He became a monk in 1758, and in 1763 was appointed Bishop of Voronezh, where he became revered for his energetic commitment to the spiritual education and wellbeing of both the laity and the clergy of his diocese.

At Zadonsk he wrote a number of luminous books and treatises, and became a much-loved spiritual advisor and man of God.

Tikhon lived with his mother in extreme poverty, and was required to do peasant labour for long hours as a child.

He encouraged and instructed the clergy in their spiritual duties, formed a Mission to restore sectarians to Orthodoxy, turned judicial administration towards correction rather than punishment, and defended subordinates from secular authorities.

He promoted education among the people, and transformed the Slavic-Latin school into a seminary, for which he developed the curriculum and assembled a staff of experienced instructors.

In Zadonsk, Tikhon's reputation for piety, humility, kindness and wisdom drew many people to the monastery in search of his blessing and advice.

He was not averse to leaving the monastery and moving among the local people if a situation required it, and would occasionally travel to more distant destinations.

Tikhon's two major literary works during his retirement were the books A Spiritual Treasury Gathered from the World (1770) and On True Christianity (1776).

He also wrote shorter works especially for monks, such as "Rules of Monastic Life" and "Instruction to those who turn from the vain world".

The dark waves of deep weariness and despair are quite clearly visible in Tikhon's limpid spirit as they rush over him... His peculiar subjective despair, his special temptation to melancholy as a form of uncustomary disclosure of the soul, is wholly unique in Russian asceticism and more readily suggestive of the Dark Night of the Soul by St. John of the Cross.

[5]Though Tikhon chose an ascetic life, he remained a pastor and a teacher, and did not refrain from actively involving himself in affairs of the world if his deep sensitivity to suffering was aroused.

[5] He frequently intervened on behalf of mistreated peasants and sought to practice and promote Christian love in a time of darkness.

On occasion he was physically attacked by landowners under the influence of the prevailing Voltairian antireligious ideas, but his strength and humility in these situations was said to be powerful enough to produce a change of heart in his assailant.

[6] He is reported by his monk-servant to have frequently engaged in ecstatic speech, but at other times to have become "lost in thought", whereupon he would retreat into solitude and prayer.

Florovsky describes Tikhon's books, particularly On True Christianity, as graceful, poetic and free, "less a dogmatic system than a book of mystical ethics", and the first attempt at a living theology, "a theology based on experience, in contrast and as a counterweight to scholastic erudition, which lacks any such experience.

The character is a former bishop living at a monastery, who suffers from a number of physical and nervous ailments but nonetheless demonstrates a profoundly compassionate insight into the state of mind of his interlocutor, the deeply troubled Nikolay Stavrogin.

Tikhon's re-affirmation of the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, and his lament for the moral and spiritual decay following from its rejection, is echoed in the novel.

Then there would be no robbery, no deceit, no murder... the jails would not be overflowing with prisoners, locked up for crimes, moneylending, failure to pay debts; there would finally be no poor or needy any longer, but all would be equal.