Venerable Zosimas of Verkhovye

Venerable Zosimas of Verkhovye, born Zachary Vasilyevich Verkhovsky, was born in 1768 into a noble family in the Smolensk region. After beginning military service, he soon left it for monasticism and entered the Konevets Hermitage, then, seeking solitary asceticism, withdrew to Mount Athos, from which he was nevertheless forced to return to Russia. He spent many years in eremitic labor in the Siberian forests near Turinsk together with the elder Basiliscus of Turinsk, with whom he shared a deep spiritual friendship. After Elder Basiliscus's death in 1824, he undertook the organization of a women's monastic community originally founded for the spiritual daughters of his late mentor: in 1826 he obtained permission to relocate the community's sisters to lands near Moscow, where he founded the Trinity-Hodegetria Hermitage (later known as Zosimova Hermitage), composed a cenobitic rule for it, and provided spiritual guidance to the sisters until the end of his life. He died on October 24, 1833. He was canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church in 2004.