St. Philip, Metropolitan of Moscow, in the world Theodore, came from a noble boyar family of the Kolychevs, who occupied a prominent place in the Boyar Duma at the court of the Moscow sovereigns. He was born in 1507. His father, Stepan Ivanovich, "an enlightened man and full of military spirit," carefully prepared his son for public service. The pious Varvara, Theodore's mother, who ended her days in monasticism with the name Varsonofia, sowed in his soul the seeds of sincere faith and deep piety. 
On Sunday, June 5, 1537, in the temple, at the Divine Liturgy, Theodore was especially struck by the words of the Savior: "No one can work for two masters" (Matthew 6:24), which decided his future fate. After fervently praying to the Moscow miracle Workers, without saying goodbye to his family, he secretly left Moscow in the clothes of a commoner and hid from the world for some time in the village of Khizhi near Lake Onega, foraging for pastoral labors. His thirst for exploits led him to the famous Solovetsky Monastery on the White Sea. There he performed the most difficult obediences: chopping firewood, digging the ground, working at the mill. After a year and a half of temptation, Abbot Alexy, at the request of Theodore, tonsured him, giving him the monastic name Philip and entrusting him into obedience to elder Jonah Shamin, the interlocutor of St. Alexander Svirsky (+ 1533; memory of August 30). Under the guidance of experienced elders, Monk Philip grows spiritually, strengthens fasting and prayer. 
In 1546, in Novgorod the Great, Archbishop Theodosius consecrated Philip to the abbot of the Solovetsky monastery. The newly appointed abbot tried his best to raise the spiritual significance of the monastery and its founders, the Venerable Savvati and Zosima Solovetsky (memory of September 27, April 17). He found the image of the Mother of God Hodegetria, brought to the island by the original Solovetsky, the Monk Savvati, and found a stone cross that once stood in front of the monk's cell. A Psalter belonging to St. Zosima (+ 1478), the first abbot of Solovetsky, and his vestments, which have since been worn by hegumens during the service on the days of the memory of the wonderworker, were found. The monastery was being spiritually revived. To streamline life in the monastery, a new charter was adopted. 
But the Lord was preparing the saint for a different ministry and a different feat. In Moscow, the Solovetsky hermit was remembered by John the Terrible, who loved him once in his teenage years. The tsar hoped that he would find in St. Philip a faithful companion, confessor and adviser, who, according to the height of monastic life, would have nothing in common with the rebellious boyars. The metropolitan's holiness, according to Grozny, was supposed to tame the impiety and malice that nested in the Boyar Duma with one gentle spiritual trend. The choice of the primate of the Russian Church seemed to him the best.
The saint refused for a long time to take on the great burden of the primate of the Russian Church. He did not feel any spiritual closeness with John. He tried to convince the tsar to destroy the oprichnina, while Grozny tried to prove to him its state necessity. Finally, the Terrible tsar and the holy metropolitan came to an agreement so that St. Philip would not interfere in the affairs of the oprichnina and state administration, not leave the metropolis in cases if the tsar could not fulfill his wishes, be the support and adviser of the tsar, as the former metropolitans were the support of the Moscow sovereigns. On July 25, 1566, St. Philip was consecrated to the pulpit of the Moscow saints, to whose host he was soon to join.
John the Terrible sought to comprehend every step of his public service, all the drastic measures he took to radically restructure the entire Russian state and public life as a manifestation of God's Providence, as an action of God in history. His favorite spiritual models were St. Michael of Chernigov (September 20) and St. Theodore the Black (September 19), warriors and figures of a complex contradictory fate, courageously marching towards a holy goal, through any obstacles that stood before them in the performance of duty to the Motherland and to the Holy Church. The more the darkness thickened around Grozny, the more resolutely his soul demanded spiritual purification and redemption. Arriving on a pilgrimage to the Kirillov Belozersky Monastery, he announced to the abbot and the cathedral elders his desire to take monastic vows. The proud autocrat fell at the feet of the abbot, and he blessed his intention. Since then, all my life, wrote Grozny, "it seems to me, damned, that I am already half a black man." The oprichnina itself was conceived by Grozny in the image of the monastic brotherhood: having served God with weapons and feats of arms, the oprichnics had to put on monastic clothes and go to church service, long and statutory, lasting from 4 to 10 o'clock in the morning. The tsar-abbot imposed penance on the "brethren" who did not appear for prayer at four o'clock in the morning. John himself and his sons tried to pray hard and sang in the church choir. They went from the church to the refectory, and while the oprichniks were eating, the tsar stood beside them. The oprichniks collected the remaining viands from the table and distributed them to the beggars when leaving the refectory. With tears of repentance, the Terrible, wishing to be an admirer of the holy ascetics, teachers of repentance, wanted to wash away and burn out his sins and his associates, harboring confidence that terrible cruel deeds were being committed by him for the good of Russia and the triumph of Orthodoxy. The most vivid spiritual work and monastic sobriety of Grozny is revealed in his "Synodic": shortly before his death, at his behest, complete lists of people killed by him and his oprichniks were compiled, which were then sent to all Russian monasteries. John took upon himself all the sin before the people and begged the holy monks to pray to God for the forgiveness of his suffering soul.
The self-styled monasticism of Grozny, which weighed down Russia with a gloomy yoke, outraged St. Philip, who believed that one should not mix the earthly and the heavenly, the ministry of the cross and the ministry of the sword. Moreover, St. Philip saw how much unrepentant malice and hatred lurked under the black coats of the oprichniks. There were also simple murderers among them, hardened in unpunished bloodshed, and extortionate robbers, hardened in sin and crime. By God's permission, history is often made by the hands of the wicked, and no matter how much the Terrible wished to whitewash his black brotherhood before God, the blood shed in his name by rapists and fanatics cried out to heaven.
St. Philip decided to resist the Terrible. This was due to a new wave of executions in 1567-1568. In the autumn of 1567, as soon as the tsar marched on Livonia, he became aware of the boyar conspiracy. The traitors intended to capture the tsar and hand him over to the Polish king, who had already moved troops to the Russian border. John the Terrible dealt severely with the conspirators and again shed a lot of blood. Saint Philip was sad, but the consciousness of his saintly duty compelled him to boldly speak out in defense of the executed. The final break came in the spring of 1568. In the Week of the Crucifixion, on March 2, 1568, when the tsar and the oprichniks came to the Assumption Cathedral, as usual, in monastic vestments, St. Philip refused to bless him, but began openly to condemn the iniquities committed by the oprichniks: "Metropolitan Philip and the sovereign in Moscow were at enmity about the oprichnina." The rebuke of the bishop interrupted the splendor of the church service. Grozny said in anger: "Are you resisting us? Let's see your firmness! "I was too soft with you," the tsar added, according to eyewitnesses.
The tsar began to show even greater cruelty in the persecution of all those who opposed him. The executions followed one after another. The fate of the holy confessor was decided. But Grozny wanted to observe the canonical order. The Boyar Duma obediently passed a decision on the trial of the head of the Russian Church. A conciliar court was held over Metropolitan Philip in the presence of the thinned Boyar Duma. There were false witnesses: to the saint's deep sorrow, these were monks from his beloved Solovetsky monastery, his former disciples and tonsured. Saint Philip was accused of many alleged crimes, including witchcraft
Rejecting all charges, the holy sufferer tried to stop the trial by announcing the voluntary resignation of the metropolitan dignity. But his abdication was not accepted. A new insult awaited the martyr. After the sentencing to life imprisonment in the dungeon of St. Philip, they forced him to serve the liturgy in the Assumption Cathedral. It was November 8, 1568. In the middle of the service, the oprichniks burst into the temple, publicly read the conciliar condemnation that defamed the saint, tore off his episcopal vestments, dressed him in rags, pushed him out of the temple and took him to the Epiphany Monastery on simple firewood. The martyr was tortured for a long time in the basements of Moscow monasteries, the elder's feet were hammered into stocks, he was kept in chains, and a heavy chain was thrown around his neck. Finally, they were taken to a monastery in Tver region. There, a year later, on December 23, 1569, the saint suffered a martyr's death at the hand of Malyuta Skuratov. In three more days, the holy elder foresaw the end of his earthly feat and took communion of the Holy Mysteries. His relics were interred initially in the same place, in the monastery, behind the altar of the temple. Later, they were transferred to the Solovetsky Monastery (August 11, 1591) and from there to Moscow (July 3, 1652).
The memory of St. Philip has been celebrated by the Russian Church since 1591 on the day of his martyrdom – December 23. Since 1660, the celebration has been postponed to January 9th.