Science and life

(Letter to Mr. Robert Gardiner, Secretary of the Commission for the Organization of a World Conference of Christianity) With great pleasure I received the brochures you sent: from them I could become acquainted with that gratifying movement among Christians in America, which aims to do what is possible for the mutual rapprochement of people calling on the holy name of the Lord Jesus Christ throughout the world. I could not help but notice the spirit of love and humility that permeates all the publications of your commission, and this spirit could not help but convince me that all your intentions flow from a pure and sincere heart. I am also amazed by the zeal with which you are spreading your idea of ​​a world conference of Christians. I see your brochures printed in three parts of the world - Europe, America and Africa. I had the pleasure of receiving your kind letters, in one of which (dated September 13/26, 1916) you express the hope that I will not only read the brochures you sent, but also convey my comments to you. I am glad to be ready to talk with you on an issue so dear to me as the question of the Church. And how could it be otherwise? Who among the conscious Christians does not grieve in soul when he sees enmity and division among those people whom their faith should unite, among whom the peace left and given by Christ to His disciples should reign, and the love shed into the hearts of Christians by the Holy Spirit! Over the centuries of division, so much hostility and denunciation of each other has already been said that it is time to speak to us in the spirit of love and benevolence. I am quite ready to repeat the words of your letter: “The spirit of love must triumph over the spirit of hatred; the spirit of humility over the spirit of rebellion and pride.” Throughout 1915 and 1916, I followed with fascinating interest in the magazine “Faith and Reason” your correspondence with the most enlightened hierarch of the Russian Church, Archbishop Anthony of Kharkov. This correspondence seems to me to be the most significant phenomenon in Russian theology of the last two years. The spirit of zeal for Divine truth in this correspondence is wonderfully combined with frankness and the spirit of love and benevolence. Archbishop Anthony made his objections to you with complete frankness and decisiveness, but I was glad, in the brochure you sent in modern Greek, to read your remark that these objections, in your impression, were not the objections of an enemy who wants to perpetuate differences of opinion between the brothers 1 . In your letter of November 1/14, 1916, I also read about your love for those studies which, in a spirit of humility, reveal new aspects of Divine truth or pluck out the tares growing among the good wheat. All this convinces me that I can write to you with complete frankness, without sometimes hiding my complete disagreement with you, without passing over in silence some dubious provisions. I will make one small remark first. In your article published in the Revue Internationale ecclesiastique, of which I have a reprint from you, you say about the treatises of Archbishop Anthony: “They are marked by the point of view of a more strict Orthodoxy (de la plus stricte orthodoxie), but they are important for determining the doctrinal position of the ultra-conservative elements of the Orthodox Russian Church, in other words - the hierarchy” 2. First of all, I cannot recognize Archbishop Anthony as a representative of the ultra-conservative elements of our Church. We have long been accustomed to look at him as a leading fighter for the renewal of our school theology, for liberating it from the deadening shackles of scholasticism imposed on it by the unfortunate historical conditions in which our Church lived in the 17th and especially in the 18th centuries. In our theology, only those who blindly cling to the scholastic theology brought to us from the West as the only possible and exclusively true can be called ultraconservatives in our theology. I can assure you that among such ultra-conservatives you would find more like-minded people on the issues raised in your correspondence with Archbishop Anthony. You would be united with them by certain scholastic positions left in the new Russian theology, which does not recognize scholastic authorities. Nor can I consider the views of Archbishop Anthony to be characteristic only of our hierarchy. Not belonging to the hierarchs, I fully share his views and know like-minded laymen who have expressed their views in print. Besides, I just can’t understand your words about a stricter Orthodoxy. I believe that in matters of faith only strict Orthodoxy is possible; here there can only be truth or error, but there cannot be more or less strict truth. Moreover, Archbishop Anthony in his letters-brochures strongly emphasized that he was not expressing his personal convictions, but was only expounding the teaching of the Church in the same way as an impartial learned Mohammedan or Jew would expound it. Archbishop Anthony has already raised the question of the unity of the Church. I also put it in my response to your kind letters. I raise this question precisely because I wish the projected world conference of Christianity the greatest success in achieving its high goal. This issue, it seems to me, cannot be completely avoided at the conference itself. The views on the unity of the Church expressed in the brochures you sent do not satisfy me. And what is important, of course, is not that they do not satisfy me, but that they can hardly be justified from the point of view of the ancient Christian Church. You briefly expressed your view of the unity of the Church in your third letter about the Church (dated February 5/18, 1916) to Archbishop Anthony: “The Church of Christ, of course, is one, despite the existence of various private churches, but human sins have darkened its appearance.” You said more in your second letter (dated June 12/25, 1915): “I think that there is a spirit of Christian solidarity among all who revere Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who believe in the Divine mission of the Church in the world and in the supernatural action of the sacraments. This spirit of solidarity exists despite all theological differences. By the sacrament of baptism, correctly performed, we all enter the spiritual kingdom of Christ. I could not allow that just because we do not understand each other on the issue of the procession of the Holy Spirit or disagree in rituals during the celebration of the sacraments, we would have the right to hurl anathemas at those who do not share our points of view on these points. I cannot allow that outside the private Church, whatever it may be, everything in the Christian world is lost, that all Churches that are called Christian would in reality only be corpses stricken with gangrene.” In the brochures you sent, my attention was especially drawn to those prayers that you recommend for public and private use, and in which your view of the unity of the Church is solemnly expressed. Namely: “Lord! Jesus Christ, who said to Your apostle: My peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you! Look not at our sins, but at the faith of Thy Church, and grant her peace and unity, as is pleasing to Thy will. Lord Jesus Christ, we ask You, look with compassion on Your Church, weakened and hindered by differences and divisions, bless the intention to gather for a conference all who profess Your holy name.” Thus, all societies that call themselves Christian constitute one Church of Christ, but only weakened in its unity. This teaching about the unity of the Church is not alien to some Russian theologians. Thus, Archpriest P. Ya. Svetlov asserts that Western Christian faiths, along with the Orthodox, are Christian Churches and belong to the Universal Church, and not extra-church societies separated from the Church - that the existing Christian Churches in the West and East are local Churches or parts of the Universal Church, and therefore the assignment of the rights of the Universal Church to any of them is illegal. At the same time, the Universal Church, according to Fr. Svetlov, there is a totality of true believers, scattered everywhere in local or private Christian churches in the West and East or, what is the same, a totality of local churches of the East and West, in the absence of the possibility of an Ecumenical Council, with an external division of the Church, deprived of complete external or visible organization, with an internal, however, unity of faith and grace-filled life in Christ, heading His Church, or Body 3. As you can see, our Russian author expresses himself even more decisively than you. However, such a teaching about the Church is completely impossible to accept, since it is certainly unknown to the ancient Church, in which they did not know any weakened concept of the unity of the Church, but always invariably confessed in the ninth member of the Symbol their faith “in one, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.” I can ask the question: do you and I belong to the one Church of Christ? When answering this question, you will undoubtedly mention the insignificance of dogmatic differences of opinion, and the almost insignificant difference in rituals. But for me, the answer is determined not by considerations of dogmatic differences of opinion, but by the present fact - there is no churchly grace-filled unity between us. This fact cannot be ignored, but you, like Fr. Svetlov, this fact is replaced by reasoning about the insignificance of dogmatic differences of opinion. The basis, for example, of the above decisions about. Svetlov, there are two thoughts: 1) in the essential, or main, all Christian faiths coincide with each other and 2) the differences between Christian faiths, even dogmatic ones, are insignificant and exaggerated. We agree that both of these thoughts are completely fair. However, they in no way provide sufficient grounds for the conclusion that all Christian denominations belong to the one Church of Christ. The Christian Church is not a philosophical or theological school, membership of which is entirely conditioned by the recognition of its theoretical principles. The fundamental truth of Christianity, its great mystery - the incarnation of the Son of God - is recognized by all Christian denominations, but this alone cannot merge them into a single Church. After all, “demons,” according to the Apostle James, “believe” (James 2:19), and, according to the testimony of the Gospel, they confessed their faith like the Apostle Peter (Matthew 16:16, 8:29; Mark 1:24; Luke 8:28). But do they belong to the one Church of Christ? On the other hand, the Church undoubtedly includes people who do not know the dogma of the Council of Chalcedon and who can say very little about their dogmatic convictions. Finally, in the Church, its members are given wide freedom of theological opinions, and the diversity of theological opinions does not violate the unity of the Church. Yes, the Church does not have a system of doctrine developed in detail in all departments. That is why school courses on dogmatics are always different from each other. This could not have happened if the Church had dogmatic mandatory answers to all questions. If the question of belonging and not belonging to the Church is brought to exclusively theoretical-dogmatic grounds, then this question cannot be definitely resolved. To what extent should dogmatic unanimity with the Church extend? What must we agree with, and what differences of opinion does separation from the Church entail? How to answer this? And who is so authoritative that his decision is firm? Perhaps you would point to faith in the incarnate Son of God as the main sign of belonging to the Church? But German Protestants will argue against the necessity of this sign, since in this religion there are even pastors who openly declare their denial of the Divinity of the Savior. Christ did not write a course on dogmatics. The most important dogmas of Christianity were precisely formulated centuries after the earthly life of the Savior. What then, at the very first time of the historical existence of Christianity, determined belonging to the Church? This is stated in the book of the Acts of the Apostles: “Those who were being saved were added to the Church” (Acts 2:47, 5:13–14). Belonging to the Church is conditioned by unity with the Church. It cannot be otherwise because the Church is not a philosophical school. She is a new humanity, a new fertile organism of love. She is the body of Christ. Christ Himself compared the unity of His disciples to the organic unity of a tree and branches. Two adjacent “bodies” or two trees cannot be in organic connection with each other. As the soul is in the body, the Holy Spirit is in the Church; the Church is not only one body, but also one spirit. The soul does not revive a member cut off from the body, just as the vital juices of a tree do not transfer to a severed branch. The severed member dies and decays. The severed branch dries up. These comparisons must be used as a guide when discussing the unity of the Church. If these comparisons, these images of the tree and the body are applied to the Church, then any separation from the Church, any cessation of unity with the Church will turn out to be incompatible with belonging to the Church. It does not matter how great the dogmatic difference of opinion of the separated one is; The very fact of separation, the very cessation of unity with the Church, is important and has full significance. Let there be separation only on the basis of church rebellion and disciplinary disobedience, without any dogmatic differences of opinion, separation from the Church will have all the sad consequences for the one who separated. Not only heretics, but also schismatics are separated from the Church. The essence of the separation remains the same. This is how they reasoned in the Ancient Church: “They cannot be with God if they do not want to be unanimous in the Church of God.” “Yes, he calls himself a Christian just as falsely as the devil often calls himself Christ,” 4 says Saint Cyprian. This holy father dealt with the church rebels Novat and Novatian. At first, their rebellion was not based on any dogmatic difference of opinion. However, Saint Cyprian says about these rebels that they are outside the Church, that they are not Christians, that they are not with Christ 5 . “Can one who resists and acts contrary to the Church hope that he is in the Church when the blessed ap. Paul, discussing the same subject and showing the mystery of unity, says: one body, one Spirit... one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God (Eph. 4:4-6). The Church is one, although with the increase in fertility, expanding, it is split into many. After all, the sun has many rays, but there is only one light; There are many branches on a tree, but there is only one trunk, firmly held by the root; many streams flow from one source, but although the overflow resulting from the abundance of waters represents multiplicity, however, at the source itself, unity is still preserved. Separate the sunbeam from its origin - unity will not allow a separate light to exist; break off a branch from a tree - the broken one will lose the ability to grow; separate the stream from its source - the separated one will dry up. In the same way, the Church, illuminated by the light of the Lord, spreads its rays throughout the world, but the light spreading everywhere is one, and the unity of the body remains inseparable. Throughout the earth she will spread her branches laden with fruits; its abundant streams flow into distant space; despite all this, there remains one chapter, one beginning; one mother, rich in the success of fruitfulness. We are born from her, we feed on her milk, we are animated by her spirit. The Bride of Christ cannot be corrupted: she is pure and uncorrupted, knows one house and chastely preserves the holiness of one bed. Anyone who separates from the Church joins an adulterous wife and becomes a stranger to the promises of the Church. He who leaves the Church of Christ deprives himself of the rewards predetermined by Christ: he is alien to her, indecent, her enemy. He can no longer have God as his father who does not have the Church as his mother. Those who are outside the Church could be saved only if one of those who were outside Noah’s ark were saved” 6 . This is how Saint Cyprian talks about the unity of the Church. It is not just dogmatic unanimity that he places as the basis for the unity of the Church, but precisely unity with the Church, as if with some organism. “If,” argues St. John Chrysostom, “the hand were to separate from the body, the spirit (flowing) from the brain, seeking continuation and not finding it there, does not break away from the body and does not pass on to the taken hand, but if it does not find it there, then it is not communicated to it” 7. And here are the words of St. John Chrysostom against those who indiscriminately pester people who are separating from the Church. “If these latter contain dogmas that are contrary to us, then we ourselves should not have communication with them; if they think the same as us, then even more (one should avoid them). Why is this so? Because this is a disease of lust. Don’t you know what happened to Korah, Dathan and Aviron? Weren't they the only ones who suffered? Aren't their accomplices also with them? What are you saying? “They have the same faith and they are also Orthodox.” If so, why are they not with us? One Lord, one faith, one baptism. If they are good, then we are bad, and if we are good, then they are bad. Tell me: do you really think it is enough that they are called Orthodox, while among them the grace of ordination has become impoverished and perished? What is the use of everything else if they do not observe this last one? One must stand equally for both faith and for it. And if everyone is allowed, according to the ancient proverb, to fill his hands, to be a priest, then let everyone come, and in vain was this altar built, in vain is the church rite, in vain is the face of the priests: let us overthrow and destroy it” 8 . In his first canonical letter to Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium, Saint Basil the Great cites the opinion of the “ancients” about those who apostatized from the Church. “Although the beginning of the apostasy occurred through a schism (δια σχίσματος), those who apostatized from the Church no longer had the grace of the Holy Spirit on themselves, for the teaching of grace became impoverished, because the legal succession was cut off.” We will have a more detailed talk about these and further words of St. Basil ahead. Now I will only note that Saint Basil did not at all reject the thoughts of the “ancients” about the complete lack of grace of all who apostatized from the Church, even schismatics. It seems to me that these patristic considerations already sufficiently reveal the thought of the ancient Church, although evidence such as the above can be multiplied without much difficulty. The ancient Church did not consider dogmatic unanimity with it to be the only condition for belonging to it. She also considered separation from her for reasons of rebellion and schism to be a falling away from the unity of the Church. She considered unity with it in life and humble obedience to it to be a condition for belonging to the Church. At the same time, falling away from the Church was considered a falling away from Christ, from Christianity. The idea that, despite visible separation from the Church, one can still belong to it invisibly and enjoy all its grace-filled gifts, such a thought is completely alien to the ancient Church. And it’s clear why this is so. Because the opposite thought would necessarily entail the destruction of the united Church. This would be a preaching of complete indifference in matters of church life and church discipline. In fact, why should I avoid church rebellion, schism, and even heresy, if falling away from the Church and ending my vital unity with it does not threaten me with anything special? Even if I am a disobedient Church, even if it casts me out from among its members, even if it anathematizes me - the trouble is not great, because I remain a Christian, I remain with Christ and am not without hope for eternal salvation! But what was the meaning of all the exhortations to obedience, to submission to the hierarchy, to visible unity with church society, with which all ancient church writing was filled, starting with the apostolic epistles and continuing with the epistles of Clement of Rome and Ignatius the God-Bearer? But Clement of Rome wrote his letter about the church rebellion in Corinth, and not about any heresy. All these admonitions were not nonsense: on the contrary, they had full meaning and significance in the ancient Church, since she was invariably convinced that without visible unity with her there is no salvation, no Christian life, no Christianity. That is why Blessed Augustine, who taught about predestination to salvation, asserts that sancti regno Dei praedestinati dividi ab Ecclesia nullo modo possunt, that the saints, predestined to the Kingdom of God, can in no way be separated from the Church 9. The harmful teaching about the need not to belong to the visible Church is something unknown to the ancient Church, but is an invention of relatively new times, inspired, moreover, by thoughts and moods that are far from those of the ancient Church. If, without any doubt, we stand on the point of view of the Ancient Church, then we cannot agree with your idea that the entire Christian world, as you say, constitutes one Church of Christ, that all the Churches of the East and West are local Churches or parts of the Universal Church. And this is not at all because I exaggerate the dogmatic diversity of Christian faiths or their differences in rituals and orders of life. Mainly, and above all, Christian denominations together cannot constitute a single Church because there is no unity between them. I cannot understand how East and West remained in the same Church after 1054. What then does the fact of the “division of the Churches” or, more precisely, the falling away of the Roman Patriarchate from the Universal Church mean? Could the division really not have happened, although both sides looked at the division as an accomplished fact? Sending letters to Patriarch Michael with his legates, Pope Leo IX sends a decisive threat: “If, somewhere in the Universe, any nation arrogantly disagrees with the Roman Church, it can no longer be called and considered a Church - it is already a gathering of heretics, a gathering of schismatics, a synagogue of Satan - non sit jam dicenda vel habenda Ecclesia aliqua, sed omnino nulla; quin potius concliliabulum haereticorum, aut conventiculum schismaticorum et synagoga satanae" 10. The lust for power of the Roman bishop bore disastrous fruit. On the unfortunate 16th day of July 1054, the legates placed a letter of excommunication on the throne in Hagia Sophia, where, among other things, we read the following words: “By the authority of the Holy and Indivisible Trinity and the Apostolic See, the message of which we carry out, of all Orthodox fathers of the seven Ecumenical Councils and of the entire Catholic Church, we sign the anathema proclaimed by our lord, the most reverend pope, to Michael and his followers, if not will be corrected, thus: anathema, Maranatha with the Simonians, Velesians, Arians, Donatists, Nicolaitans, Severians, Doukhobors, Manichaeans, Nazarenes and all heretics, together with the devil and his angels, unless they are converted. Amen, amen, amen" 11. On the same day, the legates of the pope, in the presence of the emperor and his dignitaries, repeated the anathema orally: “Whoever stubbornly contradicts the faith of the Holy Roman and Apostolic See and its sacrifice, let him be anathema and maranatha, and let him not be considered a Catholic Christian, but a prosimite heretic. Let it be, let it be, let it be." 12. On July 20, the Patriarchal Synod responded with a just anathema. From the charter of the legates we see that, in the opinion of the Greeks, the Church of Christ, the true rite of worship and baptism among the Latins perished 13 . What do we see? Both sides exchanged anathemas, and each side ceased to consider the other as the Church, recognizing only itself as the Church. Has there been a break? Of course it happened. Otherwise there is no answer. Since 1054, there have been no two separate Christian Churches, because there cannot be two Churches, and one of the local Churches ceased to be such, breaking its connection with the Universal Church. The Universal Church was preserved in all its grace-filled fullness and remained united, as it was before the fall of one of the several local Churches. The event of 1054 is sad and deplorable, but there is no need to be afraid to call things by their proper names. This fear in matters of faith and the Church can be very harmful. I think that any discussion of issues of church unity among Christians of our time should begin with an establishment of a view on the meaning of the deplorable event of 1054. What happened this year? Falling away or separation? If there is division, then the one Church existed for 1000 years, and then there were already two Churches. You are inclined to answer differently, in the precise sense that in 1054 there was no falling away or division, and the Church remained united, including both the West and the East, only its unity weakened somewhat due to the cessation of visible communication. It is absolutely impossible to agree with such an answer. In 1054 there was a falling away. Who fell away is another question, but someone fell away. The Church remained united, but either only in the East, or only in the West. After the event of 1054, the year 863 comes, and there is no unity between us. Latins were accepted into the Church through baptism, like pagans, or through confirmation, just as the ancient Church accepted Arians, Macedonians, Apollinarians and similar heretics. We have an anti-Catholic mission; in our theological school we also have a department for denouncing Latinism. Catholics convert the Orthodox to papism through violence, deception (union), and propaganda. The Pope announces an indulgence to the one who will read prayers for the conversion of Eastern schismatics for a certain number of days. The Latins formed councils, recognizing them as ecumenical, and over the past centuries they invented new dogmas unknown to the ancient Church. The Eastern Church condemned the new dogmas of Latinism as heresy. Let me take a relatively recent example. Pope Pius IX, in his message to the Orientals on January 6, 1848, defending all the fictions of Latinism, calls for a return to the true Church. Four months later, on May 5, 1848, the four eastern patriarchs and all the bishops who were part of the Synods of Constantinople, Antioch and Jerusalem issued a “district letter of the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church to all Orthodox Christians.” Along with the refutation and condemnation of the pope's message, the patriarchs talk about the conversion of the fallen Churches to the body of the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. In the same epistle the Filioque is condemned in strong words. “The One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, following the holy fathers, Eastern and Western, as in ancient times with our fathers she proclaimed, and now again proclaims to the council, that this newly introduced opinion that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son is a real heresy, and its followers, no matter who they are, are heretics; The societies that are composed of them are heretical societies, and any spiritual and liturgical communion with them by the Orthodox children of the Catholic Church is lawless.” Is it really possible to imagine such relations between local Churches in the depths of the one Universal Church of Christ? Are all these relationships really just an insignificant trifle, an everyday detail that does not at all indicate gaps in the mystical depths of the body of Christ? But this gap is clear to everyone: we do not partake of the One Bread. Is this really not enough? Is this really a lack of only apparent unity? But the sacrament of Body and Blood is the focus of the mystical life of the Church. This is the mysterious center of church unity, as the ancient Church of Christ teaches about this, starting with the Apostle Paul, continuing with Saint Ignatius the God-Bearer, Saint Cyprian of Carthage, Saint Cyril of Alexandria 14, etc. In the liturgy of Saint Basil the Great, following the Translation of the Holy Gifts, the priest prays: “For us all, from the one Bread and unite the cups of those who partake to each other into one communion of the Holy Spirit.” What other greater division could there be, internal, invisible, mysterious, if we broke in the sacrament of communion? Such relations between local Churches are certainly unthinkable. The Universal Church now consists of 16 autocephalous local Churches. Are we converting and annexing Orthodox Syrians, Serbs, and Romanians? We celebrate the Divine Liturgy with special joy if a hierarch or priest of another local Church serves with us. What happened throughout Rus' four years ago, when we had Patriarch Gregory IV of Antioch! People's enthusiasm, spiritual delight to the point of tears of tender joy, it seems, will never be forgotten. When the patriarch performed divine services in our academic church, we experienced the same thing that the Lord gives us on the great night of Holy Easter. In your letter of September 13/26, you mention that friendly and cordial relations between the Orthodox Church and the Anglican Churches are developing day by day. Yes, but the most important thing is missing: there is no church unity. At the Academy we met high representatives of Anglicanism, but how different these meetings were from the meeting of the Patriarch of Antioch! Where does this difference come from, if both the Patriarchate of Antioch and the British Church are equally local Churches of the one Ecumenical Church of Christ? It is in vain to refer to the words of one or another of the Russian theologians and hierarchs, as if the partitions between the Christian Churches do not reach heaven - the fact of the West’s falling away from the Church in 1054 for an Orthodox person is a present fact of religious experience. In a letter to Archbishop Anthony dated June 12/25, 1915, you also cite the opinion of the famous Moscow Metropolitan Philaret, who in one of his early writings wrote: “I do not dare to call any Church that believes that Jesus is the Christ false.” But there are many difficulties in completely agreeing with Metropolitan Philaret’s reasoning that Churches are either purely true or not purely true. It seems to me that what is not a purely true Church is a false one, and there cannot be a false Church; such a Church ceases to be a Church and becomes an extra-church society. And after all, Metropolitan Philaret did not commune with Catholics, just as our other theologians do not commune with them, sometimes too zealously defending the unacceptable doctrine of the unity of the Church, in which in a single Church there can be local Churches that have not had communion with each other for centuries. And this seems to me inconsistency. Why not serve, why not take communion with the priest of the local Roman Church? No, the falling away of Rome from the Church (or the East from Rome) is a present fact that does not need to be hushed up and reduced to zero. You reproach Archbishop Anthony for being prone to theological rigorism and say that his conclusions convey an atmosphere that is too dark. But what to do if such conclusions are completely true. The dark atmosphere was created not by theological rigorism, but by the historical pride and lust for power of the Roman bishop, to which church peace, unity and the very truth of the Christian faith were sacrificed. If we rotate in an atmosphere that you would call brighter, then will not the united Church of Christ turn into empty nothingness? In what form will the Bride of Christ appear before us then, if her parts can remain without communication with each other and even in a relationship of hostility? Are our Russian sectarians, Stundists and Baptists really with us, the Orthodox, in the same Church, those who hate the very name of the Orthodox Church, who will not hold a single meeting without insulting the Church, who, for the mere recognition of the dogma of the VII Ecumenical Council, consider us idolaters? But where, in this case, are the boundaries of the Church? Or are these boundaries not needed? But they were in the apostolic time, when “from outsiders... no one dared to pester the believers” (Acts 5:13). I think that you are in vain in calling certainty and frankness of judgment theological rigorism. And such certainty and frankness force us to admit that all Christian confessions cannot belong to the one Universal Church of Christ, but one of them is the true Church, and all the others are extra-church societies. For me, the only true Church is the Orthodox Church. On this you may not agree with me, and your disagreement with me on this point will be incomparably less sad for me than your disagreement in the previous position. Losing the idea of ​​the one true Church, in my opinion, is more dangerous than belonging to a false extra-church society, while still recognizing it as the only true representative of Christ’s Church on earth. To express even in prayer the thought that the Church of Christ is now “weakened and shackled by strife and disagreement,” does this not mean to doubt the truth and immutability of the prophecy of Christ’s words that the gates of hell will not prevail against the Church, founded on the stone of the incarnation of the Only Begotten Son of God? The World Conference of Christianity, the idea of ​​which you propagate with such zeal, sets itself a lofty and wonderful goal: to heal the wounds and heal the illnesses of Christian societies. But in order for this good intention to be crowned with the desired success, it is necessary to realize the disease that is corroding and burdening the Christian world in all its depth. Otherwise, the treatment will not bring tangible benefits. Yes, if you look at the Christian world as constituting a single Church, as not breaking church unity, then this will be only a superficial look at the patient’s condition. Such a view will leave without any healing the most important and fundamental disease - the falling away from the Church, which undoubtedly took place in 1054 and has not yet been corrected by either Protestants, Anglicans, or Mariavites. It is not enough to withdraw from non-church society; in order to become a local Church, it is necessary to reunite with the existing true one Universal Church, the unity of which no human sins could and will not be able to darken forever. Now I will move on to the issue that you raise in your second letter to Archbishop Anthony, and to which you devoted your entire third letter. The understanding of the unity of the Church of Christ, which I and earlier Archbishop Anthony set forth, does not currently seem to you to be the teaching of the Orthodox Church. You derive this teaching from the practice of the Orthodox Church in receiving converted Latins. You write: “The Orthodox Church admits that there are Christians in other Christian Churches who belong to the mystical body of Christ, and who do not need a second regeneration in order to enter it. If the Russian Church abstains from rebaptizing and reconsecrating Latins, both in cases of mass conversion and individual conversion, then we must conclude that this practice is instilled by a deep conviction that there is no need to repeat the sacraments performed by the Latin clergy; and since there is such a conviction, then it follows that the Russian Church officially recognizes the validity of some Christian Churches that have separated from Orthodoxy. I cannot admit that the Russian Church adheres to theories that it denies in practice. I do not think that the Russian Church, based solely on the principle of οἰκονομία, accepts unbaptized persons into its fold. The theory of οἰκονομία cannot make a pagan or a Jew become a Christian without receiving baptism. The Orthodox Church does not rebaptize Latins and does not repeat the consecration of their priests only because it recognizes the validity of their baptism and ordination.” Here you pose a question that deserves careful historical and dogmatic research and detailed reasoning. Unfortunately, in our theology this issue is confused by misunderstandings and sometimes even biased research. I call tendentious the most detailed “historical-dogmatic study” by A. Serafimov, “On the acceptance of non-Orthodox Christians into the Orthodox Church” (Kyiv, 1864), where the author sets himself the goal not of an impartial historical-dogmatic study of the issue, but of polemics against schismatics and non-priests. Having expressed your understanding of our practice in relation to the Latins, you yourself point out a serious objection to it. “If the sacraments performed outside the Orthodox Church are valid, then we no longer have a single Church of Christ, but several half-churches.” You yourself admit with rare frankness that this objection deserves the most serious attention of theologians. “I regret,” you write, “that I am not one of those who could give a strictly logical answer to this.” For my part, I believe that there is not a single person who could give any satisfactory answer to this objection. If the sacraments are valid outside the one Church of Christ, if the fullness of grace-filled church life is not limited to the boundaries of the Church, then there are several Churches, and not half-churches, then the ninth member of our Creed must be omitted. There can be no half-churches at all. I think that at the Council of Carthage in 256, Bishop Success expressed the most perfect truth when he said: “haereticis aut nihil aut totum licet - either allow heretics nothing, or allow everything” 15. If Catholic priests are the same as we are, if their ordination is the same as we, by the grace of God, received, if they teach their flock the same grace-filled gifts as we do, then why is Catholicism not the same Church as our Orthodox? What reason do I, a priest of the Church of Christ, have to evade church communion with Catholic bishops? Why don’t I serve the Divine Liturgy with them and share with them the one Body of Christ? If the recognition of the grace of the Catholic hierarchy and its sacred rites does not contradict the truth of the unity of the Church, then I must, I am obliged by my conscience, to immediately enter into unity with Catholics and, moreover, to call on my brothers, decisively condemning them if they persist. I must preach to the laity that they can receive communion both in a Polish church and in a French church. No, the truth of the unity of the Church excludes the grace of sacred rites in non-church societies. It is impossible to reconcile the unity of the Church with the reality of extra-church sacraments. This problem was not satisfactorily resolved even by the genius of St. Augustine. I expounded in detail Augustine’s teaching on the need to recognize sacraments performed outside the Church in a book dedicated to the history of the dogma of the Church 16 . According to Blessed Augustine, the recognition of the complete independence of the sacraments from the personality of their performer (in the Church) necessarily entails the recognition of the validity of the sacraments outside the Church; this idea fills the entire treatise of Augustine De baptismo. But having admitted the paradoxical thought of the complete identity of the sinful (and who is holy?) priest of the Church with the hierarchical person of the extra-church society, Augustine finds himself in a certain dead end, because for him only the Catholic Church was the only way of salvation. To recognize extra-Church sacraments as valid means to recognize the action of grace outside the Church, to recognize the possibility of salvation apart from the Church and in hostility to it, in a word, it means to recognize the optionality of the Church and discard faith in the one Holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church. But Blessed Augustine also wanted to preserve the truth that there is no salvation outside the Church 17. To this end, St. Augustine began to distinguish between the concepts of “having the sacraments” and “having the sacraments with benefit.” “Some things,” he says, “not to have, others to have are disastrous (pernitiose), others to have are salutary (salubriter)” 18. Schismatics, according to the teaching of St. Augustine, have sacraments, but without any benefit for salvation, but only to harm. Here Augustine gives the beginnings of the later scholastic distinction between the reality of the sacraments and their effectiveness. The sacraments may be valid, but not efficacious. It is difficult to perceive this thought if one renounces the scholastic play with concepts and stands on the basis of religious experience. What kind of grace is this if it gives only evil? Schismatics, according to St. Augustine, having the sacraments, are deprived of their gracious and saving effect for their separation from the Church. This separation shows that they have no love. Without love a person cannot be virtuous; the Holy Spirit cannot dwell in him. Thus, schismatics who stand outside the Church do not have the Holy Spirit. An objection inevitably arises: if schismatics do not have the Holy Spirit, 19 then how is baptism performed among them? Blessed Augustine makes a strange assumption that at the moment of baptism, only at the moment of baptism, the Holy Spirit acts outside the Church. The sins of the baptized person, argues Blessed Augustine, are forgiven, but immediately return to him again. He who is baptized outside the Church passes, as it were, through a narrow strip of light and again enters darkness. While he passes through the strip of light, he is cleansed of sins, but since immediately after baptism he again enters the darkness of discord, his sins immediately return. The Lord spoke in a parable about a servant to whom his master forgave ten thousand talents. When the slave did not take pity on his debtor, the master demanded payment of the entire debt. The same thing happens to a schismatic who is baptized outside the Church. Having received forgiveness of his debt to God, he again falls under this debt, since he reveals enmity towards the brothers in the Church. In order for the completed baptism to give the schismatic its grace-filled fruits, he must reveal his love for his brothers, that is, he must lovingly unite with the Church. With this connection, he no longer needs to be baptized 20. It is difficult to consider such a solution to the question of reconciling the unity of the Church with the reality of the sacraments outside the Church as satisfactory. After all, schismatic baptism takes place outside the Church. Why is baptism, at least only at the moment of its performance, even for a schismatic person ecclesiastical? After all, the schismatic turns not to the Church, but to schism (for the time of Augustine - to Donatism), turns, perhaps, by making a conscious choice and consciously condemning the Church. Even at the very moment of baptism he is at enmity with the Church. He, asking for forgiveness of the debt, at the same time declares that he has no love for the Church. In Augustine one can see the beginnings of the Catholic doctrine of opus operatum. The sacrament does not seem to depend on the Church, but only on the utterance of a certain formula. The Spirit of God animates only the body of the Church, and outside of this body it cannot exist, no matter what words are spoken there. It doesn’t matter who pronounces these words - a false Christian, a heretic, a schismatic, a pagan or a Jew, the only thing that matters is that the words are spoken outside the Church. After all, isn’t the essence of Christianity that it contains a collection of incantatory formulas, through which a person can force the supernatural help he needs from the Divine? Firmilian also protested against this understanding of the meaning of the baptismal formula, saying that the pronunciation of names is not enough for the remission of sins and for the sanctification of baptism 21 . Augustine's ideas were further developed by Catholic theologians. We cannot only thank God that the teaching of the Eastern Church was formed outside the sphere of Augustinianism, and we can and should consider this sphere alien to ourselves. In the great Eastern theologians we will not find even a shadow of reasoning similar to Augustine’s. This is why it is necessary to turn to the teaching and practice of the ancient Church. Surprisingly eternal questions of theology and church life! In the 20th century, I have to write from Russia to America about what in the 3rd century they wrote from Asia Minor to Carthage and from Alexandria to Rome. We have a sufficient amount of historical material; however, Augustinian reasoning is nowhere to be found. After all, the original church definitions established baptism for all those turning from heresies to the Church. Around the year 220, the Council of African and Numidian bishops, chaired by Agrippinus, determined to baptize heretics, “and since then,” Saint Cyprian testifies, “until now so many thousands of heretics, in our regions who turned to the Church, not only did not disdain and did not hesitate to receive the grace of the life-giving font and saving baptism, but also wisely and willingly insisted on this” 22. “I learned,” writes Saint Dionysius of Alexandria, “that a similar opinion existed for a long time among former bishops, in the most populous churches and at the councils of the brethren in Iconium, Sinnad and in many other countries” 23 . In the mid-50s of the 3rd century, Firmilian, Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, recalled in a letter to Saint Cyprian: “Long ago we, having gathered from Galatia, Cilicia and other nearby regions, at the Council in Iconium, in Phrygia, decided to firmly hold this opinion about heretics and defend it when doubt arises regarding this subject. Here some doubts have arisen regarding the baptism of those who, although they recognize the new prophets, however, apparently know the same thing as we do, the Father and the Son. But we, having examined this subject with all care, at the council in Iconium decided to completely reject all baptism that is performed outside the Church” 24. There is no need to set out in detail the disputes that flared up in the fifties of the 3rd century around the issue of accepting converting Novatians into the Church, where the Bishop of Rome, who wanted to see Roman practice everywhere, met objections from different sides. I will just draw your attention to some details of these disputes. First of all, the dogmatic position of the Roman Bishop Stephen, who denied the need for baptism, seems both vague and rather shaky. Therefore, one involuntarily recalls St. Cyprian’s comment that in Stephen’s letters much is either not relevant at all, or is self-contradictory, and is generally written unskillfully and thoughtlessly. Saint Cyprian tells us the true words of Stephen: “If anyone turns to you from any heresy, then let nothing new be introduced except for the devotee, that is, let one laying on of hands be performed on him as a sign of repentance” 25 . So, all heresies have the grace of baptism, and none of those who turn to the Church need to be baptized. Saint Cyprian testifies that Stephen did not even baptize the Marcionites 26. Yes, Stephen wants to stand only on the basis of the tradition of the Roman Church; the main thing for him is to maintain quod traditium est. But the ground especially shakes under the gaze of Stephen when he nevertheless demands the laying on of hands on converts and schismatics, such as the Novatians. Indeed, by the laying on of hands that Stephen speaks of, Catholic scholars also mean anointing, the mysterious imparting of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which, obviously, and according to Stephen, schismatics do not have. How did their baptism take place without the Holy Spirit? It is enough to read the letters of Cyprian to Jubayan, to Pompey and to Magnus, and the letter of Firmilian to Cyprian, to see how much more stable is the dogmatic position of Stephen’s opponents, which asserts the invalidity of any baptism outside the Church. Saint Cyprian points precisely to the inconsistency of the dogmatic teaching of his opponent “Those,” he writes, “who, although otherwise stubborn and incomprehensible, nevertheless admit that all heretics and schismatics do not have the Holy Spirit, and therefore, although they can baptize, however, they cannot give the Holy Spirit, we will dwell on this to say that those who do not have the Holy Spirit absolutely cannot baptize. Only one who has the Holy Spirit can baptize and give remission of sins. Let those who patronize heretics and schismatics answer us: do these have the Holy Spirit or do they not? If they have, then why is a hand laid on those who are baptized there, when they come to us, to bring down on them the Holy Spirit, Which, of course, would have been received where it could have been given if He were there? If, however, externally baptized heretics and schismatics do not have the Holy Spirit, then it is obvious that remission of sins cannot be given through those about whom it is known that they do not have the Holy Spirit” 27 . Stephen explained the reality of baptism outside the Church and without the Holy Spirit by the greatness of the name of Christ. “The name of Christ contributes greatly to faith and the holiness of baptism, so that whoever is baptized into Christ immediately receives the grace of Christ” 28. This opinion of Stephen is convincingly refuted by Saint Cyprian. “If the validity of baptism is attributed to the name, so that everyone baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, anywhere, is therefore already considered renewed and sanctified, then why is there, in the name of the same Christ, not the laying on of hands performed on the baptized person to receive the Holy Spirit? Why does not the same greatness of the same name exert the same power in the laying on of hands as is attributed to it in the consecration of baptism? If someone, having been reborn outside the Church, could become the church of God, then why couldn’t he also become the temple of the Holy Spirit? After all, whoever, having laid aside his sins in baptism, was sanctified and spiritually transformed into a new person, thereby became capable of receiving the Holy Spirit. The Apostle says: “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ” (Gal.3:27). So, whoever, having been baptized by heretics, can put on Christ, much more can he receive the Holy Spirit sent by Christ. Otherwise, if someone baptized outside the Church could put on Christ, but could not receive the Holy Spirit, then the one sent would become greater than the one who sent. However, is it possible to either put on Christ without the Spirit, or to separate the Spirit from Christ? Moreover, the second birth, by which we are born in Christ through the font of regeneration, is a spiritual birth; and therefore, isn’t it also an obvious absurdity when they say that one can be spiritually born among heretics, where they themselves do not recognize the existence of the Spirit? For water alone, without the Holy Spirit, of course, cannot cleanse sins and sanctify a person. So, they are faced with one of two things: either agree that where, in their opinion, there is baptism, the Holy Spirit is present, or, where there is no Holy Spirit, they do not recognize baptism, because baptism cannot be without the Holy Spirit" 29 . Saint Cyprian and his like-minded people decisively express the position that outside the Church there can be no baptism and, in general, the grace-filled actions of the Holy Spirit. “If heretics are devoted to the Church and are in the Church, then, of course, they can enjoy its baptism and other saving benefits. If they are not in the Church and even act against the Church, then how can they baptize the Church with the baptism?” 30. As you can see, in the reasoning of Saint Cyprian the train of thought is the opposite of what is sometimes proposed in our time. The first question that Saint Cyprian decides is the question of whether heretics and schismatics belong to the Church, whether they are in communion with it. If not, then they have fallen away from the body of the one Church and have lost the Holy Spirit. But it should be especially noted that Bishop Stephen is not very far from the thoughts of Saint Cyprian. After all, he, like Saint Cyprian, recognized that heretics and schismatics had fallen away from the Church, that they were outside of it, that they could not have the Holy Spirit outside the Church. Stephen laid an unfortunate foundation for the practice of the Roman Church, which met with fair criticism from Saints Cyprian and Firmilian. It is not in vain that Catholic scholars, wanting to justify the Roman bishop, make a rather strange assumption that Stephen did not express the idea of ​​​​the absence of the Holy Spirit among heretics and schismatics, but it was only attributed to him by St. Cyprian, so to speak, in the heat of polemics. But even more noteworthy is the fact that Saint Cyprian and all supporters of his views, despite the precise definiteness of their opinion about the complete gracelessness of all extra-church societies, considered it possible to allow different practices in different Churches - only if the union of peace and harmony between the bishops was preserved. Every primate is free to govern his church according to his own will, for which he will give an account to the Lord. Saint Cyprian repeats this idea many times in his letters (to Stephen, Magnus, Yubayan, Cornelius, etc.). Saint Dionysius of Alexandria, a contemporary of Saint Cyprian, argues quite in agreement, recalling the words of Deuteronomy: “Do not remove the boundaries of your neighbor that your fathers set” (Deut. 19:14) 31. “In courts and cases,” writes Saint Dionysius, “concerning individuals, how should we treat those who are outside the Church, and how should we treat those who belong to it? In our opinion, one should submit to the leaders of individual churches, who, by virtue of Divine consecration, are at the head of the ministry. And we present the judgment of deeds to our Lord” 32. From Stephen's point of view, diversity of practice cannot be allowed; this would mean, contrary to the Creed, to deny a single baptism. That is why Stefan absolutely demanded uniform practice. But now we see that Stephen’s opponents admit a fundamental difference in practice. What does this mean? After all, they looked at heretics and schismatics as unbaptized. And such, that is, unbaptized, were schismatics, in their opinion, of course, in all churches. I believe that it is possible to explain the views of Stephen’s opponents on the admissibility of various practices regarding the reception of heretics and schismatics only on the assumption that, for the sake of peace and the benefit of the Church, they sometimes considered it possible not to require a second correct rite of baptism, believing in the mysteriously grace-filled meaning of unity with the Church itself. Previously, a rite performed outside the Church was only an external form, which in the Church was filled with grace-filled content. After all, the same Saint Cyprian speaks especially a lot about “baptism by blood,” which is performed, of course, without any ritual and without any form. The assumption I made has a basis in the reasoning of the church writers themselves. Saint Cyprian was asked the question: “What will happen to those who, having previously turned from heresy to the Church, were received into the Church without baptism?” “The Lord,” answers Saint Cyprian, “in His mercy is able to grant them forgiveness, and those who, having been accepted into the Church, have fallen asleep in the Church, will not deprive His Church of the gifts.”33 Firmilian is inclined to demand baptism from such people if they are alive, but if they are dead, he assumes that they will receive the fruit of truth and faith that they deserve 34 . There is no doubt that in the age of Cyprian the question of church benefit arose. Cyprian finds that the requirement of baptism is even useful for more successful conversion of schismatics to the Church 35. We have very important news in the letter of Dionysius of Alexandria to the Roman Bishop Xystus: “In the meeting of the brethren there was someone who was considered an old believer and joined the society of Christians even before my ordination, even, it seems, before the installation of blessed Herakles. Having been at a recent baptism and having listened to questions and answers, he came to me weeping and contrition and, falling at my feet, began to confess and swear that the baptism he received from heretics was not like that and had nothing in common with ours, because it was full of wickedness and blasphemy. Saying that his soul was suffering greatly, and that from those wicked words and actions he did not even have the courage to lift his eyes to God, he asked me to teach him the truest purification, adoption and grace. But I did not dare to do this, saying that for this rather long-term communication between him and the Church, that I do not dare to again prepare the one who listened to the blessing of the Gifts, said “Amen” with others, began the meal, extended his hands to receive the Holy Food, accepted it and for a long time partook of the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. I commanded him to be of good humor and with firm faith and a good conscience to begin the communion of the saints” 36. This fact is a clear illustration of the thought of Saint Cyprian expressed in a letter to Yubayan. Saint Dionysius, like Saint Cyprian, equally recognized that the most important thing for a person is his unity with the Church, in which he receives all the gifts of grace, even if his baptism outside the Church was only a simple immersion, not even at all similar to church baptism. Otherwise, why didn’t Saint Dionysius baptize the one who himself wept, remembering his baptism among the heretics? Of the two views - Cyprian and Stephen, I believe one can be completely satisfied only with the view of St. Cyprian. Here the unity of the Church is preserved and possible leniency and independence from words and formulas is given. Stephen preserves the unity of the Church only with the thought that heretics and schismatics do not have the Holy Spirit, which is why it is necessary, when being admitted into the Church, to lay hands on them to impart the gifts of the Holy Spirit. But this idea, expressed even more decisively in the Liber de rebaptismate, belittles and even makes the meaning of baptism poorly understood. In the Liber de rebaptismate, the gifts of grace - the gifts of the Holy Spirit - are considered the exclusive property of the Church, and baptism performed in the name of Jesus is common to the Church and others. Such baptism only washes the body and remains useless outside the Church on the day of judgment (Sar. 7:12, 18). But what kind of sacrament is this? How is a sacrament performed without the grace of the Holy Spirit? If the grace-filled baptism of the Holy Spirit is allowed outside the Church, then it is absolutely impossible to preserve the unity of the Church. Very often, Church historians and patrolologists express the idea that the bishop of Rome turned out to be right in history, and not St. Cyprian. I think that in history the rigorism of St. Cyprian with regard to church practice was only softened somewhat, but his dogmatic teaching on the unity of the Church was not changed at all. To be convinced of this, you need to go to the 4th century. Here, first of all, we should carefully consider the words of St. Basil the Great from his first canonical letter to Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium. In this epistle, which has canonical dignity and indisputable authority, it is impossible not to notice the way of thinking of St. Cyprian and his like-minded people. Saint Basil only cites the opinion of Saint Cyprian in a precise dogmatic formulation. “The ancients, I mean Cyprian and our Firmilian, decided to bring all of them, the Kafars, the Encratites, and the Hydroparasts, under one definition; because, although the beginning of separation (τοΰ χωρισμοΰ) was due to a schism (διά σχίσματος), those who departed from the Church no longer had the grace of the Holy Spirit on themselves, since its teaching became impoverished after the suppression of succession, and although the first who separated had ordination from the fathers, and through the laying on of their hands they received spiritual gifts; but those who were rejected, having become laity (λαϊκοί γενόμενοι), had no power to baptize or ordain, and were not able to convey to others the grace of the Holy Spirit, from which they themselves had fallen (ής αύτοί έκπεπτώκασι). Why were those baptized by them, as those baptized by the laity, when they came to the Church, commanded to be cleansed by true church baptism” (Rev. 1). This is the dogmatic part of the rule of St. Basil, where he conveys the opinion of his predecessor Firmilian and St. Cyprian. Saint Basil does not refute or challenge these dogmatic arguments about the unity of grace-filled life in the Church with a single word. And this he had to do, because immediately, after the above words, he begins to talk about the possibility of practice, apparently, which does not agree with this dogmatic theory: “But since some in Asia, for the benefit of many (οἱκονομίας ἔνεκα τῶν πολλῶν), decided to accept their baptism, then let it be it is acceptable (ἔστω δεκτόν).” The transition from dogmatic reasoning to disciplinary orders is made in a condescending tone. The dogmatic theory does not change, but lenient practice is allowed (ἔστω δεκτόν). With one general dogmatic view, different practices are possible, as St. Cyprian also agreed in principle. Saint Basil begins his first rule by recognizing the possibility of varied practice. “We must follow the custom of each country (talking about the Kafars), because those who at that time discussed this subject thought differently about their baptism.” If Saint Basil had recognized extra-church baptism as grace-filled and valid, he could not have reasoned like that. Then he would have to insist that schismatics cannot be baptized anywhere, for baptism is one. But for St. Basil, the question of whether or not to baptize a schismatic is determined only by church practice and the benefit of the matter, depending on the circumstances. After all, according to Saint Basil, “some in Asia” decided to accept the baptism of the Kafars οἱκονομίας ἔνεκα τῶν πολλῶν, and not for dogmatic reasons, not as a result of a teaching different from that of Saint Cyprian about the unity of the Church and the unity life of grace only in the Church. St. Basil argues in exactly the same way when he speaks of the Encratites. “We should reject their baptism, and if anyone has received baptism from them, when he comes to the Church, baptize him. However, if this is an obstacle to the general improvement (ἐάν μέλλη τῇ καθόλου οἰκονομία έμπόδιον έσεσθαι τοῦτο), then again it should to adhere to custom and follow the fathers who arranged what was needed for us. For I am afraid that, wishing to keep them from haste in baptism, the strictness of the rule may hinder us from being saved. But in any case, let it be decreed that those who come to the Church from among the baptized should be anointed faithful by them and then proceed to the sacraments.” In his second letter to Amphilochius (canon 47), Saint Basil insists that the Encratites should be baptized, “although among you, like among the Romans, rebaptism is prohibited due to some discretion (οἰκονομίας τινός ἕνεκα).” Again, as is obvious, in establishing practice it is not dogmatic teaching that prevails, but the principle of ecclesiastical economy. Having recognized the need to baptize the Encratites, Saint Basil, however, agreed to a different practice, as long as the strictness of the rule did not put an obstacle to the conversion of heretics. Is it true, according to the rule of St. Basil, that the baptism of Encratites is in itself or not? Of course, it is invalid, since he considers it more correct to baptize them. Why does he agree to a different practice? Only because the practical question of the baptism of heretics for him is not inextricably linked with the dogmatic teaching about the unity of the Church. The Church is one, and in it only the sacraments are blessed. The Encratites do not have grace, and if someone does not baptize them when receiving them into the Church, then he does not make the Encratites themselves a part of the Church, a local Church, but does this only for the benefit of the Church, to facilitate the conversion of heretics. Any other interpretation of St. Basil’s words seems completely impossible. What does the custom of the country or “a certain discretion” have to do with it if it is a question of dogma? It is impossible, for the benefit of those converting or according to the customs of different countries, to either recognize or deny the truth of consubstantiality, the unity of the Church, etc.! In your third letter to Archbishop Anthony, you somewhat inaccurately referred to the Catholic book Dr. Johann Ernst – Die Ketzertaufangelegenheit in der altchristlichen Kirche nach Cyprian. (Meinz, 1901). From the books of this scientist, I am convinced that a modern Catholic is not able to understand the thought of the ancient Church regarding the life of grace. But in the place you indicated, J. Ernst does not say at all that “as if the canonical rules of St. Basil on the rebaptism of heretics do not have the meaning of Christian dogma, but express the strict discipline of the Church in the era when he wrote them.” J. Ernst writes the following: “In a large part, perhaps in the majority of Asian churches, the rebaptism of Novatians and schismatics in general who were asking to join the Church was firmly held, and Basil cites to justify this practice the Cyprian argument that an extra-church performer of baptism lacks jurisdiction to actually perform baptism. But for Basil the Great, the invalidity of Novatian (resp. schismatic) baptism is not a subject of dogma, as for St. Cyprian, but a subject of temporarily dominant church discipline. He understands Παραδέξασθαι in the mentioned canon of the “ancients” in the sense of possibility (als facultatives) and, accordingly, the recognition of Novatian (schismatic) baptism depends on the definitions existing in individual churches” (pp. 5–6). If so, then according to one or another church practice one cannot conclude about dogmatic teaching: if in practice some of the non-church members are not baptized when accepted into the Church, this does not mean at all that the Church recognizes them as belonging to it and having the grace of the Holy Spirit acting in their rite of baptism. With regard to the method of accepting all apostates into the Church, Saint Basil, following the rule of the “ancients,” divides them into three categories: heresy, schism, unauthorized gathering (αιρέσεις, σχίσματα, παρασυναγωγής), but this is precisely only in relation to the method of reception. It is absolutely impossible to understand the words of Saint Basil in the sense that for him only heretics in the proper sense do not belong to the Church, while others still remain in the Church. “To accept the baptism of schismatics,” writes St. Basil. The above Greek words are often translated as follows: “as not yet alien to the Church” (Slavic translation in the “Book of Rules”), “as still belonging to the Church” (Russian translation in the works of the Holy Father), mit der Kirche noch in Verbindung stehen (translation by J. Ernst S. 4). But these are not translations, but interpretations that cannot be considered successful. Literally it should be translated: “as those still existing from the Church.” The idea here is not that the schismatics still belong to the Church, but that they have recently left the Church. In any case, belonging to the Church can hardly be expressed by the preposition ek. It is difficult to imagine belonging to the Church in the form of successive steps: Church, unauthorized gathering, schism. If the words of St. Vasily ἒτι έκ τῆς ἐκκλησίας meant some belonging to the Church of schismatics, then unauthorized gatherings should, in his opinion, belong even more to the Church. Adherents of unauthorized gatherings are accepted only through repentance. But what does St. Basil say about them? “If someone, having been convicted of sin, is removed from the priesthood and has not submitted to the rules, but has appropriated the presidency and the priesthood to himself, and with him others have retreated, leaving the Catholic Church (καταλιπόντες την καθολικήν ἐκκλησίαν)". How can one remain in the Church, leaving the Universal Church? It would be some kind of incomprehensible self-contradiction: to say that schismatics are still in the Church, and to assert that unauthorized gatherings have retreated from the Universal Church and left it. So, this is what the first rule of St. Basil the Great teaches us. The Church is one, and she alone has all the fullness of the grace-filled gifts of the Holy Spirit. Whoever, and no matter how, retreats from the Church - into heresy, into schism, into an unauthorized gathering, he loses the communion of the grace of God. Therefore, sacraments performed outside the Church do not have any beneficial effects. Only for the benefit of the Church, for the sake of facilitating joining the Church, it is possible not to repeat the rite of baptism on converts, if it was correctly performed outside the Church. Not because this rite was already a sacrament of grace, but in the hope that the gift of grace would be received in very unity with the body of the Church. If baptism outside the Church, even in appearance, was performed incorrectly, as, for example, among the Montanists, then there is no reason, no sense (λόγον in St. Basil) to grant them such indulgence. Only because Saint Basil does not inextricably connect any dogmatic theory about the reality of extra-church sacraments with church practice, only because of this he could fundamentally agree to the admissibility of different practices in different countries, and only because of this it is possible to “follow the custom of each country.” Otherwise, if church practice were inextricably linked with dogmatic provisions, if the acceptance of a heretic or schismatic without baptism meant his belonging to the Church and the validity of the sacraments performed outside the Church, if the validity of the sacraments depended on the faith and dogmatic teaching of the heretic, then the Church would have to absolutely accurately determine what error makes a heretic, separates from the Church and invalidates the sacraments. There is no such definition, and no general guiding thought can be derived from church practice. My attention is drawn to Canon 95 of the Sixth Ecumenical Council. First of all, this rule says about all heretics and schismatics who come to the Church that they “join part of those being saved - τῇ μερίδν τῶν σωζομένων.” Previously, therefore, they were not among those being saved, that is, in the Church. According to this rule, the following “ordinary order and custom” is defined: “Arians, Macedonians, Novatians, who call themselves pure and best, the Fourtecostals, or the Tetradites, and the Apollinarians, when they give handwriting and curse all heresy, which does not philosophize, as the holy Catholic and Apostolic Church of God philosophizes, is acceptable, sealing, that is, anointing with holy chrism... The Nestorians must write manuscripts and anathematize their heresy... and then let them receive holy communion.” Is it possible to explain this definition of the Ecumenical Council from a dogmatic point of view? Impossible. Novatians are schismatics; The Nestorians are undoubted heretics, condemned by the Ecumenical Council. And suddenly, the canon of the Sixth Ecumenical Council is more strict and demanding towards schismatics than towards heretics! Rule 79 of the Council of Carthage can also be understood exclusively from the point of view of church oikonomia. “Finally, it is good to send letters to our brethren and co-bishops, and especially to the Apostolic See, on which the aforementioned worthy honorable brother and co-servant Anastasius presides, so that, according to the great need of Africa, known to him, for the sake of peace and the benefit of the Church, and from the most Donatist clergy, who have corrected their disposition and wished to come to Catholic union, according to the reasoning and to the will of every Catholic bishop who governs the Church in that place, to receive in his degrees of priesthood, if this turns out to contribute to the peace of Christians... This is not done in violation of the Council that was held on this subject in the countries lying overseas, but so that this is preserved in favor of those who wish to pass on to the Catholic Church in this way, so that no obstacles are placed to their unity. Those who in their places of residence will be seen to promote and promote Catholic unity in every possible way, to the obvious benefit of the souls of the brethren, let the determination and decree against their degrees at the Council overseas not be an obstacle, for salvation is not barred from any person. That is, those ordained by the Donatists, once corrected, will desire to begin the Catholic faith, so that they will not be deprived of acceptance in their degrees, according to the definition of the Council that was overseas, but even more so, let those through whom the Catholic union is promoted.” Here we have, first of all, the opportunity for various practices. For the “Council beyond the Sea,” Donatism was an alien misfortune, which could be approached with a strict dogmatic standard, and this Council determined to accept Donatist clergy as ordinary laymen. For the Council of Carthage, practical considerations speak more strongly. “The Council Beyond the Sea” is not rejected: dogmatically it is absolutely right. But the practice for Africa is determined by considerations of church economy. The argument here is the great need of Africa, the will of every Catholic bishop, the peace of Christians, and even the personal merits of the converting Donatist cleric. With a dogmatic point of view, all these considerations must be completely silent. If the Donatists are still in the Church, and their ordination is valid, then there is no need to refer to the need of Africa and the benefit of the church world; it is necessary to rebel against the “Council beyond the sea”, which decided to again ordain those already ordained and having the grace of ordination. Obviously, both Councils are dogmatically unanimous in that there are no hierarchical persons outside the Church, even in schism, and no ordination outside the Church has a gracious, mystical meaning. However, for reasons of church economy, for the sake of the peace of the Church, one can accept schismatic clergy in their rank, trusting that for unity with the Church the Lord will grant them the grace of the priesthood and without repeating the correctly, albeit gracelessly, ritual already performed. It is apparently completely impossible to understand Rule 79 of the Council of Carthage otherwise. I will allow myself to linger a little longer on the practice and teaching of the ancient Church. According to church rules, Arians and Nestorians were not baptized when they were accepted into the Church, although at first, when there were no conciliar definitions, some Arians were baptized 37 . Arians were at least anointed with myrrh, but Nestorians were accepted simply through repentance and renunciation of heresy, according to the third order. Did the Arians, condemned and excommunicated by the Ecumenical Council, still remain members of the Church? Could their hierarchy really perform baptism and teach the grace of the Holy Spirit in the sacraments? If there was now a society of Arians somewhere, would you recognize it as a local Church, having a grace-filled hierarchy and real sacraments? After all, the Arians are already undoubted heretics, and their heresy concerns a very significant dogma, which is why it was met with such decisive struggle and condemnation. Why didn’t the Church baptize them, accepting them into its bosom? Obviously, only for reasons of church economy, wanting to facilitate the conversion of Arians to the Church. By accepting Arians without baptism, the Church did not at all think to declare that the Arians, despite their rejection of the truth of the consubstantiality of the Father and the Son, are still Christians who have a life of grace and hope for eternal salvation. We cannot even imagine this if we remember how church teachers of the 4th century talk about the Arians. “Those who call Arians Christians are in a great and extreme error, as they have not read the scriptures and do not know Christianity and the Christian faith at all... Instead of Christ, they have Arius, like the Manichaeans - Manichaeans... How can those who are not Christians, but Arians, be Christians? Or why will those who have rejected the Apostolic Faith belong to the Universal Church?” 38. St. Athanasius also discusses the baptism of the Arians. “Heretics are in danger of losing the very fullness of the sacrament, I mean baptism. For if the occult teaching is taught in the name of the Father and the Son, they do not name the true Father, denying the One who is from Him and similar to Him in essence, deny the true Son, and name another, according to their own invention, created from non-existent things, then isn’t the baptism they teach completely empty and useless, having only an imaginary appearance, but in reality not helping at all? piety? The Arians teach baptism not into the Father and the Son, but into the Creator and the creature, into the Creator and into the work. Just as the creature is different and the Son is different, so the baptism that they supposedly teach is different and not true, although they outwardly pronounce the written name of the Father and the Son. He is not the one who teaches who only says: Lord! but whoever connects the right faith with this name. Therefore, the Savior not only commanded to baptize, but says first: teach; and then: baptize in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, so that right faith arises from the teaching, and the mystery of baptism is united with faith. And many other heresies, pronouncing only names, but thinking wrongly, and therefore, as it is said, not having sound faith, the water they teach is useless, as poor in piety; why the one sprinkled by them is more defiled by wickedness than washed... Those who are wise in the Aryan way, although they read what is written and pronounce the names, but deceive those who receive baptism from them; because they themselves are more wicked than other heretics and gradually advance in wickedness over them. Accepting, apparently, baptism in the name of something that does not exist, they will not accept anything” 39. In a similar way, Saint Athanasius judges the baptism of those heretics who brought down the Holy Spirit into creation. “The faith in the Trinity handed down to us is one and it unites us with God, and whoever takes away anything from the Trinity and is baptized in the name of the Father, or in the same name of the Son, or in the Father and Son and without the Spirit, does not accept anything, but those who are baptized, and who imagine themselves administering baptism, remain vain and not consecrated; because secrecy is carried out in the name of the Trinity: so, whoever separates the Son from the Father, or reduces the Spirit to creatures, has neither the Son nor the Father, but is godless, worse than an infidel, and most likely not a Christian” 40. All these dogmatic arguments of St. Athanasius the Great are completely indisputable, and his view of the essence of Arianism fully reflects the general conviction of the Church of the 4th and subsequent centuries. However, Arians were not baptized when turning to the Church. What was this method of receiving Arians into the Church? Obviously, it was only a condescending church practice and was not at all a dogmatic teaching that the Arians are members of the Universal One Church of Christ, located only in visible separation from it, and that baptism performed in the Arian community was a real grace-filled sacrament. Given the obvious heresy of the society excommunicated from the Church, the Church accepted its members without new baptism. This fact convinces us that the ancient Church was completely alien to the idea that some, excommunicated from it, still remain in the Church of Christ and retain the grace of the Holy Spirit. Accepting some heretics and schismatics without baptism, even accepting their hierarchs into the priesthood, the Catholic Church continued to consider itself only the one Church of Christ, the exclusive owner of the grace-filled gifts of the Holy Spirit, and did not at all think by this practice of declaring the Kafars, Donatists, Arians, Nestorians and others as its members, having the saving gifts of the Holy Spirit. It seems to me that it is absolutely impossible to understand church practice in relation to converted heretics and schismatics in any other way. If the basis for the acceptance of heretics without baptism was the idea that they already have a baptism of grace, then it would be necessary to accurately determine for all individual Churches which of the heretics has baptism and who does not have it. But this was not the case. The Church allowed a variety of practices according to the circumstances of place and time, without strictly understanding the dogmatic teaching of heretics 41 . The result is a completely unthinkable conclusion: due to the circumstances of place and time, the Church changed its dogmatic teaching about its unity. Such a conclusion, of course, is certainly unacceptable, and therefore one should agree with the explanation of church practice proposed above. This explanation can easily be accepted, if only one does not look at Christianity only as a sum of dogmatic provisions, but sees the essence of Christianity in church life. Here, under the action of the grace of the Holy Spirit, all human shortcomings are filled, and the external rite of baptism performed outside the Church can turn into a grace-filled sacrament. Only with such a view of the dogmatic meaning of church practice is the truth of the unity of the Church preserved, and this truth is persistently demanded by the purity and integrity of the Bride of Christ. With a different view, the truth of the unity of the Church is darkened, and then the Church appears to be a sum of local Churches that are alien to each other, mutually hostile, and anathematizing each other. The church consciousness cannot accept such a strange idea of ​​the unity of the Church! I cannot help but draw attention to some inaccuracy that has crept into your judgments, the inaccuracy of the historical nature. In your third letter to Archbishop Anthony, you say: “Historically, it seems to me that the question of the invalidity of the sacraments outside the Orthodox Church does not go back further than the second half of the 18th century and was raised regarding the reproaches of one ignorant monk. I read the history of this regrettable episode in the “History of the Eastern Church under Turkish Dominion” by Alexei Lebedev, who sharply condemns the Church of Constantinople, which allowed itself to be carried away by the monk Auxentius. But the Russian Church did not follow the example of the Great Church: it remained faithful to the tradition of the ancient Byzantine Church, which mourned the division of the Churches of East and West and prayed with Balsamon for the conversion of the pope, but did not cease to recognize the validity of baptism and ordination among Western Christians.” “Indeed, there was a well-known period when the Russian Church practiced the rebaptism of Latins; this innovation - I think I will not be mistaken if I use such a term - was introduced at the Moscow Council in 1620. But the Moscow Council of 1667, famous in the history of the Russian Church, abolished the rebaptism of Latins. This conciliar resolution, in my opinion, is decisive proof that the Orthodox Church recognizes the validity of the Latin sacraments.” After the above consideration of ancient church practice and its dogmatic meaning, the now acceptance of Latins without baptism does not at all tell me that the Latin sacraments are valid in themselves, regardless of the accession of those baptized in Latin to the Orthodox Church. But that's not all. You are not entirely correct in your historical statements. In the first centuries, after the separation of Rome from the Church, Latins were received differently in both the Greek and Russian Churches - through baptism or confirmation. For a long time there were no general definitions on this issue. There is a lot of news about the baptism of Latins. Even in their charter, which marked the beginning of the unfortunate separation, the papal ambassadors accused the Greeks: “Like the Arians... they rebaptize those baptized in the name of the Holy Trinity and especially the Latins; like the Donatists, they claim that with the exception of the Greek Church, Christ’s Church and true sacrifice and baptism perished throughout the world” 42. At the very beginning of the 12th century, the Serbian prince, the father of Stefan Nemanja, was forced to baptize his son with Latin baptism, but then baptized him in the Orthodox way when he returned to Pacy 43. Bishop Matthew of Krakow, in a letter dated 1130 to Bernard, Abbot of Clevros, invites him to engage in the conversion of Russians to Latinism and claims that Russians are rebaptizing Latins 44 . It is known how kindly Louis VII was received in Constantinople in 1147 by Manuel I; however, the description of his campaign to the East Odo de Dioglio mentions that the Greeks rebaptized the Latins 45. In the same 12th century, our Novgorod bishop Niphon instructs Kirik that Latins should be received through confirmation. According to him, they were received in the same way in Constantinople. However, Nifont is only interested in the details of the nature of the ritual 46. At the end of the 12th century, Theodore Balsamon forbids Latin captives to be admitted to the sacraments until they renounce Latin dogmas and customs, until they are announced according to the canons and become equal to the Orthodox. Balsamon proves the need to do this with the Latins by the fact that the Romans separated from the Church and the pope is not commemorated together with the patriarchs 47 . In interpreting Rule 14 of the IV Ecumenical Council, Balsamon testifies that the Orthodox demanded that the Latins renounce if they wished to marry Orthodox 48 . It is quite possible that by κατηχήβη in the first case, and by έξόμνυσθαι in the second, the baptism of the Latins is not meant, but the Byzantine canon considers the Latins not to belong to the Church. The Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 testifies that after the fall of Rome, the Greeks began to rebaptize those baptized by Latins and sometimes practiced this in the 13th century 49 . Around the same time, the Bulgarian Archbishop Dimitri Khomatin testifies that the attitude towards the Latins and their sacraments was different 50. Pope Honorius III in 1222, in a letter to the judges in Livonia, mentions that he learned from the Bishop of Livonia, quod Rutheni Latinorum Baptismum, quasi rem detestabilem execrantes etc 51. Pope Gregory IX in 1232 wrote to the Polish clergy not to allow marriages of Catholic women with Russians who rebaptize them according to their rite (in contemptum fidei Christianae secundum ritum ipsorum denuo baptizari faciuut 52). From the 14th century there is evidence of the baptism of Latins in Russian sources. Our chronicles under the year 6841 (1333) report that Grand Duke Ivan Danilovich married his son Semyon. “I brought a princess from Lithuania for him, named Augusta, and in holy baptism she was named Anastasia” 53. In the 15th century, the Greek Church stopped baptizing Latins. The reception of Latins into the Church was accomplished through anointing. This practice was also determined at the Council of Constantinople in 1484, where the rite of joining the Latins was approved, in which those who apply are required to renounce the Filioque, unleavened bread and other customs of Latinity, after which “εὐθύς χρίεται ὑπό τοΰ ἱερέως ό τοιοήτος τῷ άγίῳ τῆς Ἐκκλησίας μύρῳ" 54 . Although they did not baptize the Latins, they were accepted, just as the Arians, Macedonians and the like were accepted in the ancient Church. It is remarkable that the Greek writers of the 9th century, by anointing when receiving the Latins, prove that the latter are heretics. “Pious decrees,” writes St. Mark of Ephesus, - they say: those who deviate from orthodoxy in small ways are also called heretics and are subject to laws against heretics. And why do we anoint with myrrh those who join us from them? of course, because they are heretics.” Mark of Ephesus testifies here that the Latins were only anointed with myrrh. But this does not mean at all that he considers them to belong to the Church. On this issue he speaks clearly and definitely. “We,” he says, “cut them off and threw them away from the common body of the Church... We left them as heretics, and therefore we separated from them.” Mark of Ephesus also refers to the 7th rule of the Second Ecumenical Council to prove that the Latins are accepted into the Church as ancient heretics, and that they are therefore the same heretics 55. On the contrary, from the 15th century the practice of rebaptizing Latins began to dominate in the Russian Church. Thus, the chronicles hint that in the 15th century the Venetian Ivan Fryazin, who served as a coiner in Moscow, was baptized in our country 56 . We have especially much evidence of the rebaptism of Latins from the 16th century. Archbishop John of Lasski of Gniezno reported about the Russians at the Lateran Council in 1514: “They say that all those subordinate to the Roman Church are not true Christians and will not be saved... All church sacraments are profaned and blasphemed, ridiculed and despised” 57 . In the 70s of the 16th century, Daniel, Prince of Bukhov, came to Moscow as the extraordinary ambassador of the Austrian Emperor, from whom we have the essay “The Beginning and Rise of Muscovy,” where we read: “Those of our fellow countrymen who convert to their faith, they re-baptize, as if they were baptized inappropriately. The reason for this they give is the following: that baptism is immersion, not pouring. Since the Grand Duke gives such people a little money and a dress, frivolous people often allow baptism to be repeated on themselves for a small profit, and thereby cause considerable reproach to our faith.”58 At the end of his life, Tsar Ivan IV began wooing Mary Hastings, the niece of Queen Elizabeth of England. It is known that this tsar had a despotic attitude towards the Orthodox Church; however, when on December 13, 1583, Elizabeth's ambassador Bowes, in response to the demand that the bride convert to Orthodoxy, said that there was only one Christian faith, the tsar resolutely remarked: “Which princess should be ours, then first be baptized into our peasant faith” 59 . In August 1590, Queen Elizabeth wrote to Tsar Theodore Ioannovich, reproaching him, among other things, for the fact that some merchants “were forced to be baptized again when they had already been accepted into Christianity through baptism” 60. The ambassador of the Roman Emperor Nikolai Varkoch, who was in Russia in 1593, testifies in his description of his journey: “If it were possible for baptized Christians to convert to their faith, they should allow them to baptize themselves again; since the Muscovites doubt whether our baptism is true, then that poor sinner who allows himself to be baptized must renounce the baptism he has received and be baptized again" 61 . And here is what we read in the letter of the Vologda Archbishop Sylvester dated June 4, 1613 to the Arkhangelsk priest Bartholomew: “When our letter comes to you, you and your comrades with the Arkhangelsk priests and with that foreigner deacon would order before baptism and preach in our true Orthodox Christian faith according to the rule of the saints, the Apostle and The father baptized the saints, and in case of renunciation, he would have ordered them to curse their faith, to renounce their lack of faith to the true God, and after baptism and communion, he also ordered them to fast as long as they could.”62 At the beginning of the 17th century and at the end of the “Time of Troubles,” the question of rebaptizing Latins became a matter of national importance in Moscow. In 1613, instead of a Polish dynasty, Russia received a Russian one, among other things, because the Russian people and the Russian hierarchy were then convinced of the need to rebaptize the Latins. When the throne of the Muscovite kingdom was offered to the Polish prince Vladislav, he was required to first be baptized into the Orthodox faith. On August 17, 1610, Saint Hermogen, Patriarch of Moscow, and the metropolitans, and archbishops, and bishops, and archimandrites, and abbots, and the entire consecrated cathedral, and the boyars, and the okolnichy, and all the ranks of the Moscow state, servicemen and Zheletsky people wrote an order to the embassy headed by the Rostov Metropolitan Philaret, which was sent to to the Polish king Sigismund III with a request to release the prince Vladislav to the Muscovite kingdom. In this “order” the condition is repeated many times, which is put in the first place every time: “And the Sovereign, Korolevich Vladislav Zhigimontovich, would grant him to be baptized into the Orthodox Christian faith of the Greek law” 63. “Will the gentlemen be glad to say that the Korolevich was already baptized into the Orthodox Christian faith, and suddenly, how can he be baptized, there is no other baptism for a Christian? And tell the boyar Prince Vasily Vasilyevich from his companions: then we know that the Sovereign Korolevich was baptized into the Roman faith according to Roman law; but as soon as the Sovereign Korolevich has mercy on us, he will favor us: he wants to be in our Orthodox Christian faith of the Greek law, and it behooves his Sovereign to be baptized with true holy baptism, our holy Christian faith of the Greek law" 64. A letter was also sent to Vladislav himself on behalf of the holy Patriarch Hermogenes and from all Russian spiritual and secular people of every rank and title. In this letter the main idea is: “with all quietness and meekness and humility, receive holy baptism” - and the holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir is set as an example to Vladislav 65. After all that has been said, I allow myself to think that it would be inaccurate to call the resolution of the Moscow Council of 1620 an innovation. And the Council of 1620 itself looked at its definition not at all as an innovation, but as a confirmation of an old custom. Patriarch Philaret himself speaks about the motivation for the definition of 1620: “In the second summer of my flock, from the creation of the world in the year 7128 (1620), some two priests, Ivan and Euthymius, announced to me, from the church of our Most Holy Lady Theotokos and Ever-Virgin Mary, her honorable and glorious Nativity, likewise in Stolechniki, on Jonah, Metropolitan of Sarsk and Podonsk, a chintz thing: as that Metropolitan Jonah, those two priests Ivan and Euthymia, two Poles who came from the Latin faith, Yan Slobotsky and Matvey Svetitsky, did not command to baptize, but only to anoint them with holy myrrh and then commanded to give them Holy Communion Body and Blood of the Lord. Having brought me a charter, it was written out and corrected, according to his metropolitan decree not to baptize, but only to anoint with myrrh. And the humble Patriarch Philaret did not despise such a schism, so that the sheep of the flock of Christ would not perish, and through the test of the scriptures and the right faith, he would be corrected into a similar revealed thing, so that the remnant of Hellenic and Jewish malice would truly be mixed into the ripe wheat, and from the root, like the tares, let it be taken away, and the church would appear pure Niva. And for this reason he commanded Jonah to the Metropolitan to stand before him.” The Patriarch reminded the Metropolitan of Patriarch Ignatius, who, “pleasing the heretic of the Latin faith” to the Assumption Cathedral, “introduced the heretical Papal faith to Marinka, did not baptize her with the perfect baptism of the Christian law, but only with one holy anointing oil, and then crowned her with that stripped hair, and like Judas the traitor and this one scoffed at Christ,” “his same Ignatius, for such guilt, the hierarch of the great holy Russian Church, as having despised the rule of the holy apostles and holy fathers, died from the throne and from the priesthood according to the rule of the saints in the summer of 7114 (1606).” Patriarch Philaret further recalls how Saint Hermogen sent him to Vladislav “to make him king; and baptize him into our true Orthodox Christian faith of the Greek law. And our father, the great lord, the most holy patriarch Hermogenes, gave us the scripture, having chosen from the rules of the saints the apostle and the holy father, to strengthen us all, and to answer the heretics of various heretical faiths, for the sake of baptizing them.” The Patriarch also talks about how he himself studied the rules and understood that “all heretics of various heretical faiths do not have the right to holy baptism with water and the Holy Spirit. And for this reason, from all heretical faiths of various kinds, those who come to Orthodoxy of the Christian law should be completely baptized with holy baptism.” “And you, in this reigning city of Moscow, are beginning to introduce and establish in opposition to the holy fathers the rule and the seventh ecumenical and local council, and all the pious patriarchal contents, and those who come to you from the Latin faith, do not order them to baptize in three immersions, and do not test the differences in their heresies, but you command them only anoint them with holy myrrh.”... I am humble and I don’t want to hear from you the charm of new heresy, because you are introducing these new heresies not according to the divine rule and are talking about those papazhniki, as if it was not appropriate to baptize them, and as if according to the rules of the saints, the father created this.”... “And from the years of ever-memorable and Holy Great Prince Vladimir, who enlightened all of Great Russia with holy baptism, was received from the Greeks, and even to this day, in the summer of 7128, no one has dared to create such a temptation of heresy in us, except Ignatius the deposed patriarch and you. “Just as the Moscow state did, and from that time to this time it has never happened in the Moscow state that Latin heretics and other various heretics were not baptized, except for Ignatius the Patriarch, who was expelled from the priesthood” 66. In 1621, Patriarch Filaret issued a decree on how to test Belarusians - which of them to baptize, who to anoint and who not to baptize or anoint 67. Those baptized by the Uniates were instructed to be baptized in three immersions “in order that they were baptized by an apostate who prayed to God for the Pope” 68 . But when writing this “decree,” the patriarch was aware that “he introduced not a new tradition, but an ancient one that strengthened him with a new twist” 69 . All these statements by Patriarch Filaret have a genuine historical basis. That is why foreigners who were in Moscow after 1620, when mentioning the rebaptism of Latins, do not say that this practice only recently appeared. Adam Olearius in the thirties of the 17th century was quite interested in the question of baptism in ancient Rus'. He describes the rituals, reports biographies of the more famous of those who were baptized, and discusses the fact of rebaptism from a historical point of view 70 . “The Russians, without a doubt, borrowed this new baptism of Christians coming to the Russians from other confessions from the Greeks, who, having separated them from the Latin Church, consider Latin baptism insufficient, and therefore those who wish to come from the Western Church to them and become members of the Greek Church are baptized a second time” - and further Olearius refers to the acts of the Lateran Council 71. From Olearius we have the right to expect a note that the rebaptism of Western Christians in Moscow is only recent news, and, however, we do not find such a note from him. Baron Augustine Mayerberg, who was in Moscow in 1661, again reports without any reservation: “Muscovites believe that baptism is not valid if the person being baptized is not completely immersed in water three times according to ancient church custom. That is why, when someone baptized according to the Latin faith converts to the Moscow faith, he, as someone who was not baptized according to church rites, is rebaptized by three times immersion in water, and his marriage, previously concluded, is also dissolved, as a person illegally introduced by the sacred door of baptism to the use of other sacraments. The baptized person is immediately anointed with myrrh, not considering the Latin anointing as unnecessary” 72. Old Russian practice, confirmed by the Council of 1620, was abolished at the Moscow Council of 1667. This is understandable. The Council of 1667 is famous for the fact that it, led by Greeks of often dubious dignity, condemned everything, even in the small rituals of the Russian Church, that deviated from Greek practice. And the Russian Church is still worried about the oath hastily imposed by the Council on the ancient Russian rite as a heresy. The Greeks, obsequious to the secular government, were then even ready to proclaim the principle: the kingdom is higher than the priesthood - and only the protest of the Russian hierarchy prevented such a solution to the question of the kingdom and the priesthood, that is, the relationship between the Church and the state 73 . Regarding the baptism of Latins, the Council of 1667 decided: “It is not like the Latins to rebaptize, but rather, after cursing their heresies and confessing their sins and donating the manuscript, anoint them with the holy and great myrrh and consecrate them with the holy and most pure mysteries and thus introduce the holy catholics and apostles to the church” 74 . But in support of its resolution, the Council could only cite the definition of the Council of Constantinople in 1484 and the words of Mark of Ephesus 75. But it is remarkable that the resolution of the Council of 1667 did not immediately change the Russian practice of receiving Western Christians: at the end of the 17th and beginning of the 18th centuries they were still rebaptized. This is what John Korb, who was in Moscow in 1698, writes in his “diary”: “The Russians do not recognize as truly baptized and Christians those who, according to the Roman rite, are reborn in Christ by simply pouring water in the name of the Most Holy Trinity. Muscovites, due to stubborn superstition, claim that baptism should be carried out by immersion in water, since the former person needs to be suffocated in water, and this can only be done by immersing him in water, and not by dousing him with it. Stubbornly adhering to this error, Russians also allow Christians, whatever their religion, to resume baptism in cases where they voluntarily accept the Russian schism” 76. Heinrich Cederberg was in Russia from 1709 to 1718 and in his “Notes on the Religion and Morals of the Russian People” writes: “Although it is true that they recognize the Roman Catholics as Christians, however, they consider their teaching to be filled with countless errors and therefore, along with others who convert to their faith, they baptize them again, calling them Latins” 77 . In this, as Cederberg notes, the Russians do not agree with the Greeks 78 . Meanwhile, at the same time, the Church of Constantinople extended the resolution of the Council of 1484 to both Lutherans and Calvinists. The friend of all German Lutherans, Tsar Peter I, asked the Patriarch of Constantinople about how to accept Lutherans into Orthodoxy. In 1718, Patriarch Jeremiah responded with a letter, which was included in the “Complete Collection of Laws of the Russian Empire” (vol. 5, no. 3225); in it, the patriarch, readily saying what was pleasing to the Russian Tsar, establishes that “those who depart from the Lutheran and Calvinist heresy... should no longer be rebaptized, but through a single anointing with the holy chrism, made perfect Christians, sons of light and heirs of the kingdom of heaven.” Afterwards, without any conciliar determination - for the conciliar system of the Russian Church was destroyed by Peter I - they began to accept Latins even without confirmation. From the 17th century, Russian theology began to fall under Catholic influence. Kyiv practice in the 17th century was different from Moscow. The Breviary of Peter Mogila is invaded by the idea, unknown to the ancient Church, of some reality of the sacraments performed outside the Church. About Lutherans and Calvinists in this Trebnik it is said: “It is in no way proper to baptize these, since they are baptized,” and about the Latins: “We do not baptize these, but even if they are anointed from our own with this world, we will not anoint them with holy oil.” 79 Under such a practice, which in the ancient Church was allowed only for reasons of ecclesiastical economics, the Trebnik of Peter the Mogila already provides a dogmatic basis. Baptism, confirmation and priesthood are not repeated because it is as if outside the Church they “create a character, siesta seal or sign that is never worn out on the souls of those who receive.” “Baptism therefore marks or seals the soul into the known existence of the baptized as a sheep of the flock of Christ, inscribed in the books of the living; Confirmation, in the hedgehog of being anointed from one who is not anointed, is known, as it is inscribed in the catastrophes of the soldiers of Christ” 80. But how can one be a sheep outside the one flock of Christ? How can one be a soldier of Christ while fighting against the Church of Christ? It is in Latin theology with its opus operatum that lies the source of the idea adopted by some of the new Russian theologians about the reality of the sacraments outside the one Church of Christ. Patriarch Jeremiah, in the above-mentioned letter, wrote very decisively: “We affirm and decree, so that this will certainly be forever... unshakable and forever unbreakable by posterity.” Less than forty years had passed before the Church of Constantinople itself began to baptize Latins upon their conversion to the Church. Under Patriarch Kirill V in 1756, it was determined that those coming from Western confessions be accepted as unsacred and unbaptized (ώς ἀνιἐρούς καί άβαπτίστους). In this case, reference is made to the unity of the true and apostolic Church possessing the sacraments; heretical baptism, as inconsistent and alien to the apostolic divine institution, is empty water (ΰδατα άνόητα), as the holy Ambrose and the great Athanasius say, it does not provide any sanctification to those who receive it and is useless for the cleansing of sins, and therefore is rejected 81. At the end of the 18th century, the Greek Helmsman (Πηδάλιον) was compiled, where Latin baptism is called ψευδώνυμον βάπτισμα and the 1st rule of St. Basil the Great in its dogmatic part (λαϊκοί) applies to the Catholic hierarchy γενόμενοι). It is true that the decree of 1756 took place under very unpeaceful circumstances of church life. Then the crowds of people rebelled against Patriarch Paisius and again elevated Cyril V to the patriarchal throne, who even earlier, in his first patriarchate (1748–1751), was a supporter of the rebaptism of the Latins. It is impossible to explain everything in the events of 1756 by the activities and preaching of the monk Auxentius; After all, he was strangled and drowned in the sea by the Turks even before Cyril V was elevated to the patriarchate. Let prof. A.P. Lebedev does not sympathize with the definition of 1756 and cites the indignant words of BenodothVa to Patriarch Kirill V 82, even if he mocks the Greek Helmsman (Πηδάλιον) 83, this circumstance does not destroy the fact that the Greeks began to rebaptize the Latins from the middle of the 18th century. However, sometimes deviations were made from this practice in the East, for example, when receiving Catholic Arabs in Ptolemais or Syrian Melchites in 1861 84. This is, in a brief outline, the history of the reception of Western Christians into the Orthodox Church after the fall of the Roman Patriarchate from the Church. For centuries, the practice of the Eastern Church was varied, oscillating between baptism and confirmation. Then, various conciliar definitions are made in the local Churches, which change in different centuries. The Greek Church in 1484 decreed that the Latins should be anointed with chrismation, and the Russian Church from that time on became more and more established in the practice of rebaptism, later approving it at the Council of 1620. Under the influence of the Greeks in 1667, the Russian Church decided to anoint Latins with chrismation, and at the beginning of the 18th century it limited chrismation to Lutherans as well. This practice in the Russian Church is even more relaxed: anointed Latins are also freed from confirmation. The Greek Church at the same time, in 1756, restored the practice of rebaptizing Latins and Lutherans, making, however, sometimes deviations if the Catholic was an Arab or Syrian. How to look at all these historical facts? How should I think about them and how should I, a member and priest of the Eastern Church, relate to them? Can I admit that this practice is inextricably linked with the dogmatic concept of the unity of the Church? Does accepting Latins without baptism mean recognizing them as members of the same Church to which I belong? But how then will I look at my Church, which either recognizes Catholics as members who have its grace-filled gifts, then begins to baptize them as pagans and Jews? If you baptize all Catholics, then why not baptize Arab Catholics? What did Saint Hermogen, Patriarch of Moscow, who suffered martyrdom from the Latins, do when he demanded baptism from Prince Vladislav? Did he, contrary to the 10th article of the Creed, demand a second baptism? If the rebaptism of the Latins was a second baptism, then aren’t hundreds of Orthodox hierarchs subject to dethronement according to the 47th Apostolic Canon: “If a bishop or presbyter baptizes one who has been truly baptized, or if he does not baptize someone defiled by the wicked, let him be deposed, as one who mocks the cross and the death of the Lord and does not distinguish between priests and false priests?” No, I cannot dare to think that the local Churches, Greek and Russian, have been laughing and laughing at the cross and the death of the Lord for centuries! If the sacraments outside the Church are valid and gracious, then they can only be accepted; to change the practice of receiving ceremonies, as both the Greeks and Russians did from the 11th century to the 18th, this truly means blasphemy and is subject to anathema for this. I cannot recognize my Church as blasphemous or blasphemous. Therefore, for practice in relation to the Latins, one must seek explanations only in considerations of church oikonomia, and not in the dogmatic concept of the unity of the Church of Christ. The Eastern Church, like the ancient Church, was not mistaken and did not make mistakes, even if only temporarily, but with the constant immutability of the dogmatic concept of the unity of the Church, for the benefit of human souls, it made condescension, not demanding from the converting Latins a new rite of baptism, although this rite differed in appearance (pouring) from the Orthodox one. Both church definitions and authoritative church writers demanded that the Latins be anointed with myrrh. Receiving Latins without confirmation is only a local custom of the Russian Church, created under the influence of the Breviary of Peter Mohyla, and even inspired by the theological spirit of Catholicism itself. Everything that in our theology is a sad result of the influence of Catholic scholasticism - all this, of course, cannot be more authoritative than the teaching of the ancient Church and the direct heir of its grace-filled gifts, the Eastern Church. Isn’t it a convincing fact that the Eastern Church has always decided to accept Latins through anointing, that is, as in the ancient Church the Arians, Macedonians, and Apollinarians were received? Did not the Church thereby testify that she considers the Latins to belong to the Church as much as the Arians and other heretics of antiquity belonged to it? In your letters to Archbishop Anthony, you do not say how you look at the existing and existing practice of rebaptizing Latins. But I will not be mistaken if I bring your reasoning on our issue to a decisive verdict. This practice, of course, seems to you to be a mistake, a delusion and, perhaps, a blasphemy of the sacrament. The Latinist Peter Mogila is also inclined towards this thought in his Trebnik (p. 192): “Whoever dares to repeat these holy mysteries commits sacrilege and again crucifies and curses Christ.” About 70 years ago, the English theologian W. Palmer, in his letter to our famous A. S. Khomyakov in the history of Russian thought, directly accused the Orthodox Church of rebaptizing Christians and considered this a sign of its untruth, since the change in practice was the awareness of the possibility of mistakes, even unimportant ones. In his response to this accusation, A. S. Khomyakov partly hesitates, but nevertheless the instinct of a profound theologian prompts him to several beautiful and true thoughts, which I cannot help but cite here. “Local errors are not the errors of the entire Church. These are mistakes that private individuals can fall into due to ignorance of church rules. Here a private person is to blame (bishop or layman - it doesn’t matter); but the Church itself stands firmly in its unsullied purity, constantly corrects local errors, but never itself needs correction. I will add that, in my opinion, in this case the Church never changed its teaching; here only the difference in the ritual is noticeable, while its original meaning is perfectly preserved. All sacraments can finally be performed only in the depths of the Orthodox Church. In what form they take place is a secondary matter. By reconciliation (with the Church) the sacrament is renewed or completed by virtue of reconciliation; an imperfect heretical rite receives the fullness and perfection of an Orthodox sacrament. In the very fact or rite of reconciliation there is essentially a repetition of the previous sacraments. Consequently, the visible repetition of baptism or confirmation, although unnecessary, does not have the character of error; it indicates a difference in ritual, but not in concepts. A comparison with another fact of church history will make my point clear. Marriage is a sacrament in the eyes of the Church; however, the Church does not require a repeat marriage from those pagans whom it accepts into the community of believers. The very conversion of the pagans, without performing a ritual, gives the preceding union of the couple the meaning of a Christian sacrament. You must agree with this, otherwise you will have to admit the impossible, namely, that the legal union of a pagan couple had the full meaning of a Christian sacrament. The Church does not require either pagans or Jews to renew their marriage; But could a second wedding be considered a delusion? I don’t think so, although there would be a change in the ritual” 85. As you can see, A.S. Khomyakov expresses almost the same thing that, in my opinion, was the constant thought of the Church; This idea prevents many from understanding and accepting only the scholastic teaching of medieval Catholicism about the sacraments, according to which the sacraments can be performed outside the one body of Christ, outside the one Church. A. S. Khomyakov’s living faith in the unity of the Church prompted him to explain the diversity of church practices during the reception of rites, without destroying the doctrine of the unity of the Church. Faith in the unity of the Church of Christ, which we profess in the 9th article of the Creed, resolutely does not allow me to agree with the concept of the unity of the Church as proposed in your letters and brochures. One must not distort the one Church, which is the dove, the only mother of Christians (Carthage rights. 68). I cannot believe in such a “one” Church, in which local churches are at enmity with each other, do not partake of the same bread, baptize or anoint those coming from another local church, in which one local church organizes special missions to expose and destroy another! How can I call such a church united? After all, it will be such an obvious lie! And in matters of faith there is no need for untruth! It can only harm the cause of Christian unity! Do not think that my decisive disagreement with your concept of the unity of the Church is a condemnation of the very idea of ​​a world conference of Christianity. No, I have already said about my full sympathy and my prayerful goodwill for the projected conference. But I am firmly convinced that it would be a huge step on the path of unity if the conference affirmed first of all the truth of the unity of the Church and did not consider all modern Christian denominations and sects taken together as one Church of Christ, which has lost only visible unity. I will allow myself to point out one example where the concept of the Church and the sacraments introduced in my present letter could serve the cause of unity and immediately dull the severity of disputes and disagreements. You know that there were many disputes among the Latins about the validity of Anglican initiations; This issue is also discussed in church theology. Given the formulation of this question that is usually given to him, I consider his indisputable solution hopeless. The question is transferred to the vague ground of historical research and reduced to identifying, mainly, the historical circumstances of Parker’s ordination. The question of the continuity of the ordination of English bishops is being resolved 86 . For me this question does not exist. According to the first rule of St. Basil the Great, outside the Church the teaching of grace generally becomes impoverished and any succession outside the Church is illegal, since there a layman (and even less) lays his hand on a layman, without imparting to him any grace, because it does not exist at all and cannot exist outside the one Church, outside the unity of the body of Christ. Those discussing the question of the legitimacy of the Anglican hierarchy in Russian theology proceed from the seemingly indisputable position that the former Catholic bishops of England were real blessed bishops of the Church, and therefore, to resolve the issue positively, it is enough only to prove the continuity of succession in ordination. But from the bishops of extra-church society, which were the Catholic bishops before the English Reformation, according to the rule of St. Basil the Great, it was impossible to receive grace, which dried up in Catholicism back in 1054. Say what rigorism! what a gloomy look! How is unity possible with such a view? It is very possible and very easy. According to the 79th rule of the Council of Carthage, which I cited above, the entire Anglican hierarchy can be immediately accepted into its existing order without any scientific research and debate. According to this rule, “no barrier to unity should be placed” if “the benefit of the souls of the brethren is obvious.” It is precisely the “barrier to unity” that I consider the modern usual formulation of the question. A historical discussion of the issue can only provide reasons for the application of Rule 79 of the Council of Carthage. But these reasons have already been given completely enough, and further disputes are fueled only by an incorrect formulation of the question, in which they want to establish a dogmatic truth based on historical facts, which is not at all connected with these facts. Using this example, I hope you can be convinced that the teaching I have set forth about the unity of the Church and the unity of grace-filled life serves the cause of Christian unity, and not division. Above all is unity with the Church, adherence to the living body of the one Church of Christ. For one who cleaves to the Church, it should not matter who he was; it is important and saving for him that, by uniting with the Church, he becomes a member of the body of Christ. So, let us not close our eyes to the sad reality, let us not be afraid to admit that we do not belong together to the one Church of Christ! To talk about unity and for the sake of this to destroy and darken the idea of ​​a single Church of Christ - will this be useful for the very cause of unity? Why build a building on sand when there is a reliable and indestructible rock of the one Church of Christ? We are destined to live during great world events. The Tower of Babel of culture is itself crumbling. Will not new stones enter the mysterious building of the one Church of Christ in the near future? Oh, if only it were so! If only the sadness of hostility and bloodshed were replaced by joy in heaven and on earth about the multiplication of the children of the one true Church! I pray to God that He will grant me, young, to live to see the time when you and I, in the one Church of Christ and on different hemispheres of our planet, will partake of the same bread. Archimandrite Hilarion. January 18th 1917, Day of Saints Athanasius and Cyril of Alexandria The footnote is difficult to read in the original. R. H. Gardiner. L'union des Eglises et l'initiative américaine de la "World Conference". Bern, 1916, p. 73. Christian Doctrine in Apologetic Exposition, vol. 1, ed. 3. Kiev, 1910, pp. 208–209. On the unity of the Church ch. 14. CSEL 3, p. 223. Creations (Kiev, 1891) part 2, p. 189. Epist. 43, 24, p, 642, part I, p. 233. Epist. 42, 1. r. 617, p. 212. On the unity of the Church, ch. 4, 5, 6. Contga Cresconium II. 33, 42. PL, t. 43. col. 491. P.L., t. 143, col. 1004A-B. See especially Commentary on the Gospel of John, bk. 10, ch. 2 and book. 11, ch. 11. Sent. 16. CSEL 3, p. 443. Essays on the history of the dogma of the Church. Sergiev Posad, 1912, p. 527. De bapt. IV, 17, 24. PL, t. 43, col. 170.Cfr. col. 695. Contra epist. Parmeniani II 13, 28. Pl. t. 43, col. 71. De bapt. IV, 1, I. V, 23, 33. PL, t. 43, col. 155, 193. Serm. 268, 2.PL, t. 38, col. 1232. In ep. Ioan. tr. 6, 11. Pl, t. 35, col. 2026. De bapt. I, 12, 19–21. VI, 34, 65. VII, 3, 5. PL, t. 43. col. 119–121. 219. 227. Epist. 73–60 ad Jubajanum, cap. 3. Ep. 71–58 ad Quintum, cap. 4. Epist. Firmiliani capp. 7, 19. CSEL 3, pp. 815, 823. Russian translation in the Works of Cyprian, part 1, pp. 378, 384–385. Ep. 74–61 ad Pompejum, cap. 1. Ep. 69–62 ad Magnum, capp. 10–11. CSEL 3, p. 759 sq. Russian translation Part 1, pp. 368–369. Epist. Firmiliani 75, cap. 18, p. 822, part 1, page 384. Epist. 74–61 ad Pompejum, cap. 5, pp. 802–803, part 1, page 353. Epist. 74–61 ad Pompejum, cap. 5. Epist. 73–60 ad Jubajanum, cap. 11, p. 786, pp. 338–339. Tue 19:11. Euseb. H. E. VII, 7, 5. Pitra. Analecta sacra, t. 4. Parisiis 1883, pp. 171. 414. Creations in Russian translation, Kazan, 1900, p. 60. Epist. 73–60 ad Jubajan, cap. 23, p. 796, p. 347. Epist. 73–60 ad Jubajan, cap. 23. Epiplian. Expositio tidei cath. 13. PG, t. 42, col. 805. Creations in Russian translation, part 5. Moscow, 1882, p. 338. Saint Athanasius the Great. The Arian word is I, 1, 2, 4. On the Arian word II, 42–43. Epistle to Serapiope I, ch. 30. A very typical incident occurred at the first meeting of the Seventh Ecumenical Council, where they discussed for a long time how to receive iconoclast bishops. One deacon wanted to move the question onto dogmatic ground and proposed the question: “Is the heresy that has now appeared again less than what existed before or is it greater than them?” Holy Patriarch Tarasius immediately remarked: “Evil is evil, especially in church affairs; As for dogmas, it makes no difference whether you sin in a small or a great way; because in both cases the law of God is violated.” Acts of the Ecumenical Councils, vol. 7. Kazan, 1873, p. 104. And this is said when discussing the issue specifically of heretical ordination. Golubinsky E.E. A brief outline of the history of the Bulgarian, Serbian and Romanian Orthodox churches. M., 1871, p. 551. E.E. Golubinsky. History of the Russian Church, vol. 1, 2. Moscow, 1904, p. 807. De Ludov. VII profectione in Orientem. Ed. Chiffeletius, Paris 1660, p. 34. A. Pichler, Geschichte der Kirchlichen Trennung zwischen dem Orient und Occident. 1, Band. München 1864, s. 288 Anm. 7. Russian Historical Library, vol. 6, ed. 2, St. Petersburg, 1908, column. 26–27. Ῥάλλη καὶ Πότλη. Σύνταγμα τῶν θείων καὶ ἱερῶν κανόνων. T. 4, σελ. 460. Σύνταγμα, τ. 4, σελ. 460. Cap. IV. Baptisatos etiam a Latinis et ipsi Graeci rebaptizare ausu temerario praesumebant: et adhue, sicut accepimus, quidam agere hoc non verentur. Mansi. Sacrorum conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio. T. 22, Venetis 1778, coll. 989–990. Leunclavii. Jus Graeco-Roman. I pp. 318–320. A.I. Turgenev. Historica Russiae Monimenta, t. 1, Petropoli 1841, No. XII, p. 13. Historica Russiae Monimenta, t. 1, XXXIV, p. 31. Resurrection Chronicle. Complete collection of Russian chronicles, vol. 7, St. Petersburg, 1857, p. 204. Patriarchal or Nikon Chronicle. Full Collection Letop., vol. 10, St. Petersburg, 1885, p. 206. Ῥάλλη καὶ Πότλη. Σύνταγμα, t. 5, σ. 143–147. Mark of Ephesus and George Scholarius unpublished works. Ed. and translated by Abraham Norov. Paris, 1859, pp. 28–31. See Christian Reading for 1860, vol. 1. Complete collection of Russian chronicles, vol. 8, St. Petersburg, 1859, p. 176. Historica Russiae Monimenta, V. I, No. CXXIII, pp. 124, 125. Russian translation I.A. Tikhomirov in Readings at the Imperial Society of History and Antiquities at Moscow University, 1876, book. 3, pp. 37–38. Collection of the Imperial Russian Historical Society, book. 38, St. Petersburg, 1883, p. 105. Yu. Tolstoy. The first forty years of relations between Russia and England. St. Petersburg, 1875, p. 383. Russian translation in Readings in the Imperial Society of History and Antiquities for 1874, book. 4, pp. 33–34. Chronicle of the activities of the archaeographic commission, vol. 2. St. Petersburg. 1862. p. 64. Collection of state charters and agreements stored in the State Collegium of Foreign Affairs. Part 2. Moscow 1819, No. 201, pp. 408, 411, 413, 414, 416, 418, 421. Ibid., no. 207, pp. 449–450. Worldly consumer, ed. 1639, pp. 399 pp. Worldly consumer, ed. 1639, pp. 427 pp. Worldly consumer, ed. 1639, l. 431. Worldly consumer, ed. 1639, l. 429. Readings at the Society of History and Antiquities, 1868, part 4, pp. 316–324. Readings at the Society of History and Antiquities, 1873, part 3, pp. 77–78. About the cathedral of 1667, see prof. N.F. Kaptereva. Patriarch Nikon and Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, vol. 2, Sergiev Posad, 1912. pp. 209–255, 366–420, esp. pp. 394–406. Acts of the Moscow Councils of 1666 and 1667, Moscow, 1881. l. 74. Readings at the Society of History and Antiquities, 1867, book. 3, pp. 266–267. Readings at the Society of History and Antiquities, 1873, book. 2, pp. 5, 30. Ed. Kiev, 1646, p. 164. Ῥάλλη καὶ Πότλη. Σύνταγμα, t. 5, σ. 614, 916. History of the Greek-Eastern Church under Turkish rule, vol. 1, Sergiev Posad, 1896, pp. 318–322. History of the Greek-Eastern Church under Turkish rule, vol. 2, Sergiev Posad, 1902, pp. 561–563. A.N. Muravyov. Question religieuse d'Orient et d'Occident, 1859, p. 176. Proceedings of the Kiev Theological Academy, 1684, vol. 2, pp. 346–347. In the second volume of the works of A.S. Khomyakov's third letter to Palmer. See prof. V.A. Sokolova - Hierarchy of the Anglican Episcopal Church. Sergiev Posad, 1897. You might be interested in: