OPTINA PUSTYN'. - A Russian monastery near Kozelsk, in the province of Kaluga. Its uncertain origins date back to the 14th–15th centuries. During the 18th century it declined, like many others, due to the State’s hostile administrative measures against monasteries. The Metropolitan of Moscow Platon (1775–1811) sent there the monk Avraamij, a zealous follower of the archimandrite Paisio Velickovskij, a great reformer of modern Russian monasticism.
This marked the beginning of the spiritual revival of O. P., which became renowned especially for its *staretsy* (elders), monks esteemed as wise masters of spiritual life and skilled directors of consciences, sought out by countless pilgrims of every social and cultural background. Among these *staretsy* were distinguished Leonida (d. 1841), Macario (d. 1860), and especially Ambrogio Grenkov (1812–91), visited and revered even by the most eminent contemporary Russian writers, such as Kirejevskij, Leontjev, Tolstoj, Dostojevskij, Solovjev, and others. The monks of O. P. were also engaged in publishing ascetic and hagiographic works; at its height, it housed about 300 monks. The Bolshevik revolution cut short the renewed activity of O. P.