Council of the Russian Orthodox Church 1917 Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church (1917-1918)
LOCAL CATHEDRAL 1917–1918, a cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) outstanding in its historical significance, memorable primarily for the restoration of the patriarchate.
Preparations for the convening of the supreme congress, which was intended to determine the new status of the church against the backdrop of the radical political changes that were launched by the February Revolution, began by decision of the Synod in April 1917; At the same time, the experience of the Pre-Conciliar Presence of 1905–1906 and the Pre-Conciliar Conference of 1912–1914, whose program remained unrealized due to the outbreak of the First World War, was taken into account. The All-Russian Local Council opened on August 15 (28) in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin, on the day of the Dormition Holy Mother of God; Tikhon (Belavin), Metropolitan of Moscow, was elected its chairman. Along with the white and black clergy, the number of participants also included many laity, who for the first time received such significant representation in church affairs (among the latter were the former Chief Prosecutor of the Synod A.D. Samarin, philosophers S.N. Bulgakov and E.N. Trubetskoy, historian A.V. Kartashev - Minister of Confessions in the Provisional Government).
The ceremonial beginning - with the removal of the relics of the Moscow saints from the Kremlin and crowded religious processions on Red Square - coincided with rapidly growing social unrest, news of which was constantly heard at the meetings. On the same day, October 28 (November 10), when the decision was made to restore the patriarchate, official news arrived that the Provisional Government had fallen and power had passed to the Military Revolutionary Committee; fighting began in Moscow. In an effort to stop the bloodshed, the cathedral sent a delegation led by Metropolitan Platon (Rozhdestvensky) to the Red headquarters, but neither human casualties nor significant damage to the Kremlin shrines could be avoided. After this, the first conciliar calls for national repentance were proclaimed, condemning “raging atheism” - thereby clearly identifying the “counter-revolutionary” line with which the cathedral was traditionally associated in Soviet historiography.
The election of the patriarch, which met the long-standing aspirations of the religious community, was revolutionary in its own way, opening up completely new chapter event in the history of the Russian Orthodox Church. It was decided to elect the Patriarch not only by voting, but also by lot. The largest number of votes received (in descending order) were Archbishop Anthony (Khrapovitsky) of Kharkov, Archbishop Arseny (Stadnitsky) of Novgorod and Tikhon, Metropolitan of Moscow. On November 5 (18), in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, the lot fell on St. Tikhon; his enthronement took place on November 21 (December 4) in the Kremlin Assumption Cathedral on the feast of the Entry into the Temple of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Soon the council adopted a resolution On the legal status of the Church in the state(where they proclaimed: the primacy of the public legal position of the Russian Orthodox Church in the Russian state; the independence of the church from the state - subject to the coordination of church and secular laws; the need for the Orthodox confession for the head of state, the minister of confessions and the minister of public education) and approved the provisions on the Holy Synod and the Supreme church council - as the highest governing bodies under the supreme supervision of the patriarch. After this, the first session completed its work.
The second session opened on January 20 (February 2), 1918 and ended in April. In conditions of extreme political instability, the cathedral instructed the patriarch to secretly appoint his locums, which he did, appointing Metropolitans Kirill (Smirnov), Agafangel (Preobrazhensky) and Peter (Polyansky) as possible deputies. The flow of news about devastated churches and reprisals against the clergy prompted the establishment of special liturgical commemorations of new confessors and martyrs who “committed their lives for the Orthodox faith.” Were accepted Parish charter, designed to rally parishioners around churches, as well as definitions on diocesan management (implying more active participation of the laity in it), against new laws on civil marriage and its dissolution (the latter should in no way affect church marriage) and other documents.
The third session took place in July - September 1918. Among its acts, a special place occupies Definition on monasteries and monastics; it restored the ancient custom of electing an abbot by the brethren of the monastery, emphasized the preference of the cenobitic charter, as well as the importance of having an elder or elder in every monastery, experienced in the spiritual leadership of monks. Special Determination on the involvement of women in active participation in various fields of church ministry allowed parishioners to participate from now on in diocesan meetings and church services (in the position of psalmists). A project was developed Regulations on the temporary supreme administration of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, which became a significant step towards the establishment of autocephalous Ukrainian Orthodoxy. One of the last definitions of the cathedral concerned the protection of church shrines from seizure and desecration.
Under conditions of increasing pressure from the authorities (for example, the premises where the cathedral was held in the Kremlin were confiscated even before its completion), the planned program could not be fully implemented. It turned out to be even more difficult to implement the conciliar decisions, since in the next two decades severe persecution brought to naught any possibility of normal, legally secured church governance. In addition, revolutionary terror, having strengthened counter-conservatism to the limit, eliminated the immediate prospects for a more energetic dialogue between the Russian Orthodox Church and society. However, in any case, the council showed that Russian Orthodoxy had by no means become a passive victim of unfortunate political circumstances: having fulfilled its main task, the election of the patriarch, it outlined a range of most important issues for the future, which have largely not been resolved to this day (therefore, in the era of glasnost and perestroika, the hierarchy of the Russian Orthodox Church paid special attention to ensuring that the documents of the cathedral were republished for the purpose of their careful study).
On March 2, 1917, Emperor Nicholas II abdicated the throne, power passed to the Provisional Government, formed by the Provisional Committee of the State Duma. The new rulers, who continuously replaced each other in ministerial positions, failed to create a new statehood and improve life in the country. Devastation began in Russia, the front was approaching the capital, and on the outskirts of the country, separatists, without waiting for the Constituent Assembly, declared autonomies without permission, paralyzing the activities of government services and local government institutions. Arbitrary expropriations took place everywhere. Corrupting trends also penetrated into the church environment, articles appeared attacking the past of the Russian Church, in which half-truths were mixed with lies, groups were formed that openly proclaimed as their goal not only the renewal of church governance, but also the reform of Orthodox dogma.
Local Council of 1917-1918 has an important place in the history of the Russian Orthodox Church. It united the efforts of 564 members - bishops, clergy and laity. Among many other Councils of our Church, it stands out especially for a number of reasons. One of the most important acts of the Council - the restoration of the patriarchate in the Russian Church - became firmly established in church life.
Another important point is that the Local Council of 1917-1918. radically transformed the structure of the Russian Orthodox Church. He restored conciliarity in the life of the Church and sought to infuse the spirit of conciliarity into all levels of church government. The Council's resolution prescribed that Councils should be convened regularly. This was quite significant, since during the synodal period there had been no Councils for more than 200 years. His actions begin the newest period in the history of the Russian Orthodox Church.
In April 1917, the Synod, headed by Archbishop Sergius of Finland, addressed an appeal to the archpastors, clergy and laity to convene a Local Council, and on June 11 established a pre-conciliar council, headed by the Exarch of Georgia, Archbishop Platon (Rozhdestvensky). The Pre-Conciliar Council identified 10 commissions covering all areas of church life, and within 2 months all issues to be considered by the Council were prepared.
At the beginning of August 1917, general elections of members of the Local Council were held throughout Russia. The opening of the Council was scheduled for August 15 in Moscow. The last act of the Provisional Government in relation to the Church was the approval on August 13 of the elevation of Archbishops Platon, Tikhon and Benjamin to the metropolitan rank. Then, on the initiative of A.V. Kartashev, the state government renounced its rights to manage the Church and its property and transferred its rights to the Council.
On August 15, in a solemn ceremony, in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow, after more than a two-century break, the Cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Church opened. It was attended by almost all the diocesan bishops, numerous representatives of the clergy and monasticism, representatives of clergy and laity, professors of theological academies and those of the members State Duma who worked on church issues. The Council truly represented the entire Russian Church.
The meetings took place in the diocesan house on Likhov Lane, where members of the Council served the Divine Liturgy daily. From the very beginning, two currents emerged within the Council. If there were no particular disputes regarding the transformation of church life and, in particular, the revitalization of the activities of parishes, then in the restoration of the patriarchate there was a strong opposition, consisting of professors of academies, teachers of seminaries and the majority of clergy. Almost all hierarchs and most of clergy and laity.
On November 25/7, a communist coup took place in Russia, and on the same day a civil war began in Moscow. Military units loyal to the Provisional Government, mainly young cadets, locked themselves in the Kremlin and endured a seven-day siege. On October 28, amid the thunder of cannons shelling the Kremlin, the Council decided to end the debate on the issue of the patriarchate (there were still 90 recorded speakers remaining) and proceed directly to voting. Contrary to the expectations of many, an overwhelming number of votes were cast for the restoration of the patriarchate. In the difficult moment the Church and the country were going through, all disputes and disagreements were temporarily forgotten.
On October 31, the Council began electing three candidates for patriarchs. Archbishop Anthony received the most votes, then Archbishop Arseny (Stadnitsky) of Novgorod. Metropolitan Tikhon received the majority on the third vote. Among the candidates was one layman, the famous church and public figure Samarin.
On November 6, in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, Saint Tikhon was elected patriarch. A deputation of members of the Council, led by Metropolitan Vladimir, was sent to him. The newly elected patriarch addressed those gathered with a word in which he called on everyone to stand for the Orthodox faith.
The second session of the Council opened in Moscow on January 20, 1918. The day before, the Patriarch, signed by himself, issued an accusatory message in which he anathematized all persecutors of the faith and desecrators of sacred things and called on all believers to defend the trampled rights of the Church.
The Patriarch wanted to take full responsibility for the message upon himself, but the Council on January 20 issued an appeal in its own name, in which it joined the call of the Patriarch.
The work of the Cathedral proceeded very successfully for three months. In February, decisions on diocesan administration were adopted, on April 2 - on suffragan bishops and on district assemblies, and on April 7 - parish charters were adopted and a reform of theological educational institutions was carried out. Thus, by the end of the second session, a new system of church life, from the patriarch to the parish, was finally developed and put into effect.
The third session of the Council took place in the summer in Moscow, but could not gather all the members of the Council, due to the fact that Russia was divided by the front line, and the southern dioceses remained unrepresented. Among the resolutions of the third session, it is necessary to note the restoration of the feast of All Saints in the Russian land on the second Sunday after Pentecost.
The work of the Council lasted for more than a year. The third session ended on September 7/20, 1918, already under Soviet rule.
In the post-conciliar years, the burden of responsibility for the future of the Russian Church fell heavily on the shoulders of His Holiness Patriarch Tikhon. The Moscow high priest fought until his last breath for the unity and freedom of the Church. He suffered severe persecution not only from the godless authorities, but also from the former brothers of the clergy who formed the schismatic Renovationist Church. His Holiness the Patriarch suffered many sorrows in connection with the provocative campaign to confiscate church valuables.
Saint Tikhon died after illness on the night of March 25-26. Back in December 1924, the patriarch appointed himself three successors in the event of his death; Metropolitans Kirill, Agafangel and Peter (Polyansky), his closest collaborator.
The Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church, held in 1917 - 1918, coincided with the revolutionary process in Russia, with the establishment of a new state system. The Holy Synod and the Pre-Council Council were called to the Council in full, all the diocesan bishops, as well as two clergy and three laymen from the dioceses, the protopresbyters of the Assumption Cathedral and the military clergy, the governors of the four laurels and the abbots of the Solovetsky and Valaam monasteries, the Sarov and Optina Monasteries , representatives from monastics, co-religionists, military clergy, soldiers in the active army, from theological academies, the Academy of Sciences, universities, the State Council and the State Duma. Among the 564 members of the Council there were 80 bishops, 129 presbyters, 10 deacons, 26 psalm-readers, 20 monastics (archimandrites, abbots and hieromonks) and 299 laity. Representatives of the same-faith Orthodox Churches took part in the actions of the Council: Bishop Nicodemus (from the Romanian) and Archimandrite Michael (from the Serbian).
The wide representation of elders and laity at the Council was due to the fact that it was the fulfillment of the two-century aspirations of the Orthodox Russian people, their aspirations for the revival of conciliarity. But the Charter of the Council provided for the special responsibility of the episcopate for the fate of the Church. Questions of a dogmatic and canonical nature, after their consideration by the fullness of the Council, were subject to approval at a meeting of bishops.
The Local Council opened in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin on the day of its temple holiday - August 15 (28). The solemn liturgy was performed by Metropolitan Vladimir of Kiev, co-served by Metropolitans of Petrograd Benjamin and Metropolitans of Tiflis Platon.
After singing the Creed, the members of the Council venerated the relics of the Moscow saints and, presenting the Kremlin shrines, went to Red Square, where all Orthodox Moscow had already flocked in processions of the cross. A prayer service was held in the square.
The first meeting of the Council took place on August 16 (29) in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior after the liturgy celebrated here by Metropolitan Tikhon of Moscow. Greetings to the Council were announced all day long. Business meetings began on the third day of the Council in the Moscow Diocesan House. Opening the first working session of the Council, Metropolitan Vladimir said parting words to the layer: “We all wish the Council success, and there are reasons for this success. Here, at the Council, spiritual piety, Christian virtue and high learning are presented. But there is something that raises concerns. This is a lack of unanimity in us... Therefore, I will recall the Apostolic call to unanimity. The words of the Apostle “be like minded one another” have great meaning and apply to all peoples, to all times. Nowadays, differences of opinion affect us especially strongly; it has become a fundamental principle of life... Diversity of thoughts is shaking the foundations family life, schools, under his influence many moved away from the Church... The Orthodox Church prays for unity and calls on us to confess the Lord with one mouth and one heart. Our Orthodox Church is built “on the foundation of the apostle and prophet, the cornerstone of Jesus Christ himself. This is the rock against which all kinds of waves will break.”
The Council approved the Holy Metropolitan of Kyiv Vladimir as its Honorary Chairman. The Holy Metropolitan Tikhon was elected Chairman of the Council. A Council Council was formed, which included the Chairman of the Council and his deputies, Archbishops Arseny (Stadnitsky) of Novgorod and Anthony (Khrapovitsky) of Kharkov, Protopresbyters N.A. Lyubimov and G.I. Shavelsky, Prince E.N. Trubetskoy and Chairman of the State Council M .V. Rodzianko, who was replaced in February 1918 by A.D. Samarin. V.P. Shein (later Archimandrite Sergius) was approved as the Secretary of the Council. Metropolitan Platon of Tiflis, Archpriest A.P. Rozhdestvensky and Professor P.P. Kudryavtsev were also elected members of the Council Council.
After the election and installation of the Patriarch, most of the cathedral meetings were presided over by His Grace Arseny of Novgorod, who was elevated to the rank of metropolitan. In the difficult task of leading conciliar actions, which often acquired a turbulent character, he showed both firm authority and wise flexibility.
The cathedral opened in the days when the Provisional Government was in its death throes, losing control not only over the country, but also over the collapsing army. Soldiers fled the front in droves, killing officers, causing riots and looting, and terrorizing civilians, while the Kaiser's troops moved rapidly into Russia. On August 24 (September 6), at the suggestion of the Protopresbyter of the Army and Navy, the Council appealed to the soldiers to come to their senses and continue to fulfill their military duty. “With mental pain, with grave sorrow,” the appeal said, “the Council looks at the most terrible thing that has recently grown in the entire life of the people and especially in the army, which has brought and still threatens to bring innumerable troubles to the Fatherland and the Church. In the heart of the Russian man, the bright image of Christ began to dim, the fire of the Orthodox faith began to go out, the desire for achievement in the name of Christ began to weaken... Impenetrable darkness enveloped the Russian land, and the great mighty Holy Rus' began to perish... Deceived by enemies and traitors, betrayal of duty and the oath, by killing your own brethren, by robberies and violence, having sullied your high sacred rank of warrior, we pray to you - come to your senses! Look into the depths of your soul, and your... conscience, the conscience of a Russian person, a Christian, a citizen, will perhaps tell you how far you have gone along the terrible, most criminal path, what gaping, incurable wounds you inflict on your Motherland.”
The Council formed 22 departments that prepared reports and draft definitions that were submitted to the meetings. The most important departments were the Statutory Department, the Higher Church Administration, the diocesan administration, the improvement of parishes, and the legal status of the Church in the state. Most departments were headed by bishops.
On October 11, 1917, the Chairman of the Department of the Supreme Church Administration, Bishop Mitrofan of Astrakhan, spoke at a plenary meeting with a report that opened the main event in the actions of the Council - the restoration of the Patriarchate. The Pre-Conciliar Council in its draft for the establishment of the Supreme Church Administration did not provide for the First Hierarchical rank. At the opening of the Council, only a few of its members, mainly monastics, were convinced advocates for the restoration of the Patriarchate. However, when the question of the First Bishop was raised in the department of the Supreme Church Administration,
it met with widespread support. The idea of restoring the Patriarchate gained more and more adherents with each meeting of the department. At the 7th meeting, the department decides not to delay on this important issue and propose to the Council the restoration of the Primate See.
Justifying this proposal, Bishop Mitrofan recalled in his report that the Patriarchate became known in Rus' from the time of its Baptism, for in the first centuries of its history the Russian Church was under the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Constantinople. The abolition of the Patriarchate by Peter I was a violation of the holy canons. The Russian Church has lost its head. But the thought of the Patriarchate never ceased to glimmer in the minds of the Russian people as a “golden dream.” “In all the dangerous moments of Russian life,” said Bishop Mitrofan, “when the helm of the Church began to tilt, the thought of the Patriarch was resurrected with special force... Time imperatively demands feat, boldness, and the people want to see at the head of the life of the Church a living personality who has gathered would be living people's forces." The 34th Apostolic Canon and the 9th Canon of the Council of Antioch imperatively demand that there be a First Bishop in every nation.
The issue of restoring the Patriarchate at the plenary sessions of the Council was discussed with extraordinary severity. The voices of the opponents of the Patriarchate, at first assertive and stubborn, sounded dissonant at the end of the discussion, violating the almost complete unanimity of the Council.
The main argument of those who supported the preservation of the synodal system was the fear that the establishment of the Patriarchate could fetter the conciliar principle in the life of the Church. Repeating the sophisms of Archbishop Feofan (Pro-kopovich), Prince A.G. Chaadaev spoke about the advantages of a “collegium”, which can combine various gifts and talents in contrast to individual power. “Conciliarity does not coexist with autocracy, autocracy is incompatible with conciliarity,” insisted Professor B.V. Titlinov, despite the indisputable historical fact: with the abolition of the Patriarchate, Local Councils ceased to be convened. Archpriest N.V. Tsvetkov put forward an ostensibly dogmatic argument against the Patriarchate: it, they say, forms a mediastinum between the believing people and Christ. V.G. Rubtsov spoke out against the Patriarchate because it is illiberal: “We need to be on par with the peoples of Europe... We will not return despotism, we will not repeat the 17th century, and the 20th century speaks of the fullness of conciliarity, so that the people do not cede their rights to some then the head." Here there is a replacement of church-canonical logic with a superficial political scheme.
In the speeches of supporters of the restoration of the Patriarchate, in addition to canonical principles, the history of the Church itself was cited as one of the most weighty arguments. In the speech of I.N. Speransky, a deep internal connection was shown between the existence of the Holy See and the spiritual face of pre-Petrine Rus': “While we had a supreme shepherd in Holy Rus'..., our Orthodox Church was the conscience of the state... The covenants of Christ were forgotten, and the Church, in the person of the Patriarch, boldly raised its voice, no matter who the violators were... In Moscow there is a reprisal against the archers. Patriarch Adrian is the last Russian Patriarch, weak, old..., takes upon himself the boldness... to “sorrow”, to intercede for the condemned.”
Many speakers spoke about the abolition of the Patriarchate as a disaster for the Church, but Archimandrite Hilarion (Troitsky) said this wiser than anyone: “Moscow is called the heart of Russia. But where does the Russian heart beat in Moscow? On the exchange? In shopping arcades? On Kuznetsky Most? It is fought, of course, in the Kremlin. But where in the Kremlin? In the District Court? Or in the soldiers' barracks? No, in the Assumption Cathedral. There, at the front right pillar, the Russian Orthodox heart should beat. The eagle of Peter the Great, based on the Western model of established autocracy, pecked out this Russian Orthodox heart, the sacrilegious hand of the wicked Peter brought the Russian High Hierarch from his centuries-old place in the Assumption Cathedral. The Local Council of the Russian Church with the power given to it by God will again place the Moscow Patriarch in his rightful inalienable place.”
The zealots of the Patriarchate recalled the state devastation experienced by the country under the Provisional Government, and the sad state of the people's religious consciousness. According to Archimandrite Matthew, “recent events indicate a distance from God not only of the intelligentsia, but also of the lower strata... and there is no influential force that would stop this phenomenon, there is no fear, no conscience, no first bishop at the head of the Russian people... Therefore, we must immediately choose a spirit-bearing guardian of our conscience, our spiritual leader, the Most Holy Patriarch, after whom we will follow to Christ.”
During the council discussion, the idea of restoring the rank of First Hierarch was illuminated from all sides and appeared before the members of the Council as an imperative requirement of the canons, as the fulfillment of age-old popular aspirations, as a living need of the time.
On October 28 (November 10) the debate was terminated. The Local Council, by a majority vote, made a historic decision:
1. “In the Orthodox Russian Church, the highest power - legislative, administrative, judicial and supervisory - belongs to the Local Council, convened periodically, at certain times, consisting of bishops, clergy and laity.
2. The Patriarchate is restored, and church administration is headed by the Patriarch.
3. The Patriarch is the first among his equal bishops.
4. The Patriarch, together with the church governing bodies, is accountable to the Council.”
Based on historical precedents, the Council Council proposed a procedure for electing the Patriarch: during the first round of voting, the council members submit notes with the name of their proposed candidate for Patriarch. If one candidate receives an absolute majority of votes, he is considered elected. If none of the candidates receives more than half the votes, a repeat vote is held, in which notes are submitted with the names of the three proposed persons. The person who receives the majority of votes is considered to be elected as a candidate. The voting rounds are repeated until three candidates receive a majority of the votes. Then the Patriarch will be chosen by lot from among them.
On October 30 (November 12), 1917, a vote was held. Archbishop Anthony of Kharkov received 101 votes, Archbishop Kirill (Smirnov) of Tambov - 27, Metropolitan Tikhon of Moscow - 22, Archbishop Arseny of Novgorod - 14, Metropolitan of Kiev Vladimir, Archbishop Anastasy of Chisinau and Protopresbyter G.I. Shavelsky - 13 votes each, Archbishop Vladimirsky Sergiy (Stragorodsky) - 5, Archbishop Jacob of Kazan, Archimandrite Hilarion (Troitsky) and former Chief Prosecutor of the Synod A.D. Samarin - 3 votes each. Several more persons were proposed to the Patriarchate by one or two council members.
After four rounds of voting, the Council elected Archbishop Anthony of Kharkov, Archbishop Arseny of Novgorod and Metropolitan Tikhon of Moscow as candidates for the First Hierarchal Throne, as people said about him, “the smartest, the strictest and the kindest of the hierarchs of the Russian Church...” Archbishop Anthony , a brilliantly educated and talented church writer, was a prominent church figure in the last two decades of the synodal era. A longtime champion of the Patriarchate, he was supported by many at the Council as a fearless and experienced church leader.
Another candidate, Archbishop Arseny, an intelligent and powerful hierarch who had many years of church-administrative and state experience (formerly a member of the State Council), according to Metropolitan Evlogiy, “was horrified by the opportunity to become Patriarch and only prayed to God that “this cup should pass from him.” . And Saint Tikhon relied in everything on the will of God. Not striving for the Patriarchate, he was ready to take on this feat of the cross if the Lord called him.
The election took place on November 5 (18) in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. At the end of the Divine Liturgy and prayer singing, Hieromartyr Vladimir, Metropolitan of Kiev, brought the reliquary with lots to the pulpit, blessed the people with it and opened the seals. Alexy, the blind elder and schema-monk of Zosimova Hermitage, came out of the altar. After praying, he took the lot out of the reliquary and handed it to the metropolitan. The saint read loudly: “Tikhon, Metropolitan of Moscow - axios.”
The jubilant thousand-mouthed “axios” shook the huge crowded temple. There were tears of joy in the eyes of those praying. At the funeral, Protodeacon Rozov of the Assumption Cathedral, famous throughout Russia for his powerful bass voice, proclaimed many years: “To our Lord, His Eminence, Metropolitan of Moscow and Kolomna Tikhon, elected and named Patriarch of the God-saved city of Moscow and all Russia.”
On this day, Saint Tikhon celebrated the liturgy in the Trinity Metochion. The news of his election as Patriarch was brought to him by the embassy of the Council, headed by Metropolitans Vladimir, Benjamin and Plato. After the singing of many years, Metropolitan Tikhon said the word: “...Now I have spoken the words according to the order: “I thank and accept, and not at all contrary to the verb.” ...But, judging by the person, I can say a lot contrary to my real election. Your news about my election to the Patriarchate is for me that scroll on which it was written: “Weeping, and groaning, and grief,” and such a scroll was supposed to be eaten by the prophet Ezekiel. How many tears and groans I will have to swallow in the Patriarchal service ahead of me, and especially in this difficult time! Like the ancient leader of the Jewish people, Moses, I will have to say to the Lord: “Why are You tormenting Your servant? And why have I not found mercy in Thy sight, that Thou hast laid upon me the burden of all this people? Did I carry all this people in my womb and did I give birth to him, that You say to me: Carry him in your arms, as a nanny carries a child. I I cannot bear all this people alone, because they are too heavy for me” (Num. 11:11-14). From now on, I am entrusted with the care of all the Russian churches and will have to die for them all the days. And whoever is happy with this, even the weakest! But God's will be done! I find confirmation in the fact that I did not seek this election, and it came apart from me and even apart from men, according to God’s lot.”
The enthronement of the Patriarch took place on November 21 (December 3) on the Feast of the Entry in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin. For the celebration of the ceremony, the staff of St. Peter, the cassock of the holy martyr Patriarch Hermogenes, as well as the mantle, miter and hood of Patriarch Nikon were taken from the Armory Chamber.
On November 29, at the Council, an extract from the “Definition” of the Holy Synod on the elevation to the rank of metropolitan of Archbishops Anthony of Kharkov, Arseny of Novgorod, Agafan Gel of Yaroslavl, Sergius of Vladimir and Jacob of Kazan was read out.
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The restoration of the Patriarchate did not complete the transformation of the entire system of church government. The brief definition of November 4, 1917 was supplemented by other detailed “Definitions”: “On the rights and duties of the Holy Patriarch...”, “On the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council”, “On the range of affairs subject to the jurisdiction of the bodies of the Supreme Church Administration”. The Council granted the Patriarch the rights corresponding to canonical norms: to take care of the well-being of the Russian Church and represent it before the state authorities, to communicate with the autocephalous Churches, to address the all-Russian flock with teaching messages, to take care of the timely replacement of episcopal sees, to give fraternal advice to bishops. The Patriarch, according to the “Definitions” of the Council, is the diocesan bishop of the Patriarchal region, which consists of the Moscow diocese and stauropegial monasteries.
The Local Council formed two bodies of collegial government of the Church in the intervals between Councils: the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council. The competence of the Synod included matters of a hierarchical-pastoral, doctrinal, canonical and liturgical nature, and the jurisdiction of the Supreme Church Council included matters of church and public order: administrative, economic and school-educational. And finally, especially important questions- on the protection of the rights of the Church, on preparations for the upcoming Council, on the opening of new dioceses - were subject to a joint decision of the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council.
The Synod included, in addition to its Chairman-Patriarch, 12 members: the Metropolitan of Kiev by cathedral, 6 bishops elected by the Council for three years, and five bishops summoned in turn for one year. Of the 15 members of the Supreme Church Council, headed, like the Synod, by the Patriarch, three bishops were delegated by the Synod, and one monk, five clergy from the white clergy and six laymen were elected by the Council. The elections of members of the highest bodies of church government took place at the last meetings of the first session of the Council before its dissolution for the Christmas holidays.
The Local Council elected to the Synod the Metropolitans of Novgorod Arseny, Kharkov Anthony, Vladimir Sergius, Tiflis Platon, Archbishops of Chisinau Anastasius (Gribanovsky) and Volyn Evlogy.
To the Supreme Church Council, the Council elected Archimandrite Vissarion, protopresbyters G.I. Shavelsky and I.A. Lyubimov, archpriests A.V. Sankovsky and A.M. Stanislavsky, psalmist A.G. Kulyashov and laymen Prince E.N. Trubetskoy, professors S.N. Bulgakov, N.M. Gromoglasov, P.D. Lapin, as well as former minister confessions of the Provisional Government of A.V. Kartashov and S.M. Raevsky. The Synod delegated Metropolitans Arseny, Agafangel and Archimandrite Anastasius to the Supreme Church Council. The Council also elected deputy members of the Synod and the Supreme Church Council.
On November 13 (26), the Council began discussing a report on the legal status of the Church in the state. On behalf of the Council, Professor S. N. Bulgakov drew up a Declaration on the relationship between the Church and the state, which preceded the “Definition on the legal status of the Church in the state.” In it, the demand for the complete separation of Church and state is compared with the wish “that the sun should not shine and the fire should not warm. The Church, according to the internal law of its existence, cannot refuse the calling to enlighten, to transform the entire life of humanity, to permeate it with its rays.” The idea of the high calling of the Church in state affairs lay at the basis of the legal consciousness of Byzantium. Ancient Rus' inherited from Byzantium the idea of a symphony of Church and state. The Kiev and Moscow powers were built on this foundation. At the same time, the Church did not associate itself with a specific form of government and always proceeded from the fact that the government should be Christian. “And now,” the document says, “when, by the will of Providence, the tsarist autocracy is collapsing in Russia, and new state forms are replacing it, the Orthodox Church has no definition of these forms in terms of their political expediency, but it invariably stands on this understanding of power , according to which all power must be a Christian service." Measures of external coercion that violate the religious conscience of people of other faiths were recognized as incompatible with the dignity of the Church.
A heated dispute arose around the question of the compulsory Orthodoxy of the Head of State and the Minister of Confessions, which was assumed in the draft “Definition”. Council member Professor N.D. Kuznetsov made a reasonable remark: “In Russia, complete freedom of conscience has been proclaimed and it has been declared that the position of every citizen in the state... does not depend on belonging to one or another religion or even to religion in general... Count on success is impossible in this matter.” But this warning was not taken into account.
In its final form, the “Definition” of the Council reads: “1. The Orthodox Russian Church, forming part of the One Ecumenical Church of Christ, occupies a leading public legal position in the Russian state among other confessions, befitting it as the greatest shrine of the vast majority of the population and as the greatest historical force that created the Russian state.
2. The Orthodox Church in Russia is independent of state power in the teaching of faith and morals, worship, internal church discipline and relations with other autocephalous Churches...
3. Decrees and instructions issued for itself by the Orthodox Church, as well as acts of church administration and court, are recognized by the state as having legal force and significance, since they do not violate state laws...
4. State laws concerning the Orthodox Church are issued only by agreement with the church authorities...
7. Chapter Russian state, the Minister of Confessions and the Minister of Public Education and their comrades must be Orthodox...
22. Property belonging to the institutions of the Orthodox Church is not subject to confiscation and confiscation...”
Certain articles of the “Definition” were anachronistic in nature, not corresponding to the constitutional foundations of the new state, new state legal conditions, and could not be implemented. However, this “Definition” contains the indisputable provision that in matters of faith, in its internal life, the Church is independent of state power and is guided by its dogmatic teaching and canons.
The actions of the Council were also carried out during revolutionary times. On October 25 (November 7), the Provisional Government fell, and Soviet power was established in the country. On October 28, bloody battles broke out in Moscow between the cadets occupying the Kremlin and the rebels in whose hands the city was. Over Moscow there was the roar of cannons and the crackle of machine guns. They shot in courtyards, from attics, from windows; dead and wounded lay in the streets.
During these days, many members of the Council, having taken on the responsibility of nurses, walked around the city, picking up and bandaging the wounded. Among them were Archbishop of Tauride Dimitri (Prince Abashidze) and Bishop of Kamchatka Nestor (Anisimov). The Council, trying to stop the bloodshed, sent a delegation to negotiate with the Military Revolutionary Committee and the Kremlin commandant's office. The delegation was headed by Metropolitan Platon. At the headquarters of the Military Revolutionary Committee, Metropolitan Platon asked to end the siege of the Kremlin. To this I received the answer: “It’s too late, too late. We weren't the ones who spoiled the truce. Tell the cadets to surrender." But the delegation was unable to penetrate the Kremlin.
“In these bloody days,” Metropolitan Eulogius later wrote, “a great change took place in the Council. Petty human passions subsided, hostile bickering fell silent, alienation was erased... The Council, which at first resembled a parliament, began to transform into a genuine “Church Council”, into an organic church whole, united by one will - for the good of the Church. The Spirit of God blew over the congregation, comforting everyone, reconciling everyone.” The Council addressed the warring parties with a call for reconciliation, with a plea for mercy for the vanquished: “In the name of God... The Council calls on our dear brothers and children fighting among themselves to now refrain from further terrible bloody warfare... The Council... begs the victors not allow no acts of revenge, cruel reprisals and in all cases spare the lives of the vanquished. In the name of the salvation of the Kremlin and the salvation of our dear ones throughout Russia, there are shrines in it, the destruction and desecration of which the Russian people will never forgive anyone, the Holy Council begs not to expose the Kremlin to artillery fire.”
The appeal issued by the Council on November 17 (30) contains a call for general repentance: “Instead of the new social structure promised by the false teachers, there is a bloody feud among the builders; instead of peace and brotherhood of peoples, there is a confusion of languages and bitterness, the hatred of brothers. People who have forgotten God, like hungry wolves, rush at each other. There is a general darkening of conscience and reason... Russian guns, hitting the Kremlin shrines, wounded the hearts of the people, burning with the Orthodox faith. Before our eyes, God's judgment is being carried out on a people who have lost a shrine... To our misfortune, a truly people's power worthy of receiving the blessing of the Orthodox Church has not yet been born. And she will not appear on Russian soil until we turn with sorrowful prayer and tearful repentance to Him, without Whom those who build the city labor in vain.”
The tone of this message could not, of course, help to soften the then tense relations between the Church and the new Soviet state. And yet, on the whole, the Local Council managed to refrain from superficial assessments and speeches of a narrowly political nature, recognizing the relative importance of political phenomena in comparison with religious and moral values.
According to the memoirs of Metropolitan Evlogy, highest point, which the Council spiritually achieved, was the first appearance of the Patriarch at the Council after his enthronement: “With what reverent awe everyone greeted him! Everyone - not excluding the “left” professors... When... the Patriarch entered, everyone knelt down... At those moments there were no longer the former members of the Council who disagreed with each other and were alien to each other, but there were saints, righteous people, inspired by the Holy Spirit, ready to carry out His commands... And some of us on this day understood what the words really mean: “Today the grace of the Holy Spirit has gathered us together...”
The meetings of the Council were suspended for the Christmas holidays on December 9 (22), 1917, and on January 20, 1918, the second session opened, which continued until April 7 (20). They took place in the building of the Moscow Theological Seminary. The outbreak of civil war made travel around the country difficult; and on January 20, only 110 members of the Council were able to arrive at the Council meeting, which did not provide a quorum. Therefore, the Council was forced to adopt a special resolution: to hold meetings with any number of Council members present.
The main topic of the second session was the structure of diocesan administration. The discussion began even before the Christmas holidays with a report by Professor A.I. Pokrovsky. Serious controversy flared up around the provision that the bishop “governs the diocese with the conciliar assistance of the clergy and laity.” Amendments were proposed. The goal of some was to more sharply emphasize the power of the bishops - the successors of the apostles. Thus, Archbishop Kirill of Tambov proposed to include in the “Definition” words about the sole management of the bishop, carried out only with the help of diocesan governing bodies and the court, and Archbishop of Tver Seraphim (Chichagov) even spoke about the inadmissibility of involving lay people in the management of the diocese. However, amendments were also proposed that pursued opposite goals: to give clergy and laity broader rights in deciding diocesan affairs.
At the plenary meeting, an amendment by Professor I.M. Gromoglasov was adopted: replace the formula “with the conciliar assistance of clergy and laity” with the words “in unity with the clergy and laity.” But the bishops' council, protecting the canonical foundations of the church system, rejected this amendment, restoring final version the formula proposed in the report: “The diocesan bishop, by succession of power from the holy apostles, is the Primate of the local Church, governing the diocese with the conciliar assistance of the clergy and laity.”
The Council established a 35-year age limit for candidates for bishops. According to the “Definition on Diocesan Administration,” bishops must be elected “from monastics or those not obliged by marriage to the white clergy and laity, and for both of them it is obligatory to wear the ryassophore if they do not take monastic vows.”
According to the “Definition,” the body through which the bishop governs the diocese is the diocesan assembly, elected from clergy and laity for a three-year term. Diocesan assemblies, in turn, form their own permanent executive bodies: the diocesan council and the diocesan court.
On April 2 (15), 1918, the Council adopted the “Decree on Vicar Bishops.” Its fundamental novelty was that it was supposed to allocate parts of the diocese under the jurisdiction of suffragan bishops and establish their residence in the cities by which they were titled. The publication of this “Definition” was dictated by the urgent need to increase the number of dioceses and was thought of as the first step in this direction.
The most extensive of the resolutions of the Council is the “Definition of the Orthodox Parish,” otherwise called the “Parish Charter.” In the introduction to the “Charter” it is given short essay history of the parish in the ancient Church and in Russia. The basis of parish life should be the principle of service: “Under the leadership of successively God-appointed pastors, all parishioners, forming a single spiritual family in Christ, take an active part in the entire life of the parish, as best they can with their own strength and talent.” The “Charter” gives the definition of a parish: “A parish... is a society of Orthodox Christians, consisting of clergy and laity, residing in a certain area and united at the church, forming part of the diocese and being under the canonical administration of its diocesan bishop, under the leadership of an appointed priest - abbot."
The Council declared the parish's sacred duty to take care of the improvement of its shrine - the temple. The “Charter” defines the composition of the nominal parish clergy: priest, deacon and psalm-reader. Its increase or reduction to two persons was left to the discretion of the diocesan bishop, who, according to the “Charter,” ordained and appointed clergy.
The “Charter” provided for the election of church elders by parishioners, who were entrusted with the acquisition, storage and use of church property. To resolve matters related to the maintenance of the temple, the provision of clergy and the election of parish officials, it was planned to convene a parish meeting at least twice a year, permanently executive body which was to become a parish council, consisting of clergy, the churchwarden or his assistant and several laymen - by election of the parish assembly. The chairmanship of the parish meeting and the parish council was given to the rector of the church.
The discussion about unity of faith, a long-standing and complex issue burdened by long-standing misunderstandings and mutual suspicions, became extremely tense. The Department of Edinoverie and Old Believers failed to develop an agreed upon project. Therefore, two diametrically opposed reports were presented at the plenary meeting. The stumbling block was the question of the Edinoverie episcopate. One speaker, Bishop Seraphim (Alexandrov) of Chelyabinsk, spoke out against the ordination of bishops of co-religionists, seeing in this a contradiction to the canon-based territorial principle of the administrative division of the Church and a threat to the separation of co-religionists from the Orthodox Church. Another speaker, Edinoverie Archpriest Simeon Shleev, proposed the establishment of independent Edinoverie dioceses; after sharp polemics, the Council came to a compromise decision on the establishment of five Edinoverie vicar departments, subordinate to diocesan bishops.
The second session of the Council carried out its acts when the country was engulfed civil war. Among the Russian people who laid down their lives in this war were priests. On January 25 (February 7), 1918, Metropolitan Vladimir was killed by bandits in Kyiv. Having received this sad news, the Council issued a resolution which states:
"1. Establish the offering in churches during services of special petitions for those now persecuted for Orthodox faith and the Church and the confessors and martyrs who ended their lives...
2. Establish throughout Russia an annual prayerful commemoration on January 25 or the following Sunday (evening) ... of confessors and martyrs.”
At a closed meeting on January 25, 1918, the Council adopted an emergency resolution that “in the event of illness, death and other sad opportunities for the Patriarch, propose to him to elect several guardians of the Patriarchal Throne, who, in order of seniority, will guard the power of the Patriarch and succeed him.” At the second special closed meeting of the Council, the Patriarch reported that he had fulfilled this resolution. After the death of Patriarch Tikhon, it served as a saving means for preserving the canonical succession of the First Hierarchal ministry.
On April 5, 1918, shortly before dissolution for the Easter holidays, the Council of Archpastors of the Russian Orthodox Church adopted a resolution on the canonization of Saints Joseph of Astrakhan and Sophrony of Irkutsk.
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The last, third, session of the Council lasted from June 19 (July 2) to September 7 (20), 1918. There, work continued on the compilation of “Definitions” on the activities of the highest bodies of church government. The “Definition on the procedure for electing His Holiness the Patriarch” established an order basically similar to the one by which the Patriarch was elected at the Council. However, wider representation at the electoral Council of clergy and laity of the Moscow Diocese, for which the Patriarch is the diocesan bishop, was envisaged. In the event of the release of the Patriarchal Throne, the “Decree on the Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne” provided for the immediate election of a Locum Tenens from among the members of the Synod combined by the presence of the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council.
One of the most important resolutions of the third session of the Council was the “Definition on Monasteries and Monastics,” developed in the relevant department under the chairmanship of Archbishop Seraphim of Tver. It sets the age limit for the tonsured person - not less than 25 years; To tonsure a novice at a younger age required the blessing of the diocesan bishop. The definition restored the ancient custom of electing abbots and vicars by the brethren so that the diocesan bishop, if approved, would present him for approval to the Holy Synod. The Local Council emphasized the advantage of community life over individual life and recommended that all monasteries, if possible, introduce community rules. The most important concern of the monastery authorities and brethren should be a strictly statutory service “without omissions and without replacing the reading of what is supposed to be sung, and accompanied by a word of edification.” The Council spoke about the desirability of having an elder or old woman in each monastery for the spiritual care of the inhabitants. All monastery residents were required to carry out labor obedience. The spiritual and educational service of monasteries to the world should be expressed in statutory services, clergy, eldership and preaching.
At the third session, the Council adopted two “Definitions” designed to protect the dignity of the priesthood. Based on the apostolic instructions on the height of sacred service and on the canons, the Council confirmed the inadmissibility of second marriage for widowed and divorced clergy. The second resolution confirmed the impossibility of reinstatement of persons deprived of their rank by sentences of spiritual courts, correct in essence and form. The strict observance of these “Definitions” by the Orthodox clergy, who strictly preserved the canonical foundations of the church system, in the 20s and 30s saved it from discredit to which the Renovationist groups were subjected, who trampled both the Orthodox law and the holy canons.
On August 13 (26), 1918, the Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church restored the celebration of the memory of all the saints who shone in the Russian land, timed to coincide with the second week after Pentecost.
At the final meeting on September 7 (20), 1918, the Council decided to convene the next Local Council in the spring of 1921.
Not all departments of the Council carried out conciliar acts with equal success. Having been sitting for more than a year, the Council did not exhaust its program: some departments did not have time to develop and submit agreed reports to the plenary sessions. A number of “Definitions” of the Council could not be implemented due to the socio-political situation that developed in the country.
In resolving issues of church construction, organizing the entire life of the Russian Church in unprecedented historical conditions on the basis of strict fidelity to the dogmatic and moral teaching of the Savior, the Council stood on the basis of canonical truth.
Political structures Russian Empire collapsed, the Provisional Government turned out to be an ephemeral formation, and the Church of Christ, guided by the grace of the Holy Spirit, preserved during this turning point historical era your God-created system. At the Council, which became an act of its self-determination in new historical conditions, the Church was able to cleanse itself of everything superficial, correct the deformations that it suffered during the synodal era, and thereby revealed its unworldly nature.
The Local Council was an event of epochal significance. Having abolished the canonically flawed and completely outdated synodal system of church government and restored the Patriarchate, he drew a line between two periods of Russian church history. The “definitions” of the Council served the Russian Church on its arduous path as a firm support and an unmistakable spiritual guide in solving the extremely difficult problems that life presented in abundance to it.
M. A. Babkin
Local cathedral 1917-1918: the question of the conscience of the Orthodox flock
Babkin M.A. Local Council of 1917-1918: the question of the conscience of the Orthodox flock // Questions of history. No. 4, April 2010, pp. 52-61
Local cathedral 1917 - 1918 known mainly for the fact that the patriarchate was restored in the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC). The position of the Council regarding issues related in one way or another to the overthrow of the monarchy remains practically unexplored.
The local cathedral was opened in Moscow on August 15, 1917. To participate in its work, 564 people were elected and appointed: 80 bishops, 129 presbyters, 10 deacons from the white (married) clergy, 26 psalm-readers, 20 monastics (archimandrites, abbots and hieromonks) and 299 laity. The cathedral worked for more than a year. During this time, three of its sessions took place: the first - from August 15 (28) to December 9 (22), 1917, the second and third - in 1918: from January 20 (February 2) to April 7 (20) and from June 19 (July 2) to September 7 (20).
On August 18, Metropolitan Tikhon (Bellavin) of Moscow was elected chairman of the Council, as the archpastor of the city in which the church forum met. Archbishops of Novgorod Arseny (Stadnitsky) and Kharkov Anthony (Khrapovitsky) were elected co-chairmen (deputies, or in the terminology of that time - comrades of the chairman) from the bishops, from the priests - protopresbyters N. A. Lyubimov and G. I. Shavelsky, from the laity - the prince E. N. Trubetskoy and M. V. Rodzianko (until October 6, 1917 - Chairman of the State Duma). "All-Russian" Metropolitan Vladimir (Epiphany) (in 1892 - 1898 he was the exarch of Georgia, in 1898 - 1912 - the Metropolitan of Moscow, in 1912 - 1915 - of St. Petersburg, and from 1915 - of Kiev) became honorary chairman of the Council.
To coordinate the activities of the Council, decisions " general issues internal regulations and unification of all activities" a Council Council was established, which did not cease its activities even during breaks between sessions of the Council.
On August 30, 19 departments were formed as part of the Local Council. They were responsible for the preliminary consideration and preparation of conciliar bills. Each department included bishops, clergy and laity.
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To consider highly specialized issues, departments could form subdivisions. According to the charter of the cathedral, in order to adopt a cathedral resolution, from the relevant department they had to go to in writing report, as well as (at the request of the participants in its meetings) special opinions. The department's conclusion should have been presented in the form of a proposed conciliar resolution.
Since in the spring-summer of 1917 the clergy in the center (Synod) and locally (bishops and various church congresses) had already spoken out in one way or another regarding the overthrow of the monarchy, the Council considered issues related to the assessment February Revolution, was not planned. Nevertheless, in August-October 1917, the Local Council received a dozen letters, most addressed to Metropolitans Tikhon of Moscow and Vladimir of Kyiv.
The letters reflected the confusion in the minds of the laity caused by the abdication of Nicholas II. They expressed the fear of God’s wrath for the overthrow of the monarchy, the actual rejection by the Orthodox of God’s anointed, and proposed to declare the personality of Nicholas II inviolable, to stand up for the imprisoned sovereign and his family, and to observe the charter of the Zemsky Sobor of 1613 on the loyalty of the people to the Romanov dynasty. The authors of the letters condemned the shepherds for their actual betrayal of the tsar in the February-March days and for welcoming various “freedoms” that led Russia to anarchy. They called on the clergy of the Russian Orthodox Church to repentance for their support for the overthrow of the monarchy. Some appeals contained requests to free the people from their previous oath of allegiance to the emperor. In March 1917, as is known, the Synod ordered that the flock be sworn in to the Provisional Government without releasing the flock from the oath previously taken to the emperor. Because of this, according to the authors of the letters, the sin of perjury weighed heavily on the people of Russia. The Orthodox asked the church authorities to remove this sin from their conscience.
Despite the long period of its work, the Council did not respond to these letters: the minutes of its meetings do not contain any information about this. Obviously, Metropolitans Tikhon and Vladimir, finding these letters inconvenient for publication and “unhelpful” for discussion, shelved them. Both of them were members of the Synod in February-March, with Metropolitan Vladimir taking precedence. And the questions raised in the letters of the monarchists, one way or another, prompted an assessment of the political line of the Synod in the early spring of 1917.
Nevertheless, one of the letters, similar to those mentioned, received progress at the Local Council. On November 15, a peasant from the Tver province, M.E. Nikonov, addressed Archbishop Seraphim (Chichagov) of Tver: “Your Eminence, Bishop, I ask for your holy blessing for transmitting this message to the Most Holy All-Russian Council...” Thus, in fact, it was a message to the Local Council. The letter, among other things, expresses an assessment of the actions of the hierarchy in February: “We think that the Holy Synod made an irreparable mistake, that the Eminences went towards the revolution. We do not know this reason. Was it for the sake of Jewish fear? Or out of the desire of their hearts, or for some reason.” or for good reasons, but still their act created a great temptation among the believers, and not only among the Orthodox, but even among the Old Believers. Forgive me for touching on this issue - it’s not our place to discuss it: this is the matter of the Council, I just raised seemingly a popular judgment. Among the people there are such speeches that the alleged act of the Synod has misled many sensible people, as well as many among the clergy... The Orthodox Russian people
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I'm sure that Holy Cathedral- in the interests of the holy mother of our church, fatherland and father of the Tsar - impostors and all traitors who have violated the oath will be anathematized and cursed with their satanic idea of revolution. And the Holy Council will indicate to its flock who should take the helm of government in the great state... It is not a simple comedy - the act of sacred coronation and anointing of our kings with the holy myrrh in the Assumption Cathedral, who received from God the power to rule the people and give answer to that one, but not to the constitution or some kind of parliament." The message ended with the words: "All of the above... is not just my personal composition, but the voice of the Orthodox Russian people, a hundred million rural Russia, among whom I am." In the office work it was registered as a letter "about anathematizing and cursing all traitors to the motherland who violated the oath, and about taking measures to encourage church pastors to comply with the requirements of church discipline." The Cathedral Council considered the letter on November 23 (the day after Patriarch Tikhon's injunction) and sent to the department "On church discipline." The chairman of this department at that time was Metropolitan Vladimir of Kiev, who was killed in Kiev by unidentified people on January 25, 1918 (not without the assistance of the inhabitants of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra).
Approximately two months after the publication of the Soviet decree “On the separation of church from state and school from church” of January 20 (February 2), 1918, the IV subsection was created in the department of church discipline. His task included consideration of several issues, and the first of them was the question “On the oath to the government in general and to the former Emperor Nicholas II in particular.” At the second meeting of the subdepartment on March 21 (April 3) (the first meeting was organizational), 10 persons of clergy and lay ranks were present. The report “On Church Discipline” presented on October 3, 1917, by priest Vasily Belyaev, a member of the Local Council by election from the Kaluga diocese, was heard. It touched upon essentially the same problems as Nikonov’s letter: about the oath and perjury of the Orthodox in February-March 1917.
This question, the report said, “extremely confuses the conscience of believers... and puts pastors in a difficult position.” In March 1917, “one of the teachers of the zemstvo schools turned to the writer of these lines demanding a categorical answer to the question whether she was free from the oath given to Emperor Nicholas II. If she was not free, then she asked to be released so that she could given the opportunity to work with a clear conscience in the new Russia." In May 1917, in a public conversation with Belyaev, one of the Old Believers “called all Orthodox Christians oathbreakers because they, without being released from their oath to Emperor Nicholas II, recognized the Provisional Government.” In September, from one of the priests, Belyaev, as a delegate from the diocese, received a letter with a request “to raise a question before the members of the Council about the release of Orthodox believers from the oath given to Nicholas II upon his accession to the throne, since the true believers are in doubt.”
Belyaev also believed that the question of the oath was “one of the cardinal issues of church discipline.” From this or that decision “depends the attitude of an Orthodox Christian to politics, the attitude towards the creators of politics, no matter who they are: are they emperors or presidents?” Therefore, it was necessary to resolve the following questions: 1) Is an oath of allegiance to rulers generally acceptable? 2) If it is permissible, is its effect unlimited? 3) If not unlimited, then in what cases and by whom should believers be released from the oath? 4) The act of abdication of Nicholas II - is it a sufficient reason for
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Orthodox consider themselves free from this oath? 5) Can an Orthodox Christian himself, in certain cases, consider himself free from the oath, or does this require the authority of the church? 6) If required, “then are we not oathbreakers, since we have freed ourselves from the obligations of the oath?” 7) “If we have the sin of perjury, shouldn’t the Council free the conscience of believers?” .
Following Belyaev's report, Nikonov's letter was read out, and a discussion arose. Some believed that the Local Council really needed to release the flock from the oath, since the Synod had not yet issued a corresponding act. Others spoke in favor of postponing the decision until the socio-political life of the country returned to normal. The question of anointing, in the eyes of some members of the subdepartment, was a “private issue” that did not deserve conciliar attention, and from the point of view of others, it was a very complex problem that could not be solved quickly. Others even believed that this was beyond the capabilities of the subdepartment, since it would require research from the canonical, legal and historical sides, and that in general these issues belong more to the field of theology rather than church discipline; Accordingly, the department should abandon their development. Nevertheless, it was decided to continue the discussion, involving scientists from the participants of the Local Council.
Consideration of the issue was continued at the fourth meeting of the IV subdivision, held on July 20 (August 2). There were 20 people present - a record number for this subdepartment, including two bishops (for some reason the bishops did not sign up as participants in the meeting). The report “On the oath of allegiance to the government in general and in particular to the former sovereign Emperor Nicholas II” was made by Professor of the Moscow Theological Academy S. S. Glagolev. After a brief overview of the concept of an oath and its meaning from ancient times to the beginning of the 20th century, the speaker outlined his vision of the problem and came to the conclusion:
“When discussing the issue of violating the oath to the former sovereign Emperor Nicholas II, it must be borne in mind that what happened was not the abdication of Nicholas II, but his overthrow from the throne, and not only the overthrow of him, but also the throne itself (the principles of Orthodoxy, autocracy and nationality). If the sovereign had retired of his own free will, then there could have been no talk of perjury, but for many it is certain that there was no moment of free will in the act of abdication of Nicholas II.
The fact of violating the oath by revolutionary means was calmly accepted: 1) out of fear - undoubted conservatives - some part of the clergy and nobility, 2) out of calculation - merchants who dreamed of putting capital in the place of the aristocracy of the clan, 3) people of different professions and classes, who believed to varying degrees in good consequences of the coup. These people (from their point of view), for the sake of the supposed good, committed real evil - they broke their word given with an oath. Their guilt is undoubted; one can only talk about mitigating circumstances, if any are found... [Apostle] Peter also denied, but he bore worthy fruits of repentance. We also need to come to our senses and bear the worthy fruits of repentance."
After Glagolev’s report, a debate arose in which eight people participated, including both hierarchs. The speeches of the parish pastors and laity boiled down to the following theses:
- It is necessary to clarify the question of how legal and obligatory the oath of allegiance to the emperor and his heir was, since the interests of the state sometimes conflict with the ideals of the Orthodox faith;
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- We must look at the oath taking into account the fact that before the abdication of the sovereign, we had a religious union with the state. The oath was mystical in nature, and this cannot be ignored;
- Under the conditions of the secular nature of power, the formerly close connection between the state and the church is broken, and believers can feel free from the oath;
- It is better to have at least some kind of power than the chaos of anarchy. The people must fulfill those demands of the rulers that do not contradict their religious beliefs. Any power will demand that the people take an oath to themselves. The Church must decide whether the oath should be restored as it was or not. The oath to anti-Christian power is illegal and undesirable;
- Given the theocratic nature of power, the oath is natural. But the further the state moves away from the church, the more undesirable the oath;
- Members of the State Duma in the February-March days of 1917 did not violate their oath. Having formed an Executive Committee from among their members, they fulfilled their duty to the country in order to contain the beginning anarchy;
- One could consider oneself freed from the oath of allegiance only in the event of the voluntary abdication of Nicholas II. But later circumstances revealed that this renunciation was made under pressure. Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich refused to take the throne also under pressure;
- Any oath is aimed at protecting peace and security. After the restoration of order in state and public life in Russia, pastors must fight left-wing radicals who propagate the idea of the unnecessaryness of taking any oaths. It is necessary to instill loyalty to the oath among the people;
- Back in March, the Synod should have issued an act on removing the anointing from the former sovereign. But who dares to raise his hand against God’s anointed?
- The Church, having ordered that prayers for the emperor be replaced by commemoration of the Provisional Government, did not say anything about the grace of royal anointing. The people were thus confused. He was waiting for instructions and appropriate explanations from the highest church authorities, but still had not heard anything about it;
- The Church was damaged by its previous connection with the state. The people's conscience must now receive instructions from above: should it consider itself free from the previous oaths taken first of allegiance to the Tsar and then to the Provisional Government? to bind or not to bind oneself to the oath of the new government?
- If Orthodoxy ceases to be the dominant faith in Russia, then the church oath should not be introduced.
Archbishop of Astrakhan Mitrofan (Krasnopolsky) expressed the point of view, widespread since the spring of 1917, that by abdicating the throne, the sovereign thereby freed everyone from the oath of loyalty. At the end of the debate, Bishop Anatoly (Grisyuk) of Chistopol took the floor. He said that the Local Council should express its opinion on the issue of the oath to Emperor Nicholas II, since the conscience of believers should be calmed. And for this, the issue of the oath must be comprehensively studied at the Council. As a result, it was decided to continue the exchange of opinions next time.
The fifth meeting of the subdivision took place on July 25 (August 7), 1918 (13 people were present, including one bishop). The report was made by S. I. Shidlovsky, a member of the Local Council elected from the State
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Noah Duma. (Previously, he was a member of the State Duma of the III and IV convocations, since 1915 he was one of the leaders of the Progressive Bloc, and was a member of the Provisional Executive Committee of the State Duma.) The speech was only indirectly related to the original subject of discussion; Shidlovsky believed that Nicholas II's abdication was voluntary.
Bishop Anatoly of Chistopol had a different opinion: “The renunciation took place in a situation that did not correspond to the importance of the act. I received letters in which it was stated that the renunciation, especially voluntary, should have taken place in the Assumption Cathedral, for example, where the coronation took place. Abdication in favor of a brother rather than a son is a discrepancy with the Fundamental Laws: it is contrary to the law of succession to the throne." He also pointed out that the manifesto of March 2 said that the abdication was carried out “in agreement with the State Duma,” but after some time “the sovereign was deprived of his freedom by the government that arose at the initiative of the same Duma.” Such “inconsistency” of the Duma members served, in the bishop’s opinion, as evidence of the violent nature of the transfer of power.
When a number of participants in the discussion were inclined to think about the illegality of the abdication, Shidlovsky objected to them: “In the situation created at that time, two options were open to the State Duma: either, remaining on the basis of strict formal legality, completely distance itself from the events taking place, in no way falling within its legal competence.” entering; or, breaking the law, try to direct the revolutionary movement along the least destructive path. She chose the second path and, of course, was right. And why her attempt failed, all this will be revealed by impartial history."
In response to a proposal from one of the participants in the discussion (V.A. Demidov) to the Local Council to declare that the Orthodox have the right to consider themselves exempt from the oath of allegiance, the chairman of the subdepartment, Archpriest D.V. Rozhdestvensky, remarked: “When the law of God was expelled from the school or one of the priests was sent to Butyrka prison, the Council reacted to this one way or another. Why didn’t the Council protest when the mockery of the sovereign began; isn’t breaking the oath criminal?” . Bishop Anatoly supported him, pointing out that the highest acts of March 2 and 3, 1917 were far from being legally flawless. In particular, they do not talk about the reasons for the transfer of power. In addition, the bishop believed that the Grand Duke (uncrowned emperor? - M.B.) Mikhail Alexandrovich could abdicate in favor of further successors from the House of Romanov. “The team to which the power transferred by Mikhail Alexandrovich passed,” continued Bishop Anatoly, referring to the Provisional Government, “changed in its composition, and meanwhile the oath was given to the Provisional Government. It is very important to find out where we sinned in this case, and what you need to repent of."
In order to calm the conscience of believers, the Council should make a final decision on this issue, Demidov said: “The Church crowned the sovereign as king, performed anointing; now it must perform the opposite act, annul the anointing.” Archpriest Rozhdestvensky, however, believed that “this [opinion] should not be brought to the plenary meeting of the Church Council,” and touched upon the issue of swearing allegiance to the new government: “We need to find out what threatens the church ahead; whether the oath will be pressure from the state on the church, not Is it better to refuse the oath? As a result, a commission was formed to develop the question of “whether the oath is necessary, whether it is desirable in the future, whether it needs to be restored.” The commission included
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three: Glagolev, Shidlovsky and Archpriest A.G. Albitsky, who was also previously a member of the IV State Duma (from the Nizhny Novgorod province).
Thus, the initial direction of the subdepartment’s work, set by Belyaev’s report and the letter from the peasant Nikonov, changed. Questions from a purely practical plane were transferred to the theoretical. Instead of discussing pressing issues of concern to the flock about perjury during the February Revolution and the liberation of the people from the oath, consideration began to be given to problems that had very little to do with reality.
The sixth meeting of the subdepartment, consisting of 10 people, took place on August 9 (22), less than a month before the closure of the Local Council. On behalf of the formed commission, Glagolev outlined “Provisions on the meaning and importance of the oath, on its desirability and admissibility from the point of view of Christian teaching.” (The text of this document was not preserved in the records of the IV subsection.) An exchange of views took place. Some speakers talked about terminology, the need to distinguish an oath (a solemn promise) from an oath. Others discussed whether an oath according to the teachings of the Gospel was permissible? Can the church serve the affairs of the state? What is the difference between the state oath and the oath taken in courts? what to do if the Local Council recognizes the civil oath as unacceptable, and the government demands that it be taken? It was said that in the future the ceremony of taking the oath of allegiance to rulers should not take place in a church setting, that the name of God should not be mentioned in its text. At the same time, questions were seriously raised: if the government demands that the name of God be included in the oath, then how should the church behave? can she make an appropriate concession to power?
Other questions were also proposed for discussion: can a ceremony to coronate a ruler take place under conditions of separation of church and state? and the same if the liberation of the church from enslavement by the state is achieved? or should the coronation be canceled under these conditions? Is coronation acceptable if the obligatory church oath is abolished?
One of the speakers, speaking about the relationship between the church and the state, puzzled the audience with a new formulation of the problem: “We can expect that we will have to go through another five or six [state] coups. The current government has decisively severed all ties with the church; but another one is possible - and even more so.” of the dubious dignity of the authorities who wish to restore the union of the state with the church. What to do then? "
Arguments both for and against were expressed on almost all the issues discussed. Overall, the discussion resembled “mind games.” The realities of internal church life, as well as socio-political life, were far from the problems that occupied the attention of the subdepartment.
An attempt to return the discussion to real-life circumstances was made by Shidlovsky: “Now we live in such conditions that the question of the oath is untimely, and it is better not to raise it. The question of obligations towards Emperor Nicholas II can be considered completely eliminated. Before the coup, the sovereign was the head churches: he had an institution that he used to exercise his power over the church, like all others government agencies. Truly church people have always protested against the fact that the Orthodox Church was a body government controlled... The separation of church and state has been completed, and we should not return to the previous situation.
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"In his last remark, having questioned the "old regime" view of the oath of allegiance, he summed up the discussion: "Now the atmosphere [in the country] is such that it does not allow one to concentrate and engage in an abstract examination of this issue (about the oath of allegiance in general and the oath of allegiance in particular. - M. B.). Therefore, it is better to refrain from a direct categorical answer to it." After this, the subdepartment decided: "To continue the discussion at the next meeting."
Meanwhile, two days later, on August 11 (24), the Soviet government (People's Commissariat of Justice) adopted and published on the 17 (30) the “Instructions” for implementing the decree “On the separation of church from state and school from church.” According to it, the Orthodox Church was deprived of property rights and legal entity and thus, as a centralized organization, legally ceased to exist in Soviet Russia; the clergy were deprived of all rights to manage church property. Thus, from the end of August, the church found itself in new socio-political realities, due to which (primarily due to lack of funds) the meetings of the Local Council were prematurely terminated on September 7 (20).
Judging by the fact that there is no information about the seventh meeting of the IV subdivision in the records of the highest body of church authority and in other sources, it apparently did not take place. Accordingly, the question “About the oath to the government in general and to the former Emperor Nicholas II in particular,” which had worried the conscience of the Orthodox since March 1917, remained unresolved.
On all days, except for the meeting on March 21 (April 3), when subdivision IV was discussing the first issue on its agenda, members of the Local Council were free from attending general meetings and, thus, had the opportunity to participate in the work of the subdivision. The consistently small number of participants in its meetings allows us to assert that the issues considered at the meetings of the subdivision were considered by the majority of council members to be either irrelevant or worthy of much less attention than others developed in other structural divisions of the Council.
In general, the withdrawal of members of the Local Council from discussing the issues raised is understandable. The actual revision of the official church policy in relation to the oath of allegiance led to the question of disavowing a series of definitions and messages issued by the Synod in March and early April 1917. But the members of “that same” Synod not only constituted the leadership of the Local Council, but also stood at the helm of the Russian Orthodox Church: on December 7, 1917, among the 13 members of the Synod, which began to work under the chairmanship of the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Tikhon (Bellavin), were the metropolitans of Kiev Vladimir (Bogoyavlensky), Novgorod Arseny (Stadnitsky) and Vladimir Sergius (Stragorodsky) - members of the Synod of the winter session of 1916/1917.
The fact that the issue of perjury and the release of Orthodox Christians from the oath of allegiance continued to worry the flock even after a number of years had passed can be concluded from the contents of the “Note” dated December 20, 1924, by Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky) of Nizhny Novgorod and Arzamas (since 1943). - Patriarch of Moscow and All Rus') "The Russian Orthodox Church and Soviet Power (to the convening of the Local Council of the Orthodox Russian Church)". In it, Sergius expressed his thoughts on issues that, in his opinion, were subject to consideration at the Council. He believed that "conciliar reasoning... must certainly touch upon the extremely important fact for believers that the vast majority of current citizens of the USSR are Orthodox -believers were bound by an oath of allegiance to the then royal (until March 1917 - M.B.) emperor and his heir.
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For a non-believer, of course, there is no question about this, but a believer cannot (and should not) take this so lightly. An oath in the name of God is for us the greatest obligation that we can take upon ourselves. It is not for nothing that Christ commanded us: “not to swear in every way,” so as not to run the risk of lying to God. Is it true, the last Emperor(Mikhail) (sic! - M.B.), having abdicated the throne in favor of the people, thereby freed his subjects from the oath. But this fact somehow remained in the shadows, was not indicated with sufficient clarity and certainty either in conciliar decrees, or in archpastoral messages, or in any other official church speeches of that time. Many believing souls, perhaps even now, are painfully perplexed by the question of how they should now proceed with the oath. Many, forced by circumstances to serve in the Red Army or in Soviet service in general, may be experiencing a very tragic duality [between] their present civic duty and the previously given oath. Perhaps there are quite a few who, out of the sheer need to break the oath, later gave up on faith. Obviously, our Council would not have fulfilled its pastoral duty if it had passed over questions about the oath in silence, leaving the believers to figure it out themselves, who knows.”
However, none of the subsequent Local or Bishops' Councils of the Russian Orthodox Church addressed the issues discussed in the IV subsection of the section "On Church Discipline" of the Local Council of 1917-1918. and repeated in the “Note” of Metropolitan Sergius (Stragorodsky).
Notes
1. In the Code of Laws of the Russian Empire and in other official documents up to 1936 (in particular, in the materials of the Local Council of 1917 - 1918 and in the famous “Declaration” of Metropolitan Sergius of July 16 (29), 1927) mainly the name "Orthodox Russian Church" was used. However, the names “Russian Orthodox”, “All-Russian Orthodox”, “Orthodox Catholic Greek-Russian” and “Russian Orthodox” were also often used. On September 8, 1943, by a resolution of the Council of Bishops, the title of the Patriarch of Moscow was changed (instead of “... and all Russia” it became “... and all Rus'”), and the Orthodox Church received its modern name, called “Russian” (ROC). Accordingly, in historiography the use of the abbreviation “ROC” and not “PRC” has been established.
2. See, for example: KARTASHEV A.V. Revolution and Council of 1917 - 1918. - Theological Thought (Paris), 1942, issue. 4; TARASOV K.K. Acts of the Holy Council of 1917 - 1918 as a historical source. - Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate, 1993, No. 1; KRAVETSKY A.G. The problem of liturgical language at the Council of 1917 - 1918. and in the following decades. - Ibid., 1994, No. 2; HIS SAME. Holy Cathedral 1917 - 1918 about the execution of Nicholas 11. - Scientific notes of the Russian Orthodox University ap. John the Theologian, 1995, issue. 1; Odintsov M. I. All-Russian Local Council 1917 - 1918. - Church Historical Bulletin, 2001, N 8; TSYPIN V. The question of diocesan administration at the Local Council of 1917 - 1918. - Church and Time, 2003, N 1(22); SOLOVIEV I. The Cathedral and the Patriarch. - Ibid., 2004, N 1(26); SVETOSARSKY A.K. Local Council and the October Revolution in Moscow. - There; PETER (Eremeev). Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church 1917 - 1918. and reform of theological education. - Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate, 2004, N 3; BELYAKOVA E. V. Church court and problems of church life. M. 2004; KOVYRZIN K.V. Local Council of 1917 - 1918 and the search for the principles of church-state relations after the February Revolution. - National history, 2008, N 4; IAKINTH (DESTIVEL). Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church 1917 - 1918. and the principle of conciliarity. M. 2008.
3. Acts of the Holy Council of the Russian Orthodox Church 1917 - 1918. T. 1. M. 1994, p. 119 - 133.
4. Ibid. Vol. 1. Act 4, p. 64 - 65, 69 - 71.
5. Holy Cathedral of the Russian Orthodox Church. Acts. M. 1918. Book. 1. Issue. 1, p. 42.
6. The draft charter of the Local Council was developed by the Pre-Conciliar Council, approved by the Synod on August 11 and finally adopted by the Local Council on August 17 (Acts of the Holy Council... 1994. Vol. 1, p. 37, Act 3, p. 55, Act 9, p. 104 - 112).
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7. Acts of the Holy Council. T. 1. M. 1994, p. 43 - 44.
8. Russian clergy and the overthrow of the monarchy in 1917. M. 2008, p. 492 - 501, 503 - 511.
9. That is, the bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church.
10. Paraphrasing the Gospel words: [John. 19, 38].
11. Obviously, this refers to a set of measures adopted by the Synod in March 1917, which legitimized the overthrow of the monarchy.
12. State archive Russian Federation(GARF), f. 3431, op. 1, d. 318, l. 36 - 37 rev.
13. Ibid., l. 35.
14. Among the other 10 questions planned for discussion of the IV subsection, the following were: “On the reverent performance of divine services”, “On repentant discipline”, “On trampling on images of the cross”, “On trade in the temple”, “On the behavior of the laity in the temple” , “On the behavior of singers in the temple,” etc. (ibid., l. 1).
15. Ibid., l. 13.
16. Ibid., l. 33 - 34.
17. In the records of the IV subdivision, another letter (message) was preserved, similar in content and date to Nikonov’s letter, signed: “Patriots and zealots of Orthodoxy of the city of Nikolaev [Kherson province].” In this message, addressed to the Local Council, much was said about the need to restore Nicholas II to the throne, about the fact that the patriarchate “is good and very pleasant, but at the same time incompatible with the Christian spirit.” The authors developed their idea as follows: “For where the most holy patriarch is, there must be a most autocratic monarch. big ship need a helmsman. But the ship must also have a compass, because the helmsman cannot steer the ship without a compass. Likewise, a patriarch without a monarch will not establish anything on his own... Where a legal monarchy does not reign, lawless anarchy rages. This is where the Patriarchate will not help us." On the original message, at the top of the page, a resolution was written by an unidentified person: "To the department on church discipline. 1/XII.1917" (ibid., l. 20 - 22v). The letter ended up in the IV subsection, but was not mentioned in the transcripts of its meetings; it actually “went under the carpet”, like a dozen other similar letters from monarchists.
18. Ibid., l. 4 - 5.
19. Here and further it is emphasized in the source.
20. This refers to the Gospel account of the denial of the Apostle Peter, see: [Mark. 14, 66 - 72].
21. Paraphrasing the Gospel words: [Matt. 3, 8].
22. GARF, f. 3431, op. 1, d. 318, l. 41 - 42.
23. This refers to the words of the Holy Scripture: “Touch not My anointed” and “Who, raising his hand against the Lord’s anointed, will remain unpunished?” .
24. On March 6 - 8 and 18, the Synod issued a series of definitions, according to which at all services, instead of commemorating the “reigning” house, prayers should be offered for the “blessed Provisional Government” (Russian clergy and the overthrow of the monarchy, pp. 27 - 29, 33 - 35) .
25. GARF, f. 3431, op. 1, d. 318, l. 42 - 44, 54 - 55.
26. GARF, f. 601, op. 1, d. 2104, l. 4. See also: Church Gazette, 1917, N 9 - 15, p. 55 - 56.
27. Ibid., f. 3431, op. 1, d. 318, l. 47 rev.
28. During the 238 days of its existence, the Provisional Government changed four compositions: a homogeneous bourgeois government and three coalition ones.
29. GARF, f. 3431, op. 1, d. 318, l. 48.
30. Ibid., l. 45 - 49.
31. Obviously, this means the Synod and the Chief Prosecutor's Office.
32. GARF, f. 3431, op. 1, d. 318, l. 49 - 52 rev.
33. News of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of the Councils of Peasants, Workers, Soldiers and Cossack Deputies and the Moscow Council of Workers and Red Army Deputies, 30.VIII.1918, N 186(450); Collection of laws and orders of the workers' and peasants' government for 1918. M. 1942, No. 62, p. 849 - 858.
34. In those days, general meetings of the Local Council were not held (Acts of the Sacred Council. T. 8. M. 1999, p. 258; t. 10. M. 1999, pp. 254 - 255).
35. At the conciliar meetings in the last decades of March and July (Old Art.) 1918, from 164 to 279 people were present (of which 24 to 41 were in the rank of bishop) (Acts of the Holy Council. Vol. 8, 10; GARF , f. 3431, op. 1, d. 318).
36. These acts legitimized the overthrow of the monarchy, the revolution was actually declared “the accomplished will of God,” and prayers of this kind began to be offered in churches: “... prayers for the sake of the Mother of God! Help our faithful ruler, whom you have chosen to rule us, and victory for them grant against enemies" or: "All-sung Mother of God... save our blessed Provisional Government, which you commanded to rule, and grant him victory from heaven" (Church Gazette, 1917, No. 9 - 15, p. 59 and Free supplement to No. 9 - 15, p. 4, Free supplement to N 22, p. 2, Free supplement to N 22, p. 2).
37. Acts of the Holy Council. T. 5. M. 1996. Act 62, p. 354.
38. Investigative case of Patriarch Tikhon. Sat. documents. M. 2000, p. 789 - 790.
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I. Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church 1917–1918
The Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church, held in 1917-1918, coincided with the revolutionary process in Russia, with the establishment of a new state system. The Holy Synod and the Pre-Council Council were called to the Council in full, all the diocesan bishops, as well as two clergy and three laymen from the dioceses, the protopresbyters of the Assumption Cathedral and the military clergy, the governors of the four laurels and the abbots of the Solovetsky and Valaam monasteries, the Sarov and Optina Monasteries , representatives from monastics, co-religionists, military clergy, soldiers in the active army, from theological academies, the Academy of Sciences, universities, the State Council and the State Duma. Among the 564 members of the Council there were 80 bishops, 129 presbyters, 10 deacons, 26 psalm-readers, 20 monastics (archimandrites, abbots and hieromonks) and 299 laity. Representatives of the same-faith Orthodox Churches took part in the actions of the Council: Bishop Nicodemus (from the Romanian) and Archimandrite Michael (from the Serbian).
The wide representation of elders and laity at the Council was due to the fact that it was the fulfillment of the two-century aspirations of the Orthodox Russian people, their aspirations for the revival of conciliarity. But the Charter of the Council provided for the special responsibility of the episcopate for the fate of the Church. Questions of a dogmatic and canonical nature, after their consideration by the fullness of the Council, were subject to approval at a meeting of bishops.
The Local Council opened in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin on the day of its temple holiday - August 15 (28). The solemn liturgy was performed by Metropolitan Vladimir of Kiev, co-served by Metropolitans of Petrograd Benjamin and Metropolitans of Tiflis Platon.
After singing the Creed, the members of the Council venerated the relics of the Moscow saints and, presenting the Kremlin shrines, went to Red Square, where all Orthodox Moscow had already flocked in processions of the cross. A prayer service was held in the square.
The first meeting of the Council took place on August 16 (29) in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior after the liturgy celebrated here by Metropolitan Tikhon of Moscow. Greetings to the Council were announced all day long. Business meetings began on the third day of the Council in the Moscow Diocesan House. Opening the first working session of the Council, Metropolitan Vladimir said parting words: “We all wish the Council success, and there are reasons for this success. Here, at the Council, spiritual piety, Christian virtue and high learning are presented. But there is something that raises concerns. This is a lack of unanimity in us... Therefore, I will remind you of the Apostolic call to unanimity. The words of the Apostle “be like minded one another” have great meaning and apply to all peoples, to all times. Nowadays, dissent in our opinion is particularly strong; it has become the fundamental principle of life... Dissent in opinion is shaking the foundations of family life, schools, and under its influence many have left the Church... The Orthodox Church prays for unity and calls on us to confess the Lord with one mouth and one heart. Our Orthodox Church is built “on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, the cornerstone of Jesus Christ himself. This is the rock on which all waves will break."
The Council approved the Holy Metropolitan of Kyiv Vladimir as its Honorary Chairman. The Holy Metropolitan Tikhon was elected Chairman of the Council. A Council Council was formed, which included the Chairman of the Council and his deputies, Archbishops Arseny (Stadnitsky) of Novgorod and Anthony (Khrapovitsky) of Kharkov, Protopresbyters N.A. Lyubimov and G.I. Shavelsky, Prince E.N. Trubetskoy and Chairman of the State Council M V. Rodzianko, who was replaced in February 1918 by A. D. Samarin. V.P. Shein (later Archimandrite Sergius) was confirmed as the Secretary of the Council. Metropolitan Platon of Tiflis, Archpriest A.P. Rozhdestvensky and Professor P.P. Kudryavtsev were also elected members of the Council Council.
After the election and installation of the Patriarch, most of the cathedral meetings were presided over by His Grace Arseny of Novgorod, who was elevated to the rank of metropolitan. In the difficult task of leading conciliar actions, which often acquired a turbulent character, he showed both firm authority and wise flexibility.
The cathedral opened in the days when the Provisional Government was in its death throes, losing control not only over the country, but also over the collapsing army. Soldiers fled the front in droves, killing officers, causing riots and looting, and terrorizing civilians, while the Kaiser's troops moved rapidly into Russia. On August 24 (September 6), at the suggestion of the Protopresbyter of the Army and Navy, the Council appealed to the soldiers to come to their senses and continue to fulfill their military duty. “With mental pain, with grave sorrow,” the appeal said, “the Council looks at the most terrible thing that has recently grown in the entire life of the people and especially in the army, which has brought and still threatens to bring innumerable troubles to the Fatherland and the Church. In the heart of the Russian man, the bright image of Christ began to dim, the fire of the Orthodox faith began to go out, the desire for achievement in the name of Christ began to weaken... Impenetrable darkness enveloped the Russian land, and the great mighty Holy Rus' began to perish... Deceived by enemies and traitors, betrayal of duty and oath, murder our own brethren, who have sullied their high sacred rank of warrior with robberies and violence, we pray to you - come to your senses! Look into the depths of your soul, and your... conscience, the conscience of a Russian person, a Christian, a citizen, will perhaps tell you how far you have gone along the terrible, most criminal path, what gaping, incurable wounds you inflict on your Motherland.”
The Council formed 22 departments that prepared reports and draft definitions that were submitted to the meetings. The most important departments were the Statutory Department, the Higher Church Administration, the diocesan administration, the improvement of parishes, and the legal status of the Church in the state. Most departments were headed by bishops.
On October 11, 1917, the Chairman of the Department of the Supreme Church Administration, Bishop Mitrofan of Astrakhan, spoke at a plenary meeting with a report that opened the main event in the actions of the Council - the restoration of the Patriarchate. The Pre-Conciliar Council in its draft for the establishment of the Supreme Church Administration did not provide for the rank of Primate. At the opening of the Council, only a few of its members, mainly monastics, were convinced advocates for the restoration of the Patriarchate. Nevertheless, when the question of the First Bishop was raised in the department of the Supreme Church Administration, it met with widespread support. The idea of restoring the Patriarchate gained more and more adherents with each meeting of the department. At the 7th meeting, the department decides not to delay on this important issue and propose to the Council the restoration of the Primate See.
Justifying this proposal, Bishop Mitrofan recalled in his report that the Patriarchate became known in Rus' from the time of its Baptism, for in the first centuries of its history the Russian Church was under the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Constantinople. The abolition of the Patriarchate by Peter I was a violation of the holy canons. The Russian Church has lost its head. But the thought of the Patriarchate never ceased to glimmer in the minds of the Russian people as a “golden dream.” “In all the dangerous moments of Russian life,” said Bishop Mitrofan, “when the helm of the Church began to tilt, the thought of the Patriarch was resurrected with special force... Time imperatively demands feat, boldness, and the people want to see at the head of the life of the Church a living person who would gather the living popular forces." The 34th Apostolic Canon and the 9th Canon of the Council of Antioch imperatively demand that there be a First Bishop in every nation.
The issue of restoring the Patriarchate at the plenary sessions of the Council was discussed with extraordinary severity. The voices of the opponents of the Patriarchate, at first assertive and stubborn, sounded dissonant at the end of the discussion, violating the almost complete unanimity of the Council.
The main argument of those who supported the preservation of the synodal system was the fear that the establishment of the Patriarchate could fetter the conciliar principle in the life of the Church. Repeating the sophisms of Archbishop Feofan (Prokopovich), Prince A. G. Chaadaev spoke about the advantages of a “collegium”, which can combine various gifts and talents in contrast to individual power. “Conciliarity does not coexist with autocracy, autocracy is incompatible with conciliarity,” insisted Professor B.V. Titlinov, despite the indisputable historical fact: with the abolition of the Patriarchate, Local Councils ceased to be convened. Archpriest N.V. Tsvetkov put forward an ostensibly dogmatic argument against the Patriarchate: it, they say, forms a mediastinum between the believing people and Christ. V. G. Rubtsov spoke out against the Patriarchate because it is illiberal: “We need to be on par with the peoples of Europe... We will not return despotism, we will not repeat the 17th century, and the 20th century speaks of the fullness of conciliarity, so that the people do not cede their rights to some head " Here there is a replacement of church-canonical logic with a superficial political scheme.
In the speeches of supporters of the restoration of the Patriarchate, in addition to canonical principles, the history of the Church itself was cited as one of the most weighty arguments. In the speech of I. N. Speransky, a deep internal connection was shown between the existence of the Primate See and the spiritual face of pre-Petrine Rus': “While we had a supreme shepherd in Holy Rus'..., our Orthodox Church was the conscience of the state... The covenants of Christ were forgotten, and the Church in the person of the Patriarch boldly raised her voice, no matter who the violators were... In Moscow there is a reprisal against the archers. Patriarch Adrian is the last Russian Patriarch, weak, old..., takes upon himself the boldness... to “sorrow”, to intercede for the condemned.”
Many speakers spoke about the abolition of the Patriarchate as a disaster for the Church, but Archimandrite Hilarion (Troitsky) said this wiser than anyone: “Moscow is called the heart of Russia. But where does the Russian heart beat in Moscow? On the exchange? In shopping arcades? On Kuznetsky Most? It is fought, of course, in the Kremlin. But where in the Kremlin? In the District Court? Or in the soldiers' barracks? No, in the Assumption Cathedral. There, at the front right pillar, the Russian Orthodox heart should beat. The eagle of Peter the Great, based on the Western model of established autocracy, pecked out this Russian Orthodox heart, the sacrilegious hand of the wicked Peter brought the Russian High Hierarch from his centuries-old place in the Assumption Cathedral. The Local Council of the Russian Church with the power given to it by God will again place the Moscow Patriarch in his rightful inalienable place.”
The zealots of the Patriarchate recalled the state devastation experienced by the country under the Provisional Government, and the sad state of the people's religious consciousness. According to Archimandrite Matthew, “recent events indicate a distance from God not only of the intelligentsia, but also of the lower strata... and there is no influential force that would stop this phenomenon, no fear, no conscience, no first bishop at the head of the Russian people... Therefore, we immediately We must choose a spirit-bearing guardian of our conscience, our spiritual leader, the Most Holy Patriarch, after whom we will follow to Christ.”
During the council discussion, the idea of restoring the rank of First Hierarch was illuminated from all sides and appeared before the members of the Council as an imperative requirement of the canons, as the fulfillment of age-old popular aspirations, as a living need of the time.
On October 28 (November 10) the debate was terminated. The Local Council, by a majority vote, made a historic decision:
1. “In the Orthodox Russian Church, the highest power - legislative, administrative, judicial and supervisory - belongs to the Local Council, convened periodically, at certain times, consisting of bishops, clergy and laity.
2. The Patriarchate is restored, and church administration is headed by the Patriarch.
3. The Patriarch is the first among his equal bishops.
4. The Patriarch, together with the church governing bodies, is accountable to the Council.”
Based on historical precedents, the Council Council proposed a procedure for electing the Patriarch: during the first round of voting, the council members submit notes with the name of their proposed candidate for Patriarch. If one candidate receives an absolute majority of votes, he is considered elected. If none of the candidates receives more than half the votes, a repeat vote is held, in which notes are submitted with the names of the three proposed persons. The person who receives the majority of votes is considered to be elected as a candidate. The voting rounds are repeated until three candidates receive a majority of the votes. Then the Patriarch will be chosen by lot from among them.
On October 30 (November 12), 1917, a vote was held. Archbishop Anthony of Kharkov received 101 votes, Archbishop Kirill (Smirnov) of Tambov - 27, Metropolitan Tikhon of Moscow - 22, Archbishop Arseny of Novgorod - 14, Metropolitan of Kiev Vladimir, Archbishop Anastasy of Chisinau and Protopresbyter G. I. Shavelsky - 13 votes each, Archbishop Vladimirsky Sergiy (Stragorodsky) - 5, Archbishop Jacob of Kazan, Archimandrite Hilarion (Troitsky) and former Chief Prosecutor of the Synod A.D. Samarin - 3 votes each. Several more persons were proposed to the Patriarchate by one or two council members.
After four rounds of voting, the Council elected Archbishop Anthony of Kharkov, Archbishop Arseny of Novgorod and Metropolitan Tikhon of Moscow as candidates for the First Hierarchal Throne, as people said about him, “the smartest, the strictest and the kindest of the hierarchs of the Russian Church...” Archbishop Anthony, brilliantly An educated and talented church writer, he was a prominent church figure in the last two decades of the Synodal era. A longtime champion of the Patriarchate, he was supported by many at the Council as a fearless and experienced church leader.
Another candidate, Archbishop Arseny, an intelligent and powerful hierarch who had many years of church-administrative and state experience (formerly a member of the State Council), according to Metropolitan Evlogiy, “was horrified by the opportunity to become Patriarch and only prayed to God that “this cup should pass from him.” . And Saint Tikhon relied in everything on the will of God. Not striving for the Patriarchate, he was ready to take on this feat of the cross if the Lord called him.
The election took place on November 5 (18) in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. At the end of the Divine Liturgy and prayer singing, Hieromartyr Vladimir, Metropolitan of Kiev, brought the reliquary with lots to the pulpit, blessed the people with it and opened the seals. Alexy, the blind elder and schema-monk of Zosimova Hermitage, came out of the altar. After praying, he took the lot out of the reliquary and handed it to the metropolitan. The saint read loudly: “Tikhon, Metropolitan of Moscow - axios.”
The jubilant thousand-mouthed “axios” shook the huge, crowded temple. There were tears of joy in the eyes of those praying. Upon his dismissal, Protodeacon Rozov of the Assumption Cathedral, famous throughout Russia for his powerful bass voice, proclaimed many years: “To our Most Reverend Metropolitan Tikhon of Moscow and Kolomna, elected and named Patriarch of the God-saved city of Moscow and all Russia.”
On this day, Saint Tikhon celebrated the liturgy in the Trinity Metochion. The news of his election as Patriarch was brought to him by the embassy of the Council, headed by Metropolitans Vladimir, Benjamin and Plato. After the singing of many years, Metropolitan Tikhon said the word: “...Now I have spoken the words according to the order: “I thank and accept, and not at all contrary to the verb.”... But, judging by the person, I can say a lot contrary to my present election. Your news about my election to the Patriarchate is for me that scroll on which it was written: “Weeping, and groaning, and grief,” and such a scroll was supposed to be eaten by the prophet Ezekiel. How many tears and groans I will have to swallow in the Patriarchal service ahead of me, and especially in this difficult time! Like the ancient leader of the Jewish people, Moses, I will have to say to the Lord: “Why are You tormenting Your servant? And why have I not found mercy in Thy sight, that Thou hast laid upon me the burden of all this people? Did I carry all this people in my womb and did I give birth to him, that You say to me: Carry him in your arms, as a nanny carries a child. I I cannot bear all this people alone, because they are too heavy for me” (Num. 11:11-14). From now on, I am entrusted with the care of all the Russian churches and will have to die for them all the days. And whoever is happy with this, even the weakest! But God's will be done! I find confirmation in the fact that I did not seek this election, and it came apart from me and even apart from men, according to God’s lot.”
The enthronement of the Patriarch took place on November 21 (December 3) on the Feast of the Entry in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin. For the celebration of the ceremony, the staff of St. Peter, the cassock of the holy martyr Patriarch Hermogenes, as well as the mantle, miter and hood of Patriarch Nikon were taken from the Armory Chamber.
On November 29, at the Council, an extract from the “Definition” of the Holy Synod on the elevation to the rank of metropolitan of Archbishops Anthony of Kharkov, Arseny of Novgorod, Agafangel of Yaroslavl, Sergius of Vladimir and Jacob of Kazan was read out.
The restoration of the Patriarchate did not complete the transformation of the entire system of church government. The brief definition of November 4, 1917 was supplemented by other detailed “Definitions”: “On the rights and duties of His Holiness the Patriarch...”, “On the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council,” “On the range of affairs subject to the jurisdiction of the bodies of the Supreme Church Administration.” The Council granted the Patriarch the rights corresponding to canonical norms: to take care of the well-being of the Russian Church and represent it before the state authorities, to communicate with the autocephalous Churches, to address the all-Russian flock with teaching messages, to take care of the timely replacement of episcopal sees, to give fraternal advice to bishops. The Patriarch, according to the “Definitions” of the Council, is the diocesan bishop of the Patriarchal region, which consists of the Moscow diocese and stauropegic monasteries.
The Local Council formed two bodies of collegial government of the Church in the intervals between Councils: the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council. The competence of the Synod included matters of a hierarchical-pastoral, doctrinal, canonical and liturgical nature, and the jurisdiction of the Supreme Church Council included matters of church and public order: administrative, economic and school-educational. And finally, particularly important issues - about the protection of the rights of the Church, about preparations for the upcoming Council, about the opening of new dioceses - were subject to a joint decision of the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council.
The Synod included, in addition to its Chairman-Patriarch, 12 members: the Metropolitan of Kiev by cathedral, 6 bishops elected by the Council for three years, and five bishops summoned in turn for one year. Of the 15 members of the Supreme Church Council, headed, like the Synod, by the Patriarch, three bishops were delegated by the Synod, and one monk, five clergy from the white clergy and six laymen were elected by the Council. The elections of members of the highest bodies of church government took place at the last meetings of the first session of the Council before its dissolution for the Christmas holidays.
The Local Council elected to the Synod the Metropolitans of Novgorod Arseny, Kharkov Anthony, Vladimir Sergius, Tiflis Platon, Archbishops of Chisinau Anastasius (Gribanovsky) and Volyn Evlogy.
To the Supreme Church Council, the Council elected Archimandrite Vissarion, Protopresbyters G. I. Shavelsky and I. A. Lyubimov, Archpriests A. V. Sankovsky and A. M. Stanislavsky, Psalmist A. G. Kulyashov and laymen Prince E. N. Trubetskoy, professors S. N. Bulgakov, N. M. Gromoglasov, P. D. Lapin, as well as the former Minister of Confessions of the Provisional Government A. V. Kartashov and S. M. Raevsky. The Synod delegated Metropolitans Arseny, Agafangel and Archimandrite Anastasius to the Supreme Church Council. The Council also elected deputy members of the Synod and the Supreme Church Council.
On November 13 (26), the Council began discussing a report on the legal status of the Church in the state. On behalf of the Council, Professor S. N. Bulgakov drew up a Declaration on the relationship between the Church and the state, which preceded the “Definition on the legal status of the Church in the state.” In it, the demand for the complete separation of Church and state is compared with the wish “that the sun should not shine and the fire should not warm. The Church, according to the internal law of its existence, cannot refuse the calling to enlighten, to transform the entire life of humanity, to permeate it with its rays.” The idea of the high calling of the Church in state affairs lay at the basis of the legal consciousness of Byzantium. Ancient Rus' inherited from Byzantium the idea of a symphony of Church and state. The Kiev and Moscow powers were built on this foundation. At the same time, the Church did not associate itself with a specific form of government and always proceeded from the fact that the government should be Christian. “And now,” the document says, “when, by the will of Providence, the tsarist autocracy is collapsing in Russia, and new state forms are replacing it, the Orthodox Church has no definition of these forms in terms of their political expediency, but it invariably stands on this understanding of power , according to which all power must be a Christian service.” Measures of external coercion that violate the religious conscience of people of other faiths were recognized as incompatible with the dignity of the Church.
A heated dispute arose around the question of the compulsory Orthodoxy of the Head of State and the Minister of Confessions, which was assumed in the draft “Definition”. Council member Professor N.D. Kuznetsov made a reasonable remark: “In Russia, complete freedom of conscience has been proclaimed and it has been declared that the position of every citizen in the state... does not depend on belonging to one or another religion or even to religion in general... Count on success in this matter impossible". But this warning was not taken into account.
In its final form, the “Definition” of the Council reads: “1. The Orthodox Russian Church, forming part of the One Ecumenical Church of Christ, occupies a leading public legal position in the Russian state among other confessions, befitting it as the greatest shrine of the vast majority of the population and as the greatest historical force that created the Russian state.
2. The Orthodox Church in Russia is independent of state power in the teaching of faith and morals, worship, internal church discipline and relations with other autocephalous Churches...
3. Decrees and instructions issued for itself by the Orthodox Church, as well as acts of church administration and court, are recognized by the state as having legal force and significance, since they do not violate state laws...
4. State laws concerning the Orthodox Church are issued only by agreement with the church authorities...
7. The head of the Russian state, the minister of confessions and the minister of public education and their comrades must be Orthodox...
22. Property belonging to the institutions of the Orthodox Church is not subject to confiscation and confiscation...”
Some articles of the “Definitions” were anachronistic in nature, not corresponding to the constitutional foundations of the new state, the new state legal conditions, and could not be implemented. However, this “Definition” contains an indisputable provision that in matters of faith, in its internal life, the Church is independent of state power and is guided by its dogmatic teaching and canons.
The actions of the Council were also carried out during revolutionary times. On October 25 (November 7), the Provisional Government fell, and Soviet power was established in the country. On October 28, bloody battles broke out in Moscow between the cadets occupying the Kremlin and the rebels in whose hands the city was. Over Moscow there was the roar of cannons and the crackle of machine guns. They shot in courtyards, from attics, from windows; dead and wounded lay in the streets.
During these days, many members of the Council, having taken on the responsibility of nurses, walked around the city, picking up and bandaging the wounded. Among them were Archbishop of Tauride Dimitri (Prince Abashidze) and Bishop of Kamchatka Nestor (Anisimov). The Council, trying to stop the bloodshed, sent a delegation to negotiate with the Military Revolutionary Committee and the Kremlin commandant's office. The delegation was headed by Metropolitan Platon. At the headquarters of the Military Revolutionary Committee, Metropolitan Platon asked to end the siege of the Kremlin. To this I received the answer: “It’s too late, too late.” We weren't the ones who spoiled the truce. Tell the cadets to surrender." But the delegation was unable to penetrate the Kremlin.
“In these bloody days,” Metropolitan Eulogius later wrote, “a great change took place in the Council. Petty human passions subsided, hostile bickering fell silent, alienation was erased... The Council, which at first resembled a parliament, began to transform into a genuine “Church Council”, into an organic church whole, united by one will - for the good of the Church. The Spirit of God blew over the congregation, comforting everyone, reconciling everyone.” The Council addressed the warring parties with a call for reconciliation, with a plea for mercy for the vanquished: “In the name of God... The Council calls on our dear brothers and children fighting among themselves to now refrain from further terrible bloody warfare... The Council... begs the victors not to allow any acts of cruel revenge reprisals and in all cases spare the lives of the vanquished. In the name of saving the Kremlin and saving our dear shrines in it throughout Russia, the destruction and desecration of which the Russian people will never forgive anyone, the Holy Council begs not to expose the Kremlin to artillery fire.”
The appeal issued by the Council on November 17 (30) contains a call for general repentance: “Instead of the new social structure promised by the false teachers, there is a bloody strife among the builders; instead of peace and brotherhood of peoples, there is a confusion of languages and bitterness and hatred of brothers. People who have forgotten God, like hungry wolves, rush at each other. There is a general darkening of conscience and reason... Russian guns, hitting the Kremlin shrines, wounded the hearts of the people, burning with the Orthodox faith. Before our eyes, God’s judgment is being carried out on a people who have lost a shrine... To our misfortune, a truly people’s power worthy of receiving the blessing of the Orthodox Church has not yet been born. And she will not appear on Russian soil until we turn with sorrowful prayer and tearful repentance to the One without Whom those who build the city labor in vain.”
The tone of this message could not, of course, help to soften the then tense relations between the Church and the new Soviet state. And yet, on the whole, the Local Council managed to refrain from superficial assessments and speeches of a narrowly political nature, recognizing the relative importance of political phenomena in comparison with religious and moral values.
According to the memoirs of Metropolitan Eulogius, the highest point that the Council reached spiritually was the first appearance of the Patriarch at the Council after his enthronement: “With what reverent awe everyone greeted him!” Everyone - not excluding the “left” professors... When... the Patriarch entered, everyone knelt down... At those moments there were no longer the former members of the Council who disagreed with each other and were alien to each other, but there were saints, righteous people, covered in the Holy Spirit, ready to fulfill Him commands... And some of us on this day understood what the words really mean: “Today the grace of the Holy Spirit has gathered us together...”
The meetings of the Council were suspended for the Christmas holidays on December 9 (22), 1917, and on January 20, 1918, the second session opened, which continued until April 7 (20). They took place in the building of the Moscow Theological Seminary. The outbreak of civil war made travel around the country difficult; and on January 20, only 110 members of the Council were able to arrive at the Council meeting, which did not provide a quorum. Therefore, the Council was forced to adopt a special resolution: to hold meetings with any number of Council members present.
The main topic of the second session was the structure of diocesan administration. The discussion began even before the Christmas holidays with a report by Professor A.I. Pokrovsky. Serious controversy flared up around the provision that the bishop “governs the diocese with the conciliar assistance of the clergy and laity.” Amendments were proposed. The goal of some was to more sharply emphasize the power of the bishops - the successors of the apostles. Thus, Archbishop Kirill of Tambov proposed to include in the “Definition” words about the sole management of the bishop, carried out only with the help of diocesan governing bodies and the court, and Archbishop of Tver Seraphim (Chichagov) even spoke about the inadmissibility of involving lay people in the management of the diocese. However, amendments were also proposed that pursued opposite goals: to give clergy and laity broader rights in deciding diocesan affairs.
At the plenary meeting, an amendment by Professor I.M. Gromoglasov was adopted: to replace the formula “with the conciliar assistance of clergy and laity” with the words “in unity with the clergy and laity.” But the episcopal conference, protecting the canonical foundations of the church system, rejected this amendment, restoring in the final edition the formula proposed in the report: “The diocesan bishop, by succession of power from the holy apostles, is the Primate of the local Church, governing the diocese with the conciliar assistance of the clergy and laity.”
The Council established a 35-year age limit for candidates for bishops. According to the “Decree on Diocesan Administration,” bishops must be elected “from monastics or those not obliged by marriage to the white clergy and laity, and for both of them it is obligatory to wear the ryassophore if they do not take monastic vows.”
According to the “Definition,” the body through which the bishop governs the diocese is the diocesan assembly, elected from clergy and laity for a three-year term. Diocesan assemblies, in turn, form their own permanent executive bodies: the diocesan council and the diocesan court.
On April 2 (15), 1918, the Council adopted the “Decree on Vicar Bishops.” Its fundamental novelty was that it was supposed to allocate parts of the diocese under the jurisdiction of suffragan bishops and establish their residence in the cities by which they were titled. The publication of this “Definition” was dictated by the urgent need to increase the number of dioceses and was conceived as the first step in this direction.
The most extensive of the resolutions of the Council is the “Definition of the Orthodox Parish,” otherwise called the “Parish Charter.” In the introduction to the “Charter” a brief outline of the history of the parish in the ancient Church and in Russia is given. The basis of parish life should be the principle of service: “Under the leadership of successively God-appointed pastors, all parishioners, forming a single spiritual family in Christ, take an active part in the entire life of the parish, as best they can with their own strength and talent.” The “Charter” gives the definition of a parish: “A parish... is a society of Orthodox Christians, consisting of clergy and laity, residing in a certain area and united at a church, forming part of a diocese and being under the canonical administration of its diocesan bishop, under the leadership of an appointed priest-rector.” .
The Council declared the parish's sacred duty to take care of the improvement of its shrine - the temple. The “Charter” defines the composition of the nominal parish clergy: priest, deacon and psalm-reader. Its increase and reduction to two persons was left to the discretion of the diocesan bishop, who, according to the “Charter,” ordained and appointed clergy.
The “Charter” provided for the election by parishioners of church elders, who were entrusted with the acquisition, storage and use of church property. To resolve matters related to the maintenance of the temple, the provision of clergy and the election of parish officials, it was planned to convene a parish meeting at least twice a year, the permanent executive body of which was to be the parish council, consisting of clergy, the churchwarden or his assistant and several laymen - on the election of the parish meeting. The chairmanship of the parish meeting and the parish council was given to the rector of the church.
The discussion about unity of faith, a long-standing and complex issue burdened by long-standing misunderstandings and mutual suspicions, became extremely tense. The Department of Edinoverie and Old Believers failed to develop an agreed upon project. Therefore, two diametrically opposed reports were presented at the plenary meeting. The stumbling block was the question of the Edinoverie episcopate. One speaker, Bishop Seraphim (Alexandrov) of Chelyabinsk, spoke out against the ordination of bishops who were co-religionists, seeing in this a contradiction to the canon-based territorial principle of the administrative division of the Church and a threat to the separation of co-religionists from the Orthodox Church. Another speaker, Edinoverie Archpriest Simeon Shleev, proposed the establishment of independent Edinoverie dioceses; after sharp polemics, the Council came to a compromise decision on the establishment of five Edinoverie vicar departments, subordinate to diocesan bishops.
The second session of the Council took place when the country was engulfed in civil war. Among the Russian people who laid down their lives in this war were priests. On January 25 (February 7), 1918, Metropolitan Vladimir was killed by bandits in Kyiv. Having received this sad news, the Council issued a resolution which states:
"1. To establish the offering in churches during divine services of special petitions for those confessors and martyrs who are now persecuted for the Orthodox Faith and the Church and who have committed suicide...
2. Establish throughout Russia an annual prayerful commemoration on January 25 or the following Sunday (evening) ... of confessors and martyrs.”
At a closed meeting on January 25, 1918, the Council adopted an emergency resolution that “in the event of illness, death and other sad opportunities for the Patriarch, propose to him to elect several guardians of the Patriarchal Throne, who, in order of seniority, will guard the power of the Patriarch and succeed him.” At the second special closed meeting of the Council, the Patriarch reported that he had fulfilled this resolution. After the death of Patriarch Tikhon, it served as a saving means for preserving the canonical succession of the First Hierarchal ministry.
On April 5, 1918, shortly before dissolution for the Easter holidays, the Council of Archpastors of the Russian Orthodox Church adopted a resolution on the canonization of Saints Joseph of Astrakhan and Sophrony of Irkutsk.
* * *
The last, third, session of the Council lasted from June 19 (July 2) to September 7 (20), 1918. There, work continued on drawing up “Definitions” on the activities of the highest bodies of church government. The “Definition on the procedure for electing His Holiness the Patriarch” established an order that was basically similar to the one by which the Patriarch was elected at the Council. However, wider representation at the electoral Council of clergy and laity of the Moscow Diocese, for which the Patriarch is the diocesan bishop, was envisaged. In the event of the release of the Patriarchal Throne, the “Decree on the Locum Tenens of the Patriarchal Throne” provided for the immediate election of a Locum Tenens from among the members of the Synod combined by the presence of the Holy Synod and the Supreme Church Council.
One of the most important resolutions of the third session of the Council was the “Definition on Monasteries and Monastics,” developed in the relevant department under the chairmanship of Archbishop Seraphim of Tver. It sets the age limit for the tonsured person - not less than 25 years; To tonsure a novice at a younger age required the blessing of the diocesan bishop. The definition restored the ancient custom of electing abbots and vicars by the brethren so that the diocesan bishop, if approved, would present him for approval to the Holy Synod. The Local Council emphasized the advantage of community life over individual life and recommended that all monasteries, if possible, introduce community rules. The most important concern of the monastery authorities and brethren should be a strictly statutory service “without omissions and without replacing the reading of what is supposed to be sung, and accompanied by a word of edification.” The Council spoke about the desirability of having an elder or old woman in each monastery for the spiritual care of the inhabitants. All monastery residents were required to carry out labor obedience. The spiritual and educational service of monasteries to the world should be expressed in statutory services, clergy, eldership and preaching.
At the third session, the Council adopted two “Definitions” designed to protect the dignity of the priesthood. Based on the apostolic instructions on the height of sacred service and on the canons, the Council confirmed the inadmissibility of second marriage for widowed and divorced clergy. The second resolution confirmed the impossibility of reinstatement of persons deprived of their rank by sentences of spiritual courts, correct in essence and form. The strict observance of these “Definitions” by the Orthodox clergy, who strictly preserved the canonical foundations of the church system, in the 20s and 30s saved it from discredit to which the Renovationist groups were subjected, who trampled both the Orthodox law and the holy canons.
On August 13 (26), 1918, the Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church restored the celebration of the memory of all the saints who shone in the Russian land, timed to coincide with the second week after Pentecost.
At the final meeting on September 7 (20), 1918, the Council decided to convene the next Local Council in the spring of 1921.
Not all departments of the Council carried out conciliar acts with equal success. Having been sitting for more than a year, the Council did not exhaust its program: some departments did not have time to develop and submit agreed reports to the plenary sessions. A number of “Definitions” of the Council could not be implemented due to the socio-political situation that developed in the country.
In resolving issues of church construction, organizing the entire life of the Russian Church in unprecedented historical conditions on the basis of strict fidelity to the dogmatic and moral teaching of the Savior, the Council stood on the basis of canonical truth.
The political structures of the Russian Empire collapsed, the Provisional Government turned out to be an ephemeral formation, and the Church of Christ, guided by the grace of the Holy Spirit, preserved its God-created system in this turning point in history. At the Council, which became an act of its self-determination in new historical conditions, the Church was able to cleanse itself of everything superficial, correct the deformations that it suffered during the synodal era, and thereby revealed its unworldly nature.
The Local Council was an event of epochal significance. Having abolished the canonically flawed and completely outdated synodal system of church government and restored the Patriarchate, he drew a line between two periods of Russian church history. The “Definitions” of the Council served the Russian Church on its arduous path as a firm support and an unmistakable spiritual guide in solving the extremely difficult problems that life presented in abundance to it.
Meyendorff Ioann Feofilovich
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