This saint was distinguished during his lifetime by great physical strength. The family told him military career, but he chose monastic service and went to Athos. However, his path was associated with many doubts and trials. It often seemed to the monk that he had already achieved holiness during his lifetime, or, on the contrary, after some time he stopped believing in himself and plunged into the abyss of despair. And despite such differences, he was still able to become a saint. However, not everyone has heard his name. Who is Silouan of Athos, what do people mean to him? Here are the answers to many exciting questions.
What does a saint help with?
This saint became famous for many miracles and the gift of healing. Very often, after his death, he helped even seriously ill people with dangerous diseases, including such as cancer, to recover. True, for this there must be sincere and fervent prayer. However, this is not all that Saint Silouan of Athos is famous for, for which they pray to him. It is believed that he helps the military restore strength and health, and also, through his holy prayers, an invasion of enemies and a fratricidal war may not occur.
It is also worth praying to this saint if a person is tormented by passion, addiction and pain. For example, a man suffers alcohol addiction, can't stop or the girl is in love with married man who does not need it, and this causes great suffering. In the church, passion and suffering are words with similar meanings. Therefore, it is definitely worth praying to Silouan of Athos if a person suffers from some very strong passion. Here are the 2 main prayers that are read to this elder.
Also, for those who are little familiar with the life of this saint, the priests advise reading his quotes and teachings about Christian life. Of course, much of what is written was created for monks, those who have chosen exactly this path, but some advice helps get rid of passion or resist it at least for a while. This is exactly what Silouan of Athos helps with, what other people pray to him for. Therefore, those who cannot cope with passion or addiction should turn to Saint Silouan in prayer.
When will the effect of prayer occur?
If it is more or less clear who Silouan of Athos is and what they pray to him for, then when and how will the result come about? It all depends not only on the sincerity of your prayer, but also on your own willpower and desire to cope with passion. However, it may not work out the first time. Therefore, you need to read the prayer systematically until the passion itself leaves your heart. But this does not happen for everyone right away, so, of course, in addition to prayer, make volitional efforts.
Silouan of Athos is a man who learned from his own experience that prayers and requests addressed to God never go unheard. By praying before the face of the saint, everyone can get rid of sins and know the power and strength of the Almighty.
The Monk Silouan of Athos is known as a monk with extraordinary faith in God and the power of prayer. Having abandoned all the pleasures of life, at the age of 30 he entered the Panteleimon Monastery, where he decided to become a monk and devote himself forever Orthodox religion. Before last days During his life, people turned to Silouan of Athos for advice and blessings, and after his death he was canonized and began to be revered as a saint.
History of the icon of Silouan of Athos
While still in at a young age, the Monk Silouan of Athos decided that he would lead an ascetic lifestyle in accordance with church rules, and decided to leave his home and become a monk. However, the father insisted that his son think carefully about this decision, after which the future monk moved away from religion for a while, and temptations and pleasures took their place. earthly world. However, he soon returned to the righteous path, from which he never left.
How does the image of Silouan of Athos help?
In front of the icon of Silouan of Athos they pray for deliverance from sins, for the health and happiness of others, for the preservation of the family, so that atheists can find faith, for an end to wars and riots, for peace and equality in the world.
The prayers said in front of the icon of the reverend monk have special power, since during his lifetime Silouan of Athos himself gave prayers special meaning. He believed that as long as prayer is alive, the world is safe, but as soon as it weakens, the world will collapse.
Prayer before the icon
“O reverend and wonderful Father Silouan! By God's grace It has been given to you to pray for the salvation of the dead and the living, sinners and sinless, healthy and sick. Help us, Most Holy Silouan, to find the same faith, to be saved and protected by God. Thank the Holy Virgin Mary for enlightening and protecting us, servants of God. All the people sincerely ask you: turn from us to our Almighty, may He hear our prayers, may He see our faith, may He bless us sinners and protect us from terrible diseases, from evil people and from deadly wars. Hear us, Father Silouan, and convey our prayers to God. Amen!"
Days of celebration icons
Every year on September 24 Orthodox Church pays tribute to the memory of the holy monk. On this day, according to religious traditions, not only in Russia, but also in other countries, solemn services are held. People pray to the image of Silouan of Athos and ask him for what they want.
The personality of Silouan of Athos became a shining example that sincere prayer and unshakable faith will help God hear you. If such an icon protects your home, then peace will reign in it, and your loved ones will always be healthy. Take care of yourself and your familyand don't forget to press the buttons and
24.09.2017 05:32
Saint Melania is revered by women all over Orthodox world. The icon of this saint can protect girls from harm...
The book “Reverend Silouan of Athos” has been published. The book contains instructions, advice, reflections of the Monk Silouan, memories of him.
Venerable Silouan of Athos (1866-1938) - schemamonk, elder, ascetic of gigantic fortitude, witness of Divine love. Schemamonk Silouan (Semyon Antonov) was born into a peasant family in Tambov province, completed military service in the lower ranks, then lived in a monastery for forty-six years.
One of the first lessons of the young novice was the instruction to constantly repeat the Jesus Prayer. While praying before the image of the Mother of God, prayer entered his heart and began to take place there day and night. But then he did not yet understand the greatness and rarity of the gift he received from the Mother of God. As time passed, the spiritual strength of the inexperienced novice began to dry up, and he felt completely abandoned. And on the same day, in the church, near the icon of the Savior, he saw the living Christ. The entire being and the very body of the novice were filled with the fire of the grace of the Holy Spirit.
Once having come to know Divine love by the Holy Spirit, he began to experience the loss of grace incomparably more deeply and sharply and said: “Whoever has lost it tirelessly seeks it day and night and is drawn to it.” He explained about the loss of grace: “It is lost by us for pride and vanity, for hostility towards a brother, for condemning a brother, for envy, it leaves us for a lustful thought, for an addiction to earthly things, for all this grace leaves, and a devastated and sad soul Then he misses God, just as our father Adam missed his expulsion from paradise.” Fifteen years after Christ appeared to him, the monk Silouan labored in fierce spiritual warfare. According to the elder himself, the Lord took pity on him and Himself taught him how the soul should humble itself and become impregnable to enemies. “Grace no longer leaves him as before; he carries it tangibly in his heart; he feels the living presence of God,” Archimandrite Sophrony (Sakharov) wrote about this.
And Archimandrite Sophrony wrote about the elder: “A will of rare strength - without stubbornness; simplicity, freedom, fearlessness and courage - with meekness and gentleness; humility and obedience - without humiliation and people-pleasing - this was truly a man, the image and likeness of God.”
Saint Nicholas (Velimirovich) spoke about the Monk Silouan of Athos: “Only one thing can be said about this wondrous monk - a sweet soul.”
Elder Silouan explained about prayer: “Many, out of inexperience, say that such and such a saint performed a miracle, but I learned that it is the Holy Spirit, Who lives in man, who works miracles. The Lord wants everyone to be saved and to be with Him forever, and therefore listens to the prayers of a sinful person, for the benefit of others, or the one who prays.”
He also explained: “And when the Lord wants to have mercy on someone, he inspires others with the desire to pray for him, and helps in this prayer. Therefore, you should know that when the desire to pray for someone comes, it means that the Lord Himself wants to have mercy on that soul and mercifully listens to your prayers.”
The elder warned: “If someone prays to the Lord and thinks about something else, then the Lord will not listen to such a prayer.”
He also said: “He who knows the love of God loves the whole world and never grumbles about his fate, for temporary sorrow for the sake of God brings eternal joy.”
Reverend Father Silouane, pray to God for us!
Interview with the antiprosop of the Russian Panteleimon Monastery at the Holy Cinema of Athos, Hieromonk Kirion (Olkhovik), one of the two Holy Mountain residents accompanying the relics of St. Silouan of Athos.
Father Kirion agreed to talk, noting before that he never gives interviews, but now he takes it as obedience. All his composure and taciturnity reveal the spirit of the Holy Mountain. His movement through the streets during the days when the relics are in Russia is complicated by numerous questions, requests for prayerful help and requests for spiritual advice. Father Kirion answers very quietly, with his eyes downcast.
— It is significant that in the year of the 100th anniversary of the presence of Russian monasticism on Mount Athos and the days of celebration of the 150th anniversary of the birth of St. Silouan of Mount Athos, his relics arrived in our country for the first time. What significance does the bringing of the relics of this saint have for Russia?
“You see, in the spiritual world nothing happens by chance. And in this moment, when a Russian Orthodox person and Russia as a whole require spiritual help, the Lord determined that his saint - the Monk Silouan, a native of Russia, from deep Russia (Tambov province) should come to help and strengthen the people, because the situation now is truly turbulent, this can also be felt on Athos.
— Is the spiritual heritage of St. Silouan relevant today? To modern man Is it clear what he is talking about?
- Very relevant! First of all, the teachings of Saint Silouan are valuable for us, the Holy Mountain inhabitants who reside on Mount Athos, and for monks in general, because he is the patron saint of monastics. It is even more relevant than the legacy of many other elders, because he is our contemporary, our compatriot. He very deeply, but at the same time simply examines all the issues that modern monasticism faces. However, in simple and accessible language he responds to the needs of modern secular society.
— You were in the homeland of the Monk Silouan in the village of Shovskoye...
- Yes, they reconstructed it there parents' house. By this day, a large restoration work, was bought from a private person and put in order land plot on which the house stands. This was done by Mother Juliania (Kaleda), abbess Conception Monastery. In the house where the monk grew up, we were shown a hook on the ceiling; apparently, a cradle was attached to it, in which the mother rocked the venerable Silouan as a baby. The house has low ceilings and a Russian stove. It is interesting to see the nature in which he was brought up, to feel the atmosphere in which the saint grew physically and spiritually. We met with his relatives. They say there are still about twenty relatives left, but everyone lives in different places.
- Moscow is last point your journey...
- Yes it last city. The relics will remain here for a few more days, and on the 24th, the day of remembrance of St. Silouan of Athos, we fly home to Athos. On this day the brethren will wait for the monk to worship him.
— What was your impression of the trip? How did people greet you? Interested to know which one you found? modern Russia, because a person who has lived on Mount Athos for many years sees everything differently.
- Here's what caught my eye: western culture penetrates into Russia. The trends that we see in Greece penetrate here too. This is the spirit of the times, and there is little that can be done against it. I found Russia back in old times, and the current picture is very different from the Russia I left.
I was also impressed by the piety and reverence of the believers. They come with their own spiritual problems, which everyone has always had and still has. And the Monk Silouan, as a healer and helper in bringing people to God, accepts everyone - he has such a mission. Well, for us monks, such long departures from the monastery are very difficult. But seeing what spiritual benefit the Monk Silouan brings to those who come to him, we are strengthened, this inspires us.
Together with the relics, she left the monastery walls for the first time miraculous icon Savior. The Monk Silouan prayed before her, and one day, during such prayer, our Lord Jesus Christ Himself appeared to him. Now everyone can venerate this icon.
- A lot of people are coming to the relics?
— At the moment, the figure is 200-220 thousand people.
— Can you tell us a little about the technical side of such a large-scale event as the bringing of relics? How is organization and transportation carried out?
- Well, firstly, you need to go through documentary procedures. You need to obtain permission from the Council of Elders of the monastery, then permission from the Holy Kinot of Holy Mount Athos (the central executive council governing body of Holy Mount Athos - ed.) and permission from the Ecumenical Patriarch. All this is documented, certified, and obligations are given from the Russian side that order, security and transportation will be ensured.
— Are the relics themselves placed in some kind of special armored ark?
- No, there is nothing like that, the relics are in their usual ark, but it is accompanied by monks from the Holy Mountain and representatives of the security services, they monitor everything that happens near the relics.
— During the bringing of the honest Belt to Russia Holy Mother of God, there were people who did not approve of this. However, during the period of the shrine’s stay and after a long time, the Lord performed obvious miracles through it, and many changed their views. Have similar cases been noticed at the relics of St. Silouan?
— With such miracles the Lord shows the Triumph of Orthodoxy. But the fact is that visible healings are not decisive and important factor, because the most important thing is the healing of a person from sin, spiritual healing. What I observed were the screams of the possessed. When spirits torment a soul, this manifests itself very intensely at the relics. The spirits are afraid of the grace of God, which is present at the relics, they are indignant and begin to demonstrate it.
I saw people's peace, inspiration, enlightenment. Maybe some things that happen to people are simply not advertised or are discovered later. When the relics of the healer Panteleimon were brought to Russia, many healings were revealed, but people wrote to us about them only after a lapse of time.
— Now we are celebrating the millennium of the presence of Russian monasticism on Holy Mount Athos. Why is this presence so important and valuable?
— According to historical data, our monasticism has been on the Mountain since the time of Prince Vladimir. Even the Byzantine emperors were interested in this; this can be traced from some documents; this fact is recorded by historians, including Greek ones. The 1000th anniversary is still a conditional date. We take the year 1016 as our starting point, because in the act of the Great Lavra for February of that year, among the twenty-two signatures of the abbots of the Athos monasteries, there is the signature “Gerasim the monk, by the grace of God presbyter and abbot of the monastery of Ros.” But probably, Russian monasticism originated on Athos even earlier. And from that time on, a whole galaxy of Russian Holy Mountain residents appeared, who brought Russian experience into the general Athos spiritual treasury. Among the Russian monks there was a whole host of people who became famous for their holiness, including the Monk Silouan of Athos.
Russian monasticism has brought a lot of benefits to the cause of spiritual growth.
— Tell us a little about the Panteleimon Monastery itself on Mount Athos. What is he like now? When you arrived there in 1987, it was in a difficult situation.
— A lot has changed. Firstly, over the 20th century our monastery has undergone great severe trials both in terms of material and human resources. The monastery, one might say, was deserted. In those years of hard times, we suffered from fires, from floods, from the fact that the routes to us were cut off, the authorities Soviet Russia They forbade people to come to our monastery; Greece also had its own problems. Therefore, at the beginning of the 20th century, our Russian monasticism, which numbered about five thousand people throughout the Holy Mountain, began to die out, the elders left, and almost no young monks came. And when we arrived, there was great desolation there. Now everything has changed, since the mid-90s the revival of the monastery began, the monastery has been landscaped both from the inside and from the outside. Of course, all this is pleasing to the eye. His Holiness Patriarch During his visit to us on the occasion of the celebration, he noted changes for the better. He came to us when he was still an archimandrite, and found the monastery in those difficult times.
— Continuity and traditions have been preserved in the monastery, although in many monasteries this thread was severed due to persecution and execution of the clergy. Not so long ago, your abbot, Schema-Archimandrite Jeremiah, passed away to the Lord...
- Yes, we are orphans. Our father passed away at an old age, at the 101st year of his life, he passed away unexpectedly, we hoped that he would overcome all his human infirmities and stay with us for a while longer, but he left us. Now the election of a new rector is coming, and we ask all the saints to help us in this. The abbot must be not just a manager, but a mentor of his spiritual family.
- Certainly! He always encouraged that there should be peace, cooperation and love among each other. Only in an atmosphere of peace and love can the younger generation grow spiritually. After all, the Lord said, where two or three are gathered in My name, I am in the midst of you.
— And finally, tell us what they pray to St. Silouan of Athos. This will be useful for those who are going to come and venerate his relics.
— What a person will ask for depends on his spiritual level. If a person is of an infant spiritual age, he will ask for something worldly, and the Lord will condescend to this. A person who is stronger spiritually will ask for help in spiritual life. And the Monk Silouan will hear the requests of everyone who, with sincere faith in God, asks for his intercession.
There lived a man on earth, a man of gigantic spiritual strength, his name was Silouan. He prayed for a long time with uncontrollable crying: “Have mercy on me,” but God did not listen to him. Many months of such prayer passed, and the strength of his soul was exhausted; he reached despair and exclaimed: “You will not beg!” And when with these words something broke in his soul, exhausted from despair, he suddenly for a moment saw the living Christ; fire filled his heart and whole body with such force that if the vision had lasted another moment, he would have died. Afterwards, he could never forget the inexpressibly meek, infinitely loving, joyful, incomprehensible peace-filled gaze of Christ, and the subsequent long years throughout his life he tirelessly testified that God is love, immeasurable, incomprehensible love.
We have a word about him, this witness of Divine love.
Athonite schemamonk Father Silouan (secular name - Semyon Ivanovich Antonov) was born in 1866 in the Tambov province, Lebedinsky district, Shovsky volost and village. He came to Mount Athos in 1892 and was tonsured in 1896; to the schema - in 1911. The obedience took place: at the Mill, at the Kalamarei metoch (the property of the Monastery outside Athos), in Old Nagorno-Rusik, in Economy. Died on September 24, 1938. These few facts are drawn from the form of the Athos Monastery.
From “born” to “died” - everything is poor, there is nothing to talk about; touching the inner life of a person before God is an immodest, daring matter. In the midst of the square of the world, to discover the “deep heart” of a Christian is almost sacrilege; but confident that now the old man, who has left the world as a conqueror of the world, is no longer afraid of anything, nothing will disturb his eternal peace in God, let us allow ourselves an attempt to talk about his extremely rich, royally rich life, bearing in mind those few who and they themselves are drawn to the same divine life.
Many, coming into contact with monks in general and Elder Silouan in particular, do not see anything special in them and therefore remain dissatisfied and even disappointed. This happens because they approach the monk with the wrong standards, with the wrong demands and quests.
A monk is in constant feat, and often extremely intense, but an Orthodox monk is not a fakir. He is not at all interested in achieving, through special exercises, a unique development of psychic powers, which so appeals to many ignorant seekers mystical life. The monk wages a strong, strong, stubborn battle, some of them, like Father Silouan, wage a titanic struggle, unknown to the world, to kill the proud beast within themselves, to become a man, a genuine person, in the image perfect man Christ, i.e. meek and humble.
Strange, incomprehensible to the world Christian life; everything in it is paradoxical, everything is in order, as if in reverse to the order of the world, and there is no way to explain it in words. The only way to understanding is to do the will of God, i.e. keep the commandments of Christ; the path indicated by Himself.
Childhood and young years
From the long life of the elder, I would like to cite several facts that are indicative of his inner life and at the same time his “history.” The first of them relates to his early childhood when he was no more than 4 years old. His father, like many Russian peasants, loved to show hospitality to strangers. One day, on a holiday, with particular pleasure he invited a certain bookseller to his place, hoping from him, as a “bookish” person, to learn something new and interesting, for he was languishing in his “darkness” and greedily reached out for knowledge and enlightenment. The guest was offered tea and food in the house. Little Semyon (worldly name) looked at him with the curiosity of a child and listened carefully to the conversation. The book carrier proved to his father that Christ is not God and that there is no God at all. The boy Semyon was especially struck by the words: “Where is He, God?” and he thought: “When I grow up big, I will go all over the earth to seek God.” When the guest left, Semyon said to his father: “You teach me to pray, but he says that there is no God.” To this the father said: “I thought that he clever man, but he turned out to be a fool. Do not listen to him." But the father’s answer did not erase the doubts from the boy’s soul.
Many years have passed since then. Semyon grew up, became a big healthy guy and worked not far from their village, on the estate of Prince Trubetskoy. They worked as a team, Semyon as a carpenter. The artel workers had a cook, a village woman. One day she went on a pilgrimage and visited the grave of the remarkable ascetic - the recluse John Sezenovsky (1791-1839). Upon her return, she told about the holy life of the recluse and that miracles happened at his grave. Some of those present confirmed the stories of miracles, and everyone said that John was a holy man.
Hearing this conversation, Semyon thought: “If he is a saint, then God is with us, and there is no need for me to walk all over the earth to look for Him,” and at this thought, the young heart burned with love for God.
An amazing phenomenon: from the age of four to the age of nineteen, the thought that sank into the child’s soul upon hearing the book-seller lasted; a thought that apparently weighed on him, remaining unresolved somewhere in the depths, and which was resolved in such a strange and seemingly naive way.
After Semyon felt that he had gained faith, his mind clung to the memory of God, and he prayed a lot and cried. Then he felt an internal change in himself and an attraction to monasticism, and, as the Elder himself said, on the young beautiful daughters He began to look at the prince with love, but without desire, as if he were sisters, whereas before their appearance bothered him. At that time, he even asked his father to let him go to the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, but his father categorically replied: “First finish your military service, and then you will be free to go.”
Semyon remained in such an unusual state for three months; then it retreated from him, and he again began to make friends with his peers, walk with girls outside the village, drink vodka, play the harmonica, and generally live like other village boys.
Young, handsome, strong, and by that time already wealthy, Semyon enjoyed life. In the village they loved him for his good, peaceful and cheerful character, and the girls looked at him as if he were eligible groom. He himself became interested in one of them and, before the question of marriage was raised, in the late evening hour“the usual thing” happened to them.
It is remarkable that the next morning, when he was working with his father, he quietly said to him: “Son, where were you yesterday, my heart ached.” These meek words of his father sank into Semyon’s soul, and later, remembering him, the Elder said: “I did not come to the measure of my father. He was completely illiterate, and even read “Our Father” with an error, saying “day” instead of “today,” he learned by ear in church, but he was a meek and wise man.”
They had big family: father, mother, five brothers-sons and two daughters. They lived together and amicably. The adult brothers worked with their father. One day, during the harvest, Semyon had to cook lunch in the field; it was Friday; Forgetting about this, he cooked some pork, and everyone ate. Six months have passed since that day, already in the winter, on some holiday, the father says to Semyon with a soft smile: Son, remember how you fed me pork in the field? But it was Friday; you know, I ate her like a bitch then.
- Why didn’t you tell me then?
“Son, I didn’t want to embarrass you.”
Elder Silouan was quite big physical strength. He was still very young, before military service, one Easter, after a hearty meat dinner, when his brothers went out to visit people and he stayed at home, his mother offered him “scrambled eggs”; he did not refuse; his mother cooked him a whole cast iron, up to fifty eggs, and he ate it all.
In those years, he worked with his brothers on the estate of Prince Trubetskoy, and on holidays he sometimes went to the tavern; There were cases that he drank a “quarter” (2.5 liters) of vodka in one evening, but he was never drunk.
One day, in severe frost Having struck after the thaw, he sat in the inn. One of the guests who spent the night there wanted to return home; He went to harness his horse, but soon returned, saying:
- Trouble! I need to go, but I can’t: the ice has covered the horse’s hooves in a thick layer, and the pain makes it impossible for her to fight it off.
Semyon says: “Come on, I’ll help you.”
At the stable, he took the horse’s neck near the head under the armpit and said to the man: “Brace it.” The horse stood motionless the entire time; the man knocked the ice off his hooves, harnessed it and drove away.
With his bare hands, Semyon could take hot cast iron with cabbage soup and transfer it from the stove to the table at which their team was working. With a blow of his fist he could break a fairly thick board. He lifted heavy weights and had great endurance in both heat and cold, he could eat a lot and work hard.
But this power, which later served him to accomplish many extraordinary feats, was at that time the cause of his great sin, for which he brought extreme repentance.
Once, on the patronal holiday of the village, in the afternoon, when all the residents were happily talking near their huts, Semyon and his comrades walked along the street, playing the harmonica. Two brothers walked towards them - the shoemakers of the village. The eldest, a man of enormous stature and strength, a great brawler, was “tipsy.” When they drew level, the shoemaker mockingly began to take the accordion from Semyon; but he managed to hand it over to his friend. Standing opposite the shoemaker, Semyon persuaded him to “go on” his way, but he, apparently intending to show his superiority over all the guys in the village on a day when all the girls were on the street and laughing at the scene, attacked Semyon. And here is how the Elder himself spoke about it:
“At first I thought of giving in, but suddenly I felt ashamed that the girls would laugh, and I hit him hard in the chest; he flew far away from me and fell heavily on his back in the middle of the road; Foam and blood flowed from his mouth. Everyone was scared, and so was I; I think: killed. And so I stand. At that time younger brother the shoemaker took a large cobblestone from the ground and threw it at me, I managed to dodge; the stone hit me in the back, then I said to him: “Well, do you want the same to happen to you?” – and moved towards him, but he ran away. The shoemaker lay on the road for a long time; people came running and helped him, washed him cold water. At least half an hour passed before he was able to get up, and he was taken home with difficulty. He was ill for two months, but, fortunately, he remained alive, but then I had to be careful for a long time: the shoemaker’s brothers and their comrades in the evenings with clubs and knives lay in wait for me in the back streets, but God saved me.
Thus, in the noise of his young life, the first call of God to monastic feat began to be drowned out in Semyon’s soul, but God, who had chosen him, called him again with a certain vision.
One day, after spending unchaste time, he dozed off and was able to easy sleep he saw that the snake had entered through his mouth. He felt intense disgust and woke up. At this time he hears the words:
“You swallowed a snake in a dream, and you feel disgusted; so it’s not good for me to watch what you do.”
Semyon didn't see anyone. He only heard the voice that uttered these words, which was completely unusual in its sweetness and beauty. The action he produced, for all its quietness and sweetness, was amazing. According to the deep and undoubted conviction of the elder, it was the voice of the Mother of God Herself. Until the end of his days, he thanked the Mother of God that She did not disdain him, but She Herself deigned to visit him and restore him from his fall. He said:
“Now I see how the Lord and the Mother of God feel sorry for the people. Think Mother of God came from heaven to admonish me, a young man, of my sins.”
He attributed the fact that he was not worthy to see the Lady to the impurity in which he was at that moment.
This secondary call, which took place shortly before military service, was already decisive in the choice of the future path. Its first consequence was fundamental change life that has taken an unkind turn. Semyon felt deep shame for his past and began to fervently repent before God. The decision to go to a monastery after completing military service returned with increased force. An acute sense of sin awoke in him, and as a result, his attitude towards everything he saw in life changed. This change affected not only his personal actions and behavior, but also his extremely interesting conversations with people.
Military service time
Semyon served his military service in St. Petersburg, in the Life Guards, in the engineer battalion. Having left for service with living faith and a deep feeling of repentance, he never ceased to remember God.
The army loved him very much as a soldier who was always efficient, calm, and of good behavior, and his comrades as a loyal and pleasant friend; however, this was a frequent occurrence in Russia, where the soldiers lived very brotherly.
One day, on holiday, he went to the city with three guardsmen from the same battalion. They went into a large tavern in the capital, where there was a lot of light and music was playing loudly; We ordered dinner with vodka and talked loudly. Semyon was silent for the most part. One of them asked him:
- Semyon, you’re still silent, what are you thinking about?
“I think: we are now sitting in a tavern, eating, drinking vodka, listening to music and having fun, and on Mount Athos they are now holding a vigil and will pray all night; so - which of us is on Last Judgment will give the best answer, them or us?
Then the other said:
- What a man Semyon is! We listen to music and have fun, and his mind is on Mount Athos and the Last Judgment.
The guardsman’s words about Semyon: “and his mind is on Athos and at the Last Judgment” - can be attributed not only to the moment when they were sitting in the tavern, but also to the entire time he was on military service. His thoughts about Athos, by the way, were expressed in the fact that he sent money there several times. One day he went from the Ustizhora camp, where their battalion was stationed in the summer, to the post office in the village of Kolpino to transfer money to Athos. On the way back, not far from Kolpin, along the road, a mad dog ran straight towards him; when she was quite close and was ready to rush at him, he said with fear: “Lord, have mercy!” As soon as he said this a short prayer, as some force threw the dog aside, as if it had stumbled upon something; Having rounded Semyon, she ran to the village, where she caused a lot of harm to both people and livestock.
This incident made a deep impression on Semyon. He vividly felt the closeness of God who protects us and clung even more strongly to the memory of God.
Having completed his service in the guard, Semyon, shortly before the soldiers of his age went home, together with the company clerk, went to Father John of Kronstadt to ask for his prayers and blessings. They did not find Father John in Kronstadt and decided to leave letters. The clerk began to take out beautiful handwriting some kind of sophisticated letter, but Semyon wrote only a few words:
“Father, I want to become a monk; pray that the world will not delay me.”
They returned to St. Petersburg to the barracks, and, according to the Elder, the very next day he felt that “hell flames were buzzing around him.”
After leaving St. Petersburg, Semyon came home and stayed there for only one week. They quickly collected canvases and other gifts for him for the monastery. He said goodbye to everyone and left for Athos. But from the day Father John of Kronstadt prayed for him, “the flames of hell hummed” around him without ceasing, wherever he was: on the train, in Odessa, on the ship, and even on Mount Athos in the monastery, in the temple, everywhere.
Arrival at the Holy Mountain.
Monastic feats.
Semyon arrived at the Holy Mountain in the fall of 1892. and entered the Russian Monastery of the Holy Great Martyr Panteleimon. A new ascetic life began.
According to Athonite customs, the new novice “Brother Simeon” had to spend several days in complete peace in order to remember his sins throughout his life and, having stated them in writing, confess to his confessor. The hellish torment he experienced gave rise to uncontrollable, ardent repentance in him. In the sacrament of Repentance, he wanted to free his soul from everything that burdened it, and therefore, with readiness and great fear, without justifying himself in anything, he confessed all the deeds of his life.
The confessor said to Brother Simeon: “You have confessed your sins before God and know that they have been forgiven you... From now on we will make the beginning of a new life... Go in peace and rejoice that the Lord brought you to this haven of salvation.”
Brother Simeon was led into spiritual achievement by the age-old way of Athonite monastic life, saturated with the unceasing memory of God: prayer in a cell alone, long services in church, fasts and vigils, frequent confession and communion, reading, work, obedience. Soon he mastered the Jesus Prayer using the rosary. A little time passed, only about three weeks, and one evening, while praying before the image of the Mother of God, prayer entered his heart and began to be performed there day and night, but then he did not yet understand the greatness and rarity of the gift he received from the Mother of God.
Brother Simeon was patient, kind, and obedient; in the Monastery he was loved and praised for his good work and good character, and he was pleased with it. Then thoughts began to come to him: “You live holy: you have repented, your sins have been forgiven, you pray unceasingly, you perform obedience well.”
The novice’s mind wavered at these thoughts, and anxiety penetrated his heart, but due to his inexperience, he did not understand what was actually happening to him.
One night his cell was filled with a strange light, which even penetrated his body so that he saw his insides. His thought told him: “Accept, this is grace,” but the novice’s soul was confused at this, and he remained in great bewilderment.
After seeing a strange light, demons began to appear to him, and he, naive, talked to them “like people.” Gradually the attacks intensified, sometimes they told him: “You are now a saint,” and sometimes: “You will not be saved.” Brother Simeon once asked the demon: “Why do you tell me differently: sometimes you say that I am holy, sometimes you say that I will not be saved?” The demon mockingly replied: “We never tell the truth.”
The change of demonic suggestions, now lifting him to “heaven” in pride, now casting him down into eternal destruction, oppressed the soul of the young novice, driving him to despair, and he prayed with extreme tension. He slept little and in fits and starts. Physically strong, a true hero, he did not go to bed, but spent all his nights in prayer, either standing or sitting on a stool. Exhausted, he fell asleep while sitting for 15-20 minutes, and then got up again to pray.
Month after month passed, and the torment of demonic attacks increased. Soul powers The young novice began to fall, and his courage was exhausted, the fear of death and despair grew, the horror of hopelessness more and more often took possession of his entire being. He reached the last despair and, sitting in his cell in the late afternoon, thought: “It is impossible to beg God.” With this thought, he felt completely abandoned, and his soul plunged into the darkness of hellish languor and melancholy.
On the same day, during Vespers, in the Church of the Holy Prophet Elijah, which is at the mill, to the right of the royal gates, where the local icon of the Savior is located, he saw the living Christ.
“The Lord appeared incomprehensibly to the young novice,” and his entire being, and his very body, was filled with the fire of the grace of the Holy Spirit, that fire that the Lord brought down to earth with His coming (Luke 12:49). Simeon became exhausted from the vision, and the Lord disappeared.
It is impossible to describe the state in which he was at that hour. A great Divine light shone upon him, he was taken out of the world, as it were, and raised in spirit to heaven, where he heard unspeakable verbs; at that moment he received, as it were, a new birth from above (John 1:13, 3:3). The gentle gaze of the all-forgiving, immeasurably loving, joyful Christ attracted the whole person to himself and then, hiding, the sweetness of God’s love enraptured his spirit into the contemplation of the Divine, already outside the images of the world. Subsequently, in his writings, he endlessly repeats that he knew the Lord through the Holy Spirit, that he saw God in the Holy Spirit. He also argued that when the Lord Himself appears to the soul, it cannot help but recognize in Him its Creator and God.
Having known its resurrection and seen the light of true and eternal existence, the soul of Simeon for the first time after the Apparition experienced Easter celebration. Everything was good: the world was magnificent, and the people were pleasant, and nature was inexpressibly beautiful, and the body became different, lighter, and it seemed like there was more strength. But gradually the tangible effect of grace began to weaken. Why? What to do to prevent this loss?
A careful search began for an answer to the growing bewilderment in the advice of the confessor and in the works of the Holy Ascetic Fathers. “During prayer, keep your mind pure from all imagination and thoughts and enclose it in the words of prayer,” the elder Father Anatoly from St. Rusik told him. Simeon spent enough time with Elder Anatoly. Father Anatoly ended his instructive and useful conversation with the words: “If you are like this now, then what will you be like in your old age?” It just so happened, but with his surprise he gave the young ascetic a strong reason for vanity, which he did not yet know how to fight.
The young and still inexperienced monk Simeon began the most difficult, most complex, most subtle battle with vanity. Pride and vanity entail all troubles and downfalls: grace leaves, the heart cools down, prayer weakens, the mind is scattered and passionate thoughts begin to attack.
The young monk Silouan gradually learns more advanced ascetic feats, which would seem impossible to most. His sleep is still interrupted - several times a day for 15-20 minutes. He still doesn’t go to bed, he sleeps sitting on a stool; remains at work during the day, like a worker; carries the feat of internal obedience - cutting off one's will; learns to surrender oneself as completely as possible to the will of God; abstains from food, conversation, and movement; He prays the mental Jesus prayer for a long time. And despite all his feats, the light of grace often leaves him, and demons crowd around him at night.
The change of states, sometimes some grace, sometimes abandonment and demonic attacks, is not fruitless. Thanks to this change, Silouan’s soul is in constant internal struggle, wakefulness and diligent search for an outcome.
Fifteen years have passed since the Lord appeared to him. And then one day, during one of these painful struggles with demons, when, despite all efforts, it was not possible to pray purely, Silouan gets up from the stool to bow, but sees in front of him a huge figure of a demon, standing in front of the icons and waiting to bow to himself; the cell is full of demons. Father Silouan sits down on the stool again and, bowing his head, with a sick heart, says a prayer: “Lord, You see that I want to pray to You with a pure mind, but the demons do not let me. Teach me what I should do so that they don’t interfere with me?” And there was an answer in his soul: “The proud always suffer like this from demons.” “Lord,” says Silouan, “teach me what I must do to humble my soul.” And again in the heart there is an answer from God: “Keep your mind in hell and do not despair.”
From now on, it was revealed to his soul, not abstractly and intellectually, but existentially, that the root of all sins, the seed of death, is pride; that God is Humility, and therefore whoever wants to acquire God must acquire humility. He learned that that indescribably sweet, great humility of Christ, which he was given to experience during the Appearance, is an integral property of Divine love, Divine existence. From now on, he truly learned that the entire feat should be aimed at acquiring humility. It was given to him to know great secret Being, existentially to know.
He penetrated in spirit the secret of the struggle St. Seraphim Sarovsky, who, after the Lord appeared to him in the temple, during the Liturgy, experiencing the loss of grace and abandonment by God, stood on a stone in the desert for a thousand days and a thousand nights, crying out: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”
opened up to him true meaning and the power of St. Pimen the Great’s answer to his disciples: “Believe me, children! Where Satan is, there I will be.” He realized that Reverend Anthony The Great One was sent by God to the Alexandrian shoemaker to learn the same work: from the shoemaker he learned to think: “Everyone will be saved, I alone will perish.”
He learned in the experience of his life that the field of spiritual battle with evil, cosmic evil, is a person’s own heart. He saw in spirit that the deepest root of sin is pride - this scourge of humanity, which has torn people away from God and plunged the world into innumerable troubles and suffering; this is the true seed of death, shrouding humanity in the darkness of despair. From now on, Silouan, an outstanding giant of spirit, will concentrate all his strength on the feat for the humility of Christ, which he was given to know in the first Appearance, but which he did not preserve.
Monk Silouan, after the revelation given to him by the Lord, firmly stood on spiritual path. From that day on, his “favorite song,” as he himself put it, became:
“Soon I will die, and my damned soul will descend into a tight black hell, and there alone I will languish in the dark flame and cry for the Lord: “Where are you, the light of my soul? Why did you leave me? I can not live without you."
This work soon led to peace of soul and pure prayer. But even this fiery path turned out to be short-lived.
Grace no longer leaves him as before: he tangibly carries it in his heart, he feels the living presence of God; he is full of amazement at the mercy of God, deep world Khristov visits him; The Holy Spirit again gives him the power of love. And although now he is no longer the unreasonable one that he was before; although he emerged from a long and difficult struggle wise; although he had developed into a great spiritual fighter, even now he suffered from the fluctuations and variability of human nature and continued to cry with the inexpressible cry of his heart when the grace in him diminished. And so for another fifteen years, until he received the strength with one wave of his mind, in no way outwardly expressible, to reflect what had previously seriously affected him.
Through pure mental prayer, the ascetic learns the great secrets of the spirit. Descending with his mind into his heart, first this heart of flesh, he begins to penetrate into those depths of it that are no longer flesh. He finds his deep heart, spiritual, metaphysical, and in it he sees that the existence of all humanity is not something alien, extraneous to him, but is inseparably connected with his personal existence.
“Our brother is our life,” said the Elder. Through the love of Christ, all people are perceived as an integral part of our personal eternal existence. The commandment - to love your neighbor as yourself - he begins to understand not how ethical standard; in the word how he sees an indication not of the measure of love, but of the ontological community of being.
“The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son... because He is the Son of man” (John: 5:22-27). This Son of Man, the Great Judge of the world, will say at the Last Judgment that “one of the least of these” is He Himself; in other words, He generalizes the existence of each person with His own, includes it in His personal existence. He took all of humanity, “all of Adam,” into Himself and suffered for all of Adam.
After the experience of hellish suffering, after God’s instruction: “Keep your mind in hell,” it was especially characteristic for Elder Silouan to pray for the dead languishing in hell, but he also prayed for the living and for those to come. In his prayer, which transcended time, the thought of transitory phenomena disappeared human life, about enemies. It was given to Him, in grief over the world, to divide people into those who knew God and those who did not know Him. It was unbearable for him to realize that people would languish “in pitch darkness.”
In a conversation with one desert monk who said: “God will punish all atheists. They will burn in eternal fire.” Obviously, it gave him satisfaction that they would be punished with eternal fire. To this, Elder Silouan, with visible emotional excitement, said: “Well, tell me, please, if they put you in heaven, and from there you see someone burning in hellish fire, will you be at peace?” - “What can you do?” “It’s your own fault,” answered the monk. Then the Elder with a sorrowful face replied: “Love cannot bear this... We need to pray for everyone.”
And he really prayed for everyone; It became unusual for him to pray only for himself. All people are subject to sin, all fall short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:22). For him, who had already seen the glory of God in the measure given to him and experienced its deprivation, the mere thought of such deprivation was heavy. His soul was tormented by the knowledge that people live without knowing God and His love, and he prayed great prayer so that the Lord, out of His inscrutable love, would allow them to know Himself.
Until the end of his life, despite his declining strength and illness, he maintained the habit of sleeping fitfully. He had a lot of time left for solitary prayer; he prayed constantly, changing the manner of prayer depending on the situation, but his prayer was especially intensified at night, before Matins. Then he prayed for the living and the dead, for friends and enemies, for the whole world.
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