The Three Hermits by Leo Tolstoy
Quick answer: The Three Hermits by Tolstoy: full summary with the walking on water ending, the hermits' simple prayer, themes of faith versus doctrine, and the tale's craft.
A bishop crossing the White Sea hears fishermen speak of three old hermits on a bare island, and decides, from the deck of the pilgrims' ship, that such men need proper religious instruction. Tolstoy published The Three Hermits in 1886, subtitling it an old legend current in the Volga district, and its ending, three old men running across the sea because they have forgotten the Lord's Prayer, is one of the most famous images in all his short fiction.
The story fills only a few pages and reads like folklore because Tolstoy built it to. Students want the plot, the prayer, and what the ending means; writers should study how completely the story trusts one image to do the arguing. Almost nothing happens, and the almost nothing is unforgettable.
The poem
Three are ye, three are we, have mercy upon us.
The hermits' prayer in Leo Tolstoy, 'The Three Hermits' (1886), Maude translation
The story in brief, ending included
On a pilgrim ship bound for the Solovetsk monastery, the bishop overhears a fisherman telling of three hermits who live on a remote island, silent old men who once helped him when he was stranded there. The bishop insists on being rowed ashore. He finds them exactly as described: one small and bent in an old cassock, one taller in a ragged peasant coat, one ancient and white bearded, gentle, smiling, barely speaking. Asked how they pray, they answer with the only prayer they know: three are ye, three are we, have mercy upon us. The bishop is touched but explains this is not how God is properly addressed, and spends the entire day teaching them the Lord's Prayer. They are slow, they stumble, he repeats it a hundred times, and by nightfall the three can say it. Satisfied, the bishop returns to the ship, thanking God for letting him help such godly men.
That night, unable to sleep, he watches the moonlit water and sees something white and shining overtaking the ship. It is the three hermits, running upon the sea as though it were dry land. Reaching the vessel, they raise their heads and confess in one voice: they have forgotten his teaching. As long as they repeated it they remembered, then one word slipped, and it fell apart; will he teach them again? The bishop bows to them over the ship's side and answers: your own prayer will reach the Lord, men of God. It is not for me to teach you. Pray for us sinners. The hermits turn and go back across the sea, and a light shines where they pass until dawn. That is the whole story, and the reversal in the bishop's bow is its entire point.
The characters
Four figures, one of whom is really three.
Themes and meaning
The exam reading is faith versus form: God hears the heart, not the wording. Supporting themes are humility, the limits of institutional religion, the holiness of simplicity, and spiritual pride gently corrected, gently, because the bishop is not a villain but a good man whose categories are too small. The hermits' prayer matters because it is theologically clumsy and spiritually perfect: they address the Trinity as three to three, neighbourly, and throw themselves on mercy in nine words.
The sharper observation is who gets converted. The story is structured as a mission, teacher sails to pupils, but the actual conversion happens on the ship's deck when the bishop bows. Tolstoy's tales for the people usually school a peasant or a king; here he schools the church itself, and does it without one satirical sentence. Note also that the miracle is wasted on the hermits, who do not know walking on water is impossible; it exists entirely for the bishop and the reader. A miracle aimed at the witness rather than the performer is a very deliberate piece of theology.
The craft: one image, fully trusted
Everything in the story is staging for a single picture: three old men running on moonlit water to ask for a forgotten prayer back. Tolstoy spends his length making that image inevitable, the day of laborious teaching guarantees the forgetting, the sea voyage guarantees the stage, and then refuses to decorate it. No sermon follows; the bishop's one sentence of surrender is the complete commentary. The lesson for writers is brutal and useful: if your central image is strong enough, everything after it should be as short as you can bear.
The other technique worth studying is repetition as characterisation. The hermits' nine word prayer, repeated, and the bishop's hundredfold drilling of the correct prayer are the same act with opposite spirits, and the story lets the two repetitions argue with each other instead of the narrator arguing. When two characters embody a theme's opposite poles, give them the same action performed differently, and cut your own commentary. Contest judges reading hundreds of stories reward exactly this economy, the kind Writory's Short Story Contest rubric files under Language and Structure.
The prayer, quoted
The hermits' prayer is short enough to quote entirely and confidently, in the standard Maude translation: three are ye, three are we, have mercy upon us. It works because it is arithmetic turned into intimacy: the Trinity addressed as one small household to another. Any essay on the story should hold this against the Lord's Prayer, not to rank the words but to make Tolstoy's point: the second is better doctrine, the first is better prayed, at least by these three, and heaven's verdict arrives on foot across the water.
What poets can take from this
- For exams, quote the hermits' nine word prayer and contrast its spirit with the bishop's day of drilling.
- Name the reversal precisely: the mission structure inverts when the bishop bows and asks the hermits to pray for him.
- Point out that the miracle is witnessed by the doubter, not valued by the performers; that detail anchors the theme.
- Writers: build your whole story as staging for one image, then refuse to explain the image once it arrives.
- Give opposed characters the same action performed in opposite spirits and let the repetitions argue for you.
- Use a frame of travel, a ship, a road, a queue, to bring your teacher figure to the lesson they did not expect.
Try it yourself
Write a story in which an expert travels somewhere to correct amateurs and succeeds completely, only for the correction to come undone in a way that reveals the amateurs never needed it. The expert must concede in a single sentence, and the story must end within a paragraph of that sentence.
Questions
What happens at the end of The Three Hermits?
At night the bishop sees the three hermits running across the sea after the ship. They have forgotten the Lord's Prayer he taught them and ask to be taught again. Humbled, he tells them their own prayer reaches God, asks them to pray for sinners like him, and they return across the water.
What is the hermits' prayer and why does it matter?
They pray only: three are ye, three are we, have mercy upon us. It is doctrinally crude and spiritually complete, and the story's miracle endorses it. Tolstoy's point is that God answers the heart's sincerity rather than correct wording.
What is the main theme of The Three Hermits?
Faith versus religious form. The bishop, a sincere and learned man, assumes proper words matter to God; the hermits' walking on water shows their simple devotion outranks his instruction. The story also teaches humility, since the teacher ends by asking his pupils to pray for him.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated July 2026.
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