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BIRKBECK AND THE
RUSSIAN CHURCH
Published for the Anglican
and Eastern Association,
which alone is resþonsible
(or the contents.
\.
,
p} rrJ JzN
w.
U 111" J
BIRKBECK AND THE
RUSSIAN CHURCH
CONTAINING
Essays and Articles by the late
W. y. Birkbeck, M.A., P.S.A.)
written in the years I 888- I 9 I 5
(Being a continuation of Russia and the English Church,
V 01. I)
COLLECTED AND EDITED BY HIS FRIEND
ATHELSTAN RILEY, M.A.
,
SEIGNEUR DE LA TRINITE
Published for THE ANGLICAN AND EASTERN
As SOCIATION by the SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING
CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE . 68 HAYMARKET
LONDON . S. w.
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
19 1 7
To 1IY SON
CHRISTOPHER J. M. RILEY, M.C.
CAPTAIN, COLDSTREA1\I GUARDS,
THESE LITERARY RE1\IAINS OF
HIS GODFATHER
ARE DEDICATED IN GRATEFUL RE1\IEMBRA.NCE
OF LOOS, 28 SEPTEMBER, 1915.
"Nomen inane, puer, ne ducas grande memento
Semper onus Christum pectore ferre tuo."-W. J. B.
PREF ACE.
IN 1895 the following work was published under the
auspices of the Eastern Church Association,l Russia and the
English Ohurch during the Last Fifty Years, Vol. I, con-
taining a Correspondence between lrl r. William Palmer,
Fellow of lJIagdalen College, Oxford, and M. Khomiakoff,in
the years 1844-54, edited by W. J. Birkbeck, M.A., F.B.A.,
Magdalen College, Oxford. This book consisted of a corres-
pondence between the Rev. William Palmer,2 an Anglican
divine, and Alexis Stepanovich Khomiakoff: a Russian layman
and a theologian of the first rank, with a valuable introduc-
tion and notes by the Editor. Noone desirous of becoming
acquainted with the teaching and spirit of the Eastern Church
can afford to neglect this book, and it is hardly too much to
say that no Anglican will read it without taking his bearings
afresh, dissipating certain prejudices, and gaining a wider
view of Christianity as a whole. The last chapter in the book
contains Khomiakoff's Essay on the Unity of the Church, a
treatise which for clarity and profundity of thought in a
1 Now the Anglican and Eastern Association.
2 The U Cursing Deacon ". He acquired this strange soubriqf..l.8t during a
war _of theological pamphlets at Oxford, from the publication of certain open
letters to opponents containing anatheILss of Protestant statements. He was
a remarkable member of a remarkable family, being brother to Lord Chancel10r
Selborne and reckoned, the latter once told me, as the ablest of them all. He
wrote several theological books but never proceeded beyond the diaconate.
He finally joined the Roman Church whIlst holding the Eastern opinion
on the Filioq'lle (see Russia and the English Ohurch, p.186) and died in Rome
in 1879.
v
VI
PREFACE
small compass challenges comparison with any theological
essay of Western provenance in modern times.
Birkbeck originally intended to produce V 01. II, but as time
went on the intention seenled to fade. " I shall never write it,"
he used to say, and I do not know that he had even decided
on its scope. Now that he has passed away his friends have
no doubt that the collected essays on Russia and the Russian
Church of the man who devoted his life to the cause of unity
should form the second volume of Russia and the English
Ohurch. Birkbeck did more than anyone has ever done to
bring the two Churches together; what he did he - did wisely
and with infinite patience, and his writings, with a fe\v con-
necting and explanatory notes, form the best history of these
ecclesiastical relations down to the beginning of the Great
War.
About my ùear and intimate friend I will say but little
here, for his Letters and
lemoirs are now being prepared for
the press. We were boys together at Eton, fellow-under-
graduates at Oxford, and companions through life. For over
forty years we were united in the closest bond, that of faith;
for more than thirty we thought together and acted to-
gether in every phase of storm and stress which overtook
the Church of England during that period; together we tried
to serve her whether in times of difficulty or in times of tran-
quillity. He had all the instincts of the scholar, but "as saved
from anything approaching academic narrowness from the
breadth of view which comes from mixing with the world,
and, above all, from travel in many lands. On the death of
his father he succeeded to a considerable fortune and thence-
forward spent his time between his beautiful hOlne at Stratton
Strawless, Norfolk, 1 and his beloved Russia, where "I van
1 He had married in 1883 Miss Rose Gurney, by whom he had two sons
and a. daughter.
PRE.F.A.CE
VB
Vassilievich "1 was welcomed by his innumerable friends,
amongst whom he ,vas privileged to include the Emperor and
some of the men1bers of the Imperial family.
His readino- was as wide as his travels. He owed much to
b
the Oxford History School, in which he had taken honours.
He was well acquainted \vith the chief Latin and Greek
authors, and used them freely in his writings and conversation
to illustrate his lneaning. He spoke French, Russian, and
German with accuracy. He could read S\vedish, Danish, and
Italian, and even converse in those languages vlith tolerable
facility. Besides, he kne\v Old Slavonic, the language of the
Russian Church, and his interest in Iceland, ,vhere he had
travelled as a young luan, had led hin1 to acquire some kno"
-
ledge of Icelandic. He ,vas an accomplished n1usician, a per-
former on the organ, piano, and violoncello. 2 His melllory ,vas
so retentive that on one occasion he set himself the task of
reproducing the parts of a Beethoven quartet and successfully
accomplished it in a night. He was an enthusiastic student
of plainsong and edited that portion of the English H Y1nnal.
His lecture on Russian ecclesiastical music and notation before
the London
rusical Association was a remarkable exall1ple of
his power to grasp a recondite and difficult theme. He knew
a great deal about liturgical subjects, ,vas familiar with the
Saruln service-books, and could order to the smallest detail the
ceremonies of a High l\Iass. He was an accurate and cautious
theologian whom no opponent could afford to play ,vith. His
judgment was rarely, if ever, at fault, and his opinions on
men and affairs were expressed in racy and delightful lan-
guage. He could not endure folly, especially in matters of
1" John, the son of Basil," the nearest Russian equivalent to "John, the
son of \Villiam ". Birkbeck used his second Christian name; his father was
:Mr. \Villiam Birkbeck.
2 It is curious that he was incapable of singing, or even humming the
simplest melody, and though he wrote admirably, he could not deliver a
speech.
VIll
PREFACE
religion, and clerical fools, whether episcopal or presbyteral,
received scant. respect from him. He was on friendly terms
with the most distinguished prelates, and he ended by winning
their respect and then their confidence before he died. He
shared Queen Elizabeth's dislike for bishops' wives, and re-
garded their presence in episcopal palaces as not only offending
against Christian sentiment and Catholic order but as prac-
tically harmful to diocesan administration; but fron1 his
habitual courtesy and the gentleman's disinclination to make
others uncomfortable it is very doubtful whether his attitude
was often discovered. Three things he regarded as specially
lacking in the Church of England and upon these he \vas
perpetually insisting - the doctrine of the Communion of
Saints as necessary to a right conception of the Church,
the doctrine of icons, as focussed in the dogmatic decree
of the Seventh General Council (he had studied the icono-
clastic controversy and had got to the real issues which lay
beneath it), and lastly, devotion to the l\lother of God as the
great bulwark of the true faith in our Lord's Personality.
On these questions he set himself to convert the High Church
party, still largely dominated bJ7 Post-Reformation prejudices,
and he certainly lived to see the impression he had made. He
never disguised from himself the weakness of the Church of
England; he faced her difficulties resoìutely. He knew the
Roman, the Eastern,l and the Anglican Communions equally
well; he was at his ease in a Benedictine monastery or at the
Vatican 2 just as amongst Oriental dignitaries in a Russian
lavra,o but the Anglican Communion was his spiritual home,
he "'"as throughout ,life a devout recipient of her sacraments,
and attendant on her ministrations and to her service he
consecrated all his singular talents. Only once had he any
temptation to leave the Church of England, at Oxford, when he
first went up from Eton, but the glamour of Rome soon passed
1 Except the Greek portion.
2 He had a private audience with Pope Leo XIII in 1895.
PREFACE
IX
away never to return. He was persuaded that the modern
papal claims and system were dangerous exaggerations and
historically and theologically untenable, whilst the Eastern
position, fairly stated, would stand. The Papacy had made
the Reformation inevitable; Protestantism was hatched fro
the egg that Rome had laid. The Church of England had
esca ped " by the skin of her teeth " from the awful shock of
the sixteenth century; marred and scarred, her sacraments
and her ministry were still valid and though she was full of
abuses he saw no reason why these should not in time be
purged away. "From Eastern premisses," he would say, "I
can prove Rome wrong, but I cannot prove Canterbury
right." He insisted that the hopes of the Church of Eng..
land lay in a gradual approximation to the Eastern Church
and eventual union with it as the guardian of true Catholic
tradition, whilst she kept her occidental and national customs
as being necessary to us as Westerns in thought and character,
and as members of the Ecclesia Anglicana whose noble birth
.and history we cannot afford to forget. Tha t was his life's
dream and to it he consecrated his life's work.
I last saw my friend at the Athenæum Club in
Iarch,
1916. I heard he had been in cOffilnunication with high
officers of state in England, and there \vere rumours that he
was going to see important personages in Russia on matters
connected with the Great 'Var. He told me that he was
starting the next day, crossing the North Sea to Bergen,
and travelling thence to Petrograd by way of Sweden. I
asked why he was going to Russia. "Oh!" he replied, "I
think I should like to spend Easter at :ThIoscow." We parted
to meet no more in this world. He reached Stratton Straw-
less from Russia just after Ascension Day, made his last com-
muni on with the members of his family in his parish church on
the Sunday, and, being seized with a sudden illness, died on
June 9, at the comparatively early age of 57, a few days after
his return.
TABLE OF CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
THE NINE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE CONVERSION OF RUSSIA.
CHAPTER II.
THE RUSSIAN CHURCH IN THE DIOCESE OF ARCHANGEL
CHAPTER III.
THE RUSSIAN CHURCH IN THE DIOCESE OF ARCHANGEL-(Continued) .
CHAPTER IV.
THE BALTIC PROVINCES OF RUSSIA
CHAPTER V.
THE SLAVONIC LANG CAGE IN THE RUSSIAN CHURCH SERVICES
CHAPTER VI.
THE PROSPECT OF REUNION WITH EASTERN CHRISTENDOM IN SPECIAL
RELATION TO THE RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH
CHAPTER VII.
THE PROSPECT OF REUNION WITH EASTERN CHRISTENDOM IN SPECIAL
RELATION TO THE RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH-(Continued)
CHAPTER VIII.
THE CORONATION OF THE TSAR
CHAPTER IX.
THE VISIT OF THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK TO RUSSIA
CHAPTER X.
THE VISIT OF THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK TO RUSsIA-(contin.ued)
_ CHAPTER XI.
THE VISIT OF THE ARCHBISHOP OF YORK TO RUSSIA-(continued)
CHAPTER XII.
THE VISIT OF THE ARCHBISHOP OF FINLAND.
CHAPTER XIII.
VLADIMIR NA KLJASMJE .
CHAPTER XIV.
SOME NOTES UPON THE
IO:8KS AND
IONASTERIES OF RUSSIA
Xl
PAGE
1
17
31
51
60
70
87 ·
99
. 107
. 126
. 144
. 155
. 165
. 177
xu
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER XV.
PAGE
. 194
RUSSIAN THEOLOGY .
CHAPTER XVI.
RUSSIAN :MISSIONS TO THE )IOHAM1\IEDANS
. 206
CHAPTER XVII.
THE IDEA OF A NATIONAL CHURCH.
. 218
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE ATTITUDE OF THE ORTHODOX EASTERN CHURCH TOWARDS CERTAIN
CONTROVERSIES AMONGST US IN THE \V EST . 226
CHAPTER XIX.
THE FULHAM CONFERENCE ON THE DOCTRINE OF THE EUCHARIST 241
CHAPTER XX.
THE EPISTLE OF THE HOLY SYNOD OF RUSSIA TO THE PATRIARCH OF
CONSTANTINOPLE ON THE ATTITUDE OF THE ORTHODOX CHURCHES TO
NON-ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS . 247
CHAPTER XXI.
THE EPISTLE OF THE HOLY SYNOD OF RUSSIA TO THE PATRIARCH OF
CONSTANTINOPLE-(Continued) . 258
CHAPTER XXII.
THE PRESENT CONDITIONS OF RELIGIOUS LIFE IN RUSSIA
. 268
CHAPTER XXIII.
POSSIBILITIES OF INTERCOMMUNION WITH THE HOLY ORTHODOX
EASTERN CHURCH . 275
CHAPTER XXIV.
RUSSIAN ICONS AND THEIR USE IN THE RUSSIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH . 292
CHAPTER XXV.
A VISIT TO GALICIA.
. 305
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE CENTENARY OF BORODINO
. 323
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE DOCTRINE OF THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
. 332
CHAPTER XXVIII.
THE DOCTRINE OF THE RUSSIAN CHURCH-(Continued) .
. 343
POSTSCRIPT
. 357
INDEX
. 365
CHAprrER I.
THE NINE HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE CONVERSION
OF RUSSIA.
EARLY in 1888 ,ve received private letters from
lr.
Arthur Hardinge,l then Second Secretary at the
British Embassy in Petrograd, who was an old Eton
and Oxford friend of ours, and had travelled in Ice-
land and else,vhere with Birkbeck. These letters
told of the approaching religious commemoration at
I{ieff (
Ir. Hardinge had follo\ved the events which
led to the founding of the Archbishop's Assyrian
Iission to the X estorians in Persia and Kurdistan 2
and was then engaged in a study of the ecclesiastical
side of Russia, though from a political and diplo-
matic, rather than from the religious point of vie\v.)
F"fhis intelligence I gave to ___t\.rchbishop Bensoll.
-\.fter careful consideration the Archbishop resolved
to take the opportunity of opening con11nunications
,vith the Russian Church and ,ve drafted a formal
letter ,vhich took the following shape. I do not think
tbat -Birkbeck was consulted at thi
stage as he had
then no kno\vledge of the Eastern Church and its
prelates and had only visited Russia casually in 1882.
1 Fellow of All Souls. Now Sir Arthur Hardinge, P.C., R.C.B., G.C.
I.G.,
H.B.M. Ambassador at :\Iadrid.
2 I had been to these countries on behalf of the Ar
hbishop in 18S4 and
1886.
1
2 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
Edward, by Divine Providence ArchbisholJ of Canterbury,
Primate of All England, and Afetropolitan, to our
Brother, Greatly Beloved in the Faith and Worship of
the All-Holy and Undivided Trinity, Platon, by Divine
Provide'nce the Jfost Reverend lrfetropolitan of Kieff
and Galicia, Greeting in the Lord.
"Intelligence having reached us of the approaching festival
at the city of Kietf the Great, we, remembering the command-
ment of the Blessed Apostle, XaíPEtV flÆTà XatPÓVTWV, em-
brace this opportunity of communicating to your Grace, and
through your Grace to the Bishops and clergy and laity of the
Church of Russia, our most sincere sympathy and good-wilL
Great festivals are commonly either religious or national.
This celebration which you are holding is, indeed, in the first
place, religious; but it is also national in the highest way.
It is a thankful recognition before God of the sacred fact that
Russia owes all that she has yet attained of po,ver and dignity
amongst the nations of Christendom, not merely to the saga-
city of her rulers and the inborn strength of her people. You
offer your thanksgiving to God because your branch of the
Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, which you reverently
link with the name of the Apostle St. Andrew, has been co-
extensive ,vith your nation, and because the Christian Faith,
through the agency of the illustrious St. Vladimir, whose con-
version you now commemorate, has illuminated your people
through nine long centuries of history.
It was our original hope and purpose to have sent a Bishop
to Kieff to represent the Church of England at your festival,
and we were only prevented from carrying out our design by
the events of the present month. During the whole month of
July there is assembled in London under our presidency the
Universal Episcopate of the Anglican Church. That is to say,
not only the Bishops of the Church of England itself, but all
the Archbishops, :r.fetropolitans and Bishops of the Church of
Ireland, Scotland and America, as well as the Bishops of India,
and of the British Colonies, with many l\lissionary Bishops and
THE I{IEF]j' FESTIVAL
3
other Bishops who are in comlnunion ,vith us. One hundred
and forty of these are now asseffi bled here with us. This
Conference meets once only in ten years, and its assemblies
are of great importance to our Communion.
'Ve find, therefore, that it would not be fitting for one of
their number, who are assembled from all parts of the world,
to quit this solemn gathering during its session. Thus we
are, much to our regret and disappointment, compelled to
abandon our intention, and to convey by the present letter
our humble and fraternal congratulations to your Grace, and
to the Church in ,vhich you worthily bear rule. Our beloved
brethren will rejoice in the announcement that we have
communicated to you the felicitations and congratulations
and the assurance of prayer on behalf of your rejoicing
multitude, in which \ve know that all ,vill be of one heart
.and of one souL
The Russian and the Anglican Churches have common
foes. Alike we have to guard our independence against that
Papal aggressiveness which claims to subordinate all the
Churches of Christ to the See of Rome. Alike we have to
protect our flocks from new and strange doctrines, ad verse to
that Holy Faith which was handed down to us by the Holy
Apostles and Ancient Fathers of the Catholic Church. But
the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, and by mutual
sympathy that we may be one Èv Toî
ðE(]P,oî
TOÛ EùaryryEÀLoV,
we shall encourage each other, and promote the salvation of
.all men.
Praying, therefore, earnestly in the Spirit for the unity
of all men in the Faith of the Gospel, laid down and ex-
pounded by the <:Ecumenical Councils of the Undivided Church
.of Christ, and in the living kno"T ledge of the Son of God, we
ever remain your Grace's most t",ithful and devoted Servant
.and Brother in the Lord.
(Signed)
ED\v. CANTUAR.
Given at our Palace of Lambeth in London, and sealed
with our Archiepiscopal Seal on the 'Vestern Fourteenth day
4 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
of July, in the year of our Salvation, one thousand, eight
hundred and eighty-eight."
Before the draft was finally settled the question
had arisen as to how the letter should be conveyed
to Russia and by ,vhom it should be presented. A
Lambeth Conference ,vas then sitting and at first it
was proposed to send Bishop Smythies, of Zanzibar,
and that I should accompany him. This, for some
reason, was found impossible. Next, Bishop Hale, of
Cairo, U.S.A., ,vho was deeply interested in Oriental
Christendom, ,vas proposed, and I have preserved a
memoranduIl1 from the Archbishop to the Foreign
Office on the subject of sending an American instead
of an English prelate, for by that time the dé171a1-che
had assumed an official character. This proposal also
fell to the ground, and it was finally resolved to send
the letter through the British Embassy at Petrograd
and to deliver it by the hands of 1\11'. Hardinge and of
Birkbeck, ,vho ,vent to Russia for that purpose. The
latter no,v tells the tale in a. series of letters ,vhich
appeared originallydl1 the Guardian.
VIEN
A, A ug1.tst 12.
On the evening of July 14 the churches of Kieff \vere all
cro\\.ded for first Vespers of the next day's festival. It would
take too long to describe in detail these services, several of
\vhich, under the kind guidance of
l. Pùbiedonostzeff, l and of
his assistant,
l. Sabler, I attenJed; but I must n1ake an ex-
ception in the case of the in1pressive ceremony by \vhich Ves-
pel's at the Church of St. Andre\v was concluded. This church
stands on a platfol'lI1 surrounded by a stone balustrade, raised
1 Constantine Pobiedonostzeff, Chief Procurator, Le. the Emperor's repre-
sentative, at the Holy Synod. He had been tutor to the Emperor Alexander
III and was at this time the most influential man in Russia. Ee died in
1907.-[A.R.]
THE I
IEFF FESTIV
\L
5
high above the upper to,vn, and approached from it on the
west by a lofty flight of steps, while on the east it overhangs
the steep slope (I nlay ahnost say cliff) down to the lower town
several hundred feet below. It is built on the spot where St.
Andre,,,, is saiLl to have once preached; and there is a tradition
that in the time of St. Vladimir, a cross, ,vhich the Apostle had
left, ,vas found here. Towards the conclusion of Vespers, after
the reading of the Old Testament lections, a procession was
forn1ed, ,vhich left the church by the west door, and passing
rounel the stone platforn1, Inade a station at each of the four
ends of the church, which is built in the forln of a Greek cross.
\Y ords cannot describe the beauty of the scene-the officiant
surrounded by the other clergy, amidst numerous burning
tapers and clouds of fragrant incense, raising the Cross on
high, and blessing the people at each of these stations, and the
choir Inean,vhile chanting various anthen1s and psalms and the
Kyrie Eleiso1l J" ,vhile below, lit up by the rays of the setting
sun, ,vere an the gold and coloured domes of the óther churches
of the city, and the broad stream of the Dnieper winding its
,yay for nliles over the plain; and in the streets and windows
of the houses near the church were to be seen dense cro,vds of
,vorshippers, who testified to their devotion by repeatedly bow-
ing and crossing thelnselves, and, ,vhen near enough, joining
in the singing of the choir. The service concludeJ by the
singing of Nunc Dirnittis in front of the west entrance, this
canticle occupying in the Eastern Church (as formerly in the
\Vest) the position assigned to l1Iagnificat in the ROlnan Ves-
pel's, and the latter being still sung at
Iattins.
As soon as this service was over we drove to the Lavra,
a great lllonastery of Kieff, ,yhich contains altogether rather
over 1,000 monks. Here 'T espers ,vere already over, and l\Iat-
tins, ,vhich on great feasts is sung inllnediately after '"1" espers,
instead of at the ordinary hour of t,vo o'clock in the night
(not, be it ob
erved, from Illotives of laziness, but in order to
allow the poor to attend, who, in this country, assist at the
choir offices in great numbers) ,vas just beginning. It "
as
with the greatest difficulty that ,ve made our ,yay into the
6 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
church, for not only the building itself, but the court in which
it stands, was filled with a dense crowd of pilgrims from every
part of the empire; and had it not been for the good offices of
M. Pobiedonostzeff and 1\1. Sabler, I should never have been
able to have got inside the building. This service was more
particularly interesting to me, because in the monasteries the
ancient Slavonic music is still in use, whereas it has almost
disappeared in the cathedrals and parish churches of Russia.
It ,vas impossible, on account of the length of the service
(more than five hours), and the extreme heat, to remain to the
end, and at about half-past ten ,ve left the church.
The monastery court in the moonlight presented a most
impressive spectacle. In every part of the vast space there
were dense masses of pilgrinls who were unable to :find room
in the church, some joining in the service from outside, others
lying all about on the pavement and grass, taking their night's
rest.
Iany of these pilgrims had come from Siberia, and even
from the shores of the Pacific, the whole way on foot, to pass
a fortnight at this great centre of Russian Christianity, and
when one comes to consider that it is quite a common thing
for there to be 200,000 pilgrims in the year at this lnonastery
alone, one begins to have some faint notion of the hold ,vhich
the Orthodox Church has upon the Russian people.
The follo,ving day-the day of the festival-the town at
an early hour presented a most animated appearance. The
streets, which were brilliantly decorated ,vith flags, were
crowded with people, all in holiday array, and all the bells of
the numerous churches were ringing. I made my way to the
Church of St. Sophia at 8 o'clock, the hour at which the
liturgy was to be celebrated; and was kindly given a place
by
I. Pobiedonostzeff in the procession of clergy and laity
which met the
Ietropolitan Platon who was to pontificate on
this great occasion at the entrance to the cathedral precinct,
and conducted him to his throne in the nave under the great
central dome of the church) ,vhere he was solemnly vested in
his pontifical robes by the attendant Bishops and clergy, and
then conducted to the sanctuary, to begin the liturgy. It is
rrHE KIEFF FESTIV.A.L
7
impossible adequately to describe the grandeur of the service.
St. Sophia, though small as compared to most of our Western
cathedrals is one of the most beautiful churches in Russia,
,
and was built in the 11th century in imitation of its more
fanlous namesake at Constantinople. There is a great deal of
beautiful ancient mosaic work, including a superb figure of
the
lother of God in the great centra] apse, and the icono-
stasis covered with venerable icons, each adorned by almost
priceless silver and gold work, and studded with innumerable
gems, yields to none which I have yet seen in richness and
beauty; and, what with the unrivalled splendour of the
liturgy of St. Chrysostom, the number of the ecclesiastics in
their gorgeous cloth of gold vestInents, the innumerable tapers
burning round the altar or before the various pictures and
shrines, the incense, the solemn chanting of the clergy in the
sanctuary and the excellent singing of the unaccompanied
choir, and the brilliant uniforms worn by many of the assem-
bled congregation, it is impossible to imagine a more solenln
or impressive function.
The liturgy being ended, the ltfetropolitan 1tfichael of Ser-
via 1 took the place of the Metropolitan Platon, whose extreme
age prevented him from undergoing any further fatigue, and
the procession started from the cathedral to the Dnieper. The
road lay for nearly two miles through some of the principal
streets of the town, which were lined all the way \vith troops
who often had the greatest difficulty in preventing the throng-
ing crO"\vJ from breaking through the line, so anxious ,vere
they to accompany the procession and assist at the solemn
benediction of the ,vaters, where just nine centuries ago their
forefathers had received the grace of baptism. Words cannot
describe the splendour of the scene, as between lines of troops,
and to the solemn strains of several military bands stationed
at intervals along the line, the procession made its way down
the winding road which leads from the upper town to the
1 I met this prelate at :Mount Athos in 1883, when he had been dispos-
sessed of his see by King :Milan. He returned to Servia and to his see (to
which he had been appointed in 1859) and died, after a.n eventful life, in 1898.
He had been educated in the University of Kieff.-[A.R.]
8 13IRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
river; the rich vestments and jewelled mitres of Bishops and
Archimandrites glittering in the rays of the midday sun amidst
the lllagnificent silver-gilt banners, which had been presented
on the occasion by various Russian to,vnships. N or will it be
easy soon to forget the enthusiasm of the crowd, which liter-
ally covered the green slopes of the hill wherever it was pos-
sible to get a glimpse of the procession as it passed; it was
plain that they had COlne together not for the sake of witness-
ing a pageant, or frolll motives of curiosity, but in order re-
ligiously to take part in the rejoicings on the occasion of this
great festival of their Church and Nation. After the proces-
sion followed a great banquet, given by the l\fayor of Kieff.
As I have already occupied too n1uch of your valuable space,
I will not describe the various speeches, except to Inention that
few of the toasts were lllore enthusiastically received than
when his Excellency the Proctor of the Holy Synod rose to
propose the health of the Archbishop of Canterbury. The
toast was received \vith a storm of applause, and after it was
drunk the Metropolitan again assured me, as an Englishn1an,
of the pleasure and gratification that His Grace's letter had
given him, and how his expressions of sYlllpathy would be ap-
preciated throughout the Russian Church. It will be the wish
of every earnest ChurchIll an that this friendly exchange of
courtesy between the principal representatives of the Russian
and English Churches may be the forerunner of still closer
relations between the two great national con11nunions in time
to come.
CRACOW, August 5.
July 15 (O.S.), 1888, will be a day for ever men10rable in
Russia, on account of the celebration at Kieff of the 900th
anniversary of the conversion of the nation to Christianity.
On that day, 900 years ago, the subjects of St. VladÏ1nir were
baptised in the waters of the Dnieper, and thus the foundations
were laid of that great Church which now extends its juris-
diction from the Arctic Ocean to the Black Sea, and from the
shores of the Baltic to the easternlllost point of Asia. It is
not, however, only on account of the fact that from this small
THE I{IEFF FESTIVAL
9
"beginning a National Church now containing some 70,000,000
-of souls, and likely at no distant future to contain double this
nU1l1ber, has grown, that this festival ought to evoke feelings
of interest and sympathy alnongst English Churchmen, but
.also on account of the letter which the Archbishop of Canter-
bury ,vrote to the 1\Ietropolitan of Kiefl
congratulating him
.and the Russian Church on the occasion. I think, therefore,
that some of your readers may like to see a description of the
principal features of the celebration by an eye-,vitness, who,
thanks to the kindness of 1\1. Pobiedonostzefl', the Proctor of
the Holy Synod, and his assistant, ltf. Sabler, was given the
,best opportunities of seeing and hearing all the various cere-
.monies and speeches of the occasion.
I will begin by describing the delivery of the various
.addresses of congratulation ,vhich took place on Thursday,
the day before the festival itself, in the great hall of the Theo-
logical Academy, which is one of the three principal centres of
ecclesiastical learning in Russia, which are attached to each of
the three lavras or principal monasteries of the Russian
. Church. The hall, the walls of ,vhich are covered with por..
-.traits of various eminent men educated in the Academy,
an10ngst "\vhich the white head-dress and veil peculiar to the
.rank of
Ietropolitan is of frequent occurrence, ,vas cro\vded
by those who had been fortunate enough to obtain tickets;
.and, what with the uniforms of the various officers and func-
tionaries, and the picturesque robes of the nUlnerous Bishops
and other ecclesiastics, presented a most striking and brilliant
spectacle. At eleven o'clock proceedings commenced by the
.singing of a hymn in honour of St. Vladimir, while the vener-
able l\Ietropolitan entered the hall and took his place in front
.of thè portrait of the Emperor, in the lniddle of the hall, with
1.1. Pobiedonostzeff and the l\Ietropolitans of Servia and
lonte-
.negro on his right, and the Governor-General of Kieff, General
Dreutchi on his left. The choir having ended, one of the pro-
fessors of the Academy delivered an address, tracing the
.history of the Russian Church from the conversion of St.
Yladin1ir, and describing in eloquent terms its growth and
10 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIA:K CHURCH
progress, and the dangers and vicissitudes which it, together
with the Russian nation
had undergone. After the singing
of another hymn, the addresses of congratulation were read,
first by the
letropolitans of Servia and
Iontenegro, then by
a Greek Archimandrite, as representing the Church of Greece.
After which came the representatives of the more important
of the Russian dioceses and public bodies. On account of the
great age (eighty-five years) of the Metropolitan of Kietf, the
greater part of these addresses were not personally delivered,
but were left on a table under the Emperor's portrait in front
of the
letropolitan, together with various presents in the'
shape of valuable books and icons which some of the deputa-
tion had brought. But before proceedings were ended M.
Pobiedonostzeff, rising from his seat, said that there was one
document more which must be read, namely, the letter of his
Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury. His Excellency then
proceeded to read the letter aloud, translating it into Russian,
so that all might understand its contents. In it his Grace,
after congratulating the l\letropolitan of I{ieff, and expressing
his sympathy and good-will to,vards the Bishops, clergy, and
laity of the Russian Church,' regretted that it had been impos-
sible, o,ving to the Lambeth Conference, for hin1 to be repre-
sented by an Anglican Bishop, and after pointing out that the
two National Churches had common enelnies to defend them-
selves against, and the same holy faith, as handed do,vn by
the Apostles and ancient Fathers of the Catholic Church, to
preserve intact, both from Papal aggressiveness, and also from
teachers of new and strange doctrines, and that by mutual
sympathy and prayer for unity we may help and encourage
one another, ended by a prayer for the unity of all men in
the faith of the Gospel as expounded by the CEcumenical
Councils of the undivided Church of Christ. At the conclu-
sion of the reading of the Archbishop's letter, which was
listened to with the greatest attention and interest by all pre-
sent, and with frequent signs of approval and pleasure on the
part of the l\Ietropolitan, 1\1. Pobiedonostzefl: in the absence of
any official representative of the English Primate (the English
THE KIEFF FESTIVAL
11
chaplain at Cronstadt, who was to have taken the letter to
Kieff having been unfortunately, at the last lninute, prevented
by illness from taking so long a journey) presented me as an
English visitor to his Grace, who in a few well-chosen words
expressed his appreciation of our Primate's letter, and of the
kindly sympathy therein expressed for the Russian Church,
and assured me that he would lose no time in replying to it.
The Russian National Anthem ,vas then sung, and we all ad-
journed to a luncheon in the refectory of the Academy. From
the frequent references made during this lneal to the Arch..
bishop's letter, it was evident that it had made a profound im-
pression upon all who had heard it, and that it had given great
satisfaction after the refusal, on political grounds, of several
of the Eastern Orthodox Churches to take part in these re-
joicings, that the Primate of the English Church, leaving out
of sight the past and possible future political antagonisln be-
tween the two nations, should, alone among the Churches of
'Vestern Christendom, have come for,vard, and, recognising
the importance to the Universal Church of the event which
brought the Russian Empire into the great Christian polity,
should, in the ,vords of his own letter, have remelnbered' the
commandment of the Blessed Apostle" to rejoice ,vith them
that do rejoice" '. This was regarded as a peculiarly happy
feature in the day's proceedings, and I was assured on all sides
that his Grace's action ,vas fully appreciated.
Political relations bet,veen Russia and England
were very different at that time from what they have
since become. There was, indeed, great suspicion and
jealousy in 1888 between the t\VO countries, and the
fact that of all Western Churches the English Church
alone had taken any notice of the l{ieff festivallnade,
as Birkbeck says, "a profound impression". It was
acknowledged by the follo,ving important letter from
the
ietropolitan of I{jeff, ,vhich reached Lambeth in
October.
12 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
(Translation. )
To His Beloved Brother in Christ, Edward, the
[ost Re-
nowned Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of All
England, the Hur,.
ble Platon, by Divine Mercy Metro-
politan of Kieff and Galicia, Sendeth Greeting in the
Lord.
First of all I offer you, beloved Brother, sincere thanks on
behalf both of myself and of all the Russians that were at I{ieff
at the Celebration of the 900th Anniversary of the Baptisnl of
Russia into the Christian Faith, for your loving letter of con-
gratulation upon that occasion. That letter was extremely
gratifying to us, not only in itself, on account of the spirit of
Christian faith and love ill ,vhich it 'vas expressed, but also be-
cause that of all the heads of the "T estern Churches none other
has sent us a sin1Ïlar greeting.
Your Grace rightly says that Russia is indebted for her
po,ver and the position which she holds amongst. Christian
nations, not only to the ,visdom of her rulers and the inborn
strength of her people, but also to the fact that our branch of
the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church has grown up together
with our nation, and that the Christian faith has illuminated
it through nine long centuries of history. Yes, the Orthodox
Faith of Christ, professed by our Holy Church, has indeed
hitherto had a great and lTIOst blessed influence upon t.he des-
tinies of Russia. By it the Lord gives strength unto our 1\Iost
Religious and Gracious Sovereigns; it enables our Christ-lov-
ing soldiery to overcome the hosts of their enemies; and it
arouses in every Orthodox Russian that spirit of self-denial
which makes him ready to sacrificp all, even life itself, for his
Fajth, Tsar, and Fatherland.
I entirely agree "Tith you that the Russian and English
Churches have the COlnnlon foes of which you speak in your
letter to me, and that we ought together ,vith you to contend
against them, Inutually encouraging and supporting one an-
other; but for this it is indispensable that your and our
Churches should enter into a nlore complete spiritual union
with one another. Our Church sincerely desires such a union,
THE KIE:FF FESTI'T.A.L
13
for at each one of her services she intreats the Lord" for the
peace of an the ,vorld, for the welfare of the Holy Churches of
God, and for the union of them all "; but, if you also, as ap-
pears from your letter, desire that ,ve may be one with you Èv
TO'i() ot:G"ftoÎs TOÛ E ùaryryt:Àíov, I beg you to communicate to
me distinctly and definitely 'ltpon what conditions YOlt con-
sider the union of your and 01tr Churches would be possible.
Together w-ith you fervently entreating the Lord, that by
Hi
grace He may dispose all men to come into the unity of
the Faith and of the }(nowledge of the Son of God, and heartily
praying that He may preserve you and all England under His
protection in perfect prosperity.
\Vith deep respect, I remain,
Your most devoted servant and brother in the Lord.
PLATON,
j[et1.opolitan of Kieff and Gal-icia.
Pecherskija Lan'a, Kieff,
Sept. 14, 1888.
So pointed an inquiry ,vas certainly not expected
by Archbishop Benson, but it ,vas an inquiry ,vhich
could not be neglected. A reply ,vas approved by
the Bishop
of England and despatched on
Iarch 5,
1889. It took the follo\ving forn1 :-
"His Reyerence (the Reverend Eugene Smirnoft
Chaplain
to the Russian Embassy) also delivered to llle at the same time
a copy of the speech ,vhich His Excellency the Imperial Chief
Procurator delivered before a vast asscn1blyof Russian Church-
TIlen expressing in ,varm tern1S that sense of Christian fello,v-
ship tow
ard
our English Church and Churchmen which
anÍlnated the heart of the Learlers of Clergy and people in
your Holy Church.
Your own expressions as ,veIl as those of !l. Pobiedonostzefi
call for the n10st lively recognition and for devout thankfulness.
'fheyassure us that 've receive alike the common hope ,vhich
inspires, and the unrighteous pretensions ,vhich would blight,
14 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
the desire for true Catholic union among the world-dispersed
members of Christ. That is a glorious vision whose fulfilment
-depends on the sincerity of believers and on their living unity
with their one Head.
I confess that I was scarcely prepared to expect an inquiry
so direct as you propose to me, and nlY whole heart goes out
in answer to it, as if the consumnlation ,ve long for must be
nearer than we believed.
Your Holiness invites me to express to you C what are the
.conditions under which I find it possible to unite our Churches'.
In considering \vhat answer I ought to return to this most
in1portant question-no question more important has been
asked for centuries-I arrive at the conclusion that two things
are essential to a real union :-
1. First and above all, the drawing together of the hearts
of the individuals composing the two Churches which
would fain' be at one together'.
2. Secondly, a more or less formal acceptance of each
other's position ,vith toleration for any points of differ-
ence: non-interference with each other upon any such
points.
1. As to the first of these two conditions, among Christian
worshippers it resolves itself into this question-Would the
two Churches of Russia and of England be willing each to
.admit the Clergy and the Faithful Laity of the other, as indi-
viduals, to be partakers of the Holy Communion even as they
allow their own children to partake of that Feast of Love upon
their Lord's Sacrifice?
2. The second point would require much longer considera-
tion: but if the first was acknowledged and acted upon there
would exist a basis of practical unity on which might be built
the more formal structure.
Two questions seem to present themselves here:-
(a) Would the two Churches mutually acknowledge the
historic verity and reality of each other's Holy Orders?
As a contribution to the settlement of this question from
.the English side, I shall do myself the honour shortly of con-
THE KIEFF FESTIVAL
15
:signing to your Holiness four Works 1 which will present in
due form, with the necessary historical evidence, the pr.oof of
the authenticity and continuity of the Holy Orders of the
Church of England. These works I commend to those Scholars
.and Divines of your Holiness' Communion who may not yet
have given their attention to the subject. And I would ask
.your Holiness in return to communicate to us some authentic
account of the corresponding history and evidences of the
Ch urch of Russia.
(b) 'Vith regard to the non-interference \vith such points
of difference as are, however great their intrinsic importance,
of less moment than the Unity of the Spirit in the Bond of
Faith and thirst after the Righteousness of Christ, there is one
which can scarcely be passed over in honesty, namely, the
Procession of the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life.
But we do not doubt that a formula of agreement on this
.question might be arrived at, dra\vn from the Fathers of the
Church which are reverenced both by ourselves and the Eastern
Church.
The consideration of the paragraphs numbered 2 (a), 2 (b)
must necessarily be postponed for examination. It is not
possible that your Holiness should give, or that I should ex-
pect, an immediate answer.
But if in the meantirne the hearts of Christ's faithful
people should be so drawn together that in scattered folds the
Unity of the one Flock under one Shepherd should be acknow-
ledged and acted upon in the admission of Faithful1tlembers
to Communion with one another and with Him, He would, we
believe, in His time work out for us both spiritual and intel-
lectual approaches. .
I would therefore shortly outline an answer to your Holi-
ness' inquiry by saying that I shuuld understand that the
first step would be the admission of religious believers to Holy
Communion in either Church. And that the second step would
1 The books sent were (1) Episcopal Succession in England (Stubbs); (2)
Validity of English Orders (Courayer); (3) Apostolic Succession (Haddan); (4)
,Ordinatio'lLum Ecclesiæ AngZicanæ Defensio (Bailey).
16 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
be the serious consideration (taking abundant time for the
purpose) of whether any impediments, disciplinary or doctrinal,
exist, which still render necessary the formal separation in
which for strange reasons \ve finel ourselves placed."
Nobody ,vho had first-hand knowledge of the
Eastern Church had been consulted in the drawing
up of this document; it was wholly the work of the
English Episcopate and its defects are obvious. The
suggestion that Communion in sacris should come be-
fore unity of doctrine ,vould seem to the Easterns to
imply an insufficient sense of the importance of faith. 1
So, too, the question of the "verity and reality" of
each other's Holy Orders was, from an Eastern point
of vie""T, raised prematurely. Still, the reply revealed
things as they lvere ; it exposed real difficulties. The
tin1e ,vas not ripe for consideration of the basis of
union, and ..A..rchbishop Benson had learnt this when
he \vrote to the Bishop of 'Vinchester in 1896 to the
effect that personal intercourse with the Easterns
,vould "help those good feelings to strengthen them-
selves, on which more n1ay be built hereafter". Ho,v
Birkbeck laid those foundations stone by stone we
shall see as ,ve proceed. He, at least, ,vas under no
ill usion as to the careful and patiel1 t labour needed
before union could be profitably discussed.
IOn this subject see Birkbeck's trenchant criticisms in his essay on The
Prospect of Reunion with Eastern Christendom (Chapter VIr. page 93).
CHAPTEI
II.
THE RUSSIAN CHURCH IN THE DIOCESE 0]' ARCHANGEL.
AFTER the visit to Kieff, Birkbeck took up the study
of Russia and the Russian Church ,vhich ,vas to re-
main his absorbing interest to the end. He now set
to ,vork to learn Russian and Slavonic-the old ec-
clesiasticallanguage-and every year saw him in some
part of the Russian Enlpire. In 1889 we 'v ere in
Petrograd together and paid an interesting visit to
(
reat Xovgoroù. By that tinle he could carryon a
conversation in Russian fairly well. lIe introduced
Dle that year to Constantine Po biedonostzeff, the re-
markable man ,vho ,vas then C
hief Procurator of the
} [oly Synod, and the nlost pronlinent figure in Russian
politics. Birkbeck nlaintained a close friendship with
him until his death in 1907. The follo\ving articles
,vere the result of J1irkbeck's journey in the :R orth of
R.ussia in the sumUler of 1889.
I.
There are few dioceses in Christendom which present so
Inany features of interest as the diocese of Archaugel and
Kholmogory, 'v hich is the nort.hernmost Episcopal see of
Europe, and indeed of the \vhole world. It includes the whole
of the vast government of Archangel, "hich stretches from the
Norwegian frontier to the Ural l\Iountains, and is, as far as
territory is concerned, the largest government of European
(17) 2
18 BIRI{BECK
\ND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
Russia, extending over an area twice as large as the kingdom
of Prussia.
'rhe northern governnlents of Russia were for the Inost
part colonised fron1 N ovgorod the Great by settlements planted
anlongst the Lapps and Samojeds for trading purposes; but
the honour of bringing thet-Je distant regions under the do-
minion of the Cross undoubtedly is due to :ß,luscovite mission-
aries, and more especially the disciples of St. Sergius, the
founder of the celebrated Monastery of Troitza, near .Thloscow.
It is impossible to overestimate the part that monasticism has
played in the colonisation of this part of RU:-5sia. Both Khol-
mogory and Archangel itself grew up round the ,valls of
monasteries, while the great Solovetzki monastery in the
White Sea has for the last 400 years been the chief centre of
Christianity and ci vilisation in these parts. Indeed, the ,vork
of Inonasticism is still being vigorously carried on in these
districts at the present day. It was only a few years back
that. a colony froln Solovetzki refounded the n10nastery of
Pechenski 1 in the very north of Lapland, not far from the
Norwegian frontier, in order to provide a centre of enlighten-
Inent for the non1ad tribes of Lapps in those parts; ,vhile in
the year 1887 the monastery of St. Nicholas on the White Sea,
close to the mouth of the Dwina, sent a monk, Jonah by name,
together with a lay brother, to the island of N ovaja Zemlja,
in order to provide for the spiritual wants of the fifty inhabi-
tants of this distant outpost of the Russian Elnpire. Though
all of thern Inembers of the Orthodox Church, the natives had
before this to depend upon such chance visits during the
SUffiluer as the Bishop of Archangel could provide for, and it
was seldoln that they saw a priest lIlore than once in the year.
Now, thanks to the self-denying devotion of Father Jonah-
for it requires SOlle zeal and courage to spend a winter in
Novaja Zemlja-these poor fishermen have their permanent
church and regular religious ministrations throughout the
year. Father Jonah started from the monastery of St.
Nicholas on August 30, 1887, taking ,vith him service books,
1 This monastery was dastroyed by the Swedes in the sixteenth century.
THE DIOCES:b
OF ARCHANGEL 19
altar vessels, vestlnents, censers, and an other requirements
for the Church services, as ,yell as a large supply of elen1entary
books of instruction provided by the Diocesan Board of Edu-
cation, in order to teach the inhabitants to read and write, to-
gether with many copies of the four Gospels in Russian and
some lives of the saints. He arrived at his destination on
SepteJnber 4, and was received ,vith the greatest joy and en-
thusiasm by the inhabitants, lnore especially when they heard
that he was going to pass the winter with them. He landed
in full priestly vestlnents, carrying the picture of St. Nicholas,
the patron of the monastery which had sent this
Iission.
He was nlet by the inhabitants with bread and salt, and im-
mediately proceeded to choose out a place on which to build
the ne,v church. The summer is short in these northern dis-
tricts, and there was no time to be lost, so all the inhabitants
set to ,york with right good ,vill to build a church before
winter set in. And thus it was that the northernmost church
in Europe was dedicated to God on October 1, 1887. The
Inonastic community has since then been increased, and there
are now two churches in the island.
The total nun1ber of n10nastic establishments in the diocese,
not including the great Solovetzki monastery, ,vhich is one of
the seven Stavropigial communities of Russia (that is to say,
it is independent of episcopal control, and subject only to the
Holy Synod), is eleven, t,vo of \vhich are convents for women.
These latter contain in all rather over seventy nuns and thirty
lay sisters, while the nine monasteries contain about 120 monks
and thirty lay brothers.
The parochial organisation of the diocese has always been
a great difficulty, owing to the scattered distribution of the
scanty - population over the vast extent of territory which it
includes. The Orthodox population of the diocese numbers
about 350,000 of both sexes, and for these there are 279
parishes served by 302 priests, 21 deacons, and 295 lay-readers.
These latter are, of course, licensed by the Bishop, and their
duty is to lead the choir and to read the epistle at the liturgy
and the lections at the choir offices. \Vhen I was at Archangel
20 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
the Bishop showed Ine a Inap of his dioc98f': fron1 ,vhich it ap-
peared that nearly all the parishes are either on the coast or
else close to one or other of the large rivers which flow to the
sea through this government, and he told me that one of his
chief wants ,vas a slnall steamboat, by means of ,vhich he
could go on visitation tours through the more distant parts of
his diocese, especially along the river Pechora, in the eastern
part of the government, w'hich is almost inaccessible by land,
but where at the present time there is a great deal of work to
be done, both amongst the "Old Believers," ,vho are very
numerous in that part of the diocese, and also amongst the
half-savage Salnojed tribes. Since Bishop Nathaniel has oc-
cupied the see the parish churches on the Pechora have been
increased from t\VO to twenty-three, but there is still much
missionary ,york to be done in this district, especially amongst
the Samojeds. These latter are being gradually civilised by
means of the Church, their children being brought to the
diocesan schools at Archangel, where they are taught the
Russian language and the Chri
tian faith, together with some
of the elementary lessons of civilisation-such, for instance, as
to eat bread, and to cook their Ineat instead of eating it raw,
and not to <.h'ink the blood of the animals they slaughter.
The chief difficulty in civilising anll Christianising then1 con-
sists in the nOlnacl life which they lead, ,vandering about the
vast tundras with their herds of reindeer all the SUlnmer, and
fornlÌng encalnpments for the "tinter ,vhich may very likely
be miles away fron1 any parish church, so that it is extremely
difficult to keep them under Christian influences.
Of late years great efforts hav(' been n1ade to provide
parochiallinraries connected ,vith thð parish churches through-
out Russia, in order to raise the standard of religious education
in the villages. The diocese of Archangel has been no excep-
tion to the rule, and there are no\v 140 parishes which have
been provided with a suitable collection of books for the use
of the parishioners, and every year sees an addition to their
number. Another extremely useful ll1easure taken by the
Holy Synod n1ust not be passed by unmentioned. In 1888
THE DIOCESE OF ARCH....\.NGEL 21
an official weekly paper was started, entitled the Tzerkovnija
Védomosti, or Ecclesiastical Gazette. This paper, besides
publishing an official report of all the acts of the Holy Synod,
gives an account of the ecclesiastical news of the "reek, to-
gether ,vith reports of l\fission \york, the consecration of new
churches, new theological publications, etc. A weekly period-
ical of this kind \vould be useful anywhere, and it is especially
so in a diocese like Archangel, so far removed from the centres
of national life. 'T ery few of the parochial clergy in this dis-
tant part of the empire have ever been beyond the confines of
their own government, and yet I have come across parish
priests on the shores of the 'Vhite Sea who, although living
the life of the ordinary peasant, are able to discuss contem-
porary ecclesiastical events in the Balkan peninsula, the
prospects of the Russian
lission in Japan, the religious diffi-
culties in Poland and the Baltic provinces, and in fact any
matter "rhich affects the Orthodox Church; and when one
cOllles to inquire \vhere it. ,vas that they obtained their in-
formation, it generally turns out that they have obtained it
from the Tzerkovnija Védomosti.
As in all the other Russian dioceses, the clergy receive their
ecclesiastical training in a diocesan seminary. At the present
time there are bet,yeen ninety and one hundred students in
the Archangel seminary. Their course lasts for four years,
after \yhich, if they have passed their examination, they are
allo,ved, provided the Bishop's licence be obtained, to preach
in the parish churches even before they are admitted to holy
orders. I may say in passing that however true it may have
been a few years ago, the neglect of preaching \vith which one
constantly sees the Russian Church reproached is nowadays a
most Ünfair charge. The ecclesia
tical authorities are taking
the greatest pains in the matter, and it is very seldom that one
finds a young priest who does not preach on Sunday at the
Liturgy, ,vhile the elder clergy, ,vho were not trained for the
purpose, often read a short hon1Ïly upon the Gospel for the
day out of the ,yorks of St. Chrysostom, St. Basil, or another
of the Fathers. 'Vhile travelling in this diocese I passed two
22 BIRKBECK AND TH}1J RUSSIAN CHURCH
Sundays in the country and one in Archangel itself. In the
latter and in one of the villages there was a sermon, while in
the other case a homily ,vas read in its place. In districts
where the Old Believers 1 are plentiful homilies are found to be
more useful, as provided that they be read from a book printed
in old Slavonic letters these Dissenters will listen to the
writings of the Fathers, but will not pay the slightest heed to
a sermon written in ordinary
fS. by a priest of the State
Church, which they consider to be under the dominion of
Antichrist!
While I was staying at Archangel I spent an evening '\vith
a priest who holds the appointment of diocesan missioner to
the Old Believers, anà he told me many interesting anecdotes
of his conferences ,vith the various sectaries vvhich may be
included under this category. Their differences with the
Russian Church, as is ,yen known, consist entirely in ritual
minutiae, such as ,vhether the sign of the Cross should be
made with t,vo fingers or three, anù how certain ,vords should
be spelt in the service-books. On paper these differences ap-
pear to be the merest trifles, but ,vhen one penetrates a little
below the surface it becomes evident that the whole principle
of the living authority of the Church is involved in them.
English and Russian Dissent have at first sight little in COln-
mon with one another, and I an1 quite sure that no l\lethodist
or Quaker, if he chanced to visit a chapel belonging to one of
the sects of the Old Believers, would feel himself at home
amidst the icons and incense and elaborate ceremonial of the
Russian Raskolniki. And yet there is much in common be-
tween the Russian and EngliBh type of Dissent. Both alike,
albeit upon different grounds, deny that "the Church hath
power to decree rites or cereillonies and authority in contro-
versies of faith," both alike in consequenc
of this, ho,vever
much the one may appeal to the Scriptures and the other to
1 These are the Russian dissenters (raskol1
iki) who broke off from the
Church owing to their refusal to accept the liturgical reforms of the Patriarch
Nikon in the seventeenth century. Some were reunited to the Church in the
nineteenth century.-[A.R.]
THE DIOCESE OF ARCHANGEL 23
the tradition of the Church, are obliged to fall back upon the
right of private judgment, as is exemplified in the fact that
the Raskol, no less than English Dissent, has split up into
numberless rival sects, Inany of which are named after their
founders. In this respect our \Vesleyans, Irvingites, and
Huntingdonians find their Russian counterpart in the Philip-
offtzi, Theodosjúfftzi, etc. Even in the Inatter of the Royal
supremacy the Russian Dissenters take the same impractical
view of the right relations between Church and State which
characterises some N onconfol'nlist sects of this country. They
persistently refuse to recognise the fact that the Sovereign
bas never claimed for himself the right to settle matters purely
spiritual, and they are ready to see the mark of the Beast or
the sign of Antichrist in any act of the civil power, ho,vever
legitimate, which can by any ingenuity of argument be made
to appear to encroach upon the sphere of religion. A conver-
sation which I had ,vith one of these sectaries ,vill best illus-
trate the attitude of the Russian Raskol (schism) towards the
Church and Government of the country. One of the signs, he
told me, that Antichrist had acquired the mastery over Church
and State ,vas that the Government had altered New Year's
Day from Septenlber 1 to January 1. It was quite useles8
representing to him that the Church Calendar still begins
with September, and that it is only the civil N ew Year ,vhich
commences ,vith January. He retorted that this change, in-
troduced by Peter the Great, was obviously contrary to Scrip-
ture, for the \vorld must have been created in September,
otherwise there ,vould have been no apples ripe for Eve to eat!
" But surely it is quite pos,;ible that Eve lnay have eaten the
apple in September, and yet have been created in January or
any other month in the year," said I, thinking that I bad sug-
gested a most reasonable way out of the difficulty. ." No,"
said Iny friend, "the world was created in six days, and God
created light on Sunday, the 1st of September, and Adam and
Eve on Friday, the 6th, and rested from His ,york on the
Sabbath. On Sunday, September 8, Eve tasted of the apple,
and gave it to Ada-In: this is ,vhy the most holy l\Iother of
24 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
God, the second E\Te, was born on September 8." This is a
very fair specimen of the style of argument used by the Old
Believers, and it is often quite astonishing with what ingenuity
and earnestness they will Jefend their peculiar tenets, which,
trifling as they may appear to us Westerns, are looked upon
by them as matters of life and death.
Although the Raskol is now not so strong in this part of
Russia as formerly, it has played a most iInportant part in
the past history of the government of Archangel. The sect
of the Pomortzi, one of the largest bodies of the Old Believers,
took its name froln the western coast (pomorie) of the White
Sea, 'v here it first sprang into existence, with its headquarters
at the monastery of Lake Vyg, about fifty miles to the south;
while at the very beginning of the schism the monastery of
Solovetzki itself fell into the hands of the adherents of the old
service-books, and stood a siege of ten years against the troops
of the Tzar Alexis, before it \vould adn1it the reforms of Nikon 1
within its walls. At present, ho\vever, these sects are not so
numerous in this part of Russia as they used to be, \vhile ex-
cept in isolated cases on the
--'inland frontier there is no Pro-
testant propagandism of any kind. rrhe Lutherans have a
church in Archangel, but it is used exclusively by the German
residents, and the same is the case \vith the small ROlllan
Catholic chapel \vhich has been erected for a few Polish exiles
who have been sent to this distant government.
II.
DURING four days of the seven which I spent at Archangel
last summer I enjoyed the hospitality of Bishop Nathaniel,
who spared no pains in giving me every kind of information
concerning his diocese, and in eXplaining to me its practical
working. He took me to see the principal churches of the
town, including the cathedral, a fine church in the very centre
of the town close to the river, which contains SOlne interesting
relics of Peter the Great's visit in 1702 to Archangel, which
1 The greatest of the Russian Patriarchs. He reigned a t
loscow 1653-
1660 a.nd died in 1681.-[A.R.]
THE DIOCESE OF .l\..RCH
..\KGEL 25
was then Russia's only seaport. All10ngst then1 is a large
wooden cross, carved by his own hands during his stay in the
place. Another day he sho\ved me all over the Inonastery of
St.
lichael, from which the town takes its name, and which
contains a fine church dating from the end of the sixteenth
century. This monastery is situated at the extrelne southern
nd of the town, and, with its gold domes reflected in the
water and the long quays cro\vded \vith sbipping in the back-
ground, adds greatly to the beauty of Archangel on approach-
ing it from the D\yina. The Episcopal residence is nominally
in this monastery, but, finding the building set apart for this
purpose too large for his requirements, the Bishop has handed
it over to the nlonks for their school, and has moved into
smaller quarters nearer the centre of the town.
The Sunday which I spent at Archangel happened to be
the Feast of the Transfiguration, one of the t\velve principal
festivals of the Orthodox Church. On the Saturday evening
I \vent with the Bishop to the cathedral to the" all-night "
service, which consists of vespers follo\ved by matins, and
though happily it belied its name and only lasted three hours,
it is a somewhat exhausting service for anyone who is ac-
custon1ed to our shorter \Vestern forms, especially as one has
to stand all the time. The next morning the Bishop took me
to the large Church of the Transfiguration, which is the prin-
cipal church on the island of Solombal, the commercial quarter
of Archangel. This church \vas founded by Peter the Great,
and finished in the reign of Catherine II, and, though a fine
building in its way, is built in the sOlne\vhat unecclesiastical
style then in fashion, and consequently is not so interesting
as the cathedral. Whell \ve arrived the church was already
crowded from OIle end to another, the conareQ"ation consistinO"
o L.J n
chiefly of the \VOrknlen froll1 the various factories and saw-
mills of this quarter of the to\vn. A sermon followed the
liturgy, preached by a young student \yho had just finished
his sen1inary course, and ,vas soon to be ordained; and then
came a procession round the outside of the church: followed
by the whole congregation.
26 BIRI{BECK AND THE RUSSI___.\.N CHURCH
I may say in passing that the festival processions in the
Eastern Church take a different direction to those of Latin
Christendom. The latter always follow the course of the sun t
no doubt in allusion to Ps. xix. 5, 6, as mystically applied to
our Lord's life upon earth from His Nativity to His Ascen-
sion, and thus the procession symbolises the Church following
in His footsteps. The processions of the Orthodox Church,.
on the contrary, go to meet the sun, symbolising thereby that
the Church goes forth to meet our Lord, Whose first coming
was in the East, and 'Vhose second coming shall be "as the
lightning ,vhich cometh out of the east and shineth even unto
the west ".
After the procession we adjourned to the house of
lr.
Teljate
one of the principal merchants residing on the island
of Solon1bal, who had invited the Bishop, together with some
of the leading Archangel ecclesiastics and merchants, to dinner
on this occasion. This banquet consisted entirely of 'ìnaigre
dishes, because the Bishops in the Eastern Church are chosen
exclusively from the monastic, or black clergy, and conse-
quently never eat meat. Several of the merchants present
were of German origin and Lutheran by religion, but there
appeared to be no ill-feeling whatever bet,veen them and the
Orthodox who ,vere present.
The next day the Bishop told me that he had to go to the
monastery of St. Nicholas, to see about the affairs of the
N ovaja Zemlja l\Iission, which, as I stated in my last article,
'vas originally sent from there. The hour before we started
he spent intervie\ving some of the clergy of the diocese. It
was extremely interesting to hear all the inquiries he made
with regard to the state of their parishes. One of these
priests, 'v hose living is situated near the boundary of Finland,
about fifty n1Ïles ,vest of the White Sea, came in for rather a
severe reprimand, owing to the appearance amongst his flock
of a sort of semi-revivalist, semi-rationalistic sect lately started
by a preacher who had dissented from the Lutheran Church of
Finland. Father Pavel pleaded in self-defence that the sect
had been introduced unbeknown to him. "This." said the
THE DIOCESE OF .A.RC
ANGEL 27
Bishop, It would have been quite impossible, had you looked
after your parish properly and not neglected your duty." At
the end of the intervie,v, the Bishop gave him his blessing and
then walked with him to the door, and as he ,vent out kissed
him and said, "truclitesj, truditesj, truditesj," which, being
interpreted, is " work, work, ,york !"
After this we started on our journey to the monastery of
St. Nicholas, situated about thirty miles from Archangel at
the mouth of the river. One of the merchants had lent him
a small steamer, which had been brought round to the quay
just in front of the Bishop's residence. As we walked down
to it, follo\ved by the Bishop's deacon and servants carrying
provisions for the journey and beds for the night, the ,vork-
men and boatmen on the quay took off their hats in all direc-
tions, many of them running up to kiss the Bishop's hand, and
bringing their children to receive his blessing. \Ve ,vere a
long time arriving at our destination owing to the shallo\vness
of this part of the river, the steanler running aground several
times; but as soon as we came \vithin sight of the monastery
the bells began to ring, and as ,ve made our ,yay to,varc1s land
an the inmates of the monastery came down to the ,vater's
edge in their full robes to meet the Bishop, and formed a most
picturesque group a
they stood on the landing-stage \vith
candles and incense awaiting his landing. As soon as he
stepped on shore they robed him in a gorgeous ?nantija (an
Episcopal cloak shaped some\vhat like a cope, but looser, and
with a long train) of blue and silver brocade, and escorted us
with great pomp to the principal church of the monastery
chanting all the ,vhile, and then after a short service \ve \vere
conducted in the same manner all through the monastic build-
ings and to the other churches. The buildings, ,vhich were
erected early in the seventeenth century in place of others
which were destroyed by the S\vedes, are very fine, particu-
larly the principal church, ,vhich is entered by two beautiful
specimens of the staircase porches which are so characteristic
of Russian sixteenth and seventeenth century architecture.
The whole lnonastery is enclosed by an extremely picturesque
28 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
wooden wall ,vith eight to,vers at its angles, surmounted by
the curious half-spire and half-clolne which one so often Ineets
with in the wooden ecclesiastical edifices in this part of the
empire. Although it ,vas now past nine o'clock, the Bishop
ordered the carriage and pair belonging to the monastery, and
insisted on taking me in the t\vilight round the 11lonastic farm,
which is rather extensive, and then at about ten o'clock ,ve
had supper and retired to rest for the night. The next nlorn-
ing at six o'clock I ,vas roused from my slumbers by the
church bellIS, and on dressing found the Bishop's servant wait-
ing outside my room to take me to church as soon as ever I
felt inclined. The Bishop, he told me, had got up at half-past
four, and after making his preparation for saying the liturgy
had bathed in the 'Vhite Sea, and then had gone to church,
"There I found hiln pontificating at matins. The singing was
very good, and the whole service ,vas beautifully done, but so
extreluely long that I had more than once to retire froln sheer
fatigue before it was finished. The liturgy itself conlmenced
soon after eight o'clock, and the "Thole service was over a little
before ten, by which time I was nearer dead than alive from
fatigue and hunger. But the Bishop, although considerably
over sixty years of age, seeuled to think nothing of his five
hours' service upon an empty stomach, to ,vhich he was evi-
dently quite accustollled. The Russian Bishops as a rule cele-
brate the liturgy about three times a week, and habit soon
accustoms theln as ,veIl as the other clergy to these long fasts.
After breakfast the prior showed me some of the treasures of
the monastery, amongst them a portrait of Lady l\lartha, the
rich noble\voman of N ovgorod, who did so luuch for the
colonising and evangelisation of the shores of the \Vhite Sea
in the fifteenth century. It ,yas here that the bodies of her
t,vo sons "\vho were dro,vned in a stornl \vere buried, and in
her legacy to the monastery appear the following ,vords: "I,
Martha, the servant of God, have caused to be erected the
church of St. Nicholas in this lllonastery over the graves of my
children Antony and
--'elix". This church, ho\yever, is no
longer standing, having been burnt by the Swedes, as ,ve have
TH}1
DIOCESE OF
\.RCHAXGEL
29
already seen. Another -point I about this monastery \vhich
should be of special interest to Englishmen is that it ,vas here
that Chalonner first discovered the mouth of the D,vina in
1.558, and thus laid the foundation of the important \Vhite
Sea trade between England and Russia. In the earliest Eng-
lish charts "That is no,v the port of Archangel is in conse-
quence marked as the port (or quay) of St. Nicholas.
After the Bishop had settled the Inatters concerning the
Novaja Zem
ja l\lission for ,vhich he had come, we started
back, and as it was no, v high tide the return journey took
only four hours. During both journcys the Bishop never
ceased either telling me a bout his o\vn diocese or asking me
questions about the English Church, and particularly about
our Church schools, a subject in ,vhich he appeared to take
lnuch interest. He told me ho,v much he regretted that there
,vas no longer an English chaplain at Archangel, to perform
duty in the t,vo English churches there, one of \,hich is in
Archangel itself, and the other on the island of Sololn bal.
" There are more sailors fronl England in Archangel during
the sumlner than frolll any other foreign nation, and yet they
have no priest. Our clergy kno,v no English and can do
nothing for them; they cannot untlerstand our service any
better than if a Ksendz ( Roman priest) ,vas reading it to them.
in Latin. \Vhy does not the Archbishop of Canterhury spnd
Rome one to theln? \Ve "QuId ,velconle him here."
The fact is that the rich English cOIDJnunity \vhich forn1erly
re
ided in Archangel have all moved no\v to St. Petersburg,
,vhither the CnclO\VU1ents of the English churches have also
been transferred.
The llext t,vo days \vere spent in a visit to the English
Vice-Consul, )[r. Bartlett Cobb, aft.er \vhich Iny visit to Arch-
all
el caIne to an end. The evening before my departure I
,vcnt to take leave of Bishop Nathaniel. ....LÌs we parted he
took off fron1 his neck a beautiful little silver-covered icon of
the Blessed Virgin and Child, \,hich he had ,vorn as his pana-
gía (luring our journey to St.
icholas's Dlonastery, and told
me to take it home frolll hinI to DIY youngest son, ,vhose nanle-
30 BII=tKBECK AKD THE !{USSIAN CHURCH
is
lichael, in Inemory of my visit to the city named after the
great Archangel, bidding me tell him when he grew up that
he must not think that ther
,vas nothing but white bears to
be found in that part of the world. 'rhe next day I started
at about Inidday by stean1er for Sijski lllonastery up the
Dwina on the vlay to l\fosco\v, and in less than quarter of
an hour nothing ,vas to be seen of Archangel but the golden
domes of the nlonastery of St. l\lichael blazing in the mid-
.day SUllo
CHAPTER III.
THE RUSSIAN CHURCH IN THE DIOCESE OF ARCHANGEL-
(continued) .
III.
IN the Elnpire of the Tzars all roads lead to l\Ioscow, for is
she not the very "heart of Russia "? And yet the journey
thither fronl Archangel is a sOInewhat arduous undertaking,
especially when there is not sufficient ,vater in the Dwina to
.get by stealner to V ologda, \vhere the railway begins. Last
year I could only get 100 nliles by river, and had to do the
remaining 350 by road. But this I did not regret, as it
.enabled me to see some curious monasteries seldom visited by
foreigners, as \vell as some of the interesting village life in
these parts.
The journey up the Dwina is very uninteresting for the
first few hours, until one conIes to IChohnogory, which was
formerly the seat of the bishopric, and is still of considerable
ecclesiastical importance. It contains two large monasteries,
.one of which, "\vith a very fine church and separate bell-tower,
stands close to the river. This is the most populous district
of the Archangel Government. The river here breaks up into
several wide branches, the banks of which are thickly studded
with villages, each with their "summer" and " winter "
churches in the same churchyard. At one time I counted no
less than fourteen churches in sight at once, nearly all of them
built of wood, but extremely picturesque o,ving to the domes
"by which they are almost invariably surmounted, more especi-
.ally the" summer" churches, "rhich are of course the largest
and finest, the "winter" churches being built as low and snlall
.as possible for the sake of \val'mth. Fortunately the steamer
(31)
3:2 BIRKBECK .A1\D THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
stopped for wood at the village of Chukhcheremsk, which
enabled me to examine one of the finest specin1ens of these
wooden churches built in the seventeenth century. It is
dedicated to the prophet Elijah, and may roughly be described
as a copy in wood of the style of the early Romanoff period,
which can be seen at its best at Jaroslavl, Kostroma, and
throughout the region of the northern '7 olga, and which,
though Byzantine in origin, has so many original features
that it may be described as a truly national style. The great
feature of the exterior of Chukhcheremsk Church is the roof,
,vhich has nine wooden domes, all surmounted by the eight-
pointed orthodox cross. The sacred edifice is entered by the
usual covered-in staircase (lcryltzo) leading into the narthex
(pritvor), which, like in St.
Iark's at .Venice, extends across
the whole ,vest end of the church and half-way ronnd the
north and south side, ending in this case on each side in a
grill looking on to the iconostasis.
rhe interior was full of
beautiful ornaments and pictures, and many of the icons on
the iconostasis ,vere, as usual, covered over \vith silver and
studded ,,'ith precious stones. ltussia is almost the only
country \yhere the parish churches have never been subjected
to legalised plunder, and their ,vealth helps one to realise the
meaning of our own Inediæval inventories, and what our
churcheH 1l1u
t have lost in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries.
At t\VO o' clock in the morning I was roused frolll my
slulnbers and told that ,YC had arrived at Sija. The steamer
landed IDe close to a chapel, on ,vhat, to my disgust, I found
to be the ,vrong side of the river. The chapel belongs to the
neif
'hbouring S
jski l\lonastery, ,vhich is some eight miles
from the opposite bank, and a very shaggy-looking lay
brother, stationed there for the purpose, ferried three soldiers,
an ispravnilc (local head of police) from the Pechora, and my-
self and lllountaills of luggage across the river in a very top-
heavy boat, and landed us on a sandy waste \vith not a house
in sight, and 1110re than a mile fro In the village of Sija. After
an aln1ust internlinable da,vdle t,vo carts arrived from the
THE DIOCESE O
' Al
CH.A
GEL 88
village, ,vhich conveyed us and our luggage to the village
post-house, from ,vhich I obtained a tarantass to convey lne to
Sijski
Ionastery,
Olne seven miles flistant.
rrhe monastery is beautifully situated at the end of a long,
narro,v tongue of land jutting into a lake, the shores of which
are surrounded by lo,v hills covered ,vith pine, fir, and birch
forest. The vie,v of it froln the road ,vhich runs along the
edge of the lake is particularly pleasing, with its ,,,hite stone
buildings surmounted by green domes, interspersed "lith a fe,v
fine tir trees, standing in a court surrounded by ,vooden walls
built down to the ,vater, and ,vith an avenue of birch tree
leading along the narrow causeway, ,vhich connects the lllonas-
tery with the lnainland, up to the picturesque stone gateway
surlllounted by a church: Here I ,vas received by a young
lay brother, ,vho told me that the abbot had heard from thp
Bishop cf Archangel that I was coming, and that rooms ,vere
prepare(l for Ine. After breakfast I called upon the Archi-
Inanùrite .L
ntony, a young and energetic-looking man, formerly
a n1en1ber of the 'vhite or parish cJergy, but ,vho, having lost
his \\?ife, ,vas appointed by the Holy Synod at the recom-
Inendation of the Bishop to be abbot of this monastery, not
altogether, so I heard, to the satisfaction of the community,
\vho w'oul.1 ha'?e preferred the election of one of their nwn
11 HIll ber.
The founder of this monastery was
t. Antony, a Dlouk
frolH the monastery of the Transfiguration, on the river Ken,
in the district of Onega. He settled ,vith six followers on thi
spot by the lake "in the n1Ïddle of the forest in the year 1520,
and ruled the lle\V con1munity until his death, in 1557. His
last testaluent is preserved in the archives of the monastery,
and Qears his o\vn signature. It ,vas \vritten the year before
his death, and is a touching IneD10:;.-ial of his simple piety and
affection for his spiritual children. After telling them that old
age and sickness have overtaken hÍ1n, anù that he feels his en(!
approaching, he conlmends himself to their prayers, asking-
then1 to forgive all the faults which he has committed in thp.
government of the 1110nastery :-
:-3
34 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
"I have been neither a pastor to you, nor a teacher, for
Christ alone is the Good Shepherd, but I, by .n1Y sins and
folly, have been a scatterer rather than a shepherd of the flock
comll1itted to ll1Y charge in this holy habitation. But I do
not despair of my salvation and have hope in the 111ercy of
God and in your holy prayers. For God hath said: 'I came
not to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance,' and, en-
couraged by your prayers, I "rill 'cast ll1Y burden upon the
Lord'; then Inay He do unto me as it plea seth Him, for He
'will have all men to be saved, and to con1e to the knowledge
of the truth '. So now I commend my ll10nastery and you to
God, to His most pure Mother the Queen of heaven, and St.
SergÏus, the \Vonder-worker, and I appoint as my successor,
according to your petition, Father Cyril as Prior, to take care
of this holy habitation."
After this COll1e SOlne directions "rith regard to the property
of the monastery and some regulations concerning refractory
members of the community, and then the testament concludes
as follows :-
"But, above all, have the fear of God in your hearts, and
may His Holy Spirit dwell in you and instruct you, and lead
you in the paths of truth. And amongst yourselves let there
ever be love, and submit yourselves one to another for Christ's
sake; so shall the ll1ultitude of your sins be blotted out. And
take care that ye follow the rules of the community both in
spiritual and tenlporal matters, in your food and in your
clothing according to the cOll1mands of the holy fathers, nor
should the Prior fare better in lneat, or drink, or clothing,
than the rest of the brethren. N either should strangers be
admitted into the cells of the brotherhood, or intoxicating
drinks be brought into the monastery, but ye shall give food
to the poor and homeless who come to you, so shall this holy
place never be left destitute. N one of the brethren, except
they be sick, shall remain in the monastery without employ-
ll1ent, neither shall ye make the peasants execute your repairs
or look after the buildings, but ye shall do these things your-
selves, except it be in the cow-yard on the other side of the
THE DIOCESE OF ARCHA.KGEL 35
lake, which is too distant from the D10nastery. These instruc-
tions I pray of you to follow, and may the mercy of God and
the prayers of His most pure J\lother and of St. Sergius ever
be with you, now and ever and to ages of ages. Amen."
This interesting document gives quite an insight into the
spirit of Russian monasticism during the fifteenth and six-
teeuth centuries, ,vhen so many religious houses were founded
in the northern parts of the empire. It show's too, although
the present buildings date chiefly from the seventeenth cen-
tury, that in the founder's time, as now, the monastery con-
tained three churches, dedicated respectively to the Holy
Trinity, the Annunciation, and St. Sergius. The principal, or
" summer," church is a very fine building, and contains in its
left-hand corner just outside the iconostasis the shrine of the
founder, together with the vestn1ents in which he used to say
l\Iass. The relics themselves lie pod spudoJn (under a bushel) ;
that is to say, they are not exposed to view, but are buried in
the floor of the church underneath the shrine, which is a ceno-
taph, with a picture of the saint on the upper surface encased
in the usual silver covering. The" winter" church of the ...t\.n-
nunciation opens into the refectory, a very fine oblong room,
with a vaulted roof, supported (like in the far larger refectory
at Solovetzki, of ,vhich it is an evident copy) by an enormous
round pillar in the lniddle. Bet,veen the refectory and the
principal church, and separated from the shrine of St. Antony
in the latter only by a ,vall, is a chapel where all the abbots
are buried. The church of St. Sergius is over the gate,vay
by which the monastery is entered. Besides these buildings
there is a fine tower, built in the seventeenth century, con-
taining twenty bells, the largest of which weighs near upon six
tons..
O\ving to its secluded position, the history of this monas-
tery has been on the whole uneventful, although it has several
times been visited by the emperors on their way to Archangel.
It has never been besieged by the Swedes or bombarded by
the English, like some of the monasteries on the vVhite Sea,
and though, like almost every building in Russia, it catches
36 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
fire about three times in the course of each century, these con-
flagrations are not due to the malice of foreigners, but either
to lightning or the carelessness of its inmates. Nevertheless
Sijski l\Ionastery has played its part in the history of Russia.
It was here that Theodore Nikitich Romånoff, the father of
1\Iichael, the future Tzar, and founder of the present reigning
dynasty, was incarcerated in the year 1599 by the Tzar Boris
Godunofi: and compelled to take the tonsure under the name
Philaret, his wife having been separated from hin} and sent
into a convent. If a letter, still preserved in the monasteïy,
from the Tzar Boris Godunoff can be trusted, it would seeUl
that he took anything but kindly to his enforced religious lifc,
for the Tzar writes to the Prior saying that he hears that
Philaret has been neglecting hi:;; religious duties and spending
his time hunting wild beaRts in the forests, and quarrelling
with the other monks, breaking into their cells and beating
them ,vith a stick, and that all this must cease for the future,
that the Prior must insist on his going regularly to confe
sion
and communion like the other monks, and not allow hinl to
neglect the choir offices. 1\Ioreover, he nlust not be allo,ved
to see or hold any converse ,,"'ith strangers, but is to be kept
,vithin the ,valls of the monastery, and these latter, if they
have in any places fallen into disrepair, are to be mena(}d.
This letter is extremely interesting- as showing ho,v insecure
Boris Godunoff felt his position on the throne to be, o,ving to
his doubtful title, and this doubtless ,vas the real reason that
he exhibited such solicitude lest the ne\vly professed Blonk
should be corrupted by intercourse with the secular 'tvorld.
Whether Philaret's insubordination Y.as exaggerated by the
rrzar's infornlant, Bogdan V oseikotf, or not, it is impossible to
state; but it is certain that he became reconciled to the lllOH-
astic life before he ,vas released from his imprisOllluent at
Sijski by the false I)emetrius in 1606, and the comlnunity
still possess a rnagnificent
lS. copy of the Gospels, beautifully
illuminated, which he sent them after he ascended the patriar-
chal throne of l\Ioscow, in commemoration of the fact that it
,vas t.herp that he began that ecclesiastical career which, ho,,"-
THE DIOCESE OF ARCHANGEL 37
ever unwillingly entered upon, was, in the providence of God,
to be the saving of Russia, both in Church and State.
After Abbot Antony had shown IDe all over the monastery,
its churches and treasures, he took me up to his quarters,
where I found an excellent fish dinner provided for ine. He
apologised for not dining with me, but said that his rule for-
bade liinl to eat fish during the Gospozhinki, or " Fast of our
Lady," that is to say the fourteen days before 15 August, the
Feast of the Repose of the Blessed Virgin. This fast is kept
very strictly in the 11lonasteries, and \vhen I was staying at
Solovetzki, during the last three days of my visit, no fish,
eggs, nlilk, or butter appeared in the refectory, and I had to
content nlyself ,vith bread, mushrooms, and vegetables of
various kinds. But anlongst the laity fish is perIllitted as
a rule.
A good lnany pilgrims on their ,vay to Solovetzki visit this
lllonastery, ,vhich is close to ,vhere the t,vo main roads from
Ioscow and St. Petersburg to Archangel unite. They are al-
lowed to stay in the hostelry outside the gate free of charge
for a night, and are fed at the expense of the community.
No description of the religious life of the country ,vould be
conlplete ,vithout nlaking mention of the pilgrims ,vho may
be seen on every high-road leading to the great religious
centres of the country, trudging along ,vith their bro,vn habits,
their pilgrilll's staff, a large bundle on their backs, and a tin
teapot hanging by a string from their necks. It is often most
interesting to talk with them about their long journeys and
all their adventures by the ,yay. l\Iany of thenl have been
to J erusalelll at least once in their lives, and in this case their
bundle usually contains a shirt \vhich has been dipped in the
waters of the Jordan in lllemory of our Saviour's baptism,
which they constantly carry about ,vith them, in order that
they lllay clothe thenlselves in it ,vhen their last hour ap-
proaches.
The length of the journeys which they make upon foot is
sin1ply astounding. T,vice in the Archangel Government I
was recognised by pilgrims who had seen IDe at Kieff the year
38 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
before at the celebration of the nine hundredth anniversary
of the conversion of Russia, and as it takes six days posting
with three horses from Archangel to V ologda, and fifty-seven
hours of railway from there to Kieff, it may be imagined that
a journey on foot over this distance is no light undertaking.
One of the two ,vho had seen me at Kieff told me that he had
been to Jerusalem in the meantime, having been treated by a
l\Ioscow merchant to a passage from Odessa to Beyrout, whence
he had ,valked to Nazareth and thence to Jerusalem. On his
way bet,veen the latter places he had been robbed by brigands
of aU the money he was bringing to the holy places at Jeru-
salem, but he had been helped by the Russian monks in the
Holy Land, and then 0 btained a ticket through the Russian
Palestine Society back to Odessa and by rail to :Thfoscow.
From there he had started imIl1ediately on foot for Solovetzki.
He told me that his home ,vas in the government of .Vladimir,
and that besides this pilgrimage he had made four to the
Troitza monastery, near l\loscow, and one to \T alaam, on Lake
Ladoga, and one to Great N ovgorod. This ,yill give some
idea of what a Russian pilgrin1's life is, and in my opinion
they have an enormous influence upon the national life of
Russia. I often used to ,vonder ho,v it ,vas that as a rule the
mention of the great capitals of Western Europe conveyed
nothing to the peasants in this part of Russia, and ,vhen I told
them that I lived in London I ,vas often asked some such ques-
tion as "How many versts is London from
loscow?" and
yet that, on the other hand, all of them had heard of Constan-
tinople, and
lount Athos, and Jerusalem. But after travel-
ling on the pilgrim boat between Solo vetzki and Archangel
and hearing the conversation of the pilgrin1s the 111atter was
no longer a mystery to me; for the pilgrim is ,velcome in
every village throughout the length and breadth of the land,
and everybody is glad to hear the account of his travelling
experIences.
THE DIOCESE OF .A.RCHA.NGEL 39
IV.
Sunday in a Country Village.
BEFORE leaving- St. Petersburg for the 'Vhite Sea, I had
been anxious to find some one to travel ,vith, anJ had secured
the services of Vladimir J oanovich Popoff, a student who had
conipleted his course at the Seminary of Archangel, and having
passed all his examinations with distinction, had been sent to
the ecclesiastical academy at St. Petersburg for four years
before being ordained. His father is parish priest at Zacha-
chevski, a vil1age about fifteen miles from Sijski
lonastery,
and far too poor to pay the expenses of his son's journey home
for the summer holidays. So Vladimir ,vas glad to accompany
Ine on my journey to Solovetzki, as it enabled him to visit his
home, which otherwise he could not have done during his four
years' course at the academy. Directly I arrived at Archangel
I had sent him home to his father's, and arranged to meet him at
Sijski 310nastery, and his father had invited me to spend a day
or t,vo with him before starting for l\loscow. This I was very
glad to do, as it enabled me to pass a Sunday in a siulple
country village in this distant part of Russia.
'Vhile I ,vas being sho,vn round the monastery at Sijski,
Vladimir arrived \vith his father's tarantass; so after dinner I
took leave of Abbot .....
ntony and started in his carriage drawn
by three white horses) Father I van's tarantass following behind
,vith the luggage. \Ve drove through the forest along the edge
of the lake for some way, and should evidently have had some
beautiful vie,vs of the monastery, had it not been for the
sheets of rain \vhich wer
descending. About four hours'
drive brought us to the end of our journey, and ,ve drew up at
the parsonage of Zachachevski, where Vladimir's father, I van
Germanovich Popoff, met us at the door, and gave me a most
hearty welcome. He is considerably over sixty years of age,
and in his day must have been a very handsome man; even
now, though long past the prime of life, he looked the very
picture of dignity ,vith his long grey beard and dark purple
cassock. I was immediately taken upstairs and int,roduced to
40 BIRKBECK AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
the rest of the household, which consisted of his sister, Anna
Germanovna, who has kept house for him since the death of
his wife, hiH daughter, ,vho is the widow of a priest, and her
little girl, who was evidently the spoilt one of the family.
The house consisted of four rooms-a sitting-rooln, containing
a table and sofa and a fe,v chairs, and a bookshelf in the
corner, with pictures on the walls of the Tzar and Tzarina, the
Crhcifixion, and scenes from the Passion, the twelve principal
feasts of the Church, some vie,vs of l\loscow, and several
photographs of various l11embers of the family. In the corner,
with a lanlp in front of it, ,vas the icon of the Saviour, and
below it a picture of the Holy .Virgin and Child, and on each
side "'ere pictures of St. Nicholas, patron of the parish,
with scenes from his life; and of St. \Tladimir, the Apostle of
Russia; and St. Alexander N evski, after ,vhon1 his t\VO sons
are named respectively". On a small table below the icons was
a large copy of the Bible in Russian on a table by itself. The
other rOOlns of the house consisted of a second s111all sitting-
room and t,yO bedroollls, all on the saIne floor
,vhile off the
landing at the back of the house ,vas a large storehouse, in
which clothes are hung to dry, ,vood is kept for the stove in
winter, and lumber of various kinds is stored a,vay. On the
ground floor lives the old nurse of the family, who, needless
to say, was delighted to see Vladimir home again.
The village itself, like almost all Russian villages, consists
of one long wide street with ,vooden houses on each side, each
of thenl with roughly carved wooden gables and little white
window sashes. In the middle of the village is a large church-
yard containing two churches dedicated to St. Nicholas anà
SSe ZosÏIna and Savvati respectively. The" surnmer" church
of St. Nicholas is a good specilnen of the style in vogue in
these parts at the beginning of the eighteenth century. It is
octagonal in form, the roof ascending into an eight-sided spire,
'surmounted at the top by a small dome. It contains a very
beautiful iconostasis extending over three of the eight sides of
the church, the centre of which is occupied by some exqui-
sitely carved \vooden "royal doors" painted and gilded all
r
eHE DIOCESE OF ARCHAKGEL 41
over, with the usual representations of the four Evangelists
and the Annunciation painted in small canopied niches in the
carvin a, ,,'"bile in the chord of the arch are suspended two
b
cherubim appropriately suggestive of the Cherubic Hymn
which is sung during the Great Entrance. On the left of the
l{oyal Gates there is the usual icon of the
Iadonna and
Child, but on the right-hand side, the position usually oc-
upied by the icon of the Saviour is filled by a very fine icon
of Abraharn and Sarah entertaining the three angels. This is
the ordinary conventional n10de in the East of representing in
painting the mystery of the Holy Trinity. As in n10st Rus-
sian parish churches, there are lnany beautiful silver lamps,
rich sets of vestInents, icons, and other costly offerings ,vhich
ha ve been 111ade froln tÏIne to tinle by the parishioners. Only
a rear ago one of the peasants w"ho had been in Moscow at the
tÏIl1e of the festival of the 900th anniversary of the Conversion
of Russia had brought back a beautiful icon of St. .Vladimir,
which he had bought out of his savings as an offering to his
parish church. The" ,vinter" church contains nothing re-
markable, and is about to be replaced by a Dew church built
in brick, the ,valls of vlhich ,vere about half-finished when I
was there.
On Saturday afternoon "\ve all ,vent to vespers, after which
Father I van Inade .Yladimir sit do,yn and 'v rite the sermon for
next day at the Liturgy. First of all the Gospel for the day
was looked out, then pens and paper and ink ,vere produced:
and the large Bible brought out from und er the icons, and
then in order that .Yladimir should not be disturbed the priest
and I "rent for a \vall{: round the village, and all amongst the
sn1all ?elds of rye by which it is surrounded. These belong
to the village con1ll1une, and are R.pportioned off about once
every five years to the various fanlÍlies, according as they are
able to cultivate then1. It was quite evident by the way the
peasants greeted him that Father I van ,vas n1uch beloved in
his native village, ,,-here he had lived his ,vhole life except
during the tÍ1ne when he was at the senlinary at Archangel,
ha vii1g succeeded his father in the living, and it was very
42 BIRKBECK -,-
ND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
pleasing to see the simple and kindly relations ,vhich evidently
existed between him and his Hock.
The next morning I was roused from my slunlbers by the-
church bells ringing for lllatins at five o'clock, but did not ar-
rive myself in church until just before the liturgy commenced
at about seven. The church ,vas cro,vdeù, the men on the-
south side and the women on the north, the latter dressed in
their bright costumes in ,vhich red and ,vhite predominated.
The music of the service ,vas led by a lay-reader and joined in
most heartily by the congregation, ,vhose behaviour through-
out the ,vhole service was most devout and attentive. I may
here say that the ordinary notion in the 'Vest that the Russian.
peasantry cannot understand the Old Slavonic in ,vhich the
services are read and sung is quite a òe]usion. Some parts of
the choir offices, it is true, present great difficulties, not only'
to the peasantry but to the clergy themselves, especially some.
of the "canons" translated froll1 the Greek, in \vhich the
order of the ,yords in the original has been exactly preserved,
although in Greek they were written in metre. But no one who-
has any kno,vledge of the Russian peasantry ,yould n1aintain
for a moment that the Old Slavonic language in itself is un-
intelligible to the people. On the contrary, their ordinary con-
versation is full of expressions cuUed frorn the service books;
and if a foreigner resides a fe,v weeks amongst the peasantry,
he will find on his return to the capital that he has caught
many expressions which he ,vill be told belong to the Church
language, and ,vhich appear to the ordinary resident of St.
Petersburg just as stilted and pedantic, as the use of such.
terms as "dearly beloved brethren" would seem in London
society.l As for the music in the RU."5sian parish churches,
Russia has, like ourselves, gone through a parson-and-clerk-duet
period, except that the service has ahvays been sung, and
never sin1ply read. But during the last fe,v years imn1ense
pains have been taken t
make the services n10re popular, and.
not only in the country districts, but in the catl1edrals, the-
services have in many cases been much n10re congregational
1 This subject is fully discussed in Chapter V.-[A.R.]
THE DIOCESE OF Al\CH.AXGEL 43
than formerly. If anyone is inclined to dispute this state-
ment, let him attend some of the early liturgies at the Kazan
Cathedral in St. Petersburg, and judge for hinlself. I, at least,
can answer not only for the church at Zachachevski, but for
a good many of the village churches in these northern parts
of the empire.
At the end of the liturgy came Vladimir's sermon. As I
think that a sermon delivered in this distant part of Christen-
dom may be of interest to many of your readers, I give a
translation of it in full :-
Ser.mon on the Gospel for the Eleventh S'unday a jter Pe?? te-
cost. St. )Iatt. xviii. 23-35.
"In the Gospel ,,,hich has just been read, my brethren, the
Saviour's parable of the ( unmerciful creditor' is put before us.
This creditor, i
mediately after he hin1self had been forgiven
an immense debt by his lord, went to his fello,v-servant who
was his debtor and began to beat him, demanding the payment
of an insignificant debt. ''''hat was it that our Lord Jesus
Christ, in laying before us this parable, ,vished to say to us ?
,vhat ,vas it that He wished us to learn from it ? The ans,ver
is evident-mercifulness! In the parable ,ve read that a
certain King (Tzar)-by ,vhich is nleant the Lord Himself-
had conlpassion upon His debtor, and forgave hinl his debt.
Yes, my brethren, great indeed is the compassion of God to us
sinners! Of His unspeakable mercy the Son of God Himself
came do,vn to earth, 'taking upon Himself the form of a
servant'; of His tender mercy He as He journeyed from place
to place in Palestine, satisfied the hungry, healed the sick,
opened the eyes of the blind, raised the dead to life, and at
last ,vas nailed for us to the Cross, as if He had been the most
infamous of men. And all this for us sinners, us reprobates!
All this He under,vent because of His infinite love for us!
So 'gracious,' as the Psalmist David says, , and mercifuJ is the
Lord, long suffering and of great goodness,' nor can any \"ords
express the greatness of His love for us. This is the reason
why Christ loved so often to repeat that 'He came into the
44 BIRKBECK AKD THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
\yorld not to destroy, but to save that ,vhich was lost,' to de-
li vel' sinful III en. This is why He preached to us, ' Be ye there-
fore merciful, even as your Father in heaven is merciful '.
This is why He says to us, 'If ye forgive not men their
trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses'.
And \vhen on one occasion the A postle Peter asked of our
Lord, 'Ho,v oft shall 111Y brother sin against me and I forgive
him-till seven times?' the Lord answered him, , I say not
unto thee until seven times, but until seventy times seven,' by
which He n1eant that we should always forgive all injuries,
that ,ve should constantly be merciful without any exception.
And shall not we, my brethren, obey Him? Is it possible for
us to refuse to listen to the Lord, "'Tho calls upon us to be
merciful? No, n1Y brethren, God forbid that it should be so.
H But sorne may say, In ,,"'hat particular respects are we
bound to sho\v mercy? The answer to this question ,ve 11lay
find in the ,vords of Jesus Christ HiInself,
T hich He speaks
concerning His dread cOIning to judge the quick and the ùead,
and saith unto the just, , I ,yas an hungred, and ye gave 1\le
meat; I ,vas thirsty, and ye gave 1\le drink; I ,vas a stranger,
and ye took IUe in; naked, and ye clothed l\Ie ; I ,vas sick, and
ye visited
Ic; I \vas in prison, and ye came unto 1\le'. These,
brethren, are the works of love and lnercy, ,vhich ,ve have to
fulfil in order to make our life ,yorthy of the Christian calling.
But this is not all. Far from it. Our lnercy ll1ust extend
itself even to our enemies. The Lord distinctly says, ' If ye do
good to thel11 ,vhich do good to you, \vhat thank ha.ve ye? for
sinners also do even the same. And if ye love them 'v hich
love you, ,vhat thank have ye? for sinners also love those
,vhich love them. And if ye lend to then1 of ,vh9In ye hope
to receive, ,vhat thank have ye? for sinners also lend to
sinners, to receive as nluch again. But love ye your enemies,
and do good and lend, hoping for nothing again' (Luke vi. 32-
35). Here you may see, lny brethren, how great our merciful
loving kindness ought to be towards our neighbours. Then
also our re,vard ,vill be great, for the Lord goes on to say,
'your re,vard shall be great, and ye shall be the children of
TH:B
DIOCESE O:F .ARCH....\NGEL 4.S
the Highest' (Luke vi. 35). 'Blessed are the merciful for
. they shall obtain mercy' (l\latt. v. 7). So great, my brethren T
is the recompense for mercy. On the other hand, \Voe unto
you who deal unlllercifully and grievously with your neigh-
bours! Reinelllber in the parable \vhich \ve haye heard read
to-day what the Tzar did to the unmerciful creditor: he de-
livered hÏIn over to the tormentors, and commanded that he
should bt' beaten, until he should pay all that ,vas due to
him. (So like\vise,' says the Saviour, 'shall :àly Heavenly
:father do also unto you if ye from your hearts forgive not
everyone his brother their trespasses' (Matt. xviii. 35).
" }ly dear Christian brethren, be ye likewise merciful to
your neighbours! Let us, everyone of us, each according to
his po\\rers, render them our best service. Let us obey the
conlllland of our Lord, \Vho so often hath manifested His love
to us, Who hath clothed us, and fed us. Let us bear in mind
the example of the holy Philal'et,1 whose nlelllory \ve keep on
December 1, ",.ho on account of his \vonderful practice of this
virtue has received the title of 'the :\Ierciful'. This blessed
Inan, \vhen he himself had corne to the uttermost extreme of
poverty, never ceased to assist t.he poor, giving a\vay to theln
his last ox. And for this the Lord granted him salvation.
Iay He give us grace to follo\v his goo(l exanlple !
H The precept of charity and lIlercy is the greatest of all ;
in it is contained the HUIH and
ubstance of Christian virtup.
\Vherefol"e it is indispensable for us to fulfil it in holiness. If we
fulfil this great cOlllll1andluent, then the Lord also will have
mercy upon us, \",ill forgi \-e us our sins, great as they are, and
\vill give us His blessing in His hea\Tenly kingdom. A111en."
This \vas VladinlÏr's sermon, \vhich ,vas listened to \vith the
greatest attention by the village peasants, \vho had kno\vn
hiTll fronl hi
childhood, and of course were interested in his
progress at the St. Petersburg Acaclelny. ::\Iany points in it
lnay ,;eem strange to us, but the allusion to the J[agnificat
1 The blessed Philaret \vas a noble of Constantinople, who, like Job, at
one time rich, lost all his earthly possessions, and afterwards recovered his
position through his grandson marrying into the Empress Irene's family.
46 BIRKBECI
AND THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
(He hath filled the hungry) which comes in the daily morning
,service of the Eastern Church, would not be lost on then1, and
the mention of our Saviour's journeys "through the various
localities of Palestine," ,vould C01l1e especially home to the in-
habitants of a village lying on one of the main pilgriIn routes
of Russia, through which many a devout peasant ,vho has been
to the Holy Land passes on the ,yay to the shrine of SS.
Zosima and Savvati at Solovetzki: As soon as the sermon was
over, the royal doors opened, and the priest, accompanied by
his deacon, brought the Holy Sacrament forth to the people,
and a small child of about two years old was cOlllmunicated in
his mother's arlllS, it being his birthday. The practice of com-
municating infants, once the universal rule of the Catholic
Church
lnay seem strange to us, though it is difficult to see
ho,v it is possible to condemn it, and to defend infant baptisnl.
At any rate the Easterns quote one and the same act for both
(St. :ThIark x. 14), and I must say that as a rule it is a most
edifying sight, reminding one of many an old picture of our
Saviour being brought by His mother to the temple.
After this the congregation dispersed, and 'Tladimir and I
went home, where ,ve found breakfast being prepared for us,
consisting of bread and biscuits, and of course unlimited tea.
Needless to say, that Anna Gerlnanovna was anxious to know
what I thought of VladinlÏr's sermon, and for his old nurse it
,vas evidently a red-letter day. In a fe,v n1Ïnutes the priest,
who had stayed behind to take the ablutions, caIne in, his four
hours' service on an enlpty stomach seenled to ,veigh lightly
on him, and he appeared to be in no hurry to break his fast.
Indeed, he was far too busily occupie.l in preparing the banquet
for the guests ,vholn he had invited to the nlidday dinner to
Ineet me, to think of his breakfast, in spite of the solicitude of
his sister and children on his behalf.
At about n1idday the guests began to arrive. First there
came Father J oann Rozanoft
the head of the Blagochinie (a
term answering very much to our Rural Deanery), with his
wife, Father Popoff's sister-in-law. Then came Father Feodor
I vanoffski, a priest from a neighbouring parish. The Abbot of
1'HE DIOCESE OF ARCHAKGEL 47
:Sijski ,vas also expected, but as it ,vas kno,vn that he was
forbidJen by hi
nlonastic rule to eat even fish during the
fourteen Jays' fast before the " Repose of the
[other of God "
(August 15) ,ve began w'ithout him. After turning towards
the icon of "the Saviour" in the corner of the roonl ,vhile
grace was said, ,ve all sat do,vn to do justice to Anna Ger-
JllanOVna's excellent yldlá, a fresh fish soup, well kno\vn to all
travellers in Russia, and other dishes of fish in various forms.
In the n1Ïdst of a lively conversation on the suqject of lilY
visit to Solovetski monastery the week before, its shrines,
churches, wall
, ship
, seagulls, pilgrÏ1ns, and services, and just
,vhen lilY stock of Russian names for the je,vels in the vest-
lnents and mitres in t,he treasury was ,yell-nigh exhausted, we
heard the tinkling of bells, and looking out of the windo,v we
sa,v Abbot Antony's tarantass ,vith the three ,vhite horses
driving up the village street, and in a fe,y moments he and his
deacon entered, and after saluting the icons joined the party.
"Second Vespers " have not as yet Inade their appearance in
the Eastern Office-books, and there was no Sunday afternoon
service, and \ve spent the afternoon chatting over glass after
glass of tea, until the guests departed, all except Father Feodor,
,vho "
as staying for the night. The evening we spent sitting
out of doors on the grass in front of the par
onage, and both
priests asked me many questions concerning the English
Church. They had read in the Tzerkovnyja Trj{dornosti that
unlike the Gerlnans "\\"'e had Bishops, and that ,ve kept the
festivals of the Church, and allo\ved no ,,"'ork on Sundays.
They had also heard that we had a liturgy, but no saints, was
this true? I eXplained to them that our Calendar contained
the nalnes of a great many saints, and that our principal saints'
days 'Yere those of each of the holy Apostles and the Evange-
lists, ,vhile ,ve had two greater and three lesser feasts of the
Blessed ,rirgin. After supper Father Paul returned to the
.subject of the English Church, and asked me ,vhether the
Psalter was read in our Church, "Thereupon I explained to him
that the Psalter was recited throuO"h once everv month
ð oJ ,
'\vhereas in the East it is read through every "eek, and that
48 BII{KBECK .A..ND TIlE IlUSSIAN CHURCH
the song of the Blessed Virgin and the Prophet Simeon were
with us, as with them, said every day. But the part of our
service which pleased him Inost ,vas the Litany, owing no
doubt to its close resemblance in places to the Ectenae in the
Eastern services. He would not let me n1iss a single clause
in it, and as I translated it sentence by sentence to hinl he re-
sponded with Gospodi pOÎÎ
ilui (Lord, have luercy) or Pod(Û
Gospodi (Grant) 0 Lord) in the place ,vhere ,ve have" Good
Lord deliver us" and "\V e beseech Thee to hear us) good
Lord," respectively.
rfhe next day my visit came to an end, and Vladimir and
I had to start for
losco'v. \Vhen the time to
tart caIne near,
the old priest came and tole I me that he 'vas going to church to
pray ,vith .Vladimir before ,ve
tarted. \Ve all ,vent across to
the church, and the speciall5ervice for " A youth returning to
his studies" was sung. 'rhese ,nolebens or services for special
occasions are far more numerous in the Russian Church than
in Greece, and are adluira bly dra,vB up. The Epistle read ,val'>
Eph. i. 16-21, and the Gospel,
lark x. 13-16, after \vhich
Vladin1Ïr ,vent up to ki:--os the cro::;s and ,va
sprinkled \\Tith
holy \vater, and then the following prayer ,vas rt:ad :-
"0 Lord, our God and Jlaker, 'Vho hast honoured lnankilld
by creating hin1 in Thine ilnage, and hast taught thenl \VhOln
Thou hast chosen to reverence all those ,vho harken unto rrhy
doctrine, and hast revealed 'fhy ,visdom unto babes, and didHt
instruct Solomon and all those \vho have sought after rrhy
,visùom: open the hearts, understandings, and lllouths of thel'ìp.
Thy servants, that they Inay receive the Inight of Thy la\\T.
that they may effectually learn the profitable doctrine which
is placed before them, to the glory of Thy Inost holy Xan)(..,
and to the use and edification of Thy holy Church, and that
they may understand Thy blessed and perfect will. Deliv.-}"
them fro III all assaults of the enelny, connrrll them in ortho-
doxy and faith, and in all blessellness and purity all the daYH
of their life, and grant that they nlay perfect themselves in t111
understanding and fultihnent of rrhy testÏ1nonies: and that,
thus prepared they Inay glorify Thy lll0st holy N anle, and
THE ])IOCES}
O
F .A11CH
\XGEL 4B
Dlay be inheritors of Thy kingdom. For Thou art our God,
n1Ïghty in lllercy, and gracious in Inightiness: and to Thee is
due all glory, honour, and ,vorship, Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit, no,v and ever, and to ages of ages. AUlen."
Then, after being taken round to kiss the principal icons
in the church, his father took him to his Inother':-; grave in the
churchyard, and read a short service there ending ,vith the
prayer:-
"0 God of all spirits and of all flesh, \Vho has tlestroye f 1
death ana trodden do,vn Satan, and hast given life to the
".or1d: grant unto the soul of Thine handlllaid departed this
life to rest in pleasant, happy, and peaceful places, from
,vhence pain and sorro,v and sighing do flee a ,yay. Forgive,
o blessed Lord, Thou lover of Inankind, forgive the sins she
hath cOlnmitted by thought, ,vord, or deed: for there is not a
man that liveth and sinneth not: Thou alone art ,vithout sin,
Thy righteousness is everlasting righteousness, and Thy \V ord
is truth. For 'fhou, 0 Christ, art the resurrection and the
life: and to Thee \ve offer up our praise together "ith Thine
everlasting Father and Thy Inost blessed and life-giving
pirit,
no,v and for ever, even unto ages of ages. .A.IHen. .J
..A.fter this service \ve ,vent back to the parsonage to dinner,
after ,vhich we sat talking tin the bel11'; of our tarantass COIn-
ing do,vn the village announced that the hour of parting be-
t,veen father and son ,vas COffiè. The table ,vas moved aside
and all the household assen1bled in the 1'00111. The lalnps he-
fore the icons ,vere lit and the fanlily knelt clo\vn to pray for
a safe journey for UH, the old priest's ,.oice being conl';tantly in-
terrupted ,vith sobs at parting ,vith his son, \VhOlll he ,voulù
ha ve no chance of seeing again for two year
, a long time to
look for\vard to at hi
tilue of life. He thanked lie again ana
again for hringing Vladin1Ïr hOl11(> to him, ,vhile .L<\.nna Ger-
Inanovna, in the midst of her tears,
.nce n10re entreated me
not to take Vladin1Ïr "across the frontier" with tHe \vhen I
returned home. Nothing \vould satisfy her upon this point
until I told her that no one could leave Russia ,vithout a pasH-
port, and that the (}O\-ernlllcnt ,vould never allo\v D1e to carry-
4
50 BIRKBECK AKI) THE RUSSIAN CHURCH
Vladin1Ïr off to England. The tarantass ,vas no"
packed, and
we went do"\vnstairs into the village street. As the priest eU1-
braced me for the last tin1e he said: " God bless you for bring-
ing me my son. May He ever be ,vith you and all those ,vho
are dear to yo 
