in archival tomes like the OED
It appears in three of the best unabridged dictionaries of English because it was borrowed from Russian and has been used occasionally in English for the past 80 years or so. That's how the language works.
assuming I do not first get ejected from this company for myself being too much of a ringer
Welcome (as Faldo suggested) and do stick around. I haven't been here as long as some (check out the stats over to the right-side of the page), but I have never known anybody to have been ejected from the premises. Some have died and others have wandered off, but that's life.
Now on to your argument. You stated that you could not find starets in an English dictionary. I provided you with the names of some English dictionaries that it could be found in. You are entitled to your opinion about the bogus wordhood of starets in English. Oh, and, if you do stick around (as I hope you will), you'll learn that Mr Garg, who writes the AWAD list, does not read these forums.
