Elder Ambrose of Optina and turkeystranslated

A simple woman in a headscarf stood near the priest, red as a tomato. She bowed her head, lowered her eyes, tears flowed down her cheeks, and the crowd around laughed, made noise and pointed fingers at her:

- I found something to disturb the old man with! Go home, redneck!...

And then the gray-bearded little hunched monk suddenly hugged the woman! And then he looked sternly at the crowd.

He knew that her request was not at all as trivial as it seemed to those gathered. Although, even over a trivial matter, the priest would never push away the person who came to him. On the contrary, he would always console, inspire, give hope.

With what kind of trouble did this woman come to the famous Optina elder Father Ambrose? A detailed story about herself and about that incident has not been preserved, only a brief testimony. But many eyewitness stories have come down to us about how the elder received people, what he said, how his life was arranged; Based on them, we will try to imagine how everything could have happened then, almost two centuries ago.

To the Baptist Skete

...Martha hurriedly shuffles along the dirt path through the forest, slightly hunched over and leaning on the walkway. Centuries-old pines smell of resin. The blueberry bushes are full of large dark berries.…