Venerable (Monastic)14th century

Venerable Paul the Obedient

13th–14th century

Also known as Paul of the Kiev Caves

A monk of the Kiev Caves renowned for his perfect obedience (13th-14th c.)

September 10New Calendar

Feast Day

September 23Old Calendar

Also commemorated

December 7NewDecember 20Old

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Commemorated as

Our Venerable Father Paul the Obedient of the Kiev Caves

Life

Venerable Paul the Obedient was a monk of the Kiev Caves Monastery (the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra) remembered for the perfection of his monastic obedience. He took the monastic schema at the Caves and laboured among the ascetics of the Far Caves, the cave complex associated with Saint Theodosius.

His name in the tradition reflects the single virtue for which he is honoured: he carried out the burdensome obediences assigned to him by the monastery's superior without complaint, joining unceasing manual labour to constant inner prayer. The surviving notice of his life is brief, and no birth or repose date is recorded; he is placed by tradition in the 13th–14th century.

Troparion1 hymnReadHide

TroparionTone 8

By a flood of tears you made the desert fertile,
and your longing for God brought forth fruits in abundance.
By the radiance of miracles you illumined the whole universe!
O our holy father Paul, pray to Christ our God to save our souls!

Text used with permission of the Orthodox Church in America (oca.org).

Contributions & Legacy

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Life of Obedience

According to the synaxarion, upon receiving the monastic schema at the Caves monastery Paul undertook the very burdensome obediences on which the superior sent him, and bore them without a murmur. Obedience — the surrender of one's own will to the direction of a spiritual elder or superior — is a foundational discipline of cenobitic monasticism, and it is for his fidelity to it that Paul received his name.

The tradition relates that he was never idle. When he was not occupied with an assigned obedience, he ground grain under the millstone, wearing down his body by this heavy work. Through this combination of constant labour and prayer he is said to have attained ceaseless inner prayer.

Commemoration and Resting Place

Paul is commemorated on September 10, the day of his namesake Saint Paul, Bishop of Nicaea; a commemoration on December 7 is also recorded, though its details are uncertain. He reposed at the monastery, and his relics rest among the venerable fathers in the Far Caves (the Theodosius Caves) of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, where he is numbered among the saints of the Kiev Caves.

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