English Editions / The Life and Works of Saint Sergius, Hegumen of Radonezh, Miracle-worker of all Russia

Foreword by the author

“You came closer to God than any of the earthly ones”: such are the words of one of the prayers to Saint Sergius of Radonezh. Saint Sergius revived in Russia the ascetic monastic practices, established several monasteries and trained nearly a hundred monks – ascetics who in their turn founded many monasteries, which illuminated the East and the North of Russia. Saint Sergius was at the same time a wise adviser and inspirer of Russian dukes, assisting the formation of the Russian state under the rule of the Grand Duke Dimitri Donskoy of Moscow. Having received a special blessing from Saint Sergius, Grand Duke Dimitri Donskoy rose up bravely against the Tartar Khan Mamai and defeated him in the bloody Battle of Kulikov, initiating the liberation of Russia from the Tartar yoke.
The first hagiography of Saint Sergius was written by his disciple Epiphanius the Wise, twenty-six years after the blissful passage of Radonezh’s ascetic. There are more than ten different hagiographies of the Saint at present. The hagiography written by Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow is considered to be the best one. However, it is very concise as it is intended for reading in church during the Services and it does not contain details that are precious to the awestruck admirer of the great God-pleaser.
This work is mainly the narration taken from two books: the first – “The Life and Works of our Holy God-bearing father Sergius, Hegumen of Radonezh, Miracle-worker of all Russia by priest-monk Nikon (Rozhdestvensky), (first published in 1892), the second – “Saint Sergius of Radonezh and the Trinity Lavra founded by him” by the academician E. Golubinsky (1909). The original texts have been abridged and put into modern language.

Serge Jumati
Saint-Petersburg, January 2009.
 
Englishtranslationof  ‘Жизнь и подвиги святого Сергия Радонежского, всея Руси игумена и чудотворца’, published in March 2009 by Gozalov Books
Editor: M. Lydia, Mother Superior  of the Convent of the Mother of God Portaitissa, Trazegnies, Belgium
Translators: Guram Kochibrolashvili, The Hague, Holland and Oxana Podyablosnkaya, Togliatty, Russia
Corrections: Marijcke Tooneman, The Hague, Holland and Wilfred Rosdorff, Minsk, Belarus             
Extent: 96 pages (estimate)
Format Size: 216 x 140 mm
Illustrations: 5 water-colours  
                          
Design: Guram Kochibrolashvili and  Marijcke Tooneman
Cover image: a photo of an icon of Saint Sergius of Radonezh from the domestic chapel of the former Dutch Queen Anna Paulowna, who was a member of the Royal Romanov House, and the wife of  King Willem II of the Netherlands.