Venerable Macarius of Altai

Macarius, born Mikhail Glukharev in Vyazma in 1792, studied at the St Petersburg Theological Academy, became a monk and served as rector of the Kostroma seminary. In 1830 he set out as a missionary to the Altai in Siberia and made the town of Biysk the centre of his mission, writing primers for the Altai converts and Russian settlers.

He argued that the Old Testament should be translated into Russian from the Hebrew and himself translated Job and Isaiah; the Synod refused to publish them, but his translation, printed after his death, was used in preparing the Synodal Bible. He spent his last years at the monastery of Bolkhov and died there on 18 May 1847, while preparing for a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. He was canonized in 2000.