A Brief History of the Old Orthodox (Old Believer) Church #

By F.E. Melnikov

Introduction #

Three hundred years ago, Russia professed a single Christian, Orthodox faith and formed a single true Orthodox Church. At that time, there were no heresies, no schisms, no divisions within the Russian Church. For more than six centuries, beginning from the Baptism of Rus’ in 988, the Russian Church enjoyed inner peace and tranquility. It is true that in the 14th–15th centuries heretics such as the Strigolniki and the Judaizers appeared, but they quickly vanished. The Roman popes made repeated attempts to subjugate the Russian Church, striving to bring it under their authority and enslave it to the Roman papal throne. But they were unsuccessful. In response to these attempts, the Russians began to guard their Orthodox faith all the more zealously.

Even the dreadful Tatar yoke, under which the Russian land suffered for more than two hundred years (from 1240 to 1480), did not disrupt or shake the Orthodox faith of the Russian people. The Tatars did not interfere in the religious life of the Russian people. The Tatar khans granted the Russian metropolitans and bishops complete freedom to govern the Church and all its affairs according to their pastoral duty. The khans issued special charters (yarlyks) to the Russian hierarchs for this governance. Therefore, even under the Tatar yoke, the Russian Church remained in peace and quietude: no unrest disturbed it. It continued to grow and strengthen. Only on rare occasions were there minor misunderstandings with the Patriarch of Constantinople.

From the beginning, the Russian Church was under the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Metropolitans were sent from Constantinople to govern the Russian Church. However, when some patriarchs fell away from Orthodoxy and entered into communion with the Roman pope, the Russian Church began to elect and ordain its own metropolitans. It thus withdrew from dependency on the Patriarchate of Constantinople. This took place in the mid-15th century. From that time on, the Russian Church began to regard the Greeks and the entire Eastern Church with suspicion, as those who had lost the purity of the faith and of piety.

Before the Tatar invasion, the see of the Russian Metropolitan was located in the capital city of Kiev; afterward, it was transferred to Moscow. Gradually, Moscow began to rise in prominence and eventually became the capital of the great Russian state. This status of the metropolitanate over the whole Russian people was displeasing to the kings and princes of Poland and Lithuania, because the Orthodox population of those lands was, in terms of faith, subordinate to the Russian (Moscow) Metropolitan. Therefore, they sought and obtained from the Patriarch of Constantinople the appointment of a separate metropolitan for that population. Thus, two Russian metropolitanates were formed: one governed the northeastern part of Russia, and the other — the southwestern lands. The southwestern church soon fell under Latin influence. It often happened that its bishops were obedient servants of the Roman pope. Both the faith and the liturgical books, rites, and customs of the southwestern church were corrupted. The Great Russian Church, however — as the Moscow metropolitanate was called — rose to such prominence and strength that it attained the patriarchate. Instead of metropolitans of Moscow, there were now all-Russian patriarchs (since 1589). The patriarchate contributed further to the flourishing of the Russian Church. Moscow was granted the right to be called the Third Rome. Patriarch Jeremias of Constantinople, who consecrated the first Patriarch Job in Moscow, signed a “Charter of Establishment” of the patriarchate in Russia, in which he addressed the Tsar of Moscow with the following declaration:

“Since the old Rome (the capital of Italy) fell into the Apollinarian heresy, and the second Rome, Constantinople, is in the hands of godless Turks, therefore your great Russian kingdom, O pious Tsar, has surpassed all previous kingdoms in piety; and all pious kingdoms have been united in your kingdom, and you alone are now named the Christian Tsar throughout the whole universe.”

This charter was included in the canonical book of the Russian Church — the Kormchaya (on folios 15 and 26) — and became the confession of faith of the entire Russian people. The last pious Moscow Patriarch, Joseph, bore witness to this universal confession in these words addressed to Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich:

“The Russian Church shineth like a pillar unto the heavens, never to be shaken or overthrown, rightly and truly, just as from the beginning it received the Divine Ustav.”¹

During the dark and troubled time of the Time of Troubles (1605–1613), the Moscow patriarchs Job and Hermogen saved Russia from destruction and preserved the Russian Church from heresies and schisms. The Russian Church shone with a multitude of Orthodox hierarchs, miracle-workers, and God-pleasing saints glorified by signs and wonders. It was renowned for the splendor of its churches and the multitude of its holy monasteries. The Russian people amazed foreign visitors with their faith, piety, and devotion. Their feats of prayer inspired awe and wonder. One foreigner of the time remarked that Russians must have legs of iron, so long do they stand in prayer; another exclaimed, “These are holy people!” Russia was indeed Holy Rus’, and rightly bore this sacred title: holiness was the ideal of the devout Russian people.

But it was precisely at this time, when the Russian Church had reached its greatest height, that the schism occurred, dividing all the Russian people into two halves—into two Churches. This sorrowful event took place during the reign of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich and the patriarchate of Nikon, in the second half of the 17th century. The Tsar and the Patriarch—Alexei and Nikon—and their successors and followers began to introduce into the Russian Church new rites, new liturgical books and services, new relationships toward the Church, and even toward Russia itself and the Russian people; they began to establish new concepts of piety, of the Church’s sacraments and hierarchy, and to impose an entirely different worldview and spiritual orientation upon the Russian people.

All this led to the Church schism. Those who followed Nikon, accepted the new rites and services, and embraced the new faith were called Nikonites or New Believers by the people. These followers of Nikon, using the power and authority of the state, declared themselves to be the Orthodox or “established” Church, and labeled the opponents of Nikon and his innovations with the derogatory name schismatics, blaming them entirely for the Church division. But in truth, the opponents of Nikon’s innovations were not the ones who created the schism: they remained faithful to the old faith, to the ancient Church traditions and rites,² and changed nothing in their native Russian Church—nor in the ancient Eastern, apostolic, and universal Church. Thus, they rightly call themselves Old Believers or Ancient Orthodox Christians, and the Church of Christ. Later, they came to be known by the secular (non-ecclesiastical) name Old Ritualists, which refers only to the external form of Old Belief and does not at all convey its inner essence.

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