Glorification and Veneration

The Optina Elders were glorified in stages: St. Ambrose alone at the Millennium Council of 1988, then the whole synaxis of fourteen elders locally in 1996 and for general veneration in 2000, together with the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia. Their common feast, the Synaxis of the Venerable Elders of Optina, is kept on 11/24 October, and the relics of most of them are enshrined in the reborn monastery.

Tradition: Russian Orthodox (Optina synaxis glorified 1996 local / 2000 general)

The Glorification of St. Ambrose, 1988

The glorification of the Optina Elders began with the greatest of them. At the Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1988, held for the Millennium of the Baptism of Rus, St. Ambrose of Optina was canonized — one of a small group of Russian saints glorified at that historic council as the Church emerged from the Soviet persecution (the 1988 canonization of Ambrose is treated fully in St. Ambrose of Optina: Canonization 1988). Ambrose’s glorification, coinciding with the return of Optina to the Church in 1987–1988, opened the way for the recognition of the whole line of elders whose summit he was.

The Local Glorification of the Synaxis, 1996

The other elders followed. On 13 June 1996 the Russian Orthodox Church glorified the whole synaxis of the Optina Elders for local veneration at Optina, and in July 1996 the Patriarchate of Moscow established the feast of the Synaxis of the Venerable Elders of Optina, to be kept on 11 October (the local glorification of the fourteen elders in Optina on 13 June 1996 and the institution of the Synaxis feast in July 1996 are documented in the Optina and Patriarchal record; “Synaxis of the Venerable Elders of Optina,” following the church record). The synaxis so glorified numbers fourteen elders:

  • St. Leonid (Lev Nagolkin, d. 1841) — feast 11 October
  • St. Macarius (Ivanov, d. 1860) — feast 7 September
  • St. Moses (Putilov, d. 1862), founder of the skete and abbot — feast 16 June
  • St. Anthony (Putilov, d. 1865), skete superior — feast 7 August
  • St. Hilarion (Ponomarev, d. 1873) — feast 18 September
  • St. Ambrose (Grenkov, d. 1891) — feast 10 October (and 27 June)
  • St. Anatoly “the Elder” (Zertsalov, d. 1894) — feast 25 January
  • St. Isaac I (Antimonov, d. 1894), abbot — feast 22 August
  • St. Joseph (Litovkin, d. 1911) — feast 9 May
  • St. Barsanuphius (Plikhankov, d. 1913) — feast 1 April
  • St. Anatoly “the Younger” (Potapov, d. 1922), “the consoler” — feast 30 July
  • St. Nektary (Tikhonov, d. 1928) — feast 29 April
  • St. Nikon the Confessor (Belyaev, d. 1931) — feast 25 June
  • St. Isaac II (Bobrikov, d. 1938), hieromartyr — feast 26 December

(the list and individual feasts follow the Synaxis of the Optina Elders as kept by the Russian Church; the Optina record). Thus the synaxis spans the whole life of the eldership, from the first elder Leonid to the martyr-abbot Isaac II, and unites the confessional elders, the abbots who protected them, the consoler of the war years, and the martyrs of the last days in a single company.

The General Glorification, 2000

The final step was universal. On 7 August 2000, at the Jubilee Bishops’ Council of the Russian Orthodox Church, held in the newly rebuilt Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, the Optina Elders were glorified for general (church-wide) veneration — and this was done in connection with the great glorification, at the same council, of the Sobor (Council) of the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia, the vast host of those who suffered under the Soviet persecution (the general glorification of the Optina Elders on 7 August 2000, together with the New Martyrs, is documented in the acts of the 2000 Jubilee Council; “Synaxis of the Venerable Elders of Optina,” following the church record; see The New Martyrs of Russia). The pairing was fitting: the two Optina martyrs, St. Nikon and St. Isaac II, belong to both companies at once, so that the general glorification of the elders and the glorification of the New Martyrs were, for Optina, a single act (see The Hieromartyrs of Optina). It is worth noting that the Optina synaxis had also been venerated in the Russian Church Abroad, which had led the way in glorifying the New Martyrs (ROCOR glorified the New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia in 1981), so that the veneration of the Optina saints, like that of the martyrs, was received across the divided jurisdictions of the Russian Church before their reconciliation in 2007.

The Feast

The common feast, the Synaxis of the Venerable Elders of Optina, is kept on 11 October (Old Style) / 24 October (New Style) — the day chosen because it is the repose-day of St. Leonid, the first elder, so that the founder’s memory carries the whole company (the Synaxis feast on 11/24 October; the Optina record). Each elder also has his own commemoration on the day of his repose, as listed above; and the whole synaxis is celebrated together on the October feast. Because the fourteen elders lived across more than a century, the Synaxis is a feast of the whole Optina phenomenon — its founding, its flowering, and its martyrdom — gathered into one day of the Church’s calendar (see Orthodoxy: Russian Orthodox Tradition).

The Relics

The relics of the elders share the history of the monastery. When Optina was reborn, the graves of the elders — which had been lost or built over during the Soviet decades — were sought, and in 1998 the relics of most of the elders were uncovered and translated into the rebuilt churches of the monastery, principally the church of the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God, where they are enshrined for veneration (the 1998 uncovering and translation of the relics into the Vladimir church is documented in the Optina record; “The Uncovering of the Holy Relics of the Venerable Optina Elders,” OrthoChristian.com). Two of the fourteen are exceptions, for the reasons the persecution imposed: St. Nikon the Confessor, who died in exile at Pinega in the far north, and St. Isaac II, who was shot and buried in the mass grave at the Tesnitsky forest near Tula, do not have their relics at Optina, since these were never recovered (the absence of the relics of Nikon and Isaac II is noted in the Optina record; see St. Nikon the Confessor and St. Isaac II the Hieromartyr). The relics of the others — Leonid, Macarius, Ambrose, and the rest — draw pilgrims to Optina today, so that the monastery is once more, as it was in the elders’ lifetimes, a place where the faithful come to the elders.

The Legacy

The glorification of the Optina Elders sets a seal on the whole story this collection has told. A tradition of prayer, transplanted from St. Paisius Velichkovsky into a forest skete, flowered for a century in an unbroken line of elders, spoke to the whole of Russia high and low, was destroyed by a persecuting state, and was raised again — the monastery rebuilt, the elders glorified, the teaching republished, the relics enshrined. The Church’s recognition of the fourteen as saints is her judgment that the Optina way — humility, obedience, the Jesus Prayer, the patient bearing of sorrows, and love — is the way of Christ, proved holy in these men across the golden age and the age of the martyrs alike (Kontzevitch, Optina Pustyn i eyo vremya, Jordanville, 1970, on the enduring witness of the elders; see The Optina Spiritual Legacy).

See Also

References

  • Kontzevitch, I. M. Optina Pustyn’ i eyo vremya. Jordanville, NY: Holy Trinity Monastery, 1970. (The elders and their enduring witness.)
  • “Synaxis of the Venerable Elders of Optina” and “The Holy Elders of Optina” (OrthoChristian.com; John Sanidopoulos, Orthodox Christianity Then and Now), following the church record — used to locate the local glorification (13 June 1996), the institution of the Synaxis feast (July 1996, 11 October), the general glorification with the New Martyrs (7 August 2000), and the list and feasts of the fourteen elders.
  • “The Uncovering of the Holy Relics of the Venerable Optina Elders.” OrthoChristian.com, following the Optina record — for the 1998 uncovering and translation of the relics into the Vladimir Icon church, and the exception of Nikon and Isaac II.
  • On the ROCOR glorification of the New Martyrs (1981) and the Moscow Patriarchate glorification (2000): see The New Martyrs of Russia and St. Ambrose of Optina.