Onuphrius of David Gareji Monastery

Saint Onuphrius of David Gareji Monastery, in the world Otar Machutadze, was a Georgian nobleman of Kartli in the eighteenth century who left wealth and family for monastic life and reposed at the David Gareji monastery, on the day of the Baptism of the Lord. He is commemorated on 29 September.

The calling

Otar was known for wealth, hospitality and charity, but wore a hair shirt under his fine clothes and longed for monastic life. He asked his wife's forgiveness, and she consented to his leaving, and after blessing his two eldest sons at Tbilisi he went to David Gareji. Archimandrite Herman tonsured him with the name Onuphrius. He kept vigil at night, chanted psalms in the ravine with tears and ate once a day, bread and water.

Trials and miracles

When Dagestanis plundered the monastery and took him captive, those who wished to kill him could not, and he returned. After the invasion he was sent to gather alms and went from door to door as a former nobleman. At Tskhinvali he healed a young man possessed by spirits by giving him water in which he had dissolved a little earth from the grave of Saint David of Gareji to drink; then he took his youngest son, John, and returned with provisions. An Arab with a wounded eye was healed by washing in water from the monastery's spring.

The great schema and the end

After thirty days of prayer at the grave of Saint David, he received the great schema. He took a vow of silence, slept on a tattered mat and wore a heavy chain under his clothes, leaving his cell only for services. When he had worn himself out and the brothers urged him to rest on a bed, he spoke the single phrase since his vow: that he would end his days on the mat. He received visitors with the Jesus Prayer, saying: "Let me kiss the edge of your garments and wash your feet with my tears." He received Communion and eighteen days later fell asleep on the feast of the Baptism of the Lord. He was buried beside the grave of Saint David, near the altar window.