Venerable Acacius the Younger of Mount Athos

Ascetic life and teaching

Sources describe his discipline as severe. In place of bread he is said to have eaten dry grass, which he crushed with a piece of marble. Asked how much a monk ought to sleep, he held that even half an hour was sufficient for a true monk, and he taught that to subdue the flesh a monk must practice two virtues above all: fasting and vigil.

The synaxarion relates that he received the gifts of unceasing mental prayer and of divine revelations, and that he experienced visions associated with Saint Maximus of Kavsokalyvia, in whose former cave he dwelt. The igumen Neophytus is said to have handed Acacius his own staff and to have asked him to serve as superior of the brethren until his last breath.

Disciples

He is remembered as the spiritual father of several monks of the Athonite community, among them three who are venerated as Neomartyrs: Romanos, Pachomios, and Nikodimos.

Relics and shrines

His relics are reported to be preserved at the Monastery of Dionysiou and at Kavsokalyvia. He later moved to a lower cave near Kavsokalyvia that came to bear his name, and a spring in the area is known as the Holy Water of Saint Acacius.