Life of Elder Gabriel

Book Review

Life of St. Gabriel (†1915)

by Archmandrite Symeon Kholmogorov (†1937)

Platina 2016

At the"Great Flowering," our Church prophets tell us, the Russian Church will be purged of all its false clergy (KGB agents).  And the prophecy clarifies that all of the bishops will be kicked out (every single one) and almost all of the priests.  At the fall of Communism in 1991 not a single clergyman was removed from the Russian Church.   Not even the ones known to be KGB agents, like Kyrill (Comrade Mikhail) and Alexey II (Comrade Drozdov) nor any of the others that were revealed at the opening of the KGB archives.  Not a single one.  

Platina over the past two decades has continued to come out with some good materials, but their push of the false elders is also continual and ever-increasing.  I might have first noticed it with their book about Sophrony (So-Phony) who had "visions" before he was even baptized.  That book was published in 2005.  Since then other neo-likely-false elders have been promoted and supported by Platina as well.   Some true ones, but always non-Russian.

Too many of the pre-1982 books about our true Russian elders, that Fr. Seraphim introduced to English-speakers, are out of print.  Yet Platina does not put any effort to reprint these treasures, and instead always points away from Russia (which brought holiness to America) and points to the neo-false elders, promoting them and endorsing them.  Every year Platina gets worse, sinks deeper; why is Platina so focused on the the neo-elders encouraging littles ones to have itching ears?  So, you can imagine my delight to see the first English edition of the Life of St. Gabriel now available and included in Platina's online catalog.  The original Russian Life of St. Gabriel was written/published by St. Gabriel's disciple in 1915.  This book can be ordered new from Platina for a very fair price.  Do add this book to your home Orthodox Library.  But, with a warning:

Cavaet Lector

let the reader beware

There are two forewords to the book.  The one is written by our trusted ROCOR sister Helen Kontsevitch and translated from the 2nd edition of the Russian which was published in 1964 by Jordanville.  Another foreword is added by the untrustworthy neo-Platina (Abbot Damascene).  In this newly added forward it's revealed why Platina is publishing this Life of a Russian elder.

First of all, St. Gabriel is one of the most-new of the Russian elders (†1915), but more, he had/has a very dedicated and insistent local veneration.  MP is using this to win over the people.  MP restored St. Gabriel's church and canonized him, and then made a big show of it, inviting Platina out to Kazan for a visit and giving Platina a relic.  MP is using the outward restoration of St. Gabriel's monastery to help cover it up that, while the Russian Church has been released from the Communist yoke, it is still manned with KGB clergy.  And now Platina is using St. Gabriel to somehow mix light with darkness, to mingle St. Gabriel with the false elders.  This is specifically made clear in Abbot Damascene's foreword wherein he mingles the names Porphyrios and Paisios with Gabriel, and then he repeats the mention:

... St. Gabriel reminds one of the holy Athonite elders of more recent times, St. Porphyrios of Kavsokalyvia (†1991) and St. Paisios of Mount Athos (†1994), both of whom have been glorified by the Church in the last few years.... p.14

...God has given, in our times, such luminaries as St. Gabriel, St. Porphyrios, and the St. Paisios, as radiant witnesses of Divine love... p. 15

This book is the first English edition, and it is translated and edited by Platina.  The only way to know the extent of the editing is to compare it with the original Russian.  Platina is known to just leave out things that offend the MP or might show a true steadfastness as praiseworthy.  World-Orthodoxy does not like to hear criticism of heterodoxy, or learn any end times prophecy, or read about martyrs who died for the Church Calendar.  Incidents that they do like they take out of context and highlight them, spotlight them.  Because of this deliberate deceit, the rewriting of the saints, 40 years after the repose of Saint John (Shanghai & San Francisco),, one world-orthodox member was very surprised to learn that St. John would openly criticize ecumenism.*

With this precaution, being wise to Platina's agenda, English-speakers can read this book and get to know the Elder Gabriel, mostly by praying to him.  The real ROCOR has not canonized him, but the real ROCOR recognizes he is a saint, and his disciple, the author of this book, is a New Martyr of Russia.  So, read and pray, and do not be fooled by the neo-false elders of our times.

_______________________________

The foreword to the 2nd Russian edition. written by Helen Kontzevitch in 1964, serves as a preview into the book and maps out the route the book has taken to  become available to us English-speakers.  

     Just a thought on the side... you might notice that the "style" of this foreword is the same as Fr. Seraphim's foreword to the 1979 Elder Zosima book.  Is this because Fr. Seraphim was influenced by Helen? or is it that both he and Helen live in the true spirit of Orthodoxy?  We notice that all lives of saints are written in the same style, known to us as the hagiographic style, maybe forewords are the same as that? 

     Another thought...  here we have an example of how God uses evil for good purposes.  Evil is made to serve the good against its will.  The evil here is MP canonizing St. Gabriel and restoring Seven Lakes Monastery with the hidden motive to deceive the people — using people's love for the Elder to entrap them further into trusting the MP to be the true ROC.  The good that is forced out of this deceit is that we get this book.  I believe that Platina is blind to the evil of the MP, and God has allowed their blindness.  All is subject to God's Will, even evil.

Foreword to the 2nd Russian Edition

(excluding Platina editor notes, illustrations)

The biography of the reposed Schema-archimandrite Gabriel, which is here presented to the God-loving reader, was sought for reprinting for many years, in many of the world's largest libraries, as well as in Paris and Washington.  This book was sought on Mount Athos, in Finland, and through many book-dealers.  And only now—when the fiftieth anniversary of the repose of the elder (reposed September 24, 1915) has arrived, as well as the one hundred twentieth anniversary of his birth (March 14, 1844)—has it suddenly become possible to find this precious and rare book.

Elder Gabriel, who began his monastic path in Optina Monastery under the direction of the great Optina Elder Ambrose, embodied and realized in himself the spirit of Optina monasticism; that is, the spirit of ancient Eastern ascetics such as Sts. Anthony the Great, Marcarius the Great, John Climacus and others, whose teaching was brought to life in Russian monasticism by the disciples of Elder Paisius Velichkovsky.  According to the teaching of these ancient ascetics, it is necessary to purify the heart from passions through the Jesus Prayer and the revelation of thoughts to an elder (of course, an experienced director), and by this path to reach purity of heart, which attracts the grace of the Holy Spirit and leads to clairvoyance and the capability of transmitting to one's neighbors the direct will of God, healing the sick, driving out demons, as well as other gifts.  This teaching, called in monasticism "mental activity," was especially established in Optina Monastery, where it blossomed until the very end of this holy monastery.  Leading one to direct contact with God, this activity—from ancient times unto today—is the exclusive inheritance of Orthodoxy.

Such a burning and shining light (cf. John 5:35) was Elder Gabriel.  At the sunset of "Holy Russia," he was a true spiritual leader of a whole multitude of clergy, monastics, and lay people.  During his stay at the Seven Lakes Hermitage in the Kazan region, he was the spiritual director of a large number of Kazan Theological Academy students, many of whom became archpastors.  Let us mention several of his disciples who have been known to us.  One of them was Archbishop Tikhon (Troitsky) of San Francisco (†1963), who, at his tonsure into monasticism, took the name that Elder Gabriel had before his tonsure into the great schema.  Then, in the Far East, there was Bishop Jonah (Pokrovsky) of Hankou [Manchuria], who died at a young age but still, during his lifetime, was renowned as a saint.  After his repose, he appeared to a boy with ailing legs and healed him, saying, "Take my legs; I don't need them any longer."  Also in Siberia and China there lived Archbishop Meletius (Zaborovsky), who, when he was tonsured into monasticism, took Elder Gabriel as his spiritual preceptor.  Hierarch Meletius himself was an ascetic and a righteous man.  We also know that New Martyr Grand Duchess Elizabeth Fyodorovna was a venerator and disciple of Elder Gabriel.  But one of the people most dedicated to him was his biographer, Archimandrite Symeon, who lived with the elder in the Spaso-Eleazar Monastery, to which Fr. Gabriel arrived from the Seven Lakes Monastery when a persecution was raised against him there.  In accordance with is spiritual closeness to the elder, Fr. Symeon stored in his heart all that referred to the life of his preceptor: his reminiscences, spiritual experiences, descriptions of wondrous visions and apparitions, wise conversations and instructions.  Fr. Symeon himself was not foreign to spiritual like, thanks to which he would take in all that he heard and later render it on paper.  And finally, let us mention the name of a still-living disciple of Elder Gabriel, Fr. Archimandrite Polycarp (Gorbunov), whom God helped to preserve the original Russian edition of this book and bring it to America after WWII.

In conclusion, it would not be superfluous to set forth the words of an eyewitness who had the good fortune of personal contact with the elder: In Elder Gabriel's life we see the direct awareness of God, the vision of the other world, knowledge of human souls and of the thoughts of others, discernment of the future, even a partial penetration into the mystery of death and, behind its veil, into the life beyond the grave.  Because of all this, the late elder was truly one of the Ancients.   Yet, he lived so recently, in our days, amidst us..."

Helen Kontzevitch

Berkeley California

March 14, 1964

____________________

* In the RRb archives, November 2014, there is a screen shot of a Euphrosynos Cafe post where a world-orthodox poster had discovered a samizdat article by Saint John in Fr. Seraphim's 1972 Orthodox Word magazine #45, and commented: "I never knew that Saint John would often give open lectures accusing a certain church of its sick ecumenism...  Is this article known?"

The Decline of the Patriarchate of Constantinople

   By St. John Maximovitch 

   Introduction by Fr. Seraphim Rose, translator

     https://startingontheroyalpath.blogspot.com/2014/06/decline-of-ep.html

     https://web.archive.org/web/20101130035831/http://users.sisqtel.net/williams/archives/decline-constantinople.html

    https://rocorhistory.blogspot.com/2015/10/decline-of-ep.html

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