SACRED REPRESENTATIONS: V. THEATRE.
RASI (acronym for Rabbì Selômôh Jişhâqî). “Celebrated Jewish exegete, born at Troyes in 1040 into a family noted for piety and learning, died there in 1105.
He studied at Worms in Germany; at the age of twenty-five he founded a Talmudic academy at Troyes, which drew scholars from many European countries. The income from his agricultural and viticultural holdings enabled him to teach without charge. He commented on almost the entire Bible (with the exception of Ezra, Nehemiah, Ecclesiastes, and certain parts of Job) and likewise almost the entire Talmud, except for a few treatises or parts of them. He composed various liturgical texts. In his commentary on the Tôrâh he combines literal and moral interpretation. In matters of grammar he follows Ménâhîm ben Sarûq and Dûnâs ibn Labrat, though with independence; he provided French translations of three thousand words, written in Hebrew characters, which are of interest to historians of the French language. His commentary on the Talmud is sober, learned, and acute, and includes textual criticism based on eighty of the oldest manuscripts and commentaries. He avoids philosophical disquisitions and simplifies casuistic discussions. His commentaries exercised great influence on some Christian exegetes, including Nicholas of Lyra. Berliner issued a separate edition of R.’s commentary on the Pentateuch in 1866 (2nd ed. 1905).
RASIN (Hebr. Rêşîn; LXX Paşow; Assyrian Rasunun). “Last king of Damascus (c. 740–732 BC). He was an usurper. In 738 he is recorded as tributary to the Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser III (745–727). While the latter was at war with the Urarteans (737–735), R. urged Pekaḥ, king of Samaria, to form an anti-Assyrian league for mutual defense; Sidon, Tyre, and Samsi, the Arab queen, adhered to II.
Jotham, king of Judah, refused to join. R. and Pekaḥ sought to compel him by force (2 Kings 15:37), in order to secure free communication with Egypt, their supporter, and to draw Edom, Moab, and the Philistines into the league. The attack was launched against Ahaz, who had succeeded his father in 736 and followed his predecessor’s policy. Ahaz was severely defeated by R. and Pekaḥ (2 Chron. 28:5–15) and besieged in his capital; the dynasty of David was to be removed and a certain Tabeel, a partisan of Damascus’s policy, placed on the throne (Syro-Ephraimite War, 735–734; Isa. 7:1–9; 8:6; 9:11). The Edomites (2 Kings 16:6 instead of ‘Aram; Rêşîn is considered a gloss) and Philistines took advantage of this to attack Judah: the former retook Elath, the latter six cities of the Shephelah (2 Chron. 28:17 f.). According to the Masoretic text, Elath was taken by R. and handed over to the Edomites (2 Kings 16:6) to bring them into the league; hence Edom and the Philistines would have attacked Judah (2 Chron. 28:17 f.).
Tiglath-pileser, having subdued the Urarteans, was already prepared to move against the confederates when he received Ahaz’s appeal (autumn of 735; 2 Kings 16:7). Marching down the coast, he captured Gaza, whose king fled to Egypt, and defeated the Philistines (734). Secure on his southern frontier, he devastated Samaria (first deportation; Pekaḥ was killed, and Tiglath-pileser approved the election of Hoshea); then he besieged Damascus (733). “Rasunun fled like a gazelle, took refuge in the capital, where he was caged like a bird. I devastated like a flood 591 cities of the 16 districts in the land of Damascus” (Nimrud Annals, lines 1950). After two years (732) the city was taken and R. put to death. Damascus became an Assyrian province (2 Kings 16:9; 2 Chron. 28:16, 1940).
Francesco Spadafora
RASKOL. “Religious movement that separated from the Russian Church in the second half of the 17th century. However, the followers of the r. (‘schism’) always rejected the label raskolnik (‘schismatic’) as insulting, substituting instead that of starover (‘Old Believer’) or staroobriadets (‘Old Ritualist’); the latter entered also into official and literary terminology.
OUTLINE:
I. Origins
II. Doctrine
III. Internal Divisions
IV. Relations with the State
V. Relations with the Church
VI. Assessment.I. ORIGINS
The immediate cause of the r. was the Nikon (v.). Nikon corrected Russian liturgical practice and books in accordance with those then in use among the Greeks, suppressing also the particular usages of Russia hallowed by long and legitimate tradition.This provoked the strong opposition of a part of the clergy and laity, led by Archpriests Avvakum of Iur’evets, Daniel of Kostroma, Longin of Murom, Ioann Neronov, by the priest Lazar of Romanov, and by the boyar Fedor, all known for their piety and religious zeal. In 1666–67 a council was held in Moscow with the participation of Eastern patriarchs, which definitively approved Nikon’s reforms and excommunicated their opponents. Avvakum, Lazar, and Fedor refused to submit and were sent to prison at Pustozersk, on the shores of the Arctic Ocean. From there they continued to direct the movement, which their clandestine followers propagated by word and writing. For this reason Avvakum, Lazar, and Fedor, by order of the tsar, were burned alive on 4 April 1682, and many of their followers were imprisoned or exiled. Taking advantage of the disorders that broke out after the death of Tsar Fedor (1682), the raskolniki, supported by the Moscow garrison (strel’tsy), attempted to have Nikon’s reforms abolished. But the revolt was crushed, and in 1685 draconian administrative and penal provisions were issued against the r. To escape persecution and to be able to observe the ancient rites, numerous raskolniki withdrew into the forests, into sparsely inhabited border regions, into Siberia, and even abroad. The most fanatical preferred collective suicides by fire (about 20,000 between 1685 and 1690). These merciless measures did not prevent clandestine propaganda of the r., but they determined its definitive and irreconcilable opposition to ecclesiastical and civil authority.
II. DOCTRINE
The r. does not have a compact and precise doctrine, but certain principles are generally accepted by all. The Sacraments are valid only if administered according to liturgical books prior to Nikon’s reforms. The Antichrist has already come to earth. The official Church, which they call ‘Nikonite,’ is no longer the true Church, and the State, which protects it, is the servant of the Antichrist. Moreover, the raskolniki make the sign of the Cross by joining two fingers instead of three; they admit only the eight-pointed Cross (i.e., with three cross-pieces: for the title, for the hands, for support of the feet). The recitation of the psalms ends with two Alleluias instead of three.The name of Jesus is written Isus rather than Isus. For the Mass they use seven prosphora (hosts) instead of five. In general, in sacred functions they observe the ritual particularities prior to Nikon’s reforms. But this ritual conservatism was an expression of the r.’s attachment to traditional Russian forms of piety, morality, and asceticism; thus the r. also constituted a reaction against the freer customs then penetrating Russia from Poland and against the influence of the theological school of Kiev on Russian ecclesiastical life. The progressive penetration of religious, cultural, and social ideas from the West into Russia then increasingly distanced the r. from the Russian State and Church.
### III. INTERNAL SCHISMS
The end of the world expected by the raskolniki was slow in coming, and so they had to organize their religious life, concretely determine their attitude toward the official Church and the State that protected II. Avvakum’s writings, more occasional than systematic, allowed for more or less radical interpretations, and within the raskol there was no undisputed authority to settle disputes. This necessarily led to the progressive division of the raskol into various *tolk* ("interpretations") and *soglaša* ("concord").
Pavel of Kolomna, the only bishop who firmly adhered to the raskol, died in captivity as early as 1657. Thus, the raskolniki faced the problem of where to obtain new priests who could succeed those ordained before Nikon. On this point, the raskolniki divided into two factions: the *popovcy* ("priestly") and the *bezpopovcy* ("priestless").
#### 1. Popovcy ("Priestly")
The *popovcy* admit into their communities priests who defect from the official Church, who then administer the Sacraments according to the ancient rite. This practice was first adopted around 1700 by the community of Větka on the Šoša River, then in Poland, led by the monk-priest Feodorij. Later, it spread to the nearby community of Starodubje and to many others in Russia.
In 1771, during the plague in Moscow, the *popovcy* opened their own cemetery in the Rogož suburb. Around the cemetery, churches, monasteries, and charitable institutions arose; the Rogož cemetery community soon became the moral center of others, especially those formed along the Kerženec River (Nizhny Novgorod Province) and the Ingriz River (Saratov Province), as well as among the Cossacks of the Lower Don. However, the *popovcy* repeatedly sought to obtain their own bishop. The community of Bělokrinica in Bukovina, then under Austrian rule, secured for itself in 1846 Amvrosij, a former metropolitan of Bosnia, who ordained the bishops Kirill and Arkadij, initiating the so-called hierarchy of the Bělokrinica or Austrian metropolia. Its main center in Russia became the Rogož cemetery community in Moscow.
By 1905, the Bělokrinica hierarchy had 12 dioceses in Russia. However, a portion of the *popovcy* did not accept the new hierarchy, contenting themselves with the ministry of fugitive priests.
#### 2. Bezpopovcy ("Priestless")
The *bezpopovcy* represent the radical faction of the raskol. According to them, the Antichrist is already present in the official Church since Nikon’s time, and thus it no longer possesses true faith, priesthood, or Sacraments.
To communicate with God, only prayer and penitential works remain; they must do without those Sacraments that can only be administered by priests. Nor is the authority of the State, allied with the Antichrist, legitimate. Differences in the practical application of these principles led to the division of the *bezpopovcy* into several sects.
a) **Pomortsi ("Coastal Dwellers")** — They derive their name from Pomorje ("coastal region"), a marshy area of the White Sea whose sparse population, scattered over a vast territory, had already grown accustomed to practicing religion without priests. From the beginning of the raskol, many adherents withdrew there or were exiled there, including some surviving monks from the Solovetsky Monastery (on the island of the same name in the White Sea), which was captured by Tsar Aleksei in 1676. The main nucleus of the Pomortsi formed around 1695 on the Vyg River under the leadership of Daniil Vikulov; hence, they were also called *danilovcy* ("Daniilites"). The community grew rapidly thanks to the brothers Andrei and Simeon Denisov. Along the Vyg and Leksa Rivers, numerous preachers of the raskol spread throughout Russia and Siberia. The Pomortsi rebaptized converts from the official Church and, lacking priests to bless marriages, required all adherents to remain celibate. However, the impossibility of enforcing this led to tolerance of marriages contracted in the official Church and even of free unions.
b) **Fedoseevcy ("Theodosians")** — Around 1706, a group formed in Poland under the guidance of Feodosij Vasišev separated from the Pomortsi. The cause was initially ritual disagreements and later the refusal to include prayers for the tsar, as the Vyg community had done in 1739. Although Feodosij himself acknowledged the legitimacy of marriages celebrated in the official Church, after his death the Fedoseevcy reverted to rigorism. During the plague of 1771, they established near Moscow a cemetery known as Preobrazhenskoe, and later also monasteries with attached charitable institutions, through the efforts of the Moscow merchant Il’ia Korytin. This cemetery became a center of the entire sect. Even when Nicholas I’s measures (1825–55) significantly reduced its administrative autonomy, the Preobrazhenskoe cemetery did not lose all its importance.
c) **Filippovcy ("Philippones")** — They take their name from their founder, the monk Filipp, who left the Vyg community when prayers for the tsar were introduced there, deeming this a compromise with the Antichrist. Filipp founded his own monastery on the nearby Umba River. In 1773, upon the arrival of a punitive expedition, he burned himself alive along with his 70 monks. Similarly, his successor, Erzen, did the same with 90 monks. The Filippovcy neither recognize the Church nor the State nor marriage; suicide to escape the kingdom of the Antichrist is considered martyrdom for the faith.
From the aforementioned three main factions of the *bezpopovcy*, a swarm of smaller sects emerged, which either pushed the original principles to extremes, relaxed them, or fanatically clung to some particular custom or rite.
### IV. RELATIONS WITH THE STATE
The attitude of civil authority toward the raskol fluctuated. In the 17th century, severe administrative and penal measures were taken to uproot the raskol, but without success; indeed, persecution caused its dispersion and thus its spread throughout Russia. Peter the Great ordered the registration of all raskolniki; upon paying special taxes, they were tolerated, but propaganda was forbidden. Severe measures were taken against clandestine groups.
This tolerance increased under Catherine II and even more under Alexander I. Tsar Nicholas I intensified police control over the raskol; however, after his death, a period began of progressively abolishing restrictions on the civil rights of the raskol, culminating in the granting of freedom of worship in 1905. These liberal measures increasingly reconciled the majority of the raskol with the State.
### V. RELATIONS WITH THE CHURCH
Initially, the Church not only sought to prevent the spread of the raskol but also to suppress II. In the 17th century, in addition to pastoral measures (canonical censures, the creation of new dioceses, admonitions, instructions), the Church often resorted to the intervention of secular authority and insisted on the strict application of penal sanctions. In 1721, the Holy Synod established the position of synodal missionary and invited raskol leaders to debates, guaranteeing them personal inviolability, but without success.
In the second half of the 18th century, ecclesiastical authority also softened its intransigence toward the raskol. In 1800, the Holy Synod, at the proposal of Metropolitan Platon of Moscow, decided that raskolniki who returned to union with the official Church could retain their ritual peculiarities, have their own priests, but not bishops. Metropolitan Platon coined the term *edinověrie* ("one faith") for this form of union. In the 19th century, the Church intensified its missionary activity among the raskolniki, and from
From 1866 onwards there also arose numerous confraternities for the moral and material assistance of missionaries. Between 1841 and 1891, 311,279 *raskolniki* returned to the Church, but the majority of them preferred simple adherence to the official Church rather than the form of the "Old Believers." In 1908, the "Old Believers" numbered 444,407 faithful and 415 churches. With the growing tolerance on the part of the government toward the Old Believers, adherence to the official Church became less numerous (4,000–6,000 per year), but more sincere. However, defections from the official Church to the Old Believers continued. Especially immediately after the "Edict of Tolerance" (1905), several thousand openly joined the Old Believers. After the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, the Old Believers were persecuted along with the official Church. Yet even under this common persecution, union was not achieved.