HIEROCONFESSOR ALEXANDER OF OMSK, SIBERIA (+ 1977)

By Vladimir Moss

The Priest of the Orthodox Tikhonite Church, Hieromonk Alexander, in the world Athanasius Vasilyevich Orlov, was born in 1878 (according to another source, 1876) in Vologda province in the family of Protopriest Basil, who served in one parish for 50 years. His mother, who was called Olga, was a deeply believing Christian. There were six brothers and one sister in the family. All the brothers and the brother-in-law were Priests. Fr. Alexander was the youngest in the family. The Lord placed the mark of His grace on the younger son of this noble spiritual family from his youngest years – Athanasius refused to eat meat from the age of five.
He went to study in a Theological Seminary. Now atheism was widespread among schoolchildren in those years, and Athanasius fell into its nets. But this was not hidden from his mother. On her deathbed – she died at the age of 56 – she told him: “Leave your atheist comrades, change your character and God will not abandon you.’
The death of Athanasius’ mother had been exactly prophesied by a fool-for-Christ, which made a strong impression on him, the more so in that a good provincial doctor had said that she would recover.
After the death of his mother Athanasius began to become interested in theology, the philosophical approach to religion, the doctrine of the immortality of the soul and life after death. But he was burdened by the fact that he had been so attracted to atheist ideas, and he was constantly pursued by the thought: “You will not be forgiven”. The thought gnawed at his brain: “If you wish to receive forgiveness, offer yourself as a sacrifice to God”.
In despair he decided to commit suicide. His nearest relatives did not let him out of their sight, but followed him day and night. Many Priests tried to convince Athanasius to abandon his plan, but without success. He took a raw thong from a harness, put his head into a noose and stepped off the stool. But just at that moment a fiery streak of lightning flashed before his eyes, and for the rest of his life he remembered the voice which he heard: “Now you are mine. There is no repentance in the grave.” And then he heard the powerful laugh of the devil.
At that moment he repented and came to on the floor – the end of the raw thong was swaying on the ceiling, and noose hung round his neck. One hearing the noise his relatives ran up. His godfather, who was a Priest, confessed him and gave him Holy Communion. He sincerely repented and the thought of suicide never entered his mind again. Another Priest, a friend of his father’s, said to him: “Athanasius, Satan told you the truth – there is no repentance in the grave. But you are not yet in the grave, and you can still repent.”
Athanasius imposed a strict fast upon himself and intensified his prayer. He graduated from the Seminary and took up a three-year practical as a Psalm-Reader in a small parish where there were few services – only every Sunday. Since he was knowledgeable in medicine (according to one source, he had both a medical and a University training), he worked to counter epidemics of typhus and dysentery.
In 1915, during the First World War, he went to the front as a volunteer, serving as a regimental Priest. With a cross in his hand, he would go in front of the soldiers into battle for the Faith, the Tsar and the Fatherland. His fearlessness, untiring service and flaming faith attracted the soldiers.
At the defence of Yakibstadt bridgehead, Fr. Alexander did not allow the sappers to blow up the bridge until all the soldiers and the numerous wounded had been transported across from the German side of the river, for the water was cold and swift-flowing. The soldiers then met and decreed that Fr. Alexander should be given the Cross of St. George.
He was three years at the front, and fell into captivity for three months, but managed to escape. He did not go home, but returned to the front. He went into the trenches with his cross and words of encouragement. He also gave sermons. For his faithful service he was awarded with a gramota and Golden Cross by Tsar Nicholas II. He was to receive this personally from the Tsar, but the arrest of the Tsar in 1917 prevented this.
After the Revolution Fr. Alexander received no salary. However, the older soldiers tired to persuade him not to leave. And he remained until the front was liquidated, saying: “Dear ones, it’s a shame to break one’s oath”.
In 1918 he returned from the front and took up a position in Gribtsevo, Vologda province. His parish consisted of widely scattered villages and a church near a river. There was a bell-tower with one bell weighing 450 pounds, a second – 150, and a third – 80. There were always many parishioners in church. On the eve of Sundays and feasts, Fr. Alexander introduced all-night vigils, which were followed by choir rehearsals with everyone chanting. He also introduced discussions outside the services: explanations of the Creed, the Commandments and the Law of God, Church history, explanations of prayers and answers to parishioners’ questions.
Fr. Alexander used to reminisce about this period: “I felt myself t be an irredeemable debtor before the Lord for my previous sins, lack of faith and the sins of my youth, and full of gratitude to the Lord for His mercy towards me in the war and in captivity. I was young, my voice was strong, I did not tire easily. I often had to speak on the subject of atheism, and to discuss the reality of the personality of Jesus Christ. I considered it my duty to acquaint my parishioners with the great scientists who had believed in God”.
At this time the Law of God was forbidden in schools, so Fr. Alexander tried to speak more about God. This did not please the atheists. In the provincial newspaper they began to slander him. It became still more difficult for Fr. Alexander to serve in his parish. The authorities sought the slightest excuse to arrest him, they imposed insupportable taxes on him and forbade him to preach.
Once a group of agitators came to the village soviet and posted a notice ordering the villagers to appear at a debate. The old rector refused to speak at the debate, but Fr. Alexander decided to speak. He used what he himself had read and what he had heard in a debate in 1921 between Vvedensky and Lunacharsky against the atheists. The agitators could produce nothing in reply, and the senior member of the collective began to shout: “Arrest him”.
“Everything you have is based on might, not on right,” said Fr. Alexander fervently, “and not on facts or logic. A bear has got still greater might – he can beat up whomever he wants.”
Fr. Alexander went home and the peasants dispersed. Two weeks later, they arrested him while he was paying a visit with his wife. He was brought to the village soviet under the guard of a policeman. This was on Cheesefare Saturday, and there were many people in the street. The people gathered at the village soviet and began to demand the release of the Priest. The president of the soviet summoned a detachment of red-army soldiers.
“The Priest has stirred up the whole district in rebellion,” he said.
The bell for the all-night vigil was sounding, and some of the people went into the church. It became quieter on the street. They said that Fr. Alexander would be taken out the next day. However, during the service they took him out of the village, and then forced him to go the whole way by foot. Snow was falling heavily, the convoy were traveling on wooden sledges while he walked behind them for 50 km along the snowy road. The soldiers whipped the horse, and forced him to run. Later it turned out that they had been given the order to shoot him while he was supposedly trying to run away.
First he was put into a common cell in Kandakovsk Prison. The investigators interrogated him, often using the butts of their rifles and constantly coming back to the same accusation: “He went round the parishes and villages conducting discus-sions”. But this was not true – he gave sermons only in the church. The investigator demanded that he confess, and that would be the end of the matter. But this would have meant that they could drag off any villager who let him conduct a discussion in his house.
Fr. Alexander exposed their coarseness and refused to give any evidence before the drunken investigator. They sent him to the GPU in the provincial capital of Vologda, and there to a revolutionary tribunal. The interrogators began again, with yet more accusations – there were now 18 points in all. The president of the revolutionary tribunal accused him of mocking the soldiers in the war. In rebuttal of this accusation, Fr. Alexander produced his Cross of St. George. Then they accused him of conducting anti-semitic propaganda against the Jews. But Fr. Alexander had not a single Jew in his parish. And at the front he had even defended the Jews, for which they had given him a present, a sacred book in Russian and Hebrew with a silver plaque and the inscription: “To the highly respected Priest of the 237th Graiboronsky regiment, from the Jews of this regiment”. They asked to see the book, and it served as a proof of the truthfulness of Fr. Alexander’s evidence.
Throughout the Great Lent until Palm Sunday Fr. Alexander was constantly being brought under armed guard from his solitary cell for interrogations in various parts of the city. He was not allowed parcels from home. However, the day after seeing the procurator he was given back his clothes and documents and allowed to return to his parish. He served the services of Holy Week and met the Day of Resur-rection with joy.
“That Pascha was especially joyful,” he said, “for my family, for me and for the parishioners. Their petitions, even as far as the centre, had been crowned with success. By the mercy of God, I, too, was resurrected!”
The people loved Fr. Alexander, who was now a mitred Protopriest, and stood up for him through thick and thin in his conflicts with the authorities, who watched his every step. The MVD boss declared openly that he wanted to get him. And they began to threaten him with prison and execution for his fierce sermons against atheism. In 1930 he was arrested and spent three years in prison.
Fr. Alexander sought an answer to his dilemma in the Gospel. He found it in Luke 14.26-27: “If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple. And whosoever does not bear his cross, and come after Me, cannot be My disciple”. These few words made his decision clear and firm – to leave his family, because he was not allowed to serve honourably as a Priest under Soviet power and his conscience did not allow him to become a traitor.
In 1935 he left his family, his wife and four children – his youngest son Nicholas was only six years old. He went to the river, and left a note on the bank which said: “It is impossible to live like this”. Then he left his clothes there (so that they should not look for him in the surrounding villages), signed himself with the sign of the cross and left his native land. He took up employment as a shepherd, and in the winter was a sexton in the church of the Holy Spirit.
As a shepherd he wore old peasant clothes and was distinguished from the others by his meekness, humility, eagerness to please and kindness. It was clear from his face that he was not who he said he was. The villagers noticed this, and to test him gave him sour food to eat – but he was satisfied with everything.
In the Church he did not go up close to the kliros in case he forgot himself and began to chant. Once, however, in Staraya Russa, he couldn’t help it – he began to chant. This gave him away completely. Once he was asked to baptize a child, he couldn’t refuse. There were rumours that this was not a simple peasant but someone who was hiding from Soviet power.
The time had come to leave the area. And so, thanking God, Who had enlightened him through the Holy Gospel and Who had made it easier for him to bear the burden of leaving his family, he went to the railway station and got on a train taking him eastwards. This was in 1941.
He came out in Omsk in Siberia. Having neither money nor even a crust of bread, and not knowing anybody, he began to beg for alms, first by the viaduct, and then in the Nikolskaya Church. But nobody gave him anything. Fr. Alexander prayed to God and thanked Him for sending him this trial for the purification of his former sins.
He came out of the Church and saw an elderly woman with a heavy suitcase. He offered to help her. This woman turned out to be a believer, and she gave him something to eat. He told her that he was a Priest, but did not recognize the Sergianist “Church”. Gradually a parish was formed around him.
At first only a few individuals came, then it was tens of people. Finally, such a large Catacomb community was formed, that it was difficult to find a place where they could all fit in for the festal services, and admission had to be limited. The community included nuns who had been driven out of their destroyed monasteries. The nuns and believing old women collected books and vestments and Church utensils. Then people were found who sewed gonfalons, and former monastery artists who painted Icons. Then there appeared readers and chanters. People learned how to make candles, to bake prosphoras and boil incense.
People invited Fr. Alexander to their homes, and he went from house to house. Children were baptized, people repented of their sins and received the Holy Mysteries, burials and pannikhidas for the reposed were carried out. All this was done at great risk both for Fr. Alexander and for the parishioners, but God preserved and strengthened them.
On great feasts as many as 100 people gathered. The service was long, It began with an all-night vigil in the evening and finished at 4 in the morning, lasting twelve hours. The daily services began at about 3 or 4 o’clock and continued until late in the evening. During the proskomedia Fr. Alexander took out a particle for each believer. He spent a long time on confessions and sermons, which caused some of the old women to complain, but he was adamant. In his sermons, which made a great impression on many, Batyushka especially concentrated on the refutation of atheist propaganda about the existence of God, and pointed out how many of the great scientists believed in God.
Fr. Alexander had a special veneration for the Mother of God. With what emotion and love he read Akathists and molebens to Her, and recounted the miracu-lous healings wrought through her Icons in Holy Russia! He also knew the Lives of the Saints very well, and would often bring up examples from their lives to illustrate a point.
At the end of the 1940s he became a monk with the name Alexander in the city of Ufa, Siberia.
During the 1950s, when atheists were being introduced into the seminaries, Fr. Alexander would warn about these “wolves in sheep’s clothing”.
Twice Batyushka was picked up off the streets of Omsk, because of the unusual nobility of his bearing and brought to the police station. But with the help of God he was released. Once, while he was celebrating the Divine Liturgy, at the moment of consecration of the Holy Gifts the Police came in. Fr. Alexander took the chalice with the Holy Gifts and stood up against the wall, covering himself with a tablecloth. The Police did not notice him! By the Providence of God and the prayers of the Most Holy Mother of God, Fr. Alexander and his flock were often saved from the torture-chambers of the KGB.
The servant of God Anna remembers how she was healed by him. She went to Fr. Alexander on Sundays and feastdays seeking healing from her illness. Most of the time she seemed a normal person, but when they began to chant the Cherubic Hymn she suddenly became anxious and began to shout in an inhuman voice! They had to drag her up to receive Communion. In 1952, at the request of her relatives, Fr. Alexander read prayers over the sick woman, and the demon was driven out of her. Since then Anna has become a normal Christian who regularly, in peace and with the fear of God, receives the Holy Mysteries and lives a Christian life.
In the middle of the 1960s a chance arrival at one of the services turned out to be a former parishioner of Fr. Alexander’s in the Church where he served before he left his family. He recognized him, as he did her. After she had told him about his family he decided to visit them.
They were convinced that he had drowned in the river. After he had told them what happened, they told him that his daughter Olga was working for the KGB. His wife just wept. But his daughter said to him: “Father! I give you my room. I will hang it with Icons. You pray in it as much as you want, but stay with the family!”
Fr. Alexander replied: “My daughter, I’ll do everything you suggest, but only on condition that you leave your work for the KGB”.
His daughter replied that she could not do that. Then Fr. Alexander said: “Well then, my daughter, you cannot leave your work at the KGB, and I cannot leave my service to God and the people who have been entrusted to me. My life belongs to the Church of Christ.”
At this they parted. Fr. Alexander and his novice Maria left for Omsk, not suspecting that at the order of his daughter he had been placed under constant surveil-lance.
By the will of God, however, Fr. Alexander did not fall into the hands of the KGB. His novice went through all the interrogations without giving away anything about Batyushka or his address. However, this information was supplied by Maria’s landlady.
So the Church services stopped, and Maria was forced to go to her parents in Semipalatinsk, while for Fr. Alexander there began a life full of alarms and perse-cutions. In order not to expose his Omsk parishioners to danger, he went only where he was invited. By the Providence of God, faithful Christians offered him refuge in many towns, especially Tavda, Vyatka, Ufa, Ust-Kamenogorsk, Semipalatinsk and Novy Afon.
Once, when he was traveling by boat to Semipalatinsk, he sat down at the piano and began to play : “God, save the Tsar”. A detective who was travelling on the boat then told him that he would be arrested on disembarking. But it turned out that the detective got drunk, fell asleep and set fire to his mattress in the cabin. Meanw-hile, Fr. Alexander had disembarked and escaped.
Once on arriving in Omsk he said: “My daughter has betrayed me.” People came to visit him more rarely because many, and especially young people, were being summoned to interrogations. There they always demanded answers to the same questions – about Fr. Alexander. And they were asked to work as stooges for the KGB.
In 1969, eight years before his death, his sight began to fail. Then he became completely blind and fell ill. But his hearing was good to the end. He knew the simple services by heart, but he needed to be prompted when it came to the festal exclama-tions. He celebrated the Liturgy only in the presence of his spiritual father, Hiero-monk Anthony, who had been a cleric of Schema-Bishop Peter (Ladygin) and had spent many years in prison. Fr. Anthony would often go to Omsk to fulfil the needs of the Christians of that city. Fr. Alexander spent most of his time with him in Tavda, until his death there in 1973. Then Fr. Alexander returned to Omsk.
In one of his last letters which have not been destroyed, Fr. Alexander wrote:
“Dear brothers and sisters in Christ!
I appeal to you with a last humble request before my death: receive as a prayerful memento of the sinful Hieromonk Alexander a humble gift which will nevertheless be very useful for all believers: the five prayers of the Hierarch Deme-trius of Rostov.
I ask forgiveness of all if I have offended anyone in anything because of my feeble mind, lack of foresight, pettiness, insufficient self-control or, most important, lack of the fear of God – the beginning of spiritual wisdom.
I beseech you all who believe in the Lord God to raise your fraternal Christian prayer that the Lord send me a Christian end and count me worthy of a good answer before the Terrible Judgement Seat of Christ. May the Lord reward you with temporary and eternal blessings.
My path is life is ending with the words of St. John Chrysostom and the Hierarch Nicholas, my favourite Hierarchs – Glory to God for all things!”
Before his death he said: “I have much to say, but I can’t”.
And before his death he forbade anyone to make any inscription over his grave, saying: “I lived in secret and must lie in secret”.
Twenty-four hours before his death, he began to breathe with difficulty. In the neighbouring room they read the prayers for the departure of the soul from the body. On the morning of his death they had already read the prayers for him although he had not heard them. As he was dying they were reading the Akathist to the Holy Great-Martyr Barbara.
He died at the age of 99 in the city of Omsk (according to another source, Tomsk) in the family of a pious widow, on August 29, 1977 at six o’clock in the evening. He was buried in Omsk in the north-eastern cemetery.
The radiant memory of this wonderful man and pastor and fierce denouncer of the atheist Bolshevik power lives on in the hearts of his parishioners who are alive. The path to his grave is not overgrown. When the parishioners meet, the conversation always turns to Fr. Alexander, and the prayers of those who pray to him at his grave are always answered.

Holy Hieroconfessor Alexander, pray to God for us!

Sources:
“Zhiznennij put’ Ieromonakha Aleksandra (Orlova) v Omskoj obschine Katakombnoj Pravoslavnoj Tserkvi”, Tserkovnaia Zhizn’, NN 1-2, January-April, 1994, pp. 41-57;

“Ustnie vopominania raby Bozhiej N.I. Pashko o katakombnom dukhovenstve”, Pravoslavnaia Zhizn’, 52, N 11 (634), November, 2002, pp. 28-30.

HIEROCONFESSOR BASIL, BISHOP OF KINESHMA, RUSSIA (+ 1945?)
and those with him

By Vladimir Moss

Bishop Basil of Kineshma was born Benjamin Sergeyevich Preobrazhensky, in 1875 (according to other sources, 1873 or 1876) in the family of Protopriest Sergius and Matushka Paula of Kineshma.
In those years many of the clergy did not distance themselves from the worldly environment, and borrowed worldly tendencies and a worldly cast of mind from it. But Fr. Sergius Preobrazhensky and his wife Paula were not like those. There was nothing worldly in their home, and no objects of secular culture. After all, how could anything secular compare with the Sacred Scriptures!
Fr. Sergius did not accept in his home guests whose aim was vain talk. The whole sense and aim of earthly life for the couple was the cleansing of the mind and heart by prayer and the sacraments. And a purified heart was better able to detect the insidious traps of this world and the craftiness and evil thoughts coming from the devil. And for that reason the parents tried in every way possible to protect their children from the influence of the world, knowing how difficult it is to uproot the thorns of sin and passion once they have already grown through.
Benjamin was brought up from infancy in an atmosphere of prayer and spiri-tual exploits. Only prayer, only Church Services, only spiritual exploits, only true joy filled his life from early childhood. The whole structure of the life that surrounded him was similar to the monastic. Neither news, nor gossip, nor vain conversations - nothing of all this penetrated the high fence of their house, which the children were forbidden to leave. And it was a joy for the child when their house was visited by poor brothers and wanderers. On the very day of his baptism, when Benjamin was brought home from the Church, an old wanderer woman arrived in their house, looked at the boy and said:
"He will be a great man."
And there were other prefigurings of his exceptional future.
His parents did not even consider the study of letters to be important, and did not make haste about it. And this absence of worldly vanity taught the boy mental concentration, so that when the time came to study, he finished Kostroma Theological Seminary with a distinction (one of this fellow-pupils was the future Hieromartyr, Archbishop Theodore Pozdeyevsky) and entered the Law Faculty of St. Petersburg University. But however lofty the rules of piety in which a person has been brought up, and however accustomed he may be from childhood to the life of the Church, his human will remains free and the hour of free choice will without fail come in his life.
After graduating from University Benjamin decided to prepare himself for the profession of a secular writer. Knowing to perfection both the ancient and the modern European languages, he went to England (according to one source, in 1910) and entered one of the English Universities in order to continue his education and become more closely acquainted with European culture.
Every summer he returned home. The waters of the Volga flow quietly, and at its higher points, where the villages stand, its banks are adorned and as it were spiritually strengthened by snow-white Churches, amongst which the bell-tower of the Kineshma Cathedral rose up invitingly.
Once Benjamin arranged with some friends to go on a restful trip in a boat. But for some unknown reason the boat capsized, and all those who had been sitting in it began to drown. And then Benjamin turned in prayer to the Lord, beseeching him to preserve his life and vowing to abandon secular education and enter a Theological Academy, so as to learn how to defend Orthodoxy. He had hardly had time to utter this prayer in his mind when he saw a long, thick plank. Taking hold of it, he swam to safety. All the others who had been sailing with him drowned.
The young man did not put off the fulfilment of the promise he had made to God and that very year he entered the Moscow Theological Academy, from which he graduated in 1901 with the degree of candidate of theology. On June 28, 1901 he was appointed a Teacher of Polemical Theology, History and Polemics against the Old Believer Schism and local sects in the Voronezh Theological Seminary. Having been interested since youth in the ascetic side of the Christian struggle, he wrote a disse-rtation "On the Skete Paterikon", for which he was awarded the degree of Master of Theology.
When he was studying in the Academy, Benjamin began to preach in the town Churches. His sermons soon became so well-known and popular that he was also invited to the villages on the patronal feasts of the village Churches. It was at this time that he understood that his listeners were not sufficiently enlightened, and he became a missionary-preacher in his native land of Kineshma. He carefully examined the parishioners of the Churches in which he had to preach during Church services, and chose from amongst them a strongly believing woman who had a good knowledge of the Word of God, round whom he began to collect a Church circle.
In this circle the Gospel was read and then interpreted. Benjamin himself did some of the interpreting. Besides this, the appointed Church services were read, and Church chants and spiritual verses beloved by the people were sung.
It was difficult to organize these circles, but once created they gave fruit a hundredfold, educating many souls in such faithfulness and love for Christ that none of the misfortunes that came after could shake them.
During the Renovationist Heresy these circles became unshakeable fortresses of Orthodoxy.
As a missionary-preacher, Benjamin went round the parishes of the Kineshma uyezd on foot, founding circles of zealots of piety wherever he could, drawing them in by the reading and interpretation of the Word of God.
But what especially attracted them was perhaps the example and Christian exploits of the preacher himself.
In 1911 he was appointed Teacher of Foreign Languages and General History in the Mirgorod men’s Gymnasium, and in 1914 – Teacher of Latin Language in the Moscow Gymnasium. In 1917 he graduated from a Pedagogical Institute.
At a moment of mortal danger, Benjamin Sergeyevich gave a vow to devote himself to the service of the Orthodox Church, and in October, 1917 he became a reader in the Ascension Church in Kineshma. He founded Orthodox circles for the study of the Holy Scriptures attached to the Churches of the Kineshma Diocese.

In 1918, when in the country as a whole and in the confines of the Kostroma eparchy militant and all-destroying atheism was raging and Priests and monks were being tortured in their thousands, Benjamin became psalm-reader in the Church of the Ascension, where his elderly father still served.
The authorities issued a decree forbidding the preaching of the Law of God in schools; so the light of Christ was forcibly removed from the hearts of the children. And Benjamin began to gather the children in the Ascension Church and preach the Law of God to them there.
Being strict with himself and a strict fulfiller of the canons and regulations of the Church, Benjamin’s father did not consider him ready for ordination to the priesthood and monasticism before he was forty.
And only on July 16, 1920 was Benjamin ordained to the Priesthood as a celibate; he was then 45. The ordination took place in the town of Kostroma and was performed by Archbishop Seraphim (Mehscheryakov) of Kostroma. Soon after this his father died. After the death of his father Benjamin received the tonsure with the name of Basil, in honour of St. Basil the Great, and on September 19, 1921 (according to another source, September 14), he was consecrated as Bishop of Kineshma, a vicariate of the Diocese of Kostroma. Archbishop Seraphim of Kostroma and Bishops Hierotheus (Pomerantsev) and Sebastian (Vesti) carried out the consecration.
After his consecration to the Episcopate, he redoubled his ascetic efforts. Having renounced all personal property, he settle on the edge of the town in a small bath-house which was in the kitchen-garden of a soldier’s widow. The Hierarch had no possessions or furniture, and he slept on the bare floor, putting a log under his head and covering himself up with some clothes. He hid his exploit from outsiders, receiving noone in this place. Those who came met him in the chancellery, which was attached to the Ascension Church.
The bath-house was a long way from the Church, one had to go through the whole town, but the Hierarch did not want to find a nearer place for himself, although at that time he served daily. Every morning while it was not yet light he would walk across the whole town to the Church, returning home late at night. Not once was he apprehended by robbers on the street, but he meekly and lovingly gave them everything he had, and soon they began to recognize him from a distance and did not come up to him anymore.
Besides the daily Church services, in which he always preached without fail, the Hierarch confessed his numerous spiritual children, going round the homes of all who needed his help and word of consolation, visiting monasteries and the circles he had founded scattered throughout the uyezd.
On major feast-days the Hierarch served in the Cathedral, and from Thursday to Friday there were all-night vigils in the Church of the Ascension. The people loved these all-night vigils which were dedicated to the memorial of the Lord’s Passion, and were present at them in great numbers. They were especially beloved of the workers, many of whom lived not in the very centre of the town, but in the environs, two hours’ walk from the Church. They stood through the all-night vigil and it was only late at night that they got home - in the morning they were again at work. But such was the grace of these services that people did not feel tired. During the Divine service the Hierarch himself read the Akathist to the Passion and there was such quietness in the Church at that time, as if there were not a single person there, and every word was heard in the furthest corner.
The grace-filled words of Bishop Basil’s sermon pierced the hearts and drew more and more people into the Churches. After his sermons many completely changed their lives. Some, following the example of the Hierarch, gave their property to the poor, dedicating their lives to the service of the Lord and their neighbours.
The light of faith and grace began to reach even the unbelievers, and Jews began to come to the Church so as to hear the Hierarch’s words about Christ the Saviour.
Whatever people might think of the Christian faith and the Orthodox Church, almost everyone felt that the Hierarch’s words responded to the inner demands of the soul, clearly returning life to the soul and a feeling of meaning to life. And the authorities began to be more and more disturbed. But they found no excuse for arresting the Hierarch, while his popularity amidst the people was so great that the authorities could not bring themselves to arrest him. And then they began to infiltrate people into the church whose task was to tempt the hierarch with questions during the sermon so as to confuse him.
Vladyka Basil knew that there were such people in the Church, and he replied to many of their questions beforehand. Convicted in their conscience, and understan-ding the pointlessness of their situation, the atheists left the Church without asking any questions.
Like a true pastor, the Hierarch Basil protected his flock from every kind of evil and error. If he learned that one of his spiritual children was thinking incorrectly, then without wasting any time he hastened to visit this person.
Not far from the town of Vichuga there lived a sick Eldress by the name of Martha Lavrentyevna Smirnova. She was a great ascetic. From childhood she had led a God-pleasing life, and the last 22 years she had passed in immobility, ceaselessly giving thanks to God. For this the Lord gave her the gift of discernment, which many of those who came to her for advice profited from.
In exile Basil of Kineshma learned that the Eldress had begun to receive people who were in heresy and were going round everywhere glorifying her as a Saint. On returning from exile, Vladyka did not change his rule and set off on foot for Vichuga, visiting the homes of his spiritual children on the way. He arrived at the cell of the Eldress only by evening. It was full of people and the Hierarch asked everyone to leave, so that he could remain alone with Martha Lavrentyevna and her cell-attendant.
"I want to test you," said the Hierarch, "to see whether you are in spiritual deception or not. I have learned that you are visited by some people from Ivanovo who have even given you their photographs and glorify you throughout the town as a Saint. And yet they are not Orthodox. If you continue to mix with them, I will exclude you from my circle."
Without hesitation the Eldress agreed to stop seeing the heretics.
In the home of one of the Hierarch’s spiritual children, Eudocia, the oil-lamp in front of the Icon began to light of itself at midnight. "It seems that the Lord is calling me to get up and pray," she thought, not sure whether to accept this phenomenon as from God or a deception. But she had already felt the spirit of deception in her heart - you pray so much, she said to herself, that the Lord Himself lights the oil-lamp.
In order to test this phenomenon, she invited an acquaintance of hers to stay the following night. But the oil-lamp lit up in her presence, too. Then she invited another witness to stay the night with her. The same thing happened with her. At midnight the oil-lamp lit up of itself.
This finally persuaded Eudocia to accept this phenomenon as from God. When he had heard her out, the Hierarch said to her severely: "No, this phenomenon is not from God, but from the enemy, and because you have accepted it as coming from God I am laying a penance on you - you are not to have Communion for a year. And the oil-lamp will not light up again." And truly, from that day the oil-lamp did not light up.
In the summer of 1922 the heretical Church movement of Renovationism arose. Throughout the country the renovationists captured Churches and drove out Orthodox Priests and Bishops, whom the authorities gave over to imprisonment and death. In those parishes whose Church had been seized by the Renovationists the Hierarch blessed the Priests not to leave their flocks, but to celebrate the Liturgy in the squares of the villages. He himself gave an example of this, and after every service he delivered a sermon which hundreds and thousands of people came to listen to.
The Hierarch Basil served the Liturgy with the greatest reverence; often during the proskomedia his fellow-servers saw tears flowing abundantly down his cheeks. He told one of those close to him that during the Liturgy of the Presanctified, when the choir sings: "Now the heavenly powers are with us...", he had seen with his own eyes the heavenly powers standing in front of the altar in the form of white doves.
Soon after his consecration Basil of Kineshma got to know his future cell-attendant, who would share with him the difficulties of exile and imprisonment. Later, in exile, Metropolitan Cyril (Smirnov) of Kazan used to say of him: "I have seen many cell-attendants, but not one like Alexander Pavlovich. Vladyka Basil has been lucky."
Alexander Pavlovich Chumakov was born at the end of the 19th c. in the village of Polka in Kostroma province, in a peasant family. He had a deeply religious mother who from childhood tried to instil a love for God and the Church into the boy. When Alexander came of age, she insisted that he went to the Elders in Optina desert and received their blessing for his future life. And while he was going to Optina, past the villages he knew, all the girls poured out onto the road so as to laugh at him - look at the monk, they said. And he himself went with a heavy heart and was embarrassed by these gibes. But when Alexander came to Optina and was present at the services and heard the Optina chanting, then his heaviness disappeared in a flash. And he felt as if he were standing in the heavens.
Alexander was two years in Optina; when the Russo-German war began he was drafted to the front. Soon he found himself in captivity, twice he ran away and twice they caught him and imprisoned him, cruelly beating and mocking him.
In captivity, while he was carrying out forced labour, he was seen by a rich German woman who was enflamed with such a passion for him that she immediately proposed marriage to him. Alexander refused, she tried to persuade him, but her persuasion had no effect, and she began to compel him to live with her by force and threats. But the courageous warrior of Christ withstood this pressure, too. However, seeing that his life was in danger, he again fled, and this time succeeded in reaching his homeland. By this time the war had begun to change to civil conflicts, and Alexander Pavlovich became a psalm-reader in the Church of the village of Polka.
Alexander Pavlovich went to a hierarchical service in Reshemsky Monastery specially in order to look at an unusual Hierarch. He walked beside Vladyka Basil, chanted together with him and Vladyka liked him.
"Alexander Pavlovich," he said, "come and serve as psalm-reader in the Church of the Ascension." "Alright, holy Vladyka, but first I must go to Elder Anatolius of Optina and receive his blessing.""I myself used to go to Elder Anatolius," replied the Hierarch, "but he’s dead now." "Then bless me, Vladyka, to be your psalm-reader," replied Alexander Pavlovich, bowing to the Hierarch.
In 1922 famine broke out in the Lower Volga. Thousands died every day. In some cases the authorities took orphaned children and sent to children’s homes in other towns. Not long before Pascha they brought some of these children to Kineshma. Great Lent was coming to an end when the Hierarch heard about this. After the service he gave a sermon to the people, calling on them to help the starving children. "Soon the festive days of Pascha will be with us. When you come from the feast and sit at table, remember the starving children..." said the Hierarch.
After this sermon many took children into their homes. The Bishop himself rented a home for the children and put five girls in it together with a nurse, a pious believer by the name of Olga Vasilyevna.
He often visited them, and sometimes had to stay the night there. But on those occasions he did not change his rule, but lay on the floor in the kitchen with a log under his head. The Hierarch was both a refined ascetic and overflowing with simplicity and love in his relations with people. When he visited the circles, the news of his arrival spread quickly, and people hurried to come and meet him. But the situation was of the simplest. Those who arrived fitted themselves in where they could. Vladyka often sat on the floor, singing spiritual songs and accompanying himself on the cithara. And his sermons, discussions of the Gospel and singing were so full of simplicity and love that it seemed as if he were a spiritual pipe in the hands of God. He wished for and sought no other lot. Neither gold, nor silver, nor a place in the world - none of this did he wish for; nothing except to be a true servant of God.
None of those present wanted these discussions to end. For many their meeting with him became the guiding star leading them for the rest of their life. Soon the Lord began to reveal to those around that He not only gave His servant grace in his sermons, but also heard and carried out his prayers and petitions. Thus there was a girl who fell into difficult circumstances and under the instigation of the devil became more and more despondent; and things came to such a pass that she finally decided to commit suicide. Kind people brought her to the Hierarch, in whom she confided her whole story. He heard her confession in silence, and in parting blessed her and kissed her on the head. At that moment her heaviness and the tormenting thought that had oppressed her for so long fell away.
Once a couple came to the Bishop and began to complain that they had no children. They asked him to pray for them. He prayed. Soon after that a daughter was born to them.
A widow with four small children fell seriously ill with dysentery. Her condition deteriorated rapidly and finally became critical. Realizing that she was dying, the widow called the Hierarch to give her the last rites. Vladyka Basil came to the house of the sick woman. The four little defenceless children surrounded their mother’s deathbed. The Hierarch’s heart was seized with profound compassion and pity, and he began to pray fervently to the God of widows and orphans to give the woman life. After praying, he confessed her and gave her communion. And from that moment she began to get rapidly better and soon recovered completely, and she died only in deep old age.
Sometimes children came to petition for their hopelessly ill parents. Once a girl knocked at the Hierarch’s cell. He opened the door and recognized her. She was one of those who came to the church to learn the Law of God from him. The whole way there she had been weeping bitterly, and when she saw him - he was her last hope - she began to weep still more. And no wonder, when her deeply beloved father was dying. The Hierarch immediately got ready and set off with her for the dying man, whom he found already in his death throes. And the Hierarch began to pray. He prayed long and fervently. Then he gave the dying man the Holy Mysteries and, leaving the rest to the will of God, departed. Immediately the illness reached crisis-point, the sick man began to improve quite rapidly and soon recovered.
In the village of Belizanets, the whole family of the churchwarden Basil P., a spiritual son of the Hierarch, fell ill with typhus. The illness dragged on, sometimes there was an improvement, sometimes a deterioration, but no final recovery. The Hierarch, who was at that time, in Vichuga, was informed of this.
It was a nasty autumn day, rain was falling, and night was approaching when the Hierarch left the town. His journey through the rain, in the dark, along the muddy road was long and difficult. Only late at night did the Bishop reach the house of the warden. He confessed the adults, gave Communion to everyone, and went on. A few days after his departure the family had recovered.
Like many true God-pleasers, the Hierarch had the gift of clairvoyance. Once he was asked to ordain a man to the priesthood. "Let’s wait a little," replied Vladyka. The man turned out to be ill and soon went mad.
Another time a woman came to him and asked him to bless her to go on a journey. "No," replied the Hierarch, "you must now receive Holy Unction and receive Communion." During Holy Unction she began to lose the use of her tongue, and soon died.
One woman asked Vladyka to bless her to eat once a day during Great Lent. "No, I don't bless you to do this, eat twice a day, otherwise you won’t make it to Pascha."It turned out that at the beginning of Great Lent both her daughters-in-law fell ill - and their recoveries were short-lived - and she had to look after not only the sick women, but also their children and their livestock. She hardly had the strength to manage.
The Hierarch did not serve long in his see, one year and eight months in all, and on May 10, 1923 he was arrested in Kineshma and exiled to Ust-Kol in Zyryansk region, Komi SSR, where there were four Bishops and two Metropolitans at that time. One of them, Metropolitan Cyril of Kazan, gave Bishop Basil his hierarchical vestments. He carefully looked after them, and before his death gave the blessing for them to be cut up and distributed to his spiritual children as sacred objects.
Six Hierarchs assembled with some exiled Priests who had come for the service in a small hut in the taiga. That was how the Church was adorned and strengthened. Angels descended from the heavens to participate in the hierarchical service. After the service a Hierarch gave a sermon. By common consent, the Hierarch Basil of Kineshma was inferior only to Metropolitan Cyril of Kazan in the grace-filled strength and depth of his sermons. Soon Vladyka Basil’s cell-attendant came voluntarily to share with him the bitterness of exile.
On May 19, 1925, his term of exile came to end and he returned to Kineshma. His spiritual children began to come to him, gathering together in small groups in the Ascension Church. Here he confessed them after the evening service. The confessions lasted well into the night - many unresolved questions had accumulated, and everyone wanted to confess all his sins, down to the smallest. The Hierarch did not want to hurry them, wishing to give place to the action of God and His grace.
The Hierarch did not change his routines, whether in regard to services, or to preaching, or to anything else. And the Church began to grow stronger.
One of Vladyka’s spiritual children was Victor Alexandrovich Rayevsky, who was born on February 20, 1902. In 1905 his parents moved to St. Petersburg; Victor’s father, Alexander Dmitrievich, was a painter and earned his living giving lessons in painting. Between the father and the mother, Xenia Andreyevna, a quarrel took place, and she went to Kineshma taking her daughter with her, while the son remained with his father. The father was a deeply religious man, and the son was brought up in a religious spirit.
The First World War began, and Alexander Rayevsky was called up into the army. At that time Victor was studying in a modern school in Gatchina. In 1918 news from his father stopped coming. Victor moved to his mother in Kineshma and continued his education in the sixth class of the modern school. In 1918 the authorities everywhere removed the study of the Law of God in educational institutions, and as a sign of protest the youth left school and went to work in a mill. When there arose disturbances among the workers he made a speech in front of them. For this he was arrested and sentenced to three months in prison.
At this time the future Hieroconfessor, Bishop Basil of Kineshma was shining like a star from the heights of his cathedra. Victor listened to him with trembling, feeling the fire of the love of Christ burning ever more brightly in his heart. And it became ever more clear to the youth that the career that his relatives proposed to him - that of a secular painter - would be chains and captivity for his soul.
Victor went to Bishop Basil and asked his blessing to become a fool for Christ. Vladyka blessed him to begin with the feat of silence. And so, abandoning all, Victor settled in the St. Macarius women’s Monastery in the village of Reshma, which was on the banks of the Volga about 30 km from Kineshma. Here, muzzling his feelings and his rebellious tongue, he silently worked as a groom for two years.
But no ascetic feat undertaken for Christ’s sake is left without attacks from the enemy of mankind. And the devil chose to attack him through the person closest to him, his mother. On learning that her son had gone to a monastery and had taken upon himself the feat of silence and foolishness for Christ, she was very angry. She accused Bishop Basil, and demanded that he force Victor to return home.
Bishop Basil tried for a long time to dissuade her, but when she wouldn’t listen he finally said to her firmly: “He himself has chosen this path, and this is the will of God for him.”
Furious, the mother went to the St. Macarius’ Monastery. On getting out of her carriage, she did not want to enter - the very sight of the monastery and monastic clothing disturbed her too much. And when Blessed Victor came out to see her she was still more angry. She tried to persuade him to stop playing the fool, return home and take up the career of a painter. Victor loved his mother, but he loved God more, so he said: “If I follow this path to the end, then not only you, but the whole of our family will be in paradise. There things are eternal, here - fleeting.”
Xenia Andreyevna again tried to persuade her son to return home, but he was silent. Angrily she parted from him and left. Victor remained to finish his course. He lived in a tiny room that he shared with the sheep, sleeping on the floor. There was no door onto the street, and to prevent the sheep from wandering he blocked the passage in with logs. The entrance was so low that the priests who came to see Victor would say:
“The way to you is cramped.”
“To the Kingdom of the Heavens the entrance is still more cramped,” the Blessed one would reply.
If people came to him trying to look attractive and well dressed out of vainglory, he would go round thickly covering his face and hands with soot. And in both summer and winter he went barefoot. Once during the all-night vigil on Saturday night one of the Monastery novices summoned her village friends to come and have a look at the Blessed one. They came, and saw Victor cutting wood. They stopped not far away and looked, instead of going to the Church to pray. The Blessed one did not like this. He picked up a hatchet and rushed at the girls. They rushed away from him into the Church.
Soon the gift of clairvoyance began to manifest itself in the Blessed one. Once Alexandra Karacheva brought him some milk and eggs, without saying from whom she had received them - she said she had been told to give them to him. The Blessed one gave the name of the man who had given them to her, adding that he was a great blasphemer.
On great feasts, when the clergy went round the blessed one’s cell in a cross procession, the Blessed one would walk with them and publicly denounced the impure life of several inattentive nuns. And sometimes, without saying anything, he would take some soot and smear the bed of some nun and cover her cell with it. It was as if to say: there is dirt in your cell or your conscience is impure.
Sometimes when the nuns were in Church he would go round their cells and if he found a feather pillow or a feather-bed, he would immediately tear it up and plunge the feathers in a barrel of water that stood next to every cell. Sometimes he would leave a note: be like me.
If he noticed that one of the nuns had put on a ring or ear-rings, he would take them away and given them to the poor. Thus once a poor peasant came to the monastery. He was intending to give his daughter away in marriage, but he had no rings or anything else to give her as a dowry. Someone advised him to go to Blessed Victor.
“Well, which ones do you like?” asked the Blessed one, laying out various adornments in front of him.
The peasant chose what he needed, and Blessed Victor began to wrap it up. Then the peasant asked:
“How much will that cost?”
“Five ‘Save, O Lord’s, three big ones and two small ones,” replied the Blessed one.
Once the Blessed one put on a clamp and went with it into the Church during services. Then he set about cleaning the Church with a broom, saying: “Get out of here, unclean one.”
Not long before the closure of the monastery he began swearing, using the most vulgar words. He went around the monastery swearing. Or one of the nuns would ask him about something, and he would swear instead of replying. They began to be upset by this, and complained to Bishop Basil. He arrived at the monastery to investigate the matter. For a long time he talked alone with the Blessed one, who told him in detail about the future fate of the monastery. But he asked him not to reveal this to the nuns. The Hierarch could only marvel at the Blessed one’s purity of heart and the lack of understanding of some of the nuns.
The nuns’ request to bring the Blessed one to reason brought its own reply - the monastery was soon closed. That happened in 1927. Now people embittered by atheism wandered round the monastery and its lands with curses and swear-words on their lips.
In October, 1928 Blessed Victor was arrested. Bishop Basil was arrested at the same time. And the Lord gave the Blessed one the spiritual joy of being in the same cell with his spiritual father and Hierarch. The Bishop fell seriously ill in prison, and the Blessed one looked after him, trying to relieve his pain. During interrogations the Blessed one behaved courageously, and often rebuked the persecutors. When they asked him where he lived he replied:
“In Yurevtsa, in Kineshma, in Reshma. I don’t want to say where else I was or whom I knew because if I said it I would be betraying my near ones.”
When they asked him about Bishop Basil, Blessed Victor replied:
“Since I got to know Bishop Basil I have become deeper and stronger in faith. As regards my being called to account, I will say only one thing - Soviet power persecutes religion, and you have seized me because of this, just as you seized, for example, Bishop Basil. Your only work is to choose spies and follow after me. You have become very clever. What have you turned Holy Russia into? Into a kind of mob. Everything is coming to an end. Here your authority rules, but at the Terrible Judgement you will answer for everything before God. With you only a small group ruling the people lives well, while the all the people starve. Everything that Soviet power preaches is absurd. Lenin was half-mad. That’s how I look at Soviet power, but although that’s how I look at it, I have not and do not conduct any activity aimed at the overthrow of the authorities...”
The Blessed one refused to sign the protocols, saying that he was not a co-worker of Soviet power, and all its activity was aimed against religion. He was sentenced to three years exile in Siberia. After his return from exile, he settled in Kineshma, whence he often went to Reshma. The monastery had been destroyed, the nuns ejected, Abbess Dosithea and several nuns had settled in a village not far from Kineshma, where they lived a life of quiet prayer, doing work with their hands. There the Abbess died and was buried in the cemetery of the village of Mavrino.
In Reshma the Blessed one stayed in the house of the pious widow, Maria Vasilyevna Kruglovaya (born April 7, 1877 in Reshma). At the same time and in the same village there lived the girl Anna Konstantinovna Korygina (born 9 December, 1905 in Reshma). Since childhood she had wanted to go to a monastery, but the monasteries began to close in the 1920s, and so she, having given away her property, settled on the edge of a ravine in a tiny hut. Maria quarrelled with Anna, but the Blessed one persuaded her to be reconciled, saying:
“You bake some biscuits, go to Anna and be reconciled. Don’t rise up against her. You will soon have to walk along the same road with her, sharing the same bread.”
On October 2, 1927 Anna and Maria were arrested for preaching Christianity. They were imprisoned in one room in Ivanovo, and on October 8 were sentenced and shot.
In 1937 Blessed Victor was arrested and died in prison.
On January 7, 1926, the authorities, worried by the spiritual growth and strengthening of the Church, demanded that Bishop Basil leave the town. Alexander Pavlovich suggested that they go to his homeland, the village of Polka (according to another source, Anapol, Kostroma province), and there wait till the difficult times were over. Vladyka agreed. Before leaving for the village he went to Vetluga and visited his sister there.
During the two weeks of the Hierarch’s stay with his sister, Alexander Pavlovich built a small house like the one he had lived in Kineshma. There an altar was constructed on the Hierarch’s arrival, and daily services were then celebrated in it according to the typicon. He lived there as an exile, devoting the whole of his time to prayer. He served together with Alexander Pavlovich, no outsider being present since there was no Orthodox Church in the vicinity.
Here Vladyka Basil lived in almost complete isolation for about half a year. Then he went to Sarov - to pray for the last time at the Relics of St. Seraphim. From Sarov he returned by the beginning of the Apostles’ Fast to Kineshma and imme-diately began to serve in the Ascension Church.
He had served several months in all in his See when, in 1926, he was transferred to the See of Vyazniki, a Vicariate of the Vladimir Diocese, as temporary adminstrator. (According to one source, in 1926 he was arrested and exiled to the village of Anapol in Kostroma province.) He served half a year in Vyazniki, until 1927, when he was expelled to Kineshma. The sermons and spiritual steadfastness of the Hierarch began to attract many people to the Church. The authorities were frightened by the rejuvenation of Church life that was taking place in front of their eyes and demanded that the Hierarch leave the town.
The Hierarch left for Kineshma and served there for four months, after which the order came from the authorities for him to leave the town. In June, 1927, he was expelled to Kostroma, where he lived until August, 1928 before again returning to his See in Kineshma. According to one source he signed the decisions of the so-called “Nomadic Council” of the Catacomb Church, which took place between March and August, 1928.
But now he served for an even shorter time there: after only a month, in September, 1928, he was arrested in connection with the affair of the True Orthodox Church. If until that time it had been difficult to find a "lawful" way of sentencing the Hierarch to prison, now the publication of the Declaration of Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky) gave the authorities ample excuse for persecuting the Orthodox. Bishops, Priests and laymen were now arrested in their thousands and sent to prison, where hunger, cold, forced labour and death awaited them.
The Hierarch rejected the Declaration, was sent to prison in Ivanovo-Boznesenk, and in February or March, 1929 was finally condemned to three years’ exile in the village of Malorechka, Urals district. According to Nicholas Balashov, in 1931 he was again given the choice: accept the Declaration or go to prison. He refused, and was subjected to tortures.
In 1931, in a brochure called “Ryasniki” and published by the local section of the militant atheists in Ivanovo, the following was written about Bishop Basil’s followers: "Among the Old Tikhonites of our region there is a branch of the so-called Basilites. They received this name after the name of the founder of this group, Bishop Basil (Preobrazhensky). We already know that this ryasnik was in the group of Ryashintsev. The Basilite programme differs in no way from the programme of the Old Tikhonites, but this group is distinguished by its activism. In those places where the Priests belong to the Sergianists, the Basilites leave the membership of the religious communities, cease to go to the Church and organize house prayer-centres, giving as the reason for their departure the fact that the Priests have changed their stripes and forgotten the true God. «Once I went into the Church,» says the profiteer Mazina, leader of the group, «and I felt a pang in my heart, my head went dim and a voice told me to leave and pray at home' (village of Semenovskoye, Kineshma district)."
By order of the authorities, the Hierarch settled in a small taiga hamlet 25 km from the district town of Taborovo, Sverdlovsk province. Here, too, Alexander Pavlovich shared all the difficulties of exile with the Hierarch. The two of them set up an altar in the little house, the Hierarch consecrated it, and they celebrated Divine services there every day. Prayer, Divine services and heavy work in the woods - all this was like the strictest form of Skete life. Life was poor, and Alexander Pavlovich earned some extra by making wooden wash-tubs and catching fish.
They conversed little with each other. Sometimes they had a kind of break for an hour, and they sat amidst the woods in the fading twilight. Fish splashed in the dark waters of a little river. A bonfire burned, lighting up the concentrated face of the Hierarch, whose soul was totally immersed in prayer. The gloom of the woods wrapped them round every more closely, and it was then that Alexander Pavlovich wanted to strike up a conversation with the Hierarch, to ask him something, but on looking at Vladyka, he decided not to trouble him.
Three years passed in isolation, prayer and work, and the fourth was already coming to an end. The Hierarch’s thoughts began to incline towards the idea of staying forever there, where they had acquired a desert. But it turned out that it was impossible to choose exile voluntarily. He only decided to ask the local authorities for permission to stay when they themselves had begun to demand his departure.
"Give us permission to stay," he asked.
"No, you can't stay here. Leave. You can go to any town except the forbidden ones."
"I must think about it," said the Hierarch and went out into the street where his cell-attendant was waiting for him:
"Well, Alexander Pavlovich, where shall we go?"
"I'm not the one who gives the orders, holy Vladyka, you choose."
The Hierarch pondered. But where, where were they to go? What place of exile should he choose? Desolate Sarov... Diveyevo... Optina desert. Alexander Pavlovich often used to tell the Hierarch about his stay in Optina, and he loved listening to stories about the monastery so beloved by the Russian people. He loved to hear about the obediences Alexander Pavlovich had to labour in.
"Tell me, where was the baker Photius from - the one you helped in Optina?"
"From Orel."
"Well that’s fine then – let’s go to Photius’ homeland”.
They lived for in Orel from September, 1932 to March 31, 1933, when they were summoned by the NKVD, who demanded that they leave the town.
"Where shall we go?" asked the Hierarch.
"Go to Kineshma."
For the last time the Hierarch entered his native Diocese, where he had sown so many good seeds. Although physically separated from his flock, he had never been separated from it spiritually, and by prior agreement they even prayed at the same time.
It was the last time that Vladyka Basil beheld his native town, because immediately after his arrival he and his cell-attendant were thrown into prison.
This time it was the atheists’ intention to kill them. But the Lord judged otherwise. The schoolchildren who had been called to the trial to witness against Vladyka Basil and his cell-mate refused to give evidence, saying that they did not know the men in the dock and were seeing them for the first time. After the failure of the prosecution, the judged sentenced the Hierarch Basil and his cell-attendant to five years in a hard labour camp, for belonging to a branch of the True Orthodox Church. This was in July, 1933. He served his term not far from the town of Rybinsk, in a camp whose inmates worked on the construction of a canal. Alexander Pavlovich was exiled to the vicinity of Murmansk.
The third and cruellest persecution against the Church had begun. The atheists planned that it would end by crushing and annihilating Orthodoxy. Bishops, Priests and lay confessors of Holy Orthodoxy were shot. Vladyka Basil was also called to suffer torments. The Hierarch refused to sign the Declaration of Metropolitan Sergius and recognize it as Orthodox. At that the enraged torturers set about beating him with the buckles of their soldier’s belts. But they could not shake his resolute, pure and Orthodox confession of Christ, which could not be deflected by any worldly enticement.
Some Priests who were summoned for interrogation after him were told by the torturers: "That Preobrazhensky is not like you, he’s straight, he’s not for turning, while you are for us to our face and against us behind our backs."
In January, 1938, Vladyka Basil settled in Rybinsk, and then, after a short period, he moved to the village of Kotovo, near Uglich, where he had the intention of ending his days. He served in the Church in Kotovo and in a secretly constructed house church.
In 1943 the Sergianist Metropolitan of Yaroslavl offered him a See."I don’t recognize Sergius as Orthodox," wrote Basil to him in reply. "And I ask you not to offer me any other sees, because I am old and too worn out by exiles." The Metro-politan promised.
But the very thought that a Hierarch who was faithful to God and His Holy Church was still at liberty terrified the torturers, and on November 5, 1943, three months after this correspondence, Vladyka Basil was again arrested, in Kotovo on November 5, 1943. From November 7, 1943 to January, 1944 he was in the inner prison of the NKVD in Yaroslavl, and then from January 26 to July, 1944 - in the inner prison of the NKVD in Moscow. From July 13, 1944 he was in the Butyrki prison, and in the same month, because of his unbending confession of Orthodoxy, he was sentenced to five years’ exile in the village of Birilyussi, in Krasnoyarsk region.
The little Siberian village was in a remote area surrounded by boundless woods and a network of rivers. The young people had already been deeply corrupted by atheism and made cruel by the war. Even young children became savage in the surrounding cruelty. For a long time the Bishop was not able to find a suitable flat for himself, and finally he settled in the house of a widow who had three young children. When he was praying, they used to gather little balls of horse manure and throw them at him, saying: "There you are, granddad, eat."
Soon the Lord gave him some alleviation from his sufferings: some believing women found another flat for him. The landlady was single, and an exiled nun was living with her at the time.
The Hierarch’s ascetic labours and years of imprisonment and exile had under-mined his health, and he began to fall seriously ill. In Birilyussi he had a minor paralytic fit which made it difficult for him to walk and necessitated nursing.
The war was coming to an end, and the authorities were establishing a concordat with the Church based on a compromise whereby from the Church was demanded everything while the authorities promised in exchange not to kill Bishops and Priests or subject them to imprisonment, and to open a certain number of Churches and Seminaries. Once again the authorities tried to compel Vladyka Basil to recognize Sergius’ Synod.
"You know why you’re in exile. Recognize the Synod and we will immediately free you and take you by air to Moscow, where you will be treated and will be able to live."
The Hierarch refused.
"Then stay where you are, we have no right to let you go."
Seeing that the Bishop was seriously ill, the believing women asked the local Bishop to send a Priest with the Holy Gifts. This was done. But Vladyka refused to receive Communion from the Sergianist Priest.
At Pascha, 1945, he wrote to one of his spiritual daughters, congratulating her on the feast and saying:
"My child! Once more I congratulate you on the feast. Christ is risen indeed!.. I met Pascha very well. The Lord has blessed me with all good things - all your wishes were fulfilled. Glory to the Creator for His mercies and kindnesses…
My child! Do not be upset, everything is in the will of God, I have already reached the term of human life, 70 years, and from now on life has little of interest to offer me. Of one thing I am certain, that I will not last five years in Birilyussi. I am not frightened of death. I would like to die surrounded by children and relatives, so that I can talk with and bless them all. Or at least have one person who is close to me by my side, someone to whom I can entrust my will and instructions with regard to my burial.
Alas! There is not one such person. Complete isolation is a heavy burden. I am being treated, I am taking iodine, but I received the most precious medicine on Great Thursday. I thank the Maker for all these joys and consolation. I am choking with a cough, it's difficult to breathe, I lie down most of the time. But I shouldn't lie down too much. Still, complete immobility helps my breathing, I can inhale with my whole chest.
Farewell, my child! Don't be downcast that I'm too tired to go on writing. Be healthy. Entrust yourself entirely to the will of God. Bow your head and say: Thy will be done. Pray. I believe in the prayers of children, they often help me. You will find consolation in prayer. I wish you good health and a long and happy life.
Bishop Basil of Kineshma, who sincerely loves you.
Send my greetings and best wishes to the children. I ask forgiveness of all and bow to the earth."
At the same time, in spring, 1945, he wrote to Alexander Pavlovich, inviting him to come. Alexander Pavlovich replied that he would come when the haymaking was over. But the Hierarch knew that he would not live to the autumn. However, Alexander Pavlovich did not hasten to come, and when he did arrive the Hierarch was already dead.
On July 29 or 31, 1945 (old style) Basil of Kineshma asked the nun who was living with his landlady to read the canon for the departing of the soul. Having read the Canon, she began to read the final prayer. The Hierarch listened attentively, and when the prayer was over said "Amen" in a firm voice and quietly passed away. According to other sources, he died on July 27 or 28, or August 1 or 11 o 18, 1947.
When the news of his death came to his spiritual children, by common agreement of those close to him the funeral service was performed in another place by the Hierarch’s spiritual son, Hieromonk Benedict of Lukhsky Monastery, who was living in hiding at that time near Kineshma.
Some sermons have been preserved from Basil of Kineshma’s writings, as well as most of his "Conversations on the Gospel according to Mark", in which one can clearly hear the voice of the great preacher converting the hearts of thousands of people to Christ.
In July, 1993 the Holy Relics of St. Basil of Kineshma were translated to the women’s Monastery of the Entrance of the Mother of God into the Temple in Ivanovo.

Sources:
Samizdat MS;

Russkie Pravoslavnye Ierarkhi, Paris: YMCA Press, 1986, p. 22;

Nicholas Balashov, "Yeshcho raz o 'deklaratsii' i o 'solidarnosti' Solovchan", Vestnik Russkogo Khristianskogo Dvizheniya, 157, 1989-III, p. 201;

M.E. Gubonin, Akty Svyateishago Patriarkha Tikhona, Moscow: St. Tikhon's Theological Institute, 1994, p. 968;

Lev Regelson, Tragediya Russkoj Tserkvi, 1917-1945, Moscow: Krutitskoye patriarsheye podvorye, 1996, pp. 535, 606;

Hieromonk Damascene (Orlovsky), Blagovest, N 1, 17, 1992;

Hieromonk Damascene (Orlovsky), Mucheniki, Ispovedniki i Podvizhniki Blagochestiya Russkoj Pravoslavnoj Tserkvi XX Stoletia, Tver, 1996, vol. II, pp. 21-29;

Michael Khlebnikov, "Pravda o Svyatitelye Vasilii Kineshemskom", Pravoslavnaya Rus', N 1 (1574), January 1/14, 1997, pp. 13-14;

Bishop Ambrose (von Sievers), “Katakombnaya Tserkov’: Kochuyushchij Sobor 1928 g.”, Russkoye Pravoslaviye, N 3 (7), 1997, p. 39;

“Episkopat Istinno-Pravoslavnoj Tserkvi 1922-1997gg.”, Russkoye Pravoslaviye, N 4 (8), 1997, pp. 12-13;

Za Khrista Postradavshiye, Moscow: St. Tikhon’s Theological Institute, 1997, pp. 224-225;

I.I. Osipova, “Skvoz’ Ogn’ Muchenij i Vody Slyoz…”, Moscow: Serebryanniye Niti, 1998, pp. 272-273.

ST. OSWALD KING OF NORTHUMBRIA, BRITAIN (+ 642)

The Man who reintroduced Christianity to the North

By Vladimir Moss

In the Kingdom of Northumbria, St. Oswald was a King worthy of emulation by modern monarchs. The shrines of St. Oswald were many, a natural sequence to the brutality of his conqueror, King Penda of Mercia, who mutilated the body of his victim on the battlefield (Heavenfield, 5th August AD 642).
The arms and head of the dead King were impaled on stakes until St. Oswald’s successor, King Oswiu, removed them to various localities. His head was buried at Lindisfarne and placed within the coffin of St. Cuthbert, in which it remains to this day, in the Cathedral at Durham. In the 14th c. Durham also claimed to have a rib enclosed in a silver gilt image of Oswald. Further associated Relics there included his banner, ivory horn, ivory sceptre and parts of his mail-shirt and the cross which he erected before his death.
The arms of St. Oswald were enshrined in silver at the Northumbrian Royal Seat of Bamburgh, traditionally in the Church of St. Oswald. This no longer exists, bur appears to have stood on the site of the present Castle Chapel. This Chapel along with the parish Church, was later given to Nostell Priory in West Yorkshire and, in the 13th c., the monks there claimed hold a substantial portion of Oswald’s body, presumably one of the arms. The second, right and incorrupted, arm, blessed by St. Aidan, had been stolen from Bamburgh by the monks of Peterborough Abbey (now the Cathedral). Here it was preserved as one of the Monastery’s most prized possessions, until lost or destroyed at the Reformation. St. Paul’s Cathedral in London also claimed an arm of St. Oswald, though this may have been St. Oswald of Worcester.
St. Oswald’s body, which had originally been buried on the field of battle, was dug up by his neice, Queen Osthryth of Mercia, and translated to Bardney Abbey in Lincolnshire some time in the 680s or 90s. The story goes that the Mercian monks were not over-keen to welcome an old enemy who had imposed his rule on them not so many years before. The bones arrived at their gates on a cart, but they refused them entry until persuaded by an unquestionable miracle. Having been accepted, the Relics were washed and the water poured away into a corner of the sacristy. They were finally enshrined in a fine feretory and covered with the King's gold and purple standard. Not only this shrine, but also the dust from the dust from the floor of the sacristy, became the source of many miracles and a popular destination for pilgrims. The feretory became covered in gold and silver and was bejewelled by King Offa of Mercia.
Thus the Bardney monks learnt to become quite attached to their profitable acquisition; and, in the days of Norse piracy, were obliged to resort to all sorts of expedients for the preservation of such a treasure. The feretory was even saved from marauding Danes by Prior Aethelwold secreting it in the straw of his bed. It was because of such attacks that, in AD 909, St. Oswald's remains were again translated by Queen Aelflaed of Mercia (daughter and ally of King Alfred the Great), to St. Peter's Priory in Gloucester, thenceforth known as St. Oswald's, where his shrine was a conspicuous object of veneration until the 16th c.
Three bones were said to have remained at Bardney and there were others claimed by monasteries across the country: at Bath, Glastonbury, Reading, St. Albans, Christchurch (Hants), Tynemouth and York. His cult was also popular abroad. St. Winnoc's monastery in Bergues (Flanders) claimed to have been given St. Oswald's body by King Harold Harefoot. This was burnt by protestants in 1558. St. Willibrord also recorded as having taken a number of the King's relics to Frisia and his foundation of Epternach (Luxemburg) once possessed a supposed head of St. Oswald.
In the 11th c., Lady Judith, widow of Earl Tostig of Northumbria, also appears to taken some Oswaldian relics to the Continent. There are further rival head shrines, to those at Durham and Epternach: at Schaffhausen & Zug in Switzerland, Uhtrect (Netherlands) and Hildesheim (Germany). The magnificent shrine from the latter town's Cathedral can now be seen in the Dom und Diozesanmuseum.

HIEROMARTYR SERAPHIM
AND BLESSED DUNIUSHKA OF USSURUISK, RUSSIA (+ 1918)

By Vladimir Moss

Blessed Duniushka appeared among us soon after the end of the Russo- Japanese War. Whence she came, none knew. She would usually come to our town in the summertime, departing with the arrival of cold weather. Whither she went, none knew. I do not recall Duniushka’s presence in my early childhood, but I would chance to meet her in our house later on, and sometimes to be present at her conversations with my elders. She was respected in the town – and somewhat feared. The peasant-women often turned to her for advice on household and family matters; they would confide their women’s woes to her, attending to her words and trusting her. But such popularity weighed heavily on Duniushka, although she realized that this was the way she had to travel to her targeted goal in life; then the cross which she had consciously taken upon herself would not appear to be beyond her strength to bear. She never gave precise replies to the questions asked of her. Her arguments could be understood in a twofold manner; and there were even times when she would reply sharply to some questions. "How’s that, my dear? I’m no prophet – how can I know? " And then she would add, quietly: "It will be as you say, my dove, if you but pray properly for it." To another question, she responded with an unclear reply, and the woman felt that Duniushka was leaving something unsaid. "Well, what is one to do?" she would usually reply." Maybe it won’t be as you say; be patient – it means that you haven’t yet merited it. The Lord knows, after all, what will be best for you. Don’t try to find out – I’ll say a prayer," she would add, with a sigh.
Sometimes there would be moments when she would be inspired to "speak." Then she would become transformed, in full view of everyone: she would appear to grow taller; her cheeks would acquire a rosy hue; her voice would sound loud and self-assured; her eyes would gleam unnaturally, illumining her entire face. At such times, she would be listened to with bated breath.... At first she would speak with a restrained voice, with only the expression on her face changing; gradually, she would grow ecstatic and her voice would grow stronger, as she no longer restrained it – and quickly, very quickly, as though afraid that she might be stopped, she would continue hastily: " Blood! Blood! People will end their lives in martyrdom!… The Holy will be desecrated!… Brother will rise up against brother! The Nation will lose her Gosudar’ [Sovereign]!… Oy!" would burst forth from her lips, with some sort of hopeless moan.… But what she said was not comprehensible to anyone at the time…
I recall Duniushka as already being an old woman: skinny, of tiny stature, – she appeared very cheerful and lively. Her face was unwrinkled, retaining its sweet appearance. Her eyes, in particular, stood out; with her gaze, she would pierce anyone with whom she was speaking, and rarely was that person able to bear it. She was always cleanly attired, in a long, dark skirt and a light-colored blouse, over which she wore a small, dark kurmushka [jacket]. The white scarf on her head was always neatly tied at her chin. During the summer, she would wear lapotochki [small bast-sandals]; in the winter, valenki [felt boots] and a poorly-fitting shuba [fur coat]. She always exuded a scent of rose-oil or incense, and wherever she had been present, the aroma would remain long after she had left. I would ask my father why Duniushka gave off such an aroma – and my father would explain it to me thus:
"Duniushka leads a different kind of life; she is a person given to strict fasting and prayer – she eats no meat or fish; on the days [that the Church has] appointed [for fasting], she nourishes herself with milk and vegetables – mostly raw, and even then, without eating her fill. On Wednesdays and Fridays she eats nothing at all. She has no place to call her own, where she might go to rest, such as a home. During the summer, the peasants see her in the fields or in the forest, whither she goes to be alone -- apparently for prayer -- spending long periods of time upon her knees. It is much more difficult for her in the wintertime. No one knows where she spends her time during the cold winter nights. For people such as Duniushka, food and drink cease being necessities. Usually, their bodies become permeated by spiritual vibrations. As a result of refraining on the physical plane, they obtain power on the spiritual one – and, as a result of prayer and ascetic podvigs [exploits], they might well be endowed with miracle-working abilities, even during their lifetimes. Under such conditions, Duniushka cannot emit an unpleasant smell. We know of many similar cases from the Lives of the Saints."
Duniushka acted like a peasant-woman, but rumours circulated about that she had been the wife of a prominent chinovnik [government official]. Having lost her beloved husband, having early become a widow, she had chosen for herself "the way of a wanderer for the sake of Christ." She patiently bore this cross with honour to the end of her life, never departing from the appointed rules…
Before the German War of 1914, Duniushka again often repeated her prognostications of calamities which seemingly were to come upon the land. No one thought of war. After all, the Japanese War had but recently ended; the nation was recuperating from military action, life had begun to settle down into a normal routine, and then -- suddenly -- war again! Duniushka, after all, "never cast her words upon the wind!" -- "Brother will rise up against brother! They will destroy everything acquired by their ancestors…. They will sweep away religion, and -- most importantly -- there will be no master in the land!" The master in the land, of course, is the Tsar’ – God’s Anointed One! He cannot go anywhere! Duniushka ‘s predictions were incomprehensible….
Before the war started, my father was transferred to a new parish in the Cossack stanitsa [encampment] on the Chinese border. Our family took it hard, parting with the Ussuriisk Region and their native "Uspenka." There were no such beauties of nature in the new locality as those for which the Ussuriisk Region was renowned. Mother had her own problem: it was necessary to part with her beloved farm – with the cow, the horse, with the domestic fowl…. We were moving to different surroundings, and Mama took it hard…. Duniushka would often come by; she liked to have some tea from Mama’s samovar. She and Mama were both great tea-drinkers. After dinner, I was sometimes given permission to spend some time in the dining room. From childhood, I had liked to draw and copy the pictures from my favorite magazine, "NIVA." Thus, being present during Duniushka’s conversations with Mama, I would become an invisible witness of what was said….
A month before our departure, Duniushka came to say her farewells. It was the end of summer. In the dining room, the silence was broken by the samovar, releasing hissing steam. Mama poured out the just-steeped, fresh tea. It was cozy. In the front corner burned an unquenchable lampadka [a tiny votive-lamp]. I sat quietly with my pencils and with my "NIVA." And I knew that I would never again see Duniushka. Today, there was much that she promised to tell Mama…. And she said: "Don’t grieve that you’re leaving ‘Uspenka’. It will be easier to bear the world’s woes where you’re going. This trouble will come upon everyone and grind them up, as though in a meat-grinder. It won’t touch Batiushka [Reverend Father], though, and many will later envy him." (She bent over, closer to Mama, and said something to her, quietly)…. "The war will end, and its end will turn the whole country upside-down. Insurgents will appear – leaders – who will incite the people against the Tsar’.… It will be terrible!"…
Duniushka appeared pale, with faded eyes, and it was as though she did not have enough air to breathe…. "And later, they will seize upon religion. They will sweep away that which has been gathered through the ages and assiduously preserved by our ancestors. But it will be impossible for them to root it out; the roots will remain – and, after many years, they’ll give forth a most-beautiful bloom and fruit…. The Tsar’ will leave the nation, which shouldn’t be, but this has been foretold to him from Above. This is His destiny. There is no way that He can evade it." Being briefly quiet and, as it were, having gathered her thoughts, she added: "For this, He will receive a martyr’s crown on earth, for which He’ll receive, subsequently, an eternal crown, a Heavenly one…. He will be a prayerful Zastupnik [Intercessor] for the nation and the people, when the chastisement fallen upon dozens of generations for the harm done to God’s Anointed One will reach an end…. The generations to come will bear the responsibility for this act on the part of their ancestors. The disaster in the land," (she had the revolution in mind) "will disperse the people; they will be scattered to various countries, losing touch with one another. But, wherever Russians go, they will bring their culture and their religion.
At the far end of Russia, there will be an enormous earthquake. The waters will break out of the ocean, flooding the continent, and many nations will perish. Many diseases beyond understanding will appear…. The face of the earth will change…. The people will comprehend their guilt; they will come to understand how far they have departed from God and from His teachings, and then they will begin to be reborn spiritually, gradually being cleansed physically, as well. People will become vegetarians. By that time, many animals will have vanished. The horse and the dog will only be seen in pictures; and later – the cow, the goat, and the sheep will disappear forever from our planet…. People will no longer be interested in politics, and the spiritual principle of each nation will predominate…" Duniushka paused momentarily. I was left with the impression, looking at her and listening to her prophecy, – that she had grown extremely tired.
We thought that she had already finished her prophesying, but then, suddenly, with a great surge of energy, she continued: "Russia will be supreme in the world. Her name will be Holy Russia. All sects and religions will pour into Orthodoxy…. But Orthodoxy, and -- essentially speaking -- religion, will draw closer to what it was in Apostolic times. . . . In those centuries to come, there will no longer be any Tsars or Korols [Kings]. In Holy Russia a Kniaz [Prince/Duke] will reign, who will come from the nation that gave us our religion [i.e., Byzantium (See the relevant prophecies of St. Methodius of Patara]. He will be a supremely spiritual person, who will provide the opportunity for uplifting the moral fibre and the spiritual principles of the nation…
In the course of one of those centuries, Asia will bestir herself; she will try to penetrate into Europe, but her attempts will be futile. No one will ever overcome Holy Russia, and only through her will salvation come to the world…. Keep my words secret until my death. She [i.e., Death] already waits for me; she’s not beyond the hills. And you, Matushka, [Reverend Mother], will have to suffer cruelly; you will endure everything in a Christian manner; you will lose your children; but, later, fate will be kind to you – you will meet again…"
In 1918, we received a sad bit of news. On Uspienije [the Feastday of the Dormition of the Most-Holy Mother of God, in the large selo [village] of V., according to his custom, Father Serafim was celebrating the Liturgy. With shouts and curses, a group of the "local authorities" burst into the Church. They grabbed Father Serafim and, just as he was – in his riza [vestments] and his poruchi [liturgical cuffs] – they hanged him upon the Royal Doors [the central doors in the wall which separates the sanctuary of a Russian Orthodox Church from the nave]. Duniushka rushed to his defense, and was slain immediately with a ramrod.
Mama later told me that all of Duniushka’s predictions concerning our family had come to pass…. I have tried to record, in this, my diary, everything that I had once heard personally, having been present at my Mama’s meeting with Duniushka…

Excerpted from the Diary of V. Zarskaya-Altayeva.Translated into English by G. Spruksts, from the Russian text appearing in "The Russian Community Bulletin of Seattle", vol. 16, No. 161, March 1986, pp. 3 - 6. English language translation copyright © 1986, 2002 (with revisions) by The Russian Cultural Heritage Society, The St. Stefan of Perm' Guild, and the Translator.

MARTYR-KING EDMUND OF EAST ANGLIA (+ 869)
and those with him

By Vladimir Moss

St. Edmund, one of the greatest and most famous of the British Saints, lived and suffered during the 9th c., one of the most tragic and difficult moments of British history, when the pagan Danes were killing and destroying over a large part of the British Isles. The problems of the English were made worse by the fact that there was no unity among them, and instead of being united into one powerful force to repel the invaders they were divided into seven kingdoms, which were not always united even within themselves. No part of the country was more exposed to the pagan attacks than the small kingdom of East Anglia, and the old King Offa of East Anglia resolved to go on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, to pray for the forgiveness of his sins and the safety of his kingdom.
On the way, he visited his cousin Alcmund, who, on being exiled from East Anglia after the death of the Martyr-King Ethelbert (+ May 20, 793), had been entrusted with the kingdom of Old Saxony by the Emperor Charlemagne. Alcmund had married a German Princess named Siwara, and with her often besought the Lord to give him a numerous and saintly family. In answer to his prayer, an Angel appeared to him and told him to undertake a pilgrimage to the tombs of the Apostles in Rome, where God would grant his petition. During this pilgrimage, while the King was one day conversing with his hostess, a noble and pious Roman woman, she noticed on his breast a brilliant sun, whose rays, darting to all four points of the compass, threw a miraculous light on all around. Filled with the spirit of prophecy, she declared that from him would come a son whose fame, like the sun, would illumine the four quarters of the world and bring many to Christ. A few months later, after returning to North Hamburg, the capital of Old Saxony, Alcmund’s wife Siwara bore him his second son, Edmund.
Now when King Offa came to Saxony, Edmund was appointed accompany him; and the old King was immediately struck by the beauty, both physical and spiritual, of the young Prince, and by the zeal of his service. He applied to him the words of Solomon: "Hast thou seen a man swift in his work? He shall stand before kings and shall not be in obscurity" (Proverbs 22.29). Then in the presence of the whole Court he embraced him and, putting a ring on his finger, said: "My most beloved son Edmund, accept this memento of our kinship and mutual love. Remember me as one grateful for your service, for which with God's permission I hope to leave you a paternal inheritance."
Edmund’s father hastened to explain to him the significance of this ceremony: was he prepared to accept King Offa as his adoptive father in place of his natural father? On Edmund’s acceptance, Offa tearfully drew from his finger his ring - in fact, it was a coronation ring - and said: "Son Edmund, observe closely this ring, notice its design and seal. If, when I am far away, I intimate to you by this token my wish and desire, do you without delay execute my order. As the noble assembly here bears witness, I intend to regard you as my most beloved son and heir."
Then Offa continued on his pilgrimage. Having arrived in the Holy Land and venerated the Holy Places, he set out on his return journey via Constantinople. But as he was sailing through the Hellespont, he fell ill; so, disembarking at the Monastery of St. George, he received the Holy Mysteries and prepared for death. His last act was to entrust his kingdom of East Anglia to Edmund, ordering his nobles to take his ring to Saxony as a token of his will. Then he reposed in peace and was buried in St. Geo-rge's Bay on the Hellespont, in the year 854.
And so, in his 14th year, St. Edmund set sail with a retinue of nobles for the promised kingdom, which he had never seen before. They landed at what is now called St. Edmund’s Head, near Hunstanton in Norfolk. Disembarking in a dry river-bed, the King prostrated on the ground and prayed to God to bless his coming and make it profitable for the land and its people. As the Saint rose and mounted his horse, twelve springs of sweet, clear water gushed out of the earth, which worked many miracles of healing for the sick. From that hour the soil of that region, which before had been sandy and barren, bore the richest crops in all Eastern England.
The Saint then proceeded to Attleborough, Offa’s former capital, and staked his claim to the Throne. On November 5, 855, he was in Winchester, attending a Council convened by King Ethelwulf of Wessex (Southern England), to provide a charter of immunities for the English Church. Then he returned to Attleborough, where on Christmas Day he was proclaimed sovereign of the people of Norfolk (the northern half of East Anglia), by Hunbert, Bishop of Elmham.
For the next year the King stayed quietly in Norfolk, learning the Psalms of David under the guidance of Bishop Hunbert. Eventually the people of Suffolk (the southern half of East Anglia), decided to accept him as their King, and on Christmas Day, 856 he was anointed and crowned King of the whole of East Anglia. The Church in Bures, Suffolk, where the coronation took place, survives to the present day.
St. Edmund was fair-haired, tall, well-built, with a natural majesty of bearing. By the piety and chastity of his life he won the respect of all the Christians. He was a defender of the Church, a protector of orphans and widows, and a supporter of the poor. No man sought for justice from him and failed to get redress, and no innocent pleaded in vain for mercy. It is said that under his strong and just rule a boy could drive a mule from Lynn to Sudbury, or from Thetford to Yarmouth, and no one would dare to molest him.
But in 865 the pagan Danes, led by the three brothers Hinguar, Healfdene and Hubba, again invaded England, bent on revenge for the death of their father Ragnar Lodbrog, at the hands of the English King Alle of Northumbria. Hinguar carried with him the famous standard of the Raven, which had been woven by the three daughters of Lodbrog for their three brothers. Magical spells had been cast during the weaving, so that when the bird flapped its wings in the wind, it was believed to betoken victory, while when it hung motionless, it betokened defeat. St. Edmund went out to meet the Danes under another banner, which showed Adam and Eve eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and above them the Lamb of God slain to wash away their sins.
Edmund defeated the enemy in several skirmishes, showing subtlety no less than valour. Thus he was once surprised by the enemy within one of his camps with no avenue of escape. The siege was so long that both besiegers and besieged began to suffer from famine. But Edmund determined that the enemy should not learn about his men’s suffering, which might persuade them to disband their own troops. So he ordered a fatted bull which had been fed with good wheat to be set loose outside the enclosure. The Danes seized it and killed it. And when they opened its stomach and found fresh wheat inside, they concluded that the English had no lack of provisions. So they abandoned the siege and split up into foraging parties. Edmund then followed them stealthily, and killed large numbers of them.
On another occasion Edmund and his men were besieged inside the almost impregnable fortress of Framingham. However, Hinguar captured an old and decrepit man by the name of Sathonius, whom the Saint had been feeding and accommodating at his own expense in the castle. By means of a bribe, the old man was induced to betray to Hinguar a weak spot in the castle walls, which he himself had helped to build in his youth. Advancing on the castle at this point, Hinguar caught the English by surprise. Edmund jumped onto his swiftest charger and galloped out through the open gates. Some of the Danes saw him, but did not suspect who he was and galloped after him, hoping to get some information about the King. But Edmund, like St. Athanasius the Great on a similar occasion, turned to them and said: "Go back as fast as you can, for, when I was in the castle, the King whom you seek was there also." Turning back, they discovered that the King had fooled them. Then St. Edmund gathered his forces and fell upon the baffled Danes as they were retreating.
The Danes now made peace with Edmund and headed north to Northumbria (North-Eastern England), arriving in York on November 1, 866. The English Kings Osbert and Alle, who had been fighting each other up to that moment, now joined forces and marched on York, and after destroying the city walls they entered the city on March 21, 867. However, the resultant battle within the city was disastrous for the English: both kings and eight of the leading noblemen were killed. The Danes then ravaged the whole of Northumbria as far as the River Tyne before installing an Englishman named Egbert as puppet-King of the region under their power.
This was only "the beginning of sorrows" for the English. At the end of the year the Danish "Great Army" moved south into Mercia (Central England) and took the city of Nottingham. In answer to King Burhred of Mercia’s appeal for help, King Ethelred of Wessex, his younger brother Alfred (the future King of England) and St. Edmund came to meet him outside the walls of Nottingham. However, the Danes avoided a battle with the English Kings outside Nottingham, so peace terms were concluded. In exchange for giving up Nottingham, the Great Army was allowed to retreat back into Northumbria.
Now began a horrific despoliation of the Christian inheritance of the whole of Eastern England. In the north, St. Ebba’s Monastery at Coldingham was burned down with the nuns inside after they had all, with their Abbess Ebba giving them the lead, cut off their noses and upper lips to deter the attackers from raping them. Tynemouth, Wearmouth, Jarrow, Whitby and other famous monasteries were destroyed; and in Eastern Mercia Bardney and Crowland were gutted.
When the news of the Great Army’s approach reached Abbot Theodore of Crowland, he ordered all the able-bodied men to leave with the Holy Relics and the Monastery’s jewels and charters, while he buried the altar-stone and gold and silver plate in a wall of the Church. However, before leaving they decided to celebrate the Divine Liturgy. As the flames of nearby Kesteven lit up the sky, Abbot Theodore calmly celebrated with the assistance of the Priests Askega and Lethwin, Deacon Alfget, Subdeacon Sabinus and the Monks Grimkell, Agamund, Hereberht, Ecgdred and Ulric, together with 70 others. Hardly had they finished when the Danish leader Oscytel burst in and beheaded the Abbot at the altar. Then they tortured the elder monks, trying to get them to disclose where they had hidden the Monastery’s treasures. But none of them cooperated, so they were all killed with the exception of a ten-year-old novice called Turgar. The Danes then opened the tomb of St. Guthlac, but, finding nothing, heaped the Relics and the contents of the tombs into a pile and then burned them, together with the bodies of the dead monks and the Church and Monastery buildings. This took place on August 26, 869.
Then it was the turn of the fenland monasteries Thorney, Peterborough, Ramsey and Ely. At Thorney the Holy Hermits Tancred, Torthred and Tova (two brothers and a sister) were killed. At Peterborough Hinguar was struck by a stone; so his brother Hubba with his own hand slaughtered Abbot Hedda and 84 monks on one stone to avenge his injury. The Monastery, “which once was rich, was reduced to nothing.” At Ely a Dane took hold of the pall which covered the incorrupt body of St. Etheldreda (+ June 23, 679) and struck the marble of the tomb with his battle-axe. But a splinter flew back from off the ground and entered the striker’s eye, and he fell dead. At this the others left the tombs of the other Saints, which they were thinking of violating, and fled.
Another Saint resisted the invaders in a different way. The body of St. Werburga (+ 3 February, c. 700) had been preserved incorrupt at Chester right up to the coming of the Danes. But when they approached the city, the body suddenly disintegrated!
While Hubba with 10,000 men was sacking Ely and Soham, Hinguar pressed eastwards into East Anglia. On Newmarket Heath he encountered Ulfcetyl defending two or three earthworks later known a “Holy Edmund’s Fortifications”. But the English were overwhelmed and slaughtered to a man. Then the host proceeded to the capital of East Anglia, Thetford, which they captured amidst terrible scenes of rape and butchery. The whole population of the city was killed, and only King Edmund with a small army survived to face the Danes.
Hinguar then sent a messenger to Edmund, saying: “Hinguar our King, brave and victorious by sea and by land, has subdued many nations and has now landed suddenly here with his host. Now he orders you to divide your hidden treasure and the wealth of your ancestors with him quickly. And if you want to live, you can be his under-king, because you do not have the power to resist him.”
Then Edmund summoned Bishop Hunbert and discussed with him how he should answer Hinguar. The Bishop, fearful because of the disaster at Thetford and the threat to the King’s life, counselled him to submit to whatever Hinguar demanded. The King was silent for a while, looking at the ground. Then he said: “O Bishop! This wretched nation is humiliated, and I would rather die in battle against him who is trying to possess my people’s land.” Then the Bishop said: “Alas, dear King, your people lie slaughtered, and you do not have the forces to fight. And these pirates will come and bind you alive, unless you save your life by fleeing, or by submitting to him in this way.” The King replied: “What I want and desire with all my heart is that I should not be left alone when my beloved nobles with their wives and children have been suddenly killed by these pirates. It was never my custom to flee, and I would rather die for my country if I have to. And Almighty God knows that I will never renounced His worship, nor His true love, in life or in death.”
Then he turned to Hinguar’s messenger and said: “You would certainly deserve to die right now, but I will not dirty my clean hands in your filthy blood, for I follow Christ, Who set us this example. And I will gladly be killed by you if God so ordains it. Go quickly now and tell your savage lord: ‘Edmund will never while living submit in this land to the pagan war-lord Hinguar, unless he first submit in this land to Christ the Saviour in faith.”
Then Edmund marched with his men to Thetford. The battle raged for seven hours on the plain between Melford and Carford bridges; and finally Hinguar and his men retreated to their entrenched camp. Edmund was the victor, but at a terrible cost; and as he marched back to Hoxne he resolved to give himself up rather than continue the bloody carnage.
Shortly after his arrival in Hoxne, the news came of a fresh Danish inroad into the country. Hubba had completed his destruction of Ely and Soham, and had now set out with 10,000 more men to help his brother complete the conquest of East Anglia. Resistance was now hopeless, and Edmund’s only thought was how to preserve his country from further bloodshed and preserve it in the Christian faith. Bishop Hunbert again counselled flight, if only in the hope that he might return to reconquer the land for Christ. But Edmund knew that the enemy would the more ruthlessly put to sword any able-bodied man who might assist in his restoration. Moreover, Hinguar had a personal hatred of him which would be satisfied only by his being captured alive… So the Saint turned to Hunbert and said: “O Bishop Hunbert, my father, it is necessary that I alone should die for my people, and that the whole nation should not perish” (cf. John 12.50).
Then, having dismissed his men and laid aside his arms, he entered the Church and prostrated himself in front of the altar, praying for strength for his feat of martyrdom for Christ and his suffering people.
Having marched up to the town (Framlingham, according to one source, “Haegilsdun”, according to another) and surrounded it, Hinguar demanded that Edmund renounce his kingdom and his religion. Then he sent his men into the Church with orders to touch no one except the King. They seized him, bound him, and beat him with cudgels while insulting him continually. Then they tied him to a tree and flogged him with whips for a long time. Meanwhile the King called unceasingly on the name of Christ. This infuriated the pagans, and they now shot at him with arrows “until he bristled like a hedgehog”, like the Holy Martyr Sebastian. When Hinguar saw that the Holy King would not renounce Christ, he ordered him to be beheaded. And so they dragged him, still calling on Christ, to the place of slaughter and there beheaded him. Then Bishop Hunbert, too, was led into the arena and beheaded. This took place on November 20, 869, when St. Edmund had reigned for fifteen years and was twenty-nine years old.
The pagans returned to their ships, having thrown the head of St. Edmund into dense brambles so that it would be left unburied. Then the local inhabitants came and found the headless body, but could not find the head. A man who had been a witness of the martyrdom said that he thought they had hidden the head somewhere in the wood. So a search-party was organised, which scoured the bushes and brambles. Then the Saint himself helped them: as the men were calling to each other, the holy Head cried: “Here! Here! Here!”, leading them to the place. And there they saw it lying between the two paws of a grey wolf, who, while not daring to harm it himself, had been protecting it from the other wild beasts. Thanking God Almighty for His miracles, the people took the Holy Head and carried it back to the town. The wolf followed them as if he were tame, and then, having seen it into the town, returned to the woods. The people joined the head back onto the body, and then buried it as best they could, hastily erecting a wooden Chapel over it….
Early in the 10th c., the process of the reconquest of England from the Danes was well under way. The Danish rulers accepted Holy Baptism, and East Anglia was ruled by a Dane, Eric, under the suzerainty of the All-English King Edward the Elder. In 915 a miracle drew the attention of the liberated people to their last Christian King, St. Edmund. One night, a blind man and a boy who was leading him were walking through the woods near Hoxne. Not seeing any house nearby, they resolved to stay the night in what was in fact the wooden Chapel constructed over St. Edmund’s grave. Upon entering, they stumbled across the Martyr’s grave. They were terrified, but decided not to leave but to stay in the Chapel, using the grave as a pillow for the night. Hardly had they closed their eyes, when a column of light suddenly illumined the whole place. The boy woke up his master in fear. “Alas!, alas!” he cried, “our lodging is on fire!” But the blind man calmed him down, assuring him that their host, St. Edmund, would not let them come to harm. And indeed, at daybreak they discovered to their astonishment that through St. Edmund’s prayers the blind man was able to see.
The news of this miracle spread throughout East Anglia, and the people resolved to translate the body of their Saint to a safer and more honourable shrine. They chose the town of Bedricsworth (now Bury St. Edmunds), whose Church and Monastery, founded by St. Sigebert in the 7th c., had been destroyed by the Danes. However, some of the Priests still survived. In 951 when the Church had been rebuilt, Bishop Theodred of Elmham and the whole clergy of East Anglia inspected the holy body, testified to its incorruption, reclothed it and then translated it with great ceremony into its new shrine.
“Then there was a great miracle,” writes Abbot Aelfric, “in that he was just as whole as if he were alive, with unblemished body; and his neck, which was previously cut through, was healed, and there was, as it were, a red silken thread about his neck as an indication to men of how he was slain. Likewise the wounds which the savage heathens had made in his body with repeated missiles were healed by the heavenly God. And he lies incorrupt thus to this present day [about the year 1000], awaiting resurrection and eternal glory. His body, which lies there undecayed, proclaims to us that he lived here in the world without fornication, and journeyed to Christ with a pure life. A certain widow called Oswyn lived in prayer and fasting at the Saint’s tomb for many years afterwards; each year [on Holy Thursday] she would cut the hair of the Saint and cut his nails, circumspectly, with love, and keep them on the altar in a shrine as Relics.”
Many miracles continued to be performed at the Saint’s tomb. At night a column of light was often seen rising above it and illumining the whole Church. In 925, King Athelstan founded a community of four Priests and two Deacons to look after the shrine.
“Then,” continues Abbot Aelfric, “the inhabitants venerated the Saint with faith, and Bishop Theodred [the second of that name, called “the Good”] endowed the monastery with gifts of gold and silver, in honour of the Saint. Then at one time there came wretched thieves, eight in a single night, to the venerable Saint; they wanted to steal the treasures which men had brought there, and tried how they could get in by force. One struck at the bolt violently with a hammer; one of them filed around it with a file; one also dug under the door with a spade; one of them with a ladder wanted to unlock the window. But they laboured in vain and fared miserably, inasmuch as the holy man miraculously bound them, each as he stood, striving with his tool, so that none of them could commit that sinful deed nor move away from there, but they stood thus till morning. Then marvelled at how the villains hung there, one up a ladder, one bent in digging, and each was bound fast in his labour. Then they were all brought to the Bishop, and he ordered them all to be hung on a high gallows. But he was not mindful of how the merciful God spoke through His Prophet the following words: “Eos qui ducuntur ad mortem eruere ne cesses, Always redeem those whom they lead to death”; and also the Holy Canons forbid those in orders, both Bishops and Priests, to be concerned with thieves, for it is not proper that those who are chosen to serve God should be a party to a man’s death, if they are the Lord’s servants. Then after Bishop Theodred had examined the books, he repented, with lamentation, that he had appointed so cruel a judgement to those wretched thieves, and regretted it to the end of his life, and earnestly prayed the people to fast with him a whole three days, praying to the Almighty that he would have mercy on him.
There was in that land a certain man called Leofstan, powerful before the world and foolish before God, who rode to the Saint with great arrogance, and insolently ordered them to show him whether the Holy Saint was uncorrupted; but as soon as he saw the Saint’s body, he immediately went insane and roared savagely and ended miserably by an evil death.
From the year 999 the incorrupt body of St. Edmund was in the care of a monk named Ethelwine. In 1010, related Abbot Sampson, when the Danes were again ravaging East Anglia, the Saint appeared to Ethelwine and ordered him to place his body in a casket, put it on a cart and convey it to London. But the clerics were to remain in their places.
At dusk one day, as Ethelwine was proceeding on his way to London, he came to the house of a Priest named Edbriht, and asked hospitality for himself and the Holy Body of the Saint. The Priest at first refused to give shelter to strangers; but eventually, after people protested, he allowed the monk to sleep in the open air on his land, while not allowing him into his house. So Ethelwine slep under the cart on which the Holy Martyr’s body lay.
That night, however, a column of light was seen stretching up from the cart to heaven, and during the fourth watch of the night, the cart began to make a noise as if its wheels were turning. Startled by the noise, Ethelwine woke up and understood that the Saint wished to move from there. Soon he was on his way, and when he was already some distance from the house, he looked back and saw that it was on fire – a just retribution for the Priest’s inhumanity.
Later that day, Ethelwine came to the crossing of the River Stratford, three miles from London, and wished to cross over. But part of the bridge had subsided into the river, and the whole structure was unsafe. The Danes were threatening from the rear, and there was no other crossing. So Ethelwine resorted to prayer. Suddenly the cart began to move of its own will. The right wheel rolled over what remained of the bridge, while the left wheel passed through the air above the water as if it were dry land. Those who saw the miracle from the other side of the river praised God, and as the Holy Body approached the outskirts of London a great crowd of monks, clerics and nobles came to meet it. Taking it upon their shoulder, they moved towards the Church of St. Paul, singing praises and rejoicing greatly.
Between the Aldgate (a gate in the walls of London) and the Church of St. Paul, 18 people were cured of various maladies through the prayers of the Saint. A woman who was confined to her bed with paralysis heard the clamour accompanying the passing of the Saint and asked her servants what it signified. “Don’t you know,” they said, “St. Edmund, the King of the East Angles, who was innocently killed for Christ by the unfaithful and impious pagans, has come into this city and has given health to many!” “Woe is me!” she cried, “that God has not counted me worthy to obtain mercy in his presence. For if I could just touch the edge of his bier, I am confident that I would be immediately healed of my infirmity.” So saying, she suddenly stood on her feet completely healed – the nineteenth healing to the glory of the Saint that day. Realising what had happened, she rushed into the crowd and with tears pressed her lips to the saint’s bier.
Now the procession came to the Church of St. Gregory, near St. Paul’s. The Holy Body was let down and all the people prostrated in prayer to the Saint. At this point a certain Dane who was curious to know what was happening came on the scene. Seeing the others prostrate in prayer, he proudly remained upright, and, drawing aside the veil which covered the body, he peered inside. Suddenly he was struck with blindness. Then, realising his sin, he confessed it, promised amendment of life and faithfulness to God and St. Edmund, and implored forgiveness. All those present joined their prayer to his, and his sight was restored. Then he took off his golden armlets and offered them to the saint. Moreover, he was as good as his word and led a pious life thereafter.
For almost three years the fame of the Martyr spread far and wide through the miracles of healing, both physical and spiritual, wrought through his intercession in London.
Then St. Edmund appeared in a vision to Ethelwine and ordered him to bring his body back to Bury St. Edmunds. Immediately the monk went to Bishop Alfhun with a request to leave, explaining that he had come to London rather as a pilgrim, than as a permanent resident. The Bishop acceded to his request, though reluctantly. But when Ethelwine, had gone, he hastened with three clerics to the Church of St. Gregory. There they tried to lift the Holy Body in its reliquary onto their shoulders. But to no avail: the weight was insupportable. Four more men joined them, then twelve, then twenty-four. But after much sweat and labour they had not succeeded in moving the reliquary a single inch. Then the Bishop with his men felt ashamed, realizing that their devotion, though pious, was contrary to the will of God and St. Edmund. When Ethelwine came up, however, and prayed in the presence of the Saint, he was able with three of his companions to life the reliquary as though it weighed nothing.
So he set out on his journey, but not unnoticed as before. For a great crowd of clergy and people followed him in great sorrow as far as the Stratford bridge, and beyond it all the villages along the route poured out to meet the Saint with great joy. Bridges were repaired and roads cleared. And, as in London, many miracles took place. Near Stapleford, the lord of the village gave hospitality to the Saint and was cured of a chronic illness; whereupon he donated a manor to the Saint in perpetuity. Finally, the holy treasure was received by the clerics of Bury St. Edmunds and placed with all devotion in its former resting-place. There, for centuries to come, miracles did not cease for those who sought with faith.
In the year 1013, the Danes under King Swein again invaded England, and the whole country north of Watling Street surrendered to him. London, however, under the leadership of King Ethelred and Earl Thurkill, held out against him for some time. But when Swein turned northwards again, the whole nation accepted him as their undisputed King, and even the Londoners were forced to submit, while the King, the Royal Family and Bishop Alfhun of London went into exile in Normandy.
In 1014 Swein came to Bury St. Edmunds, demanding tribute and threatening that if it was not paid he would burn the town with the townsfolk, destroy the Church of the Saint from its foundations and torture the clerics in various ways. But the townsfolk refused, trusting in the protection of St. Edmund. Nor did the tax-collectors dare to use force against them, for they had heard how the Saint protected his own. So they hastened to the King and informed him of the rebellion against his authority. Meanwhile, not only the townsfolk of Bury St. Edmunds, but also people from all over East Anglia hastened to the Church of the Saint to beseech him by prayers, fasting and almsgiving to free the land from the yoke that had been imposed upon it for ten years or more. Moreover, they asked Monk Ethelwine to make a special intercession for them at the shrine of the Saint, that he would in his accustomed manner reveal a means of salvation for them through a nocturnal visitation.
That night, therefore, St. Edmund appeared to Ethelwine in his sleep, with joyful countenance and in shining white garments, and said: "Go to King Swein and tell him this from me: 'Why do you vex my little flock by imposing on them a yoke that no other King has imposed upon them? Tribute has never been demanded of, nor paid by, them at any time since my repose. Therefore correct this unjust sentence, lest, when you wish to, you will be unable to. For if you do not obey my admonition, you will soon know that you displease both God and myself; for you will discover that East Anglia has me as her protector.'"
So Ethelwine obediently sought out King Swein at Gainsborough, and humbly doing obeisance, delivered the Saint’s message, mixing soft words with the harsh. But the King refused to listen, ordered the monk out of his sight, and showered the Saint with abuse, saying that he had no holiness. Seeing that the King had no fear of God nor reverence for the Saint, Ethelwine sadly turned back. Near Lincoln he was given hospitality for the night; and as he was sleeping the Saint appeared to him and said: "Why are you fearful and sad? Have you forgotten my words and incurred the risk of falling into despair? Rise immediately and continue your journey; for before you will have reached its end, news about King Swein will delight you and all your compatriots."
Strengthened by this revelation, Ethelwine rose and set off on his way before dawn. As he was travelling he heard the sound of Danish horsemen behind him. One came up, greeted him, and said:
"By your leave, are you the Priest whom I saw the day before yesterday delivering the orders of a certain King to King Swein?"
"I am."
"Alas, alas," he said, "how weighty was your threat! How true your prophecy! For the death of King Swein has left England glad and Denmark in mourning. The night after you left, the King went to bed happy and fearing nothing. The whole palace was sleeping soundly. Suddenly the King was woken up by an unknown soldier standing before him, a man of wondrous beauty and brandishing arms. Addressing the King by his own name, he said: “Do you want tribute from St. Edmund’s land, O King? Get up - here it is.” He got up but fell back on his bed, terrified at the sight of the arms, and began to cry out. Then the soldier went up to him, thrust him through with his lance and left. Hearing his cry: “Help! Help! St. Edmund has come to kill me!”, his men came rushing in and found him dead, covered in his own blood."
Marianus relates that at that moment in Essex, a pious man named Wulfmar who had been ill for three days with a disease that deprived him of the use of his tongue and of all his limbs, suddenly sat up on his bed in the presence of his parents and neighbours, and said:
"On this night and at this hour King Swein has been killed, pierced through with the lance of St. Edmund."
Saying this, he fell back on his bed and died.
When Ethelwine heard this news, he judged the time opportune to publish what he had previously covered in silence. The story then spread like wildfire throughout the province, inciting all the English to refuse to pay tribute. King Swein perished on February 2, 1014, and his body was placed in salt and shipped back to Denmark.Thus was the Scripture fulfilled: “The Saints shall boast in glory, and they shall rejoice upon their beds. The high praise of God shall be in their throat, and two-edged swords shall be in their hands, to do vengeance among the heathen, punishments among the peoples, to bind their kings with fetters, and their nobles with manacles of iron, to do among them the judgement that is written. This glory shall be to all His saints” (Psalm 149.5-9).
In 1032, the body of St. Edmund was once more inspected and its incorruption verified, this time by Archbishop Aethelnoth of Canterbury and in the presence of witnesses. Further inspections and verifications took place in 1050, 1095 and 1198.
From the 16th c. the French Abbey of St. Sernin, Toulouse claimed to be in possession of the Holy Relics. In the 20th c. these were returned to England. Howe-ver, a controversy arose over their authenticity, and in 1994 a committee was set up to examine the question. No conclusion has yet been reached.

Sources:
Abbot Aelfic, Passio Sancti Eadmundi, Regis et Martyris, translated in Michael Swanton (ed.), Anglo-Saxon Prose, London: Dent, 1975, pp. 97-102;

Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, E, 1013;

Nova Legende Anglie, Appendix II, pp. 596-602;

Rev. J.B. Mackinlay, Saint Edmund, King and Martyr, London: Art & Book Company, 1893;

Trefor (Fr. Elias) Jones, The English Saints: East Anglia, Norwich: Canterbury Press, 1999, pp. 135-157.