Venerable Pimen the Faster, of the Kiev Caves

IMPORTANT NARRATIVE CORRECTION: the legend of angelic tonsure and of tonsuring many monks on their deathbeds, previously mistakenly associated with this saint, in fact belongs to a DIFFERENT Pechersk saint — Venerable Pimen the Much-Ailing (feast August 7 O.S.), miraculously tonsured by angels during a childhood illness. There is also a third, separate Pechersk Pimen — Abbot Pimen of the Far Caves (d. 1141). These three same-named saints are distinct individuals and should not be confused.

This saint's genuine, well-attested miracle is his spiritual foreknowledge of the martyrdom of Hieromartyr Kuksha, apostle to the Vyatichi.

Venerable Pimen the Faster was a monk of the Kiev Caves Monastery (Near Caves) who lived in the late 11th–early 12th century; his birth date is unknown, and he reposed shortly after 1114. He became renowned for extreme abstinence — reportedly eating only once a week — combined with unceasing labor and prayer, for which God granted him the gift of clairvoyance.

Standing in the monastery church, Pimen cried out to the brethren that "our brother Kuksha has been killed this day," though no one in the monastery could have known this by ordinary means — Hieromartyr Kuksha had been killed by pagans far from Kiev. Pimen himself died that same day, sharing his day of repose with Kuksha. His relics rest among the fathers of the Near Caves of the Kiev Caves Lavra.