The Holy New Martyrs of Eastern Russia 2
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1 THE HOLY NEW MARTYRS OF EASTERN RUSSIA 2 1. HIEROMARTYR JOACHIM, ARCHBISHOP OF NIZHNY-NOVGOROD ..........................3 2. HIEROMARTYR LAURENCE, BISHOP OF BALAKHNA .....................................................7 3. HIEROMARTYR AMBROSE, BISHOP OF SARAPUL ..........................................................16 4. HIEROMARTYR HERMAN, BISHOP OF VOLSK .................................................................20 5. HIEROMARTYR METROPHANES, ARCHBISHOP OF ASTRAKHAN ............................21 6. HIEROMARTYR LEONTIUS, BISHOP OF TSAREVO ..........................................................25 7. HIEROCONFESSOR PHILARET, ARCHBISHOP OF SAMARA.........................................26 8. HIEROMARTYR SERGIUS, BISHOP OF BUZULUK.............................................................27 9. HIEROCONFESSOR MICAH, BISHOP OF UFA....................................................................34 10. HIEROMARTYR STEPHEN, BISHOP OF IZHEVSK........................................................... 38 11. HIEROCONFESSOR VICTOR, ARCHBISHOP OF VYATKA ............................................47 12. HIEROMARTYR SINESIUS, BISHOP OF IZHEVSK............................................................69 13. HIEROMARTYR NECTARIUS, ARCHBISHOP OF YARANSK ........................................72 14. HIEROMARTYR CYRIL, METROPOLITAN OF KAZAN ..................................................90 15. HIEROMARTYR JOASAPH, BISHOP OF CHISTOPOL ...................................................102 16. HIEROMARTYR RAPHAEL, BISHOP OF ALEXANDROVSK ........................................121 17. HIEROMARTYR BENJAMIN, BISHOP OF STERLITAMAK ...........................................122 18. HIEROMARTYR NICHOLAS, BISHOP OF AKTAR ......................................................... 135 19. HIEROCONFESSOR PAUL, BISHOP OF KOTELNICHI ..................................................149 20. HIEROMARTYR ZENOBIUS, ARCHBISHOP OF TAMBOV ...........................................150 21. HIEROCONFESSOR PETER, SCHEMA-BISHOP OF NIZHEGOROD ........................... 152 22. HIEROCONFESSOR BENJAMIN, BISHOP OF BAIKI ......................................................206 23. HIEROCONFESSOR BARNABAS, BISHOP OF VASILSURSK ........................................208 24. HIEROMARTYR MICHAEL, BISHOP OF CHISTOPOL ...................................................221 25. HIEROCONFESSOR BARSANUPHIUS, BISHOP OF BUINSK .......................................223 26. HIEROMARTYRS AND MARTYRS OF NIZHNI-NOVGOROD VYATKA AND KOMI PROVINCES ...................................................................................................................................229 27. HIEROMARTYRS AND MARTYRS OF KAZAN PROVINCE .........................................301 28. HIEROMARTYRS AND MARTYRS OF PENZA, TAMBOV, LIPETSK AND MORDOVIA PROVINCES ...........................................................................................................365 29. HIEROMARTYRS AND MARTYRS OF THE MIDDLE AND LOWER VOLGA REGION ..........................................................................................................................................................387 30. HIEROMARTYRS AND MARTYRS OF ORENBURG PROVINCE .................................431 31. HIEROMARTYRS AND MARTYRS OF UFA PROVINCE ...............................................491 32. HIEROMARTYRS AND MARTYRS OF SAROV AND DIVEYEVO................................514 3 1. HIEROMARTYR JOACHIM, ARCHBISHOP OF NIZHNY- NOVGOROD Archbishop Joachim, in the world John Ioakimovich Levitsky, was born on March 30, 1853 in the village of Petrushek, Kiev province, the son of a junior deacon (according to another source, reader) of the Kiev diocese. He was educated in the Kiev Sophia theological school and the Kiev theological seminary. On March 30, 1879, he graduated from Kiev Theological Academy with the degree of candidate of theology. On August 9 he was appointed a teacher in the Riga theological seminary. On June 24, 1880, he was ordained to the priesthood for Riga cathedral. He was married with two sons. Between 1883 and 1886 he was a teacher of the Law of God in the Riga infantry school and in the Tailova higher maidens’ private school. In 1886 his wife died. On June 28, 1893, he was tonsured, and the next day became rector of the Riga theological seminary with the rank of archimandrite. While in Riga, he was editor of the diocesan journal, and wrote several articles for it on the ecclesiastical history of the Baltic region with a historical-statistical description of the diocese. On January 14, 1896 Fr. Joachim was consecrated Bishop of Baltsk, a vicariate of the Kamenets-Podolsk diocese. On May 24, 1897 he became bishop of Brest, a vicariate of the Lithuanian diocese, and on January 13, 1900 - bishop of Grodno and Brest. On November 26, 1903 he was appointed bishop of Orenburg and Uralsk, and in November 15, 1908 - bishop of Orenburg and the Turgai. Vladyka was a man of outstanding spiritual gifts, a fiery preacher with a warm, responsive heart. While in Orenburg, he protected and greatly expanded the diocese's missionary work among the Kirghiz, Bashkirs and Tatars, and a huge number of them were converted to the Orthodox Faith during his episcopate. The Tatar language was introduced into the teaching of the Orenburg seminary, as was the compulsory study of Islam. Vladyka managed to find resources for the upkeep of four diocesan missionaries with a good annual salary. He personally converted many sectarians and Old Ritualists to the Orthodox Faith, and founded several yedinovertsy parishes, serving in them himself according to the old books. In 1905 in the village of Sukhorechensky he converted (with the help of the local missionaries) the Old Ritualist priest Fr. Sabbas Sladky, who brought with him several hundred families into the yedinoveriye. A big parish was formed, and every year many families were added to it. In the conversion of the Old Ritualists Vladyka was greatly helped by the Synodal missionary Fr. Xenophon Kryuchkov, who had been Orenburg diocesan missionary during the 1880s. Thanks to their joint labours in the Urals region, 50 yedinovertsy parishes, each with their clergy, were founded in the vast region from Orenburg to the Caspian Sea. Hundreds and 4 thousands of Cossacks and non-Cossacks living in the Cossack villages were converted to yedinoveriye Orthodoxy, and every year tens of new parishes were added to the diocese. In 1903, a movement of resettlement from the southern districts of Russia to the Turgai region began. Spiritually speaking, the settlers were left to cope for themselves. Thus the Turgai settlers were forgotten about, and the Chief resettlement administration concentrated its attention on the peasants of Siberia, the Altai and the Far East. Many sectarians came with the settlers from the southern regions of Russia to the Turgai. In each settlement there were Baptists or Seventh Day Adventists, whose semi-literate "priests" and pastors wasted no time in founding their own prayer assemblies. But the Orthodox were like sheep without a shepherd, and had no place in which to satisfy their spiritual needs. The sectarians took advantage of this and began to invite the Orthodox to their prayer meetings. Soon the Orthodox settlers began to fill up the sectarian prayer meetings and without realizing it themselves became members of sectarian communities. Children were born, the old died, the young entered into conjugal relationships - and there was nobody to carry out the rites. The Orthodox population experienced particular hardships during the Great Fast and on great feasts. In one settlement the Orthodox gathered on Pascha night on a site which had been set aside for the construction of a church, erected six bells which had been brought from Tauris province, rang them for several minutes, chanted "Christ is risen" as best they could, and then dispersed despondently to their huts and dugouts to break the fast. On such days the sectarians arranged their triumphant prayer services and insistently invited the Orthodox to come and "listen to the chanting and preaching". Many went unwillingly, but then stayed for ever. From June, 1906 to the beginning of 1907, Bishop Joachim sent two diocesan missionary priests to Turgai. They established that the whole region was in captivity to the sectarians. This missionary trip had a reviving effect on the waverers: people brought tens of babies for baptism; young newly married couples came asking that they "receive the law", that is, be married according to the Orthodox rite; and many believers asked for pannikhidas to be performed for those who had died without a church rite. On the return of the missionaries, Bishop Joachim sent a report to the Holy Synod, which then assigned 50,000 roubles above the normal annual budget for the construction of churches and schools in the Turgai region. Special missionary courses were organized in Orenburg and Kustanai, at which candidates for the priesthood were trained for four months. These were mainly teachers, readers and experienced deacons. Churches, schools and hospitals were built, and every central point received a priest-teacher. A new life began in the Turgai region. Many zealous pastors from other regions asked to do missionary work in the Turgai, and in this way the whole region 5 was soon covered with well-organized parishes led by principled pastors. An end was put to sectarian propaganda. Those who had been lured into the sects were converted without difficulty to Orthodoxy.