John theological monastery. Current state of the monastery

The exact date when the St. John the Theologian Monastery (Poshupovo) was built is unknown. For my centuries-old history he managed to acquire many legends and traditions.

Legend one: the emergence of the monastery

One of the legends says that the monastery appeared at the end of the 12th or at the beginning of the 13th century. It is believed that Christian missionary monks came to these lands with the goal of enlightening the local pagans. With them was a miraculous icon of the saint in whose honor the monastery founded by the monks was named. This image was one of the many shrines that the Church of Constantinople donated to the Russian state. According to legend, it was written by an orphan boy who lived in Byzantium back in the 6th century, whose hand was supposedly controlled by the apostle himself.

At first the monastery was located south of the present one, on the slope of a hill, above the Oka River, in a cave. Naturally, the area around in those days looked somewhat different than it does now: centuries-old oak forests grew on the high hills, and the rest of the space was occupied by small lakes and oxbow lakes.

St. John the Theologian Monastery, Poshupovo. Historical background

A whole complex of inhabited caves has survived to this day; the estimated time of their settlement is the end of the 12th century. And this fact allows us to make the assumption that the monks acted in the same way as their brothers during the founding Kiev-Pechersk Monastery, which later became wooden.

Legend two: golden seal

Having moved with his army to Russian lands, he met fierce resistance from the inhabitants of Old Ryazan, which defended itself for five days. But still the city was taken and, of course, burned to the ground (it is known that modern city erected in a new location). Then the khan and the horde approached the monastery and camped for the night. The next morning they planned to rob and burn it. As the legend says, Batu had a dream where he saw the face of the Apostle John. He and his warriors were so frightened by the vision that they abandoned their original plan. They say that the khan was very afraid of Christian saints.

Arriving at the temple, he saw on the icon the same face of the apostle that he had dreamed of. After this, Batu placed his personal golden seal on the shrine, which was supposed to protect the monastery and all its brethren from numerous raids and devastation. The monks carefully preserved it for 416 years. It was subsequently melted down into a cup used for communion.

Legend three: the missing icon

Over time, the power in the Horde changed, and the golden seal of Khan Batu ceased to be a protection for the monastery. Raids became more frequent, bringing with them the killing of brothers and destruction. But each time the monks restored their monastery with enviable tenacity.

But in the end the monks got tired of it, and they decided to find another place to build a monastery. They collected all their surviving property and hit the road. But after some time they discovered that the miraculous icon with the face of St. John the Theologian had disappeared. And then they doubted the correctness of their action.

The brothers decided to return and find the lost shrine at any cost. On the way back, passing through the grove, they saw a missing icon on a tall oak tree. Taking this as a sign from above, they decided to build new monastery at the place where the face of John the Evangelist was discovered. Now the monastery is located a little north of its original location.

A board was made from the oak tree on which the icon was found and placed on high altar to the St. John the Theologian Monastery (Poshupovo). Later it was moved to the newly built Assumption Cathedral.

Construction

The construction of the monastery on the current site began in the 16th century. At first it was made of wood, but by the end of the 17th century they began to build stone buildings. Now the St. John the Theologian Monastery (Poshupovo) is completely made of stone.

TO mid-19th century, the monastery became very dilapidated and was abandoned until David Ivanovich Khludov settled in these places in 1859. He made every effort to revive it. At the end of the 19th century, it became almost the most beautiful in the Ryazan diocese. A four-tier bell tower 76 meters high was also built.

At the same time, a school was organized at the monastery, where peasant children were taught. It was this that saved the monastery from closure after the October Revolution.

In the spring of 1931, the St. John the Theologian Monastery (Poshupovo) was nevertheless closed, and the monks were arrested. And the day before, the ancient miraculous icon of John the Theologian disappeared from it, which, by the way, has not yet been found. During Soviet times, various institutions were located in the monastery buildings. Only in the fall of 1988 was he returned back to the Russian Orthodox Church.

John the Theologian monastery Poshupovo village

The men's monastery in honor of the holy apostle and evangelist is located on the right bank of the Oka River, near the village of Poshupovo, Rybnovsky district, Ryazan region, 25 kilometers from the city of Ryazan, and is one of the oldest in the Ryazan diocese.

Monastic tradition dates the establishment of the monastery to the end of the 12th or beginning of the 13th century. It is believed that its founders were missionary monks who came to these lands to educate the local pagans. They brought with them the miraculous icon of the Apostle John the Theologian - one of the many shrines handed over to Church of Constantinople Russian land. This image has become main shrine new monastery. The icon itself, according to legend, placed in the Slavic Prologue under September 26, was painted in the 6th century in Byzantium by an orphan boy, whose hand was guided by the apostle himself, who appeared to him.

Initially, the monastery arose somewhat to the south of the current one, on the slope of a large hill rising above the floodplain of the Oka River, and was most likely a cave. The complex of monastery caves, dating from the end of the 12th century, has survived to this day. This suggests that the founding of the monastery is connected with the missionary activities of the monks of the famous Kiev-Pechersk Monastery. Somewhat later, the monastery was moved from the caves to the surface of the earth and rebuilt in a tree.

There is a legend that in 1237 the Apostle John the Theologian defended his monastery from the Tatar-Mongol conquerors. Khan Batu, moving with his army after the destruction of the capital of the Ryazan principality - Ryazan (old) - along the Oka to Kolomna, approached the St. John the Theologian Monastery with the intention of plundering and burning it. However, the formidable khan and his warriors were frightened by the vision of the Apostle John. Abandoning the idea of ruining the monastery, Batu came to the monastery and left his golden security seal near the icon of the apostle, which subsequently remained with it for 416 years. In 1653, during the reign of Hieromartyr Misail, Archbishop of Ryazan and Murom, when the miraculous image was temporarily in the old Assumption Cathedral of the Ryazan Kremlin, the seal was removed and, among several dozen gold coins from the archpastor’s “koshta,” it was used to gild a large water-blessed chalice, which has survived to this day. time and now located in RIAMZ.

In the 16th - first half of the 17th centuries, the monastery was repeatedly devastated by the Crimean Tatars and Mordovians who came from the south and southeast, but was invariably revived. Tradition says that after one of these devastations, the monks attempted to move the monastery to a safer place - the village of Vysokoye, Mikhailovsky district. But it turned out that the miraculous icon disappeared from the new monastery church and was found again in Poshchupovo, but not in the old place, but in the monastery forest on a huge oak tree, where the cathedral in the name of the Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian now stands. The abbot and the brethren returned to their original place, they cut down the oak tree, and placed a board made from it on top of the main altar. Subsequently, this board was moved to the new Assumption Cathedral of the monastery.

Although the monastery owned extensive estates, repeated devastation for a long time did not make it possible to improve the monastery. Until the middle of the 17th century, all buildings in the monastery were wooden. In the 50s of the 17th century, a stone fence and the Holy Gate were built according to the design of the Moscow architect Yuri Korniliev Ershov. Frescoes of such antiquity have been preserved in the Ryazan region only in 2 places: in the Singing Building of the Ryazan Kremlin and in the Holy Gates of the St. John the Theologian Monastery.

In 1689 a stone two-story building was erected St. John the Theological Cathedral . In the same year a second one was built stone temple- in honor of the Assumption Holy Mother of God.

St. John the Theological Cathedral. 1689

Mosaic icon on the facade of the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist

Mosaic icon of John the Theologian on the apse of the Cathedral of St. John the Theologian

The main (cold) cathedral of the monastery. Under its altar part there is a temple-tomb, consecrated in the name of Seraphim of Sarov, Juvenal of Ryazan and all the new martyrs and confessors of Russia. The last abbots of the monastery, who ruled it until the 1930s, are buried in the tomb.
The ancient miraculous icon of John the Theologian, brought to the Oka from Byzantium, was kept in the cathedral.

Temple-tomb, consecrated in the name of Seraphim of Sarov, Juvenal of Ryazan and all the new martyrs and confessors of Russia, attached to the Cathedral of John the Theologian. Bones from a necropolis destroyed by the Bolsheviks.

Temple-tomb, consecrated in the name of Seraphim of Sarov, Juvenal of Ryazan and all the new martyrs and confessors of Russia, attached to the Cathedral of John the Theologian. White tombstone - Archimandrite Abel (Makedonov), who took over the monastery after the Soviet devastation, through whose efforts it was restored.

Temple-tomb, consecrated in the name of Seraphim of Sarov, Juvenal of Ryazan and all the new martyrs and confessors of Russia, attached to the Cathedral of John the Theologian. Tombstones of the last abbots of the monastery.

From the stone buildings of the 17th century, the hipped bell tower and the abbot's building have survived to this day.

In 1652, with his letter, Patriarch Adrian blessed Archimandrite Anthony and subsequent abbots to perform all sacred services in a silver-forged miter. In this charter, the St. John the Theologian Monastery is named third in its place among the monasteries of the Ryazan-Murom diocese.

After the secularization of church lands by Empress Catherine II in 1764, the St. John the Theologian Monastery, like many monasteries, fell into decay. New flourishing of the monastery in economic and spiritual relations begins only in the second half of the 19th century.

In 1860, not far from the monastery, a hereditary honorary citizen, Moscow merchant of the 1st guild David Ivanovich Khludov acquired a country estate. He became the main donor of the monastery. With his funds, the St. John the Theological Cathedral is being completely reconstructed. A new iconostasis is being installed in it, the icons for which were painted by the famous Ryazan artist N.V. Shumov. The temple was rededicated on October 5, 1862.

Thanks to the initiative of D.I. Khludov, rector of the St. John the Theologian Monastery on March 22, 1865. The Holy Synod appointed hieromonk, and then abbot and archimandrite Vitaly (Alekseev). Over the following years, the appearance of the monastery completely changed. The communal charter was introduced in it on the model of the Konevsky Monastery - with ascetically strict rules.

In 1868-1870, at the expense of D.I. Khludov a new one is being built Assumption Cathedral with three altars, and in 1868–1878 - a new three-story fraternal building.

Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Fragment of a faience icon case in the Assumption Cathedral

Faience icon case in the Assumption Cathedral

Interior of the Assumption Cathedral

Outside the monastery fence in 1867, a two-story stone Gostiny Dvor for pilgrims and a school for peasant children in the village of Poshupovo. The monks trained more than 70 boys there every year. All necessary educational supplies were also provided at the expense of the monastery.

After the death of D.I. Khludov, but at his expense, in 1901 according to the design of the Ryazan architect I.S. Tsekhansky is building an 80-meter bell tower I, the largest bell on which weighed 545 pounds. The bell tower housed large library, in which ancient books of the 17th-18th centuries were kept.

Belfry

Archimandrite Vitaly (Vinogradov) ruled the monastery for half a century and died in 1915 at the age of almost 100 years. The number of brethren under him increased unusually and amounted to more than 100 people.

During the years of persecution of the Church in the first half of the 20th century, the monastery shared the fate of many other Russian monasteries and churches. In 1930, the inhabitants of the monastery, led by the elderly abbot Archimandrite Zosima (Musatov), were arrested, taken to Ryazan and sentenced on charges of counter-revolutionary activities to various terms of exile to Kazakhstan; the monastery itself was closed and abolished. The St. John the Theologian Monastery was returned to the Russian Orthodox Church in the fall of 1988. Then the restoration began.

Over the past years, with God's help, a lot has already been done. In the St. John the Theologian Cathedral, a new carved iconostasis, in the Old Russian style, was built by Ryazan masters. The altar was painted by the Moscow icon painter Alexander Chashkin. The Assumption Church has been restored. The fraternal building was completely restored, in the lower floor of which a refectory for the brethren was built. Under the small tented bell tower, from the very first time of the monastery’s existence, it was consecrated temple in honor of the Tikhvin icon Mother of God and in the name of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker.

Church of the Icon of the Mother of God of Tikhvin. XVII century

The Church of the Tikhvin Icon of the Mother of God, Nicholas the Wonderworker and Tsar-Passion-Bearer Nicholas is built in the lower tier of a small hipped bell tower.

An ancient bell in front of the entrance to the Tikhvin Church

fence gate

Holy Gate

Domes over the Holy Gate

In the ancient Holy Gates there is a chapel in honor of the Iveron Icon of the Mother of God .

Iverskaya Chapel. XVII century

Part of the interior of the Iveron Chapel

On the third floor of the fraternal building a temple was built in honor of the icon of the Mother of God “Quick to Hear” and in the name of the Great Martyr Panteleimon. By the grace of God and the diligence of the monastery manager from 1989-2004. the deputy of Archimandrite Abel (Makedonov), many shrines were collected. Revered by the brethren miraculous icons The Most Holy Theotokos “Znamenie-Korchemnaya” and “Tikhvinskaya”.

The monastery houses relics with the relics of Saints George the Victorious, healer Panteleimon, Nicholas the Wonderworker and many other saints of God, both universal and domestic, as well as relics associated with the names of the holy martyr Misail of Ryazan.

Under the altar Theological Cathedral in 1993, a temple was built and consecrated in honor of St. Seraphim Sarovsky, Hieromartyr Juvenaly of Ryazan and all the new martyrs and confessors of Russia. The remains of the last three abbots of the monastery, found in 1992, are buried in this temple, and a fraternal ossuary is built, and Archimandrite Abel (Makedonov), who died in 2006, is buried here.

Wooden house of the governor with a brownie Znamenskaya Church

Excursions are organized for pilgrims with visits to churches and prayer at the monastery shrines. There is also a hotel for them where they can stay overnight. According to monastic custom, all pilgrims are offered a free meal.

Registration for long-term commemoration of health and repose is carried out, including through postal transfer.

One of the attractions of the monastery is the extensive library collected during recent years. In addition to modern publications on theology, philosophy, history, art, it also contains old printed books (the earliest - mid-17th century), rare pre-revolutionary publications and valuable manuscripts related to modern history Russian Church.

The monastery has an extensive subsidiary farm: for many years there has been its own apiary, bakery, and also a dairy shop. WITH God's help a pottery workshop was opened in 2008. The monastery garden is being built.

Patronal holidays

The fraternal building with the house Boris and Gleb Church

The St. John the Theologian Monastery in Poshupovo is considered one of the most ancient monasteries of the Ryazan land.

Its foundation dates back to the end of the 12th century.

True, there is no documentary information about this. There are only ancient legends about the Greeks who founded the monastery.

Greek monks brought with them the icon of John the Theologian, after which the monastery was named.

According to the same legend, at first the monastery was underground. The caves still exist today, but during our short visit to the monastery we could not figure out where they were.

In the Middle Ages, the monastery was plundered several times by Tatar nomads, and only Batu, who ravaged Ryazan, did not touch the monastery.

The history of the monastery is similar to the stories of other monasteries. In the middle of the 17th century, the first stone buildings appeared in it.

After the reform of 1764, which took away most of the land holdings, the monastery became poor, but by the middle of the 19th century there was a benefactor - David Ivanovich Khludov, through whose efforts the St. John the Theologian Monastery became one of the most comfortable monasteries of the Ryazan diocese.

After the 1917 revolution, the monastery was first plundered new government, and then, in 1931, it closed completely.

In monastery buildings over time Soviet power There was also a colony for minors and a school for mechanization and air traffic control.

In 1988, the monastery was transferred to the Church.

Under the leadership of Archimandrite Abel, the restoration of the St. John the Theologian Monastery began.

Now a lot has been done and you can see the beauty of the monastery in photographs, as well as when you come to Poshupovo in person.

Usually the central entrance to the monastery is the Holy Gate.

Now in the ancient Holy Gates there is a chapel of the Iveron Icon of the Mother of God.

The fact is that the fence has expanded somewhat since the 17th century and they ended up inside the monastery.

The Holy Gates have been preserved due to the high artistic value of the frescoes located inside.

But, as you can see in the photo, the degree of preservation of the frescoes is certainly not the best...

And here is the modern Holy Gate.

The tented bell tower appeared in the monastery in the middle of the 17th century. And the new bell tower was built in 1901 by the architect S.S. Tsekhansky. The bell tower is very high, only 5 meters lower than the Ivan the Great Bell Tower in the Moscow Kremlin.

Between the two bell towers is the cellar building, which, like the tented bell tower, was built in the middle of the 17th century.

In the lower tier of the tented bell tower there is a church, from which the restoration of the monastery began.

This church was consecrated in the name of the Tikhvin Icon of the Mother of God, St. Nicholas and the blessed Tsar-Passion-Bearer Nicholas.

Nearby is a cemetery with old tombstones.

The central cathedral of the monastery is St. John the Theologian Cathedral

Construction time this cathedral- end of the 17th century.

In the middle of the 19th century, the cathedral was in disrepair. And only with donations from D.I. Khludov managed to stop the destruction and renovate the cathedral by 1862.

After the revolution, the cathedral housed a club and various outbuildings, and only after the return of the monastery to the Church its restoration began.

Another large church of the monastery is the Assumption Cathedral.

It was built and consecrated in 1870. However, even before him, a temple in honor of the Dormition of the Mother of God stood on this site.

During Soviet times, it was used as a garage for equipment, so its condition at the end of the 20th century was extremely depressing.

Now the cathedral has been restored and is operational.

The decoration of the cathedral is very interesting - its iconostasis is made of faience.

Perhaps this is precisely the reason for the original tradition - in the cathedral (at least on ordinary days) candles are not lit, they are simply placed in front of the icons.

Most likely there is a fear that open fire and candle smoke will quickly destroy the interiors of the cathedral...

The fraternal building with the church in honor of the icon of the Mother of God "Quick to Hear" was built in 1868-78

The temple is not very noticeable, but many of the monastery’s shrines are kept here.

There are also new buildings in the monastery, for example this cell building for pilgrims with the Church of Boris and Gleb.

The building fits well into the monastery ensemble.

There is a small house near the Assumption Cathedral. It's called the "Hestster's House"

Archimandrite Abel lived here for a long time, who headed the monastery after the return of its Church, and made a lot of efforts to restore the monastery.

You cannot go to the St. John the Theologian Monastery and not visit the healing spring located next to it.

Moreover, the path to the source lies through the most beautiful places.

The area near the source is being improved, but it is still very good there. And drinking cold water from a spring on a hot summer day is simply a pleasure.

The baths at the source are located in the same building with separate entrances - for women and men.

The wooden building of the old bathhouse still stands. Then she was both for women's and men's. One by one, women and men entered, while others waited. But when the popularity of the spring increased, the bathhouse was clearly not enough, so a new one was built.