Our Holy Father Maximus of Kapsokalyvia.

Commemorated January 13 in the Orthodox Christian Menaion

From the Prologue

Maximus lived in the fourteenth century, following the ascetic life as a monk on the Holy Mountain according to his own particular way: that is to say, he pretended to be slightly crazed and constantly changed his abode. This being a hut of boughs, he built them and burned them down in rapid succession, thus earning himself the name 'of Kapsokalyvia', that is, 'of the burnt huts'. He was regarded as a fool until St Gregory the Sinaite came to the Holy Mountain and perceived in Maximus a unique ascetic, a wonderworker with the gift of prayer and an 'angel in the flesh'. He went to the Lord in the year 1320. January 14

From The Prologue From Ochrid by Bishop Nikolai Velimirovich
©1985 Lazarica Press, Birmingham UK