Ivan Souslov, who was a serf of the Nariskyne family, chose twelve apostles, and with them preached the twelve commandments of his father, Sabaoth. He was arrested by the police, scourged, branded, and tortured without revealing the mysteries of his creed, and was crucified near the holy gate of the Kremlin; buried on Friday, he rose again on the night of Saturday, and reappeared among his disciples. The legend, so far drawn from the Biblical narrative, was not sufficient to satisfy the cravings of his followers for miracles; and it goes on to relate that he was again seized and crucified, and his skin flayed from his body; that over the bloody and palpitating limbs a woman spread a sheet, which formed a new skin, and Christ, resuscitated again, lived many years on earth, and finally ascended into heaven to be joined with the Father.
Every relic of their incarnate deities, the villages where they were born, the dwellings they inhabited, their places of burial before ascending on high, are held in special veneration. Although the Khlysti rejected marriage as unclean, an exception was made for the families of Daniel Philippovitch and Ivan Souslov, in order that the blood of the first Redeemer might not die out from among men. Towards the close of the reign of Nicholas there lived in the hamlet of Staroë, thirty versts from Kostroma, a woman named Ouliana Vassiliev, to whom they rendered divine honors, as the last lineal descendant of Philippovitch. To put an end to the pilgrimages and manifestations of which she was the object, the government placed her in an Orthodox convent, but the house she had occupied is still venerated as a holy shrine, as "God's house," and Staroë has become their Nazareth; a well in the village furnishes the water used to make the bread for their communion, and
