Memorial Day of St. Job, Abbot of Pochaev (10/11)

The Monk Job was born in 1550 in Galicia and was called John Iron in the world. As a ten-year-old boy, he entered the Ugornitsky Monastery and for 12 years he was already tonsured into a robe with the name Job, elevated to the priesthood by adulthood, and for thirty years he was awarded the great schema, and the name John was returned to him. He especially loved this name and always signed it, but was canonized with the name Job.

St. Job was the rector of the Dubensky Monastery, where he wrote a lot in defense of Orthodoxy. However, the thirst for an ascetic solitary life forced him to move to the holy Mount Pochaevskaya, but even there he was elected rector. For prayerful feats, he was forced to retire to a stone cave.

Job was a minister of unceasing prayer. The following incident shows how strong the holy elder achieved over the sinful human soul: one day, arriving at the monastery threshing floor at night, he saw a thief who wanted to put a grain stump on his back. The Monk helped him raise this stump, but reminded him of his answer at the terrible Judgment of Christ. Shocked by the saint's meek word, the sinner fell at his feet begging for forgiveness.

In the monastery, which St. Job surrounded with a fence, he introduced a dormitory charter and erected the Holy Trinity Cathedral, and then six other smaller churches. He created the Pochaev printing house and continued to write in defense of Orthodoxy. And in his free time, St. Job loved gardening and planted a beautiful garden in Pochaev.

In 1620, he took part in the Kiev Council, which condemned the union and decided to firmly stand for Orthodoxy. Under the resolution there is a signature: «John Iron, Abbot Pochaevsky».

St. Job died on October 28 (November 10, new style), 1651. His relics were discovered in 1659 after his appearance three times to Metropolitan Dionysius of Kyiv. Soon after this, Eva Domashevskaya came to the monastery for a pilgrimage. At night she saw the light shining in Trinity Church and heard singing. Her maid, the maiden Anna, went to find out what service was being performed, and to her horror she saw that the church doors were open, and in the middle of the church, between two angels, the Monk Job was praying in an unusually bright robe. Turning to the maiden, he ordered her to call Abbot Dositheus, at this time hopelessly ill, and gave her a payment for him, soaked in myrrh. The patient, having received this fee, anointed himself with it and received healing.

In 1675, the Tatars besieged the Pochaev Monastery. On the third day of the siege, during the reading of the akathist, the Queen of Heaven herself appeared over the monastery. The Tatars tried to shoot arrows at a celestial phenomenon, but the arrows returned back and hit them themselves. Then the Tatars fled.

In 1721, the Uniates took possession of the Pochaev Monastery. They honored the miraculous icon of the Mother of God, but they closed access to the relics of the monk to believers. However, after 20 years, the miracles of the Monk forced them to allow believers to see them.

In 1831, the Uniates were reunited with the Orthodox Church. The relics of the Monk were again solemnly opened, and the Pochaev Monastery was declared a Lavra.

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