A.I. Solzhenitsyn #
Repentance and Self-Restraint as Categories of National Life (1973) #
“In the distant past (before the 17th century), Russia was so rich in movements of repentance that it stood out as one of the leading Russian national traits. In the spirit of pre-Petrine Rus’, there were impulses of repentance—more precisely, religious repentance—on a mass scale: it began in many individual hearts and merged into a torrent. This is likely the highest and truest path of national repentance… Both the chronicles and Old Russian literature abound with examples of repentance.
But from the time of Nikon’s and Peter’s soulless reforms, when the eradication and suppression of the Russian national spirit began, repentance too began to fade, and this capacity of ours dried up. For the monstrous repression of the Old Believers—with pyres, pincers, hooks, and dungeons—continued for another two and a half centuries in the senseless persecution of twelve million defenseless, unarmed compatriots, driving them into all the uninhabited lands and even beyond the borders of their homeland. For that sin, the ruling church never uttered repentance. And this could not but weigh like a boulder upon the entire Russian future. Instead, in 1905, the persecuted were simply forgiven… (And even then, too late—so late that it could no longer save the persecutors themselves.)
The entire Petersburg period of our history—a time of outward grandeur and imperial arrogance—led the Russian spirit ever further away from repentance… In the 20th century, the blessed rains of repentance no longer softened the hardened Russian soil, scorched by doctrines of hatred.”
From the Letter to the Third Council of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (1974) #
“I dare to draw the attention of those gathered here to yet another—distant, three-hundred-year-old—sin of our Russian Church. I dare to repeat this word in full force—sin, lest I be compelled to use an even graver one. A sin in which our Church—and the entire Orthodox people!—have never repented, and therefore a sin that weighed upon us in 1917, still weighs upon us to this day, and, according to our faith, may be the reason for God’s punishment upon us—an inexhaustible cause of the calamities that have befallen us.
I refer, of course, to the Russian Inquisition: the suppression and destruction of the established ancient piety, the oppression and persecution of twelve million of our brethren—fellow believers and compatriots. The cruel tortures inflicted upon them—tongues torn out, pincers, racks, fire, and death—their churches taken away, their exile over thousands of miles, far into foreign lands. And this upon those who never rebelled, who never took up arms in response—those steadfast, faithful, Old Orthodox Christians, whom I would not only refrain from calling ‘schismatics’ but would even hesitate to call ‘Old Believers,’ for in doing so, we, the rest, would at once expose ourselves as merely New Believers.
For nothing more than their unwillingness to yield and accept the hasty recommendations of dubious, itinerant Greek patriarchs, for nothing more than their preservation of the two-fingered sign of the cross—the very same gesture by which our entire Church had blessed itself for seven centuries—we condemned them to persecutions no less severe than those which the atheists of the Lenin-Stalin era inflicted upon us in turn. And never did our hearts tremble with repentance!
Even today, at Sergiev Posad, amidst a gathering of believers, an unceasing liturgy is offered over the relics of St. Sergius of Radonezh—yet the liturgical books by which the saint himself prayed, we burned upon pitch-fed pyres as if they were devilish. And this irreversible persecution—this self-destruction of the Russian root, the Russian spirit, the Russian wholeness—lasted not for sixty years, as it does now, but for two hundred and fifty. Could such an assault not have rebounded upon all of Russia and upon us all?
Throughout these centuries, some emperors were inclined to put an end to the persecution of their loyal subjects—but the highest hierarchs of the Orthodox Church whispered and insisted: the persecution must continue!
Two hundred and fifty years were given to us for repentance—and yet all we found in our hearts was to forgive the persecuted, to forgive them for how we had destroyed them. But let us recall: that year was 1905—a year whose numbers burn on their own, like Belshazzar’s writing upon the wall…
Less than a year ago, I observed our most ancient branch of faith in their services and conversations in the churches of Moscow—and I bear witness before you to their astonishing steadfastness in faith (and, even more so, in resistance to state oppression), to such a preservation of Russian countenance, language, and spirit as can no longer be found anywhere else within the Soviet Union. And what my eyes have seen and my ears have heard will never allow me to consider the longed-for reunification of the Russian Church as complete—until we unite in mutual forgiveness with our most ancient branch.”
From the Article “The Russian Question at the End of the 20th Century” #
“The ‘conciliar’ post-Troubles period ended quickly under Aleksey Mikhailovich, who, due to a historical misunderstanding, has been immortalized as ‘the Quietest’… Yet the reign of Aleksey Mikhailovich was filled with revolts… There was an eagerness to keep up with Western influences in every way, a hasty desire to conform—even in the revision of liturgical books. And this led him to the most ruthless crime: the anathema against his own people and a war against them for the sake of the ‘Nikonian reform’ (even when Nikon himself had already distanced himself from the ‘Greek project’).
Just forty years after the people had barely survived the Time of Troubles, the entire nation—still not yet recovered—was shaken to its very foundation, both spiritually and in daily life, by the Church Schism. And never again—once more for the next three hundred years—did Orthodoxy in Rus’ regain the high vital strength that had upheld the spirit of the Russian people for more than half a millennium. The Schism left us weakened, and its effects were felt even in the twentieth century.”
From a Letter to “Vestnik RHD,” 1975 (“Letter from America”) #
“Before us, I see two spiritually uplifting steps, and both of them lie in repentance…
The first—to take upon ourselves the burden, to repent, and to seek ways of ensuring that it is never repeated: that the Russian Church, in a fateful era for the homeland, allowed itself to become a submissive appendage of the state, failed to spiritually guide the people, and was unable to cleanse and shield the Russian spirit before the years of fury and turmoil arrived…
The second—prior to that—is our madness—our demonic!—persecution of the Old Believers.
Had it not been for these two truly ecclesiastical sins, which followed from one another in cause and consequence, modern terrorism would not have been born in Russia, and Lenin’s revolution would not have come into the world through Russia: in an Old Believer Russia, such a thing would have been impossible!
Two such successive acts of repentance would shake but also revive our churches abroad, giving them that spiritual impulse by which alone they could make up for their lack of participation in Russia’s current development.
Alas, Metropolitan Filaret’s response gave little hope. Even today, he reproaches the Old Believers for their fragmentation into sects (yet it was we—through our meddling, and then through our cruelty—who forced them into this position!), for their supposed lack of ‘true holiness,’ and even for the loss of ‘any signs of Orthodoxy.’ Here, we see both ignorance of them and indifference toward them.
One must see these remaining Old Believers—their strength, their conviction, their self-sacrificing night-long prayers (which we are no longer capable of), their courage in life, their determination: whether enduring two hundred years in Turkey or, in a single generation—without languages, without knowledge of this world—moving as entire families, with ten children at a time!—from China to Brazil, from Brazil to the United States, and now even to Alaska, saving their children from the corrupting breath of this age.
One must see how they have preserved their national appearance, their folk character, and hear their unaltered, original Russian speech. Nowhere in the entire West, and hardly anywhere even in the Soviet Union, does one feel as much in Russia as among them.
But they have been hunted and terrorized by us. They scarcely consider us Christians at all. Some parishes will not even permit us to cross ourselves in their narthex—neither in our own manner nor in theirs—while Russian churches, one after another, readily allow them to ‘reunite’ with us…
An insurmountable lack of understanding.”
“It may seem strange: to begin our development into the 21st century with repentance for a sin of the 17th century? But the weight of our guilt is not measured by how long ago it was committed, nor by the number of those still alive today who have suffered from it (there were once 12 million Old Believers; today, perhaps a hundred times fewer remain). Rather, it is measured by the magnitude and significance of the crime itself. And as for whether a crime was committed—no one today would dare dispute it.
Must Christians be reminded that without repentance, no Christian life and no movement toward the light is possible? The mystical significance of such repentance for this 300-year-old sin is difficult to foresee—it extends beyond church politics and ecclesiastical practice. It could open the same kind of turning point in our country’s history as did the original persecution of the Old Believers, which first led us astray.
The three Orthodox jurisdictions abroad daily offer countless prayers for the “union of all the holy churches of God”—and yet they do not unite? But here is one obvious, unifying truth: instead of arguing and reproaching one another, let us look closely at ourselves—aha! We are all the same, all Nikonian! All of us together, even now, continue to share in and approve of the great crimes committed against ancient Orthodoxy—and this has bound us together forever (even as it has condemned us to remain eternally divided).
All three of our New Rite branches, despite their merits and differences, are united in one thing: they neglect the trampled Old Belief, the ancient Orthodoxy of Sergius of Radonezh. And do we truly believe that without falling to the ground in supplication and begging forgiveness from him (the only one who came close to such an appeal after the Council was Archbishop Anthony of Geneva), any one of our three branches—no matter how brilliant its theological arsenal—can hope to achieve the triumph of faith?
And in the very land of the American church, the Old Believers live among them, on their very territory. Is this not a sign?
In the perspective of centuries, all our present-day “jurisdictional” differences will appear insignificant, but ever greater will grow the shadow of that great ecclesiastical crime with which the downfall of Russia began.”
From a Letter to Vestnik RHD, 1979 (“Once Again on the Old Believers”) #
“In issue № 128, A.N. makes a sweeping judgment about Old Belief, basing it on the fact that M. Menshikov, you see, called it ‘misonoism’—a fear of novelty. Well, Menshikov was certainly free of such fear—so much so that his Novoye Vremya (New Time) newspaper, at the moment of the February Revolution, made a complete about-face in a single day, betraying everything it had defended for decades. It adopted such an obsequious tone toward the new regime that even its enemies from the leftist camp urged it to maintain some dignity. (By contrast, in the frenzy of that March, only the Moscow Old Believers had the courage—yes, by then it already required courage—to speak out in favor of a parliamentary monarchy.) One should choose oracles more carefully.
I am astonished that our contemporaries, having themselves endured the Soviet inferno, can remain so indifferent and merciless toward the Old Believers. How can they fail to put themselves in the place of these helpless, defenseless millions—12 million people in what was then a relatively small Russian population—who suddenly saw their centuries-old prayer books burned, their icons hacked apart, their sacred objects burned together with living people? How can they not imagine the horror of having their right hands chopped off, of being tortured with iron—all, as it turned out, in order to introduce a few minor formal changes and thereby maintain ‘spiritual unity’ with a fallen Byzantium that none of them had ever even seen?
The Bolsheviks did the same, but in proportion to their goal: to completely eradicate the Christian faith. But what need did the Nikonians have for such methods? By using violence and executions to impose their faith, Nikon’s followers placed themselves outside of Christianity altogether.
And then, of course, once they were dead, blame them for anything you like. A.N. claims that Old Believer Russia would not have been able to withstand foreign invasions. And yet, what other Russia had stood firm and endured from the 10th to the 17th century? It was Old Believer Rus’ that, for 250 years, never submitted to the Tatars and, through the initiative of the people—without rulers!—managed to withstand the unparalleled trials of the Time of Troubles. And in the Bolshevik decades, no one stood their ground more resolutely than the Old Believers.
But the most painful part is that A.N. goes even further, voicing blind suspicions that Old Belief is somehow dangerous in the manner of modern Iran. Whom have they executed? Against whom have they sought vengeance? This accusation conveniently aligns with the latest slanders from those bitter enemies of our current revival—the ones who, rushing ahead with their lies, shamelessly try to scare the Western press into believing that the Russian religious and national awakening is ‘worse than Iranian Islamic fanaticism,’ that it will bring even greater bloodshed, that it has no right to exist on Earth.
A vile accusation—made without a shred of fact, evidence, or justification.
For sixty years, we were not allowed to breathe or think as Russians—and that did not trouble our critics. That was considered ‘progressive development.’ But the moment we began to recover, they rush to trample us down.”
From the Book Russia in Collapse #
“Our Time of Troubles in the 17th century… did not shake the moral foundations of the people, which remained intact. But the religious Schism of the 17th century had a much deeper and more irreversible effect. The Schism created that fateful crack, into which Peter’s cudgel later struck, beating down our customs and laws indiscriminately.
For a long time after, the true Russian character survived only within the isolated community of the Old Believers—and you cannot accuse them of licentiousness, nor of corruption, nor of laziness, nor of incompetence in industry, agriculture, or trade, nor of illiteracy, nor, least of all, of indifference to spiritual matters.
What we have observed as the ‘Russian character’ over the past three centuries is already the result of its distortion by the mindless cruelty of the Schism—from Nikon and Aleksey Mikhailovich, then from the ruthlessly enterprising Peter, and later from his ossified successors…”
“And when will we finally reach true reconciliation with our deepest-rooted branch—with the Old Believers? Not simply ‘forgiving’ them, but bringing them our repentance for the cruel persecutions of the past.
Even now, when all of ruined Russia does not know whether it will survive this great Russian Calamity, we still cannot swallow our pride and acknowledge that this ancient dispute was entirely fabricated?”
From the Epic The Red Wheel #
“They believe as they were once taught at the baptism of Rus’—and why, then, are they called schismatics?
Suddenly they are told: ‘Your forefathers, your fathers, and you yourselves have all believed wrongly until now, and we will change it…’
And the ‘most quiet’ Orthodox Tsar is busy appeasing the Muslim sultan with gifts, so that he will restore deposed wandering patriarchs—and thus reinforce the trampling of some Orthodox by others…
For them, at that time—not as it is for us—faith was life itself. And suddenly, it was changed.
Yesterday they cursed the three-fingered sign of the cross; today, only the three-fingered sign is correct, and the two-fingered is cursed…
But to the indifferent and the self-serving, it costs nothing at all to accept this—curse it one way today, reverse it tomorrow.
But those in whom truth beats—that is who refused, that is who was destroyed, who fled into the forests.
This was not just an indiscriminate extermination—but the destruction of the best part of the people.
Did Orthodoxy really collapse because in ‘Jesus’ there would be one ‘i,’ because ‘Alleluia’ would be sung twice instead of three times, because they would process around the lectern in a different direction?
And for this, the best of Russia’s life force was driven into the fire, into hiding, into exile?
The laws of personal life and the laws of great nations are alike. Just as an individual cannot escape paying for a grave sin, sometimes even in this life—so too does a society, a nation.
And everything that later happened to the Church… from Peter to… Rasputin…
Was it not punishment for the Old Believers?
The Church must not stand on falsehood…
My God, how could we trample down the best part of our own people?
How could we tear down their chapels, while we ourselves prayed undisturbed and imagined we were at peace with God?
How could we cut out their tongues and ears!
And still, to this day, we have not acknowledged our guilt?
Tell me, Father Severian—does it not seem to you that until we beg the Old Believers for forgiveness and reunite once more, Russia will never know peace?”