1. Tsentr khraneniia sovremennoi dokumentatsii, fond 89 (Kollektsiia rassekrechennykh dokumentov), perechen’ 49, delo 17, listy 4–5. Archival notation follows the standard practice in Russian archives: fond (f.), opis’ (op.), god (g.), otdelenie (otd.), stol (st.), delo (d.), dela (dd.), list (1.), listy (11.), oborot (ob.) This study draws upon materials in Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi istoricheskii arkhiv (RGIA), Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Rossiiskoi Federatsii (GA RF), Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi istoricheskii arkhiv g. Moskvy (RGIAgM), Tsentral'nyi gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Moskovskoi oblasti (TsGAMO), Tsentral'nyi gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Oktiabr'skoi revoliutsii i sotsialisticheskogo stroitel'stva g. Moskvy (TsGAORSSgM), Rossiiskii tsentr dlia khraneniia i izucheniia dokumentov noveishei istorii (RTsKhlDNI), Otdel rukopisei Rossiiskoi gosudarstvennoi biblioteki (OR RGB), and Tsentr khraneniia sovremennoi dokumentatsii (TsKhSD).

2. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 246, 1. 3. The term “Living Church” was often used by contemporaries as synonymous for renovationism, but actually referred to a segment of the larger movement.

3. RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 112, d. 620, 1. 17 (Iaroslavskii to Orgburo, 15.12.1924).

4. Altogether 6, 245 of 28, 743 parishes (in 84 dioceses) were still formally ascribed to the renovationist camp. It bears noting, however, that the rate of loss varied considerably from diocese to diocese but was most intense in central Russia. According to the renovationists’ own records, by 1927 they controlled only a fraction of the parish churches in the dioceses of Nizhnii-Novgorod and Tver’ (1.5%), Iaroslavl’ (2.6%), Riazan’ (1.6%), Kostroma (3.2%), Kursk (4.3%), Penza (5.1 %), Ivanovo-Voznesensk (6.6%), Vladimir and Samara (7.6%), Moscow (8.5%), Ulianovsk (8.6%), Kaluga (8.9%) and Saratov (10.7%). See the official report in “Sostoianie eparkhii,” Vestnik Sv. Sinoda, no.2 (1927): 17. For a detailed analysis of the statistics on parish registration as renovationist and Tikhonite, see Edward E. Roslof, “The Renovationist Movement in the Russian Orthodox Church, 1922–1946” (unpub. Ph.D. diss., University of North Carolina, 1994), 209–13. It bears emphasizing, however, that these data refer only to the number of parishes, not parishioners; in many cases the renovationist parish had few lay members and enjoyed its ascription to favoritism by state authorities. Hence renovationist support was, in many cases, even weaker than these figures indicate.

5. Typical was a police report from the GPU in December, 1922: “The renovationist church has affected only the city of Vologda; as far as the countryside is concerned, the revolution in the church has had virtually no impact. The believers do not agree with the reforms of the renovationist movement and are seeking to create an autocephalous religious community” (RTsKhlDNI, f. 89, op. 4, d. 164, 1. 5). The disproportionate strength of the renovationists in cities is partly due to organizational factors (stronger ecclesiastical and police controls), partly to the superior education and greater liberalism of urban clergy and partly to the less traditional religious attitudes of urban laity.

6. Exaggerated but essentially correct (to judge from the records of the Moscow diocesan council [eparkhial'nyi sovet] in RGIAgM, f. 2302), this estimate appears in an unidentified communication (probably from the Tikhonite church in Kazan’ diocese) to the NKVD of the Tatrespublika (26 November 1923) in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 202, 11. 13–15 ob.

7. RGIAgM, f. 2023, op. 1, d. 17, 1. 71 ob.

8. Curtiss, John S., The Russian Church and the Soviet State, 1917–1950 (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1953)Google Scholar; Pospielovsky, D., The Russian Church and the Soviet Regime, 1917–1982, 2 vols. (Crestwood: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1984)Google Scholar; Alekseev, V. A., Illiuzii i dogmy (Moscow: Politizdat, 1991 Google Scholar; Levitin, Anatolii and Shavrov, Vadim, Ocherki po istorii russkoi tserkovnoi smuty, 3 vols. (Zurich: Institut Glaube in der 2. Welt, 1978)Google Scholar; Walters, Philip, “The Renovationist Coup: Personalities and Programmes,” in Church, Nation and State in Russia and Ukraine (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1991), 250–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Shishkin, A. A., Sushchnost’ i kriticheskaia otsenka obnovlencheskogo raskola Russkoi Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi (Kazan': Izdatel'stvo Kazanskogo Universiteta, 1970)Google Scholar; idem, “Obnovlencheskii raskol Russkoi Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi” (kand. diss., Kazan', 1972); RoBler, Roman, Kirche und Revolution in Rufiland: Patriarch Tichon und der Sowjetstaat (Cologne: Bohlau Verlag, 1969), esp. 122–64Google Scholar; Vasil'eva, O. Iu., “Russkaia Pravoslavnaia Tserkov’ i sovetskaia vlast’ v 1917–1927 godakh,” Voprosy istorii, no. 8 (1993): 40–54 Google Scholar. For a definitive account of the renovationists, drawing upon an impressive array of archival sources and carrying the analysis to the demise of the movement in the 1940s, see Roslof, “The Renovationist Movement in the Russian Orthodox Church, 1922–1946.” Other important aspects of religious politics in the 1920s are accorded a meticulous analysis in Daniel Peris, “Storming the Heavens: The Soviet League of the Godless and Bolshevik Political Culture in the 1920s and 1930s” (Ph.D. diss., University of Illinois, Urbana, 1994).

9. This paper will draw upon the contemporary ecclesiastical press but primarily upon a complex of archival materials: the chancellery of Patriarch Tikhon (RGIA, f. 831), the renovationist diocesan council of Moscow (RGIAgM, f. 2303), and a variety of state and party documents (including Politburo materials in RTsKhlDNI and TsKhSD, as well as state documents in GA RF, TsGAMO, and TsGAORSS g. Moskvy). The KGB archives are, for all practical purposes, still inaccessible but copies of the regular reports (somewhat reminiscent of the annual report of the Third Section in the nineteenth century) are available in Lenin's personal archive in RTsKhlDNI (f. 5, op. 1 for 1919 to early 1923) and, for later periods, in various personal and party archives (e.g. RTsKhlDNI, f. 17 and f. 89).

10. See, for example, the police report of December 1922 claiming that “bourgeois and black-hundredist” elements were responsible for great pressure on the clergy not to accept renovationism (RTsKhlDNI, f. 89, op. 4, d. 164, 1. 4). For another example, see the police report of April 1923 in GA RF, f. r-5446s (Sovnarkom), op. 55, d. 409, 11. 103–4.

11. See Freeze, Gregory L., “Rechristianization of Russia: Church and Popular Religion, 1750–1850,” Studio Slavica Finlandensia 7 (1990): 101–36.Google Scholar

12. Renovationists, eager to legitimize their reforms, eagerly cited these precedents. For example, a 1923 circular from the bishop of Viatka, Evdokim, cited the recommendations of the 1906 preconciliar commission on liturgical reform. See “Uspokoites'!” in Viatskoe eparkhial'noe upravlenie. Tsirkuliar', [Viatka], no. 1 (10 May 1923): 3.

13. For example, see the diocesan assembly in Kazan’ at its meeting in 1905 in Kuliasov, A., ed., Kazanskie eparkhial'nye s “ezdy za piat'desiat let (1867–1917 gg.) (Kazan', 1917), 27 Google Scholar, as well as the commentaries by the bishops from 1905–1906 in RGIA, f. 796, op. 187, g. 1906, d. 6972, 1. 103 ob. (Vladikavkaz), 1. 105 (Stavropol’), 11. 119 ob.-120 (Don) and 1. 231 ob. (Nizhnii-Novgorod).

14. See V. M. Andreev, “Liberal'no-obnovlencheskoe dvizhenie v russkom pravoslavii nachala XX v. i ego ideologiia” (Kand. diss., Leningrad, 1971); O. V. Ostanina, “Obnovlenchestvo i reformatorstvo v Russkoi Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi v nachale XX veka” (Kand. diss., Leningrad, 1991).

15. See G. Nardov, “Tserkovno-slavianskii iazyk,” Vladimirskie eparkhial'nye vedompsti, no. 43 (1906): 648–52; Vasilii Kedrin, “Ustranima li odna iz prichin razvitiia sektantstva?” ibid., no.4 (1906): 65–68. For the more radical issue of the remarriage of widowed priests (who, under canon law, were forbidden to do so), see the proposal and documents from 1905 and 1917 respectively in RGIA, f. 797, op. 75, otd. 2, st. 3, d. 217, 11. 1–10 and GA RF, f. r-3431, op. 1, dd. 334–336.

16. For example, the assembly of lay and clerical representatives in Mogilev (13–19 May 1917) declared that “monasticism is not obligatory for the elected bishop. Married life, moreover, does not serve as a barrier for election as bishop” (GA RF, f. r-3431, op, 1, d. 580, 1. 2). This assembly even proposed to allow widowed priests to remarry and to disregard the custom of wearing the cassock and having long hair (1. 5 ob.). Similarly radical reforms were favored by assemblies of clergy and laity in Don, Penza, Riazan’ and Kherson dioceses; see the protocols and resolutions, respectively, in the following: GA RF, f. r-3431, op, 1, d. 253, 11. 110–116 ob.; OR RGB, f. 60 (Vserossiiskii s'fezd dukhovenstva i mirian), papka 4, d. 4; ibid., papka 4, d. 2; Trudy khersonskogo chrezvychainogo eparkhial'nogo s “ezda predstavitelei klira i mirian Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi, 19–26 aprelia 1917g. (Odessa, 1917). Not all assemblies were so liberal; the clerical and lay delegates meeting in Vologda (June 1917), for example, opposed the adoption of a Russian language liturgy but did admit the need for some corrections (GA RF, f. r-3431, op, 1, d. 580, 11. 91 ob.-92).

17. For example, 34 members of the Church council made a formal proposal to improve the liturgy—by abolishing arbitrary excisions and by encouraging priests to read audibly and directly to the people. However, the patriarch and the synod reaffirmed the traditional practices; although they did concede that priests could make some deletions from the full liturgy, they cautioned them “not to disturb the conscience of zealots for a proper church liturgical order.” See the resolution of 29 October/11 November 1918 in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 7, 11. 297–302. Such innovationism proliferated during the tumultuous years of the civil war. See, in particular, the resolution of a deans’ assembly in Petrograd (28 November 1918) proposing to conduct services in Russian (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 50, 1. 13 ob.). See also the main file of the Church council on liturgical language (GA RF, f. r-3431, op. 1, d. 295) and proposals by A. Ust'inskii, Tezisy dlia obnovleniia byta religioznoi storony zhizni pravoslavnykh khristian (Petrograd, 1917), a brochure dated 16 April 1917; a copy is found in GA RF, f. r-3431, op. 1, d. 286.

18. See the report of the “Committee on Bringing Order into the Liturgy and Church Singing,” which was established on 20 July/2 August 1919 under the metropolitan of Novgorod. It complained that some priests had already begun to leave the main altar gates open during the liturgy, to perform more of the liturgy outside the altar, to read some sacred prayers with a full voice, to read the Gospels directly to the parishioners and to permit women to enter the altar. On the basis of these reports, the patriarch and the Supreme Church Council sent an admonition to the metropolitan of Moscow to eradicate such practices (22 November/5 December 1919 in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 25, 11. 82–85).

19. A. G. Kliashev, a member of the Supreme Church Council, submitted a report “on the necessity of immediate reforms” to combat the “pagan cults of the Orthodox people” on 15/28 March 1919; the report was approved by Patriarch Tikhon, the Holy Synod and the Council. See RGIA, f. 831, op.l, d. 22, 1. 131–131 ob. The bishop of Velikii Ustiug, Aleksei, reported on 19 November/2 December 1918 that the Church's mission used to focus on the Old Believers and sects but now must concentrate on “unbelief and atheism.” Bishop Ioann of Penza (5 December 1918) likewise emphasized the need for vigorous missionary activity “because godlessness is growing among the youth, not by the day but by the hour; hooliganism is expanding, moral law for this same youth has lost any meaning; true patriotism is languishing; Judaism and sectarianism proudly raise their heads and try to undermine Orthodoxy still more boldly” (ibid., d. 65, 11. 11–12). See also the resolution by an assembly of clergy and laity in Kursk (20 May/2 June 1918) in ibid., d. 7, 1. 151–151 ob.

20. In a secret communication to the Politburo on 19 March 1922, Lenin emphasized, in response to a pitched conflict in Shuia, that now was the time to launch a frontal attack on the Church because “the great majority of peasant masses will be for us or, in any event, will be in no condition to give decisive support to that handful of black-hundredist clergy and reactionary petite bourgeoisie in the cities.” Lenin thereupon recommended measures to force a direct confrontation, an approach that elicited the enthusiastic support of Trotskii and led to several show trials and executions. See “K 120-letiiu so dnia rozhdeniia V. I. Lenina,” Izvestiia TsK KPSS, no. 4 (1990): 190–92. See also the report to the Politburo, filed on 24 May 1922, by L. Trotskii, who candidly discussed strategies to “disorganize” the Church, with three variants: a patriarchate with a loyal patriarch, a renovationist synod and “total decentralization, with the absence of any central administration.” See the report, with Politburo endorsement (26.5.1922), in RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 1, d. 294, 1. 3 and unpaginated appendix. The purpose in supporting the renovationists, as E. Iaroslavskii made clear in 1922, was to weaken the Church and accelerate the demise of religion. See, for example, the summary description in Alekseev, Illiuzii i dogmy, 232–35. For a large set of critical, hitherto secret documents in the “Presidential Archive,” see Pokrovskii, Nikolai N., “Politbiuro i Tserkov', 1922–1923,” Novyi mir, no. 8 (1994): 186–213 Google Scholar.

21. Deianiia II-go vserossiiskogo pomestnogo sobora Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi (Moscow: Izdanie Vysshego Soveta Rossiiskoi Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi, 1923), 5. See also the copy of Vvedenskii's “[Doklad] ob otnoshenii Tserkvi k sotsial'noi revoliutsii, Sovetskoi vlasti i Patriarkhu Tikhonu,” in RGIA, f. 834, op. 4, d. 335. Similarly, another renovationist faction declared itself in opposition to “the counterrevolutionary designs of church politicians” and in favor of “the recognition and Christian obedience to Soviet state power” (Proekt programmy soiuza obshchin drevle-Apostol'skoi tserkvi [Smolensk: Tipografiia V. N. K. Zap., 1923), 2.

22. “Rezoliutsii zasedanii pervoi vladimirskoi eparkhial'noi konferentsii chlenov gruppy belogo dukhovenstva i mirian ‘Zhivaia tserkov’ 10–11 dekabria 1922 g. Vladimir,” Tserkov’ i zhizn’ (Vladimir), no. 4 (15/31 December 1922): 7.

23. See Chto postanovil Vladimirskii gubernskii s “ezd dukhovenstva i mirian 27-go marta 1923 (Vladimir: Izdanie Vladimirskogo eparkhial'nogo upravleniia, 1923), 6–7. Also see analogous resolutions by the clergy in Penza and Tambov dioceses in: “Vozzvanie svobodnomysliashchei gruppy dukhovenstva ko vsem veruiushchim khristianam,” Zhivaia tserkov1 (Penza), no. 1 (5 May 1922): 1; “Protokoly s “ezda,” Golos zhivoi very (Tambov), no. 1 (1922): 12.

24. “Rezoliutsii zasedanii pervoi vladimirskoi eparkhial'noi konferentsii chlenov gruppy belogo dukhovenstva i mirian ‘Zhivaia tserkov'’ 10–11 dekabria 1922 g. Vladimir,” Tserhov’ i zhizn’ [Vladimir], no. 4 (15/31 December 1922): 7.

25. See, for example, “K nosheniiu riasy i dlinnykh volos,” Zhivaia tserkov’ (Penza), no. 3 (29 May 1922): 5; Archpriest T. Shalamov, “Golos novoi tserkvi (k otkrytiiu novogo eparkhial'nogo upravleniia),” Tserkovnaia zaria (Vologda), no. 1 (1922): 4–9.

26. Titlinov, B. V., “Piat’ let bor'by,” Vestnik Sv. Sinoda, no. 4 (1927): 13–15.Google Scholar

27. Proekt programmy soiuza obshchin drevle-Apostol'skoi tserkvi, 3.

28. “Programma tserkovnykh obnovlentsev,” Tserkovnaia zhizn’ [Vladimir], no. 3/4 (1924): 12.

29. See the discussion at the renovationist church council of 1923, where the sentiment was plainly critical of relics and led to the recommendation that all such remains be buried (Deianiia H-go Vserossiiskogo Pomestnogo sobora, 11). See also the discussion at the clergy-lay assembly in Vladimir on 27 March 1923. After hearing a report by P. Malitskii (recounting the absence of such relics in early Christianity and the abuses associated with the custom), the assembly voted for a resolution (43 in favor, 17 against and 1 abstention) to confiscate all relics and store them in the diocesan cathedral. See Chto postanovil Vladimirskii gubernskii s “ezd, 9.

30. Biulleteny. Deianiia 11-go vserossiiskogo pomestnogo sobora Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi (Moscow: Izdanie Vysshego Soveta Rossiiskoi Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi, 1923), 10–13.

31. To be sure, the assembly bravely asserted that the renovationist movement “will not perish but will develop and will yield the desired results in the earliest possible time.” See “Rezoliutsii zasedanii pervoi vladimirskoi eparkhial'noi konferentsii chlenov gruppy belogo dukhovenstva i mirian ‘Zhivaia tserkov'’ 10–11 dekabria 1922 g. Vladimir,” Tserkov’ i zhizn’ [Vladimir], no. 4 (15/31 December 1922): 7.

32. The archimandrite was rebutting the optimistic assessment given by Serafim at an assembly session on 4 October 1926. See RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 17, 1. 76 ob.

33. RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 1, d. 2639, 1. 2.

34. Ibid., 1. 45.

35. Ibid., d. 2635, 1. 17. The police filed similar reports about women in Petrograd: “Discontent over the seizure of church valuables is noticeable chiefly among women. Rumors are circulating among them that Patriarch Tikhon renounced his position because of the intervention of Soviet authorities into Church affairs and that the Church schism was prepared by the communists. The peasants regard Patriarch Tikhon and the clergy on trial as martyrs, and the progressive clergy as traitors to religion and agents of soviet authority. The believers are hostile to the Church schism” (RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 1, d. 2639, 1. 44). The prominence of female opposition should be ascribed not to some special bent in female religiosity but to their increasing prominence in the Church, especially at the parish level, where they now were fullfledged voting members and, after the Church council of 1917–1918, had the right to serve as Church elders and even as sacristans or readers. Bolshevik attitudes toward women, especially religious ones, no doubt played a role in emphasizing the role of women; typical was the dismissive contempt implicit in a remark by a key functionary in the People's Commissariat of Justice, P. A. Krasikov, that “it is impossible to make the old women [starukhi] to cease believing” in the miracles of relics—as if it were only a problem of old women, not the Orthodox popular religion more generally. See Krasikov's note of 31 May 1919 in GA RF (TsGA RSFSR), f. 353, op. 3, d. 731, 1. 34.

36. See the files of the “Commission on the Separation of Church and State,” responsible for implementing the 1918 decree and generally for repression of the Church. On 21 October 1922 the commission heard a report by a leading functionary, E. A. Tuchkov, who accused the Tikhonites of clandestinely organizing against the renovationist central governing body (the Supreme Church Administration), of driving renovationists from diocesan administrations and of various other counterrevolutionary activities. The commission thereupon ordered a relentless struggle against the Tikhonites, support for the renovationists, a purge of Tikhonites from parish councils and the requirement of public recognition of Soviet power by diocesan councils by 1 January. The support of the GPU in this process was explicitly stipulated. See RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 12, d. 443, 1. 3 (protokol of 21 October 1922). Later, however, the commission tempered this support of renovationists; its minutes for 2 July 1924 admonished the OGPU to avoid suppressing the Tikhonites through “overt support of renovationists by state agencies and trampling on the rights of the Tikhonites” and also first to verify “all the denunciations by renovationists against the Tikhonites prior to their arrest” (RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 1, d. 775, 1. 3).

37. Indicative was a police report from Simbirsk (20 September 1922): “Rumors have been spread that Soviet authorities caused the schism in the Orthodox Church, that the Supreme Church Administration is run by Jews, who forced Patriarch Tikhon to resign” (RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 1, d. 2643, 1. 57). Fear of such a reaction probably inspired Lenin's warning that Trotskii not become identified with the campaign to confiscate Church valuables, as well as later demands that key functionaries in the Ukraine not be Jewish. See “K 120 dniu,” Izvestiia TsK KPSS, no. 4 (1990): 192.

38. K. Rychkov, “Pod svezhim vpechatleniem,” Tserkovnaia zaria (Vologda), no. 1 (15 September 1922): 10–11.

39. GA RF(TsGA RSFSR), f. A-353, op. 7, d. 17, 1. 88.

40. See, for example, the rotaprint missive from the archbishop of Simbirsk, Aleksandr, on 10 March 1923. It accused the Living Church of resorting to coercion and intimidation, which simply evoked among clerics and laymen “a justified discontent and indignation and, in the first instance, destroyed faith and respect for the Supreme Church Administration and local renovationist activists” (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 11. 10–11 ob.). Reports that the renovationists, especially their plenipotentiaries from Moscow, relied upon the GPU were very widespread. See, for example, the report from the Tikhonite bishop of Tambov, sent to Tikhon on 19/28 July 1923, in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 198, 11. 2–3 ob.

41. Understandably, clergy who sought reinstatement by the patriarchal Church were especially wont to exaggerate the role of intimidation and coercion. Thus an archpriest in Vladimir diocese wrote Tikhon on 12 April 1924 that he had acceded to the demands of the Living Church only because of “intimidation on the part of the appropriate spiritual authorities of the Renovationist Church and partly the civil [authorities]” (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 246, 1. 59).

42. GA RF (TsGA RSFSR), f. A-353, op. 7, d. 17, 1. 83 ob. (petition from laity of Samara to the People's Commissariat of Justice, 1 January 1924).

43. Deianiia III vserossiiskogo pomestnogo sobora Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi na territorii SSSR ot 1–10 oktiabria 1925 goda (Samara: Samgublit, 1925), 17.

44. Tserkovnyi vestnik (Irkutsk), no. 9 (1925): 2.

45. Interestingly, notaW the parishioners shared such views—a small minority did favor adoption of the renovationist liturgy. In this case 188 favored the old ritual, 12 the new. See RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 300, 1. 1 (resolution of 15 August 1923).

46. Police report of 27 September 1922 from Penza guberniia in RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 1, d. 2644, 1. 14.

47. Vvedenskii, Aleksandr, “Doklad na plenume Sv. Sinoda, 22/XI.1927,” Vestnik Sv. Sinoda, no. 1 (1928): 15.Google Scholar

48. Nikolai (Platonov), “Doklad obshchemu sobraniiu chlenov Sv. Sinoda 31.1.1927 po organizatsionnym i informatsionnym otdelam,” Vestnik Sv. Sinoda, no.2 (1927): 18–23.Google Scholar

49. For the psychology of popular resistance to liturgical reform, see: Dinges, William, “Ritual Conflict as Social Conflict: Liturgical Reform in the Roman Catholic Church,” Sociological Analysis 48 (1987): 138–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Blasi, Anthony, “Ritual as a Form of the Religious Mentality,” Sociological Analysis 46 (1985): 59–72 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Goffman, Erving, “The Interaction Order,” American Sociological Review 48 (1983): 1–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

50. For example, see the resolution of renovationist clergy and laity in Vologda, which expressed a disdain for the “blind attachment to ritual and letter, with the preservation and defense of archaic church-archeological order of the liturgy … that promotes the dissemination and support of religious superstitions.” See “Programma vologodskoi progressivnoi gruppy dukhovenstva i mirian (tserkovnogo obnovleniia),” Zhivaia tserkov', no. 5/6 (1/15 August 1992): 15–17. Similarly, see the project of the Union of Communes of the Ancient-Apostolic Church in 1923, which set as its goal “the spiritualization and simplification of liturgy, the reduction of superfluous verbosity, a weakening of the ceremonial demonstrative side and a defense of the liturgy against deviation into ritual-faith and mechanical ritual performance” (Proekt programmy soiuza obshchin drevle-Apostol'skoi tserkvi, 4).

51. GA RF (TsGA RSFSR), f. A-353, op. 3, d. 749, 1. 132 ob.

52. GA RF, f. 5446-s (Sovnarkom), op. 55, d. 409, 1. 4 ( “informatsionnaia svodka” from 17 April 1923). The popular rumors were far from groundless; the renovationist leader, Krasnitskii, even sent the draft resolutions to the GPU official in charge (E. Tuchkov) for approval. See his signed “Proekt postanovlenii Sv. Sobora Pravoslavnoi Rossiiskoi Tserkvi,” GA RF (TsGA RSFSR), f. A-353, op. 7, d. 25, 11. 8–16.

53. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 11. 26–29. See also the resolution from Iaroslavl’ diocese (30 August 1923) in ibid., d. 197, 1. 218.

54. See the report from the Saratov diocesan council in 1923, which accused antirenovationist forces of “playing on the ignorance of the dark mass of simple people” and spreading rumors that the Living Church is “without grace” (RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 18, 1. 7).

55. See, for example, the revisionist goals adopted in Moscow on 16/29 May 1922, giving the clergy freedom for “pastoral creativity” ( “Osnovnye polozheniia gruppy pravoslavnogo dukhovenstva i mirian ‘Zhivaia tserkov',” Zhivaia tserkov', no.3 [15 June 1922]: 11–12).

56. See also the report of P. N. Krasotin, “O deiatel'nosti Sv. Sinoda za vremia s Sobora 1923 goda do nastoiashchego Sobora” (Deianiia III vserossiiskogo pomestnogo sobora, 13). For the synod circular of 2 March 1927, emphasizing that radicals were the principal cause of popular opposition and denying any responsibility for the actions of their former collaborators, see RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 20, 1. 65–65 ob.

57. See Edward E. Roslof, “Calendar Reform of 1918,” Modern Encyclopedia of Religion in Russia and the Soviet Union (Gulf Breeze: Academic International Press, 1993), 5: 51–53.

58. Ever since the mid-nineteenth century, the state had attempted to reduce the number of holidays, which it blamed for the low labor productivity and alcoholism that seemed responsible for Russia's economic backwardness. See, for example, the discussions of 1874, 1904 and 1909 in RGIA, f. 796, op. 155, g. 1874, d. 84/a; ibid., op. 185, g. 1904, d. 5997; f. 797, op. 79, otd. 2, st. 3, d. 120; f. 79, op. 96, d. 230. This also included explicit discussions about adoption of the Gregorian calendar; see RGIA, f. 797, op. 69, g. 1899, otd. 1, st. 1, d. 41 and f. 797, op. 72, g. 1902, otd. 2, st. 3, d. 232. See also N. Demichinskii, “Novyi stil',” Novoe vremia, no. 9628 (22 December 1903). For the continuing interest, especially at the Academy of Sciences, see the materials on its calendrical commission from 1906 and 1910 in RGIA, f. 797, op. 76, otd. 2, st. 3, d. 19, 11. 1–13 and f. 797, op. 80, otd. 2, st.3, d. 184.

59. The Conciliar council (Sobornyi sovet) resolved on 3/16 April 1918 to keep the Julian calendar until the entire Orthodox Church could consider the calendrical issue (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 6, 1. 75). The Church council itself similarly resolved on 17/30 September 1918 that the matter required a universal Orthodox decision. As the patriarch and synod explained, the calendar is so important and affects so many dimensions of Church life that it could only be resolved by the ecumenical Church council. Until then, it ruled, the old style was to remain in effect. See the resolution by the patriarch and synod (7/20 December 1918) in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 21, 11. 139.

40. When a priest in Pskov complained about demands by local soviet authorities that he observe the new calendar, the patriarch and synod replied that he must observe the old calendar, given the decision of the Church council (resolution of 5/18 December 1918 in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 21, 11. 126–27). At the same time, the Church did partially accept the new calendar in its own record-keeping, by instructing clergy to put both the old-style and new-style dates into documents. See the instruction (15/28 November 1919) from the patriarch (with the synod and Supreme Church Council) to the archbishop of Viatka in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 25, 1. 71–71 ob. More striking still, in one case—Orthodox parishes in Finland—the synod authorized the clergy to observe the new calendar: because the dominant Lutheran population had already switched to the new calendar, the synod authorized Orthodox priests to conform “where this proves unavoidable” (synod resolution of 17–28 November 1917 in RGIA, f. 796, op. 445, d. 33, 1. 3–3 ob.).

60. See Tikhon's letter of 11 January 1919 in RGIA, f. 796, op. 445, d. 781. As part of the anti-religious calendrical reform, the regime sought not only to reduce the large number of religious holidays (which negatively affected labor productivity) but also wanted to replace religious with “revolutionary” holidays. For plans in 1924 to establish two “revolutionary” holidays in lieu of religious ones, see the minutes of the Politburo meeting on 15 April 1924 in RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 437, 1. 21 (a directive to turn the question over to central control commission). A few months later, on 17 July 1924, the Politburo ordered the people's commissariat of labor (Narkomtrud) to review all holidays, to establish new revolutionary holidays and to reduce the total number of holidays by half (ibid., d. 451, 1. 2). For plans to replace religious with revolutionary holidays in Moscow (5 February 1925), see the Politburo minutes in ibid., d. 487, 1. 2. Such efforts gained new urgency during the “Great Turn,” when the regime launched an all-out campaign to eradicate religious holidays and to substitute commemorations of the October revolution. See, for example, the Politburo minutes of 11 July 1929 regarding a proposal by the people's commissariat for labor to replace holiday of Transfiguration with a second day to commemorate the October revolution (RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 748, point 15).

61. For a dismissive attitude toward popular attitudes, see “Reforma kalendaria,” Zhizn’ i religiia [Kazan’], no. 7 (15 March 1923): 6–7 and also “K Kazanskoi predsobornoi komissii,” ibid., no. 8 (15 April 1923): 5.

62. Shortly before the council met, on 6 March 1923, the commission on the separation of church and state resolved to have the council abolish the old calendar, to permit only anti-religious references to saints in state calendars and to allow the publication of private Church calendars only if they observed the Gregorian style. See RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 12, d. 448, 1. 88.

63. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 197, 1. 132 (18 September/1 October 1923).

64. Ibid., A. 197, 1. 188 (24 April 1924).

65. Report from P. Sharin to Patriarch Tikhon (29 July 1923) in ibid., d. 198, 11. 4–6.

66. Ibid., d. 203, 11. 2–7 (29 June 1923 meeting).

67. Deianiia III Vserossiiskogo Pomestnogo Sobora, 17.

68. See, for example, the synodal decree of 18 December 1926 directing renovationist parishes to observe Easter according to the Julian calendar (RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 17, 1. 21).

69. On 14 June 1923 the Politburo approved E. M. laroslavskii's proposal (submitted earlier to Stalin) about an agreement with Tikhon. The latter was to be released if he “repented” for crimes against Soviet power and the people, if he publicly declared his “loyalty” to Soviet authority, if he admitted the justness of his prosecution, if he renounced any ties to monarchist and white-guard counterrevolutionary organizations, if he repudiated the new Karlovitskii church council, if he rejected the machinations of foreign clergy and if he “expressed his agreement with certain reforms in the religious sphere (e.g. the new calendar).” laroslavskii's explicit goal was to weaken the entire Church, including the renovationists. See RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 360, 11. 9–10.

70. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 192, 1. 1.

71. Response from Tikhon to a parish priest, who had urged the patriarch to “issue a precise and definite order” (Fedor Kubli to Tikhon, 24 June 1923, in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 192, 11. 2–3).

72. RTsKhlDNI, f. 89, op. 4, d. 118 (E. A. Tuchkov, “Doklad o tserkvakh i sektakh, 1–15 sentiabria 1923 g. “).

73. Minutes of an assembly, 21–22 August 1923, in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 204, 11. 9–11.

74. See the protocol (dated 29 June 1923) in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 203, 11. 2–7.

75. Ibid., A. 192, 11. 10–11. Responding to such complaints, Tikhon granted “permission to celebrate, for the time being, in accordance with the old calendar” (marginal resolution by Tikhon on the undated petition from the parish council).

76. Petr Vinogradov (archpriest and superintendent of the second Volokalamsk district) to Patriarch Tikhon, 9 September 1923 (ibid., 1. 31–31 ob.)

77. For Tikhon's missives of 1 October 1923 and 8 November 1923, see RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 192, 1. 38–38 ob. (printed). Tikhon's appeal of 10 December 1923 (the manuscript is in the patriarch's own hand), as an appendix to his missive of 1 October 1923, reaffirmed that his original endorsement of the Gregorian calendar remained in effect but conceded that (as local circumstances dictated), the clergy could celebrate some rites under the old calendar if civil authorities permitted (ibid., 1. 40).

78. See G. A. Nosova, “Bytovoe pravoslavie na materialakh vladimirskoi eparkhii” (kand. diss., Moscow, 1969); Helmut Altrichter, Die Bauern von Tver: vom Leben aufdem russischen Dorf zwischen Revolution und Kollektivierung (Munich: R. Oldenbourg, 1984), 111–18.

79. Assembly minutes, with Tikhon's resolution, in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 192, 11. 8–9 ob.

80. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 202, 11. 4–6.

81. A meeting of the anti-religious commission on 18 September 1923 heard a report from Tuchkov and insisted that “Tikhon and Co., above all, really introduce the new calendar into the Church, demolish the parish councils and establish a remarried parish clergy,” which would be the basis for permitting the Tikhonite Church to publish its own journal (RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 87, d. 196, 1. 33). In November the commission authorized Tuchkov to implement the new calendar with Tikhon's support (20 November 1923, ibid., 1. 43). See also the discussion at the People's Commissariat of Justice, on 17 November 1923 (GA RF [TsGA RSFSR], f. A-353, op. 7, d. 2, 1. 8). • 82. Circular from Patriarch Tikhon, dated 8 November 1923 (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 192, 1. 38 ob.). In December, however, Tikhon made a further announcement that stirred anew the confusion—and dismay—among the faithful, who erroneously thought that the patriarch was again demanding introduction of the new calendar. Thus, shortly before Christmas, Tikhon had to explain a recent announcement (published in Izvestiia on 19 December) which, he admitted, had provoked considerable discontent. Although reaffirming his support for the new calendar, he declared that adoption was not obligatory this year, because “this extraordinary transition would cause a violation of the liturgical order and Lent.” See Tikhon's directive of 20 December 1923 in ibid., 1. 45–45 ob. Indeed, the patriarch virtually abdicated his earlier insistence and left it to the parish itself to resolve the calendar issue. For example, in response to a telegram dated 13 December 1923 asking for instructions on precisely when Christmas was to be observed, Tikhon replied: “Maintain the old [calendar] or, if the parishioners desire, perform services according to the new calendar” (ibid., 1. 46).

83. See, for example, the complaint from parishioners to Kalinin on 22 September 1924 in GA RF (TsGA RSFSR), f. A-353, op. 7, d. 17, 1. 186.

84. On this process (castigated as a “bureaucratization” of the parish), see Papkov, A. A., Upadok pravoslavnogo prikhoda XVIII-XIX w. (Moscow: Tovarishchestvo tipolitografii Vladimira Chicherina, 1899 Google Scholar.

85. Thus a chief procurator like K. P. Pobedonostsev complained in 1887 that villagers tended to “meddle in church affairs,” as village assemblies passed resolutions for the appointment or removal of priests (see the circular by the minister of interior dated 21 March 1887 in RGIA, f. 796, op., 168, g. 1883, d. 2014, 1. 2–2 ob.). The procurator's complaint was not without cause; parishioners were adamant, sometimes even violent, in the defense of their interests and rights. For a sample of typical complaints to the synod against local bishops, see the 1910 file demanding establishment of a deacon's position (f. 796, op. 191, g. 1910, ch. 1, otd. 2, st. 2, d. 12, 11. 1–21), a 1903 suit demanding the establishment of a new parish (op. 184, g. 1903, d. 2303,

11. 1–24), a 1904 petition for the return of an icon (op. 185, g. 1904, d. 31–8) and a 1900 complaint against a local priest (f. 796, op. 181, g. 1900, d. 2765, 11. 1–19).

86. The councils, although gradually established in parishes, failed to generate the funds that reformers had intended. In 1914, for example, for more than 50, 000 churches there were only 19, 332 popechitel'stva. As earlier, they spent the overwhelming bulk of their funds on the repair and renovation of parish churches (72.1%) but relatively little on parish schools and welfare (19.9%) or for the maintenance of parish clergy (8.0%). For the empire as a whole the average expenditure of popechitel'stva was only 253.18 rubles; in central dioceses like Vladimir it was a mere 62.19 rubles. See Vsepoddanneishii otchet oberprokurora Sv. Sinoda po vedomstvu pravoslavnogo ispovedaniia za 1914 god (Petrograd: Sinodal'naia tipografiia, 1916), 16–19. This dismal performance was the focus of a despairing article by A. Papkov, that indefatigable advocate of parish reform, in early 1914. Reviewing the procurator's annual report for 1912, he pointed out that the 99, 166, 662 members of the Orthodox Church had established only 19, 750 popechitel'stva, which generated a mere 3, 401, 572 rubles—that is, about 3.5 kopecks per member! Of this sum only a fraction had been spent on parish schools and charity (794, 348 rubles, or “about one-eighth kopeck per capita! “). See A. Papkov, “Za tserkovnoi stenkoi,” Novoe vremia, no. 13628 (17 February 1914). For a typical low assessment of the councils, see the annual report by the bishop of Pskov for 1890 in RGIA, f. 796, op. 442, d. 1352, 1. 40. For other literature on these agencies, see: Barsov, T. V., Oprikhodskikh popechitel'stvpri pravoslavnykh tserkvakh (Moscow, 1896)Google Scholar; Fudel', I., O reforme prikhodskikh popechitel'stv (Moscow, 1894)Google Scholar; Lebedev, I., Tserkovno-prikhodskie popechitel'stva (Chernigov, 1901)Google Scholar.n

87. Most important, a synod decree of November, 1905 authorized the establishment of parish assemblies (sobraniia) and councils (sovety). See M. Liubskii, “Obrashchenie k pastyriam i pastvam po povodu otkrytiia pri tserkvakh prikhodskikh sobranii i sovetov,” Tverskie eparkhial'nye vedomosti, no. 1 (1907): 4–10; Antonii (Vadkovskii), “Prikhodskoi sovet i vybor dukhovenstva,” Vera i tserkov', no. 1 (1906); A. R., Istoricheskaia perepiska o sud'bakh pravoslavnoi tserkvi (Moscow, 1912), 16–17 (memorandum by S. Iu. Witte). The oft-studied otzyvy of bishops in 1906–1907, which similarly drew a dismal picture of the parish, are summarized in: O blagoustroenii prikhoda. Svod mnenii eparkhial'nykh preosviashchennykh (St. Petersburg: Sinodal'naia tipografiia, 1906); Immekus, P. E., Die Russisch-Orthodoxe Landpfarrei zu Beginn des XX. Jahrhunderts (Wiirzburg: Augustinus Verlag, 1978), esp. 249–64Google Scholar. For a good overview of the parish question (based only on printed sources), see Rozhkov, V., Tserkovnye voprosy vgosudarstvennoi dume (Rome: Pontificium institutum orientalium studiorum, 1975), 278–88Google Scholar. See also Serafim, archbishop of Tver, , O vozrozhdenii prikhodskoi zhizni: Obrashchenie k dukhovenstvu tverskoi eparkhii (Petrograd, 1916)Google Scholar and Sviderskii, M., Vopros o tserkovnom prikhode v predsobornom prisutstvii i v russkoi literature XX-go veka (Kiev, 1913).Google Scholar

88. The two pre-conciliar commissions also devoted considerable attention to the parish question. See, for example, the recommendations of the predsobornoe prisutstvie in RGIA, f. 796, op. 186, d. 657, torn 2, 11. 271–76 and torn 4, 11. 1–293 (including journals of 1906–1907). For the abortive attempts to redefine the juridical status of the parish (addressing such issues as the election of clergy, role of women and financial audits), see the following archival files: RGIA, f. 797, op. 75, g. 1905, otd. 2, St. 3, d. 518 (contains Synodal materials from 1905–10); f. 797, op. 77, otd. 2, st. 3, d. 110a and 110b; f. 797, op. 84, otd. 2, st. 3, d. 396, 11. 1–150; f. 796, op. 189, d. 2229 and d. 2229/b, 11. 209–229, 260–61; f. 796, op. 445, d. 223 (draft materials on reform compiled in 1916–17, including local responses to a synod resolution of 4.3.1916). For a good summation of the battles in the duma, see Rozhkov, Tserkovnye voprosy, 288–329 and E. V. Fominykh, “Proekty tserkovnykh preobrazovanii v Rossii v nachale XX v.” (Kand. diss., Leningrad, 1987).

89. Many of these, however, became agencies to press lay demands against the church, above all, for lay control over parish finances and (in many cases) for parish election of the local clergy. See Gregory L. Freeze, “The Orthodox Church and Social Crisis in Late Imperial Russia: Parish Clergy in the Revolution of 1905–1907” (paper presented to the Colloquium on the German and Russian Empires, Universitat-Tubingen, December 1993).

90. Sv. Pravitel'stvuiushchii Sinod, Opredelenie Sv. Sinoda ot 17–21 iiunia 1917 g. ob utverzhdenii vremennogo polozheniia o pravoslavnom prikhode (Petrograd: Sinodal'naia tipografiia, 1917); Vremennoe polozhenie o pravoslavnom prikhode (Petrograd: Sinodal'naia tipografiia, 1917).

91. For example, see the files on the removal of bishops in Riazan', Vladimir, Orel and Nizhnii Novgorod in RGIA, f. 796, op. 204, otd. 1, st. 5, dd. 78, 102, 113 and 124.

92. See, for example, the minutes of a parish council at a Moscow parish, which, without consulting diocesan authorities, assumed the prerogative to set the time for parish services, to make decisions about the disposition of parish property and to supervise clerical activities (RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 103, 11. 1–3 ob. [minutes of 21 July 1917]). See also the complaints of diocesan authorities in Eniseisk (11 July 1917) as well as the diocesan assembly of clergy and laity in Turukhanskii krai (8–9 July 1917) in RGIA, f. 796, op. 204, otd. 1, st. 5, d. 95, 11. 22–23, 85–88.

93. For reports, see the plaintive, often hysterical letters by clergy to the All-Russian Assembly of Clergy and Laity (OR RGB, f. 60, papka 4, d. 2, 1. 1–1 ob.; papka 6, d. 3, 11. 1–2; papka 10, d. 3, 11. 1–4 ob.); the memorandum by the bishop of Orel to the Synod on 6 April 1917 (RGIA, f. 796, op. 204, otd. 1, st. 6, d. 113, 11. 1–3); reports on Voronezh, Kazan', Novgorod, Tambov and Kiev dioceses in RGIA, f. 797, op. 96, d. 309; complaints by the Church council in 1917 (Osviashchennyi sobor Pravoslavnoi Rossiiskoi Tserkvi, Deianiia, 11 vols. [Moscow-Petrograd, 1918], 2/2: 201); reports in the diocesan press, such as Glortsiozov, A, “Pastyrskii soiuz,” Vladimirskie eparhhial'nye vedomosti, no. 24/25 (30 June 1917): 245–46.Google Scholar

94. The obligatory lease gave the parish council responsibility—and accountability— for the property and utilization of the parish church. For a copy of the standard lease, not only prohibiting proselytization and anti-Soviet agitation, but also empowering the parish council to arrange church services, to elect clergy, “to organize theological religious-moral and church-historical talks, readings, lectures, and to be concerned with mutual assistance,” see RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 50.

95. To be sure, not as a juridical entity (iuridicheskoe litso) but as the de facto holder of authority. That was an inadvertent consequence of the Decree on Separation of Church and State, which specifically denied the Church (as an aggregate institution) the status of juridical entity. Interestingly, in 1924 Patriarch Tikhon applied, in vain, to the Mossovet to obtain juridical recognition as the “Orthodox hierarchical organization.” See TsGAMO, f. 66, op. 18, d. 365, 1. 2–2 ob. for the text of the draft charter.

96. The parish council was also a bulwark of resistance against bolsheviks, not just bishops. See “V zashchitu tserkovnogo dostoianiia,” Tserkovnye vedomosti, no. 11/12 (1 April 1918): 419.

97. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 5, 1. 18–18 ob.

98. See the petition from Sevastian, dated 27 July-9 August 1919, and the resolution by the patriarch (with the synod and Supreme Church Council), in ibid., d. 24, 1. 128–128 ob.

99. Diocesan interest in the Smolensk icon of Uspenskoe parish first appeared in 1785 and culminated two years later in its confiscation and seclusion in the diocesan cathedral. The parish never tired of complaining and petitioning; for example, in 1911–1913 it had waged another campaign for the return of the icon. In the wake of the revolution, the parish predictably renewed its efforts, filing innumerable petitions with the new patriarchal authorities. When the case first came before the patriarch and his synod, they found it “inconvenient” to return the icon, chiefly because believers elsewhere in Vladimir were now attached to the icon. Curiously, the patriarch and synod did not challenge the purported thaumaturgical powers of the icon. After further requests, the patriarch and synod eventually considered returning the icon. See RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 78; d. 6, 1. 99–99 ob.; d. 7, 1. 159–159 ob.

100. See, in particular, the reports from early 1918 in RGIA, f. 796, op. 445, d. 29. Already in January 1918, the bolsheviks acted quickly to seize Church assets; see the memorandum from the “Liquidation Commission on Synodal affairs,” dated 28 January 1918, that reported the seizure of 46.5 million rubles in securities, small sums of currency and about one-quarter million rubles in securities from the administration of church schools (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 28, 1. 1). On the nationalization of the Church's candle factories, which had been a major source of income, see ibid., d. 22, 11. 1–183. For the confiscation of the clerical pension funds and attempts by the patriarch in 1919 to arrange support for retired clergy, see RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 22, 11. 165–166). On the case of Iaroslavl', where the diocesan council reported on 13/25 November 1918 that the entire funds of the missionary brotherhood had been confiscated, see RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 65, 1. 5–5 ob. A similar report came from the bishop of Orel, Serafim, on 28 December 1918, confirming that the missionary council has been suspended and its funds confiscated (11. 15–16). Significantly, when diocesan authorities hired lawyers to defend the bishop of Vladimir (who had been accused of collaborating in a white-guard uprising in Murom), neither the diocese nor the patriarch were able to pay (see ibid., d. 22, 1. 176 (26 April/9 May 1919). On the nationalization of church candle factories in Novgorod, Simbirsk and Tver’ (earlier a fundamental resource of diocesan education and administration), see the resolution of the patriarch and Supreme Church Council of 28 Febraury/13 March 1919 in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 17, 1. 103, and the resolution of 8/21 February 1919 in ibid., d. 22, 11. 47–48.

101. For the attempt to establish a tax on the preparation of ecclesiastical documents, see the materials in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 22, 11. 1–183.

102. To circumvent the government ban on obligatory assessments or contributions, dioceses like Novgorod and Nizhnii Novgorod established a “voluntary per capita levy” to support church administration. See RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 24, 1. 20 ob.

103. Their determination was not to be underestimated. Suggestive is the case of parishes in Donetsk district: confronted by official attempts to thwart formal registration, the stubborn parishioners filed three times for recognition and spent 15, 000 rubles in the process. See the report (from 1923) in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 212, 11. 19–20 ob. Similarly, even if (as the GPU claimed) many parishioners were indifferent to the confiscation of church valuables in 1922, some parish councils put up organized resistance. See, for example, the minutes of the Kazan’ church (at Kaluga Gates in Moscow), which demanded that the priest immediately forewarn council members of impending confiscation and take no actions without its knowledge and consent. See the minutes of 24 February 1922 in RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 35, 1. 3 ob.

104. “Rezoliutsii zasedanii pervoi vladimirskoi eparkhial'noi konferentsii chlenov gruppy belogo dukhovenstva i mirian ‘Zhivaia tserkov'’ 10–11 dekabria 1922 g. Vladimir,” Tserkov’ i zhizn’ [Vladimir], no. 4 (15/31 December 1922): 7.

105. See “Pervyi vserossiiskii s “ezd,” Zhivaia tserkov1, no. 8/9 (1/15 September 1922): 8.

106. Thus the standard lease agreement included specific bans on the political use of the parish church (RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 132, 11. 38–39). The government also demanded precise social information about the status of those who served on parish councils: their current social status (pt. 4), social and service positions since 1914 (pt. 5), membership in a soslovie (social estate) before the revolution (pt. 6), property-holding (pt. 7) and date of entry into the given confession (pt. 8). See, for example, the formular of a parish council in Moscow diocese in ibid., d. 78.

107. RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 87, d. 195, 11. 41–42 ob.

108. RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 12, d. 443, 1.12. Glennys Young's dissertation, relying chiefly upon anti-religious journals, has demonstrated how authorities perceived and reacted to the resilience of religious associations. See her “Rural Religion and Soviet Peasant, 1921–1932” (Ph.D. diss., University of California at Berkeley, 1989).

109. See, for example, the vigorous protests in 1929–1930 about the illegal closing of churches in Ivanovo oblast’ in GA RF, f. r-5263, op. 1, d. 693.

110. GA RF, f. r-5263, op. 1, d. 32, 11. 56–57.

111. Letter to Metropolitan Sergii, dated 11/24January 1919 (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 65, 1. 19–19 ob.) In that sense, bolshevik attempts to disorganize certainly played a major role. Local soviet authorities, in particular, were wont to apply a more draconia'n, punitive policy than Moscow often intended. See, for example, the decision by local authorities to abolish the diocesan council in Kazan’ described in a report from Metropolitan Iakov (21 February 1918) to patriarchal authorities in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 19, 1. 34–34 ob. Such intervention persisted during NEP as well. As one bishop complained on 19 March 1924, local officials had banned both the diocesan council and a diocesan assembly, thereby depriving the Church of any agency to govern subordinate parishes. See ibid., f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 11. 16–17 ob. Similar complaints from the bishop of Ufa (18 March 1924) are in ibid., 11. 12–13 ob.

112. See, for example, the telegram from the Kostroma diocesan council complaining that local authorities had banned the council, seized all diocesan records and forbidden the collection of any funds to support diocesan administration (GA RF [TsGA RSFSR], f. A-353, op. 2, d. 703, 1. 49).

113. The archive of Tikhon's chancellery contains numerous reports of clergy who were arrested and executed; see, for example, the report from Novgorod diocese in May 1919 (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 23, 11. 7–16 ob.) or the reports from Tambov, Pskov and Riazan’ (ibid., d. 10, 11. 28–29). A massive compilation of such information is also to be found in Regel'son, Lev, Tragediia russkoi tserkvi, 1917–1945 (Paris: YMCA Press, 1977)Google Scholar. See also Titov, lu. P., “Revoliutsionnye tribunaly v bor'be s tserkovnoi kontrrevoliutsiei,” Istoriko-pravovye voprosy vzaimootnoshenii gosudarstva i tserkvi v istorii Rossii. Sbornik nauchnykh trudov, eds. Isaev, I. A. and Omel'chenko, O. A. (Moscow: VliZI, 1988), 147–69.Google Scholar

114. See the report from the Samara Soviet to Tikhon, 6 November 1918 and 7 December 1918 in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 54, 11. 3, 5–5 ob.

115. Thus an assembly in Vologda emphasized the importance of such meetings “in view of the total anarchy” reigning in the Church (Father Ioann Kopylov, “Gubernskaia konferentsiia obnovlencheskogo dukhovenstva i mirian,” Slovo zhizni [Vologda], no. 1 [5 January 1923]: 10). As a meeting of representatives from the Simbirsk city parishes noted (17 February 1924): “Church life in the districts of Sevsk, Bezhetsk and esp. in the city of Briansk is in complete anarchy” (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 1. 37). At a church conference in Barnaul, a delegate bluntly declared that “one can characterize contemporary church life with a single word: anarchy.” See Zhurnal'nye postanovleniia barnaul'skogo eparkhial'nogo s “ezda starotserkovnikov ot 15–18 fevralia 1927 g. (Barnaul, 1927), 5. Likewise, at an assembly of Moscow renovationists in December 1927, ranking clerics also bemoaned “the lack of discipline” and “anarchy.” See RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 20, 11. 439–443.

116. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 11. 12–13 ob. (Ioann to Tikhon, 18 March 1924).

117. Note to Tikhon, 24 July 1923, in ibid., d. 192, 1. 6–6 ob.

118. Ibid., d. 247, 11. 18 ob.-19.

119. Thus an unsigned memorandum to Tuchkov (entitled “K voprosu ob organizatsii upravleniia russkoiu tserkov'iu “) emphasizes that by transferring power to 40, 000 parishes, “we have terribly complicated the work of the GPU, which will be placed before a multitude of communities, which will hardly make it possible to establish correct control over them” (GA RF [TsGA RSFSR], f. A-353, op. 7, d. 25, 1. 5).

120. The bishop of Ufa, Ioann, complained that “communication with the center [central Church administration] is difficult” (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 11. 12–13). Likewise, another prelate wrote to Tikhon (1 March 1924) that “communications with local areas is made extremely difficult because of the conditions of postal delivery, and ties with Your Grace are grounds for accusations of counterrevolution” (RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 1. 18–18 ob.). See also the report from Bishop Ioannikii of Don diocese (11/24 July 1923) in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 201, 1. 2–2 ob.

121. Even before the onset of bolshevik censorship, the Church—like the rest of society—had suffered from the high price of paper and consequent breakdown in its publication network. See the comments in “Dukhovnaia periodicheskaia pechat’ v nastupivshem godu,” Tserkovnye vedomosti, no 3/4 (31 January 1918): 163. In July, 1918 the bolsheviks closed down the Church's central organ, Tserkovnye vedomosti, because of alleged “pogrom agitation” (GA RF (TsGA RSFSR), f. A-353, op. 2, d. 696, 1. 62–62 ob. [Krasikov to the Commissar on Press Affairs in the Petrograd Labor Commune, 10 July 1918]). See the minutes of the Church Council's Publication Department (Izdatel'skii otdel) in RGIA, f. 833, op. 1, d. 50, 1. 7–7 ob. On the seizure of the synodal typography in early 1918, see RGIA, f. 797, op. 92, g. 1917, d. 101. As the former editor of the Vladimir diocesan press pointed out, “the situation in the provinces is just as onerous as in the capital.” Thus the diocesan authorities were forbidden to publish not only Vladimirskie eparkhial'nye vedomosti but even the resolutions by local diocesan assembly (ibid., 1. 7 ob.) For the difficulties that Church authorities encountered even in publishing the Church calendar for 1919 (which ultimately had to be printed in the reformed civil orthography), see the report of 12/25 December 1918 in RGIA, f. 831 op. 1, d. 6, 11. 149–50. Policy did not loosen during NEP. In November 1922 the Politburo banned the import of religious literature and further directed that “the publication of religious literature in Russia be reduced to a minimum and solely with the permission of Glavlit” (RTsKMDNI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 323, 11. 5, 19).

122. For difficulties of publishing the Deianiia, see RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 17, 1. 3.

123. See Peter Kenez, The Birth of the Propaganda State (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985).

124. Even amidst the crisis over the confiscation of Church valuables, Trotskii recommended giving permission for journals by the liberal, loyal clergy (TsKhSD, f. 89, perechen’ 49, d. 17, 1. 5. Trotskii to the Politburo, 30 March 1922). But government control remained pervasive, compounded by the renovationist dependence on financial assistance. See the complaint by the anti-religious commission about excessive “mysticism” and need for tighter controls over the ecclesiastical press, already by the end of 1922 (memorandum to the Politburo, 12 December 1922, in RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 2, d. 55, 1. 229). Thus at a meeting on 20 March 1925 the commission on the separation of church and state forbade the Kazan’ renovationists to publish a journal, agreeing only to allow a diocesan gazette with official announcements. It also issued a general directive through the OGPU that “in the future clergy are not to publish religious journals” but just “diocesan gazettes,” which were to contain nothing other than “church decrees” (RTsKhlDNI, f. 17, op. 1, d. 775, 1. 33).

125. RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 1, d. 2641, 1. 2.

126. RTsKhlDNI, f. 5, op. 1, d. 2643, 1. 107. Weakness of the press also applied to the bolshevik journal, Revoliutsiia i tserkov'; see the comments from provincial authorities (who complained that it was virtually unknown outside the main urban areas) in GA RF (TsGA RSFSR), f. A-353, op. 5, d. 262, 11. 1–2, 3, 7.

127. RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 15, 1. 249 ob.

128. “Kratkaia istoricheskaia zapiska o polozhenii pravoslavnoi tserkvi v polotskoi eparkhii,” in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 205, 1. 2–2 ob.

129. “Rezoliutsii zasedanii pervoi vladimirskoi eparkhial'noi konferentsii,” Tserkov’ i zhizn’ [Vladimir], no. 4(1922): 7–8.

130. See “Ot redaktsii,” Tserkovnaia zhizn', no. 1 (August 1924): 1.

131. RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 192, 1. 6 ob.

132. Significantly, in the teeth of popular resistance, the commission proposed establishing a uniform time for the liturgy in all churches but leaving the language question alone (RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 17, 1. 81).

133. A meeting in December 1927 confirmed that work was still underway to prepare Russian texts for the liturgy. See A. Boiarskii, “K rabotam komissii po perevodu bogosluzhebnykh knig na russkii iazyk,” Tserkovnye vedomosti, no. 3/4 (1928): 13–14.

134. Deianiia III vserossiiskogo pomestnogo sobora Pravoslavnoi Tserkvi, 16.

135. RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 20, 1. 437 (memorandum of 27 February 1924).

136. Tobol'sk Bishop Ioann to Tikhon (27 February 1924) in RGIA, f. 831, op. 1, d. 247, 11. 20–23.

137. See “Pastyrskaia shkola v Vologde,” Tserkovnaia zaria, no. 1 (15 September 1922): 11.

138. RGIAgM, f. 2303, op. 1, d. 17, 1. 81.

139. See, for example, the GPU report of August 1922: “The progressive clergy works badly, in view of its dispersion among the districts and the lack of ties among them” (RTsKMDNI, f. 5, op. 1, d. 2639, 1. 2).