The Russian Church and Russian Dissent

Front matter

THE RUSSIAN CHURCH

AND

RUSSIAN DISSENT

Chapter 1

THE

RUSSIAN CHURCH AND RUSSIAN DISSENT.

CHAPTER I.

1em

The immediate causes of the great schism between the churches of the East and the West, in a.d. 1054, were ecclesiastical in their nature, but political events had material influence in preparing the way for the separation.

The partition of the world, in a.d. 395, between Honorius and Arcadius, aroused diverse and conflicting interests which had slumbered while the empire was united.

The transfer of the capital from Rome to Ravenna, the conquest of the West by the barbarians, and its final severance from the East, resulted in the rise of papacy to temporal as well as spiritual power. It obtained ascendancy over half the world, and claimed jurisdiction over the whole.

The foundation of Constantinople, the dismemberment of the empire, and the complete separation, in a political sense, of the East from the West, exalted the pride of the patriarch, and raised his see to an equality with that of Rome. He as indignantly resented the pope's pretensions to supremacy as they were vehemently asserted.

During these centuries of incessant struggle great changes supervened in the character and constitution of the two Churches.

In the West the theocratic element became predominant; the Church, left to its own resources, learned to suffice for itself. It gave, instead of asking, protection, grasped the sceptre of absent emperors, and successfully established its dominion over king and princes.

In the East the Church, shielded from harm by the State, remained subservient to civil authority, rarely interfered in political affairs, and was content with its own spiritual jurisdiction.

The persistent pretensions of Rome, the constant antagonism, the frequent wars, the incessant conflicts to which they gave rise, were accompanied by differences of dogma and of discipline. These served to further embitter the struggle, to render the contest more implacable, and to make reconciliation or harmony impossible.

Disputes arose in the second and third centuries as to the date and celebration of Easter. The heresy of Arius, at first, and for a time, accepted in the East, but condemned in the West, followed in the fourth century. In the seventh, discussion as to the double or single nature of Christ convulsed the Christian world. The monotheletian patriarchs and the dyotheletian popes mutually anathematized each other, until unity was restored by the Sixth Œcumenical Council, a.d. 680 to 691. Then came the great controversy on the subject of image worship, which raged with intense virulence for a century and a half.

Meanwhile another grave subject of dispute arose, which still constitutes the essential dogmatical difference between the Churches. The doctrine of the Double Procession of the Holy Ghost originated in Spain during the fifth century. From Spain it spread into France, was accepted by Charlemagne and the Council of Aix-la-Chapelle in a.d. 809, and finally, approved at Rome, became an obligatory article of belief throughout the West. The Greek Church obstinately adhered to the old faith and letter of the creed. It absolutely rejected the Double Procession, and both parties appealed to the records of œcumenical councils. The interpolation of the words "filioque," in the creed established by the Council of Constantinople in a.d. 381, was detected. Nevertheless the Latin Church maintained the dogma, while the Greek persisted in denying it.

The seventh general council, convened at Nicæa in a.d. 787, is, in the estimation of the Eastern Church, the last œcumenical council. It completed, by its decrees, the entire body of doctrine of the Universal Church of Christ. By it unity was apparently restored, and in outward appearance the ecclesiastical fabric was then one and indivisible. The innumerable shades and differences of opinion within it were indiscriminately distributed through the whole mass. Sects and denominations abounded, with mutual denunciations and revilings; but no schism, properly so called, arrayed any great geographical division of the world in open religious hostility to the others.

In the middle of the ninth century the emperor, Michael III., deposed the patriarch Ignatius for daring to rebuke the licentiousness of the court, and named Photius in his stead. The new prelate was a man of unimpeachable character, commanding genius, and vast ambition. He excelled in theological erudition, but, as he was a layman, his appointment was irregular. Ignatius appealed to Nicholas I., Pope of Rome, who was glad of the opportunity to assert his right of interference. He anathematized Photius, and endeavored to reinstate Ignatius. Photius, undisturbed, retaliated upon Nicholas his sentence of deposition and excommunication, and widened the field of controversy by making appeal to the whole Christian world. In a circular letter, addressed to his brother patriarchs, he formally charged the Roman Church with five distinct heresies, and formulated the differences dividing the Churches. He declared:

That the Romish Church erroneously fasted on the Sabbath, or seventh day of the week.

That in the first week of Lent it wrongfully permitted the use of milk and of food prepared from milk.

That, contrary to Scripture, it prohibited priests from marrying, and separated from their wives such as were married when they took orders.

That it uncanonically authorized bishops, only, to anoint baptized persons with the Holy Chrism, withholding that authority from presbyters.

That it had sacrilegiously interpolated the words "filio-que" in the creed of the Council of Constantinople, and held the heretical doctrine of the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son and from the Father.

To arid discussions, characterized by the bitterness and rancor of religious fanaticism, were added fierce contentions on either side for increased jurisdiction, aroused by the addition to the see of Constantinople of Bulgaria and other provinces, conquered by Greek armies and converted by Greek missionaries.

That the final schism should have been delayed must be attributed, not merely to the pious horror which so direful an event would have inspired, but to the peculiar condition of the Greek Empire and Church. There was, within the empire, a continual struggle for power, with constantly fluctuating success, between contending parties, and which, from the intimate connection of State and Church, affected both. Photius and Ignatius were alternately deposed and reinstated. A submissive clergy bent to the nod of the sovereign, and venal bishops hailed or condemned one prelate after another at command. The pope was appealed to in turn by the contending factions, and flattered by delusive hopes; in reality his pretensions were hateful to them all, and he was but a tool in the hands of the astute Greeks, to be availed of when needed, and to be denied when he claimed his reward.

Amid these internal dissensions, these alternate appeals to, and rejection of, Romish intervention, a species of armed neutrality, of impending, yet deferred hostility, seemed to pervade the Churches, and the final catastrophe, though ever threatening, was ever postponed.

A fresh subject of theological discussion arose early in the eleventh century, regarding the use of leavened or unleavened bread in the Eucharist. The Greeks adhered to the custom of the primitive Church and condemned the Latins, who, in the eighth century, had substituted unleavened for leavened bread.

Michael Cerularius, the patriarch, was a prelate as bigoted as he was zealous. Chafing against the pretensions of the pope, and resenting his oft-renewed assump tion of superiority, he seized upon this occasion to make a violent attack upon the Latin Church and its chief. He proclaimed their apostasy from the true faith, ordered their churches and monasteries in Constantinople to be closed, and prohibited the celebration of their service. Retaliatory measures followed in the West. A final effort was made by the emperor, Constantine Monomachus, to restore harmony. At his request. Pope Leo IX. sent delegates to Constantinople with power to adjust all matters of controversy; but the haughty patriarch, in- censed at the lofty tone assumed by them as ambassadors of Rome, refused to admit them to his presence. The papal legates, filled with a sense of the august authority of their chief, boldly resented the indignity offered him in their persons. Resorting to the great Church of St. Sophia, they publicly excommunicated the patriarch and his adherents, and reverently deposited the written declaration of anathema upon the grand altar. By this solemn act the schism between the Churches was finally consummated on the 10th of June, a.d. 1054.

The points of difference, besides minor matters of practice and discipline, may be summarized as being those stated in the circular letter of Photius, to which are to be added the use of leavened or unleavened bread in the Eucharist and the question of papal supremacy. The most important, as involving fundamental principles, was that concerning the Double Procession of the Holy Ghost. The most potent and wide-spread in its influence was that regarding Rome's pretension to universal jurisdiction. It has ever been the chief obstacle at every attempt to restore unity. This point the popular mind, however bewildered on theological controversies, has always been able to appreciate, and by it popular indignation has always been easily aroused to support clerical or state authority.

The divergence of the two Churches was greater in reality than it appears to be from a superficial view. It was based on essential variations in the character and disposition of the people in the East and in the West, on the nature of their civilization, and on the different, almost antagonistic, development of the Christian idea in one Church and in the other.

These influences, profoundly affecting the character and constitution of the Greek Church, merit consider- ation from the consequences which have ensued and which are still perceptible. They aid in appreciating the attitude of the Russian Church, as chief exponent and representative of the Greek communion, towards other Christian denominations; and they also help to explain the dissensions which, in Russia, have arisen within its bosom.

The natural bent of the Greek mind was to speculative inquiry; it was more active and acute, more lively and less practical, easily swayed by and interested in scholastic disquisition and controversy, fond of argument for argument's sake, skilled in disputation, nice in definitions and distinctions. The East was the home and fountainhead of science and literature; the cultivation of letters was there carried to a far greater extent and held in higher estimation than in the West. The Greeks were vain of their superior learning and more polite culture; they looked down with supercilious contempt upon the outer world as mere barbarians; they felt pride in their inheritance of the wisdom and intellect of ancient Greece, and gloried in their language, formed and fashioned by sages and philosophers, as the only competent vehicle of elevated refined thought; in it Christ taught, the apostles and early fathers preached and wrote; the first heads of the Church were Greek, and the name of pope was Greek. The Eastern Church rejoiced in its direct affiliation with apostolic times, in its careful preservation of traditions, and was convinced of its especial right to be considered the true heir and successor of Christ.

Intellectual and moral progress in the East was, however, stifled by political and spiritual despotism when the seat of empire was established at Constantinople, and the Church came under the immediate protection and control of the State. With Christian emperors on the throne it no longer feared persecution, and, relying on the temporal power, it gradually fell into subjection and tutelage, a condition fatal to its true development: it submitted to the encroachments of imperial authority; human passions proved stronger than religious convictions, and its patriarchs and prelates, eager for advancement, appealed to the emperor in their mutual quarrels and contentions, striving by subserviency and compliance to conciliate his favor. The theocratic theory of its independence of principalities and powers gradually yielded to servility and dependence; civil authority became paramount over the Church, influenced or dictated its decrees, and was the supreme judge and arbiter of its destinies. Spiritual life within it became dead, and its religion degenerated to scholastic investigation and metaphysical disquisition on barren points of doctrinal belief; its intellectual activity, though great and in constant exercise, wasted its ingenuity and energy on the study of the historical, exegetical, dogmatical side of Christianity, and neglected the practical application of its precepts to the daily life and conduct of men. The fathers were busy in establishing precise definitions, in collecting and transmitting to posterity the lore and learning of the past, augmented and explained by their comments, rather than in endeavoring to improve humanity in the present; nor was this disputatious spirit peculiar to dignitaries of the Church, it pervaded all classes of society; in the words of Gregory Nazianzen, "this city is full of mechanics and slaves, who are all of them profound theologians, and preach in the shops and in the streets. If you ask a man to change a piece of silver, he informs you wherein the Son differs from the Father; if you demand the price of a loaf, you are told by way of reply that the Son is inferior to the Father; and if you inquire whether the bath is ready, the answer is that the Son was made out of nothing."

The letter of the law superseded the spirit; religion stiffened into formalism; piety consisted in strict observance of ceremonial rites; external holiness replaced sincere and heartfelt devotion.

The Church eagerly embraced the idea of monastic discipline, and monasticism exercised profound influence upon its destinies; but in this element of Christian life the tendency was the same: convents became the seats of mystical theology, of refined speculations on abstruse points of doctrine; penances, mortification of the flesh, worship of images and symbols, were spiritualized and raised far above the comprehension of the ignorant, who could grasp only the outward and material expression, and, blindly following their teachers, were plunged into the grossest, most superstitious, and idolatrous practices.

Delight in discussion, fondness for dialectic controversy and mental gymnastics, led to the development of inherent weaknesses of the Greek character—insincerity, fickleness, and disregard of truth. In keen but unscrupulous emulation sophistry became a justifiable weapon when reason failed; falsehood and deception were plied without hesitation to compass success. Amid the general degradation manly virtues disappeared from among the people. Instead of courageously resisting invasion, the empire purchased safety from barbarians, whom it despised, but with whom it dared not cope; the Church, in common with the community, suffered from these debasing influences, and sank into spiritual apathy. It became stationary, or, as it claimed, and still pretends to be, immutable and orthodox.

Throughout the West the tendency was in a contrary direction—towards the practical application of the religious idea. The effete, worn-out civilization of the past was there renovated by contact and admixture with young and vigorous races, and gained new strength and vitality in the struggle for existence. The Church, freed from control, became independent and self-asserting; the responsibility of government, the preservation of social order, devolved upon it, and it rose proudly to the task; it subdued and conquered by the Word the fierce Northern tribes whom the State was powerless to resist; by its spiritual dominion over them it exalted its station and increased its influence; popes grasped the sceptre of absent emperors, and assumed their authority; they had no rival prelates to dispute their claims, and the Western Church was united under their sway. What imperial Rome lost, papal Rome gained; it was willing and able to protect itself and the people who gathered around it; its independence of the civil power fostered and encouraged the theocratic element which had disappeared from the Eastern Church; the assertion of its divine origin and prerogatives raised it to be a judge and arbiter between princes, and established its superiority over temporal rulers; its army of priests and monks, filled with devotional zeal, instead of resting content with spiritual abstractions and contemplative self-communion, went forth boldly as a Church militant, trusting in their sacred mission to overcome by preaching and example the enemies of the faith. Mere learning, polemical discussions, scholastic and theological controversies, were secondary considerations amid the dislocations of a falling empire and the reconstruction of new states, and in the struggle for existence. The monastic establishments of the Church were organized to fight error, to propagate the truth, and to enlarge its domain, not for indulgence in polite ease or literary culture, nor for the satisfaction of individual aspirations towards an ideal life by asceticism and mortification of the flesh; they undertook works of active piety, benevolence, and charity, and their inmates were inspired by the desire to accomplish good for others rather than for themselves. The religious orders were instituted for divers ends, with definite and varying purpose. A spirit of rivalry and emulation among them grew with increase of power and wealth, and, while acknowledging a single head and pursuing a common object, the keen struggle for pre-eminence kept alive within them the fervor of religious enthusiasm. From the supreme pontiff to the mendicant friar action and progress were the characteristics of the Church, and blind adoration for the past was forgotten in anxiety for the present and hope for the future; while recognizing ancient authority and tradition, it believed in a constantly increasing and more thorough comprehension of Christ's teachings, and of the essential nature of Christian doctrines to be attained by study and gradually revealed. Its restless activity, exercised in this direction, saved it from the formalism of the East, and preserved the energy of its spiritual life; from progressive it became aggressive; victorious over the West, its ambition was insatiable, and it looked for other worlds to conquer; it aimed at universal dominion, and claimed to be, not merely orthodox, but catholic.

Chapter 2

CHAPTER II.

Introduction of Christianity into Russia.

The power and dignity of the Church in the East were doomed to dwindle and decrease with the waning glories of the lower empire. Its patriarchs were to become mere puppets of court favor, nominees and sycophants of an infidel sovereign; but brighter destinies and renewed splendor awaited it in other climes. From the dwarfed and puny shoulders of the effeminate Greek its mantle was to fall on the strong and stalwart frame of the Barbarian; enervated and lifeless in its ancient home, it was to be rejuvenated by the bracing atmosphere of the North, and spring again into fresh and youthful life in the rude, inhospitable regions of its later conquests.

But little is positively known regarding the first introduction of Christianity into Russia, although legends and traditions abound.

In popular belief, the city of Novgorod was founded by Japhet, son of Noah, and thither St. Andrew came to preach the gospel. The wild and barbarous natives ridiculed teachings so contrary to their fierce and savage habits. They found amusement in tormenting the apostle and mocking his simplicity; they plunged him, bound with cords, into a bath heated to the utmost, and the saint, distressed and suffocated by the vapor, exclaimed, "ἵδρωσα" ("I sweat"); hence, it is said, came the name of Roussa, or Russia. Moved by his patience and meekness, his rough hosts released him, listened to his words, and believed. They glory over all the rest of the people of Muscovy for being rooted in the faith from ancient times, and having been the first to receive it.

Novgorod is a city of great antiquity, and its religious edifices are held in deepest veneration by the people. In popular tradition its celebrated monastery of St. Anthony the Great, or "the Roman," was founded by a monk of Rome, who, during the persecution for image worship, was miraculously borne upon a rock from the Tiber, over seas and rivers, to Novgorod on Lake Ilmen. The treasures of his convent, which he had consigned to the waters, followed him on his voyage. At Novgorod he found a Christian church, of which St. Nikita was metropolitan; with him Anthony joined in prayer, and immediately a knowledge of each other's tongue was imparted to them both. The ruler of the city gave him land for a convent; and his treasures, fished up from the lake, provided sacred furniture for the altars. The boat of stone still excites the devotion of the worshippers, and the palm branches in the chapel are still as green as when brought from Rome by Anthony.

Of St. Nikita it is related that he shut up Satan in a jar, and released him upon condition that he would carry him to Jerusalem and back. Thus the saint visited the holy places of the East in a single night.

These pious legends generally bear impress of the Oriental origin of the Church.

The Russian monk, Nestor, who died in 1116, relates in his chronicle that St. Andrew the Apostle, journeying by the river Dnieper, on his way from Asia Minor to Rome, came to the hills surmounting the site of the city of Kiev, and on their summit, after kneeling in prayer, he exclaimed to his companions: "Behold this mountain, for it is here that the grace of God shall shine forth. A great city shall arise on this spot, and in it the Lord shall have many temples to His name."

Byzantine annalists record the labors of St. Peter of Kiev, a Greek monk sent thither by the Emperor Basil, the Macedonian, and who was, according to them, the first metropolitan of Russia. The heathen inhabitants demanded proof of the divine nature of his teachings; to convince them he passed, uninjured, with the Gospel in his hands, through a great fire kindled by them, whereupon they all embraced the faith. He repeated the same miracle among the Muscovites, and they also were converted.

The patriarch Photius, in a circular letter addressed to the Eastern bishops in a.d. 866, speaks of the Russians as having renounced their pagan superstitions and professed the faith of Jesus Christ, and adds that he has sent them a bishop and priests.

In the same year Oskold and Dir, companions of Ruric and rulers of Kiev, pursuing their quest for booty and plunder, descended the Dnieper and appeared before Constantinople; the city was saved by the miraculous interposition of the Virgin; her robe, a relic of the Church of Blacherne, was bathed in the sea, whereon a furious tempest arose which dispersed the hostile fleet. According to Greek chroniclers the Russian princes, struck with awe, abjured their heathen gods and embraced Christianity. These chroniclers also enumerate Russia as the seventieth archbishopric depending on the see of Constantinople.

The recruitment of the imperial body-guard from the Varagians along and beyond the Dnieper, bringing many from those regions under Christian influences, and the intercourse between Russians and Greeks, arising from trade and from frequent predatory excursions of the former against the empire, doubtless combined to spread among them some knowledge of Christianity. Efforts for their conversion, attempted by emperors preceding Basil I., were continued by him and by his successors, stimulated by their desire, during the struggles of the Greek Church with Rome, to extend its sway. A treaty, concluded in 945, between Igur of Kiev and Constantine VII., distinguishes Russians who had been baptized from those who were yet pagans, and makes mention of a church at Kiev, dedicated to St. Elias.

From these scanty and confused historical data it would appear that Christianity had penetrated into Russia prior to the middle of the tenth century.

The conversion of the savage tribes who occupied the vast deserts of Dacia and Sarmatia was preceded, and the way for it prepared, by the missionary labors of the Greek Church along the Danube and in the Chersonesus. Slavonic tribes, who had heard of Christ, applied to Constantinople for teachers. Constantine Cypharas, a monk better known as St. Cyril, was sent to them by Michael III. in 860. He called to his assistance his brother Methodius, and they both, animated by true apostolic zeal, extended their mission to the surrounding pagans. They invented a Slavonic alphabet, translated the Scriptures and the Liturgy, and celebrated religious services in the language of the people, according to the rites of the Greek Church. Their lives were devoted with singlehearted earnestness to the conversion of the heathen, and the results of their missionary efforts spread far beyond the sphere of their labors. They had great influence upon the growth and destinies of the Church in Russia, where their translations of the Bible and the Liturgy into Slavonic were subsequently adopted, and their practice of celebrating the service in a language familiar to the people was followed.

In 955 Olga, wife of Igur, ruler of Kiev, mother of Sviatoslav, and whom Nestor calls "the dawn and morning-star of salvation for Russia," journeyed to Constantinople in search of knowledge of the true God, and was there baptized by the name of Helena, in memory of the sainted mother of Constantine the Great. The humble creed and self-denying precepts of her new religion were repugnant to the rude barbarian, her son, a proud and haughty chief of fierce warriors; but he respected the genius and virtues of his mother, who, venerated and loved by his people, was surnamed by them "the Wise." He tolerated and protected the belief she professed, and confided his children to her care. His son, Vladimir, was a kindred spirit to his own—enterprising and ambitious, of fiery passions, strong and enthusiastic temperament, imbued with the superstitions and addicted to the gross and sensual indulgences of his race, fit leader of hardy and rapacious tribes, whose only occupation was war, and whose pastimes were revelry and the chase. A zealous worshipper of idols, Vladimir erected a huge image of Peroun, the God of Thunder, and offered to it human sacrifices. To celebrate a victory over a neighboring tribe, lots were cast for a victim, and fell on Feodor, son of Ivan, a Christian Varagian; the father refused to yield him up, mocked the heathen deities of wood and stone, and declared the God of the Greeks to be the true and only God; whereon the people massacred them both—the first and the only martyrs of the Church at Kiev. Vladimir's success in war spread his renown abroad; his alliance was courted, and his conversion became an object of solicitude to nations near and remote. Emissaries came to him from the Mahometan Bulgarians and the Khorazian Jews, from the Latin Christians of Germany and Rome, and from the Greeks of Constantinople. To each of them he returned a characteristic reply. The pleasures of Mahomet's paradise were tempting, but he refused to be circumcised or to abstain from pork or from wine, "for drinking," said he, "is the delight of Russians, nor can we live without it." Of the Jews he asked: "Where is your country?" and when they acknowledged that for their sins God had driven them forth and scattered them over the earth, he indignantly rejoined, "Do you, whom your God has forsaken and dispersed, pretend to teach others, and would you have us share your fate?" The Western doctors were dismissed with scant courtesy, as coming from troublesome neighbors; "Our fathers have never believed in your religion," said he. He listened more attentively to the Greek, who alternately aroused and soothed his superstitious fears by eloquently depicting the future torments of the wicked and the reward of the righteous, enforcing his words by pictures representing the Judgment Day. "Tell me more," said Vladimir, "happy are those seated on the right, wretched the sinners on the left." All the mysteries of the Orthodox faith were explained; he was deeply moved, and perhaps recalled the teaching of his grandmother Olga. In the succeeding year, 987, by the advice of his boyars, he sent trusty counsellors to examine in different countries the religion of each. At Constantinople the importance of their mission was more seriously realized than elsewhere, and every effort was made by the emperor and the patriarch to impress their imaginations and convince them of the superiority of the Greek Church. They were dazzled by the magnificence of the court, and transported by the splendor and imposing ceremonies of the ritual "When we stood in the temple," said they, on their return, "we hardly knew whether or not we were in heaven, for, in truth, upon earth it is impossible to behold such glory and magnificence; we could not tell all we have seen; there, verily, God has His dwelling among men, and the worship of other countries is as nothing. Never can we forget the grandeur which we saw. Whoever has enjoyed so sweet a sight can never elsewhere be satisfied, nor will we remain longer as we are." They adduced Olga's example as an additional reason for adopting the Eastern faith: "If the Greek religion had not been good," they urged, "thy grandmother Olga, wisest of mortals, had not embraced it." Vladimir still hesitated; but when, in the following year, his armies were held in check before the walls of Kherson, he made a vow to be baptized if he captured the city. It fell, and then the crafty prince, eager for every advantage, demanded as a condition of peace and of his conversion the hand of Anna, sister of Basil II., in marriage, threatening otherwise to march on Constantinople. An old prophecy of unknown origin was current in the tenth century on the shores of the Bosphorus, and had been inscribed on the statue of Bellerophon within the city walls, that "the Russians would some day seize upon the capital of the Empire of the East." It has not yet been forgotten, and it may, in those ancient days, have influenced the emperor's decision. The danger was imminent, and in order to avert it and to bring so powerful an enemy under the banner of the cross, the haughty Greek consented, and, in spite of her reluctance, sent the Princess Anna, with a retinue of priests, to Kherson. On her ar- rival she found Vladimir suffering from a sudden attack of blindness; but when the bishop laid hands upon him in baptism he recovered his sight and exclaimed, "Now it is that I know the true God!"