60 years ago, one of the most mystical events in the history of the USSR took place. On the outskirts of the closed Kuibyshev, a young girl Zoya turned to stone with the icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in her hands. Zoya's stand became an all-Union scandal: crowds of people from Zoya's house were dispersed by horse militia, party officials did everything to hide this mysterious incident.
“The whole city is buzzing like a beehive! You sit here, and there … The girl froze with the icon in her hands, rooted to the spot! They say God punished her! - Dr. Anna gasped with excitement.
The fact that the girl was petrified, there is evidence of eyewitnesses of those days, documents of party meetings.
This extraordinary and mysterious event took place on December 31, 1956 at 84 Chkalov Street. There lived an ordinary woman Claudia Bolonkina, whose son decided to invite his friends on New Year's Eve. Among those invited was the girl Zoya, with whom Nikolai had begun dating shortly before.
All the friends were with gentlemen, and Zoya was still sitting alone, Kolya was delayed. When the dancing began, she said: "If my Nikolai is not there, I will dance with Nikolai Pleasant!" And she went to the corner where the icons were hanging. Friends were horrified: "Zoe, this is a sin," but she said: "If there is a God, let him punish me!" She took the icon and pressed it to her chest. She entered the circle of dancers and suddenly froze, as if she had grown into the floor. It was impossible to move it from its place, and the icon could not be taken out of hand - it seemed to be glued tightly. The girl did not show external signs of life. But in the area of the heart, a subtle knock was heard.
Ambulance doctor Anna tried to revive Zoya. Anna's sister, Nina Pavlovna Kalashnikova, is still alive, I managed to talk to her.
- She ran home excited. And although the police took a nondisclosure agreement from her, they told everything. And about how she tried to give the girl injections, but it turned out to be impossible. Zoya's body was so hard that the needles of the syringes did not enter, they broke …
The incident immediately became known to the law enforcement agencies of Samara. Since it was connected with religion, the case was given emergency status, a police squad was sent to the house in order not to let onlookers inside. There was something to worry about. By the third day of Zoya's standing, all the streets near the house were crowded with thousands of people. The girl was nicknamed "Zoya Stone".
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Nevertheless, the clergy had to be invited to the house of the “stone Zoya”, because the police were afraid to approach her holding the icon. But none of the priests was able to change anything until Hieromonk Seraphim (Poloz) came. They say that he was so bright in soul and kind that he even had the gift of prediction. He was able to take the icon from Zoe's frozen hands, after which he predicted that her "standing" would end on Easter. And so it happened. They say that Poloz after this was asked by the authorities to refuse to be involved in Zoe's case, but he rejected the offer. Then they fabricated an article about sodomy and sent him to serve time. After his release to Samara, he did not return …
Zoya's body came to life, but her mind was no longer the same. In the first days she kept shouting: “The earth is perishing in sins! Pray, believe! " From a scientific and medical point of view, it is difficult to imagine how a young girl's body could survive for 128 days without food or water. Scientists from the capital who came to Samara at that time for such a supernatural case were unable to determine the "diagnosis", which at first was mistaken for a kind of tetanus.
After the incident with Zoya, as her contemporaries testify, people flocked en masse to churches and temples. People bought up crosses, candles, icons. Those who were not baptized were baptized … Only it is known: from fright, a change in consciousness and heart occurs in exceptional cases. As a rule, a "good" person becomes only for a while. To deeply feel the essence of everything spiritual and present, to open the heart to goodness and love, the work of the soul is required. And religious, like any external attributes, have nothing to do with it.
Therefore, we are talking about Zoya or some other character with whom something out of the ordinary happened, the question begs the following: why do we need dramas, tragedies in order to gain faith, to pay attention to ourselves, our actions, our own life or miracles and mysticism? Until the thunder breaks out, does the man cross himself?
