Ioasaph of Belgorod

Saint Ioasaph of Belgorod
Saint Ioasaph of Belgorod
Born	8 (19) September 1705 Pryluky, Poltava, Russian Empire
Died	10 (21) December 1754 Grayvoron, Belgorod, Russian Empire
Venerated in	Eastern Orthodoxy
Major shrine	Cathedral of the Transfiguration of Our Lord in Belgorod, Russia
Feast	10 December

Saint Joasaph of Belgorod (Russian: Иоасаф Белгородский; secular name Joachim Andreievich Gorlenko; 8 (19) September 1705 – 10 (21) December 1754) was an 18th-century holy hierarch, bishop of Belgorod from 1748 until his death.

He was glorified by the Eastern Orthodox Church in 1911.

Born at Pryluky, in the province of Poltava (modern-day Ukraine), Joachim Gorlenko was the son of Colonel Andrei Dmitrievich Gorlenko of the Pryluky Regiment by his marriage to Maria Danylovna, a daughter of Danylo Apostol (1654–1734), a significant military leader and Hetman of the Cossack Hetmanate from 1727 until his death. After attending the Kiev Theological Academy, in 1725 the young Gorlenko was tonsured a monk of the Mezhyhirya Monastery, under the name of Hilarion.

In 1727 Hilarion (as he then was) took monastic vows and received the name of Ioasaph, and in 1728 he was ordained a deacon. By the end of that academic year he was teaching at the Academy. In 1737 he was appointed archimandrite of the Mhar Monastery near Lubny. In 1744, by command of the Empress Elizabeth, Iosaph was advanced to the rank of archimandrite and translated to become head of the Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius, the most important Russian monastery and the spiritual centre of the Russian Orthodox Church. On 2 June 1748 he was consecrated as bishop of Belgorod and Oboyanska.