And Benjamin Biography

Article from the Encyclopedia "Tree": Drevo-info. Innocent Moscow memory on March 31 on the day of death, September 23 on the day of glorification, February 3, along with Equal. He was six years old when his father died. The mother was left alone with four children, and Vanya took his father’s brother, Deacon Demetrius, who served in the same Ilyinsky church.

At seven, Vanya became a reader. In the year, Ivan entered the Irkutsk Theological Seminary. He studied well, and spent his free time at the seminar library or at the uncle, who, Vedovov, tonsured monks and moved to Irkutsk. Dimitri's Deacon, in the monastication of David, was a good watchmaker and a self-taught mechanic and carried away his studies and nephew.

In the seminary, in order to distinguish between numerous namesakes, the rector changed the name of many students, why Ivan Popov then became Veniaminov, in memory of the recently dead Irkutsk bishop Veniamin. Since the Irkutsk diocese was extremely needed by the church and clergymen, the young Ivan, a year before the end of the seminary, married the daughter of a priest of the Annunciation Church, Ekaterina Ivanovna, and immediately was dedicated to deacons to the same church.

He graduated from the seminary as one of the best, and four years later was ordained a priest. The young father gained the love and respect of the parishioners for their good disposition and solemn grace of worship. On Sundays, before the Liturgy, Father John gathered children in the church and told them about the Christian faith, about worship, the rules of pious and a godly life.

In his spare time, he made hours and musical organic organisms with spiritual hymns, which made it possible to ensure the material situation of the family. From Anginsky, his mother and brother Stefan moved to him, the father was born to the father, who was called Innocent and the family lived a measured life that did not foresee changes. At the end of the year, a new parishioner appeared in the Annunciation Church-a certain Ivan Kryukov, who has been living in the colonies of the Russian-American company for forty years, who, with his passionate stories about Russian America and Aleuty, convinced his father John to go to this distant country.

At the same time, the Irkutsk Bishop Mikhail received an indication of the Holy Synod that on the island of Unalashka, to the Aleutian islands, which were then part of the Irkutsk diocese, it is necessary to send a priest. He received an invitation to missionary service and father John Veniamins, but, like others, refused. Meanwhile, Ivan Kryukov was about to leave Irkutsk and went on a farewell visit to Bishop Mikhail, where he met Father John.

When their conversation switched to the topic of the priest’s commanding to Unalashka, Kryukov again began to talk about the zeal of the Aleuts in faith and his words wound the heart of Priest John, who decided to go to America, despite opposition to his will, seeing God's fishing in this. Vladyka, not without hesitation, agreed and blessed the selfless determination of his father John and on May 7 he left Irkutsk with his family.

The priest on Unalashka on a hard trip took almost a year and Father John and the family arrived at Unalashka on July 29. His new parish was formed by two groups of the Aleutian Islands - Foxes and Polovalov, with a harsh climate and a population of Aleuts, Creole and few Russians. The flock of Father John was poorly strengthened in Christianity - the indigenous inhabitants of the islands sincerely accepted the gospel gospel in the year, when the hieromonk of the spiritual mission of Macarius baptized them, but had only the most general ideas about God as an omnipotent and good man.

Thinking and asking God for what to do, Father John decided to build a temple first of all on the site of the already existing chapel and study the language of the islanders. To build a church on a raw unalashka, materials were needed with whom the board of the Russian-American company promised to help, as well as workers, for the preparation of which Father John himself took up.

Having launched a thorough acquaintance with the mechanics and the craft skills that he acquired in his youth, Father John began to teach Aleuts to the carpentry, Plotnitsky, partly locksmith and blacksmithing, the manufacture of brick and masonry. In this joint work, he got closer and recognized his parishioners, their character, customs, an idea of ​​the world, met their language.

A year later, when the Aleutians-builders were quite prepared, on July 1, the work began, but the construction of the church was led by Father John himself. He cut and gilded the throne and iconostasis with his own hands. According to the construction of the church, most of the time, Father John spent on trips on the arrival, swimming on kayaks from the island to the island, which required considerable courage and patience.

His companions were only aleut rowers and interpreter. More than once, getting into the storm, they moored in a deserted place and, without a few days of food, they were forced to wait for the weather change or to get to the nearest village, carrying kayaks and the whole load.But God sent spiritual comfort to the selfless priest - the Aleuts accepted him with sincere love and surprised him with the jealous fulfillment of Christian duties.

The case on the island of Akun in the great post of the year was especially noteworthy. The population, who had never seen him before, met the priest standing on the shore as decorated, as for a solemn holiday. Surprised, he asked them how they could find out about his arrival and received the answer that the old man Ivan Smirennikov from the speech, whom they called the “shaman”, predicted his arrival and described his appearance.

Having met with Smirennikov, Father John found out that he was taught by Christian life from two “white people” - angels who began to appear to him after baptism. They told Smirennikov about the arrival of Father John and punished him to obey him. Marked, Father John wanted to meet with the angels, but, having understood, with humility decided to get down to the Irkutsk archbishop Mikhail on this issue.

When the Vladyka’s answer came after three years, the old Smirennikov was already elderly. The travels of Father John helped him learn the Aleutian language and he took up translations. First of all, he translated the main prayers: “Our Father”, “The Virgin Mary, Rejoice” and the symbol of faith, then began to translate the Gospel from Matthew. The father did not like and did not know how to be idle.

At a time when trips on the arrival were impossible, Father John wrote a scientific work - “Notes about the islands of the Unalashkinsky department”, which included the materials of his perennial travel diaries. The main ruler of the company F. Wrangel somehow instructed him to calculate the hunt of hunting. Father John has always been surrounded by children, his own and strangers, certainly finding an occupation for them.

He told them a sacred story, played the ball, walked around the mountains, collecting stones and telling about them. When the stones accumulated decently, he invited the children to lay out the path from home to church. In the evenings, he, as once at his homeland, often made hours and musical organs for sale, introducing to work and children. Father John spent ten years on Unalashka, gaining not only universal love among Aleuts, but also deep respect for the company's management.

It was such a priest who wanted to see the rule in the main city of Russian America - Novoarkhangelsk and in the year he was transferred to the Mikhailovsky Cathedral of the Novoarkhangelsk port located on the western coast of the island of Sitka. The abbot of the Novoarkhangelsk Cathedral arrived with his family on Sitka on November 22, Father John was busy with the affairs of his previous ministry for a long time, and did not manage to really get acquainted with the indigenous inhabitants of the island - Koloshas or Tlinkites.

Then, some uncharacteristic reluctance held him, he began a sermon until the time of the Nativity of Christ of the year, when the smallpox suddenly broke out among the column. If he came to them with preaching to her, then hostile spikes would attribute the infection to the new Russian shaman, and instead the spikes themselves reached for the Russians, seeing that the disease did not harm them and wanting to get a vaccine from a local doctor.

After that, Father John was accepted among them, but was in no hurry to christen more people, but waited for their own desire and always asked the consent of their leaders and mothers. In the year, Father John went to Redut Stakhin, who was on the mainland, where he committed the first divine liturgy, which also instilled in the local wayward and brave column, expressing the desire to see the priest again.

At Sitka, Father John arranged a school for the converts and their children, where he taught them the law of God, literacy and various crafts, composing textbooks himself. It was on it that the care of the temple of the Archangel Michael lay on it. He did not leave scientific papers: having completed the “experience of the grammar of the Aleutskoye-Iliyevsky language,” the priest with the same thoroughness took up Koloshensky and Kodiak, and kept the customs and traditions of Kolosh.

He did not forget his first flock, having finished translation into the Aleutian language of the Gospel from Matthew, translating other prayers and compiling small books about the Orthodox faith and Christian life. Father John lived in Russian America for fifteen years in love with the local population and earned the respect of the company's management. But for the successful statement of Christianity in the vast American lands, much more people and funds were required than it was at that time.

In addition, in Russia, they could not print his translations without Father John, since in the Holy Synod there would be no knowledge of the Aleutian language. Then Father John asked for a long vacation to explain the state and the needs of the distant land and ask for help. Upon the arrival of June 22, the missionary was warmly met in Kronstadt in St. Petersburg and Moscow, his work was preparing for the publication, and the funds were successfully raised.

But in the meantime, on November 25, his wife suddenly died, who returned with children to Irkutsk.The father, shocked by grief, wanted to immediately go to his homeland to orphaned children, but the Saint of Moscow Filaret, who had come down with him, saw the instructions of God in this and began to convince John Father to accept monasticism. Meanwhile, the fate of his children settled: the daughters were admitted to the Patriotic Institute, and the sons in the theological seminary in St.

Petersburg and November 29, Archpriest John Veniamiaminov, was tonsured by Metropolitan Filaret with the name Innocent, in honor of St. Innocent of Irkutsk, to whom the father prayed for all these years, asking for his help in his own helps in his help, asking for his help in his own help, missionary works.

The next day, the newly -put monk Innokenty was elevated to the rank of archimandrite, and then he wished to see Emperor Nicholas I. Meanwhile, the Holy Synod decided to form a new Kamchatka, Kuril and Aleutian diocese and asked the sovereign with a request to approve one of three candidates for the department. One of them was Archimandrite Innocent, which the emperor approved. In the village of Anginsky, his relatives were waiting - he from here sent to Petersburg two of his sons and daughters Olga and Paraskev, and his daughter Catherine, who had just married priest Ilya Ivanovich Petelin, went to America with him.

Autumn and half of the winter took place in Novoarkhangelsk in the first concerns of the new diocese. In the year, Bishop Innokenty began the construction of a missionary house on Sitka - now the oldest building in Alaska - with a chapel consecrated in honor of the Annunciation. As soon as the navigation opened, on February 19, Vladyka began bypassing his diocese.

Many of his native flocks met by a shepherd with tears of joy. When he arrived at Unalashka, the Aleuta loved by him after the liturgy and preaching brought him extremely skillfully woven from wood roots and various herbs of the Eaglets. In the fall of the year, the saint went to Kamchatka. Having stayed in Petropavlovsk, together with his brother, priest Stefan Popov all autumn, and waiting for the snow road, Bishop Innokenty went into the dogs deep into Kamchatka.

From here the saint went to Gizhiga, and from there to Okhotsk. Mixedness in circulation and paternal affairs, he earned love among Koryaks, Chukchi and Tungus. In September, Grace Innocent returned from a difficult and long journey along Kamchatka and the Okhotsk coast, having drove five thousand miles on dogs and partly on deer. By the arrival of the bishop in Novoarkhangelsk, the company's board built a house for him and soon he arranged a school there, where he taught children the law of God.

Saint Innokenty opened a theological seminary in Novoarkhangelsk, and arranged Orthodox missions in remote corners of the diocese. In the year, the construction of a new cathedral on Sitka in honor of the Archangel Michael began. Despite many responsibilities, Bishop Innocent found time to make hours that adorned the cathedral bell tower. The saint was continuously in the works and long trips to the diocese-in the year, Vladyka traveled around Asia, since the Kamchatka diocese expanded and its limits southwest of Okhotsk now concerned the Chinese border.

Then he visited Ayan and the Udsky Territory, who had just been transferred from the Irkutsk diocese to Kamchatka. He met his fiftieth anniversary on the way, then returned to Sitka by the end of August, and learned about his erection to the rank of archbishop on a trip to Kamchatka in the year. The Kuril Islands also belonged to the diocese of St. Innocent, where no more than sixty people lived, but the Vladyka sent the gospel for them in the year.

The works of the active archpastor and priests of the diocese brought visible fruits in the appeal of many local inhabitants to Christ - the good, the miraculous, to lead from different ends of the vast diocese. The special concern of the saint remained Koloshi, for which the temple consecrated by Bishop Innokenty on April 24 of the year was specially built, where the newly figured parishioners in their native language sang “Lord have mercy”, a symbol of faith and “Our Father”.

Since Kolosh was preserved by the brutal custom of the murder of slaves-Kalgs after the death of the master, Vladyka turned to the Synod for permission to redeem from the pricky slaves to save them from death. In the year, Archbishop Innocent himself went on a trip to this area. Then, having returned from Amur to Yakutsk, he set to build and adjust the monastery buildings. Together with other missionaries, he began translating liturgical texts and scripture into the Yakut and Tunguska.

The Crimean war did not interrupt the activity of the Lord - in the spring of the year he hit the road, first for the secondary viewing of Yakutia, then to Ayan and from there to the Amur.