Tired of the impressions of the day, I thoughtlessly fell asleep on the stone bed of Valaam.A sharp bell woke me up on the threshold of late night. A strange feeling - anxiety, joy... something familiar..? As if I were in the gymnasium, and the old porter, nicknamed "Caesar" because of his round bald head, announced with a joyful bell that the Latin lesson was over and it was time to run home. But someone, mysterious, interferes... And the familiar feeling - to somehow dodge the rehearsal, from the difficult "Bortnyansky", where I can't manage to "solo", and at home, in the garden, an unfinished skating rink is waiting for me - acutely worries me." Singing in time..." - a mournful voice is heard, - "mo-li-tve cha... Ah!" - and a sharp bell outside the door tells me irresistibly that I cannot avoid the rehearsal. And now somewhere they are already singing... and, as if the deacon of the Church of St. Nicholas in Tolmachi, who came to the gymnasium to serve pannikhidas and molebens with the gymnasium priest, for some reason sad, already exclaims in the hall: "Lord Jesus Christ... Our God..." - and falls silent. I want to sleep, but oh, the deacon won't leave. I feel that he needs me very much, and he stands somewhere outside the door and waits for me, and again begins to exclaim: "... And he rings and rings outside the door.How many years have passed since that Valaam night? Forty years! And I still hear this bell and exclamation. Did you think then - what will happen?! Did I think that the deacon from Tolmachi was not an ordinary deacon, but a connoisseur of the works of the Church Fathers and... Dostoevsky, that he would become a hieromonk, take the schema, accept the great feat of the Russian eldership, like Fr. Varnava at the Trinity, like Elder Ambrose of Optina, like Elder Macarius of Optina, who served for Dostoevsky as a prototype of Elder Zosima in "The Karamazovs"! Did I think then, in the firm Russian serenity, that a terrible time would come, and this deacon would be called from the strong hermitage, from the Smolensk-Zosima hermitage, like the ascetic Hieroschemamonk Fr. Alexis, revered by Orthodox Russia, to the All-Russian Council, and the lofty and strict lot would fall to him - to remove from behind the icon of the "Vladimir Mother of God" the name of the Holy Hierarch - Patriarch - Martyr Tikhon written on a piece of paper? Did I think that this bell and the exclamation of "Fr. Deacon" - "Time for singing, time for prayer" - as if in a dream, would become a sign of something for me?!. But then someone waiting outside the door stops ringing. I hear a familiar voice - and remember that there is no gymnasium, I am a student, I am in distant Valaam, yesterday I arrived, that I am married, that they wake me up for the Midnight Office and wait for an answer from me - "Amen". To the prayerful exclamation - here you need to "aminid". That is how the novice instructed me yesterday, and it was probably the voice of Fr. Anton, the innkeeper, who said to him in a low voice: "Don't wake up, Fyodor, let them rest from the journey... I hear the steps of the "alarm man" scratching on the slabs of the corridor, the sad melody goes on, the bell is muffled. Unhurried steps are heard along the corridor, the doors of the cells are slammed, pilgrims and altar boys pass by, singing in a low voice: "Behold, the Bridegroom is coming at midnight"... "Hear my voice in the morning..." I strike a match, look at my watch, but it's five o'clock. The night is deaf! - and I hear the bell ringing as if it were Holy Night! Joyful excitement in me. Everyone leaves, I need it too...- but the dream interrupts my thoughts. Pale blue sky, milky clouds, thin as muslin. On the whitewashed window there are cheerful streaks of sun. Maybe from the distant Ladoga, still anxious, there is a lively reflection from the waves - a "bunny" on the ceiling. I open the window, I see the velvet forests on the rocks, beyond the strait, I breathe in the air... - not the air, but youth, strength, hopes, joy - I see and feel, in my heart I melt - "the clear smile of nature". In the flower garden there were asters sprinkled with dew, fresh blue, pink and white stars - "earthly stars", lush dahlias, dark as church wine - everything refreshed by the dewy night, everything cheerful and, it seemed, everything sacred. And in the bush of fading rosehips - August, and here the rosehips have not yet bloomed! - some bird briskly whistles a short song of a small northern summer. And above all, fresh, bright and joyful, - a blessing chime - to "It is worthy". I do the usual morning movements in front of the window - "room gymnastics" - I breathe and breathe, absorb strong infusion air - from the great distances, from the forests and Ladoga. There is no such air anywhere. It is so transparent that you can see individual trees, variegated mosses on the stone, cracks and "puffs" behind the strait... how the mast is reeling on the monastery soima... how swallows draw black dots in the blue sky... As along the edge of the mountain, above the pier, a cast-iron lattice glitters in the sun.- Through the prayers of the Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ our God... We are dressed, waiting for something, for some reason we are embarrassed to stick our noses out of the cell, and the exclamation of Brother Vasily delights us. I shout joyfully - "Amen!" Brother Vasily, anointed and new, he now reminds me of a young shopkeeper - brings in... dinner! And what about tea?- We have early lunch. Eleven, everyone has prayed - they have worked hard. And there are seagulls after the early one, whoever wishes. Well, maybe the father is a guest and will bless you with tea. Does it smell terribly delicious - like pearl barley soup? I look at the bowls: as if it were soup and porridge! The monastery's painted spoon, with a blessing handle on the stem, with a cathedral written in a hollow out, stands in the soup - it does not fall. Slices of purple beets and glossy camelina are scattered over the vinaigrette. Brother Vasily looks out the door to see if Father Antipa is coming: apparently he wants to talk, - from Moscow! That's good. The air is useful, then..." and his lips move, although he is silent. For some reason he stammered, but it was clear that he wanted to answer me. From all sorts of fleeting thoughts and superstition, one must say the "Jesus Prayer". You know?.. I do not know. He says, separately: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner." only a few ascetics are vouchsafed this. And we, spiritual simplicity, so, as we walk for the time being, we absorb and become accustomed to ourselves. Even from a single sound, there can be salvation. I even argue that there can be no salvation from "sounding". Brother Vasily looks out of the door.- We need to enlighten you, - he says, sighing. - In our stupidity, the Lord condescends, enlightens even with the sound of the holy word. I'll tell you what kind of admonition I had. You will remember, for edification. The world does not understand this, but if you come to Valaam, enlighten yourself for the benefit of your soul. Like you, at first I began to doubt. And this, then, was a temptation from him. I began to think, and he settled in my soul, began to whisper: "Do not pray in passing, do not whisper a great word with an empty soul!" Maybe this heresy has become in me, fear? I went to my "elder"... Which "old man" then? And you don't know that?! Be sure to know how. In the world, all of you are shepherdless, like sheep without supervision, but here you can't. In our country, the enemy of salvation is very strained to confuse, he especially wants to win in the monastery, but in the world everything is under his command. Here, for the salvation of the soul, the abbot assigns to each of them an elder experienced in spiritual work. An elder is appointed for life. But we must reveal everything to him cleanly, every sinful thought or doubt, and he will instruct him. As if it takes all the burden from the soul upon itself, and we are relieved by this, like Christ in our bosom. And we are fortifying ourselves against the enemy's offensive. And I went to my elder. A wise old man, very loving. I came, and he looked at me like that. And I see that he knows that a spirit of malice is building a nest in my soul. And the elder said to me: "Pray, pray, and don't let you doubt!" As if he had foreseen, he said, "And don't let you doubt!" He blessed me and announced me. Did you proclaim it? And so here, on Valaam, they always say - he proclaimed. So, he ordered. "Repent," he said. "And here you have five hundred bowers a day, for your superstition." For forty days. Why, he said, I'll say a word to you for admonition, as if it were a parable." And he told such a parable... I was immediately imbued with the concept of meaning. That is why my elder is of a lofty spirit, as if he is a seeer.- What parable? I asked, eager to know, "but don't tempt me, don't laugh at me." A certain bishop, he said, had a learned bird, called a parrot, because it wore red feathers on its tail. And that parrot knew how to shout many words, he had heard a lot from that bishop. And the bishop had a habit... He was a strict bishop... Everything is as he instructs: "Do not dare!" - so he said everything, and very strictly. The parrot adopted and fell in love with that word. Everyone used to shout at him - "Don't dare!" and it happened that parrot flew away from the bishop... well, let's say, the servant did not finish the inspection. And that parrot soared into the very heavens. And for his escape he was sent to his hawk. I scratched him from above, grabbed his back... The parrot squeals with fear, and shouts at the top of his lungs - "Don't dare.." The hawk, as soon as he heard a human voice, got frightened and let the parrot out of fear! Here is such a parable. Of course, no one has seen such a thing, but such a parable is for admonition. The tempter of the serpent, the eternal enemy, guards like a hawk, and the very sound of the name of the Lord frightens him. So he confused me with doubts - "don't pray, don't remember!" He wanted to turn it around: he said, "I'm talking about it, I'm light-mindedly keeping the Holy Name in my mind." And he was admonished...- Through the prayers of the Holy Fathers, Lord Jesus Christ our God...- is heard outside the door, and in response to the answering "Amen" comes the anxious Fr. Antipas.- Why are you stuck, superstition? - he jokingly frightened his brother Vasily, - I'll give you obedience, to be silent for a week... Have you taken a break from the track? He asked kindly, and his eyes stared at the saucer with the cigarette butt. He sighed, but said nothing.I knew from the pilgrims and read the "rules" on the wall of the cell that smoking was not allowed in the monastery. I was indignant at the "strictness," but I admitted that the monks had the right to do so: they did not invite me, I came myself, and "they do not meddle in someone else's monastery with their own rule!" I said frankly: "Excuse me, father... "Yes, yes, a sinful weakness. Sometimes, they don't cross their foreheads, but when they wake up, they get to smoke. "That's what I did. "It's not a matter of tobacco, it's a matter of weakness, of pleasing the flesh. Abstinence is the first stage. Have you rested?- Everything is very good, - I say, - only hard, the sides hurt.- Is it the same?! Fr. Antipa looked reproachfully. - Will it be soft for us there? Feather beds are a ruin. The body basks and the soul sleeps. And what verse does the psalmist sing, eh? You don't know... "A man is like the grass of his days, like the flower of the country, so he fades: as the spirit passes through him, and he will not be, and will not know his place for it." "Here's the same. Do not please the body, for it is dust, but take care of the soul. We forget the soul. Your spirit is weak, you can't resist tobacco, and what is more important, what will happen. By the way, this is what I mean. And now you must observe the rule, appear to the father abbot, and ask for a blessing to live. I will lead you... you are from Moscow, and our abbot, Hegumen Gabriel, is also a little from Moscow, you will be fellow countrymen... "I'm very glad," I said, "with your blessing, father, let's go..." I try to get into a monastic tone, "and I feel that it's not going well. Fr. Antipas waves at me: "No, I'm not a hieromonk, I'm not worthy to bless..." I am a simple monk, I carry out hotel obedience. Decay, of course, and there is a lot of sin, but you can't have a monastery without a household... Later, taking a closer look at us, Fr. Antipas opened up a little, and I realized that this was not only obedience, but podvig, and a difficult podvig: Fr. Antipas overcame the temptation: the temptation, as he said, "to accept the most difficult podvig." Either a hieromonk or a host. And I got used to it. He puts on a whiter cassock and leads us, the "Moscow outlanders", to the holy gates, to the heart of the monastery, to the cathedral.

IV. At the Rector's. Miracles

We pass through the monastery gates, which are called saints: above them is the Church of Peter and Paul. Further - another gate. I say: "How do you live in a fortress!" Fr. Antipas does not understand, as if he says with a smile: "Desert dwellers should always stay in a fortress. Ah, you mean about stones... This is an economic matter, built for centuries. And we have a fortress against the enemy - the Cross of the Lord. You can't protect yourself from the enemy with a stone. We pass another gate, and the "monastery courtyard" opens. On the right is the magnificent Cathedral of the Transfiguration of the Lord. What a radiant light! What blue domes in azure, golden crosses glittering! He comes up, from childhood: "His face was like the sun, and His garments were white as snow." No, I haven't forgotten yet. I talked about this at the exam when I entered the gymnasium. And so, also on August 7, as it was then, the same sunny day, with the strong freshness of the north, and I saw, as I saw then, the Transfiguration of the Lord.Only then was Gorkin there, talking about the "three Saviors" [1] and comforting: "Don't be timid, they will let you into the school." And now they "let me in", and now I am a student... Dear Gorkin is no longer in the world, but here is almost the same, the same Russian and affectionate - Fr. Antipa. And his dialect is a little similar. Only he does not say "dear." - And now, dear, I will take you to be blessed by Fr. Hegumen Gabriel. He is good, do not be afraid, he will bless you for a good stay." Do not be afraid"... It was as if Gorkin used to say: "Don't be timid, they will let you in."To the left, opposite the cathedral, a wide glazed porch glitters in the sun - the entrance to the abbot's cells. A novice, in a white cassock, bows, silently, greets us. Clean, painted floors, carpeted "paths", ficus trees in tubs, a huge pawed arma. Fr. Antipas approaches the arma, removes a drop from a wide lance-shaped leaf with his finger and says in a whisper, reverently: "The Lord has commanded this flower to announce the weather: as soon as it begins to cry, wait for the rain. This army was planted by Fr. Damascene.The ceiling was set with vaults; On the white walls there are paintings, various views of Valaam, the works of visiting artists, a gift for hospitality. And here, in the framed portrait, is the stern master of Valaam, the great organizer, the late Fr. Damascene. He is revered on Valaam strongly. Wherever you go, you will stumble upon the works of his hands and iron will: bridges, roads, granite crosses, ditches lined with stone, water supply... Near the tall antique clock in a case, counting down the unhurried time of Valaam, there is a humble old praying mantis, in purple paws. And the bishop of Valaam will accept her? Everyone is accepted here: "We have no sight on faces." - Clearly, to each his respect...- Fr. Antipa says in a whisper. - Glory to the sun, glory to the moon... Well, she will be received later, and I will see you off in advance. I must hurry to the hotel, and you are from Moscow, you have a distant fame, and a special respect for the farther. I ask about the pale novice at the door, with his head bowed in sorrow, why he is so condemned. This place, at the lintel, is for bitter repentance. So he waits for obedience to himself. You don't look at him, he's already crushed. The sinner is not great... so, a little disobedient.The abbot comes out of the next room. The old woman wants to approach him, but Fr. Antipas defends him: "Don't be the first, show humility here - but there you will be the first. You're trying to get it, I know you, and we're doing it for the first time." tall, strong, with an intelligent look of kind and bright eyes. He speaks slowly, smoothly, apparently thinking whether he will get down to business. He blesses us. The guilty novice bows to him to the ground and begins to wait at the lintel. Fr. Gabriel honors us: he invites us to tea, to the living room. Fr. Antipas is pleased, blinking at me affectionately, as if he wants to say: "I told you not to be afraid!" The furniture of the living room is old, mahogany, heavy: the table is oval, and again there is a tall clock with chimes: it must be remembered - "the time for singing, the hour for prayer". Above the table is a painting by Shishkin, painted by the artist in the sea, "two versts away". Holy islands, dense forests on the rocks and a white monastery blessing with crosses; St. Nicholas Skete, All Saints Skete, and a seagull over the waters.- The famous Shishkin, - says the abbot, - worked here for the glory of God. Artists do not forget us, they love the nature of God. We have our own artists, they painted the whole cathedral themselves. Our school is also picturesque. Look at everything, both the shrines and our workshops. From Moscow, you... Do you know the Donskoy Monastery.. My father is buried there... and Gorkin. The abbot studied there:- I studied at the theological school there, Moscow is dear to me. And he smiled sadly, remembered.- I bless you, look at everything. And you can ride a horse, far away. And on the boat, and on our steamer, in the sketes.We receive a blessing - "for all that is good". This is very important here. Here, without a blessing, not a step, strictly.In front of us is the Cathedral of the Transfiguration. The Lord's, goes into the sky like a high bell tower. Thirty and three fathoms! The blue domes are burning. Granite columns in the windows and at the porch. Granite crosses on stone. Everything is surrounded by granite. Built to last. And everything was built by the monks, themselves. I can't believe it.- All by yourself?! - I ask the guide-monk. - The work of the brethren, - he answers humbly. And I remember how often it was said: "monks are parasites"! How can it be? "Everyone, to the last nail, on their own", "God helped", "they worked for the Lord". And all without boasting, humbly. We enter the finished lower church, - here is the altar of St. Sergius and Herman. Columns, vaults, walls are in patterns, in cherubs. On the bluish vault there are stars. And that's sami? All? The work of the brethren. And this iconostasis, carved, pink-blue and golden, - by yourself? The Lord helped.- And the icons..? "The work of the brethren." crosses on the domes?.. "They were pouring here. From the brethren they worked...- the monk humbly answers, fingering the rosary.They sing in an ancient, "famous" chant - Valaam. I hear the folk, simple, laborious, - both sadness and cries. And the voices are simple, simple. I hear my dear: they sang like that in a cooperative, we used to have ... In the columns, on the right, there is a silver reliquary, "sud". The relics of the Venerable Sergius and Herman are under a bushel. The monk explains sparingly: about seven hundred years ago, the monks returned from Nova-Gorod "to their homeland"; the relics were taken away from the Swedes, so that the "Luthers" would not be abused, and now, "deeply", they rest under a bushel. We bow down, venerate the faces on the silver. A prayer service is sung. Not far from the shrine is a schema-monk. He covered himself with schema, his face was not visible. I look at the schema with a shudder: crosses, words, prayer sewn in white on black? - skull, bones... To remember death? I remember: "A man is like the grass of his days..." I don't understand, but... Know? Would you talk..? But the schema-monk is motionless, all in the other. Schema-monks... Who? I, a student, do not know this. I don't know why. Or do I know? As if Gorkin was telling me..? The old carpenter knew. And I don't know.The upper temple is in decoration, there are scaffolding. The guide is taciturn, leads us into the network of crossbars, guards: "Don't look down, it's dangerous here." We walk hesitantly. They paint the walls, hang on thin boards - it's terrible. An old thin monk, all in paint, with a brush, explains: "And these are the Pharisees... What kind of noses do they have... Humped! And this is a parable... And he begins to explain the parable to us.- Yes, they are learned, - says the monk, - they know all the parables. You, Fr. Fedul, take them to the bell tower, tell them about the bells, and they know the parable, scholars. I have been ordered to take him to you, to give him from hand to hand.- Scientists, - Fr. Fedul looks at us. "Scientists don't know anything!" Scientists do not revere the Lord either. Do you revere the Lord? - he asks us, point-blank and sternly.- Well, Fr. Fedul...- our guide says embarrassedly, - then why did they come to the Venerables!- Don't be offended...- says Fr. Fedul, and in the look from under his gray eyebrows I see an inquisitive doubt. "There are many scholars who do not revere the Lord. And what does the Apostle say? Where are the smart and sensible, eh? Where are the questioners of this age, eh? At the Last Judgment they will answer. Well, let's go to the bell tower. The Lord is with you. I feel, embarrassed, that there is also some truth in the words of Fr. Fedul. We go up a wide granite staircase. We come across monks in working cassocks, with piles of lime and bricks. In the first bay there is a huge bell.- You're a lot of poods! - says Fr. Fedul. "Andreevsky, fifty versts away, can be heard in Karelia. The Apostle Andrew the First-Called himself entered here and proclaimed the Gospel to the fanatics. And "the proclamation went out into all the earth, and his word went out to the ends of the world." And its ringing is ma-a-lin! And what does Isaiah the prophet say? Well... You scientists, well? So you don't know. "Let them give glory and praise to the Lord in the isles, let them proclaim." So we proclaim on the islands.You can see the entire monastery, the strait, the steamer "St. Nicholas" at the pier, Ladoga sparkling in the sun.- A miracle affected this bell!- A miracle?.. - Faith moves mountains. Having said this, Fr. Fedul took a breath and looked at me, as if to say: "Do you understand, learned?!" "A miracle is not a miracle, and it will not yield to a miracle. We assign everyone to work, to obedience. Yes, our peasants know more about the land, and the Lord leads by skill. Here is Fr. Leonid, he was in the smithy. He was a foundryman, and then he was jealous. I went to the abbot and said: "I don't have enough work in the foundry, bless me, Father Abbot, to work in the smithy." Fr. Damascene gave his blessing: "Just don't be proud!" he said. And then this very bell was brought from St. Petersburg, brought to the mountain, placed near the chapel. Now we need to hang it on the poles, the cathedral has not yet begun to be laid. And the owner of the smithy fell ill and was in the hospital. So Hegumen Damascene sent the treasurer to Fr. Leonid: "To erect for him to forge eight clamps, a bell to be held on the pillars... he asked me to do it himself." The treasurer went to Fr. Leonid and announced. And he only forged nails, studied. He was afraid, he cried: "I dare not accept such obedience... not only forging clamps, but I don't see it, just like there are clamps." And the bell costs more money - well, it will come off bad clamps... What a ruin! Well, the treasurer announced to the abbot. "Go," says the abbot, "tell Fr. Leonida, I bless him." Fr. Leonid in the treasurer's note, shedding tears...- "I cannot accept obedience, I am unworthy!" Well, again Father Damascene blessed him: "Go and proclaim: he himself was jealous, let him work... I bless him, forge his collars. The Lord will help!" and what do you think.. - Fr. Fedul looked at us, - enlightenment came over him, he told himself, - he forged such wonderful clamps..! Swifts were curling under us, circling around the crosses, flying into the gaps of the bell tower. We climbed to the last tier.- Look at the sketes, where our schema-monks are found, where they live in the forests like wild animals, they give praise to the Lord.- And they are silent?.. - And they are silent... And what? Therefore, the will is cut off. Be silent - and he is silent. In the Forerunner Skete, Schema-monk Basilisk has been silent for another year. And he will remain silent anymore... And for forty years he will remain silent! As long as the abbot blesses, he will be silent until the term, and it will be a joy for him. Have you heard about Schema-monk John, who lived on an island? He loved, like I, a sinner, to talk to a good man. And the late Father Damascene has everything in plain sight. And he decided to test his obedience. He called - and said: "Consider yourself unworthy to talk to people, be silent! I allow you to talk to the Lord, yes, when you have to, with me or with your confessor." Up to 14 years old, that's it! And then, in order to test his humility even more, he declared: "You are not worthy to bear such a feat... Speak as usual." And he spoke, and did not complain. Well, do you have any?- And what is all this for? - I don't understand.- Scientists, but you don't understand. Yes, I am not condemning. Lord, forgive me. How can we fight the most terrible enemy, if we do not forge our will? Everything is on command, everything is on self-truncation, when we serve the Lord, and He leads us along the path. From what did the sin of Adam come? Out of disobedience. So it is with every sin on earth. Here we have a forge of God's children, holy workers... to the glory of the Lord and for the life of the earthly order. There will be sorrowful times, and then we will weep. Above us was the very last tier, "impassable," Fr. Fedul said, "a seeing trumpet." From there, through the spyglass, the one assigned to obedience watches when he brings the fog.- Can you send these scholars there, brother Lyaxandra? - Fr. Fedul asked his brother - "watching" Ladoga: ships wander in the fog, and the "watching" - watches, and when he sees a spark in the fog - orders to ring. - I don't dare, father...- the novice hesitated hesitantly, - the abbot only blessed me. If he announces, I will let him go. Fr. Fedul praised the novice.- Practice, brother Lyaxandra. And you know that nothing will do to the chimney, and it is impossible if there is no blessing.- It is good here, what beauty is far away!- Stand and see, how beautiful is the universe! Fr. Fedul agreed. "Remember your soul, take care of it." It is said: do not cleave to the treasure. Here," the old man pointed to the forest distances, "is the Skete of All Saints. We have schema-monks there. There is the Baptist, also a schema-monk. And here he is, it seems, Konevsky, also a schemamonk, Fr. Sysoy, a clairvoyant. And over there - and Lyaksandr Svirsky. All here, the desert is ours. Dark forests, granite crosses, silver-domed churches, holy places. Silence is with us, peace of mind. And whoever is a man of freedom, the spirit in him walks restlessly, and there is no peace in his bones.- Yes, you are a philosopher, Fr. Fedul! O. Fedul looked doubtfully: the unfamiliar word confused him. In your opinion, maybe it's a shame, but what do I... I do not accept superstition. And why did you say such a word? But because the spirit of superstition is in you troubled. Oh, how high! You, I suppose, are afraid to look at, but here, even higher, a nun painted a kumpolok and sang prayers. And the old man, he was over sixty. The wind, as if on a lake, swayed and dulled against the kumpolok, and he sang "To the King of Heaven", and sang somehow.. And why? Blessing, cutting off the will. "Climb, Fr. Anthimus!" the abbot announced, "he climbs and sings prayers. And thirty-three fathoms.. There, the brethren went out of the church, the hour for a meal has come. Well, let's go, I spoke to you.We began to descend from the bell tower. "Summer of the Lord": Apple Savior. ^

V. In the refectory

- Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us... Brother Vasily brings dinner.- I have only brought one person. And Fr. Antipas has assigned you an obedience," he says to me with a smile, "to go to the refectory. There we eat in a dignified manner, with the hagiographies. I don't understand, I ask him: what does it mean - "under the hagiographies"?- Everyone eats, and the next reader reads about the "hagiographies". This is so that harmful thoughts do not enter. Food is sanctified by prayer, and then nourishment is beneficial. I am surprised: it is in physiology that it is said that - I recently read Lewis's "Physiology". It turns out that the monks also know.I tell Brother Vasily that this is also said in science, so that you can eat in complete calm, without irritation. He looks at me doubtfully, whether there is a trick in my words.- We do not know your science, but the Holy Fathers established it so, from ancient times. There is such an instruction of Elder Nazarius of Sarov: "To eat in silence, as if you were performing some sacred action." "And in our opinion, the order of Elder Nazarius," says the stubborn brother Basil, "is not to defile your daily bread with evil thoughts. And for the female sex, for their person..." - he points to my wife, the refectory at our hotel. But for them the rite is not allowed, they eat without "hagiographies".- That's sad, - I say. - And what if you have bad thoughts? It is unfair to leave the female sex unprotected from temptation.Brother Vasily senses my joke and smiles. He says that the order for the brethren has been established, but in the convents, they say, they also eat under the "hagiographies." It is in the monastery quadrangle, opposite the gate, at the Church of the Dormition of the Most Holy Theotokos. Fr. Antipa meets and carries a basket. I looked into it and saw: a large red currant! It amazes me like a miracle. In Moscow, it left a long time ago, there the raspberries have already come down, and here - summer has returned again. Fr. Antipas takes out a brush, shows it to me and admires it himself: the currants shine juicily in the sun - live yakhontas! For the feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord, ten poods were collected, and these are the remainders, the rector blessed for a meal, for a hotel. Haven't you seen our gardens yet? Take a look. All monk Gregory, by his great labor. Through it, we have currants, and as many apples as we gather, and plums, and cherries, to the glory of the Lord. For twenty years he carried the earth on himself, poured it on the bare stone, on the rusty luda, and now all the brethren rejoice, and we rejoice the pilgrims. We even have oriental grass.- What kind of grass is this... Eastern?- Why, don't you know... is-sop! King David cries out in the Psalms?.. "Sprinkle me with hyssop... and I will be cleansed..." He lived in the East, so the Eastern, because. Go and eat with the brethren, listen to the teachings, and you will be nourished in health. You'll tell yourself later what delicious food you eat... With a prayer so delicious, consecrated.I enter the refectory. A long, low chamber, vaults. I see long, long tables, simple, uncovered, and on them, in orderly rows, bowls, light purple spoons, white handpieces, canvas bowls covering in pairs, all in even, even rows, salt cellars, tin ladles, squat wide vessels - bowls, as if made of dull old silver, filled with burgundy kvass, with ladles floating like ducks, dark slices of bread, and these snow-white handcuffs - linen like the wings of seagulls,.. - so reminds me of epic "swearing" tables and something close and dear to me...- working festive tables of our old yard in distant childhood? It smells thick and sweetish-spicy - kvass and warm bread. Thoughtfully and secretly they look from the desert walls - the venerable ascetics, in black schemas, bless. The brethren sit dignified at the tables, in deafening silence. I feel embarrassed, how they look inquiringly at me, so unseen here, in a gray student jacket, in gilded buttons with eagles, looking for a place for myself. Someone whispers to me sternly: "Give, give, for the brethren... the pilgrims are there, in the second ward." I pass through rows of dark, mute tables, looking in strict silence, and find a place - next to pale old Olonets. Opposite me sat the hushed Petersburgers, the cabmen who had traveled on the steamer with us. They blink at me familiarly, as if they want to say: "Here, brother, you can't talk... A skinny monk sits behind the old Olonets, looking at the empty bowl without raising his eyes, and it seems to me that he also says in silence: "Yes, strictly here." And immediately, as if on command, the altar boys get up from the tables and go to the kitchen for food. In front of the iconostasis, a monk earnestly crosses himself and makes prostrations. I ask the skinny monk why it is the monk who bows and does not sit with everyone. The monk does not answer. An acquaintance from St. Petersburg cautiously says: "I am guilty, I must assume." The gaunt monk whispers, without raising his eyes: "At the meal we are supposed to be silent." The acolytes bring in tin bowls with food, put them on the tables in rows, one bowl for four, and now I see how a tin strip stretches out on the tables - the road, smoking with fragrant brew. A discordant choir begins, as if something prayerful. It is the acolytes who cry out in a low voice, setting the bowls: "Lord Jesus Christ our God, have mercy on us." The elders at the tables answer them - "Amen". A silent rustle grows, blissfully restrained, - splashing, jingling; white handcuffs soar, broth pours into bowls, spoons flicker, pieces of bread darken, heads bow in order. It seems to me that a very important thing is happening. A sonorous, melodious voice reads from the ambo the "life" of this day. I listen to the rustle, to the measured, profound chewing of hundreds of people, and a thought that I had not thought of before: what an important thing is being done! It is as if I comprehend a deep meaning: "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread." For the first time I feel, having forgotten, the most heartfelt prayer: "Give us this day our daily bread." I look at the old Olonets, how reverently and joyfully they eat this daily bread... they do not eat, but eat as a miraculous gift... they do not enjoy themselves, but receive them prayerfully, in order, in humility...- and I think: "How good it is! and this is not simple, not commonplace, but sacred something in this, elevating, sanctifying a person!" When I was a child, Gorkin told me, our carpenter: "Eat, my dear... This is our daily bread, we earned it with you... be baptized, you must always be baptized on bread, the gift of the Lord." Then I also ate - and with what reverence! - sour working bread, with carpenters, in the cooperative, and this "daily bread", forgotten in childhood, was unusually sweet. And then I remembered, I resonated here, on Valaam, in another cooperative - the same Russian ordinary people, who covered their shirts and shoulders with their cassocks, only special people, selected, gathered from the villages and fields of Russia in the name of God, "ideologically", as I said then. "We have more and more peasants," I remembered the words of Fr. Antipas.At our table there are pilgrims, mostly ordinary people, and even poor brethren, and these poor brethren eat from the same bowl and with the same spoon, linden, with a blessing handle on the stem, as the abbot, the guardian of the labor, St. Valaam. Old Olon residents, in worn-out grays, splendidly and diligently sip thick pearl barley soup and look around. It seems to me that they do not believe that they are equal here, it seems that they are afraid: how will they say, "Get out of here, this is not your place!" A skinny monk gently says to them: "Eat, brothers, for your health, for the glory of God," and also pours them soup. They look with hesitant eyes and cross themselves. "It's not often, I suppose, that you have to dine like this," the St. Petersburg cabman whispers, pointing to the old men, "poor people, these Olonets and Karelians, are glad - they have got their hands on pure bread." "It's so hearty and sweet... And no one will say a word.I see others, the same, with exhausted faces, in worn-out clothes, timidly looking, listening to the melodious voice of the reader: "The rich dwell in drink and food, but forgets about the poor and about the soul..." I listened, looked at the poor brethren, and my heart boiled. I think habitually, like a student: "Bebel doesn't know that... This is also socialism, only spiritual... if he came here, our monks could make amendments to his social system..."The bowls change. For pearl barley soup, they bring mashed potatoes with salted mushrooms. The old people are horrified: everyone is carrying! They put a new bowl: cabbage soup with mushrooms, covered with porridge.- Eat, brothers, to your health... "I'll fill it again," whispers the skinny monk, "get well on the taverns of Sts. Sergius and Herman." They were, too, like you and me, workers... It seems that the end of the meal is over. No, they also put it: porridge, with vegetable oil. Father.. And with a spirit! - the old man is amazed, sniffing at the spoon, - why such mercy... yes, with oil..! And so they carry on tin dishes a wonderful red currant, grown on the Valaam stone by the great labors of the unknown monk Gregory.- And this is pampering-oh...- says the St. Petersburg cabman, rejoicing. They looked at the kvass in the bowl and timidly asked the monk: "Can I have kvass?" - How much hunting will there be, - says the monk, scoops it up with a ladle and serves it. - Oh, kvass-juice... the kvasok is good...", says the old man, panting, passing the ladle to the other. "A noble kvasok... We forgot when we drank such kvasok... The meal ends with the singing of thanksgiving "for the brush". The abbot blesses, the brethren bow in order and go back to their cells. The monk at the iconostasis continues to make prostrations. I asked a monk I knew why the monk did not dine, but prayed. And for his fault and humility he tried him, and in obedience to him he proclaimed that the worshippers should be put down. At meals, in full view of the brethren. This is for humility, such obedience.- Why is there such a test, on all the people?- The monk sighs.- The abbot announced it, for the edification of everyone. Here, you say, there is a test on all the people... As if for shame. It is a joy for him that in the people, as if everyone accepts repentance from him. And no one will judge. Our will is with the Lord.I leave the refectory. Pilgrims go to take a nap. Who goes to the lattice to look at the expanses of Ladoga; On the threshold of the hotel, Fr. Antipas meets me, with his arms outstretched, as if he wants to hug me - a wonderful old man, really.- Well... We saw how we have a meal?.. Did you like it?- Wonderful, Fr. Antipas! And how they eat, and how they beat off the worshippers...- Oh, you joker, right...- laughs Fr. Antipas. - Humility is the way to salvation.- You know, Fr. Antipas...- I say, feeling that I cannot but say the most important thing that overwhelms my heart, - I am so grateful to you that you have proclaimed obedience to me...- No, no...- warns Fr. Antipas, - I am not worthy to proclaim... This is only Fr. Abbot, according to the rule. Yes, I was joking, obedience... I liked it - and thank God.- I learned from you the most important, the most profound... I understood how they eat their daily bread... And what is... Did Fr. Antipas understand me? He looked at me kindly and patted me on the shoulder.

VI. At the cemetery. Gardens. Fr. Nicholas

On a high rock, above the "Monastyrsky" Strait, the old Valaam cemetery rests. So one of the monks told us: "He is at rest." It is separated from the holy monastery by a white stone fence. There is a deafening silence in the monastery: Valaam is dozing to the soporific whisper of the pines, to the splashes of Ladoga; And here it is no longer silence, but muffled and deeper than silence: peace. So I thought then: "grave silence". And this bookish expression became clear to me. Old maples, lindens, in the gold and crimson of August, drop their leaves on the hillocks-graves overgrown with grass. The whole of Valaam is made of stone, it has a lot of granite and marble, but there are no tombstones to be seen. The monks of Valaam do not like tombstones: memory is a God-pleasing life. The Lord has everything in his memory. Round pebbles on grass bumps here and there." Novice Vasily. He passed away in the summer of 1871, on the 26th day of April, 23 years old," I read on the round of the grave. Who is he, where does he come from, why did he come to this remote cemetery in such years? "I was not even in the world yet, and he...!" - sadness runs through his soul, and floods the joyful consciousness that I am alive, young, and ahead... How much is ahead, in total! I look at my wife, young as I am, and our speaking eyes meet in one feeling: what joy, and how much is ahead - everything! We are cramped in this cemetery. I would like to leave... But the monk accompanying us is embarrassed: it is awkward to leave immediately, we need to look "at the schema-monks." They're all the same, just like the ones underneath. These are the graves of schemamonks, inhabitants of the wilds of Valaam, hermitages, deserts. Eleven of them rest, men of prayer, ascetics, silents. The oldest is 95 years old. I know that all these ascetics gave their lives to serve the "idea", that they are all people of a powerful will, but it is not clear to me, a young student, why they left their lives and loved ones, went into the forests. And what is left of them? Only tombstones and "hagiographies". I tell the monk. He sighs.- How is it possible...- he says, - and how much consolation did people have had from them? And how is it written in the Gospel with the Lord? "Let the corruptible of the world leave and take up her cross, and come after me." They have chosen a good yoke for themselves. How is it - for what! I'll tell you what's the matter. How do you take your soul for a trifle? And in it is all the matter, it must be preserved, brought up for eternal life, as it is predestined, in preparation. How come you can't understand? No, think about your soul. Listen. It is desolate here, but still the people reach the deepest deserts, the wilderness, and desire blessing and prayer from the holy ascetic man... His soul desires it. For example, one schema-monk among us was jealous, overthink, in temptation: I need to save my soul, cleanse it, and here I have entertainment from people. And he lived on a distant island, where people came to him once a year, demanding consolation. And he was jealous: I want to renounce the world completely. And so, look, what a will was done to him, what an instruction was given to him. It means that you are an ascetic, but remember these little ones. And so, he was blessed by the abbot, the abbot, and went to the Perm forests, to the wilderness, where only bears live. He went to the Perm Territory. He huddled deep in the forest, set up a cell for himself, like a kennel in a hole, covered himself with earth - he hissed and lived, correcting prayers. And there was the first warning to him. He went to the spring of water to get it, and came to his hermitage, and his hut was all swept away, and a bear seemed to be sitting on a stump. Well, he was afraid of that bear, buried himself in the bushes. Well, the bear sat for a while and left. The hermit straightened his cell and began to pray again. And then, as if that bear, you might think, he pointed out the path to him: suffering people came to the cell, seeking consolation, began to annoy him with his needs, to ask for advice and blessing. He went even further, into the most deaf deafness, fenced himself with a fence, hung shutters to the window... - and there they found a path to him. He would stand for prayer, and people were knocking and knocking on the fence, climbing over the fence, knocking at the window, asking for consolation and blessing. Then it was revealed to him: how much grief was uncovered around him, he felt sorry for the people. Maybe the Lord sent him to think so. And he is a simple schema-monk, not a hieromonk, he cannot bless, he has no right, he is not vouchsafed grace. At this point he even felt bitter, so imbued with the tears of those who came. And so, in the condescension of worldly sorrow and for his comfort, His Grace allowed him to bless. This is how ascetics are sought from us. And you say - why leave the world! For podvig, for consolation, he is already above the world, he is an ascetic, he leads souls... How is it possible! Look at how they are attracted to our schema-monks. It means that the soul desires purification, and you say - what is it for. No, it was not for nothing that they stood at the feat. I lived - and learned, learned a lot. And how I would like now, decades after that August morning, to find firmly on the podvig one who has renounced all earthly things - to be blessed. Where is Russia, which created bright elders, spiritual fathers of the people? Are they now, on the new Valaam? My heart tells me that there are, in the vast expanses of our native land, implicit ones, perhaps sprouting only in our great people. The time will come - and rare spiritual flowers will blossom: the Lord's sowing will not be destroyed.Right there, at the slabs, from the stump of a hundred-year-old linden, the wise monk made a chair, so that the one who came here would sit down to rest next to these eleven ascetics, who rose above the vanity of the world, and reflect on the transience of the transitory. We sat down. The yellow butterfly swayed on a stalk that grew out of the stove and flitted over the fence. Maple leaves fell silently, Ladoga splashed and sighed evenly under the rock, clouds slowly floated by... - everything spoke of movement, of time slipping away... Where to? On the edge of the cemetery there is a long, grassy slab. A stone inscription says on it that rests here... king! It's unbelievable. Magnus II Smek, king of Sweden: "having been in the crown, and was crowned with schema." There was one, but I have hardly been to Valaam. Or maybe... A high granite cross overshadows the peace of the departed - schema-monks, monks, laborers: "Rest with the saints, O Christ God, Thy servant..." At its foot is a scarlet late poppy, still in the dew. His wife timidly plucks it, - is it possible... In here? And, holding hands, with relief we go out of the fence, into the free air. Below, deeply, there is a strait. The sun burns brightly, splashes on the waves, blinds. The rocks on the other side of the strait are not so gloomy, the forest on them in the sun is cheerful. You can see how a nun with a birch bark basket is wandering along the shore, over the stones, blessed to go mushroom picking, for the brethren; a red boat with rowing monks sails to an island in the Strait. And to the right - free Ladoga, calm. Rarely will a gray wave flare up on it like a lamb, splash on the stones near Nikolsky Island. The hermitage on the island is a desert, not a single duckweed is visible. Directly opposite him, on the other side of the Strait, like another guardian of the silence of the forest kingdom, the silver-domed bell tower of the Great Skete of All Saints shines like a sun-topped golden cross over the peaked firs. Under the rock there are monastery gardens, and mighty maples stretch along the rock itself, the peaks, crimson and gold, rustle under our feet. There is no ground under your feet, but by some miracle you hang over the ocean of leaves. Beyond its edge, below, there are gardens. The glory of the laborers of Valaam, the glory is a miracle. On the stone - luda is called this stone on Valaam - gardens have sprung up. Spreading apple trees, pear-blows, through cherry trees - joy - are in regular rows. There are also the favorite berry bushes of currants and gooseberries, taken in a dignified manner in poles - you can even see from here the shining clusters of berries - through the yakhonts of red currants, heavy catkins of gooseberries. Pressed against a rock of granite, a wooden gazebo turns black, all in greenery, bird cherry, lilac and jasmine. What a beauty in spring.. - Are you curious? - asks an old novice in a skufeka. "Yes, we have paradise in the spring. Nightingales, the angelic breath of the air, the flowers of the Lord. It even floods your head, you can't move away. We have enough apples for the whole year. And what an Antonovka..! On the Annunciation, we console ourselves with a soaked apple. And you can make tea with tea... And think about it: after all, such beauty grows on a stone! For twenty years the monk Gabriel worked here, dragging the earth to the bald meadow, planting everything himself. And over there, to the right, at the bridge over the ravine, there is another garden. We have medicinal herbs growing there. There, on each apple tree, maybe a dozen or two varieties will be born through the efforts of Fr. Nicanor the Wise. - We have awards for apples, gold medals. And there are so many flowers, what kind of argins, and... something that is not there! We remove the icons, and the Life-Giving Cross, on the Exaltation of the Cross, and on the banners, on the procession of the cross when... Lilies even grow, white, pure, for example, the Archangel Gabriel is written, with lilies... The most so, all by work. In the month of June, the ice floes are still walking on our lake, and the gardens are blooming - fragrant, such an angelic breath... Where do you go, and you can still hear how the bird cherry tree gives itself... all over the monastery, it even languishes, we close the windows, stains the soul.- Will they go to the sketes? - asks a familiar pilgrim, a cabman from St. Petersburg, who went with them on a steamer. You see, our steamboat is smoking, they are making vapors. And where did they deign to go?- We went to Konevskaya, to Alexander Svirsky... And now where will they take you?- Fr. the treasurer announced that to St. Andrew the First-Called, the chapel there, at a height, a very picturesque beauty of the location. Have you ever been?- How can it not be, every year we go around all the sketes, always to the sketes, we rejoice the soul. When you didn't even have a steamship, you used to go in boats for twenty years. We are old pilgrims, then we did not choose these tickets. And now for the tickets, for money.- And what about ... Do you need to make steam? At one time they carried it on their own pair, on oars, and now we have to justify the steamer. And we do not demand from the poor pilgrim. Whoever is richer will pay for him, so it turns out all right, in God's way. Isn't it? And we are not from self-interest. We provide every pleasure for the pilgrim. They even sing a verse for a pilgrim, our nun came up with it. "The wonderful island of Valaam" is called "the abode of chosen people".You can see from above, as if on the pier, near the steamer, solemnly walking in long-brimmed cassocks and sharp shlykas, tied with leather belts, boys-nuns, given by their parents as spiritual instruction for a year or two. They behave in a dignified, respectable manner, even like real monks. On their faces - I looked at them for a long time - lay concentration, thoughtfulness, consciousness of some kind of feat, unusual for their years. Perhaps this is good. Fr. Antipas kept saying: "There will be no harm from the saint, prayers gain strength." You can't help but smile when you hear how a boy, serious beyond his years, entering your cell with the air of a humble brother, singing: "Through the prayers of the Holy Father, Lord, Jesus Christ, our God, po-lui na-as..."Not far away I see a stocky old man in a priestly hat. He stands at the bars and looks at the St. Nicholas Skete. His tanned fists are tapping on the bars as if with impatience. From there, from Ladoga, steamships come. But you can't see anything there yet. "Steamer!" - I hear a hoarse exclamation, anxious, excited, and I see how the old man's red boot hits the granite column of the grating. "Do you hear... Is it buzzing?" the old man says anxiously to himself. I looked to Ladoga - there was no steamer. I asked: "Are you waiting for the steamer...? He waved his hand, tiredly, hopelessly, so it seemed to me. All the deadlines have passed... I'm still waiting... Three years here... He spoke abruptly and, it seemed to me, irritated. He looked at us and smiled in confusion, as if he wanted to say: "See what the situation is," he smiled pitifully, guiltily. And I was embarrassed: a priest, an old man, and - for correction, like a boy! I was ashamed to ask him why he was under command, for correction. But he began to speak: "You know, Mr. Student... After all, I have a family there, six guys, the priest is grieving, waiting, and they have forgotten! Far away, near Ponevezhe, Olonets province, is our desolate place. Well, I am guilty, I confess, I drank. It's about time... The Lord has forgiven, He sees my repentance. It's hard to get through, I've become more prosperous in the village... my daughter is a teacher in the village, my boys are in the seminary...- Why don't you go if it's time...? "There is no consistory decree, and my parish is busy. And my priest has no money to bother. I kept waiting for the steamer to come, the decree would be sent, and the arrival would be given. Quietly, as if on wheels, a nun boy approached and fell at the priest's feet:- Bless me, Father Nicholas. The old man fervently blessed him and let him kiss his hand. He patted the nun's cheek. "His father brought him, according to his promise, to work for the monastery. I want to play with money, tea, to fight with the boys, eh?- No, no... - the boy said humbly and sadly, - there is a lot of sin...- Yes, there is a lot of sin... What does he say! Do you still know the sin? Sin, brother.. Lord, forgive my sins... Fr. Nicholas did not finish. A steamer on Ladoga hummed and smoked from behind the cape. In the Skete of St. Nicholas, on an island, two black figures appeared: hermits came out to look at the herald of the forsaken world. A white steamer enters the strait, announcing with a mighty roar the quiet forests on the rocks. He moves closer, closer. A dark crowd of pilgrims on deck is visible. You can hear how harmoniously they drink on the steamer, the church, causing the echo of the forest: "... may it shine forth for us sinners... Thy ever-o-o-s-s--s The monks on the pier answer: "... through the prayers of the Mother of God, O Giver of Light, glory to Thee." The monastery cart rolls down to the pier with a crash. A monk with a book solemnly descends a granite staircase. Pilgrims run along the mountain - to meet the "world". They come up to the bars, look. They said:- Father Nikolai ran like that... "Though he has become accustomed to us, he is eager for a sinful will," says the old novice, "and why? Superstition nourishes everything, it is not accustomed to cutting off one's will.We are frightened by these words. I feel unspeakably sorry for the poor father. We understand his melancholy. We hold hands tightly, walk to the hotel and say to each other with our eyes: no, never be separated! We are greeted by the annunciation for vespers, the evening glow on the domes, on the crosses.

VII. The Labors of Obedience "in the Name." The Ustav of Elder Nazarius

On a high rock of granite - thirty sazhens - a white building of workshops and a water supply. In the lower tier there is a black mouth of the smithy. Enter. It is the nun boy who throws a drive belt over the wheel, and the huge machine bellows begins to throw whirlwinds of blinding sparks from the furnace. Fur sighs heavily, sniffles and squelches. It is hot for us to stand at the threshold. The blacksmith-monk greets us with a silent bow gloomily. His sinewy hands strike the white-hot strip with a heavy hammer, and behind each dry blow you can hear a wet wheeze. It's in his chest. Above it is the golden glow of sparks. Even on him, even in his gray beard, sparks flash and go out. His graying curls are caught by a strap, his hairy chest is open, black streams of sweat on it. This is the "owner" of the smithy, Fr. Luke. He is, perhaps, sixty years old, and he works from morning to evening with iron, fire and hammer - he works in obedience in the name of God, for the glory of Balaam. And we are afraid to stand at the threshold. Here is the foundry. A sooty monk fiddles with a smoke light bulb, molds a casting in the black earth. "We don't need overseers," says the monk guide, "we work for God, and you can't deceive God." We are zealous for the name of God.Amazed, I think: there is no "struggle", no "labor and capital", no "surplus value", only "value" - in the name of God. In the name of - what a power it is! There - in the name of... what? And these, "dark", all those issues were resolved, one - "in the name".We inspect the sawmill, the bathhouse. On the second tier - locksmith, turning, drilling, grinding, drying... - and everywhere the work is in full swing, everywhere the machines are screeching. And everywhere they are, the "dark ones": novices, monks, laborers.- God help me! - says the monk who sees us off, entering the new department of the workshops. Only the host monk will bow silently. Pilgrims are also standing at the machines: they have come "for God's sake," according to a vow, to work for the monastery. Who are they? St. Petersburg workers, "all excellent masters-specialists". I can't believe my eyes: St. Petersburg workers... Wizard?! Why, everyone was talking t... At meetings at the university, that the Petrograd workers are the most bulwark in the political struggle for...? And here they are - "in the name", in the name of God. I see faces, good, bright, Russian, dear, human faces, kind, thoughtful faces. No anger, no irritation, no "struggle".- And they work for a long time?- Yes, different things happen... It happens that it stays for a month, and then... the soul will embrace him, the blissful will enter him, he will like the holy work, he will remain for half a year. And it happens that there will be completely left, the chosen ones who are called. And this is like the Lord. Man is different from man. One has more souls in the flesh, and he will subdue the flesh. But the monks-owners are all the first masters from the St. Petersburg factories, the brainiest, connoisseurs. And how do they work... to the point of blood sweat. Because - in the name of God." Why should we be lazy? we are for God's sake, we have done it of our own free will!" - I often heard on Valaam. And there... We look at the water supply, descend into the infinite depths of the earth. The water rises by the pump by thirty fathoms. From the Monastyrsky Strait you can see a granite tall rock. The monks broke through it with gunpowder, arranged a water supply in it. Those same Valaam monks, more peasants, who, at the all-night vigil in the dark corners of the cathedral, bowing down to the stone slabs, humbly sort out the rosary, say the Jesus Prayer.- One hundred and forty-two steps...- whispers the nun. The walls are oozing in drops. In the floor there is a "window" covered with a bar.- Would you like to look in, the Ladoga water is splashing... Don't be afraid, it's not deep, it's only four fathoms... This well is dug in granite. A pipe leads water from the lake to two fathoms from the shore... I kneel, bend down, look into the depths of the well: black depth, water.The creator of this "miracle" of Valaam, a sign of the spiritual power of the Valaam monks, was the abbot Damascene. The monks say that one engineer asked for ten thousand rubles for the plan and management of the structure. Hegumen Damascene answered: "Where can we, poor people, throw such millions!" - and rejected the engineer's plan. The wise and active elder decided to do it in an economic way and found an "engineer" at his place - Hieromonk Fr. Jonathan. Once he worked at a St. Petersburg plant, he understood mechanical work. He created the plan and supervised the work. The whole of Valaam worked - "zealous for the Lord". And now, after four years of bloody labors, a miracle appeared - for Valaam, undoubtedly, a miracle! - which shocked the monks so much that even when we visited Valaam - 30 years after the construction - the monks spoke with admiration about this "miracle" and drew the attention of visitors to it. And what happened? Always and in everything severe, strict with themselves, so hard-working, business-like, wise, they still rejoiced at "our water supply", rejoiced not as a sign of their strength, but as children of an intricate toy. They do not consider it a podvig at all, they do not attribute it to their "stupidity", they almost do not talk about how the work went, they have even forgotten the name of the builder and attribute it to the person under whose direction they lived in the monastery: - Under the hegumen Damascene, it was built. In the Valaam books about it, it is written: "In 1860, Fr. Damascene began, and at the age of 4 he completed a very important and remarkable structure for the monastery." That's all. There are 142 steps in the chamber of the water tunnel! - An inscription is carved on the stone: "The water was raised in 1863 summer, December on the 12th day". You find exactly the same "deaf" inscriptions everywhere on the silent Valaam. Here is a wonderful dirt road to the forest thicket, strong - "made of cartilage". How much work was put into leading her through the swamps, through the "luda", in the slums. It is said sparingly about this: "this road of 1845 was built." "This bridge was built in 1848." And not a word about whom. Here the works are nameless, "deaf", not for glory, but "in the name". And if "in the name", what words can there be about difficulties, about faces, about "superstition"! And what meaningfulness in meager speech, what consciousness in actions, what penetration in service in the name! And through this meaningfulness, naivety-childishness and... joy that all this, which only we see here, is theirs, brotherly, given to them by the Lord. For example, he was completely transformed, revived when he brought us to the third floor, where there were large reservoirs, and pointed to a string: "And here is a kind of living eye-watch!" Our water meter is here... As soon as the water reaches the edges, the weight will press the bell, and the alarm will go off. I didn't tell him that it had been in Kraevich's physics for a long time: it was a pity to disappoint the simpleton. It is possible that they invented it themselves, without our Kraevich. Then brother Artemy showed us a clothes dryer - "dry steam", then - a hydraulic press for squeezing clothes, a crane that lifts dirty laundry from the bath to the laundry. And then I remembered the words of the merchant on the steamer: "They have a car for everything"! On the farm, in the barnyard, on the wharf, in the workshops - all the machines and the "adaptation". Drive belts rustled everywhere around us, machines worked, drills squealed. And I thought they were stagnant people, monks. And these monks - all simpletons peasants - knew immeasurably more than I, a student, in "earthly affairs". And in the "unearthly"...- what can I say. They comprehended in their hearts the great poetry of prayer. They knew the canons, akathists, irmoses, stichera, some - I did not understand what they were - "kontakions", "voices", "antiphons", "katavasias"... They somehow reached the mystery of uniting in their souls, merging in themselves inseparably two different worlds - the earthly and the heavenly, and this "heavenly" became as close to them, as almost their own, as appearances. At that time I still vaguely felt that they were immeasurably richer than I was spiritually, in spite of my "pamphlets" and "philosophies." And a playful thought came - to tempt the boy. It was on a deserted staircase of the water supply. I took out my purse and took out a brand new two-hryvnia one. Brother Artemy shook his head in embarrassment: "No, sir... we don't take money.- Well, for bagels for you, drink with tea... - No, I can't accept it. Read our charter.I felt ashamed. But I tried to persuade. I wanted to thank the dear boy for the zeal with which he showed the "glory of the monastery." All the same, if you break the charter, you will succumb to temptation... Anyway, there is nothing to buy with them here. Only you will smear your soul. And the boy said this; told me, a student. And so it was with everyone to whom I offered payment for services: "If such a desire of yours is good, put it in the monastery mug, for the needs of the holy monastery... will go from your mite to the poor, many of them come to us." "Just once," said one brother, who had also refused the "gold," said to me, "If you wish to show me your love, send me a sacred book. Bishop Feofan or Brianchaninov... On the wall of the hotel, at the entrance, hangs behind glass the monastic rule, obligatory for pilgrims and monks. According to this rule, without the blessing of the abbot, neither a pilgrim to a monk, nor a monk to a pilgrim, nor even pilgrims can enter one another. But the man is weak, and therefore supervision has been established over him.Entering the hotel, you will notice the stern face of the monk. This is a watchman. He is either standing on the porch or pacing along the corridor. In his pocket he has a book where he takes his notes. For example: "Brother Tikhon went into cell No28, I stayed there for 10 minutes." This is the "eye" of the monastery, for the suppression of violations. The monks say: "For the weak in spirit, for the beginners and those who are not strong in freedom."Some monk who has not yet strengthened learns, for example, that his relatives have arrived with a steamer that has arrived from St. Petersburg. What a temptation for the "immature"! The nun would go to the abbot for a blessing, and he was away on business. He went to the Father Treasurer," and the Father Treasurer went on business. And I want to see you. So the nuns ran to the hotel and went to the cell. And on the heels of the "eye" is the observer: "why"? - "To see my relatives." - "With a blessing?" and he turned back and even reported to the rector. And the abbot will announce to the disobedient "bowers" or something else, stricter. At that time, forty-two years ago, on old Valaam, the order introduced by the stern "master" of Valaam, Fr. Damascene, was strong, the rule of Elder Nazarius was strictly observed. Sin is strong. The "world" with its "charms" tries to break through or crawl into the quiet Valaam, sheltered from sin, to confuse the already restless monastic soul. This sin penetrates with every steamer in the bags and bundles of pilgrims. As soon as the steamer's whistle is heard in the strait, the "sentinels" descend from the mountain, and a very important obedience rests on them: to make sure that the steamer does not bring ashore a "plagued" drunken Petersburger, as it used to be, and that the pilgrims who arrived earlier do not slip onto the steamer and do not buy something "malicious." Monks and novices, according to the rule of Valaam, do not have access to the pier, except for those appointed for inspection and singers. If any of the monks is free from obedience, which very rarely happens, he only looks from a high cliff, from a cast-iron grate, at the pier busy by a steamer, at the herald of another world. Parcels, letters, and "gifts" are entered in a special book, forwarded to the abbot, and when he announces, an announcement is posted to which of the brethren the parcels or letters have been sent. Under Damascene, this was strict. On our visit, it was easier: only the control of the abbot.- And with the late Father Damascene... oh, you used to cry with a parcel ... - they told me on Valaam. "The abbot will burn you out with his word, that he will burn your heart with a red-hot iron, that's how it was." He himself may have endured so many temptations, so he was zealous for piety. I knew by experience how sin is introduced. Yes, I will tell you one case. A man from St. Petersburg came to us as a novice. Well, I spent the winter - nothing. Only, as I remember now, the first steamer came to us on May 12. It is impossible to reach us earlier, the ice is carrying on the lake. And the sister of that novice, brother Vasily, came with this steamer, she was a merchant's wife. My sister came and brought a basket of gifts: well, caviar, pastilles, fish, jam, raisins - all in a lean, dignified way. Brother Vasily and see her in the church. Well, she whispered to him in passing that she had brought you a gift. After Mass, Brother Vasily turned to the abbot for a blessing: "So and so... A sister has arrived, bless, father, to accept a gift." And Father Damascene was a clairvoyant, he used to do nothing. Now - the treasurer. "Father Treasurer, go," he said, "find out what kind of sister has come to Brother Vasily, what kind of gift she has brought him. Call her here to us with a gift for her." Well, a beautiful sister came, of the merchant class, she brought such a basket with her, she could hardly drag it. The abbot looked into the basket... Yes, he said, sadly and heartfeltly: "And how much money you, my mother, have you wasted... And for what! The generals can only eat such food - to delight mammon... And where are we, sinners... we would like to sip the Lenten sip - and then glory to Thee, O Lord." She was unaccustomed to making excuses: "From our prosperity, father... to please my brother... he is accustomed to such a thing..." - "Brother Vasilichko! - says the abbot, and so pitifully: - Well, why is it bad for you here? Are you hungry, or what, are you with us? eat, or what, you have nothing to eat with us?.." He at his feet, with all diligence. "Forgive me, father... I brought it myself, I didn't ask..." "Brother Vasilichko! The abbot said again, and everything was pitiful, "I, a sinner, eat caviar, or something..." I enjoy the pastille, huh? And you are not ashamed, brother Vasilichko... you have offended our monastery..." Well, my sister kept asking me to accept the gift, for the glory of God. The abbot looked at her affectionately. "We don't need your gift, mother... And why do we need such luxuries... After all, to the temptation! Brother Vasilichko will eat caviar, and when his brothers and fathers see him, they will desire it themselves, and if they did not ask for it before, they will ask for caviar and pastilles to be brought to them too..." So he did not bless me to accept the gift.- Well, and now they are inspecting your parcels?- How can they not inspect it? You never know what they will stuff into the parcel. How does the devil introduce his flattery into the world? Everything strives to make everything sewn and covered... And you unfold it with a blessing, think it over, and his dirty trick will come out. For example, we had such a case... A tabash book comes to us... And this one, a tabashnaya one. They sent a holy book to one brother, the teachings of John Chrysostom... Well, now to the abbot, the abbot was away. He, having been blessed, began to unwrap it. He turned it around, and there... The tobacco is full! Yes, so cunningly, a dozen pages ... and imperceptibly at all, so subtly, scattered, in order to conceal sin. Well... He ordered to burn it in the fiery furnace. And in the sklyanitsy they send obscene things... There are also various pilgrims, unless you know him. Some come not to pray, but to corrupt and seduce..., and then laugh at how he has bypassed the monks... It is not he, of course, but through him the unclean one penetrates, to lead him astray. You also need to know this, these temptations. This is how he takes up arms against a holy cause... monks can only feel this. You, worldly, why should he seduce, you are in his pocket, and here he strives to work, here the fortress stands across his path, so he tries to overcome. You ask experienced elders, and they will tell you how hardened he becomes when he sees that a person has risen above his passions, that the old flesh is overpowered, and that the pure spirit is manifested in him. This is where the most terrible struggle lies, even to the point of appearance. All these great ascetics bear witness, especially the most highly pure. And why did you start smiling like that, you don't believe it..? Ah, these educated unbelievers... Why, it's been so many centuries. Read my father's books, my father's... all the Holy Fathers... Then I was smiling. Then I felt the world, real, this world, and nothing more. And he explained a lot - "physiology". Now... Now science itself has become more modest, more cautious: "other worlds" are opening up to it: the known world is small for it, it is looking for others. Without naming - he is looking for it.

VIII. On a steamer to the sketes. Response from a distance of years. In the Nikon Bay

In the vestibule of the hotel, the monk is selling tickets for the monastery steamer: they are going to go to the chapel of St. Andrew the First-Called, which is on the mountain near the Nikonov Bay, to serve a prayer service. Sometimes, you go into the forests, what a pristine nature! Squirrels here are not afraid of humans, and birds are not afraid. What about squirrels! A large animal is not afraid either. Do you hear - it crackles more often. You stand and wait. And then he came out on the road... deer? Deer. With branchy horns. And he looks, rooted to the ground, with a moist, calm eye - without surprise, without fear. "Ah, it's you, man... I know you..." - as if he speaks in silence, with a look. And - never mind, he will cross the road. Somehow such an unexpected meeting, as if unearthly, is frightening. And they vaguely remember, as if: somewhere... Did this happen..? You pass - and a new meeting, also quite unexpected: a chapel. Wilderness, impassable wilds, and here, in the twilight of the crease, in the chapel, there is the Mother of God, a lamp, wax, a crust of bread left as a gift to some good forest animal: a gift from God. You will be amazed: a lamp glows in the wilds! shines not only to the Face, but to these wilds, to the wilderness of the forest, to the pure nature of God. "Man sanctifies the wilds..." - I remember that thoughts wandered in me, bright thoughts, born of this Valaam light. They drowned, winged - "physiology". The path to the chapel at Nikonov Bay goes through straits, past steep cliffs covered with lichen and moss, thickets of lingonberries and blueberries - whole carpets on the stones, scarlet, burgundy, black, in glossy matte. The straits wind between the rocks, and suddenly Ladoga will open, the free surface of the lake, the sea. On the rocks there are forests, forests. A mossy spruce has fallen, it has been torn up by the winds, hanging high, clinging to its roots, and is about to fall. Or - suddenly the whole fabulous, enchanted island will emerge from behind a rocky cape. On it there is juicy, tender green grass, untrodden by anyone, drowsy. Golden dragonflies on it, asleep in flight. Dream-slumber. And quiet, light green birches, white-white, drowsy. Not ordinary birches, but holy ones - they are so pure, virgin, childlike and tender. And you see - mushrooms under them! And the mushrooms are fabulous, drowsy. And how many times, it happened, a desire arose in my heart: "It would be nice to stay here." Such things happen only in dreams: fabulous, drowsy - unearthly. Or - thickets of reeds, calm, still water, water lilies, yellow, white, - depth. All water has run out, there is no road, there is a high wall of granite ahead. How will our steamer pass? Under the wall, in the sun, there is a red carpet of lingonberries: juicy, large, unearthly. You stretch out your hand - it's so close, now overboard, the steamer scratches the shore...- and suddenly the wall moves away, and again the bay is wide, and in the depths of it, between the rocks, the freedom of Ladoga is blue. Nikolai" is no more than a good boat: how will we sit down? So many people are coming. From the window of our cell I see Fr. Nicholas, who had been sent to correct him, heading towards the pier. His obedience is to travel with pilgrims to the sketes and serve molebens. The chorister nuns follow him in a dignified manner. It's time for us to do the same. Now I understand that the steamer will pull the boats. We are invited to "honor", we will go on the steamer itself, in a cabin: in case of bad weather. "And don't rely on our weather, the lake weather is coming right away," says the novice with a pole to fight in the straits. Low rain clouds advanced, the forests on the rocks darkened, covered up. Should I go? On Valaam, the weather is not taken into account: and bad weather is from the Lord, accept it. The lake will rage - let it rage. A small steamer is wrapped in smoke, hissing. The novice driver, a stocky fellow, sits on the firewood, waiting for the pilgrims to get into the boats. - they ask him. "And your old steamboat, won't it break the boiler?" - the driver answers with amazement, as if he had never heard that the boilers were bursting. cauldron, I asked, that one... "Is it possible?" What are you talking about, brother...? "Why not?" - asks, apparently knowledgeable, perhaps also a "mechanic", from St. Petersburg. How can it be... Tear it apart! And then how many people are ruined.. "That's what I'm talking about..." Is it possible? We have such a thing that they don't even know how to refuel the car, but nothing... They say that with this driver you can even go to the oceans, he knows the matter. There's a steamer over there, a little bigger, the Valaam... so he took "Peter" with him to St. Petersburg all over Ladoga, and then nothing, he brought it. The "Peter" broke the propeller, ran into a stone. Well, "Valaamushka" led him around the lake, it was funny to look at: he was a small man, and what a huge entot! But bad never happens here. The pilgrims are crammed into two large boats. The steamer whistles like a child, we set sail with a prayer: "By the wave of the sea... hidden..." At the stern of the boats, strong novices with poles began to rule. Fr. Nicholas sat in the cabin, sad. Three St. Petersburg girls in headscarves immediately settled down with us. The red-haired novice-chorister, apparently, tried to show his art in front of the girls: he sang with expression and sighs. The girls looked at him and whispered something. They began to be capriciously indignant: and everyone was singing something spiritual... We have romances for you, only spiritual ones! - I hear, not without surprise, the gallant conversation of the novice, who thereby - by talking to the girls - violated all the rules of the Valaam rule. - At large here, - sighs Fr. Nicholas, - they are not ashamed of me. -Nature... young years, you can't hold your spirit.The boys-singers run away to the deck, and from there you can hear their fuss.- A trumpet.. Take the pipe.. - shouts the helmsman. We drive up to the stone arch of the Vladimir Bridge. This bridge passes the road to the Skete of All Saints. The funnel is removed, and the steamer crawls under the bridge, wrapping us in smoke. We sing "It is worthy". Two nuns run into the cabin. One puts on Fr. Nicholas's hat, the other approaches him humbly and says: "Bless, father." A nun in a hat is fervently blessing. Fr. Nicholas smiles meekly at them, patting their flushed faces. "Won't you sing our Valaam rhyme with us, madams?" - gallantly, like a St. Petersburg clerk, the red-haired singer exclaims and thrusts books with a "rhyme" to the girls. The redhead assumes a pose like a tenor in the theater, and, putting his hand picturesquely behind the leather belt of his faded cassock, begins a "rhyme" with a basque. The "Watchman's Eye" is far away, and Fr. Nicholas... who is afraid of him!" Rhyme" is touching and long. It was composed by a young monk, the rassophore monk Fr. Peter, who was saving himself in the skete of Alexander Svirsky, "on the mountain." This skete is distant, deaf, ascetic. Fr. Peter is preparing to receive the full rank of angels there. Maybe he will become a schema-monk. The verse expresses the monk's delight before the worthless beauty of the monastery. Other stanzas have been preserved in my memory. Here, I remember:Oh, the wondrous island of Valaam!The hand of divine fateHas erected here the abode of paradise,The abode of the highest purity.God's chosen abode,The wonderful island of Valaam!Your inhabitant dared to sing you:Accept his insignificant gift!I do not know how to sing how I will be able to singYour valleys and fields,Your forests, your bays,Your sacred places.I do not have enough strength to count,Your holy ascetics,But their overgrown gravesCan easily replenish the verse.Maidens easily master with a simple tune and sing with enthusiasm. The red-haired acolyte apparently forgets where he is. He famously straightens his skufia, ruffles his lush hair so that it falls on his back wavy, and very noticeably preens himself. The maidens shout to him: "Sing more gently, more tenderly!" "With our pleasure!" exclaims the red-haired man.I dare not speak of you:!You are so beautiful, so good!I do not know how to compose a song:In front of you she is pale.Of course, the monk-poet understands by her a monastery, but the red-haired one, it seems to me, means something quite different. He looks at the girls, and his hand is pressed to his heart. Girls also understand this: they suddenly squirt into their palms. Fr. Nicholas sighs: "Ah, youth, youth..."Did I think then, listening to this poem and singing along with my young wife, that by the end of my life, our life, this stormy day would resonate in my soul - what a wonderful day! - and you will remember everything vividly - the deep silence of the forest, sowing rain, the Easter trees on the shallows, Fr. Nicholas, who is no longer in the world, and - this red-haired, playful novice! All my life this was kept in me, firmly forgotten, and now the time has come, and everything has risen untouched, bright, to the point of dazzlingness. And what is connected with it, another, most important.- Where do you want to...? - a thin-cheeked monk asks me, with such a pleasant face, humble. He sat on the deck in the rain and looked at the forests and waters sadly and attentively. I told you where it came from. He continued humbly: "And I will soon have to see Moscow. The day after tomorrow I'm going there, and from there to Eastern Siberia.- Why so far... Will you go to another monastery?- Such obedience is given to us. My brother and I," he called the other novice, who was sitting there in silence, "have been appointed, and we accept this obedience in our souls..." to Vladivostok. A monastery is opening there.- And how long have you been on Valaam?- About fifteen years. It's hard to part, everything is native here. So now I go to the sketes, saying goodbye. Oh, it's good with us, the century would not have gone... He looked sadly at the walls of gray rocks, at the rare fir trees in the cracks of the cliffs. Siberia... Everything there is someone else's. And here we have brotherhood. I'm a peasant, it's hard for peasants... And here we have brotherhood... A meeting, of which there are many on the way. Did I think that this meeting would resonate in me, almost half a century later, at the end of my life, so that I would understand something, the most important...? Did he, who was departing into an unknown distance, think that he was destined to fulfill great things, as well as to his silent companion, to fill his whole life with light, and, perhaps, and so it happened, to fill and sanctify many lives? that our paths will one day cross again, spiritually meet? And then it happened... Autumn, 1935. Forty years had passed since that steamboat trip. I received a letter. The letter was not addressed to me, but to my brother, with a request to give me some information, perhaps not without interest to me. And it is true: the information turned out to be not only interesting, but - for me - great and invigorating significance.After a trip to Valaam, I wrote my first book, a young, naïve, a little, perhaps, and fervent - after all, he was a student! - detained by censorship - I had to remove more than 30 pages from the already printed book and replace them, with corrections - I wrote a book - "On the Rocks of Valaam". A long time ago, it spread all over Russia. Even before the war, I could not find a single copy even at second-hand booksellers. I sent one book to Valaam to Hegumen Gabriel, who once received us in his chambers. The book also described a trip to the chapel of St. Andrew the First-Called, the liveliness of the red-haired singer and a meeting with monks who had accepted obedience in distant Siberia. Someone who knew Valaam well, who had read my book, sent me a letter, thinking that it would be of interest to me to know the fate of the persons I have described. And so! Long forgotten - forty years have passed since then! - turned out to be alive to this day. Their life is truly amazing. This is what my well-wisher writes." As I have already informed you earlier about the red-haired novice George, whom I.S. Shmelev so inimitably presented in his work, and who later settled down to such an extent that he accepted monasticism, priesthood and even the great schema, and now in great humility performs his great schematic feat; so I would like to inform you about the two monks mentioned by I.S., who, at the same time as the red-haired novice, made their last trip to the sketes of their native monastery, since the next day these two monks were to part forever with their native Valaam. On this memorable trip, I.S. talked with them and kindly mentioned them in his book. These two monks - Sergius and Herman - the very next day after their meeting with I.S. set off for the Far East for holy obedience. There they founded the New Valaam, a holy monastery, under the name of the "Ussuri Holy Trinity Nicholas Monastery". These two Valaam monks, Sergius and German, so ideally arranged the organization of the new monastery that, after its creation, this monastery was famous not only in Siberia, but even in Russia for its exemplary monastic discipline, the strictness of its rule and its beneficial influence on everything around. In some respects, this monastery even surpassed its spiritual mother - Old Valaam. Namely, the equipment of its own printing house, which supplied not only the entire Ussuri region and Siberia with printed works, but even shared it with Old Valaam.The above-mentioned monks Sergius and German are still alive, they are in Russia, in the Rostov region.The eldest of them, Fr. Hegumen Sergius, won such respect for himself by the holiness of his ascetic life that he was honored by Met. Sergius offered the rank of bishop, but Fr. Sergius begged Vladyka, in his deepest humility, to leave him in his present rank.The Ussuri monastery did not escape the common suffering fate: the Bolsheviks dispersed its entire brotherhood, burned down the monastery's large book and icon warehouse, burned down the wooden churches, and set up their notorious "state farm" in the brethren buildings. The most reverend Fr. Hegumen Sergius, who in the course of a quarter of a century created an ideal monastic monastery with tireless, superhuman labors, saw for himself all its destruction and all the satanic mockery of its shrines... Now, weeping with bitter tears over the general collapse and ruin of his offspring, he awaits death from the Lord, as a longed-for consolation from all his life's struggle. In the monastery library there is a portrait of these two monks - Sergius and Herman."These lines revealed a lot to me. What am I saying - a lot! A great deal was revealed to me, which the author of that letter could not have imagined. They discovered the mystery of human fate, the unfathomable spiritual depth and power of the human personality. The veil of the past, almost half a century, was opened, and what did I see! He saw life in creation and life in creation. During these forty years, by unknown miraculous ways, a "spiritual man" was created, grew from an ordinary young man in a novice cassock into a great schema-ascetic and a humble servant of the Lord. His feats are unknown, and if we cannot yet take into account what he gave to these little ones who came to Valaam for spiritual bread, his personal feat is clear to us: spiritual perfection - in the name of the Lord. Over these decades, day after day, they carried out great obedience, performed a lofty feat of spiritual enlightenment, fulfilled the commandment of Christ: "Go ye therefore and teach all nations..." - "Take My yoke upon you..." Russian peasant boys, they went from Valaam to a distant and wild land and carried there the Light of Christ. How many hardships and deprivations they endured, how much they gave their lives to the Light, they became historical Russian ascetics, successors of the work of the Russian hierarchs. And in these feats and sufferings they preserved the sacred, and this sacred in them, visible to the people, amidst the abomination of spiritual desolation, what an example and restraint for those around them, encouragement and hope for those who hunger and thirst for Truth. This is how Russia is and will be alive. Old Valaam raised and sent such people into the world.A lot of things were revealed to me, great things. And one more important thing. Human destinies are closed; In the phenomena of life, accidental and insignificant, there are sometimes great contents: be careful in your assessments; in difficult times of trials, do not lose heart, believe in the soul of man: it is the Lord's vessel. Four decades! How much you have seen, received joy - and suffering too - and lived for the most part for yourself. And these, the three "accidental strangers"... Their life is all in podvigs: in podvigs of spiritual growth, service to "these little ones"... to the point of complete rejection of oneself. And also, joyful, invigorating: this is dear, from your people.We are in the deep Nikon Bay; its depth, they say, is up to forty fathoms. On the corner cliff there is a white lighthouse. When there is a storm on the lake, the lantern calls the sailors to a calm bay. A wooden pier, a house for fishermen. Silence and wilderness. Saying: "Where has the skete of Alexander Svirsky taken refuge, that's where the wilderness is! and the height... truly a conversation with the Lord." The deaf silence of the bay, forests and stone affects the soul. The singers fall silent. The lines of the "Valaam song" are still kept in memory: Andrew the Apostle - there is a legend - With the Cross he dispelled the darkness of sin,Foretelling the prosperity of faith,Fasting, prayer and work. We run up the hill, to the chapel. Fr. Nicholas sings a moleben. Pilgrims hide from the rain under the paws of old fir trees. From a height you can see the lake, muddy with the rain, gloomy forests, cliffs, the cross of the hermitage abandoned in the forests. Near the chapel there is a wooden cross, signifying the ancient Cross, erected, according to legend, by the Apostle Andrew. Rain turns into downpour. We run down the mountain along the path, rolling on slippery needles. People are cramming into the cabin, stampede. Fr. Nicholas was pressed, but he was meek, he would not say a word. The apprehensive say: "How many are crammed in... Well, the steamer will sink!" This cannot be: it is impossible to sink on Valaam, the saints will not allow it, this has never happened. They all pick up joyfully, hoping: "Go-o-nitelya, mu-u-chi-chitela... under the ground hidden-y-i-i-sha-a"... We step into a narrow ditch. Carved into the stone: "This ditch was built in 1865..." Is it a good thing.. - they shout merrily from the boats. The bottom of the steamer scrapes, the steamer trembles and snorts. A nun boy hangs his head overboard.- What, my brother... ran aground! - he says to me cheerfully and pats me on the shoulder: satisfied. They shouted: "Give me a pair, driver!" - "Why a pair, we'll spend the winter.. Oh, good, brothers... "Brothers, get down to the ladle, lighten the steamer!" The pilgrims jump onto the islands and begin to collect lingonberries. The monks-feeders stand motionless on the boats. The driver and the fireman push back with poles, hanging in the air above the water. The nuns sniff from the stern to the bow.- Brother Peter, nalega-ay! - they shout from the boats. "Pleasers, help me out.. They advise you to sing "Dubinushka", but older ones are warned: it does not approach holy places, here prayer takes over. At last, after the joint efforts of the pilgrims, the monks and the machine, after the troparion and the "Club", which was not very loudly dragged on the boats, the steamer was released - and again a string of quiet bays, granite masses, straits, islets, an old pine forest, mysterious, silent. There's a monastery. Deanery reigns. The nuns are humble again. The singers conceive the troparion to the Transfiguration. On boats they cross themselves - golden crosses are visible! - and they pick up in a splendid and cheerful way: "Thou hast been transfigured on the mountain..."

IX. Holiness. In a large skete. Admonition

Under the arches of the gate, in the crease, there is a monastery shop of "saints". A strict monk-owner does not offer his goods to the pilgrims: he does not know how to do something, or considers it a sin. He will only answer how much it costs. He will say - and stand in thought. Everything is only for the pilgrim from the people. Valaam does not please a casual tourist, he does not care about tourists: it would be better if they did not exist, there is less temptation. Old Valaam is harsh. His pilgrim is after him, simple, laboring, spiritually fasting: he demands crosses and icons, "from his life", pictures-parables. You only hear: - For a holy corner... for fifty.- From the divine... instructive something. Or, rarely: "I would like a Bible, a real big one, the most... so that the grandchildren would be imbued with how many years everything was gathered, from a holy place..." We want something local.- Do you have anything Valaam, artistic? The monk does not understand. He looks incredulously, as if: "These St. Petersburgers, from the pure... entertainers, they should have everything for fun..." - he thinks so, perhaps:- What's that, thin... How to understand? I try to explain, in a simpler way: well, handicrafts from Valaam granite... well, paperweights, some figurines... on the desk... He doesn't understand what kind of paperweight! Standing - silent.- Maybe a box for rings... so elegant? in the Urals they do, such... No, he is silent.- Here for pilgrims, "holiness"... There are no handicrafts. Fi-gurki..? From Valaam granite? a game..?! - In St. Petersburg... There are all sorts of trinkets. Here - "holiness". On Valaam, they do not waste time on trinkets. You don't catch fish with a fishing rod: it's pampering. You don't bathe in the strait: it's a sin, the water is holy. There are only wooden products - shrines: crosses made of juniper, cypress-wood, Holy Athos, and spoons with a view of Valaam and a "blessing" on the handle: if you begin to eat - you will remember Valaam. We choose spoons.An ancient old man, completely blind, is picking at something behind the counter - stringing olive seeds, Holy Athos, for rosaries with a large needle. With each new buyer, he barely rises with a stool varnished over the years, and not with his voice, but with an exhalation - he is so weak - he humbly offers his product: "To the holy monastery, donate... thirty kopecks, your generosity..." We buy prayer beads. The old man beams with a smile, confides in the gloomy monk like a child: "The Lord gave it... So they also took the beads ... Glory to Thee, the Creator..." He is childishly happy that he can still serve the monastery to the glory of the Lord. I remember and reproach myself: why didn't I take from him more, more, all the rosaries that I had. If only he would bring joy! After all, work for him is sacred, podvig, like prayer. On Valaam, everyone is in labor: from the abbot himself, from the hundred-year-old schema-monk to the boy-nun brought by his father "for bearing" - according to the promise, "for God". Everything is at work here - both soul and body. And all in the name. From dawn to dawn. And what about the night? Is there a night on Valaam! We forgot a little, and at half past 2 in the morning another "alarm clock" calls: "Time... singing... mho... li-tve cha... And here are the schema-monks, in the photo. It is necessary to buy it: it is "Valaam", native. Ten of them, in schema-caps, with crosses, bones, skulls. They stand side by side, downcast, humble. It must have been unusual. But - it was necessary. At the head is the abbot. It was necessary: the people, "out of holiness", under the icon, demanded to decorate the "holy corner". This is the light of Balaam, his glory. What faces! The holy elders, from antiquity, are fathers. The tallest is Schema-monk John, a silent man, who was silent for fourteen years. And here, on the edge, is Schema-monk Sergius, the humblest one. For many years he suffered excruciatingly from illnesses and, despite the pain, did not miss a single service. I was told about him on Valaam.Humble Sergius was strong in spirit. The disease "ate him alive." Which one is unknown. He was ill for a long time, melting. Maybe cancer. Once, during a long service, he could not overcome the terrible pain. He approached and crawled up to his elder-confessor, in tears, perhaps in tears of shame for his infirmity, and began to beg: "Let me go, father, to my cell... I'm dying... bless me to depart..." But the elder was strict. He shook his head, said: "And who will stand for you! rule, who will listen?" - "I can't, father, I have no strength to stand..." - "If you can't stand, sit down." - "Oh, I can't sit anymore, father..." - "If you can't sit, lie down. It is better to depart in the temple of God, standing in prayer." And he did not let go. And humble Sergius endured. Monk Seraphim told me about his death: "At the church I carried out obedience. I remember that the mass was over. Schema-monk Sergius came up to me and whispered a little, like a breath from the breeze: "Farewell, Father Seraphim... goodbye..." And he himself is crying so brightly, with copious tears. And I had noticed before how he wept throughout the Holy Liturgy... so he cried! And I asked him: "Why are you, Father Sergius, crying like this?" And he seemed to hear me, as if by a breath, in a dream: "Ah, Father Seraphim... if they always sang like nonche... The century would not have gone... like angelic voices... and I feel so good, so sweet, that's why I cry... as if I were in heaven..." And his whole mantle is covered with tears... All wet, wet, from tears. - "And I communed of the Holy Mysteries. of the Mysteries of Christ... and so now it is easy for me... and my pains do not torment me, they fell asleep..." We kissed on the shoulders. And as soon as they began to ring the bell for vespers, he reposed. And it was his spirit that trampled on the perishable, the pain and fell asleep... was spiritualized in advance. He was humble..! We liked the image of the saint: a bright heartfelt face. I ask the gloomy monk: whose work is it.- Father Alypy. He is in charge of iconography. Alypia... I remembered. They told me about him.- Once I studied at a high academy, I received gold medals for my pictures... Now he does not paint "peace": only icons. Once he could not cope with the struggle, left Valaam.- I could not humble the spirit... He stopped sleeping, he was muddy. And when he returned, he submitted to Balaam. He did not go to the forests, to the islands, to paint in silence the nature of God. He took monastic vows. He only paints holy faces. I was indignant at such enslavement: Balaam had eradicated a living soul from him! I was told:- No, it's not like that. Our Balaam freed his living soul, and did not enslave him. Are the holy faces inferior, in your opinion, to earthly beauty, which disintegrates into dust? The holy face is a reflection of the Lord's Light. Well, write the Light with the brush of the Lord...? This is no longer a pictorial art, but the grace of the Lord. Our Fr. Alypy is now seeing in spirit, seeking the Light in the faces of the Lord... He accepted the lofty feat. Not enslavement, but inspiration. He writes the imperishable, the heavenly eternal beauty.Now I know: high art in the eternal.The sixth hour of the evening. The sun is completely over the forest, soon it will hide behind Valaam. I should go to the Big Skete, not far away; tomorrow we are going to Konevsky, and then we are leaving. Isn't it too late? O. Antipas advises, even forces gently: "Your legs are young, why is it too late for you! look at our Great Skete, strict ascetics there, and a rich building, what a church. Only the spouse will not be allowed, the female sex is only allowed on the Altar, on All Saints' Day. Well, see your husband off, wait outside the gate. Look, how friendly you are, all together. Or even on a horse you will be taken away... We don't need horses, we'll run - it's wonderful in the forest.We walk quickly, run: we need to return to the meal, not to upset Fr. Antipa; He is strict, he loves order.Past the deserted pier, through the strait. The sun had set behind Valaam. It faded, it was fresh. On the shore, an old nun is stacking wood chips - for the steamer. Fishermen-monks stretch their nets on holders; Just tarred: a strong smell, penetrates to the heart. It smells of spruce chips, resin, water and... incense? It smells like Valaam. Is it the smell of evening freshness, tarred nets and holiness? - the smell of Valaam, the monastery "beyond the world", - I called it so, - was absorbed into my memory, and I still hear it. The workers are still digging, chopping granite, chasing, sawing... with a wire saw! "How strange. I want to watch, but I need to return to the meal. Run. The hammers of the lapidaries knock less often, the workers are tired, they sit on granite blocks. Slumber and silence creep out of the thicket. Soon they would crawl to the cathedral, the altar boy would ring the bell, and the day would be over. The day will end on Valaam, and there, on Ladoga, there is still dawn: there is still a fiery sun. It is still light on the road. You can see how something has reddened... squirrel! We look at how it winds in the spruces. Below them, the twilight is already thicker. It smells of spruce, spicy warmth. The road uphill. You can see from the hill how the road winds, pines dozing at the turns. That's where the wilderness is! Something rustles above them, softly, loosely...- a large bird drowned in the thicket. In the greenish sky, the dotted stars are already white. Looking at the sky. White muslin-clouds, motionless. Listening...- not a sound. Here it is, a deaf silence. And for some reason, it's sad. We run.Across the stone bridge, over the water. Black water, deaf. We look into the horrors: the tops of spruces, the sky - darkness and light. How terribly overturned into the bottomless! Run... Chapel! No, we are not alone here. The face of the Mother of God, looking. A ribbon, a whisk, a candlestick is glowing. Look... It seems to smell like incense. Log in? We don't enter, it's too late. And it is good to pray in the wilds. Well, we'll have time... The lawn, the ringing of the bell, the crackle of dried wood... What is this... horse! He goes out onto the road, stretches out his lips, asks for bread. It's a pity we don't have bread with us. The monks taught and carried bread. Caress, pat on the lips. What meek, what gentle lips... velvet. We run, look around: everything is standing, waiting for a loaf of bread, looking. Strange - a cross in the forest! He stands and looks. We look around - he is looking. No, not creepy, but easy now: he stands, blesses.Something has turned white, the walls of the tower, the hermitage of All Saints. Somewhere the water glitters in the trees. Pond? Grove, there... hillock? Someone's grave, a cross. We are sad. We pass by the garden. The gate is locked. And here is the gate. Here is the limit: women are not allowed. Through the gate you can see: the yard, the grass, thick, dark. The tower on the corner is like a fortress. We must part. The wife is timid, begging - hurry, not for long... He sits down on the grass at the gate. It's strange - women are not allowed! Only for some reason - on a holiday. I regret why you came here. A deaf kingdom, darkness.I walk on the grass - and no footsteps are heard. Silence, deaf as... in the grave. A temple, quiet, in emptiness. Over there the barracks are like... low - cells? A cold gleam in the windows, uncomfortable.I am annoyed why they came here, "to the grave". I thought about going back, and I heard a cough, dull, viscous. Look. A dark one, slightly approaching, from the temple. Schema-monk? Right towards me, crawling. I'm scared.- Who's there..? I don't see... ha-a-ah... Creeps. I remember "Viy" - "raise my eyelids". It's creepy. I speak, timidly, and hear how clearly he speaks from the cells: - I, a pilgrim... to see the skete... And I feel that I am not telling the truth: now I have nothing to see here, I would rather be free. But it's too late: he's coming." It's late, we're already eating, it's night. Well, who is he?.. - he looks at me from under the doll, with crosses, - a scientist, or what? Ah, student... That's who... These are the smartest of all... Heard. Will you give it up? The voice of the schema-monk is deaf, "grave".- From Moscow.- From Moscow... far away. Everything is far from us. From the earth farther - closer to the sky...- points to the sky with his finger. "Well, let's go... I will show you our church. Here, I only read the Psalter. Do you understand the Psalter? Ok. Day and night we read for the departed fathers and brethren. We will all depart in due time... We will be commemorated. A man is like grass in his days... do you understand? Well, let's go.I walk limply into the gloom of the church. A lonely lamp flickers. Incense, stuffy air. On the vaults - monks, with shadows. The dark iconostasis is slightly golden, vaguely. An old psalter on an analogion. The schema-monk lights a candle. Under the doll with crosses I can distinguish a dead nose, shaggy gray eyebrows, a stern face, a wedge-shaped beard like a tow. I remember the same beards of our carpenters and plasterers, I saw them as a child. I think: everyone here, on Valaam, is from the people. The black cover on the analogion, in silver glaze, is commemorative. The ascetic pokes at the analogion with a candle, feels for the insert. He says "beyond the grave":- Day and night we read for two hours, the next one. Do you understand it in the Church's way? Well, honor... I will hear how you understand... we are not sufficiently learned... I'm embarrassed: he's examining, that's not enough. Does he know that I am weak in the Church? And why should I read to him? What am I to him, boy? That's it. And you can't see anything: a yellow sheet, covered with wax, stained, these titles... Who can figure it out!- Well, honor... Here, I've finished... Honor...- in a sheet, with a skinny finger.I am cramped. And I can't disobey, it's somehow embarrassing. And I'm ashamed that I'll be ashamed. Thoughts flash: "Maybe he is a seer... knows that they came "out of curiosity"... and on purpose, in order to shame, he examines?.. This does not suit a saint, this is already a mockery..." And I can't disobey: I got caught. And he kept pulling:- Well, honor... What do you mean...? Close the book, turn around, and...? No, it's obscene. In excitement, I peer into the lines - to understand the titles... And - joy! Familiar... I remember from childhood, from the "Six Psalms"! We read with Gorkin, and there was a lot left of the vigils. I read it firmly, without looking at the title, -..."Tell me, Lord, the way, in which I will go, for I will take my soul to Thee...""What, do you hear? "I think, what, dashing?" "Teach me to do Thy will, as Thou art my God: Thy good Spirit shall guide me to the land of righteousness." Whoa-ka-ak...- the schema-monk praises, and I think: "No, you won't, you're not a seer..." - Do you understand what is said... you? You've hit it all at once... What a word! Oh, you know, eat?.. "I understand," I answered, not understanding. He passed the exam. Leave. It's easy for me. And a pleasant schema-monk. It smells of the forest, of will. I look at the towers.- Do you live in the fortress? - I say, jokingly: it is easy for me.- With whom we fight, a bulwark against sin. We live in the forest, crawling along the chapyg, inconspicuously, quietly... Oh, I crawled up to the grave, and buried it... all life and perishable, earthly life. Don't understand. Someone in Shakespeare... about the frailty of life... yes, in Hamlet, "poor Yorick", they laughed at the skull, and this one was so calm, terrible... Valaam suddenly seems to be a grave... everyone crawls, covered with mantles, with crosses, skulls... "indecently, quietly" crawl up and... - The day has outlived - I have moved to the grave...- sighs the schema-monk, calmly. - What do you eat? - I ask for some reason.- And cabbage, water, bread... Everything is one to the worm of the grave to devour with corruptible flesh. And the soul... there! - he points to the sky.In the greenish sky - stars. Night. Say goodbye. The elder trudges to the cells - "to get ready". I run to the gate.- How are you doing...- I hear a sweet voice - a sigh of relief.We join hands, run in the darkness. From the thicket there is a horror. Wilderness, darkness. And now, joy, a bell in the distance. This is in the monastery, the "summons": for a meal. There was a smell of warmth. Shore, nets. The old man is trudging up the hill, towards the monastery.- It's time to eat, father... the day is over, glory to the Almighty... have mercy on us, Jesus the Saviour..." - he says to us affectionately. So glorious - "Jesus-Saviour", - with caresses.From the mountain you can see the whole kingdom of Valaam. The light is behind us: in the illuminated sky there are clear tops of fir trees. The moon is rising, golden in the fir trees. The light is ahead: the white cathedral, the crosses are shining, they see the moon. Antipas asks if you liked the skete. I say - yes... It's only sad there... and scary. He doesn't understand:- Ka-ak... it is frightful? What's so scary about it... a holy place, our most important skete, ascetics are being prepared... What did you think was scary there?.. He speaks reproachfully. I'm sorry that I've embarrassed him. I try to explain so that he understands our mood: - I don't know, father... mood...- What... non-structure? No, he doesn't.- I don't know how to explain it to you... This is our mood... everything is only about death and death, everyone is being prepared, all life! And all the crosses are there, and the graves... And it's still night... So it seemed scary. He looked at me with contrition. pu-gan! Why are you afraid of crosses? It is the demons who are only afraid of the cross. And we, Orthodox Christians, are alive by the cross. And why be afraid of graves! Behind the grave it will open... eternal life, in Christ... a spiritual person. And to an insensible person, who has a lack of structure - what can be revealed...! Oh, how senseless, ah... Well, the Lord will guide you. Are you tired? Well, I'll tell you, they'll bring it to your cell. The Lord is with you. Non-structure..! It is easy from Fr. Antipas's admonition, from his gentle rebuke. I am hungry. We grab fresh prosphora bread, hard, fragrant, Valaam. The window is open. It breathes coolness. Ladoga. Chew and watch. A moon over the forests. Life is wonderful! And everything is wonderful. And so it will be - all days and days, all tomorrow, tomorrow... infinitely. We don't count the days, we don't think. Chew and watch.

Kh. "The Builder of Valaam". Nikolay Smirenny. Wanderer