Рассказы современников об отце Серафиме, собранные иеромонахом Иосифом

The story of Hierodeacon Alexander The elder of the Sarov Hermitage, Hierodeacon Alexander K., who led a solitary life, knew in detail the entire initial life of Father Seraphim, because he was his compatriot and contemporary, and, moreover, from the merchant class. He was always amazed at his suffering life, his exploits and gifts of Grace, with which Elder Seraphim tied everyone to himself and consoled everyone with his saving instructions. In conversations about him, he told me the following wonderful incident. One time, when I left the church after the Divine Liturgy and walked past the church and cell of Father Seraphim, suddenly a simple peasant with disheveled hair and a hat in his hand ran up to me and in despair threw himself at my feet, saying: - Father! Are you Seraphim? - No, I’m not Seraphim; what do you need it for? - Yes, they say that he is guessing, but my horse was taken away, and now I am left completely poor: I don’t know how I will feed my family. Surprised by such simplicity of the peasant and heartily regretting his loss, I looked at Father Seraphim’s cell and saw him himself at the porch: at that time he was carrying and putting firewood in the woodpile. I pointed the peasant to the place where the old man was working and said to him: - Look, Father Seraphim is working at his cell. And I myself stayed to see what the elder would tell him. The peasant, hearing the name of Father Seraphim, immediately rushed there and fell straight at his feet. Father Seraphim picked him up and asked tenderly: - Why did you come to me, wretched one? - Father! - answered the peasant, - my horse was stolen, and now I am completely poor without it, I don’t know how I will feed my family; and they say, are you guessing? Then Father Seraphim took him by the head and, placing it against his own, said: - Protect yourself in silence and hurry up now (here he named him one village), when you approach it, then turn off the road to the right and pass the backs of four houses; there you will see a little gate; enter it, untie your horse from the block and lead it out silently. Having heard everything, the peasant immediately rushed to the village assigned to him; and I heard later that he immediately found and led away his horse. I also heard what Father Seraphim said: - So, now it’s difficult for Seraphim to live; What will happen when we talk about everything? The story of the Sarov monk Alexander The monk of the Sarov desert, Alexander, conveyed to me and many God-loving persons the following three important events that happened to him at Father Seraphim’s. “When I was still in the world,” he says, “I was sick with the relaxation of all my limbs; I especially suffered from unbearable pain in one ear. No matter how much I was treated, nothing helped, and only made the disease even worse, so that later a blockage formed in my ear. Finally, I was advised to go to the Sarov Hermitage, which is not very far from us, and ask for the help and prayers of Father Seraphim. I carried out this advice with joy: I came to Sarov and, having prayed to God there, went to Father Seraphim. As soon as I entered him and fell at his feet, he, having blessed me and without saying a single word, approached the lamp burning in front of the image of the Mother of God and, dipping his finger in oil, touched my ear and anointed the sore spot in it. At that very moment I felt relief, because before any touch to my sore ear was unbearable for me; and soon all pain stopped completely. But my wonderful benefactor surprised me even more by saying to me, among other things: “You will be ours.” Although I wanted to enter monasticism, I had no hope of being dismissed from society, because I had no intercessors. Despite my faith in Father Seraphim, who had already shown me both the gift of clairvoyance and the gift of miracles, I submitted my resignation upon returning home and soon received it without any difficulty. Thus, I entered the Sarov Hermitage, thanking the Lord, the Mother of God and Father Seraphim. Upon entering the monastery, the former relaxation in my right hand intensified to such an extent that I could neither eat with it nor cross myself without the help or support of my left hand. In this extreme situation, I again resorted to Father Seraphim. This time I found an unfamiliar deacon with him; but, despite the stranger, he fell straight at his feet and asked for his blessing and holy prayers. The elder blessed me very graciously and with a joyful face said: “Pray to the Queen of Heaven and bow to her three times.” I immediately, out of obedience, made three bows before the image of the Queen of Heaven. Then the elder took a bottle of holy water and began to give it to my sore hand. But I answered him: “Father, I can’t take it with this hand, because it hurts and is all relaxed.” Then the elder took me by the sore hand and, again handing me the bottle, said: “Take it and drink!” I obeyed, although with great difficulty; and the elder supported my sore hand at this time. When I got drunk, he blessed me and sent me to my cell in peace. Since that time, I thank God for the prayers of Father Seraphim, I do not feel any pain in my hand. Wanting to learn to read and write, but despite all my efforts, achieving very little progress in it, I also decided to resort to Father Seraphim, who had already shown me his grace-filled gifts twice. I had just arrived at the elder’s cell and preceded his blessing with a bow to the ground when he asked me: “Do you know how to read and write?” Amazed by his insight, I answered: “No, father, I just want to learn, but I can’t understand anything and I’m falling into despair.” Then the elder asked me: “When is bread sown and when is it reaped?” When I answered him to this, he concluded: “That’s what you do: start and learn.” With this word he blessed me. Soon I completely understood the letter and now, by the grace of God and through the prayers of Father Seraphim, I freely read the Word of God. The story of the old lady of the Diveyevo monastery Matryona and the testimony of the Sarov monk Peter – Having entered the Diveyevo community, I passed, with the blessing of Father Seraphim, obedience in preparing food for the sisters. One day, due to poor health and the enemy’s temptation, I became so embarrassed and despondent that I decided to completely leave the monastery quietly, without blessing: this obedience seemed so difficult and unbearable to me. Without a doubt, Father Seraphim foresaw my temptation, because he suddenly sent me to tell me to come to him. Fulfilling his orders, I went to see him on the third day of Peter’s Day, after finishing the meal, and cried all the way. Arriving at his cell in Sarov, I said a prayer, as usual, and the elder, saying “Amen,” greeted me like a loving father and, taking me by both hands, led me into his cell. Then he said: “Behold, my joy, I have been waiting for you all day.” I answered him with tears: “Father, you know what my obedience is; it was impossible before; I had just fed my sisters when at that very moment I went to see you and cried all the way.” Then Father Seraphim wiped my tears with his handkerchief, saying: “Mother, it’s not for nothing that your tears are dripping onto the floor,” and then, bringing Tenderness to the image of the Queen of Heaven, he said: “Bow, Mother; The Queen of Heaven will comfort you." I venerated the Image and felt such joy in my soul that I was completely revived. After that, Father Seraphim said: “Well, mother, now you go to the living room; and tomorrow come to the distant desert.” But I objected to him: “Father, I’m afraid to go alone into the distant desert.” Father Seraphim said to this: “You, mother, go to the hermitage, and read everything in your voice: Lord have mercy,” and he himself sang several times: “Lord have mercy,” but don’t go to Matins; but when you get up, make 50 bows and go.” I did so, as Father Seraphim blessed: I stood up, made 50 bows and walked, and all the way I said to my voice: “Lord have mercy.” From this I not only did not feel any fear, but I also felt the greatest joy in my heart, according to the prayers of Father Seraphim. Approaching a distant desert, I suddenly saw Father Seraphim sitting on a log near his cell, and next to him stood a terrible-sized bear. I froze with fear and screamed at the top of my voice: “Father, my death!” - and fell. Father Seraphim, hearing my voice, hit the bear and waved his hand. Then the bear, like a reasonable person, immediately went in the direction where Father Seraphim had waved to him, into the density of the forest. Seeing all this, I trembled with horror, and even when Father Seraphim came up to me with the words: “Don’t be horrified and don’t be afraid.” “I continued to shout as before: “Oh, my death!” To this the elder answered me: “No, mother, this is not death; death is far from you; and this is joy." And then he led me to the same deck on which he had sat before and on which, having prayed, he sat me down and sat down himself. Before we had time to sit down, suddenly the same bear came out of the density of the forest and, approaching Father Seraphim, lay down at his feet. I, being close to such a terrible beast, was at first in the greatest horror and trembling; but then, seeing that Father Seraphim treated him without any fear, like a meek lamb, and even fed him from his hands with the bread that he brought with him in his bag, I began to little by little be revived by faith. The face of my great Father seemed especially wonderful to me then: it was bright, like an Angel’s, and joyful. Finally, when I had completely calmed down, and the elder had fed almost all the bread, he gave me the rest of the piece and told me to feed the bear myself. But I answered: “I’m afraid, father; he’ll eat my hand off,” and meanwhile she rejoiced, thinking: if he eats my hand off, then I won’t even be able to cook. Father Seraphim, looking at me, smiled and said: “No, mother, believe that he will not eat your hand.” Then I took the bread given to me and fed it all with such consolation that I wished I could feed it more, for the beast was meek even towards me, a sinner, for the prayers of Father Seraphim. Seeing me calm, Father Seraphim said to me: “Do you remember, mother, a lion served with the Monk Gerasim on the Jordan; and the bear serves the poor Seraphim. So the animals listen to us, and you, mother, are despondent, and why should we be despondent? Now, if I had taken scissors with me, I would have cut his hair as a certificate. I ask you by God, mother, never lose heart in anything; but always imitate the humility of St. Isidora. In the monastery she was the last to everyone, but the first to God, and she did not disdain any obedience.” Then I simply said: “Father! What if the sisters see this bear, they will die of fear!” But he answered: “No, mother, the sisters will not see him.” - What if someone stabs him? – I asked, “I feel sorry for him.” The elder answered: “No, and they won’t kill you; no one will see it except you.” I still thought about how to tell my sisters about this terrible miracle? And Father Seraphim answered my thoughts: “No, mother, before eleven years after my death, don’t tell this to anyone; and then the will of God will reveal who to tell.” Father Seraphim, a week before his death, said to her: “Now you see me in the flesh, and soon you will see me in the tomb, and your grief will be universal. But the power of God is made perfect in weakness.” Later, out of some necessity, this old woman came to the cell where, with the blessing of Father Seraphim, the peasant Efim Vasiliev, known for his faith and love for the elder, was painting, and, seeing that he was painting Father Seraphim, suddenly said to him: “It would be decent to paint Father Seraphim with a bear.” Efim Vasiliev asked her why she thought so. And she told him first about this wonderful event. Then he turned exactly eleven years old, commanded by the elder. Although many outsiders also saw Father Seraphim with a bear, due to the unknown nature of these persons, it is impossible to convey their testimonies, except for one, transmitted by the Sarov monk Peter. This monk, attached by love to Father Seraphim, one day went into the distant desert in order to take advantage of the soul-saving edifications of the elder, and suddenly, approaching her, he saw that Father Seraphim was sitting on a log and feeding the bear standing in front of him with crackers, which he took from his bag. Struck by this wondrous and terrible phenomenon, Peter stopped behind one large tree and began to prayerfully ask the elder to free him from fear. Immediately he saw that the bear had gone from the old man into the forest along the opposite road. Then he took the courage to approach Father Seraphim. The elder met him with a joyful spirit and said that if he was honored to see this forest animal near him, he would keep silent about it until his dormition. Monk Peter never ceased to be amazed at the purity of soul and faith of the righteous elder, to whom even dumb animals obey, while the very sight of them frightens us. The story of the peasant Likhachevsky E.V. The peasant Likhachevsky E.V., who had complete faith and love for Father Seraphim, reported the following testimonies about the elder. “Once in 1831,” he says, “I felt signs of cholera in myself to such a strong degree that I could barely crawl to Father Seraphim’s cell and beg him for help. The elder placed me next to the image of the Mother of God of Tenderness, gave me holy water to drink and gave me a few pieces of prosphora to eat. When I calmed down a little, he ordered me to go around the monastery and then enter the cathedral. “There,” he said, “God’s mercy will heal you.” I did all this and returned, by the grace of God, to the hotel completely healthy. “I also witnessed,” he says, “how several men brought, with the greatest efforts, to the vestibule of Father Seraphim’s deserted cell one demon-possessed woman, who resisted all the way and finally fell at the porch of the vestibule and, throwing her head back, shouted: “He will burn, he will burn!” Then Father Seraphim left the cell and forcibly, despite the fact that the woman did not want to open her mouth, poured a few drops of holy water into her. At that very moment, I and all of us saw that a kind of smoky cloud flew out of her mouth. When the elder, after that, protected her with the sign of the cross and, having blessed her, made a prayer over her, the woman became conscious and began to pray herself. Subsequently, I saw her in the Sarov Cathedral completely healthy, and asked: what does she feel now? She answered me: “Thank God! Since then I haven’t felt the same illness.” At the same time, I saw how Father Seraphim with one word brought to consciousness a peasant who, among many people, also wanted to enter Father Seraphim, but every time it was as if someone was pushing him away. Finally, the elder himself turned to him and asked sternly: “Where are you going?” At the same moment, heavy sweat appeared on the peasant’s face, and in the greatest fear he began to repent to many who were here: “Father Seraphim guessed right, I really am a thief and have been stealing cows and sheep until now, and I’m climbing into such a lamp.” I once walked into the desert to visit Father Seraphim and, approaching her, I saw that some girl, about sixteen years old, very well dressed, was sitting with him. As someone inexperienced in spiritual life, I thought: “What is the priest talking to her like that about? What other instructions are appropriate for her age? I had just approached Father Seraphim with these thoughts when he, without saying anything, took my hand and, putting my finger in his mouth for a minute, said: “You see, I don’t even have teeth in my mouth, and I’m dead to everything; What do you think?” I fell at his feet and repented of my guilt. Then he fatherly forgave me and, blessing me, said: “Don’t repeat it again and calm down.” I once contracted to erect a spire on a monastery tower in the Sarov Desert. When everything was ready and the people began to pray below, and I stood with several workers on the roof of the tower to watch the work and correctly place the spire in its place, it suddenly occurred to me: why didn’t I ask for the prayers and blessing of Father Seraphim for this task, then I would have known for sure that everything would end well. I had just thought about this, with extreme repentance and regret, when I immediately saw Father Seraphim himself, coming out of his cell onto the porch and blessing me three times. I was horrified by the elder’s perspicacity. The story about Father Seraphim I.M.K. In 1831, on July 18, my wife Yu.P. and I were in Sarov and in the desert of Father Seraphim. We found the old man at work: he was breaking out a garden bed with a hoe; and when we approached him and bowed to the ground, he blessed us and, placing his hands on my head, read the troparion to the Dormition of the Mother of God: “You preserved your virginity at Christmas.” Then he sat down on the garden bed and ordered us to sit down as well; but we involuntarily knelt before him and listened to his conversation about the future life, about the life of the saints, about intercession, intercession and care, about us sinners, the Lady Theotokos, and about what we need in this life for eternity. This conversation lasted no more than an hour, but I cannot compare such an hour with the entire past of my life. Throughout the conversation, I felt an inexplicable, heavenly sweetness in my heart, God knows how it overflowed there, which cannot be compared with anything on earth and which to this day I cannot remember without tears of tenderness and without a feeling of the liveliest joy in my entire being. Until now, although I have not rejected anything sacred, I have not affirmed anything either; for me in the spiritual world everything was completely indifferent, and I was equally cold-blooded towards everything. Father Seraphim now for the first time made me feel the omnipotence of the Lord God and His inexhaustible mercy and all-perfection. Previously, because of this coldness of my soul towards everything holy and because I loved to play with godless words, the Just Lord allowed the nasty spirit of blasphemy to take possession of my thoughts, and these abusive thoughts, which to this day I cannot remember without special horror, for three whole years crushed me constantly, especially at prayer, in church, and most of all when I prayed to the Queen of Heaven. I was already thinking in despair that no torment, according to earthly judgment, was sufficient for my punishment and that only hellish eternal torment could be a righteous retribution for my blasphemies. But Father Seraphim completely calmed me down in his conversation, telling me with his characteristic inexplicably joyful smile that I should not be afraid of this mental noise; that this is the action of the enemy, out of his envy, and so that I always fearlessly continue my prayer, no matter what nasty and blasphemous thoughts the enemy may present. Since then, indeed, this mental noise began to disappear little by little in me and, in less than a month, stopped completely. At the end of his conversation, the elder gave us one order, like a commandment for married life, and with an angelic smile he said: “If you do not fulfill this, then you or she will soon die.” The next day, after the liturgy, we were once again in Father Seraphim’s cell, and he, having given us holy water to drink, gave us three crackers and blessed us on our way. All this happened a year and a half before his death; and during this time, upon arriving home, we kept, with the help of God, the commandment of the elders; but then little by little they began to forget her and transgressed several times. After this, I suddenly became ill with relaxation of all my limbs and something like a strong fever, so that two weeks after I went to bed, I lost my voice, my lips became dead, and I was completely hopeless. On that very day, when death was ready to take its victim, the local doctor D.A.V., who was treating me, came to me in the morning and told those around me his dream; he imagined that he was walking towards me, and suddenly a gray-haired old man, in bast shoes and rags, came towards him, who stopped him and said: “Are you going to treat him? You will not cure him, and he must die; but tell him to make some vow before God, and then he will live.” By the grace of God, I heard this story from the doctor, and after he left, I began to reflect on what I had heard. I immediately realized that this old man was none other than Father Seraphim, although he had already died, and that my real illness was a consequence of violating his commandment. Then I began to bitterly repent of my offense and made a vow to God that if I remained alive, I would take one of my relatives, the orphan girl Nadezhda, under my protection. As soon as I made this vow in my soul, I felt instant relief from the illness, after a few minutes I sat up on the bed by myself, and then began to call my wife in the ordinary voice of a healthy person, and together with her I poured out joyful tears before the Lord about the miracle performed by Father Seraphim. The next day I began to walk from room to room and completely recovered. The same Kr. talks about his relative living in Nizhny Novgorod, V.I. Br. She married a widower who had two children from his first wife, and was so unhappy in this marriage that her relatives finally wanted her to leave her husband. But before starting the matter, she went to consult with Father Seraphim, and the elder answered like this: “Tell her not to leave her husband in any way; The sinful monk Seraphim asks her about this; all the troubles she endures will soon end.” Indeed, no more than six months later her husband died, and with God’s help she placed her orphans in government institutions for education. The story of Elder Maria Ikonnikova Elder Maria Ikonnikova, a Tomsk bourgeois, told me the following: “Here I am, a great sinner, I have traveled a lot around the world, but without any spiritual benefit. I was in Kyiv five times; I went to other Russian monasteries and to holy relics; I was in Sarov with Father Seraphim and in Irkutsk with St. Innocent. I heard a lot of good things about Elder Daniel; and so, on the way from Irkutsk, having been in the city of Achinsk, I went to see Elder Daniel and receive his blessing for the future journey. He, my father, met me on the way, not allowing me to reach his cell, looked at me with the most angry and angry look and reproached me in a loud voice: “Why have you, an empty wanderer, come to me? I've been expecting you for a long time; You’ll remember me!” And he threatened me with a stick. I trembled all over with fear, almost fell to the ground, my tongue became numb, and I could neither run nor say a word, for I knew my guilt. He began to say the following: “Why do you wander around the world and deceive God and people. They give you money in Kyiv for candles and prayers, and you spend it on your whims. She traveled to many stations on carts, hired them, spending the money given to God. And in such and such a place I drank wine and bought so much of it; and in such and such a place she was talking idlely.” And so he, my father, told me what I had already forgotten; as if he walked with me and wrote down my deeds. And I stand neither alive nor dead; he also said: “Now it’s enough for you to walk around the world; go and live in Tomsk, eat from your handicrafts, knit stockings, and when you grow old, then collect alms for food; listen, don’t walk around Russia anymore.” Then he went to his cell, and I bowed and left without saying a word to him. Arriving in Tomsk, I put aside worries about traveling and began living at home and doing handicrafts. After six months, my relatives and young people I knew began to gather in Kiev for worship and began to invite me with them to accompany them to Kiev, because the road was familiar to me. For a long time, at first I did not agree, because Elder Daniel did not give me his blessing to walk. But finally, upon strong request, she agreed, and we set off. Having walked three thousand and a half miles, we came to the Sarov Hermitage, first to the hotel, and then to Father Seraphim, to receive a blessing on the way. He received my companions kindly and blessed everyone, and gave crackers for the journey, but he did not bless me, a sinner, and even drove me away without saying a word to me. So, we lived for about a week, my companions went to him every day, and he instructed them with soul-saving words, but he didn’t even see me, no matter how long I didn’t come to him. Finally, my companions began to get ready for the journey, and only the matter was up to me. Therefore, I decided to bother him and, coming to his cell, I shouted with tears: “Father Seraphim, bless me on my journey; my comrades want to go!” Coming out of the cell, he looked at me sternly and said loudly: “No, there is no blessing for you! Why did you go to Russia? After all, brother Daniil did not order you to walk around Russia anymore! Now go back home!” I told him: “Father, bless me to go for the last time, I won’t go again.” He answered loudly: “I told you: go back, but there is no blessing for you to go forward!” I also told him: “Father, how can I go back alone; such a long journey, and I don’t have a penny of money?” He answered: “Go, go back; and without money they will take you on horseback all the way to Tomsk.” After that, he blessed me and gave me one cracker, and he closed the door. I came to the hotel, cried, and said goodbye to my companions: they went to Kiev, and I went to Nizhny Novgorod. There I found fellow travelers, our Tomsk merchants, and took me all the way to Tomsk. So the words of Father Seraphim have come true! The servants of God see and hear one another so far away - four thousand miles away! And I, according to the word of Elder Daniel, collect alms. But then, when he said this, I did not foresee this, because I had rich children, and now I have buried them all a long time ago. Conversation between Elder Seraphim and N.A. Motovilov about the purpose of Christian life Once, it was in the Sarov Hermitage, shortly after my healing, at the beginning of the winter of 1831, on a Tuesday at the end of November, I stood during Vespers in the warm Cathedral of the Life-Giving Spring in my usual place, as it always happened later, right opposite the miraculous icon of the Mother of God. Then one of the sisters of the Diveyevo Mill community came up to me (at the Diveyevo community, at the beginning of its existence, Father Seraphim ordered the construction of a windmill so that the sisters, in their poverty, could feed themselves from their labors. From this mill, that part of the monastery, into which, according to the elder’s behest, only girls were to be admitted, received the name “mill.” At that time I still had no idea about the name and existence of this community, separate from another church community, also the Diveevo community. This sister told me: “Are you, perhaps, a lame gentleman who was recently healed by our father, Father Seraphim?” I answered that this is exactly who I am. “Well,” she said, “go to the priest - he ordered to call you to him.” He is now in his cell in the monastery and said that he will be waiting for you. People who, at least once during the life of the great elder Seraphim, were in the Sarov desert and even only heard about him, can fully comprehend with what inexplicable joy my soul was filled with this unexpected call from him. Leaving the hearing of the Divine Service, I immediately ran to him, to his cell. Father Seraphim met me at the very door of his vestibule and said to me: - I was waiting for your love for God! And just wait a little while I talk to my orphans. I have a lot to talk with you. Sit down here! At these words, he pointed to me a ladder with steps, probably made to cover the stove pipes and placed opposite his stove, with the mouth in the entryway, as in all the double cells built in Sarov. I sat down on the bottom step, but he said to me: I moved to the second one, but he told me: - No, your love for God! Please sit on the top step. - And, having sat me down, he added: - Well, sit here and wait until I, having talked with my orphans, come out to you. Father brought two sisters into his cell, one of whom was a girl from the nobility, the sister of the Nizhny Novgorod landowner Manturova, Elena Vasilyevna, as the sisters who remained with me in the Senets told me about this when I asked. For a long time I sat waiting for the great elder to open the doors for me. I think I sat there for two hours. The cell attendant of Father Seraphim, Pavel, came out to me from another cell closest to the entrance to the entrance of this cell and, despite my excuses, convinced me to visit his cell and began to give me various instructions on spiritual life, which in fact had the goal, at the instigation of the enemy, to weaken my love and faith in the merits of the great elder Seraphim before God. I felt sad, and I said to him with sorrow: “I was stupid, Father Pavel, that, having obeyed your convictions, I entered your cell. Father Abbot, Niphon, is a great servant of God, but even here I did not come to the Sarov Hermitage for him and am coming, although I respect him very much for his shrine, but only for Father Seraphim alone, about whom I think, and in ancient times there were few such holy saints of God, gifted with the power of Elijah and Moses. Who are you that you impose yourself on me with your instructions, while, I guess, you yourself don’t really know the way of God. Forgive me - I regret that I listened to you and came to your cell. With that, I left him and sat down again on the top step of the staircase in the entryway of my father’s cell. Then I heard from the same Father Pavel that the priest threateningly reprimanded him for this, telling him: “It’s not your business to talk with those who thirst for the poor Seraphim’s word and come to him in Sarov. And I myself, poor one, do not tell them my own things, but what the Lord deigned to reveal to me for edification. Don't mind your own business. Know yourself, but never dare to teach anyone: God did not give you this gift - after all, it is not given freely to people, but for their merits before the Lord our God and according to His special mercy and Divine care for people and His Holy Providence.” I write this here for the memory and edification of those who value the small speech and barely noticeable character trait of the great elder Seraphim. When the elder had talked with his orphans for about two hours, then the door opened, and Father Seraphim, having seen the sisters out, said to me: - I detained you for a long time, your love of God, don’t punish me! Behold, my orphans needed many things: so I, poor one, consoled them. Welcome to the cell! In this monastery cell of his, he talked with me about various subjects related to the salvation of the soul and to worldly life, and ordered me and Father Gury, the Sarov hotel keeper, to go to him in the nearby hermitage the next day after early mass. Father Gury and I talked the whole night about Father Seraphim, hardly sleeping for the whole night with joy, and the next day we went to Father Seraphim in his nearby hermitage, without even drinking or eating anything; and the whole day until late at night, without drinking or eating, they stayed at the door of this nearby hermitage. Thousands of people came to the great elder, and everyone left without receiving his blessing, and, after standing a little in his vestibule, they returned; seven or eight people remained with us to wait for the end of this day and the exit of Father Seraphim from the hermitage: including, as I remember now, the wife of the Balakhna treasurer, from the district town of the Nizhny Novgorod province of Balakhna, and some wanderer, who was still busy with the discovery of the holy relics of Paphnutius, who, it seems, rests incorruptibly in Balakhna. They decided to wait with us for the opening of the doors of the great old man. Finally, they too became confused in spirit, and even Father Gury himself, when it was already late in the evening, became very confused and said to me: “It’s already dark, father, and the horse is hungry, and the coachman boy probably wants to eat.” Yes, if we went later, the animals wouldn’t attack us. You need to know the virgin Sarov forest, which surrounds the Sarov desert for tens of thousands of acres, in order to appreciate the natural fear of Father Gury. - No, Father Gury, go back alone if you are afraid of anything, and even if the animals tear me to pieces here, I will not leave the door of Father Seraphim, even if I had to die of starvation in front of them; I will still wait for him until he opens the doors of his holy cell to me! And Father Seraphim, quite a bit later, actually opened the doors of his cell and, turning to me, said: “Your Love of God, I called you, but don’t blame me for not opening the door all day: it’s Wednesday, and I’m silent; but tomorrow - you are welcome, I will be glad to talk with you. But it’s not so early, if you please, to come to me, otherwise, without eating all day, you are exhausted. And so - after late mass, and having fortified yourself with enough food, come with Father Gury to me. Now come and refresh yourself with food - you are exhausted... And he began to bless us, starting with me, and said to Father Gury: - So, friend, so, my joy, tomorrow, with the master, come to my nearest field - you will find me there; and now come in peace. Goodbye, your love for God! With these words the priest shut himself up again. No word can express the joy that I felt in my heart. I floated in bliss. The thought that, despite the long-suffering of the whole day, at least in the end I was worthy, however, not only to see the face of Father Seraphim, but also to hear the greetings of his God-inspired words, so comforted me! Yes, I was at a height of bliss unimaginable by any earthly semblance, and, despite the fact that I had not drunk or eaten all day, I became so full that it was as if I had eaten to the point of satiety and drunk to the point of reasonable ecstasy. I am speaking the truth, although perhaps for some who have not experienced in practice what the sweetness, satiety and rapture with which a person is filled during the influx of the Spirit of God means, my words will seem exaggerated and the story too enthusiastic. But I assure you with my Orthodox Christian conscience that there is no exaggeration here, and everything I have said now is not only the absolute truth, but even a very weak representation of what I really felt in my heart. But who will give me a verb that can at least partially, at least partially, express what my soul felt the next day?! It was on Thursday. The day was cloudy. There was a quarter of the snow on the ground, and quite thick snow pellets were falling from above, when Father Seraphim began a conversation with me on his nearby field, near the same nearby hermitage opposite the Sarovka River, near a mountain that comes close to its banks. He placed me on the stump of a tree he had just cut down, and he squatted opposite me. “The Lord revealed to me,” said the great elder, “that in your childhood you earnestly wanted to know what the purpose of our Christian life was, and you repeatedly asked many great spiritual persons about this... I must say here that from the age of twelve this thought constantly bothered me, and I, indeed, addressed many of the clergy with this question, but their answers did not satisfy me. The elder did not know this. “But no one,” Father Seraphim continued, “told you definitively about this.” They told you: go to church, pray to God, do God’s commandments, do good - that’s the goal of Christian life. And some were even indignant at you because you were busy with unpleasing curiosity, and they told you: do not seek higher yourself. But they did not speak as they should have. Here I, poor Seraphim (the priest pronounced his name like all the Kursk residents of Kursk - not Seraphim, but “Serakhvim”), will now explain to you what this goal really is. Prayer, fasting, vigil and all other Christian deeds, no matter how good they are in themselves, however, the goal of our Christian life is not in doing them alone, although they serve as necessary means for achieving it. The true goal of our Christian life is to acquire the Holy Spirit of God. Fasting, and vigil, and prayer, and almsgiving, and every good deed done for the sake of Christ are means for acquiring the Holy Spirit of God. Please note, father, that only for the sake of Christ does a good deed bring us the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Still, what we do not for the sake of Christ, even though it is good, does not represent a reward for us in the life of the next century, and it does not give us the grace of God in this life either. That is why the Lord Jesus Christ said: “Everyone who does not gather with Me scatters.” A good deed cannot be called otherwise than gathering, for although it is not done for the sake of Christ, it is nevertheless good. Scripture says: “In every nation, fear God and do what is right and acceptable to Him.” And, as we see from the sequence of the sacred narrative, this “do righteousness” is so pleasing to God that the Angel of the Lord appeared to Cornelius the centurion, who feared God and did righteousness, during his prayer and said: “Send to Joppa to Simon Usmar, there you found Peter, and to her he spoke the words of the eternal life, in them you and your whole house will be saved.” So, the Lord uses all His Divine means to provide such a person with the opportunity for his good deeds not to lose his reward in the life of rebirth. But for this we must begin here with right faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who came into the world of sinners to save, and by acquiring for ourselves the grace of the Holy Spirit, introducing the Kingdom of God into our hearts and paving the way for us to acquire the bliss of life in the future century. But this is where this pleasingness to God of good deeds not done for the sake of Christ is limited: our Creator provides the means for their implementation. It is up to the person to either implement them or not. That is why the Lord said to the Jews: “If you had not seen it, you would not have sin. Now you say, we see, and your sin remains on you.” If a person, like Cornelius, takes advantage of the pleasure of God in his deed, not done for the sake of Christ, and believes in His Son, then this kind of deed will be imputed to him as if done for the sake of Christ and only for faith in Him. Otherwise, a person has no right to complain that his good did not go to work. This never happens only when doing any good for Christ’s sake, for good done for His sake not only in the life of the next century intercedes for the crown of righteousness, but also in this life fills a person with the grace of the Holy Spirit, and moreover, as it is said: “For God does not give the Holy Spirit in measure. The Father loves the Son and gives everything into His hands.” That's right, your love for God! So the acquisition of this Spirit of God is the true goal of our Christian life, and prayer, vigil, fasting, almsgiving and other virtues done for the sake of Christ are only means to the acquisition of the Spirit of God. - What about acquisition? - I asked Father Seraphim. – I don’t understand something. “Acquisition is the same as acquisition,” he answered me, “after all, you understand what acquiring money means.” So it is the same with the acquisition of the Spirit of God. After all, you, your love of God, understand what acquisition is in the worldly sense? The purpose of the worldly life of ordinary people is to acquire or make money, and for nobles, moreover, to receive honors, distinctions and other awards for state merits. The acquisition of the Spirit of God is also capital, but only grace-filled and eternal, and it, like money, official and temporary capital, is acquired in the same ways, very similar to each other. God the Word, our Lord God-man Jesus Christ, likens our life to a marketplace and calls the work of our life on earth a purchase - and says to all of us: “Buy until I come, redeeming the time, for the days are evil,” that is, gain time to receive heavenly goods through earthly goods. Earthly goods are virtues done for Christ’s sake, providing us with the grace of the All-Holy Spirit. In the parable of the wise and holy fools, when the holy fools lacked oil, it is said: “When you go, buy in the marketplace.” But when they bought, the doors to the bridal chamber were already closed, and they could not enter into it. Some say that the lack of oil among holy virgins signifies a lack of good deeds during their lifetime. This understanding is not entirely correct. What kind of lack of good deeds did they have when, even though they were holy fools, they were still called virgins? After all, virginity is the highest virtue as a state equal to the angels and could serve as a substitute in itself for all other virtues. I, poor thing, think that they lacked precisely the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God. While creating virtues, these virgins, out of their spiritual foolishness, believed that this was the only Christian thing, to do only virtues. We have done virtue and thus done the work of God, but whether they received the grace of the Spirit of God or whether they achieved it, they did not care. About such and such ways of life, based only on the creation of virtues without careful testing, whether they bring and how much exactly they bring the grace of the Spirit of God, it is said in the books of the fathers: “There is another way, imagine yourself to be good in the beginning, but its ends are at the bottom of hell.” Anthony the Great, in his letters to the monks, speaks about such virgins: “Many monks and virgins have no idea about the differences in the wills operating in man, and do not know that there are three wills at work in us: the first will of God, all-perfect and all-saving; the second is our own, human, that is, if not destructive, then not saving, and the third is demonic - completely destructive.” And it is this third, enemy will that teaches a person either not to do any virtues, or to do them out of vanity, or for the sake of good alone, and not for the sake of Christ. The second - our own will - teaches us to do everything to please our lusts, and even, as the enemy teaches, to do good for the sake of good, not paying attention to the grace that it acquires. The first - the will of God and all-saving - consists only in doing good only for the acquisition of the Holy Spirit as an eternal treasure, inexhaustible and cannot be fully and worthily assessed by anything. It is this acquisition of the Holy Spirit, in fact, that is called the oil that the holy fools lacked. This is why they are called holy fools, because they forgot about the necessary fruit of virtue, about the grace of the Holy Spirit, without which no one has or can have salvation, for: “By the Holy Spirit every soul is alive and exalted by purity, and the sacred mystery is illuminated by the Trinity unity.” The Holy Spirit Himself dwells in our souls, and it is this very dwelling in our souls of Him, the Almighty, and the co-dwelling with our spirit of His Triple Unity, and is given to us only through the all-out acquisition of the Holy Spirit on our part, which prepares in our soul and flesh the throne of God’s all-creative co-dwelling with our spirit, according to the immutable word of God: “I will dwell in them and walk and be they shall be God, and these shall be My people.” This is the oil in the lamps of the wise virgins, which could burn brightly and for a long time, and those virgins with these burning lamps could wait for the Bridegroom, who came at midnight to enter with Him into the chamber of joy. The holy fools, seeing that their lamps were going out, although they went to the marketplace to buy oil, did not manage to return in time, for the doors were already closed. The marketplace is our life; the doors of the bridal chamber closed and not allowing the Bridegroom - human death; wise virgins and holy fools are Christian souls; oil is not works, but the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God received through them into the interior of our nature, transforming it from this to this, that is, from corruption to incorruption, from spiritual death to spiritual life, from darkness to light, from the den of our being, where the passions are tied, like cattle and animals, - into the church of the Divine, into the bright chamber of eternal joy in Christ Jesus the Lord our Creator and Savior and Eternal Bridegroom of our souls. How great is God’s compassion for our misfortune, that is, inattention to His care for us, when God says: “Behold, I stand at the door and it does no good!”, meaning by the door the course of our life, not yet closed by death. Oh, how I would like, your love for God, that in this life you would always be in the Spirit of God! “Whatever I find, that is what I will judge,” says the Lord. Woe, great woe, if He finds us burdened with the cares and sorrows of life, for who will endure His wrath and who will stand against the face of His wrath! That is why it is said: “Watch and pray, so that you do not fall into misfortune,” that is, do not lose the Spirit of God, for vigil and prayer bring us His grace. Of course, every virtue done for the sake of Christ gives the grace of the Holy Spirit, but prayer gives it most of all, because it is, as it were, always in our hands as a tool for acquiring the grace of the Spirit. For example, you would like to go to church, but either there is no church, or the service has passed; you would like to give to a beggar, but there is no beggar, or there is nothing to give; you would like to maintain virginity, but you do not have the strength to fulfill this due to your constitution or due to the efforts of the enemy’s machinations, which you cannot resist due to human weakness; They would like to do some other virtue for the sake of Christ, but they also don’t have the strength or can’t find the opportunity. But this has nothing to do with prayer: everyone always has the opportunity to do it - the rich, the poor, the noble, the simple, the strong, the weak, the healthy, the sick, the righteous and the sinner. How great is the power of prayer even for a sinful person, when it ascends with all his soul, judge by the following example of Holy Scripture: when, at the request of a desperate mother who had lost her only begotten son, kidnapped by death, a harlot wife, who got in her way and had not even been cleansed from the sin that had just happened, touched by her mother’s desperate grief, cried out to the Lord: “Not for my sake, a damned sinner, but for the sake of tears.” a mother grieving for her son and firmly confident in Thy mercy and omnipotence, O Christ God, raise up, O Lord, her son!” - and the Lord resurrected him. So, your love for God, the power of prayer is great, and most of all it brings the Spirit of God, and it is most convenient for everyone to correct it. Blessed will we be when the Lord God finds us vigilant, in the fullness of the gifts of His Holy Spirit! Then we can confidently hope to be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, who is coming with glory and much power to judge the living and the dead and to reward each according to his deeds. Now, your love for God, you deign to consider it a great happiness to talk with the poor Seraphim, being confident that he is not deprived of the grace of the Lord. What are we talking about the Lord Himself, the ever-inexhaustible Source of all goodness, both heavenly and earthly?! But through prayer we are worthy to converse with Him Himself, the All-Good and Life-Giving God and our Savior. But even here we must pray only until God the Holy Spirit descends on us in the measures of His heavenly grace known to Him. And when He deigns to visit us, then we must stop praying. Why then pray to Him: “Come and dwell in us and cleanse us from all filth and save, O Blessed One, our souls,” when He has already come to us to save us, who trust in Him and call on His holy Name in truth, that is, in order to humbly and lovingly meet Him, the Comforter, inside the church of our souls, hungry and thirsty for His coming. I will explain this to your love of God with an example: at least you invited me to visit you, and at your call I would come to you and would like to talk with you. But you would still invite me: you are welcome, they say, please come to me! Then I would inevitably have to say: what is he? Are you out of your mind? I came to him, but he still called me! The same applies to the Lord God the Holy Spirit. That is why it is said: “Be abolished and understand that I am God, I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted on the earth,” that is, I will and will appear to everyone who believes in Me and calls on Me, and I will talk with him, as I once talked with Adam in paradise, with Abraham and Jacob and with My other servants - with Moses, Job and the like. Many interpret that this abolition applies only to worldly affairs, that is, that during a prayerful conversation with God one must abstain from worldly affairs. But I will tell you, according to God, that although it is necessary to abstain from them during prayer, but when, with the almighty power of faith and prayer, the Lord God the Holy Spirit deigns to visit us and comes to us in the fullness of His ineffable goodness, then it is necessary to abstain from prayer. The soul speaks and is in rumor when it prays; and during the invasion of the Holy Spirit, one must be in complete silence, hear clearly and intelligibly all the verbs of the eternal life, which He then deigns to proclaim. Moreover, one must be in complete sobriety of both soul and spirit, and in chaste purity of the flesh. This is what happened at Mount Horeb, when the Israelites were told that before the appearance of God on Sinai they would not touch women for three days, for our God is “a fire that consumes all unclean things,” and no one from the defilements of the flesh and spirit can enter into fellowship with Him. - Well, what, father, should we do with other virtues done for the sake of Christ to acquire the grace of the Holy Spirit? After all, you only want to talk to me about prayer? – Acquire the grace of the Holy Spirit and all other virtues for Christ’s sake, trade them spiritually, trade those of them that give you a greater profit. Collect the capital of the grace-filled excesses of God's goodness, put them in God's eternal pawnshop from immaterial interest, and not four or six per hundred, but one hundred per spiritual ruble, and even that countless times more. Approximately: prayer and vigil gives you more of God’s grace, watch and pray; Fasting gives much of the Spirit of God, fast; Alms give more, do alms, and thus reason about every virtue done for the sake of Christ. So I’ll tell you about myself, poor Seraphim. I come from Kursk merchants. So, when I was not yet in the monastery, we used to trade goods that gave us more profit. Do the same, father, and just as in the business of trade the strength is not in just trading, but in getting more profit, so in the business of Christian life the strength is not in just praying or doing any other good deed. Although the apostle says: “Pray without ceasing,” but, as you remember, he adds: “I would rather speak five words with my mind than thousands with my tongue.” And the Lord says: “Not everyone, say to Me: Lord, Lord! will be saved, but do the will of My Father,” that is, he who does the work of God, and moreover, with reverence, for “cursed is everyone who does the work of God carelessly.” And the work of God is: “That you believe in God and Him who sent Jesus Christ.” If we judge correctly about the commandments of Christ and the Apostles, then our Christian work consists not in increasing the number of good deeds that serve the goal of our Christian life only as means, but in deriving greater benefit from them, that is, in the greater acquisition of the most abundant gifts of the Holy Spirit. So I would like, your love for God, that you yourself would acquire this ever-depleting source of God’s grace and always judge for yourself whether you are found in the Spirit of God or not; and if in the Spirit of God, then blessed is God, there is nothing to grieve about, even now at the Last Judgment of Christ! For “whatever I find, that is what I will judge.” If not, then we need to figure out why and for what reason the Lord God the Holy Spirit deigned to leave us, and again seek and seek Him and not give up until the sought-after Lord God the Holy Spirit is found and will be with us again by His grace. We must attack our enemies who drive us away from Him until their ashes are thrown up, as the prophet David said: “My enemies will marry me and I will suffer, and I will not return, until they die, I will insult them, and they will not be able to stand, they will fall under my feet.” That's it, father! So, if you please, trade in spiritual virtue. Distribute the gifts of the grace of the Holy Spirit to those who need it, following the example of a lighted candle, which itself shines, burning with earthly fire, and lights other candles, without diminishing its own fire, to illuminate everyone in other places. And if this is so in relation to earthly fire, then what can we say about the fire of grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God?! For, for example, earthly wealth, when it is distributed, becomes scarce, but the heavenly wealth of God’s grace, the more it is distributed, the more it multiplies for the one who distributes it. So the Lord Himself deigned to say to the Samaritans: “He who drinks from this water will thirst again, and he who drinks from the water that I will give him will never thirst, but the water that I will give him will be a spring in him, ever flowing into an eternal belly.” “Father,” I said, “you all deign to talk about acquiring the grace of the Holy Spirit as the goal of Christian life; but how and where can I see her? Good deeds are visible, but can the Holy Spirit be visible? How will I know whether He is with me or not? “At the present time,” the elder answered, “due to our almost universal coldness towards the holy faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and our inattention to the actions of His Divine Providence for us and man’s communication with God, we have reached such a point that, one might say, we have almost completely withdrawn from the true Christian life.” Now the words of the Holy Scripture seem strange to us, when the Spirit of God through the mouth of Moses says: “And Adam saw the Lord walking in paradise,” or when we read from the Apostle Paul: “We went to Achaia, and the Spirit of God did not go with us; we turned to Macedonia, and the Spirit of God went with us.” Repeatedly in other places of the Holy Scriptures it is spoken of the appearance of God to men. So some say: “These places are incomprehensible: could people really see God so obviously?” And there is nothing unclear here. This misunderstanding occurred because we moved away from the simplicity of the original Christian knowledge and, under the pretext of enlightenment, entered into such darkness of ignorance that it already seems inconceivable to us what the ancients understood so clearly that the concept of the appearance of God between people did not seem strange to them even in ordinary conversations. So Job, when his friends reproached him for blaspheming God, answered them: “How can this be when I feel the breath of the Almighty in my nostrils?” - that is, how can I blaspheme God when the Holy Spirit abides with me. If I had blasphemed God, the Holy Spirit would have departed from me, but I feel His breath in my nostrils. In exactly this way it is said about both Abraham and Jacob that they saw the Lord and talked with Him, and Jacob even wrestled with Him. Moses saw God and all the people with him when he was honored to receive the tablets of the law from God on Mount Sinai. The pillar of cloud and fire, or, what is the same thing, the obvious grace of the Holy Spirit, served as guides for the people of God in the desert. People saw God and the grace of His Holy Spirit not in a dream, and not in a daydream, and not in the frenzy of a frustrated imagination, but truly in reality. We have become very inattentive to the matter of our salvation, which is why it turns out that we and many other words of Holy Scripture are not accepted in the sense that they should be. And all because we do not seek the grace of God, we do not allow it, through the pride of our minds, to dwell in our souls and therefore we do not have true enlightenment from the Lord sent into the hearts of people who with all their hearts hunger and thirst for the truth of God. For example, many interpret that when the Bible says: “God will blow the breath of life into the face of Adam, the first created and created by Him from the dust of the earth,” as if this meant that in Adam before that there was no soul and human spirit, but there was only one flesh, created from the dust of the earth. This interpretation is incorrect, for the Lord God created Adam from the dust of the earth in the same composition as the Holy Apostle Paul states: “May your spirit, soul and flesh be all-perfect at the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” And all three of these parts of our nature were created from the dust of the earth, and Adam was not created dead, but as an active animal being, like other animate creatures of God living on earth. But this is the power that if the Lord God had not then breathed into his face this breath of life, that is, the grace of the Lord God of the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from the Father and rests in the Son and is sent into the world for the Son’s sake, then Adam, no matter how absolutely superior he was created above other God’s creatures as the crown of creation on earth, would still have remained without the Holy Spirit within himself, elevating him to God-like dignity, and would be like all other creatures, although they have flesh, soul, and spirit, belonging to each according to their kind, but not having the Holy Spirit within themselves. When the Lord God breathed into Adam’s face the breath of life, then, according to Moses’ expression, “Adam became a living soul,” that is, completely like God in everything and like Him, immortal forever. Adam was created to such an extent that he was not subject to the action of any of the elements created by God, that neither water could drown him, nor fire could burn him, nor could the earth devour him in its abysses, nor could the air harm him by any of its actions. Everything was submitted to him as the favorite of God, as the king and owner of creation. And everyone admired him as the all-perfect crown of God’s creations. From this breath of life, breathed into Adam’s face from the All-Creative Lips of the All-Creator and Almighty God, Adam became so wise that there has never been, no, and there will never be a man on earth wiser and more knowledgeable than him. When the Lord commanded him to name the names of every creature, he gave each creature in the language names that fully signify all the qualities, all the strength and all the properties of the creature that it has according to the gift of God given to it at its creation. It was by this gift of God’s supernatural grace, sent down to him from the breath of life, that Adam could see and understand the Lord walking in paradise, and comprehend His words and the conversation of the holy Angels and the language of all the animals, birds, and creeping things that live on the earth, and everything that is now hidden from us, as fallen and sinful, and which was so clear to Adam before his fall. The Lord God gave the same wisdom, strength, omnipotence, and all other good and holy qualities to Eve, creating her not from the dust of the earth, but from Adam’s side in the sweet Eden, in the paradise He planted in the middle of the earth. In order for them to be able to conveniently and always maintain within themselves the immortal, God-gracious and all-perfect properties of this breath of life, God planted the tree of life in the middle of paradise, in the fruits of which he contained the entire essence and completeness of the gifts of this Divine breath of His. If they had not sinned, then Adam and Eve themselves and all their descendants could always, taking advantage of eating from the fruit of the tree of life, maintain in themselves the eternally life-giving power of God’s grace and the immortal, eternally youthful fullness of the powers of the flesh, soul and spirit and the constant agelessness of their infinitely immortal all-blessed state, even incomprehensible to our imagination at the present time. When, by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil - prematurely and contrary to the commandment of God - they learned the difference between good and evil and were subjected to all the disasters that followed for breaking the commandment of God, they were deprived of this priceless gift of grace of the Spirit of God, so that until the very Coming into the world of the God-man Jesus Christ, the Spirit of God “was not in the world, for Jesus was not glorified.” However, this does not mean that the Spirit of God was not in the world at all, but His presence was not as complete as in Adam or in us, Orthodox Christians, but manifested itself only from the outside, and the signs of His presence in the world were known to the human race. So, for example, many secrets that related to the future salvation of the human race were revealed to Adam after the fall, as well as to Eve along with him. And Cain, despite his wickedness and his crime, clearly understood the voice of the gracious Divine, albeit accusatory, conversation with him. Noah talked with God. Abraham saw God and His day and rejoiced. The grace of the Holy Spirit, acting externally, was reflected in all the Old Testament prophets and saints of Israel. The Jews then established special prophetic schools, where they taught to recognize the signs of the appearance of God or Angels and to distinguish the actions of the Holy Spirit from ordinary phenomena that occur in the nature of ungraceful earthly life. Simeon the God-Receiver, the Godfathers Joachim and Anna, and many countless servants of God experienced constant, varied and visible Divine appearances, voices, revelations, justified by obvious miraculous events. Not with such power as in the people of God, but the manifestation of the Spirit of God acted also in the pagans, who did not know the True God, because from among them God found people chosen for Himself. Such, for example, were the virgin prophetesses, the Sibyls, who doomed their virginity, although for the Unknown God, but still for God, the Creator of the Universe and the Almighty and Ruler of the World, as the pagans recognized Him as. Also, pagan philosophers, who, although they wandered in the darkness of ignorance of the Divine, but, seeking the truth beloved of God, could be, by this very God-loving search for it, not uninvolved in the Spirit of God, for it is said: “Tongues that do not know God by nature create what is lawful and what is pleasing to God.” And the Lord so pleases the truth that He Himself proclaims about it by the Holy Spirit: “Truth came from the earth, and righteousness came from heaven.” So, your love for God, both in the Jewish sacred people, dear to God, and in the pagans who do not know God, the knowledge of God was still preserved, that is, father, a clear and reasonable understanding of how the Lord God the Holy Spirit acts in man and how exactly and by what external and internal sensations one can be convinced that it is the Lord God the Holy Spirit who acts, and not the charm of the enemy. This is how it all happened from the fall of Adam until the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in the flesh into the world. Without this, your love for God, which has always been preserved in the human race, a tangible understanding of the actions of the Holy Spirit would not have been possible for people to know for sure whether the fruit of the seed of the Woman, which was promised to Adam and Eve, had come into the world, having to erase the head of the serpent. But here is Simeon the God-Receiver, preserved by the Holy Spirit after the mystery of His ever-virgin conception and birth from the Most Pure Ever-Virgin Mary was announced to him in the 65th year of his life, having lived by the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God for three hundred years, then, in the 365th year of his life, he said clearly in the church of the Lord that he tangibly knew by the gift of the Holy Spirit that this was He Himself, that Christ, the Savior of the world, whose supernatural conception and birth from the Holy Spirit was foreshadowed to him three hundred years ago by an Angel. So Saint Anna the prophetess, daughter of Phanuel, who served the Lord God for eighty years from her widowhood in the church of God and was known for the special gifts of God’s grace for a righteous widow, a pure servant of God, announced that this, indeed, He is the Messiah promised to the world, the true Christ, God and man, the King of Israel, who came to save Adam and the human race. When He, our Lord Jesus Christ, deigned to complete the entire work of salvation, then, after His resurrection, He breathed on the apostles, renewing the breath of life lost by Adam, and gave them the same Adamic grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God. But this is not enough - after all, He told them: “They have no food, but He goes to the Father; If He does not come, then the Spirit of God will not come into the world; If He, Christ, goes to the Father, then He will go into the world, and He, the Comforter, will instruct them and all those who follow them in all truth and will remember to them everything that He told them was still in the world with them.” This was already promised to them by grace and grace. And so, on the day of Pentecost, He solemnly sent down to them the Holy Spirit in the breath of a storm, in the form of tongues of fire, which sat on each of them and entered into them, and filled them with the power of fiery Divine grace, dew-bearing, breathing and joyfully acting in the souls of those who partake of Its power and actions. And this very fire-inspired grace of the Holy Spirit, when it is given to us, all the faithful of Christ in the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, is sacredly sealed with Chrismation in the most important places of our flesh, indicated by the Holy Church, as the eternal custodian of this grace. It says: “The Seal of the Gift of the Holy Spirit.” And what, Father, your love for God, do we, poor people, put our seals on, if not on vessels that store some treasure that is highly valued by us? What could be higher than everything in the world and what is more precious than the gifts of the Holy Spirit sent down to us from above in the Sacrament of Baptism, for this baptismal grace is so great and so necessary, so life-giving for a person that even from a heretic person it is not taken away until his death, that is, until the period designated from above by the Providence of God for the lifelong trial of a person on earth - what will he be good for and what, de, will he do at this time? With the help of the power of grace given to him from above, he will be able to complete the time given by God. And if we had never sinned after our baptism, then we would forever remain holy, blameless and free from all defilement of the flesh and spirit, saints of God. But the trouble is that, while we prosper in age, we do not prosper in the grace and mind of God, as our Lord Christ Jesus prospered in this, but, on the contrary, being corrupted little by little, we are deprived of the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God and become sinful and many-sinful people in many different ways. But when someone, being excited by the wisdom of God that seeks our salvation, bypassing all things, decides for her sake to train toward God and vigil for the sake of gaining his eternal salvation, then he, obedient to her voice, must resort to true repentance for all his sins and to the creation of virtues opposite to those committed by sins, and through the virtues of Christ, to the acquisition of the Holy Spirit, acting within us and within us the Kingdom God's arranger. It is not for nothing that the Word of God says: “The Kingdom of God is within you, and it is needed, and those in need do not delight.” That is, those people who, despite the bonds of sin that bind them and do not allow their violence and incitement to commit new sins to come to Him, our Savior, with perfect repentance to suffer torture with Him, despising the entire strength of these sinful bonds, are forced to break their bonds, such people then truly appear before the face of God whiter than snow with His grace. “Come,” says the Lord, “even though your sins are like scarlet, I will make them white like snow.” So once the holy seer John the Theologian saw such people in white robes, that is, robes of justification, and “finches in their hands” as a sign of victory, and they sang to God the wondrous song “Hallelujah.” “No one can imitate the beauty of their singing.” About them the Angel of God said: “These are the beings who came from great sorrow, who have consumed their garments and made them white in the Blood of Lambs,” having washed them with suffering and made them white in the communion of the Most Pure and Life-Giving Mysteries of the Flesh and Blood of the Lamb, the immaculate and Most Pure Christ, who was slain before all ages by His own will for the salvation of the world, ever to this day, tempered and crushed, but in no way expected, giving us eternal and inexhaustible salvation, our path of eternal life in response is favorable at His Last Judgment and a replacement dearest and surpassing all minds of that fruit of the tree of life, which the enemy of mankind, who fell from heaven, wanted to deprive our human race, Dennitsa. Although the enemy the devil deceived Eve, and Adam also fell with her, the Lord not only gave them a Redeemer in the fruit of the Seed of the Woman, trampling death by death, but also gave us all in the Woman, the Ever-Virgin Mother of God Mary, who erased in Herself and erases in the entire human race the head of the serpent, an unremitting Intercessor to His Son and our God, unashamed and an irresistible Representative even for the most desperate sinners. For this very reason, the Mother of God is called “The Plague of Demons,” for there is no way for a demon to destroy a person, as long as the person himself does not retreat from resorting to the help of the Mother of God. “Also, your love for God, I, poor Seraphim, must explain what the difference is between the actions of the Holy Spirit, which in sacred mystery dwells in the hearts of believers in the Lord God and our Savior Jesus Christ, and the actions of sinful darkness, at the instigation and kindling of the demonic thief in us. The Spirit of God remembers to us the words of our Lord Jesus Christ and acts in unity with Him, always solemnly, creating joy in our hearts and directing our feet on the path of peace, but the flattering spirit, demonic, philosophizes contrary to Christ, and its actions in us are rebellious, obstinate and filled with carnal lust, lust of hair and worldly pride. “Amen, amen, I say to you, everyone who lives and believes in Me will never die”: he who has the grace of the Holy Spirit for his right faith in Christ, even if, through human weakness, were to die mentally from any sin, he will not die forever, but will be resurrected by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, who takes away the sins of the world and bestows grace upon us. About this grace, revealed to the whole world and our human race in the God-man, it is said in the Gospel: “In Him was the life and life of man,” and it is added: “And the light shines in the darkness and His darkness is not embraced.” This means that the grace of the Holy Spirit, bestowed at baptism in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, despite the fall of man, despite the darkness around our soul, still shines in the heart with the primordial Divine light of the priceless merits of Christ. This light of Christ, with the sinner’s unrepentance, speaks to the Father: “Abba Father! Don’t be completely angry at this unrepentance!” - and then, when the sinner turns to the path of repentance, he completely erases the traces of the crimes he has committed, clothing the former criminal again with the clothing of incorruptibility, woven from the grace of the Holy Spirit, the acquisition of which, as the goal of Christian life, I have been talking about for so long to your love for God. I will also tell you so that you understand even more clearly what is meant by the grace of God and how to recognize it, and in what way its effect is especially manifested in people enlightened by it. The grace of the Holy Spirit is the light that enlightens man. All Holy Scripture speaks about this. Thus, the Godfather David said: “The lamp of my feet is Your law and the light of my paths, and if Thy law had not been my teaching, then I would have perished in my humility.” That is, the grace of the Holy Spirit, expressed in the Law by the words of the commandments of the Lord, is my lamp and light, and if it were not for this grace of the Holy Spirit, which I so carefully and diligently acquire that I study seven times a day about the destinies of Your righteousness, enlightened me in the darkness of worries associated with the great title of my royal rank, then where would I get even a spark of light to illuminate my path along the way? a life darkened by the ill will of my enemies? And in fact, the Lord repeatedly demonstrated to many witnesses the action of the grace of the Holy Spirit on those people whom He sanctified and enlightened with His great inspirations. Remember about Moses after his conversation with God on Mount Sinai. People could not look at him - he shone so with an extraordinary light that surrounded his face. He was even forced to appear to the people only under a veil. Remember the Transfiguration of the Lord on Mount Tabor. A great light enveloped Him, and “His garments shone like snow, and His disciples fell on their faces in fear.” When Moses and Elijah appeared to him in the same light, then, in order to hide the radiance of the light of Divine grace, which blinded the eyes of the disciples, the “clouds,” it is said, “overshadowed them.” And in this way the grace of the All-Holy Spirit of God appears in an indescribable light for everyone to whom God reveals its action. “How,” I asked Father Seraphim, “can I know that I am in the grace of the Holy Spirit?” - This, your love for God, is very simple! - he answered me. “That’s why the Lord says: “Everything is simple for those who acquire reason...” Yes, our whole trouble is that we ourselves are not looking for this Divine reason, which does not show off, because it is not of this world. This mind, filled with love for God and neighbor, creates every person for his salvation. About this mind the Lord said: “God wants everyone to be saved and to come to the mind of truth.” He said to His Apostles about the lack of this understanding: “Are you not foolish in nature and do not honor the Scriptures, and do you not understand these parables?” Again, about this mind, the Gospel says about the apostles that “then the Lord opened to them the mind to understand the Scriptures.” Being in this mind, the Apostles always saw whether the Spirit of God abides in them or not, and, imbued with it and seeing the presence of the Spirit of God with them, they affirmatively said that their work was holy and completely pleasing to the Lord God. This explains why they wrote in their epistles: “It pleased the Holy Spirit and us,” and only on these grounds did they offer their epistles as immutable truth for the benefit of all the faithful - so the holy apostles were tangibly aware of the presence of the Spirit of God in themselves... So, your love for God, do you see how simple it is? – Still, I don’t understand why I can be firmly convinced that I am in the Spirit of God. How can I recognize His true appearance in myself? Father Father Seraphim answered: “I have already, your love for God, told you that this is very simple, and I have told you in detail how people are in the Spirit of God and how we should understand His appearance in us... What do you need, father? “It is necessary,” I said, “for me to understand this thoroughly!” Then Father Seraphim took me very firmly by the shoulders and said to me: - We are both now, father, in the Spirit of God with you!.. Why don’t you look at me? “I can’t look, father, because lightning is pouring from your eyes.” Your face has become brighter than the sun, and my eyes are aching with pain!.. - Do not be afraid, your love of God! And now you yourself have become as bright as I am. You yourself are now in the fullness of the Spirit of God, otherwise you would not be able to see me like this. And, bowing his head to me, he quietly said to me in my ear: - Thank the Lord God for His ineffable mercy towards you. You saw that I didn’t even cross myself, but only mentally prayed to the Lord God in my heart and said within myself: “Lord! Honor him clearly and with his bodily eyes to see the descent of Your Spirit, with which You honor Your servants when You deign to appear in the light of Your magnificent glory!” And so, father, the Lord instantly fulfilled the humble request of the poor Seraphim... How can we not thank Him for this ineffable gift of His to both of us! This way, father, the Lord God does not always show His mercy to the great hermits. This grace of God has deigned to console your contrite heart, like a loving mother, through the intercession of the Mother of God Herself... - Well, father, don’t look me in the eye? Just look and do not be afraid - the Lord is with us! After these words, I looked into his face, and an even greater reverent horror attacked me. Imagine, in the middle of the sun, in the most brilliant brightness of its midday rays, the face of a person talking to you. You see the movement of his lips, the changing expression of his eyes, hear his voice, feel that someone is holding your shoulders with his hands, but not only do you not see these hands, you do not see either yourself or his figure, but only one dazzling light, stretching far, several fathoms around, and illuminating with its bright brilliance both the snow veil covering the clearing, and the snow pellets showering from above both me and the great old man. Is it possible to imagine the situation in which I was then? - How do you feel now? – Father Seraphim asked me. - Extraordinarily good! - I said. - How good is that? What exactly? “I feel such silence and peace in my soul that I cannot express it in any words!” “This, your love for God,” said Father Seraphim, “is the peace about which the Lord told His disciples: “My peace I give to you, not as the world gives, I give to you.” Even though you were quicker from the world, the world loved its own, but because you were chosen from the world, for this reason the world hates you. Either way, dare, for I have conquered the world.” It is to these people, hated by this world, but chosen by the Lord, that the Lord gives the peace that you now feel within yourself; “peace,” according to the apostolic word, “above all understanding.” The apostle calls it this because no word can express the spiritual well-being that it produces in those people into whose hearts the Lord God introduces it. Christ the Savior calls it peace from His own generosity, and not from this world, for no temporary earthly well-being can give it to the human heart: it is given from above by the Lord God Himself, which is why it is called the peace of God... What else do you feel? – Father Seraphim asked me. - Extraordinary sweetness! - I answered. - This is the sweetness about which the Holy Scripture says: “Thy house shall be drunk with the fatness, and with the flow of Thy sweetness will I give to drink.” Now this sweetness fills our hearts and spreads through all our veins with indescribable delight. From this sweetness our hearts seem to melt, and we are both filled with such bliss that no language can express... – What else do you feel? - Extraordinary joy in all my heart! And Father Seraphim continued: – When the Spirit of God descends upon a person and overshadows him with the fullness of His influx, then the human soul is filled with indescribable joy, for the Spirit of God brings joy to everything that He touches. This is the same joy that the Lord speaks about in His Gospel: “When a woman gives birth, she has sorrow, because her year has come; When the child gives birth, he does not remember the sorrow for the joy that a man was born into the world. You will be in a world of sorrow, but when I see you, your heart will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you.” But no matter how comforting this joy, which you now feel in your heart, is, it is still insignificant in comparison with that about which the Lord Himself, through the mouth of His Apostle, said that that joy “neither eye has seen, nor ear has heard, nor has the good breath come into the heart of man, even as God has prepared for those who love Him.” The preconditions for this joy are given to us now, and if they make our souls feel so sweet, good and cheerful, then what can we say about the joy that is prepared there in heaven for those who cry here on earth?! So you, father, have cried quite a lot in your life on earth, and look at the joy with which the Lord consoles you even in your life here. Now it is up to us, father, to add labor to labor, to ascend from strength to strength and to reach the measure of the age of the fulfillment of Christ, so that the words of the Lord may be fulfilled on us: “But those who endure the Lord, they will change their strength, they will become winged like eagles, they will flow and not be weary, they will walk and not hunger, they will go from strength to strength, and the God of gods will appear to them in the Zion of understanding and heavenly visions..." Then our present joy, which appears to us in small and brief ways, will appear in all its fullness, and no one will take it from us, filled with inexplicable, heavenly pleasures... – What else do you feel, your love of God? - Extraordinary warmth! - How, father, warmth? Why, we are sitting in the forest. Now winter is outside, and there is snow under our feet, and there is more than an inch of snow on us, and croup is falling from above... How warm can there be here?! - And the kind that happens in a bathhouse, when they turn it on the stove and when steam comes out of it like a column... “And the smell,” he asked me, “is it the same as from the bathhouse?” “No,” I answered, “there is nothing on earth like this fragrance.” When, during my mother’s life, I loved to dance and went to balls and dance evenings, my mother used to sprinkle me with perfume that she bought in the best fashion stores in Kazan, but those perfumes did not emit such a fragrance... And Father Seraphim, smiling pleasantly, said: “And I myself, father, know this just as much as you do, but I’m asking you on purpose: do you feel it this way?” The real truth, your love for God! No pleasant earthly fragrance can be compared with the fragrance that we now feel, because we are now surrounded by the fragrance of the Holy Spirit of God. What earthly thing can be like it!.. Notice, your love for God, you told me that it’s warm around us, like in a bathhouse, but look, the snow doesn’t melt either on you or on me, and underneath us too. Therefore, this warmth is not in the air, but in ourselves. It is precisely this same warmth about which the Holy Spirit, through the words of prayer, makes us cry out to the Lord: “Warm me with the warmth of the Holy Spirit!” The hermits and hermits who were warmed by it were not afraid of the winter filth, being dressed, as in warm fur coats, in grace-filled clothing woven from the Holy Spirit. This is how it should actually be, because the grace of God must dwell within us, in our hearts, for the Lord said: “The kingdom of God is within you.” By the Kingdom of God, the Lord meant the grace of the Holy Spirit. This Kingdom of God is now within us, and the grace of the Holy Spirit shines and warms us from the outside and, filling the air around us with a variety of fragrances, delights our feelings with heavenly delight, filling our hearts with unspeakable joy. Our present situation is the same one about which the apostle says: “The kingdom of God is not food and drink, but truth and peace in the Holy Spirit.” Our faith consists “not in the skeletons of earthly wisdom, but in the manifestation of strength and spirit.” This is the state we are in now. It is about this state that the Lord said: “There are none of those who stand here, who have not tasted death, until they see the Kingdom of God coming in power...” Behold, father, your love for God, what indescribable joy the Lord God has now vouchsafed us with!.. This is what it means to be in the fullness of the Holy Spirit, about which Saint Macarius of Egypt writes: “I myself was in the fullness of the Spirit Holy...” With this fullness of His Holy Spirit the Lord has now filled us poor ones too... Well, now there seems to be nothing more to ask, your love for God, how people are in the grace of the Holy Spirit!.. Will you remember the present manifestation of the ineffable mercy of God that has visited us? “I don’t know, father,” I said, “whether the Lord will honor me forever to remember this mercy of God as vividly and clearly as I now feel.” “And I remember,” Father Seraphim answered me, “that the Lord will help you to forever keep this in your memory, for otherwise His goodness would not have so instantly bowed to my humble prayer and would not have so quickly preceded to listen to the poor Seraphim, especially since it was not given to you alone to understand this, but through you for the whole world, so that you yourself, having established yourself in the cause of God, could be useful to others.” As for the fact, father, that I am a monk, and you are a worldly person, then there is nothing to think about: God is required to have right faith in Him and His Only Begotten Son. For this, the grace of the Holy Spirit is given abundantly from above. The Lord is looking for hearts filled with love for God and neighbor - this is the throne on which He loves to sit and on which He appears in the fullness of His heavenly glory. “Son, give Me your heart! - He says, “and I myself will add everything else to you,” for the Kingdom of God can be contained in the human heart. The Lord commands His disciples: “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. For your Heavenly Father knows that you require all these things.” The Lord God does not reproach us for using earthly blessings, for He Himself says that, according to our position in earthly life, we demand all of them, that is, everything that calms our human life on earth and makes our path to the Heavenly Fatherland convenient and easier. Based on this, the holy Apostle Peter said that, in his opinion, there is nothing better in the world than piety combined with contentment. And the Holy Church prays that this will be granted to us by the Lord God; and although sorrows, misfortunes and various needs are inseparable from our life on earth, the Lord God did not want and does not want us to be in only sorrows and misfortunes, which is why He commands us through the Apostles to bear each other’s burdens and thereby fulfill the Law of Christ. The Lord Jesus personally gives us the commandment that we love each other and, being comforted by this mutual love, make it easier for ourselves on the sad and difficult path of our journey to the Heavenly Fatherland. Why did He come down from heaven to us, if not in order to, having taken upon Himself our poverty, to enrich us with the wealth of His goodness and His ineffable bounties. After all, He did not come to be served, but may Himself serve others and may He give His soul for the deliverance of many. So you, your love for God, do the same and, having seen the mercy of God clearly shown to you, communicate this to everyone who desires salvation. “For the harvest is plentiful,” says the Lord, “but the laborers are few.” So the Lord God led us out to work and gave us the gifts of His grace, so that, reaping the salvation of our neighbors through the greatest number of those brought by us into the Kingdom of God, we would bring Him fruit - some thirty, some sixty, and some a hundred. Let us take care of ourselves, father, so as not to be condemned with that crafty and lazy slave who buried his talent in the ground, but let us try to imitate those good and faithful servants of the Lord who brought to their Master one instead of two - four, another instead of five - ten. There is no need to doubt the mercy of the Lord God: you yourself, your love for God, see how the words of the Lord, spoken through the prophet, came true on us. “God is not afar off, but God is near and at your mouth is your salvation.” Before I had time, poor thing, to cross myself, I only wished in my heart that the Lord would deign you to see His goodness in all its fullness, when He immediately and in fact deigned to hasten to fulfill my wish. I say this without boasting, and not in order to show you my importance and lead you to envy, and not so that you think that I am a monk and you are a layman, no, your love for God, no! “The Lord is near to all who call on Him in truth, and He has no sight of their faces, for the Father loves the Son and gives everything in His hand,” if only we ourselves loved Him, our Heavenly Father, truly in a filial way. The Lord listens equally to a monk and a layman, a simple Christian, as long as both are Orthodox, and both love God from the depths of their souls, and both have faith in Him, even “like the grain of a pea,” and both will move mountains. “One moves thousands, but two are darkness.” The Lord Himself says: “All things are possible to him who believes,” and Father Apostle Paul loudly exclaims: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Isn’t it even more marvelous than this, our Lord Jesus Christ says about those who believe in Him: “Believe in Me, not just the works that I have done, but will do greater things than these, because I go to My Father and pray to Him for you, that your joy may be filled. Hitherto you have not asked for anything in My Name, now ask and you will receive...” So, your love for God, whatever you ask from the Lord God, you will accept everything, as long as it is for the glory of God or for the benefit of your neighbor, because He also attributes the benefit of your neighbor to His glory, which is why He says: “Everything that you have created to one of the least of these is to Me.” co-create." So do not have any doubt that the Lord God will not fulfill your requests, as long as they relate either to the glory of God or to the benefit and edification of your neighbors. But even if for your own need, or benefit, or benefit, you needed something, and even the Lord God would deign to send it to you just as quickly and benevolently, if only the extreme need and necessity were urgent, for the Lord loves those who love Him: the Lord is good to everyone, and He is generous and gives to those who do not call on His name, and His bounty in all His deeds, but He will do the will of those who fear Him and He will hear their prayer, and all counsel will He will fulfill them; the Lord will fulfill all your requests. However, beware, your love of God, so as not to ask the Lord for what you do not have an extreme need for. The Lord will not deny you this for your Orthodox faith in Christ the Savior, for the Lord will not give up the rod of the righteous to the lot of sinners and will strictly do the will of His servant David, but He will exact from him why he disturbed Him without special need, asking Him for something that he could very conveniently do without. So, your love for God, I have now told you everything and shown in practice what the Lord and the Mother of God through me, poor Seraphim, deigned to tell and show you. Come in peace. May the Lord and the Mother of God be with you always, now and ever and forever and ever. Amen. Come in peace!.. And throughout this conversation, from the very moment when Father Seraphim’s face became illuminated, this vision did not cease, and everything from the beginning of the story to what has been said so far he told me, being in the same position. I myself saw the indescribable brilliance of light emanating from him, with my own eyes, which I am ready to confirm with an oath. From the memoirs of Elena Ivanovna Motovilova about St. Seraphim On the night of December 27, 1910, Elena Ivanovna Motovilova died at the age of 88, who lived after the death of her husband, known for his closeness to the Monk Seraphim, Nikolai Alexandrovich Motovilov, in the Seraphim-Diveevsky Monastery. Elena Ivanovna was the same one about whom the Monk Seraphim said to N.A. Motovilov who came to him: “Your God-named bride is now eight years and four months old, and I will tell you according to God that she is like an angel in both body and soul” (see about this in the book by S. Nilus “The Great in the Small”). Elena Ivanovna, this favorite of the Monk Seraphim, had an amazingly clear mind and a bright memory; she was completely full of spiritual love for St. Seraphim; She had strong faith and a straightforward character and was never shy about telling the truth to her face. When one day some clergy, having come to visit her, began to talk about some of their financial accounts, Elena Ivanovna, in response to the question of Abbess Maria, who was nearby, who had trouble hearing the conversation: “What are they talking about?”, answered loudly: “They count the income, Mother Abbess, who has more!” Elena Ivanovna also said: “We must accept sorrows as sweets and thank the Lord for them, who does not send them in vain.” When I was in Diveyevo in 1906, at night Elena Ivanovna was stolen a very large sum of money, which she had received shortly before and kept it not in any locked room, but simply in a bag under the bed. Having learned about the theft, I went to visit Elena Ivanovna in the morning and in my conversation with her I did not see at all that she was upset. “God gave and God took away: blessed be His name forever,” she said. Elena Ivanovna always staunchly defended the purity of Orthodoxy and the inviolability of the apostolic traditions and was deeply indignant at all the rumors about supposedly desirable innovations and changes in the Statutes of our Orthodox Church. She directly told the clergy that they should not be cowardly and silent, but should openly and directly tell the truth when it comes to the Orthodox Church. "Apostolic legends are inviolable,” she said. “Church statutes and monastery statutes were established by the great saints and spirit-bearing fathers, and the wrath of God will be revealed to all who dared to make changes to them, just as it was revealed to Father Seraphim.” In the last five years of Elena Ivanovna’s life, I visited her many times and talked with her for a long time. In these conversations, which were always of a spiritual nature, she especially and often recalled the Monk Seraphim, for whom she had great spiritual love. In order not to forget, I always wrote down these memories, and I want to share some of them - mainly those that are still unknown in print. “With my late aunt, Praskovya Semyonovna,” said Elena Ivanovna, “and with the sisters of the monastery, I visited Father Seraphim several times every month. Then, when the sisters didn’t even take me with them, for example in winter, the priest told them: “Bring the little one with you next time.” Father Seraphim's appearance was always joyful, smiling, round eyes, heavenly blue, blush on his face, reddish hair, but not gray, average height, bent. He told everyone nothing less than: “My joy! My treasure! At the same time, he even straightened up, the bending was slight. Every time he met us, he fell at our feet, this extraordinary humility of Father Seraphim brought tears to the sisters and forced them to bow to the ground to him. However, he didn't get up until we got up first. One day, not finding him in the monastery cell, we went to see him in the nearby desert. After talking with the sisters of the monastery, Father Seraphim told us to go back to the monastery, and he himself walked behind us. On the way, I often looked back and saw that Father Seraphim, after walking ten steps, stopped, made three bows in the direction of Sarov and walked on. So he walked all the way to the monastery (two and a half miles), and such were his secret desert exploits. Often another little girl (later nun Evanthia) walked with us; Father Seraphim ordered us to bow to each other and kiss. Indeed, we have been extremely friendly all our lives. When Father Seraphim had a long conversation with my aunt and sisters, I became bored, and he ordered me to collect lingonberries, of which there were a lot around the cell. Once, interrupting the conversation with his aunt, he said: “The little one is bored” - and gave me a small bag of hazelnuts, saying: “Don’t you dare gnaw them with your teeth, but when you come to Diveevo, you know, you have a pile of stones there, there is a hollowed-out stone in it, you find it. Put the nut in the hole and use another stone to break it.” When I arrived in Diveevo, I actually found such a stone 4. When the relics of Saint Mitrofan were discovered, many small icons of this saint were brought to Father Seraphim. The priest gave each of the sisters who came to us an icon of St. Mitrofan, and he gave me a cross. When I came to Diveevo, I kept thinking: why didn’t he give me an icon? A day later, the priest and one of his sisters ordered that the aunt led me to him. When we arrived, he took a plate with icons and began to sprinkle them with his hand - at the same time he would look at me and smile, look and smile again; Finally, taking the icon of St. Mitrofan, blessing it, he gave it to me and sent me home. Once Praskovya Semyonovna went to visit her father in the nearby desert. Not finding him, she began to look for him around. The day was sunny. Suddenly she sees something moving in the bushes on the hill. Coming closer, she saw something that looked like a calf, and thought: where did the calf wander into the forest? But, to her surprise, it turned out to be Father Seraphim, who put on an old, rusty leather robe. Unusually for the elder, he quickly approached Praskovya Semyonovna, he was the first and hastily to speak, starting like this: “What are you doing, mother? Where does a calf come from here? The Lord is with you! When Father Seraphim ordered the sisters to dig a ditch in Diveevo 5, Elena Ivanovna also took part in this work and carried the earth. Praskovya Semyonovna once found Father Seraphim crying. “The Lord revealed to me,” he said, “that there will be a time when the bishops of the Russian land and other clergy will deviate from preserving Orthodoxy in all its purity, and for this the wrath of God will strike them. For three days I stood, asking the Lord to have mercy on them and asking it was better to deprive me, poor Seraphim, of the Kingdom of Heaven, rather than punish them. But the Lord did not bow to the request of the poor Seraphim and said that he would not have mercy on them, for they would teach “the doctrines and commandments of men, but their hearts will stand far from Me.” “This,” said Elena Ivanovna, “Father Seraphim passed on to other sisters of the monastery, and told my future husband, N. A. Motovilov.” Shortly before the death of Father Seraphim, as is known, His Eminence Arseny Tambovsky visited him, and for this reason. Father Seraphim was slandered and attacked a lot for the fact that he was involved in the construction of Diveev. The Right Reverend Arseny, wanting to check this, came to Sarov and asked Abbot Nifont. Hegumen Nifont suggested that the Eminence send the messenger to Father Seraphim to his nearby hermitage, so that Father Seraphim himself would come to the Eminence. Father Seraphim was already very weak. When the messenger came to him, he found him lying in a coffin. Father Seraphim said: “Tell the Reverend: I can’t walk, I’m lying in a tomb, I’m wounded by ulcers.” Hegumen Niphon sent for him a second time. Father Seraphim said: “Tell the Eminence that it was not Lazarus who came to Christ, but Christ who came to Lazarus.” Hearing this answer, the Right Reverend Arseny exclaimed: “Ah, Nifont, Nifont! I have sinned with you against the great elder!” And he went to his father Elena Ivanovna also remembered how Father Seraphim often told the sisters: “We love, we please the saints, but we don’t want to imitate them.” Father Seraphim also said to everyone: “It will not be a wonder when my bones rise, but it will be a wonder when the poor Seraphim transfers his flesh to Diveevo.” The last prediction is known to everyone in Diveyevo. Elena Ivanovna's aunt, Praskovya Semyonovna, was told by Father Seraphim that the Tsar would visit Elena Ivanovna. And indeed this was fulfilled in 1903, when His Imperial Majesty, Sovereign Emperor Nikolai Alexandrovich with his entire August family, during his stay in Sarov at the opening of the relics of St. Seraphim, unexpectedly visited Elena Ivanovna and talked with her. Elena Ivanovna remembered this visit with tears every time, saying: “What a wonderful family of the Emperor! Holy family! When Father Seraphim died, his body stood in the Assumption Cathedral for seven days, and then for the funeral service it was transferred to the warm cathedral. “There were people,” said Elena Ivanovna, “you couldn’t hit them with a cannon. Hegumen Nifont and all the people cried. “And I was at both the funeral service and the burial,” said Elena Ivanovna, “but the Lord deigned me, the only one left alive, to be in the cathedral at the opening of the holy relics of St. Seraphim.” Remembering Father Seraphim, Elena Ivanovna always said: “This is a wonderful, extraordinary saint of God! Prophet of God! After the death of Father Seraphim, they wanted to transfer the stone on which he prayed to both Sarov and Diveyevo; but they could neither lift it nor even break it. The stone was very large! In a dream, Father Seraphim appeared to N.A. Motovilov and ordered to build a fire on a stone and, when it burst from the heat, move it where they wanted. And so it was done. The first miracle from the stone was like this: N. A. Motovilov always had a piece of the stone in his coat pocket. One day he came to Voronezh and, as always, stayed with Archbishop Anthony of Voronezh, who loved him. At this time, a sick woman came to Voronezh for help with her illness to the relics of St. Mitrofan. That same night, Saint Mitrofan appeared to His Grace Anthony and said: “Motovilov is staying with you: he has the stone on which Father Seraphim prayed. Let them seek help from Father Seraphim. He is great before God. Order the water to be blessed on a stone and given to the sick.” The next morning, Anthony, who still did not know anything about Father Seraphim’s stone, called and asked Nikolai Alexandrovich: “What stone do you have?” Motovilov has now taken it out he took it out of his pocket and gave it to Eminence Anthony. When the sick woman drank water from the stone, she recovered completely. Hegumen Nifont gave the Gospel of Father Seraphim to N.A. Motovilov. One day Nikolai Alexandrovich fell ill with a severe fever; he was sick and exhausted for two days. Finally he stood up with great effort, went to the table on which the Gospel lay, and, barely able to stand on his feet, yet standing, began to read the Gospel of John from the very beginning and read the entire evangelist to the end, and as soon as he finished, the fever left him. When Elena Ivanovna was already married to Nikolai Alexandrovich, a portrait of Father Seraphim hung in their house. Nikolai Alexandrovich, having an ardent love for Father Seraphim, often conveyed his memories of him out loud. A German woman lived in their house - the children's governess. One day she got tired of listening to Nikolai Alexandrovich’s stories, she could not stand it and exclaimed: “Oh, Nikolai Alexandrovich, you are all Seraphim and Seraphim!” – went upstairs to her room. Elena Ivanovna immediately got up to go calm her down, when she ran back in tears and said: “Forgive me, Nikolai Alexandrovich, now I won’t talk about Seraphim like that anymore. I was just walking past his portrait when he looked at me sternly and shook his finger.” Among many other memories from her life, Elena Ivanovna told me about the then-famous elder Anthony of Murom, a blind man who had achieved great perfection in spiritual life. “Once we were in our Diveyevo house,” said Elena Ivanovna, “and I became very ill (I had a baby). Nikolai Alexandrovich decided to go to Ardatov to show me to the doctor. We went. Having entered the city and driving past the house of a lady we knew, we saw her through the window. She asked us to come in, saying that Elder Anthony from Murom, about whom we had heard a lot, was with her. When we went up, we found him lying (he was blind); he began to talk a lot with Nikolai Alexandrovich. During the conversation, seeing that he had a stocking on his hand, I thought: why did he put it on? When suddenly, responding to my thought, he said: “Mother, I put this on because my hand hurts.” His conversation with Nikolai Alexandrovich was very long, and it was already getting dark. Nikolai Alexandrovich and I began to get ready to go home. Suddenly Elder Anthony stood up, took his heavy iron cap, which he had worn for many years, and with this cap crossed my chest three times with the words: “Touch the grace of God to God’s servant Elena,” and hooked it so hard on my sore chest that, as they say, sparks fell from my eyes. Having said goodbye, we got into the cart, and Nikolai Alexandrovich ordered us to go back home, saying that it was too late now, and tomorrow we would go early to the doctor. Arriving home, I wanted to bandage the sore breast, but, to my surprise and everyone at home, I found no traces of the disease. From the above memories of Elena Ivanovna about the Monk Seraphim, we see that he had a special spiritual love for her during his life and then when she was a child; Could he have stopped spiritual communication with her from the heavenly abodes when she had already reached a ripe old age? Here is an incident that happened two weeks before Elena Ivanovna’s death. Exactly two weeks before her death, while traveling from Moscow, the Sarov monk Father Jacob visited her on my instructions. He had a long conversation with her, and her conversation made a deep impression on Father Jacob. “She lived entirely in memories of St. Seraphim,” said Father Jacob. “For many years,” Father Jacob continued his story about this visit to Elena Ivanovna, “I had a desire to have a pebble from the stone on which the Monk Seraphim prayed; but I didn't tell anyone about it. During a conversation with Elena Ivanovna, this thought flashed through my mind, but I did not dare express my request to Elena Ivanovna. Finally, she apparently got tired and, having said goodbye to me, went into the bedroom and lay down to rest, 6 but I began to get dressed to leave, and thought: “Apparently, I am not worthy to receive the stone,” and I went to the door. Suddenly I hear Elena Ivanovna’s voice: “Father of Sarov! Wait, don't leave, come here! I was about to lie down, and Father Seraphim now said to me: “Get up and give Father Jacob six stones.” And so I give them to you by order of Father Seraphim himself.” “You can imagine,” said Father Jacob, “what a state I was in!.. From this we can conclude that the love of Father Seraphim accompanied Elena Ivanovna all her life in exactly the same way as her husband, Nikolai Alexandrovich. And the death of both of them was quiet, peaceful, like a dream. Yes, this is not death, but a dream. It should be noted that St. Seraphim did not visit Diveyevo in the last years of his life. About this groove and the predictions of St. Seraphim regarding it, see the chronicle of the Diveyevo Monastery, arch. Leonida (Chichagova). In Elena Ivanovna’s bedroom there was a very large full-length portrait of Father Seraphim.