Self-defense of V. I. Ekzemplyarsky

Vasily Ekzemplyarsky. Why was I convicted? I. A few words from a dismissed professor of theological academy in defense of his theological direction. II. Gr. L.N. Tolstoy and St. John Chrysostom in their view of the vital meaning of the commandments of Christ. Kyiv, 1912. The named brochure is a heavy indictment against judges prof. V. I. Ekzemplyarsky. The story of his dismissal, in which you don’t know what to be more indignant at: arbitrariness and primitive rudeness or some kind of fatal darkness, is still remembered by everyone. But who will believe that for the board, which only recently divorced the Butovich spouses, tried Hermogenes and connived and made peace with Rasputin, is really so demanding in matters of the purity of Orthodoxy. At the expense of V.I. Ekzemplyarsky, obviously, some personal scores were being settled, which in themselves are not even interesting to society. Since the appearance of the audit report of Arch. Anthony, who at one time received a heated rebuke from the professors of the academy - this report should make the most difficult impression on any truthful and impartial person - one could expect reprisals. But they didn’t even bother to find a convenient reason for them, because, in fact, the chosen reason turned out to be completely unsuitable. For those who take the trouble to read the article by V.I. Ezemplyarsky, it will become obvious that his “Tolstoyism,” at least in the dogmatic sense, is out of the question. As a member of the editorial committee of the publishing house Put, I cannot help but add that the editors of Put would probably have treated the dogmatic Tolstoyanism in the collection “On the Religion of Leo Tolstoy,” one of the main tasks of which was to show all the religious limitations of Tolstoyism, probably more uncompromisingly than the Synodal Collegium, which knows how, when necessary, to find good reasons for timely mercy. With the content of the article by V.I. One can completely disagree with Ekzemplyarsky and consider the comparison of Tolstoy with Chrysostom to be of little clarity, unsuccessful, scientifically unproven, even erroneous; one can find in it ambiguities in very significant points - in a word, it is open to criticism, like every article, but one thing cannot be discussed - the Tolstoyanism of its author. And V.I. Ekzemplyarsky, indeed, could not find a better means of self-defense than to reprint his article verbatim and, if we had an organ for expressing church-public opinion to which he could appeal, if Ekzemplyarsky had been heard, his accusers would have found themselves, frankly speaking, in a stupid and ugly position. To his article, V. I. Ekzemplyarsky added “a few words” on the topic “why I was condemned,” in which he wants to absolve himself in the eyes of the Orthodox world, closest to his listeners, of the accusation of unorthodoxy, which is difficult for a professor at the Orthodox Academy. This apology, in our eyes, has the significance of in some way an event in church life and a gratifying symptom in church-social self-awareness. We have somehow become accustomed lately to seeing how quickly yesterday’s theological school professors shake the church dust from their feet and, in general, pay the same coin to their alma mater as experts on church affairs in the columns of the “progressive” press and in public organizations. V. I. Ekzemplyarsky acted differently. He responded to the synod's decision on his dismissal with a noble and confident confession of his faith. He declares in front of the Orthodox world that he, in the incriminated article, wanted to “serve the interests of the Orthodox Church” and “in his mind and conscience he recognizes himself before others as an Orthodox Christian, accepting in its entirety the confession of the Greek-Eastern Church.” V.I. Ekzemplyarsky overcame a difficult temptation for his church identity; he did not follow the line of least resistance, but chose the “narrow” path for himself. He was able in his ecclesiastical self-awareness to separate the sins and weaknesses of the church authorities, demoralized by bureaucracy and connections with the state, from the abiding city of the Church of Christ, and it should therefore be said that if the universal church is alive for him, then it lives in him. And, on the contrary, the external reform of the church is powerless if it does not live in the souls - it then becomes the playground of history. The half-rotten connection between the Russian church and the state will, undoubtedly, sooner or later be forcibly dissolved, and along with it the power of the present church government will be abolished, insofar as it rests on the “sword of Caesar,” but will there be any oil in the lamps then! This is the sense in which the document you are considering is important, and what we want to draw the reader’s attention to in the apology of Prof. V. I. Ekzemplyarsky. May his beloved church teacher, St. John Chrysostom, who had to endure a lot of persecution from the politicians and careerists who sat “in the seat of Moses!” From the history of the dismissal of Prof. V.I. Ekzemplyarsky has, of course, a principled side. In his article he raises the question of how much Christianity should be the norm of public life. Within the limits and in the form in which he poses it, there is no question here: Christian ideals or admiration for power, the calling of a bare fact that is not a principle? Here the answer lies in the question. The question - and, moreover, a fatal, painful one - arises only when the question is no longer about the ethics of social relations, for which Christianity provides completely clear standards, but about the very nature of the public, in other words, about the non-religious or religious public. But this question is not asked by Prof. V. I. Ekzemplyarsky. It brings us to the ground of possibilities, aspirations and promises that are inherent in Christianity, but not revealed, and can only be revealed on its own ground, when the times and deadlines are fulfilled. But we won’t talk about that here.