Память преподобного Зосимы

Our Reverend Father Zosima felt a desire to serve God from childhood. While still at a young age, he entered a monastery and took monastic vows in Tire 2390, in the country of Palestine. Having lived valiantly in the monastic life, he became an experienced monk and received many revelations from God. While spending time in prayer, he constantly did manual labor with tears. And one day it occurred to him whether there would be a man among the desert dwellers who would be superior to him in his exploits. Then someone unknown appeared to him and said: - Zosima, you, as a person, have achieved a high degree of asceticism, but no one can be perfect, and so that you know how many different ways of salvation there are, leave the place where you are now asceticizing and go to the monastery, which is located near the Jordan. Zosima did as he was commanded and went to the indicated monastery 2391. In this monastery there was a custom according to which, during Great Lent, all the monks left the monastery for prayer in the desert, leaving only the gatekeeper in the monastery, and then on Maundy Thursday they again converged on the monastery for Holy Communion. When the time came, Zosima went into the desert along with other monks. Here he saw Saint Mary and chased after her, but she said to him: - Zosima! If you want to see me, then give me your clothes. Zosima fulfilled Mary's request, and she, putting on her clothes, told him in order about herself everything that she had done from her youth - how she first spent her life in fornication and how then she came to the desert. After this, she asked Zosima to come to the Jordan with the Holy Gifts next year. When a year had passed, Zosima came with the Body and Blood of Christ. Then he saw how the saint came to him through the Jordan, like dry land, and gave her communion. In the third year he again came to the desert and found the Venerable Mary already dead 2392. Because of his old age, he did not have the strength to bury her and, seeing the lion, he said to him: - Beast! Bury the Venerable Mary, for I am old and cannot dig. Immediately the lion dug a hole, and Zosima buried the honorable body of the Venerable Mary. Returning to the monastery, he told Abbot John and all the brethren about the Venerable Mary and how the Lord glorified her. After this, our honest father Zosima continued to strive in prayer, tears and various exploits and died at a ripe old age in 2393. The monks of the monastery buried him with honor. On the same day the memory of St. George the Silent. Tire is a city located near the northeastern shores of the Dead Sea on the southwestern slope of the Gilead mountain range in left-bank Palestine, known in ancient times as Perea or Transjordan. It was the Jordan Monastery of St. John the Baptist, ruined before 1651 and fell into disrepair in 723. The saint died on Good Friday, April 1, 521. The Monk Zosimas died in 523 at almost 100 years of age. You might be interested in: