Rare publications about the Tikhvin icon of the Holy mother of God – in the Presidential Library stock

The Day of the Tikhvin Icon of the Mother of God (also known as The Theotokos of Tikhvin) is celebrated on July 9, and 13 years ago on this day one of the most revered shrines of the Orthodox world was returned back to Russia. There are some rare editions related with the centuries-old history of the Tikhvin Mother’s of God Assumption (Uspensky) Monastery and the miraculous icon on the Presidential Library website. In 2014, on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the return of this icon back to the native land, the Presidential Library has offered the amount of digitized sources to the Russian Orthodox Church, including to the monastery of the Tikhvin Diocese.

“Layout planning of Tikhvin is remarkably correct, - as writes L. Grigoriev in the edition of Tikhvin and His Shrine of 1889, presented in digital format on the Presidential Library website. – There is a square with an ancient cathedral in the name of the Transfiguration of the Lord in the city center. There are also two monasteries, one male, another female, in the city, the Znamensky (the Holy Sign) Parish Church and two churches without a parish - one cemetery in the name of Job the Long-suffering, and the other one of Common Faith. Except for the latter, all the churches in Tikhvin are made of stone; they are all kept with remarkable accuracy and visible splendor. Against the cathedral there is a fairly dense central garden.”

Such a number of churches for six and a half thousand of the population of the town in the marsh- and woodland depths in the Northwest of the Leningrad Oblast is explained by the appearance of the Hodegetria type icon of the Mother of God, described by many authors. For example, Yakov Berednikov in his book of 1859 Historical and statistical description of the first-class Tikhvin Bogoroditsky large male monastery, belonging to the Novgorod Diocese and located in the city of Tikhvin tells: “During the pious Power of Grand Duke Dmitry Ioannovich Donskoy fishers, engaged in catches in the abyss of the Nevo Lake (Ladoga), Suddenly were illuminated by extraordinary brilliance. With confusion and fright they looked at the sky and saw the icon of the Blessed Virgin in a dazzling radiance, quietly coursing over the waters. Amazed by this inexplicable vision, they with a heartfelt trembling followed with a look and a thought for her procession, but soon its miraculous wraith was hidden from their eyes. <…> In this place, in a reverent memory of the marvelous standing of the icon of Our Lady in the atmosphere, during one hour the orthodox people built a wooden chapel, and then it was replaced with a stone one and dedicated to the manifestations of the of Tikhvin icon of the Mother of God.”

The image of the Virgin Hodegetria, which was written by St. Luke the Evangelist and came to Russia from Constantinople in the XIV century, caused the pilgrimage of Orthodox people of different social categories in Tikhvin. For instance, Grand Duke Ioann Vasiliyevich (future Grozny) visited the city in 1547. He came for the worship of the holy icon and after his return to Moscow ordered to replace the parish church in Tikhvin with a new monastery. Its erection required the great efforts: the uneven and swampy site of construction had to be cleaned and drained with the help of ditches, and only then start with creating monastic cells, a bell tower, a refectory, a fence with turrets, etc. So, in the Tikhvin monastery was established.

In the book of Yakov Berednikov is given a detailed description of the icon: “The Tikhvin miraculous icon of the Blessed Virgin with eternal infant on the left hand, about 31,5 inches long and 3,5 inches wide is sited in the right column of the cold monastery cathedral in the name of the Assumption of the Mother of God. Among the mass of gold, diamonds, brocade, an abundance of lighted candles and precious lamps, the divine image of the Blessed Virgin appears to the eyes of the worshipers surrounded by such majestic glory that to each coming first of all it witnessing of the special importance of the sacred object in front of them, which for centuries saw around itself the entire generations of worshiping people.”

During the Great Patriotic War the icon was taken to Riga. Bishop John (Garklavs) saved it, but in several years he moved to the United States, where he became Archbishop of Chicago and Minneapolis. For 60 years the shrine was kept overseas and only in 2004 it was returned to Russia, when the main clauses of the will of John Garklavs were fulfilled - the monastery was restored and the spiritual life returned to it. The Theotokos of Tikhvin is one of the most celebrated Orthodox Christian icons.

The cooperation of the Presidential Library with the Tikhvin Mother of God Uspensky Monastery has been successfully developing. Launching a remote electronic reading room of the Presidential Library in the Tikhvin Spiritual and Awareness-raising Center provided it with an efficient access to the entire library stock, which now numbers more than 550,000 entries. The access center to the resources of the Presidential Library is also open in the territory of the Teffi Sociocultural Center in Tikhvin. Among its materials a special place belongs to the collection, which reveals the history of the Russian Orthodox Church. Part of it is the evidences of the famous Tikhvin icon.