The unclean enemy especially raises up a battle against a person through impure fornication, so that a person darkened by this filth does not look to God in all his deeds, because only "the pure in heart shall see God" (Matt. 5:8). Having struggled in that battle more than others, having suffered much as a good soldier of Christ, until he had completely conquered the power of the unclean enemy, our blessed father Moses left us with his life an example of a lofty spiritual life. They write about him as follows.

It is known about this blessed Moses, that he was a native of Hungary, was close to the holy right-believing Russian prince, and the passion-bearer Boris, and served him with his brother, George, who was killed with Saint Boris. Then, at the Alta River, George wanted to shield his master from the murderers, but the soldiers of the godless Svyatopolk cut off George's head in order to take the golden grivna, which Saint Boris had put on him. Blessed Moses, the only one who escaped death, came to Kiev to Predislava, the sister of Yaroslav, where he hid from Svyatopolk, diligently prayed to God, until the pious prince Yaroslav came, attracted by pity for the murder of his brother, and defeated the godless Svyatopolk. When Svyatopolk, who had fled to the Lyash land, came again with Boleslav and expelled Yaroslav, and he himself sat down in Kiev, then Boleslav, returning to his land, took with him two of Yaroslav's sisters and many of his boyars into captivity; among them was the blessed Moses, bound hand and foot with heavy iron; He was strictly guarded, because he was strong in body and handsome in face.

This blessed one was seen in the land of Lyash by a certain noble woman, beautiful and young, possessing great wealth and importance; her husband, who went on a campaign with Boleslav, did not return, but was killed in battle. She, struck by the beauty of Moses, felt the lust of carnal lust for the monk. And she began to persuade him with words of flattery: "Why do you endure such torment, when you have a mind by which you can free yourself from these fetters and sufferings?" Moses answered her: "This was the will of God!" Understanding her vile lust, the blessed one said to her: "What husband, having listened to his wife, has done a good deed? The first-created Adam, obeying his wife, was expelled from paradise (Gen. 3:23); Samson (Judg. 16:21), surpassing all in strength and overcoming the soldiers, was betrayed by his wife to the foreigners. Solomon (1 Kings 11:33), who comprehended the depth of wisdom, submitted to his wife and worshipped idols. Herod (Matt. 14:10), who had won many victories and was enslaved by his wife, executed John the Baptist. How then shall I be free when I become a slave of my wife? I have not known women since my birth." And she said, "I will redeem you, and make you famous, and make you lord of all my house, and I will have you as my husband; Only you do my will, for I am sorry to see how madly your beauty is dying." Blessed Moses said to her: "Know that I will not fulfill your will; I do not want your power or wealth, for for all this is more precious to me than purity of soul and body. I do not want to ruin the labor of the five years in which the Lord has granted me to endure in these bonds, being innocent, such torments for which I hope to be delivered from eternal torments." Then the woman, seeing that she was deprived of such beauty, made another diabolical decision, reasoning thus: "If I ransom him, he will submit to me against my will." And she sent to the one who brought him into captivity, to take from her as much as she wanted, if only to give her Moses. And he, taking advantage of the opportunity to acquire wealth, took from her up to a thousand gold pieces and gave her Moses. The woman, having gained power over him, shamelessly dragged him to a vile deed. Having freed him from his bonds, she clothed him in costly garments and fed him with sweet foods, and, embracing him with unclean embraces, forced him to bodily lust. Blessed Moses, seeing her fury, was even more diligent in prayer and fasting, preferring for God to eat dry bread and water in purity than expensive dishes and wine in filth. And he took off his beautiful garments, as Joseph once did, and escaped sin, despising the blessings of this life. The woman, being put to shame, was filled with such rage that she thought to starve the blessed one to death, throwing him into prison. But God, Who gives food to every creature, Who once in the wilderness nourished Elijah, also Paul of Thebes and many of His other servants, who trusted in Him, did not abandon this blessed one. He bowed down to mercy one of the woman's servants, and he secretly gave him food. Others exhorted him: "Brother Moses, what prevents you from getting married? You are still young, and this widow has lived with her husband only one year, and is more beautiful than other women; it has innumerable wealth and great power in this Lyash land; if she had wanted to, the prince would not have neglected her; You are a prisoner and a slave, and you do not want to be her master! But if you say: "I cannot transgress the commandments of Christ," does not Christ say in the Gospel: "Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh" (Matt. 19:5). Likewise, the Apostle: "It is better to marry than to be inflamed" (1 Cor. 7:9). He also says of widows: "I want young widows to marry" (1 Tim. 5:14). But you, who are not bound by the monastic order, but are free from it, why do you subject yourself to evil and bitter torments, and so suffer? If you happen to die in this trouble, what praise will you have? Who abhorred women from the first righteous men, Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob? No one, only today's black-robed people. Joseph first fled from the woman, but then he also took a wife, and you, if you come out alive from this woman, then we think so, you will seek a wife yourself, and who will not laugh at your madness? It is better for you to submit to this woman and be free and master of all her house." Blessed Moses answered them: "O my brethren and good friends, you advise me well; I understand that you are telling me words worse than the serpent's whispering said to Eve in paradise. You compel me to submit to this woman, but I do not ask your advice, even if I have to die in these bonds and in bitter agony; I believe that I will certainly receive God's mercy. And if many righteous men have been saved with their wives, I am the only sinner and cannot be saved with my wife. But if Joseph had listened to Pentephrius' wife earlier, he would not have reigned later, when he took a wife for himself in Egypt (Gen. 39 and 41). God, seeing his former patience, granted him the kingdom of Egypt, and therefore he is glorified in the generations for his chastity, although he had children. But I do not wish to rule over the kingdom of Egypt, and not to rule over the authorities, and to be great in this land of Lyash, and to become known far away in the Russian land, but I have despised all this for the sake of the highest Kingdom. Therefore, if I come out alive from the hands of this woman, I will never look for another wife, but, with God's help, I will become a black-robed man. For what Christ said in the Gospel: "Whosoever shall forsake houses, or brothers, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and shall inherit eternal life" (Matt. 19:29). Listen more to you or to Christ? The Apostle says: "He who is unmarried cares about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord; but he who is married cares about the things of the world, how to please his wife" (1 Cor. 7:32, 33). I ask you, for whom is it proper to work for the Lord or for a wife? I also know that he writes: "Servants, listen to your masters," but in good, and not in evil; so understand you, who hold me, that feminine beauty will never deceive me and will not tear me away from Christ's love."

Hearing of this, the woman took another evil thought into her heart: she gave orders to put the blessed one on a horse and with a multitude of servants to lead him through their cities and villages, saying: "All this is yours, if it pleases you. Dispose of everything as you wish." And she gave the order: "This is your master, and my husband. When you meet him, bow to him." The blessed one, laughing at the madness of the woman, said to her: "Thou labourest in vain, thou canst not deceive me with the perishable things of this world, nor steal my incorruptible riches; understand and do not labor in vain." The woman said to him furiously:

"Or don't you know that you have been sold to me? And who snatches thee from my hands; I will not let you go alive, but after many torments I will put you to death." The blessed one boldly answered her: "I fear no misfortune, for the Lord is with me, to Whom henceforth, according to His will, I desire to work the monastic life."

At this time, by the inspiration of God, there came to Blessed Moses from the Holy Mountain a certain black-robed man, with the rank of priest, and clothed him in the holy angelic monastic image; He taught him much about purity, so as not to yield to the enemy and not to be afraid of that vile woman, and then he left. Everywhere they searched for this black-robed man and did not find it. Then the woman, despairing of her hope, inflicted grievous wounds on the Monk Moses: stretching him out, she gave orders to beat him with a rod, so that the earth was soaked with his blood. The executioners said to him: "Submit to your mistress, do her will; but if you disobey, we will break your body into pieces. Do not think to avoid these torments, after which you will give up your soul with sorrow. Have mercy on yourself, throw off this monastic rag and put on the precious boyar's clothes, and you will be freed from the torments that await you." The holy Moses answered them: "Brethren, do not hesitate, do what you are commanded. And I cannot renounce monasticism and the love of God, and no languor, neither fire, nor sword, nor wounds can separate me from God and from this great angelic image. To this shameless and darkened woman, who has clearly shown her shamelessness, who has offended not only the fear of God, but also the shame of man, who shamelessly compels me to defile and adultery, I will not submit in any way and will not fulfill her accursed will."

The woman, anxious to avenge her disgrace, finally wrote the following letter to Prince Boleslav: "You yourself know that my husband was killed fighting with you, and you have given me the freedom to take as my husband whom I want. I fell in love with one of your captives, who is beautiful, and having ransomed him, I took him into my house. I paid a great deal of gold for him, and gave him all the silver and gold in my house, and all the power, if only he would be my husband. And all this he considered as nothing; I often tormented him with hunger and wounds, but I did nothing. It seemed not enough for him to be chained for five years by the one who had taken him prisoner, but now he spent the sixth year with me, and I tortured him much for his disobedience, which he himself had brought upon himself by his hardness of heart. And now he has been tonsured by a certain black-robed man. What do you order me to do with him?"

Prince Boleslav ordered the woman to come to him and bring Moses. When his command was fulfilled, and he saw the monk, he greatly exhorted the monk to take that wife, but he did not persuade him. At last he said to him: "Who is so insensible as you, that you deprive yourself of many blessings and honor, and give yourself over to bitter torments? Know from now on that it is up to you to choose life or death: or, having fulfilled the will of your lady, to be honored with us and have great power, or, disobeying, after fierce torments, to accept a cruel death." He also said to the woman: "Let the captive you have bought not be free, but, as a mistress, do with your servant what you will, so that others do not dare to disobey their masters." Our venerable father Moses answered him: "What profit is it to a man (saith the Lord), if he shall gain the whole world, he shall forsake his own soul; Or what will a man give treason for his soul? That you promise me honor and glory, which you yourself will soon lose, and that the grave will receive you, who have nothing; in the same way this vile woman will be killed in an evil way" (and so it happened according to the prediction of the monk).

But before that, the woman, having gained even greater power over him, shamelessly inclined him to sin even more, so that she ordered him to be forcibly laid on her bed, embraced and kissed him, but even by this deception she could not attract him to her desire. The monk said: "In vain, woman, are thy efforts; do not think that I do not commit this sin, because I am foolish or cannot do it, but because of the fear of God, and I abhor you, unclean." Having received such an answer, the woman ordered him to be given a hundred strokes daily, and then ordered to cut off his secret limbs. The Monk Moses lay as if dead from a hemorrhage, barely breathing.

Interfering in this matter and wishing to please the woman even more, for the sake of the greatness of her family and his affection for her, Boleslav raised a great persecution against the Chernorizians and expelled all of them from his region. And God soon avenged His servants. In one night, Boleslav suddenly died, and a strong revolt took place throughout the Lyash land. The people rebelled, beat the bishops and boyars, and among them was killed that shameless woman.

Of this wrath of God, which occurred after the expulsion of the Chernorizians for the tonsure of the Monk Moses, many years later the great prince of Kiev Izyaslav was reminded by his princess, by birth Lyakhovitsa, the daughter of Boleslav, urging him insistently not to expel from her region the Monk Anthony with his brethren for tonsuring the blessed Barlaam and Ephraim the eunuch. But let's turn to the present.

Our venerable father Moses, gathering a little strength, came to the cave to the Monk Anthony, bearing upon himself the wounds of martyrdom, like a brave soldier of Christ, and he lived pleasing to God, asceticizing in fasting, prayer, vigil and all the monastic virtues, by which he conquered to the end all the snares of the unclean enemy.

For his many victories over the prodigal passions, which tempted this monk, the Lord granted him the power to help others to overcome the same passions. A certain brother, struggling with the passion of fornication, came to the monk and besought help for him. "I promise to keep it unto death," he said, "if thou wilt command me to do anything!" The monk said to him: "Never in all thy life speak a single word to a woman." He promised with zeal. Then the saint, imitating the first Moses, who worked miracles with a rod, touched his brother's bosom with his rod, without which he could not walk because of the pain of the wounds he had received before, and suddenly all the impure passions in the body of that brother became dead, and from that time there were no more temptations for him.

This good soldier of Christ in the midst of his sufferings reached the sixteenth year of his God-pleasing feat; five years innocently tormented, he showed patience to Job to those who took him prisoner, and in the sixth year he bravely suffered more for his purity than Joseph; then, by a ten-year silence equal to the angels in a cave, transmitted from the holy Mount Athos, he shone before the others, like the first Moses with a tenfold law, transmitted through angels from the holy Mount Sinai. And our Monk Moses was truly vouchsafed to be a God-seer, he turned out to be worthy of the blessedness of the pure in heart. And, in order to see God face to face, he migrated in the month of July on the 26th day, while the Monk Anthony was still alive, in whose cave lie the incorruptibly miraculous relics of this saint, who had not corrupted the purity of the man.