Venerable Pimen the Much-Ailing, of the Near Caves (+c. 1110)

The Venerable Pimen the Much-Ailing was born sickly, and fervently begged his mother and father to take him to the monastery of the Kiev Caves. When his illness grew much worse, his parents granted his wish. They asked the monks of the monastery to pray for the young man’s recovery, but the sick man himself besought the Lord to prolong his illness and to make him worthy of monasticism as well. The blessed one’s prayer was heard: when everyone was asleep, angels appeared in the room where Pimen lay, in the guise of the abbot and the brethren, tonsured him a monk, and told him that he would be ill all his life and would be healed only three days before his death. Hearing the sound of singing, the monks hurried to the Venerable Pimen and found him in monastic garb, with a lighted candle in his hand; his shorn lock of hair was found in the shrine of Theodosius of the Caves. For many years the saint was gravely ill. For patiently enduring his sufferings without complaint the saint was granted the gift of healing the illnesses of others. He healed a sick man like himself on condition that he would care for the sick until his death. Once that brother grew weary of serving the sick, and his illness returned. The Venerable Pimen healed him again and instructed him that the sick man and the one who serves the sick receive an equal reward. The blessed father spent twenty years in terrible suffering and, as the angel had foretold, recovered three days before his death.

On the day of Saint Pimen the Much-Ailing’s departure from this world three luminous pillars rose over the altar, reaching up above the dome of the church. A similar vision described in the chronicle is dated 11 February 1110; on this basis it is supposed that the Venerable Pimen reposed on 11 February 1110. The holy father’s incorrupt relics are buried in the Caves of Antony.