Spring, holy spring of Saint Kuksha near the village of Frolovka. Venerable Kuksha of Odessa: life, miracles, prayers Kuksha, hieromartyr, venerable monk of Pechersk

Chapter twenty-one FINALLY KUKSHA IS HOME! The new Ladoga, smelling of fresh wood, is behind us. And from Ladoga to Lake Nevo it’s just a stone’s throw. Once upon a time, Kuksha, having escaped from the Vikings, sailed here in a small shuttle, he rowed with all his might, as if his boat could escape from the high-speed

September 9 marks the 900th anniversary of the baptism of the land of Vyatichi and the martyrdom of St. John Kuksha. We bring to your attention an essay about the feat of the saint, prepared by Viktor Livtsov, professor at OSU, head of the department for the canonization of saints of the Oryol-Livensky diocese.

Hieromartyr Kuksha

Vyatichi

The Vyatichi tribe inhabited the territory of the upper reaches of the river. The Oka, occupied before them by the Baltic tribes of the Golyads (Golinds), was quite late, only in the 8th century, when the rest of the Slavic tribes had long lived in Eastern Europe. According to the chronicler, they came “from the Poles” - from the territory located near the one occupied by the Poles, that is, from the west. The name of the Vyatichi tribe comes, according to legend, from the name of their leader Vyatko (Vyacheslav, i.e. “more glorious”). The Vyatichi gradually occupied a huge area of ​​​​what is now Bryansk, Oryol, Kaluga, the south of Moscow, Tula, Voronezh, Lipetsk, and later Ryazan regions. The cities of Dedoslavl (the supposed capital of the Vyatichi - north of Tula), Bryansk, Karachev, Kozelsk, Sevsk, Krom, Mtsensk, Novosil, Yelets, etc. were founded here. At that time, the giant Okovsky forest was located in the center of this territory. According to anthropologists, the appearance of the Vyatichi people also took shape at that time. These were tall people with tall, narrow faces and large noses. Living in the forests, the Vyatichi preserved their pagan traditions for a long time. As the chronicler points out, foul language and polygamy flourished among them, with the kidnapping of brides by conspiracy at games between villages. The dead were burned (there is evidence that his beloved wife could have been burned along with the dead men) and buried in mounds, which were temples where sacrifices were made. We do not know for certain what kind of sacrifices these were, but, according to the evidence of chronicles and based on archaeological research in Europe, it can be argued that bloody sacrifices of animals and even people were made everywhere.

Initially, the Vyatichi were subject to tribute by the Khazars, who professed Judaism, but chronicles indicate the Vyatichi as participants in the campaign of the Kyiv prince Oleg the Prophet in 907 against Byzantium. In 964, Svyatoslav the Great apparently made an unsuccessful campaign against the Vyatichi. But after the defeat of the Khazar Kaganate, in 966 he organized a new campaign against them. Perhaps, from that time on, the Kyiv princes considered the Vyatichi their subjects.

The future baptist of Rus', Prince Vladimir the Holy, back in 981, made a campaign against the rebellious Vyatichi, imposing tribute on them and thereby nominally including their lands in Kievan Rus. But the chronicle states that the Vyatichi “got too much”, that is, they raised an army against the Kyiv governors and squads, and in 982 the prince pacified them again. In 988, according to the Tale of Bygone Years, the prince began to build cities on the river. Desna and recruit the “best husbands”, including from the Vyatichi tribe, and populated the southern Russian cities with them. However, R. The chronicler does not mention Oka. There is no doubt that Vladimir baptized these “best,” that is, noble men. To this time, archaeologists attribute the appearance of the first Vyatichi mounds, where the remains were placed without burning, while the hands of the deceased were folded crosswise on the chest in a Christian manner. But alongside this were pagan amulets and rituals, which indicates the existence of pagan dual faith, when Christ was perceived and revered by local pagans as another pagan god. It remained dangerous to seriously go deep into the land of the Vyatichi, and they lived there according to the old pagan laws. This land was ruled by a local dynasty and remained generally unbaptized.

In 1024, after the victory of Prince Mstislav the Udal in the Battle of Listven, where he defeated Yaroslav the Wise, Chernigov was allocated from the Kyiv principality for Mstislav, which included the nominally subordinate lands of the Vyatichi.

The baptism of the Oryol region and the entire land of the Vyatichi tribe is associated with the name of the Kyiv prince Vladimir Vsevolodovich Monomakh (1053–1125). His father, the son of Yaroslav the Wise, Vsevolod Yaroslavich (1030–1093), after the death of Yaroslav, inherited the Pereyaslavl throne. Vladimir, as he himself says in his “Instructions for Children,” became acquainted with our region at the age of 13, when for the first time, on behalf of his father, in about 1066, he made his first trip to the city of Rostov the Great, which belonged to Prince Vsevolod, through the land of the rebellious Vyatichi. He was apparently proud of this until the end of his days, and begins his autobiography with a description of this event.

In 1077, Vsevolod became the prince of Chernigov, but the next year he ascended the capital throne of Kiev, and Chernigov passed to his son Vladimir. Since the Vyatichi tribes were formally part of the Chernigov principality and had not yet been fully baptized, introducing them to Christianity became one of the main concerns of the new prince. However, before this, the inhabitants of these lands had to be brought to submission. Presumably in 1092–1093. Vladimir makes two winter trips to the lands of the Vyatichi. In winter, they were carried out because among the roads through these territories, only one direct road is mentioned, the one on which Saint Ilya Muromets fought with the robber Solovy Budimirovich. Therefore, the army was forced to walk along frozen rivers. First, fighting with Prince Khodota near his city of Kordno and, apparently, killing him, in the second winter Vladimir entered into battle with his son, whose name he does not name. In April 1093, the great Kiev prince Vsevolod died, and in 1094 Vladimir ceded Chernigov and transferred to the Pereyaslavl throne.

Having lost their political independence, the lands of the Vyatichi after the Lyubech Congress and the Treaty of 1097 finally became part of the Seversky and Ryazan appanages of the Chernigov principality. The lands along the Desna and Oka went to the first, and everything along the river went to the second. Pines. Later, three independent principalities were formed from it: Chernigov, Novgorod-Seversky and Murom. According to this division, the land of the Vyatichi goes to the Novgorod-Seversky principality. However, in church terms they were under the control of the Chernigov See, which could take upon itself the spread of Christianity among the Vyatichi.

When in April 1113, after a solar eclipse that frightened the people of Kiev, the Grand Duke of Kiev Svyatopolk Izyaslavich, who robbed monks and patronized moneylenders, died, and an uprising broke out in Kyiv, the people called Vladimir Monomakh to reign. Thus, the Monomashich dynasty was finally established in Rus', ruling it for another 500 years.

Holy mission of Kuksha

Undoubtedly, at the insistence of the Grand Duke, who knew the land of the Vyatichi well, and with the blessing of the Kiev Metropolitan, already in the summer of 1113 a Christian mission headed by Kuksha and his disciple Nikon was sent to the Vyatichi region. Some historians believed that Kuksha was a captured prince, possibly the son of Khodota, and Vladimir Monomakh, fearing uprisings and wanting to remove the captured prince from hereditary power, took him to Kiev, converted him to Christianity and tonsured him as a monk, depriving the Vyatichi of hereditary leader. According to another version, Kuksha came from among the “best men” baptized by Saint Vladimir, among whom Christianity continued to develop, and this may explain the vague legends about his nobility. At his tonsure, according to legend, he received the name John. However, there is no reliable information about this, since the Church canonized him under the name that he received in paganism. Many historians also saw this as evidence of his nobility. The custom of having a folk name in addition to a Christian name persisted for a long time in our region after the adoption of Christianity. Even under Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich, the following names are mentioned in the Bolkhov census books: “Bear Nechaev, son of Kishaev”, “Neustroy Ivanov, son of Belenikhin”, etc.

The name Kuksha, which was brought to us by the Kiev Pechersk Patericon, is clearly pagan in origin. There are several versions of its meaning. In northern Russian regions, this word means a bird of the raven family. Another explanation for the meaning of the name follows from the ancient root “kuk”, meaning “dryness” (you can compare the words “skuksit” - to wrinkle or “shrink” - to shrink). An extensive list of geographical names of the Oryol province of the early 20th century with this root convinces us that St. Kuksha could have come from the lands of the Vyatichi. In an early version of the Kiev Pechersk Patericon, the saint is also mentioned as Kupsha, which is an abbreviation for the name Kipriyan (Kuprian). At the same time, in sources from this time there is a mention of the Kiev Kupsha Monastery on the river. Setoml. In this case, Kupsha is perhaps the second - already schematic, monastic - consonantly chosen name of the same person, probably even the founder and abbot of the monastery.

It is reliably known that the Hieromartyr Kuksha was a monk of the Kiev Pechersk Monastery. One of the main forms of activity of the monastery was the implementation of the apostolic mission in the lands of the pagans. The Kiev Pechersk Lavra, from where the mission took place, was closely connected with the Chernigov See. Probably, Kuksha was called to preach the Gospel among the Vyatichi by the Chernigov Archbishop John, who draws attention to the spiritual state of the Vyatichi. Obviously, the mission consisted of several people, otherwise it would have been impossible to sail such distances and overcome the jungles of forests and swamps on river boats.

In 1113, Archbishop John was replaced by St. Theoktist, former abbot of the Kiev Pechersk Monastery from 1103 to 1113, whose closest associate was Kuksha. Apparently, the missionaries set off from Chernigov along the river. Desna. Having passed Novgorod-Seversky and Trubchevsk, inhabited by northerner tribes, the mission reached the Vyatichi borders near the city of Bryansk. In the western districts of the Oryol province, an ancient legend about the “great man” Kuk was recorded. Forests and mountains opened up before him. He moved rivers and lakes. This was followed by a transition to Karachev, after which the monks entered the pagan lands through impenetrable wilds and swamps. Having reached the river Oka, along it they went to Mtsensk. Here the Monk Abraham of Pechersk separated from the mission and preached in the land of Novosilsk.

According to legend, St. Kuksha in Mtsensk Vvedenskaya Church - a small wooden church cut down from huge oak trees that grew nearby - erected a miraculous image of St. Nicholas made of wood in human height and an eight-pointed stone cross. In 1238, when Batu Khan went to Mtsensk, the priests hid him at the foot of Mount Samorod in a hidden underground passage, near a hidden spring. It was found only in the year of the final victory of Christianity in the city of Mtsensk in 1415. There is an assumption that the Vvedenskaya Church marked the beginning of monasticism in the city of Mtsensk.

Kuksha's preaching was accompanied by miracles. He “healed the sick and through miracles brought many to Christ.” In the Pechersk Patericon, where the life of St. Kuksha, we read that Kuksha’s contemporary, Bishop of Vladimir Reverend Simon (Simeon) (1214–1226), in a letter to blessed Polycarp, later archimandrite of the Kiev Pechersk Monastery, wrote that Kuksha: “zane Vyatichi and people darkened by unbelief, cross and enlighten many with faith . Do many and great miracles.” He drove away the demons, “bringing down the rain from heaven, drying up the lake.” Indeed, among the elements deified was water, personified in the image of Kupala, and all lakes and rivers, according to the ideas of our ancestors, were filled with lower deities who bore the general name “water ones.” They drowned living people as sacrifices, tying stones to their feet. Thus, the dried up St. Lake Kuksha had a religious character for the Vyatichi.

The pagans began to be baptized. But further in the Kiev Pechersk Patericon we read that the saint “after many torments was beheaded with his disciple Nikon.” Since St. Simon does not call Nikon a holy martyr, which means that he did not have holy orders, but was a novice or cell attendant of Kuksha.

According to legend, for the prayer of St. Kuksha, 12 km from the city of Mtsensk in the direction of Bolkhov, near the right bank of the Oka, in a forest on a slope 1.5-2 versts from the village of Karandakovo, he erected a hermitage house, and nearby he dug up a “Bogomolny”, or “suffering saint” , well. At the beginning of the twentieth century, local residents said that “St. Kuksha lived in these places” and shed blood half a mile from the wells in the forest along the high road near a swamp, the banks of which gradually narrowed. Apparently, on an August night, the pagans attacked the missionary camp, subjected the monks to torture, and then St. Kuksha was taken aside and beheaded by the swamp - with a sword “he and his disciple were beheaded.”

His spiritual brother, the ascetic of the Pechersk Monastery, blessed Pimen the Faster, saw through the martyrdom of the saint. He “cry out loudly in the middle of the Pechersk church: our brother Kuksha has been killed on this day against the light,” and he himself reposed. Against the light - most likely, we must understand that he suffered a martyr's death at dawn on August 27 (September 9), 1113. Historians of the past believed that the killers of the saint were the Vyatichi priests or their elders.

Kyiv monks sent people to the country of the Vyatichi to search for the bodies of missionaries. The arriving monks took away the relics of the first baptist, which were placed in the nearby (Antony's) caves of the monastery, where they remain to this day. There was a belief that the relics of Kuksha’s student Nikon would be revealed in the village. Grigorovo (now Bolkhovsky district). Already five years after Kuksha’s death, clear traces of Christianity can be found in the cities of the region. Thus, near Krom in 1147, a peace treaty between Svyatoslav Olgovich and his Chernigov relatives was signed and approved by kissing the cross of prominent Vyatichi. Bishops Porfiry I and Porfiry II on their way to Vladimir passed through the Mtsensk region more than once.

Archaeological finds also indicate that already at the end of the 13th century, pots with ritual pagan funeral food - offerings to the pagan gods - disappeared from Vyatichi burials. Archaeologists have found stone crosses dating back to this time.

Apparently, the memory of Kuksha was maintained at first. Saint Simon wrote that in his time St. Kuksha was known and revered by everyone. According to peasants in the 19th century, the well where the enlightener was killed was a “holy place”, and pilgrimage near it “has taken place since time immemorial.” According to legend, near the swamp, at the site of the death of St. Kuksha over the “Bogomolny” or “suffering saint” well, his admirers built a chapel with a cross, where local residents annually on the second day of the Trinity holiday gathered for a prayer service in front of icons from the parish church of the village. Tel'che. On the road opposite the well there was a cross with a built-in mug for collecting donations. However, over time, veneration began to weaken. By the end of the 19th century, these structures collapsed.

However, at the end of the 19th century, a number of church-educational societies and brotherhoods opened. A brotherhood is being created in Mtsensk in memory of the Hieromartyr Kuksha. In 1872, the newly appointed dean of the churches of the city of Mtsensk, I. S. Popov, drew attention to the stone Church of the Epiphany, located in the cemetery near Streletskaya Sloboda. As the city grew, it was left without a parish and fell into disrepair. On February 28, 1876, I. Popov created the brotherhood of the holy martyr Kuksha at the church. Its first chairman was military doctor N.V. Utochkin. In 1894, a deputation was sent to the Synod with a request to transfer the relics of the holy martyr to the Church of the Epiphany. Despite the refusal, the Mtsensk residents, with the assistance of Oryol Bishop Misail, turned to Metropolitan Ioannikis of Kyiv, and he agreed to transfer part of the relics to the city of Mtsensk. An icon made of cypress wood with the image of Kuksha in vestments is commissioned from the Kiev Pechersk Lavra. In his right hand was a mica-covered reliquary containing relics. The chairman of the brotherhood council, Archimandrite Joasaph, accompanied by him, went from Mtsensk to get the icon. On August 25, 1895, the icon was delivered by fast train to the city of Orel. There she was met by the bishop and members of the brotherhood. The icon was placed in the Trinity Church of the Bishop's Compound. Subsequently, the same icon appeared in Bolkhov. In the Kiev Pechersk Lavra they were preparing the next icon for the Eagle, for the Peter and Paul Cathedral.

The Oryol Church Archaeological Committee, which arose in 1900 on the initiative of Bishop Nikanor of Oryol and Sevsky, also elected Kuksha as its heavenly patron. In 1901, the committee made a request to move the relics of the holy martyr to Oryol. On August 27, 1905, the committee was transformed into the Oryol Church Historical and Archaeological Society. It also chose St. Kuksha. By the resolution of Bishop Kirion of February 25, 1905, the celebration of the memory of St. Kukshi. The decree of the Synod of August 13 of the same year allowed the celebration on August 27 (September 9). In 1909, the society again asked to move the relics of the holy martyr to the city of Orel. In 1912, residents of Mtsensk unsuccessfully addressed the Synod with the same request.

At the end of August 1913, the 800th anniversary of the death of Kuksha was widely celebrated in the Oryol diocese. Solemn services with prayers to Kuksha were held in all churches of the diocese. All students in the city of Oryol were excused from classes, and all shops were closed to allow their employees to pray. The celebration was led by Bishop Gregory of Oryol, Governor S.S. Andreevsky and members of the State Duma. The arrival of the royal guest, Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna, gave the holiday special grandeur. Among the honored guests were also our fellow countryman Flavian - Metropolitan of Kiev and Galicia, Misail - rector of the Moscow Simonov Monastery (former Bishop of Oryol), Stefan - Bishop of Kursk and Oboyansky and Fr. Mitrofan of Srebryansky, now glorified as a saint. Elizaveta Fedorovna spent two days in Orel, staying at the Vvedensky Convent. She participated in solemn prayer services dedicated to Kuksha in the main church of the monastery, the Peter and Paul Cathedral and on the cadet parade ground (now L. Gurtiev Square), where over 15 thousand people gathered. On August 27, a crowd of thousands of pilgrims headed to the wells in Mtsensk district to perform a prayer service. On the evening of August 27, a solemn spiritual evening took place in the hall of the Noble Assembly. His program included choir singing and speeches by church leaders about Kuksha.

In 1914, at the celebration of Kuksha’s memorial day, members of the Church Historical and Archaeological Society found about 2,000 people in the Karandakovsky forest. There were so many people that all the hills and hollows surrounding the well were occupied. In 1914, residents of the village of Karandakovo began collecting funds for the construction of a stone chapel near the site of the saint’s death.

During the years of persecution of Orthodoxy, the name of Kuksha was not forgotten. In 1999, the monastery of St. Kuksha at the site of his murder in the Mtsensk region. In 2012, in accordance with the request of Archbishop Anthony of Oryol and Livensky and with the blessing of the Holy Synod, it was converted into a monastery.

Victor Livtsov
"Orlovskaya Pravda"