Holy fools - who are they: the mentally ill, simply eccentric or saints? There is no definite answer to this question. However, foolishness is voluntary, but it is natural. Most holy fools are quite reasonable people, since foolishness is a deliberate departure from an ordinary "normal" life into a martyr's. A real holy fool is always an ascetic and a prayer book, but he prays without witnesses, most often at night, when he is alone.
The holy fool spends his whole life in imaginary madness, mortifying the flesh - he lives anywhere, dressed in unimaginable rags or naked, eats whatever he has to follow the New Testament “if anyone wants to follow Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. And he always humbly accepts humiliation and beatings from offenders.
In a sense, the holy fool repeats the path of the cross of Christ, who voluntarily accepted torment and death for the sake of saving the world, but the behavior of the holy fool, like his life, looks completely different. It is impossible to call him pious. It is just the opposite: ugly, "obscene", mocking.
Basil the Blessed. Icon.
Here are examples of the actions of the well-known holy fool Basil the Blessed, who lived in Moscow in the 15-16th centuries: “I have a free soul, without being ashamed of the human shame, much more in his belly, and create a passage before the people,” that is, Vasily relieved in public, without hiding. And the meaning of such an act was not in the desire to offend, but in allegorically reminding people what they conceal inside their souls and what the nature of man is.
He also committed other, blasphemous at first glance acts. Once, in front of the amazed crowd, he smashed with a stone the miraculous image of the Mother of God at the Varvara gate of Kitai-Gorod. (Then it turned out that a devil was drawn on the icon under the image of the Virgin.)
He could give his alms to a seemingly rich city dweller, but he was actually ruined and hungry, but he was ashamed to ask for alms. He could have punished a saint. So two merchants, who laughed at his absolute nakedness, were blinded, however, after repentance, Vasily returned their sight.
Promotional video:
Basil the Blessed returns sight to merchants.
Blessed Basil threw stones at the houses of decent and pious people, and the walls of houses inhabited by drunks and balamuts, on the contrary, kissed and mourned. And all because the angels could not get into the impious houses inhabited by demons and huddled outside, and in the pious ones, on the contrary, the demons turned out to be outside, in which the holy fool and stoned. He had the gift of seeing the invisible world.
Understanding of the insulting and absurd actions of the holy fool often required ingenuity and mental effort from his contemporaries, but nevertheless he communicated with the people in an understandable language, so the holy fools were revered and taken seriously to their speeches and prophecies. Basil the Blessed was venerated by Ivan the Terrible, although in the church during the divine service, Vasily shouted reproofs, which the tsar humbly endured. According to the testimony of the Englishman Fletcher, who visited Russia during the reign of Ivan the Terrible's son Fyodor Ioannovich, the holy fools “are considered prophets and very holy men, which is why they allow them to speak freely whatever they want, without any restrictions, even about God himself. If such a person clearly reproaches someone for anything, then they do not object to him, but only say that they deserve it because of their sins."
By the way, the exposure of those in power is one of the "points of the program" of the holy fools, which could result in death. The same Fletcher mentions two holy fools who were executed during the time of Fyodor Ioannovich's predecessor. In addition, it is known that during the period of the church schism that began in the middle. 17th century, several holy fools were executed for defending the old faith.
The Orthodox Church canonized more than three dozen ascetic holy fools. There are even foreigners among them. The revered Saint Procopius of Ustyug lived in the 13th century and was a wealthy merchant "from the Western countries, from the Latin language, from the German land" and annually came by ship to Novgorod with goods. "And the sight in Veliky Novgorod is a great church decoration, and the worship of holy icons, and a great ringing, and he hears holy singing and reading of holy books, and many monasteries."
A recent Catholic was so imbued with the spirit of Orthodoxy, the beauty of the rite and the decoration of churches that he distributed property and goods, was baptized, tonsured, and then "he himself pretended to be foolish and clothed himself in torn and obscene vestments." Thus, the foreigner grasped the idea of the feat of foolishness: external, beauty - nothing, salvation of the soul and morality - everything.
The holy fool lived in the open air in charity, which he accepted only from poor people. As expected, he was poor from hunger and cold, sometimes he did not have the strength to move, but he always prayed fervently, for which he acquired the gift of foresight - he determined the fruitful and hungry years, and once he predicted a terrible hurricane that struck Ustyug. Through the prayer of Procopius, the hurricane stopped and the sun came out again.
St. Procopius Ustyug.
The saint lived in Ustyug for over 60 years. On the day of his death, July 8, 1303, it was very cold and snowed. A few days later, Procopius was found in a snowdrift, falling asleep forever. He became the first saint to be glorified by the church as fools.
By the end of the 17th century, the attitude of the authorities towards the holy fools was changing. If earlier at the court of the sovereign, holy fools always lived in the care of the treasury, then Peter I ordered to end this tradition, declaring all the holy fools "feigned raging." "God's people" were caught and handed over to the "city court", or even without it, they were quietly exiled to monasteries, from where they were no longer released. And since the 18th century, the church also joined the persecution of the holy fools.
However, despite all the persecutions, this ancient Russian tradition turned out to be practically ineradicable and in a modified form has survived to our days.
Foolish twentieth century.