Avvakum
Avvakum Petrov was a Russian Old Believer and protopope of the Kazan Cathedral on Red Square who led the opposition to Patriarch Nikon's reforms of the Russian Orthodox Church. His autobiography and letters to the tsar and other Old Believers such as Feodosia Morozova are considered masterpieces of 17th-century Russian literature.
Life and writings
He was born in, in present-day Nizhny Novgorod. Starting in 1652 Nikon, as the patriarch of the Russian Church, initiated a wide range of reforms in Russian liturgy and theology. These reforms were intended mostly to bring the Russian Church into line with the other Eastern Orthodox Churches of Eastern Europe and the Middle East.Avvakum and others strongly rejected these changes. They saw them as a corruption of the Russian Church, which they considered to be the true Church of God. The other churches were more closely related to Constantinople in their liturgies. Avvakum argued that Constantinople fell to the Turks because of these heretical beliefs and practices.
For his opposition to the reforms, Avvakum was repeatedly imprisoned. First he was exiled to Siberia, to the city of Tobolsk, and partook in an exploration expedition under Afanasii Pashkov to the Chinese border. In 1664, after Nikon was no longer patriarch, Avvakum was allowed to return to Moscow, and was then exiled again to Mezen. He was then allowed to return to Moscow again for the Church Council of 1666–67, but due to his continued opposition to the reforms, he was exiled to Pustozyorsk, above the Arctic Circle, in 1667. For the last fourteen years of his life, he was imprisoned there in a pit or dugout. He and his accomplices were finally executed by being. The spot where he was burned has been commemorated by an ornate wooden cross.
Avvakum's autobiography recounts hardships of his imprisonment and exile to the Russian Far East, the story of his friendship and fallout with Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, his practice of exorcising demons and devils, and his boundless admiration for nature and other works of God. Numerous manuscript copies of the text circulated for nearly two centuries before it was first printed in 1861.
''The Life of the Archpriest Avvakum''
The Life of the Archpriest Avvakum, originally titled The Life Written By Himself is a hagiography and autobiography written by the Old Believer and protopope Avvakum Petrovich. The text discusses Avvakum's struggle against Patriarch Nikon's reforms during the Schism of the Russian Church and extensively details the trials he experienced during various exiles in Siberia. The text is remarkable for its style, which blends high Old Church Slavonic with low Russian vernacular and profanity. The Life is considered "one of medieval Russia's finest literary works" and was regarded highly by both Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky.Historical background
Schism of the Russian Church
In the 17th century, the Russian Church underwent significant reforms spearheaded by Patriarch Nikon and supported by Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. The resulting split in the Russian Church between supporters of the reforms and their opponents, who came to be known as the Old Believers, is known as the Schism of the Russian Church.Historian Georg Bernhard Michels writes that "the Russian Orthodox Church became a significant target of popular hostility during the second half of the seventeenth century." Having survived the destabilizing Time of Troubles, the Church had become a "powerful bureaucracy" by the 1630s. As the Time of Troubles was seen as a punishment for impiety, the Church was "intensely conservative" and "aspired to restore the 'ancient piety' in its fullness."
This drive for strengthening and purification was further influenced by the Ruthenian Orthodox revival led by Petro Mohyla in Kiev in the 1630s to 1640s, who likewise sought to strengthen Orthodox religiosity and spirituality in Ruthenia. In Kiev and Lviv, "Orthodox brotherhoods set up schools under the direct patronage of the patriarch of Constantinople."
In the late 1640s, Nikon and Avvakum were members of the Zealots of Piety, a circle of ecclesiastical and secular figures who aimed to improve religious and civilian life and to purify and strengthen the influence of the Russian Orthodox Church. Gradually, a split appeared in this circle: while certain Zealots echoed the sentiments of the Ruthenian revival, others, most notably Avvakum, "felt that homespun truths were sufficient and suspected foreigners of , which would adulterate the simple, strong native faith." When Nikon became the patriarch of Moscow and all Russia in 1652, he initiated ambitious reforms, entrusting "Jesuit-trained scholars from Ukraine and White Russia with a critical review of the forms of Russian worship." This exacerbated tensions with and among the Zealots, who "wanted to create a church which was morally pure and close to the ordinary Russian people".
Tsar Alexei and Patriarch Nikon, by contrast, had imperial aspirations. Nikon's vision of ecclesiastical restoration assumed the "continued dominance of the church over state" and stretched beyond Muscovy to the "entire Eastern Christian ecumene." Nikon's ambitions were further strengthened by his "contact with Greek and Ukrainian churchmen" and by Russian territorial gains in the Russo-Polish War of 1654–1667. After the Ruthenian revival, western Slavic Orthodox practices became closer to those of Greek Orthodoxy than to the Russian tradition, which had been increasingly isolated from the Greek Orthodox Church over the past several centuries. Nikon sought, likewise, to bring Russian church practice into line with Greek Orthodoxy. Russian linguist Alexander Komchatnov further emphasizes that that goal was in line with Muscovy's newly developed imperial aims, allowing Russia to position itself at the center of the whole Orthodox world instead of remaining a marginal religious entity.
From 1653 to 1656, Nikon's reforms changed the manner of making the sign of the cross, introduced new liturgical vestments modeled in the Greek style, and imposed a normalized revision of liturgical books.
Those opposing Nikon's reforms came to be known as the Old Believers. Their texts painted the Schism as an apocalyptic contest between good and evil, with Nikon as the Antichrist. They were continually repressed, arrested, and exiled from the onset of Nikon's reforms.
Nikon and Tsar Alexei soon fell out, and Nikon was placed in confinement, but the tsar continued to enforce his reforms. In 1666, the Great Moscow Synod summoned by Tsar Alexei anathematized all who refused to abide by Nikon's changes. A trial of the Zealots was held and leading Old Believers, Avvakum among them, were exiled beyond the Arctic Circle to Pustozersk on the Pechora River, in today's Nenets-Autonomous Okrug, 27 km from Naryan-Mar. The reforms and their enforcement prompted outright rebellions that continued over the next several decades.
Persecution of Avvakum and the Old Believers
In 1653, Avvakum and his family were exiled to Tobolsk, Siberia. In 1655, they were moved to Yeniseysk, from which Avvakum departed with A.F. Pashkov's expedition to Dauria on the Chinese border, traveling past Lake Baikal to Nerchinsk. In 1664, Avvakum returned to Tobolsk, remaining for two years before being permitted to return to Moscow in 1664. Several months later he was once more exiled with his family to Mezen. He was permitted to return to Moscow for the Great Moscow Synod of 1666-1667, but was finally exiled to Pustozersk alongside his fellow Old Believers Lazar, Fyodor, and Epifany. From 1670 onward, they were condemned to life "on bread and water" in a dugout, where they lived until they were burned alive on 14 April 1682. During his imprisonment, Avvakum wrote his autobiography; the first version of The Life was drafted in 1669–1672, and the subsequent three redactions from 1672 to 1675. The trials he suffered in his numerous exiles are largely the subject of this text.Genre
Avvakum referred to his memoir as a hagiography, which might suggest that he was characterizing himself as a saint, though he may have referred to it that way because, simply, no other word for what we would today call autobiography had yet been coined. D. S. Mirsky writes, "It is not an all-round autobiography: it was written for purposes of edification and propaganda. It is in essence an Apologia ''pro vita mea, not a disinterested exposition of all the facts of his life." Scholars such as Alan Wood consider The Life'' a prototype of Siberian prison literature, a tradition that would most famously be continued by Fyodor Dostoevsky in the 19th century and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn in the 20th.Content
Early life
Avvakum's account largely follows his biography. He was born circa 1620 in Grigorevo in present-day Nizhny Novgorod Oblast to an alcoholic priest named Pyotr, who died while Avvakum was a child, and a nun, Maria. Avvakum married a merchant's daughter, Nastasya Markovna, at age 17, became a deacon at 21, a priest at 23, and an Archpriest in Yurevyets at 28. By his own account, Avvakum appears to be a passionate, faithful man, who was nonetheless often harsh and unforgiving in his religious zeal. Before the Nikonian reforms, he dealt harshly with harlequins, lechery, and unbelievers. His zeal causes continuous conflicts with local boyars and officials. Eventually, Avvakum flees to Moscow, where he encounters Nikon as the latter is rising in prominence. The two are initially friends, but Nikon begins his reforms soon thereafter, forcing several dissenting members of the clergy to undergo shearings, markings, and exile. Avvakum himself is also seized, and is exiled with his family to Siberia.Exile in Siberia and expedition to Dauria
Avvakum extensively describes his first exile to Tobolsk and his experience on the forced expedition to Dauria, led by Afanasy Pashkov. Pashkov orders that Avvakum be beaten, but Avvakum's prayer alleviates his pain. The travelers become so hungry that they eat a newborn foal, along with its blood and afterbirth, but two of Avvakum's sons eventually die. Amidst these trials, Avvakum heals the mad and the ill and urges them to repent.Avvakum also denounces shamanism. In one episode, Pashkov sends his son Eremej to battle in Mongolian territory, but first asks a shaman to predict the outcome of the war. The shaman predicts victory. Avvakum is angered, knowing the shaman to be channeling devils, and prays for the demise of Pashkov's men. However, recalling the previous kindness of Eremej, he is overcome by pity, and asks the Lord to pardon him. Pashkov's men are decimated but Eremej is spared, and a vision of Avvakum appears to Eremej to lead him back home from the wilderness. Pashkov is nonetheless angry with Avvakum for his malignant prayers. Avvakum concludes his description of Pashkov's military expedition thus: "Ten years he tormented me, or I him — I don't know. It will be sorted out on Judgement Day." Avvakum also extensively describes the beauties and bounty of the land explored during the expedition to Dauria.
Avvakum describes saving a man by lying about his whereabouts. Avvakum asks whether, having lied, he has sinned and should seek penance. The narrative is then interrupted by words of absolution attributed to Avvakum's confessor, Epifany:
"God doth forgive and bless thee in this age and that to come, together why thy helpmate Anastasia and thy daughter, and all they house. Ye have acted rightly and justly. Amen."