Q4482713

Vasily Mikhailovich Drozdov was born on 26 December 1782 in Kolomna, in the Moscow Governorate of the Russian Empire, the son of Mikhail Fedorovich Drozdov, a cathedral deacon who later became a priest, and Evdokia Nikitichna. Raised in a clerical household, he was educated at the Kolomna Theological Seminary, then at the seminary of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, and at the Saint Petersburg Theological Academy. In 1808 he received monastic tonsure with the name Philaret, in honor of Saint Philaret the Merciful, and was ordained hierodeacon and hieromonk. His preaching soon earned him comparison with John Chrysostom, and he became known as the Moscow Chrysostom. He taught at and later served as rector of the Saint Petersburg Theological Academy.

Consecrated a bishop in 1817, he served as vicar of Reval, then as bishop of Tver and of Yaroslavl, before his appointment in 1821 as Metropolitan of Moscow and Kolomna, an office he held for forty-six years. During the Synodal period, when there was no patriarch, he was the most prominent hierarch of the Russian Church. He was a permanent member of the Most Holy Governing Synod and took part in the coronations of Emperors Nicholas I and Alexander II.

Philaret was the principal author of the Longer Catechism of the Orthodox Catholic Eastern Greco-Russian Church, which remained the standard catechetical text for generations. He played a leading role in the project to translate the Bible into Russian, work that culminated after his death in the Synodal Version. A prolific preacher and writer, he left numerous sermons, letters, and theological works. Generally conservative in outlook and cautious toward Western theological influence, he nonetheless supported monastic spiritual renewal, including the tradition associated with the Optina elders.

He died in Moscow on 19 November 1867 and was buried at the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. In 1994 the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church glorified him as a saint. His principal feast is 19 November; he is also commemorated with the synaxis of Moscow hierarchs. His relics are venerated at the Lavra.