On church unity (according to the works of St. Philaret [Drozdov])

Abstract: The article presents the theological position of St. Philaret (Drozdov) on the action in the Church of the gifts of grace to establish its unity and sanctify creation. The main attention in the article is aimed at describing the sanctifying action in the Church of the word of God in conjunction with the word of man in relation to the Eucharistic and historical aspects of its life. The mysterious aspect examines the relationship of the Church with the state and society, as well as the efforts on the part of the hierarchy and members of the Church, which are necessary as a condition for its implementation. The application of the theological provisions of the saint is shown through examples of both the means proposed and implemented by him to heal the Old Believer schism and protect the Church and the state from its growth. It seems important to consider the doctrine of the unity of the Church on the basis of the works of St. Philaret (Drozdov), in connection with his significant contribution to Russian theology, which received its primary expression in ecclesiology. He is one of the first Russian theologians who reveals the provisions of Christian teaching on the basis of the doctrine of the Church. About the gift of peace in the Church His Beatitude Metropolitan Vladimir (Sabodan) writes about the possibility of considering the economy of human salvation according to the teachings of St. Philaret as the creation and gathering of the Church 1 . Saint Philaret writes that it was created on the reconciliation of God with humanity in his death with Christ, which is expressed in the forgiveness of sins and the enlightenment of people with the light of eternal life according to their faith. Saint Philaret sees the center of the unity of the Church in God the Father. Explaining the above words of the Apostle Paul (Eph. 4:3-6), he speaks of the Father, who provides and governs the Church through its members, abiding in them, by the action of grace. Also “The decoupled name of the “one Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church” 2. The unity of the Church, as St. Philaret also notes, is the gift of God’s peace, which is acquired for preservation in it by believers through their striving for union with God. “O peace, desired above all! O grace, desired above all! - for the world is a consubstantial child of grace,” 3 exclaims the saint. The peace of God, “surpassing all understanding” (Phil. 4:7), given as His gift to believers striving for unity, allows us to maintain the unity of the Church. “O Lord our God, give us peace” (Is. 26:12). The Giver of peace is God the Father, “for this reason He Himself was called the God of peace (1 Thess. 5:23); For this purpose He gave us His only begotten Son Jesus Christ, who “is our peace” (Eph. 2:14)” 4. When “all authority in heaven and on earth” (Matthew 28:18) was given to Him, “Jesus came and the hundred in the midst, and said unto them, Peace be unto you” (John 20:19). “Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you” (John 14:27), to the disciples, embarrassed by His departure to the path of the cross. He sends peace to His disciples both when sending them to preach the gospel (John 20:21), and when founding the Church in every place (Matthew 10:11-12). In the thought of Saint Philaret, one can notice that peace is preserved in the Church by the presence of the Holy Spirit with its members through the grace given to them in the sacraments. The Lord Jesus Christ, as its Head, carries out the dispensation in the Church. The saint, as if summing up his description of the action of the Persons of the Most Holy Trinity in the life of the Church, speaks of the interconnection of affairs in it, with the goal of Her glorification and the sending of grace. On the transition from the sensory church to the internal one through its sanctification by the action of the Church In relation to the initial ecclesiological position of Saint Philaret, Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky points to the appearance of the church in the theology of the saint as a sign associated with the need for man to sense the presence of God on earth. It allows us to visibly separate the Church from the world. “The House of God on earth is formed by God’s condescension towards man and man’s bringing closer to God” 5 . God reveals Himself in “transitory phenomena.” On the other hand, man “gathers God-imprinted signs” 6 and “uses them exclusively for worship” 7, visiting the place of their appearance, which forms the church, with special reverence. Saint Philaret proposes the construction of Christian churches in the form of monuments to the actions of God or persons united with Him by grace: “You are the church of God alive, and the spirit of God lives in you” 8. According to the early thought of Saint Philaret, God “does not so much come down to man in church as remind him of Himself” 9 . At the same time, he speaks of the church as a place of “tactile presence” of the glory of God. According to Saint Philaret, a person’s approach to God is based on the concept of forming an internal church in him. To do this, it is necessary for a person to sacrifice sensuality and a “broken spirit” as a “sacrifice to God,” leaving in the soul “one heavenly fire of pure Divine love” 10 and then presenting to God himself his dispensation into His Church. According to Saint Philaret, the Lord appears in His church “in the majesty of the Creator and Almighty” 11, the church is therefore the center of the moral and civil world. But His appearance does not take place in majesty and glory, but “in the meek simplicity of the Father” 12. The church, thus, is a wonderful bed “on which, under the cover of secrecy, rests the Divine body of the Divine Redeemer, and together with the meal from which the faithful eat His flesh and drink His blood” 13. Through this, there is a connection between man, the church and the Church, which are identified in a certain way in the theology of St. Philaret. At the same time, in contrast to Blessed Augustine, who lacks the “concept of the earthly” in this context, “St. Philaret, from a building that is a “composition of stones, wood and metals,” builds a transition to the “sanctuary of God” and the true house of God, newly created by the action of the same Church” 14 . Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky notes that, according to St. Philaret, all the mystery and glory of the internal church is similar to the external one in its sanctification, which occurs through cleansing, decoration and grace-filled visitation. In relation to the church, these actions are performed through sacred rites; in a person, through the renunciation of self-will and “effective imitation of Christ” 15. When the inner church is consecrated, it is not man himself who acts, but Christ who acts in him. It is in the church, the gates of which “are the true gates of the house of God” 16, “where if two or three are gathered in the name of the Lord, then He is in the midst of them” 17. It is those who can live in His omnipresence, discover their closeness to God, who form the Church, because, even being in the church, “does everyone here exactly approach the throne of omnipresence?..” 18 says Saint Philaret. During this period, St. Philaret’s theology of the church was based on the theme of worship. It is precisely because of the performance of divine services in the church that God “deigns to be known... like love itself, like the most perfect unity” 19 . “For the Doctrine of the Church” 20, Saint Philaret lays out historical foundations from Old Testament events that describe the connection of the Old Testament church with the life of the Jewish people. Saint Philaret emphasizes the need for a reverent attitude towards the church, towards the Church and towards every believer, “in whom the Spirit of God dwells” 21 and which are the houses of God. “The church is consecrated and protected by God not for its own sake, but for the sake of the Church gathering in it” 22. In this regard, he points to the internal relationship between prayer for the church and prayer for the Church. According to Saint Philaret, this connection also extends to the church, which is created in every believer. It is determined by their single foundation, the Lord Jesus Christ. The second reason is the internal unity of the community members, who stand in the unity of living faith, expressed in charity towards each other and unanimity. The giving of grace and strength to the Apostle Peter in the word of the Lord, “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build My Church” (Matthew 16:18) in response to his confession of the Lord Jesus Christ as the Son of God, shows what the structure of the internal church of a member of the Church should be. This confession, according to St. Philaret, must be from “the Heavenly Father, internally revealed from the full soul, sincere, undoubted, fearless” 23, “when necessary, in word, but always in life” 24. The creation of the inner church is a matter that more closely concerns every believer; “it requires our complete care” 25. “The building of the body of Christ must continue unceasingly” 26. Through the church, the believer gains the Church and salvation in it. At the same time, the saint especially notes the need for believers to join the church as a sanctuary of sacraments and a guardian of grace to enter “the holy, grace-filled presence of God” 27 . About the sacrament of the church and the Church. About the action of Divine Grace in the Church and in relation to the world. About the boundaries of the Church The other, dogmatic side of St. Philaret’s teaching about the church and the Church originates in the teaching about the sacraments, during the performance of which, in the substance of the sacrament, transformed by grace, a “new spiritual-sensory reality” 28 arises, affecting a person. This thought, according to Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, who relies on the words of the holy fathers, became the starting point for the dogmatic ecclesiological teaching of St. Philaret. According to him, the incarnation of the Savior makes it possible for the holiness of God to be accessible to man until the end of the age, “now no longer in His single personal body, but in the entire mystical body of the Church,” 29 which is the fulfillment of Him, the divine power emanating from Him, abiding in it. The concept of a new spiritual-sensory reality is transferred here to the entire Church. This places the holiness of its members as the basis for the unity of the Church, achieved in Christ by the action of grace or divine power, which exercises a certain effect on them. Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky explains the teaching of Saint Philaret on the action of grace in the Church on the basis of the saint’s disclosure of the mystery of the consecration of the church. The saint speaks here about the new creation in the rite of consecration from “stones, wood and metals” of “the true house of God and the gates of heaven.” It is accomplished “by the measure of the entire building of the Church of Christ” 30 - by the cross, which is also the basis of “church priesthood.” Saint Philaret says that the glory of the Lord, identified with the “Tabor light: the glory of the Divine, poured out through the flesh of the Savior,” fills the church 31. The source of holiness is the actual and true presence of God in the church. It is the desire for vision and the very vision of this glory that allows a person to cease from his sins in order to join it. Here, according to the thoughts of Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, one can see the closeness of the teachings of St. Philaret to the theology of hesychasm of St. Gregory Palamas. In this we can see some connection that the saint establishes with the definition of the boundaries of the Church. “The church is a reality “newly created” by church rites and at the same time the reality of church history” 32. Containing the Church within itself, it defines its mystical limits, which are the limit of contact with the infinite and an essential affiliation of the Church, “concentrating its life and revealing its properties” 33. “Of course, no special place is needed for the omnipresence of God: but for human limitations it is necessary, at least to some degree of perfection, to have a certain limit where the touch with the infinite would be perfected” 34. “The arrogant wisdom of man, which with the imaginary knowledge of the omnipresence of God wants to destroy the church of God, will not build anything except Babylon” 35. Saint Philaret describes the condition for a person’s presence in the Church as the need for him to lose the whole world, to lose “himself in the boundless depth of his insignificance: this boundlessness is the limit of communication with the infinite Divinity” 36 . Here, Saint Philaret’s thought about the manifestations of Divine power that organizes church unity continues in the fact that he considers the church or Church as a “point of transition” connecting “the world of Sacred history contained in Scripture and the world of the soul with the world into which the Church is sent” 37 . After the Fall, the need arises for a “visible and secret” 38 church, which is intended for the Church as “a council of Orthodox Christians with their clergy” 39 . The Christian church is also a “multiplied” “Apostolic upper room of the descent of the Holy Spirit” 40. According to St. Philaret, the church sanctifies the life of the people, but the wickedness of the people destroys the church due to neglect of the gift of grace. “If there is no living Church, that is, believers: the stone church will either collapse... or... remain empty and useless” 41. “If the people do not use the grace of a holy place for their sanctification, then the unacceptable grace is removed, the shrine is hidden, and the abomination of desolation may appear in the place of God’s habitation” 42. In this case, the Church will not perish, since the Lord called His body a church and in Him Himself the true church is found, which cannot be perfect on earth. The fulfillment of the Divine in the earthly church and in the Church is established only in the image of the body of the Savior, in the fullness of Divine power, “which came through the body of the Lord and “healed everything” 43. She appears in "sacred signs, images, rituals" both hiding the Church from the external and having some appearance of the visible boundaries of the Church, and making possible a ""touch" of the Divine" 44, the phenomenon of communion with the Church, her life. The essential coincidence of the bodily fulfillment of the Divinity in the Church with the body of Christ will occur in the New Jerusalem, where "the Lamb Himself will be the church" 45. By this, in the words of St. Philaret, shows the need for a church in the state “in which we now find ourselves” 46 46. By the power of the Lord present in the church-church, according to St. Philaret, matter is “newly created,” the earthly world is sanctified, its communication with the heavenly world arises, and a special time-space arises in which church life is formed. Dwelling in the church of divine power gives the gospel word read in it power and action. Here, through the sanctification of the “ministers of the word and the Sacraments” by the Holy Spirit, 47 “the “human” insufficiency and fallibility of tradition is overcome” 48, and they are taught the grace and sanctification of the hierarchy and sacred rites, thus establishing the unity of Tradition. “The saints consecrate the churches and sacraments, and mutually the churches and sacraments consecrate the saints” 49. “All who belong to the Holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church are made partakers of the one blessing of Jesus Christ and His Father, who blesses us with every spiritual blessing in heaven in Christ (Eph. 1:3)” 50. On the significance of Sacred Tradition in the structure of the life of the Church: public prayer and worship. About the union in the church and the Church of the Eucharistic and historical aspects of human life in the word of God Researcher N.Yu. Sukhova notes that Saint Philaret, relying on Holy Scripture, warns of the need to adhere to true tradition, which is given exclusively by the Church, the pillar and foundation of the truth (1 Tim. 3:15). It is available only to those who are in the Church and is “the actual teaching of grace and sanctification” 51, which is transmitted through apostolic succession. On the basis of sacred tradition, as well as on the basis of clear passages of Holy Scripture, the interpretation of Holy Scripture is carried out. By sacred tradition, Holy Scripture, as a single criterion of Christian knowledge, is lived in the Church and thereby testifies to the truth of the word of God through his personal awareness, which is expressed in the “religious activity of the Church and theological interpretation” 52. According to Saint Philaret, church life, finding its focus in the church, is to a certain extent carried out by the action of the grace of the saints. “Here, even to this day, the Holy Spirit strikes the strings of David’s Psalter, and announces to you its divinely moving sounds... Even to this day, every day, the Most Holy Virgin Herself opens Her heart, filled with Divine love, to our hearts, and proclaims Her supreme seraphim magnification of the Lord. Even to this day, Vasily and Chrysostom put their sacred verbs into the mouths of our clergy. Even to this day, Ephraim teaches here, Damascene sings songs together and theologizes, Savva the Sanctified rules the order of church prayers.” 53. Church worship is considered by the saint as an act of sacred history 54 . The doctrine of the church as the center of the life of the Church is considered by Saint Philaret to be the basis for the idea of ​​its life, purpose and tradition. It is in the church during Divine services that the unity of the earthly and heavenly Churches is most clearly accomplished. “Glory with the shepherds, rejoice with the Angels, sing hymns with the Archangels,” 55 says Saint Philaret, calling on believers to directly participate in the Divine service of the Feast of the Nativity of Christ. In his work 56, Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky leads the reader to the idea that the word of Scripture, according to St. Philaret, essentially connects the mystical-Eucharistic and historical sides of the Church. “It is obviously necessary, through the same word of Scripture, to establish a connection between its historical and dogmatic coordinates, and it was precisely this task that Saint Philaret solved... took a new look at the word as such” 57. According to Saint Philaret, the Old Testament church is significantly reflected in the New Testament Church, including through the sacred history of the Old Testament, in its historical existence. According to the observation of Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, liturgical action in the late Byzantine theological tradition can be an analogue of Holy Scripture and a source of sacred history and thereby be the basis of the “sacral presence of the Church in the world” 58. St. Maximus the Confessor wrote that God “keeps near Himself things that are by nature distant from each other, forcing them to be united by the power of one connection with Himself as with the beginning” 59 . From this, according to Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, “follows the fundamental and essential conformity of heavenly and earthly things” 60. The same idea can be seen in the holy righteous Nicholas Kavasila, when he speaks of the church as a participant in the sacrament. “For from the beginning he appointed the altar to be anointed, and for priests to be priests is to be anointed.”61 On the mysterious action of the word of God in the word of the Church Also, according to Saint Philaret, along with the Sacraments, the “essential accessory” of the Church is the word transformed by grace, in which a new spiritual-sensual reality also arises affecting a person. At the basis of this position, a certain equivalence is established between the concepts of the church of the Word, the name of God, knowable, glorified, invoked, divinely powerful, divinely effective in it 62 and the church of the sacraments, the action of the Word and the action of the sacraments. In the name of God, as in the sacraments, the connection of the “limitless with the limited” is realized, the contact of God, descending by action, with man. The place of this connection is the church or Church. “My name will be that” (2 Kings 23:27) 63. The Name of God is the creative word of God, embodied, in particular, in the human names of God, in the word of God and in the word of the Church and sanctifying a person who through his word knows, glorifies and glorifies God 64. Moreover, according to Saint Philaret, who is based on the prophecy of Daniel, the Church “divided and fragmented” is its last state defined by this prophecy. These divisions, in his opinion, do not separate those who have a teaching that disagrees with the Church from the body of the Church completely, but they, like weak members, are “animated” by the glory of God abiding in it. Thus, according to the thoughts of St. Philaret, the “purely true Church” and the “not purely true Church” - in the sense of healthy and sick members, “and in the sense of pure and not entirely pure teaching” 65 abides in a single body, “outlined by the boundaries of the reality of the sacraments” 66. This approach was outlined by St. Augustine and is based on the validity of the sacraments, regardless of the moral qualities of those through whom they are given, that is, in the entire body of the Church and their subsequent effectiveness in relation to “true Christians” and their ineffectiveness in relation to “untrue Christians”. The true Church consists, according to the saint, of God’s chosen ones, who bear prevenient grace in the depths of their hearts, unshakable because of its secret presence for him. The body of the Church, thus, “is imprinted with such secrecy in its parts and its internal composition that only the Lord truly knows His being” 67 . Blessed Augustine spoke about the possibility of such a union in a single body of the Church with the consent of its “untrue” members in certain matters with the Church. Researcher A.A. Gorbachev writes about this: “It should be noted that the definitions “purely true” and “not purely true” used by St. Philaret, here refer not to the Church itself, but to church doctrine” 68. Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky speaks of this view of St. Philaret as enshrined “de facto by the canons of the Ecumenical Councils” 69. Thus, Saint Philaret distinguishes between the visible, “external” image of the Church and the invisible one - its full measure and composition, which is “known” only to Christ and can also embrace independent Churches. Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky notes that in relation to heterodox people, the thought of St. Philaret “embraced both the “idea of ​​brotherly love” and a sober look, “forgiving the hostile, distinguishing and excusing the dissimilar, removing contradictions” 70 . The Word of God, according to St. Philaret, is a really active verb of power, giving “life and effectiveness to the word of man” [14], especially in the words of the Savior and in the words of the Holy Scriptures. The word of man, as the image of God, is “a certain image of the word of God” 71, the name of a thing for St. Philaret is “the power of a thing contained in the word” 72. The Name of God, according to Saint Philaret, is “the action of God,” the revelation of His glory. “His name is the Word of God” 73. The word of the Church according to St. Philaret in its meaning approaches the meaning of a church sacrament. He notes their essential belonging to the Church, and speaks both about the verbality of the sacraments and about the mystery of the word, through which the Church is created by the “verb of power” in the mystery of Communion with God - “a new sanctified and sanctifying reality” 74. In the unity of the Church with its Head, “the unity of the word and what is named in it is restored” 75. In the word of tradition, as well as in the sacraments, according to St. Philaret, there is a continuous and inexhaustible “teaching of grace and sanctification” 76 in the Church. The sacred creation carried out in the Church by the word of God as a manifestation of the action of Divine power through the sanctification of people is the realization of the unity of the Church and, in particular, leads to the emergence of holy tradition in it. According to Saint Philaret, the word in the Church is an image of the manifestation of the glory of God, like the light of Tabor, and comes from prayer 77. “The finding of the limit with the infinite” 78 in the word occurs, according to St. Philaret, through the glory of God, revealed primarily in His word, in its circulation, establishing the “well-being of creatures” 79, just as with the holy righteous Nicholas Cabasilas, through the word “anointed”, a connection is established between the Savior, the church and the Christians in it, that is, the Church. The acquisition by the human word of the miraculous power of the word of God, or the power of God, occurs in the Church, as in the “house of the name of God,” 80, in the place of the presence of the Word and the Holy Spirit, and is granted to people through faith. Based on the principle of the union of two natures in Christ, “His word acts as the word of the Living God in the word of the Church (which is His body)” 81 . As Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky notes, referring to St. Philaret, the original power of the human word has been returned to people in the single word of the Church, which is proclaimed independently of human speech, the word of Scripture, and is its language. About the action of the Church in history. On the sanctification of the life of society and the state in history by the word of the Church Due to the presence of the image of God in every person, Saint Philaret speaks of the history of the world as the history of the relationship between God and man, the Church and the world, which allows us to consider the correlation of each event in the history of the world with the sacred history of the Church. According to Saint Philaret, the word of Scripture, as the word of the Church, is connected with the history of the Church and with the history of the world as sacred history, in which “the history of the chosen people is an abbreviated world history in general” 82 . The basis for this is, according to the explanation of Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, the creative action of the word of God as the power of Christ outside the church and the Church in a person who bears within himself the image of the Word of God. Saint Philaret speaks of the sacred history contained in Scripture as an abbreviated presentation of world history and the laws of its development 83. In this sense, one can also understand the words of Archpriest Georgy Florovsky that “the entire sacred history of the world,” according to St. Philaret, “is the history of the Testament of God and man,” “is the history of the Church” 84. At the same time, according to Saint Philaret, as already noted, the Old Testament Scriptures are educational for world history, “they create history” 85. Through the renewal of the fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy, the will of God, the power of the “King of kings” 86, is mysteriously correlated with the actions of pious kings. “From the depths of eternity He foresees and prepares them; assigns them a time and a feat not only for their earthly kingdom, but also for His heavenly Kingdom; and grants them both strength and victory over opposing forces” 87. Here, according to the view of Saint Philaret, as already mentioned, the verb of power, the word of God, in the form of the human word of sacred history, contains the whole world and, therefore, directs its history, it establishes “an essential connection between phenomena” 88. “In modern events we read the ancient book of the God-ruled kingdoms” 89. According to V.P. Zubov, Saint Philaret had a careful attitude towards the word - as a shrine, a force that brings “a world of order and meaning into a world of chaos” 90. Being at its various levels, according to St. Philaret, is formed by the word of Scripture, which is the word of God, it is its “core and internal structure” 91, it is given by it. “The Spirit of God pervades all times” 92. As Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky notes, this is how the saint forms the concept of the New Israel. In this thought of the saint one can see the justification, on the one hand, for the timeless existence of the Church, and on the other, for the implementation of the action of the Church in the life of the state, their unification to a certain extent. “The truth elevates the language, but the tribes of sin degrade. This is the common fate of kingdoms and peoples!” 93. Essentially, the unveiling of this concept points to the unity of grace and the word. The need for the union of the Church and the kingdom, according to St. Philaret, is determined by the truth of the word of God, “requiring its embodiment in history” 94. In the “Inscription” of Archbishop Feofan (Prokopovich) it is written that the sovereign is responsible before God for violating human laws, while “the people renounced their will in favor of the emperor and gave power over themselves to him” 95. This justifies the possibility of subordinating the Church to the monarch. For Saint Philaret, “the kingdom has a completely subordinate and servant character” 96. He speaks of the new creation of the New Israel like a church “of stones and metals,” which represents “the unity of the kingdom of priests, the nation of saints (Ex. 19:6)” 97 . The unity noted by the saint is based on the “monarchy of Christ,” which is possible only in the Orthodox state as “the repository of the true Church” 98. At the same time, it acquires the “quality of invincibility” 99, God becomes in it the single head of “everyone and everything” 100, directly the head of the Church and, through the king, the head of the state. The sacred kingdom in this union, in the understanding of Saint Philaret, is the image of the kingdom of God, and the connection with the prototype is established through the Church. The degree of this connection depends on the approach of its servants and residents of the state praying for his well-being to God. Residents of the state become the Church in the “sacrament of the altar” 101. The laws of such a state must be consistent with the will of God. Saint Philaret speaks of hereditary monarchy as a God-established form of his government, establishing it in contrast to democracy. The unity of such a society has two sources: the Church and the family. Social truth in him finds its highest expression in love, exercised by everyone “in his circle... according to his rank and condition” 102. “For everyone and for everyone... the direct measure of truth is conscience, straightened by the word of God” 103. Saint Philaret also speaks of the dependence of the improvement of “state existence” on the state of “the moral life of the kingdom and the people” 104. Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky finds in the concept of the state of St. Philaret a correlation with the state ideas of the ancient Greek philosopher Plato. However, the complete dissimilarity in the views of St. Philaret with Plato is seen in the saint’s definition of the origin of power in the state from paternal power in the family, which points to the source of any human power in the Creator of man. “The kingdom is an “artificial image of this power,” established by God” 105 in the state as in an enlarged family. “Bees and ants form societies not by agreement, but by nature, by the idea of ​​​​communication impressed in their being” 106. To confirm the idea of ​​​​the Divine origin of state power, Saint Philaret gives an example in which the Jewish people are considered. In this example, he notes that God Himself created in Abraham “the quality of a father... made from him a tribe... guided his Patriarchs... raised up leaders and judges... He Himself reigned... He Himself reigned” 107. According to Saint Philaret, the rights of the king and state law in this case are approved by God, since they are “based on the word of God” 108. Thus, with the help of bibliocentrism, Saint Philaret distinguishes between the Church and the state. He notes that the “world of ideas of Sacred history”, which has its origin in God, “is objectively revealed in the word of Scripture,” which, in turn, in the images of the human word carries within itself “the living power of the creative verb of God” 109. This position explains the saint’s firm position in defending the need to translate the Holy Scriptures into Russian. The saint assigned the decisive importance in achieving and maintaining the well-being of the state not to external conditions, but to language, through which the word of Scripture would be “implanted” into the context of life, forming the new life of the New Israel. Through reading the Holy Scripture in the language of communication, the language itself would become, according to St. Philaret, in its power close to the biblical word, would shape the thought and life of the people, would establish it on the foundations and dogmas of the Orthodox faith 110. The Church, in the teaching of St. Philaret, is the revelation of the glory of God that transforms earthly life 111. The word received such an effect in relation to the Slavic peoples after “the truth of Christ and the Gospel spirit of life entered into Slovenian word and writing” 112. Thus, in the word of God in St. Philaret one can see the realization of the unity of grace, the action of the Church as part of the sacred kingdom, the life of the Church, which appears in the church in its timeless plane, in society. Saint Philaret associates the preservation of the unity of society in the state with the fact that its citizens and leaders are guided by love, which has the advantage of completeness over state law. Also, according to the saint, “there is a correspondence between the height of love and between the space of the region in which it acts” 113. About the creation of a church by man in himself. About man's efforts to preserve within himself the Divine gifts of unity As already mentioned, according to Saint Philaret, there is a connection between the church and the kingdom, according to which its perfection and strength depend on the degree of creation and sanctification of its fans of the church in themselves. “And if you walk before Me, as David your father walked, in honor of heart and in righteousness... and I will establish the throne of your kingdom in Israel forever” 114. According to Saint Philaret, “the king builds a church for God, God preserves the church and the kingdom through the prayers of the Church” 115. He notes that the earthly kingdom becomes “invincible” by the word of God through the gospel spirit and life, spread in the popular word and giving “the fruit of “public love of truth” 116. “...It is the church that connects the coming Jerusalem, which must come down from God from heaven (Rev. 21:10), with today” 117. From the side of the will of man, as a church and a resident of New Israel, to the necessary conditions for acquiring the gospel spirit and life for unification in the Church in a new life, Saint Philaret includes faith in God, the life and activity of people in the Church in accordance with the conditions established by the will of God - the law of God, submission to the hierarchy, at the head of which “is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself” 118. Following the context of St. Philaret’s thoughts, we can assume that in his understanding, a believer, discovering in himself the inability to achieve peace through his own efforts, tries to acquire the gift of it in the desire to find love for God, in devotion to Him and humility, with heartfelt attention to the word of God, prayerful invocation of Him, and trust in his work in the help of the saints. “And then the Lord turns towards us “like a river of peace” (Is. 66:12)” 119, healing and enlightening a person in keeping this gift and the life that comes from it. The acquired peace for the inner man will give peace for the outer man: “For the peace of the whole world, and the well-being of God’s holy churches, and the unity of all” (from the following of the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom), the Church prays at the Liturgy for the quenching of the discord of the churches, for the unification of all Orthodox Christians among themselves and for the unification with them and with the Church of all Christians. The unanimous prayer of believers for peace in the Church allows its shepherds “with power and action” 120 to proclaim grace and peace to their flock, gathering and preserving the Church in her grace-filled life. According to the teachings of St. Philaret, life in the Church is supported by the action of grace through the sanctification of its members - people in the Church who, in union with Christ as their head, form the Church - by their participation in the Sacraments, by teaching them the teachings of Christ and personal gifts. It is continuously gathered by the apostles, shepherds and teachers through the word of their teaching, prayer, sacraments and exploits of life, as well as through the active participation of believers “... in their spiritual creation, so that there may be in it a church, and a priesthood, and the offering of spiritual sacrifices” 121, in the union of their souls and bodies with Christ 122. According to Saint Philaret, unity in the Church is, first of all, the unity of “immortal life in Him” 123, the life of the one Body of Christ, which is the entire universal Church. Life excluding all uncleanness, uncertainty, weakness, ill health, destruction, corruption due to union in one body with Christ. The saint expresses the need for conciliar communion among pastors in the organization of the life of the Church. These provisions make it possible to define the teaching of divine gifts to people and human actions aimed at assimilating these gifts in the Church as necessary conditions for maintaining its unity. From the above we can conclude that unity in the Church is not achieved through the efforts of people, but is given by Christ as a source of grace, subject to the preservation of the purity of “the confession of faith and the teaching of life, the intact Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition and the continuous succession of the hierarchy and sacraments” 124 through His union with people. This can be confirmed by the words about the Church in the form of a woman clothed with the sun, “that is, human wisdom” 125, in the book of Revelation of John the Theologian. “With the advent of the kingdom of glory,” as Saint Philaret notes, “the One Image of God will appear in the true members of the Church” 126. Saint Philaret contrasts the “invincibility” of the Church in its unity and completeness with the “overcomeness” of those who separate from it and are in dispersion. “Be careful to stand, and be careful that you do not fall” (1 Cor. 10:12). Those who have abandoned the Church regain grace only upon returning to it, primarily through the shepherds and teachers who preserve grace in the Church of Christ, having for this purpose the spiritual authority given by the Lord Jesus Christ. Having concern for the preservation of church unity, “... let us strive to observe the love of peace for everyone, which, in my opinion, is the crown of our Church,” St. Philaret calls, which is facilitated by maintaining gratitude to her 127. An expression of the theology of St. Philaret (Drozdov) on the unity of the Church in some types of his archpastoral activities On the means to heal the Old Believer schism and protect the Church and the state from its growth The theology of the word of St. Philaret found its expression in his activity as an archpastor in healing the Old Believer schism. Saint Philaret writes that the condition for the prosperity of the Church and the Orthodox Russian state is “the preservation of the principle of church-state unity” 128, noting that their unity and harmony are not the result only of mutual benefit, but of an essential connection between them. The guardian of the unity of the Church and the state, according to the saint, is the Sovereign, who, “as the chosen one and anointed of God” 129, is obliged by nature to be the protector of the Church, since through it he receives legitimacy. It can be noted that this thought of St. Philaret characterizes the state of the Church in his time, but it does not lose its relevance today. Recognizing the Orthodox Church as the true Church, Saint Philaret classifies other “Christian and philosophical beliefs” 130 as schism and heresy 131 . He calls for tolerance towards those of different opinions to be protected by a measure of justice and caution, so as not to “give weapons to evil” 132. According to the definition of Saint Philaret, a schism is “... a society of people who, as a result of long-standing discord and intensely refined doubts about the Ecumenical Orthodox Church, have alienated themselves from the Ecumenical Orthodox Church” 133. Saint Philaret, in his activities to overcome the Old Believer schism, on the one hand, recommended anti-schism measures to the government and the ruling bishops at their request; on the other hand, being the ruling bishop himself, he implemented these measures in his diocese. With the spread of the Old Believer schism, as it was observed during the archpastoral activity of St. Philaret, an important condition for overcoming it was mutual support from other bishops and the government 134. In church terms, the danger of the Old Believer schism, according to St. Philaret, lies primarily in the seduction of “thousands of unfortunates.” “...The newly built and opened gates of hell to deceive the ignorant with some small semblance of the Church, feignedly painted” 135. Saint Philaret writes that all the schismatic Old Believers in the Russian Empire, despite their division into “sects” in relation to the Orthodox Church, “... all of them “blame it” and consider it “heretical” 136 and “do not recognize the sovereign as God’s anointed and do not respect any legitimate authority” 137. Saint Philaret notes the desire of schismatics, who are in a state without grace, to present themselves as the true Church. He speaks of the inadmissibility of violating the unity of the dominant religion in the state, unity in faith in the state, which preserves “church unanimity and unanimity” 138, and, consequently, the unity of the people’s spirit, which is important for governing the state “in terms of civil and patriotic” 139. “The protection of the Church is the protection of the state” 140. The negative attitude of the Old Believers towards the government was caused, according to the explanation of Saint Philaret, by its patronage of the Church and agreement with it 141. Those without priests who did not pray for the tsar considered the government “anti-Christ.” The schismatics introduced a predominantly democratic principle in their governance. They did not recognize any civil authority and, therefore, state laws, and did not fulfill public duties. “According to the teachings of the wandering sect, it is not permissible either to enroll in the audit, or to pay taxes, or to take an oath of office, or to enter military service, or even to hire others as recruits for yourself” 142. Saint Philaret describes a case of schismatics collaborating with the French army in 1812. The distinctive side of the schism is the immorality of its teaching. “A sect is never completely honest. Religious and moral truth are rays of the same light: where the former is mixed with error, the latter is not pure either” 143. Dissenters do not consider it immoral to act aggressively towards their opponents. They “spread immorality under the guise of belief” 144 in relation to family and childbirth. As Saint Philaret notes, the Orthodox faith, recognized as the dominant religion in the Russian state, is “one of the firmest foundations of state unity” 145, which, in turn, requires the preservation of its unity. Therefore, the schism, according to St. Philaret, accompanied by proselytism, has a destructive effect on “church unanimity and unanimity” 146 and, as a consequence of this, on the “unity of the people’s spirit” 147, in which faith and morality are the center 148. According to Saint Philaret, in relation to the schism, which “in the spirit of its proselytism... does not differentiate itself from the Orthodox” 149, protective measures are especially necessary. According to him, the power of schism is given by “money... worldly benefits,... freedom and impunity for crimes” 150, which overcome “the knowledge and jealousy of the clergy” 151. It is a trade based on “earthly unclean motives” 152 for its leaders who want to arbitrarily arrange church affairs. Saint Philaret says that the schism is maintained through the participation of sincere but poorly educated people; it “is a product of ignorance and delusion of mind” 153. Therefore, as long as his actions are not associated with alienation from the Orthodox faith or violation of state law, according to St. Philaret, the most suitable means for conversion from schism is “instruction in the true teaching” 154 through education in schools, educational activities of the clergy and monasticism, the activities of special missionaries and the dissemination of polemical literature. At the same time, Saint Philaret notes the difficulty of attracting schismatics to school, the need to maintain the impeccable personal life of the clergy, to “zealously and orderly perform” divine services, to preach, to conduct home conversations, and also to receive missionary education by the clergy. “Healing” the schism, according to Saint Philaret, should be carried out “prudently” in the spirit of Orthodoxy, in accordance with the nature of the actions and plans of the government and taking into account the dispositions of those who are supposed to be added to the Church and the conditions in which they find themselves 155. According to Saint Philaret, the spiritual healing of schism consists of holding conversations between the Orthodox clergy, especially diocesan bishops, and schismatics, “convincing them of the truth” where possible. Saint Philaret says that the nature of the conversations should be “calm and peace-loving” 156, without denouncing schismatics and arguing with them: “Tolerance, calm, meekness, condescension, caution are also needed in denunciation, just like jealousy” 157. Another means, as St. Philaret notes, is the opening of a large number of “literacy schools”, in which the teaching of reading and the teaching of spiritual disciplines is accessible to the common people, “under the guidance of the clergy.” An obstacle to the implementation of these measures, as Saint Philaret writes, is the reluctance of schismatics to communicate with the Orthodox clergy, which requires, in his opinion, protective actions on the part of the state in relation to schismatic teachers and the provision of the opportunity to teach children primarily in the home of an Orthodox priest or deacon 158. Saint Philaret writes about the need for protective measures for the flock on the part of the clergy to counter the “propaganda” of alienation from the Church for “instruction and enlightenment” through personal interviews, schools, delivering teachings on Sundays and holidays, “... in which catechetical truths would be presented in order with their main arguments and necessary explanations, with all possible applications of thoughts, feelings and language to the degree of understanding and to the state of the listeners" 159. In areas where the effect of the schism is most pronounced, Saint Philaret recommends the establishment of anti-schism missionaries, an increase in the number of clergy and the opening of monasteries for “the fulfillment of the ancient rite of worship” 160. The conditions necessary for the implementation of spiritual measures are, as the saint notes, first of all, “the blessing of God” 161, then “the personal impeccable life of the shepherds” 162 and “a sincere, impartial desire to know the truth of God” 163. The active spread of the schism and the resulting suppression of Orthodox teaching, according to St. Philaret, can be stopped by the “patronage of sovereigns” 164 through the establishment of laws with the tireless “exhortation and teaching of the erring” by the shepherds of the Church. He confirms the possibility of such assistance from the state with examples from church history, citing the holy fathers and canonical institutions. “How then do kings serve God with fear, if not by forbidding and punishing with pious severity that which is contrary to the commandments of the Lord?” 165 “The Council of Carthage, Rule 59, and the VI Ecumenical Rule, 23, Rule 5 and 11 of Antioch, Rule 9 of Constantinople, decreed: “Those who violate the church structure should be removed involuntarily from the reigning city; those who create disturbances and sedition in the church and do not want to submit to the meek admonition of church pastors to convert them as rebels to order by secular power” 166. With the spread of schism in the spirit of proselytism, if one village is divided into parts by representatives of different faiths, then the unanimity of the people will not stand, notes Saint Philaret. He writes that allowing freedom of religion for the least harmful sects is also dangerous for national unity, due to their possible internal division. Saint Philaret considers unity of faith as a forced retreat from Orthodoxy towards schism, as far as possible allowed for joining the Church from the schism, separated, to the unity of two foundations - the Orthodox faith and the hierarchy. Therefore, as researcher V. Belikov notes, the saint does not consider the possibility of a free transition “from Orthodoxy to Edinoverie as a general rule” 167. Saint Philaret sees significant obstacles to achieving unity with the Church in deviations from precisely these two foundations, which “radically enters into the concept of schism” 168. He considers it possible that “an insignificant difference in rituals” is possible because of its permissibility “since ancient times” in the Orthodox Local Churches, but he warns against following the leaders of the schism in “deviating from the sanctity, the priesthood and the sacraments” 169. As St. Philaret notes, unified faith differs from schism in that it is in union with the Church, in a single “spirit of faith and unity of spirit in love and obedience,” 170 which makes the occasional difference in the details of rituals insignificant and “takes advantage” of the grace-filled gifts present in it. He hopes that it will allow schismatics to be completely reconciled with the Church, “those separated from the Church to be drawn into its unity” 171. Saint Philaret writes about the implementation of such actions to join schismatics to the Church in common faith, in which “church rules” and the purity of teaching are not violated. The main thing is “prayer for them and persuasion out of love and with patience” 172. Saint Philaret calls “faith, zeal for faith and self-sacrifice for the service of God and the salvation of neighbors” 173 as means against unorthodoxy, unbelief and wickedness. Saint Philaret considered it dangerous to establish a complete independent hierarchy, to install a separate bishop or to grant priests independent from the Russian Church for the co-religionist flock, so as not to contribute to the strengthening of the self-appointed Old Believer bishops and because of the insincerity of some co-religionists who are trying to lead the priesthood into schism. “It would be incomparably more dangerous if the church of the same faith received, through a special bishopric, a complete hierarchy and the appearance of a special Church” 174. Saint Philaret also writes as unpredictable about the results of the necessary coordination of the issue of creating a co-religious bishopric with the Eastern patriarchs. Another reason would be the inconvenience that would be caused by the dissection of Orthodox dioceses by fellow believers. The main obstacle was the anti-canonical nature of such a production. A bishop serving only in churches of the same faith would thus be deprived of the overall liturgical communion with Orthodox bishops, that is, he would be alienated from the Church, which would lead to the separation of fellow believers from the Church when the same faith and Orthodox bishops and flocks, who do not communicate with each other in divine services and sacraments, and the flock are located in the same geographical territory. If many bishops were installed, “the Church would be dissected” 175. At the same time, Saint Philaret was not against the establishment of a vicariate of the same faith. He writes: “Love does not act outrageously (1 Cor. 13:5), does not upset the church order, does not violate church rules, does not dissect church unity”... “To go further would mean... to lead Orthodoxy away from the right path, and to plunge the well-ordered world of the church into the chaos of schismatic arbitrariness and disorder” 176. Saint Philaret also writes about the inadmissibility of establishing a complete independent hierarchy with their subsequent withdrawal from communion with the Orthodox as dissecting the unity of the Church. Another area of ​​practical implementation of the theology of the word by Saint Philaret is the liturgization of events in state life. As Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky notes, in order to sanctify events by elevating them to Holy Scripture and directing them “into the mainstream of Sacred history,” the saint compiled and performed a series of prayer services on significant days for the state. To summarize, the following can be noted As Archpriest Pavel Khozinsky notes, the ecclesiology of St. Philaret continues the Byzantine theology of St. Maximus the Confessor and St. Nicholas Cabasilas, in which, based on the position that “God is the connection of all things,” the Church and the church have a real connection with each other through the word. For the Byzantine fathers, the church signifies the anointed one. Here we find a possible continuation of this thought in relation to the monarch of an Orthodox state. In this regard, Saint Philaret, in the opinion of Protopresbyter John Meindorff and Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, also does not contradict the theology of hesychasm of Saint Gregory Palamas, when the saint speaks of the procession of divine power in the form of a sensual word. In the opinion of Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, in the church ecclesiology of St. Philaret, based on the establishment of a connection between the word of Scripture and the “creative word of God,” there is a rapprochement between the historical and internal Church. The Holy Scripture and human tradition, the external and internal aspects of the sacraments, received the unity of their basis. The life of the Church in society, accomplished through unity through the word of God, received its foundation in the concept of the sacred kingdom. The Holy Scripture in the theology of St. Philaret is called upon not only to clarify the meaning of the events taking place, but, through raising them to it, to direct them into the “channel of Sacred history” 177. Saint Philaret, according to Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, is the creator of Russian “biblical” ecclesiology, in which the human word acquires a “living and mysterious connection” 178 with the word of God in the word of the Church. In the opinion of Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, the issues of understanding the essence of the Church and its boundaries and the meaning of words in it are system-forming in the entire “synodal theology.” At this time, it was important to determine where the Church was located in the state and public environments. On the other hand, the theology of Archbishop Feofan (Prokopovich) forced the resolution of ecclesiological questions “directly from the word of God” “as an object of scientific study” 179, which made further steps to organize life in the Church on its basis impossible. Saint Philaret, understanding the problem of secularization of the life of society, took steps that made it possible to preserve the theological position of Archbishop Theophan on the paramount importance of the word of God in ecclesiology, while changing the “attitude towards the word” 180 through the introduction of a position on its sacred significance. According to Archpriest Pavel Khondzinsky, the ecclesiology of the Church of St. Philaret through the action of the word of God on the foundations of life opened up the possibility of overcoming the disunity between the civil and church life of Russian society at that time 181 . The achievement of church unity by Saint Philaret is based on union with Christ, its Head, and the preservation of this union through the Holy Spirit in the grace of the world. As a condition for achieving unity in the local Church, the saint shows the need to preserve doctrine and church life in the conciliar participation of the Church's Fullness, in the agreement of the believers with the bishop. He also expresses the need for conciliar communion among pastors in the organization of the life of the Church. At the same time, he notes that maintaining peace in the Church is the main task of all believers. Saint Philaret notes the complete revelation of the Universal Church in the church and in every Christian, its unity in love in Christ, expressed through prayer for the entire Church and for every believer. Only through church life in the Local Church does he see the possibility of salvation for a person. He characterized the Old Believer schism as “a society of people who, as a result of long-standing discord and intensely refined doubts about the Ecumenical Orthodox Church, alienated themselves from the Ecumenical Orthodox Church” 182 and attributed it to a church-state phenomenon 183 . Saint Philaret believed that the means to heal it were the word of God, which finds its expression in the word of the Church and in state laws, as well as actions carried out on the basis of church-state unity. 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Words and speeches. In 5 volumes. Volume 5. – M.: Novospassky Monastery, 2007. P. 171 Saint Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow, Homily upon entering the administration of the Moscow flock // Creations. Words and speeches. In 5 volumes. Volume 2. – M.: Novospassky Monastery, 2005. P. 8. Quote from: Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. Saint Philaret of Moscow: theological synthesis of the era [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Pavel_Hondzinskij/svjatitel-filaret-moskovskij-bogoslovskij-sintez-epohi/ (06/14/2023). Quote from: Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. Saint Philaret of Moscow: theological synthesis of the era... Quote from: Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. Saint Philaret of Moscow: theological synthesis of the era... Time of appeal 06/14/2023). Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky “City or Church”? ― on the question of the key concepts of the ecclesiological concepts of Blessed Augustine and St. Philaret of Moscow [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. 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P. 3. Quote By: His Beatitude Metropolitan Vladimir (Sabodan). Decree. Op. Quote from: Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. Saint Philaret of Moscow: theological synthesis of the era... 24 Ibid. P. 330. His Beatitude Metropolitan Vladimir (Sabodan). Decree op. Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. St. Philaret of Moscow: theological synthesis of the era.. [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Pavel_Hondzinskij/svjatitel-filaret-moskovskij-bogoslovskij-sintez-epohi/ (Access time: 06/14/2023). Quote by: Sukhova N.Yu. Holy Scripture and tradition in the ecclesiology of St. Philaret (Drozdov) [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Filaret_Moskovskij/svjashennoe-pisanie-i-predanie-v-ekklesiologii-svjatitelja-filareta-drozdova/ (Access time 06/14/2023). Quote from: Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. “City or Church”?.. Saint Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow. Word on the Day of the Nativity of Christ, 1825. // Creations. Words and speeches. 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Pavel Khondzinsky. Saint Philaret and the Tradition of the Church... Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky “Church” and “Word” in theological views... Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. “Church” and “Word” in theological views... Archpriest Georgy Florovsky. Paths of Russian theology [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Georgij_Florovskij/puti-russkogo-bogoslovija/ (Access time 06/14/2023). Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. Resolution of ecclesiological problems of Russian theology of the 18th – early 19th centuries. in the works of St. Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Pavel_Hondzinskij/razreshenie-ekklesiologicheskih-problem-russkogo-bogoslovija-17-nachala-19-v-v-trudah-svjatitelja-filareta-mitropolita-moskovskogo/ (Access time 06/14/2023) Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. "City or Church"?... Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. “City or Church”?.. His Beatitude Metropolitan Vladimir (Sabodan). Decree. Op. 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Metropolitan's opinion Philaret on the meaning of the schism [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Filaret_Moskovskij/mnenie-mitr-filareta-o-znachenii-raskola/ (Access time 06/14/2023). Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. “Church” and “Word” in the theological views of St. Philaret of Moscow and St. John of Kronstadt [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Pavel_Hondzinskij/tserkov-i-slovo-v-bogoslovskih-vozzrenijah-svt-filareta-moskovskogo-i-sv-ioanna-kronshtadtskogo/ (Access time 06/14/2023). Prot. Pavel Khondzinsky. Resolution of ecclesiological problems of Russian theology of the 18th – early 19th centuries. in the works of St. Philaret, Metropolitan of Moscow [Electronic resource] // ABC of Faith [Site]. URL: https://azbyka.ru/otechnik/Pavel_Hondzinskij/razreshenie-ekklesiologicheskih-problem-russkogo-bogoslovija-17-nachala-19-v-v-trudah-svjatitelja-filareta-mitropolita-moskovskogo/ (Access time 06/14/2023).