Nicodemus of Tismana

“A hesychast missionary in the spirit of St Gregory the Sinaite, whom he had known in his youth, St Nicodemus established his rule of life in the many communities founded by himself or his disciples in the three Romanian lands. Romanian monasticism thus owes to him its hesychastic orientation in the 14th century. The resulting cultural and spiritual blossoming was to continue, more or less without interruption, for the next three centuries.”

“Considered in its entirety, the work of Nikodimos represents an original synthesis between the hesychast movement imported from Mount Athos and the artistic and literary influences coming from Serbia. Contrary to the currents that supply the first literary school in Moldavia established at the monastery of Neamț by the monk Gabriel (1424–49), it stands apart from the Bulgarian tradition of the fourteenth century. Nikodimos’s relations with Patriarch Euthymius of Trnovo merely assume the character of an episode without profound implications for the life of his foundations.”