Blessed Paraskeva of Diveevo (born Irina; c. 1795 – October 5, 1915) was an Orthodox ascetic and holy fool (yurodivaya), venerated as a saint of the Russian Orthodox Church. She spent most of her life in the Sarov forests and in the Seraphim-Diveevo Convent in Nizhny Novgorod Governorate, where she died and was glorified among the blessed. Her commemoration days are October 5, June 27 (the Synaxis of the Diveevo Saints), and a movable date — the Synaxis of the Saints of Nizhny Novgorod.[1]

Life

Irina was born in the early 19th century in the village of Nikolskoye in Spassky Uyezd, Tambov Governorate, into a family of serf peasants, Ivan and Darya, who belonged to the Bulygin landowners.[2] At seventeen she was married off at the landowners' will to a peasant named Fyodor; the couple lived together for about fifteen years and had no children. After the Bulygins sold their peasants to the German landowners the Schmidts and resettled them in the village of Surkot, Irina's husband fell ill with consumption and died.[1]

Soon after her husband's death, Irina was falsely accused of stealing two bolts of linen from the manor house. On the orders of the local police officer (stanovoy pristav), she was brutally beaten, her head was split open, and her ears were torn; her guilt was never proven — the linen, found later, turned out to have been stolen by another woman.[2] After the torture, Irina went on a pilgrimage to Kiev, where she met with elders and took monastic vows with the name Paraskeva.[1] Twice the police tracked her down and sent her back to the landowners under escort; in the end, the Schmidts drove her out into the street with no clothing or food.[2]

For five years Paraskeva wandered the surrounding countryside, regarded by the peasants as a holy fool. She then went into the Sarov forests and spent more than twenty years there in a cave she had dug herself, living on alms and keeping up a discipline of fasting and prayer. After long years in the wilderness, according to the sources, her appearance came to resemble the image of Mary of Egypt — gaunt and blackened by the sun.[3] In the forest she was attacked by assailants and badly beaten; from then on, headaches and a swelling in the pit of her stomach stayed with her until the end of her life.[3]

At the Diveevo Convent

A few years before the death of Blessed Pelagia Ivanovna, Paraskeva began appearing more and more often at the Seraphim-Diveevo Convent, carrying dolls that she called her children. After Pelagia's death she settled in the convent for good.[3] There she knitted stockings and spun yarn, accompanying her work with the unceasing Jesus Prayer; her yarn was especially prized — it was used to make belts and prayer ropes (chotki).[3]

During the celebrations in honor of Saint Seraphim of Sarov, Diveevo was visited by Emperor Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. According to tradition, Paraskeva foretold to the tsar the birth of an heir and the fall of the autocracy; Nicholas II, according to eyewitnesses, called her a "great servant of God."[3]

Paraskeva Ivanovna died on October 5, 1915, at the Diveevo Convent.[1] She was canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church as a blessed one.

Sources

  1. azbyka.ru — Blessed Paraskeva of Diveevo: Life, Icons, Feast Day
  2. brooklyn-church.org — Blessed Praskovya Ivanovna — Paraskeva of Diveevo — Church of the Holy New Martyrs and Confessors of Russia
  3. diveevo-monastyr.ru — Blessed Paraskeva of Diveevo — Holy Trinity Seraphim-Diveevo Convent