MONASTERY OF ST. GAVRIL LESNOVSKY

The Lesnov monastery occupies an important place in the Macedonian church, in the national and cultural history. Since its creation, the great Lesnov Lavra, with its numerous chapels and hermitages, has become a nursery for many new sanctuaries of the Orthodox Church.

Starting from St. Venerable Gavril Lesnovsky went to the bishop Gavril Svetogorets, whose body rests next to the monastery itself, on the part of the SAS, the MOC has started a process for canonization for a saint who, with his blessed and holy life and his fiery prayers, illuminated, warmed and confirmed our Macedonian people in the love and faith of Christ and has taken care of its national and religious existence. According to the oldest prologue life of St. Gavriil Lesnovsky, which was written by Stanislav Gramatik in 1330, this holy monastery originated somewhere in the 11th century, and was founded by St. Gavril Lesnovsky and dedicates it to the Holy Archangel Michael. Many holy places were built around the monastery – small monasteries, chapels, hermitages and hermitages, which were in use by the famous copyist Lesivka literary school. Later, during the Ottoman slavery, they were destroyed.

In the historical literary text “Explanatory Writing”, written immediately after the extensive life of St. Gabriel, in the vicinity of the monastery there are mentions of four hermitages in which the holy Gabriel of Lesnovsky was resurrected, which are preserved to this day, in one of them, dedicated to the holy prophet Elijah (St. Elijah), according to the life and ministry of Saint Gabriel, this a great man spends 30 years of his ascetic life. It was rebuilt in 1341 by Despot John Oliver. The fresco was completed in 1347, probably by four artists. The iconostasis is in deep carving from 1811-1814, the first work of the group of Petre Filipovski-Garkata.