ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

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The Life of Andrei Yurodivyi is a biography of Andrei Tsaregradsky (Constantinopolsky), telling about him and about the miracles that happened to him. The author of this life is considered Nikephoros, priest of the temple of St. Sophia in Constantinople. According to the life of Andrew Yurodivy lived in the V century, during the time of the “Christ-loving king Leo the Great” (Emperor Leo I) and the Monk Daniel Stolpnik. The author describes the events as if he had witnessed them. However, life, despite the fact that in its text there are anachronisms, people and signs of the realities of that time are mentioned, could not be created before the IX-X centuries.
Bollandist K. Janning, the first publisher of the life of Andrei Yurodivoy, attributed the creation of life to the X century, based, among other things, on the fact that the life of Andrei Yurodivoy could be modeled on other lives that were created around the X century: Simeon of Emes, Vasily the New, Nifon of Cyprus. In addition, the later origin of life is indicated by the fact that the name of Andrei Yurodivoy appeared in Greek synaxaries only in the XII century.
In the 60s of the XII century, Prince Andrei Bogolyubsky established a new holiday - the Intercession of the Most Holy Mother of God. The basis was the mention in the life of Andrew the Furious Appearance of the Virgin to the saint. In the future, the celebration of the memory of Andrei Yurodivoy church timed to the celebration of the Intercession of the Most Holy Mother of God.

History
The original life of Andrei Yurodivoy (Tsaregradsky) was written around the end of the IX - early X centuries in Constantinople by a priest named Nikephoros, who served in the church of St. Sophia. The Old Russian translation was created in North-Western Russia at the beginning of the XII century (or earlier), its fragments were included in the brief edition of the Prologue (mid-twelfth century).

Despite the fact that the events are described as if the author was their contemporary, Andrei Yurodivy actually lived, apparently, about the fifth century, as indicated by the mention of some personalities, and Nikifor simply used early sources when writing.

Popularity in Russia is due to the fact that Andrei Yurodivyi is called a Slav, and in later translations even a Novgorodian, and the fact that the content of life is very interesting. The spread of the book in Russia was also influenced by the fact that the life describes the appearance of the Mother of God to St. Andrew, which played a role in establishing the feast of the Intercession of the Most Holy Mother of God in Russia.

Organization of the work
Life is a collection of stories about the life of Andrei Yurodivoy, although in some of them he does not act as the main character: for example, in life there are many episodes about Epiphany, a virtuous friend of Andrei Yurodivoy. The book also contains a section where Andrei Yurodiv answers Epiphanius to various questions about religion and the structure of the world (Epiphanius Questions and Answers of Blessed Andrew). The Greek edition has 245 episodes, all of which are easily separated. This arrangement of life gave the scribes the opportunity to include various stories from it in other collections.

The peculiar and popular life in Russia served as a source for the lives of Russian fools and influenced the spread of the very idea of juridical life