Panteleimon Prokhorov

Panteleimon Prokhorov was a Russian schemamonk, born in 1811 in a peasant family in the village of Starye Kostychi, Simbirsk province, who came to Athos and founded a convent in Russia. He reposed on 3 January 1884. He is venerated by the faithful, without a synodal canonization.

Named Pyotr Savelyevich Prokhorov in the world, he loved the church and solitude from childhood and, not knowing how to read, learned the prayers from his mother. The renown of the life of the Russian monks on Athos drew him, but he reached there only after three years at the Odessa metochion, gathering alms. At St Panteleimon, Father Pachomius, as he was first called, lived very strictly: he entered church first and left last, ate little, and wished the service to continue unceasingly in his heart. Between the 1840s and the 1880s he had no bed and was never seen lying down. After twenty years of solitude, in 1869, he opened his cell and received anyone, with a child's gentleness. Seven times he went to St Petersburg on the community's business, was presented to the Tsar and visited Diveyevo, on whose model he wished to found a convent, where he would place his former wife and daughters. He built a wooden church of the Smolensk Icon of the Mother of God, consecrated in 1869, and the convent grew quickly, though it met many obstacles. It was officially recognised on 15 December 1883, a few days before his repose. He died on 3 January 1884, making the sign of the cross; his hand fell on his head and he fell asleep with the sleep of the righteous.