SAINT ANTHONY OF PECHERSK

Saint Anthony of Pechersk, also called St Anthony of Kiev (983-1073), and whose name is literally translated as St Anthony of the Caves, is called the founder of monastic life in Kievan Rus. There are several versions of the life of Anthony. Each of them is self-sufficient and, in some of its details, contradicts the others. According to one of the editions of the Life, soon after he founded a monastic community in the Kyiv caves on the banks of the Dnepr, he retired into solitude, where, albeit with interruptions, he remained until the end of his days.

One of the Latin medieval sayings in Russian translation sounds like this: “He lived as one who had to die, so that having died, he could live.” According to the life, when the Mother of God appeared to Anthony and predicted his imminent death, his only desire, which he turned to the Virgin in prayer, was for his body to be hidden forever. Just as during life, he always evaded people… Anthony asked God for oblivion after death.

One of Milan Kundera’s books is called “Broken Wills.” In fact, Kundera, with his characteristic insight, reveals this pattern: our personal biography, as well as the collective biography of humanity, called history, consists of … broken wills. Out of disregard for the requests of those people who are no longer with us.

When Anthony asked God for his body, he was sincere. Knowing about this will of Anthony, the brothers of the Pechersk Monastery, nevertheless, tried to find his relics. According to legend, they were stopped only by fire and streams of water, alternately escaping from the place where the earth once closed its mouth over Anthony’s body.

We constantly want there to be more of us. So that we are heard, so that we are seen, so that we are remembered, so that we are not forgotten, so that—to paraphrase the famous song of Till Lindemann - “they eat me, they drink me and they breathe me.” Modernity is built on this desire to impose oneself on others. Being flesh of the flesh of this world, we also try to impose our presence on others.

“The grace of Unobtrusiveness,” which is so lacking in modern times, lacking in us, and even lacking in the Church, was revealed in an amazing, relevant and so instructive way in the life of St. Anthony. Revealed in the image of the One who, in the words of the biblical testimony, “passes in the still wind” (1 Kings 19:12). The One who “passed through the midst of them and hid himself” (John 8:59). By his example, Anthony teaches us to turn away from ourselves. For this brings God closer.