This extraordinary and mysterious event allegedly occurred on December 31, 1956 in house 84 on Chkalova Street. lived in it ordinary woman Claudia Bolonkin, whose son decided to invite him to New Year's Eve his friends. Among the invitees was a girl, Zoya, with whom Nikolai had recently begun dating.

All the friends were with their gentlemen, but Zoya was still sitting alone, Kolya was delayed. When the dancing began, she said: “If my Nikolai is not there, I will dance with Nikola the Pleasant!” And she headed to the corner where the icons hung. The friends were horrified: “Zoe, this is a sin,” but she said: “If there is a God, let him punish me!” She took the icon and pressed it to her chest. She entered the circle of dancers and suddenly froze, as if she had grown into the floor. It was impossible to move it from its place, and the icon could not be taken out of hand - it seemed to be stuck tightly.

External signs The girl showed no sign of life. But a subtle knocking sound was heard in the area of ​​the heart.

The ambulance doctor Anna tried to revive Zoya. Native sister Anna, Nina Pavlovna Kalashnikova, is still alive, I managed to talk to her.

“She ran home excited. And although the police made her sign a non-disclosure agreement, she told everything. And how she tried to give the girl injections, but it turned out to be impossible. Zoya’s body was so hard that the syringe needles did not fit into it, they broke...

The incident became known immediately law enforcement agencies Samara. Since it was related to religion, the case was given emergency status, and a police squad was sent to the house to prevent onlookers from entering. There was nothing to worry about. By the third day of Zoya's stay, all the streets near the house were crowded with thousands of people. The girl was nicknamed “Stone Zoya”.

They still had to invite the clergy into the house of the “stone Zoya,” because the police were afraid to approach her holding the icon. But none of the priests managed to change anything until Hieromonk Seraphim (Poloz) came. They say that he was so bright-hearted and kind that he even had the gift of prediction. He was able to take the icon from Zoya’s frozen hands, after which he predicted that her “standing” would end on Easter Day. And so it happened. They say that Poloz was then asked by the authorities to recant his involvement in Zoya’s case, but he rejected the offer. Then they fabricated an article about sodomy and sent him to serve his sentence. After his release he did not return to Samara...

Zoya's body came to life, but her mind was no longer the same. In the first days she kept shouting: “The earth is perishing in sins! Pray, believe!” From a scientific and medical point of view, it is difficult to imagine how the body of a young girl could last 128 days without food and water. The capital's scientists, who came to Samara at that time for such a supernatural case, were unable to determine the “diagnosis,” which was initially mistaken for some kind of tetanus.

After the incident with Zoya, as her contemporaries testify, people flocked en masse to churches and temples. People bought crosses, candles, icons. Those who were not baptized were baptized...

But what really happened?

Despite the fact that decades have passed since the events described, there are still stories about the miracle of the “petrified girl Zoya”, in which reality is fancifully mixed with fables. But based on the materials collected as a result of the journalistic investigation conducted by the author, it can now be argued that in fact there was simply no so-called “miracle of stone Zoya” in January 1956 in Kuibyshev. But what happened here then? Which real facts Is there a “petrified Zoey” in the story?

First fact. No one has ever disputed that in the period from January 14 to January 20, 1956 in the city of Kuibyshev, near house No. 84 on Chkalovskaya Street, an unprecedented crowd of people was actually observed (estimated from several thousand to several tens of thousands of people). All of them were attracted here by oral messages (rumors) that in the indicated house there supposedly stood a certain petrified girl who committed blasphemy by dancing with an icon in her hands. At the same time, the name Zoya was not mentioned by anyone during these events, but it appeared in relation to this story decades later. The main character's surname Karnukhov appeared only in the 90s.

As for the reasons for this pandemonium, then, according to experts, a rare, but actually and repeatedly described in the literature, socio-psychological phenomenon called “mass psychosis” occurred here. This is the name for the phenomenon when, under favorable social conditions, a careless phrase or even one word thrown into a crowd can provoke mass unrest, riots and even hallucinations. In this case, fertile ground for such psychosis was the political situation in the country, which developed under the conditions of “ Khrushchev's thaw“and the debunking of Stalin’s personality cult, when people felt real relaxations on the part of the state in relation to believers.

Second fact. In Samara regional state archive socio-political history ( former archive Regional Committee of the CPSU) contains an uncorrected transcript of the 13th Kuibyshev Regional Party Conference, which took place on January 20, 1956. Here you can read how the then first secretary of the regional committee of the CPSU, Mikhail Timofeevich Efremov, spoke about the “miracle”:

“In the city of Kuibyshev, rumors are widespread about an alleged miracle that occurred on Chkalovskaya Street. There were about twenty notes about this. Yes, such a miracle happened - shameful for us, communists, leaders of party bodies. Some old woman walked and said: young people were dancing in this house, and one woman began to dance with the icon and turned to stone. After that they began to say: she became petrified, numb, and so on, people began to gather because the leaders of the police authorities acted foolishly. Apparently, someone else had a hand here. A police post was immediately set up, and where the police are, there are eyes. It turned out that our police were not enough, since the people kept arriving, they sent out mounted police, and the people, if so, all went there. Some even went so far as to propose sending priests there to eliminate this shameful phenomenon. The regional committee bureau consulted and gave instructions to remove all orders and posts, remove the guards, there is nothing to guard there. As soon as the orders and posts were removed, the people began to disperse, and now, as they reported to me, there is almost no one there. The police acted incorrectly and began to attract attention. But essentially this is pure stupidity, there were no dances, no parties in this house, an old woman lives there. Unfortunately, our police did not work here and did not find out who spread these rumors. The bureau of the regional committee recommended that this issue be considered at the bureau of the city committee, and the culprits be severely punished, and Comrade Strakhov [editor of the newspaper of the regional committee of the CPSU “Volzhskaya Kommuna” - V.E.] give explanatory material to the newspaper “Volzhskaya Kommuna” in the form of a feuilleton.”

Such an article entitled “ Wild case"was indeed published in the Volga Commune of January 24, 1956

As for the search and punishment of those responsible for this “wild incident,” they were found at the same party conference in the person of the secretaries for ideology of the regional and city committees of the CPSU. Here's what's written about it in the uncorrected transcript:

“Today Comrade Efremov told about the miracle. This is a shame for the regional party conference. Culprit No. 1 is Comrade. Derevnin [third secretary of the Kuibyshev regional committee of the CPSU for ideology - V.E.], culprit No. 2 comrade. Chernykh [third secretary of the Kuibyshev city committee of the CPSU for ideology - V.E.], they did not comply with the decision of the party Central Committee on anti-religious work. After all, even in the report of the regional party committee, not a word is said about what work the regional party committee did to implement this remarkable decision of the party Central Committee. I think that Comrade Derevnin should have freed himself from many unnecessary burdens and dealt only with ideological work; ideological work only suffers. I do not reject his candidacy, but I want the third secretary to be truly engaged in ideological work, to be decisive and courageous in any issues, so that we, workers on the ideological front, do not suffer from this.”

In the end, it all ended with Comrade Derevnin being only slightly scolded at the party conference for omissions in anti-religious work - and left in his previous position, and in his response he swore to make up for lost time.

From other sources:

Data given in the newspapers “Moskovsky Komsomolets” and “ TVNZ“, indicate that Zoya’s story is probably a fiction of a certain Claudia Bolonkina. The first secretary of the Kuibyshev regional committee of the CPSU in 1952-1959, Mikhail Efremov, tells the following about the event:

Some old woman walked and said: young people were dancing in this house - and one woman started dancing with an icon and became petrified, stiff... And off it went, people began to gather... A police post was immediately set up. Where the police are, there are eyes. They sent out mounted police, and the people, if so, all went there. They wanted to send priests there to eliminate this shameful phenomenon. But the regional committee bureau consulted and decided to remove all the posts; there was nothing to guard there. It was stupid: there were no dances there, an old woman lives there.

House No. 84 belonged to Claudia Bolonkina, and the names of Zoya Karnaukhova and monk Seraphim were not found in the archives. According to eyewitnesses, dancing with the icon actually took place, and a passing nun said: “For such a sin, you will turn into a pillar of salt!”, and Claudia began to spread rumors that this was what happened.

The name Zoya Karnaukhova was given by a woman who believed in the legend so fanatically that she identified herself with the petrified girl. Gradually, her acquaintances began to call her “stone Zoya”, and the name became part of the legend...

Almost three decades have passed since that time, and Gorbachev’s perestroika began in the country. It was then that many “secondary” witnesses appeared around the “miracle of petrified Zoya,” that is, people who themselves were not present at the events of 1956, but heard a lot about them that never actually happened, and still have nothing to do with it. confirmed. It is their fantasies that the “yellow press” now mainly publishes, although these speculations have nothing in common with real events.

But why the crowd described above appeared at house number 84 on Chkalovskaya Street, no one could say for sure in 1956, just as no one can say now. Therefore, the most plausible in this case is the version outlined above about mass psychosis, which provoked a crowd of people into mass unrest, riots and even hallucinations.

Undoubted fiction in this story includes, for example, stories constantly found in the media about ambulance doctors who allegedly tried to revive Zoya on the spot or give her injections, as well as about police officers who supposedly visited the legendary room and were instantly shocked by what they saw. graying. In the same row are the legends about a certain holy elder, who in those days seemed to come to Kuibyshev from a distant monastery and somehow communicated with the “petrified youth.” In reality there are no real evidence existence of all the people listed above, but there is only common gossip.

At the same time, it is very sad that interest in the events in Kuibyshev many years ago, before, and now, was and is shown by anyone, but not official science. It is possible that if the phenomenon of rumors about Zoya had been studied by scientists, then now there would not be so many fabrications and outright falsifications surrounding it.

It is impossible not to mention that in 2009 the film “Miracle” was shot by director Alexander Proshkin

where the author used the plot of this Kuibyshev urban legend. The film takes place in the fictional city of Grechansk, and certain mythical personalities appear in it, among which we must include the then leader of our country, Nikita Khrushchev. The character named by this name also never existed in reality, since the real Khrushchev did not come to Kuibyshev during the events described above, and, accordingly, could not see the “stone girl,” and even more so could not behave boorishly in relations with subordinates, which is also shown in Proshkin’s work.

But, however, despite all the absurdities listed above, at the very end of this fantastic film the credits float across the screen, from which it follows that the film was based on real events that occurred in 1956 in the city of Kuibyshev. It looks about the same as if the authors of the famous film fairy tale “Kashchei the Immortal” wrote in the credits that the film was based on the events that happened in Rus' in 1237. If this had happened then, the director of “Kashchei the Immortal” Alexander Row would simply have been laughed at

But today’s viewers take Proshkin’s film very seriously, and many even consider it almost a documentary source on Soviet history. It’s sad that in this way our master of cinematography had a hand in promoting outright obscurantism.

And in 2010, local authorities announced that another memorial sign should appear in the city - this time not to a historical figure, but to the heroine of one of the urban legends - “Stone Zoya”.

Whether he appeared or not, I don’t know, let the locals know!

sources

This story happened in simple Soviet family in the city of Kuibyshev, now Samara, in the late 50s. Mother and daughter were going to meet New Year. Daughter Zoya invited seven of her friends and young people to a dance party. It was the Nativity Fast, and the believing mother asked Zoya not to throw a party, but her daughter insisted on her own. In the evening the mother went to church to pray.

The guests have gathered, but Zoya's groom named Nikolai has not yet arrived. They didn’t wait for him, the dancing began. The girls and young people paired up, and Zoya was left alone. Out of frustration, she took the image of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker and said: “I’ll take this Nicholas and go dance with him,” without listening to her friends, who advised her not to do such blasphemy. “If there is a God, He will punish me,” she said.

The dancing began, two circles passed, and suddenly an unimaginable noise arose in the room, a whirlwind, and a dazzling light flashed.

The fun turned to horror. Everyone ran out of the room in fear. Only Zoya remained standing with the icon of the saint, pressing it to her chest - petrified, cold, like marble. No efforts of the arriving doctors could bring her to her senses. When injected, the needles broke and bent, as if encountering a stone obstacle. They wanted to take the girl to the hospital for observation, but they could not move her: her legs seemed to be chained to the floor. But the heart beat - Zoya lived. From that time on, she could neither drink nor eat.

When the mother returned and saw what had happened, she lost consciousness and was taken to the hospital, from where she returned a few days later: faith in God’s mercy, fervent prayers for the mercy of her daughter restored her strength. She came to her senses and tearfully prayed for forgiveness and help.

In the first days, the house was surrounded by many people: believers, doctors, clergy, and simply curious people came and came from far away. But soon, by order of the authorities, the premises were closed to visitors. Two policemen were on duty there in 8-hour shifts. Some of the people on duty, still very young (28-32 years old), turned gray with horror when Zoya screamed terribly at midnight. At night, her mother prayed next to her.

"Mother! Pray! - Zoya shouted. - Pray! We perish in our sins! Pray!” The patriarch was informed about everything that had happened and asked him to pray for Zoe’s pardon. The Patriarch replied: “He who punishes will have mercy.”

The following persons were allowed to visit Zoya:

1. A famous professor of medicine came from Moscow. He confirmed that Zoe's heart did not stop beating, despite the external fossilization.

2. At the request of the mother, priests were invited to take the icon of St. Nicholas from Zoya’s petrified hands. But they couldn't do that either.

3. On the Feast of the Nativity of Christ, Hieromonk Seraphim (probably from the Glinsk Hermitage) arrived, served a water blessing service and consecrated the entire room. After this, he managed to take the icon from Zoya’s hands and, having given the image of the saint due honors, returned it to its original place. He said: “Now we must wait for a sign on the Great Day (that is, Easter)! If it does not follow, the end of the world is not far off.”

4. Metropolitan Nikolai of Krutitsky and Kolomna also visited Zoya, who also served a prayer service and said that a new sign should be expected on the Great Day (that is, Easter), repeating the words of the pious hieromonk.

5. Before the Feast of the Annunciation (that year it was on the Saturday of the third week of Lent), a handsome old man came and asked to be allowed to see Zoya. But the police officers on duty refused him.

He came the next day, but again, from other duty officers, he was refused.

The third time, on the very day of the Annunciation, the duty officers let him through. The security heard him gently say to Zoya: “Well, are you tired of standing?”

Some time passed, and when the police officers on duty wanted to release the old man, he was not there. Everyone is convinced that it was St. Nicholas himself.

So Zoya stood for 4 months (128 days), until Easter, which that year was April 23 (May 6, new style).

On the night of Svetloye Christ's Resurrection Zoya began to cry out especially loudly: “Pray!”

The night guards felt terrified, and they began to ask her: “Why are you screaming so terribly?” And the answer came: “It’s scary, the earth is burning! Pray! The whole world is perishing in sins, pray!”

From that time on, she suddenly came to life, softness and vitality appeared in her muscles. They put her to bed, but she continued to cry out and ask everyone to pray for a world perishing in sins, for a land burning in iniquities.

How did you live? - they asked her. -Who fed you?

Doves, doves fed me, was the answer, which clearly proclaims mercy and forgiveness from the Lord. The Lord forgave her sins through the intercession of the holy saint of God, the merciful Nicholas the Wonderworker, and for the sake of her great suffering and standing for 128 days.

Everything that happened so amazed those living in the city of Kuibyshev and its environs that many people, seeing miracles, hearing cries and requests to pray for people dying in sins, turned to faith. They hurried to church with repentance. Those who were not baptized were baptized. Those who did not wear the cross began to wear it. The conversion was so great that there were not enough crosses in the churches for those asking.

With fear and tears, the people prayed for forgiveness of sins, repeating Zoya’s words: “It’s scary. The earth is burning, we are perishing in our sins. Pray! People are dying in lawlessness."

On the third day of Easter, Zoya went to the Lord, having gone through a difficult path - 128 days of standing before the face of the Lord to atone for her sin. The Holy Spirit preserved the life of the soul, resurrecting it from mortal sins, so that on the future eternal day of the Resurrection of all the living and the dead it would be resurrected in a body for eternal life. After all, the name Zoya itself means “life.”

AFTERWORD

The Soviet press could not keep silent about this incident: responding to letters to the editor, a certain scientist confirmed that, indeed, the event with Zoya was not fiction, but was a case of tetanus, not yet known to science.

But firstly, with tetanus there is no such stone hardness and doctors can always give an injection to the patient; secondly, with tetanus, you can move the patient from place to place and he lies down, but Zoya stood, and stood for as long as she could not even stand healthy person, and, moreover, they could not move her; and thirdly, tetanus itself does not turn a person to God and does not give revelations from above, and under Zoya not only thousands of people turned to faith in God, but also showed their faith in deeds: they were baptized and began to live as Christians. It is clear that it was not tetanus that caused this, but the action of God Himself, who affirms faith through miracles in order to save people from sins and from punishment for sins.

On January 24, 1956, one of the local publications in the city of Kuibyshev (today Samara) published an article entitled “Wild Case.” In it, the party leadership provided enough evidence to refute the “horror story” circulating around the city about the petrified Zoya.

A beautiful and scary legend

Eat two versions what happened:

• A great, religious miracle that plunged the girl into a stone statue.
• The hostess's inventions about a miracle in order to attract attention.

According to legend, on Chkalova Street, in house 84, she lived ordinary girl- Zoya Karnaukhova. Before being dumbfounded, the heroine of the story decided to host a party in honor of the New Year. Several city acquaintances were invited, including the groom of a young lady named Nikolai. The guests had already gathered, but the guy was late.

Fate decreed that she was unable to meet her lover. Grabbing the icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, Zoya began to dance with her in an embrace. Apparently, in this way she imagined her betrothed nearby. The image belonged, according to rumors, to the mother of the girl, who professed Orthodoxy. The gathered friends tried to persuade the amused Karnaukhova to stop blasphemy. But the excited person continued to dance with the icon, cheerfully saying that if the Lord exists, he will punish her.

At that very moment, lightning struck outside the window, and Zoya froze, turning into a stone pedestal. Her body was solid, only somewhere in the depths her heart was barely beating. Those gathered tried to help the petrified Komsomol member, but could not even move her. The police and doctors who arrived just shrugged and did not understand what could have happened. For a long time Zoya seemed to freeze, not giving obvious signs life. They said that at night she screamed something indistinctly and asked to pray for all sinners.

Time passed, the house was cordoned off by the police. Onlookers kept coming here to look at the petrified, frozen Zoya. For a long time no one was allowed near the girl. But a local clergyman Tyapochkin Seraphim appeared on the threshold. He begged to be allowed to see the standing martyr. After prayers, he managed to take the icon from Zoya’s hands. The hieromonk assured that she would come to her senses on Easter. His words were destined to come true. After standing like a stone for exactly 128 days, the girl suddenly came to life. It all ended badly. After this she lived only three days.

Another story about Zoya

A more real, not at all mystical, but similar version says that the owner of that ill-fated house was citizen Klavdiya Bolonkina, who lived with her son. She gathered guests for the New Year's celebration, including Zoya. Shortly before this, the girl started an affair with a young man, Nikolai, who was doing an internship in the city. As the first option says, the guy was very late.

It is unknown which of the guests, perhaps Karnaukhova herself, grabbed the icon of St. Nicholas the Pleasant and began to dance. A passing nun saw all this through the window from the street. It was she who shouted the words of the curse: “For sin you will turn into a pillar of salt.” Of course, nothing happened, but Bolonkina began to spread rumors about the frozen sinner. The reasons for this behavior of a woman may lie in the desire to attract attention to her own person.

Divided public opinion

Whether the stone Zoya existed, whether truth or myth underlies what happened to her, no one can tell for sure. But many in the region confirmed the fact that the girl was petrified after sinful behavior. The rector of the Church of Our Lady of Kazan in the village of Neronovka (not far from Kuibyshev) said that his own father told him the story of this phenomenon.

According to his version, the mystical events happened in 1956, in January. Zoya Karnaukhova was a pipe factory worker. Her mother, a religious lady, did not allow her daughter to have fun parties during the Nativity Fast. But the girl disobeyed. Further, the whole story repeats the familiar scenario about the petrified girl.

Residents of Kuibyshev received the news of such a miracle in different ways. Comrade Efremov, who then held the position of First Secretary of the local CPSU, directly told the public that a miracle had happened, but only with that old woman who passed by and cast a curse. He did not forget to mention shame on communist party from these events.

Then his speech became more frank and harsh. He claimed that not only Zoya’s standing was a fiction, but there weren’t even any dances, and the police posts had long been removed, since there was nothing interesting in the house that required investigation. There is only one old woman living there and there is no one else. Efremov called on everyone not to believe in fiction and religious stories that can only be placed in a feuilleton.

It is interesting that a few years later research was carried out in the archives of Kuibyshev. Mentions of Zoe standing, photographs from 1956. or the biography of the monk Seraphim, were not found. But in house 84 on Chkalova Street there really lived a certain Klavdiya Bolonkina. There were rumors about her as a woman who dedicated her life to the church. Allegedly, it was this person who declared herself a petrified maiden.

Bringing history to life on screen

About the legend for a long time they didn’t remember, putting all the evidence into a distant drawer. But in beginning of XXI century, it was decided to film this story for the first time. Mysterious, mystical events that once happened in Samara region, again attracted attention:

• year 2000. The first documentary film “Zoya’s Standing”. Its duration was only 20 minutes.
• year 2009. Full-length feature film “Miracle” from Alexander Proshkin.
• 2015 Television film “Zoya” based on the play of the same name by Alexander Ignashev.
• 2015 Archpriest Nikolai Agafonov’s story about Zoya’s fate, “Standing,” was published.

Now the house at number 84 on Chkalov Street is no longer there; it burned down on May 12, 2014. But a strange and frightening story about a petrified girl with an icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker circulates among Orthodox Christians to this day.

Zoya's standing

ZOYE'S STANDING

This story shocked everyone Orthodox world, happened in a simple Soviet family in the city of Kuibyshev (now Samara) in 1956 . A pipe factory worker, a certain Zoya Karnaukhova, decided to celebrate the New Year with her friends and invited them to her home for a party. It was the Nativity Fast, and the believing mother asked Zoya not to throw a party, but she insisted on her own. In the evening the mother went to church to pray.

The guests have gathered, but Zoya's groom Nikolai has not yet arrived. Music played, young people danced; only Zoya didn’t have a partner. Offended by the groom, she took the icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker from the red corner and said: “If my Nicholas is gone, I’ll dance with Saint Nicholas.” To her friend’s advice not to do such blasphemy, she boldly replied: "If there is a God, let Him punish me!" With these words she went to dance in a circle.On the third circle, an unimaginable noise arose in the room, a whirlwind, and a blinding light flashed. The fun turned to horror. Everyone ran out of the room in fear. Only Zoya remained standing with the icon of the saint, pressing it to her chest, petrified and cold, like marble.

No efforts of the arriving doctors could bring her to her senses. When injected, the needles broke and bent, as if encountering a stone obstacle. They wanted to take the girl to the hospital for observation, but they could not move her: her legs seemed to have become fused to the floor. In the absence of external signs of life, Zoya was alive: medical examination confirmed that the girl’s heartbeat did not stop, despite the petrification of the tissues. From that time on, she could neither drink nor eat.

The news of the miracle quickly spread throughout the city. In the first days, the house was surrounded by many people: believers, doctors, clergy, and simply curious people came and came from far away. But soon, by order of the authorities, the premises were closed to visitors: the approaches to the house were blocked, and a squad of police officers on duty began to guard it. And visitors and the curious were told that no miracle had happened here and had never happened.

The patriarch was informed about everything that had happened and asked him to pray for Zoe’s pardon. The Patriarch replied: "He who punishes will have mercy".

At the request of the mother, priests were invited to take the icon of St. Nicholas from Zoya’s petrified hands. But even after reading the prayers, they could not do this.

Came on Christmas Day O. Seraphim Tyapochkin (then Father Dimitri), served a prayer service for water and blessed the entire room. After that, he took the icon from Zoya’s hands and said: “Now we must wait for a sign on the Great Day (that is, Easter)! If it does not follow, the end of the world is not far off.” Visited Zoya and Metropolitan Nikolai of Krutitsky and Kolomna , who also served a prayer service and said that a new sign should be expected on the Great Day (that is, Easter), repeating the words of the pious hieromonk.

Before the Feast of the Annunciation (that year it was on Saturday of the 3rd week of Lent), a handsome old man came and asked to be allowed to see Zoya. But the police officers on duty refused him. He came the next day, but again, from other duty officers, he was refused. The third time, on the very day of the Annunciation, the guards did not detain him. The attendants heard the old man lovingly say to Zoya: “Well, are you tired of standing?” Some time passed, the elder still did not come out. When they looked into the room, they did not find him there. All witnesses to the incident are convinced that Saint Nicholas himself appeared.

Zoya stood for 4 months (128 days), until Easter , which that year was April 23 (May 6, new style). On the night of the Holy Resurrection of Christ, she began to come to life, softness and vitality appeared in her muscles. Zoya's body came to life, but her mind was no longer the same. In the first days she kept screaming: “Pray! It’s scary, the earth is burning! The whole world is perishing in sins! Pray!” From a scientific and medical point of view, it is difficult to imagine how the body of a young girl could last 128 days without food and water. The capital's scientists, who came to Samara at that time for such a supernatural case, were unable to determine the “diagnosis,” which was initially mistaken for some kind of tetanus. They put her to bed, but she continued to cry out and ask everyone to pray for a world perishing in sins, for a land burning in iniquities.

How did you live? - they asked her. -Who fed you?

Doves, doves fed me, was the answer, which clearly proclaims mercy and forgiveness from the Lord.

Through the prayers of St. Nicholas, the Lord had mercy on her, accepted her repentance and forgave her sins.

Everything that happened so amazed those living in the city of Kuibyshev and its environs that many people, seeing miracles, hearing cries and requests to pray for people dying in sins, turned to faith. They hurried to church with repentance. Those who were not baptized were baptized, those who did not wear a cross began to wear it. The conversion was so great that there were not enough crosses in the churches for those asking. With fear and tears, the people prayed for forgiveness of sins, repeating Zoya’s words: “It’s scary. The earth is burning, we are perishing in sins. Pray! People are perishing in iniquities.”

On the third day of Easter, Zoya went to the Lord, having gone through a difficult path - 128 days of standing before the face of the Lord to atone for her sin.

The house where everything happened still stands and has become a place of pilgrimage for curious people from all over the country. They say that the house should soon be demolished, and in its place the Samara diocese will erect a small chapel.

House 84 on Chkalova street in Samara

AFTERWORD

The Soviet press could not keep silent about this incident: responding to letters to the editor, a certain scientist confirmed that, indeed, the event with Zoya was not a fiction, but was a case of tetanus, not yet known to science. But, firstly, with tetanus there is no such stone hardness and doctors can always give an injection to the patient; secondly, with tetanus, you can move the patient from place to place and he lies down, but Zoya stood, and stood for as long as even a healthy person could not stand, and, moreover, they could not move her; and thirdly, tetanus itself does not turn a person to God and does not give revelations from above, and under Zoya not only thousands of people turned to faith in God, but also showed their faith in deeds: they were baptized and began to live as Christians. It is clear that it was not tetanus that caused this, but the action of God Himself, who affirms faith through miracles in order to save people from sins and from punishment for sins.

When, years later, Archimandrite Seraphim (Tyapochkin) was asked questions about his meeting with Zoya, he always avoided answering. Archpriest Anatoly Litvinko, clergyman of the Samara diocese, recalls. “I asked Father Seraphim: “Father, was it you who took the icon from Zoya’s hands?” He humbly lowered his head. And from his silence I understood: he.” Father hid this out of his humility. And the authorities could again begin persecuting him due to the large influx of pilgrims who wanted to venerate the miraculous icon St. Nicholas, which was always in the church where Father Seraphim served. Over time, the authorities demanded that the icon be removed, hidden from the people, and it was moved to the altar.

Elder Seraphim (Tyapochkin) (1894-1982)

Quite recently, a person was found who told something new about the Samara miracle. It turned out to be priest Vitaly Kalashnikov, a respected rector of the Sofia Church in Samara: “Anna Pavlovna Kalashnikova, my mother’s aunt, worked in Kuibyshev as an emergency doctor in 1956.” That morning she came to our house and said: “You are sleeping here, and the city has been on its feet for a long time!" And she told about the petrified girl. She also admitted (although she gave a subscription) that she was now in that house on call. She saw Zoya frozen. She saw the icon of St. Nicholas in her hands. She tried to make her unhappy an injection, but the needles bent and broke, and therefore it was not possible to give an injection. Everyone was shocked by her story. Anna Pavlovna Kalashnikova worked as an ambulance doctor for many more years. She died in 1996. I managed to offer unction to her shortly before her death. Now still Many of those to whom she told about what happened on that very first day of the New Year are alive."

This is what Abbot Herman, a resident of Optina Pustyn, said in 1989 (in the 50s he served in cathedral Kuibyshev): “What I haven’t seen, I won’t talk about, but what I know, I’ll say. The street was cordoned off, they took a non-disclosure agreement. The rector of the cathedral received a call from the commissioner and asked to announce from the pulpit on the coming Sunday that there was no miracle. The rector replied: “Allow me.” I’ll go and have a look and tell people what I saw.” The commissioner thought for a minute and promised to call back soon. The call came again an hour later and the abbot was told that there was no need to announce anything. Since there was a lot of talk among the people, even local Soviet newspapers did not were able to pass over this miracle in silence and tried to present it as a “deception of the priests.” Soon after this incident, Father Seraphim was given three years.” He was forbidden to talk about the taking of the icon from Zoya and, after serving his sentence, he was sent to serve in a remote village of the Dnepropetrovsk diocese, and then transferred to the village of Mikhailovskoye.

Based on this story, it was filmed in 2009 Feature Film, directed by Alexander Proshkin “Miracle”. Actors such as Konstantin Khabensky, Sergei Makovetsky and Polina Kutepova took part in the film.

60 years ago one of the most mystical events in the history of the USSR took place. On the outskirts of closed Kuibyshev, a young girl Zoya was petrified with an icon of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker in her hands. Zoya's arrest became an all-Union scandal: crowds of people were dispersed from Zoya's house by mounted police, party officials did everything to hide this mysterious incident.

“The whole city is buzzing like a beehive! You are sitting here, and there... The girl froze with the icon in her hands, rooted to the spot! They say God punished her!” - Doctor Anna was choking with excitement.

There are eyewitness accounts of those days and documents from party meetings that the girl was petrified.

This extraordinary and mysterious event occurred on December 31, 1956 at 84 Chkalova Street. An ordinary woman, Claudia Bolonkina, lived in it, whose son decided to invite his friends on New Year’s Eve. Among the invitees was a girl, Zoya, with whom Nikolai had recently begun dating.

All the friends were with their gentlemen, but Zoya was still sitting alone, Kolya was delayed. When the dancing began, she said: “If my Nikolai is not there, I will dance with Nikola the Pleasant!” And she headed to the corner where the icons hung. The friends were horrified: “Zoe, this is a sin,” but she said: “If there is a God, let him punish me!” She took the icon and pressed it to her chest. She entered the circle of dancers and suddenly froze, as if she had grown into the floor. It was impossible to move it from its place, and the icon could not be taken out of hand - it seemed to be stuck tightly. The girl showed no external signs of life. But a subtle knocking sound was heard in the area of ​​the heart.

The ambulance doctor Anna tried to revive Zoya. Anna’s own sister, Nina Pavlovna Kalashnikova, is still alive, I managed to talk to her.

She ran home excited. And although the police made her sign a non-disclosure agreement, she told everything. And how she tried to give the girl injections, but it turned out to be impossible. Zoya’s body was so hard that the syringe needles did not fit into it, they broke...

Samara law enforcement agencies immediately became aware of the incident. Since it was related to religion, the case was given emergency status, and a police squad was sent to the house to prevent onlookers from entering. There was nothing to worry about. By the third day of Zoya's stay, all the streets near the house were crowded with thousands of people. The girl was nicknamed “Stone Zoya”.

They still had to invite the clergy into the house of the “stone Zoya,” because the police were afraid to approach her holding the icon. But none of the priests managed to change anything until Hieromonk Seraphim (Poloz) came. They say that he was so bright-hearted and kind that he even had the gift of prediction. He was able to take the icon from Zoya’s frozen hands, after which he predicted that her “standing” would end on Easter Day. And so it happened. They say that Poloz was then asked by the authorities to recant his involvement in Zoya’s case, but he rejected the offer. Then they fabricated an article about sodomy and sent him to serve his sentence. After his release he did not return to Samara...

Zoya's body came to life, but her mind was no longer the same. In the first days she kept shouting: “The earth is perishing in sins! Pray, believe!” From a scientific and medical point of view, it is difficult to imagine how the body of a young girl could last 128 days without food and water. The capital's scientists, who came to Samara at that time for such a supernatural case, were unable to determine the “diagnosis,” which was initially mistaken for some kind of tetanus.

After the incident with Zoya, as her contemporaries testify, people flocked en masse to churches and temples. People bought crosses, candles, icons. Those who were not baptized were baptized... But it is known: from fear, a change in consciousness and heart occurs in exceptional cases. As a rule, a person becomes “good” only for a while. In order to deeply feel the essence of everything spiritual and real, to open the heart to goodness and love, the work of the soul is required. And religious, like any external attributes, have nothing to do with it.

Therefore, whether we are talking about Zoya or about some other character to whom something out of the ordinary happened, the following question arises: why do we need dramas, tragedies in order to gain faith, pay attention to ourselves, our actions, our own lives? or miracles and mysticism? Until the thunder strikes, the man will not cross himself?