02 — Saint Leonid and Saint Macarius
The two elders who established the Optina eldership: St. Leonid (Lev), the first elder, who planted startchestvo in the skete and bore the early opposition to it; and St. Macarius, who consolidated the eldership and, with the Kireevsky circle, launched the great Optina project of publishing the Paisian and patristic texts.
Tradition: Russian Orthodox (Optina synaxis glorified 1996 local / 2000 general)
St. Leonid and St. Macarius are the first two elders of the confessional type at Optina and the joint founders of its distinctive life. The first file follows Leonid — his Paisian formation, his arrival in 1829, the crowds that came to him, and the ecclesiastical suspicion that dogged the new phenomenon of open eldership. The second follows Macarius, Leonid’s disciple and co-elder, under whom the eldership became secure and Optina became a publishing house, printing the Life of St. Paisius and a stream of patristic translations in partnership with the Slavophile philosopher Ivan Kireevsky and his wife Natalia.
Navigation
| File | Description |
|---|---|
| saint-leonid-the-first-elder.md | St. Leonid/Lev (Nagolkin, d. 1841), the first Optina elder; his Paisian formation and the early opposition to startchestvo |
| saint-macarius-and-the-publishing-work.md | St. Macarius (Ivanov, d. 1860) and the Optina publishing project with Ivan and Natalia Kireevsky |
See Also
- The Paisian Root of the Eldership — the tradition Leonid and Macarius carried
- St. Ambrose in the Line of Optina — the disciple of both these elders
- The Published Inheritance — the fruit of Macarius’s publishing work