What is the difference between prophets and foretellers? For religious leaders, the answer to this question is obvious: some are praised as spiritual teachers of humanity, while others are often accused of having connections with evil spirits. So the Bulgarian clairvoyant Vanga, despite all her adherence to the Orthodox faith, arouses a lot of suspicion among the clergy.
Famous soothsayer
The biography of this amazing woman is told in many sources. For example, information about her is contained in the book "50 famous soothsayers and clairvoyants", written by a team of authors: Valentina Sklyarenko, Tatiana Iovleva, Yana Batiy and Maria Pankova.
The daughter of ordinary peasants Pande and Paraskeva Surchevs, who was named Vangelia, was born in 1911 in the town of Strumitsa. The girl was left an orphan early, she was raised by her stepmother. When the future seer was 12 years old, the family moved to the town of Novo Sel
about. There was an accident with Vanga. Once in the very epicenter of the hurricane, she almost died and lost her sight forever. When the adults found the child, they found that the girl's eyes were completely clogged with sand. All attempts of doctors to defeat blindness were unsuccessful.
When Vangelia was 18, she almost died again. This time - from pleurisy. During a serious illness, the girl had a prophetic dream. A rider in a halo of light warned her about the imminent start of World War II and promised a manifestation of a visionary gift. And so it happened. Soon, all neighbors and acquaintances already knew that Wanga was able to predict the future.
In 1942 she married Dimitar Gushterov and moved with him to the city of Petrich. More than 500 thousand people attended a reception at the fortune teller, whose fame quickly spread beyond the borders of Bulgaria. A special hotel was even built near her house for people wishing to get an appointment with the famous Vanga. In her advanced years, she at her own expense erected the Orthodox Church of St. Petka in the town of Rupite, which was consecrated on October 14, 1994. The seer died in 1996 of cancer.
Promotional video:
The opinion of the clergy
Religious ministers, as a rule, assess the activities of various psychics, sorcerers and healers extremely negatively. If in the Middle Ages such people were brutally tortured and then burned at the stake, now they are usually called charlatans.
According to the spiritual pastors, only firm faith can save a person from the intrigues of evil spirits. And trying to find out your own future is a sin, because the fate of a person is God's providence. So the attitude of the Orthodox Church towards Vanga has always been wary at best. Hieromonk Job (Gumerov) believes that the Bulgarian soothsayer was under the influence of dark forces.
“A person, limited by a physical body, cannot cognize the other world on his own. Holy Scripture and the Holy Fathers speak of two sources of our knowledge of the supersensible world: the Revealed and the demonic. There is no third. Who gave information to Vanga about the invisible world? Where did the amazing awareness come from? - wrote Hieromonk Job (Gumerov).
Based on the memoirs of Krasimira Stoyanova, the niece of Baba Vanga, religious leaders believe that this unique woman was possessed by demons in her own way. After all, sometimes she fell into a semblance of a trance, during which she made her predictions.
In the book by Krasimira Stoyanova "Vanga clairvoyant and healing" the following words of the soothsayer are given: "Oh, these forces, small forces that are always with me. But there are also big ones, their bosses. When they decide to speak with my lips, I feel bad, and then I feel like a broken one all day …”.
Representatives of the Orthodox Church believe that only fallen spirits can take away vital energy from a person during mystical contacts. After all, angels, on the contrary, fill believers with positive emotions, give people confidence.
Another indirect evidence of Vanga's obsession is the following recollection of her niece: “Only sometimes we could not understand why our aunt turns pale, why she suddenly becomes ill and a voice suddenly comes out of her mouth, striking us with its strength, unusual timbre, words and expressions, which are not in the usual Vanga dictionary. According to Hieromonk Job (Gumerov), such behavior testifies that the human body has been taken over by some otherworldly hostile force, depriving people of their own will.
Conversations with the dead
Another reason for the wary attitude of the Orthodox Church towards Vanga is her conversations with the spirits of the dead. As you know, the Old Testament negatively evaluates such practices. Kinga Leviticus contains the admonition: “Do not turn to the summoners of the dead, and do not go to the wizards, and do not bring yourself to desecration from them. I am the Lord your God”(chapter 19, verse 31). Representatives of the religious clergy of three world religions are guided by these words: Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
Vanga herself has repeatedly admitted in her numerous interviews that she communicates with the spirits of the dead. When a visitor came to her, she saw next to the man his deceased relatives, who gave her all the necessary information. Most religious leaders fear that, under the guise of deceased ancestors, psychics are representatives of evil forces who seek to confuse people, deceive and direct them along the wrong path.
Moreover, such esoteric spiritual practices are themselves condemned by the church fathers. And after her death, Vanga was made their banner by representatives of various faiths seeking to revise Christian dogmas.
However, the Orthodox clergy does not personally accuse the soothsayer of anything. Rather, she is considered a victim of evil forces. Thus, Hieromonk Job (Gumerov) wrote: “Vanga herself did not realize that she was communicating with the world of fallen spirits. Its numerous visitors did not understand this either.
Church of Baba Vanga
And yet the famous Bulgarian soothsayer was a woman of faith. It is no accident that in her declining years she spent almost all of her personal savings on the construction of an Orthodox church. Yuri Kosorukov and Zhenya Kostadinova co-wrote the book "Great Prophets from Nostradamus to Vanga", in which they told the story of the appearance of the Church of St. Petka in the town of Rupite.
“In the circle of relatives and friends, the prophetess for many years shared her dreams of building a Christian church, in which people would pray for the salvation of their souls, light candles to God and cleanse themselves of bad thoughts, becoming kinder,” the authors of the book noted.
It is noteworthy that representatives of the Orthodox clergy were extremely picky about the new church. Vanga even complained about this in one of her interviews: "Some dogmas are not observed, you see … Vladyka came, leaned on his staff and shouted:" This is against the church canons! " Instead of saying hello and congratulating us on the completion of the construction of the temple."
Vanga especially venerated Saint Petka, who spent almost her entire life in solitude and prayer. And the psychics who came to her were often advised by the fortuneteller to join the faith, read religious literature in order to understand how important it is to properly dispose of their own gift.