Saint Arsenios of Cappadocia – Aged Lithography – Mount Athos

Description

Antiqued Lithograph with Saint Arsenios of Cappadocia.

The Venerable Arsenios of Cappadocia was born around 1840 AD in Farasa, Cappadocia, with the secular name Theodoros.

From a young age, he was orphaned along with his brother Vlasios, and they were cared for by their aunt. A miraculous event that occurred to the children, and the miraculous rescue of young Theodoros by Saint George, who saved him from certain drowning, led to Vlasios dedicating himself to God as a teacher of Byzantine Music, while Theodoros became a monk.

At around the age of 26, he was tonsured a monk with the name Arsenios. However, he did not enjoy his solitude for long, as Metropolitan Paisios II ordained him as a Deacon and sent him to Farasa to teach reading and writing to abandoned children. At the age of 30, he was ordained a priest in Caesarea with the title of Archimandrite and the blessing as a Spiritual Father.

He lived with self-sacrifice because he loved God first and His image, the neighbor, second. With the abundant Divine Grace that God had endowed him with, he healed human suffering indiscriminately, whether among Christians or Turks, which caused his spiritual influence to begin spreading everywhere. Countless miracles were performed by the Saint with the Grace of God. When he raised his hands to pray to God for something, he would begin to plead, shouting “My God!” as if his heart were being torn apart at that moment, and it seemed as if he was holding onto Christ’s feet to make his request.

In addition to his other gifts, he also had the gift of foresight. This was evident, among other things, in the baptism of the little Arsenios (later Saint Paisios – July 12), to whom he gave his own name, saying, “He will leave a monk at his feet.”

He fell asleep in the Lord on November 10, 1924, in Corfu.

Antiqued Lithograph: Characteristics

This particular image has been created using the technique of lithography, which is taught in the iconography workshops of Mount Athos and is also used by several monks to create exceptional works of art. In this case, the monk used a lithographed copy of Byzantine art and crafted this work following the traditional method of artificial aging. The technique of lithography in iconography essentially constitutes a printing technique.

Origin: Mount Athos