John the Domvoites

Venerable John the Domvoites, in the world John Smyrnaios, was a monk and poet at the Monastery of St Seraphim at Domvou in Boeotia, born at Piraeus in 1903 and fallen asleep on 1 June 1962. He is honoured by the faithful as a hermit ascetic, without synodal canonization.

He was born at Piraeus in 1903. His father was a shipbuilder from Ermoupoli on Syros, and his mother from the island of Hydra. At two he was orphaned and raised by his grandmother in the fear of God. He was well educated and graduated from the School of Law of the University of Athens; his fellow students called him "the spiritual one", and his teachers would have liked him for an academic career. He was gentle, cheerful, lenient and ready to help without display. He read Holy Scripture day and night after prayer, and counted prayer the food of the soul. With the blessing of his spiritual fathers, Metropolitan George of Kalavryta and Aegialia, the venerable Hieronymos of Simonopetra and Fr Konstantinos Paraskevas of the church of St John Rentis in Piraeus, he climbed the steps of the virtues. Divine love took him away from relatives, friends and the bustle of Piraeus.

He first went to the Monastery of the Venerable Meletios at the foot of Kithairon, near Oinoi, on the border of Attica and Boeotia. He presented himself to the abbot as an illiterate porter, and so was given the obedience of shepherd and gatherer of wood in the forest. When his identity was discovered he left secretly for the Monastery of the Venerable Seraphim at Domvou, where he lived as a recluse all his life. There he cultivated virtue in secret, mortifying his body and praying without ceasing, and wrote the Poems of the Monk, published after his repose in three volumes by the Metropolis of Thebes. He avoided meetings with people, with the saying "Be benefited, or benefit another, or leave", but was always gracious.

On 8 September 1943 he received the angelic schema. He lived simply in his narrow cell near the bell tower and wrote standing at the window. His only belongings were two tins, which he called "the golden and the silver cups". He ate little, kept vigil like no other, and every night at the same hour went to the church to kiss its door, whatever the weather. He lit his fire rarely and had written in chalk on the black pot: "The monk does not want talking." He received the gift of tears, and his hands, knees and forehead were calloused from prostrations. He impressed all by his devoutness in the reading of the Psalms and the Prophets at the services, his chanting was sweet, and he was never seen sitting even during long vigils. When he had to go to Athens or Piraeus he took the shortest route, head down, never looking at people or shops.

On 1 June 1962 he fell asleep during the reading of Compline, just as he finished saying the Creed: he lifted his hands as if he saw someone and, with a wide smile, departed to the Lord.