SIGHTINGS OF THE BURYATIA
KABANSKY REGION
The Posolsky Spaso-Preobrazhensky monastery
The Posolsky Spaso-Preobrazhensky monastery was founded in 1681 by
mission of the heguman Feodosiy Òroitsky of the Selenginsky monastery due to the
decree of the tsar Fyodor Alekseevich on the right coast of Baikal lake. Next to
the monastery there appeared the village of Posolskoe.
First, on the place of the monastery, zaimka (a temporary house) was built and
the pustyn (a desert) for monks was arranged. The place for the monastery was
chosen on the Baikal cape where in 1651 members of Russian embassy to Mongolia
had been killed and buried: an imperial ambassador Erofey Zabolotsky, his son
Kirill and their satellites. The mission travelled on a vessel and moored to the
coast. 8 persons from 20 members of embassy who left the vessel for the coast
were lost. The embassy carried treasury, they were accompanied by the Mongolian
ambassador, the interpreter and industrial people. The embassy was attacked with
the purpose of robbery by the yasak people of the khan Tarukhay-tabun to whom
the embassy was carrying the salary. But they failed to do it.
The monastery was built gradually. Its first structures were wooden. The walls
with angular defensive towers, intended for repulsing the attacks of nomad
tribes were also wooden. There guns were established and fighting supplies and
other weapons were stored in the monastery. Then an altar was added to the
chapel and in 1700 the first church on Baikal – Posolskaya was consecrated in
honour of the name of Svyatitel (Saint) and Chudotvorets (Wondermaker) Nikolay.
Originally the church monastery on the Baikal was called the Nikolaevskaya
pustyn. Then the shown image of Svyatitel Nikolay Mozhaisky belonging to the
Posolsky monastery became famous for miracles.
In the middle of the 18 century the monastery possessed 22 peasant farms, 5
villages and zaimkas (small remote houses), in the manor of the monastery 220
peasants and investors were registered. Besides ploughmen in the monastery “were
found” impregnated, retired soldiers, ill people who were treated in the
monastery cells, prisoners and attendants in the church.
In 1764 the monastery was deprived of its manors and lands. In 1862 the special
chief of Transbaikalian Spiritual mission in the dignity of bishop was
appointed, his residence was settled down in the monastery. Since that time a
new stage of development of the monastery began. The missionary school was
opened in it, its purpose was to prepare capable Buryat boys for missionary
service, also there was a missionary alms-house for 20 persons where the ill,
the old and the disabled were completely kept. In 1880 the residence of the
chief of mission was transferred from the Posolsky monastery to the regional
city of Chita. Since 1902 the monastery became female which had later two
farmsteads: in the station Mysovaya (t. Babushkin) and in the city of
Verhneudinsk. Also two candle factories were built which supplied the whole
Transbaikalye with candles.
The monastery was closed by the decision of the Administration managerial
control of Central Electoral Committee BMASSR in 1930. Its buildings were used
as the club, school and hospital for mentally ill children. In 1995 the orthodox
community was recreated. In 1998 the monastery was transferred by the decision
of the Ministry of culture of the Russian Federation on the balance of the Chita
and Transbaikalian diocese. Since 2000 in the monastery again began the
monastery life. The monastery has been revived as men's one.The ensemble of the
Posolsky monastery is an outstanding monument of architecture of Siberia. It is
the first stone temple of Transbaikalye, “ a magnificent sample of the Siberian
baroque ”
Till now from monastery constructions only the Spaso-preobrazhenskiy cathedral
and Nikolskaya church have been preserved. Since 2002 the monastery has been
revived with the participation and guardianship of the Ministry for Foreign
Affairs of Russia. The project of restoration of the monastery was initiated by
the businessman from Moscow, Suharev V.I., the native of Buryatia. The project
of restoration has been worked out, in which not only the restoration of the
monastery, but also its new role are foreseen. Taking into account that one of
the main directions of development in Kabansky region is tourism, in future the
monastery can become the town-forming centre of the village Posolskoe in which
the sphere of tourist services should develop. The probable specialization of
villages in tourism - pilgrimage, religious tourism, rural tourism. The plan of
restoration of the monastery includes the construction of a hotel. At present
excursions are regularly organized in the monastery.
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