RASKOL. — A religious movement that separated from the Russian Church in the second half of the seventeenth century. However, the followers of the r. (“schism”) always rejected the appellation raskolnik (“schismatic”) as insulting, replacing it with starovēr (“Old Believer”) or staroobrjadec (“Old Ritualist”); the latter also entered official and literary terminology.
SUMMARY:
I. Origins
II. Doctrine
III. Internal divisions
IV. Relations with the State
V. Relations with the Church
VI. Evaluation.I. ORIGINS
The immediate cause of the r. was the liturgical reforms carried out by Patriarch Nikon (v. Nikon). Nikon revised Russian liturgical practice and books in accordance with those then used by the Greeks, also suppressing particular Russian customs sanctioned by long-standing and legitimate usage.This aroused the vigorous opposition of a number of ecclesiastics and laypeople, led by the archpriests Avvakum of Jurjevec, Daniel of Kostroma, Longin of Murom, and John Neronov, by the priest Lazarus of Romanov, and by the deacon Theodore, all renowned for their piety and religious zeal. In 1666–67, a council convened in Moscow with the participation of the Eastern patriarchs; it definitively approved Nikon’s reforms and excommunicated their opponents. Avvakum, Lazarus, and Theodore refused to submit and were sent to prison at Pustozersk, on the shores of the Arctic Ocean. But even from there they continued to direct the movement, which their clandestine followers spread by word and in writing. Consequently, by order of the tsar, Avvakum, Lazarus, and Theodore were burned alive on 14 April 1682, and many of their followers were imprisoned or exiled. Taking advantage of the disorders that broke out after the death of Tsar Theodore (1682), the raskolniki, supported by the Moscow garrison (strēlcy), attempted to have Nikon’s reforms abolished. But the revolt was suppressed, and in 1685 draconian administrative and penal measures were enacted against the r. To escape reprisals and to be able to observe the ancient rites, numerous raskolniki withdrew into the forests, into the sparsely populated adjoining regions, into Siberia, and also abroad. The most fanatical preferred collective suicide in the flames (approximately 20,000 between 1685 and 1690). These ruthless measures did not prevent the clandestine propagation of the r., but they determined its definitive and irreconcilable opposition to ecclesiastical and civil authority.
II. DOCTRINE
The r. has no compact and precise doctrine, but certain principles are generally accepted by all. The Sacraments are valid only if administered according to the liturgical books preceding Nikon’s reforms. The Antichrist has already come to earth. The official Church, called by them “Nikonian,” is no longer the true Church, and the State, which protects it, is the servant of the Antichrist. Furthermore, the raskolniki make the Sign of the Cross by joining two fingers, not three; they admit only the eight-ended Cross (that is, with three crossbars: for the title, for the hands, and as support for the feet). The recitation of the psalms ends with two Alleluias, not three.The name of Jesus is written Isus, not Iisus. For the Mass they use seven prosphorae (altar breads) instead of five. In general, in sacred services they observe the ritual particularities that preceded Nikon’s reforms. But this ritual conservatism was an expression of the r.’s attachment to the traditional Russian forms of piety, morality, and asceticism; thus the r. also constituted a reaction against the freer customs that had then entered 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 subsequently distanced the r. ever further from the State and the Russian Church.
III. INTERNAL SCHISMS
The end of the world awaited by the raskolniki was slow to come, and they therefore had to organize their religious life and concretely determine their attitude toward the official Church and toward the State that protected II. The writings of Avvakum, more occasional than systematic, admitted more or less radical interpretations, and in the r. there was no undisputed authority to settle controversies. This necessarily led to the progressive division of the r. into various tolk (“interpretation”) and soglasie (“concord”). Paolo di Kolomna, the only bishop who firmly adhered to the r., died in captivity as early as 1657. Thus the problem arose for the raskolniki of where to obtain new priests who could succeed those ordained before Nikon. On this point the raskolniki divided into two factions: popovey (“presbyterians”) and bezpopovey (“without priests”).1. Popovey (“presbyterians”). — They admit into their communities priests who pass to the r. from the official Church, and who thereafter follow the ancient ritual in administering the Sacraments. This practice was first adopted around 1700 by the community of Větka on the Soža River, then in Poland, directed by the monk-priest Feodosij. Later it spread to the neighboring community of Starodubje and to many others in Russia.
In 1771, during the plague in Moscow, the popovey opened their own cemetery in the Rogož suburb. Churches, monasteries, and charitable institutions subsequently arose around the cemetery; the community of the Rogož cemetery soon became the moral leader of others, especially those formed on the Kerženec River (province of Nižnij Novgorod) and the Irgiz River (province of Saratov), and among the Cossacks on the lower Don. But the popovey repeatedly also sought to obtain a bishop of their own. In 1846 the community of Bělokrínica in Bucovina, then under Austrian rule, won over Ambrogio, former metropolitan of Bosnia, who ordained the bishops Cirillo and Arcadio, thus initiating the so-called hierarchy of the metropolitanate of Bělokrínica, or Austrian hierarchy. Its principal center in Russia became the community of the Rogož cemetery in Moscow.
In 1905 the hierarchy of Bělokrínica had 12 dioceses in Russia. But part of the popovey did not accept the new hierarchy, contenting themselves with the ministry of fugitive priests.
2. Bezpopovey (“without priests”). — They are the radical faction of the r. According to them, the Antichrist has been present in the official Church since the time of Nikon; consequently, in it there is no longer either true faith, priesthood, or Sacraments.
To communicate with God, only prayer and works of penance remain; one must do without those Sacraments that can be administered only by priests. Nor is the authority of the State, ally of the Antichrist, legitimate. Differences in the practical application of these principles determined the division of the bezpopovey into several sects. a) Pomorcy (“people of the marshes”). — They take their name from Pomorje (“marshland”), a marshy region of the White Sea, whose sparse population, scattered across the vast territory, had already become accustomed to practicing religion without priests. From the beginning of the r., numerous followers withdrew there or were exiled there, including some surviving monks from the monastery of Soloveckij (on the island of the same name in the White Sea), which was conquered in 1676 by Tsar Alessio. The principal nucleus of the pomorcy formed around 1695 on the Vyg River under the direction of Daniele Vikulov; they were therefore also called danilovey (“Danielites”). The community grew rapidly thanks to the brothers Andrea and Simone Denisov. On the Vyg and Leksa Rivers, numerous propagators of the r. arose and spread throughout Russia and Siberia. The pomorcy rebaptized adherents coming from the official Church and, having no priests to bless marriages, obliged everyone to celibacy. But the impossibility of securing this from everyone led to tolerance of marriages contracted in the official Church and even of free unions. b) Fedosijevcy (“Theodosians”). Around 1706, a group formed in Poland under the leadership of Feodosij Vasiljev separated from the pomorcy. The cause was certain ritual disagreements, followed by the refusal to introduce prayer for the tsar, as the community of Vyg did in 1739. Although Teodosio himself admitted the legitimacy of marriages celebrated in the official Church, after his death the fedosijevcy returned to rigorism. During the plague of 1771, they founded near Moscow a cemetery called Preobraženskoje and later also monasteries with attached charitable institutions, through the efforts of the Moscow merchant Elia Kovylin; the aforementioned cemetery became a center for the entire sect. Not even when the measures of Nicola I (1825–55) greatly reduced its administrative autonomy did the Preobraženskoje cemetery lose its importance. c) Filipovey (“Philippians”). — They are so called after their founder, the monk Filippo, who abandoned the community of Vyg when prayer for the tsar was introduced there, considering this a compromise with the Antichrist. Filippo founded his own monastery on the nearby Umba River. In 1773, upon the arrival of a punitive expedition, he burned himself alive with his 70 monks. His successor Terenzio did likewise with 90 monks. The filipovey recognize neither the Church nor the State nor marriage; suicide as an escape from the “kingdom of the Antichrist” is regarded as martyrdom for the faith. From the three principal factions of the bezpopovey mentioned above emerged a swarm of small sects, which either pushed the original principles to extremes or relaxed them, or else attached themselves fanatically to some particular custom or rite.
IV. RELATIONS WITH THE STATE
The attitude of the civil authorities toward the r. fluctuated. In the seventeenth century, attempts were made to eradicate the r. through severe administrative and penal measures, but without success: indeed, the persecutions caused its dispersion and thus also the spread of the r. throughout Russia. Peter the Great ordered the registration of all raskolniki; on payment of special taxes, they were tolerated, but propaganda was prohibited to them. Clandestine practitioners were dealt with severely.This toleration increased under Catherine II and even more under Alexander I. Tsar Nicholas I intensified police control of the r.; but after his death began the period of the gradual abolition of restrictions on the civil rights of the r., which ended with the granting of freedom of worship in 1905. These liberal measures increasingly reconciled the majority of the r. with the state.
V. RAPPORTI CON LA CHIESA
At the outset, the Church sought not only to prevent the spread of the raskol, but also to win its adherents back. In the seventeenth century, in addition to pastoral measures (canonical censures, the establishment of new dioceses, admonitions, and instructions), the Church often resorted to the intervention of the secular arm and insisted on the rigorous application of criminal sanctions. In 1721 the Holy Synod established the office of synodal missionary and invited the leaders of the raskol to debates, guaranteeing their personal safety, but without success.In the second half of the eighteenth century, the ecclesiastical authorities also moderated their intransigence toward the raskol. In 1800 the Holy Synod, on the proposal of Metropolitan Platone of Moscow, decided that the raskolniki, upon returning to union with the official Church, might retain their ritual peculiarities and have their own priests, but not bishops. For this form of union Metropolitan Platone coined the name edinověrie (“one faith”). In the nineteenth century the Church intensified its propaganda activity among the raskol, and from 1866 onward numerous confraternities also arose to provide missionaries with moral and material assistance. 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 edinovérie. In 1908 edinovérie had 444,407 faithful and 415 churches. As the government’s tolerance toward the raskol increased, accessions to the official Church became less numerous (4,000–6,000 per year), but more sincere. Nevertheless, defections of members of the official Church to the raskol continued as well. Especially immediately after the Edict of Toleration (summer 1905), several thousand openly joined the raskol. After the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, the raskol was persecuted together with the official Church. But not even under the common persecution was union achieved.