[1][2][3] At Patmos, he befriended Nikephoros Theotokis, a Greek cleric and enlightenment figure, with whom he taught at the Princely Academy of Iași in 1776.

[2] In 1779 he became a monk in Constantinople, then continued his studies in Patmos, returning to Moldavia in 1781 to be a preacher at the Metropolitan cathedral.

[3] After the second Russo-Turkish War began, he fled to Ukraine, together with the phanariot ruler of Moldavia, Alexander Mavrocordatos Firaris.

[3] In 1789, as Russians occupied the Danubian Principalities, Catherine II of Russia and the Holy Synod appointed Archbishop Amvrosii Serebrennikov of Ekaterinoslav to be the locum tenens Exarch of Moldo-Wallachia, naming in 1791 Bănulescu-Bodoni bishop of Cetatea Albă.

[7] Falling ill, Bănulescu settled in Odessa and Dubăsari, where he stayed until 1806, when following the Russo-Turk War, the Russian Army occupied again the Principalities and he was once again named Exarch of Moldo-Wallachia.

[8] The local boyars, led by Bănulescu-Bodoni, petitioned for self-rule and the establishment of a civil government based on the Moldavian traditional laws.