1 comments about One of the Ancients: The Life and Struggles of a Russian Man of Prayer : Elder Gabriel of Pskov and Kazan (Acquisition of the Holy Spirit in Ancient Russia).

1. That a book changes something fundamentaly in ones life is a rare occasion, but this book did that to me. I read the book in the fall 1998 an was moved by it, but nothing more. Than, after a year, I read it again. During this time I had continued my search for my Patron Saint within The Orthodox Church which had been going on for eight years. Suddenly everything fell in their right place. St.Gabriel of Pskov and Kazan(commemorated September 24.(Julian calendar)/October 7.(Gregorian calendar)) was to be my Patron Saint. I won't go into any details, but the shining love of this Holy Elder is a lasting impression. And the love of God for the love of one's neighbour was the Gospel of this Starets.

   It should also be noted that the author, New Martyr Fr. Simeon a saint himself, was not only St.Gabriel spiritual son, but also took over the Eldership after the Elders repose in 1915. The author therefore knew the Elder Gabriel very well and so did many people still alive when the book was first published in Russia in 1917. Thanks to this we can regard theses accounts as highly reliable. And the strange occurances of how this book was refound and published again is a mystery I leave to the happy reader to find out for him- or herself in it's Foreword and Introduction.

   I highly recommend this book to everybody!

No comments about Ways of Russian Theology.

No comments about Byzantine Hermeneutics and Pedagogy in the Russian North: Monks and Masters at the Kirillo-Belozerskii Monastery, 1397-1501.

No comments about Manjava Skete: Ukranian Monastic Writings of the Seventeenth Century (Cistercian Studies Number 192).

No comments about The Russian Orthodox Church: A Contemporary History.

No comments about Russian Orthodox Bible for Children with Illustrations.

No comments about The Optina Pustyn Monastery in the Russian Literary Imagination: Iconic Vision in Works by Dostoevsky, Gogol, Tolstoy, and Others (Middlebury Studies in Russian Language and Literature, Vol 3).

No comments about Memory Eternal: Tlingit Culture and Russian Orthodox Christianity Through Two Centuries.

1 comments about Many Worlds: A Russian Life.

1. This intimate and and compelling journey through the life of a remarkable woman during and through several remarkable periods of time during the 20th century is a pleasure to read. The strength of character that is displayed in the author, as she guides herself and her family through the Russian Revolution, escape to Europe, World War II, and emigration to the United States, while maintaining stability in her family, preserving the Russian language and culture with her children and grandchildren, is inspiration to all.

1 comments about Russian Letters of Spiritual Direction, 1834-1860.

1. Some 35 years ago I visited The Orthodox Church Museum of Finland in Kuopio. I came to an icon representing Staretz Macarius. I had recently read Russian Letters of Spiritual Direction 1834 - 1860. Elder Macarius appeared to me to be just the Optina Elder who expressed himself in a way that talked to me more than the others did, although other Optina elders might have been more `popular' and better known.
   
   Suddenly he was looking at me! There was an eye contact between us that felt very real and made cold shivers run down my spine. This seemed to take quite a long time - I have no idea exactly how long, perhaps one minute. I was standing some seven feet from the icon and his gaze was constant and intense. I then moved to another position sideways his eyes following me. I went 10 yards further and he was still watching. When I some minutes later left the building he was still looking.
   
   Things happen in a way that can not be explained or understood! I lost the book between moves, but recently found a copy. In these 35 years a lot of things have changed, but the message of elder Macarius' spiritual direction has even today the same strength and simplicity that it had then.
   
   What he communicated to me was without words; the effect was that it changed my life!