Venerable
Venerable Nicodemus of Kozheozero
? — 1640
Also known as: Никита (в миру), Никодим Хозьюгский
Venerable Nicodemus of Kozheozero — a 17th-century Russian ascetic, a blacksmith by trade before monasticism, who spent most of his life as a hermit near Kozheozero Monastery in the Arkhangelsk region.
IMPORTANT CORRECTION: the category has been corrected from "righteous" to "venerable".
Venerable Nicodemus, born Nikita, was born in the village of Ivankovo near Rostov, to a peasant family, and trained as a blacksmith in Yaroslavl. He went to Moscow and there took monastic tonsure. In 1602 he followed his abbot (later Metropolitan of Sarsk) north; around 1603 he entered the Kozheozero Theophany Monastery in the Arkhangelsk region, then withdrew to live as a hermit nearby for the rest of his life in extreme asceticism.
He died July 3, 1640. He was canonized in 1662; his relics were found incorrupt in 1695. His Life records fourteen posthumous miracles (healings, the rescue of fishermen, help for those lost in the forest).
His feast is kept on July 3/16; also August 3 and October 31 (Synaxes of Arkhangelsk, Novgorod, and Rostov-Yaroslavl Saints).