SILVESTER, LEBEDINSKIJ. – Russian theologian and ecclesiastical writer of the eighteenth century. Born on an unknown date in southern Russia, he died at Astrakhan on 5 November 1808.
He studied at the ecclesiastical Academy of Kiev. In 1791 he was elected rector of the Seminary at Astrakhan, in 1794 of the Seminary of Kazan, and on 25 July 1797 the first rector of the ecclesiastical Academy of Kazan. In 1799 he became bishop of Poltava and Perejaslavl, and in 1807 archbishop of Astrakhan.
S. composed in Latin a theology manual for seminaries: Compendium theologiae dogmaticae (1st ed., Petersburg 1799; 2nd ed., greatly enlarged, Moscow 1805). In theology, S. follows the Protestantizing tendency of Teofane Prokopovič, admitting as the sole basis of faith Holy Scripture, whereas councils cannot establish irreformable dogmas and oral tradition is not necessary; the “deuterocanonical” books are excluded from the canon, etc. Other noteworthy writings (in Russian): The Incorruptible Food, 1st ed. Moscow 1789, 3rd ed. 1843; Evangelical Interpreter of the Proverbs (an interpretation of the Proverbs, with parallel texts from Holy Scripture for each verse), 1st ed. Moscow 1796, 4th ed. 1894.