Venerable
Venerable Paul of Xeropotamou
IX—X вв.
Also known as: Прокопий (мирское имя, по преданию)
Venerable Paul of Xeropotamou — a 10th-century saint, founder of the Xeropotamou Monastery on Mount Athos; the tradition of his imperial parentage (son of Michael I Rangabe) is scholarly disputed, with some researchers holding the vita conflates two different ascetics named Paul.
HONEST SCHOLARLY CAVEAT: the tradition that the saint was the son of Emperor Michael I Rangabe (r. 811–813) is not merely "disputed between two versions" but internally inconsistent, and is treated with caution by modern scholarship — Michael I's chronology fits poorly with the saint's traditional dates, since Paul's documented activity intersects with the reign of Emperor Romanos I Lekapenos (920–944), a century later. The leading scholarly theory holds that the received vita conflates two different ascetics named Paul, each the founder of one Athonite house (Xeropotamou and the later Monastery of St. Paul).
Venerable Paul of Xeropotamou (secular name Prokopios) was a 10th-century Athonite saint, founder of the Xeropotamou Monastery. Per tradition, he received an excellent education, wrote theological works and canons, then withdrew to Athos, settled amid ruins said to have been founded by Empress Pulcheria, and was tonsured by the elder Cosmas as Paul.
Emperor Romanos I Lekapenos, a kinsman by tradition, helped restore Xeropotamou and donated a relic of the True Cross. Paul later founded a second monastery, dedicated to St. George, later renamed in his honor (Monastery of St. Paul). He foretold his own death to the brethren; his relics were later translated via Constantinople to Venice. His feast is kept July 28/August 10.