Mikhail Zavalov. Do Russians want war?

We treat Jews very well, especially Jewish miners, Jewish farmers, machine operators, those Jews who stand at open-hearth furnaces, sweep streets, build roads.

"Black Hundred", 1995, #25 (quoted from the book under review, p. 55)

...Now God's chosen people are Russians.

Archim. Ambrose Yurasov, confessor of "Radonezh" (ibid., p. 123)

From time to time someone asks me: “Tell me, is it true that all Orthodox Christians are anti-Semites?” Twenty years ago I laughed in the face of the questioner. About ten years ago, I sighed and said that no, it’s not true. Today I... am reading this book in search of an answer.

Its author, Alexander Verkhovsky , director of the information and analytical center "Sova" , has been dealing with this hot topic for many years, where there is no conceptual clarity, but clarity here, nevertheless, is critically important. No longer only for politicians or for those who regularly go to church, but also simply for the “population”.

Handbook of Russification

Two-thirds of the book resembles a stripped-down (the author does not pretend to be comprehensive) reference book, which is so lacking among religious scholars. The object of the study is “Orthodox nationalists,” although this term “ should for now be understood as a symbol for a certain circle of groups and publications, characterized not only by a combination of Orthodoxy and nationalism, but also by a more or less clear priority of the former over the latter .”

website The first chapter is something like a brief reference to organizations and publications (in particular: the Union of Orthodox Citizens, the Radonezh society, groups of “fighters against INN”, the Pravoslavie.Ru , the Union of Orthodox Brotherhoods, etc.) . Then follows their short political history: born in the first half of the 90s as purely ideological movements, they from time to time unite over the fight against enemies (INN, the screening of “The Last Temptation of Christ,” the Pope’s visit to Ukraine), gradually gaining political weight. Their history can be traced back to 2001, that is, it covers the Putin period, when in general these groups lost their oppositional degree (influenced not only by hopes for the new president, but also by the Council of Bishops in 2000, which canonized Nicholas II), but gained greater influence.

Next comes the simplest and most legitimate section: “their opinions,” that is, a “ comparative analysis of ideology ,” where the positions of “Orthodox nationalists” are examined on 22 points, including this:

• Russia's place in the world
  
• Anti-Westernism
  
• Anti-Semitism and the global conspiracy
  
• Apocalyptic expectations
  
• Radical Orthodox anti-globalism (bar codes, tax identification numbers, etc.)
  
• Monarchism and democracy
  
• The relationship between ethnic and religious identity
  
• Attitude towards violence
  
• Attitude towards Yeltsin and Putin
  
• Perceptions of ecumenism and “church liberals”
  
• Problems of the calendar and language of worship
  
• Canonization initiatives.

The most interesting thing here is the quotes given by the author as an illustration:

...The purer the blood, the more the owner of this blood shows a predisposition to orthodoxy and, accordingly, the higher the degree of cross-breeding, the greater the tendency to various heretical perversions.

("The Tsar's Oprichnik" - hereinafter the quotations in quotations are based on the book under review. I note that these "blood lovers" in the group described are the most radical phenomenon)

Slavs, Slovenes, - translated into modern: - having the Word of God, having the right glory, Orthodox. This is the self-awareness of the Slavs, in contrast to other languages, although they speak, but do not have the Word of God, they are dumb. ("Russian Bulletin")

In Rus', people of other faiths have always been respected and never despised. They always lived in safety; Another thing is that they were not allowed to occupy dominant positions in Russian politics and interfere with the main mission of Russia - the preservation of Orthodoxy and its establishment on Earth.

...And the fact that Chechens are planting bombs is why they are Chechens. This is already like a natural disaster . (speech by Father Alexei Masyuk on the radio)

In no case do I urge all non-Christians living in Russia to be forcibly baptized into Orthodoxy, but it is necessary to create conditions so that a person himself wants to come to a Russian church and feel Russian... Yes, yes, yes! It is necessary to Russify the population. There is no need to be afraid of this word. <...>

...Our historical task is to remain Russian. And to create a stable, viable society, Russification is necessary. Voluntary or, if you like, forced.

Those who do not want to accept Russian citizenship, faith, customs, let them create their own state. But with only one condition: never again ask to join Russia. ("Russian house")

It is worth considering that the author is not carried away by oddities (of which the verbal output of this kind of publicists, who for some unknown reason are completely devoid of a sense of humor, is generous) and tries to cite not the most radical, but rather “mainstream” statements. This part of the book reveals the variety of areas being explored. It turns out that “ there are many political issues on which Orthodox nationalists do not agree with each other; there are probably more of them than those on which they agree .” For example, they often do not agree on issues: foreign policy, attitudes towards Islam (an ally, after all, in the fight against the West, but Chechnya interferes) and the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, Yeltsin or Putin. But they are almost one hundred percent in agreement regarding: Catholicism, ecumenism, as well as the calendar and language of worship: “ The Russian Orthodox Church must strictly preserve the old style - the Julian calendar, according to which the Orthodox prayed for almost two millennia <...> sacredly preserve the Church Slavonic language - the holy language , language of prayer appeal to God "("Radonezh").

In terms of volume, this “worldview” section occupies more than half of the entire book. The author is careful with generalizations and starts with the concrete, with a description of the phenomenon, postponing conceptual construction until later, in the final third of the book. In general, I lack breadth, lack context: in the historical part - prehistory, at least of the end of the 19th century and the entire 20th century; in the ideological part - the background, without which the image is vague and lacks scale. In fact, in what space do they exist, what place do “political Orthodox” occupy among simply conservatives, church liberals, indifferents, etc.?

The only “contextual” move is this: while expressing the opinions of fundamentalists, A. Verkhovsky did not forget about the opinion of the Moscow Patriarchate, which takes completely different positions on most issues. But, with the exception of a few speeches by the Patriarch, he is increasingly “silent” and refrains from sharply and decisively condemning the same anti-Semitism or monarchism. And this silence gives rise to the impression that the radicals express the general church point of view.

Analysis: in search of the foundations of Orthodox fundamentalism

Next comes the analytical part of the book - the most controversial and most vulnerable. To the author’s credit, he does not overuse journalistic emotionally charged labels and is careful with terminology, trying to understand it. Thus, in search of a definition of the described phenomena, he goes through various terms: integration, “Orthodox fascism,” extremism, traditionalism, etc. - and chooses the word “fundamentalism”. Then he applies Western descriptive criteria of fundamentalism to our realities - and makes a timid conclusion that “the word has been found” and the described groups (some to a greater extent, others to a lesser extent) can be subsumed under the category of “Russian Orthodox fundamentalism.”

Although it remains unclear to what extent this term (invented to describe phenomena within American Protestantism of the twentieth century) is adequate in our country. To begin with, fundamentalism “ emerges as a mobilization against the destruction of traditional social structures occurring in the process of modernization ,” and in the 80-90s of the last century there was practically nothing to destroy, if we talk about religious life. So this answer raises a number of new questions. Fundamentalism always calls “back to the origins” - and where do these origins lie in Orthodoxy, for which it is so important to rely on tradition? For Orthodox fundamentalists, this is, as a rule, a return to the Russian Empire before 1905 (when in reality the Synodal Church existed in extreme humiliation in the face of the state).

A striking feature of this type of Christianity is its pronounced enemy-centrism , fueled by apocalypticism. The enemy is, in principle, the entire “outside world”, mired in evil, but a particularly good projector of Evil is the “world behind the scenes” and the West (especially the USA). A. Verkhovsky describes the curious dynamics of how by 2001 all the infernal forces were embodied in a single collective phenomenon - globalization (relegating the Masonic conspiracy and even the INN to the background), and the “enemies” became more political enemies. So we can call Orthodox fundamentalists anti-globalists, paradoxically proposing their project of alternative globalization, the project of the “Third Rome”.

And one more important point: they are always based on the paradigm of war - a holy war, more defensive than offensive. The positive program is quite utopian, the main thing is to destroy the enemy, and then Russia will be reborn on its own. Although there are not so many calls for direct violence, but rather abstract speeches: “ We will have to very soon, throwing away false pity, take by the throat every scoundrel who is consciously or unconsciously destroying our Fatherland, destroying our great people to the roots ” (“Russian Messenger” ) - with a modernist reinterpretation of the ancient commandment “thou shalt not kill!” This passionarity is apparently attractive against the background of the general Orthodox indifference and complacency.

The author rightly distinguishes “political Orthodox” from traditionalists and conservatives, and this is another paradox. While they call for a fight against modernism, they themselves are not so conservative: they willingly use the Internet, criticize the clergy, are no strangers to PR, in particular in canonization campaigns, and the church-political struggle itself, to put it mildly, is not very traditional in our country.

Predictions: where is the holy war going?

The book's conclusion is devoted to cautious and confusing predictions. Having read the words in the note: “ We do not undertake to predict the results of the elections on December 7, 2003, but we have no doubt that the national patriots will not be able to regain their lost positions ,” I somehow lost faith in the author’s predictions. By the way, let me remind you that the rising political star - presidential candidate Glazyev - is, among other things, co-chairman of the UPG (Union of Orthodox Citizens, one of the organizations described in the book).

I am not a political scientist to assess the degree of sanity of the program of the Third Rome with a monarchy without a monarch, and not an economist to criticize the program of economic justice without private property, which proposes to get out of the crisis:

Carry out targeted, non-inflationary emission of funds for enterprises and the population...

Increase wages in the public sector by 3-5 times... At the same time, market prices must be regulated!

Fix the exchange rate (Russian Bulletin).

I just want to understand where this miracle is growing from, where it is going and what it wants. No answer. The collected valuable material is not combined into a single “gestalt”. Which the author himself, as I have already said, does not pretend to do.

And yet - I still couldn’t understand: would it be more difficult or easier for me to answer the question “are all Orthodox Christians anti-Semites?” after 10 years.