Testament of the Venerable Father Theodosius of the Kiev Caves (+1074)

This is a rather stern but fundamentally true instruction for Orthodox Christians.

 

Lord, give the blessing! I, Theodosius, the miserable slave of the All-Holy Trinity, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, was born in the pure and right-believing faith and brought up in good teaching by an Orthodox father and mother.

Do not commune with the Latin [Roman Catholic] faith, do not attach yourselves to their customs, flee from their communion, avoid all their teachings and abhor their morals.

Beware, my children, of the crooked in faith and their conversations, for our land has been filled to the full with them. If anyone will save his soul, then let him only live in the Orthodox Faith, for there is no other faith better than our pure and holy Orthodox Faith.

Living in this faith, you do not only escape sins and eternal torment, but become partakers of eternal life, and you will rejoice without end with the Saints. As for those who live in another faith: the [Roman] Catholic, or the Muslim, or the Armenian - they shall not see eternal life.

Moreover, it is not right, my child, to praise another faith. He who praises another faith is as if he is blaspheming his own. If someone begins to praise both his own and another faith, then he is two-faithed, and close to heresy. But you, my child, observe such people, and constantly praise your own faith. Do not be friendly with them, but flee from them and struggle in your own faith through good works. Give alms not only to those of your own faith, but also to those of other faiths. If you see someone who is naked or hungry, or who has fallen into misfortune, - whether he be a Jew, or a Turk, or a Latin, - be merciful to every such person, deliver him from his misfortune as far as you are able, and you will not be deprived of a reward from God, for God Himself in the present age pours out His mercies not only on Christians, but also on the unfaithful. God cares in this life for the pagans and those of other faiths, but in the future age they will be alienated from the eternal blessings. But we who live in the Orthodox Faith will receive all blessings from God both here, and in the future age our Lord Jesus Christ will save us.

My child, if you will even have to die for our holy Faith, go to your death with boldness. Thus did the Saints die for the faith, and now they are living in Christ. But you, my child, if you see people of other faiths quarrelling with the faithful, and trying to draw them away from the right faith by deception, help the Orthodox. In this way you will, as it were, save a sheep from the mouth of a lion. But if you are silent and leave them without help, then this is as if you took a redeemed soul from Christ and sold him to Satan.

If one who opposes you says: “Your faith and our faith are from God,” then you, my child, must reply as follows: “O crooked in faith! Or do you consider God also to be two-faithed! Have you not heard, you who have been corrupted by an evil faith, how Scripture says: ‘One God, one Faith, one Baptism’ (Eph.4.5)?

“Have you not heard the Apostle Paul saying: ‘If an angel comes from heaven and preaches to you a gospel that we have not preached to you, let him be anathema’ (Gal. 1.8).

“But you [Latins], who reject the apostolic teaching and the Holy Fathers, have received an incorrect and corrupted faith, full of destruction. Therefore, you are rejected by us. Therefore, it is not right that you should serve with us and approach the Divine Mysteries with us, neither should you approach our Mysteries, nor we to yours, because you are dead and offer a dead sacrifice, while we offer to the living God a pure and immaculate sacrifice in order to inherit eternal life.

“For thus is it written: ‘Give unto each according to his works' in Christ Jesus our Lord.’ To Him be the glory. Amen.”

 

Source: The Shepherd: An Orthodox Christian Pastoral Magazine, Vol. XLV, No. 9, May 2025, pp. 11-12.