Christians believe that at the end of the world during the Last Judgment people will go to God to be judged and rewarded according to the way they behaved on earth. The icon showing the Last Judgment is an encyclopedia of stories from the Bible and from folklore. You can see familiar people, such as the Mother of God, John the Baptist, Christ, the Archangel Michael, the prophets, and the disciples. Someone else you may have heard of is the serpent that tempted Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and led them to disobey God. The serpent’s body has big black circles on it. Each of the circles represents a sin. The sins include lying, anger, drunkenness, bad language, murder, pride, and many others.

Near the serpent is Satan, who is also known as the devil. He and the angels are fighting for human souls. The souls of people who have led a good life will go with the angels to heaven. But the souls of people who have been bad will be given to Satan and thrust into the fires of hell.

Satan is the black figure with horns and a tail. Satan has little devils, or evil spirits, who are his servants and who help lead people astray. This story is about one of those little devils.

A good young man lived all alone in a little village. He was well off and never had fewer than four horses in his barn. But he began drinking and became addicted to drink. One night while he was drunk, he burned down the village.

The village men caught him and grabbed the matches out of his hands. They tied up the young man and took him to the government seat to be judged.

Knowing that he was guilty, the arsonist bowed to the earth and said, “Forgive me, Russian Orthodox people. I didn’t know what I was doing. Someone helped me or persuaded me—I can’t tell which. I just remember that someone shoved a burning match into my hands. I thought I was lighting a cigar, but he took my hand and poked the match under someone else’s straw roof. I didn’t know him. He was all black. Suddenly, the roof was on fire.

“I heard him whisper, ‘Run away from them!’

“Someone knocked me over and tied me up. When I looked around, the whole village was on fire.”

White as a sheet the young man fell to his knees and in misery looked at everyone. He wept and prayed pitifully.

One of the villagers said, “Look at him. How could he possibly be bad?”

“The devil led him astray,” another person said. “After all, the devil is evil and likes to cause people to do bad things.”

The entire village agreed that the fire was not the fault of the young man, but of the devil. People pitied the boy and forgave him for his sin. They rebuilt the village. The Russian people are very kind and forgiving, you see; they value mercy and charity above all other qualities.