Date

Author

Source

Polit.ru

Preserved copy

Internet Archive

Translated material

Vladimir Pastukhov: On the way to the split

Vladimir Pastukhov

“Breeches are bombing heavy and
Unlivable and laid them
on the shoulders of people, but they themselves do not want
And move them with a finger. ”
The gospel of Matthew

Every day, there is confidence in me that the hidden “cold” civil war, which lasts almost two decades in Russia, then fading, then flaring up again, can soon receive an additional religious dimension.

However, at a time when most Russians with tension are waiting for an open clash of Orthodoxy with Islam, I do not exclude that the main front of religious confrontation will be the internal front, and not external. On the horizon of the Russian Church again loomed a split. Moreover, the catalyst, it seems, will become the actions of the church upper tops, tirelessly repeating about the inadmissibility of religious strife.

Orthodox mobilization

I'm afraid that many of us are not quite correctly “read” the situation around the scandal with “Pussy Riot”. The reaction of church circles to this hooligan trick was interpreted mainly either as a manifestation of “obscurantism” (from the church), or as a “distracting maneuver” (from the authorities). One way or another, it is believed that the position of the Church in this matter was dictated by either emotions, or self -interest, or nearby, but by no means sober calculation and long -term interests.

I believe, however, that the fathers of the Russian Church are smarter and more cunning than many think about them. They know that they are doing, and count a lot of steps forward. From the very beginning, the church was not a secret that the echo in the educated strata of society would cause both the arrest of the participants in the punk group, and the defiantly militant rhetoric of the hierarchs, accompanying this execution. Moreover, it was precisely this reaction that the Church, most likely, planned to get in order to appear in the eyes of the flock in the image of a persecuted victim and appeal to protection against reproach.

The church has long been waiting for a convenient reason for a demarche and provocation, and therefore did not miss its chance when such an occasion introduced itself. President Medvedev claims that the artists have achieved their own, having gained fame with the help of a scandal. But the scandal is not the merit of “Pussy Riot” at all, they could not do it. Their action in itself, without powerful information promotion from the church, would have caused no more noise than singing from the amvon of Philip Kirkorov.

The excitement, which accompanies today the theme of “abuse of shrines”, is artificially supported by the Church itself. Young provocateurs accidentally knocked on the wrong door. There they were waiting for people who had long gone to this field. Punks could not even imagine, with which caliber provocateurs and with what experience they decided to compete. The lambs wandered to the swelling of the wolves.

The inadequate, disproportionate response of the Church to the petty hooliganism of the buffoons is nothing more than the oncoming “draw”, which should demonstrate the flock of “Orthodox steepness” of hierarchs. The patriarchy responded with a provocation to the provocation, and, taking advantage of the case, went on a counterattack. Compared to the professional Patriarch Show, the performance of the punk group seems to be a rehearsal of an amateur drama circle in a rural club.

The Patriarchate deliberately set itself in the center of the scandal, caused fire on itself in order to mobilize its “Orthodox electorate”. She needed a reason to stir up the inert dark mass. It was necessary that, as in the XVII century, a cry to sound: "Faith in danger!" The church set a goal at all costs to bring this dark mass in motion, and for this she was ready to sacrifice her relations with a few educated class, in any case critically configured to it.

Orthodoxy and Russian people

Staging a carnival with arrests and curses, the church did not so much seek to serve the authorities as it acted in its own interests. The motives of the Church are much more serious than the primitive enrichment of its hierarchs at the expense of the state to which the Church in response is ready to provide a number of “good services” on occasion. In the case of Pussy Riot, it is hardly that the church decided to play along with Putin. Rather, on the contrary, the church pulled Putin into a conflict that was beneficial to her.

The eternal gravity of the Russian Church to the Russian state is often simplifiedly explained by the acquisition of the Church fathers, worshiping the authorities in the search for purely material benefits. In fact, the connection of the Russian Church with the Russian state is essential and does not come down to the greed or cowardice of priests alone. The Russian Church needs the state, as in the necessary condition for its survival, without relying on the state, it is not viable and uncompetitive.

If you look more attentive at the history of the relationship between the Russian Church and the state, you can notice that the Russian Church more supports power, the more “anti -Western” the latter is. If the Russian state began to pursue a policy oriented to the West, opening the doors for cultural expansion from the West, relations between it and the Russian Church became, at least, cool. At the same time, the state that opposed Western influence, the Russian Church, ultimately, was ready to forgive all sins, including official godlessness.

There is an opinion about the "national" character of the Russian Church. No wonder for centuries the words “Orthodox” and “Russian” were almost synonymous. It seems to me that this is not a very correct look at the subject. The Russian Church is Russian exactly as it is beneficial to it and how much this "Russianness" contributes to its self -preservation. At one time, nothing prevented her from looking for protection and patronage from the Mongol khans and glorify a “non -Russian” state from the department.

Just the opposite - the Russian Church is quite "supranational." “Russianness” is the shell that allows it to successfully resist the reformation (in the broad sense of the word). Byzantine Orthodoxy saddled Russian history and turned the Russian people and the Russian state into an instrument of protecting itself from the "decaying" influence of Western Christianity.

The egoism of Orthodoxy

It is in Western Christianity, and not at all in Islam, Russian Orthodoxy sees the main threat to itself. The challenge from the west for the hierarchs of the Russian Church was always worse than the call from the east. Any modernization in Russia was therefore possible so far only through a conflict with the church, and not in alliance with it. At least the experience of the two previous modernizations - the Bolshevik and Petrovskaya - indicates this particular.

For many centuries, the Orthodox Church has consistently opposed any rapprochement with the West and, as a result, against any social development. Full political, economic and cultural isolationism is the ideal state of Russian society and the state for the Orthodox Church. And, if Russian society and the state have not yet been in such isolation, then only because the Russian government from time to time found forces to suppress the reactionary and suicidal for the Russian people of the policy of the Church. Of these two forces that acted in Russian history - the authorities and the church - the church, of course, has always been a more reactionary element.

The Russian Church is more likely to sacrifice a “shell”, its objective carrier - the Russian people, which will come to their principles. To a certain extent, we see how one of the prophecies of Nikolai Berdyaev, who noted the similarity of the fate of the Russian and Jewish peoples, is coming true. The Russian people led by the Orthodoxs can, in the end, lose their land, their state and turn into a nation of the wanderers dispersed around the world.

Today, Russia has almost completely exhausted the resource for its development as an empire, it is unable to maintain statehood within the existing borders without outside help. Upon maintaining the existing trends in demographic and economic development, by the middle of the current century, Russia risks losing almost all its colonies, including the Caucasus and Siberia.

In these conditions, the Russian people have a difficult choice. Either rely on the help of the West, or to be in the future absorbed in a violently developing Chinese civilization. In the first case, there is a great risk to be in spiritual dependence on the West while maintaining “physical” independence within the existing boundaries. In the second case, on the contrary, with a complete loss of physical independence due to the absorption of a significant part of the territory of China, there is a chance to maintain a certain cultural autonomy. It is known that the Chinese, like the Mongols, are distinguished by significant religious tolerance.

It leaves no doubt that today, like seven hundred years ago, during the time of Alexander Nevsky, the Russian Church prefers the absorption of the East and the loss of political independence to the Union with the West. The willingness to sacrifice the “body” for the sake of saving the “soul” in this case acquires a very grotesque form.

Paradoxically, the Russian Church is completely nonpatriotic. She acts exclusively in her interests, protecting, first of all, her church sovereignty. And, if the protection of this church sovereignty demands to sacrifice a political sovereignty, the Russian church, without hesitation, will go to this victim. It is better for her to be in the long term absorbed in China than in the near future to face the need for reformation.

Orthodoxy and modernization

The preservation of political sovereignty today directly depends on the possibility of holding a third (and, apparently, the last) in Russian history of modernization. Modernization is not a technical, but, above all, a cultural (in the broadest sense of the word) revolution. This revolution today is impossible in Russia without support to the West and, as a necessary consequence, without the assimilation of the next “portion” of Western cultural values.

Among other things, this modernization also implies a religious update (revival). This is a very long and painful process, without which, however, the Russian people will almost be impossible to find spiritual forces for the grand reconstruction of all aspects of the life of Russian society. A religious rise is a necessary condition for successful modernization. And for a real religious rise, Orthodox Reformation is necessary. Only subject to the implementation of the Orthodox Reformation, the Russian people will be able to protect their statehood and territories.

But it is precisely the threat of reformation that the existing Russian Church is most of all. She sees an alternative in her own way. The support to the West will preserve Russia as a geopolitical reality, but the Russian Church itself in the form in which it exists today will come to an end. If Russia goes to rapprochement with the West, this will inevitably lead to cultural correction. The flock will change and she will need a new church.

For modern, possessing a wide horizons, more free, more tolerant, speaking different language of people in the current Russian Church, there is no place. The church for them is not ready to “adapt” and does not consider it necessary. Inside the church itself there is no strength capable of responding to a challenge of time. The church clearly and unequivocally makes it clear that it will resist modernization and prefer to risk the future of Russia rather than its own future.

The Russian Church for three centuries received privileges from the Mongol khan, praising his power. The Russian Church of the Decade collaborated with the atheistic power of the Bolsheviks and their heirs. We can say that it is historically prepared to begin to pray for the prosperity of the Communist Party of China.

The loss of the Russian people of political independence, oddly enough, will less tragically affect the fate of the Russian Church than on the fate of the Russian people. The Russian church will rather agree to become the church of the people in exile, which will come to the principles and begin to change.

Orthodoxy and Russian power

There is nothing new in this position of the Russian Church. Its point of view in this matter can be considered traditional. At different stages of history, this position either coincided or did not coincide with the position of power.

There were times when the Russian authorities preferred the three -hundred -year -old eastern yar of Western influence, as under Alexander Nevsky, and the Russian Church declared this choice of princes saints.

There were times when the Russian authorities used the Russian church in order to justify its autocracy, as under Ivan the Terrible, and the Russian Church, although it was Roptala, but obeyed.

There were times when the Russian authorities pushed the church and began to carry out reforms oriented to the West, as under Peter the Great, and then the Russian church bristled, calling the king to itself an antichrist.

Today, the position of the Russian Church and the position of Russian power coincide. Both that and the other put the interests of their own survival above the interests of the survival of the Russian people, from whose body they grow. Therefore, the alliance between the “Putin” and “Kirillovites” is not a conjunctural, but a strategic character. This is not a matter of momentary benefit, but a long -term union of like -minded people.

For modern Russian semi -criminal bureaucracy, modernization, liberalism, democracy, that is, everything that is associated with the strengthening of state institutions and legality, pose a threat to a lesser extent than for the Russian Orthodox Church. Therefore, in practice, the bureaucracy, together with the church, will resist modernization to the last, and will be ready to pay for the stability of their position to the future of Russia.

The inevitability of a split

Having sided with the authorities, the church made a choice in favor of itself, but not in favor of the flock. She pushes the active, thinking and truly religious part of society outside the church circle. As compensation, she mobilizes fanatics who should protect the church from people who seek genuine faith and truth. The frantic fanatics should create the appearance of a religious rise where a religious decline has long settled.

It was for this purpose that the Patriarchate needed to inflate the universal fire from the match. If Pussy Riot did not exist, then the church would have to invent them. And I must admit that the counter -propaganda operation was fame. And the power started, and the fanatics stirred up. The first act remained with the Patriarchate. It's time to move to the second.

Now that the initial goals have been achieved, it will be possible to forgive the artists, showing mercy and breaking the applause. I will not be surprised at all if the Patriarch will soon replace anger to mercy or simply “lifts up” his eyes to how the authorities will lower this matter on the brakes. But even if the criminal case is covered and the accused is released from custody, then the whole story with the Pussy Riot will not end as quickly as it began.

After all, the main question remains - what to do with that mass of “new believers”, who are crowded and stuffy in a modern Russian temple?

The church won the Pirrov Victory. Having mobilized millions of statists, she pushed away from herself, literally threw out hundreds of thousands of active, sincerely believing or looking for people to the faith of people (about convinced atheists, a separate conversation, although they are also believers in their own way-they believe that they do not believe in anything). After all, these people also need to go somewhere. They will continue to look for their path to God and build their temple. Therefore, it is not clear how this song came to the history of Russian Orthodoxy.

Nicon laurels do not let Cyril sleep calmly. At the head of the Russian Church, in the difficult time, a strong and charismatic leader turned out to be. At first it was assigned a lot of hopes. He could become a reformer of the Russian Church, and instead became its zealous guardian. Ultimately, he drowned the church reform in Pharisee, reducing it to ritual spells and fiery speeches. Nikon’s fate was tragic, the role in history was ambiguous, efforts were futile. What awaits Patriarch Cyril? Will he regret that he contacted the singers at an unkind hour?

Today, the attention of the Orthodox community is riveted to the external: to the clock, to the villas and to other dust of the patriarch. But there are much more significant issues - about the true faith, about the new church, about the relations of the flock and shepherds, the princes of the Church and the Princes of the Light. These questions are posed by the very course of Russian history and are waiting for their answer. Moreover, time does not tolerate.