“It is very important to learn Christian asceticism.
Asceticism is not life in a cave and constant fasting,
austerity is the ability to regulate, among other things, one's own consumption by ideas and the state of one's heart.
Asceticism is the victory of man over lust, over passions, over instinct.”
© Patriarch Kirill
From the speech of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus' on the air of the Ukrainian TV channel "Inter"
Now the Russian holy fathers of the Russian Orthodox Church, who are monastics (black clergy), are the main determining and guiding force for the modernization of the entire great democratic Russia and the pious transformation of the spirituality of the wise and heroic Russian people.
A group photo of the faithful Supreme Teachers and Russian Reformers before a banquet in the Grand Kremlin Palace:
The monastery meal is a collective ritual. The monks ate twice a day: lunch and dinner, and on some days they ate only once (although this "once" could be very long); for various reasons, it occasionally happened that meals were completely excluded. The main thing was not the quantity of food, but the quality of the dishes: fast or modest, the role of the dish in rituals, the time of eating.
Lean baked cold fish with decoration with lean mayonnaise and chopped vegetables.
Sturgeon baked whole without skin
(before baking, carefully remove the skin from the base of the head to the tail from the fish).
Pike-perch stuffed with mushrooms, avocado, potatoes (avocado and potatoes 1:1) and herbs and baked in the oven. The monks consider pike perch the leanest fish, because. it has only 1.5% fat.
Additives to the monastic diet of fat-rich avocados, olives, and nuts make it possible to make up for the lack of fat on fasting days, on which, according to the monastic charter, dishes without oil are supposed to be eaten.
Representation of the ceremonial monastic dinner of the middle of the 19th century. allows you to compile a list of dishes that were served at the table on November 27, 1850, the day of the celebration of the memory of the founder of the monastery.
“Register of food on the feast of St. James 1850 November 27th
For an appetizer at the top
1. 3 kulebyaki with minced meat
2. 2 pike steamed on two dishes
3. Jellied perches with minced meat on two dishes
4. Boiled carp on two dishes
5. Fried bream on two dishes
In the fraternal meal for lunch
1. Kulebyaka with porridge
2. Pressed caviar
3. Lightly salted beluga
4. Botvinya with salted fish
5. Shchi with fried fish
6. Ear from carp and burbot
7. Pea sauce with fried fish
8. Fried cabbage
9. Dry bread with jam
10. Kanpot from apples
Snack for the white clergy
1. Caviar and white bread on 17 courses
2. Cold head with horseradish and cucumbers on 17 dishes”
Serving examples:
Lenten monastic table setting for dinner.
Slices of tomato with lean soy cheese, slices of lean fish sausage, fish and vegetable snacks, hot lenten a la carte dishes, various monastic drinks (kvass, fruit drink, freshly squeezed juices, mineral water), fruit plate, savory and sweet monastery pastries.
Monastic culinary recipes
St. Danilov Stauropegial Monastery
What is the fundamental difference in nutrition between laymen and monks - the former simply love to eat deliciously, the latter do the same, but with a deep charitable meaning and with lofty spiritual intentions. Of course, this great spiritual wisdom is not easily understood by ordinary lay people.
Blaming the contemporary atheistic Russian intelligentsia, Fr. Pavel Florensky said this about her attitude to food:
“The intellectual does not know how to eat, let alone eat, does not even know what it means to “eat”, what sacred food means: they don’t “eat” the gift of God, they don’t even eat food, but “burrow” chemical substances».
It is likely that many do not clearly understand the importance of food in the life of a Christian.
A modest monastic lunch:
Cold snacks:
- figured vegetable cutting,
- painted stuffed pike perch
- tender salmon of its own special salting
Snack hot:
- julienne of fresh forest mushrooms baked with bechamel sauce
Salad:
- vegetable with shrimps "Sea freshness"
First course:
- fish hodgepodge "monastic"
Second course:
- salmon steak with tartar sauce
Dessert:
- ice cream with fruits.
Beverages:
- branded monastic sea
- kvass
And, of course, for dinner are served:
- freshly baked bread, honey cakes, various savory and sweet pastries to choose from.
Serving examples:
Monastic lenten snacks for the common monastic table.
Semuzhka own special monastic ambassador.
For squeezing lemon juice, monastic cooks recommend wrapping it with gauze to prevent lemon seeds from getting in.
Lenten fish hodgepodge with salmon.
Lenten fish hodgepodge of sturgeon with pie stuffed with burbot liver.
Steam salmon with lean mayonnaise tinted with saffron.
Lenten rice pilaf, tinted with saffron, with slices of fish and various seafood, which God sent today for dinner to the monastic brethren.
Fruity bouquet for a common monastic table.
Monastic lean chocolate-nut log.
Chocolate-nut masses of three colors (from dark chocolate, white chocolate and milk chocolate) are prepared as indicated in the previous recipe "Monastic Lenten Candy Truffles". Then they are poured in layers into a mold, previously neatly covered with plastic wrap.
The widespread use of various nuts and chocolate in the monastic diet makes it possible to make monastic food tasty and quite complete.
Monastic fasting sweets-truffles.
Ingredients: 100 g of dark dark chocolate, 1 teaspoon of olive oil (on days when oil is prohibited, do not add olive oil, but the sweets will turn out to be somewhat harder), 100 g of peeled nuts, 1 teaspoon of good cognac or rum, a little grated nutmeg.
Peel the nuts in a mortar, heat the chocolate with the addition of olive oil, stirring, in a water bath to 40 gr. C, add crushed nuts, grated nutmeg and cognac, stir; take a warm mass with a teaspoon in a plate with cocoa powder (to taste, powdered sugar can be added to cocoa powder) and, rolling in cocoa powder, form balls the size of a walnut.
Recall that in monasteries they do not eat meat very often, in some they do not eat it at all. Therefore, the "spell" "Crucian, crucian, turn into a pig" does not work.
On great and patronal holidays, the brothers are blessed with a “consolation” - a glass of red wine - French or, at worst, Chilean. And, of course, dishes are being prepared for a special holiday menu.
breakfast menu of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus' on one of the days of April 2011.
Menus of patriarchal nutrition are carefully developed and balanced by nutritionists to maintain the proper energy in the patriarch, which is necessary for the tireless conduct of his enormous spiritual, organizational and representative work.
In the patriarchal menus, all raw materials and ready-made dishes undergo the same check as in the Kremlin kitchen. All the dishes on the patriarch's table are the fruit of a long analysis, discussions and endless tastings of the highest class culinary specialists, sanitary doctors and nutritionists.
For Patriarch Kirill's indispensable faith in God's mercy and protection is a high spiritual matter, and the work of the patriarchal guards from the FSO and the corresponding doctors and laboratories is a daily earthly matter.
Cold dishes:
Sturgeon caviar with buckwheat pancakes.
Caspian sturgeon, smoked, with galantine from grapes and sweet pepper.
Salmon stroganina with parmesan cheese and avocado mousse.
Snacks:
Pheasant roll.
Calf jelly.
Bunny pate.
Pancake pie with blue crabs.
Hot appetizers:
Fried grouse.
Duck liver with rhubarb sauce with fresh berries.
Hot fish dishes:
Rainbow trout poached in champagne.
Hot meat dishes:
Smoked duck strudel.
Roe deer back with lingonberry galantine.
Venison grilled.
Sweet foods:
Cake with white chocolate.
Fresh fruits with strawberry galantine.
Baskets with fresh berries in champagne jelly.
The monastery chef is happy to share his recipes for vegetable salad with shrimp and fish hodgepodge.
First of all, in order for everything to turn out tasty and pleasing to God, you need to start cooking by reading a prayer. Have you read? Now to business!
Serving examples:
Layered lenten salad according to the monastery recipe.
Lay the salad in layers, each layer under lean mayonnaise, salt to taste.
1st layer - canned crab meat, finely chopped (or crab sticks),
2nd layer - boiled rice,
3rd layer - boiled or canned squid, finely chopped,
4th layer - Beijing cabbage, finely chopped,
5th layer - steamed stellate sturgeon, finely chopped,
b-th layer - boiled rice.
Decorate with lean mayonnaise, caviar, green leaf and serve to the monk's table.
Vinaigrette according to the monastery recipe.
The composition of the vinaigrette includes: baked whole in the oven, peeled and diced: potatoes, carrots, beets; canned green peas onion, pickles, olive oil.
Sometimes monastery cooks prepare a vinaigrette with the addition of boiled beans and mushrooms (boiled or salted, or pickled).
To taste, finely chopped salted herring can be added to the vinaigrette.
Lenten portioned dish of lobster boiled in vegetable kurt-broth (dip a live lobster upside down in boiling kurt-broth of carrots, onions, herbs, salt and spices, lobster boil time is 40 minutes, then let it brew for 10 minutes under the lid) with a side dish of boiled rice, tinted with saffron, and vegetables with separately served in a cup of lean flour sauce from sturgeon broth with the addition of onion, mashed through a sieve, simmered until transparent (avoid browning) and spices; garnish with a slice of lemon.
There is still a lot of interesting things about products, dishes and those who eat these dishes.
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Girls, yesterday I took my mother for examinations - veins, joints, flat feet - as a result, swollen legs and it hurts to walk. The doctors said - the first is to lose weight, my mother weighs 80-82 kg with a height of 156 cm. The fact is that she has long been preoccupied with this weight and eats almost nothing - she lives alone, drinks coffee, eats cheese, vegetables, meat not every day. Doesn't have dinner at night. BUT something weight only + - 2 kg goes .. I'm thinking - if we start from our rules - do I need to force her to eat 4-5 times a day? She's out of the habit and can't do that much.. And drink water? Or how to lose 10 kg in old age????
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Diet of Athos monks: do's and don'ts. Great fasting and diet. What to eat in fasting? Do's and Don'ts: Products for Lenten and Fast Days. Quite physiological nutrition, unlike the Dukan and Atkins diets and a huge number of them. The survey, IMHO, is incorrect.
The food of the monks gives us a good example of the diet we should follow in our lives. Monks don't eat meat. They eat a lot of legumes and in some cases eat fish. They eat twice a day at fixed times and consume small amounts.
During the summer months meals are two meals: one at 8 am for breakfast and one at 6 pm for dinner, with no lunch or meal in between.
During the winter months, the clocks change by one hour.
But why do you only get breakfast and dinner?
The hours of Mount Athos are solar, the monks call them "Byzantine time". Byzantine time is based on sunset. With the sunset, the day ended, and this moment coincides with all the monks who have finished their work.
In this way, they know exactly when they will eat, and therefore their body has adapted to balanced diet and a fixed schedule.
In addition, the measure satisfies the consumption of a certain amount of food. In particular, once the amount of food is finished, there is no possibility for supplementation.
The quality level of their products is very high, since all products are organic and grow in their beds.
The way of cooking is also very simple, the foods they choose help them in their mental activity and in their bodily strengthening.
Therefore, they successfully do their job.
Despite the absence of meat in their diet, they do not have health problems, on the contrary, they rarely get sick, and even if they do, they are usually already old.
It is worth noting that the monks do not smoke.
Let's summarize the diet on Athos and highlight the most important secrets:
Products without fat and spices,
Small portions of food at certain times;
Abstinence from meat
The use of only olive oil in food - butter, margarine, cream, and other related products in cooking are excluded;
Olives, vegetables, bread and pasta;
Cheese, eggs and pies (except fast days)
Consumption of shellfish (squid, octopus, cuttlefish),
fasting period,
Unlimited consumption of herbs, mushrooms and wild berries (strawberries, cranberries, blueberries, cranberries, chestnuts, etc.);
Wine, crayfish, coffee, tea and halva
Consuming plenty of vegetables and fruits rich in vitamins (A, C, E), folic acid, micronutrients, antioxidants and fiber.
Their diet is "poor" only in saturated animal fats. Legumes, in turn, are the "meat" of fasting. They contain complex carbohydrates and protein fat proteins.
When legumes are properly combined with cereals (rice, corn, bread), they give us protein equal to meat.
Bread is at the heart of the monastic nutritional pyramid and, in addition to complex carbohydrates(the main source of energy for our body), it contains fiber and vitamins B and E.
A rich diet with nutritional value, like that of the monks, forms a natural shield for protection of cardio-vascular system and has the following advantages:
● Reduces blood cholesterol and triglyceride levels
● Helps regulate blood sugar and arterial pressure
● Protects bones from osteoporosis and various types of cancer.
● Has anti-aging properties.
● Helps improve bowel function.
For monks, fasting is the basis of all virtues.
Fasting is the reduction and replacement of food with care and observance of the rules.
The law of fasting seems to apply to the body, and in particular to the stomach, but in fact it applies to the soul, and especially to the mind.
At the 7th Congress of the oncological clinic in Western Greece, held on December 10, 2011 in Patras, the monk Epiphanius of the Holy Mountain, the elder of St. Eustathius (Mylopotamos) spoke.
I deliberately quote this from his speech: “Today, about two thousand monks live on Mount Athos. They usually die of natural causes, living to a ripe old age. Important role in the physical health of monks, this is an inevitable fast. Fasting is usually not a punishment. This is an offer of salvation. Monks follow the rules of fasting with pleasure because they experience the benefits. Fasting clears the mind. Reflects thinking. Fasting is as essential as breathing ».
Potatoes “in uniform” in the monastery are jokingly called “in cassock” - after all, monks do not wear uniforms
Recently, I began to notice that when talking about products, dishes “monastic ...”, or “like a monastery ...”, people mean: “high-quality”, “real”, “delicious”. Honey, bread, lunch...
Observing it on purpose, it struck me that this trend is not only expanding, but is already being used by various product manufacturers, conscientious and not so good. Then the question arose: what is modern monastic food, monastic products? What stands behind the recognition of the consumer - the traditional respect for the religious way of life, which excludes deceit and laziness, or the absence of intelligible state quality guidelines, the same GOSTs, for example?
For answers to these questions, we turned to Father Micah, Hieromonk of the Holy Danilov Monastery. The path that led this remarkable man to the church was not easy.
Let's start with the fact that Father Mikhey was a paratrooper and knows the concept of "hot spot" firsthand. Already, while in the monastery, Father Mikhei performed difficult obediences: setting up a skete in the Ryazan region, organizing a monastery apiary, acting as a cellarer in the St. Danilov Monastery itself, and many others that I don’t know about.
As a result, we managed to build a picture of how a Russian Orthodox monastery lives today from questions and answers: what it produces, what it eats, whom and how it feeds.
AIF.RU: It is known that the vast majority of monasteries in Rus' were self-sufficient in the production, storage and distribution of products. The monasteries owned gardens, fields, orchards, ponds and apiaries. Also, since ancient times, the tradition of feeding monastic products not only to the brethren, but also to workers, pilgrims, students, and guests has been preserved. Is this tradition alive in St. Daniel's Monastery today?
O. Mikhey: From a century in Rus', monasteries were not only centers of spiritual life, but also economic ones. Not only did they feed themselves, but they also carried out selection work, grew new varieties of plants, searched for and found new ways to store and preserve food. For many hundreds of years, monasteries not only fed themselves, but also widely helped those in need. As in normal times, and especially in war years, during lean periods, during epidemics.
There is no other way in the monastery: today the economy of the St. Danilov Monastery feeds up to 900 people daily. We have a little over 80 brethren, almost 400 laity workers. And also pilgrims, guests of the monastery, those in need - every day the monastery kitchen, with God's help, provides food for all these people.
Most of the products we have are our own production. This is flour, from the monastic fields in the Ryazan region, and vegetables, and fruits, and honey. For the time being, we mainly buy fish, but we want to dig ponds in the same place, on the lands of the skete, and start raising fish. We keep cows - for butter, cottage cheese, milk. They don't eat meat in the monastery.
- How did the revival of the monastic economy begin?
— The revival of the monastic economy began from the moment it was handed over to the Church in 1983. Over the next five years, the monastery as a whole was restored, and the economy providing it began to function along with it. However, up to a truly independent structure that produces, preserves and nourishes – we are still just going to this all.
Until 1917, the monastery had vast lands, arable land, apiaries, and ponds. There were many good products. The monastery sold a lot, incl. in their own shops and stores. People have always loved them - both Muscovites and pilgrims. Then everything was destroyed, literally - to the ground.
But over the past 17 years, of course, a lot has been done. If you look back today, you see how much we, with God's help, have achieved! And we ourselves grow wheat on the monastery lands, grind flour, bake our famous muffin. And we grow and preserve all the vegetables we need: we preserve, sour, salt.
And now the monastery has more than one apiary - in the suburbs at the monastery farm, near Ryazan, near Anapa and from Altai, honey is also supplied from the apiaries of the Church of the Archangel Michael. Near Ryazan is the largest apiary. Now we have about 300 hives here, and during the season we manage to get more than 10 varieties of honey in apiaries. This is sweet clover, and linden, and buckwheat, and forest and field forbs honeys. Every new season, before the departure of the bees, special prayers are performed to consecrate the apiary, and the beekeepers receive a blessing for the upcoming work.
Honey is such a product - God's blessing. He should be treated that way. After all, if you put an apiary, for example, near the road, then there is nothing coming out of the exhaust pipes: both lead and all kinds of heavy metals. And the bees also collect all this and transfer it to honey. We are responsible before God for the fact that we have apiaries in good, ecologically clean places, and now we offer pure honey to people.
We love our people and want people to be healthy and beautiful and that children are born healthy. Beekeeping is a traditional Russian craft. Back in the 16th century, they said: "Russia is a country where honey flows." Almost every house was engaged in honey. It was also supplied abroad with wax. All Russian people ate honey. It is a necessary product for every person.
It is now customary for us to eat honey only when we are sick. Only this is wrong. Honey should be eaten three times a day: a spoonful in the morning, afternoon and evening. Honey contains everything the body needs, including vitamins. After all, honey is a natural product that people have been eating for centuries to improve their health. Warriors of the past on campaigns always had honey with them. Tasting it, they increased their strength before the upcoming battle.
They began to revive the tradition of monastic bread. People come for our pastries from all over Moscow and even from the Moscow region. A variety of pies, which are prepared according to old monastic recipes, are very popular. Made with soul - and people love it!
Our parishioners and guests of the monastery really appreciate the fact that we use recipes not only from our monastery, but also from other holy places: for example, we have yeast-free bread baked according to Athos recipes, we eat bread from sisters from the Serpukhov Convent.
- And all this is managed by a small brethren of St. Danilov Monastery?
— Of course not! Lay workers and volunteers help us. There are really few monks, especially those who know how to work on earth. Many came to the monastery from the cities, some are not able to do physical labor. But work in honey apiaries is called "sweet hard labor" ...
Not everyone knows how much work you have to put in order to good products hit the table and the monastery.
— Tell us, please, about the monastic food system. What products and dishes make up the monastic table for the brethren?
— We don’t come to the monastery to eat delicious food – we come to reach the Kingdom of Heaven through labor, prayers and obedience. The highest virtue is fasting, prayer, rejection of worldly temptations and obedience.
By the way, according to the monastic charter, there are about 200 fasting days a year. Fasts are divided into multi-day (Great, Petrovsky, Assumption and Christmas) and one-day (Wednesday, Friday of each week). It was during the days of abstinence from fast food that thousands of original, simple, accessible to the population dishes were developed in the monastery refectories.
The main difference between the monastic table and the worldly table is that we do not eat meat. In the monastery they eat vegetables, cereals, dairy products, pastries and fish, mushrooms. A lot of sauerkraut, cucumbers, tomatoes, mushrooms are always prepared in the storerooms of the monastery.
The cellar supervises this, and the monk brothers and the laity workers do it. And it goes to the table for everyone without exception. According to the charter, the monks eat only twice a day: at lunch and at dinner. The cellar of the monastery especially makes sure that the meals are both tasty, varied and supportive - after all, the interval before meals is long, and no one sits idly by, everyone has their own housework - obedience.
The everyday menu usually consists of fish soup, if allowed on that day, pickle, vegetable, mushroom or milk soup, and fish with a side dish. For dessert - tea, compote or jelly, pies, cookies. The Sunday menu consists of fish borscht, fried fish with a side dish of mashed potatoes or rice with vegetables, fresh vegetables, cold cuts of fish and products from the monastery courtyard - cheese, sour cream and milk. On the holidays of Christmas and Easter, a festive menu is served at the meal.
We have Father Hermogenes - he was the cellar of the monastery for more than 10 years, so he even wrote a book about the monastery meal, "The Kitchen of Father Hermogenes." On this moment cellar in the monastery of Fr. Theognost. I was a cellarer for several years, and before that I carried out obedience in the construction of the skete, the restoration of the Church of the Archangel Michael, the care of apiaries, the bakery ...
Now I have an obedience - I offer monastic products for Muscovites, in a honey shop and 2 monastic stores "Monastyrsky honey" and "Monastic grocery store", where you can buy our products: honey, beekeeping products, honey jam, an assortment of fish, cereals, monastery pastries, yeast-free bread, pies, health products: alcohol-free balms, sbitni, teas, herbs.
And also I have an obedience in the department of making posters of spiritual and patriotic content by modern and classical artists.
— We thank you, father Mikhey for your attention and story. We wish you joy in your work!
- Publications
Monastery life
At that moment, when a worldly person decides to put on an angelic image and change his habitual clothes for a monastic cassock, his life turns into a path along which, step by step, he tries to get closer to God. And in order for this path of monastic life to be the most successful, the holy fathers developed an excellent "program" for everyday spiritual life - the charter. The cenobitic charter that prevails today in the monasteries of Russia, Greece and Mount Athos comes from the Studio tradition. This tradition was brought to Athos by St. Athanasius of Athos (961), who later became abbot of the Great Lavra. The charter of the Athos community harmoniously combines hesychasm, prayer and obedience. That is why the resurgent Nikolaevsky Malitsky Monastery, when choosing a monastery charter, settled on the Athos tradition.
LIFE
For Malitsky monks, it is quite simple. In a cenobitic (cinovial) monastery, everything is common, including the meal. There are separate, so-called "decent" tables in the refectory if you need to receive guests and honor them with your presence.
A monastic monk has a room - a cell with a bed, a pillow and a mattress, a water jug with a cup, two wardrobes for clothes and books, icons, a table, a reading lamp and a chair. Judging by the size of the cell (3.5 x 1.90 meters), one can imagine how many things will fit there. Monks who are studying can ask for a CD player or cassette recorder in their cell. If a radio receiver is built into the tape recorder, it is broken out. In general, if a monk needs even such a trifle as toothpaste, he turns to the abbot of the monastery. Without a blessing, a monk will literally not bring even a needle into the cell. Moreover, most of the inhabitants arrange an audit of their cell once every few months in order to find items that can be disposed of. Every thing eats up time. The more things you have, the more time they take away from the main goal of life.
The clothes of a monk - a sign of repentance and humility - consist of a cassock, a leather belt, trousers and a skufi. Expensive, silk or colored fabrics are not blessed - wool and costume fabric are used. At the services, the monks are required to be present in the Greek cassock and klobuk (kamilavka with a basting). Linen can consist of two or three shirts and trousers. Shoes, jackets can be working and clean. Any clothing in excess of the above is considered excess.
The inhabitants do not earn money for their living on their own, as they are fully supported by the monastery, and they receive everything they need from batteries to medicines with the blessing of the abbot. Of course, the revival monastery accepts donations from various individuals and organizations. Due to the lack of trade and a developed economy, the monastery does not have permanent material receipts. There is no bookstore either, so besides the candles in the temple, "experienced" pilgrims will not be able to buy anything.
What all monks have in common is a cell, but in it they are “tenants”, or guests for the time allotted by the Lord for repentance. Earthly life is temporary: there is no need to worry about comforts. A cell for monks is a coffin where one should think about death. The monks as a whole look at life, the body and the world as at a coffin: life is bitter and short on earth, but infinitely sweet in heaven.
CELL RULE.
Each monk has his own appearance, spiritual world and internal routine, therefore, for each monk, the confessor special approach. At the same time, the life of the monastery still obeys a strict charter and flows strictly according to the schedule. Long before dawn, no later than an hour before the start of the morning service, at a quarter to five, the monks wake up to fulfill their cell rule. The great service starts an hour early. The personal monastic rule is performed mainly according to the rosary. Their monks always have with them. Knot after knot they repeat the most important ascetic prayer: "Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me." The monks read the night prayer or canon every night, and every night they ask the Lord God for help in the fight against human passions and worldly thoughts.
The holy fathers call the night prayer the "arena", since every night in the cells prayer battles are fought with dark forces. And the faster the monk approaches God, acquiring virtues, the stronger the attack from the dark forces. Personal prayer and teaching is one's own feat in the cell.
The cell rule is performed standing, with the sign of the cross and small bows from the waist at each prayer. For hermits, it consists of 12 rosaries (hundreds) with small bows and one with great ones, for mantle monks it consists of 6 rosaries (hundreds) with small bows and 60 great bows, and for novice monks and novices of 3 rosaries with small bows and 33 great bows. Earthly bows are left only on Sundays of the whole year, and on Bright Week.
SERVICE
Worship has always been and continues to be the center of all monastic life.
The liturgical charter, which the modern Malitsky Monastery adheres to, was compiled by the ancient holy fathers - the Athonites. According to its rules, it is more suitable for the desert-hermit life. IN present time owing to the especially developed conditions of life, this charter is not observed as strictly as before. But the modern charter, worked out by life, is also not easy. It can be said with certainty that in Russia there are hardly a dozen monasteries that follow such a charter. Church services are, of course, daily. In total, the monks take about seven hours of worship a day, taking into account the cell monastic rule.
The main places of liturgical worship in the Malitskaya monastery are the large Church of the Intercession, which plays the role of a katholikon (καθολικὸν - the cathedral church of the monastery), and the "old church" paraklis (παρεκκλήσ) - a small house church in honor of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, located in the southern wing of the fraternal corps. Usually, daily services of the daily cycle are performed in the old (house) church, and in the new one - Pokrovsky, which is much larger in size - they serve on major holidays and Sundays throughout the year.
At a quarter to six, Midnight Office begins. This part of the service is always performed in the dark, and only the glare from burning lamps illuminates the walls of the temple. In a side corner illuminated by a lamp, one of the monk-readers reads the Midnight Office. The atmosphere is peaceful, prayerful: in the muffled light of the lamps illuminating the golden backgrounds on the icons, black-clad figures of monks and novices silently appear, traditionally baptized and bowing towards the altar and both kliros; they take the morning blessing from the abbot and disperse to the stasidia.
On weekdays, the entire service is read and sung "quickly", instead of longer Byzantine chants, "everyday" is used.
After the midnight service, if it is read in the Church of the Intercession, the priest opens the veil of the Royal Doors of the vestibule and everyone goes into main temple where matins and hours will be served.
Along the walls of the entire temple, monks and laity are located in stasidia. Thanks to this distribution, the temple is placed a large number of people, while not creating fuss and noise.
A quarter of an hour before the start of the Divine Liturgy, a monk, dressed in a robe, goes around the monastery and, with blows on a portable wooden beater (τάλαντον), summons workers and pilgrims to the temple for one article. Then he immediately hits the iron beater (riveted), after which, if there is a holiday, there is a short ringing in the bell tower.
Liturgy on ordinary days lasts about an hour. The moments of the liturgy that are considered the most important - the initial exclamation "Blessed is the kingdom", the great entrance, the epiclesis, the exclamation "Holy to the Holy", the time of Communion (from the exclamation "With the fear of God" to the exclamation "Always, now and forever ..."), are marked by those that at this time everyone comes out of the stasidia and bows low.
The frequency of confession in the Malitsky monastery is not stipulated by a single rule and is determined by the spiritual need of each resident. Confession is usually made in one of the aisles of the cathedral or in the confessor's cell. The confessor in the monastery is the hegumen. All brethren partake of the Holy Mysteries at least once a week (usually on Tuesday and Saturday or Sunday, clergy monks commune every day.
At the end of the liturgy, if there is a celebration for the saint, a dish with koliv is delivered in front of the proskintarium (analoe for the icon), the troparion and kontakion to the saint are sung, the serving hieromonk censes the kolivo and reads a prayer for his blessing; the same thing happens on the days of commemoration of the dead (with the singing of funeral troparia instead of the festive one). At the end of the liturgy, an antidoron is distributed to the faithful.
The requirements in the monastery are performed in limited quantity. Basically it is baptism and funeral service. The frequency of confession of the brethren is determined by their desire. The hegumen blesses them to come to him at least once a week, not necessarily for confession - you can just for a conversation. While the abbot is outside the walls of the monastery, all divine services are performed by the second monastery priest.
Immediately after the completion of the Divine Liturgy, tea usually follows around 9.30 am.
OBEDIENCES
After tea, the monks retire for a while to rest, after which they go to daily obediences, that is, to work. All monks go to obedience, including the abbot, since common work is fundamental in every cenobitic monastery. And no matter how difficult or unpleasant the obedience may be, the monk accepts it as sent by God, as the Cross, the bearing of which is the way to salvation.
In the Malitsky Monastery, various obediences are performed: secretary, sacristy, librarian, ecclesiarch, sexton, singers, readers, bell ringers, icon painters, in the kitchen - cooks and trapezars, carpenters, builders, cleaners, gardener, beekeeper, gasman, driver, guide, etc. d. In addition, fathers should participate in common works (panginyas), such as watering and harvesting, cleaning the territory, preparing for the patronal feast, etc. The monastery has several courtyards, where brothers and parishioners also work. Pious laity provide great help to the monastery; they selflessly work for the Glory of God, helping the brethren in almost all obediences. Often you have to involve electricians, plumbers and other specialists from the "world".
The word obedience (diakonym) in Greek comes from the verb diakono, which means: "service of love." The offering of love is also being in prayer and remembrance of God.
Therefore, during the obediences, the brethren say the Jesus Prayer. Be sure to pray out loud so as not to be distracted and not to talk to each other. Those who practice do not pray aloud mental labor, for example, the office or guides working with pilgrims.
Any obedience has an established rank. If circumstances allow, then they fulfill it for a year or two, then they give another. Sometimes they leave it for another year. The one who fulfills it must, on all issues, contact his leader (chief in obedience) or, if necessary, directly to the abbot. This achieves a lot: it does not allow fantasy to rush about and offer solutions, clears the mind of complex and simple thoughts, focuses attention on prayer, teaches you to seek advice and cut off your will. To ask is to be saved. There is obedience - there will be humility - the basis of obedience itself.
In cinovium, monastic duties are carried out responsibly. Where at least a few people live, there are already many worries. There are no fewer things to ensure the life of the monastery than in any human society. And only unquestioning obedience and precise performance can ensure the well-being and tranquility of a monk.
For perfect obedience and cutting off thoughts and will, from the first day of life in the Malitsky Monastery, the inhabitants are required to learn how to perform any work accurately and consistently. The rules briefly formulated by Fr. Joachim from the skete of St. Anna: talk like a monk, look like a monk, eat like a monk, sleep like a monk, think like a monk, pray like a monk, perform obedience like a monk - the fathers try to observe always and everywhere.
MEAL
There is a meal at exactly one in the afternoon. 5 minutes before its start, all the inhabitants are notified by rhythmic knocks on the iron beater. The refectory in the monastery is located next to the Church of the Intercession, inside on the east side, there is a table of the abbot; along the walls there are tables for monks and pilgrims; To western wall, much higher than the floor, a pulpit with a stand for a book in the form of a golden eagle for a reader is attached. During the meal, the teachings of St. fathers or the lives of the saints.
The meal depends on the day of the week and the preparation for the Communion of the Holy Mysteries. The monks themselves eat little, since food is secondary to them. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays - the food is simple, lenten. During the fasts, only vegetable food is relied upon; there is not even olive oil on the tables. Eating fish on a fast day is a big sin. The inhabitants eat food twice a day, never eating meat and wine. On ordinary days, there is soup, potatoes or pasta, rice, salad, vegetables and fruits on the tables. From drinking - herbal tea, dried fruit compote and water. On holidays and Sundays, salted or baked fish, eggs and cocoa can be served.
At the meal, after a short prayer, the brethren eat in silence for no more than 15 minutes. At this time, the Lives of the Saints or spiritual teachings are read. Sometimes in front of the abbot's table you can see a monk performing a punishment for an offense - bows. During the meal, the abbot strikes the bell three times: after the 1st strike, drinking is allowed, after the 2nd, the reader stops reading, descends from the pulpit and accepts the blessing from the abbot, and the trapezar (if it is Sunday) brings the abbot ukrukha (leftover bread) for blessing , after the 3rd stroke, the eating stops, everyone stands up, then prayers of thanksgiving are read. Before thanksgiving prayers, several are added. petitions uttered alternately by the hegumen and the reader. After the meal, the abbot becomes right side from going out with a raised hand in blessing; the cook, the reader and the trapezar freeze in a bow in front of the abbot (on the left side of the exit), asking for forgiveness from the brethren for possible errors in their service. Thus, everyone leaving the refectory "falls" under the blessing of the father rector. After the meal, the fathers again disperse according to their obediences.
VESPERS
One hour before Vespers, after the monastic labors, rest is allowed. This helps the brethren to have the strength to pray at the evening service. Twice, half an hour before a quarter, the sound of a wooden beater again calls all the inhabitants to the temple. Vespers, preceded by the reading of the 9th hour, begins at 5 pm. It lasts about an hour and ends with a daily funeral litia performed in the vestibule. An evening meal follows immediately after the service.
Dinner often consists of the same dishes and in the same quantity as at lunch, only cold. Only sick people are allowed to take food out of the refectory. Weak brothers from among the laity living in the monastery and bearing a certain obedience are allowed to drink tea with a piece of bread in the evening. In the cell and in obedience, sometimes you can drink tea, but you must definitely take a blessing for this. In general, a blessing is taken for any, even the most insignificant action.
After supper, the brethren immediately go to the temple to serve Compline. On it, a prayer canon to the Mother of God is sung in front of the Vatopedi icon “Joy and Consolation”, and then the abbot anoints everyone with oil from the lamp burning before the holy image. Also at Compline, the Akathist to the Mother of God is read daily. This Athonite feature is never omitted, since the Mother of God is the guardian not only of Her earthly inheritance - Holy Mount Athos, but also the Mother of all monks in general. Compline ends with prayers for the coming sleep. At the end of the service, to the Byzantine singing of the Theotokos troparion “To the beauty of your virginity ...”, all the inhabitants venerate the icons and take a blessing from the abbot for the coming night.
After Compline (at 19.15) there is a short period of time, about an hour, when there is an opportunity to talk with each other. But then conversations with anyone, including pilgrims, are not blessed, so as not to fall into idleness and condemnation. Talking too much is harmful; it has a negative effect on monastic work. Monks do not have a special need to communicate with each other: if a monk is attentive to himself, observes the monastic rules and does not hide his thoughts from the confessor, grace consoles him and he does not have a great need to speak. Evening silence should prepare your mind for night prayer.
After Compline, monks are also strictly forbidden to enter the cells of pilgrims without blessing. Radio and TV are prohibited in the monastery. No one leaves the monastery without a blessing.
HYGIENE
The ancient founders of monasticism for the sake of the salvation of the soul were indifferent to the body. Thus, the father of monasticism, St. Anthony the Great (251-326) ate bread and salt, lived in caves, without observing hygiene. Previously, monks in Svyatogorsk monasteries were forbidden and considered a sin to wash their hair, comb their hair or beard, and go to the bathhouse. Very strict ascetics did not wash their faces, washing themselves only with their own tears. In modern times, the rules regarding personal hygiene have softened. Monks are allowed to bathe, and medication is mandatory. There is a monastery doctor who often comes to the monastery and regularly examines each monk and worker. If serious symptoms are found, then hospitalization is made in the regional hospital. Health is a gift from God and is taken very seriously in the monastery.
Some rules remained unchanged: without special need, do not expose the body, even hands during work. For monks, seeing a person, for example, in shorts, with bare legs (not to mention women) is considered a great indecency.
DREAM
The monks sleep in clothes: in cassocks, loosening the belt, in thin cloth skufis and socks, in order to always be ready for prayer, obedience, and the Last Judgment. Sleep occupies exactly the same place in monastic life as eating: the monks sleep as much as necessary so as not to lose their sanity and be able to fulfill their obediences. Usually it is 5-6 hours. It should be noted that the cenobitic charter is specially scheduled in such a way that the time of eating is never combined with the time of rest and sleep. This is very important point from an ascetic point of view.
The pilgrims living in the monastery gradually accustom themselves to a strict routine. They also have to get out of bed long before dawn for the church service, and in order to understand and feel the whole essence of the monastic reality, this is really necessary to do.
The day is divided into approximately 3 eight hours, allotted for prayer, work and rest. Ancient Greek. the verse describes the daily work of the monk as follows: (Γράφε, μελέτα, ψάλλε - στέναζε, προσεύχου, σιώπα) "Write, study, sing, sigh, pray, be silent."
