Contemporary assessments
St. Tikhon (Belavin), patriarch:
“Do you know that Vladyka is a holy man? He is an extraordinary, rare person. Such lamps of the Church are an extraordinary phenomenon. But it must be taken care of, because such extreme asceticism, complete disregard for everything in life affects one’s health. Of course, the bishop chose a holy, but difficult path; few are given such strength of spirit.”
Priest Xenophon Tsendrovsky, the main ideologist and leader of renovationism in Astrakhan, bringing public repentance for the sin of schism, said the following:
“For a long time I have been stuck in the sin of renovationism. My conscience was calm, because it seemed to me that I was doing some necessary and right thing. But then I saw Vladyka Thaddeus; I looked at him and felt some kind of revolution taking place in my soul. I could not bear the pure, heartfelt look that convicted me of sin and warmed me with all-forgiving love, and I hurried to leave. Now I was clearly aware that I had seen a man whom I could worship not only in my soul, but also here, before your eyes.”
Arrest and martyrdom
Archbishop Thaddeus never participated in the political movement; during interrogations he behaved courageously and with dignity, which especially infuriated the jailers. They sent the saint to a cell with criminals, who began to abuse him from the very first minute of his stay in the cell. Vladyka slept under the bunk, giving his pillow to one of the prisoners.
The Lord showed His love for his faithful son by sending the Mother of God to help. The Most Pure Mother of God appeared to the senior criminal and ordered him to leave the saint alone, threatening him with cruel death. In the morning, after listening to their comrade, the criminals bowed under their bunks, but were blinded by the bright light pouring out from the priest’s resting place. The ardent criminals fell to their knees, asking for forgiveness from the saint, after which they began to take care of him. The prison management became aware of this and the bishop was transferred to another cell.
Just 10 days in prison changed the lives of some criminals, but Archbishop Thaddeus himself was sentenced to death; his holiness so embittered the investigator that he insisted on drowning the bishop in prison.
Relics of the Hieromartyr Thaddeus in the Cathedral of the Ascension of the Lord in Tver
Thanks to the assistance of the prison doctor, who conveyed the news of the saint’s burial place to the outside world, it became possible to find his relics in the future.
Prayers
Troparion, tone 1
Praise be to God and your living sacrifice,/ Hieromartyr Thaddeus, appearing./ By fasting, vigil and prayer, I received the heavenly gifts,/ I became a good helper and comforter to many./ Pastoral You are adorned with wisdom and quietness of disposition,/ You have overcome the wickedness of Christ’s enemies./ Glory to Him who gave There is strength in your suffering, / glory, like a martyr, who crowned you, / glory to him who brings healing to all through you.
Kontakion, tone 4
The spirit of fearlessness, strength, love and hope/ the Chief Shepherd gave to you, Saint Thaddeus,/ in your suffering you gave thanks to God/ and in persecution you comforted the afflicted, eyes Goly // do not be discouraged, for Christ is with us.
Married "groom"
In the rank of hieromonk.
Photo from the site kizhi.karelia.ru Bishop Thaddeus helped with good advice and prayer. People noticed that if you ask the Bishop for anything, help comes. One day the mother of the bride came to Vladyka Thaddeus on the eve of the wedding to ask for a blessing. She proudly shared that her daughter met a rich groom who presented him with expensive gifts.
In response to the mother’s request, the archpastor said: “Wait a little. Wait two weeks." The woman was indignant, since the table had already been prepared and guests had been invited. But the bishop asked to wait. The mother of the family was afraid to disobey the archbishop and postponed the celebration for two weeks.
On the fourteenth day, the “groom’s” wife arrived with two children and took her husband home.
Eyewitnesses from the life of Saint Archbishop Thaddeus recall many other cases of miraculous help to people. One day, when the Volga overflowed its banks and threatened to flood the fields, the residents of these places turned to Archbishop Thaddeus for help.
The Bishop went with the peasants to the river bank, served a prayer service, blessing the waters. And the waters receded.
One girl made a bet (!) that she would receive communion without confession. She approached the Chalice, but the serving Bishop Thaddeus stopped her with the words: “Do not sin. Confess first.” Such foresight of the bishop, who somehow “learned” about her “brave act,” so amazed the girl that she sincerely repented.
In one family, the son, who held a major party post in the 1920s, went crazy and was hospitalized. The mother came to him, the son knelt before her, begging to take him away from here. The woman went to consult Archbishop Thaddeus. He said:
“Take it immediately: it will not bring harm to any of you, and endure it until your death.”
The couple did as the Bishop blessed. The patient died during the war; Before his death, he turned to God and took communion.
Used materials
- Life based on materials of the Synodal Commission for the Canonization of Saints:
- Holy Hieromartyr Thaddeus, Archbishop of Tver and Kashin commemorated December 18 (31) // Orthodoxy and modernity.
Information and analytical portal of the Saratov Metropolitanate : - (prayers)
- (partially used)
[1] Official church calendar on the website of the Publishing House of the Moscow Patriarchate -
[2] Dating of appointments in 1927 - according to Gubonin, M. E. et al., History of the hierarchy of the Russian Orthodox Church
, Moscow: PSTGU, 2006, 404-405.
Early life and entry into monasticism
On November 12, 1872, a male child was born, who was named Ivan, the son of Vasily. In the Uspensky family, who lived in the village of Naruksovo, in the Lukoyanovsky district of the Saratov province, both the boy’s father and grandfather were clergy. God gave the local dean, Archpriest Vasily Fedorovich and his wife Lydia Andreevna nine sons and two daughters. The children were raised according to strict Christian canons, in love for the Savior and humanity.
Thaddeus Uspensky
Having graduated from the Nizhny Novgorod Theological Seminary, the young graduate joined the ranks of students at the Moscow Theological Academy, graduating from its walls in 1896 as a candidate of theology.
Ivan is eager to study the Bible, and in 1901 he defended his master’s project “The Unity of the Book of the Prophet Isaiah.” Being a master, he thinks about taking monasticism, but he is stopped by only one thought: whether he will be able to serve people. The young man’s decision is influenced by his father, closest adviser, and friend Anthony, who headed the academy at that time.
At the end of the summer of 1897, the master's theologian became a monk with the name Thaddeus, he was ordained as a hierodeacon and sent as a teacher to the theological seminary of Smolensk. In 1900, the hierodeacon read the basics of theology to Ufa seminarians.
Interesting! On March 15, 1902, Thaddeus was ordained to the rank of archimandrite, and at the same time his theological work “Notes on Didactics” on the foundations of pedagogy and education in the church was published.
On January 8, 1903, Olontsevo Seminary welcomed its new rector, thirty-year-old Archimandrite Uspensky.
Finding the relics of the holy martyr Thaddeus
In the course of studying the lives of confessors and martyrs of the twentieth century in the first half of the 1980s, the author interviewed witnesses who knew clergy and laity who suffered during the persecution of the Russian Orthodox Church in the 1920s and 1930s. And among others, Archimandrite Spiridon (Lukich), who lived in retirement in the city of Zhitomir, was himself interested in the fate of the confessors, especially those whom he personally knew. He treated the Hieromartyr Thaddeus (Uspensky), who lived in Zhitomir for quite a long time, with great reverence. Maintaining close relations with parishioners in Tver, he collected everything that related to the archbishop.
Then, in Tver itself, almost everyone who knew Archbishop Thaddeus during his lifetime was interviewed. Some indicated the place of his burial. However, as it turned out later, a change in the appearance of the area and the destruction of the Church of the Burning Bush Icon of the Mother of God, which had long been an important landmark, led to the loss of the exact location. In the mid-1980s, excavations were carried out in this area, which showed that the burial site was indeed inaccurately marked.
Having no new witnesses, the author began to study this section of the cemetery more carefully and came to the conclusion that one of the places was still somehow different from the others, as if a human hand was touching it, but just enough so as not to identify it to outsiders, as if wanting to keep this place a secret. Considering that the Soviet era had not yet ended, such a desire was quite natural.
Having determined the place, I had to wait until it was no different from the surrounding area, and thus fulfill the wish of the unknown admirer of the memory of the righteous man. In the end this happened, all signs of visiting this place disappeared and were no longer renewed, which made it possible to make the assumption that the person who visited the grave had died. By this time, the political life of the country had already changed, the state in which Archbishop Thaddeus lived no longer existed, and it itself, while millions of people silently watched this process, disintegrated, and, as always happens in such cases, its population on the outskirts was again plunged into the flames of civil war. To begin work aimed at finding the relics, it was necessary for the will of God to become clear, which could manifest itself, in particular, through the believing residents of Tver, in their desire to find the relics of the holy martyr.
More than six years passed from the time the place of the supposed burial of the holy martyr was determined, when in the summer of 1993, Yulia Efimovna Toporkova (later the abbess of the Kashin Klobukov Monastery Anna, who was tonsured into the schema with the name Stefanida before her death) contacted the author, who asked to begin research to find the burial place of the holy martyr Thaddeus . It was necessary to take the blessing of the diocesan bishop for this. At the beginning of October 1993, the author met with the ruling bishop of the Tver diocese, who also wished to begin the search.
Employees of the archeology department of the Tver State United Museum were involved in the research. Work began on October 24, 1993. The author outlined three possible burial sites in order to discard all versions after their official study, and Yulia Efimovna was told where the excavations should begin. The first day yielded results that were more of an archaeological nature - the remains of ancient buildings in Tver were discovered. After which the second place was indicated. The excavations carried out during the second day also did not give the desired results. As often happens, at the very first failures there is not enough patience, people lose faith that what they expect will come true. The littered edge of the cemetery next to the road and the absence of any landmarks really did not inspire much hope for success.
However, the author believed that the relics of Archbishop Thaddeus would be recovered. He knew that the burial took place in the presence of witnesses, and two witnesses knew exactly what day the archbishop’s body would be brought to the cemetery, the third one ended up here largely by accident, having come that day to pray at her father’s grave. It was also known that Archbishop Thaddeus was buried without a coffin, in his underwear. Preliminary research revealed that in the post-Easter days of 1938, the prison grave was secretly opened by admirers of the righteous man, the body of the archbishop was placed in a hastily knocked together coffin, and a painted Easter egg was placed in his hand. The death of the last Tver Archbishop, during the bloodiest years of the persecution of the Church, was immediately reported to the Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne, Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky), who performed his funeral in absentia.
The author explained to Yulia Efimovna in detail where to dig this time. On October 26, the third day of excavations, workers came across an unusual burial. Archaeologists were invited and completed the work.
The remains of a man buried in the 1930s were discovered in a grave that had all the signs of a prison burial, when generally accepted customs are not followed during burial. This was evidenced, in particular, by a coin from that time that was placed in the grave. The remains were in a coffin, more like a box, made of thin and narrow boards. The man's hands were tied with wire, and one of them contained shells from a painted Easter egg. All this coincided with the stories of witnesses who pointed to the circumstances of the burial of Archbishop Thaddeus.
On the same day, a memorial service was celebrated for the martyred Tver saint. After this, the remains were transported to the archeology department of the Tver State United Museum, which Yulia Efimovna informed the author about and asked him to come, since the diocese did not know what to do next with the remains.
The next day, October 27, the author arrived in Tver, at the archeology department, where he served a litany for the archpastor who had suffered martyrdom. Archaeologists suggested seeking assistance from the head of the Department of Forensic Medicine of the Tver State Medical Institute, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor Viktor Sergeevich Chelnokov. Having examined the found remains and reported after their examination some considerations that made it possible to think that they could belong to the holy martyr Thaddeus, he proposed to do a detailed study and contact his teacher in Moscow - the head of the forensic medical examination department of the Research Institute of Forensic Medicine of the Ministry Healthcare of the Russian Federation, Doctor of Medical Sciences, Professor Viktor Nikolaevich Zvyagin. Viktor Nikolaevich brilliantly conducted the research based on the analysis of historical data and the methodology that experts use in these cases. It was carried out from November 2, 1993 to March 15, 1994, after which it was concluded that the remains found on October 26, 1993 are the relics belonging to the holy martyr Thaddeus (Uspensky), Archbishop of Tver.
After completing the study, the Tver diocese proposed to transfer the relics privately, which was hardly worthy of the memory of the great archpastor. The author proposed making the transfer of the relics an official procedure so that the believers of Tver could participate in it, scheduling it for December 30, on the eve of the day of remembrance of Archbishop Thaddeus. The diocese agreed and agreed with the city authorities on the meeting place of the relics and the route of the procession to the Ascension Cathedral. The bus for transferring the relics from Moscow to Tver was provided by Alexander Vasilyevich Burenkov, publisher of the first in the series of books “Martyrs, confessors and devotees of piety of the Russian Orthodox Church. Biographies and materials for them,” published in 1992. However, in order to avoid the fact that people, if the bus was possibly late, would wait in the cold on the street, which Bishop Thaddeus would hardly have approved, it was decided to come to Tver the night before and stay at the house of Alexander Vasilyevich and Alexandra Vasilievna Burenkov, about which, however, they did not know in advance that before the transfer of the relics to the Ascension Cathedral, the relics of the holy martyr would visit their home. This was one of those cases when you are not accompanying the shrine, the relics of the martyr, but the martyr is accompanying you.
At that time they came to congratulate the owner of the house on her friend’s birthday. Having placed the shrine with the relics of the holy martyr, the author suggested to them: “You can ask Archbishop Thaddeus for whatever you want.”
One of the hostess’s friends was raising two children without a husband, with whom she lived in a barracks, in dire need of other housing, but getting it in those days was almost impossible: the country, which declared itself social, had already ceased to exist. And she asked, standing at the relics of the holy martyr, that he help her get an apartment. The answer was not long in coming. Within a few weeks she got an apartment. But when the paperwork began, they could not be completed, and various authorities even began to claim that she had been given an apartment illegally. She called Alexandra Vasilievna and began to complain about her bad luck. She asked her if she had gone to Vladyka Thaddeus and thanked him? After this, she immediately went to the cathedral, where the relics of Archbishop Thaddeus were located, and ordered a memorial service for him. After this the matter was soon settled. Another friend of Alexandra Vasilievna lost her first child, a girl, and could not get pregnant. She asked Bishop Thaddeus to beg God to give her and her husband a child. A year after her request to the bishop, she gave birth to a girl. The owner's mother, Nina Aleksandrovna, was ill at that time; she was lying in a cast, which the doctors decided to remove in a month and a half due to a complex fracture of the femoral neck. When the next morning the relics of the Hieromartyr Thaddeus were taken out of the house, she began to ask that the relics be brought into her room, which was done, and she asked that the Lord, through the prayers of Bishop Thaddeus, give her health. Two or three hours after she asked Bishop Thaddeus for her recovery, the plaster crumbled from her chest to her knee. An x-ray was immediately taken to find out whether it needed to be applied again, but it turned out that the plaster was not needed, Nina Alexandrovna was completely healthy; Then she could help with the housework herself.
People asked the holy martyr for the fulfillment of their urgent desires, and the Lord, through the prayers of the saint, immediately fulfilled his request. This was the beginning of the first miracles associated with the transfer of the holy relics of the Hieromartyr Thaddeus, Archbishop of Tver, to the Ascension Cathedral in the city of Tver.
Archimandrite Damascene (Orlovsky)
“Martyrs, confessors and devotees of piety of the Russian Orthodox Church of the twentieth century. Biographies and materials for them. Book 3." Tver. 2001. pp. 481-565
In the photo:
in the new church in honor of the Hieromartyr Thaddeus (Uspensky), the place where he was buried on January 2, 1938, and his holy relics were found on October 26, 1993.
"Present Christian Time"
Bishop of Vladimir-Volynsky Thaddeus (Uspensky).
1908 Photo from the site kizhi.karelia.ru In 1919, Bishop Thaddeus was first arrested and placed in Vladimir prison. Sitting on the bunk with him was Metropolitan Kirill (Smirnov), the third candidate for the patriarchal see according to the will of Patriarch Tikhon. One of the most intelligent and persistent hierarchs of the Russian Church wrote this in his memoirs about Arch. Thaddee:
“The terrible prison situation among thieves and murderers had a depressing effect on me... Vladyka Thaddeus, on the contrary, was calm and, sitting in his corner on the floor, thought about something all the time, and prayed at night. One night, when everyone was sleeping, and I was sitting in melancholy and despair, Vladyka took me by the hand and said:
“This is a real Christian time for us. Not sadness, but joy should fill our souls. Now we must open ourselves to heroism and sacrifice. Don't be discouraged. Christ is with us!”
My hand was in his hand, and I felt as if some kind of fiery stream was running through my hand. At some point, everything changed in me, I forgot about my fate, my soul became calm and joyful.
I kissed his hand twice, thanking God for the gift of consolation that this righteous man possessed.”
How Bishop Thaddeus hid the bread under his pillow
The prison where Archbishop Thaddeus (Uspensky) died a martyr.
Photo from the site kuz1.pstbi.ccas.ru When they brought parcels to Bishop Thaddeus in prison, he gave everything to the warden of the cell, who divided the parcel among all the cellmates. But there was a case when the archbishop hid some of the food under his pillow, and only after that he gave the rest to the warden and asked him to divide it among the prisoners.
Metropolitan Kirill was surprised at such a “concealment” of the product, and Bishop Thaddeus immediately explained: “No, no, not for myself. Today our brother will come to us, we need to feed him, but will they take him for allowance today?”
That same evening, Bishop Afanasy (Sakharov) arrived to serve his sentence, and he was placed in a cell with Bishop Thaddeus. So the archbishop’s stock made in advance came in handy! The unsentimental Metropolitan Kirill immediately told Bishop Athanasius about how Bishop Thaddeus “predicted” his arrival.
Architects were imprisoned and arrested. Thaddeus more than once. And in the intervals between arrests and prison, he served selflessly. When the authorities deprived him of registration, and Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky) appointed him to the Tver See, which had previously been occupied by Arch. Thaddeus, Archbishop Nicephorus (Nikolsky), recognition and veneration of arch. Thaddeus was so unconditional that the clergy of the diocese continued to communicate with him as with their ruling bishop.
