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The Mighty Cabbage Hurling Saint

By Anastasija Ropa

What would you call a man who crosses a river by walking on water to throw a cabbage head at his opponent? A fool, for sure, but no ordinary fool. He is a fool of God.

Fools of God are a special category of saints and miracle workers, akin somewhat to the Muslim dervishes, but peculiar to the Orthodox Christianity. A fool of God is usually dressed as a vagabond and behaves in an unconventional way, sometimes challenging the norms of society, and sometimes ridiculing them. Suffering the heat and the cold and oblivious to both, praying and working miracles, the fool of God is at the same time despised and revered; he or she is a buffoon and a seer rolled into one. Some fools of God were women who dressed in male clothes (St. Xenia of St. Petersburg, who lived in the 17th century). Others would kiss the walls of brothels and spit on the church walls. Their earned ridicule, social opprobrium and even, on occasion, persecution.

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Their behaviour, however, had underlying logic inaccessible to the unenlightened: to use but one example, spitting on the walls of churches bears on blasphemy, while kissing the walls of brothels appears to be repulsive. But the reason for this apparently illogical behaviour is simple: when people pray, the demons depart from them and stay outside the church walls, but when people drink in brothels, their angels stand outside and weep. Fools of God are those who see something others do not and by their seemingly illogical behaviour point to the spiritual, moral or social shortcomings.

The way of a fool of God is a thorny one: staying within society, rather than joining a monastery or living as a hermit, the fool remains an outcast, setting himself or herself aside from society through his or her appearance and behaviour. The physical hardships of living as a beggar and the humiliations the fool receives from the people who do not understand their behaviour are the sources of their salvation. St. John of the Ladder, whose writings on the ascetic way of attaining salvation, invites Christians to not only endure humiliation but to also actively seek out situations and circumstances where one would be humiliated. The behaviour of fools of God can be understood within the context of Greek monastic asceticism, which bore considerable influence on the devotional culture of medieval Rus’ from the twelfth century onwards.

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St. Nicholas of the Cabbage Head is one of these fools of God. Having been born in the busy mercantile hub that was the late-fourteenth-century Novgorod, most likely in a well-off and noble family, he decided to devote his life to God. He was a seer and a miracle worker, typically despised by his co-citizens, whom he put to shame more than once.

One of the episodes has St. Nicholas invited to a feast by a pious nobleman and being chased out by the servants as a filthy beggar. St. Nicholas did not call lightning and thunder on the impious, far from it: he meekly walked away, saying “God’s will be done.” While the guests at the table may have rejoiced at getting rid of the inconvenient smelly beggar, they must have been rather disappointed when they realized that the wine disappeared with the man. The host sought out and called St. Nicholas back, for no feast is good without a good drink, and the saint obliged them. After his prayers, the wine was returned to the jugs and the barrels, and the feast went on.

A 16th-c. icon of a vision showing the citizens of Novgorod going on with their daily business while being guarded by the city’s guardian angel. – Wikimedia Commons

At this time, the democratic Novgorod was torn apart by civil conflict, with merchants on the one bank of the Volkhvov River, the Sophia side, fighting against their compatriots from the other bank, the Torgovaya side. St. Nicholas and his spiritual brother, another fool of God living on the other bank of the river the blessed Feodor, modelled their struggle through their behaviour. Typically, they would come to the riverbank and pelt each other with food refuse and verbal offences. One day, a nobleman invited St. Feodor to the Sophia side, where Feodor went rather reluctantly, repeating that he was scared of the ferocious Nicky, as he nicknamed his fellow fool. Indeed, Nicky promptly spotted and attacked the perpetrator, who retreated in some panic and in such haste that he ran over the river. Unabashed, Nicky followed on his heels, wielding a mighty weapon, a hefty cabbage head. In a culmination of their struggle, Nicky threw the cabbage at him, which Feodor (or Teddy, for he also had a nickname) promptly caught. Indignant at the thief, Nicky called: “Now give me back the cabbage, it’s mine, not yours!”

The hagiographies do not specify if St. Nicholas got the cabbage back, but the incongruity of the miracle and the ridiculous gesture (what could be more ridiculous than smashing your political opponent with a cabbage head?) had a sobering effect on the citizens of the free city of Novgorod.

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St. Nicholas received his name for this impressive deed, and he is depicted on modern Orthodox icons holding a cabbage head – the ultimate reminder that medieval Christianity was anything but tedious and that at least a few saints had an outstanding sense of humour.

Anastasija Ropa, PhD, is a scholar of history, literature and language, whose first book, Historical Horsemanship in Medieval Arthurian Romance, brought together her fascination with history, Arthurian legend and horses. A horse owner and trainer for many years, she lives on her private estate with her family and horses, lectures at the Latvian Academy of Sport Education, rides and trains horses and writes books. She is co-editor of the pioneering Cheiron: The International Journal of Equine and Equestrian History and of Rewriting Equestrian History book series, scientific publications appreciated by historians and horse people alike. You can support her work on Patreon.

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