The Orthodox Church has endowed the world with many holy people. Many of them were ordained, others were glorified for righteous life as laymen. There were also those who took monastic vows and became famous for outstanding spiritual exploits. Such saints are called saints in the Orthodox tradition.
On November 17, according to the new style, the Orthodox Church commemorates the memory of St. John the Great. The saint was born in 752 and was from the Bithinian country. In his youth, Ioannikiy grazed cattle and even then became famous as a meek, kind, humble and patient boy. From childhood, the young man loved to pray. Often he left the cattle, crossing the sign of the cross, and retired all day to a secluded place to pray.
Upon reaching adulthood, Ioanniki entered military service, where at first he continued to maintain piety. However, later, serving in the ranks of the imperial army under the ruler Leo Copronymus, he fell into the iconoclastic heresy. The emperor Leo himself was an ardent opponent of the veneration of icons.
Once, passing near the Olympic Mountain, Ioannikios was met by a hermit elder, who denounced the warrior as heresy. The elder, not knowing Ioannikios, addressed him by name and admonished: "If a person calls himself a Christian, then he should not despise the icons of Christ …".
During his military service, Ioanniki took part in hostilities. For special bravery, the emperor wanted to reward the warrior with gifts and honors, but the latter, having come to his senses after communicating with the elder, refused the gifts and the service itself and wished to retire for solitude in the desert.
Seeing that Ioannikios was not ready for such a great feat of solitude, the abbot of the Avgar monastery advised the former soldier to start living in the monastery. Ioanniky followed the blessing of the abbot. Only two years later, he left the monastic monastery and retired to retire to the Olympic desert.
In the Olympic Desert, he lived for three years in a deep cave dug out. He ate bread and water, which the shepherd brought to the ascetic. After a three-year hermitage, Ioanniky asceticised in other monasteries, and ended the days of his earthly life in solitude on Mount Trichalin.
Saint Ioannicius, after repenting for the iconoclastic heresy, turned many away from it, having labored to convey to people the truths of Christianity. The monk healed many people by means of the sign of the cross and prayers. The elder had clairvoyance: he predicted death to the emperor Nicephorus and his son, as well as his own death.
The great reverend died at the age of 94 in the year 846. Some of his holy relics are still on Mount Athos.
