The usual planned restoration work, which was carried out in the thousand-year-old Church of St. Sophia of Kyiv this year, ended with an incredible opening. It turned out that the three-hundred-year-old St. Sophia icon of the Virgin Mary was completely rewritten in the nineteenth century and contains the first image of the Ukrainian saint, according to TSN.

The 300-year-old icon of Rafail Zaborovsky was first subjected to research under an X-ray machine for restoration and were surprised by what they found.

Rafail Zaborovsky – Kyiv Metropolitan of the XVIII century. He is the creator of the architectural face of Kyiv: researchers claim that it was during his cadence that the main business cards of the capital were laid or built: St. Andrew's Church, the Lavra and Sophia bell towers, the monastery of St. Catherine and the academic building of Mohyla in Podil, finally – the Zaborovsky Gate, the shape of which became the prototype of the independence stele on the Maidan.

The creator of the face of Kyiv, Metropolitan Raphael, was considered a saint during his lifetime, but they did not have time to canonize. He was buried in the crypt on the territory of St. Sophia Cathedral, but according to documents his remains were burned in the 37th year of the last century. The Soviet administration of the museum gave such an order with the wording - "having no scientific value." However, a year ago, Ukrainian historians and scientists made a sensational discovery.

The probing of the tomb showed that the relics of Raphael miraculously survived. Most likely, thanks to archaeologist Theodosius Movchanivsky. It was he who found Zaborovsky's tomb, and when the remains were ordered to be burned, he took out only things from the tomb, and carefully folded the bones back and walled them up. A year after this heroic act for those times, Movchanivsky was shot for anti-Soviet activities.

Two months ago, by the decision of the synod, Raphael was canonized, his glorification in the count of saints was planned by the Church for the summer. In the St. Sophia Reserve, they returned to their usual life and planned work, but the holy Metropolitan of Kyiv did not let himself be forgotten. This winter, scientists started the restoration of the Sophia iconostasis. Each icon was removed and carefully examined. In particular, hidden in the twilight - the amazing Cathedral of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

In fact, for the first time in decades, the icon was seen illuminated, and not in the twilight of the iconostasis. Scientists immediately became clear that the image was written on top of another image. And the man kneeling before the image of the Virgin Mary is Raphael. "I was struck by the color of his eyes! I came closer to the icon and saw that the iconographer depicted blue eyes to him, and in the description of his contemporaries he was "the eye of light," the scientists say.

Everything coincided: the favorite green color of Raphael's vestments, the fact that he is depicted next to Metropolitan Timothy, the saints with these names next to each other and on the bell tower of the cathedral. After all, the dating of the icon – it was painted immediately after Zaborovsky's death. "Our problem is that this icon is redrawn. And only X-rays make it possible to see what was preserved there under that record," Mr. Anatoliy, the chief restorer of Sofia, explains to the doctor why an X-ray examination is required.

The study shows how the faces of saints appear under the faces painted in the nineteenth century. "This saint turned into a secular man with a standing collar! The beard was painted over. And this man who became a woman," researchers show on the icon.

The head of St. Sophia Cathedral concludes that most likely it was an icon of the Intercession with a classic plot for Ukraine of that period. In the nineteenth century, the saints were painted over, writing in their place either patrons of arts or respected persons of the time. "This portrait is a common phenomenon for Ukrainian culture, and we are still observing, for example, in the Lavra. Introducing real people. I'm talking about Paul," the scholars say.

So, it turned out that this is the first and only St. Sophia icon of the Intercession, so researchers began to find out whether Raphael Zaborovsky is really depicted under the Intercession of the Saint. X-ray proves that the icons are the earliest image of a saint.

It was painted by a person who accurately saw Zaborovsky during his lifetime, the portrait was photographic. That is, before his canonization, the saint revealed not only his face, but also the unique Sophia Intercession, which no one had imagined until now, but which Ukrainians needed so much in the midst of war.

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