Varlaam (russian: Варлаам) was Metropolitan of Moscow and All Rus' from 1511 to 1521. He was the seventh Metropolitan in Moscow to be appointed without the approval of the

Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople The ecumenical patriarch ( el, Οἰκουμενικός Πατριάρχης, translit=Oikoumenikós Patriárchēs) is the archbishop of Constantinople (Istanbul), New Rome and '' primus inter pares'' (first among equals) among the heads of th ...

as had been the norm. From 1506 he was archimandrite of the Simonov Monastery in Moscow. He was selected by Grand Prince

Vasily III Vasili, Vasily, Vasilii or Vasiliy (Russian: Василий) is a Russian masculine given name of Greek origin and corresponds to ''Basil''. It may refer to: *Vasili I of Moscow Grand Prince from 1389–1425 *Vasili II of Moscow Grand Prince fro ...

on July 27, 1511 and consecrated Metropolitan on August 3, 1511. He was said to be austere, never sycophantic to the grand prince, and never one to do anything against his own conscience. He was of the

Non-possessors Non-possessors (russian: нестяжатели, ''nestyazhateli'') belonged to a 16th-century movement in the Russian Orthodox Church in opposition to ecclesiastical land-ownership. It was led by Nil of Sora and later Maximus the Greek and other ...

, those who opposed ecclesiastical land-ownership, although that group had been defeated at earlier church councils. He also protected Maximus the Greek, who was brought to Moscow to translate Greek texts. In 1515, Varlaam consecrated the main church of the Khutyn Monastery just outside Novgorod the Great (the archiepiscopal see being vacant from 1509). That same year, he consecrated the

Tikhvin Monastery Tikhvin (russian: Ти́хвин; Veps: ) is a town and the administrative center of Tikhvinsky District in Leningrad Oblast, Russia, located on both banks of the Tikhvinka River in the east of the oblast, east of St. Petersburg. Tikhvin ...

, also in the Novgorodian Eparchy. Vasily III wished to divorce his wife and remarry. The metropolitan opposed his wishes. As a result, the Grand Prince deposed Varlaam was removed from office on December 17, 1521. He was confined in shackles in the Kyrilo-Beloozersky Monastery north of Moscow. He was later moved to the Spaso-Kamenyi Monastery in Vologda where he died sometime in 1522.Isabel de Madariaga, Ivan the Terrible (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006), 29; Janet Martin, ''Medieval Russia 980-1584''(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 262-264.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Varlaam Metropolitans and Patriarchs of Moscow 1522 deaths Year of birth unknown