Dositheus Tsereteli

Saint Dositheus Tsereteli, hieromartyr (born Datuna Nikolozovich Tsereteli, about 1750 to 6 March 1820), was metropolitan of Kutaisi from 1781 to 1820, locum tenens of the Catholicosate of Abkhazia (1792 to 1814), taken into exile after the uprising of Imereti and died on the way. He was numbered among the saints by the Holy Synod of the Georgian Orthodox Church on 27 May 2005, together with Metropolitan Euthymius Shervashidze.

Family and ministry

He was born at Sachkhere, around 1750, of a princely family of Imereti. His father, Nikoloz, was minister of armaments, his grandfather Papuna was commander of the army of Imereti in the 1720s, and his cousin Daredjan was the wife of King Heraclius II of eastern Georgia. His mother, Khoreshan, was a daughter of King Alexander V of Imereti. As metropolitan of Kutaisi he cared for the prosperity of the diocese and the return of church lands and peasants taken by the nobles: he bought them back with his own money and gave to many churches and monasteries of western Georgia (Jruchi in 1779, Mghvimevi in 1808 and others). He gave to the cathedral of Kutaisi, the Bagrati church, an abbot's cross made with his blessing. From the 1760s he also lived at the second residence of the metropolitans of Kutaisi, in the village of Maglaki.

He was an active supporter of the restoration of Georgia's unity; in 1790, with other leaders of western Georgia, he was part of the delegation of Imereti to King Heraclius II, with the proposal to reunite the kingdoms and principalities of western and eastern Georgia. After the death of Catholicos Maxim II, on 30 May 1795, King Solomon II of Imereti named him successor of the catholicos; the enthronement did not take place, and in documents he signed himself "Most Reverend Metropolitan of Kutaisi and governor of the Catholicosate".

Exile and death

On 30 August 1814 the Catholicosate of Abkhazia (of western Georgia) was abolished, and the Church of western Georgia was incorporated in the exarchate of Georgia. The exarch, Archbishop Theophylact (Rusanov), prepared a plan of reform meant to bring Georgian church order closer to that of all Russia: a reduction in the number of dioceses, churches, monasteries and clergy, the secularization of church and monastery property, services in Church Slavonic and the replacement of payments in kind by payments in money. The clergy of western Georgia protested firmly, but in June 1819 representatives of the synodal office began to close churches in Imereti, Guria and Mingrelia. In 1819 to 1820 the uprising of Imereti broke out, led by Metropolitans Dositheus and Euthymius Shervashidze, Princess Daredjan, daughter of King Solomon II, and Prince Ivan Abashidze. The exarch accused them of inciting the revolt and convinced the authorities that the situation could be calmed only by arresting and exiling the rebellious bishops. Additional troops were brought, and the governor of Imereti was advised, "if they cannot be seized alive, to destroy them", and to remove the bodies of those killed from Georgia.

In the night of 4 March 1820 Metropolitans Dositheus and Euthymius, Archimandrite Gregory (Tskitishvili) and several princes of Imereti were seized. Dositheus resisted and was beaten with rifle butts and bayonets. The prisoners, with sacks on their heads, were sent on horseback over the Likhi pass toward eastern Georgia, to be taken then to Russia by the Georgian Military Road. Metropolitan Dositheus died in 1820 on the way between Surami and Gori; the Georgian Church holds that it was on 6 March, while the Russian source does not give the day. He was buried in the Dormition church in the fortress of Ananuri. The gravestone is lost, but a historian cites oral testimony that he was buried two and a half arshins from the icon of the Mother of God. A post-⁠mortem inventory of his belongings survives: a cross of Saint Anna first class, two Vladimir crosses, a panagia with an image of Christ and precious stones, a large gilded silver cross with enamels, a silver icon with particles of saints and of the Great Martyr George, a Gospel in a gilded silver binding with precious stones, a censer, a large hyacinth stone in a silver setting, a small gold icon, Russian and Turkish money and other household things.