A Visit with the Doukhobors of Irkutsk

by Nikolai Mikhailovich Astyrev

Nikolai Mikhailovich Astyrev (1857-1894) was a writer who specialized in subjects of Russian folk life. From 1888 until his death, he was a government statistician stationed in Irkutsk. In 1891, Astyrev visited the village of Koty in northern Irkutsk province. The population of Koty was predominantly Orthodox, but the village did serve as the sole point of the weak development of Doukhoborism in the province. His article, originally published as “V Gostiakh u Dukhobortsev Irkutskoi Gubernii” in the Russian journal “Sievernii Viestnik” (St. Petersburg, No. 4, April 1891: 52-65), provides a rare glimpse of a small group of Doukhobors isolated from the main body of Doukhobors in the Caucasus. It is made available for the first time in English translation in this Doukhobor Genealogy Website exclusive. Translation and editorial notes by Jack McIntosh. Afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

Preface by the Author

According to official statistics, there are, apart from the 212,000-strong rural population of the Russian Orthodox faith in the three southern districts of Irkutsk guberniia (province) (not counting Buddhists and Shamanists, who number 12,000 and 38,000 respectively), 5,800 sectarians of both sexes, that is, 2.2% overall. A substantial proportion of them are first-generation exiles. Many of the convicts, as is well known, have not settled down to married life and thus leave no heirs (this is especially true of Catholics and Lutherans). Of the sectarians who could or might under other circumstances be able to have a marked influence on the Orthodox masses, only two groups are noteworthy: the Dukhobortsy (Dukhobors) and the Subbotniki (Sabbatarians). The remaining sects are represented by only a few first-generation individual exiles, although of course under exceptionally favourable circumstances, on prepared soil, even one Stundist or Shelaput (sic – i.e. Shalaput) could grow many seeds with his teaching. But the soil, I emphasize, is not all that favourable to any kind of ethical doctrine, be it mystical or rationalistic. As for the two sectarian groups mentioned, according to the national census of 1888, they number as follows: Subbotniki – ninety-one families, totaling 653 persons, and Dukhobors – eight families comprising forty-three individuals.

While traveling around Irkutsk Province, I happened to become personally acquainted with these groups of local inhabitants, albeit very fleetingly, unfortunately. Nevertheless, in view of interest in the subject itself, I think that a few pages telling the story of my encounter with people “searching for the Holy City,” will not be squandered uselessly.

In the literature about the Dukhobors I have read many articles, all of which suffer from a casual approach and incomplete observations, or from a narrow and unseemly one-sidedness. Novitsky’s work on the Dukhobors, published back in 1832, deserves to be considered the most substantial contribution to the history of the Dukhobors. It is based on the author’s personal observations and investigations. Plenty of water has flowed under the bridge since then, and perhaps to a considerable extent Novitsky’s prediction of numerous changes in store for the Dukhobors’ philosophy has been borne out. Thus it would be all the more important and interesting now to have a new detailed and disinterested investigation of this subject, tracing the changes in beliefs, rituals and communal life that have taken place during the sixty-year interval during which a significant event for all Dukhobors occurred – the migration of the Dukhobors from the Molochnye Vody (Milky Waters) to the Transcaucasus.

While it is not firmly established when the Molokan/Dukhobor sect emerged, it is commonly accepted that it happened in the first half of the last century in the provinces of Tambov and Kharkov. The sectarians called themselves “Spiritual Christians” and to some extent, this name is still in use. After the death of Siluan Kolesnikov, who gave flesh and blood to this sect, a split formed within it. Some of the sectarians remained loyal to the teaching of Kolesnikov and his disciple, Uklein; the others followed the interpretation of the new reformers, Pobirokhin and Kapustin, as to the significance of the holy scriptures and parted from Uklein’s followers in their understanding of several other questions of essentially secondary importance. Thus there occurred a division of the sect into Molokans and Dukhobors, who differ very little even now in the spirit of their beliefs, but abhor each other with the passion of narrow-minded fanatics. In the last century, the Dukhobors were severely persecuted: they were exiled to Siberia, to Ezel island, and to the Kola Peninsula.

Nikolai Mikhailovich

Nikolai Mikhailovich Astyrev (1857-1894)

In 1802-1804, the sectarians who remained in various localities of central Russia were allowed to move together as a group to the Molochnye Vody area (located in the Melitopol district of Tavria province); later, after becoming personally acquainted with the sectarians, Tsar Alexander I permitted all other sectarians who had been previously exiled to outlying areas of Russia to move there too. The new Milky Waters settlements prospered greatly, especially during their first years. The sectarians laid purely communistic foundations for their mutual relations; but although the rural economy of the peasant village (mir) developed very successfully in terms of material results, the Milky Waters commune did not hold out for long, and by the end of the 1820s no trace of it remained. What took its place was theocratic domination by the “Council of Thirty”, who took it upon themselves to keep a watch on the conduct of their unreliable brethren, acted like St. Hermandad (in medieval Castile, holy “brotherhoods” formed for vigilante purposes) and disgraced themselves with numerous clandestine crimes. When some of those crimes nevertheless came to light, a decree was issued in 1841 forcing the sectarians to be evicted from Milky Waters to present-day Akhaltsykh and Elizavetpol districts in the Transcaucasus. The localities chosen for settlement were unhealthy; the settlers were threatened by constant danger from as yet unsubdued mountain tribes and numerous criminals, but the colonists withstood all these trials and by now have settled whole districts in the area in question.

This has been a brief historical sketch of the Dukhobor sect in Russia. As for the life of the exiled sectarians in Siberia in general and in Irkutsk Province in particular is concerned, almost nothing is known. However, there is some indication that in 1805, exiled Dukhobors in Irkutsk Province petitioned for transmigration to the Milky Waters, but were refused at that time and possibly migrated later after receiving gracious permission from Tsar Alexander I, who personally visited the Milky Waters colonies. As for specifically who among the Dukhobors were subsequently exiled to Eastern Siberia and why, I am also uninformed. In the Oyek volost (rural district) in Irkutsk okrug (larger territorial division), forty versts (Imperial Russian linear measure equal to 3,500 feet or 1.067 km) from Irkutsk and three versts from the large village of Oyek with its 3500 inhabitants lies the village of Koty, perfectly ordinary in outward appearance, land and other economic conditions, with its 150 Siberian old settler homesteads and ten belonging to the recent arrivals. The village has its own parish priest and a church built by a merchant-benefactor from Irkutsk who used to be a peasant in Koty. There is a tavern maintained by another merchant who so far has only said that he intends to build a church somewhere to atone for his sins. There is also a little shop run by “a political exile from the nobility“ (i.e. a participant in the Polish Revolt), who has put about five thousand rubles into circulation at an annual “Christian“ rate of interest of 40-80 per-cent secured by pasture allotments, arable lands, cows, horses and other peasant properties, in return for which they call him a “benefactor”. In a word, as a village, Koty stands out from the rest solely by being the only place of development, weak though it is, of the Dukhobor sect in Irkutsk Province.

Before my arrival there, all I knew about the local Dukhobor community was that it numbers forty persons; in addition, information about the sect’s origin, its growth, and attitudes of the Orthodox towards the Dukhobors was related to me by the local village clerk, a local peasant who bore no resemblance to the usual type of clerk appointed from among the exiled settlers – typically drunk, sneaky and thievish. About twenty years ago, the mother of a Koty peasant who had served her sentence in exile in Yakutsk Oblast, returned to her native village accompanied by “an old man of quiet demeanor”. This guest spent a winter modestly in the village and left for parts unknown in the spring, while leaving lasting traces of his stay in Koty. Some time later, at a village assembly, three or four families among the local old settlers ceremoniously refused to pay their ruga (annual contribution to the local clergy), to supply firewood to the church and the parish priest, or to pay housing support to the sexton. In a word, they declared that they would no longer “carry” any church duties and, as confirmation of their break with Orthodoxy, they returned their home icons to the church. When asked by their surprised fellow-villagers what all of this meant, the dissidents declared that from now on they reject the church, sacraments, rituals and the clergy and had become “Spiritual Christians – Dukhobors”. “Up to now, we wandered in darkness, and only now have we found the true faith and the pathway to salvation,” they solemnly replied.

Of course such a significant fact could not pass unnoticed by “those responsible for keeping watch.” At first, the sectarians experienced hard times. However, they firmly withstood this ordeal and their existence in Koty was finally officially acknowledged. The volost was issued with books to register the births, marriages and deaths of the sectarians and the reprimands ceased or became less persistent. The Orthodox believers began to “carry” church duties and taxes on behalf of the sectarians, in return loading on them cartage duties and other village responsibilities not related to the church.

Over the past twenty years, four more peasant families have joined the sect at various times, so now they number twenty men and twenty-three women. Still, this growth of the sect has to be considered very slow when compared to the incredibly rapid success of sectarian propaganda in Russia. The attitude of the Orthodox toward the sectarians in Oyek and neighboring districts nowadays can be described as reserved and curious: every son of the true church observes the actions of his heretical neighbors with distrustful curiosity at times masked by indifference, as if in constant expectation that all of a sudden they will “pull some kind of stunt.” The Orthodox express their common opinion about the sectarians in approximately the following words: “We have seen nothing bad about them that we don’t do ourselves: they are not used to drinking, they care for the salvation of their souls much more than we do – only in their own way, of course. The bad thing is that they have no respect for the church, icons and all that.”

But if in conversation one brings up the economic relations between these two sides, the Orthodox people inevitably begin to speak in offended tones about the sectarians’ refusal to fulfill their obligations to the church. “But didn’t you pile on them lots of extra obligations in exchange for relieving them of the ruga and church duties?” “That’s right, but it’s still offensive ….”

For their part, the Dukhobors explained that they fulfill extra village duties worth twice as much as all the services to the church that they had rejected. “They are glad to oppress us because they are a force, a whole army, while we are a small handful. Still, we are yet prepared to put up with it for the sake of our faith.”

Among the householders of Koty I spoke to about “the pleasures of the soil” and community affairs, there was a Dukhobor, one who had only recently abandoned Orthodoxy, as the clerk told me. Snatching a moment when no one was paying attention to us, I asked, “You are a Dukhobor, aren’t you?” Suspicious, he gazed at me intently, but hastened to answer in the affirmative.

In the evening, the work being over, I asked the clerk whether he could take me to the recently met Dukhobor and whether it would be acceptable to show up at his place unannounced. The clerk dispelled my doubts and led me through the narrow, winding streets of the village. He stopped at the small, plain hut with a tumbledown fence around the yard. “This is Nikolay Petrovich’s hut. Shall I knock?” “What about you?” I asked, “Will you come in too? Won’t he be embarrassed?” “Don’t worry. He is entirely without formality! They know me.”

Our knock on the gates and the dog’s growling brought the man out into the yard. “Who’s here?” he asked, half-opening the wicket-gate. I stood so that the moonlight fell on my face and asked in return: “Will you welcome unexpected guests, Nikolay Petrovich?” He was somewhat confused at first by our unexpected arrival, but immediately tried to regain his composure and replied in an exaggeratedly calm voice: “There are no two guests alike. There are all sorts!… Please come in.”

The interior furnishings of the hut also turned out to be very poor. A Russian stove, already caving in from decrepitude, took up a quarter of the space. Burning brightly in the small hearth set into the corner of the stove an arshin (Imperial Russian linear measure equal to 28 inches or 71 cm) and a half above the floor were four finely chopped pieces of firewood spreading warmth and light throughout the hut (poor peasants in Siberia warm their homes in such a way all through the winter). Small dark pegs were hanging right over the door; in the corner there was a bed with a torn large felt mat with two soiled cushions instead of a mattress. There was a table in the krasny ugol (“red corner”, a special space in a Russian peasant hut usually decorated with embroidered towels and one or more icons, to form a private chapel); along two walls were benches. There were no icons, but hanging along the walls forming the krasny ugol were several oleographs (a chromolithograph printed from metal or stone plates using oil paint on canvas – in imitation of oil paintings), portraits of the royal family, a group of European emperors, among whom, incidentally, I noticed the Shah of Persia; I noticed “The Broad and Narrow Way”, a painting of a group of ladies and gentlemen in the funniest caftans and dresses passing through the gates of hell, and a group of simple men, pilgrims and monks passing through the narrow gate into the kingdom of heaven. There was also “Christ being tempted by the Devil”, a picture issued by the “Posrednik” publishing house and some others, none of which exhibited the least trace of romantic or humorous content.

In the peasant hut, apart from our host, his wife and two children, there were two peasants who had obviously just “dropped in for a minute” and were sitting with their hats in their hands. One of them, an altogether common peasant type in appearance, was smoking a pipe; the other, by virtue of his cleaner clothing and broad, well-fed countenance looked more like a dvornik, (i.e. the proprietor of a coach inn) than a peasant ploughman. When I entered, the hostess started fussing and began to wipe something off the table, though it was clean enough, lit a small blackened lamp, set the logs straight in the hearth and sat up to the cradle where a baby was starting to cry. Our host did not know what to do with his tall self and aimlessly paced the floor near the table, watching his wife’s efforts. Only the man with the full face remained unperturbed. “Look, His Honour wanted to know how you are living, Nikolay Petrovich,” said the clerk as a kind of weak recommendation and sat down on the bed near the man who was smoking. “Well, then, welcome! We are glad to meet a good person.…”

Then there was a pause; naturally, it was up to me to break it. I looked around hoping to find a topic of conversation and soon, fortunately, I found one. I asked them about the price of kerosene and whether it was widely used in the villages. In return they asked me about the price of kerosene in Russia. Then we moved to the prices of other products in the local shop; from here it was easier now to bring up the benefits provided to peasants needing credit from the local “nobleman among the exiles”; then we talked about setting up savings and loans banks in the district, and other matters. We were having a rather lively conversation, though only three people took part in it besides me: the fellow with the full face and the clerk; the others kept quiet almost all the time.

I did not know whether it would be proper to turn the conversation to religious questions in view of the presence of guests whose relationship with our host was unknown to me, but in one of the short lulls in the conversation, the stout fellow asked me: “You are, by all appearances, Russian; have you been to the Kavkaz (Caucasus)?” (He pronounced it “Kapkaz”). “No, I haven’t, but I know something about it from books.” “It seems that’s where our Dukhobors are living. I wonder if life is good there.” “You mean the Transcaucasus, specifically, near Lenkoran in Akhaltsykh and Elizavetpol districts?” “Exactly, so have you had an opportunity to be there?”

I told them everything that came to mind about the climate there, living conditions, and so on. They listened attentively, asked if it was far from St. Petersburg and Irkutsk, how to get there and what would it cost. I could not give any kind of definite answer to the last question, but I described the possible routes in detail. Finally, I asked why they were so interested in life in Transcaucasia.

“Who knows, maybe we’ll have to go there! Our spiritual brethren live there, and here – strangers all around. They are offended at us not paying the annual fee to the church or contributing firewood. They also are threatening to take away a desiatina (Imperial Russian land measure equal to 2.7 acres) of land per head. So how can we live here? We’ve got no place to go: there’s little room here, stony ground stretches from here up to the sea (Lake Baikal): although the land there doesn’t belong to anybody, it’s no good. We also heard rumours that the local officials themselves are going to drive us out of here….” “For years they have been singing the same old song, yet nothing has happened and it looks as though it never will. Where can they exile us even farther away?” remarked our host.

I stood up to take my leave, thinking that my first visit was long enough and counting on seeing these sectarians again the next day. “Why have you sat with us such a short time?” asked Vasily Nikolayevich, the stout one, “We should talk longer, we much enjoy good conversation. Tomorrow – will you still be here?” (I answered in the affirmative.) “So, please come in the evening, if you don’t find our company boring. I live across from here, kitty-corner, two houses over.” “Please, please come and see us,” our host also extended an invitation as he saw us to the gates.

“That man, the fat one, he is chief among the brethren,” said the clerk as we walked down the street. “Oh, how clever they are at talking! He’ll talk your ears off, you won’t be able to get a word in edgewise in response.” “Do they live peaceably among themselves?”

“Didn’t you see? They visit each other every evening, read holy books and sing psalms, but in life you wouldn’t notice anything that makes them different from us. Remember, you mentioned that Polish exile; there are those among them who would buy hay fields from their own brethren at half price and take the land in pawn. At Nikolay’s place, where we were, consider – there is nothing to eat, while at Vasily’s house – you’ll see tomorrow – it’s like a merchant’s mansion! So with them it’s “live and struggle, every man for himself,” just as it is with us…. Well now, as for the women, we’ve also noticed something about them: it’s hard for a young woman to live in a family with an old man…. We have seen enough of them – sweet singers, indeed!…. Well, here are your digs. Will you excuse me now? Good night!”

The next evening, I entered the clean, spacious house where Vasily lived. My hopes were realized. Obviously a prayer gathering was about to begin, because five or so of the “brethren” had gathered in the sitting-room; members of Vasily’s family were also there: his wife, already quite an old woman (however, he appeared no more than forty-five, although he was actually approaching sixty), his two daughters, both in their early twenties, and a son about twelve years old. They greeted me as a friend, without reserve. Immediately we were given brick tea with milk, warmed up hard-boiled eggs and some kalachi (wheatmeal loaves) baked from homemade flour. The tea was served to me first, and then to the “brothers”, the wife handing each person a loaf and a lump of sugar. Most of them had only one cup of tea – out of delicacy, I suppose.

During tea we had a conversation on scientific topics. Somebody recalled the eclipse of the sun on August 7, 1887; another mentioned some lunar eclipses: a whole series of questions gave me an opportunity to give a sort of lecture about the reasons for eclipses, day and night, and the seasons. Using a lamp and two small shan’gi (round loaves) as visual aids, I described how the earth goes around the sun, how the moon goes around the earth, and so on. Everyone listened with great attention and acceptance, without making skeptical comments. Their questions were sensible; I even found myself unable with total accuracy to answer from memory some of their questions about numbers. In our conversation it turned out that some of them had their own ideas as to the reasons for the phases of the moon: they thought that some kind of dark “planetoid” orbiting the Earth is hiding the moon from our sight. In general, this whole episode made a very favourable impression on me; clearly, mental gymnastics are not foreign to these people, they possess a certain inquisitiveness, and if they are wandering in the semi-mystical labyrinths of Dukhobor teachings it is not their fault that life has not given them anything better, has not led them to strive for self perfection in another, more rational direction. I recall my three-year stay among peasants in one of the “black soil” provinces of Russia: not once there did I ever have occasion to carry on such a long scientific discussion and never did I have such attentive and inquisitive interlocutors. With regard to the waning and waxing of the moon, my friends in the black soil areas had virtually no interest; I never once heard from them any sort of even childishly naïve interpretations of these phenomena, not even of a sort such as “angels are crumbling the moon into stars”; there I would always receive the same answer to my questions: “Who knows!… We don’t have a clue!…

Of course, a small group of Dukhobors cannot be assumed to represent the state of mind of the Siberian peasantry in general: the latter, as I have already pointed out in a previous essay, are little interested in abstract ideas, let alone religious matters; however, more practical questions affect even the average Siberian deeply. Everywhere, for example, the rumour of a railway creates a virtual sensation and everyone with whom I discussed that topic was interested in what exactly a chugunka (Russian archaic term for railroad train, comparable to “iron horse” in English) is like, how powerful it is, what quantity of goods it can transport, how far it can travel in a day, and so on.

The Dukhobors thus appear, by virtue of their inquisitive nature, to be the cream of the local peasantry: they are interested not only in the chugunka, which will one way or another affect the pocketbooks of the whole population, but also in issues more remote from everyday life.

When we had finished sipping our tea, the host’s daughters, after clearing away the dishes, sat down right there with their needlework. The boy went over to the front corner and took out two rather worn books from a drawer. The brothers were sitting on the beds and benches; our host himself was sitting almost squatting – whether intentionally or without forethought, I do not know – at the doorway from the main room out leading out beyond a partition; he thus occupied the lowest position in line with the others. “Shall we read, brothers?… Well, then, Senia (diminutive form of the Russian men’s name Semen, Ksenofont, etc), read chapter 13 from the Epistle to the Romans”, he said.

None of the rituals that researchers who have studied this sect say are performed before a prayer session did I observe; the men and women even remained sitting alternately without separating into two groups; everybody continued to sit in the most natural postures just as before the reading; one man was even unhurriedly finishing smoking his pipe. The boy began reading rather animatedly. After he finished reading, everyone repeated, “Lord, save us!” in a low voice. They repeated the same words after each subsequent reading or singing.

“This is what the Christ’s apostle passed on to us,” explained our host, “Every person should be subject unto the higher powers.” And then, “render to all their dues: custom to whom custom is due; honour to whom honour is due. That means the rulers are God’s ministers. That’s why we show respect to them and obey them; we also pay all taxes prescribed by the officials, except those prescribed by others. We honour the powers that should be honoured, but not everyone who desires to be honoured.”

It was clear that all this and much of what followed was addressed directly at me. “Now, then, Senia, read chapter 23 from Matthew!” “But be not ye called Rabbi: for one is your Master, even Christ; and all ye are brethren…” Senia went on reading: “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them that are entering to go in. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour widows’ houses, and for a pretence make long prayer… . ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity”… . Again, “Lord, save us” with commentary: “And this we consider to mean authorities in the world other than our village powers. We do not honour the former ones and we want nothing to do with them. We acknowledge only one Teacher and Guide, our Lord Jesus Christ.”

“I remember reading somewhere that the Dukhobors supposedly do not recognize the Holy Scripture, as they consider one tradition to be sufficient, that is, the fruit of inner revelation or enlightenment from God the Word, and that for you people the Bible and its Gospel have been replaced by a “book of life”, i. e. a collection of altered psalms of David?” I asked. “Possibly that is so in other places, but we read both the Gospels and the Epistles.” “Do you acknowledge any later prayers and the writings of the holy fathers?” “We accept only the Lord’s Prayer given to us by the Lord and the beginning of ‘I believe in one God, the Father Almighty…’. And that’s all.”

When I asked why they use only the first words of the Apostles’ Creed, our host answered “we don’t need anything beyond that.” With that he indirectly acknowledged that they conceive of the divinity of Christ with great reservations.

But just then I was astonished by the following answer to my question about baptism. “Of course we baptize our children ‘in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit’ and name the child right then.” “Surely isn’t that just what the Orthodox do?” “We don’t make up our own names. We name children according to the church calendar. Only when we come to the names of bishops or priests, we skip them.”

“Then do you bury and marry people yourselves?” “Yes, on our own. We announce the marriage before all the brethren; we consider that sufficient. Only we also recite Psalms that are appropriate.”

“But look here, with respect, you all surely were Orthodox once. Do you remember what beautiful prayers there are? For instance, take just the burial ceremony. Why did you reject them and recite nothing but the Psalms? Does it matter who composed a prayer if it speaks to the heart?” “I know them all very well. I used to go to church often thinking I would find the true way to salvation. The only thing is, all that was not to my liking; the prayers themselves are good, but the way they read them!? So let them have them!”

“Why do you not recognize icons?” “An icon is the work of man’s hands, sometimes a vile man; how can we worship it? We only worship God alone, as the Gospel says: ‘Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them.’ We gather as often as possible in His name so that He will be in our midst as much as possible. Let’s recite some psalms, brothers.”

He started reciting the 10th Psalm “In the Lord we trust”. After that, an old woman who had been sitting all the time motionless, but with clear signs of fanaticism on her wrinkled face, solemnly recited the 90th Psalm “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High….” Then our host’s elder daughter laid her needlework down on her lap and recited the 113th Psalm; then all those present, with the sole exception of the peasant sitting next to me, recited various psalms in turn. They all distinctly pronounced the words, though their diction was monotonous and sluggish. Whether they deviated at all from the text, I was unable to tell, as I didn’t have the book in hand to check on it.

“But all of you, it would seem, cannot read: how then did you learn those long Psalms?” “This is how: Senia reads and the rest repeat after him; that’s how we learn them.” “For others, it is awfully easy,” remarked my neighbour, “It’s enough for her (pointing to the girl) to hear a psalm two or three times and she’s ready: she knows it to the last little word. My memory is poor, or the Lord is not letting me: I just can’t memorize! I try and try, but as soon as I learn one verse, I forget another.”

“How many Psalms do the rest know?” “That girl over there, it seems, knows over forty.” “Forty-two,” said the girl, not taking her eyes off her work. “Well, brothers, let’s sing something: these folks will listen.” They sang several psalms. Every time the old woman and our host would start the singing and the rest would join in after the third or the fourth word. “I’m not in good voice today,” said one of the brethren, coughing and spitting. Their psalm singing was extremely doleful; some of them exuded sincerity as they sang. I was especially taken with their singing of the 99th Psalm “Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands.”

It was already eleven in the evening when I said good-bye and thanked them for their trust and cordial hospitality. “We thank you most humbly for paying us a visit, and thank you for not looking down on us. But how are we to address you and remember you?” asked our host. I gave him my visiting card and again shook hands with everyone. “If you ever happen to visit our region, don’t pass by, do us the kindness!” “Come visit us again, we humbly beg you! We’ll be glad,” said the others also.

However, I was not to have an opportunity to see any of them again. Recently I have found out from the newspapers that on such and such a day, “a provincial court considered the case of a peasant from the village of Koty, a Dukhobor charged with uttering blasphemous words at a village meeting…” and so on. The accused was that silent and gloomy recent Dukhobor convert, the one I had once visited late at night uninvited. Why was it specifically he who was put on trial? Was it because long-repressed indignation at pressure from the community had boiled up in him and exploded in a stream of reproachful and abusive words, or had he during this interval of time become, owing to outside influence, a fanatic who had decided to “suffer for the true faith,” to strengthen thereby the unity of the commune and call sympathetic attention to it from wavering members of the surrounding population? The dry newspaper account reported only that the accused had been deemed by the judge to have acted without clear understanding and had, therefore, been sentenced to a light punishment. However, some time later I read in another paper a report about a severe drought in the northern district of Irkutsk okrug and that the Koty community regards it as punishment sent down on the Orthodox folk for the indulgences granted by them to the Dukhobors, and they then decided to take away from each of them one desiatina of arable land.

What brother Vasily feared has come to pass. Thus, for this small group of Dukhobors, a new period of ordeals has begun. The reasons for this onslaught are difficult to gauge from afar, some six thousand versts away: it all may come down to the fact that there has been some change unfavourable for the Dukhobors in the personnel of the volost or higher ranking administration. Or, possibly, due to scarcity of land, the rural community intends to expel entirely from their nest these local renegades to somewhere “beyond the ‘Kapkaz’” (Transcaucasia), to where even the Dukhobors themselves would apparently not be averse to resettling were they not apprehensive about the vast distance separating them from their “brothers in spirit”.

Such is life for the group of Dukhobors with whom I chanced to become slightly acquainted in one of the remote frontier areas of Russia. However slight this acquaintance, it would seem possible that on this basis it may be concluded that the beliefs of the Irkutsk Dukhobors differ in many respects from the more fixed Dukhobor doctrines in Russia proper. This difference in dogma and rituals is considerably favoured by the isolation of Koty’s semi-mystical, semi-rationalistic Dukhobors from their Russian brethren.

Afterword

Throughout nineteenth century Russia, a number of small, isolated groups of Doukhobors existed, separate and apart from the main body of Doukhobors in the Caucasus, in places such as Samara, Orenburg, Irkutsk, Amur, Kamchatka and elsewhere. Unfortunately, little is known or documented about them. In this regard, Astyrev, who displays considerable knowledge of Doukhobor history and historiography, provides us with a rare, valuable glimpse of one such group.

Astyrev traced the origins of the Doukhobors of Koty village, Irkutsk to a wandering Doukhobor, an “old man of quiet demeanour” who had been exiled to Yakutsk province.  Following his release, in circa 1871, he wintered in the village. Over the course of several months, he taught the villagers the Doukhobor life concept. The following spring, he departed the village for “parts unknown”. Despite his brief stay, this “Christ’s apostle” left lasting traces; for a short time later, several village families converted to the Doukhobor faith.

The Doukhobors Astyrev met espoused many of the central tenets of Doukhoborism, including the belief that the spirit of God can be found in the soul of every man; the worship of God in spirit and in truth; and the rejection of external rites, sacraments and dogma. They did not attend the Orthodox Church and rejected the use of icons. They met for simple prayer meetings in their homes, during which they sang hymns and recited psalms and prayers. Many of these they committed to memory, as exemplified by the young woman Astyrev encountered who knew forty-two psalms “by heart”.

At the same time, Astyrev observed some differences in their religious practices from those of the Caucasian Doukhobors. For instance, they did not separate into two groups of men and women during their prayer meetings. As well, they adopted only the first person of the Trinity, the Father; the Son and Holy Ghost, they informed Astyrev, were “not needed”. In addition, they baptized their children according to Orthodox ritual; although they married and buried their dead themselves. Perhaps most significantly, they continued to hold the Bible as a source of divine authority.

Unlike the Doukhobors in the Caucasus, the Doukhobors of Koty did not manifest any strong ideological opposition to the state. While visiting them, Astyrev found portraits of the reigning Romanov family and other secular rulers – including the Shah of Persia – on the walls of their homes. They respected and obeyed the government and paid their taxes regularly, according to the maxim that “every person should be subject unto the higher powers” and “render to all their dues: custom to whom custom is due; honour to whom honour is due.”

Some differences in religious expression were probably inevitable, given the Koty Doukhobors’ geographic and social isolation from other Doukhobor groups.  Indeed, their brief time spent with the old Doukhobor exile, twenty years earlier, was their only point of reference. However, for their part, the Doukhobors did not consider such discrepancies to be important. When Astyrev explained how the practices of the Caucasian Doukhobors differed from their own, they casually remarked that “possibly that is so in other places”, but “this is what the Christ’s apostle passed on to us.”

During the course of his visit, Astyrev discussed a broad range of issues with the Doukhobors, including current events, religious philosophy, the role of education, scientific phenomena and technological advances. The statistician was favourably impressed with their “shrewd questioning” and “intellectual curiosity” in matters both practical and remote from everyday life.  On this basis, he deduced that the Doukhobors were “the cream of the local peasantry”.

In particular, the Koty Doukhobors expressed a keen interest in the lands “beyond the Kapkaz”, inquiring about the climate there, living conditions, how to get there, and what it would cost. When Astyrev asked them why they were so interested in life in Transcaucasia, the Doukhobors explained that they wished to join their “brothers in spirit” living there, were it not for the vast distance which separated them.

Not surprisingly, the Koty Doukhobors encountered hostility from their Orthodox neighbours, who viewed them with “distrustful curiosity” tinged with “concealed contempt.” The Doukhobors told Astyrev, and the Orthodox freely admitted, that they were forced to shoulder disproportionate mir duties and obligations because of their refusal to support the local Orthodox Church. The Orthodox, the Doukhobors explained, “are glad to oppress us because they are a force, a whole army, while we are a small handful.”  Despite this discrimination and maltreatment, the Doukhobors remained unshakable in their faith.

After his departure from Koty, Astyrev learned from newspaper accounts that several of the Doukhobors were brought before a provincial court for uttering “sacrilegious words” in a village meeting.  The court sentenced the offenders to only light punishment for acting “without clear reason”.  A short time later, a severe drought struck northern Irkutsk.  The Koty community decided that its affliction was caused by Orthodox “indulgence” of the heretical minority in its midst.  It was resolved to reduce the Doukhobors’ share of arable land.  Astyrev learned nothing of their subsequent fate.

In an incredible postscript to this story, the Doukhobors of Koty did indeed meet their “brothers in faith”.  In April 1899, a group of forty-one Doukhobor women and children from the Caucasus, escorted by the Tolstoyan doctor Prokopy Nestorovich Sokolnikov, arrived in Irkutsk en route to Yakutsk to join their husbands and fathers who were exiled there for their rejection of military service.  There, they were warmly welcomed by the Koty Doukhobors who had traveled to meet them.  Over the course of ten days, the local Doukhobors visited with the weary travelers, hosting them in their homes, and supplying the women with provisions and a small amount of money.  On the day of their departure from Irkutsk, the Koty Doukhobors came out to the main road to meet them, bringing them additional supplies and bowing to the ground before them.  Their parting was very touching, and many of the Doukhobors cried to the point of sobbing.  The remarkable historic meeting of these two Doukhobor groups was recorded by Sokolnikov in his diary, published as “Wives and Children of the Doukhobors“.

The fate of this small group of steadfast Spirit Wrestlers in twentieth century Russia and beyond remains unknown – JJK.

New Materials from the Earliest History of the Doukhobor Sect

by Nikolai Gavrilovich Vysotsky

Between 1767 and 1769, peasant sectarians were discovered in Tambov and Voronezh who rejected the Orthodox Church, priests, icons and all church ritual. An official investigation ensued, in which ecclesiastic authorities tried to ascertain when the sectarians had rejected Orthodoxy, the specific sect to which they belonged, their beliefs, and the names and locations of their leaders. Although they were not referred to as such, the sectarians were, without a doubt, members of what would later be known as the Doukhobor sect. The following article recounts the investigation and reveals that Doukhoborism, which had emerged decades earlier in Tambov and Voronezh, was already a fully formed religious sect in the 1760s with a distinct organizational structure, mature set of beliefs, a fully developed order of worship and behavioral norms. Reproduced from Nikolai Gavrilovich Vysotsky’s article, “Novye materialy iz rannieishei istorii dukhoborcheskoi sekty” Russkii arkhiv, g. 52, t. 1 (1914: 66-86, 235-61) as republished in P.N. Maloff, Dukhobortsy, ikh istoriia, zhizn’ i bor’ba (1948: 36-46). Translated by Vera Kanigan, with additional translation and editing by Jack McIntosh, for the Doukhobor Genealogy Website. Afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

According to researchers, Doukhoborism became known as a sect relatively late, around the middle of the 18th century. By that time it was already a society that had set itself apart with a more or less definite set of beliefs.

However, if one looks up the historical information on which the researchers base their assertion, it turns out that this information pertains mainly to the last quarter, and not the middle of the 18th century. Up to now, researchers had at their disposal almost no information dealing with the earlier period of the sect’s history.

Now we have an opportunity to fill this gap to some extent. We were successful in finding fresh archival material about the history of Doukhoborism relating specifically to the first quarter of the second half of the 18th century [i.e. 1750-1775].

The materials that we have found concern “apostates” from the faith who had appeared within the present-day boundaries of Voronezh and Tambov Provinces; these are significant documents for the history of Doukhoborism. They contain much information that lead to answers that differ from hitherto accepted views about the beliefs of the Doukhobor sect in the earliest period of their existence known historically, how the authorities – both church and civil – treated the Doukhobors, what measures were attempted to root out sectarian error, what were the methods used to spread Doukhoborism, who were the leading personalities in that period, how large was their following, etc., etc.

1767 Report of the Bishop of Tambov

On May 29th, 1767 a report was received by the Holy Synod [the highest ecclesiastical council governing the Russian Orthodox Church] from Tambov Bishop Feodosii (Golosnitsky), stating that in the village of Zhidilovka, in Kozlov district, persons were brought before the administrative law enforcement authorities who had departed from true devout worship and had fallen “into some kind of new sect that was unknown to him”; such sectarians in this village already numbered up to twenty-six people, both male and female. Moreover, the following persons undoubtedly belonged to the same sect: Kirill Petrov, tserkovnik (lay clergyman) of the village of Goreloye, and six odnodvortsy (smallholders) of the village of Lysye Gory.

Since, according to information in possession of the Holy Synod, the individuals indicated by Bishop Feodosii had not been registered as belonging to the Raskol (Schism), the Holy Synod, in response to this bishop’s report, sent him a decree instructing the Right Reverend Feodosii to carry out a thorough investigation to ascertain from what time these sectarians had begun to stray from true piety [i.e. Orthodoxy], of what specific sect are they followers, who had enticed them into it, where their teachers are located, and whatever else is relevant, granting him at the same time the right to render a decision in accordance with the regulations of the Holy Fathers and the decrees of Her Imperial Majesty [Empress Ekaterina II]. The Right Reverend Feodosii was ordered to make a detailed report to the Holy Synod of his actions in this matter.

Feodosii (1723-1786), Bishop of Tambov and Penza.

1768 Investigation and Detailed Report of the Tambov Bishop

The investigation prescribed by the Synod took a rather long time to carry out. It was only in 1768 that the Right Reverend Feodosii presented to the Synod his detailed report on the results of this investigation.

In his report, the Tambov bishop brought to the attention of the Synod that “the aforesaid odnodvortsy, both churchgoers and other like persons, altogether forty in number, listed by name and by gender, being dispatched from the Kozlov Voevoda (Military Governor’s) Chancery and the Tambov Provincial Chancery, accompanied by a deputy appointed from the aforesaid provincial chancery, were interrogated separately in the Consistory Office [the main diocesan administrative and judicial organ in the Russian Orthodox Church].”

These interrogations once again confirmed what the Right Reverend Feodosii had already reported to the Holy Synod: all the persons questioned proved to be apostates from Orthodox faith; during the interrogations they were subjected to admonishment [i.e. mild counseling and reproach] through a priest skilled in teaching; however, in spite of that, they did not repent of their error; in particular it became apparent during questioning that:

1st – That they, abandoning true piety, had joined the aforesaid sect in 1767, and along with their households believe in the true living God, in the Holy Blessed Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, creator of heaven and earth, and they believe just as they recite in the Apostles’ Creed; however, they bow down to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit not bodily, as others do, but in spirit and in truth;

2nd – God’s Law, bequeathed in the Ten Commandments, they accept and revere, except for what is written therein about revering images painted on tablets [i.e. icons], which they do not accept, and do not revere, and do not bow down to them; moreover, in them supposedly there is nothing divine or sacred, and they are all made by human hands;

3rd – They believe in the Most Pure Mother of God, and confess and esteem Her, only instead of bowing down bodily they are submissive, both before Her and before the Apostles, Prophets and all Christ’s saints, whom they alone supposedly revere;

4th – They do not believe in the Cross of Christ, and do not bow down to it or revere it, as (they say) it was made of wood by human hands, whereas they worship the Cross, that is the Word of the Lord for which our Lord Jesus Christ was crucified and by which He was raised from the dead;

5th – The sign of the cross made with three fingers on oneself they reject, because (they say) there is no salvation in making that sign, but they cross themselves with the Word of the Lord, in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, Amen;

6th – They do not attend our Orthodox Church, and do not accept all the sacraments, rituals, and prayers, because (they say) the aforesaid church and all it contains was built by human hands, and there is no salvation of any kind in the sacraments, rituals and prayers performed therein; moreover the aforesaid sacraments have been fabricated by human hands, and are not from God, and are preached by priests who indulge in drunkenness, foul language, and noisy squabbling, whereas they say they wish to go to a church not made by human hands, a catholic, apostolic assembly of the saints (about which according to them the Lord said this: you are the temple of the living God; I will dwell in you, and walk among you, and I will be your God), and to receive Christ’s sacraments created from God Himself and this communion to receive also and confess in the presence of a priest whom they themselves will choose, one who has been ordained by God, and who receives the word from God’s lips;

Of these in the Consistory Office, the odnodvorets Andrei Popov said that it is written: God the Father is memory, God the Son is reason, God the Holy Spirit is will; while the tserkovnik Kirila Petrov declared, referring to the Holy Eucharist, that he does not believe in it or that the bread turns into the body and the wine the blood, but his belief is that bread comes from wheat, and grape wine, kvass and water simply exist; also that he does not believe in the Mother of God and the Holy Saints, but merely respects them and rather than bowing down to them is obedient to them.

Having set forth the essence of the doctrine espoused by the sectarians, the Right Reverend Feodosii went on to declare that without a directive from the Holy Synod, he considered it impossible for himself to make a final decision on his own in this case. In his opinion it would be fitting for these sectarians to be brought before a civil court and there be “thoroughly investigated by a true interrogation” [presumably torture during interrogations], in view of the fact that in the Consistory they display stubbornness and not only do not answer the questions posed to them, but in general do not want to speak at all, and if they do speak, it is only to abuse and criticize the Orthodox Church, her Sacraments, the Holy Cross and sacred images; for such lack of respect they properly deserve in the first instance civil punishment (in accordance with Paragraph 1, Chapter 1 of the Ulozhenie (Law Code) and Paragraph 3, Chapter 1 of the Voinskii Artikul (Military Code), and thereupon also excommunication from the church in accordance with Paragraph 16 of the Dukhovnyi Reglament o delakh episkopskikh (Spiritual Regulation on Episcopal Matters)).

Ulozhenie, Par. 1, Ch. 1

“If there will be member of another faith, regardless of which faith, or even if he is Russian, who would blaspheme the Lord God and our Saviour Jesus Christ, or that Most Pure Lady who gave birth to Him, our Mother of God and Virgin Mary, or the Holy Cross, or His Holy Saints, he is to be strictly investigated by any and all means; let him be investigated as to this straight away and this blasphemer, once exposed, executed and burned.”

Voinskii Artikul, Par. 3, Ch. 1

“Whoever heaps abuse on God’s name, despises that name and service to God and God’s Word and the Holy Sacraments, and is thoroughly exposed in this, whether this was committed while drunk or sober, his tongue is to be burned out with red-hot iron, and then he is to be beheaded.”

Dukhovnyi Reglament o delakh episkopskikh, Par. 16

“If someone manifestly blasphemes God’s name, or Holy Scripture, or the Church, or is clearly a sinner who is unashamed of his acts and, even more, boasts of them, or neglects regular repentance for guilt and the Holy Eucharist for more than a year, or does anything else with manifest abuse and mockery of God’s law, such a one, if he remains obdurate and proud after repeated punishment, will be judged deserving only of execution (i.e. anathema), for not merely for sin is he deserving of anathema, but for manifest and haughty contempt for God’s judgment and Church authorities that presents great temptation to weak brethren, and because such a one exudes the foul odour of godlessness.”

In the opinion of the Tambov Bishop, not only those who persist in their sectarian errors should be brought to civil court, but also those who have already abandoned them and returned to the Orthodox Faith, as the latter may render great assistance in obtaining thorough disclosure of the truth concerning these sectarians. Of the individuals subjected to interrogation, only one has left the sect and returned to the bosom of the Orthodox Church: Efrem Mzhachev, an odnodvorets of the village of Ranino, who, probably influenced by admonitions, has started attending church and has begun to pray using the sign of the cross with his hand and bowing in the customary manner. The Tambov bishop was referring to this odnodvorets when he pointed out the need to send persons who had converted from sectarianism to Orthodoxy for the purpose of having a thorough investigation of the truth.

While declining to make an independent determination in the case of the sectarians who had been discovered, the Right Reverend Feodosii requested the Holy Synod to give him guidance both on how to proceed in this matter as well as how generally to act if apostates such as those who had been interrogated began to appear again in his eparchy [ecclesiastical jurisdiction].

As for the sectarians who were taken in for investigation and held under guard, all of them, after questioning, were sent off by the Right Reverend Feodosii to the Tambov Provincial Chancery, where they were to be kept under guard until the ensuing issuance from the Holy Synod of an authoritative decree. However, he sent the man who had returned to Orthodoxy, the odnodvorets Efrem Mzhachev, for confession to Troitsky Monastery in Kozlov.

Presentation by the Tambov Provincial Deputy

The Holy Synod had not yet considered the above-cited report from the Right Reverend Feodosii, when it received a new official document that had direct and immediate relevance to the case of the Tambov sectarians.

On November 17th in the same year Vasily Vedeneev, a deputy of Tambov Province, came to the Holy Synod with a “presentation” stating that he was forwarding for the consideration of the Synod a declaration sent to him signed by priests: Boris Poluektov, of the Zavoronezh suburb of the city of Kozlov, Stefan Vasil’ev of the village of Ranino, and Leontii Ivanov and the deacon Sila Osipov of the village of Zhidilovka; this declaration, in their names and those of selected odnodvortsy and their comrades, report the apostasy from the Orthodox Faith of many of their parishioners, listing them by name and at the same time reporting that the very same sort of apostates from true piety [i.e. Orthodoxy] have also appeared in other places. Reporting about this, the ecclesiastical individuals named requested Vedeneev to declare this matter to the higher authorities.

During their consideration of this “declaration”, the Holy Synod took note of the fact that therein were named many of the same persons mentioned by the Right Reverend Feodosii in his report. It was thus clear that both cases involved essentially the same phenomenon. Therefore the Synod did not attribute to this “declaration” separate significance, but instead attached it to the report of the Right Reverend Feodosii, for which a special decree had already been prepared by the Synod.

Special Decree of the Holy Synod, 1768

Soon this decree was signed by the members of the Synod and sent to the Tambov bishop. The content of the decree was as follows:

As in the report of Bishop Feodosii it was not clear whether the Right Reverend himself had admonished the sectarians, the Holy Synod ordered as follows: those odnodvortsy and the tserkovnik who had departed from true piety, in anticipation of their correction, be again subjected to admonition, first by teacher-priests, and then by the Tambov Bishop himself; this admonition be carried out in the presence of the Tambov Voevoda (Military Governor) or a person designated by him; all the sectarians held in the Tambov Provincial Chancery to be freed from being under guard on condition that they not absent themselves from Tambov before their case is decided and that they be unable to absent themselves, and that when they are summoned for this admonition, they appear without any sort of resistance; beyond that, in order that under no circumstances they might lead anyone astray into their sect, both the Tambov Bishop and the local Provincial Chancery were to keep a strict watch; the Right Reverend Feodosii being obliged to deliver a thorough report without delay on the results of the admonition to the Holy Synod; the tserkovnik Kirill Petrov, until the upcoming decision on his case, was ordered held at the Consistory under strict supervision; Efrem Mzhachev, the odnodvorets who had returned to Orthodoxy, was ordered released without delay from the Kozlov Troitsky Monastery and that he be appropriately received into the Orthodox Faith, but in view of the fact that because he had abandoned his own true piety and that of his fathers by following the sect of those odnodvortsy, he was deserving, by virtue of the regulations of the Holy Fathers, of having to perform strict penance; yet nevertheless, in consideration of his voluntary and sincere repentance and conversion, the aforesaid penance is reduced in measure, and so he is ordered for only one whole year on all Sundays and holy days to go to the church of God for prayer and to bow to the ground, and to make confession on all fasting days, but he is not to be admitted to the Holy Sacraments during this year, except in case of a death, and upon the completion of this period he is to be released from this penance.

This determination of the Synod was communicated by means of decree not only to the Tambov Bishop, but also to the Tambov Provincial Chancery, whereas the Senate was sent a vedenie (memorandum): “May [the Senate] be favourably disposed to be informed …”. This vedenie was recorded December 22nd, 1768.

The Tambov Bishop’s Response to the Decree, 1769

The aforesaid decree was received by the Right Reverend Feodosii on January 15th, 1769. The Tambov bishop set about immediately to fulfill its instructions, and already on March 24th he sent a report in response, saying:

“Not only those named who are held in the Chancery, but also in addition, according to cases submitted and by their own admission having been determined to be in the same sect, one hundred and fifty-one persons, or overall, male and female, up to two hundred and thirty-two persons, according to the investigation through the Tambov Provincial Chancery and according to their submission from the deputy assigned to them from that Chancery, Tambov Invalid Detachment second lieutenant Mikhail Oduevtsov; repeatedly they were admonished from the Word of God in this deputy’s presence, in the first instance by those appointed: the priest Alexander Poliansky, the sacristan of the Tambov Cathedral, Alexei, and other clergymen, and then also by myself in the presence of the appointed Tambov Voevoda, Collegiate Councillor Cherkasov and in the presence of numerous other former noblemen, also before and after them, but the aforesaid apostates not only would not listen to or accept true admonition from the Word of God, what is worse, they affirmed their false beliefs, those mentioned in their testimony presented by me to the Holy Governing Synod, as being true.

Moreover, some of them, up to ten in number, were found even earlier to be in the same apostasy; in 1765 the odnodvorets Semyon Zhernoklev testified in the Streletskaya suburb of Tambov that in March of that year he had traveled to the home of the above-named Goreloye tserkovnik Kirila Petrov for instruction in holy writ, where present from the same village were the odnodvorets Larion Pobirokhin (who has not been tracked down after taking flight), along with others, up to eight in total; and the aforesaid Pobirokhin was sitting behind a table in the front corner while the rest were all standing before him singing from the Bible, specifically the 14th chapter of the book of the prophet Zechariah; “the days of the Lord are coming, when the spoil taken from you will be divided in the midst of you,” and also various psalms from the Psalter, specifically which ones he – Semyon – cannot recall. When they had finished singing psalms, the aforesaid Pobirokhin, contrary to the Holy Church interpreted for them these psalms, at which time he said that he had never found anywhere in the Scripture that people should bow down to wooden, copper, silver, golden, or stone images, but should bow down to man, because he was created in the image and likeness of God. And then all the declared persons of different ranks, including himself – Zhernoklev – at the command of the aforesaid Pobirokhin, as they began to lie down to sleep right at midnight, each in turn came up to Pobirokhin, bowed twice to him at his feet and kissed him on the mouth, and then, yet again for the third time bowing to the ground, went away; when they got up in the morning, they repeated this kissing and bowing. Moreover, all of them by his order always refer to him as “Radost’” (Joy); why – he, Semyon, does not know, but, he says, when somebody comes into the house and the aforesaid Pobirokhin is present, they never pray to God, but just as soon as they enter the hut, they fall at his feet and kiss him on the mouth, with which, he says, he – Semyon – at their insistence, also fully complied. And although then the others, aware of his non-denial, even swore that they are in the Orthodox Faith, as Christian duty commands, and will do nothing like that person who has given evidence hostile to the church, but now they have again even departed from that oath, as it turns out that they, of course, as was presented by myself previously to the Holy Governing Synod, in accordance with their false beliefs, maintain and propagate their peculiar worship and elect their own peculiar priests.

And as a great number of them are now having an influence in different places, they are in a convenient position to covertly entice others into the same error, as to which there is no way that they can be kept under observation. For this reason, the Right Reverend Feodosii concluded his report, presenting the above by means of this report most respectfully for the Holy Synod’s most favourable consideration as to what to do with such apostates, I beg most humbly that I be furnished with an authoritative decree that the aforesaid tserkovnik Kirila Petrov, who has been held at my Consistory under guard, in accordance with the communication sent to me February 26 of this year from the Voronezh Governor, be taken to him in Voronezh, according to a special order for him about this matter, via a specially dispatched messenger, in chains.”

1769 Report of the Bishop of Voronezh and Elets

This report from the Tambov Bishop was received in the Synod on April 21st; however, on the previous day, April 20th, a secret report arrived in the Holy Synod from Tikhon (Malinin), Bishop of Voronezh and Elets – a report whose content was very closely related to the case brought up by the Tambov Bishop. From this report it comes to light that the same kind of apostates from the Orthodox Faith had also penetrated into Voronezh eparchy, where they also attracted the attention of the church and civil authorities. The Right Reverend Tikhon wrote as follows:

Tikhon (1724-1783), Bishop of Voronezh and Elets, later canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church as St. Tikhon of Zadonsk.

By the decree of Her Imperial Majesty sent by Your Excellency to me, your most humble servant, it was ordered with respect to the following opponents of the Holy Church who had been found to be in the city of Voronezh: Stepan Kuznetsov and his accomplices of the village of Tishanka, Dvortsovaya Bitiutskaya district, including the peasant Ignat Danilov, also known as Balychev, who works for the local factory man Vasily Tulinov, that in the presence of the deputy appointed by the Voronezh Provincial Chancery, they be investigated here in the Consistory in the proper manner, finding out firstly from what time they abandoned true piety, by whom exactly were they enticed therefrom, and in specifically which sect were they instructed, and where their aforesaid teachers are to be found, and how many of them are brought to light by this investigation, in the first place this is to be reported, and upon completion of the investigation, what appropriate punishment is decided upon for their opposition to the Holy Church, in accordance with the law, with thorough reporting of all evidence and with opinion appended, to be presented to Your Excellency without delay and to await a decree concerning the aforesaid.

However, last year, on December 29th, 1768, a secret communication sent to me by Major-General Maslov, Cavalier and Governor of Voronezh province informing that (he said), the said house-serf of the factory man Tulinov, Ignat Balychev, had been sent to him, the Governor, kept in custody by him for dissent against the Orthodox Faith, along with an order to him, the Governor, by Her Imperial Majesty, in consideration of this, promptly and fittingly to make a determination as to how (he says) in relation to such corrupters of faith, by virtue of Your Holiness’s decree, it has been ordered, in the presence of a deputy appointed by the Provincial Chancery, for me to investigate, and said Balychev to be subjected to individual inquisition and the conclusion of these cases sent herewith, it has been requested, regarding their stubborn dissent against the Orthodox Faith, to investigate expeditiously and when finished to report on all of them clearly explaining everything relevant and what punishment will be appropriate for their crimes, an extract to be sent to him, the governor, as soon as possible for submission to Her Imperial Majesty.

And then, in response to the reports sent by me, it was announced by the Governor in communications on February 6th and 10th of this year, 1769, that for the indicated investigation he had appointed as deputy the Governor’s Assistant, Court Counsellor Popov, to be present two days a week, that is, Tuesday and Friday; he was in the office from the 13th of February and commenced the investigation, with the opponents of the Holy Church and corrupters of the Orthodox Faith, by virtue of the above-mentioned decree sent by Her Imperial Majesty from Your Holiness; the investigation began on the appointed days and although it was carried out, the said debauchees were not forthcoming about by whom precisely they had been enticed and instructed, and where their teachers are to be found.

In their answers they revealed very little, but even during their interrogation and admonition in the office they have demonstrated no little severity, stubbornness and disrespect, and covering up their teachers, among other things declared contradictorily: some had supposedly taught themselves from books; others allegedly heard things in church, and others thought about it and came to the judgement that God dwells in temples not built by human hands and takes no pleasure in the work of human hands; one is not to make for oneself handmade images: the image of God is the human soul; true worshippers worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Lord seeks such worshippers; confess to God in Heaven; I am the Living Bread, and if you eat of this bread, you will live forever; He did not offer salvation from a handmade and soulless God. And that they belong to the following sect, namely:

1st – They believe in the Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, they pray and worship God in spirit and in truth;

2nd – To no services of the Church of the Greek confession do they go, but instead gather with one another for prayer in their homes, where they sing together and recite psalms from the Psalter, the Lord’s Prayer, and they regard their assembly as the church not built by human hands;

3rd – They do not bow down to holy images either painted on boards or other things or cast, and they do not regard them as sacred, but instead revere persons, and therefore bow to one another, and kiss;

4th – They do not go to priests for confession, but confess to their Heavenly Father;

5th – The Holy Sacraments, that is, the Body and Blood of Our Saviour, performed in churches of the Greek confession in the form of bread and wine, they do not receive and do not regard them as the true Body and Blood of Our Saviour, but as ordinary bread and wine, and instead of taking the Holy, Immortal and Life-Giving Sacraments, they keep to the Word of God and carry out His commandments.

6th – They do not cross themselves, and, without replacing it with anything, regard it as a shchepot’ [a play on words, meaning either a pinch (as in “a pinch of salt”) or the sign made by the middle and index fingers held together, as in making the sign of the cross]; instead they cross themselves by word alone in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit;

7th – They keep the Sacrament of Baptism thusly: when a baby is born, he should remain unbaptized until he comes of age, so that when he comes of age he will be baptized by the Holy Spirit, that is by repentance for the remission of sins, meekness, humility and patience;

8th – They do not regard priests ordained by the laying on of hands by church hierarchs as genuine priests, but recognize as true priests those ordained by carrying out the works of Christ Himself;

9th – All those favoured of God they esteem as saints, but they do not bow down to their images or their relics, for they do not regard bodies of the dead as sacred things;

10th – One of them, Stepan Kuznetsov, explained that among people who have been married by priests ordained by the laying on of hands by hierarchs, as false priests (he says), their weddings are regarded as illegitimate, but in accordance with their (he says) true worship the husband should choose for himself a bride on the basis of love and having taken her in the presence of witnesses live with one another according to the Law of God;

11th – In its departure from the faith of the Greek confession, according to the kind of sect to which they belong, they have not instructed anyone and supposedly nobody except those confined with them, and they do not know persons in other places of the same sect; however, on the contrary, on March 17 of this year, there arrived at the Consistory at the time of the visitation, odnodvortsy and women, seven named persons in all, living in the city of Voronezh, who announced that they are one in agreement and common doctrine with the prescribed persons, the eating-house proprietor Stepan Kuznetsov and his accomplices, and asked to be held together with them under investigation in the Consistory in the presence of the deputy of the Holy Church; thus through the said persons, openly declaring themselves to be followers of the corrupters of the Orthodox Faith, have exposed the lie told by those who testified that they do not know of anyone belonging to such a sect in other places; and henceforward, both with regard to their accomplices and more so their teachers, investigate them for their many instances of stern and stubborn behaviour and disrespect committed during interrogation and admonition and in conducting this investigation it has been impossible to obtain the desired results.

In consideration of such circumstances my Consistory has been ordered and I have confirmed that the following steps be taken:

1st – Everything concerning what which is described above is be presented to Your Holiness most humbly begging that such measures be undertaken, in view of the circumstances promulgated above, to bring said opponents of the Holy Church and perverters of the Orthodox Faith to inquisition by priests and teachers for thorough, most prompt and successful investigation, to provide me with an authoritative decree, and while the aforesaid is pending, not to suspend the said investigation but on predetermined dates, to carry it out, and this will be done;

2nd – To His Lordship the local Governor here to report secretly (and it has been so reported), as to whether he would also deign to present on his own behalf to the appropriate authority as to the aforesaid, and to inform me concerning the response he receives to this representation;

3rd – To send to the Voronezh Provincial Chancery (and it has been sent), a memorandum to the effect that the Chancery would see fit, as to the aforesaid, to draw up an authenticated document certifying that the opponents of the Holy Church who had arrived in the Consistory, Kuznetsov and his accomplices, have been registered by decree as belonging to the Schism, and when they are proven to have been registered, that my Consistory be informed of this; if they are not registered, they are to be sent immediately to said Consistory for investigation. Most humbly bringing this matter to Your Holiness’s attention, I await from Your Holiness an authoritative decree concerning the above situation.”

Special Decree of the Holy Synod, 1769

Having heard the cited reports of the Tambov and Voronezh Bishops, the Holy Synod made the following determination: “Having made copies of the promulgated reports sent by the Tambov and Voronezh hierarchs, to report to the Governing Senate indicating what will be done; and from the Holy Synod to confirm just such a warning and abhorrence of this far-away debauchery to the Tambov and Voronezh Right Reverend Bishops, instructing that in those localities where the said deviants from the Holy Church are located, the priests strictly and in a proper manner see to it that other Orthodox folk will not be infected with the same sort of error by them, and if the priests in those places have demonstrated little skill in doing this, said priests should be transferred to other churches, seeking out worthy priests to appoint in their stead; and at the same time to confirm as regards said priests that if, in spite of all their efforts, such depravity were to be discovered anew, each of those priests should immediately inform his own bishop, and these eminences are to report to the Holy Synod without delay.”

The “transaction” was dispatched by the Synod to the Senate on May 5th, 1769, and received the very same day.

1769 Senate Decree

Thus, the Senate had already received two “transactions” of the Synod regarding deviants from the Orthodox Faith: those of December 22nd, 1768 and May 5th, 1769. These “transactions” were heard by the Senate on May 20th, 1769 and at that time the Senate’s decision on this matter was made. We cite it here verbatim in view of its importance in the subsequent history of the sect, with the unavoidable repetitions this entails. (These repetitions have been omitted here in order to shorten this article, but in such a way that nothing is lost. P. M. [Peter Maloff].)

It has been decreed: Although the above-registered raznochintsy (people of miscellaneous ranks) in accordance with Chapter 1 of the Ulozhenie (Law Code) and Paragraph 3, Chapter 1 of the Voinskii Artikul (Military Code) have, on account of their deviation from true piety and abuse of the true faith [i.e. Orthodoxy], rendered themselves liable not only to the severest punishment, but even to the death penalty, however, according to church custom based on Holy Writ, it is left for sinners to acknowledge their own sin, and those who have not confessed are granted time to recognize their error and repent, therefore, considering that said persons, being of a base nature and upbringing, and by virtue of their shallow-mindedness and superstition, and equally, their ignorance, are not as likely to be brought to a realization of the truth by fear of death as by other means and by being allowed time, and beyond that, in accordance with the unparalleled kindness and mercy of Her Imperial Majesty, their sentence ought, in accordance with law, to be rescinded; and, in view of our present war with the Turks and the need for soldiers, when not only profligates such as these, but even the very children of the Holy Church and true sons of the fatherland are sacrificing their lives, and so that these ignorant men, having yet time to repent of their crime, might be led into the unity of the Holy Church with all pious Christians living in the unambiguous Law of God – the Governor of Voronezh is instructed:

1st – If among them there are some of the male gender who up to now remain in their delusion, then without regard for old age, starting with fifteen-year-olds, all without exception are to be sent to Lieutenant General Vernes [Wernes], now stationed at the renovated Azov and Taganrog fortresses. Having ascertained who among them is able to perform military service, he will assign them to military troops stationed there, and those unfit for military service, as labourers for fortification work, as much as possible without letting them stay together in the same locations or work teams, and with precautions taken to prevent them from communicating there with one another about their false beliefs and spreading their “delights”, as to which they are to be kept under strict watch.

2nd – That their minor male children, fifteen years of age and under, that is, up to the age of fifteen, be sent out to garrison schools to learn Russian reading and writing and, as they come of age, equally with other children of soldiers attending those schools, they be distributed according to ability among the regiments; while those fifteen and under are to be sent for upbringing to a Siropitatel’nyi dom (foundling home), but all of those on the poll tax roll for the settlements from which said offenders come are not to be included in recruitment rosters because they up to now have been tolerated in those settlements without them having been reported; moreover, as they are legally liable to suffer the death penalty, and have been spared from that only by the kindness and mercy of Her Imperial Majesty; such persons are not eligible to be counted in this reckoning; and consequently,

3rd – Their property, that is their grain – on hand, threshed and sown – cattle, domestic buildings and so on, all such having been inventoried, seeing to it meanwhile that all the above is not scattered and looted by their fellow residents or by the miscreants themselves through others, is to be sold at public auction, and the land at those settlements where they lived is to be divided among the rest of the residents of those places who, in their stead, until a future revision, bear the burden of responsibility, and the proceeds of the sale are to be used for the dispatch, escort, and feeding of those offenders and their children as far as the destination chosen at his gubernatorial discretion; and then,

4th – The wives of those criminals who have persisted in their error may remain with their husbands on the same basis as other soldiers’ wives, remaining in their own husbands’ care, but only on condition that they on no account remain in their previous places of residence; while widows and young girls who have come of age and have been taken to other settlements are to be dispersed in the care of other odnodvortsy and peasants who are devout and living a good life so that as the latter make use of their labour in their homes they will endeavour to lead the aforementioned persons away from their error and bring them back into unity with the Holy Church, and then by the measure of the merits and inclinations of each one, to give them in marriage in different state settlements to such as wish to take them, and if nobody desiring them is to be found in the state settlements, then let them be given in marriage to other raznochintsy who abide in the true faith; those among their minor children who have not come of age, in accordance with the above proscription, are to be sent to a Siropitatel’nyi dom, and as for the most elderly women and those young girls who are unsuitable for marriage and cannot be accepted into care, a list of names with detailed information on their status is to be sent to the Senate; and finally,

5th – If, in addition to the persons mentioned, there prove to be others of the same sect or criminals of similar sort, the governor is to deal with them in the same manner as has been ordered for these offenders, but the Senate is to be given advance notice. Also, orders relating to this matter are to be sent to the Governor of Voronezh, the Military College, the Main Palace Chancery, and to the Board of Guardians of the Moscow Foundling Home, and for information, in addition to the Holy Synod, notification to the Moscow Departments of the Senate, and a humble report to Her Imperial Majesty.

The Fortress of Azov, where in 1769, Tambov and Voronezh sectarians were sentenced to serve as military recruits and as labourers for fortification work on account of their Doukhobor faith and beliefs.

Afterword

The following is a summary of the somewhat complicated events surrounding the official investigation of sectarians in Tambov and Voronezh provinces in 1767-1769 set out above.

On May 29, 1767, Bishop Feodosii of Tambov and Penza reported to the Holy Synod the discovery of twenty-six sectarians in the village of Zhidilovka and six in the village of Lysye Gory by civil authorities. Although the sect was unknown and new to the Bishop, Orthodox authorities in Tambov and Voronezh had already investigated a similar heresy in 1765.

The Holy Synod responded by instructing the Bishop to carry out a thorough investigation to ascertain when the sectarians had rejected Orthodoxy, the specific sect to which they belonged, the names and locations of their leaders, and anything else relevant, and report back to them.

Thereafter, Bishop Feodosii undertook a lengthy investigation of the matter. The sectarians (who by this time had increased from thirty-two to forty) were dispatched, first to the Kozlov Military Governor’s Chancery and the Tambov Provincial Chancery, and then to the Tambov Ecclesiastical Consistory where they were held for interrogation. During the interrogations, the sectarians displayed a marked stubbornness, refusing to answer the questions put to them, and when they did speak, displaying open contempt for their interrogators. Despite admonishment, all (except one) of the sectarians refused to repent of their heresy. They were remanded to the Tambov Provincial Chancery pending direction from the Holy Synod.

Bishop Feodosii made a report of his investigation to the Holy Synod in late 1768. He declined to make an independent determination in the case, and requested the Holy Synod to give him guidance on how to proceed on the matter. He voiced his opinion however, that the sectarians should be brought before a civil court, be thoroughly investigated by true interrogation (presumably involving torture) and subjected to civil punishment (which ranged from strict penance to execution by burning or beheading) followed by excommunication from the Church.

In the meantime, on November 17, 1768, a Deputy of the Tambov Provincial Chancery, on behalf of clergy and churchgoers from the city of Kozlov and villages of Ranino and Zhidilovka, presented the Holy Synod with a list of apostates from the Orthodox faith who had appeared in those places. Many of those named were also named in Bishop Feodosii’s report.

On December 22, 1768, the Holy Synod issued a decree ordering Bishop Feodosii to once again subject the sectarians to admonition, first by teacher-priests, and then by himself, in the presence of the Tambov Military Governor. The sectarians were then to be released from the Tambov Provincial Chancery on the condition that they not absent themselves from Tambov before their case was decided, and under no circumstances were they to lead anyone else into their sect. The one sectarian who returned to Orthodoxy was ordered to perform strict penance for a year.

On March 24, 1769, Bishop Feodosii reported to the Holy Synod that, upon further investigation, 232 sectarians had been discovered in Tambov province, including those already held in the Tambov Provincial Chancery. Ten of the sectarians had been interrogated as long ago as 1765 for the same heresy. Despite repeated admonitions, conducted in accordance with the Holy Synod’s decree, they all remained obstinate and refused to renounce their beliefs. The Bishop concluded that the sectarians had spread to such a degree that they could not be kept under observation, and requested that the Holy Synod authorize him to dispatch those held in the Tambov Ecclesiastical Consistory to the Voronezh Governor in chains.

The Holy Synod had no sooner received Feodosii’s report when, on April 20, 1769, it received a report from Tikhon, Bishop of Voronezh and Elets about the discovery of several members of the same sect in the city of Voronezh and the village of Tishanka. He reported that the sectarians had been dispatched, first to the Voronezh Provincial Chancery, and then to the Voronezh Ecclesiastical Consistory, where they were interrogated in the presence of the Deputy of the Voronezh Provincial Chancery. When questioned, they demonstrated no little severity, stubbornness and disrespect to their interrogators and revealed very little about their faith. They were joined by seven more people who declared themselves to belong to the same sect and asked to be held together with them in the Consistory. Despite admonitions, they all refused to recant their beliefs.

In his report, Bishop Tikhon asked the Holy Synod to authorize him to bring the sectarians to inquisition by priests and teachers for a thorough, prompt and successful investigation. They were held in the Voronezh Ecclesiastical Consistory pending the Holy Synod’s response.

On May 5, 1769, in response to the reports of Bishops Feodosii and Tikhon, the Holy Synod issued a decree ordering that priests in localities where the sectarians were located “strictly and in a proper manner” ensure that other Orthodox peasants were not infected by the same heresy. New cases of the heresy that arose were to be immediately reported to the Holy Synod.

On May 20, 1769, the Senate, having reviewed the Holy Synod’s investigation, issued a decree sentencing those Tambov and Voronezh sectarians who refused to confess their errors and repent to civil punishment. Men over fifteen years of age were to be sent to the Azov and Taganrog fortresses as military recruits, or if unfit, as labourers for fortification work. Their wives were permitted to join them there. Widows and unmarried girls were to be dispersed among Orthodox families in other settlements. Boys aged five to fifteen were to be sent to garrison schools, while children under five were to be sent to orphanages. The sectarians’ property was to be sold at auction and the funds thus raised sent on to their present location. Other members of the sect, upon discovery, were to be dealt with in the same manner.

In light of these events, a number of observations can be made about the official investigation of Tambov and Voronezh sectarians in 1767-1769:

First, the sectarians under investigation were, without a doubt, members of what would later be known as the Doukhobor sect. In this period, the sect had still not given itself a specific name; its members referred to themselves as “people of God” and “sons of God”. They only accepted the name “Doukhobor”, which was given to them derisively by Orthodox clergy, decades later. Many of the sectarians named in the investigation appear in subsequent historical records listed as Doukhobors.

Second, by the 1760s, the sect already had a well-developed set of beliefs. Based on the responses given by Doukhobors under questioning, their doctrine included the following: they believed in a true living God, whom they worshipped in spirit and truth; they believed in the Holy Trinity, the Father Son and Holy Ghost, which they represented as MemoryReason and Will; they believed in God’s law bequeathed in the Ten Commandments; they did not attend the Orthodox Church but instead gathered with one another for prayer in their homes, where they sang and recited psalms; they rejected all sacraments and rituals as there was no salvation in such manmade things, and instead sought communion directly with God, who dwelt in every person; similarly, they refused to revere or bow down to icons and the Cross of Christ, as these things were manmade, but instead revered persons, and thus bowed to one another and kissed; they rejected the priesthood for its drunkenness, foul language and noisy squabbling and looked upon those carrying out the works of Christ as true priests; they did not go to priests for confession, but confessed to God directly; they refused to make the sign of the cross with three fingers as the Orthodox did; and they did not worship the Mother of God, Apostles, Prophets or Saints, but respected them as those favoured by God. These responses represent one of the very earliest documented expositions of Doukhobor beliefs.

Third, by this time, Doukhoborism was a fully formed religious sect with a distinct organizational structure (consisting of leaders, teachers, homilists and rank-and-file members), a mature dogma, a fully developed order of worship (at their meetings, they sang psalms, the teacher would interpret them, and at the end of the service they would sing again, bow twice to one another, kiss one another on the mouth, and bow a third time) as well as distinct behavioral norms.

Fourth, it is evident that the sect did not emerge in Tambov and Voronezh in the 1760s, but had arisen in these provinces several decades earlier. A review of the historical evidence shows that Doukhoborism was being actively disseminated in these provinces as early as the 1730s and 1740s. For years, members of the sect concealed their affiliation to avoid attracting the attention of their neighbours. It was only during the events of the 1760s that the sect garnered official attention.

Fifth, although the sentences imposed by the Senate in 1769 affected the upper echelons of the sect and its most active members, it did not affect the majority of rank-and-file members, who continued to conceal their beliefs. Membership in the sect in the eighteenth century cannot be readily tallied, since most Doukhobors remained underground. Scholars contend, however, that there were, without question, far more Doukhobors in Tambov and Voronezh provinces at the time than the numbers discovered by Bishops Feodosii and Tikhon during their investigations.

Sixth, the descendants of those Doukhobors sentenced to serve in Azov and Taganrog fortresses in 1769 were permitted, thirty-six years later in 1805, to join their brethren being resettled along the Molochnaya River in the Melitopol district of Tavria province. Historical records indicate that these included members of the Petrov, Vorob’ev, Pichugin, Strelyaev, Plotnikov, Suzdal’tsev, Kuznetsov and Astafurov families, amongst others.

For a comprehensive scholarly analysis of the 1767-1769 official investigation of sectarians in Tambov and Voronezh provinces, as well as newly discovered archival information relating to the Doukhobor sect during this period, see Russian ethnographer Svetlana A. Inikova’s article, “The Tambov Dukhobors in the 1760s” in Russian Studies in History, Vol. 46, No. 3 (Winter 2007-8), pp. 10-39.

The Dukhobortsy, 1865

by Vasily Vasil’evich Vereshchagin

Vasily Vasil’evich Vereshchagin was one of the most famous 19th Century Russian Realist painters and one of the first Russian artists to be widely recognized abroad. In 1864-1865 he went to the Caucasus in search of subjects for his canvas, where he encountered a variety of local peoples, including the Doukhobors of the Kedabek district of Elizavetpol province.  He kept a journal and wrote down his observations, which were published in “Vassili Verestchagin: Painter-Soldier-Traveller, Autobiographical Sketches” (F. H. Peters, trans., London: R. Bentley & Son, 1887).  The following excerpt provides a detailed and unique first-hand account of the Doukhobors during their early settlement in the Caucasus, and highlights their social customs, spiritual beliefs, religious services and general prosperity.  It also includes a number of rare and historically important drawings by Vereshchagin of various Doukhobor subjects and scenes from the aforesaid publication and from “Voyage dans les provinces du Caucase” par Basile Vereschaguine, traduit du russe par Mme et M. Ernest le Barbier. 1864-1865. Texte et dessins inédits. Seconde Partie. – “La Transcaucasie” Le Tour du Monde (Paris), t. 19, premier semestre 1869: 315-21; 322-36. Foreword and Afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

Foreword

Vasily Vasil’evich Vereshchagin (1842-1904)

Vasily Vasil’evich Vereshchagin (1842-1904) was born in the town of Cherepovets in Novgorod province, Russia into a relatively prosperous family of landowners. As the son of a nobleman, he was expected to follow a military or diplomatic career. At the age of eight, he entered the Alexander Cadet Corps, an educational institution in St. Petersburg that prepared future military officers from a very early age. Three years later, he entered the Sea Cadet Corps at St. Petersburg, making his first voyage in 1858. Vereshchagin was one of the ablest students in his class and looked to be at the outset of a promising naval career.

However, during the years of his military education, the young man developed a passion for art – viewed as a ‘lowly’ calling by his peers. Immediately upon graduating from the naval school in 1860, Vereshchagin left the service and enrolled full-time at the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts to begin the study of drawing in earnest. He left the Academy four years later, dissatisfied with its classical standards and approach. The same year, in 1864, he entered the Academie des Beaux-Arts in Paris where he studied under the famous Jean Leon Gerome. But in the Paris Academy, too, classical standards were prevalent, and thus Vereshchagin soon departed, frustrated.

In search of new subjects, Vereshchagin travelled to the Caucasus in 1864-1865, where he created a series of sketches and studies devoted to the life and customs of the local people. It was his second trip, having briefly visited the Caucasus in 1863.  It was at this time that he visited the Doukhobors living in the Kedabek district of Elizavetpol province, whom he sketched and wrote about in his journal.

Not far from the town of Shusha… live the Russian sectarians who were banished from Russia proper on account of their indefatigable zeal in propagating their doctrines. They live as settlers among the Armenians and Tatars; and as their villages lay but a short distance off my route, I went so far out of my way in order to visit them, to question them, and to observe them with my own eyes.

From a lofty mountain ridge we looked down into a valley in which lies the village of Slavyanka, inhabited by the Dukhobortsy (“Doukhobors”). A little further behind the mountains lie some more villages [Novo-Goreloye, Novo-Spasskoye and Novo-Troitskoye], inhabited by the same sect, but these I did not see. Presently we met some of the inhabitants returning home in large parties from their hay making, and carrying their scythes and rakes. They wear white shirts, stuck soldier-wise into their white breeches, and caps with broad peaks. Most of them had a merry air, and were talking and laughing together. When they saw me they politely raised their caps.

Water wheel in Slavyanka, Vereshchagin, Le Tour du Monde.

The village lies in a hollow, by a rushing torrent that falls into the Kura [River]. The distance from Elizavetpol may be sixty versts [an Imperial Russian measure equal to 1.0668 km] or a little more. All round rise mountains, almost bare of vegetation; though in the place itself, which numbers 205 houses, and some 600 male inhabitants, there are trees and more vegetation in abundance. The Dukhobortsy came, or rather were transplanted, to this place from the Tauride [Tavria] district, whither they had been forced to migrate from the interior of Russia between 18[02] and 1830.

Many of their old men still remember quite well their homes in old Russia, in the districts of Tambov, Saratov and elsewhere. The first batch of these were sent here in 1840, others later. They had a hard time of it at first, as they had to take up their abode among the neighboring Armenians and Tatars, who treated them with great cruelty, constantly robbing them and sometimes going to the length of murder. 

Doukhobor woman, left, Vereshchagin, Le Tour du Monde.

Doukhobor woman, right, Vereshchagin, Le Tour du Monde.

There are no forests in the neighbourhood, and the carriage of timber by the mountain paths is exceedingly laborious, so that they could not think at first of making a permanent settlement. Many returned to the bosom of the Orthodox Church and went back to Russia. Those who remained gradually improved their condition, and today, after five-and-twenty years, the settlements of the Dukhobortsy (four villages, if I mistake not) are so well built and well arranged as to be an object of envy to the natives of the district.

In earlier times severe measures were taken against their doctrines, and great efforts were made to prevent them from spreading; and it was with this object that the Dukhobortsy were transplanted to the mountains of Transcaucasia. The Tsar Alexander I visited them while they were still in the Tauride district, was present at their worship, and by his gracious behaviour not only left behind him a good name among the sectarians, but also improved their position in the community, which at that time was far from enviable. “It is only since his visit,” say the Dukhobortsy, “that we are looked upon as human beings and suffered to drive our cattle into the town and to buy and sell in peace. Before that, when we went among our neighbours on business, we heard nothing but insulting remarks, such as ‘You are no Christians: you are people who are not fit to show your faces among men.'” It is easy to see that the Dukhobortsy retain a vivid recollection of the persecution and insult which they formerly suffered, and that though better times came afterwards few of them would care to return to the interior of Russia. 

Sketch of a Doukhobor man, Autobiographical Sketches.

The main thought of their religion may be expressed in a very few words – one God in three persons, vix. God the Father – the memory; God the Son – the understanding; God the Holy Ghost – the will: the Trinity in unity. They have no sacred books, and do not recognize the Old or the New Testament, or the writings of the Fathers of the Orthodox Church. “These books,” say they, “are written by human hands, and the work of human hands is imperfect.” Their conception of Christ is very obscure: beyond a confused notion that He is at once man and God, they have not the least idea how He lived or for what He suffered.

The sources of their knowledge of Christ are their so-called ‘Psalms of David’. These ‘Psalms’ are the only prayers in use among the Dukhobortsy; some specimens which I have collected show how absurd it is to ascribe them to David, whom they hold in high honour.

It may be that these prayers had more meaning at the time when the sect was founded; but in being handed down from father to son (for to this day they are preserved by oral tradition only) it is not to be wondered at that many words and phrases have been so corrupted as to make the most ridiculous nonsense, especially as these people can neither read nor write.

But the Dukhobortsy are convinced that these psalms have been handed down to them word for word as they came from the mouth of the Psalmist.

Their mistrust of, or rather aversion to, everything that is written sometimes leads them into strange absurdities. Besides the prophet David, for instance, there are three persons of the Old Testament whom they hold in special honour; these are Ananias, Asarias and Misael; and the reason is that these three stood still till the last moment by the cross of Christ. “The apostle Peter,” say the Dukhobortsy, “was very near to Christ, and yet denied Him: these three stood by Him.” When I remarked that these three men lived long before Christ, and therefor could not be present at his crucifixion, they answered that it was not their business to criticize, it was enough to believe what had been handed down by their fathers.

Не убоюся на Бога сположуся.”

“Fear nothing and trust in God.”

                19th century Doukhobor slogan

“Is it not known to you,” said I to some old men with whom I was talking, “that besides David there are other prophets of the Old Testament who prophesized a great deal of Christ, for instance Isaiah?” “What Isaiah do you mean, little father?” was the answer. “Do you mean Abraham, or Isaac or Jacob? Who can know them all? They are many, and it is a long time since they lived.” As for the saints of the Orthodox Church, they allow that they may have been very good men, but no more.

Sketch of Doukhobor women chanting their psalms, Vereshchagin, Le Tour du Monde.

The dogma of obedience to the authorities is beginning, under the stress of practical necessity, to come into force with them, and, on the other hand, the favourite dogma of the Dukhobortsy, “Fear nothing and trust in God,” is beginning to lose its significance. This reminds me of an amusing incident. One Sunday (which day the Dukhobortsy spend in idling and drinking brandy) a discharged soldier (for many men of this class are found in the sect) was cursing and swearing under my windows. I sent down my guide, a Cossack, to tell him to take his curses elsewhere. I watched from the window how my Cossack accosted him: “What do you mean by cursing and swearing here? Don’t you see that a stranger, an official, is lodging here? It is most unseemly.” The drunkard looked contemptuously at my envoy, rested his hands on his sides, and replied in a sing-song voice, “I fear thee not, but trust in God.” The Cossack made an angry gesture, and returned to me in great vexation. “It is no good speaking to him, sir; a rude fellow, as drunkards are wont to be.”

The Dukhobortsy protest that they honour the Tsar, and that it is a slander to say they do not. “It is impossible not to honour the Tsar: only, we do not call him our father as the Orthodox do.”

Their worship is extremely simple. One Sunday I was taken into a peasant’s house where the service (moleniye) was to be held. The room was such as you may see in an ordinary peasant’s house, very clean, spacious but low, with a great Russian stove, and decorated with fine towels (rushniki). It was crowded with people – the men on one side, the women on the other – the elders seated on benches, the rest standing.

They repeat the prayers in turn. When one makes a mistake the others correct him: “That is not right.” “How should it be then?” “Thus,” and then the prompter himself makes a slip, and is corrected on all hands. I observed that the mistakes are mostly made by the men: the women know the prayers better, and the corrections come chiefly from their side. The saying of the prayers lasts a considerable time, till the whole stock is exhausted, or (as more frequently happens in seasons of hard work) till the congregation shows signs of exhaustion and snoring is heard from the corners and comfortable places. Then some one suggests to the meeting that it is time to pass from praying to singing.

Doukhobors chanting their psalms at a moleniye (prayer meeting), Vereshchagin, Le  Tour du Monde.

“What think you? It is close here: shall we not go into the courtyard and sing?” All turn out into the court, and the men again take their places on one side, the women on the other. This custom is strictly observed, for it is counted as obedience to the precept “During prayer have God’s image before thee.” The singing also lasts a long time, and is always in such a sad and pensive strain as to make one quite melancholy; one’s thoughts turn to the distant home – to the Volga and the Burlaks with their songs. At the head of the men stands a precentor who begins each psalm. In the village of Slavyanka this post of honour was held by an old man, who often came to chat with me, and never came empty handed: one day he would bring a piece of honeycomb, another day some fresh cucumbers; and I, on my side, never failed to slip into his pocket a handful of cigarettes, which which, as I heard, he made a great display before the neighbours. “All these the Government official gave me, to show his respect for me.” Often he alluded complacently to the importance of his office – “It is not everyone that is equal to it: one must have a calling to it.” Only the precentor and perhaps a few others keep to the words in singing; the rest merely make meaningless sounds.

Sketch of Doukhobor men chanting their psalms,  Vereshchagin, Le Tour du Monde.

Before the end of the service the congregation form a semicircle, bow, and kiss each other, the men passing in turn along the men’s ranks, and the women doing the same on their side. They grasp each other by the right hand, bow twice, kiss, and again bow twice. A final and more profound bow is made by the men in the direction of the women, and by the women in the direction of the men. The bows look very awkward, and are made rather to one side. Each member of the congregation goes through this ceremony with every other member, without any distinction of age. But I did not see any very small children at these services. The singing goes on during the salutation; as soon as it is finished, they put on their caps and all go to their houses.

I wrote down their psalms as dictated to me by members of the sect – some old, some young. Both the old and the young, but especially the old, have a very imperfect understanding of what they say, and gabble the words off by rote without any regard to the sense. If I asked them to explain a passage the old men would answer, “Who can understand it? The wisdom of God is hard to grasp” or “God knows, I know not. So prayed our fathers before us, so pray we and teach our children to pray. As for what it means, we leave that to God.”

I did also get some explanations, but they were mostly very obscure, and it was impossible not to remark that likeness in the sound of words and phrases was taken for identity of meaning. When they are repeating their psalms, if they forget a word they at once get confused and have to go back to the beginning.

It also sometimes happens that a good Dukhobortsy leaves out a long piece in the middle of a prayer and is not conscious of the omission till he comes to the end. After a little reflection he will say, “I seem to have left out something, for I have come to the end too soon.” Sometimes he will notice the omission at once. “No, that is not it. Read, please, what you have written down there.” I read “and we become partakers of the holy communion of the divine, the life-giving…” “Yes, yes. Now write ‘Saviour’, ” and he begins to gabble through the words by rote, “the divine, the life-giving Saviour – the divine, the life-giving” – add “the immortal”. How does it go on? To make sure I am forgetting nothing, read it right through again from the beginning.”

When they are saying their prayers together of course this does not happen, because each mistake is at once corrected by those present. They have prayers not only on Sunday but also on week-days, late in the evening when their work is done, especially on Saturday.

It is strange that the Dukhobortsy, with their sound common sense, should ascribe their psalms to the prophet David, seeing that the greater part of them contain the plainest allusions to the time and the circumstances of the foundation and development of their sect. As an instance of this I here give a prayer or psalm which serves as a sort of catechism of the doctrine of the Dukhobortsy. I repeat that I wrote it down word for word as it was dictated to me:

“The God whom we serve in the spirit we glorify in Jesus Christ. The spirit was given to us; of the spirit we partake, and are of good cheer. We believe in the universal almighty God, Creator of the heavens, and the earth, and the bright light. In Him we believe. We are baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. We pray to God in the spirit: in the true spirit we pray, and to the true God. With my voice I call upon God, and with my voice I pray to God. we make confession to our heavenly Father, for He is gracious, His goodness is everlasting; and as our sins are remitted we receive the holy, divine agonizing, life-giving communion of the immortal Jesus to the forgiveness of sins. We go into the church of God, into the only holy apostolic cathedral, where the true Christians are gathered together. We have an upright and honourable priest, not a false and wicked one, who is set apart from sinners. The mother of God we name and venerate, for she bore Jesus Christ to the forgiveness of the sins of Adam. We honour and emulate the saints. We adore the holy picture of God, the priceless picture of God, the holy picture, which sings and speaks: true pictures of saints, unlike written parchments, made by the Son of the Father and of the Holy Ghost. 

The Tsar we hold in honour: God save the Tsar! Hear us, O God! We observe the fasts – continence in thought. Keep me away from all evil, from murmuring with my lips, from sudden death, from incontinence. Take away from me all untruth. We have marriage, an institution of eternal welfare, wherein we make ourselves sure. Into a church built with hands we will not go. The painted images of saints we do not adore, for in them we see no holiness and no saving virtue. Therefore we practice not the laying on of hands, but turn to the word of God, the life-giving cross. To our God is all honour due!”

After I had written down the psalms, of which the above is a specimen, I read them to various members of the sect in order to make quite sure that they had been given to me correctly. All assured me that, with some unimportant exceptions, what I had taken down agreed with the tradition as known to them.

These same Dukhobortsy, who glorify God and their faith in this wise, live an honest, reasonable, and prosperous life. These qualities, indeed, they share with other religious communities that have been banished and forgotten, such as the Molokans, the Subbotniks, and the Skoptsi in Transcaucasia. But, being acquainted with the Molokans as well as the Dukhobortsy, I place the latter far higher than the former in respect of morality. For instance, among the Molokans the use of wine and tobacco is forbidden, and they do not take either in public; but in private they indulge in these forbidden pleasures. The Dukhobortsy, on the other hand, openly drink and smoke and grow tobacco. The Molokans are not averse to cheating, or even to stealing when the opportunity occurs; with the Dukhobortsy, on the contrary, acts of this kind are so rare that you might count them upon your fingers. It is remarkable that the Dukhobortsy regard the Molokans as apostates from Dukhoborism, while the Molokans declare that the Dukhobortsy are apostates from Molokanism. Probably the Molokans are right. The two sects hate each other. “Godless creatures, worse than dogs,” say the Molokans of the Dukhobortsy, who in their turn, say of the Molokans, “Are they human beings?”

 

With regard to myself and my occupations the Dukhobortsy showed much less distrust than the Molokans, who apparently persisted in believing that my visit had secret inquiries for its purpose, and their transference to Siberia for its probable result. The Dukhobortsy, indeed, were not at once ready to talk. “You question us about this and that,” said an old Dukhobortsy to me, “but you have not yet told us who you are.” “Why do you want to know that?” “So that we may know what we may say to you and what me may not. We want to know whether you are an official or not, whether you are a noble or a simple gentleman, and by what name we are to call you.” I explained as simply and clearly as I could that I was nothing but a traveller who wanted to see what sort of life is led by Russians, Tatars and Armenians.

Sketch of a Doukhobor woman, Autobiographical Sketches.

“You live in the mountains,” I said, “and it is seldom that anyone comes to you, or that you leave your villages. Hence various rumours about you are spread abroad, and I wanted to ascertain what was true in these rumours and what was false.” Some seemed to understand my motive, and nodded their heads in assent: “So it is, indeed; much nonsense is talked about us.” There were even some “politicians” among them who thanked me for the honour I did them by my questions.

As I have already mentioned, the Dukhobortsy have no books and keep no kind of records. The old men cannot read, and do not get their children taught, for they consider such knowledge superfluous for peasants. The only exceptions are the clerks to the village governments, who are generally discharged soldiers that know how to read.

When I learned about this systematic ignorance (for so it may be called), I saw that an old man had not been joking when he asked me to reckon how old he was now, having been a boy of fourteen when he moved with his father from the Government of Tambov into the Taurus district in the year 1822. “I have long been trying,” he said, “to find this out; but there is no one here whom one could ask.” When my old friend learned that I had travelled a great deal he would have me tell him where the sun goes to rest. “Is there, he asked me several times, “Is there, then, no place at all where the sun rests?”

I wanted to know where the men’s dress came from. In answer to my questions the Dukhobortsy said theirs was a genuine Russian costume; but it is not found anywhere in Russia. As to their long and broad trousers, there may be truth in what they say; but what is the origin of the short archaluk (“jacket”), embroidered in soldier fashion, with a stand-up collar, which is always fastened with hooks, as among the Cossacks? This archaluk is worn by all without exception.

The women wear the ordinary Russian dress, but their head-dress is shaped like a sugar loaf, and has a kerchief or piece of stuff tied round it with the ends hanging down. The houses of the Dukhobortsy are like the peasant’s houses of Southern Russia. On the outside they are decorated with wood carvings representing a little horse, a man on horseback, a cock, etc; the interior is always extraordinarily clean; the walls neatly adorned with embroidered towels, samplers, popular pictures and other knick-knacks.

Their carts are very like those I was in East Prussia – great ladder wagons, ie. with the sides not made of solid boards, but of rails sloping outwards. A telega (“wagon”) of this kind will hold twenty persons, and even a twenty-first can find a corner.

Doukhobor wagon, Vereshchagin, Le Tour du Monde.

The village abounds in beehives, and a good bee master will make as much as a hundred rubles a year out of his honey. Besides honey they sell yarn and linen cloth, and in good years other products, especially potatoes and corn.

The soil is somewhat stony, but nevertheless bears good crops. They sow oats which yield ten-fold, or even fifteen fold; wheat and barley do not succeed so well as oats; buckwheat does well; millet, again, not so well. They also grow good crops of spelt. From hemp seed they extract an oil which they use for food, and also bring to market. Their potatoes and linseed are nothing to boast of.

Sketch of Doukhobor merino sheep, Vereshchagin, Autobiographical Sketches.

The Dukhobortsy in the village of Slavyanka, with 205 houses, have about 7,000 head of cattle. Their horned cattle, a cross between the native and the Black Sea breeds, have a splendid appearance. Their sheep, too, which they call shpanki, and which probably come from Spain or the south of France, deserve notice: their wool fetches from eight to nine rubles the pud, while the natives in the neighbourhood only get three, four or five rubles for theirs.

It is evident that the Dukhobortsy are thriving; it is only of their neighbours that they complain. About these neighbours – ie. the Tatars and the Armenians – they express themselves in very severe terms.

The only difference between them is that the Tatars have recourse to robbery and murder, while the Armenians deceive you and cheat you on every opportunity. There is no end to their tales of robbery and murder.

“It is only since the arrival of the new governor of the district,” say the Dukhobortsy, “that we have begun to live in any tolerable manner; before that we had no chance against the Tatars. They robbed us in open day; they would seize you, bind your hands behind your back, and hold a dagger to your throat while others drove off the cattle. It is useless to think of getting satisfaction or appealing to the law; if you do, you are summoned before the court from your work just when the day is worth a ruble, and have to go into the town merely to learn that the thieves have not been discovered. “So sign this paper, little brother, so that we may have no more charges brought on this score.” And there the matter ends. When you undertake a journey, your friends do not know whether they will ever see you again; and if you come back safe from even the shortest excursion you say, “The Lord be praised!” If a night passes quietly, without a single theft being committed, we all thank God and think, “Perhaps we shall get through the day too without any misadventure.”

Afterword

On August 10, 1865, while en route from the town of Shusha to the town of Kazakh in Elizavetpol province, Vereshchagin passed through the Doukhobor village of Slavyanka. He stopped there for several days, during which time he conversed with his Doukhobor hosts, visited their homes, sketched a number of subjects and scenes, and observed their state of affairs and way of life.

The Russian painter found a population of 600 male Doukhobors living in 205 households in Slavyanka in 1865. Presumably, there was comparable number of female Doukhobors living there at the time.

Vereshchagin noted that the mountain lowlands of Slavyanka had a temperate climate and fertile soil with trees and vegetation in abundance. Having arrived there from Tavria twenty years earlier, the Doukhobors, through hard work and diligence, had adapted to their surroundings and become “thriving” and “prosperous”. Their homes were finely decorated and extraordinarily clean. They built flour mills (sketched by Vereshchagin), kept an abundance of beehives, maintained a herd of 7,000 cattle as well as extensive herds of sheep (sketched by Vereshchagin), planted sizeable grain fields, pasturage and market gardens, and operated oil presses. They also engaged in the cartage trade (their wagons were sketched by Vereshchagin) and marketed their surplus grain (oats, wheat, barley, buckwheat, linseed, hemp, millet and spelt), vegetables (potatoes and corn) and honey as well as yarn and linen cloth. Indeed, the Doukhobor settlement of Slavyanka was “so well built and arranged as to be an object of envy” of all their neighbours.  Few, if any, would have cared to return to Central Russia from whence they came.

The Doukhobors complained only of their neighbours – the native Tatars and Armenians – who treated them with great cruelty, constantly robbing them and sometimes going to the length of murder. Until recently, the local Tsarist administration had proven ineffective in protecting the Doukhobors; however, under the new district governor, peace and order had begun to prevail.

Vereshchagin made note of the distinctive form of Doukhobor dress, which he was told was a “genuine Russian costume” yet was not found anywhere else in Russia. The men (sketched by Vereschagin) wore white shirts, stuck soldier-wise into their long and broad trousers, with a short, embroidered jacket with a stand-up collar, and caps with broad peaks. The women (sketched by Vereshchagin) wore ordinary Russian dress, but had a unique head-dress shaped like a sugar loaf, with a kerchief tied round it with the ends hanging down.

The Russian painter wrote approvingly of the Doukhobors’ simple, honest way of life as well as their general morality, noting that acts of theft and cheating were virtually unheard of. He noted, however, that the Doukhobors’ growing material prosperity had resulted in a softening of their religious principles. For instance, they were more obedient to Tsarist authorities than they had been in past generations. They had also abandoned their strict prohibitions against drinking, smoking and swearing. They recited their prayers by rote, with little understanding of their spiritual meaning, and when asked to explain them, gave only obscure answers. Moreover, some of the prayers, handed down orally over the generations, had been so corrupted “as to make the most ridiculous nonsense”; this was no doubt exacerbated by the systemic illiteracy among the Doukhobors, who kept no books or records.

Vereshchagin gave a concise summary of Doukhobor religious philosophy, which rejected church institutions, sacraments, sacred books, icons, saints and clergy in favour of a simple, individual-based religion founded on egalitarianism, love and compassion. He noted the Doukhobor belief in the indwelling of God in every person, as well as their figurative, rather than literal, interpretation of the Trinity – God the Father – memory; God the Son – understanding; God the Holy Ghost – will.

Vereshchagin described the Doukhobor form of worship in extensive detail. On Sundays, the service was held in a peasant’s house. The men stood on one side of the room and the women on the other. They repeated their prayers in turn, correcting each other when one made a mistake. After a considerable time, the congregation went outside into the courtyard, where the men again took their places on one side, and the women on the other. An elder stood at the head of the men, who then led the congregation in singing. The sad, melancholy strains of the Doukhobor psalms made a profound impression. After some time, the congregation then formed a semicircle, bowing and kissing each other, the men passing along the men’s ranks, and the women doing the same on their side, all the while continuing their singing. Once this was finished, the service is over and the congregation returned to their homes.

Vereshchagin’s impressions of the Doukhobors, through his writings and sketches, are among the few rare sources of detailed published information about them in the two decades following their settlement in the Caucasus. As such, his work is a valuable contribution to our understanding of this little-known, little-document period of their history.

As for Vereshchagin himself, he returned to the Paris Salon in 1866 to exhibit his very first drawing, which, quite fittingly, was “Doukhobors Chanting their Psalms”. The next year, he accompanied the Russian military expedition to Turkestan, where he was granted the rank of ensign and was awarded the Cross of St. George for his heroism at the siege of Samarkand. He was an indefatigable traveler, returning to St. Petersburg in late 1868, to Paris in 1869, back to St. Petersburg later in the year, and then back to Turkestan at the end 1869 via Siberia. In 1871, he established an atelier in Munich, and made a sole exhibition of his works at the Crystal Palace in London in 1873. He made another exhibition of his works in St. Petersburg in 1874. Later that year, he departed for an extensive tour of the Himalayas, India and Tibet, returning to Paris in 1876. With the start of the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878), Vereshchagin left Paris and returned to active service with the Imperial Russian Army. Thereafter, he settled at Munich, where he produced a series of sensational works aimed at promoting peace through representing the horrors of war. In 1882-1883, he again traveled to India, followed by Syria and Palestine in 1884. Vereshchagin was in the Far East during the First Sino-Japanese War, with the American troops in the Philippines, and with the Russian troops in Manchuria. During the Russo-Japanese War, he he sailed aboard the Russian flagship, Petropavlovsk, which on April 13, 1904, struck two mines and sank, taking down with it most of the crew including Vereshchagin.

Remarkably, almost eighty years later, there were still Doukhobors alive who were able to recall Vereschagin’s visit to Slavyanka. In his book, Dukhobortsi: Ikh Istoria, Zhizn I Borba (Regehr, North Kildonan, 1948), Doukhobor historian and philosopher Peter N. Maloff (1900-1970) retells his grandmother Malasha I. Maloff’s (1856-1943) recollections about the Russian artist’s visit to her village:

Many years later, a little before her death, I was reading her a booklet by a well-known writer, V.V. Vereshchagin, under the title of “Doukhobors and Molokans’.  As she listened, she suddenly became transported with delight, as though she recalled something from the distant past.  “My god!” she exclaimed, “this happened at our home, in Slavyanka.  Right after [actually, before] the Turkish war, my father-in-law brought him from Ganzha, a clean, attractive gentleman he was.  He stayed with us for several days.  He heard some Doukhobors singing at our neighbours’ at a funeral and said: “I would like to hear some more of your singing.”  Then the melodious Agafonovs took him to their home and, gathering the Slavyanka choir together, sang for him for several days.  We had real singers there: Mavrunya and Masha Strelyaev, the Nichvolodovs, the Konkins and many others. Heavens!  Who ever thought that he was going to write a book about us.

Today, over twelve sketches of the Doukhobors, drawn by Vasily Vasil’evich Vereshchagin in 1865, are kept at the Tretyakov State Gallery in Moscow, Russia.

To read more, search, download, save and print a full PDF copy of “Vassili Verestchagin: Painter-Soldier-Traveller, Autobiographical Sketches”  by Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin (F.H. Peters, trans., London: Bentley, 1887), visit the Google Book Search digital database.

Spiritual Origins and the Beginnings of Doukhobor History

by Svetlana A. Inikova

The following is a keynote address given by Russian ethnographer and archivist Svetlana A. Inikova at the Doukhobor Centenary Conference, held at the University of Ottawa on October 22-24, 1999.  Her address, based on extensive research of Russian archival sources, including a significant number of previously unknown documents relating to the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, reveals many new and important insights into the spiritual origins and early history of the Doukhobor movement in Russia.  Reproduced by permission from A. Donskov, J. Woodsworth & C. Gaffield (eds.), The Doukhobor Centenary in Canada, A Multi-Disciplinary Perspective on their Unity and Diversity. (Ottawa: Slavic Research Group and Institute of Canadian Studies at the University of Ottawa, 2000).

Doukhoborism is now three centuries old. While Doukhobors have never been able to boast great numbers or a widespread population, they have made a definite mark on Russian history. Their dramatic development has drawn the attention of historians for the past two hundred years. In spite of all that has been written about them, there are still noticeable gaps in their historical record. The early history of the movement and the consolidation of its teachings are very poorly researched, and there are only a very few articles dealing with eighteenth-century Doukhoborism.

Modern researchers are well acquainted with Orest Novitsky’s Dukhobortsy: ikh istoriya i verouchenie ["Doukhobors: their history and teachings"], published in 1882, which has become a leading textbook on the subject. Worth noting for their research on early Doukhobor history are A.S. Lebedev’s study on the Sloboda-Ukraine Doukhobors and N.G. Vysotsky’s work on the Doukhobors of Tambov and Voronezh Provinces. These major works written around the turn of the century are for some reason largely unknown to scholars today.

Much better known is F.V. Livanov’s Raskol’niki i ostrozhniki ["Raskolniks and Ostrozhniks"], based on a wide range of archival sources, although the author takes a less-than-serious approach to his subject, not distinguishing between the Doukhobors and the Molokans and thereby introducing an element of confusion into the question of territorial distribution. There is an article by Soviet researcher P.G. Ryndzyunsky on the so-called "Tambov free-thinkers" discovered in Tambov Province in 1768-69, but the writer did not identify the sect under discussion with the Doukhobors, as he was convinced that the Doukhobors did not yet exist at that time.

In 1977 A.I. Klibanov published his Narodnaya sotsial’naya utopiya v Rossii. Period feodalizma ["People’s social Utopia in Russia. Feudal period”], which featured an analysis of a “Note of 1791 submitted by the Doukhobors of Ekaterinoslav Province to Governor Kakhovsky” [Zapiska, podannaya dukhobortsami Ekaterinoslavskoy gubernii u 1791 g. gubernatoru Kakhovskomu] and the Doukhobor teachings outlined therein. In 1997 Svetlana Inikova’s “The Tambov Doukhobors of the 1760s” [Tambovskie dukhobortsy v 60-e gody XVIII veka] appeared in Vestnik Tambovskogo universiteta, showing that by that time the Doukhobors had already established themselves as a sect in Tambov province.

These are the only studies known on the early period of Doukhobor history.

Scholars still have not solved the question as to where or when the movement first appeared. Some look upon Ukraine as the birthplace of Doukhoborism, others refer to the Tambov area, still others maintain that the teachings came from Moscow. Before 1917 it was generally assumed that the Doukhobor teachings were of non-Russian origin. Some traced them to the early offshoots of Christianity, others to Bulgarian bogomil’stvo ("Bogomils") though the rise of Doukhoborism was most often associated with Quaker or Anabaptist proselytizing in Russia. Soviet historiography, which always related everything to the struggle between social classes, maintained that it was a uniquely Russian populist teaching arising as a form of social protest. Thus, even after three hundred years of Doukhoborism not one of the questions raised above has been finally resolved. This is due primarily to the scarcity of eighteenth-century historical sources, and secondarily to the difficulty in accurately identifying the dissidents described in the documents.

The word Doukhobors did not appear until 1786. It was coined not, as is commonly supposed, by Ambrosius, Archbishop of Ekaterinoslav, but by Nikifor, Archbishop of Slovenia. The Doukhobors themselves did not adopt the term until the beginning of the nineteenth century, while the clergy and secular officials continued to confuse the Doukhobors with the Molokans, and more often than not simply called them raskol’niki or iconoclasts to avoid a mistaken reference.

However, the problem of identification of the Doukhobors in their earlier historical periods still eludes the researchers of today just as much as in the past. In order to determine the precise point in time in which Doukhoborism first took organizational form, it is important to identify sectarian references in archival materials. To solve this rather complex problem it was necessary to compile a catalogue of Doukhobor families and their places of origin at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries. This facilitated the preparation of a list of provinces populated by Doukhobors, the date of their first discovery there and the sectarians’ social status.

Describing the spiritual roots of the Doukhobors means first establishing what its doctrinal teachings are. For the past two centuries theologians and secular researchers have been citing the work carried out by Orest Markovich Novitsky, along with his principal source of reference, the “Note of 1791 submitted by the Doukhobors of Ekaterinoslav Province to Governor Kakhovsky”. True, as early as 1806 Prefect Evgenii of the Aleksandr Nevsky Monastery (who would later become Metropolitan of Kiev) noted that it was written not by the Doukhobors themselves, but by a rather well-educated sympathiser. Novitsky repeated this argument and supposed that this person might have been the Ukrainian philosopher Grigory Skovoroda – a supposition which has been repeated more than once in the literature on the subject. At this stage we are interested not so much in the authorship of this note, but to what extent it reflects actual Doukhobor teachings.

Let us start with the assumption that the “Note of 1791 submitted by the Doukhobors of Ekaterinoslav Province to Governor Kakhovsky” was never actually submitted. It is known only in copies; the original has never been discovered. We have ascertained, however, that the first copy was made from a document belonging to Senator Ivan Vladimirovich Lopukhin, who is known to have made an inspection tour of the Province of Sloboda-Ukraine in 1801 and, after meeting with the Doukhobors there, to have petitioned Alexander I to allow their relocation to Tauride Province (now the Crimea).

Senator Lopukhin was a prominent and active Mason, who had a multitude of religious-philosophical works and translations to his credit. It is surprising that one who played such a major role in the Doukhobors’ destiny, if he indeed had such a document about them in his possession, not only did not make use of it but failed even to mention its existence in his memoirs.

Lopukhin was accused by the Orthodox hierarchy of helping the Doukhobors and of predisposing Alexander I favourably toward the sect. Right at the time he needed to justify himself, there appeared the “Note of 1791”, painting the Doukhobors as a religious-philosophical movement completely loyal to the authorities.

A comparative analysis shows strong similarities between the “Note of 1791” and the Masonic writings of Lopukhin himself. Kiev Metropolitan Evgenii and later Novitsky were quite correct in observing the influence of the Masons in the Note, but attributed it to the peculiarities of the teachings of the Ekaterinoslav Doukhobors rather than the peculiar world-view of the Note’s author.

Both Novitsky and Klibanov draw attention to the literary nature of the verses cited in the Note. Klibanov goes so far as to identify the cited quatrains as “inherent to Skovoroda’s poetry, in both form and content”. After considerable investigation we were able to determine that these verses came from a German poet held in high regard by Russian Masons by the name of Johann Scheffler, who was also known as “the Angel of Silesia”. A collection of his poetry was published by a Mason named Novikov in Moscow in 1784 under the title Rayskie tsvety [“Flowers of Paradise”], and was familiar to a narrow circle of supporters in St. Petersburg and Moscow at the time. An examination of the main idea of each quatrain shows remarkable similarities with the concepts outlined in the “Note of 1791”.

It is unlikely that the author was Lopukhin himself, however, as the language of the Note suggests someone very close to the South Russian ecclesiastical hierarchy. But neither are the language and style characteristic of Skovoroda’s writings. While the question of authorship is still undecided, there is no doubt that the teachings contained in the Note are Masonic rather than Doukhobor, although the two movements most definitely shared common elements – the doctrine of the “inner church”, for example.

Another factor against the Doukhobors’ own authorship of the Note is the naming of their teachers – Kirill and Petr Kolesnikov (still alive at the time) – something the Doukhobors themselves would never have done.

The author of another “Note on the Doukhobors living in the Melitopol’ district of Tauride Province” [Zapiska o dukhobortsakh, obitayu-shchikh v Melitopol’skom uezde Tavricheskoy gubernii], written in 1841, upon enquiring of the Doukhobors living at Molochnye Vody (“Milky Waters”) as to what they knew of the note outlining their faith that was to have been submitted to Governor Kakhovsky in 1791, was told that “they had absolutely no idea whatsoever”.

There is no doubt the author of the “Note of 1791” was personally acquainted with the Doukhobors. Certain historical facts and tenets contained in the Note (though possibly misinterpreted) have been actually confirmed through other sources, but cannot be considered on the whole to represent a statement of Doukhobor teachings.

Another document usually cited by researchers into early Doukhobor history is an 1805 note entitled “Several characteristics of Doukhobor society” [Nekotorye cherty ob obshchestve dukhobortsev], quite justifiably ascribed either to an unidentified Mason or directly to Senator Lopukhin. For some reason, however, the fact that the two basic documents on the Doukhobors’ history and teachings have both turned out to be connected with the Masonic order has never caused anyone to doubt their validity as historical source-materials.

Such investigations have served to emphasize the necessity of selecting undisputedly reliable sources. The past few years have brought to light a significant number of previously unknown documents on the history of the group at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries, which were not accessible to earlier researchers.

Our research has led to the following conclusions:

In the second half of the eighteenth century the teachings of the four main groups of Doukhobors (in Sloboda-Ukraine, Ekaterinoslav, the Don River area and the Tambov-Voronezh region) were essentially the same. The few differences were not serious enough to warrant sub-classifications of Doukhoborism or to categorize their development as incomplete. One can, for example, note the relatively radical stance of the first group in their attitudes toward supreme authority and defence of the state compared to the more moderate Tambov-Voronezh Doukhobors. This is apparently attributable to the social psychology of the Cossacks who were more prevalent in the first group.

Following the doctrine of the inner church and the worship of God in spirit and in truth, the Doukhobors uncompromisingly rejected material forms of worship, especially the external church with its icons, the cross, sacramental rituals, sacred relics and making the sign of the cross. The temple of God was none other than the believer himself or herself. The congregation of true Christians was Christ’s apostolic church, in which all the sacraments were commemorated spiritually, worship was directed toward the image of God shining within and Christ himself was master and head. The Doukhobors endeavoured to interpret everything connected with faith in a spiritual sense.

Even back in the 1760s and 1770s the Doukhobors declined to consider the Bible a God-inspired book. They doubted that God’s word could be contained in the Scriptures, maintaining that it was capable of being written only in the heart and soul of a believer and not on paper; others declared that the Scriptures represented “baby’s milk”, while their teacher was God Himself. The Doukhobors did know by heart, however, certain passages from the New Testament which, in their opinion, confirmed the rightness of their teachings.

The non-Biblical canon was rejected completely. Doukhobor teachers read and interpreted the Scriptures at meetings as they were inspired by the Lord – i.e., within the framework of their teachings. They sought out especially obscure spiritual meanings, and the New Testament, which even in its earlier form abounded in parables, was transformed in their teachings into a set of allegories. It appears that this was not so much the result of a rationalistic approach to the miracles described in the Bible as a desire to transpose everything connected with religious life into the realm of the spiritual. Doukhobor rationalism consisted in the holding of reason to be the highest criterion by which to evaluate the correctness of one’s perception of Biblical revelation. Finally, the Doukhobors rejected reading and interpreting the Scriptures altogether during their first years at Molochnye Vody in the Tauride Province.

Up until now scholars have been generally inclined to consider the Doukhobors to be anti-Trinitarian, i.e., as refusing to recognize the Holy Trinity. Even though Doukhobor psalms constantly affirmed worship of one God in three persons – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – scholars have maintained that the Doukhobors view the Trinity not in the form of three persons dwelling inseparably in the one God, but as powers of some kind emanating from God. In fact, God, in their understanding, was not a personality but some kind of substance spread everywhere without an independent existence, a Universal Mind, a Supreme Wisdom. One might go so far as to say that the Doukhobors believed in God as a single personality, appearing in the roles of three persons. In their interpretation God the Son – created before time – and the Holy Spirit – which proceeds from the Father – were still inferior to God the Father in terms of divinity, but that is a different matter.

The Doukhobors have been called pantheists, as they maintained that there was no place where God is not, and their psalms constantly feature images suggesting a God spread throughout the universe: God the Father represents height, the Son – breadth, and the Holy Spirit – depth. In their understanding, however, the one God, while embracing the whole world, was greater than the world; He was not limited to His presence in it, but was personified in an unfathomable being. The Doukhobors’ pantheism was on an extremely limited scale.

According to Doukhobor teachings, God the Son was never embodied in human form in Mary’s womb; she did not bear a God-man. She bore Jesus of Nazareth, whom God had chosen as His anointed – Christ, whose body was occupied for thirty years by God the Son, and not by some kind of Mind or Spirit. After Jesus’ corporeal death God the Son (Christ) ascended and appeared to the apostles in a different fleshly form that they failed to recognize at first, and only later identified as God through the miracles they witnessed. The Christ-figure of the Trinity continued to be embodied in each Doukhobor leader in turn, each of which represented Christ, the true God. In Orthodox teachings the God-Son, embodied in human flesh in Mary’s womb, actually ascends with this same flesh, dwells in it in heaven and will act as judge at the Last Judgment, sitting on the throne at the right hand of the Father. The Doukhobor Trinity, on the other hand, appears to have been divided before the Last Judgment, at which point this Christ-God, having sojourned in various fleshly forms, will sit close by the Lord’s throne (but not at the right hand, as in Orthodoxy) and judge the people, or rather their souls, as the Doukhobors do not believe in the resurrection of the flesh. Even thus exists the Christ-man, in whom dwells the true God-Son – the living God mentioned over and over again in Doukhobor psalms and in recorded Doukhobor testimony.

The Doukhobors did not recognize original sin, since God the Son came into the world not for its redemption, but to show people the pattern of suffering for the truth. His flesh died on the cross; hence it was quite logical that in the Eucharist wine could not be transformed into Christ’s blood or bread into his flesh.

The other Doukhobor tenet which has always provoked a multitude of interpretations is that of God dwelling in man. A Doukhobor psalm says that God created the human soul in His image and likeness, in the sense that the soul, like God, is immortal, self-governing and intelligent. God is spiritual and Trinitarian, hence His image in man is also spiritual and threefold. God gave man three blessings: memory, mind and will. In terms of memory the human soul resembles God the Father, in reason – the Son, and in will – the Holy Spirit. And just as these three blessings, three qualities of the soul, constitute one and the same soul, even so the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are one and the same God. These three qualities of the soul are also the image of God (not God Himself) which is to be worshipped.

In some psalms, however, the word upodoblyaetsya (“resembles”) is omitted and it is simply stated: God the Father [is] in memory. God the Son in mind. God the Holy Spirit in will. In some of the psalms and recorded testimony the Doukhobors also declared: “God is in man”. This is an indication that not just the image of God is to be found in man, but the impersonal God Himself dwells in man, thereby creating a mystical union between God and man. In such a case, however, denominational worship and psalm-reading would be totally unnecessary: it would be enough to pray to one’s self.

It is still not clear whether Doukhobors felt it simply unnecessary to explain that it is the image of God that is meant here, or whether the concept of likeness gradually gave way to actual dwelling. After all, God’s image in man and God in man are two completely different things.

The Doukhobors held themselves to be God’s chosen children, selected by God Himself; they held that Christ (their living God) was their pastor, and that the Holy Spirit guided them, but in all their documents and practices I have never encountered any indication that they believed in the incarnation of God in each individual Doukhobor.

During their services, while carrying out a particular ritual of thrice bowing to one another, the Doukhobors would say that they were worshipping God’s image shining within, that man was the temple of God, containing not hand-made icons but the image of God, and in the place of the usual candles was ardent prayer. The more perfect a person was, the greater was this Godlikeness of the soul in him and the closer he was to God. Hence it would seem completely wrong to take the words “God is in man” only in their literal sense.

It must be emphasized that we are not talking here about the teachings of the Doukhobors today, who have far removed themselves from their traditional doctrines; hence it would be wrong to apply our conclusions to them.

Novitsky’s identification of Doukhobor teachings with faith in some kind of impersonal God, as well as his treatment of the doctrine of Christ not as God the Son incarnate in man but as an ordinary mortal endowed “with a divine quality of intelligence but in the highest degree” were to have tragic consequences. In the 1880s Novitsky’s book and the “Note of 1791 submitted by the Doukhobors of Ekaterinoslav Province to Governor Kakhovsky” came under the studious eye of Prince Dmitry Aleksandrovich Khilkov and formed the basis of a series of manuscripts he penned on the Doukhobor sect.

Believing the Doukhobor teachings to be virtually identical with those of their mentor, the followers of Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy were already beginning to prepare for their “missionary activity” among the Doukhobors. The Tolstoyans fanned the flames that had been dying out in Doukhobor society. The Tolstoyan dream of building the Kingdom of Truth on earth cost the Doukhobors dearly. The disenchantment felt by the Tolstoyans upon learning that they were not kindred spirits to the Doukhobors hurt them sorely and in some cases led to a breakdown of their own beliefs.

One cannot examine the doctrine regarding Christ without touching upon the question of the Virgin Mother. Without accepting the incarnation of God in the Virgin Mary’s womb and without venerating her as the Mother of God, the Doukhobors still retained her titles of Virgin and Mother of God (devaBogoroditsa). Mary had borne God’s anointed, Jesus, whose body had been chosen by God, which made her (perhaps not from time immemorial, and to some degree formally) the mother of the God-man. Every Doukhobor woman, bearing a man of God, a child of God embodying God’s image, is likened to Mary and in this sense she is also a mother of God.

Virginity was something the Doukhobors saw not as a family status or a physiological condition of the female organs but as purity, codified by the unpleasantness of the church’s marriage ceremony. Before being relocated to Molochnye Vody in the Tauride Province the Doukhobors were obliged to be married in churches, but did not accept the sanctity of this ceremony. It is interesting that the concept of virginity is reflected not only in the psalms but also in the Doukhobor women’s outward appearance. There is evidence by contemporary eyewitnesses dating from the period 1768-97 that Doukhobor girls did not change their dress or hairstyle after marriage, as did those of the Orthodox faith.

One question only sketchily explained in the Doukhobor teachings relates to the creation of souls. Nowhere in their psalms, in the research materials or in personal conversations was there any indication, even indirectly, of a belief in the creation of souls in a pre-material world, as stated in the “Note of 1791”. There were, however, a number of contemporary accounts of the Doukhobors’ faith in the transmigration of souls after death. This is fairly clearly stated in Psalm 79 of the Book of Life of the Doukhobors, and is also confirmed by their funereal and memorial ceremonies.

For all the emphasis on the spiritual, the Doukhobors’ teachings include no dichotomy of soul and flesh. In their view, our bodies are by no means dungeons, as is suggested by the author of the “Note of 1791”, where the soul is punished for its fall. In contrast to the soul, which is divine, the body is taken from the earth, and if one is to “walk in the flesh” and indulge the appetites, “your flesh will tarnish you as it did Adam and Eve”, but along with that, man’s body is also seen as the temple of God, the temple of the soul, and even flesh is purified by a pure spirit. Besides, it is the presence of the body that enables one to do good works, without which faith is dead. Hence the Doukhobor faith was not characterized by any special asceticism.

The Doukhobors were not averse to caring for private property acquired by honest, preferably manual labour, although greed was always to be condemned. And in order that greed should not become the stimulus of hard work and that the virtue of brotherly love should not be forgotten, Doukhobors were to help each other financially. In 1768, the Tambov Doukhobors went so far as to declare that anyone might freely take from his brother anything he had need of.

The question of the Doukhobors’ attitude toward military service did not figure significantly in the eighteenth century. Their numbers included many Cossacks: from the Zaporozhye, Don River area, Ekaterinoslav and Kuban, both soldiers and pikinery (similar to halberdiers). They all performed military service, many of them in the Russo-Turkish wars of the eighteenth century. It is known that some Doukhobors refused service in the Russo-Turkish war of 1787-91, but their motivation is not clear. The Cossack Doukhobors maintained that they were obliged to ‘defend themselves on the borders” against the enemy, but not to attack or kill. Recruits’ refusal to swear the oath of allegiance was explained on the grounds that Doukhobors in general refused to swear oaths, all the more so in church.

During police investigations the Doukhobors would declare that all people were equal, horrifying their interrogators, but this referred only to social equality and not equality in terms of spiritual value, since the Doukhobors considered themselves a step above others and less sinful. For God’s chosen people who recognized Christ as their head, no human authority was needed. However, the degree of explicitness with which they directly denied human authority varied depending upon how their relationship with such authority unfolded at any given period. The question of defence of the Empire and the Empress and the Doukhobors’ allegiance to her was tied to the degree of mercy she bestowed upon them and the freedom she allowed them to hold their services. In other words, these two questions took on much more of a political than a religious tone.

Our outline of Doukhobor teachings thus far is based primarily on documents dating from the second half of the eighteenth century. Of course this teaching was formed over the course of many decades, and its ideological origins must be sought in the second half of the seventeenth century. But where does one begin this search?

Researchers have found parallels between the teachings of the Doukhobors and those of various Christian sects. Contradictions and ambiguities in the Gospel texts have given rise to similar dissident movements, although each succeeding period has introduced its own modifications.

Among Western Protestant teachings there is no template to be found from which Doukhoborism could have been taken as an exact copy. There is no such template, for Doukhoborism selected and re-worked a whole set of ideas from Western Protestant motifs, and not just Protestant ones.

It may be concluded that the Doukhobor doctrine is closest to Polish-Lithuanian Socinianism. It is quite likely that some influence was also exerted by German Anabaptists. The question then arises as to how Socinianism and other Protestant ideas could have penetrated the hearts of so many ordinary Russians. There is no doubt that some representatives of these Western sects played a personal role in the formation of Doukhoborism.

There are legends about an aged foreigner who preached in the village of Okhochee in Sloboda-Ukraine, and about the Pole who hid in the house of the Doukhobor leader Illarion Pobirokhin in the village of Goreloye in Tambov Province. However, the most convincing evidence in favour of such contact was, strange as it may seem, the very non-Russian hairdos worn by the Doukhobor women, similar to those we discovered among women of the modern German Anabaptist sect known as the Hutterites.

In addition to direct contacts and preaching, we have reason to believe that Western Protestant ideas made their way into Russia through Ukrainian Orthodox preachers and writers who had been heavily influenced by such teachings spread throughout the Polish-Lithuanian Empire (including what is now Belarus and Western Ukraine). They may have also come through both original and translated literature produced by Orthodox and Socinian printing houses in Ukraine and Belarus. Most probably, the influence trickled in through all the channels here mentioned.

It is quite possible that the Doukhobor teachings were born out of ideas drawn from Socinian books printed on Radivil Cherny’s estate not far from Slutsk, in a hybrid language of Belarus and Church Slavonic used in the Nesvizh district – in particular from the works of Simeon Budnyj and Martin Chekhovich. The Polish-Lithuanian Socinians believed that the principal source of faith was revelation, and that the Scriptures could be understood and interpreted by anyone so gifted; hence priests and especially church hierarchies were unnecessary. God was a Spirit and must be worshipped in spirit and in truth; He paid no heed to homage from human hands. It was the human being, made in God’s image, that was to be venerated instead of icons. Jesus Christ, in their view, was an ordinary man, chosen by God. In support of this view Budnyj presented twenty-six arguments. The Holy Spirit was upon Christ, and thus he was the son of God and mankind’s only advocate before God; since he was not God, he could not offer a sacrifice of redemption.

The Socinians rejected the doctrine of original sin; they did not consider communion and baptism to be sacraments but only symbolic rituals; they did not recognize the saints and did not appeal to them for help; they maintained that faith by itself was insufficient for salvation, that good works were required; they allowed for the need to defend one’s self in war, but held attacking and killing to be wrong.

The main difference between Socinianism and Doukhoborism lay in their approaches to the substance of the Trinity and Christ. The Socinian doctrine with its rather radical basic tenets was adapted to the perception of Ukrainian Cossacks and Russian peasants who had up until recently been Orthodox, and who found it difficult to part with the tradition of a three-person God. This modification, however, did not significantly change the basic doctrine. The Belarus-Lithuanian reform movement showed a considerable radical influence on the part of German Anabaptists and Hussites, especially in respect to attitudes toward church and state, as well as a certain element of mysticism. They fomented a left-leaning tendency in Socinianism which promoted universal equality and rejected private property along with state authority and the officials who exercised it.

All these radical Protestant ideas received broad circulation in Ukraine, which at the time was strongly under the influence of Polish Catholic scholasticism. The scholastic preachers searched for hidden meaning in the Scriptures, interpreting entirely realistic subject matter as allegories and taking significant liberties with the texts in their quest for picturesque images. It is virtually impossible sometimes to determine whether their allegorical interpretations are based on the canons of scholasticism or on a rationalistic approach to a divinely inspired book.

The Moscow church authorities understandably adopted a very cautious approach to the ideas of the Ukrainian priests, whom they regarded as heretics. Some Ukrainian publications were banned from entry into Russia or even destroyed. The works of some South Russian Orthodox writers most certainly influenced the development of Doukhobor teachings.

The German economist and historian August Haxthausen, who visited the Molochnye Vody settlements in 1843, took note of two books held in great regard by the Doukhobors. One of them he described as “Key to the understanding or to the mysterious” [Klyuch k urazumeniyu i k tainstvennomu]. Novitsky mistakenly thought this was a reference to Eckartshausen’s mystical work Klyuch k tainstvam natury [“Key to the mysteries of Nature”]. In fact it was Ioannikii Galyatovsky’s Kljuch razumeniya [“Key to the understanding”], which was very popular in Ukraine and southern Russia, having gone through three editions. In the “Note of 1791” it is also mentioned that the Doukhobors read “Key to the understanding” and other ecclesiastical books.

Galyatovsky, who was constantly speaking out against the so-called Arians (as the followers of Socinianism were known), was himself accused of Arianism. Galyatovsky was particularly famous for his free interpretations of Scripture and giving a different meaning to traditional concepts – something very common in Doukhobor practice. Giving words a second meaning was characteristic not only of the scholastic school but also of Russian apocryphal literature. Similar phenomena may be noted in Galyatovsky’s works and in Doukhobor psalms and apocryphal pieces. In “Key to the understanding”, for example, Galyatovsky writes that an angel took a golden censer and filled it with fire from the altar, explaining that the censer was the body of Christ and the fire was God’s love. In one Doukhobor psalm in answer to the question “What is incense?” it is stated that “Incense is doing great works”. The dialogue continues:

The theme of the image of God in man was a favourite among the Ukrainian preachers. Under the influence of humanistic ideas, they endeavoured to help their hearers and readers grasp hold of their human destiny, believe in the possibility and necessity of self-perfection and see the divine image in themselves and their neighbour. They argued that since man is made in the image and likeness of God, and the one God contains the whole Trinity, so too the divine image in man’s soul is threefold.

In his Evangelie Uchitel’nom [“Students’ Gospel”] the Ukrainian theologian Kirill Trankvillion listed the powers of the God-like soul – will, reason, thinking – and in another place in the same book: mind, conscience and will. There is a dichotomy in the thoughts of man because of his earthly origin and divine soul: he is at once both heaven and earth.

In his Katekhizis (“Catechism”) of the end of the 17th century the well-known writer Lavrentii Zizaniya also remarked that man’s soul contains the whole Trinity: in our minds we have the spirit and the word, just as God the Father has the Spirit and the Son, and just as they are inseparable, so our soul is an integral whole. For Ioannikii Galyatovsky man’s God-likeness lay in the fact that his soul, like God, was immortal and possessed reason and will.

It was from Ukrainian religious literature that the Doukhobors borrowed the concept of the God-likeness of the human soul. Witness the following example from a Doukhobor psalm: The soul is God’s image; through it we too have threefold power in one and the same being. The powers of the human soul are: memory, reason, will. In memory we are like God the Father, in reason – like God the Son, in will – like God the Holy Spirit. Just as in the Holy Trinity there are three persons, so in the one soul there are three spiritual powers – one God.

Novitsky perceived the similarity of this psalm to the heathen beliefs of the ancient peoples of North and South America, and attributed it to the Doukhobor leader Kapustin. In fact it is taken from the writings of a Ukrainian preacher who later became Metropolitan of Rostov and a Russian saint, Dmitry Tuptalo:

…the soul is God’s image, inasmuch as it possesses a threefold power but it is one and the same being; the powers of the human soul are: memory, reason, will. In memory it is like God the Father, in reason – God the Son, in will – God the Holy Spirit. And just as in the Holy Trinity there are three persons, but not three Gods, only one God, so in the human soul there are three spiritual powers, so to speak, but not three souls, only one soul.

Dmitry Tuptalo repeatedly wrote about these three powers of the human soul at various stages of his life – “wherefore one is also obliged to glorify God in one’s own self, in the three persons of Him who exists, but in the one Deity”.

Dmitry Tuptalo also wrote that God created the soul to be like Himself: “self-governing, intelligent and immortal, companion to eternity and in union with the flesh”. The Doukhobors incorporated these words into one of their psalms. While not rejecting outward worship, Dmitry gave preference to the inner, hidden communion with God in one’s heart. He held that the Scriptures were to be understood through spiritual reasoning. Dmitry Tuptalo understood the essence of Christ in accord with Orthodox doctrine, but there are many ambiguities in his writings, many unorthodoxly arranged nuances, as well as obvious departures from Russian Orthodoxy, which made his works popular among the Doukhobors. The Doukhobor teachers also borrowed from him two splendid poetic variations on the psalms of David.

One may well ask how the affirmation of the similarity of man’s three spiritual qualities to the divine Trinity and other unorthodox concepts found their way into the writings of Dmitry Tuptalo. In 1675-77, Dmitry Tuptalo was preaching in an Orthodox monastery in Chernigov, which had belonged to Poland since 1618. In 1677-78 he preached in an Orthodox monastery in the town of Slutsk in Belarus, then part of Lithuania. It was about that time that a Calvinist pastor in Slutsk had in his service a man by the name of Jan Belobodsky, who later came to Moscow. In his Vyznanie very (Confession of faith) he admitted that he did not accept the most fundamental Orthodox doctrines, maintaining that:

…God’s image is in man and the human soul has three powers: reason, will and memory, but one and the same being: in memory it is like the Father, in reason – like the Son, in will – like the Holy Spirit; and God’s likeness in man lies in the fact that God gave man an incorporeal and immortal soul, a companion to eternity, and man can accept wisdom, grace, bliss and the vision of God.

At a church council meeting in 1681, Belobodsky was condemned as a heretic. The influence of Polish religious tendencies of the period are palpably evident in the writings of Kirill Trankvillion, Ioannikii Galyatovsky and Dmitry Tuptalo, who succeeded each other in turn as Archimandrite of the Eletsky Monastery in Chernigov.

Protestants of various persuasions who reject the external church and call worship of icons and the cross “idol-worship”, often support their arguments by referring to the Biblical story of the three Babylonian lads:

Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah (also known, respectively, as Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego — see Daniel 1:6,7; 3:1-30). They were thrown into a “burning fiery furnace” for their refusal to worship an idol, but were miraculously saved. Hans Hutter, the founder of the Hutterite sect, compared himself to these lads as he was led to his death at the stake. Galyatovsky’s “Key to the understanding” includes many references to the story. The Doukhobors recognized therein an all-too-familiar pattern.

In response to prosecutors’ questions as to where they had acquired their “criminal thoughts”, the Doukhobors would sometimes say that they had been enlightened by the Lord, but sometimes admitted that they had heard them from a priest or a sexton or learnt them from some church books, without specifying which ones. They claimed to have obtained these books from country preachers. These books were being used for proselytizing and stirring up people who were inclined to reflection on religious matters.

For assimilating and reflecting on new religious teachings, as well as for working out new religious systems, a certain degree of literacy, preparation and Scriptural knowledge was required. There was no prohibition in Russia against individual parishioners reading the Bible on their own, but this became possible for ordinary people only after the creation of the Russian Bible Society at the beginning of the nineteenth century. It should be taken into account, moreover, that few peasants were literate. It is likely, therefore, that the Doukhobor teachings must have come through the ideas of the lower ranks of clergy, monks and lay brethren – i.e., people acquainted with the Scriptures.

In southern Russia in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries there were many itinerant preachers, usually a wandering preacher or monk, spreading dissident ideas. One of these may well have been Grigory Skovoroda, whose writings show a good deal in common with the ideas of Dmitry Tuptalo, as well as with Doukhobor teachings, confirming the widespread circulation of Protestant religious ideas in Ukraine.

The followers of the Doukhobor teachings were recruited from the ranks of Orthodox parishioners. The promoters of the new teachings, therefore, endeavoured to maintain the popular traditional forms of psalms and catechisms. For their psalms the Doukhobors made extensive use of Russian popular religious verse, including those by Ukrainian writers, as well as Polish canticles they translated into Russian.

The evidence here presented, we believe, is sufficient to conclude that the Doukhobor teachings may trace their origin to the Protestant teachings and dissident ideas of the seventeenth century, widely circulated in the territories of the Polish Republic and popular among Ukrainian Orthodox writers.

The organization of Doukhoborism as a sect began not long thereafter in Sloboda-Ukraine (approximately the same territory now occupied by Kharkov Province in eastern Ukraine), probably toward the end of the seventeenth century or at the beginning of the eighteenth, and paralleled the development of a religious system.

Sloboda-Ukraine can be considered the cradle of Doukhoborism for several reasons. In the seventeenth century it was populated by Ukrainians who had fled there from Polish domains, bringing with them their Protestant dissident ideas. Sloboda-Ukraine was situated far from Russia’s centre, and for a long time neither secular nor religious authorities were able to exert any meaningful control over the lives of its population. It was a place where the libertarian traditions of the Zaporozhye Cossacks held sway.

In the 1680s Russian military-service people began moving to Sloboda-Ukraine as odnodvortsy (“smallholders”). They came primarily from the southern Great Russian provinces to protect the empire’s southern flank from the Poles and Crimean Tatars. In return for their service the Cossacks and smallholders were granted land – not, like the peasants, on terms of community ownership without right of sale or inheritance, but land which was both private property and inheritable – like the land granted to noblemen, only without peasant serfs.

The fast-growing settlements were populated with a mixture of Russians and Ukrainians. The smallholders and especially the Cossacks on the southern flank who were risking their lives defending the Russian fatherland felt a keen pride and awareness of their self-worth, as well as a spirit of freedom. Attempts by the state to infringe upon their rights, to turn them into peasant wards of the state, fostered a mood of opposition on the part of these social classes and prepared the soil for reception to a teaching which elevated people’s sense of self-worth, proclaimed universal equality and denied the need for authority and an external church.

Another fertile ground for adoption of Doukhobor teachings was to be found among the Don Cossacks, especially since their territory bordered on Sloboda-Ukraine. Another border territory was Novorossiya (“New Russia”), which at the beginning of the eighteenth century witnessed an influx of Ukrainian and Russian smallholders. In the 1780s, this group gave rise to the Ekaterinoslav Cossacks. History shows that the growth of religious pluralism in any given territory is determined by the intensity of missionary activity, the socio-psychological makeup of the population affected – i.e., its readiness to assimilate new teachings – and the particular characteristics of individual preachers.

Russian smallholders who had settled in the south and adopted the Doukhobor teachings also brought the new doctrine with them when they visited their former places of residence. There is no doubt that Doukhobor teachers from Sloboda-Ukraine were carrying on missionary activity in neighbouring territories at the beginning of the eighteenth century.

The question naturally arises as to how Doukhoborism became so strongly rooted in the Tambov and Voronezh areas. At the beginning of the eighteenth century these areas were flooded with a great many Ukrainians (or Cherkassians, as they were called), who could have been not only carriers but also preachers of the new teachings. According to a number of accounts, Doukhoborism was introduced to Russian villages by Ukrainians who had come in search of work.

In addition, in the second half of the eighteenth century, the population of Tambov Province included a great many smallholders who were characterized, as mentioned above, by a special social status and psychological makeup. Doukhoborism flourished almost exclusively among the free classes. Later, during the second half of Catherine the Greats reign, several settlements of state and noblemen’s peasants in the Tambov and Voronezh Provinces (where Doukhobors were also living) were handed over to their residents as private property. Hence the number of serfs among the Doukhobors was extremely limited.

As far as Doukhobors in other territories are concerned – places where they were discovered to have resided at the end of the eighteenth and beginning of the nineteenth centuries (e.g., Astrakhan, Tauride and Caucasus Provinces) – the majority of these were migrants from Sloboda-Ukraine, Novorossiya or Tambov Province. The Penza Doukhobors lived in territories formerly belonging to or adjoining Tambov Province. The Belgorod district of Kursk Province, where Doukhobors were found residing at the end of the eighteenth century, bordered on Sloboda-Ukraine. Doukhobors were exiled and served forced-labour terms in Arkhangelsk and Ekaterinburg Provinces, as well as in the Baltic Sea region, but this does not mean the sect actually grew there. The Doukhobors were actually rooted in an extremely limited geographical area, attracting far fewer numbers (because of the radicalness of their teachings) than, for example, the Molokans or Khlysts.

Active missionary campaigns on the part of Doukhobor preachers began in the 1730s and 1740s. It has been said that Doukhobor proselytizing in the village of Okhochee in Sloboda-Ukraine in the 1740s was led by an unknown foreigner, a retired non-commissioned officer. There are indirect indications that at this time Doukhoborism, probably including some established organization, was already prevalent in the Voronezh area. There is documentary evidence showing that Doukhobors were living in the Tambov district of the Voronezh area in 1762, and that the Doukhoborism prevalent there in the 1760s and 1770s had the status of an actual sect rather than simply an amorphous religious persuasion.

According to F.V. Livanov, who had access to archives that have since been lost, in 1733 there appeared at the home of Illarion Pobirokhin, who lived in the Tambov village of Goreloye, a Pole named Semen (or, in other sources, a “Polish Jew”). The word Pole, however, could refer to a Russian who had fled to or been imprisoned in Poland or Lithuania; it could also refer to a Ukrainian from western Ukraine, which at that time was under Polish domination. Of course, he might have been a real Pole or a Polish (or Ukrainian) Jew.

Apparently he was an itinerant preacher who had converted the then young Pobirokhin to his faith, and the two preached for some time together in the Tambov district. The argument that Pobirokhin was not the first Doukhobor leader, but had received the teaching already formulated, is supported by a legend recalled by elderly Doukhobors about Pobirokhin receiving all the teaching and wisdom from his saintly father, who had in turn received it from sources unknown.

Is it not possible that this Pole who preached in the Tambov area and the retired officer from Okhochee in Sloboda-Ukraine might be one and the same person? Both were foreigners and preached at roughly the same time.

And this brings to mind the Doukhobor legend of one of their early leaders named Edom. The name is not included in the Doukhobor psalm about their “righteous progenitors” – i.e., their leaders – but it does figure in other psalms, for example, in those declaring that Doukhobors adopted “marriage – holy, mysterious and divine – from Edom, his holy soul”. Edom is a variant of the Biblical name Esau – i.e., the son of Isaac the patriarch, whom the Doukhobors revere as wise, holy and immortal. This legend and its inclusion in the psalms may be seen as confirming the account of the Polish Jew who taught truths to the Doukhobors in the village of Goreloye.

Another Doukhobor legend says that Illarion Pobirokhin spent his youth in Kiev, where he built an Orthodox cathedral. It is possible that the young Illarion might have been in Kiev, and might have travelled through the villages of Sloboda-Ukraine where he could have become acquainted with the Doukhobor teachings, along with the preacher (Edom) with whom he would later appear in Tambov and eventually replace.

It is known that in 1765 the Tambov Doukhobors were paying special homage to Pobirokhin. Interestingly enough, Pobirokhin was never registered as a resident of Goreloye; he lived there illegally. After 1765 we lose track of him, and his name is not mentioned in a single court case. Apparently he moved away from Goreloye to some other place, probably to Ekaterinoslav Province, where the centre of the Doukhobor faith also moved to in the 1770s – specifically, to the village of Bogdanovka.

There seems to be no reason to consider Siluan Kolesnikov, mentioned in the “Note of 1791”, a “Doukhobor Christ” as Pobirokhin was held to be, and Edom before him. Kolesnikov was simply an ordinary Doukhobor preacher. Following Pobirokhin there appeared a new leader – Savely Kapustin, who is often referred to as Pobirokhin’s son, though most likely a “spiritual son”. There is reason to believe that Edom, Pobirokhin and Kapustin were all generally recognized Doukhobor leaders, whose collective activity spanned the whole of the 18th century.

The level of organization of the Doukhobor sect in the 1760s and 1770s is indeed amazing: passport control, poor roads and a lack of means of communication notwithstanding, the Doukhobors of various regions knew where their fellow sect members lived; they had common financial resources which they could use to bribe their members’ way out of prison and afford them monetary assistance; as in secret conspiratorial societies they had passwords and degrees of admission into secret circles. Unlike the Molokans, the Doukhobors had no dissidents. All of which testifies to the unusually strong sacred authority of the leader.

The questions surrounding the early period of Doukhobor history are far from being exhausted. If we delve into other periods of their history there is no doubt that we shall find a similarly vast area ripe for scientific research. Unfortunately, Doukhobor history has not only been poorly studied, but it has been largely mythologized, and we shall be still breaking down myths and filling in the gaps well into the twenty-first century.

Dr. Svetlana A. Inikova is a senior researcher at the Institute of Ethnography and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow.  Considered one of the world’s foremost authorities on the Doukhobors, Svetlana has conducted extensive archival research and has participated in several major ethnographic expeditions, including field research among the Doukhobors of Georgia and Azerbaijan in the late 1980’s and 1990’s and a North American ethnographic expedition on the Doukhobors in 1990.  She has published numerous articles on the Doukhobors in Russian and English and is the author of History of the Doukhobors in V.D. Bonch-Bruevich’s Archives (1886-1950s): An Annotated Bibliography (Ottawa: Legas and Spirit Wrestlers, 1999) and Doukhobor Incantations Through the Centuries (Ottawa: Legas and Spirit Wrestlers, 1999).

To order copies of the book in which this article was originally published, The Doukhobor Centenary in Canada, A Multi-Disciplinary Perspective on their Unity and Diversity, contact: Penumbra Press, Box 940, Manotick, Ontario, K4M 1A8, Tel: (613) 692-5590, Web: http://www.penumbrapress.ca.

For more online articles about the Doukhobors by Svetlana A. Inikova, see Doukhobor Holidays and Rituals in the Caucasus as well as Leo Tolstoy’s Teachings and the Sons of Freedom in Canada.

The Dukhobortsy, 1822-1828

by Daniel Schlatter

Daniel Schlatter (1791-1870) was a Swiss missionary who lived among the Nogay Tatars on the Molochnaya River in South Russia between 1822 and 1828. During that time, he had opportunity to study and observe their neighbours, the Dukhobortsy. Schlatter was sharply critical of the Dukhobortsy, whom he viewed as materially prosperous but in spiritual decline and discord. He maintained a journal and recorded his impressions, which he later published in Swiss German in “Bruchstücke aus einigen Reisen nach dem südlichen Russland in den Jahren 1822 bis 1828: Mit besonderer Rücksicht auf die Nogaÿen” (Huber, 1836). Available for the first time in this exclusive English translation, Schlatter’s account provides a rare, penetrating glimpse into this little-known period of Doukhobor history. Translated by Gunter Schaarschmidt for the Doukhobor Genealogy Website. Afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

Other neighbours of the Nogay Tartars are the Dukhobortsy whose self-identifying name means “Spiritual Ones; those born [sic] from the Spirit”. They are a sect that split from the Russian-Greek [Orthodox] Church and its members now reside in large and pretty villages on the right bank of the Molochna [Molochnaya] and of Lake Molochna. They are people who were no longer satisfied with the ritual and ceremonial practices of the Church and who believed they had sought and found something better. Especially by reading the Holy Scriptures (which had been spread in Russian by Bible societies that arose all over the Empire), they had been awakened out of their slumber and led to contemplating. A large part of them had been scattered all over the Empire even before the spread of the Bible.

A significant number of people, of both sexes, from various Russian provinces, in particular also from Finland and from the more enlightened Don Cossacks, separated from the great Mother Church. Neither forced exile nor imprisonment deterred them. As usual, resistance increased their zeal and the dissemination of new teachings and principles. Since all efforts to make them return to the Church failed, the authorities granted them freedom and allotted them landed property on the Sea of Azov. However, a few of them had to leave behind wives and children in the retention of the great Church. The reasons for the split [from Orthodoxy] as well as the religious beliefs among the dissenters were understandably not very uniform.

A mass of people who descended from various regions of the wide Russian Empire and differed in customs, practices and character, could not stay united. The character and views of the Cossacks in particular did not agree with those of the remaining resettled groups [of Dukhobortsy on the Molochnaya]. What kind of partial or religious motives may have caused a split [among themselves]?

Yet at the time of the foundation of this colony there certainly were truly enlightened or, even if labouring under a delusion, upright and well thinking people who were striving to worship God in spirit and in truth instead of in lifeless hypocrisy and formalism. However, gradually these [people] passed away; the spirit was extinguished and people got benumbed – and what started in the spirit ended in the flesh.

They rejected almost all outward means for [spiritual] revival and edification; they completely lacked religious instruction for youth; they relegated God’s written word – all this soon led to a great decline, disorder, irreligiosity, and even indifference to religion.

Many began to want to return to the Greek Church, or, separating again, hope to form a new sect. Many families returned to the Mother Church and left the colony either because they desired a physical worshipping of God or due to pecuniary advantage because the Government imposed severe punishment in order to maintain at least an external order. Yet others formed their own sect named Molokans and received new landed properties in the middle of the regions of the Nogay Tartars.

The Dukhobortsy are for the most part handsome, physically well-shaped people. They dress well and are industrious and capable farmers. Their villages give evidence of wealth. They engage a lot in cattle-raising and agriculture. A large part of them, however, indulge in envy, quarrels, indecency and all sorts of sensual pleasures. At the same time they consider themselves to be spiritual, to be sons of God, and to be God themselves.

If you ask them about their belief system, they give evasive or shrewd answers. And how could they account for their belief system since they do not know what to believe, are in disagreement among themselves, and, to be sure, may of them do not believe in anything at all. They have not accepted a proper Symbolum (creed).

Germans who served under them as farm-hands and others who have business dealings with them, say that the Dukhobortsy have meetings every now and then in which they sing psalms. It is also reported that they live in partial abstinence and that they still have many adherents in the interior of Russia and especially in the Caucasus. In addition, they are reported to have no proper teachers but recognize a supreme leader. Few of them are reported to keep Bibles, and if so, then in secret. Finally, a small better group is afraid of the larger group which exerts a lot of pressure on the former. Visiting English and American Quakers who were hoping to find similarities with their own principles among the Dukhobortsy already many years ago, were painfully disappointed in their expectations. 

View Tavria Doukhobor Villages, 1802-1845 in a larger map

Afterword

Daniel Schlatter (1791-1870) was raised in St. Gallens, Switzerland, where he gained a sophisticated education and a deep immersion in Pietist religious belief, which emphasized personal faith and salvation through piety, Bible study and prayer rather than church doctrine and theology. He was also strongly influenced by ecumenical religious belief, which promoted unity within and among different Christian churches and groups, as well as by physiognomic ideas that people could be physically and morally transformed through education.

From his earliest years, Schlatter was gripped by a passion for travel and adventure coupled with a fervent desire to perform missionary work among non-Christian peoples, and in doing so, influence and benefit them religiously and economically. To this end, at age 29, Schlatter set out for South Russia in 1822 to promote Christianity among the Nogay Tatars.

Schlatter arrived in the Molochnaya River region in Autumn 1822. He found himself a position as a servant in a Nogay Tatar home, shed his western clothing in favour of Nogay robes, and pursued the religious enlightenment of his host. He also became a frequent visitor of the home of Johann Cornies, leader of the Mennonites settled on the upper left bank of the river, with whom he formed a close friendship and enjoyed a lengthy discourse on Christianity. Schlatter spent much of the next six years on the Molochnaya, departing briefly to Switzerland in 1823 and England in 1827, before making his final departure in June 1828.

During his time on the Molochnaya, Schlatter came to observe and study the neighbouring Dukhobortsy living in nine villages on the right bank of the river. He obtained his information about them in part from his Nogay hosts, in part from the Mennonite Johann Cornies, from German labourers in the employ of the Dukhobortsy, and partially from the Dukhobortsy themselves.

Schlatter wrote approvingly of the Dukhobortsy’s industry and capability in agriculture and animal husbandry. He admired their “large and pretty” villages which displayed “evidence of wealth” and abundance. Schlatter also noted that the Dukhobortsy were “handsome, physically well-shaped people”; observations that no doubt stemmed from his interest in physiognomy.

At the same time, Schlatter’s Pietist and ecumenical beliefs made him sharply critical of mainstream Dukhobortsy society, which in his view, suffered from “a great decline, disorder, irreligiosity, and even indifference to religion”.

From a Pietist perspective, Schlatter was strongly sympathetic to the early founders of the Dukhobortsy colony, “upright and well-thinking” people who had been spiritually “awakened out of their slumber”, and were dissatisfied with the “lifeless hypocrisy and formalism” of Church ritual and ceremony. In Schlatter’s view, these “truly enlightened” people were “led to contemplating” and strove “to worship God in Spirit and in truth”. In doing so, they “believed they had sought and found something better”. However, with the passing of these early founders, the spirit of truth and enlightenment declined among the Dukhobortsy and was slowly extinguished. In Schlatter’s opinion, while the Dukhobortsy of the 1820’s “consider[ed] themselves to be spiritual”, they showed little evidence of the spiritual enlightenment of their founders.

Equally disconcerting for Schlatter, from an ecumenical point of view, was the lack of unity among the Dukhobortsy regarding their belief system. Disagreement over religious creed had led some members of the sect to leave the colony and return to the Orthodox Church, while others joined the rival Molokan sect situated on the lower left bank of the Molochnaya River. Those remaining in the colony could not, in Schlatter’s estimation, properly account for their creed “since they do not know what to believe”. This stemmed from the fact that the Dukhobortsy had been resettled on the Molochnaya “from various regions of the wide Russian Empire” and differed in their “customs, practices and character”. Their reasons for joining the sect were also varied. Thus, the religious beliefs of the dissenters were, from Schlatter’s viewpoint, “understandably not very uniform”.

For Schlatter, the roots of the spiritual decline and discord among the Dukhobortsy lay in the absence of religious education; sentiments derived from his physiognomic beliefs. He censured the sectarians for having “no proper teachers” among them and for completely lacking “religious instruction for youth”. He was disturbed by the lack of scriptural study and noted that “few are reported to have Bibles, and if so, then in secret.” In the same vein, he disapproved of their rejection of “almost all outward means” of spiritual revival and edification.

If Schlatter was a harsh critic of the Dukhobortsy, he reported much the same of the Mennonites he encountered on the Molochnaya, writing that their faith was “superficial”, formalistic, and showed little evidence of “true belief”. His comments must therefore be taken at face value, in the context of his particularly aggressive Pietist evangelical religious beliefs.

Schlatter recorded his observations during a period of rapid and profound transition within the Dukhobortsy colony. Prior to 1820, under the able leadership of Savely Kapustin, the colony was organized on a communal basis, was well administered and reasonably united, and relations with Tsarist authorities were cordial. The period following Kapustin’s death in 1820, by contrast, was marked by the abandonment of communal institutions, weak and ineffectual leadership, the decay of internal administration, disunity within the sect and a deterioration of relations with Tsarist authorities.  Schlatter’s writings reflect these changes, and are among the very few sources of published information for this little-known and little-explored period of Doukhobor history.  Therefore, Schlatter’s work is a valuable contribution to our understanding of the period.

To read more, search, download, save and print a full PDF copy of the original Swiss German text of “Bruchstücke aus einigen Reisen nach dem südlichen Russland in den Jahren 1822 bis 1828: Mit besonderer Rücksicht auf die Nogaÿen” by Daniel Schlatter (Huber, 1836), visit the Google Book Search digital database.

Quaker Visit to the Dukhobortsy, 1819

Passages by William Allen and Stephen Grellet

In 1819, two Quaker missionaries visiting Russia, William Allen and Stephen Grellet, at the suggestion of Tsar Alexander I, travelled to the Dukhobortsy living on the Molochnaya River. Both kept journals and recorded their impressions. The following accounts are reproduced from Grellet’s “Memoirs of the Life and Gospel Labours of Stephen Grellet” (Longstreth, Philadelphia, 1862) and Allen’s “Life of William Allen” (Longstreth, Philadelphia, 1847). Together they are the earliest surviving descriptions by western observers of Doukhobor religious practices.  They also reveal the Quaker missionaries’ distress at the deep doctrinal differences they encountered with their Doukhobor hosts.  Foreword and afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff. 

Foreword

In 1818, two members of the Society of Friends, English philanthropist William Allen (1770-1843) and French-born American evangelist Stephen Grellet (1773-1855) embarked on an extensive missionary tour of Europe designed to establish a network of correspondents “who have at heart the promotion of real vital religion…”.  They visited most countries and were respectfully granted meetings with many rulers and dignitaries with whom they discussed their Quaker beliefs.

In November of 1818 Allen and Grellet arrived in St. Petersburg, Russia where they met with prominent members of the Russian nobility.  In February of 1819, they had an audience with Tsar Alexander I whom they first met in London in 1814, at which time he showed a great interest in the Quaker faith.  The Tsar warmly recalled their previous meeting “saying that this meeting provided for him cheer and firmness of spirit…”  When the Quakers informed Alexander of their intention to tour parts of the Russian Empire, the Tsar observed that they “should be pleased with some of the people (i.e. sectarians) in the South….”

Allen and Grellet travelled to southern Russia in the spring of 1819.  In Tavria province, the Quakers first visited the Mennonite village of Altona.  From there, on May 29 and 30, 1819, they journeyed about five versts (an Imperial Russian unit of measure equal to 1.0668 km) to the Doukhobor village of Terpeniye, accompanied by German-born Superintendent of the Tavria Colonies, Samuel Contenius (1749-1830) and their Mennonite host.  In Terpeniye, the visitors were conducted to the Sirotsky Dom (Orphan’s Home) where they met with a group of several Doukhobors.  They recorded the following accounts of their visit.

William Allen’s Account

In the evening, Contenius and our host accompanied us a distance of about five versts to Terpeniye, a village where there is a settlement of one of the sects of the Dukhobortsy.  We crossed the Molochnaya river, and on our arrival, were conducted to the house where they are in the practice of meeting on public occasions, and where we found several of the fraternity.  They were well dressed according to the custom of the country, but there was something in their countenances which I did not quite like.

William Allen (1770-1843)

We had some conversation through Contenius, and informed them that we had heard in England of the persecution they had endured, and also of the humane interposition of the Emperor, on their behalf, – that while we had felt sympathy with them in their sufferings, we wished to know from themselves what were their religious principles.  It soon appeared, however, that they have no fixed principles; there was a studied evasion in their answers, and though they readily quoted texts, it is plain they do not acknowledge the authority of scripture, and have some very erroneous notions.  I was anxious to ascertain their belief respecting our Saviour, but could learn nothing satisfactory.

Stephen endeavoured, through Contenius, to convince them of their errors on some points, but they appear in a very dark state; they have driven out from among them, all those persons called Dukhobortsy, who receive scriptural truth, and who are of the class with whom we were so much pleased at Ekaterinoslav.  My spirit was greatly affected, and I came away from them much depressed.

The following morning (First-day) was also spent with the Dukhobortsy; a considerable number attended what they called their worship, but some of their ceremonies were painful to witness.  They manifested great ignorance on the subject of religion, and the interview did not prove more satisfactory than that on the preceding day.  An opportunity was however afforded for some gospel labour among them.

Stephen Grellet’s Account

29th of Fifth month. This afternoon we went to the principal village of the Dukhobortsy; they inhabit several others near. We went to the abode of the chief man among them. He is ninety years old, nearly blind, but very active in body and mind. He appears to be a robust, strong man. Fourteen others of their elders or chief men were with him. We had a long conference with them. He was the chief speaker. We found him very evasive in several of his answers to our inquiries.

They however stated unequivocally, that they do not believe in the authority of the Scriptures. They look upon Jesus Christ in no other light than that of a good man. They therefore have no confidence in him as a Saviour from sin. They say that they believe that there is a spirit in man, to teach and lead him in the right way, and in support of this they were fluent in the quotation of Scripture texts, which they teach to their children; but they will not allow any of their people to have a Bible among them.

We inquired about their mode of worship. They said they met together to sing some of the Psalms of David. Respecting their manner of solemnizing their marriages, they declined giving an answer; but a very favourite reply to some of our questions, was, “the letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life.” We found however that they have no stated times for their meetings for worship; but that tomorrow, which is First-day, they intend to have one, and this, they said we might attend, and see for ourselves. We left them with heavy hearts and returned to Altona.

Stephen Grellet (1773-1855)

First-day, 30th. I had a sleepless night; my mind being under great weight of exercise for the Dukhobortsy. I felt much for these people, thus darkened by their leaders, and I did not apprehend that I should stand acquitted in the Divine sight, without seeking for an opportunity to expostulate with them, and to proclaim that salvation which comes by Jesus Christ. It appeared best to go back to their village, and see what opportunity the Lord would open for it, after their meeting, whilst they are all congregated. My dear Allen and Contenius felt very tenderly with me on the occasion. We rode again to their village in the morning; having previously appointed a meeting here among the Mennonites to be held in the afternoon.

The Dukhobortsy collected, at about ten o’clock, on a spacious spot of ground out of doors; they all stood, forming a large circle; all the men on the left hand of the old man, and the women on his right; the children of both sexes formed the opposite side of the circle; they were all cleanly dressed; an old woman was next to the old man: she began by singing what they call a Psalm; the other women joined in it; then the man next the old man, taking him by the hand, stepped in front of him, each bowed down very low to one another three times and then twice to the women, who returned the salute; that man resuming his place, the one next to him performed the same ceremony to the old man, and to the women; then, by turns, all the others, even the boys, came and kissed three times the one in the circle above him, instead of bowing. When the men and boys had accomplished this, the women did the same to each other; then the girls; the singing continuing the whole time.

It took them nearly an hour to perform this round of bowing and kissing; then the old woman, in a fluent manner, uttered what they called a prayer, and their worship concluded; but no seriousness appeared over them at any time.

O how was my soul bowed before the Lord, earnestly craving that he would touch their hearts by his power and love! I felt also much towards the young people. I embraced the opportunity to preach the Lord Jesus Christ, and that salvation which is through faith in him; “If ye believe not that I am He, (the Christ the Son of God,) ye shall die in your sins.” I entreated them to try what manner of spirit they are of; for many spirits are gone out into the world; and “hereby know we the Spirit of God; every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh, is not of God; but this is that spirit of Antichrist,” &c.

Whilst I was speaking, the old men appeared restless; they invited me several times to retire to the house, but I could not do so till I had endeavoured to relieve my mind of the great concern I felt for them; many of the people were very attentive, and the Truth appeared to reach their hearts. We then went into the house with the old men; they had a few things to say, but not to any more satisfaction than yesterday. We left them with heavy hearts, and returned to Altona.

Afterword

Allen and Grellet arrived in the village of Terpeniye the evening of May 29, 1819. A religious colloquy took place between the Quakers and the Doukhobors, during which the latter were asked to expound on their religious principles. The colloquy, which at times became more of a dispute, touched on the authority of Scripture, divinity of Christ, Doukhobor worship services and marriage rites. Allen and Grellet then returned to Altona for the night. They returned the following morning of May 30, 1819 and attended a moleniye (prayer service) which they dutifully described. The Quakers then attempted some “gospel labour” but the Doukhobors proved unresponsive to the missionaries’ entreaties. Allen and Grellet again returned to Altona “with heavy hearts”.

Remarkably, the names of the Doukhobors whom Allen and Grellet met with and held religious debate have been preserved in historical records. In Orest Markovich Novitsky’s classic work, Dukhobortsy: ikh istoriia i verouchenie (Kiev: Universitetskaia tip., 1882), widely regarded as the most substantial and comprehensive treatment of Doukhobor history in the nineteenth century, it is recorded that the Quakers met with those Doukhobors held to be the “main teachers” and “mentors” in their colony.  Their names are recorded by Novitsky as follows: from Terpeniye – Vasily Kalmykov, the son of Kapustin, Aleksander Krylov, Matvey Kuchaev, Grigory Malen’kov, Kirill Kolesnikov, Ivan Barbin, Fatei Zhikharev, Sergei Sukharev, Grigory Remez, Nikolai Zakharov and Stepan Tikhonov; from Goreloye – Abrosim Tomilin, Gavriil Sorokin, Ivan Ostryakov, Trofim Kalmykov and Ivlii Kudrin; from Orekhov (or Rodionovka) – Semeyon Perepelkin and his son Ivan; from Bogdanovka -Yakov Peregudov; from Kirilovka – Timofei Khudyakov and his son Ivlii, and Ivan Ishchenkov; from Troitskoye – Mikhail Bezlepkin, Mikhail Stroev; and in Spasskoye – Abram Samoylov. According to Novitsky, the discussion between the Quakers and Doukhobors was dominated by Grigory Malen’kov and Grigory Remez, who willingly joined in the religious debate, which lasted as much as half a day, and whose responses to the Quakers’ questions “did honour to the most clever sophist”.  The revered Doukhobor leader Savely Kapustin was not himself present at the debate, as he was then in hiding from Tsarist authorities. 

In any case, the visit proved to be deeply disappointing for Allen and Grellet. They found the Doukhobors to be “very evasive” in several of their replies to their inquiries. What the Quakers did not take sufficiently into account, however, was the intensity of persecution that had made the Doukhobors evolve evasion as a means of dealing with the authorities or with passing strangers. On some points, however, the Doukhobors made no attempt to conceal their religious views. They “stated unequivocally” that they denied the divine authority of the Scriptures and looked upon Christ in no other light than as a good man; views which scandalized the evangelical-based Quakers. Moreover, the Quakers, whose own worship services were characterized by strict silence and solemnity, were prudishly upset by the lack of “seriousness” they observed at the Doukhobor moleniye and by the rounds of bowing and kissing which they found “painful to watch”. Overall, the Quakers’ disapproval of the Doukhobor variety of folk Christianity implies a certain intolerance and insensitivity, tinged with religious bigotry.

View Tavria Doukhobor Villages, 1802-1845 in a larger map

The Quakers did not return to Terpeniye, but they encountered groups of Doukhobors elsewhere. On May 24, 1819 in the city of Simferopol, Allen and Grellet met with “five or six of the people called Dukhobortsy”. This group, the Quakers decided, was “of the right sort” because they “prized” the Scriptures. Similarly, on June 10, 1819 in the town of Nikolaev the Quaker pair “met a number of the Dukhobortsy”. This group had read the Scriptures and had “seen the gross errors under which they had been.” The Quakers concluded, however, that “their eyes [were] only partially opened…”. The Nikolaev Doukhobors told Grellet that “several” of the Molochnaya Doukhobors desired to read the Scriptures and that “they [the Molochnaya group] think that they see farther than their old men and elders.” Unlike the Molochnaya Doukhobors, who under the magnetic influence of their leader Savely Kapustin (1843-1819) had rejected the divine authority of the Scriptures, these groups still maintained the earlier Doukhobor tendency to follow the Bible as well as their Living Book. Moreover, in Nikolaev, the Quakers also encountered a group of Molokans who “were originally Dukhobortsy…”. These individuals told Allen that “many” of the Molochnaya Doukhobors “read the Scriptures privately, and teach their children to read them.”

The visit of Allen and Grellet to the Molochnaya, while painfully depressing for the Quakers, was to become for the Doukhobors a fondly memorable event. Eighty years later, during the voyage to their new Canadian home in 1899, a group of Doukhobors gathered in the cabin of a steamship and spoke warmly with appreciation of the Allen and Grellet visit to Joseph Elkinton, an American Quaker assisting in their migration to Canada. Interestingly, the Doukhobors told of a prophecy, purportedly from Grellet, which foretold of their persecution, exile and final deliverance to a foreign country “among a people of a different language.” There, the prophecy continued, the Doukhobors would prosper and be visited by members of the Quaker brotherhood. While the prophecy is no doubt apocryphal, it demonstrates the spiritual significance which the Allen and Grellet visit acquired among Doukhobors over the years that followed.

To read more, search, download, save and print a full PDF copy of Memoirs of the Life and Gospel Labours of Stephen Grellet  by Stephen Grellet (Longstreth, Philadelphia, 1862) or Life of William Allen by William Allen (Longstreth, Philadelphia, 1847) visit the Google Book Search database.

Several Characteristics of Doukhobor Society, 1805

p>Translated by Robert Pinkerton

In 1805, a “gentleman of the highest respectability” in St. Petersburg, Russia composed a tract entitled “Nekotorye cherty ob obshchestve Dukhobortsev” [“Several Characteristics of Doukhobor Society”]. It was a sympathetic exposition of the religious and social teachings of the Dukhobortsy. Ten years later, the tract was published as an appendix to Robert Pinkerton’s translation of “The Present State of the Greek Church in Russia” by Metropolitan Platon of Moscow (New York: Collins and Col, 1815). Reproduced below, it contains the earliest systematic account of Doukhobor religious doctrine and provides invaluable historic insights into the belief system of our Doukhobor ancestors. Editorial comments and afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

From among the common peasants, who are in general not only illiterate, but strongly attached to the external ceremonies of religion, there sprung up all at once a sect, in the middle of the last century, that not only threw aside all the ceremonies and rites of the Greek church, but who also rejected baptism and the Lord’s supper.

A sect of this description could not long remain unnoticed, or be secure from molestation, both by their neighbours and by government, especially as both were unacquainted with their principles. Accordingly, they suffered from all quarters continual persecution, being constantly exposed to reproach, and not infrequently to imprisonment. In their intercourse with their neighbours, they endured the most abusive language, and other insults; and all were ready to construe every action of their lives in such a way, as to point them out the disturbers of the public peace, and as the offscouring of society.

The higher departments of government judged of them according to the reports of the lower departments; and hence many of them were sent into exile, as if they had been the worst of criminals. In this manner the persecution of the Dukhobortsy continued, with few intermissions, until the reign of the humane and peaceable Alexander I.

Robert Pinkerton (1780-1859), agent of the British and Foreign Bible Society in Russia who translated  the 1805 tract.

In 1801, the senators Lopukhin and Neledinsky, being sent to review the state of affairs in the government of the Ukraine (Sloboda-Ukraine province, Russia – ed.), were the first who represented these people to the emperor in a true light. According to their representations, his Majesty granted the scattered Dukhobortsy permission to remove from the governments of Ukraine and Malorus (“Little Russia”, the Ukrainian provinces of Russia – ed.) and to settle at a place called Molochnye Vody, in the government of Tavria. Here the Dukhobortsy formed two settlements in 1804, and their brethren from the governments of Voronezh and Tavria were also permitted to settle along with them.

The name Dukhobortsy was already given to this sect in 1788, probably by the then-Archbishop of Ekaterinoslav Amvrossi, who, by this designation, no doubt intended to point out the heresy contained in their doctrines; for Dukhoborets literally signifies a wrestler with the spirit. Formerly they were called by government Ikonobortsy, on account of their rejecting, with other things, the use of pictures (ikons – ed.) in their worship. But the Dukhobortsy call themselves Christians, and all other people they denominate men of the world.

The origin of this sect is altogether unknown to its present members; for they are in general illiterate, and they possess no written history of the founders of their sect. Their traditionary story affirms, that they are the descendants of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abedriego, who suffered for not falling down to worship the golden image of Nebuchadnezzar. No doubt they intend to intimate by this, that they not only suffer, but are willing to suffer, rather than worship the ikons, or observe the external rites and ceremonies of the Greek church.

The Dukhobortsy, till of late, had been very much scattered in different parts of the empire; seldom could as many of them be found in one place as to form a separate village. But, exclusive of those in the southern provinces above-mentioned, they are dispersed throughout the governments of Caucasus, the Don Cossacks, and Arkhangel’ in Lapland, and even in Irkutsk, and Kamchatka.

They say also that there are many of their members in Germany and Turkey; but that they are more persecuted in Germany than even among the Mohammedans.

The communication which they have with each other is only occasional; as when any of their number travels into distant provinces on business; however, when affairs of importance happen among them, they send some of their members expressly to give information.

Excepting their principles of faith, the Dukhobortsy, in their domestic and social life, may serve as examples to all other sects. In 1792, the governor of Ekaterinoslav, Kokhovsky, in his reports to the general procurator, Vesemskoy, at that time represents the Dukhobortsy as leading most exemplary lives; being sober and industrious, diligent in their occupations, and of good and gentle dispositions. The taxes, and other public obligations, they pay and perform punctually, and in this respect were always before their neighbour peasants; otherwise the agents of government in the villages were ever ready to catch an occasion to harass them. Laziness and drunkenness are vices not suffered among them; so that those who are infected with such sins are excluded from their society.

As soon as we approach, however, and take a view of their creed, we at once see the contrast between it and that of their surrounding neighbours. The Dukhobortsy never enter the national churches, or bow before the pictures in time of prayer; they do not cross themselves, or observe the appointed fasts; they take no part in the joys and corrupt deeds of the men of the world. These are causes sufficient to separate them for ever from the company of the other peasants, and to expose them to continual persecution.

The Dukhobortsy affirm that every external rite, in regard to salvation, is of no avail whatever, and that the outward church, in consequence of her corruption, is now become a den of thieves. On this account, they confess that alone to be the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church, which the Lord gathered by his appearance, which he enlightens, and adorns, by the gifts of the Holy Ghost, and which on this account is the company of the faithful, or of true believers, in all ages.

In this persuasion they frequently have meetings among themselves, but have no stated place appointed for this purpose, as they account every place alike holy; hence these meetings are held in the first convenient place they can find. Neither do they appoint any particular days for this purpose, accounting all days alike. They have, therefore, no holidays, but their meetings are frequently held on the holidays appointed by the church, when other people are not engaged in labour; for if they were to work on the holidays of their neighbours, they say, they should subject themselves to double persecution, and might be represented as disobedient to the laws of the empire.

Each of them is at liberty to hold a meeting in his own house, and to invite such of his brethren as are near him to attend. In such meetings, they always sup together; and should the brother in whose house the meeting is held not be able to provide food sufficient to entertain his guests, in that case they either send themselves, before hand, provisions for this purpose, or bring them along with them.

Being assembled, they salute one another; the men salute the men, and the females the females, by taking each other by the right hand, and thrice bowing and kissing one another; at the same time every one pronounces a short prayer. These three bows and three embraces, they perform in the name of the three one (tripartite – ed.) God, to the purifying of the flesh, and to the rooting out of pride. They take each other by the hand as a mark of their union in love, in calling, in knowledge of judgment, and of the unseen God, who is within them.

In the course of the meeting, they pray one after another, sing psalms, and explain the word of God; but as the greater part of them are unable to read, most of this is performed in their assemblies extemporaneously. They have no appointed priests, but confess Jesus Christ alone to be the only just, holy, pure, undefiled priest, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens; he also is their only Teacher. In their assemblies they instruct each other from the Scriptures; every one speaks according to the grace given him, to the admonishing and comforting of his brethren. Even women are not excluded from this privilege; for they say, “Have not women enlightened understandings as well as men?” They pray standing or sitting, just as it happens. At the end of the meeting they again embrace each other thrice, as at the beginning, and then separate.

What has been said above of their time and place of meeting, regards in particular those Dukhobortsy who are scattered among the villages of the peasants (Orthodox – ed.); but those that are settled at the Molochnye Vody have their meetings in the open air when the weather permits, in two circles, the one of men, and the other of women.

The virtue which shines with greatest lustre among the Dukhobortsy is brotherly love. They have no particular private property, all things are common. After their settling at the Molochnye Vody, they were enabled to put this in practice without any hindrance; for they laid all their private property together, so that now they have one general purse, one general flock, and in their two villages two common magazines for corn, out of which every brother takes according to his wants.

They are also hospitable to strangers, and entertain most of them at the expense of their society, having a house built for the express purpose of accommodating strangers. They are also praised for their compassion to such as are in distress; even the governors of the places where they live have borne testimony to the readiness with which the Dukhobortsy assist their neighbours in affliction. Solomon’s maxim is strictly observed among them, “A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast,” Proverbs xii. 10.

Their children are in the strictest subjection to their parents, and, in general, young people among them pay the most profound respect to the aged; though at the same time, their parents and elders do not assume any superior power, as it were, over them, accounting them equal in spirit with themselves.

They have no kind of punishments among them except expulsion from their society; and this takes place only for such transgressions, as prove the person evidently to have lost the spirit of Christianity, since, were such a one suffered to remain among them, he would become a stumbling block to the brethren. But as soon as any of them observes a brother guilty of a transgression, he reproves him for his fault, according to the spirit of the gospel. If this is not laid to heart, he is then admonished before two or more. Should he still remain impenitent, he is finally brought before the whole society; after which, in case of contumacy, he is excommunicated from their society.

Metropolitan Platon of Moscow (1737-1812), author of “The Present State…”. It is unlikely that he wrote the 1805 tract.

It sometimes happens, though seldom, that individuals leave their society without having done any thing to deprive them of its privileges, for no other reason but to have liberty to live as they please; and it has even happened that wives have left their husbands from the same cause. Such they do not restrain; but grant them liberty to depart if they will, and divide with them a share of their common property. But those who are excluded from their society, and also such as leave it, may again be admitted, if they give evidence of their repentance, and quit their sinful courses, of which there have been few instances.

Their occupations are regulated according to the knowledge of individuals among them. Hence, the merchant engages in merchandize, and the husbandman in agriculture. But as the greater part of them are husbandmen, so the cultivation of the ground is their chief employment; and in their estimation, this employment is more honourable than all others.

In their society they have no superior powers, such as magistrates to govern and command; but the society at large governs itself and each individual in it, and they have neither written laws, nor regulations of any kind. Judging according to the spirit of common people in general, it might be expected that the Dukhobortsy would be often troubled with divisions; this however, seldom happens; for at the Molochnye Vody, we find frequently two or three young families all living together in one house.

In respect to the government of their families, the weakness of the female sex, inexperience of youth, and education of children, naturally require the superintendence of age and experience, to preserve order. Hence it naturally follows, that in every family the father is the governor, who is bound to care for the wants of his family, to look after the conduct of his children, to correct their faults, and teach them the law of God. When the father dies, the eldest son succeeds him.

The manner of educating children among the Dukhobortsy is simple, and peculiar to themselves. As soon as a child begins to speak, the parents teach him to get by heart, short prayers and psalms, and relate to him such passages out of sacred history as are calculated to engage his attention. In this manner they continue to instruct their children, till they are of age, in the doctrines of the gospel. When the children have thus learned by heart several prayers and Psalms, they go along with others to their meetings, repeat their prayers, and sing Psalms with the rest. But the Dukhobortsy look upon it as the duty of every parent, not only to instruct his own children, hut also, when opportunity occurs, to teach those of his neighbour also, and to restrain them from folly and sin wherever he observes it.

In this way, the sentiments of the parents are, by little and little, formed in the minds of their children, and are rooted in their young minds by the exemplary conduct of their parents. Hence, it has been observed, that the children of the Dukhobortsy are distinguished among all other children, like stalks of wheat among oats.

1. The chief and distinguishing dogma of the Dukhobortsy is, the worshipping God in spirit and in truth; and hence they reject all external rites as not being necessary in the work of salvation.

2. They hold no particular creed, but only say, in regard to themselves, that they are of the law of God, and of the faith of Jesus. The symbol of faith of the Greek church or the Nicene creed they not only respect, but confess all that it contains to be truth; they merely, however, assign it a place among their common Psalms.

3. They confess one God in three persons (the Trinity – ed.) incomprehensible. They believe that in memory we resemble God the Father, in intelligence God the Son, and in will God the Holy Ghost. Also, that the first person is the Father of light, our God; the second person, the Son of life, our God; and the third person is holy rest, the Spirit of our God. The likeness of the three one God: the Father is height, the Son is breadth, the Holy Ghost is depth. These also they take in a moral sense. The Father is high, and none can comprehend him; the Son is broad in intelligence; and the Holy Ghost is deep, past searching out.

4. The conceptions they have of Christ are founded on the doctrines of the gospel; they confess his incarnation, his acts, doctrines, and sufferings; but in general, they take all this in a spiritual sense, and affirm that all that is said in the gospel must be perfected in us. Thus, Christ must be begotten in us, be born in us, grow up in us, teach in us, suffer in us, die in us, rise again from the dead in us, and ascend into heaven in us; and in these different acts they understand the process of regeneration, or of a man’s being born again. They say, that Jesus himself is, and was, the eternal and living gospel, and that he sent out his disciples to preach himself in the word; for he himself is the word, which is written only on the hearts of those who believe in him.

5. They believe that in God and in his Christ alone salvation is to be found; but that if a man does not call upon God out of a pure heart, even God himself cannot save him.

6. To the salvation of man, unfeigned faith in Christ is absolutely necessary; but faith without works being dead, so also works without faith are dead. True and living faith is a hearty reception of the gospel.

7. With respect to baptism, they say that they are baptized by the word, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, as Christ commanded his apostles, saying, “Go ye and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” That this baptism takes place when a man truly repents, and in the sincerity of his heart crieth unto God; then his sins are forgiven him, and his affections are no more set upon the world but upon God. This is the only baptism which they confess for the remission of sins.

Regeneration and spiritual baptism are, in their opinion, one and the same thing. The means of attaining regeneration are a living faith in God and prayer. The marks of the regenerated, or of one’s being baptized from above, are the works of the new man. However, this baptism they hold to have seven degrees: 1st, Baptism for the remission of sins. 2d, Anointing with ointment, that is, the understanding of ointment, or the knowledge of the ways of the Lord. 3d, The understanding the word of the Lord. 4th, The anointing with holy oil, or the unction of prayer. 5th, Spiritual confession. 6th, Spiritual communion. And 7th, the agony of blood, or humility. These seven degrees also signify their union with God. If any one has attained to an union with God, which they place in the seven degrees of spiritual baptism or regeneration, such a one lives in God, and by his spiritual eyes can behold the angels.

They look upon external baptism with water as of no use, and say that it only washes off the impurities of the body.

8. They believe that to every Christian are given two names, one by his parents when he is born, and another by his heavenly Father at his spiritual baptism, according to his works. This last name is unknown on earth, but shall be made known in heaven.

9. Those who confess their sins to their heavenly Father, who is infinitely good and merciful, shall receive the remission of their sins by means of faith and prayer. Those who sin against their brethren among the Dukhobortsy confess their faults before all, and beg forgiveness of those they have offended. They who are known to conceal their sins, are by them accounted great transgressors; if any one after a third admonition does not make confession, they exclude him from their society.

They severely condemn such as call themselves sinners, and who by their feigned confessions, seek after a sort of humility which is founded in pride, or who try by confessions, to excuse themselves; but are not careful to reform their lives. When a man falls, they say, he ought immediately to rise again, ask forgiveness of God with a contrite spirit, and resist with all his might temptations to a similar fall in future.

10. In regard to the Lord’s supper, they say, that they always communicate in the holy and life-giving, immortal and awful mysteries of Christ to the remission of sins, by spiritually and internally receiving into themselves the word of God which is Christ; and such communion, they say, penetrates the judgment of man, through bones and marrow. But the ordinance of communicating of the body and blood of Christ, under the symbols of bread and wine, they do not receive; for they say, that bread and wine enter the mouth, like our common food, and are of no advantage whatever to the soul.

Ivan Vladimirovich Lopukhin (1756-1816), the most likely author of the 1805 tract.

11. They place fasting, not in abstaining from food of any kind, but in abstinence from gluttony and other vices: in parity, in humility, and meekness of spirit. Abstinence from flesh, they say, is of no advantage to the soul.

12. They respect departed saints, but do not invoke them for help, saying, that in pleasing God they benefited themselves, and that we ought only to follow their example. This they call invoking their good works.

They do not, however, consider the actions of those who have pleased God to have been indiscriminately holy.

13. They do not hold marriage to be a sacrament. It is constituted among them simply by the mutual consent of the parties. And as there are no distinctions among the Dukhobortsy of family or rank, so the parents, in general, do not interfere in the marriages of their children. They have scarcely any sort of ceremony on such an occasion; a reciprocal consent, and promise before witnesses that the parties resolve to live together, is sufficient. Sometimes, however, this mutual consent is not made evident till the bride has become a mother. But whenever a man is known to have seduced a woman, he cannot refuse to make her his wife; otherwise he is excluded from their society. Oh the death of one of the parties, the other is at liberty to marry again, even a third time, which, however, seldom happens; for they say Christians ought to subdue their sensual desires.

14. They preserve the memory of their departed friends only by imitating their good deeds; for they neither pray for nor to them. They say, the Lord himself will remember them in his kingdom. But they do not style the departure of a brother out of this world death, but call it a change; and hence they do not say, our brother is dead, but our brother is changed.

They have no particular ceremonies at burial, nor do they mourn over the change of their friends. When the Dukhobortsy lived in persecution, they buried their dead in the common burying places; but since persecution has ceased against them, and they are known, they bury their dead in their own particular burying grounds.

15. They believe in the creation and fall of man, as stated in the Holy Scriptures, that is, that his body is taken from the earth, and that God breathed into him the breath of life. That before his fall his soul was pure and holy, and his body was vigorous and perfect; or, as they express it, he lived in a body of gentleness.

The Dukhobortsy say, that the flesh of man is made of earth, his bones of stone, his sinews of roots, the blood of water, his hair of grass, his thoughts he receiveth from the wind, and grace from heaven. This may explain their common proverb: “Man is a little world” (microcosm – ed.). In regard to the soul of man, they say that the soul is power, power in God, and God in man.

16. Concerning original sin, they believe, that from wicked parents are born wicked children; nevertheless, they affirm, that the sins of the parents do not hinder the salvation of their children; and that with respect to salvation; every one shall render an account to God for himself.

17. In respect to the future state of the righteous, they say that the kingdom is in power, and paradise in words; that the souls of the righteous are in the hands of God, and therefore no harm can come near them. Of the sufferings of the wicked, and of hell, they say, that the souls of the wicked wander in darkness, ever in expectation of sudden destruction, and that hell is founded on wrath.

Of the destination of the soul after death, they say that a man’s actions will either justify or condemn him; and therefore, that the works of men in this world bring every one to his place in the next, in which there is no repentance.

18. With regard to the resurrection of the righteous and the wicked at the last day, with their present bodies, the Dukhobortsy do not determine any thing dogmatically, but leave that event entirely to God.

19. They, in general, conceal their opinions in regard to mysterious points, from those with whom they are not intimately acquainted, and justify themselves by the words of our Saviour, “Cast not your pearls before swine.” They say this is not the time to reveal these things; but that ere long they shall be made manifest unto all.

In like manner, in regard to the second coming of the Saviour, they say, that judging from the events which now take place in the world, we may expect him soon.

20. They do not consider it to be essential to salvation that a man should be a member of their society; they say that it is necessary only to understand the ways of the Lord, and to walk in them, and to fulfill his will, for that this is the way of salvation.

21. The Dukhobortsy call the theatre the school of Satan, where he himself and his agents preside. They compare those who dance either on the stage or in private companies to young geese, which in spring, go out with their dame and frolic upon the green, but still, they say, they are but geese, and have no knowledge of God, and when the frost comes they sit with their heads beneath their wings, and hide their feet from the cold.

22. They are distinguished for the orderly and cleanly manner in which they live; and they say, that it is becoming in a Christian to live in this way. In regard to having the pictures or portraits of eminent men or of saints in our dwellings, they observe that they serve to adorn the house, and are agreeable to the eyes; but, to worship before them, they consider as a mortal sin.

23. Of shaving the beard and making use of tobacco, which some Raskolniks (schismatics – ed.) look on as sinful, they say that as neither the one nor the other makes a Christian, therefore they are both matters of indifference. That if it were proper for them as peasants to shave the beard, they would have no objections to do so.

24. When the Dukhobortsy lived in a concealed manner, necessity obliged them to conform to many of the external usages of the Greek church; but as they paid no internal respect to them, they concealed their real opinions by giving to every article and ceremony of the external service a different name and a spiritual signification; thus, for instance, in regard to the five loaves of shewbread, they called the first, the union of the true faith; the second, unfeigned love; the third, the value of the knowledge of truth; the fourth, the reception of the holy mysteries; the fifth, the enlightener. Being accustomed to express their ideas in this allegorical manner, they give a moral signification to many other objects.

Thus, to every day of the week they give the following denominations by way of short moral lessons.

Monday. Understand the works of the Lord.

Tuesday. Regeneration.

Wednesday. The Lord calleth the people to salvation.

Thursday. Bless the Lord all ye his saints.

Friday. Sing praises to the name of the Lord.

Saturday. Fear the judgment of the Lord, that thy soul be not ruined by iniquity.

Sunday. Arise from your dead works, and come to the kingdom of heaven.

The seven heavens they distinguish by the seven following gospel graces. The first heaven is humility; the second, understanding; the third, self-denial; the fourth, brotherly love; the fifth, mercy; the sixth, counsel; the seventh, love, where God himself reigneth. In like manner, these twelve Christian virtues, they denominate the twelve friends. These friends are:

1. Truth. Which saveth man from death.

2. Purity. Which bringeth man to God.

3. Love. Where love is, there God is.

4. Labours. Honourable to the body, and beneficial to the soul.

5. Obedience. The nearest way to salvation.

6. Not judging. The salvation of man without difficulty.

7. Understanding. The first of virtues.

8. Mercy. By the merciful man, Satan himself is made to tremble.

9. Subjection. The work of Christ himself, our God.

10. Prayer and fasting. Which unite man with God.

11. Repentance. Than which, there is no law, and no commandment higher.

12. Thanksgiving. Pleasing to God and to his angels.

He who hath found these twelve friends, they say, is under the guidance of twelve angels, who, at last, will transport his soul to the kingdom of heaven.

As examples of their manner of prayer, we subjoin the two following, from among those which they use in their meetings:

First.

To whom shall I go but unto thee, O Lord; or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend unto heaven, lo, thou art there; if I descend into hell, lo, thou art there; if I take the wings of the morning and fly to the uttermost comers of the sea, there thy hand guides me, and thy right hand shall find me out. To whom shall I go, and where shall I find eternal life, except in thee, my Creator! To whom shall I go, and where shall I obtain comfort, joy, a refuge, and rest to my soul! To whom shall I go, and whither shall I fly from thee, my Lord and my God, for thou alone hast the words of eternal life in thy self? Thou art the fountain of life, and the giver of all good. My soul thirsteth for thee, my heart panteth for thee, O God, my life! I will rejoice in thy most holy name, and in my beloved Lord Jesus. Subdue my heart by him, and may he occupy my whole soul! Let nothing be dearer to me in life than thy most Holy Spirit. Let thy words be sweet unto my taste, and sweeter far to my mouth than the honey comb. Let thy favour ever be more desired by me than gold, and more precious than jewels. – Amen.

Second.

What reason have I to love thee, O Lord! For thou art my life; thou art my salvation, my glory, and praise; thou art my treasure, my eternal riches; thou art my hope and trust; thou art my joy and eternal rest. Shall I rather love vain things, or corrupting or ruinous things and things that are false, than thee my real life! Thou alone art my life and my salvation; therefore all my hopes and all my desires, and the panting of my soul are towards thee only. I will seek thee, O Lord, with my whole heart, with my whole soul, and with my whole mind. To thee alone, in the depths of my soul, I cry, to thee alone I will pour forth my supplications. I desire to be wholly in thee, and to have thee in me. I know and confess thee in truth, the one true God and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent. In thy light, I shall behold light, and the grace of thy most Holy Spirit. – Amen.

25. The Dukhobortsy, who came to St. Petersburg in the year 1804 to entreat permission of the Emperor for their brethren to settle at the Molochnye Vody, and from whom many of the above particulars were taken, being ready to set out on their return, just on the eve of the festival of the birth of Christ, were entreated to stop and spend the holidays in that city. But they replied: “for us there is no difference of days, for our festivals are within us.” When they were also admonished, after receiving their privileges from government, that they should live in their new settlements in peace, and should not attempt to propagate their opinions in that quarter, they replied, “All that is needful is sown already; now the time of harvest is come, and not the seed-time.” *

* Most of these interesting particulars concerning the Dukhobortsy I have taken from a manuscript account of them in the Russian language, composed by a gentleman of the first respectability in Petersburg. I also perused this manuscript with a Russian nobleman, who, in 1808, was the civil governor of the province of Kherson and was well acquainted with the principles and character of the Dukhobortsy at Molochnye Vody.

Afterword

The 1805 tract has been acclaimed by many scholars to be the earliest systematic account published about the Doukhobors. Yet in spite of this, its author has yet to be positively identified.

Ostensibly, the tract was published in 1815 as part of the translated works of Metropolitan Platon (Levshin) of Moscow (1737-1812). However, the extreme sympathy of its author towards the Doukhobors would seem to preclude the cleric from being the original writer, given the hatred of the sect by the Orthodox clergy.

There is nothing to suggest that the tract was written by the Doukhobors themselves. The sectarians were largely illiterate and would have been loath to reduce their tenets to writing, lest it become a basis for further persecution. On the contrary, the style and substance of the tract suggests it was composed by someone well educated and highly conversant in the Russian literary language.

The most likely author of the tract is Ivan Vladimirovich Lopukhin (1756-1816), an envoy sent by Tsar Alexander I to investigate the Doukhobors in the southern provinces in 1801. Intellectually, Lopukhin was very receptive to Doukhoborism, and he is cited by several scholars as the “probable” author of the tract appearing in Platon’s volume. In the footnote at the end of the tract, the translator wrote that the “interesting particulars concerning the Dukhobortsi” were taken from a Russian language manuscript “composed by a gentleman of the first respectability in Petersburg.” In 1805, the date of composition assigned to the tract, Lopukhin was a senator, certainly a respectable position, who had first-hand experience with the Doukhobors. And as scholar Svetlana Inikova has observed, he had a motive to write the tract at that time. In 1805, Lopukhin was accused by the Orthodox heirarchy of helping the Doukhobors and of predisposing Tsar Alexander I favourably toward the sect. Right at the time he needed to justify himself, there appeared the “Nekotorye cherty ob obshchestve Dukhobortsev” [“Several Characteristics of Doukhobor Society”], painting the Doukhobors as a religious-philosophical movement completely loyal to the authorities.

In any event, the 1805 tract appended to Platon’s translated volume is generally regarded as a contemporary and accurate, if idealized, description of the Doukhobor faith. During his 1816 visit to Tavria province, the Doukhobors encountered by Robert Pinkerton (1780-1859) vouched for the veracity of the tract, and the Scottish missionary had the satisfaction of hearing them “distinctly state their principles in the very terms” of the document contained in his translation of Platon’s volume.

To read more, search, download, save and print a full PDF copy of “The Present State of the Greek Church in Russia” by Metropolitan Platon of Moscow, translated by Robert Pinkerton (New York: Collins and Col, 1815), visit the Google Book Search digital database.

A Visit to the Dukhobortsy on the Sea of Azov, 1816

by Robert Pinkerton

Robert Pinkerton (1780-1859) was a Scottish missionary of the British and Foreign Bible Society who travelled extensively throughout Russia during the reign of Tsar Alexander I. In 1816, he travelled to the Dukhobortsy living on the Molochnaya River in Tavria province, Russia. He kept a journal and recorded his detailed impressions of his visit. The following account is reproduced from his published memoirs, “Russia: or, Miscellaneous Observations on the Past and Present State of that Country and its Inhabitants” (London: Seeley and Sons, 1833). It is the earliest surviving Western account of the Doukhobor colony on the Molochnaya and provides invaluable historic insights about their way of life and beliefs. Afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

In 1816, after having visited the tribe of Nogai Tartars that wander with their flocks and herds about the extensive steppes of Little Tartary, on the Sea of Azov, and having made preparations for supplying the villages of German colonists recently settled there with the Holy Scriptures, I purposed, on my way towards the Crimea, to see the Dukhobortsy [Doukhobors] who live on the River Molochnaya and on the Sea of Azov [collectively known as Molochnaya Vody or “Milky Waters”].

Robert Pinkerton (1780-1859).

On approaching the first of their villages on the Molochnaya, I met with a female and inquired of her where the chief person of the place resided. The answer she gave me was, “Among us, no one is greater than another”. The next person I met was a shepherd attending his flock, an old man with grey hair. I made my driver stop, and beckoned to the man to draw near. This he did, and uncovering his head, he leaned over his staff and replied to my inquiries. 

I asked the old man if he could could read. He replied, “Yes, I can read the word of life”. From this I naturally thought that he was able to read the Bible, and offered him a Tract on the Bible Society. He refused, however, to accept it, saying that he could not read our books, but only the Book of Life which he had learnt by heart. In other words, that he could repeat the principal doctrinal and moral articles of the Dukhobortsy sect. And when I touched upon some of the articles, as given in my work on the Orthodox Church, he repeated them distinctly; in others of them his memory failed him.

I stopped in a second village [Terpeniye], the capital, and without ceremony entered one of the best looking houses, requesting a glass of water. This a young man readily handed to me. After a little talk with him, I discovered that I was in the chancery, or place where the civil affairs of the sect are transacted [Sirotsky Dom or “Orphans Home”].

I told him distinctly what my object was in visiting them, and begged him to introduce me to some of their seniors. All this seemed rather suspicious to him; yet he sent for one of the Elders, who had been in St. Petersburg as a deputy to the Government, and who soon after, with several of his brethren, made his appearance. After a little talk about Senator Hoblitz and other gentlemen who had shown them kindness during their stay in St. Petersburg, they seemed in some degree to lay aside their reserve, and replied freely to my inquiries.

I took out my volume on the Orthodox Church and read to the assembly the passages which I had written concerning the Dukhobortsy, and I had the satisfaction of hearing them distinctly state their principles in the very terms there given. As soon as I began any paragraph by translating a few words, they generally gave the remainder exactly as stated in the book. The two prayers they repeated verbatim. One passage only was found to require explanation that of their “having all things in common”. This was their practice when they came to the Molochnaya, but now every family has its own private property, cattle, fields, etc. Still they have fields of corn, gardens and flocks which belong to the whole community, and the revenues of which are applied for the common benefit of the society. This is also the custom of the Mennonites, who live near them, and of other German colonists; a custom, in their case, independent of religious considerations.

Doukhobor village, Melitopol district, Tavria province, Russia circa 1816.

This extraordinary sect, the Dukhobortsy, is settled in eight [nine] villages and consists of about 2,500 souls. I saw an individual of them who had been sixteen years exiled to Siberia, for conscience sake. He spoke with great feeling, when contrasting his former sufferings with his present prosperous circumstances. He was a fine looking, middle aged man, and was returning on horseback from viewing his corn fields and flocks, country like, without his coat. They have been collected from every part of the Empire, and are entirely separated from the Orthodox Church. Indeed, it was the object of the Tsarist government, in colonizing them here, to put it out of their power to make any more proselytes to their peculiar opinions. Their neat and clean dress, comfortable looking huts, and industrious habits, their numerous flocks, and extensive and well cultivated fields, widely distinguish them from the common Russian peasantry.

Their neighbours the Mennonites and other German colonists speak well of their morals; but all complain of their reserve and shyness of character. No doubt they have been taught this by the severe persecutions to which they have for ages been exposed, and out of which they can scarcely yet believe themselves delivered. Their neighbours seem to know but little of their religious tenets. The Mennonites say they are a peaceable and industrious people, but accuse them of hypocrisy. Hence, they say, when some of their members were convicted of drunkenness, they denied the fact, and maintained that their members were all holy.

Very few among the Doukhobors appear to be capable of reading; yet their members seem to have had the doctrines of the sect instilled into them by oral instruction. These lessons are committed to memory. They have no schools among them, nor did I see a book of any kind among them. I recommended to them the Bible, and offered to supply them with it; but they refused to accept any copies, saying, “That what was in the Bible was in them also”. I told them that some of their neighbours suspected them of immoral habits, because in speaking of females and children they did not use the common expressions of “my wife”, “my child” etc. but rather “my sister”, “our child” etc. This insinuation they indignantly repelled, exclaiming, “Are we then beasts?” “But” continued they, “we are accustomed to every kind of false accusation”.

Dukhoborets – a Doukhobor man.

Dukhoborka – a Doukhobor woman.

Their whole aspect and manner of intercourse with strangers, indicates a degree of shyness and distrust which is quite extraordinary. Hence, also, their evasive answers to all direct inquiries respecting their sect. Some of them, however, ventured to speak with me freely, and with warmth, against the use of images in worship. Their assemblies for religious purposes are held in the open air, or in private dwellings, according as the weather suits. They say their doctrines are as old as the world, and they either would not, or could not, give me any particulars of the rise of the sect in Russia.

It was, doubtless, the heavy burden of superstitious ceremonies in the services of the Orthodox Church which drove the founders of this sect to reject all ceremony, and external ordinances of every kind. Many of this sect, I fear, are deists.

But we need not wonder at these indications of fear and distrust. For at the very time I visited them, as I afterwards learned, intrigues were on foot in order to ruin them, under the twofold accusation of their harbouring deserters and making proselytes.

Afterword

Between 1812 and 1822, Robert Pinkerton travelled extensively throughout Russia in the service of the British and Foreign Bible Society, a non-denominational Christian charity formed in England in 1804 for the purpose of making affordable, vernacular translations of the Bible available throughout the world. Through his indefatigable efforts, readily supported by Tsar Alexander I and the Russian nobility, the Russian Bible Society was established in St. Petersburg in 1812-1813. In the years that followed, Pinkerton assisted in the formation of dozens of local branches of the Russian Bible Society, through which thousands of Russian language Bibles were distributed to the peasantry.

Through his travels and studies, Pinkerton became acquainted with the Doukhobor religious sect. In 1815, he translated an 1805 tract about the sect, Several Characteristics of Doukhobor Society as part of his English publication of Platon’s “Present State”.  In September of the same year, he travelled forty miles north of Vyborg, Finland to the Imatra Waterfall, where he found a colony of Don Cossack Doukhobors living in exile there: Visit to the Dukhobortsy Exiled in Finland, 1815. The Scottish missionary was deeply moved by his meeting with the Doukhobor exiles, who were most thankful to receive copies of the Russian Scriptures and publications from the Russian Bible Society.

It was in this context that in 1816, Pinkerton, accompanied by a cargo of Bibles, set out to visit the largest group of Doukhobors in the Russian Empire: those living on the Molochnaya River in Tavria province near the Sea of Azov. There, he expected to find kindred spirits whom he could supply with copies of the Scriptures on behalf of the Russian Bible Society.

Pinkerton visited two Doukhobor villages on the Molochnaya. At the first unnamed village, he encountered two Doukhobors with whom he had a short exchange. At the second village, which was Terpeniye, he was conducted to the Sirotsky Dom (Orphan’s Home) where he addressed a group of Doukhobors and met briefly with a Doukhobor elder. Thereafter, Pinkerton departed from Terpeniye and travelled to the neighbouring Mennonite villages across the Molochnaya. His recorded impressions of his visit are brief, forming a random compendium of his conversations with the Doukhobor colonists and their Mennonite neighbours.

Pinkerton found the Molochnaya Doukhobors to be settled in eight villages (he erred as there were nine Doukhobor villages in 1816) with a total population of 2,500 residents. Materially speaking, his impression of the colony was highly favourable. The Doukhobors’ “neat and clean dress” he wrote, “comfortable-looking huts, and industrious habits, their numerous flocks, and extensive and well-cultivated fields, widely distinguish them from the common Russian peasantry.” In every aspect, the Doukhobors verified the opinion of their Mennonite neighbours that they were a “peaceable and industrious people…”.


View Tavria Doukhobor Villages, 1802-1845 in a larger map

The Scottish missionary noted that when they first came to the Molochnaya, the Doukhobors held everything in common. However, by 1816 the Doukhobors had abandoned communalism and distributed their property on an individual basis. Pinkerton recorded that “now every family has its own private property, cattle, fields, etc. Still they have fields of corn, gardens and flocks which belong to the whole community, and the revenues of which are applied for the common benefit of the society.” By this he meant the lands belonging to the Sirotsky Dom, the Doukhobors’ financial, administrative and spiritual centre.

Pinkerton found the Doukhobors proficiently disciplined in matters of faith and doctrine. The first sectarian he encountered was a female, whom he met on the approaches of the first village. He inquired of the woman “where the chief person of the place resided.” She answered that “among us, no one is greater than another.” The second Doukhobor Pinkerton met was an elderly shepherd tending a flock of sheep. With him, Pinkerton began a discussion of the chief doctrines of Doukhoborism, based on the 1805 tract. He found that the old Doukhobor could repeat some of the articles “distinctly”. Similarly, when Pinkerton read passages from the tract to the Doukhobors at Terpeniye, he “had the satisfaction of hearing them distinctly state their principles in the very terms there given.” They also dutifully advised him against the use of images in worship.  As these encounters indicate, the Molochnaya Doukhobors possessed a strong doctrinal unity.

At the same time, Pinkerton found the Doukhobors to be evasive in their replies to many of his inquiries. “Their whole aspect, and manner of intercourse with strangers,” he found, “indicate a degree of shyness and distrust which is quite extraordinary; hence, also their evasive answers to all direct inquiries respecting their sect.” Neighbouring Mennonites also complained of the “reserve and shyness” of the Doukhobors, which gave rise to various vague rumours and accusations about the sect. What Pinkerton and the Mennonites did not take sufficiently into account, however, was the intensity of persecution that had made the Doukhobors evolve evasion as a means of dealing with authorities or with passing strangers.

Unlike their brethren in Finland, the Molochnaya Doukhobors were now living in a completely Doukhobor setting under the dynamic influence of their leader Kapustin and the exclusivist doctrines embodied in his psalms.  They possessed the fully-developed version of the Living Book and had come to reject the Bible as an exclusive source of divine revelation.

Hence, Pinkerton’s main objective of distributing Bibles among the Molochnaya Doukhobors proved unsuccessful. He had travelled far only to find people who, when he offered copies of the Scriptures, ‘refused to accept any copies, remarking, “That what was in the Bible was in them also.”’ He had one moment of hope, when the old shepherd told him, ‘Yes, I can read the Word of Life’; however it turned out that the old man was illiterate but knew by heart the Living Book of the Doukhobors. Consequently, Pinkerton left the Molochnaya disappointed, having failed to dispense a single Bible to the Doukhobors there.  

To read more, search, download, save and print a full PDF copy of “Russia: or, Miscellaneous Observations on the Past and Present State of that Country and its Inhabitants”  by Robert Pinkerton (London: Seeley and Sons, 1833), visit the Google Book Search digital database.

The Dukhobortsy in Transcaucasia, 1854-1856

by Heinrich Johann von Paucker

During the Oriental (Crimean) War (1853-1856), Imperial Russian Army regiments stationed on the Caucasian Front were billeted in Dukhobor settlements. One such soldier was Heinrich Johann von Paucker, a young Baltic German military cadet quartered in the village of Rodionovka.  Paucker kept a journal and recorded his observations of his Dukhobor hosts, with whom he came in regular contact. Having a keen ethnographic eye, he documented the geography and climate, historical background, religious beliefs, customs and practices and religious services of this unique people – virtually unknown to western members of the Russian Empire. His account was published anonymously in German as “Die Duchoborzen in Transkaukasien” in the Baltic journal “Baltische Monatsschrift” (Volume 11, Riga: Jonck & Boliewsky, 1865, pp. 240-250); republished under his name in the German journal “Deutsche Rundschau für Geographie und Statistik” (Volume, 4, Lepzig: October; November 1881, pp. 18-21; 66-69). Available in English for the first time ever, this exclusive translation provides the reader with an extraordinarily rare, in-depth glimpse into this little-known period of Doukhobor history, for which few other published sources exist. Translated by Gunter Schaarschmidt for the Doukhobor Genealogy Website. Afterword and editorial comments by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

When roaming through the Great Russian Empire in its more distant parts, one comes upon ethnic groups and religions that are not known at all, or only known by name, to we Western members of the Empire. These groups and religions still offer the investigator a large scope for study. Included in these groups is the sect of the Dukhobortsy in Transcaucasia with whom I came in frequent contact during the last Oriental War [Russian name for the Crimean War, 1853-1856] because the regiment in which I had the honour of serving had been assigned to their villages for a base-camp during the winters of 1854-1855 and 1855-1856. This small ethnic group which dwells so far from the Motherland at the border of European civilization (one could almost say outside this civilization) was of such great interest to me in its isolation that I felt obliged to record my observations in writing. Perhaps they deserve a more general interest, too, especially since everything concerning the Schism in Russia [the Raskol or splitting of the Orthodox Church into an official church and the Old Believers movement in the 17th century] is covered by a veil of secrecy that has been lifted only in very recent times.

Geography and Climate

The land of the Dukhobortsy, the so-called Dukhoborye is located in the Western part of the Akhalkalakian circle and occupies the entire plain adjoining the Turkish border. This plain, almost 3,000 feet above sea level and traversed by low mountains that are covered by early snowfalls, is open only towards the Turkish side and gives the impression of a lifeless desert. The snow usually begins to fall in September and disappears in March but sometimes lingers into April. Nonetheless the cold is moderate and seldom exceeds 10-12˚ Réaumur [-12.5˚ to -15˚ Celsius]. But the amount of snow is quite significant and it is so loose that drifts are caused by the slightest of winds and this drifting snow can at times last for several days in a row. In the winter 1854-55 an entire village was literally buried by such a violent storm and there was not enough manpower to shovel away the snow mass, so that it became necessary to tear away the straw roofs of the stables in order to drop food and water through the openings for the animals.

The inhabitants don’t have much of a summer – in the short season they have to hurry to bring in the hay crop and prepare for the winter months. The hay is usually stored in the backyard in large bundles. The Dukhobortsy employ a strange unit of measure when they sell hay: they sell it by the cord – the price is approximately 9-12 rubles depending upon the amount and the quality of the hay. Hay is extremely important as a merchandise among the Dukhobortsy since their only source of [outside] income are loads of hay delivered for Crown and private enterprises. The Dukhobortsy keep relatively few cattle although the latter would be very necessary for them because the Kisyak or manure must be used in these bare, woodless steppes not only as a heating fuel but also for construction – you don’t find any wooden buildings at all. The walls of the houses are produced simply from Kisyak cut into blocks and are carefully whitewashed. There is no ceiling; instead there is a plain roof consisting of rafters and covered with a thick layer of straw. Nonetheless the huts are roomy and bright. The local Kisyak does not give off heavy fumes when heating, like among the Armenians, probably because the Dukhobortsy dry it very carefully and store it wrapped in straw in a shelter – a process that the Armenians should copy from their neighbours.

There is no way to grow grain [wheat] in these areas although the inhabitants have never tried to grow it and most probably spared themselves unnecessary labour. The land here seems really not capable of producing anything but grass. The impression of this lifeless steppe is very sad – there are miserable individual villages but no forest, no field, no garden or lawn, in some places there are meagre vegetable gardens in the yards. The inhabitants must buy the necessary grain for their consumption from the bazaars of Akhalkalaki or Alexandropol which are approximately 60-70 versts [an Imperial Russian unit of measure equal to 1.0668 kilometers] away. The climate is on the whole very unhealthy: people suffer often from fevers and many die from typhoid every year. However, many doctors are of the opinion that the diseases are rather the result of the close living quarters and the damp dwellings than of the unhealthy climate.

Historical Background

The Dukhobortsy attract our attention because of their religion that differentiates them both from the Greek Orthodox Church and from the other sects of Russia as well as because of the mysterious nature of their religion. One could call them the Quakers of the Greek church since like the latter they believe in the direct effect of the holy spirit; their main teachings, however, consist in their peculiar conceptualization of the soul, the mind, and the heart. They do not possess any written records that would elucidate their religious beliefs. These are laid down only in their oral tradition. But since the individuality of each person who hands down the tradition plays an important role, their dogmas are not as clear as seems to be the case with other sects. If the authorities had found a written record among them in the years of persecution, such a record would of course have been incontrovertible evidence of heresy.

The 16th and 17th centuries in Europe were a time of general turmoil and politico-religious revolutions; Russia, too, was not exempt from this. In Russia, the revision of the parish registers by Patriarch Nikon caused different interpretations (tolki). The so-called Old Believers adhered to the [old] ritual to the letter and sought to maintain the sanctity and inviolability of the Orthodox Church. However, others became opposed to the dogma itself – this trend eventually led to the formation of the Dukhobortsy sect. The many foreigners that the Tsar had called into Russia no doubt contributed to feeding the spirit of the religious disputes by importing many ideas from their old country into their new home country.

In the first years of their existence the Dukhobortsy, i.e., Spirit-Wrestlers, formed a single sect with the Ikonobortsy, i.e., icon-wrestlers, because like the latter the Dukhobortsy rejected icons as attempts at idolatry; later, however, when they intensely developed the teaching of the effect of the holy spirit, they separated [from the Ikonobortsy] and adopted their present name. The Dukhobortsy derive the origin of their belief from the three boys in the fiery stove mentioned by the prophet Daniel [the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego: Daniel 3:1-30] but designate a certain Siluan Kolesnikov, who lived in the village of Nikolskoye in the Province of Ekaterinoslav at the end of the last century, as the founder of their belief system. However, while they recognize Kolesnikov as a famous religious hero, others maintain that their sect had been founded already at the beginning of the 18th century and that its origin was in the Province of Tambov. It seems that the latter view is more correct because even though their traditions begin with Kolesnikov, these traditions existed already earlier and were widely spread in the southern provinces of Chernigov, Kursk, Kharkov, Ekaterinoslav, Voronezh, Tambov and Saratov. The Dukhobortsy, like all dissenters, had to endure severe persecution and oppression until a new star rose for them with the government of Alexander I.

In the year 1801 the government considered it necessary to resettle the adherents of this sect to a more distant area. For this purpose the Dukhobortsy were allotted a huge segment of untilled land called Molochnye Vody [Milky Waters] in the Province of Tavria in the district of Melitopol as a new residence. At first only 30 families were sent there. They started tilling the land with great zeal. Soon rumours about the free and happy life of the new settlers reached those left behind and caused them to ask for permission to move there as an entire group. This permission was granted. As a result the Dukhobortsy formed a colony consisting of 9 (nine) villages in the Crimea. The names of these villages can still be found today in the Caucasus, e.g., in the Akhalkalakian district: Bogdanovka, Troitskoye, Spasskoye, Rodionovka, Tambovka, and Goreloye, or, near Bashkichet or Elizavetpol: Akimovka, Terpeniye, and Gavrilovka. The Dukhobortsy reproduced so vigorously that by the year 1832 their number had grown to 800 families with 4,000 members of both sexes.

They could have lived happily and contentedly in Tavria especially since they excelled in considerable work ethic and good management but soon the old spirit of rebelliousness and of religious fanaticism was stirring among them. They began to interpret their resettlement to the Crimea as an apocalyptic event, openly preached their faith, and were disobedient to the authorities. Thus, for example, they refused to supply recruits to the Governor General of Kherson by arguing that those recruits would have to swear an oath of allegiance which oath would be prohibited by their religion. Punishing them achieved nothing so that the authorities arrived at an agreement that under such circumstances they would accept the Dukhobortsy’ word of honour. The numerous complaints and remonstrations by local authorities finally led to a decision in 1841 to resettle the sectarians to Transcaucasia, which decision was carried out in the same year.

Religious Beliefs

Let us now examine more precisely the religious notions of this sect. What is peculiar is their development of the doctrine of the Trinity and of Christ’s person. While they believe in a triune God [God in three persons], He reveals himself as such only in the human soul: God the Father in the power of memory, God the Son in the wisdom of reasoning, and the Holy Ghost in volition and conation. Their [the Dukhobortsy’] conception of the entire earthly life of our Saviour is symbolical and they interpret this life as a mystical habitation of Him in man’s heart. In accord with their doctrine He is conceived and born from the words of Archangel Gabriel in the soul of every person. Here He preaches the word of truth, suffers, dies, and rises again from the dead. Therefore even those who have never read the Gospel or heard about Christ must recognize His inner workings because Jesus is the human conscience that teaches everyone to distinguish between good and evil.

Furthermore, the Dukhobortsy are convinced that not only Christians but also Jews, Muslims, and non-believers enter the kingdom of heaven and that on Judgment Day all people will rise from the dead in spirit. Concerning the Day of Judgment, the torments of hell will consist in the eternal pangs of conscience. The soul is God’s image but after the fall of man the image disappeared, memory was weakened and man forgot what he had been before, reasoning became deadened, and the will was no longer governed by the Holy Ghost and thus turned towards evil.

The biblical story of Adam and Eve is regarded by the Dukhobortsy as a symbolic image of our earthly existence. The soul had already fallen earlier, before the creation of the world, together with the other evil angels. The world was created only as a prison to which they were transferred for their sin. Thus sin came into the world not with the fall of man but Adam and Eve were themselves already created as sinners. This teaching underlies the commandment not to mourn the deceased because they have been pardoned and death has redeemed them from wandering on this earth. They see in Abel’s fate the persecution of the just by the unjust or the Cains; [they see] in the march of the Israelites through the Red Sea and in the decline of the Egyptians the perdition of the sinners and the salvation of the believers.

They completely reject the sacraments; likewise they have no clergy and do not even attribute any importance to the decrees of the general councils which otherwise are recognized by most sects of the schism. They reverence the saints and apostles of the Greek Church as mere humans who, although born in sin, led a life pleasing to God. They consider crossing oneself a useless ceremony and therefore refrain from doing it; neither do they pray for their fellow-men and enemies; and they do not even mention those “who have power over us” in their prayers because everyone already has enough to pray for himself.

An important doctrine in practice is that of the equality of all people. Thus there are no masters and servants among the Dukhobortsy but only completely equal “brothers”. For this reason the children call their father simply “elder” and they call their mother “keeper”; the men use the term “sisters” when addressing their wives while the latter call their husbands “brothers”; none of them use the term “Dad” which is otherwise so popular in Russian because, as they say, all people are brothers, only God alone is our father. As an expression of thanks they use the phrase “may God help you”. They do not bear arms and further consider war a sinful and unjust activity, citing in support the doctrines of love and compassion in the Gospel as well as the Seventh Commandment. This view of religion demands that its adherents live in larger communities so that in case of someone’s mishaps everyone can help the individual. They must also avoid quarrelling and any kind of brawl as well as using indecent or abusive language. And while they must not drink wine or spirits, curiously they are allowed to smoke tobacco which is so taboo among the Old Believers. They do not practice fasting.

Once an elderly Dukhobor recounted to me a very charming symbolic story which I will try to render here in its entirety:
“Far, far away from here, in a region inaccessible to the human mind, there is an azure ocean and in that ocean there is an island. Once in a while, muffled in thick fog, it reveals itself to the seafarer but constant waves stir the ocean and prevent man from setting foot on the island. This ocean and the island represent human destiny which, obscure and dark, lies ahead of us until man forces his ship through the wild surf into the quiet harbour of death. On the island there is a high temple which is not man-made and has been here from the first day of creation. The vault [ceiling] rests on as many pillars as there are religions in the world. At every pillar there is a person who is in the process of professing the religion represented graphically on the pillar. One single pillar is made of pure gold – it is the symbol of the pure and true belief in God who created the island as well as heaven, earth, and water. All the other pillars are made of stone representing the false wisdom of the human spirit petrified in his sins. All these pillars including the golden one are covered with marble representing the ignorance of man that deprives him of an unobstructed view into the light of divine doctrine. And while nobody is able to see the gold, everyone tells the other that he is holding the golden shaft of belief in his hands. Centuries pass, the world ages oppressed by the wrath of the Creator of all things. And then comes the hour of the general and terrible decline – the billows of the ocean wallow blood and fire, the sky collapses, the earth’s joints tremble violently, and the magnificent temple, not man-built, falls. The marble chips off and the golden pillar glitters and it alone illuminates the entire world where there is only darkness and agony. Now all men recognize the gold and fall on their faces blinded by the light of divine truth. Woe to those who held a stone shaft in their hands while those who listened to their inner Christ will be saved because only in Him there is salvation. We are all blind and do not know who is holding the gold of true belief in his hands.”

Customs and Practices

Let us say a few words about the outward appearance of our Transcaucasian Dukhobortsy, about their practices and customs, and their domestic life! Most of them are tall and robust; all men, except the old ones, shave their beards leaving just a moustache. They cut their hair and, together with their clothing consisting of wide trousers and a cloth jacket, thus resemble the looks of the Germans who had settled in Transcaucasia. When you see one of these Russian sectarians drive by on a covered wagon with iron axles and harnessed with two horses, you could easily mistake him for a German colonist. The female sex deserves the epithet “fair sex”; however, it is not the usual type of a Russian village beauty, i.e., of robust health; rather in the pale, oval faces of these girls and women there is a somewhat nobler expression that harmonizes splendidly with their cleanliness, grace, and carefully selected clothing. The latter consists of a white, often very elegant chemise with wide, stitched sleeves and a coloured skirt; their head is covered by a low round small cap very artfully made of various coloured triangular flaps. Their hair is clipped a little in front – the married women hide their hair at the back under the cap, while the girls wear braids. The women are very industrious, get up early and, before sunrise, have already taken care of everything connected with domestic chores after which they usually busy themselves with some or other needlework. In the evenings they very much love socializing and gather under whatever pretext in someone’s house where before long the young lads show up and they spend the evening with work, fun, and laughter.

The character of the female sex is marked by a considerable vivacity and frivolity so that even marital fidelity is not held in high esteem among them. The passion for dressing up has contributed a lot to the decay of morals. The men view their wives’ conduct with lenience and do not on their own accord seek to punish them for being unfaithful. Incidentally, if one of the women goes too far and does not know how to hide her amorous adventures properly, she is subjected to a harsh punishment: she is led naked through the village streets and is pelted with excrement and dirt. Such a case occurred during our stay in Rodionovka and the procedure was stopped only through the intervention of the troop commander.

On the whole, the Dukhobortsy do not attribute any importance to matrimony. To get married requires only the good will of two adult persons of different sex, mutual love, and the parents’ consent. The transaction on such an occasion is roughly the following: the relatives and acquaintances of bride and bridegroom gather in the house of the bridegroom’s or the bride’s parents where the oldest family member pronounces the two man and wife, without any further promises or even written contracts. As a result divorce is very easy because just the simple desire of the married couple to get divorced is sufficient. After the completion of the divorce both parties are completely free. In spite of being so easy, however, divorce is a rare occasion.

In the old days the Dukhobortsy were known for their diligence and their good management but nowadays little has remained of that except a certain cleanliness and orderliness. In the Crimea they practiced extensive agriculture as well as cattle- and horse-breeding. Likewise they possessed large flocks of sheep and practiced the art of weaving. When they resettled to Transcaucasia they had to give up all of this because in many respects the character of the new region was not conducive to continuing these former activities. In this deserted steppe where trade was dominated by a few enterprising Armenians, there was no choice but to devote oneself to [wagon] cargo transporting since it was the most lucrative form of income.

This on the whole lazy life, we believe, has produced the now dominating addiction to alcoholic beverages which, after all, are forbidden by the doctrine of this sect. In Dukhoborye everyone, men, women, boys, and girls, drinks very heavily. No meeting proceeds without some hard drinking. When they visit one another, they sit down at a large table and discuss their everyday concern with a glass of brandy. The more they drink the more solemn and concentrated they become until their mood gives vent to the singing of an Old Testament psalm. Rocking back and forth, supporting their heavy heads with their hands, they keep sitting until one of them begins: “Oh brothers!” After that nothing makes sense any more since all words get absorbed by a lengthy monotonous screaming of the chorus.

Notwithstanding their drunkenness the Dukhobortsy are very frank and honest – they do not steal nor do they break their word of honour. Since they never swear oaths they instead value a simple promise that much more.

Like all Russian sectarians the Dukhobortsy, too, believe in religious customs: every morning, before and after a meal as well as at night before going to bed, the entire family forms a circle and the head recites aloud the Lord’s Prayer or a psalm.

Religious Services

Finally we shall say a few words about their divine service. Every person, Christians, Jews, Muslims, and non-believers, can visit the Dukhobortsy’ house of prayer because of their tenet that man cannot desecrate God’s temple by his presence but only by bad deeds. On a bright winter day on a holiday we set out to attend a divine service. The crowd of the devout, all in festive clothing, presented a very friendly picture. We joined the procession that was moving to the end of the village where the house of prayer was located. We entered with all the others. At the entrance the crowd divided – the men lined up to the left, the women to the right, apparently according to age. The room where we found ourselves was furnished in a very simple manner; at the far end there was a wooden table with salt in a wooden salt barrel and bread; otherwise there were no further ornaments.

After everyone had been seated as assigned, the choir leader began the psalm: “Thus speaks the Lord, the God of Israel” etc. whereupon the choir joined in. It is very noteworthy that their sacred songs consist of different biblical texts that are often taken out of context and occasionally arranged in a meaningless way. After the end of the singing the second-eldest stepped in front of the table, took the hand of the eldest, and both of them twice bowed very low to each other, then they kissed and bowed for the third time. After that the third stepped forward and began the same procedure with the former two, and then that procedure made the round, first for all the men and then the women. In spite of the long duration of this ceremony we had waited for it to end and, leaving the house, we addressed an elder with the request to explain to us the significance of those bows and kisses. He replied: “One must worship God’s image in one’s fellow man because man represents God on earth.”

Because of this doctrine the Dukhobortsy lapse into a peculiar form of idolatry in spite of the fact that they reject icons. That is because they select from their midst a handsome boy whom they call the “mother of God”, and whom they worship in superstitious awe like a deity. This custom may partially explain the demoralization of the female sex because this boy gathers around him a kind of court consisting of the young girls of all villages, and no girl can be wed without having spent some time there. It goes without saying that this mother of God generis masculini [Latin for “of the male sex”] is severely persecuted by the authorities but they seldom succeed in locating the boy in question and stemming this abuse.

In the above I have only attempted to put down my personal observations of a peculiar form of the Russian Schism and I implore the disposed reader not to try to measure this short sketch in terms of the standards of a thorough scientific treatise.

Afterword

Heinrich Johann von Paucker (1839-1898) was a Baltic German from the province of Estonia in the Russian Empire. As a youth, he received an excellent classical education at Revel (now Tallinn) and Mitau (now Jelgava). In 1855, at age sixteen, he joined the Life-Guards Lithuanian Regiment of the Imperial Russian Army as a cadet and was immediately transferred to the Caucasian Front of the Oriental (Crimean) War.

In the Caucasus, Paucker’s regiment was billeted in the Dukhobor village of Rodionovka in the Akhalkalaki district of Tiflis province during the winters of 1854-1855 and 1855-1856. During his stay there, the young military cadet came to closely observe and study his Dukhobor hosts, with whom he came in regular contact. He kept journals, and with a keen ethnographic eye, recorded his detailed observations of this unique people, little known to western members of the Russian Empire.

At the time, the Dukhobors had been settled in the Akhalkalaki district for less than a decade, having been exiled there from Tavria province in 1841-1845. This relocation had brought about profound and rapid changes in the social, cultural and economic life of the Dukhobors, who were still adjusting to the harsh realities of their new physical environment, as well as the disruption wrought by the Oriental War, when Paucker stayed among them.

Paucker described in detail the geography and climate of Dukhobor’ye – the “land of the Dukhobors” (which, significantly, is the first recorded usage of that name). The climate, he noted, was overall very unhealthy and many Dukhobors, not yet acclimatized to their new surroundings, suffered and died from fever. There on the high mountain plateau, spring came late and winter early; there was no way to grow grain in the short season. The Akhalkalaki Dukhobors, he observed, had thus abandoned their traditional agricultural economy and relied on contracts for wagon transport and the sale of hay for income, with which they bought grain for their consumption in nearby market towns. At the time of writing, they had not yet established the large horse and cattle herds for which they would later become known. He noted also that there were no wooden buildings in the barren, treeless region; the Dukhobors had adapted by constructing their homes from bricks of dried cattle manure.

Recounting their history, Paucker identified the Dukhobors’ origins in the Russian Schism of the 17th century; a time of general religious turmoil when some dissenters, imbued with new ideas introduced by foreigners, rejected the dogma and authority of the Orthodox Church. He traced the growth of the sect from early 18th century Tambov and Ekaterinoslav, through the severe persecutions and oppressions of later that century, to their settlement in Tavria at the beginning of the 19th century, whereafter they enjoyed an era of peace, toleration and prosperity. Later on, stirred by a spirit of “rebelliousness” and “religious fanaticism”, they began to openly preach their faith and disobey the authorities, which led to their exile to Transcaucasia.

Paucker gave a concise summary of Dukhobor religious philosophy, which rejected church institutions, sacraments, icons and clergy in favour of a simple, individual-based religion founded on egalitarianism, love and compassion. He noted the Dukhobor belief in the indwelling of God in every person, as well as their figurative, rather than literal, interpretation of the Trinity. They refused to bear arms and avoided quarrels and abuse. They did not possess any written records about their beliefs, which, he observed, were passed down by oral tradition.

Of particular interest is Paucker’s description of the outward appearance and character of the Dukhobors. The Dukhobor men, he observed, were tall and robust with clothing resembling that of the German colonists in Russia. The same observation had been made by earlier writers, and it is generally accepted that the Dukhobor men adopted aspects of their dress from their Mennonite neighbours while living in Tavria. He noted the noble beauty of the Dukhobor women, and their industry, cleanliness, grace and carefully selected clothing, of which he provided a full description. In general, he found the Dukhobors to be orderly, frank and honest, but lacking the diligence and good management for which they were renowned in Tavria. He also observed that many Dukhobors had lapsed from their prohibition against alcohol, and now drank heavily.

Paucker observed that the Dukhobor community played an important role in reinforcing the behavior and morality of its individual members “so that in case of someone’s mishaps everyone can help the individual”. For example, he recounted how, as punishment for infidelity, a Dukhobor woman was led through the village streets and pelted with excrement and dirt. Inexplicably, however, he inferred from this incident that Dukhobor women generally did not hold marital fidelity in high esteem; a sweeping statement unsupported by the historical evidence.

Paucker discussed the religious customs of the Dukhobors, noting the importance of prayer in their daily lives and describing in detail their unique marriage ceremony and religious service. He also noted the Dukhobor custom of bowing to one another, in reverence to the spirit of God that dwells within each man; a custom he mistakenly confused for idolatry.

Finally, Paucker made note of a boy whom the Dukhobors held in inordinately high esteem; who held court in the villages, and whom they referred to as Bogorodets (masculine form of Bogoroditsa or “Mother of God”). While not identified by name, this could only have been Petr Ilarionovich Kalmykov (1837-1864), the youngest in a line of hereditary Dukhobor leaders dating back to the time of Kapustin. Paucker noted he was severely persecuted by Tsarist authorities, however, they seldom succeeded in locating him; presumably he was concealed by his followers. His account thus provides significant insights into the early life of this important historical personage.

Paucker’s writings are among the remarkably few sources of detailed, published information about the decade immediately following the Dukhobor exile to Transcaucasia; a little-known and little-explored period of Dukhobor history.  His work is thus an invaluable contribution to our understanding of the era.

As for Paucker himself, following the Oriental War, he was promoted to the rank of officer and transferred to the Light-Infantry Battalion in Riga in 1858. He was subsequently promoted to the rank of Second Lieutenant. In 1860, he transferred to the Telegraph Corps and served as Chief of Telegraph Stations in Voronezh and later Yaroslavl. After receiving his discharge from the Imperial Russian Army in 1864, he settled in Wesenberg (now Ravkere), Estonia where he took up teaching and translation work. He also served as a civil servant for the Estonian Provincial Government. From 1865 until his death he published a large volume of translations and original works on various subjects.

Significantly, Paucker’s first published work was on the Dukhobors, which appeared anonymously (under the initial “K”) as Die Duchoborzen in Transkaukasien in the Baltic journal Baltische Monatsschriften in 1865. Anonymous publication was common in Russia at this time, as the state censorship regime was particularly severe and maintained a strict vigilance over the publication of written materials, removing or banning anything it considered even remotely ‘subversive’. Hence, many writers, fearing reprisals from Imperial censors, published their works under initials or pseudonyms.  Sixteen years later, in 1881, Paucker republished the article under his own name in the German journal Deutsche Rundschau für Geographie und Statistik.

Special thanks to Jack McIntosh, former UBC Slavic languages bibliographer, for identifying the anonymous author of the 1865 publication of Die Duchoborzen in Transkaukasien as being Heinrich Johann von Paucker.  

To read more, search, download, save and print a full PDF copy of the original German text of Heinrich Johann von Paucker’s “Die Duchoborzen in Transkaukasien” in Baltische Monatsschrift (Volume 11, Riga: Jonck & Boliewsky, 1865, pp. 240-250), visit the Google Book Search database.

Travels to the Dukhobortsy Living on the Molochnaya River, 1818

by Ebenezer Henderson

Ebenezer Henderson (1784-1858) was a Scottish linguist, Biblical scholar and missionary who travelled extensively in Scandinavia and Russia from 1806 to 1832 on behalf of the British and Foreign Bible Society. In 1818, he travelled to the Dukhobortsy living on the Molochnaya River. He kept a journal and recorded his impressions of his visit. The following account is reproduced from his published memoirs, “Biblical Researchers and Travels in Russia: Including a Tour in the Crimea and the Passage of the Caucasus (London: James Nisbet, 1826). While brief, it is one of the earliest Western accounts of the Doukhobor colony on the Molochnaya and provides rare historic insights about their way of life and beliefs. Afterword by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff.

…The following day, we skirted the Moloshnaia [Molochnaya], in all probability Gerrhus, the seventh of the principal streams specified by Herodotus, and that which formed the boundary between the nomadic and royal Scythians. As has already been observed of most of the Russian rivers in these parts, its western bank is the higher, and exhibits, in some places, a free-stone projecting through the mould.

We also passed a remarkable assemblage of rocks in a valley [probably Kamennaya Mogila, a Scythian stone monument near the village of Terpeniye], standing quite isolated, but evidently connected with others which we could descry in the high bank at no great distance. The Moloshnaia flows in a southerly direction, and empties itself into a liman [estuary] connected with the sea [of Azov].

The right bank of this river is inhabited by the Duchobortzi [Dukhobortsy], a sect of Russian Dissenters; and the left, by the Mennonites. The former of these people eight villages, to which are attached 37,114 desiatines [an Imperial Russian unit of land equal to 1.0925 hectares] of land, independently of an island called the Isle of Wolves [Biryuchiy Ostrov] which makes about 1,000 desiatines more, and affords excellent pasturage for their cattle in winter.

Their number, in 1818, amounted to 1,153 souls [adult males]. We spent a few hours at one of their villages, and endeavoured to elicit some information relative to their peculiar sentiments and practices, but found them uncommonly close, and evidently influenced by a suspicion that we had some design against them.

They have been called the Russian Quakers; and much as the enlightened members of the Society of Friends would find to object to among this people, as opposed to their views of divine truth, it cannot be denied that many points of resemblance exist between them. Their name, Wrestlers with the Spirit, indicates the strong bearing their system has on mystic exercises, in which they place the whole of religion, to the exclusion of all external rites and ceremonies.

All their knowledge is traditionary [oral tradition-based]. On our urging upon them the importance of being well supplied with the Scriptures, they told us we were much mistaken if we imagined they had not the Bible among them – they had it in their hearts: the light thus imparted was sufficient, and they needed nothing more.

Everything with them is spiritual. They speak indeed of Christ, and his death; but they explain both his person and sufferings mystically, and build entirely upon a different foundation than the atonement.

They make no distinction of [Orthodox feast] days and meats; and marriage, so far from being a sacrament with them, as in the Greek [Orthodox] Church, is scarcely viewed as a civil rite, and it not infrequently happens, that proofs are given of a connection between the parties previous to any announcement of their mutual determination to marry. 



View Tavria Doukhobor Villages, 1802-1845 in a larger map

Afterword

Between 1818, Ebenezer Henderson travelled throughout Russia with the Rev. John Patterson in the service of the British and Foreign Bible Society, a non-denominational Christian charity formed in England in 1804 for the purpose of making affordable, vernacular translations of the Bible available throughout the world. Through their efforts and ministry, thousands of Russian language Bibles were distributed to the peasantry. It was under these auspices that Henderson, accompanied by a cargo of Bibles, travelled to Tavria to visit the Dukhobortsy living on the Molochnaya River in 1818.

Henderson found a Doukhobor population of 1,153 adult males settled in eight villages (he erred as there were nine Doukhobor villages on the Molochnaya in 1818) along the right bank of the Molochnaya River. Their landholdings totalled 37,114 desiatinina, along with an additional 1,000 desiatina of land on the island of Biryuchiy Ostrov in the Sea of Azov. Henderson is one of the very few Western writers to reference the island among the Doukhobor landholdings.

Henderson spent a few hours in an unnamed Doukhobor village, where he “endeavoured to elicit some information relative to their peculiar sentiments and practices”. In response to his enquiries, he found the Doukhobors “uncommonly close, and evidently influenced by a suspicion that we had some design against them”.  What Henderson and Patterson did not take sufficiently into account, however, was the intensity of persecution that had made the Doukhobors evolve evasion as a means of dealing with authorities or with passing strangers.

Henderson observed that “many points of resemblance” exist between these so-called “Russian Quakers” and the Society of Friends in England, not the least of which was the exclusion of all external rites and ceremonies. They observed none of the Orthodox feast days and holidays. Unlike the Russian Orthodox, the Doukhobors did not view marriage as a religious sacrament but as a civil rite only. 

When Henderson urged upon the Doukhobors the importance of being well supplied with the Scriptures – the ostensible reason for his visit – he was advised that he was “much mistaken if we imagined they had not the Bible among them – they had it in their hearts”. This was a reference to the Doukhobors’ Zhivotnaya Kniga (“Living Book”), an orally-transmitted collection of religious psalms and precepts. The Doukhobors informed Henderson that the light imparted from thus was sufficient, and they needed nothing more. 

Consequently, Henderson’s main objective of distributing Bibles among the Doukhobors proved unsuccessful, and the Scottish missionary left the Molochnaya disappointed, having failed to dispense a single Bible to the Doukhobors.

To read more, search, download, save and print a full PDF copy of “Biblical Researchers and Travels in Russia: Including a Tour in the Crimea and the Passage of the Caucasus”  by Ebenezer Henderson (London: James Nisbet, 1826), visit the Google Book Search digital database.