Saint Ignatii of Mount AthosThis Great and Holy Saturday, the day of Christ’s repose in the tomb, is also the first of May – International Labour Day. In addition to this, in the Orthodox Church commemorates on this day the Prophet Jeremiah who preached repentance to the Hebrews that included just wages for the workman, as well as Saint Tamara of Georgia, Saint Berhte of Kent, the seventy-nine monastic martyrs of Sînâ’ and aṭ-Ṭûr in Ægypt, Saint Pafnutii of Borovsk, and another holy monastic martyr: Saint Ignatii, the new martyr of Stara Zagora and Mount Athos. He is remembered alongside his fellow Athonites and fellow sufferers for Christ, Saints Euthymios and Akakios of Mount Athos.
Saint Ignatii [Bg. Игнатий] was born Ivan, in the city of Stara Zagora in Bulgaria. His parents were named Georgii and Mariya. His parents moved from Stara Zagora to Plovdiv when he was still only a small child, and enrolled him at school there. Despite performing well in school, young Ivan was an unusually pious child, and he soon evinced a strong desire for the monastic life. Upon graduating from school and becoming an adult, Ivan entered the novitiate at the Rila Monastery (the mediæval abode of Saint Ivan of Rila). He spent six years living under the rule of a wayward, irascible and tyrannical elder before returning to Plovdiv. The Bulgarian hagiography suggests that Ivan’s uncle Saint Ignatii (Kalpakchiev) – a bandit who repented, turned to God and became a monk – may have been the head of the monastery.
Ivan’s return to Plovdiv was eventful. The Turks were conscripting fighters to put down the Serbian Revolution under Karađorđe Petrović at the time. Georgii was summoned to command an Ottoman brigade in battle against Petrović, but he refused to fight and harm his Serbian brothers in the Orthodox faith. For this, the Turks executed him in a cruel manner, stabbing him multiple times and then beheading him. His wife Mariya and his two daughters – Ivan’s mother and sisters – were forcibly converted to Islâm, and Ivan himself was forced into hiding. He hid with a pious Orthodox woman nearby, but when his sisters learned of it, they betrayed him to the Ottoman authorities. However, the woman he took shelter with bravely defied the Ottoman gendarmes in order to help Ivan escape to the free part of Romania.
Ivan spent some time in Bucharest, where he made the acquaintance of a priest named Elefterie – the future martyr Euthymios – with whom he became friends. However, he soon was gripped by a desire to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Mountain. He left Bucharest some time later, and on his way to Athos he stopped in the town of Shumen, where he learned that Elefterie had renounced Christ and converted to Islâm, taking on the name of Rashîd. Saddened and dismayed by this news, Ivan resumed his journey to Athos. It was not long before he was stopped on the road by Turkish soldiers, who plundered him of all his possessions and at gunpoint demanded his own conversion to Islâm. In fear Ivan gave them a promise that he would, and they rode off, seemingly satisfied with his answer. This promise, however, weighed heavily on Ivan’s conscience.
He made it to Athos and spent some time in the company of a certain Fr Vasilii at the Skete of Saint Anna. After some time he moved to the Iviron Monastery of Saint John the Forerunner, where he was placed under the guidance of Elder Akakios. While at the Iviron Monastery Ivan learned that two men, David and his old friend Fr Elefterie – who had renounced his conversion to Islâm and become a monk by the name of Euthymios – had suffered martyrdom for Christ at the hands of the Turks. Ivan was filled with a flame of zeal, and seeking permission from his spiritual elder Akakios, he was blessed for martyrdom and tonsured a monk by the name of Ignatii. (The Bulgarian Life says that this was in honour of his uncle, the abbot at Rila.)
On the twenty-ninth of September of 1814, Saint Ignatii travelled from Mount Athos in the company of another monk, Grigorii. That Tuesday, he received the Holy Eucharist and thus prepared himself for his ordeal. He changed into Turkish garb and entered the Turkish court where the qâḍî was holding session. He tore the turban off his head and threw it to the ground in front of the judge. There he told his story about how in his travels he had had to lie and promise to convert to Islâm to save his own life, and he thereupon renounced his promise and professed Christ as God. The qâḍî, thinking that this man before him might be insane, tried at first to calm and assuage him, promising him gifts and honours if he would convert to Islâm. Saint Ignatii replied that he knew already about such ‘gifts’, and had come here specifically to refuse them. He further denounced Muḥammad as a false prophet, and invited the Muslims there present to put their faith in Christ.
Speechless with rage, the qâḍî had Saint Ignatii removed from his sight with a wave of his hand, and ordered him to be tortured. Saint Ignatii withstood two days of horrific tortures before the qâḍî summoned him again. Asking who had sent him, Ignatii replied that the Lord Jesus Christ had done so. And then the qâḍî remarked that he should put any hope out of his mind to be beheaded – that he would be sentenced to the more drawn-out death by hanging, so that his blood could not be collected by the Christians for a relic. Saint Ignatii replied that it was all one how he was killed, for he accepted all sufferings for the love of Christ.
Seeing that he could make no headway with him, the qâḍî sentenced Saint Ignatii to be hanged on the eighth of October, 1814. His body was publicly exposed for three days, before the monk Grigorii ransomed the body from the authorities, had it prepared and coffined, and shipped it to Athos. He had Saint Ignatii’s relics placed together with those of Saint Euthymios in the Iviron Monastery. The head of Saint Ignatii currently lies in a place of honour in the Russian Athonite Monastery of Saint Panteleimon.
It is worth remembering Saint Ignatii, Saint Akakios, Saint Euthymios and all those who suffered under the Turkish yoke today. They are holy martyrs for Christ indeed… for the same Christ who sides with all those who are suffering, those who are poor, those who are under exploitation and oppression. It is not an accident that Saint Ignatii’s father chose not to fight in the Ottoman Sultân’s war against Karađorđe and his peasant army, and suffered the ultimate penalty for his conscientious objection. It is also not an accident that God chose for holy martyrdom these two people – Saints Ignatii and Euthymios – who were not at first perfect in their courage, and who did falter and fear and make moral compromises in order to survive. Their experience reflects the struggles and plight of the great many Bulgarian people at the time who suffered under Turkish tyranny. Holy martyrs Euthymios, Ignatii and Akakios, pray unto Christ our God that our souls may be saved!
Apolytikion for Saint Ignatii of Athos, Tone 8:
The image of God was truly preserved in you, O Father,
For you took up the Cross and followed Christ.
By so doing you taught us to disregard the flesh for it passes away
But to care instead for the soul, since it is immortal.
Therefore your spirit, O venerable Ignatii, rejoices with the angels.
Iviron Monastery of St John the Forerunner, Athos
No comments:
Post a Comment