Prochorus of the Kiev Caves
Our Venerable Father Prochorus the Wonderworker of the Kiev Caves
Venerable · Wonderworker · d. 1107, at the Kiev Caves
Commemorated 10 February — Repose at the Kiev Caves
Prochorus of the Kiev Caves (died 1107), called Lebednik — "the goosefoot-eater" — was a monk of the Caves monastery famous for an extreme abstinence from bread and for two great wonders wrought through it in a time of famine and want. A native of Smolensk, he entered the Caves under the igumen John and refused ordinary bread, gathering instead the wild plant lebeda (orach or goosefoot) and baking it into loaves; in a great famine his bitter weed-bread turned sweet as honey in the mouths of those to whom he gave it with a blessing, but bitter to any who took it by theft. When war cut off the supply of salt and speculators drove up its price, he gathered the ashes from the monks' cells and distributed them, and in the hands of the faithful the ashes became pure salt — a wonder that drew the anger of the Grand Prince Svyatopolk, whose profiteering it undid, until the prince repented and became the saint's friend. Prochorus foretold his own death, was buried by the same Svyatopolk with his own hands, and rests in the Near (Anterior) Caves. He is commemorated on February 10.
The goosefoot-bread
Prochorus came from Smolensk to the Kiev Caves monastery in the days of the igumen John (who governed the house from about 1089 to 1103), and there received the tonsure. He gave himself to an abstinence remarkable even in that house of ascetics: he would not eat bread, but gathered the wild herb lebeda — orach or goosefoot, a bitter weed — dried it, ground it, and baked it into loaves that were his only food, from which he took his by-name Lebednik. He bore, besides, all the burdens of obedience without complaint, and God answered his abstinence with power over the very want he embraced.
The wonder of the sweet bread
In a season of famine, when the people were dying for lack of bread, Prochorus made his weed-loaves in great quantity and gave them to all who came. To those who received them from his hand with a blessing, the loaves — bitter by nature — were sweet as though made with honey; but any who took them without his blessing, or by stealing, found them bitter as wormwood and unfit to eat. When one such complaint reached the igumen and the bread was tested openly, the marvel was confirmed, and the people knew that God fed them through the saint's blessing and not by the herb.
The wonder of the salt
A second want followed: war — the strife of the princes and a blockade of the trade — cut off the supply of salt, and merchants hoarded it and sold it dear, so that the poor could not buy. Prochorus gathered the ashes from all the monks' cells and gave them out freely to whoever came, and in the hands of those who received them the ashes turned to pure salt. The whole city thronged to him, and the salt-sellers, their trade ruined, denounced him to the Grand Prince Svyatopolk (Svyatopolk II Izyaslavich). The prince, whose own profit was in the scheme, seized the "salt" to sell it himself — whereupon in his storehouses it turned back to ashes, and only after three days became salt again, so that he was forced to throw it away and the people gathered it. Humbled by the sign, Svyatopolk sought out Prochorus, repented of his greed and his oppressions, and became the saint's devoted friend, promising to bury him with his own hands and to free prisoners at his death.
Repose
Prochorus foretold his own death. He sent to Svyatopolk — then away on campaign — to say that his end was near and to remind him of his promise; the prince hastened back, and when the saint reposed on February 10, 1107, Svyatopolk himself carried the body and laid it in the Near Caves, and (the Patericon says) his campaign thereafter prospered as the saint had promised. He is counted among the wonderworking fathers of the Kiev Caves, his relics resting incorrupt in the Anterior (Near) Caves of Saint Anthony.
(Not to be confused with the Apostle Prochorus, one of the Seven Deacons and of the Seventy — see the Synaxis of the Seventy Apostles — a figure of the apostolic age, kept July 28 and January 4; this Prochorus is a monk of medieval Rus'.)
Feast and commemoration
Prochorus is commemorated on February 10 (church date; Old Calendar civil February 23), the day of his repose, in the Russian Church. He is kept also among the Synaxis of the Venerable Fathers of the Near (Anterior) Caves, whose common commemoration falls on the second Saturday of the Great Fast, and with the general Synaxis of All the Saints of the Kiev Caves. His is a local Russian commemoration; the Greek calendars do not keep him.
Hymns
Troparion — Tone 8
By a flood of tears thou didst make the desert to blossom, and by thy deep sighs thou didst bear fruit a hundredfold in labours; and thou becamest a luminary, shining upon the world by thy wonders, O Prochorus our venerable father. Intercede with Christ our God, that our souls may be saved.
Original translation from the Slavonic
Iconography
Prochorus is depicted as a Caves monk in dark habit and schema, often shown holding or distributing loaves of bread, or with vessels of salt and ashes, the attributes of his two wonders; he appears among the ranks of the venerable fathers in the great group-icons of the Saints of the Kiev Caves. No pre-1900 identity-verified image has been secured for this entry.