person
St. Nicholas the Wonderworker
Nikolai the Wonderworker
also: Николай Чудотворец, St. Nicholas of Myra
The widely venerated fourth-century bishop of Myra, honored in Orthodox Christianity as a wonderworking saint; Ieronim quotes genuine lines from the akafist written in his honor as an example of the genre's conventions, and shares his name, left unremarked, with the dead hierodeacon Nikolai.
Reading notes
- On Holy Night §45 to Nikolai the Wonderworker
St. Nicholas the Wonderworker (Nikolai Chudotvorets), better known in the West as St. Nicholas of Myra, is one of the most venerated saints in Orthodox Christianity; the akafist Ieronim quotes in his honor is a real, widely used liturgical text, and the shared name "Nikolai" between the saint and the dead hierodeacon is left unremarked by Chekhov but is unlikely to be accidental.