Guarding the gates of the Athonite monastery Icon of the Mother of God of Iverskaya

The icon of the Mother of God of the Iberian, one of the most venerated in Orthodoxy, has several other names related to its history - the Odigitriya, or the "Guidebook", "The Goalkeeper", "The Gateway" or in Greek "Portaitissa", "Merciful" .

Icon of the Iberian Mother of God is covered with legends. According to legend, the first mention of it refers to the 9th century, the time of rigid iconoclasm. On the territory of modern Turkey, near the town of Nicaea, in the house of the orthodox widow and her son, a relic was kept and revered, which later became known as the Icon of the Mother of God of Iversk. With the aim of destroying it, soldiers came to the house. Bribed by a widow, they left the icon until the morning. But when at the exit one soldier struck the holy face with a spear, blood was abundant from the icon (therefore the Virgin on the icon is sometimes depicted with a wound on the cheek, sometimes - without). The frightened soldiers fled, and the widow, in order to preserve the holy face, carried him to the sea. But the icon did not go to the bottom, but, being in a vertical position, began to move away from the shore.

For two centuries it was not heard of. According to legend, after this time the icon approached Mount Athos, where the Iver Monastery was located. Gabriel, one of the holy elders, brought the icon out of the sea and installed it in the temple, outside the gate which they found in the morning. After repeated repetition of this action, the monks realized that the face of the Virgin does not want to be protected by anybody, but wants to serve as the guardian of the monastery. For her, outside the church's gates, a church was built, into which an icon was placed (hence the names "The Goalkeeper", "The Gatekeeper"). There she is now.

The icon of the Mother of God of Iberia is revered as miraculous. Under her tutelage, the monastery escaped the invasion of the barbarians, its reserves were not scant, the sick were recovered. The glory of her was born throughout the Orthodox world, providing an inexhaustible influx of pilgrims.

In the reign of Alexei Mikhailovich Romanov, who, because of his piety, received the nickname "Quietest", the icon of the Mother of God of Iversk began to be directly related to Russia.

Under Patriarch Nikon, at his initiative and with the support of the "Quietest" Romanov in the likeness of Athos began to build a monastery on Valdai, which later became known as the "Valdai Iveron Bogoroditsky Svyatozero Monastery.

At the request of the king on Athos, a copy of the Iberian Mother of God was written, which at the end of the work was delivered to a new monastery and placed in the gate church. There were several more lists of icons, also made on Athos and brought to Russia. One of them was in a church near the Kremlin's Resurrection Gate, another traveled in a special coach around Russia. It is preserved until our days and is in the temple in Sokolniki. The gate church of the Kremlin, destroyed in 1928, is now restored, but the icon stored in it has disappeared without a trace.

Prayer to the Iberian icon of the Mother of God does not exist in the singular. The icon saves in the fire, heals the wounds and bodily wounds, helps the farmers, preserves the crop, increases the fertility of the earth. In addition, she relieves grief and sorrow, heals illnesses. Therefore, so many prayers, voices and kontakion, pronounced before this bright face, the shrine of the whole Orthodox world.