spiritual elders
Guides of souls
Spiritual elders are respected figures within a religious or spiritual community, regarded as sources of wisdom, guidance, and moral authority.
The term emphasizes accumulated insight rather than formal rank—one becomes a spiritual elder through experience and perceived closeness to sacred truths, not necessarily through ordination: She sought counsel from the spiritual elders of her congregation.
In Indigenous and traditional cultures, spiritual elders often serve as keepers of ceremonial knowledge and oral traditions.
- counselorOne who advises
- priestOne who performs sacraments
- mysticSeeker of sacred truth
- rabbiJewish spiritual leader
- patriarchMale head of family
imam · holy man · griot · storyteller · oracle · monk · advisor · hierophant · healer · curandera · faith healer · wise man · wise woman · shaman · sage · medicine man · guru · crone
- Russian mysticismholy fools, Russian Orthodoxy, divine light
- Russian OrthodoxyRussian Orthodoxy, Orthodox icons, holy fool, Church Slavonic, Silver Age
- Orthodox ChristianityOrthodox Church, Nicene Creed, Hagia Sophia, Greek Orthodox, patriarchate
- Eastern SpiritualityBuddhism, Hinduism, Taoism, Confucianism, Shinto
- Orthodox clergyarchpriest, patriarchs, patriarch, metropolitan, metropolitans
- Orthodox saintsSaint Nicholas, Saint George, Saint Basil, Saint Peter, Saint Paul
spiritual elderslaypeople
Those outside a profession
congregants · followers · parishioners · subordinates · disciples
spiritual, spirit, spirits, spirited, spiritually, spirituality, spiritualism, spiritualist, dispirit