The Hermits of the Zverinets Monastery
“Kiev boasts a wealth of wonderful ancient monasteries, yet the most mysterious of them is the Zverinets Monastery of the Archangel Michael of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (the UOC-MP), located in the capital’s Pechersky district, to the south of the Kiev Caves Lavra.
The monastery derives its Russian name (“Zverinetsky”) from either the word “zveri” (meaning “animals”) or “zverinets” (meaning “a menagerie”). According to one version, the place was named after the local animal hunting that was once very popular in the thick forests of the area, which had a great variety of animals centuries ago. The “Tale of Bygone Years” [composed in the twelfth century by Monk Nestor in Kiev] reads: “There were a great forest and pine woods near the city [that is, Kiev], and people would hunt beasts there.”
Ivan Mikhailovich Kamanin (1850-1921), a historian, paleographer, archivist and author of the first research study of the Zverinets Caves, in his book entitled The Zverinets Caves in Kiev. Their Antiquity and Holiness, published at the printing office of the Kiev Caves Lavra back in 1914, wrote that all the earliest Kiev monasteries were under the ground and only later “rose up to the surface”.
Over the centuries, all of them were subject to alterations: they were reconstructed, remodeled, renewed; and only the Zverinets Caves, untouched beneath the ground for many years, remain absolutely intact and show us how these most ancient underground cells, which were used by zealous brethren of old times, really looked.
The fact is that the earliest Zverinets Monastery, founded during the first century of Christianity in Russia (Rus’), was covered up with earth in the troubled period of attacks by the Polovtsians and Mongol-Tatars, and forgotten for 800 years.
The mysteries of this monastery are yet to be unraveled by pioneers and discoverers—its caves’ total length exceeds that of the Near and the Far Caves of the great Kiev Caves Lavra; moreover, it has at least roughly a kilometer (c. 0.62 miles) of passages which are still unknown and unexplored…
Undoubtedly, the people who rested in the caves were monks: their leather monastic belts depicting the Twelve Major Feasts, prayer ropes, monastic paramans woven from fine threads, half-decayed leather and felt shoes, wooden boards of old coffins (some of them were of cypress and still had their peculiar odor), fragments of millstones for grinding grain—all of them survived the corruption of time.
This is how Ivan Mikhailovich Kamanin who explored the caves described the cells of hermits in the Zverinets Caves: “Inside, the hermits’ cells are in the form of a large Russian cooking stove. Their length was equal to human height. A man could squeeze into it through its opening—sometimes easily, sometimes with effort. In the middle of the floor of the cell a hollow was dug knee-deep the full length. There were two benches for lying down on either side of the cell parallel to the hollow. On getting into this cell an ascetic could easily sit on one of the benches with his feet down in the hollow. Standing in the bottom of the hollow, a recluse could rise to his full height. Icons, icon lamps, holy books, vessels for holy water and prosphora could be placed on the opposite bench. The hollow could serve a recluse as a bed in his lifetime and as a grave after his death… The closeness of these cells to the altar enabled the hermits to listen to church services.”
The spiritual writer Evgeny Nikolaevich Pogozhev (who wrote under the pen-name, Poselyanin; 1870-1931) wrote in connection with the discovery of the Zverinets Caves: “There are no words to describe this sense of peace and the absolutely unknown feelings and emotions you are seized with in these caves, inside this diminutive simple church, in complete isolation from the world, amidst the silent remains of the brethren of an unknown monastery!”
Ivan Mikhailovich Kamanin admired the nature around the cave monastery: “The nature around the caves is truly delightful. Standing on the top of this high hill [within which this cave system is hidden], which is still uninhabited and open from all sides, with the blue sky above, and admiring these stunning, beautiful landscapes, you cannot help but feel a closeness to God and are filled with sublime emotion; dispirited by the hustle-bustle of city life, your soul feels relieved and free from the worldly cares, even if it’s just for an hour! What glorious nature!”…
It is hard to imagine the privation and hardships the ascetic had to suffer—cold and scorching heat, threats from treasure hunters and thieves, intrusions of the curious. Nevertheless, most of the pilgrims began to come here in order to pray and sense the grace of the ancient holy site. Thus a skete in the Zverinets Caves came into existence.
Prince Vladimir Davidovich Zhevakhov was so fascinated by the Zverinets Caves that he couldn’t leave them. The prince became the caves’ benefactor and patron and a churchwarden of the church above the caves. It was with his funds that the land above the caves was taken on lease and archeological excavations were carried out. Thanks to his patronage, theft of the caves’ relics was brought to a halt. Later, over the period of the Revolution and the Civil War, Prince Vladimir Davidovich Zhevakhov together with his twin brother Nicholas hid from the Bolsheviks in these caves and labored as hard as any of the skete monks.
Igumen Valentin and Prince Zhevakhov at the entrance to the caves at the beginning of the excavation work in 1912.
It was perhaps through the prayers of the Zverinets saints of the old times that a brilliant lawyer, honorary justice of the peace and Senior Adviser of the Kiev Governorate Administration Prince Zhevakhov received his monastic tonsure in these caves and became the meek Monk Joasaph—he was given this monastic name in honor of his ancestor, St. Joasaph of Belgorod. Monk Joasaph (Zhevakhov) was ordained a hierodeacon, then a hieromonk, and, lastly, consecrated a bishop.
Shortly before its closure, the Zverinets Skete had about forty monks. In 1933, godless people murdered the abbot of the skete, Archimandrite Philaret (Kochubey), and a year later the skete was dissolved and the church blown up.
At the present time, twelve monks live at the monastery, and they have different types of obediences: cleaning the territory of the monastery and tidying up the church; work in the greenhouses and the kitchen-garden, kitchen and refectory; and other obediences that are common at all monasteries.”
From: Olga Rozhneva “The Most Mysterious Monastery in Kiev: On of the Archangel Michael”
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