Ukrainian Old Believers. Exhibition and round table “Traditional culture and everyday life of Russian Old Believers in Podolia

An exhibition of the famous Ukrainian scientist Doctor of Historical Sciences S.V. opened at the Vinnytsia Regional Museum of Local Lore. Tarantsa.

On September 7, 2017, the opening of the exhibition of Doctor of Historical Sciences S.V. Tarantsa, dedicated to the life of the Old Believers of Podolia. The researcher is a member of the commission for the study of the Old Believers at the International Committee of Slavists, works as a senior researcher at the Institute of Ukrainian Archeography and Source Studies named after. M.S. Grushevsky NAS of Ukraine. Sergei Vasilievich is studying the history and culture of the Old Believers not only in Ukraine, but also in Russia, Belarus and other countries of the world. In 2012 and 2013, he published the fundamental monograph “Old Believers in the Russian Empire at the end of the 17th – beginning of the 20th centuries,” which brings the science of the Old Believers to a qualitatively new level of knowledge. S.V. Taranets is the organizer and executive editor of seven collections scientific works and materials “Old Believer Culture and the Modern World”, which highlight various problems related to the study of the Old Believer, he is the leader and active participant in a number of international scientific conferences dedicated to the Old Believer, and the organizer of more than 100 scientific expeditions to study the Old Believer culture, in particular in Podolia.

The material collected during the expedition formed the basis of S.V.’s collection. Tarants, part of which is on display at the exhibition, supplemented by valuable exhibits from the collection of the local history museum. The exhibition presents liturgical and instructive books, images, copper-cast plastics (icons, folds, crosses), clothing and household items, allowing you to get acquainted with the unique culture of Russian Old Believers, who, beyond their own ethnic territory tried to preserve their traditions.

The exhibition introduces the viewer to various areas of activity of supporters of ancient Orthodoxy, their spiritual world, features of everyday life, and the activities of communities in Podolia. As is known, one of the main services of the Old Believers to world culture is the development and preservation of the traditions of rewriting books, which have experienced a special rise over the course of several centuries. These books were used in worship and everyday reading.

The complex looks presentable at the exhibition women's clothing, which represents different types seasonal outfit. In appearance, the Old Believers stood out from the general rural environment, preserving the characteristic cut of clothing, color and decoration. The clothing of Russian women retained vivid ethnographic features until the mid-twentieth century.

Another semantic exhibition block was the reconstruction of the interior of an Old Believer house, which, despite museum conventions, gives some idea of ​​the human environment and tells about his lifestyle, aesthetic ideas and traditional way of life. How in Ukrainian house, in the house of the Old Believers, a towel occupied a prominent place, often serving as a decoration for the red (holy) corner. The towels were woven and embroidered, decorated with lace self made. The home iconostasis occupied a prominent place in the interior; the exhibition features work by Kirill Vetrov from the early 20th century. This item is typical for the homes of wealthy Old Believers. The total number of physical exhibits on display is about 120. Also of interest are the author’s large-scale photographs in the museum’s exposition, which depict the modern life of the Old Believers.

During the expedition work S.V. Taranets, in synchronicity with large-scale archival work, received the exclusive and most complete (on the identified issues) material concerning various aspects of the life of Old Believer communities in Ukraine, ranging from everyday life, everyday life, history and ending with issues of culture and theology. The scientist established the level of preservation and viability of traditional culture, its adaptive capabilities to modern conditions, established contacts with hundreds of Russian Old Believers and dozens of representatives of the Ukrainian ethnic group of South-Eastern Podolia. He received information about the situation of the Kyiv diocese of the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church, the communities of the Pomeranian and Fedoseevsky concords, as in Soviet period, and at the present time.

As part of the exhibition, round table with the participation of His Eminence Nikodim, Bishop of Kyiv and All Ukraine, representatives of the regional administration and regional council, heads of the Chechelnitsky district administration and district council S.M. Pustovoy and S.V. Pyanishchuk, Chairman of the Board of the Vinnytsia Regional Organization of the National Union of Local History of Ukraine S.D. Galchak, the intelligentsia of the region and the Old Believers themselves.

Among the reports that were made during the round table, it is worth highlighting the speeches of Bishop Nikodim (Kovalev) on the current state and prospects for the development of Old Believer communities in Podolia, the rector of the St. George Old Believer community of Khmelnitsky, Fr. Konstantin Litvyakov about the history of the publication of the journal “Bulletin of Old Believer Podolia”, rector of the Assumption Old Believer community in the village. Petrashy Vinkovets district, Khmelnytsky region. Viktor Galkin on the organization and conduct of congresses of Old Believer youth of the Kyiv diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church, teacher of the Bratslav Agricultural Economic College A.G. Matveeva, who spoke about the history of the Bratslav Old Believer community in the Vinnytsia region.

Ukrainian scientists who have long been studying complex and controversial issues related to the history and culture of the Old Believers spoke at the round table. In particular, a well-known researcher of the Old Believers in Ukraine, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor of Odessa national university them. I.I. Mechnikova A.A. Prigarin made a presentation “Old Believers facing the challenges of globalization,” and Candidate of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor at Kharkov National University. V.N. Karazina P.V. Eremeev presented the report “Old Believer communities of the Kharkov region in the 19th – early 20th centuries: an attempt at historical and religious typology”, Candidate of Historical Sciences, senior lecturer at Zhitomir state university them. AND I. Franko A.A. Sychevsky – “Communities of the Old Believers of Drevle” Orthodox Church Belokrinitsky hierarchy in the Zhytomyr region in 1944–1961,” senior researcher at the Vinnitsa Regional Museum of Local Lore A.V. Lipskaya spoke about the history of the creation of the museum collection of monuments of Old Believer culture in Eastern Podolia.
The highlight of the event was the performance of the hierarchal choir of the Kyiv and All Ukraine diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church with the program “Patronal Feasts of the Old Believer Churches of Podolia” under the direction of I. Pishenin and a folk group from the village of Bratslav, Vinnitsa region, consisting of V.I. Rylsky and E.S. Marchenkova.

The spacious hall of the Vinnitsa Regional Museum of Local Lore was crowded with guests, visitors to the exhibition and round table, which indicates a growing interest in the topic of history and the revival of ancient Orthodoxy in Ukraine.

According to rough estimates, there are about two million followers of the Old Believers in the world. Nobody can say exactly how many there are in Ukraine. They are not officially considered in our country. Statistics only report that there are Old Believers church communities in 13 regions

Every year the world of the zealots of ancient piety shrinks. The Old Believers, as in the times of persecution that are long behind them, still face the same task: to survive. It's much more complicated. They have to resist not the regime, but the time, which sends new trials to the Old Believers.

But here, in addition to the general challenges that the 21st century poses, globalization and lack of spirituality, there are private, subjective factors that influence the preservation of the culture, customs and traditions of this distinctive group.

State policy on issues of national minorities, formed after the collapse of socialism in countries of Eastern Europe, consolidated the current position of the Old Believers and determined their future fate. Each land that sheltered the Old Believers three centuries ago has its own.

Let them drive us to Turkestan,

let them send us to the North...

But our happiness will not be taken away

It is always inside us...

(From spiritual verses

Old Believers of Verkhokamye)

World of old faith

Old Believer settlements and parishes are scattered all over the world. They can be found in Moldova, Poland, Bulgaria, the Baltic countries, the USA, Canada, Australia, China and even in South America.

According to rough estimates, there are about two million followers of the Old Believers in the world. Nobody can say exactly how many there are in Ukraine. They are not officially considered in our country. Statistics only report that there are church communities of Old Believers in 13 regions, Crimea, Kyiv and Sevastopol. Most of all in Odessa, Vinnitsa, Chernivtsi.

Researchers of the culture and traditions of the Lipovan Old Believers cite the total figure for the Lower Danube region - Ukraine, Moldova, Romania and Bulgaria. More than 100 thousand people live here. Only Romania provides official figures. According to the latest census data, there are 35.7 thousand Russian Lipovans in the country.

Behind last years Many studies have been conducted on the Old Believers. Hundreds of articles have been written. Every year, scientific conferences and meetings are held in the countries where Old Believers live. Interest in the study of this unique phenomenon does not fade. Works related to history, faith, way of life, way of life, language, customs, traditions, culture were presented by both venerable scientists and young researchers.

Conference participant from Bulgaria Yerolova Yelis in Lipovan clothes

Historians, ethnologists, and art historians today are studying the Old Believers more deeply. It seems there is no facet of their lives that is not being explored now. These are housing, clothes, nicknames, folk calendar, beliefs, spiritual poems, dialect, business qualities, funerals, wakes, worship, literacy training, activities of clergy, cultural monuments, for example, the book “Flower Garden”. In general, the list can be endless.

The Old Believers have always attracted the attention of scientists for their originality and expressiveness. But in recent years an attempt has been made to comprehensively study it. The only problem is how to make it in time. Scientists, one might say, are collecting the remaining antiquities bit by bit in order to describe and preserve them for future generations. For there are fewer and fewer true zealots of ancient piety left. Along with them, traditions, dialect, and culture go away.

Steppe and steppe all around

The Old Believers are often compared to an island, but in Ukraine it is more like a ridge of small, fragmented, forgotten and abandoned islands. There is no interest in them either from the former Motherland or from the new one.

I allow myself these personal, subjective assessments, because I myself am an Old Believers. The native Old Believer village of Bolshoye Ploskoye (officially Velikoploskoye) in the southeast of Odessa region, the former Tiraspol district of the Kherson province over the years Soviet power became so modernized that only the old faith with its rituals and part of the traditions remained unchanged.

I remember how my grandfather Ilya walked around in a belted blouse and lived according to Julian calendar, strictly observed fasting, loved to listen last news on the radio and read the Izvestia newspaper. TV appeared in our house in the sixties. Grandfather was then nearly eighty. But no matter how much we tried to persuade him to watch the “Time” program at least with one eye, he never decided to look at the TV until his death. And he scolded Grandma Stepanida, his wife, who loved films about the war, saying: “You're a nosy demon.”

Grandfather Ilya spent the entire First World War in captivity world war- home and stopped waiting. When I returned, I got ready to go to Moscow. At night, my great-grandfather burned all the documents - it was not welcome to break away from native land, from home.

The Old Believers' family was strong, one might say, eternal - no one got divorced. They lived together until their death. As a child, I remember only one case in the village when elderly people separated - the priest allowed it. Well, now, like everywhere else, like everyone else. “The time has come,” the villagers say.

Revolution, forced collectivization and godless Soviet years They broke the centuries-old foundations and caused irreparable harm to the Old Believers. In recent years, already in independent Ukraine, the village has aged and noticeably become poorer.

In the house, in every room, there were icons in a prominent place in the corner. But the “lovers” of antiquity and easy money did their dirty work. The theft forced people to hide images and liturgical books in attics and closets, where they gathered dust for years, and then sell them cheaply to visiting speculators.

And even the huge rural church is now filled with people on major holidays. But the service with lonely old women is done every day. And at the beginning of the last century, there were three churches and two houses of worship in the village. After the terrible thirties, one church survived.

I remember how in Brezhnev’s times at school they asked whether we wore pectoral crosses. And one day, on the most important holiday in the village, Easter, teachers declared Sunday a school day. The village in those years was huge: about 9 thousand people, three schools - only a few came. After this failed incident, experiments of this kind were no longer carried out in our village.

For three centuries, in conditions of persecution, persecution and all kinds of prohibitions, Old Believer villages were islands of Old Orthodoxy, guardians of spiritual and cultural

national traditions. Today villages are dying out, a new generation of Old Believers has long gone to the cities, where they are lost among the general uniformity...

Big Ploskoe, towering above the endless fields, which, slowly falling, abut the now alien Tiraspol, glowing with lights, which has lured away more than one generation of Plovo Old Believers with city life, like a lonely island, still preserves the traditions of its ancestors. But what will happen in ten, twenty, thirty years?..

On both sides of the Danube

Our distant neighbors, the Romanian Lipovans (this is the name given to the Old Believers who settled in Bessarabia, Dobrudja, and Bukovina), are asking the same questions. But everything is different with them. Old Believer villages are also aging. Young people leave for the city for better life, to other countries - in search of work. But with the heritage of ancestors, customs and traditions, the situation is different.

The Romanian village of Sarikoy, which has never been heard of in Ploskoye (and in Sarikoy - about Ploskoye), is known for the fact that Old Believers-Nekrasovites live here. Fugitive Cossacks, who did not accept the new faith and were therefore persecuted, settled in Dobruja in the first half of the 18th century. At that time, these lands belonged to the Ottoman Empire, which is why the village has a Turkish name: translated as “yellow”, “sunny”. In the rest of the Old Believer settlements, the names are Russian - Zhurilovka, Periprava... But not everyone has preserved them to this day: Novinkaya is now Ginderesti, Sokolintsy - Lipoven, Manuilovka - Manolya.

The village of Sarikei is almost as big as its native Ploskoye. People speak the same way, in an acacia Russian dialect. Dressed the same way. The same houses and streets. But they have four churches. Our Stalinist thirties did not exist here. They weren’t even closed under the communists. And they look different: small, with painted walls.

The fate of the Lipovans was different from that of the Old Believers of New Russia. The latter settled on the outskirts of the Russian Empire and first suffered from the tsarist power, and then from the Soviet one. At the beginning of the 19th century, the tsarist authorities turned the Old Believer villages of the Kherson province into military settlements and introduced unified faith into them (they subordinated them to the dominant church, but allowed them to pray according to old books). Many were forced to leave their homes and flee to the uninhabited, waterless steppes of the Northern Black Sea region. This is how the village of Ploskoye arose, which grew over the years.

It’s probably not entirely correct to compare these two villages. But if you take the villages of the “Romanian” and “Ukrainian” Lipovans of the Lower Danube, then there is now a gulf between them. “Ukrainian” Lipovans also settled outside the Russian Empire. These lands changed their political boundaries several times, but they were not affected by the damned thirties. That’s why old temples have survived here too. And after the annexation of Southern Bessarabia to Soviet Union In the outlying and border territories, the authorities behaved with restraint in matters of religion.

The current Lipovan villages of Ukraine and Romania are two separate islands, identical and so different. They are separated not just by a river, but by the Ukrainian-Romanian border, beyond which a common two-century history remains. In the newest one, everything is new. “Ukrainian” Old Believers can only dream of this.

Russian Lipovans in Romania have the status of national minorities (hence many rights). They have their own representative in the Chamber of Deputies of the Romanian Parliament. Today this post is occupied by Miron Ignat. He also heads the Russian Lipovan community in Romania, which is, one might say, the guarantor of the preservation of the traditions of the Old Believers. Created in 1990 after the collapse of socialism, today this powerful structure has its own branches in cities and villages where Lipovans live compactly, its own cultural centers, and offices. Has his own Russian House in Bucharest.

In addition to sponsorship, the community annually receives government subventions. Therefore, she has a wide range of activities. It holds folklore festivals, round tables, conferences, scientific symposiums, and Olympiads. Having its own publishing house, it publishes books on Lipovan history, religion, ethnography, and collections of scientific reports. And also the bilingual monthly newspaper “Zori”, which is published in Bucharest, and the magazine “Kitezh-grad” - in Iasi.

In Kyiv, three years ago, the Old Believers also made an attempt to publish their own newspaper, “Holy Origins.” But due to lack of funds, its release was suspended.

The Old Believer Church in Romania is an officially recognized institution, has the status of autocephaly, and receives assistance from the state. The Archbishop is equal to the highest officials state power and has the right to speak in parliament. Most priests are in the care of the state treasury.

Before the emergence of the community, the church for the Old Believers of Romania was the only help in preserving the language, customs, and traditions. She was the only unifying link, their spiritual center, the core, the basis of their self-identification. For the Old Believers of Ukraine, who do not have their own civil institutions, like in Romania, the church remains so to this day. Especially for their descendants living in major cities. Here it is the only criterion for their self-identification. And here a big problem. The point is that in modern conditions The Old Believer Church in Ukraine is unable to cope with this role.

Your Jerusalem

In cities Old Believer churches You won't find it during the day with fire. They either don’t exist or they are located in adapted premises. And those that have survived are in dilapidated condition. The dry figures of official statistics say: in Ukraine there are 56 churches of the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church of Belokrinitsky Harmony. But the reality is much sadder.

In Kharkov, the Old Believer Church huddles in the basement of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. In Odessa - in the building of a former synagogue (without a dome and church bells), sandwiched between residential high-rises and unkempt courtyards. Outwardly, it looks like a house of worship. One well-known commercial structure in the city even wanted to demolish it and build a residential building instead - the place was too profitable, near Privoz. The community had to resort to the help of the press to force the authorities to intervene and make decisions in favor of the believers.

There is not a single church in Simferopol.

In Kyiv - the only one active temple on Pochaininskaya street. And that one is in disrepair. The architectural monument, according to experts, cannot be restored. Land has been allocated for new construction. Parishioners have been collecting money for its construction for many years. But there are very few funds. And the Old Believers are afraid that the land, for which they pay large sums to rent, may even be taken away.

There is no money to put in order the unique monument to the Old Believers that Ukraine inherited. On its territory is Belaya Krinitsa, the former spiritual center of the Old Believers. This is the place where in 1784 fugitive Old Believers founded a settlement, named so because of the white water in the wells, and a monastery, then a women's monastery. It was here that the Old Believer Church found its hierarchy. In 1846, with the highest permission of the Austrian Emperor, a metropolitanate was established, which existed here for almost a century. With the advent of Soviet power in 1944, she was transferred to Romania. And at the beginning of the 20th century, with the money of the Moscow merchant Ovsyannikov, the Old Believers erected a rich Assumption Cathedral in this village, consistent with the traditions of Moscow architecture.

Now all this is desolate, as is the village, where no more than sixty households remain.

For Ukraine, Belaya Krinitsa is an ordinary border village in the Chernivtsi region, where ethnic Russians live out their lives. True, the regional authorities have plans to revive this world spiritual center of the Old Believers by creating tourism infrastructure in the village. Belaya Krinitsa could become a place of pilgrimage and an international tourist route. But there is no money.

The Old Believer Archbishop of Kiev and All Ukraine Savvaty noted with regret to the author of these lines that the Old Believer environment has always been famous for its philanthropists. “There were famous dynasties of philanthropy. But the revolution, then militant atheism, swept away everything. The church is deprived of the support of patrons and is left to the mercy of fate by the state. But God didn’t leave.”

Unfortunately, in Ukraine, unlike Romania, Old Believers can only count on God. The state, designed to promote the development of all faiths, provided equal opportunities for Old Believers only on paper.

Very little is known about the Old Believers

It’s a shame that this is happening on Kyiv soil, where the Orthodox faith came from, taken from Byzantium. It was this faith, which existed in Rus' for six and a half centuries, from the baptism of Kievan Rus by Prince Vladimir until the middle of the 17th century, that the Old Believers brought to the present day. This is exactly how the Old Belief, or Old Orthodoxy, is viewed by historians and researchers of the Old Believers. And in this sense, the Old Believers for Ukraine are the spiritual heritage of Kievan Rus. Ukraine preserves its shrines - cathedrals, temples, monasteries. And the bearers of the faith that Sophia of Kiev prayed for, to say the least, does not notice. Once, one Ukrainian politician, having learned that I was one of the Old Believers, said: “Oh, this is that same sect”...

This painfully offensive phrase concentrates the current level of understanding and perception of the Old Believers in Ukraine.

The Old Believers, as is known, arose in the second half of the 17th century as a result of a schism in the Russian Orthodox Church. The idea of ​​​​making Moscow the third Rome pushed the then Patriarch Nikon and Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich to rewrite the liturgical books, to change church ceremonies, rules and dogmas, so that everything would be like the Greeks.

Liturgical books, icons, and rituals were hastily corrected. Two fingers were replaced by three fingers, the double exclamation of “Hallelujah” was replaced by a triple one, walking “on the sun” when performing church rituals was replaced by walking against the sun, and the spelling of the name Jesus by Jesus.

Part of the clergy and laity flatly refused to accept corrections. That is why they began to be called Old Believers or Old Believers and, quite unfairly, schismatics. And those who humbly accepted Nikon’s church reforms are new believers, new believers or Nikonians. The last names have long been erased from human memory. For the new Orthodox faith, after the schism, began to reign everywhere, protected by the state. And the old faith, or Old Orthodoxy, survived thanks to the people who paid a high price for it: they accepted martyrdom and protected it for more than three centuries. The Old Believers, who were anathematized by the dominant Russian Orthodox Church, were starved to death, burned at the stake, quartered, expelled - everything was used against the evil that the Old Believers were considered to be in Rus' after 1654.

For modern man These differences in rituals are perhaps insignificant details and even trifles. But deep Orthodox people of that time, brought up in ancient piety, this is a hasty, violent and unjustified correction liturgical books and church rituals according to the new Greek model, the destruction of old books and icons alarmed and caused a completely fair and understandable protest.

Old Believers still do not accept new rituals. The three-fingered sign of the cross is called a “pinch.” And those who were baptized in the Nikonian church were called oblivans. The priest will not marry the newlyweds if one of the future spouses is of a different faith. Only after he baptizes himself according to the old rite: three times, in the font, with his head...

More than three centuries have passed since the split. The Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1971 lifted the oaths imposed on the old rites. Anathemas against adherents of the old rituals were recognized as “as if they had not been”, and the old rituals were recognized as equally honorable and salutary. In 2000, the Council of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad addressed the Old Believers with a message in which they asked forgiveness for the persecution caused, for the cruelty of the authorities, “only for the love of the Old Believers for the tradition received from their pious ancestors, for their zealous preservation.”

Attempts to heal the consequences of the church schism - this bleeding wound of Orthodoxy and to revive a united Orthodox Church, as is known, have been made more than once. Such calls are heard in our time. Especially in independent Ukraine. But at the same time, the voice of the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church in our country is virtually not heard.

Meanwhile, the Russian Orthodox Church considers itself the only heir of the Holy Apostolic Church of Christ, because it has preserved all its dogmas, rules and regulations, which Rus' received from Byzantium at its baptism. Saints whose relics reside in Kiev

Pechersk Lavra, were two-fingered and prayed according to ancient statutes and books, according to which divine services are still performed in the Old Believer church. Therefore, the way out in the current situation, when Orthodoxy in the country is divided into several patriarchies, the Old Believer Church sees in the revival in Ukraine-Rus of a single Orthodox Apostolic Catholic Church with a single patriarch.

Missing Pages

It must be assumed that the problem is that the assessment has not been given church schism. Many call this a tragedy that divided the Russian Orthodox Church and the soul of the Russian people. Exactly. However, the Old Believers today cannot be considered only as tragic pages in the history of the Russian church. This is the history of Orthodoxy. And here the question is whether the difference between the Orthodox Old Believers and the mainstream Orthodoxy is fully clear, the difference is spiritual, not ritual, “the difference between thought and life, and not external casual attire.” This question has always bothered me. It is still relevant today.

In addition, the rejection of church reform was a social protest against the dominant church, state and their ideology. It was a powerful movement of defiance. Therefore, the Old Believers are studied as the greatest manifestation of the national spirit. And there is no exaggeration here. Think about it, for three centuries, in conditions of persecution, prohibitions, and all kinds of infringements, the Old Believers jealously preserved the faith of their ancestors - they survived.

Unfortunately, when people in Ukraine talk about the tragic history of the Ukrainian people, they only mean Ukrainians. What about other ethnic groups? With their tragic fate? The history of any people ends where its memory ends. This also relates to the question of how to deal with historical memory in a multinational state. Old Believers consider themselves the guardians of the spiritual heritage of Holy Rus'. They preserved this heritage for three centuries. And now this is the property of those states on whose territory they settled and lived for three centuries.

By cutting off the Old Believers, Ukraine thus cuts off not only part of its spiritual heritage, but also impoverishes its own history. For the Old Believers have their own, three-century old. This is the history of the settlements of the Old Believers on the lands that sheltered them. Ukrainian ones too. These lands have long become their second homeland. And this is the latest history of Ukraine.

Old Believer settlements arose on the lands of Chernigov Starodubye, in Podolia, on the half-empty lands of Southern Bessarabia, the Lower Danube, in the northern part of New Russia, Bukovina, Volyn. At different times, these territories were under the influence of various states: Poland, Austria-Hungary, Romania, Turkey, Russia. It was they who determined the policy towards the Old Believers-migrants, allowing them, with restrictions or without oppression, to profess Old Orthodoxy, observe their rituals, traditions, build Orthodox churches with domes, with a belfry, to have priests and its own metropolis. For example, they received freedom of religion under the Turks, who did not give any of the Christian denominations that existed in the Ottoman Empire. And in the Land of the Soviets they lost what they had. Before the revolution of 1917, there were about 20 Old Believer monasteries and monasteries on the territory of Ukraine - not a single one remained.

Moreover, science, which has been consistently studying the Old Believers for many years, considers this phenomenon not only from a religious point of view, but also from an ideological, historical, cultural, ethnic, and social point of view. And the current position of the Old Believers in different countries It just depends on the attitude of the state towards this distinctive group as a socio-cultural, ethno-confessional community. And here, it seems, everything is simple and clear.

Alas. Old Believers on Ukrainian lands as they lived on the outskirts, they continue to live. This, of course, is largely the fault of the Old Believers themselves. In Kyiv in 2001 and 2004, active representatives attempted to create a national-cultural association of Old Believers of Ukraine to revive ancient Orthodoxy, the primordial traditions and culture of Christianity. At the same time, the Old Believers declared themselves as adherents and guardians of the old faith and spiritual traditions, rooted in Kievan Rus. They stated that the Old Believers should be considered not only in the Old Russian context, but also in the Old Ukrainian and even Old Bulgarian context, which is where its value lies.

The Old Believers thus tried to fill in the missing pages in the modern history of Ukraine. But the idea of ​​an all-Ukrainian organization was never brought to life for a number of reasons. And here we can only shrug our shoulders: in Ukraine, to preserve the spiritual and cultural heritage, Old Believers can only rely on their own strength.

The first Old Believer settlements on the territory of modern Ukraine arose back in the 60s of the 17th century on the Left Bank, on the territory of the Starodub regiment - administrative unit Little Russia. Starodubye became one of the powerful centers of Old Believers-priests. In total, more than three dozen settlements of Old Believers arose here, mostly immigrants from the central lands of Russia. After the creation of the Belokrinitsky hierarchy, the Chernigov diocese was opened in this region with its center in Novozybkov.

Another place of “compact” residence of Old Believers in Ukraine was Podolia, which at the time of their settlement belonged to Poland. Up to thirty Old Believer settlements arose around Gomel. In total, on the territory of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, according to the assessment of the modern Polish historian E. Ivanets, at the time of its first partition there were up to 100 thousand Russian Old Believers. These were people from the central, as well as partially northern and southern provinces of Russia. Accordingly, the religious composition of the population turned out to be mixed: Old Believers-Priests predominated, and Bespopovtsy were represented mainly by Fedoseevites.

The third important region of settlement of the Old Believers, which has already been mentioned, was Southern Bessarabia. Compared to Starodubye and Podolia, the settlement of this territory was more intense and prolonged. The social portrait of the immigrant here was significantly different from the two previous regions. After all, the development of this region took place in two ways - sea and land. Moreover, the first one was probably earlier. It was used by representatives of the Don Cossacks, who spoke out for the old faith. After the Bulavinsky uprising of 1707-1709. They came under the leadership of Ataman Ignat Nekrasov to the Taman Peninsula, and then to the Crimea and the Lower Danube. Here, on the Lower Danube, the Don Cossacks received from the Turks complete freedom of religion, as well as legal and economic benefits that no one else had Christian denomination. At the same time, the settlers were given the condition that they would act on the side of the Sultan at the first request of the Porte. By the way, and Russian authorities after coming to Southern Bessarabia, it was necessary to confirm the freedom of religion of supporters of church antiquity: they were allowed to conduct services “according to their own rite.” This never happened in any other region of the Russian Empire!

In addition to the Nekrasovites, representatives of other movements of the Old Believers settled here, in particular, those who came here by land. They were based on the peasantry, whose representatives, in contrast to the Old Believers-Nekrasovites, were called Lipovans. In Moldova, Romania and Bukovina, this is the generally accepted name for all Old Believers. More than a dozen settlements were founded in the Danube Delta and adjacent Ukrainian territories. Main settlements Izmail, Staraya and Novaya Nekrasovka (now Izmail district of Odessa region) became Nekrasov Cossacks. And the Lipovans settled in the village of Vilkovo, Kilisky district. Mostly Old Believers-priests lived here, who recognized the supremacy of the Belokrinitsky hierarchy and who had their own Izmail diocese, covering, in addition to Southern Bessarabia, also its central part, that is, Moldova.

In the 30s of the XVIII century. in the northern part of the Novorossiysk region - Elizavetgrad province, settlements also appeared, which later became part of the Kherson province. The Old Believers of the Elizavetgrad province were represented mainly by merchants and state peasants. As a rule, priests lived in this region, who later recognized the Belokrinitsky hierarchy.

The fifth region was Slobozhanshchina and Kharkov, in which different social groups population - archers, merchants, peasants, Cossacks, and where the Old Believers conducted quite a large and lively trade. According to modern researchers, about 60% of all-Russian capital belonged to the Old Believers, while the total number of Old Believers in Russia was about 2% of the population. And almost all sources covering the history of the Old Believers note high level the lives of his followers. (to be continued...)

Old Believers of the Podolsk province in the 1850s. according to the report of Eusebius, bishop. Podolsky and Bratslavsky .

Information about the Old Believers of the Podolsk diocese was provided by Bishop. Eusebius in the form of a report to the Governing Synod in accordance with the requirements of the secret Decree of the Holy Synod No. 37, dated July 28, 1853. The report is contained on seven sheets (format 220x350 mm) of handwritten text, personally signed by the bishop. Eusebius and dated February 14, 1854. According to Eusebius, the collection of materials for the report was carried out by “trusted clergy.”

Considering that the document was compiled within the framework of the official, synodal church, we admit the possibility of some inaccuracies in assessing the state of the Old Believers, but still this material allows us to get a general idea of ​​​​the spread of supporters of ancient Orthodoxy in the Podolsk diocese. The compilers of the report noted all the main factors in the life and activities of the local Old Believers.

It follows from the document that representatives of both priestly consents and non-priests, who in official documents were called “sacristans,” lived in this territory. This is how the Bezpopovtsy were called throughout the 19th century in Little Russia, since the communities were led by sextons (mentors) and who had no relation to the Beglopopovtsy-Dyakonovites known on Vetka and in Starodubye, but belonged to the Pomeranian Concord. The total number of Old Believers in the Podolsk diocese was determined to be 7,887 people of both sexes, of which the vast majority belonged to the priestly consents.

The largest number of Old Believers lived in Vinnitsa (2312 people), Bratslav, Yampol, Litichevsky and other districts. In the Mogilev district and the city of Gaisin, there were the smallest number of supporters of the old rituals. In Kamenets and Proskurov districts, the compilers of the report did not record permanent residents of Old Believers. Bezpopovtsy lived mainly in Litinsky district. In addition, two monasteries were noted in the Olgopol district, a male monastery with 34 monks and novices and a female one with 28 nuns.

1. People are literate and well-read.

2. Favorites mentors, the so-called "sacristans".

3. Those living in monasteries monks and nuns who walk around the villages, perform rituals, confirm in the faith and according to the words of the bishop. Eusebius “strengthens the spirit of resistance among the Old Believers.”

4. So-called "team elders" and contractors walking among the Old Believers and collecting funds for the maintenance of the chapels of houses of worship, as well as looking for Old Believers workers to carry out various contracts.

5. Old Believers priests, which by that time had already appeared in the border cities of the Russian Empire, such as Khotin, Izmail and Akkerman.

The financial situation of the Old Believers was generally defined as insignificant, and the main occupations were arable farming, small trade and crafts. The sources of the main income of the Old Believer societies of Podolia were donations from large societies of Izmail, as well as the Little Russian and Great Russian provinces. Monasteries especially receive such assistance in money and property, which in turn provide assistance to small Old Believer societies.

As a significant factor in maintaining the Old Believers in the diocese, Bishop Eusebius of Podolsk, in addition to the “rudeness and ignorance of the schismatics themselves,” pointed to the connivance and indulgence on the part of local officials of the Zemstvo police, “who see the means of enrichment in maintaining the schism.”

Summing up the state of the Old Believers in the reportable territory of the Podolsk diocese, Bishop. Eusebius offers ways of influencing Old Believers in order to attract them to the official church and the measures necessary for this. Here are just some of the initiatives:

· Introduce education for Old Believer children in parish schools of the Synodal Church.

· Close Old Believer houses of worship and in every possible way prevent the possibility of performing religious services.

· Introduce strict supervision over officials and increase official discipline.

· Do not recognize as legal marriages performed by Old Believers.

· Increase the education of synodal priests.

· For the Vinnitsa district, appoint a seminary professor with a master's degree to the city church as rector.

Moreover, Eusebius personally undertook to select clergy called to serve in parishes in which Old Believers were common, and in one of the parishes he even banned a priest from serving for unreliability, which manifested itself in communication with Old Believers.

By examining reports such as those presented, we have the opportunity not only to learn about the number and distribution of the Old Believers, but also to obtain overview information about various aspects of the activities, economic life, material and spiritual state of the Old Believers.

The photo shows an Old Believer cemetery in the town of Litin (Vinnytsia region).

Bishop's report Eusebius of Podolsk and Bratslav to the Governing Synod. (02/14/1854) – a copy of the document is stored in the archive Russian Council Ancient Orthodox Pomeranian Church (Moscow).

Bezgodov A.A., Pisarevsky A.Yu. A guide to the Old Orthodox (Old Believer) concords: a reference book. – M., 2004.

A.A. Bezgodov.(Museum of History and Culture of the Old Believers, Moscow.)

Report at the Odessa conference in 2005 (Kiliya)

After the primate of the Russian Orthodox Old Believers Church, Korniliy, recently visited our country again, I thought - what do we, residents of Moldova, know about the Old Believers? That once in the 17th century a split occurred in the Russian Orthodox Church into supporters of the reforms of Patriarch Nikon and adherents of the former canons. The latter began to be called Old Believers and Old Believers. For a long time they were persecuted and settled almost all over the world.

What do we know about the Old Believers of Moldova? Wide audience - practically nothing. Have you heard that there is Old Believer communities in Chisinau and in the north of the country, that there is such a mysterious village of Kunicha, where only Old Believers live. They are also called the Russians of the Russians and the Orthodox of the Orthodox.

The architectural beauties of Chisinau that have disappeared forever >>>

But we will not engage in a general educational program here, but will tell only about one of the episodes in the history of the Old Believers of Moldova. In the Rezinsky district there is the village of Syrkovo. According to the newspaper " Russian word", today a memorial complex is being built here in memory of the Old Believer monastery that once stood on that site. Work has already been completed to clean up the area, the well has been restored, and it is planned to build a small belfry. The initiator and main sponsor of the project is Yakov Timofeevich Tyutyunnikov, a native of the village of Kunicha. He found one of the bells that once belonged to the monastery and is now negotiating its return.

Now in that place there is only a memorial cross installed in 2011 and a well. And earlier there was Serkovsky (Sirkovsky) men's Old Believer monastery in the name of the holy martyr Catherine.

According to Doctor of Historical Sciences Natalya Abakumova, historical meaning The Sirkovsky Monastery is associated with the names of the famous Old Believer monks (monks) of the 19th century - Gerontius, Paul and Alimpius.

Masonic secrets, or how the “world behind the scenes” unfolded in Chisinau >>>

Archimandrite (monastic rank - ed.) Gerontius, in the world Gerasim Isaevich Kolpakov, was born in the Moscow province, at the age of 19 he went to the Serkovsky monastery, and took monastic vows there. Gerontius traveled to Russia to receive donations for the monastery, where he met the monk Pavel (Peter Vasilyevich Velikodvorsky). Together with the monk Alimpiy, who joined later, they for a long time were looking for a bishop for the see in the village of Belaya Krinitsa (then part of the Austrian Empire, now on the territory of Ukraine - ed.), who would lead the Russian Orthodox Church Old Believer Church. The fact is that for the Church this was a fundamental issue - the bishop was supposed to be at the head of the spiritual hierarchy. And after the schism of Patriarch Nikon, the Old Believers were left without bishops, only with priests and deacons. The three-rank (three ranks) hierarchy remained incomplete, and the situation had to be resolved somehow.

In 1845, a hierarch to replace the bishop was found. He became Metropolitan Ambrose, who headed the department in Belaya Krinitsa.

That is why the Serkovsky monastery located in Moldova, with which all three monks who obtained a bishop for the persecuted Church in their homeland are associated, is a significant place for Old Believers of the “priestly kind,” that is, those who recognize the priestly hierarchy.

It is known that this Old Believer monastery is the oldest in Eastern Moldova (Bessarabia). It was founded in the 1730s, most likely by monks from Podolia (southwestern part of modern Ukraine).

It turns out that ideas " Dead souls" and "The Inspector General" originated in Moldova >>>

The lands on which the Old Believer monastery was located, together with the forest surrounding it, constituted the patrimony of Piscaresti. It, like the patrimony of Sirkovo, from ancient times, according to approved charters issued by various Moldavian sovereign princes, belonged to the boyar Ilie Sturdze.

As Natalya Abakumova writes, in 1845, the Highest command of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church “to abolish the Serkovsky monastery without publicity” was conveyed to the military governor of Bessarabia, Pavel Fedorov. All property of the monastery was transferred to the Kalarashevsky Orthodox monastery. The monastery buildings were destroyed by time. The remains of the cells survived until the 60s of the 20th century. Today, the last witness to deep history remains the preserved well...