The Russian Orthodox Church versus the State: The Josephite Movement, 1927-1940

Author(s): Mikhail V. Shkarovskii

Source: Slavic Review, Vol. 54, No. 2 (Summer, 1995), pp. 365-384
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The Russian Orthodox Church versus the State: The
JosephiteMovement,1927-1940
MikhailV. Shkarovskii

Russia is embarking upon a new path of historical development. To-

day, as the country gradually liberates itself from the vestiges of a non-
democratic society, it seems especially propitious to trace the subor-
dination in the 1920s and 1930s of Russia's most important social
institutions to a nascent totalitarian regime. The Russian Orthodox
Church belongs on the list of such institutions. During its long history
it frequently exerted a stabilizing, consolidating effect on the nation,
especially during times of national crisis; even during the civil war it
maintained a neutral position. The Patriarch of the Holy Synod strug-
gled tirelessly to end fratricidal discord and alleviate what the Church
deemed an overriding obsession with political ideas. The Church
preached tolerance and brotherly love. In the 1920s, as a result of the
increase in totalitarian tendencies and a general suppression of legal
opposition, a portion of the Orthodox clergy became one of the most
important hotbeds of free-thinkingopposition to the communist state.
Until 1927 government attempts to control the Orthodox Church, to
make it an adjunct of the state apparatus on the whole failed. Critical
to these attempts was that the Church make concessions, including the
"legalization" of the Provisional Patriarchal Holy Synod (Vremennyi Pa-
triarshiiSviashchennyiSinod, abbreviated VPSS) under the Deputy of the
Patriarchal Locum tenens (DPLt), Metropolitan Sergii (Stragorodskii).
The "Declaration of 1927" signified the Church's transition from an
apolitical position to one of internal spiritual solidarity with the au-
thorities. "Concessions" included in it, for example, transfers of bish-
ops for reasons of political expediency, created a new form of mutual
interdependence between the Patriarchal Church and the government;
indeed, from this point on the state almost totally controlled life in
the Church. These far-reaching changes were received negatively by
many clergymen and laity.
The unsuccessful attempts by some members of the Orthodox clergy
to protect their Church from the imposition of alien state influence,
to stem the tide of the Church's internal erosion, are of special interest.
Indeed, the events of the late 1920s may be seen as the starting point
of schisms of the Patriarchal Church. And, at present, the need for the
unification of the three existing branches of Russian Orthodoxy (For-
eign, Catacomb and Moscow) is felt more keenly than ever.
The "Nepominaiushchii" movement arose in 1927 and received its
name from the fact that its adherents were clerics who refused to "men-
tion," and thereby pray for, those individuals they felt had betrayed
"true Orthodoxy," especially Metropolitan Sergii and state authorities.
The movement was quite widespread throughout Russia, including
nearly 40 bishops who had rejected administrative subordination to
the DPLt and the VPSS, but most of whose seas lacked coordination
SlavicReview54, no. 2 (Summer 1995)

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366 Slavic Review

and cohesion. The strongestand most united group comprised the

Josephites,who took theirdesignationfromthe name of theirleader,
the Metropolitanof Leningrad losif (Joseph) Petrovykh.Their activity
is the subjectof this analysis.
In all of Soviet historiographythereare no worksdedicated to this
topic.Workson Churchhistorywere generallyof the nature of surveys
and bore the strongideological imprintof the officialnegativeattitude
towardreligion.' The Church was oftenrepresentedas an absolutely
reactionaryinstitutionopposed to the people (e.g. theJosephitemove-
ment was termed "chernosotennyi" [black hundredist] for no reason),
while governmentalagencies were unfailinglyportrayedin a positive
light. More objective investigationshave begun to appear quite re-
cently.Among these, the works of V.A. Alekseev and M.I. Odintsov
stand out. While they are devoted to state religious politics in the
USSR, some attention is also given to the internal situation in the
Orthodox Church itself,including a neutral approach to internal
Church conflict.But Alekseev unjustifiablyrefers to the "Josephite
schism"as an inconsequentialoccurrencein thehistoryof Orthodoxy.2
Historicalwritingssince the mid-twentieth centuryof clergyof the
PatriarchalRussian Orthodox Church (PROC) (notably those of Met-
ropolitan Manuil [Lemeshevskii],Abbot Innokentii [Pavlov],A.I. Kuz-
netsovand especiallythose of theMetropolitanof St. Petersburg,Ioann
[Snychev])provide us withvaluable information.But, while these writ-
ings contain interestingfactual data, in their conceptualization of
events their treatmentof Metropolitan Sergii is apologetic and they
lack any criticalapproach to theirsubject: not only are theJosephites
described,again unreasonably,as "schismatics"but Metropolitanloann
even goes so far as to assert that theydesecrated everythingdeemed
holyby the Orthodox Church.Withthesewritingsmaybe grouped the
recollections of the late Leningrad UniversityProfessorN.A. Mesh-
cherskiiwho, in his youth,had played an active role in the opening
stagesof theJosephitemovementbut who later had distanced himself
from it and viewed it negatively.3

1. N.S. Gordienko, 1) Evoliutsiiarusskogo pravoslaviia(20-e-80-egodyXX stoletiia)

(Moscow: Znanie, 1984); 2) Sovremennoe russkoe pravoslavie(Leningrad: Lenizdat, 1988);
M.S. Korzun,Russkaiapravoslavnaiatserkov' 1917-1945 gg. (Minsk:Belarus', 1987).
2. V.A. Alekseev, 1) Illiuzii i dogmy(Moscow: Politizdat, 1991); 2) "Shturmnebes"
otmeniaetsia? (Moscow: Rossiia molodaia, 1992); M.I. Odintsov, Gosudarstvo i tserkov'
(Istoriiavzaimootnoshenii. 1917-1938 gg.) (Moscow: Znanie, 1991).
3. Manuil (Lemeshevskii),Metropolitan,Russkiepravoslavnye ierarkhi periodas 1893
po 1965 gody,six vol.,(Erlangen:Kafedra istoriii teologiikhristianskogoVostoka,1979-
89); Innokentii(Pavlov),Abbot,"O deklaratsiiMitropolitaSergiia," ZhurnalMoskovskoi
Patriarkhii, no. 11/12(1992): 70-75; A.I. Kuznetsov,"Obnovlencheskiiraskol v Russkoi
Tserkvi"(ms.,threevol.,Astrakhan',1956-59); Ioann (Snychev),Metropolitan,1) Tser-
kovnye raskolyv RusskoiTserkvi20-khi 30-khgodovXX stoletiia- "Grigorianskii," "Iaros-
lavl'skii,""Iosiflianskii,"
"Viktorianskii"i drugie.Ikh osobennostii istoriia,(Sortavala: Izda-
tel'stvo Sortaval'skoi knizhnoi tipografii,1993); 2) MitropolitManuil (Lemeshevskii),
Biograficheskii ocherk(St. Petersburg:Danza, 1993); N.A. Meshcherskii,"Na starostiia
syznovazhivu: proshedshee prokhoditpredo mnoiu.. ." (ms.,Leningrad, 1982).

This content downloaded from 188.72.96.189 on Thu, 12 Jun 2014 14:06:32 PM

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TheRussianOrthodox
ChurchversustheState 367

Opposing views are held by those who were permitteda fewyears

ago to emerge fromthe undergroundCatacomb Church.This church,
too, is subdivided into smaller movements,whose views of historydo
not alwayscoincide. Membersof the so-called"BogorodichnyiCenter"
deem the PatriarchalChurch one of the main pillars of communist
partyrule in the Soviet Union, actingat the devil's instigation,because
of its acceptance of the "Declaration of 1927."4 The talentedhistorian
and monk Amvrosii(Sivers), an adherent of a differenttrend in the
Catacomb Church,has condemned the Sergians while at the same time
tryingto avoid polemical extremes. He correctlyevaluates the Jo-
sephite movementin many respects but believes that it had died out
by the early 1930s. He also frequentlyand unjustifiablyidentifiesthe
Josephiteswiththe Catacombists.5A numberof new anti-Sergianshold
views similar to Amvrosii's:for example, Z. Krakhmal'nikovahas re-
centlyconnected the establishmentand development of Soviet totali-
tarianismdirectlyto the position of the Moscow Patriarchate.6
Essential contributionsto the historyof Russian Orthodoxyhave
also been made on foreignsoil, mainlyby Russian emigreresearchers,
who may be divided into two irreconcilablecamps. Anti-Sergians(M.
Pol'skii,I. Andreev,L. Regel'son, V. Stepanov [Rusak] et al.) have per-
ceived the Deputy PatriarchalLocum tenens as betrayerof the "new
martyrs"who were languishing in correctivelabor camps and have
viewed the DPLt as having made much greatercompromiseswiththe
authoritiesthan had his predecessors.In so doing, he betrayedPatri-
arch Tikhon and Locum tenens Peter. The worksof these authorsare,
on the whole, dedicated to the resistance movement in the Church
(evaluations of whose scale differedgreatly)and they treat the Jo-
sephite movementseparatelybut do not analyze it in any detail.7The
same may be said for the publications of the opposite camp. Arch-
presbyterVasilii Vinogradov,Archpriestloann Meyendorf,Metropol-
itan Elevferii(Bogoiavlenskii)and othersin general have justifiedthe
position ofMetropolitanSergii,assertingthathe in factadded nothing
to PatriarchTikhon's declarations of loyalty.8

4. SviashchenstvoTserkvi Presviatoi Bogoroditsy,Krasnaia Patriarkhiia:Volkiv

ovechlei
shkure(Moscow:BogorodichnyiTsentr,1992); TragediiaKrasnoiTserkvi(Moscow:
BogorodichnyiTsentr,1992).
5. Amvrosii(Sivers), Monk, "Istoki i sviazi katakombnoi tserkviv Leningrade i
oblasti (1922-1992 gg.)," (ms.,Moscow: 1993).
6. Zoia Krakhmal'nikova,1) "Gor'kie plody sladkogo plena," Russkaiamysl',1989.
20 January-20March; 2) "Eshche raz o gor'kikhplodakh sladkogo plena," Russkaia
mysl',1989. 23June-14July;3) "V poiskakhobeshchannogo raia. Zametkio tserkovnoi
zhizni v Rossii XX veka,"Neva, no. 10 (1992): 205-38.
7. M. Pol'skii,Archpresbyter, Novyemucheniki rossiiskie,
2 vol., (Jordanville:Sviato-
Troitskiimonastyr',1949-57); I.M. Andreev,Zametkio katakombnoi tserkviv SSSR (Jor-
danville:Sviato-Troitskii
monastyr',1947); Lev Regel'son,TragediiaRusskoiTserkvi1917-
1945 (Paris: YMCA Press, 1977); Vladimir Stepanov (Rusak), Svidetelstvoobvineniia.
Tserkov'i gosudarstvo
v Sovetskom Soiuze,3 vol., (Jordanville:Sviato-Troitskiimonastyr',
1987-88).
8. Elevferii(Bogoiavlenskii),Metropolitan,Nedeliav Patriarkhii (Paris:YMCA Press,
1993); "Doklad mitr.Elevferiiamitr.Evlogiiu (1928g.)," Vestnik Russkogokhristianskogo

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368 Slavic Review

Westernhistorianswho are read in Russia lean in the other direc-

tion although,of course, theyhold a more objective and neutral po-
sition.Among themare DmitryPospielovsky,Nikita Struve,I.O. Khri-
zostomus (Blashkevich),Hans-Dieter Depman and others.9Struvehas
made the argument that more than 20 bishops, imprisoned in the
Solovetskii camp in 1927, largely supported Metropolitan Sergii.
Khrizostomusasserted that the OGPU had threatenedMetropolitan
Sergii with the execution of all the bishops held in the camps if he
refusedto come to termswiththe authorities.Pospielovskyhas given
significantattentionto the problems of "Church sedition" at the end
of the 1920s and many of his conclusions seem completelyfair.How-
ever, in assertingthat Metropolitan Sergii essentiallycontinued the
course of PatriarchTikhon and Locum tenensPeter,he ignoresChurch
toleranceof OGPU interferencein Church policies after1927. Indeed,
fromthis time on clerical appointmentscould only be made withthe
sanction of appropriate state entities.One cannot agree withPospie-
lovsky'sappraisal of thejosephite movementas the mostextremeright-
wing schism withinRussia, nor with his assertion that Metropolitan
losif triedto forma parallel Church.Like otherwesternscholars,Pos-
pielovskydoes not have sufficient informationabout the genuine Cat-
acombists.One should note that,in general, extensive,foreignhisto-
ries of religion have a limited source base since in the past Russian
archivescould be utilized to only a small degree (see Appendix to this
article).
One of the main goals of this work is to present the Josephite
movementas an attempton the part of some clergymenand believers
to findan independentalternative-distinctfromthe Sergian and Cat-
acomb variants-forthedevelopmentof theRussian OrthodoxChurch,
be it in legal or semi-legalopposition to the consolidatingtotalitarian
regime.I shall also define the tacticsand characterof the movement
indicating serious differences,sometimes bordering on strife,which
existedbetweentheJosephitesand the Catacombists,and approximate
its previouslyunderestimatednumerical strength.I will place it in a
chronological frameworkand discuss the causes for the end of Jo-

dvizheniia,no. 158 (1990): 285-93; "Krestnyiput' russkoi ierarkhii,iz pisem proto-

presviteraV. Vinogradova vladykeIoannu Shakhovskomu,"Vestnik Russkogokhristian-
skogodvizheniia,no. 150 (1987): 251-55; Ioann Meyendorf,"Sviateishii PatriarkhTi-
khon-sluzhitel'edinstvaTserkvi,"Vestnik LeningradskoiDukhovnoi Akademii, no. 3 (1990):
30-41.
9. DimitryPospielovsky,1) The Russian ChurchundertheSovietregime1917-1982
(Crestwood:St. VladimirSeminaryPress, 1984); 2) "MitropolitSergii i raskolysprava,"
Vestnik Russkogokhristianskogo
dvizheniia,
no. 158 (1990): 53-81; 3) "Po povodu tserkov-
nogo raskola,"Leningradskaia panorama,no. 3 (1991): 33-35; Nikita Struve,1) Khristiane
v SSSR (Paris: YMCA Press, 1963); 2) "Solovetskie episkopy i deklaratsiiamitropolita
Sergiia 1927g.," VestnikRusskogokhristianskogo dvizheniia,no. 152 (1988): 207-11; 3)
"Vozvrashchenieutrachennogo,"ZhurnalMoskovskoi Patriarkhii,no. 1 (1991): 35-37;
0.1. Khrizostomus (Blashkevich),Kirchengeschichte Russlandsder neustensZeit, 3 vol.,
(Munich: A. Pustet,1965-68); Gans-DiterDepman, "Russkaia Pravoslavnaia Tserkov'
v proshlom i nastoiashchem,"(ms.,Moscow, 1976).

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The Russian OrthodoxChurchversustheState 369

sephitismand the consequences of its destruction.I conclude that,in

the final analysis,a viable path other than the "Sergian" for the Pa-
triarchalChurch in the Soviet Union was not possible.
The unprecedentedand perilous situationin whichthe Patriarchal
Church found itselfin spring1927 bode ill forits future,even though
the influenceof its ideological enemyin the struggleforsouls, the pro-
Soviet Synodal (Renovationist)Church, had long since peaked. The
Renovationistmovementhad formedin May 1922 withthe active par-
ticipationof the authoritiesand had attempteda "ChurchRevolution,"
therebytransgressingwhat were for Orthodoxybasic ecclesiastical,li-
turgical and dogmatic principles, and losing contact with the laity.
AlthoughbyJanuary1927 Renovationistparishes comprised only 16.6
percent'0of the country'stotal,theirthreatremained. Moreover,after
the death of PatriarchTikhon in April 1925, the PatriarchalChurch
had begun to develop centrifugaltendencies. In December that year
the OGPU had instigatedthe new "Grigorian Schism" in the Church
(which met with even less success than Renovationism).Constant ar-
rests of bishops who might head a supreme church administration
hindered the creationof a stable canonical center:therewere thirteen
patriarchaldeputies and locum tenentes,twelveof whomwere in exile
or prison and the last, Archbishop Serafim (Samoilovich) of Uglich,
was so littleknownthatmost dioceses had never heard of him. OGPU
policies to liquidate theunifiedcenterof thePatriarchalChurch(whose
existence was not formallyrecognized by the authorities)were close
to success.
MetropolitanSergii (Stragorodskii),who had occupied the post of
deputyof the patriarchallocum tenens fromthe end of 1925 to 1926,
was in prison when he entered negotiationswith the OGPU. Threat-
ened withliquidation of the entireOrthodox hierarchy,Sergii agreed
to meet the authorities'basic demands, especially to toleratetheirin-
terferencein internalChurch policy,in exchange forthe "legalization"
of the PatriarchalChurch:episcopal ordinationscould onlybe carried
out withthe agreementof the OGPU, bishops could be transferredfor
political reasons, pulpits of convicted bishops could be occupied by
OGPU appointees and so forth.MetropolitanSergii chose cooperation
with the authoritiesafterlengthyvacillation and numerous attempts
to find a more advantageous path for the Church. He acted in order
to preservethe supremacyof "legal" Orthodoxy.Indeed, the statement
by ArchpriestI. Meyendorfis not withoutfoundation: "To agree to
the abolition of the Patriarchal'Center' would have effectedtransfer
of the monopoly of the 'legalized' Church by the Renovationist'Synod'
(recognized by the Eastern Patriarchs!),which would gradually have
been followed by all the open churches.But maintenance of the Pa-
triarchaladministrationpresupposed state control.""l

10. Vestnik SviashchennogoSinodaRossiiskoiPravoslavnoiTserkvi,no. 2 (1927): 17.

11. Lev Regel'son, 616; 414-17; A.A. Shishkin,Sushchnost'i kriticheskaia otsenka
obnovlencheskogoraskolarusskoipravoslavnoitserkvi(Kazan'. Izd-vo Kazanskogo universi-
teta,1970), 302-3.

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370 SlavicReview

The experience of succeeding decades demonstrates that the only

alternative to the path chosen by Metropolitan Sergii would have been
illegal self-ruleby dioceses and parishes, i.e., a Catacomb Church. And
even this avenue would have led to an impasse, by which the Church
would have become a sect. Still, millions of believers refused to rec-
ognize the Renovationists and lost the opportunity to take part in
divine service and the sacraments; and the movement was equally un-
acceptable for the majority of the hierarchy. Moreover, in the second
half of the 1930s, at the peak of NKVD terror, the possibilities for a
continuing Catacomb Church decreased significantlyand the chances
for secret religious organization were quite slim. The Josephites opted
for the third path, legal opposition. Their tragic fate underscores the
impossibility of that path, too, in the Soviet reality of those years.
Despite his sagacity and skill Metropolitan Sergii was mistaken in
his belief that concessions would lead to a reduction in the repression
of the clergy. Still, in light of the following decade, when the tendency
was not state subordination but rather full destruction of Orthodoxy,
his compromise is justified in many respects since it allowed for the
preservation of the Patriarchal Church, if only in part.
On 30 March 1927 Stragorodskii was freed from imprisonment and
on 7 April Archbishop Serafim conferred on him the authority of
Locum tenens. On 20 May Metropolitan Sergii and his Synod were
officially"legalized" as the NKVD allowed them to function and as
diocesan and ecclesiastical councils began to legally organize.'2 Finally,
on 29 July Metropolitan Sergii issued his "Epistle to Pastors and their
Flocks" (the Declaration of 1927) which stated:
We mustshow,not by words but ratherby deeds, thatnot only those
who are indifferent to Orthodoxy,not only those who have betrayed
it,but even its most zealous adherentscan be faithfulcitizensof the
SovietUnion and loyal to Soviet authority... We wantto be Orthodox
and at the same time recognize the Soviet Union as our civil moth-
erland,whosejoys and successes are ourjoys and successesand whose
failuresare our failures.
In scholarly literature one encounters the assertion that the "Decla-
ration" was one of the main sources of mass discontent; it did not,
however, radically differfrom analogous epistles of Patriarch Tikhon
composed between 1923 and 1925. (During the civil war the Patriarch
had sharply censured many of the actions of the authorities.) Although
it seemed ultra-loyalist,it really did not contain anything new and no
schisms would have occurred if it had expressed the full extent of the
concessions to the authorities.
There was, however, disagreement over the text of the "Declara-
tion" immediately after its publication. This discord firstappeared in
one of the country's most important dioceses, Leningrad. In mid-Au-
gust 1927 a few clerics of the "northern capital" sent off a message to

12. Regel'son, 414-17; Shishkin,302-3.

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 ChurchversustheState
TheRussian Orthodox 371

Metropolitan losif (then exiled to the Modenskii Monasteryin Nov-

gorod province) detailing their disapproval of the principles of the
"Declaration." losif (the formerIvan SemenovichPetrovykh), was born
in Ustiuzhnain 1872. He had graduatedfromtheMoscow Ecclesiastical
Academyin 1899 and had been tonsuredtwoyearslater.During World
War I, while servingas Bishop of Uglich, he had become close to the
futurePatriarchTikhon, who was the then head of the Iarolsavl' dio-
cese. Under the administrationof Tikhon's aide, ArchbishopAgafan-
gel, losif had been named Archbishopof Rostov;upon Tikhon's exile,
losif had been appointed to administer the diocese, where he had
showed himselfa decisive opponent of the "Grigorians" and had en-
ergeticallysupportedMetropolitanSergii againstthem.In August1926
Sergii had designatedArchbishoplosif the Metropolitanof Leningrad.
But losif was in the "northerncapital" less than three days: on 13
September,in Moscow while in transitto Rostov,he was "invited" to
the OGPU. He expressed a negative opinion about the planned "le-
galization"of the PatriarchalChurch to the OGPU departmentalhead
of the Church division,E. Tuchkov,and, as a result,would be prohib-
ited from departing Rostov. In December 1926, upon the arrest of
MetropolitanSergii,losif was deputyof the patriarchallocum tenens,
but he was arrestedand exiled to the Modenskii Nikol'skii monastery
in Ustiuzhenskiiregion.'3 Despite his exile, Metropolitanlosif's faith
and authorityattracteda followingof tens of thousands of believers.
On 13 September 1927, most likelyat the insistenceof the OGPU,
the Deputy PatriarchalLocum tenens and the Synod transferredlosif
to Odessa. On 28 SeptemberMetropolitanlosif wrotethatthe transfer
was not canonical, that it had been adopted under outside influence
and thatit therebywould have a pernicious effecton Church organi-
zation. On 3 October the provisional directorof the Peterhofdiocese,
Nikolai (larushevich),reported to the Synod that the transferof His
Eminence was causing disturbancesin the city.There, as elsewhere,
Church members objected to the Deputy of the Patriarchal Locum
tenens having permittedinterferencein what had been importantin-
ternalChurch policy (in just a fewmonthsnearly40 bishops had been
displaced). In view of the seriousness of the situation,Metropolitan
Sergii himselfpromptlytook over the administrationof theLeningrad
diocese. The situationwas greatlyaggravatedby MetropolitanSergii's
ukase of 21 October mandatingprayerfor civilian authoritiesduring
divine service and prohibitingprayer for bishops in exile. Not only
allies of Metropolitanlosif objected to thisukase but also a large num-
ber of other bishops.
It should be pointed out thatstate agencies originallymaintained
a duplicitous position in this conflict.On the one hand, upon Metro-
politan Sergii's compromisewith them,theyhad grantedthe Church
he headed several rightswhich it previouslyhad lacked. But, on the
otherhand, upon the tenthanniversaryof the October revolutionthe

13. Izvestiia,19 August 1927.

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372 SlavicReview

state granted amnesty to a large number of Leningrad clergy who un-

doubtedly strengthened opposition to Metropolitan Sergii and signif-
icantly weakened the Patriarchal Church. Sergii determined to visit
Leningrad and the day of his arrival was fixed.'4 But, clearly under-
estimating the scale of possible resistance to "pro-Soviet" Church pol-
icy, the authorities prevented the visit, even though Sergii's interven-
tion into diocesan administration, in all likelihood, would have blunted
the conflict.
During the final months of 1927 discord continued to intensify.
Parishes in Leningrad sporadically refused to pray for Metropolitan
Sergii at divine service. Even lower clergy were gripped by a wave of
dissatisfaction: "Many of those pastors who, during the years of strug-
gle with Renovationism showed themselves to be staunch fightersfor
the purity of Orthodoxy, now came out against Metropolitan Sergii,"
for in his policy "they saw a clear-cut distortion of the purity of Or-
thodoxy and the enslavement of the Church to the state." 15 The Pa-
triarchal Synod had made a serious tactical blunder: it had enacted
and enforced new Church policy too hurriedly, without considering
whether the faithfulwere ready for it.
Hoping to avert the approaching schism, at the beginning of De-
cember a group of Leningrad clerics and laymen alerted Metropolitan
Sergii to the situation and attempted to persuade him to change course.
They appealed to him in a letter written by Professor and Archpriest
V. Veriuzhskii:
1) to renounce theprospectiveenslavementof theChurchto theState.
2) To reject proposed transfersof bishops withoutthe consent both
of their congregationsand of the concerned bishops themselves.3)
To organize a ProvisionalPatriarchalSynod as it had originallybeen,
i.e., as a deliberativebody, and to ensure that its decrees be issued
only under the auspices of the Deputy. 4) To remove troublemakers
fromthe staffof the Synod. 5) To universallyuphold the decrees of
the Local Council of 1917-1918 [composed of lower clergyand laity]
and theauthorityof the dioceses in diocesan administration,thefoun-
dations of the Orthodox Church and the canons. 6) To returnMet-
ropolitan losif [Petrovykh]to the Leningrad pulpit. 7) To cease pro-
motingthe Deputy Locum tenens. 8) To rescind decrees which had
eliminated from divine service prayer for exiled bishops and had
mandated prayerfor state authorities.16
On 12 December, before there was a reply to this appeal, a signif-
icant portion of Leningrad's upper and lower clergy, as well as laity,
sent representatives to Metropolitan Sergii with three petitions, one
of which was signed by six of the eight Leningrad bishops. The meeting

14. N.A. Meshcherskii1, 30; RusskaiaPravoslavnaiaTserkov'988-1988, 2nd part

(Moscow: Izd-vo MoskovskoiPatriarkhii,1988), 40.
15. Protokol sobraniia prikhodskogosoveta PokrovskoiKolomenskoi Tserkvi 5
aprelia 1928 (see also note 22) (TsGA SPb), f. 7384, op. 33, d. 321, 1. 159.
16. Ioann (Snychev),Metropolitan,"Raskoly,"Khristianskoe chtenie,no. 6 (1991):
19.

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 ChurchversustheState
TheRussian Orthodox 373

concluded withoutconcreteresults.Two dayslaterMetropolitanSergii

presentedto one of the delegation his response to Veriuzhskii'sletter,
rejecting,in effect,all demands. "MetropolitanSergii triedto win over
the emissaryand, practicallyleaping around the room said: 'Well, they
persecute us and we retreat!But to make up for it we preserve the
unityof the Church!' The emissaryconcluded that it was impossible
to reach an agreementwithSergii."17 The delegation returnedto Len-
ingraddeeply disillusionedand withthefirmintentionof breakingoff
liturgicalcommunionwiththe Metropolitan.
On 26 December the bishops of Gdov and Narva, Dimitrii(Liubi-
mov) and Sergii (Druzhinin), took the initiative of leadership and
signed a resolutionof separation:
... Not through pride,Lord let itnotbe so,butforthesakeofpeace
of conscience,we disavowthepersonand deeds of our formerpro-
tector,whoimmensely and illegallyexceededhis rightsand initiated
greatconfusion. .. And so,byGod's mercy, remainingin everything
obedientchildrenoftheUnifiedHolySynodaland ApostolicChurch,
preserving the apostolicsuccessionthroughthe PatriarchalLocum
tenensPeter,Metropolitan Krutitskii,and havingtheblessingof our
legal diocesanMetropolitan, we severcanonical communionwith
Metropolitan Sergiiand withall thosehe leads;and thushenceforth
untilthejudgmentof a "conveningof theentireCouncil,"i.e.,with
theparticipation of all Orthodoxbishops,or untiltheopen and full
repentanceofMetropolitan SergiibeforetheHolyChurch. . .
(It was Metropolitanlosif who had given prior approval to this reso-
lution, since the Patriarchal Locum tenens, Metropolitan Peter [Po-
lianskii],had been in prison or in exile since 1925, unable to partici-
pate in Church life; he was executed on 10 October 1937 in the
Magnitogorskprison.)
The act of separation was read aloud in the Cathedral of the Res-
urrection of Christ,which had become the center of the Josephite
movementin Leningrad; Bishop Dimitriilater declared Metropolitan
Sergii not blessed and demanded an immediateend to liturgicalcom-
munion withhim. In response the Deputy PatriarchalLocum tenens
and the Synod issued a decree on 30 December 1927 whichprohibited
the dissidentLeningrad bishops and theirsupportersfromparticipat-
ing in divine service.The breach became actualized and intensified.
In fact,it seemed thatthe majorityof the "northerncapital's" parishes
would desertMetropolitanSergii. Only two bishops remained faithful
to him; four hierarchs,Archbishop Gavriil (Voevodin), and Bishops
Serafim(Protopopov), Grigorii (Lebedev) and Stefan (Bekh), did not
openly align themselveswith theJosephitesbut reacted negativelyto
many of Sergii's acts. In those churcheswhere theyconducted divine
service the bishops prayed for Metropolitan Peter only and omitted
MetropolitanSergii entirely.

17. Lev Regel'son, 136-37.

18. Ioann (Snychev),Metropolitan,"Raskoly,"23; ibid.,27.

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374 SlavicReview

The anti-Sergianmovementwas not confinedto Leningrad. On 6

February 1928 the larolsavl' diocese, in the persons of Metropolitan
Agafangeland threeof his vicars,declared itselfself-governing accord-
ing to the 20 November 1920 decree of the Patriarch and the Holy
Synod grantingself-governanceto dioceses should there lack a can-
onical center or communication with one. The declaration of the
Iarolsavl' bishops was also signed by Metropolitanlosif,who had been
residingin Rostov since the previous October. On 2 March he wrote
an epistle to the Leningrad congregationstatingthat he considered
decrees of MetropolitanSergii no longer in force.He also demanded
a canonicallycorrectdecision, i.e., by a court of bishops, concerning
his transferfromLeningrad.And, until such a decision mightbe forth-
coming,withinhis rightsas protectorof his flockfromthe "tyranny"
of "Church Administrators,"he entrustedtemporaryadministration
of the diocese to Bishop Dimitriiand asked Bishop Grigoriito repre-
sent him in the governance of Aleksandr Nevskii Monastery.'9Al-
though Metropolitanlosif attempted to unite the Iarolsavl' diocese
with the Leningrad Josephites,the former chose to function inde-
pendently;on 16 May 1928 MetropolitanAgafangeland his vicars es-
sentiallyreconciled withMetropolitanSergii.
Nevertheless,theJosephitessucceeded in spreadingtheirinfluence
beyond the Leningrad region to Voronezh, Novgorod, Tver, Vologda
and Pskov dioceses. In the cityof Serpukhov,in Moscow diocese, al-
mosthalfthe churches,eightin all, allied themselveswithBishop Dim-
itrii (Liubimov); in February 1928 Bishop Maksim (Zhizhilenko) was
assigned to Serpukhov by Josephite decree. Three Moscow churches
had joined the dissenters;individual churches in Kuban' and in the
Uralsjoined as well.SmallJosephitecommunitieswere formedin Kiev,
Khar'kov and Krasnoiarsk.Parallel to the Leningrad riftthere arose
in a numberof districtsof Viatka diocese a division led by threebish-
ops (the so-called "ViktorianSchism"). On the whole, the wave of de-
fectionsfromMetropolitanSergii involveda comparativelysmallnum-
ber of parishes. The overwhelmingmajorityof the Orthodox clergy
and faithfulremained true to the Deputy PatriarchalLocum tenens-
more than two thirds,in fact.(In 1928 8-9% of the parishes had be-
come autocephalous, via theJosephitemovementor by other means,
about 5% submittedto the GrigorianChurch Council and about 16%
were subordinateto the RenovationistSynod.20)
A similarsituationexisted in the Leningrad diocese. Althoughthe
"Nepominaiushchii" movementwas substantiallybroader, according
to archivaldata about 45 parishes,including15 of the city's110, openly
joined theJosephites.Approximately100 parish clergyand 200-300
monasticswereJosephite.But the majorityof Bishop Dimitrii'sclergy
and parishionersof his home church,the PokrovskaiaChurch in Ko-
lomna, preferrednot to separate from Sergii, even though eminent

19. Ibid.,27.
20. Lev Regel'son, 270, 455.

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TheRussian Orthodox
ChurchversustheState 375

churchmenwho had served in the parish, ArchbishopsV.A. Akimov

and N.V. Chepurin, supported Bishop Nikolai of Peterhof.On 5 Jan-
uary 1928 a general meetingof parishionersconsidered the resigna-
tions of Bishop Dimitriiand two other priestsand asked them to in-
stead "be in unitywiththe entire Orthodox Church."2' However, the
parishioners'requesthad no effectand a decree dated 20 Januaryfrom
"the synod" to the Regional Bureau of RegistrationstatedthatBishop
Dimitriiand six of his followershad resigned and that "they ceased
being our coreligionistsand memberswithus of one creed."22
MetropolitanSergii took various concertedmeasures to admonish
and to exercise his authority,for example his epistle of 30 January
1928 which was read during Sunday Divine Service in almost all the
churches,"To Archpastors,pastors and faithfulchildrenof the Ortho-
dox Church of the Leningrad diocese."23 The activitiesof several out-
spoken bishops, allies of Metropolitan Sergii specially sent to Lenin-
grad,were effective. These included Sefafim(Chichagov),appointed as
Metropolitan,and the Bishop of SerpukhovManuil (Lemeshevskii).Of
course, the sharplyhostile position of state agencies toward the schis-
maticsalso had an effect.
The Josephitemovementhad, fromthe verybeginning,expanded
beyond a purelyreligious frameworkand acquired an anti-statepolit-
ical coloring.Some scholars believe, withsome justification,that"the
core of the ideology of the Josephite schism was a negative attitude
towardnational Soviet realityand thatthe churchand canonical motifs
were merelyan external covering."24This is not completelytrue, al-
thoughduring the tragicyears of the "great division" the movement
had a significantsocial base in opposition to the authorities.Eyewit-
nesses recalled: "At thattime in the Church of the Resurrectionin the
Blood there were verymany worshipers. . . A mass of peasants who
had been dekulakized clustered here . . . All those bearing a grudge
and dissatisfiedcame here as well. Metropolitanlosif unintentionally
became a banner for them."25 It is significant that one of the main
"Nepominaiushchii" demands was for the enforcementof the decree
of 15 August 1918 of the All-RussianLocal Council on freedom of
political activityfor Church members.And state agencies, according
to archival documents,considered theJosephitestheir main enemies
among all religious currentsand confessions.
The more active participants in the Josephite movement from
among the laitymay be divided into threerough categories:represen-
tativesof the scholarlyintelligentsia,who would not compromise on

21. A.A. Shishkin,335.

22. Protokol obshchego sobraniia prikhozhanPokrovskoiKolomenskoi tserkvi.5
ianvaria 1928: TsGA SPb, f. 7384, op. 33, d. 321, 1. 90.
23. Zaiavlenie prikhodskogosoveta Pokrovskoi Kolomenskoi tserkviv raionnyi
stol registratsii.20 ianvaria 1920, ibid.11.100-101.
24. Protokol sobraniia prikhodskogosoveta Pokrovskoi Kolomenskoi tserkvi.7
fevralia1920, ibid.1. 147.
25. Ioann (Snychev),Archimandrite,5.

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376 SlavicReview

theirreligious views; fanaticsamong the faithful-the "blessed," the

"holyfools,"the "wanderers,"the "seers" and so forth;representatives
of social stratadissatisfiedwiththe new system.It was this last group
which impartedto the movementits political coloration. Among the
Josephiteclergytherewas an unusuallylarge number of idealistswho
were notable for their moral purity;the monastic communitywas
widelyrepresentedin and provided support for the movement.Sig-
nificantly,Bishop Manuil (Lemeshevskii)expressed his griefover their
estrangementin his sermon of 29 April 1928 in the Leningrad Trinity
Cathedral: "Fallen away, split offare the best pastors who, by their
purity,stood much higher than others in the struggleagainst Reno-
vationism."26
The diversityof Josephiteswas reflectedin differencesin views.
The majoritylooked upon Metropolitan Sergii as a bishop who had
exceeded his powers and who consequentlyhad allowed improper ac-
tivities.But some saw him as an actual apostate of Orthodoxy,a traitor
and murdererof Churchfreedom,communionwithwhomwould have
been impossible even if the PatriarchalDeputy himselfhad supported
Sergii's activities.The latterJosephitessaid:
If MetropolitanPeter were to recognize Sergii's epistle as legal and
enter into liturgicalcommunion with him, then we would break off
liturgicalcommunionwithMetropolitanPeter and withall the clerics
who exalt his name. If all churcheswere takenaway fromus we would
then pray secretlyin cellars. If we are persecuted for our faith in
Christ,then we, in imitationof first-century Christians,shall go joy-
ously to the firesand to prisons. But we shall not willinglyallow the
landlord of the Church of God to be the antichristcommunistTuch-
kov. We are prepared to die for the freedomof the Church.27
It is grievousto contemplatethepotentialof Orthodoxythatwas wasted
withthe destructionof theJosephites.
The traditionof referringto theJosephitesas schismaticsis long
establishedin Soviet scholarlyliterature;clergyof the Moscow Patriar-
chate continueto consider themsuch to thisday.This traditionderives
fromthe edict of MetropolitanSergii and the Synod of 6 August 1929
which effectively equated theJosephiteswith the Renovationistsand
the Grigorians:
Invalid are the sacramentscelebrated in isolation from the Church
unity... by the followersof the formerLeningrad Metropolitanlosif
(Petrovykh), formerBishop of Gdov, Dimitrii(Liubimov),formerUr-
azovo Bishop Aleksii(Bui), as well as the excommunicated.Those who
are convertsto these schisms,if they are baptized in schism,must
accept the sacramentof ExtremeUnction.28

26. N.A. Meshcherskii,10.

27. Ioann (Snychev),"Tserkovnyeraskolyv Russkoi Tserkvi 20-khi 30-khgodov
XX stoletiia":238.
28. Ibid.;"Raskoly,"35.

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The Russian OrthodoxChurchversustheState 377

The Josephitesthemselvesnever considered themselvesschismat-

ics. Thus, Metropolitanlosif in a letterto ArchimandriteLev (Egorov)
in February1928 pointed out:
... notonlydid we notleave,we are notleavingand nevershallleave
thebosomof thetrueOrthodoxChurch.Her enemies,traitorsand
murderers are thosewho are not withus and forus, but againstus.
It is notwewhoenterschismbynotsubmitting toMetropolitan Sergii.
Ratherit is you,thoseobedientto him,who are following himinto
theabyssof condemnation.29
And, in fact,theJosephiteswere not schismatics.Unlike the Renova-
tionistsand the Grigorians,theydid not claim to be the new centerof
Church authority.Metropolitanlosif and Bishop Dimitrii did not at-
tempt to form a parallel Church, like the Catacomb Church, which
would have existed outside the bonds of universal Orthodoxy.
By 1928 the Catacomb Church had already been in existence for
fiveyears.This secret Church, whose serviceswere held illegally,ap-
peared in 1922 as a reaction to Renovationism.Its membersincluded
thosewho opposed the removalof churchvaluables and those defend-
ers of Orthodoxywho were opposed to clerics who had openly com-
promisedwiththe "Godless" authorities,e.g. PatriarchTikhon and the
PetrogradMetropolitanVeniamin (Kazanskii). In Leningrad province
the Catacombistswere headed by Bishops Stefan (Bekh) and Makarii
(Vasillev).In 1925, preferringto continue servicessurreptitiously,
they
had refusedto recognize the Deputy Locum tenen's appointmentof
MetropolitanPeter, an action which distinguishedthem fromtheJo-
sephites,since losif always remained faithfulto Metropolitan Peter.
Anotherimportantdifferencewas thatthe Catacomb Church categor-
icallyrepudiated Soviet law concerningreligious organizations,while
the Josephites,regardless of their opposition, attempted to remain
withinthe legal framework.The majorityofJosephiteclergycomplied
withthe regulationthattheybe registeredwithregional inspectorsfor
cult affairs;parishes selected local councils (dvadtsatkas),
who negoti-
ated the use of churches,etc. And there was even occasional discord
betweentheJosephiteand Catacomb Churches.For example, in Bash-
kiriia therewere bothJosephite and Andreeviteparishes; membersof
the latterwere composed of allies of the Catacomb Archbishopof Ufa,
Andrei (Ukhtomskii).In 1928, when Bishop Dimitrii assumed admin-
istration of the "Nepominaiushchii" parishes in Novgorod diocese
(againsttheirwishes),Bishops Bekh and Makarii presumedthatmasses
of OGPU agents would infiltrateall legally sanctioned parishes and
from 1928 on prohibited their spiritual children from attendingJo-
sephiteopen churches.30 Their alternativewas manyyearsof preaching
in the "catacombs." The followersof Metropolitan losif instead en-
deavored to win over the majorityof the clergy-firstthe episcopate-

29. Lev Regel'son, 168-69.

30. Ioann (Snychev),36.

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378 SlavicReview

and, ultimately, the upper Church administration of the existing Pa-

triarchal Church. To this end, although the actions exceeded their
authority,the Leningrad bishops not only sent archpastoral epistles to
various cities to attract clergy and laity, they also ordained priests and
even sent their Bishop Maksim (Zhizhilenko) to other dioceses.
TheJosephites also hoped to attract the so-called "Solovets" epis-
copate, those influential bishops who had been imprisoned in the ter-
rible Solovets "special purpose" camp located on the Solovki Islands
in the White Sea. In 1926-1927 more than twentymetropolitans, arch-
bishops and bishops were confined there31and the faithfulof all Russia
harkened to their opinion. Bishop Dimitrii secretly had sent an emis-
sary to the bishops in Solovets but they had condemned the Lenin-
graders. It should be pointed out, however, that their support for Met-
ropolitan Sergii was far from unconditional or unanimous. In February
1928 Metropolitan losif proposed to Bishop Manuil, just released from
the Solovets camp, that he lead those in Moscow and in southern Russia
who had broken liturgical communion with Metropolitan Sergii.
Bishop Manuil was to come to Moscow to be elevated to the rank of
metropolitan by losif. But Bishop Manuil, representative of the major-
ity of the "Solovets episcopate" who had sworn not to abandon Met-
ropolitan Sergii, refused. This lack of "Solovets-episcopate" support
doomed theJosephite movement: without it their chances of ever lead-
ing the Russian Orthodox Church were non-existent.
Most of the fortybishops who comprised the "Nepominauishchii"
movement did not ally themselves with any of the "schisms"; without
officiallybreaking liturgical communion with Metropolitan Sergii, they
tried to isolate themselves from him and remain on the sidelines of
Church life. In essence, they retired: there is little evidence that they
ever ordained priests or bishops.
Josephite influence reached its peak at the beginning of 1928. Then
in February Metropolitan losif was exiled again from Moscow to Mod-
enskii Monastery. In April he wrote to E.A. Tuchkov requesting that
charges against him be dismissed and that he be allowed to return to
Leningrad. He was refused; never again did he appeal to the authori-
ties. In 1929 he was arrested and exiled to Kazakhstan where he lived
for several years near the Aral Sea. On 22 September 1937 there were
new charges against him and on 20 December 1937 he was shot. To
the end he remained firm in his convictions.
The successor to Metropolitan losif as leader of thejosephite move-
ment, Bishop Dimitrii, was without sufficientepiscopal authority for
the task at hand. The wide spread assertion that the Josephite move-
ment gradually disintegrated is untrue. Undoubtedly, it was ultimately
destroyed by pervasive OGPU repression, as is attested to by docu-
ments of the Central State Archives of St. Petersburg. Of the fifteen
Josephite churches of Leningrad, only four came under the adminis-
tration of Metropolitan Sergii (and were compelled to do so under

31. Amvrosii(Sivers),46.

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 ChurchversustheState
TheRussian Orthodox 379

threatof liquidation); eleven were closed by the authorities.Some of

these joined the Josephitesin fall 1928; the lower Cathedral of the
Church of the Resurrectionof Christ(Malokolomenskii)in Leningrad
became Josephiteon 31 October 1929,32despite the factthatits dean,
Archbishop M.P. Chel'tsov, was an outspoken "Sergian."33(A "new
martyr,"according to Pol'skii, he was arrested four times and sen-
tenced to be shot in 1922. Finally,on 2 January1931 he was executed
on a directivefromOGPU agencies.34)But theJosephitecommunity
of the cathedraldid not waver,despite repression (in December 1930
a deacon and in June 1931 the church'sprecentorwere arrested).The
community'sincome grew rapidly-from 13,000 rubles in 1930 to
26,000 for the period January-October1931. In March 1932 the ca-
thedralwas closed and demolished.35
Graduallythe persecutionof theJosephiteshad increased. Bishop
Dimitriiwas arrestedon 29 November 1929 on the charge thathe was
"the factualleader of the church group 'The Defense of True Ortho-
doxy'; that,togetherwith the core of this group, he had conducted
counter-revolutionary agitation to undermine and overthrowSoviet
power;thathe had receivedclergyand managed thisgroup throughout
the USSR." By a decree of the Collegium of the OGPU dated 3 August
1930 Bishop Dimitrii was sentenced to ten years' incarcerationin a
concentrationcamp.36 Within a year, his replacement in the move-
ment,Bishop Sergii (Druzhinin),met the same fateas his predecessor.
Both men perishedin captivity.The dean of the Resurrectionof Christ
Cathedral,ArchbishopV.M. Veriuzhskii,was arrestedon 3 December
1929 on chargesthathe had "workedfor'The Defense of True Ortho-
doxy,'thathe had distributedcounter-revolutionary literature,subver-
sive to Soviet power, that he had received clergyfromvarious places
in the USSR, thathe had confessed to and had given instructionsfor
the struggleagainst the Soviet authorities."37And on 18 November
1930 the authoritiesclosed the churchand turnedit over to theSociety
of PrerevolutionaryPolitical Convicts.

32. Akt peredachi novomu iosiflianskomu prikhodskomu sovetu kliuchei' ot

nizhnegokhramatserkviVoskreseniiaKhristova.31 oktiabria1929: TsGA SPb, f.4914,
op. 3, d. 2,1. 50.
33. Kartoteka repressirovannogo v SSSR dukhovenstva Sankt-Peterburgskogo
Nauchno-Issledovatel'skogoTsentra "Memorial."
34. Sudebnye prigovorypo sledstvennymdelam protoiereia Mikhaila Chel'tsova.
Sentiabr' 1919, iiul' 1922, ianvar' 1931: ArkhivUpravleniia Ministerstvabezopasnosti
Rossiiskoi Federatsii po Sankt-Peterburgui oblasti, dd. P-28774, P42182, P-66675.
35. Anketadiakona K.K. Ivanova. 10 noiabria 1931: Spravka prikhodskogosoveta
nizhnego khrama tserkviVoskreseniia Khristova o sostave khora. 17 iiunia 1931:
Spravka prikhodskogosoveta nizhnego khramatserkviVoskreseniia Khristovao dok-
hodakh za 1930-oktiabr' 1931 gg. 23 noiabria 1931: TsGA SPb, f. 4914, op. 3, d. 2, 11.
200, 206, 210.
36. Sudebnyi prigovor po sledstvennomudelu episkopa Dimitriia (Liubimova).
Avgust 1930: ArkhivUpravleniia Ministerstvabezopasnosti Rossiiskoi Federatsii po
Sankt-Peterburgu i oblasti, d. P-78806.
37. Sudebnyi prigovorpo sledstvennomudelu protoiereiaVasiliia Veriuzhskogo.
Avgust1930, ibid.

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380 Slavic Review

But the "autocephaly" of the Josephites did not disintegrate,as

almost all researchersthink.Although in 1931-1932 Leningrad and
regional parishes maintained only six churcheswhichhadn't officially
been closed,38Metropolitanlosif's allies did not halt social activism
and theiranti-government tone even intensified.The Church of Holy
Moses on Porokhovyebecame central to the movement;as inspectors
of cult affairsand OGPU functionariespointed out in 1932:
... Moneyand foodare beingcollectedin MosesChurchby"true
orthodox"churchmen forclergymen and monksrepressedfortheir
counter-revolutionary . .. Moses Churchwas and is a place
activity
wherefanaticalbelieverssecretlytakemonasticvows(administered
previouslyby BishopVasiliiDokhtorovand mostrecentlyby Hier-
monkIvanovand AnatoliiSoglasnov).WhenOGPU agenciesbegan
especiallyactiveelementsofthe"trueorthodox"churchmen
arresting
on 4 November1932,HiermonkArkadiiand FatherP. Petukhov,
beganto serveat MosesChurch... One presumesthat
eludingarrest,
thoseclergywho eluded arrestdid not reportto the Registration
to do so.39
Officebecausetheyconsideredit canonicallyinadmissible
Under the totalitarianconditionsof the 1930s,theJosephitemovement
was a unique organization,perhaps the only semi-legalopposition in
the country.But such tacticscould only temporarilybe effective.
In 1932 one of the main supportsof theJosephiteswas destroyed:
monasticism.On the terriblenight of 18 Februarynearly all monks
who had been living in freedomdisappeared into Leningrad prisons;
so did parish clergyand laymen who were connected with the mon-
asteries-in all about 500 people.40On 21 November 1932 the Presid-
ium of the Leningrad Soviet decided to close three of the fourJo-
sephitechurchesin thecitywhichhad remainedactive,includingMoses
Church. Parishioners of the church lodged a complaint with the All-
Russian CentralExecutiveCommitteebut the churchwas closed on 25
January1933. (The legal activityof the "Nepominaiushchii"movement
is assumed to have ended in 1933 when theirlast Moscow churchwas
closed.) At a 16 March meetingof the regional inspectorson cultaffairs
the OGPU directedthat"internalpassportsnot be issued to ministers
of the cult of theJosephitedenomination,' tantamountto theirau-
tomaticexpulsion fromLeningrad.
Yet the authoritiesdid not completelyprohibitthe activityof the
Josephites,who had mass support in the "northerncapital." Aware
thatstaunchallies of Metropolitanlosif in otherregionshad taken the

38. Spiski deistvuiushchikhkhramovLeningrada i prigorodov. 1932, TsGA SPb,

f. 1000, op. 18, d. 77, 11.3, 7.
39. Dokladnaia zapiska raionnogo inspektora po voprosam kul'tov v sektor ad-
ministrativnogonadzora Lensoveta. 20 dekabria 1932: Spravka sotrudnika OGPU.
Dekabr' 1932, ibid.op. 50, d. 29, 1. 18, 20.
40. Anatolii Krasnov-Levitin,Likhiegody,1925-1941 (Paris: YMCA Press, 1977),
222; N.A. Meshcherskii,102-6.
41. Protokol soveshchaniia raionnykhinspektorovpo voprosam kul'tov Lenin-
grada. 16 marta 1933, TsGA SPb, f. 7384, op. 2, d. 20,1. 5.

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TheRussian Orthodox
ChurchversustheState 381

"Catacomb" path when legallytenable opposition was extirpated,the

authoritiesapparentlyfeared a large-scalerepetitionof this in Lenin-
grad. Throughout the 1930s there functionedon the outskirtsof the
city,in Lesnoe, a small wooden Josephitechurch,Holy Trinity.Many
timesthe fate of that church hung by a thread.But the parishioners,
who filledthe church to overflowing,knew how to defend it so that,
despite repression,it attractedpolitical enemies of the Soviet regime.
Numerous denunciations referto the church as attended by "exiled
priests," "disenfranchisednuns," "dark personalities without pass-
ports" and so forth.42 The number of clergygraduallydecreased: in
fall 1933 therewere five.In March and April of 1935 when therewas
a mass expulsion of the "alien population" fromLeningrad-the so-
called Kirov flood-of 429 clergyalmost half, 198, were sent to rural
areas.43The last prominentJosephitefigurewas then dean of Trinity
Church, ArchpriestAleksandr Sovetov; frequentlyarrested, he was
struckfromthe registeras a "whiteguard officer."44 Afterthe terrible
year 1937 only one sacristan remained in the Holy TrinityChurch,
Father Superior ArchmonkPavel (Ligor). While there were secretJo-
sephite communities in Moscow, Kazakhstan, northwestRussia, etc.
duringthe second half of the 1930s, theygraduallydrew closer to the
Catacombists.
By 1938 the Russian Orthodox Church was, for all intents and
purposes, crushed. Still, the governmenthad not achieved its goals:
the religious needs of an enormous number of people did not disap-
pear withthe annihilationof a large portion of the clergy."The [1937]
census demonstratedthat in this huge countryan enormous percent-
age of the population were believers:twothirdsof theruralpopulation
and one thirdof the municipal.. ," totaling100 million people. These
figuresare supported by other data.45In reality,it was the laitywho
withstoodstate attemptsto destroytheir Church once and for all. In
June 1941 in Leningrad,witha population of more than threemillion,
eight Orthodox churches were still active and one of those was Jo-
sephite.46 Its transfer to the Moscow Patriarchate occurred under the
quite differenthistoricalcircumstancesof the Great PatrioticWar.
From the firstdays of World War II the Orthodox Church dedi-
cated itselfto the defense of the motherland;this resulted in a signif-
icant change in the state policy toward religion. I.V. Stalin and the
leadership of the All-RussianCommunist Party sought to unite the
faithfuland atheistsagainstRussia's enemy.The state'sattemptto neu-

42. Zaiavleniia osvedomiteleiinspektorupo voprosam kul'tov i v organyNarko-

mata vnutrennikhdel. 1935-1936, ibid.op. 33, d. 114,11.98, 129.
43. Spiski vyslannykhpravoslavnykhsviashchennosluzhiteleiLeningrada i pri-
gorodov. Mart 1935g.,ibid.d. 112,11.2-3, 5-34.
44. Anketa protoiereia Aleksandra Sovetova. 1935, ibid.d. 114,1. 208.
45. M. Pol'skii, vol. 2: xxiv; B.N. Konovalov, K massovomu
ateizmu(Moscow: Poli-
tizdat,1974), 108.
46. Spisok tserkvei,deistvovavshikhdo nachala Otechestvennoivoiny po Lenin-
gradu i oblasti, 1944, TsGA SPb, f. 9324, op. 1, d. 14,1. 8.

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382 SlavicReview

tralize fascist propaganda, which had represented Germany as the pro-

tector of Christianity on the territoryof the USSR, also played a role
in the policy change, as did the Soviet Union's relationship with its
allies, the US and Great Britain. In September 1943 Stalin permitted
the election of a Patriarch, whereupon churches opened and religious
literature began to be disseminated. Thus the continuation of the Pa-
triarchal Church provided the foundation from which to build, for,
had the entire Orthodox Church taken the "Catacomb" path, it is un-
likely that "Stalin would have summoned isolated groups of clergy
from the underground and would have, in any case, established a pa-
triarchal administration which would have been internally freer and
morally more pure than the 'Sergian.' 47 Moreover, as has been noted,
by 1943 there were few clerics active in the underground and no bish-
ops who could have contended for the post of Patriarch; party lead-
ership would hardly have sought the cooperation of its most notorious
"enemies" when the "pro-Soviet" Renovationists and Grigorians were
still active; and, finally,if Stalin had made overtures to an underground
branch of the "true Orthodox Church," that branch would have been
compelled to make the very compromises that Metropolitan Sergii had
also made during the "legalization" in 1927.
In those areas of the Leningrad region occupied by German forces,
the Josephites operated legally while the Catacombists preferred to
remain "underground." But the Leningrad Josephites had distanced
themselves from the militaryauthorities of the citymore than the other
Orthodox at the start of the Great Patriotic War. They had made their
firstcontribution of 15,000 rubles to the Society of the Red Cross only
on 2 November 1941; but by September 1943 they had contributed
137,000 rubles for defense needs.48 The Leningrad blockade was a
crisis in more ways than one: not only did more than a million die of
hunger, but patriotism and the impetus to unite fundamentally changed
the situation of the Orthodox. On 24 November 1943 the parishioners
of the last Josephite church in Leningrad sent a petition to the Len-
ingrad Metropolitan Aleksii (Simanskii):

the Dvadtsatkaand the faithfulof the Lesnoe Holy TrinityChurch

humblybeg Your Most High RightReverend to takeour churchunder
your archpastoralprotectionand lead us spiritually.For a long time
our churchhas adhered to the Josephite'denomination,recognizing
as the Head of the Church The Most High Right Reverend Metro-
politan losif (Petrovykh).Having separated ourselves fromthe Rus-
sian Orthodox Church,which is lead by His Most Holy Patriarchof
Moscow and all Russia Sergii,we, the followersof Metropolitanlosif,
have committeda great sin before the Russian Church. We have vi-
olated its unityand, at the same time,have committedno less of a

47. Lev Regel'son, 617.

48. Spravkao perechisleniiv fondoboronydeneg prikhozhanamiTroitskoitserkvi
v Lesnom. 20 avgusta 1943, TsGA SPb, f. 7384, op. 33, d. 126,1. 184.

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TheRussianOrthodox
ChurchversustheState 383

sin before the Soviet authoritiesand the Motherland by strivingto

place ourselves in a kind of isolation outside of the State . . . The
yearswhichhave passed, especially those of the Great PatrioticWar,
have demonstratedthe needlessnessand baselessness of the existence
of the josephites.' We are the 'lost sheep' who have wandered from
theirflock.While all the congregationsand pastorsof otherchurches
are ardentlyprayingfor the giftof the victoryof our forcesover the
bitterenemies of the entirerace of man-the fascistmarauders-and
contribute,according to their ability,to the Red Cross and to the
defense of our Motherland,we, theJosephites,have sat on the side-
lines. It is now bitterforus to acknowledge this ... 49
MetropolitanAleksii,the futurePatriarch,issued a resolutionthatvery
day to accept the Holy TrinityChurch communityinto canonical com-
munion withthe PatriarchalChurch. The lastJosephite clergymanof
the church,ArchmonkPavel, was defrocked"for violation of his oath
beforeGod, betrayalof conscience and coarse violation of the sanctity
of God's holy service."50(He continued to illegallyconduct religious
servicesin Leningrad cemeteriesuntil the 1950s.)
Thus theJosephitemovementended in the mid-1940s as its last
representativesfinallyabandoned their isolation. Most of the fewJo-
sephite clergymenwho had survived the camps-Archpriests Veriu-
zhskii,Kibardin,Vernustov,et al.-reconciled themselveswiththe Pa-
triarchateand theirformercongregationsfollowedthem.(For example,
in 1945 in Gatchina near Leningrad there existed withinthe Patriar-
chal Church a peculiar communityof formerJosephitesled by the
priestPeter Belavskii,who had at one timebeen close to Bishop Dim-
itrii.) Another faction of the movement refused reconciliation and
mergedwiththe Catacombists.The Catacomb Church was able to sur-
vive from1922 until the presentand in recentyearsits activitieshave
finallybeen legalized. The tragedyof the Josephites vividlydemon-
stratesthe impossibilityof a third way for the Orthodox Church, a
legal religiousmovementexistingin opposition to both "Sergianism"
and the state.
The crushingof the Russian Church in the 1920s and 1930s (in-
cluding the destructionof the opposition clergy,among whom the
Josephiteswere prominent) and that Church's inner crisis resulting
fromincorporationinto a totalitariansocietywere tragicnot only for
theRussian Churchbut also fortheRussian nation as a whole: it greatly
accelleratedthelimitationof freedomof conscience,the establishment
of universalideological control,and the erosion of the moral basis of
struggleand protestin the countryat large.

49. Zaiavlenie prikhozhan Troitskoi tserkviv Lesnom Leningradskomu mitro-

politu Aleksiiu s pros'boi priniat' tserkov'pod svoe pokrovitel'stvo.24 noiabria 1943,
ibid.11.214-215.
50. Soobshchenie sekretariaLeningradskogomitropolitav administrativnyi nad-
zor gorodskogo ispolnitel'nogokomitetao rezoliutsiiVladykiAleksiia po povodu ier-
omonakha Pavla Ligora. 28 dekabria 1943, ibid.d. 76,1. 187.

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384 SlavicReview

Appendix
The main sources forthisarticleare documentshoused in the Central State Archives
of St. Petersburg(TsGASPb), the main repositoryfor materialson this subject. Dio-
cesan officialswere only recentlyaffordedopportunityto create their own compre-
hensive archive; it contains virtuallyno materials for the years before 1945, so the
TsGASPb materialsare practicallya unique source. A large portion of this documen-
tation was previouslyclassified and inaccessible to researchers;what was accessible
was not, for all practical purposes, put to any scholarly use. In my work as chief
archivistI had opportunityto systematically studythe necessaryinventoriesand doc-
uments.
Documents of the stateregulatoryagencies of religious organizationsin the Len-
ingradoblast'are also housed in the TsGASPb. The largestset of documentsis located
in the collection of the Leningrad municipal executivecommittee(f.7384) and in the
records of the decisions of the municipal commission on cult affairs,which in 1931
had superseded the bureau of the registrationof societies, unions and religious or-
ganizations,and had inherited its archives. These documents include surveillance
reportson dioceses of the "northerncapital," including those of the Josephites,as
well as historicalinquiries,inventories,questionnaires,membershiplists of the dvadt-
satki("the groups of twenty,"religious councils or synods) and clergy,protocols of
parish meetings,personal correspondence,etc. Especiallyvaluable is informationcon-
cerningreligiousfestivals,the closing and destructionof churches,and the arrestand
exile of clergymen.Analogous informationon the oblast'level is contained in docu-
mentsin the collection of the Leningrad regional executive committee(f.7179).
Records of the area inspectorson cult affairsand of the bureaus of registration
have not been preserved in toto. The best collections are of the Petrograd (f.151),
Moscow-Narvskii(f.104)and October (f.4914)area executivecommitteesof Leningrad,
whichalso contain littleknown circularsby highergovernmentalauthorities.It must
be noted,however,thata significantportion of correspondingdocumentsof the Vas-
ileostrovskii,Smolnya and a series of other area executive committeesremain un-
available to researchers.A valuable source of informationfor this article is the col-
lectionof thePetersburgprovincialcouncil (f.1000),includingcorrespondencebetween
the Leningrad cityexecutive committeeand the OGPU fromthe late 1920s to early
1930s. Correspondence thatwould shed lighton repressiveanti-Churchcampaigns of
the second half of the 1930s has unfortunatelynot yetbeen declassified.Concerning
the years of World War II, when the last officiallyfunctioningJosephite community
disappeared, there are records of the council on the affairsof the Russian Orthodox
Church for the Leningrad oblast'(f.9324).
Importantinformationconcerningthe interrogationof clergy,particularlyBish-
ops Dimitrii (Liubimov) and Manuil (Lemeshevskii),and ArchpriestsVasilii Veriu-
zhskii,Mikhail Chel'tsov,is available in the archives of the bureau of the ministryof
securityof the Russian Federation forSt. Petersburg.Unfortunately, responses to my
requestsfordocumentationwere limitedto oral replies frompersonnelof the ministry
of security.In addition,documentspertainingto internalChurch strugglesduringthe
1920s are in the libraryof the Ecclesiastical Academy of St. Petersburg.Altogether
thesematerialscurrentlyreveal a clear pictureof theJosephitemovementat itscenter,
Leningrad.In the near futureadditional Church materialsin the TsGASPb should be
declassifiedand the gradual transfercompleted of the archival collections of the Pe-
tersburgbureau of the ministryof securityto the TsGASPb, begun in August 1991.
TRANSLATED BY JOHN HOLMAN

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