Niphon of Lukovë

Venerable Niphon of Lukovë, called Niphon Kausokalybites, was an Athonite monk of the fourteenth century, born in the village of Lukovë, in the Himarra region of the Despotate of Epirus, in 1315. His father was a priest. From childhood he read the Holy Scriptures and Lives of the saints. Desiring stillness, he entered the Monastery of Geromerion, near Filiates, as a disciple of an elder from Sinai, then Mesopotamos, where he was tonsured a monk and ordained priest at twenty; he tried to act the fool in order to escape ordination, but God found him worthy.

After 1335 he went to Mount Athos, under the guidance of the elders Neilos Erichiotes, Theognostos and Maximos Kausokalybites. He lived three years under Theognostos, then fourteen years in the Kathisma of Saint Basil the Great. In 1345 he was Protos of Athos, but in 1347 or 1348 he was tried and removed on a charge of heresy, replaced by a Serbian monk, Anthony. He was defended by Saint Gregory Palamas and, later, by Patriarch Kallistos. He wrote the first life of Saint Maximos Kausokalybites, his spiritual father. He foretold his death during the Fast of the Holy Apostles and departed to the Lord on 14 June 1411, aged 96, with the gifts of wonderworking and clairvoyance. He is commemorated on 14 June.