Why is the new rite considered heresy? #

To answer this question, we must first examine the meaning of the word “heresy.” Often, words lose their original meanings over time, and people use them in new contexts, leading to confusion. This has also happened with the word “heresy.” Today, it is often used to mean “nonsense” or “absurdity.” For example, one might hear, “What heresy are you talking about!"—in which case it expresses outrage at a foolish or absurd statement. However, the word originally had a somewhat different meaning.

According to N. M. Shansky’s Etymological Dictionary of the Russian Language, heresy derives from the Greek hairesis (“sect”), which itself comes from “choice” or “alternative,” stemming from the verb haireō, meaning “to choose.” Heresy literally means “what is chosen as true” (from a doctrine), which does not conform to the established dogmas of the latter.

In the early centuries of Christianity, this word was used to describe philosophical schools. Thus, in the New Testament, we find phrases such as “the sect of the Sadducees” (Acts 5:17), “the sect of the Pharisees” (Acts 15:5), and “the sect of the Nazarenes” (Acts 24:5), referring to the community of Christians. This same term was also used by the Jews with whom St. Paul conversed in Rome (Acts 28:22). Interestingly, in the First Epistle to the Corinthians, St. Paul writes: “For there must be heresies among you” (1 Corinthians 11:19, quoted from the Slavonic text, lection 148), which the Russian Synodal Translation renders as, “For there must be divisions among you.”

The Holy Fathers continued to use the word heresy in the sense of a “narrow teaching or doctrine.” In this regard, St. Basil the Great taught that there are three categories of accepting heretics who wish to reunite with the Church of Christ, corresponding to three types of heresy:

First Category: Those who distort the doctrine of the Godhead and the very foundations of Christianity. These heretics are received into the Church through full baptism.
Second Category: The so-called schismatics, who do not distort the foundations of faith but pervert the Church’s canons, rules, rites, and sacraments. Such heretics (schismatics) are received into the Church through the Sacrament of Chrismation (provided they were properly baptized with three full immersions).
Third Category: Those who do not distort Church teaching or canons but separate from the Church due to ambition, envy, or struggles over parishes and ecclesiastical positions. Such heretics are called “discordant” and are accepted into Church communion through repentance (confession).

Thus, new ritualists (Nikonites) are considered heretics of the second category (schismatics) and are received through Chrismation (if they were properly baptized with three full immersions).

— Priest Mikhail Rodin.