my wife various artificial flowers as a keepsake, and at the same time he said: when you walk through the field of life, then pick flowers, and you will collect a whole bouquet, and you will receive fruits later. We did not understand what the priest was hinting at here, for he did not do or say anything idle. Then he explained to me. Flowers, these are sorrows and sorrows. And so you need to collect them and you will get a wonderful bouquet, with which you will appear on the day of judgment, and then you will receive fruits - joy. In married life, he continued, there are always two periods: one happy, and the other sad, bitter. And it is always better when the bitter period happens earlier, at the beginning of married life, but then there will be happiness.

Moreover, the priest turned to me and said: Now let's go, I'll teach you how to put a samovar. The time will come when you will have no servants, and you will be in need, so you will have to install the samovar yourself. I looked at the priest in surprise and thought: “What is he saying? Where will our fortune disappear to? And he took my hand and led me to the pantry. There were stacked firewood and various things. There was also a samovar near the exhaust pipe. Batiushka says to me: first shake out the samovar, then pour in water; but often they forget to pour water and start to kindle the samovar, and as a result, the samovar will be spoiled and they will be left without tea. The water is standing right there, in the corner, in a copper jug, take it and pour it. I went up to the jug, and it was very large, two buckets large and in itself massive copper. I tried to move it, no, - there is no strength - then I wanted to bring the samovar to it and sharpen the water. Father noticed my intention and again repeats to me: “you take a jug and pour water into the samovar.” - "Why, father, it is too heavy for me, I cannot move it from its place." Then the priest went up to the jug, crossed it and said - “take it” - and I picked it up and looked at the priest with surprise: the jug felt completely light to me, as if weighing nothing. I drank water into the samovar and put the jug back with an expression of surprise on my face. And the priest asks me: “Well, what about a heavy jug?” No, father, I am surprised, it is quite light. So take the lesson that every obedience that seems difficult to us is very easy when performed, because it is done as an obedience. But I was directly amazed: how he destroyed the force of gravity with one Sign of the Cross! And the priest goes on, as if nothing had happened, and tells me to chop the splinter, kindle it, and then put the coals. While the samovar was warming up and I was sitting next to it, the priest lit a kerosene stove and began to boil apple peels in a pot. Pointing to her, the father said to me, this is my food, I eat only this. When volunteers bring me fruits, I ask them to eat these fruits, and peel off the skins, and so I brew them for myself ... Batiushka brewed the tea himself, and the tea was surprisingly fragrant with a strong honey smell.

He himself poured tea into cups for us and left. At this time, after the evening prayer, the skete brethren came to him to accept the blessing before going to bed. This was done every day, morning and evening. The monks all approached the blessing, bowed, and at the same time, some of the monks openly confessed their thoughts and doubts. Batiushka, as an old man, the leader of souls, comforted and encouraged some, and after confession, he let go of their sins to others, resolved doubts, and lovingly let go of everyone who was at peace. It was a touching sight, and during the blessing, the priest looked extremely serious and concentrated, and in every word he spoke care and love for every restless soul. After the blessing, the priest retired to his cell and prayed for about an hour. After a long absence, the priest returned to us and silently cleared everything from the table.

On one of my visits to Optina Pustyn, I saw how Fr. Nectarios read the sealed letters. He came to me with the received letters, of which there were about 50, and, without opening them, began to sort them out. He put aside some letters with the words: here you need to give an answer, and these letters of thanks can be left unanswered. He did not read them, but he saw their content. He blessed some of them, and kissed some of them, and two letters, as if by chance, he gave to my wife, and says: here, read them aloud. It will be useful. The content of one letter was forgotten by me, and the other letter was from one student of the Higher Women's Courses. She asked the priest to pray, as she was suffering and could not control herself. She fell in love with one priest, who captivated her with his incendiary sermons, and now she quit her studies, and runs to him for all sorts of trifles, deliberately often fasts, only to touch him. Doesn't sleep at night. Batiushka responded to this letter and said: you know this priest and have dealt with him. He would later occupy a very big post, which he never thought of. He does not yet know anything about this, but he will receive this power due to the fact that he deviates from the truth. “What kind of priest is this, I think, well known to me?” Then the priest said that this was the student of the Theological Academy who came with me to Optina for the first time, and who wooed my sister. But the Lord saved my sister, through the elder Barsanuphius, for he upset this marriage... (Now he can really be in the Renovation Church and rule there). Sorting through the letters, oh. Nectarios says: they call me an old man. What an old man I am when I receive more than 100 letters every day, how about Fr. Barsanuphius, then you can call him an elder who has so many spiritual children... Having selected the letters, the priest took them to the secretary.

Father Nectary advised my father to sell the house in St. Petersburg and the dacha to Finland, otherwise, he said, all this would be lost. But my father did not believe and did not sell anything. It was at the beginning of the great war.

In 1914, my older brother entered the Optina Skete as a novice and sometimes served as a cell attendant at Fr. Nectaria. He often sent letters to his father asking him to send him money. because he bought various books of spiritual content and built his own library there. I was always indignant at this and said that since I left the world, according to my vocation, already break with your passions. And my brother had such a passion: to buy books. I wrote to Father Fr. A letter to Nectarios, and a rather harsh letter expressing my indignation and surprise. The father did not answer. The brother continued to send his requests, and sometimes outright demands. Then I wrote the priest an even sharper letter, accusing him of not holding back his brother's passions, but indulging her. The father again did not answer. But then I managed, from the front, during my vacation, to go with my wife to Optina. This was already in 1917, under the Provisional Government. We arrive at the monastery, the priest greets us with a low, low bow and says: thank you for your sincerity. You wrote without any embellishment, but what you have in your soul, what worries you. I knew that after these letters you yourself would come, and I am always glad to see you. Keep writing such letters, and after them come here yourself for an answer. So, now I will say that soon there will be a spiritual book famine. You won't get a spiritual book. It is good that he is collecting this spiritual library - a spiritual treasure. It will be very, very useful. The hard times are coming now. In the world, now, the number six has passed, and the number seven is coming. The age of silence is coming. Be silent, be silent, the priest says, and tears flow from his eyes... And now the Sovereign is not himself, how many humiliations he endures for his mistakes. 1918 will be even harder. The sovereign and the whole family will be killed, tortured. One pious girl had a dream: Jesus Christ is sitting on the throne, and around Him are the twelve apostles, and terrible torments and groans are heard from the earth. And the Apostle Peter asks Christ: when, Lord, will these torments stop, and Jesus Christ answers him, I give the term until 1922, if people do not repent, do not come to their senses, then everyone will perish like that. Right there, before the Throne of God, our Sovereign in the crown of the great martyr will stand. Yes, this sovereign will be a great martyr. Recently, he redeemed his life, and if people do not turn to God, then not only Russia, all of Europe will fail ... The time for prayers is coming. Say the Jesus Prayer while you work. First with the lips, then with the mind, and, finally, it will pass into the heart itself... Batiushka retired to his cell, prayed there for an hour and a half. After the prayer, he, concentrated, came out to us, sat down, took me by the hand and said: I know a lot about you, but not all knowledge will be to your advantage. A hungry time will come, you will starve... There will come a time when our monastery will be destroyed. And maybe I'll come to your farm. Then accept me for Christ's sake, do not refuse. There's nowhere for me to go...

This was my last meeting with the elder.

I remember another case with Fr. Nectarios. My wife, on one of our visits to Optina, painted a picture: a view from the monastery on the river, and on its low bank, at sunset, with a completely clear sky and a bright play of colors. She put her drawing on the open balcony and went for a walk with me through the forest. Darling, we argued, and seriously, so that we were completely upset, and did not want to look at each other. We return home: a picture immediately caught our eye: instead of a clear sky, thunderclouds and lightning are painted on it. We were stunned. Come closer and take a look. Paints - absolutely fresh, just superimposed. We called the girl who lived with us and asked who came to us. She replies that some kind of short stature, a monk, was doing something here on the balcony. We thought and thought who it could be, and from a more detailed description of the monk and interviews with others, we guessed what it was about. Nectary. It was he, who owned the brush, who symbolically depicted our spiritual state with his wife. And this thunderstorm with lightning made such an impression on us that we forgot our dispute and made peace, because we wanted the sky of our life to clear up again and become completely clean and clear again.

Personally, I happened to be in Optina Hermitage in a later period than Fr. Vasily Shustin, namely already during the First World War.

The literature teacher of our gymnasium told us in the classroom how, thanks to the elders, Gogol burned his brilliant work, the second part of Dead Souls (The true explanation of this event and its psychological analysis was first made by professor-philosopher and doctor-psychiatrist I. M. Andreev - “ Orthodox Way", Jordanville, 1952). This made me prejudiced against elders in general.

But then the war of 1914 began. My brother Vladimir, exceptionally gifted, loved by all who knew him without exception, “the pride of our family,” deeply experienced the trials that befell our homeland. With the blessing of his parents, he voluntarily went to war and was soon killed in the autumn of 1914, when he was not even 19 years old.

It was a pure sacrifice to God, he "lay down his life for his others." His death brought our family to Optina Pustyn.

When we were looking for consolation in the spiritual, we "accidentally" stumbled upon Bykov's book: "Quiet shelters for the rest of the suffering soul."

It described Optina Pustyn and her elders, about whom we knew nothing until then.

And I, at the first opportunity, as soon as the holidays began at the university where I then studied, went to Optina Pustyn. I lived there for two months. That was in 1916. And the following year, 1917, also in the summer, I stayed there for two weeks.

Then, being abroad, I had the opportunity to communicate in writing with Fr. Nectarius until his death.

In addition to me, some of my acquaintances and friends also used the spiritual guidance of the elder.

His blessing always led to success, in spite of any difficulties. Disobedience was never in vain.

The monastery and the elders made an unexpected and irresistible impression on me, which cannot be expressed in words: it can only be understood through personal experience.

Here one could clearly feel the grace of God, the holiness of the place, the presence of God. This evoked feelings of reverence and responsibility for every thought, word, or action, fear of falling into error, delusion, fear of any selfishness and "gag".

Such a state could be called "walking with God."

Here, for the first time, the spiritual world opened up to me, and as an antithesis, “the depths of Satan” were shown to me.

Here I was born spiritually.

At this time, in Optina they were elders in the monastery itself, Fr. Anatoly, and in the skete, Fr. Theodosius and Fr. Nectary.

Anatoly the comforter, Theodosius the wise man and the wondrous Nectarios - according to the definition of one priest close to Optina.

In the hallway of the "hut" Fr. Anatolia was always crowded with a lot of people. Usually about. Anatoly went out into the hallway and blessed everyone with a short, quick sign of the cross, at first lightly hitting the forehead several times with his fingers, as if introducing and imprinting the sign of the cross. Small in stature, unusually lively and quick in his movements, he, bypassing everyone, answered questions asked, and then received some separately for conversation in his cell. Love and tenderness of treatment always attracted Fr. Anatoly crowds of people. I remember how, during my illness, Fr. Anatoly, without leaving the cell, only went to the window and through the glass blessed the gathering of people, concentrated outside at the window. Seeing him, the whole crowd fell to the ground.

On the contrary, at Fr. There were few visitors to Nectarios; he lived in seclusion in a skete in the cell of Fr. Ambrose and often did not go out for a long time. He blessed with a wide sign of the cross; slow in movement and concentrated, he seemed to be carrying a bowl filled to the brim with precious moisture, as if afraid to spill it.

On the table in his waiting room, there was often a book open to a particular page. A rare visitor in a long wait began to read this book, not suspecting that this was one of Fr. Nectaria to give a warning, an indication, or an answer to a question asked through an open book in order to hide his insight.

And he knew how to surround himself with mystery, to stay in the shadows, to be hardly noticeable. There is no photograph of him: he has never been filmed; this is very typical of him.

THE END OF THE OPTINA DESERT. LIFE IN KHOLMISHCHY
(1923-28). DEATH.

Optina Pustyn lasted until 1923, when its temples were officially closed.

In one of her letters, nun Nektaria reported about the elder Fr. Anatoly (Potapov): "He suffered a lot." We heard from the late Fr. arch. Solodovnikov that his Red Army men shaved, tortured and mocked him. A day before his death, they came to arrest him. But the elder asked for a reprieve for 24 hours, and during this interval he went to the Lord.

A detailed history of Optina Pustyn since the revolution is unknown to us. Sometimes fragmentary information came. One eyewitness said that nuns, like birds from destroyed nests, flocked to Optina as the convents were liquidated. They had nowhere to go, and they immediately huddled. Crowds of laity also carried their grief here. They asked how to pray for loved ones who had not returned: the horrors of the revolution, the civil war inflicted losses on almost every family.

After a long break, in 1922 A.K. (later nun Nektaria) arrived in Optina with her teenage son.

“In 1922, when Mamochka and I were in Optiia for the first time,” O. said, “the elder Fr. Anatoly. We still had no information about you, and Mommy asked Fr. Anatoly, how to pray for you: for health, or for repose? O. Anatoly asked my mother if she ever dreamed about you? Mom replied that she saw her sons riding horses in a dream: first the deceased Volodya, and then you. But the horses were of different colors. O. Anatoly said: “Well, well! God is merciful, pray for health, God is merciful!” Mom thought that. Anatoly only consoles.

"After visiting Fr. Anatoly, we visited Father Fr. Nectarios Mamochka asks the Elder a number of questions about her daughters, about herself, both me, but he doesn’t say anything about you, because he knows that one and the same question cannot be addressed to two elders. I didn’t know this, and believing that mommy forgot to ask about you, I pull mommy all the time and tell her: “And Vanya? And Vanya? Mom keeps asking. Then Father said to her after one of mine: “And Vanya?” - "He's alive. Pray for health. You will receive news of him soon. It was useless for you to know about him." We arrive home, and mommy hurries to Fr. Nicholas 3. to inform that Vanya is alive. Mother Ekaterina Ivanovna, seeing her mother through the window, goes out to meet her with the words: “And you have a letter from Vanechka.”

“Glory to the Heavenly Creator! You are alive!” writes Mon. N. to his son: “We learned about your life 3 days before receiving your letter, from Fr. Nectaria. On the 14th of July we returned from Optina, and on the 15th we received your letter to Dema. Father Nectarios said: “He is alive, pray for health, you will learn about him. Until it was useful to know about him - submit to necessity.

“Elder Theodosius died (1920); Elder Anatoly is alive (O. Anatoly died 15 days later, on July 30, 1922), he suffered a lot, now he receives in his cell (only in another). In the same building lives Fr. Joseph (Hieroschemamonk Father Joseph (Field), who is mentioned here more than once, was born in 1852, in the world he was the director of a bank in Moscow, at the age of 46 he went to Optina and survived its defeat). He dislocated his leg and is very sad that he has not been able to serve for 2 years, it was a great time for our arrival.”

“I am sending you a letter. Joseph. He exists positively by the miraculous grace of God, feels this and is filled with joy in the Lord. The wise and all-good Lord arranged everything prudently about him. And the quantity served to his well-being - no one touches him.

“Many signs are happening in our country: domes are being renewed, blood has flowed from the Holy Cross, blasphemers are being punished with tetanus and dying. Unfortunately, the people in the mass do not come to their senses, and the Lord sends his executions. Again, a dry autumn led to the worms eating the sown bread. Those who unshakably believe in the Lord and hope for him, the Lord showers His mercies and bounties.

Another incident is connected with the last days of the liquidation of Optina Pustyn: a certain baron Mikhail Mikhailovich Taube, a Protestant with a university education, was sent there by the Soviet authorities. He was ordered to dismantle the Optina library (subsequently sold by the Bolsheviks to foreign booksellers). When Taube arrived in Optina and began studying in the library, he began to look closely at everything, got acquainted with Fr. Joseph (Polevoi), then became more and more interested in Optina life and its elders. Penetrated and to Nectarius. No one knows the details of their date. Only the result remained obvious: Saul turned into Paul. The elder brought Mikhail Mikhailovich closer to his confessor, Fr. Dositheus - the "elder-lad", about whom we will speak later, and with Fr. Agapit (a friend of Elder Ambrose, a deep elder, a doer of the Jesus Prayer, who discovered the wrong teaching about the Jesus Prayer in Schema-Monk Hilarion’s book “On the Mountains of the Caucasus”). He entered into close communion with Fr. Dositheus, converted to Orthodoxy. Remaining in the service of the museum, Taube became a novice of Fr. Dositheus. He was tonsured in Kozelsk with the name Agapita. While still living in Optina, he was placed in a tower, above the gate that led to the skete. In his cell there was only one board - his bed. He was a doer of the Jesus Prayer. He was in exile with Fr. Dositheus and with him was returned to Orel. Soon he fell ill and died.

M. Nectaria was present at the closing of Optina Hermitage in 1923. It happened as follows: “Mommy, leaving Optina,” says O., “used to ask Batiushka when he would bless her to come next time. And so, Father answers: “Come on the seventh week (of Lent), you will live for two weeks and you will not regret it.” Batiushka, when he spoke, smiled and was very affectionate. At that time I was studying and could not go with Mommy, and she went alone, having agreed that I would come around Easter. Arriving in Kozelsk, she learned from a woman at the station that there was no service at Optina, that a liquidation commission was working in the monastery, that Vladyka Micah, the rector Fr. Isaac, oh treasurer, etc., that father Fr. Nektariy was also arrested and is in the prison hospital in Kozelsk. Having learned all this, Mamochka nevertheless decided to go to the monastery, mentally turning to the elder with a request to direct her and indicate to whom to go, to whom to confess, etc. Having prayed to Batiushka in this way, she went to Fr. Joseph (Field) - lame hieromonk. Mommy knocked on the door, which was opened by ... a Komsomol member armed with a rifle. "Who are you?" - "K o. Joseph." - "Where?" - "From N-ska" - "Why did you come here?" - "In m-r to pray to God." - “They found out that the monastery was closing and rushed for their gold! Come here!” And my mother is arrested.

“In this building, the persons whom I had previously listed and others were arrested. Each occupied a separate cell. There was no free separate room for mommy, and they put her near the sentry in the corridor. It was already evening and my mother was told that she would be sent to Kozelsk for an investigation. Mommy sits and prays, and believing the words of Batiushka that she will stay here "for two weeks and will not regret it." It was late evening, night. The Komsomol sentry is dozing, struggling with sleep, it is difficult for him to stay awake, he really wants to sleep. Mommy feels sorry for him, she affectionately tells him to lie down on the bench and that if someone goes, she will wake him up. Feeling trust, the sentry falls into a heroic sleep. Mommy guards him. Far past midnight. She is praying. Suddenly, the door of one of the cells quietly opens, a gray-haired elder, Vladyka Micah, appears, and calls her to him with a sign, asking her if she wants to confess and take communion, Vladyka has the Holy Gifts with him. Mom happily agrees, enters the cell, confesses and takes communion, and in the seventh heaven returns to guard the sleeping sentry. O. Nectarios heard her prayer request! Being completely sure that she would "not regret" that she had come to Optna, she calmly waited for the morning. In the morning she was sent to the Kozel prison. They took her for interrogations several times, suspecting that she had come to Optina on some secret business. They were going to send her by stage to her place of residence, but due to the lack of free escorts, this was canceled. They released her on Holy Thursday morning, warning her not to be in Kozelsk. Mommy went to the market and talked with one peasant. He turned out to be a forester. He had a hut about a kilometer from the monastery in the forest downstream of the Zhizdra. He invited his mother over. Mom bought everything that was needed for the Holiday at the market and went to him. They came to church services in Kozelsk, where they still served in churches. Then Mom knew that she was wanted in Kozelsk and in Optina, but, dressed in the clothes of the forester's wife, she was unrecognizable. On Friday, or Saturday according to our condition, she met me at the station. I did not recognize her in her peasant appearance: in boots, or felt boots, a sheepskin coat, wrapped in a large scarf. (It was early Easter). Mom and I met Easter in Kozelsk. We spent a bright week with a forester. It was very interesting. The wolves approached the hut itself, howling at night.

Thus, Mother Nectaria partake of the bowl of the Optina Confessors, together with them she was imputed to the “villains”, and as a result it turned out as Batiushka said: “You will live for two weeks and you will not regret it.”

Optina was closed by the Bolsheviks to Krasnaya Gorka (Fomino Resurrection), in 1923. The churches were sealed. O. Nectary was arrested and taken to Kozelsk. Notes of Metropolitan Nektaria have been preserved about this moment: “The elder never let anyone into his cell, so the cell-attendants did not know what was there. When they came to describe his property, the cell-attendants also entered for the first time. And what did they see? Kids toys! Dolls, balls, lanterns, baskets! Those who made the inventory ask: “Why do you have children's toys?” And he replies: "I myself, like a child." They found church wine and canned food from him - he tells them: "Drink and eat." They drank the wine. During the arrest, his eyes swelled up and he was placed first in the monastery hospital, and then in the prison. When he left the monastery (on a sleigh), his last words were: “help me” - this is to help him climb onto the sleigh; sat down, blessed his way, and left. We were there then, but we didn’t see him.”

We heard in 1935 in Algiers from the priest Fr. Vasily Shustin a case passed to him by one of the emigrants.

After the departure of Nectarios from Optina, the Bolsheviks brought a certain occultist to his cell to discover, as they thought, the treasures hidden here. It is known that they made extensive use of occult powers for their own purposes. It was night, a kerosene lamp burned in the cell. The occult sorcerer began his sorcery and, although the lamp continued to burn, darkness fell in the room. There was one nun here (at that time there were many of them in Optina). She took the rosary Fr. Nectaria and with them drew the sign of the cross. It immediately became light, and the sorcerer struggled on the ground in convulsions of an epileptic fit.

Upon leaving prison, Fr. Nektary first lived in the village of Plokhino in close proximity to Kozelsk, and then moved 50 miles away to the village of Kholmishchi. “The mercy of God is infinite to those who love him. Now he is calmer than it was in the skete. Recently, many people came to him (mainly nuns). He confessed to everyone, blessed everyone, and, apparently, was very tired. In addition, he was the abbot of the skete. Now he is much calmer - he has two bright rooms and a hall; warmly, the monk cooks dinner for him, and the owner reads the rules. Visitors are very rare. He is so bright, joyful, full of grace. The reflection of this heavenly joy pours out on those who come to him, and everyone leaves him comforted, pacified. So writes M. Nektary and further in a letter dated 1 XII, 1923 confirms: “Grandfather” (i.e., Fr Nectary) lives in the village with a peasant. He has two good rooms: a bedroom and a reception room, his cell-attendant Peter lives with him, takes care of him and at the same time works for the owner for nothing. The house is very good: high ceilings, large windows, light and cozy. There is plenty of firewood in the forest: go and collect it. Constantly Grandfather is visited by relatives and friends from all sides. I lived with the widow-mother near Grandfather for two months, often saw him. Olezhok took me there and then he came for me.”

But not all the time the Elder lived calmly and well. We heard from another source that his master, a rude materialist, soon became insolent (one eyewitness was surprised how the Elder settled with such a person!) and began to oppress him, but the authorities pressed him even more, extorting money. “Grandfather is being oppressed,” writes M. Nektariya: “Pray for him daily. The last time I was with him, he said: "I have everything, everything is bad." Apparently, he foresaw how he and his master would be oppressed ... "This summer, Grandfather was threatened with Kamchatka, here he is joking with O. What kind of Kamchatka is this, has he met her in geography?" In another letter: “He asked to pray for himself, because he does not want to go to Kamchatka” ... Grandfather invited me to stay longer on vacation and allowed me to visit him on Easter if we were in Optina. This time O. got me and himself tickets, and we rode in a second-class train. I don’t know how it will be at Easter and next holidays: will it be possible to get tickets. But in any case, I live with the thought that Grandfather will still be alive and that I will see him. Lately, Grandfather has been very sad, he said that he had: “everything, everything is bad.” I don’t know if he has his own spiritual experiences, or if he suffers for the world, but I know that he is very sad and I ask you to diligently remember him in prayers and give him a piece for him ”(commemorate at the proskomedia).

In the autumn of 1927, the Bolsheviks imposed a particularly heavy tax on Denezhkin (the owner of the house where Father Nektary lived). Someone let the priest Fr. A. R., asking to make a gathering among the people of Kiev. Mother E. G. brought Fr. Nectarios had a very large deposit of provisions and the money collected for him. This was fraught with extreme difficulties. She managed to convey Fr. Everything that she brought to Nectarius is a secret, so that even the owner did not see it. Fr. Nectarios then blessed their family with the image of St. Seraphim and passed on to Fr. Ah, the pectoral cross.

Thus, in recent years, Fr. Nectarios were a complete cross-bearing, he was crowded from everywhere. To this must be added his very old age and the diseases associated with it. But the clarity of spirit did not leave him even at that time. M. Nectaria says: “Everything is special with Grandfather, - you never know what to ask - that's how it will stop your mouth - and you won't ask with all your desire. Or answer with a joke. When we visited him in the fall, he talked to us for a very long time, joked a lot with O., called him "a suitable teacher for himself," he would like to borrow learning from him, to join science. In general, he laughed a lot and made us laugh, but it was already three in the morning and soon it was blessed for us to leave, so I didn’t ask everything, but it’s not casual; it means that he did not want to answer that, because if you sometimes forget to ask something, he will suddenly say... they try to deceive him, but he does not show that he understands everything.

It was sometimes very difficult to make our way from the station to the village of Kholmishchi ... It was especially difficult during the spring thaw. “I was with Grandpa. On the occasion of the flood of rivers and bad weather, I stayed with him for 10 days, which I was infinitely glad about. He's already so frail it's amazing how alive he is. Moves the legs a little. He sends you a blessing and says: “May the Grace of God help him now and forever and forever.” At each teaching, let him say a short prayer: "Lord, open my mind to this teaching." The following incident is connected with one of these trips: “Once, says O., my mother was in Kholmishchi, in a terrible mudslide, and tore her shoes. Upon learning of this, Father took her out of his cell and gave her a pair of cloth shoes. And he said: “This is for your memory, as a consolation, and on Easter you will flaunt in them.”

“But it was impossible to walk in them on the way back through the melting snow. I had to set off on the road to the railway station. d. Duminishchi station (25 versts) in the same torn shoes. Soon she had to quit. The stockings turned to shreds, and mommy got to the station barefoot. Here she put on Father's shoes and they warmed her wet and cold feet.

“In order for Father’s words to come true:“ On Easter you will flaunt in them, ”mommy went to the Light Matins in these shoes. But later, when she woke up at home after a rest, it turned out that her pupil Lelya used her only shoes, who, having put them on, left. Thus, willy-nilly, she had to "flaunt" on the day of Bright Sunday in Batyushkin's gift. Mom later said: “There is no need to strive to help the elder’s words come true - this happens by itself.” We called these shoes “dandies”, they were kept as a keepsake. They buried my mother in them.

Such heroic journeys were repeated: “Yesterday we returned from grandfather. Today is Palm Sunday. Now we have spring in full swing: it is warm, the trees are turning green, the sun is shining. The journey to Grandfather was very difficult. On the occasion of the flooding of the rivers, there was no communication on horseback, and we made 75 versts on foot (bypassing). They walked knee-deep in water, kneaded the impenetrable mud, glided over frozen bumps. In some places there was also a good road, but in general we were so tired that by the end of the road, after walking a mile, we lay down to rest. But Grandpa consoled us all the time. He had no one but us. We spent a day and a half with him.

And here is another kind of difficulty: “We have bred a lot of wolves, in many farms they destroyed all the livestock. When Olezhok and I were going to Grandfather, a wolf also met us on the road in the forest. He was sitting on the road along which we were walking, then politely gave way to us, crossed to the edge of the forest, then again sat down behind us in the same place. It was getting dark. Olik got a little scared: we didn’t even have a stick, but I didn’t feel the slightest fear in the hope of Grandfather’s prayers. Wolves are one of the natural disasters of the peasant.”

“I received a comforting letter from my mother,” writes M. “She lives very well there, often sits at the feet of Fr. Nectaria and asks everything she wants. But only a little of what Mother Nectarios listened to, sitting at the feet of the elder, could reach us. This is what we share with the reader.

INSTRUCTIONS OF FATHER NEKTARIUS.

Grandfather said that marriage for a woman is a service to the Holy Trinity. Her whole life in marriage is a service to the Holy Trinity - that's how great her fate is for a woman to be a wife and mother. This is my question: "How could I serve the Lord." Grandfather answered: “Since you were legally married, you have continuously served the Rev. Trinity. Legal marriage for a woman is the beginning of her ministry to the Rev. Trinity.

Grandfather said that it’s better for you to live together if there is a quiet, meek, non-abusive cohabitant: “You will be chosen with the chosen one”; but you yourself must leave a bad roommate.

We have been robbed! They took all winter things and dresses out the window. Father Nektarios said that when they are robbed, one should not grieve, but decide that they have given alms, and the Lord will return 10 times. So don't worry about us.

When asked by a friend how to love Christ, he said: “Take a lesson from Christ Himself: “let you love one another, as I love you.” First of all, you must try to love your neighbor, and from your neighbor, love will pass to Christ. But one must love one's neighbor sincerely, and not with calculation - only then can there be success.

From the fact that the soul is restless and does not know what to take up, pray and answer with full faith.

Grandfather does not give instructions on how to live at all. I think because, so as not to impose a yoke and so that the questioners do not suffer responsibility for not doing what he ordered. But he always answers direct questions. Eg. I asked what to do with bad thoughts, and he said: “Repeat“ Lord have mercy ”and you will see how everything earthly departs.” Another time he said to me: "Pay no attention to them." And by the grace of God, through the prayers of Grandfather, my thoughts left me.

Grandfather said that “they used to thank the Lord, but the current generation has ceased to thank the Lord, and now there is impoverishment in everything, the fruits are badly born and some are sick.”

Grandfather advises, if anyone manages to do something good, or give alms, to say: With Your blessing, Lord, I did this: “You can’t do anything without Me.”

As for the forgotten sin, grandfather said that you can say it after communion, when you meet with the confessor again.

Even Grandfather said that it is very good if the Lord does not listen to prayers for a long time. You just need to continue to pray and not lose heart: “Prayer is capital: the longer capital lies, the more interest it brings. The Lord sends His mercy when it pleases Him; when it is USEFUL for us to accept. If we urgently need something, then we should pray two or three times, and we should thank God for the fulfillment of the request. Sometimes after a year the Lord fulfills the petition. An example should be taken from Joachim and Anna. They prayed all their lives and did not lose heart, but they all hoped, and what a consolation the Lord sent them!

I am sending you a letter. Joseph (Field), sent by the clerk Fr. Nectaria. There is a long letter from the elder in which he answers questions. By the way: is it possible to argue with comrades about religion and read religious and anti-religious books with them? He did not allow this, warning that a heart ulcer might be inflicted, which would be very difficult to get rid of.

Opening the Bible, what will be opened, is a sin. In doubtful cases, this cannot be done, but you only need to pray three times, and no matter what you do after that, everything will be useful for the soul, but guessing from the Bible is sinful, and you only need to read for instruction in the word of God.

He ordered you to convey that the forgotten sin, although it is remembered before communion, can be confessed later, another time. Usefully spend the days in which you commune like this: do not rush to do anything, give yourself a privilege until half a day, abide in prayer, supplication and thanksgiving, read the Holy Scriptures.

The elder also said: “Our most difficult sorrows are like insect bites, compared with the sorrows of the next century.”

Imagine my position: I know that he reads thoughts, and then a terrible scum creeps into my head - I ask: - what should I do? - says: "do not pay attention."

In Grandfather, she found support for her opinion about the superiority of the “royal way” (in other words, to avoid extremes in everything, including feats). When I lived there for two months near him, did nothing and had the opportunity to pray and read the Holy Books, an evil spirit began to attack me ferociously. He filled my mind with such thoughts that I could not look at the icons, and it was a shame to sit with Grandfather, because I knew that he read thoughts. Regarding thoughts, he answered me, as I already wrote to you: “pay no attention to them.” And I wished to bow, and in order not to be self-willed, I asked him for permission to make 100 bows a day. He smiled and asked: “Is there any zeal?” I say: "Yes." He allowed me, and after 2-3 days he sent me to fast for 50 miles. On the way, my leg hurt, and I was not able to make a single bow. Since then, I have never asked permission for any exploits.

Grandfather wrote that one can have good communication in everyday life with unbelievers, only one cannot have prayerful communication with them, and disputes about religion cannot be started so that the Name of God is not offended in a dispute.

I often read from the “Sixth Hour” a prayer: “As if there were no imams of boldness for our many sins,” because I think that this is the root of our sorrows. Grandfather, in case of any failures, ordered to say: “Lord, I believe that I endure what is due and get what I deserve, but You, Lord, according to Your mercy, forgive and have mercy on me,” and he advises repeating this several times until you feel peace in soul.

Grandfather, once from himself said: "Pray bodily - the Lord God will send His grace to help you." This means to pray with waist bows and, when necessary, with earthly bows. Grandfather even stood in front of the icons, slowly put the sign of the cross on himself and bowed low, touching his right hand to the ground and said to me: “Pray like this.”

Pray that the Lord will reign in your heart - then it will be filled with great jubilation and joy, and no sorrow will be able to disturb it. For this purpose, Grandfather advised to pray like this: "Lord, open the doors of Your mercy."

Grandpa told me to get ready for the tonsure. I was very happy, really, how strange it is for you to hear this from me? Do you remember my attitude towards the monks? How I felt sorry for them that they did not have their own will, that they should do everything as they were ordered, etc. But now I realized that there is no greater happiness than to be in obedience, when you can be sure that you do the will of God and you are not responsible for your actions.

Grandfather gave me a small cell rule: 30 times “Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner”; 10 times “Most Holy Lady Theotokos, save me”; 10 times “Holy Guardian Angel, pray to God for me” and 10 times “All Saints, pray to God for me.” And he added: “As you say: “All saints, pray to God for me” - so all the saints will say in heaven: “Lord have mercy” - and you will gain.”

Now, every time I say: "All saints, pray to God for me" - I imagine how all the saints - all the sky - cry out to the Lord: "Lord have mercy."

Pray for Grandfather, he said: "Your prayers console me and help me." I live from trip to trip. What a great mercy of God to be able to see him and talk to him.

Have you received a letter in which I admire the work of Rev. Hesychia? I have been looking for it all my life, but it turns out that it was in our pantry, and only miraculously I found it after I asked Grandfather: how to open the doors of the heart.

O-u said that he had a talent (but did not say what) and continued: "It's good not to announce talents, otherwise they might steal."

Life is defined in three senses: measure, time and weight. The most beautiful deed, if it is beyond measure, will not make sense. You get into mathematics, you are given a sense of proportion, remember these three meanings, they determine your whole life.

I understand about measure and weight, but what is time? Is it an era? He smiled silently.

But there is a greater art - the word. The Word that Resurrects and Kills (Psalms of David). But the path to this art is through personal achievement, the path of sacrifice. RI one out of many thousands reaches him.

At the second Argeron (in France) congress of the Christian Movement, which took place around 1926, among other speakers was Prof. Berdyaev. Rev. Veniamin, then an inspector at the Theological Institute in Paris, raised objections, as an Orthodox bishop, against certain provisions of Berdyaev's report that contradicted Orthodox teaching. The latter was offended, immediately took his suitcases and left. The next day, Metropolitan Evlogy arrived at the congress and made Bishop. Benjamin is a strict suggestion. Vl. Benjamin, wanting to test himself, turned to Fr. Nectarius (At that time we had the opportunity to communicate in writing with Father Nectarius). The elder replied: “In such societies (like the Christian Movement) a philosophy is developed that is unacceptable to the Orthodox spirit.” Then, even more precise confirmation came that he did not approve of precisely that society (i.e., the Movement), at whose meeting Vl. Benjamin.

In the same period of time, a certain G-m turned to Father Nectarius for an indication of whether he could enter the Academy (the Theological Institute in Paris), expressing fear that it was heretical. With the last o. Nectarios agreed, but gave his blessing to enter the academy and said: “Whatever it is, there will be no obstacle for a learned husband. Knowing the science that will be taught will not hurt him.”

At the same time, one unfortunate incident occurred at the Sergius Compound: a man with a dry hand came to the kitchen of the Theological Institute and asked for some work there. There was none; then he shot himself in the garden.

Vladyka Benjamin was very mournful, they wrote to Father Nektariy. Church commemoration of suicides is prohibited by the canons. O. Nectary advised ow. Benjamin read the Psalter in private for the deceased for forty days, and also find two more readers to bring their number to three. At the same time, about Nektarios said: "The Lord takes away the mind from a person, what cattle do not dare to do - a person decides."

CASES OF INSIGHT AND WONDERFUL HELP.

In order not to bring on a person the sin of disobedience, or forgetfulness, or negligence, Grandfather does not impose any rules on anyone, but, according to his prayers, the person himself (with the help of the Lord, of course) comes across books that are suitable for him at a given time, meets people who can help him. What greatness of humility and love for people! How marvelous is God in His Saints!

I noticed that if you only write to Grandfather a request for something, then at the same time help comes from him. Obviously, by the grace of God, his soul hears all the requests addressed to him.

Grandfather had such a case: one young girl came to ask for blessings for monasticism, and he said: “No, you will have a fiancé, you will get married, give birth to a son and he will weigh 10 pounds” ... This is exactly what happened, and two years later, she brought a lovely butuzik to Batiushka for a blessing.

Lida B. was looking for a whole year for some place and could not find it, in the summer she worked day by day on farms for pennies: she plowed, cleaned the oxen, in a word, she suffered incredibly - she wanted to get a job as a cook, a laundress - and could not anywhere. I advised her to pray for Grandfather's health - and three days later she got a job in the teacher's village. Her joy is indescribable.

You asked me to write what Grandfather said the last time. When we arrived, Olezhok was sick. His temperature was 40 degrees. I tell Batiushka: “Olezhok is ill,” and he says, smiling: “It’s good to be ill in good health.” The next day he gave him an apple and said: "Here's your medicine." And when he blessed us on the way, he said: “When you feed the horses, let Oleg drink boiling water and be healthy.” We did just that, Olezhok drank boiling water, fell asleep and woke up, saying: “Mommy! - I am well".

4. 13. 24. One boy complained to Grandfather that his comrades offended him at school, and Grandfather said smiling: “and you call on George the Victorious for help, so you will defeat them all, they will only kick with their legs.” That is exactly what happened. He, as he rushed at the bully himself, calling on St. George the Victorious for help, so he only twitched his legs and since then no one has touched him.

He blessed Olezhka to apply for a salary, and in a miraculous, one might say, way, he received it - and not only for this year, but for the entire past without any patronage, meanwhile, last year he was refused. Olezhok was blessed to study well - to this day, he is very satisfactory in all subjects that go to the certificate.

He blessed me to take lessons, and 6 students themselves asked for me, and all of them are smart, capable, believing children!

Oh, how sad that we live far from Grandfather and can rarely resort to his blessing.

The mother of two of the students of M. Nektaria instructed her to ask the Elder in which educational institution to send her sons. “There is no need to give them away: it is enough for them and what you teach them.” It was embarrassing for M. Nektaria to convey these words of the Elder, because the mother of these children, who was little known to her, could think that she was saying this in order to keep her disciples. And so it happened: the mother just shrugged her shoulders and sent the children to school. There they fell into a bad community, became depraved, began to steal the clothes and belongings of their comrades, and then went out to rob and into the street and fell into the number of juvenile delinquents.

I don’t remember what I wrote to you from a conversation with Grandfather, but what is important for us, he said that O. would finish his studies, and asked us to pray for him, because he did not want to go to Kamchatka.

Grandfather was, as usual, very cheerful, he joked and laughed a lot. At parting, he said to us: “You are welcome, come again, although you are of no use to me, but you are of use to me,” hinting at the gifts that we brought him.

We have one familiar family. The wife is a believer and a good Christian and prayer book, and the husband is a mocker of the fasts and a weak believer. Here they were in an extremely distressed situation, they were selling the last. She diligently went to the temple, and her husband pestered her that she was smashing everything to the priests and that because of this they would die of hunger. In desperation, she was close to suicide and wanted to leave her husband, unable to endure his constant reproaches. In grief she turned to Grandpa. He told her through me: “Let a prayer service be served to St. Nicholas - the Lord will help her.” On the same day she sold some thing and served a prayer service to St. Nicholas. Two days later, her husband meets a friend who offers him a service. He happily agrees. But here in the (U.S.S.R.) service cannot be obtained by a non-member of the union, and the members of the union are waiting in line by the thousands. He went to the one on whom his appointment depended. He says: “I’m even surprised how you can contact me, knowing the rules and seeing thousands of queues, but he is not a member.” He returns to his comrade, he says: "I can do nothing without the consent of the union." He goes back to the union and says: "I am dying, do a good deed at least once in your life - my life is in your hands." As a result, I got a place: 120 rubles. (60 dollars) per month and 4 and a half rubles. per diem - only about 250 rubles. (And we have old employees in the administration of the railway and in other institutions receive 30-40 rubles a month). What does the traveling service have to do with it, and he comes home once a month as a welcome guest. You cannot understand the whole greatness of this miracle without having an idea of ​​how difficult it is to get into the service here at all, and without knowing that it is absolutely impossible for a non-member of the union and that every month we have staff cuts, and dozens of people are dismissed from service, served even for 10-15 years. The wife achieved everything: and he is not at home, so she prays and fasts without hindrance, and relations with her husband improved, and when he left, he said “pray for me.” It remains to exclaim: God is wondrous in His saints!

Six years later, Fr. Nectarios that L-a will not be taken into military service. L-b blessings about. Nectaria was engaged in physical education and became an instructor in this area. And so, at the draft board, he impressed everyone with his athletic build and health. The call seemed imminent. In the evening, L. had to come to the office for an indication of the destination. But there he was ordered to appear the next day. And so it was repeated several times. L. and all his relatives were worried, because, not understanding the reason for the delay, they feared that there might be political persecution. Finally, it was announced that L. was released from military service as a gymnastics instructor. It turned out that that year there were not enough instructors, and only in this call were they released.

Grandfather allowed me to visit the Sarov desert in June and visit him on the way back. It will be in two months. Write in advance everything you need to know, I will definitely ask Grandfather about the elders, about the fact that the image of an elder can obscure the image of God, about reasoning, about everything.

I asked him about the end of the world. He showed me the letters that are sent to him: about the vision of the Savior, Who said that the end of the world was coming soon, about the excerpt from the newspapers that the Messiah appeared in India, and Elijah in America, etc. He talked a lot, but also smiled, and before that, immediately upon meeting us, he addressed with the following words: “what are you all turning to my thin-wittedness - now turn to the Optina monks.” I smiled, and he said: "I'm telling you this seriously, they will tell you everything for your benefit." When I saw them, they say: “There are people who are looking for signs of the end of the world, but they don’t care about their souls, they do it all for the sake of others” (obviously to break the news). So, the monks told me that it is not useful for people to know the time of the second coming: “Watch and pray,” the Savior said, so you don’t have to foresee events, and in due time everything will be revealed to be true. Grandfather was pleased with the answer of the monks, because he is also not a supporter of trusting all sorts of fantasies in this area. I asked: “Batiushka, do they say that John the Theologian will come?” He replied: "All this will be, but it is a great mystery." And he also said: “In the days of Noah, the Lord said for a hundred years that there would be a flood, but they did not believe Him, did not repent, and out of the multitude of people one righteous man with his family was found” (“So it will be at the coming of the Son of Man” (Matt. XXIV , 37) And Grandfather repeated many times: "Hold fast to Orthodoxy."

During my confession, Grandfather repeated many times: “God, be merciful to me!”

We give cases of clairvoyance about. Nectarius, handed over to us by Professor I. M. Andreev.

Professors Komarovich and Anichkov during a trip to Fr. Nektarios (we will return to this visit later), argued about name glorification, and one of the professors, objecting to name glorification, gave an example when the name of God is pronounced by a parrot, or by a gramophone record.

When these professors arrived at Fr. Nectarius, with a desire to clarify this question from the elder, the latter preceded them and, before they had time to ask him about it, invited them to listen to the "tale". The meaning of this tale was as follows: in one house, a parrot lived in a cage. The maid of this house was very religious and often repeated a short prayer: "Lord, have mercy!" The parrot learned to repeat this prayer too. Once, when the maid came out, forgetting to close the cage, a cat ran into the room and rushed to the cage. The parrot in it darted about and cried out in the voice of a maid: “Lord, have mercy!” Since the cat was very afraid of the maid, when she heard the voice of the latter, she ran away in fear. Both professors were very shocked by this story about. Nectaria.

Once, in 1927, Fr. Nektary instructed one of his spiritual sons to come to his acquaintances who lived on Aptekarsky Island in Petrograd, and at the same time said: “There you will meet with an accountant of a woodworking factory who will get you a job.” Having come to his acquaintances, this person really met the accountant of such a plant there. They met, and this latter got him a job at his factory.

Prof. I. M. Andreev during 1927 was in correspondence with Fr. Nectarius, through one monk Z., who lived in Kozelsk. Father Nectarios, giving his instructions, predicted to the professor that he would face very difficult trials and sufferings, but that in the end everything would end well and he would be released and would have the opportunity to actively serve the Orthodox Church. In February 1928, this professor was arrested for participating in the Catacomb Church, exiled to the Solovetsky concentration camp, and then was in exile. But all this ended happily, and after the war of 1941-1945, the professor emigrated to America.

It is impossible to pass over in silence the relationship of Elder Nectarios with Patriarch Tikhon and the importance of the elder in the life of the Church.

One of the regular visitors Nectaria tells the following about this: “Patriarch Tikhon was not with Father Fr. Nectarios, and Batyushka was not with the Patriarch. It seems that there was no correspondence between them, however, many issues were resolved by the Patriarch in accordance with the opinion of the Elder. This happened through persons close to the Patriarch and those who communicated with the Father. The latter expressed his point of view on this or that question, or spoke allegorically, talking about some case. This conversation was passed on to the Patriarch, who always acted on the advice of the Father.

The position of the Patriarch was extremely difficult. The authorities sought to break the Christian foundations. A split was organized, expressed in the so-called. renovationism; other groups were formed, based not on purely Christian, but on political considerations. At the same time, Optina, being under the guidance of the elders in general and the last elder Father Fr. Nectaria, in particular, walked on a solid path, not deviating to the sides. Optina, with the authority of the Elder, spread its influence to all corners of Russia, because people devoted to the Church flowed to it from all sides, despite the difficulties and dangers. Bishops, priests and laity, both personally, and in writing, and orally - through other persons, turned to the Elder for the resolution of spiritual, ecclesiastical and everyday issues. The view of the Elder on this or that issue was absolute authority and quickly spread among true believers, who were the support of the Patriarch in all his undertakings; but there was also such a case: the Patriarch, submitting to the godless influences of the Church, issued a decree on the transition of worship to a new style. Optina and the clergy under her influence were very embarrassed by this decree and refrained from introducing it into church life. This and other circumstances, such as the opinion of Metropolitan Arseny, hastened the abolition of the new style by the patriarch.

A completely different situation was created with the coming to power of Metropolitan Sergius: between the latter and Fr. There was no communication nectarios.

Even before the release of the declaration of Metropolitan Sergius, in the same summer of 1927, Elder Nektariy, in a conversation with professors Komarovich and Anichkov who visited him, called Metropolitan Sergius a renovationist. To their objection that the latter repented, the elder answered them: “Yes, he repented, but the poison sits in him.”

From the moment this declaration was issued, which betrayed the Church into the hands of enemies, the best bishops and staunch believers began to leave Metropolitan Sergius.

The process was lengthy: some hesitated to leave, hoping that thanks to the denunciations, Mr. Sergius would come to his senses; but, finally, the process ended in 1929, when Metropolitan Kirill headed the Catacomb Church, raising the name of Metropolitan Peter ** (Father Nektary’s prediction made in the summer of 1923 about the closure of all churches dates back to this time. We quote it in full: 19-3-1924. In the summer (1923), Grandfather said that churches would be opened for a while, but after 5 years all churches would be closed. The first came true for us, so that we enjoy the wonderful church singing).

The elder did not live to see this event. During the last year of his life (1927-1928), Fr. Nektary was very weak and received almost no one. His strength was noticeably waning. In December 1927, they thought that the elder was dying, however, there was a temporary improvement.

But at the end of April 1928 it became clear that the end was approaching. When Fr. Nektariy was asked whom to call for parting words, he pointed to Fr. Sergius Mechev, who had previously signed a protest against the declaration of Mr. Sergius.

Father Sergius arrived, confessed and communed Fr. Nektariy, and immediately left. On the same day, April 29, Father Nektary quietly departed to the Lord late in the evening.

They buried him only on the 4th day, on May 2nd, as groups of believers were constantly arriving from different cities.

On the day of the burial, an extraordinary confluence of people from nearby and distant places was observed. The burial lasted from 5 am to 5 pm. It seemed like some great celebration was taking place. There were many clergy. Fr. Sergei Mechev.

I. M. Kontsevich.

* Prot. Chetverikov is mistaken when he says that after Fr. Ambrose, "the eldership, although it did not die out, did not have its former strength and glory." (Optina Pustyn). This mistake is repeated from his words by modern hagiographers, including prof. Igor Smolich in his extensive work in German "Russisches Moenchtum". 1953. Würzburg.

The subsequent elders also had all the power and fullness of grace-filled gifts. You come to this conviction, at least when you get acquainted with the biography of Elder Joseph, the direct disciple and successor of Fr. Ambrose. Other elders, for example, Fr. Barsanuphius, whom our egiographers have almost silenced, is also Fr. The nectarium we are talking about here. It was not the “strength and glory” of the elders that decreased, but the number of believers.

** See Prof. Andreev. A Brief Review of the History of the Russian Church from the Revolution to the Present Day. Jordanville. 1952. p. 51

“The paths of your soul are unsearchable, the secrets of your heart are incomprehensible, reverend father Nectarios, but like the rays of your most luminous words they announce to us the Kingdom of God, which you have hidden inside yourself. Also, pray to Christ God to save and enlighten our souls. This troparion to the Monk Nectarius of Optina was found among other sketches in the spiritual diary of the Optina New Martyr Hieromonk Basil. His akathist to the elders of Optina remained unfinished, but we believe that where there is no more death, both of them, the monk-martyr and the elder, who preserved his faith amid persecution, glorify the Lord and pray for us, for Russia, for the earthly Church.

"Unsearchable are the ways of your soul"

...Perhaps it is better not to express. The Reverend Father Nectarios was, perhaps, the most "secret" of the Optina elders. After all, what did casual visitors see, what remained in the memory of the external? Toys: tiny cars, airplanes and trains given to him by someone once, colored blouses worn over a cassock, strange shoe "pairs" – shoe on one foot, felt boots on the other. The young brethren were embarrassed by his music boxes and gramophone, records with spiritual hymns ... In a word, this priest was “strange” and very unpredictable.

He almost never left the gates of the St. John the Baptist skete, and his appearance in the monastery itself could only be caused by the need to obey the rector of the monasteries of the Kaluga diocese, who persistently invited him for a conversation. However, the writer Sergei Nilus, who lived in Optina for a long time, also recalled the unexpected “interferences” of Father Nektariy in their “dacha” life, when, returning with his wife, after a temptation that happened to him during the pilgrimage, they suddenly found unattended fresh paintings. Either the sunny landscape will “plunge” into the rain and lightning will cut through the sky, then the sad inscription “le nuage” (cloud) made by coal in French will appear in the whole expanse of heaven.

– Oh, father, well, a prankster!

And the “prankster” sometimes himself waited for them on the terrace, looking at what would come of his undertaking. He brushes off the coal dust with the sleeve of his cassock, and, you see, nothing remains of spiritual confusion.

...Toys, funny tales – about, for example, how the cat saved Noah's ark from a malicious mouse, who, at the suggestion of the evil one, planned to gnaw through the floor, and thus earned special respect and “the right to bliss” for the entire cat family, – jokes, hints. It seemed that this was all he was. And few managed to see, feel at once that, eccentric, Fr. Nectarius hides his God-given second sight – the gift of foresight, foresight.

It happened that even experienced priests were mistaken about him. Once Vladyka Theophan of Kaluga, who visited Optina, watched in amazement as the elder one by one began to “imprison”, “beat” his pupae and utter something incomprehensible to them, attributed all this to age-related infirmity. The meaning of all these mysterious manipulations became clear to him much later, when the Bolsheviks imprisoned him, subjected him to humiliation, and after – exile, where the lord suffered greatly from the owner – house owner. The words spoken by the elder, which then seemed unintelligible, referred to what awaited the bishop in the future.

Father Nektary himself spoke of himself in such a way that visitors would not even think about his spiritual talent: “Elder Gerasim was a great old man, therefore he had a lion. And we are small - we have a cat. Or: “How can I be the heir of the old elders? I am weak and weak. Their grace was whole loaves, and I have a slice.

With such and similar words, he not only protected people from feelings of unprofitable, but also himself. – from everything false and pompous. Behind the strange form was a constant spiritual composure, sobriety – "weapon" necessary for a monk in "invisible battle". His inner life remained a mystery, known only to God.

"Blessing the Kingdom"

Wisdom about. Nectaria flowed from the experience of his life. Left seven years old without a father and having lived for many years in the service of strangers, even before entering the monastery, he had the habit of hard work and patience. Through outwardly random circumstances – the owner's senior clerk planned to marry him to his daughter and it was necessary to get a blessing for this important step – still in his youth he ended up in Optina. However, this trip changed his whole life: after a conversation with Elder Ambrose, he was received by the head of the skete, Fr. Hilarion, into the brethren, and never returned to the world.

"Round orphan, completely beggar", – as he recalled many years later, – Father Nektary felt himself in the monastery, where there were many educated brethren, "the last of the disciples." And only over the years I appreciated this unexpected "advantage". How important it is for a monk to keep this very feeling – discipleship and unworthiness, because it alone is able to protect the soul from spiritual pride – "self-worth". But it was he who was singled out from among the other novices by the experienced look of Father Ambrose. “Wait, Nikolka will oversleep, it will come in handy for everyone”, – out of habit, he replied in rhyme to those who complained about Fr. Nectarios to the elder brothers.

Only eleven years after entering the monastery, the Lord honored him with a monastic mantle. More time will pass, and the elders will begin to send him for spiritual advice and guidance.

Brief words about Nectarios, which has come down to us, thanks to letters and memories of him, is striking in its clarity. In them – spiritual wisdom, mind of the highest quality. Here are just a few of them: “Man is given life to serve him, and not he to her, i.e. a person should not become a slave to his circumstances, should not sacrifice his inner to the outer. In serving life, a person loses proportion, works without prudence and comes to a very sad bewilderment; he does not know why he lives. Like a "squeeze", the core of the spiritual writings of St. Theophan the Recluse! Such a simple reminder that the Lord calls a person to a rationally free and immortal life, one where the Spirit penetrates and fills with meaning everything - both spiritual and related to the cares of the flesh.

Or more: “By prayer, by the word of God, all filth is cleansed. The soul cannot come to terms with life and is comforted only by prayer, without prayer the soul is dead before grace. About the highest need of the soul, about spiritual hunger, which can only be satisfied by food of the same quality. – spiritual.

The gift of reasoning was united by Fr. Nectarios with gifts and more amazing: a prayer of extraordinary power and insight. For some, he predicted a monastic vocation, while for others, on the contrary, he kept them from hasty steps, blessing them to create a family, which was soon fulfilled. There is enough evidence of this kind.

And at the same time, one of his most striking, individual qualities remained an interest in the external course of life. Without leaving the skete, he read scientific journals with pleasure, studied certain disciplines, even took lessons in French and painting, often talking about himself: "I'm into science." That is why he never kept the youth who turned to him from the possibility of obtaining a higher education, reminding only that it is necessary to correctly correlate the values ​​of faith and knowledge: “Young men, if you live and study in such a way that your scientific nature does not spoil morality, but the morality of scientificity, then you will achieve complete success in your life.”

In fact, what will scientificity be, is there a great price for it, if the spirit is damaged and the heart is unclean? Respectful, and at the same time far from cult, encouraging addictions attitude towards science attracted spiritual pupils from among the intelligentsia and scientists to Father Nektariy. Often people simply could not believe that the elder did not have not only a university degree, but no education. When asked, he usually replied: "All our learning comes from Scripture."

So – all his life: between increasing knowledge, spiritual experience and maintaining simplicity with a touch of foolishness, which kept him from even for a moment entering the role of an “elder brother”, who did not need either humility before the Father or repentance. When in 1903 the brethren unanimously elected Fr. Nektarios as the confessor of the monastery and the elder, the father this time also appeared in the meeting, in which he was caught – in different shoes, and for a long time refused to accept the duty assigned to him “out of stupidity”, reconciling with her only for obedience to the archimandrite.

heavy cross

Gift of Prophecy counts not only one of the highest (not without reason, the apostle also speaks of him, as about what one should strive for most of all), but also one of the most difficult. Long before the events of 1917, people in the monastery began to notice that the holy foolishness of the priest increasingly took on the character of “tips,” the meaning of which, however, was not so easy to unravel. He suddenly began to walk in a dressing gown, from under which his bare shins “shone”, then he suddenly arranged a whole warehouse of glass, pebbles and various junk things with the words: "This is my museum."

All this was remembered already in the 20s – The 1930s, when citizens began to go to public places, to services, according to the new fashion without stockings and without underwear, and in Optina, in fact, a museum was organized, with the help of which it was still possible to save the monastery for some time from destruction. What was it like for the old man with this knowledge, when every day was for him an approximation to the line beyond which their great Russia would not be?

Very rarely did the priest speak openly. So he once said: “... 1918 will be even harder. The king will be killed along with his family. Tortured."

Many monks were then waiting for stages, camps, and some – prison tortures and death for Christ. In 1923, Father Nektary was also arrested. But the Lord saved him for the support and comfort of people during the years of persecution of Orthodoxy. Upon his release from prison, the elder settled with one of the residents of the village of Kholmishchi, Bryansk region. People flocked to him from everywhere. And in those years when everything seemed to be lost irretrievably, his words sounded encouraging and confident: “Russia will rise up and will not be rich materially, but it will be rich in spirit, and there will be seven more lamps, seven pillars in Optina.” Until the end of the 1920s, he held a prayer for Russia, for those who lived in the world, in constant danger, and for those who languished in prison, for the living and the dead, for those killed and missing. He died in 1928, in a foreign land, far from his native monastery, "outside the city."

And decades later, his relics were transferred “home”, to Optina, even before the temples were restored, and the appearance of the monastery lost signs of ruin. Like an antimension on a throne, they were placed at the base of the monastery rising from the ruins. And already a new generation of monks, looking at the end of the last Optina ascetics, drew strength in order to bear both the difficulties of the first years and the test that befell the monastery in 1993.

But on that Pascha, through the shed blood of the martyrs, the new Optina inherited from the former one, who had suffered reproach, who had seen the exile and death of her pupils. Three monks, our contemporaries, became participants in the Lord's Spiritual Supper, where holiness speaks no longer in disguise and where earthly robes of humiliation are replaced by garments woven from light.

Venerable Nectarios

MIRACLES

Prophecy hidden under foolishness
“When he was appointed an elder, he was so buffoonish (foolish) that they even wanted to remove him, but one monk of high spiritual life said: “You leave him, he is prophesying.”
Now everything comes true, what he then represented. For example, he will put on a dressing gown on his naked body, and his bare legs sparkle on the go. In 20-22 years, even students, female students and employees went to work barefoot, without underwear, or coats with torn underwear. He collected various rubbish: pebbles, glass, clay, etc., arranged a tiny cabinet and showed it to everyone, saying: “This is my museum.” Indeed, there was a museum in Optina for a long time.”

The clairvoyance of the old man, hidden under the foolishness
“We are getting ready for June 8 to be partakers of the Holy Mysteries of Christ,” writes S. Nilus. – The enemy does not sleep, and today, before confession, he wanted to treat me with a big nuisance, giving rise to a misunderstanding with the rector, whom I deeply respect and love. But it was not in vain that two years of my life passed side by side with the monastic humility of the Optina ascetics for me - I also humbled myself, no matter how difficult it was for my worldly pride. There was this temptation at the late mass, after which my wife and I had to go to confession to our spiritual elder, Fr. Barsanuphius. We returned home after confession, I entered the entrance, I looked, and on the freshly painted sky of my sketch, someone wrote with charcoal, in large letters, in the whole sky in French “le nauge” (cloud).
I immediately guessed that the culprit of this "mischief" could not be anyone else but our friend Father Nektary. It was so similar to his inclination to some kind of foolishness, under which for me the instructive lessons of one or another Christian virtue were often hidden. It is he, undoubtedly he, who has seen the appearance of a cloud in my spiritual sky; he, my dear father, sometimes, to general amazement, loves to insert his unexpected French word into speech! .. I looked at our terrace, and he, our favorite, sits in his corner and chuckles good-naturedly, waiting for what will come out of his joke .
- Ah, father, father! - I laugh with him - well, and a prankster!
And the “prankster” got up, approached the study, brushed off the inscription with the sleeve of his cassock, and announced with a smile:
See, there's nothing left!
Nothing remains in my heart from the morning turmoil. Undoubtedly, our friend has a second sight, with which he sees what is hidden to the eyes of an ordinary person. It is not for nothing that his pious life in the monastery for almost forty years.

A miraculous change in the soul of a woman through the prayers of Elder Nectarios and the prediction of her monasticism
“I talked to my father for a long time. The father said to me: “If you had the whole world in your power, you would still not have peace, and you would feel unhappy. Your soul rushes about, suffers, and you think that it can be satisfied with external things, or external self-forgetfulness. No! All this is not right, she will never calm down from this ... You need to leave everything ... "
After that, the priest sat for a long time, bowing his head to his chest, then he said:
“I see the grace of God around you: you will be in a monastery…
- What are you, father?! Am I in a monastery? Yes, I don't fit in there! Yes, I can't live there.
– I don’t know when it will be – maybe soon, or maybe in ten years, but you will definitely be in the monastery.
This trip to Optina strengthened me even more.
A few days later I left for the Altai and entered the monastery indicated to me by the elder Metropolitan Macarius.
This is how the words spoken by Father Fr. Nektarios: "I see the grace of God around you, you will be in the monastery." I was surprised then and did not believe it, and two months after this conversation, I really already put on monastic clothes. I thank the Lord, who instructed me to go to this fertile corner - Optina Pustyn.

Prediction of the date of death of the elder Barsanuphius
Father Nectarios said: “The elder Barsanuphius was great! And the priest was surprisingly humble and obedient. Once he, being a novice, walked past my porch, I told him jokingly: "You have exactly twenty years left to live." I told him in jest, but he obeyed, and exactly twenty years later, on the same day, on the first of April, he died. What a great obedience he was." Before such a force, Fr. Nectaria shuddered involuntarily.

Miracle with a jug
“Batiushka tells me,” one of his disciples recalled, “first shake out the samovar, then pour water, but often they forget to pour water and start lighting the samovar, and as a result, the samovar will be ruined and left without tea. The water is standing right there, in the corner, in a copper jug, take it and pour it. I went to the jug, and it was very large, two buckets, and massive in itself. I tried to move it, no - there was no strength, then I wanted to bring the samovar to it and pour water. Father noticed my intention and again repeats to me: “You take a jug and pour water into the samovar.” - “Why, father, it is too heavy for me, I cannot move it from its place.” Then the priest went up to the jug, crossed it and said: “Take it.” And I picked it up and looked at the priest with surprise: the jug felt completely light to me, as if weighing nothing. I poured water into the samovar and put the jug back with an expression of surprise on my face. And the priest asks me: “Well, what, a heavy jug?” - "No, father, I'm surprised, it's quite light." “So take the lesson that any obedience that seems difficult to us is very easy when performed, because it is done as an obedience.” But I was directly amazed: how he destroyed the force of gravity with one sign of the cross!

The clairvoyance of Elder Nectarios
“On one of my visits to Optina Pustyn,” said one of the elder’s contemporaries, “I saw how Fr. Nectarios read the sealed letters. He came to me with the received letters, of which there were about fifty, and, without opening them, began to sort them out. He put aside some letters with the words: “Here you need to give an answer, but these letters of thanks can be left unanswered.” He did not read them, but he saw their content. He blessed some of them, and kissed some of them, and he gave two letters, as if by chance, to my wife, and says: “Here, read them aloud. It will be useful". The content of one letter was forgotten by me, and the other letter was from one student of the Higher Women's Courses. She asked the priest to pray, as she was suffering and could not control herself. She fell in love with one priest, who captivated her with his incendiary sermons, and now she quit her studies and runs to him for all sorts of trifles, deliberately often fasts, only to touch him. Doesn't sleep at night. Batiushka responded to this letter and said: “You know this priest, and have dealt with him. He would later occupy a very big post, which he never thought of. He does not yet know anything about this, but he will receive this power due to the fact that he deviates from the truth. “What kind of priest is this,” I think, “well known to me?” Then the priest said that this was the student of the Theological Academy who came with me to Optina for the first time and who wooed my sister, but the Lord saved my sister through the elder Barsanuphius, for he upset this marriage ... (Now this priest can really be resides in the renovationist church and rules there). Sorting through the letters, oh. Nectarios says: “Here, they call me an elder. What an old man I am! When I receive more than a hundred letters every day, how about. Barsanuphius, then you can call him an elder who has so many spiritual children…” Having selected the letters, the priest took them to the secretary.
I remember another case with Fr. Nectarios. My wife, on one of our visits to Optina, painted a picture: a view from the monastery on the river, and on its low bank, at sunset, with a completely clear sky and a bright play of colors. She put her drawing on the open balcony and went for a walk with me through the forest. On the way, we argued, and seriously, so that we were completely upset, and did not want to look at each other. We return home: a picture immediately caught our eye: instead of a clear sky, thunderclouds and lightning are painted on it. We were stunned. Come closer and take a look. The paints are completely fresh, just applied. We called the girl who lived with us and asked who came to us. She replies that some short monk was doing something here on the balcony. We thought and thought who it could be, and from a more detailed description of the monk and interviews with others, we guessed what it was about. Nectary. It was he, who owned the brush, who symbolically depicted our spiritual state with his wife. And this thunderstorm with lightning made such an impression on us that we forgot our argument and made peace, because we wanted the sky of our life to clear up again and become completely clean and clear again.

* * *

The last time when mother Xenia was with the elder, he gave her a ball of nobody and said: “Here, wind this ball, you see how tangled it is.” She remembers that after the illness, the leukemia was very weak and therefore it was beyond her power, and he says: “Nothing, nothing, this is how your life will turn out; It will be difficult for you at the beginning, but then it will be good. So it was.

* * *

The elder predicted to mothers Alexia and Xenia, then still young, that they would have many children. He said: "Here you will leave for the Holy Land, and you will have many children." Mothers were horrified, because. thought to devote their lives to God, and not to have a family. And only in 1933, when they really lived already in a Russian monastery in the Holy Land, the elder's prophecy began to be fulfilled. First, they brought to them one 8-year-old girl, later mother Joanna, and then Vladyka Metropolitan Anastassy told mother Alexia to take Arab children to raise. She did not want to, since she painted icons all the time, but she did not dare to disobey the bishop. But when, six months later, after mother Joanna, her cousin was brought, and other children, including the three-year-old current mother Juliana in 1938, then matushka Alexia remembered the prophecy of Elder Nectarios. It must be said that in the Gornensky monastery, where they then lived, the charter was different than in Olivet and Gethsemane. The monastery was self-sufficient, and each sister had to earn a living. Therefore, each sister had the right to raise one novice for herself, or even more. So the mothers had "many children." After moving to Chile, they organized a shelter named after St. Righteous John of Kronstadt and the school. 89 children were brought up there.

* * *

Vladyka Theophan of Kaluga did not believe in the holiness of Elder Nektarios. When he visited Optina Pustyn and came to the elder, the elder did not pay any attention to him and took care of his dolls, which the children gave him as their most precious, out of love for the elder; O. Nektarios began to put one of the dolls into prison, saying something, he beat another, and punished the third. Vladyka Theophan decided that he was crazy. When the Bolsheviks took Vladyka and put him in prison, then he understood everything and said: “I am a sinner before God and before the elder: everything I said was about me, but I thought he was crazy.” While living in exile, Vladyka suffered greatly from his master, but did not complain. Lived with the Plokhins family.

* * *

Elder Nectarios also said: “Russia will rise and will not be rich materially, but it will be rich in spirit, and in Optina there will be seven more lamps, seven pillars.”

* * *

“I also got to the old man,” says one actor, “and this is how it happened.
The Russian poetess N., being in contact with him, once told me that during her last visit, the elder saw my portrait in her in the role of Hamlet. Looking at the portrait, he said:
- I see the manifestation of the spirit. Bring him to me.
Then, thanks to N., for the first time I learned about the existence of Elder Nectarios and, having gathered, I went to him.
“Don’t worry about your wife,” he said suddenly, “she is healthy and everything is safe at home with you.
Indeed, I have already begun to worry a lot about what is being done at home, in Moscow. The detectives, who always and everywhere followed me, could not help but know, it seemed to me, about my trip to the elder, and could come to my apartment without me. In the morning I saw his clairvoyance and knew that he was telling the truth.
Several times I managed to visit Elder Nectarios. He was always cheerful, laughed, joked and made happy everyone who came to him and spent at least a few minutes with him. He took upon himself the sins, burdens and sufferings of others - everyone who came into contact with him felt this, as I felt it too. When asked about this ability of him to give relief to those who came to him, he, answering, said: “When a lot of heaviness accumulates on my back, then the grace of God comes and, like dry leaves, sweeps it away, and again it is easy.”
Two or three times, already after the death of the elder, I saw him in a dream, and each time he gave me advice that led me out of spiritual difficulties, from which I could not get out on my own.

* * *

We give cases of clairvoyance about. Nectarius, handed over to us by Professor I. M. Andreev.
Professors Komarovich and Anichkov during a trip to Fr. Nectarios was arguing about the name glorification, and one of the professors, objecting to the name glorification, gave an example when the name of God is pronounced by a parrot or a gramophone record.
When these professors arrived at Fr. Nectarius with a desire to clarify this question from the elder, the latter preceded them and, before they had time to ask him about it, invited them to listen to the “tale”. The meaning of this tale was as follows: in one house, a parrot lived in a cage. The maid of this house was very religious and often repeated a short prayer: "Lord, have mercy!" The parrot learned to repeat this prayer too. Once, when the maid came out, forgetting to close the cage, a cat ran into the room and rushed to the cage. The parrot in it darted about and cried out in the voice of a maid: “Lord, have mercy!” Since the cat was very afraid of the maid, when she heard the voice of the latter, she ran away in fear. Both professors were very shocked by this story about. Nectaria.
One day, in 1927, Fr. Nektary instructed one of his spiritual sons to come to his acquaintances who lived on Aptekarsky Island in Petrograd, and at the same time said: “There you will meet with an accountant of a woodworking factory who will get you a job.” Having come to his acquaintances, this person really met the accountant of such a plant there. They met, and the latter got a job at his factory.

From the letters of nun Nektaria (Kontsevich)
We have one familiar family. The wife is a believer and a good Christian and prayer book, and the husband is a mocker of the fasts and a weak believer. Here they were in an extremely distressed situation and were selling the last. She diligently went to the temple, and her husband pestered her that she was smashing everything to the priests and that because of this they would die of hunger. In desperation, she was close to suicide and wanted to leave her husband, unable to endure his constant reproaches. In grief she turned to her grandfather. He told her through me: “Let a prayer service be served to St. Nicholas - the Lord will help her.” On the same day she sold some thing and served a prayer service to St. Nicholas. Two days later, her husband meets a friend who offers him a service. He gladly agrees, but here (in the USSR) a non-trade union member cannot get a job, and thousands of trade union members are waiting in line. He went to the one on whom his appointment depended. He says: "I'm even surprised how you can contact me, knowing the rules and seeing thousands of queues, but he is not a member." He returns to his comrade, he says: "I can't do anything without consent." He goes back to the trade union and says: "I'm dying, do a good deed at least once in your life - my life is in your hands." As a result, I got a job: one hundred and twenty rubles a month and four and a half rubles per day - about two hundred and fifty rubles in total, while our old employees in the Railway Administration and in other institutions receive thirty or forty rubles a month. Moreover, the service is traveling, and once a month he comes home as a welcome guest. You cannot understand the whole magnitude of this miracle without having an idea of ​​how difficult it is to get into the service here at all, and without knowing that it is absolutely impossible for a non-union member, and that every month we have staff cuts, and dozens of people are fired from the service, served even for ten or fifteen years. The wife has achieved everything: and he is not at home, so she prays and fasts without hindrance, and relations with her husband improved, and when he left, he said: “Pray for me.” It remains to exclaim: “Wonderful is God in His saints!”

* * *

In order not to bring on a person the sin of disobedience, or forgetfulness, or negligence, grandfather does not impose any rules on anyone, but, according to his prayers, the person himself, with the help of the Lord, comes across books that are suitable for him at a given time, meets people who can help him with this. What greatness of humility and love for people! How marvelous is God in His saints!

* * *

I noticed that if you only write a request for something to your grandfather, then at the same time help comes from him. Obviously, by the grace of God, his soul hears all the requests addressed to him.
My grandfather had such a case. One young girl came to ask for blessings for monasticism, and he said: “No, you will have a fiancé, you will get married, give birth to a son and he will weigh ten pounds ...” This is exactly what happened, and two years later she brought a lovely butuzik to father for blessing.
Lida B. looked for a whole year for some place and could not find it, in the summer she worked day by day on farms, for pennies: she plowed, cleaned the oxen, in a word - she suffered incredibly - she wanted to get a job as a cook, a laundress, and she could not anywhere. I advised her to pray for the health of the girl, and three days later she got a job as a teacher in the village. Her joy is indescribable.
You asked me to write what grandfather said the last time. When we arrived, Olezhok (her son, future Bishop Nektariy, ~1983) was ill. His temperature was 40 degrees. I say to the father: "Olezhok is sick," and he says, smiling: "It's good to be sick in good health." The next day he gave him an apple and said: "Here's your medicine." And when he blessed us on the way, he said: “When you feed the horses, let O. drink boiling water and be healthy.” We did just that, Olezhok drank boiling water, fell asleep and woke up, saying: “Mommy! I am well".

* * *

One boy complained to his grandfather that his comrades were offending him at school, and grandfather said, smiling: “And you call on George the Victorious for help, so you will defeat them all, they will only kick their legs.” That is exactly what happened. He, as he rushed at the bully himself, calling on St. George the Victorious for help, so he only twitched his legs and since then no one has touched him.
He blessed Olezhka to apply for a salary, and in a miraculous, one might say, way, he received it, and not only for this year, but for the whole of the past without any patronage, meanwhile, last year he was refused. Olezhok was blessed to study well, and so far he has been very satisfactory in all subjects that go to the certificate.
He blessed me to take lessons, and six students themselves asked for me, and all of them are smart, capable, believing kids!
Oh, how sad that we live far from grandfather and can rarely resort to his blessing.

* * *

The mother of two of the students of M. Nektaria instructed her to ask the elder what educational institution to send her sons to: “You don’t have to send them anywhere: it’s enough for them and what you teach them.” It was embarrassing for M. Nectaria to convey these words of the elder, because the mother of these children, little known to her, might have thought that she was saying this in order to keep her pupils. And so it happened: the mother just shrugged her shoulders and sent the children to school. There they fell into a bad community, became depraved, began to steal the clothes and belongings of their comrades, and then went out to rob the streets and fell into the number of juvenile delinquents.

* * *

Six years later, Fr. Nectarios that L-a will not be taken into military service. L., with the blessing of Fr. Nectaria, was engaged in physical education and became an instructor in this area. And so, at the draft board, he impressed everyone with his athletic build and health. The call seemed imminent. In the evening, L. had to come to the office for an indication of the destination. But there he was ordered to appear the next day. And so it was repeated several times. L. and all his relatives were worried, because, not understanding the reason for the delay, they feared that there might be political persecution. Finally, it was announced that L. was released from military service as a gymnastics instructor. It turned out that that year there were not enough instructors, and only in this call were they released.

Elder Nectarios and Patriarch Tikhon
One of the regular visitors Nektariya says: “Patriarch Tikhon was not with Fr. Nectarios, and the priest was not with the Patriarch. It seems that there was no correspondence between them. However, many issues were resolved by the Patriarch in accordance with the opinion of the elder. This happened through persons close to the Patriarch and communicating with the priest. The latter expressed his point of view on this or that question, or spoke allegorically, talking about some case. This conversation was passed on to the Patriarch, who always acted on the advice of the priest.”

Incorruptibility of the relics of Elder Nectarios
In 1935, it was reported to Moscow that robbers dug up the grave of an old man and opened the coffin, thinking to find valuables there. Then the priest's admirers, putting everything in order, discovered that the body was imperishable (E. G. Rymarenko. “Memoirs of the Optina hieroschemamonk Nectaria”).
“Two years ago, by chance, the grave of Father Nektariy was excavated. Linen and stockings have decayed, and the body is white. Peace to your ashes, dear father! ("Optina Pustyn and its time").
“In the 1930s, six or seven years after the burial, village hooligans dug up the grave at night, tore off the coffin lid and removed it from the face of the deceased. The open coffin was leaned against a tree. In the morning, the children drove the horses out of the night, saw the coffin and galloped to the village, shouting: "The monk got up." The collective farmers ran to the cemetery and saw that the old man was standing imperishable. Wax skin, soft hands. One woman gave a white silk scarf. They covered the face of the elder with it, closed the coffin again and lowered it into the grave with the singing of “Holy God.”
Then they said that a few days later the body of the elder was taken out and buried somewhere in the field with. Kholmischi" (Collection "Hope", issue 4, 1980, pp. 125-126).

Notes

"Grandfather" of m. Nektariy in all letters he calls St. Nectaria. Ed.

Among the great Optina elders, the last of them, Elder Nektary (Tikhonov), enjoyed special love. He was born in the city of Yelets in 1858 to poor parents Vasily and Elena Tikhonov and received the name Nikolai at baptism. His father worked at a mill and died early. Nicholas had the deepest spiritual intimacy with his mother. She was strict with him, but acted more with meekness and knew how to touch his heart. But her mother also died early. Nikolai remained an orphan at a young age.

In 1876, he came to Optina Hermitage, carrying only the Gospel in a knapsack behind his shoulders. "God! What beauty is here, the sun has been here since dawn, and what flowers! Like in paradise! - so the monk recalled his first impression of Optina. Nicholas was received by Elder Ambrose himself. A conversation with this great seer made such an impression on Nikolai that he remained forever in Optina. His spiritual leaders were the elders Anthony (Zertsalov) and Ambrose.

The first obedience of Nektariy was to take care of the flowers, then he was appointed to the sexton obedience. The door of his cell went straight towards the church. Here he lived for 25 years. Because of the obediences imposed on him, he was often late for services and came to church with red, swollen, as if sleepy eyes. The brothers complained about him to the elder Ambrose, and he answered, as was his custom, in rhyme: "Wait, Nikolka will sleep through - it will come in handy for everyone."

Obedience was given great importance. “The highest and first virtue is obedience. Christ came to us for the sake of obedience to His Father, and the life of man on earth is obedience to God.” Already in his mature years, Father Nektary himself said more than once: “Without the obedience of a person, a rush, burning, and then relaxation and cooling come. And in obedience, at first it is difficult, and then all obstacles are smoothed out.

During these years, Father Nektary read a lot and was engaged in self-education. He read not only spiritual literature, but also scientific, studied mathematics, history, geography, Russian and foreign classical literature, studied languages ​​- Latin and French. In 1894 Father Nektariy was ordained a hierodeacon, and four years later Archbishop Macarius of Kaluga ordained him a hieromonk. About his ordination, Father Nektarios said the following:

“When Vladyka Macarius consecrated me as a hieromonk, then, seeing my spiritual disorder, after the ordination he spoke to me a short and strong word. And this word was so strong that I still remember it - how many years have already passed - and I will not forget it until the end of my days. And how much did he tell me? He called to his altar and said: “Nectarius, when you are sorrowful and despondent, and when a heavy temptation comes upon you, you repeat only one thing: “Lord! Spare, save, and have mercy on me Thy servant." That's all the Lord said to me! But this advice saved me many times and still saves me, for it was spoken with authority.

What kind of misfortune this word saved him from, remained unknown, but the elder once told about several of his temptations. One was in the first years of his obedience. In his youth, he had a beautiful voice, and his ear for music was preserved into old age. In the first years of his life in Optina, he sang in the skete church on the right kliros and even had to sing "The Prudent Robber". But there was a custom in the skete: once a year during Great Lent, the monastery regent came to the skete and selected the best voices for the monastery choir. Brother Nikolai was also threatened with a transition from the skete to the monastery, but he did not want this. But singing "The Robber" was comforting and flattering. And yet, in the presence of the regent, he began to mercilessly falsify - so much so that he was transferred to the left kliros, and, of course, the question of his transfer was not raised again.

Another temptation befell him when, being a hieromonk, he became a semi-recluse. He almost stopped going out and sealed the windows of his cell with paper. He did this in order to strengthen his feat of prayer and self-education. Constant reading gave him, who had just graduated from a rural school, such versatile knowledge that he could freely talk about general cultural and special topics, and not just spiritual ones. He could talk about Pushkin and Shakespeare, Milton and Krylov, Spengler and Haggart, Blok, Dante, Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. In the hour of rest after dinner, he asked to read aloud to him Pushkin or some folk tales - Russians or the Brothers Grimm.

And so, having drawn from books the breadth and diversity of the world, he passionately wanted to travel in order to see with his own eyes what he was reading about. At this time, an order came to Optina from the Holy Synod to recommend one of the hieromonks to the fleet on a ship assigned to circumnavigate the world. Father Archimandrite proposed this appointment to Hieromonk Nectarius. He was so delighted and excited that, having come from the archimandrite, he began to collect things, forgetting for the first time that nothing is done in Optina without the elder's blessing. Only after a while he came to his senses and went for a blessing to Elder Joseph. But he did not bless him for this journey, and Father Nectarius resigned himself.

In order not to become proud, Father Nektariy began to play the fool little by little. For example, over a cassock, he wore colored sweaters; the food served in the refectory, he poured into one pot, all together - both sour, and sweet, and salty; he walked around the skete with a felt boot on one foot and a shoe on the other. He began to embarrass the monks even more during his eldership, when he acquired various toy cars, steamboats, trains and airplanes.

The transition from a secluded cell to public service was not easy for him. In 1913, at the insistence of Father Benedict, the abbot of Borovsky and the dean of the monasteries, the Optina brethren gathered to elect a new elder. First, eldership was offered to Archimandrite Agapit, who lived in Optina in retirement. He was a man of vast knowledge and lofty spirit, the author of an excellent biography of Elder Ambrose, who resolutely evaded the hierarchship that had been offered to him more than once. He also categorically refused eldership. Father Agapit kept only a few close students. One of them was Hieromonk Nectarios.

When the brethren began to ask Father Agapit to point out a worthy candidate, he named Father Nektary. The same one, in his humility, was not even present at the meeting. The brethren chose Fr. Nektariy as an elder in absentia and sent Fr. Averky after him. He comes and says: "Father, you are asked to attend the meeting." But Father Nektary refuses: “They will choose who they need without me.” - "Father Archimandrite sent me for you and asks you to come," Father Averky insisted. Then Father Nektary dutifully put on a cassock and, as he was - one foot in a shoe, the other in a felt boot - went to the meeting. “Father, you have been chosen as the confessor of our monastery and an elder,” they meet him. “No, fathers and brothers! I am a poor-witted person and I cannot bear such a burden, ”objects Father Nektariy. But the archimandrite tells him resolutely: "Father Nektary, accept obedience." And then he obeyed.

During this period, Elder Nektary became close to Konstantin Leontiev, who, while living in Optina, read his works in manuscript to him. He studied painting with academician Bolotov, who became a monk, and until the last days of his life he followed it, was interested in the latest trends in art and made sketches of icons. For example, he made a sketch of the Annunciation in the last year of his life in Optina.

Painting, for which Elder Nectarios had an ability, was especially close to him. “Now the art of painting is in decline,” he said. - Previously, the artist was preparing to paint a picture - both internally and externally. Before sitting down to work, he prepared everything he needed: canvas, paints, brushes, etc., and painted the picture not for several days, but for years, sometimes all his life, as, for example, the artist Ivanov his “Appearance of Christ to the people.” And then great works were created. And now artists paint in a hurry, without thinking through, without feeling... For example, when you paint a spiritual picture, you need the light not to fall on the Angel, but to flow from it.

The elder really wanted a picture of the Nativity of Christ to be created. “The world needs to remember this greatest event, because it happened only once in history! ... Shepherds in short robes torn at the edges stand facing the light, with their backs to the viewer. And the light is not white, but slightly golden, without any shadows and not in rays or sheaves, but all the time, only in the farthest edge of the picture is slightly dusk to remind that it is night. The light is all of angelic outlines, gentle, barely perceptible, and so that it is clear that this beauty is not earthly - heavenly, so that it is not human! - added the father with special force. And in another case, the elder said to one girl: “Why did the shepherds deign to see angels that night? Because they were awake.

Once the elder was shown the icon of the Transfiguration of the Lord, where the brightness of the Tabor light was achieved by contrast with the black knotted trees in the foreground. The elder ordered them to be erased, explaining that where the Light of Tabor is, there is no place for any blackness ... When this light lights up, each crack begins to glow.

Valuable memories of Elder Nectarios can be found in Father Vasily Shustin, who, together with his wife, visited him. “Batiushka tells me,” says Fr. Vasily - Shake out the samovar first, then pour water. The water is standing right there, in the corner, in a copper jug, take it and pour it.” The jug was massive, two buckets. I tried to move it, no - there is no power. And the father says to me: “You take a jug and pour water into the samovar.” - "Why, father, it's too heavy, I can't move it." Then the priest went up to the jug, crossed it and said: “Take it.” I raised. The pitcher seemed quite light to me.

After the evening prayer, the skete brethren came to Elder Nectarius to receive the blessing before going to bed. This was done every day, morning and evening. The monks all approached the blessing, bowed, and at the same time, some openly confessed their thoughts and doubts. Batiushka consoled some, encouraged them, and after confession, remitted their sins to others, resolved their doubts, and lovingly let go of all those who were at peace. It was a touching sight. During the blessing, the priest had an extremely serious and concentrated look, and in every word he spoke care and love for every restless soul. Then the priest retired to his cell and prayed for about an hour. After a long absence, the priest returned to us and cleared everything from the table.

On one of my visits to Optina Pustyn, - Father Vasily recalls, - I saw Father Nektariy reading sealed letters. He came to me with the received letters, of which there were about 50, and, without opening them, began to sort them out. Some he put aside with the words: "Here you need to give an answer, but these thanks can be left unanswered." He, without reading, saw their content. He blessed some of them, and even kissed some of them, and he gave two letters, as if by chance, to my wife and said: “Here, read them aloud, it will be useful.”

In 1914, my older brother (Fr. Vasily's brother) entered the Optina Skete as a novice and sometimes served as a cell attendant to Elder Nektariy. He often asked his father to send money to buy books of spiritual content and built his own library there. I was always indignant at this and said: "Once you left the world according to your calling, then break with your passions." And he had a passion for buying books. On this occasion, I wrote a letter to Father Nectariy with my indignation. The father did not answer. The brother continued. I wrote an even harsher letter to the priest, accusing him of not holding back his brother's passions. The father again did not answer. In 1917 I managed to go from the front with my wife to Optina. Batiushka greets us with a low bow and says: “Thank you for your sincerity. I knew that after the letters you would come yourself, I am always glad to see you. Always write such letters, and then come yourself for an answer. Now I will say that soon there will be a spiritual book famine. You won't get spiritual books. It is good that he is collecting this spiritual treasure, it will be very useful. The hard times are coming now. The number six has passed in the world and the number seven is coming, the age of silence. Shut up, shut up, - says the priest, and tears flow from his eyes. The humiliated sovereign suffers for his mistakes. In 1918 it will be even harder. - The sovereign and the whole family will be killed, tortured. One pious girl had a dream: Jesus Christ is sitting on the throne, and around him are 12 apostles, and terrible groans are heard from the earth. And the apostle Peter asks Christ: When, O Lord, will these torments end? - And Jesus Christ answers him: “I give the term until 1922. If people don’t repent, if they don’t come to their senses, then everyone will perish.” Right there, before the Throne of God, our Sovereign in the crown of the great martyr will stand. Yes, this Sovereign will be a great martyr. Recently, he redeemed his life, and if people do not turn to God, then not only Russia, but all of Europe will fail.

From the very beginning, Father Nektary did not want to become an elder and was weary of this obedience. Most of the time he lived closed in the cell of the elder Ambrose. Out of humility Father Nectarios said of himself: “Well, what kind of an elder am I, and how can I be the heir of the former elders? ... They had whole loaves of grace, but I only have a slice. On the table in his waiting room there was usually a book of some kind, open to a particular page. The visitor, in a long wait, began to read this book, not suspecting that this was one of the methods of Father Nektariy to give a warning, an indication or an answer to a question asked through an open book in order to hide his insight. The elder blessed the visitors with a wide sign of the cross. Slow in his movements and concentrated, he seemed to be carrying a bowl filled to the brim with precious moisture, as if afraid to spill it.

With the revolution, a period of severe trials began for Elder Nectarios. With the disintegration of the Optina Hermitage, Elder Nektary wanted to completely abandon the spiritual guidance of others and end his life as a wanderer. But then, in a dream, the Optina elders, who had died earlier, appeared to him and said: “If you want to be with us, then do not leave your children.” Elder Nectarios resigned himself to the cross laid upon him.

Optina Hermitage lasted until 1923, when all its churches were closed. Very little is known about the events of the post-revolutionary period. One eyewitness said that as the neighboring nunneries were liquidated, the nuns, like birds from the ruined nests, flocked to Optina. They had nowhere to go, and they immediately huddled. Crowds of laity also carried their grief here. They asked how to pray for loved ones who had not returned: the horrors of the revolution, the civil war inflicted losses on almost every family.

After the expulsion of Elder Nektary from Optina, the Bolsheviks brought an occultist to his cell in order to find, as they hoped, the treasures hidden here. It was night, and a kerosene lamp was burning in the elder's cell. The occult sorcerer began his sorcery, and although the lamp continued to burn, darkness fell in the room. There was a nun in the next room. She took the rosary of Fr. Nectarios and used it to draw the sign of the cross in the direction of the elder's cell. It immediately became light in his room, and the sorcerer struggled on the ground in convulsions of an epileptic fit.

The main features of Elder Nectarios were humility and wisdom. He approached each person personally, individually, with a special measure. He said, "You can't ask a fly to do the work of a bee." Outwardly, the monk was short, with a somewhat rounded face; long sparse strands of half-gray hair were knocked out from under the skuffi; in the hands of a pomegranate rosary. When confessing, he put on a red velvet stole with galloon crosses. His face, as it were, had no age: now senile, stern, now young and expressive, now childishly pure and calm. During the years of eldership, he was bent, with a small, wedge-shaped beard, thin, with constantly crying eyes. Therefore, he always had a handkerchief in his hands, which he applied to his eyes. He liked to keep himself in the background, to be hardly noticeable. There are almost no photographs of him, because he did not allow himself to be photographed. This is very characteristic of him.

Elder Nectarios died on April 29, 1928, in the village of Kholmishchi, Bryansk Region. They buried him in the local cemetery. He himself said during his lifetime that there would be no grave for him. Indeed, there was a war in those places. But the memory of Elder Nectarios was preserved by believers.

Despite all the upheavals of the revolution and the changes that took place during the years of communism, the grave of Elder Nectarios was nevertheless found. In 1992, the brethren of the restored Optina Monastery arrived at the burial place of the elder and began to dig. First, at a depth of 1.5 meters, they found the coffin of schema-nun Nectaria Kontsevich, the mother of Bishop Nectarius of Seattlia and the novice of Elder Nectarius, and then lower and a little to the side, a coffin with the relics of Elder Nectarius. When the coffin of the elder was opened, everyone felt the fragrance; his mantle was incorruptible. On Sunday, July 16, the solemn transfer of the relics of Elder Nectarius from the cemetery of the village of Kholmishchi to the Vvedensky Cathedral of Optina Hermitage took place.

Thus, one of the most comforting predictions of Elder Nektariy began to come true: “Russia will rise and will not be rich materially, but it will be rich in spirit, and there will be 7 more lamps, 7 pillars in Optina.”