PAGES

November 1, 2024

Midnight Visitations of Venerable David the Elder to Saint Iakovos Tsalikes


Saint Iakovos spoke of Venerable David as follows:

"Venerable David, my children, lived in the 15th century, he is very miraculous. He would leave the Monastery and go to the Hermitage, half an hour from here, and he would spend there the whole week with an antidron, my children, with fasting, vigil and prayer.
 
He came to the Monastery on Saturday night, saw the fathers, liturgize on Sunday morning, took his antidron and went to the Hermitage again. After the Master Christ called for him, he went down to the Monastery and reposed five hundred years ago.

And yet everyone knew this monk. Russia knew him and Constantinople.

Patriarch Jeremiah knew him and even wanted to make him a Bishop. Out of humility, Venerable David did not want to become a Bishop. He was not like us, he didn't want elevations, he wanted to be a humble servant of God. Only to be a Priest and please God. Who recognized him as a Saint in this wilderness? God makes saints."

+ + +

A spiritual child of Saint Iakovos recounts:

When night fell and the fathers were quiet in their cells, Elder Iakovos would open the back door of the Monastery and in the middle of the night set off for the Hermitage of Venerable David. However, due to the dense darkness, he could not see at all to advance among the cliffs, rocks and dense vegetation, so he begged the Saint to help him:

"You, my Saint, my protector, help me to reach your Hermitage."

And then - O the wonder! - a little star came down from the sky and lit up the path in front of him!

This is how he was able to see and reached the Saint's cave, where many times Saint David himself was waiting for him.

+ + +

Testimony of Saint Iakovos of a visitation of Venerable David:

"There in the Hermitage, I saw many wonders! I saw the Saint coming at midnight and he came, as I had begged him, sometimes in the form of Father Nikodemos and sometimes in the form of Father Euthymios, who had been fifty years in the Monastery and was an old man, very thin and died in 1974.

There at night I lit the oil lamps, burned incense, read various spiritual things and prayed on my knees and at 3 o'clock I got up, went outside and made an entreaty to God, in the quiet of the night, and God and Venerable David listened to it. Then I would come to the Monastery and do the liturgy, without anyone knowing anything.

One night the Saint appeared to me in the form of Father Euthymios, he opened the door and entered.

I then, thinking it was Father Euthymios, said to him:

'My pappouli, have you come to stay at the Hermitage with me tonight? You did well and I also came to the Hermitage of Venerable David.'

As I was doing my prayer, I saw the pappouli holding his skoufi in his hand and having a white long long beard and then he disappeared.

Another time he presented himself to me in the form of Father Nikodemos."