134. Три святительские поучения духовенству к мирянам, о разных предметах церковной дисциплины

These, still unpublished, teachings have much in common and are literally similar in places to the epistles of Metropolitan Photius to Novgorod and Pskov, placed above under Nos. 33 and 34. They are published according to the lists found in the August book of the Makarevsky Menaion-Chetyi (dorm. sp. l. 1551–1554; synod. sp. l. 788–792). Priests, teach your spiritual children the fear of God, so that they may go to church and pray to God for the sovereign and for Orthodox Christianity, which the Lord God would deliver from infertility and from Latinism. Yes, punish them with the fear of God: they would live lawfully with their wives, but they would not know anyone else for their wives; and whoever falls into any kind of fornication by his wife, otherwise he will undergo penance for fifteen years. And which of your spiritual children are not married, and you would marry them, and single ones would not live without wives. And those girls who have matured, you should give them for a husband, otherwise you wouldn’t do dashing things. And those widows live illegally and do not marry their husbands, and you give them to marry them; but they won’t listen to you, and you tell me. And you would not have concubines among peasants, illegitimate wives, or wives of illegitimate husbands: order them to get married, and for the wives to marry their husbands unmarried; but they won’t listen to you, and you tell me. And whoever has a priest in the parish has an unmarried wife, or a widow lives illegally, and I will excommunicate the priest, and I will put him to church execution. And your spiritual children would not bark swearing, would not say a bad word, would not steal or snitch, would not listen to lies, would not think any evil against each other. Everyone live by his own labors, and don’t touch anything that belongs to anyone else. And whoever invites you to a feast, and you would glorify God, and you would sit in order, and there would be no disorder, no wasteful lawless games. And there were no women in your parish who were sorcerers or sorcerers; and who has it in the parish, and you tell me; and whoever does not tell, I will excommunicate the priest, and hand over the woman or man sorcerer to the clerks, and they will execute him by city law. May your spiritual children partake of the great conscience; and those who live illegally, any murderer, or a fornicator, or a thief, or a robber, do not give such communion, excommunicate them for a year and give them penance; until they have done penance, do not let such people into the church, do not eat anything from them, unless they repent, and forbid them, no matter what they do in advance; and they just won’t stop doing those things, otherwise give the sacrament to such a person before the hour of death. And on a holiday, they would not drink or eat until lunch, and they would not sleep with their wives, and neither on Wednesday nor on Friday. But do not give communion to bigamists and triplets without penance: a young bigamist is two years old, and an old one is four years old, and a young threegamist is four years old, and an old one is six years old. But baptize children and do not pour water on them: that is illegal; pour water into the tub and immerse it in three immersions: the first immersion in the name of the Father, the second in the name of the Son, the third in the name of the Holy Spirit. Yes, they would naturally go with communion to the pain, and baptize children: through neglect you will not be able to catch the pain, or the child will die unbaptized, otherwise you will give an answer to God for that, and penance to the priest for three years. The wife will give birth to a child, but she will be sick, although on the same day, wash her and take her to another church, and give her communion, and when she gets up, you order her to reprimand for six weeks. And you, priests, would naturally give an image to spiritual children in everything, and then everyone would look at you. It is written in the holy rules: “you are the light of the world”; to teach you and give you an example in everything, and God will require their souls from you, all your spiritual children. It is written in the holy rules: “If you do not teach, if you do not punish, if you do not forbid, God will require their blood at your hands; If you forbid, if you punish, if you teach, God will not require their blood at your hands: they will give an answer to God for themselves.” But they themselves would naturally not behave outrageously, would not blaspheme, would neither drink nor eat before dinner, would not speak any foul words, and would not bark swear words: the priest utters a bad word, or barks obscene words, or else six weeks of penance; but he will not calm down, otherwise it is written in the holy rules - to excommunicate; You are already eating the body of Christ, and from the same satanic mouth come vile words. And the ordination that the saint gave you from the holy rules 3419, and you would read it on every Saturday. And with whom you have a fight, do not say goodbye without saying goodbye. But a murderer wouldn’t put you on notice. Repent and give communion to the murdered one, and tell the beaten one to ask Christians or good people who his murderer is; but the priest doesn’t care about that. And the priest is not ordered to obey any kind of obedience; and who in it has to listen, apart from murder, otherwise he would not lie; but if a priest lies in obedience, otherwise the holy rules command that he should be excommunicated from service: and if they bring a lie to anyone, I will not spare him in any way, I will not order him to serve, I will excommunicate him according to the holy rules. Yes, they would not have told the mother to eat colostrum from a cow, since milk with blood is disgusting, prohibited in the rules of the Holy Fathers. And whoever eats after my commandment, I will not bless him; and whoever ate in ignorance to this place, and he said goodbye to them from the spiritual father, and took penance, so that they would not do it in advance; and you, priests, should protect your spiritual children from this. Yes, so that they do not serve mass without wine, and that they do not mix anything with wine, neither honey, nor kvass, except water; and whoever teaches this to serve without wine, or whoever teaches to mix it in, and I will excommunicate him from the priesthood, and he will receive an inexorable judgment from God, and in the next century endless torment, even though it is criminal and heresy is terrible. And whoever kisses the cross on the guilt, and you would not give them communion without penance: you would naturally excommunicate them for years from the Mysteries of Christ, and penance for six years, according to the holy rules. And the dog will jump into the church, otherwise you won’t serve mass for eight days, and you will bless the water with August baptism, and you will sprinkle the church, and you will serve. And the husbands of their wives, who are not widows, would not have children. But a prosphora maker who had two or three husbands would not bake the prosphora; she who was a widow had one husband, then bake the prosphora. Blessing to my children, princes and boyars and boyar children, and guests and all people, urban and rural: so that naturally strangled animals do not eat animals, hare, black grouse and any edible bird. But you, priests, would not eat this yourself and would not tell your spiritual children to eat such things. Having taken the hare, prick it in the throat and draw out the blood; and take away a black grouse or other edible bird, and you kill it alive; and which bird got stuck in a snare and hanged itself, and you wouldn’t eat it; and that’s why the hare hanged himself in the sloptsy 3420, and in which he wouldn’t have died in the trap, and you wouldn’t have eaten it. And if you take a hare from a dog, kill it, but if it’s not alive, you’ll take it away and mark it to the dogs. And whoever eats something strangled, or a beast of prey, through our commandment, - and it is written in the rules of the Holy Fathers: that sin is equal to murder. And I will find out someone, and I will excommunicate him from communion and from the church. But you, priests, would not do this, but you would stop your spiritual children from all this. And if the priest was drunk in the evening, he would not serve mass the next day. And whoever marries his first wife, and before his wife lived uncleanly and committed fornication, and you give the young one two years of penance, and the old one four years, do not give communion to the wife, but to the girls because she married her husband uncleanly. Be it known to you, O priests, whose offering you will accept: from a murderer, from a robber, from a fornicator, from an adulterer, from a robber, from a slanderer, if you accept such an offering and bring it to the altar of God, you will also accept condemnation with them; Banish the offerings of such, for they are all enemies of God unless they repent: offering such offerings is an abomination and hatred of God. Bring from such people to the service of God, you are guilty of the court. Teach them to stop doing those things and not do that evil—take it from them too; and not teaching, nor punishing, merely rejoicing at the offering, then you are not teachers by nature, but destroyers of their souls and you will suffer common torment with them, if you do not teach; what is brought is to your destruction, if you are silent and careless. Don’t appoint a bigamist sexton; although a bigamist will be holy in the monastery, but will never enter the altar. And naturally they should not bring anything edible to the altar, no meat, no cheese, no eggs, no beer, no honey: this is prohibited by the holy rules. 3421 Baptize children, and you cut your hair, and say: in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit; and whoever does not cut his hair is otherwise criminal. 3422 A master, if he does not marry his slave or give a slave to a husband who knows that he commits fornication, the master will be excommunicated from the church. Keeping and keeping a harlot in his house, unless he stops from doing so, she will be excommunicated. The fornicator, the obavnik, the rebel, the sorcerer, the buffoon, the prisoner, washing away people, believing in the birds, the storyteller of fables, believing in a meeting, wishing for birds and reptiles, such will be excommunicated for the years 3423, if they repent; Unless they repent, the priest will not let such people into the church, nor accept offerings from them, nor go into their house. If a priest has a spiritual son who has committed fornication from the priest, or killed a man, he is not ordered to serve; and whoever orders such a person to serve, and he sent him to hell, and he himself with him; but he won’t listen to you, and you tell me. The following is the apostolic canon (69th) on observing the fast of Pentecost, Wednesday and Friday. And here are several extracts from Kormcha, which have no connection with the instructions of the unknown Russian saint. 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