Avimelech of Pantokratoros

Avimelech of Pantokratoros, with the secular name Antonios Manidakis, the son of Emmanuel and Olympia, was born in 1957 in the village of Miamou in Heraklion, Crete. He came to the hut of the Nativity of the Theotokos at Kapsala in 1989; in the world he had worked as an air force officer. He was tonsured into the great schema in 1991 by Elder Meletios, and in 1994 he came to live at Pantokratoros Monastery.

He was of a hesychast nature, refined, of few words, serious, willing, obedient and content with little. He never asked for anything and never showed a will of his own. His elder Meletios relates that once, when he returned to their hut, Father Avimelech said to him with joy: "Elder, I have found, I have found." "What have you found, Avimelech, a cell to move to?" "No, Elder, I have found the place of my heart." After that he stayed awake for five days, unable to sleep for joy. He was a great struggler; while in the hut, to overcome sleep, he hung himself from chains. He was one of the few who passed from cell life to monastery life. On the last day he came to his elder at Kapsala and said: "Elder, I found rest in the monastery, I would like to die there." The next day he reposed suddenly, of pulmonary oedema, on 4 March 1997, shortly after the Divine Liturgy in which he had communed.

He was adorned with simplicity and humility. Monk Moses the Athonite remembers his kindness, compunction, courtesy and spiritual nobility. He is venerated by the faithful, without synodal canonization.