From the Academy to Athos. By East and West. Travel sketches

Contents Part 1. Preface Part 2. On the high seas Part 3. Burgas Part 4. Along the Bosphorus Part 5. Constantinople Part 6. Church life Part 7. Church school Part 8. From Constantinople to Athos The great ascetic, who lived in desert solitude, the Monk Anthony, was once asked how he knew so much, where were the books from which he studied. Anthony, pointing to the world of God, answered those who asked: “Here are my books.” One of the old Russian preachers, reproducing this story, said: “If the world is a book, then who reads this book more? Is it the one who sits in the same place all his life who has never been anywhere outside his narrow corner, or the one who travels around different countries “sees many natures” and observes human customs and customs? Of course, the last one. It is not for nothing that the ancient Sirach says that the flow around the country multiplies the mind 1. We will not repeat here all kinds of arguments about the benefits of travel; These reasonings, we hope, are known to everyone. Let us not disturb the eternal peace of the great writers - Russian and foreign, who wrote extensively and talentedly about the benefits of travel. Everyone is attracted to travel. Since childhood, everyone has already dreamed of different countries. Many have already made more or less significant trips, mainly around Russia. However, we had the idea to take a grandiose journey, and not only throughout Russia, but also abroad. The successful and most interesting journeys of our academic predecessors in 1900 and 1905 2, journeys that we knew about even before entering the academy, involuntarily forced us to think about how we too could follow the already beaten path to foreign countries. The East with its original culture, history and life also attracted us, but the West was no less attracted with its cultural life, treasures of centuries-old knowledge, which for the imitative Russian person have always served and still serve as a model in all areas of life. They say that without the West, all our scientists would be left broke, and our external life would be embellished only by Tula samovars. After all, it is not without reason that in our life, in the press, even in scientific writings, such facts are very common when they prove something and justify something with only one phrase: so in the West, so abroad! To see this alien thing with your own eyes, to think for yourself, without any instructions, about what you see in the life of highly cultured peoples, to broaden your horizons, to enrich your inner experience, to establish certain relationships with your own, native, and alien, with everything national and universal, to have the opportunity to then dare to have your own judgment about everything, not without your own basis - this was the subject of thoughts and desires of many of us. We are living through one of the most interesting times. While some, having forgotten everything familiar, all the centuries-old experience of their people, openly and entirely rushed to the West for the truth of social and state life, others completely disavow the West and do not want to hear a single word about any experience of Western peoples. Currently, over relations with the West, we have the most fierce struggle between many. It seems that we did well that we decided to combine both the East and the West in one trip, and limited the East only to Byzantium and Athos. Palestine was far from us - aloof, and historically it was also far from our Rus'. Everyone should be drawn there primarily by religious sentiments. Byzantium and Athos... is it possible without them not only the history of the Russian Church, but also the history of the Russian state? After all, all ancient Russian life was created “according to the Tsaregrad custom.” Athos is the torch of Russian Orthodox piety, which in the minds of Russian people is always heroism and self-denial. Athos is the source of Russian monasticism, which even now stands in close connection with it. Athos to this day is an earthly paradise for every Orthodox Christian. The most mobile people began to talk about the journey long ago among themselves. In general meetings headed by the Most Reverend Rector of Academy 3, an approximate route was outlined. We had a lot of desires, only one thing was missing... There wasn't enough... funds to carry out our grandiose enterprises. Therefore, I involuntarily had to moderate my ardent desires, cool down my excessively divergent imagination, choose something more significant from the many, leaving little things and details until a better future, if only it ever comes for someone. How you will regret that at our educational institutions there is no pilgrimage fund from which one could borrow a small fraction. With what gratitude would everyone return this “little bit”... 4 Be that as it may, we soon moved from words to action. The travelers were led by the Reverend Rector of the Academy and Professor A.I. Vvedensky. There were over 40 people who wanted to travel together with outsiders. Offering a brief narrative about our “walk,” we say in advance that it is hardly possible to describe everything that we saw, state that we changed our minds, and tell what the numerous participants of the excursion felt. From the boundless treasury of our experience, we can offer, unfortunately, only a small part, although this “small” part will turn into two large volumes. June 15 is the day of the [long-awaited] departure. However, when this long-desired and cherished day arrived, some vague, unclear anxiety involuntarily began to creep into my heart. I couldn’t help but think: where are we going? thousands of miles away, abroad... This last word sounds somehow scary to a Russian person. Mother Russia is too big. You can travel a lot around the world, from north to south, from east to west, but you won’t be able to leave Russia all the time. They say that the sun never sets in the domains of the Russian Emperor. True, improved communication routes make it possible for each of us to quickly fly to the western border, but the Russian consciousness somehow does not reconcile itself with the limitations of its native land. A Russian person from central Russia - and this was the majority of the excursion participants - always thinks, like one Gogol hero, that no matter how much you gallop, you still won’t reach any border. Later, when we saw other lands, where from one border to another is very close, sometimes even only a few hours’ drive, we noticed how easy it is for them to travel beyond such a “border.” For a resident of a small state, going abroad is the same as going from Kharkov or from Kazan to Moscow. It is unlikely that native Russians will look at traveling abroad in the same way. So we were involuntarily amazed at the task ahead of us, which seemed too bold and risky - to go abroad. According to Orthodox custom, they prayed solemnly, and some even took communion. Now it’s time to leave, while it’s not far – from Posad to Moscow. The path is well known to us. The whole excursion was supposed to gather together in Moscow, but most of it still left Posad. It was somehow scary to travel alone. Everyone was huddled together. Our friends and well-wishers gathered to see us off at the Sergiev Posad station. Encouraged by their good wishes, we set off on the short journey to Moscow. Our native place saw us off sadly, it was raining and it was cloudy. But my soul was light. And the rain could not cool our cheerful mood... In Moscow, the entire excursion gathered at the Bryansk station. The authorities of the roads along which we had to travel were so kind and kind to us that they put at our disposal an entire second-class Pullman carriage, all the way to Odessa. And that's all... for the price of only an excursion ticket, for 2 rubles 70 kopecks from Sergiev Posad to Odessa. It is amazing what enormous benefits are provided in Russia for students. The right, it seems, is even a sin not to enjoy such privileges. Thanks to everyone who gives the younger generation the opportunity to continue their education outside of school. We were especially imbued with this consciousness when we boarded the carriage and left Moscow on a fast train. Together with us, in the same carriage, both the Reverend Rector and Professor A.I. Vvedensky fit in. They occupied a separate compartment at the very entrance to the carriage. This compartment resembled a fortress where the commandant's unit was located. And this was partly fair: all sorts of orders came from here, people turned here for all sorts of information. This compartment gave the entire pilgrim caravan as much uniformity as possible. We quickly moved away from Moscow to the south. Whole rivers of fresh, rich air, purified by the past rains, rushed through the open windows. We were driving through places where, within a day or two, there had been terrible downpours, the heaviest during the entire rainy summer of 1908. Here we could see what enormous proportions the flood had reached. There were entire forests flooded with water, rivers overflowing their banks, streams and rivers that at other times were probably barely visible through the surrounding bushes and grasses. Now these streams and rivers were experiencing a second spring, when they, in their insignificance, can seem great and powerful, albeit for a while. Through the window we seemed to see early spring, only the forests were covered with green foliage. A day spent in bustle and troubles made itself felt. Everyone felt it was time to have a snack. Before they had time to untie their “knapsacks” and get out who had what, “brother” Mikhail unexpectedly appeared on the stage with the words: “Ribeshka.” In his hands was some kind of stick-shaped, long package. It turned out that this “ribeshka” is nothing more than a whole lightly salted salmon. And not in a carriage, and even among travelers, such a “ribe” would attract everyone’s attention. And here?.. But what can we say about what was here... It’s unlikely that in another place this “semushka,” as she was often called later, would have deserved such high attention to herself. We, of course, were prudent; we crushed only part of the seedlings, leaving the rest for tomorrow. Many more had not completely parted with the “semushka” when the same “brother” Mikhail appeared with a new stick-shaped bundle in his hands and with the words: “Ribeshka!” Everyone rushed to him and began to quickly unwrap the package. The new “ribeshka” turned out to be an excellent balyk. They also started working on the balyk and paid tribute to it. There was no end to the jokes, witticisms, and fun. But then “brother” Mikhail appears again. This time he has a whole mountain of boxes with all kinds of canned goods in his hands. “Brother” Mikhail was surrounded on all sides. Some shout out: “Peppers, eggplants, tomatoes!”, some: “Bulls, stellate sturgeon, lobsters!”, some: “Eggplant caviar, mackerel, sturgeon!” We decided to try some of the new booty, wisely hiding the rest for the next day. The selflessness of “brother” Mikhail involuntarily revealed the “secret” of everyone traveling, and everyone’s “secrets” began to walk around the carriage, to the general pleasure. There were fruits, cookies of all kinds, sweets, and various “convenient” edible delicacies. Many kettles with wonderful boiling water appeared. Tea drinking began everywhere, and such tea drinking as had never been seen at home. Everyone felt at home. There are conversations everywhere, the most cheerful and cheerful mood. The unusualness of the situation lifted my spirits even more. To feel so wonderful in a carriage moving at great speed, just as you don’t feel at home, means a lot!.. And this evening was deserved by all of us. Sitting conscientiously behind books for a whole year, having just passed the most difficult exams, is no small feat. After so much work, everyone will be able to appreciate the freedom and pure joy of relaxation hours. There was, of course, no end to the conversations, stories, memories, assumptions, good-hearted jokes... After tea we broke up into groups. One group sang almost the entire all-night vigil. Others read the book together. Still others were having a conversation. The fourth played some simple games. In the most complacent mood we spent the first evening in the carriage, which was not very long: after all, we left Moscow at 8 o’clock in the evening. But envious fate must have repented that it had provided us with too many comforts and pleasures, without any special merit on our part, and decided to cool us down a little, to show us that despite all its complacency, we are still at its complete disposal. And indeed, we needed a warning so that we would keep our eyes open on the way and not count the crows and jackdaws. They say that every cloud has a silver lining. Is there good without bad? It probably doesn't happen either. It rained heavily. It’s nice to breathe in clean air, it’s nice to sit in a carriage with the window open and be carried away, as it were, along the waves of a fresh ocean of air into the foggy, darkening distance. But the same rains wash out the road surface, and you can fly with the carriage to the very bottom of some very deep ravine, and even with a large river. Don't think that anything like that happened to us. No, God was merciful to us and did not allow misfortune to touch our soul. We have only lost our former comfort and everyday conveniences. While still in Moscow, we learned that about 200 miles away the track was damaged, so the train could not run continuously. But it turned out that while we were traveling, the path was corrected and our fast train, albeit at a sparrow's pace, made its way through the dangerous places of high embankments softened by the rain. Thus, we avoided what we feared, but we encountered something we did not expect at all. We drove a little more than 200 miles, and the path turned out to be cluttered and spoiled. A freight train crashed ahead of us, crashed on a high embankment, broke the rails, and blocked the track. I had to change to another train. Having been carried away by the luxurious first evening in the carriage, we, of course, sat until late at night, and at dawn of the early summer morning we had to leave our boxes and trudge with our things almost a mile to another train. Moreover, we had to remain homeless there, since there was not, and could not be, a special place for us on the “newly invented” train. To tell the truth, there simply wasn’t even any. A clear summer day was just dawning. It was cool. Our mood immediately dropped. We just started the journey and immediately fail. You have to stand in one place. While we were having fun examining a rather large wreck. We watched how tender, southern, tempting berries for us - northerners: cherries, raspberries and others - suffered and died during an unceremonious overload. We lost several hours at the mercy of a freight train. But thank God for this too. Almost everyone said with one voice: what would have happened to us if our fast train had rushed through this place, and not a freight one? Of course, we would have flown all upside down from a high embankment into the abyss, and it is unlikely that many of us would have survived. That is why we soon came to terms with the inconvenience and warmly thanked God for our salvation. Many of us will never forget this miraculous morning. People are not raspberries and cherries. Let the berries crumple and crumble, as long as the people are safe. We moved on in great crowds and with great delay. I wanted to sleep, I remembered the amenities that were now inaccessible to us. Some of us, like the Jews in the desert, were even ready to grumble. Meanwhile, the train quickly ran south. New pictures were already opening up before us; It was not our country that was visible through the window. We were already driving through Little Russia... Unknown to us, the northerners, the inhabitants of the hills and hillocks, were those boundless plains that now spread everywhere before our eyes. If you look in one direction, the plain stretches out as far as you can see. If you look at the other one, it’s the same. The steppe is a dry sea. And she worries like the sea. Only occasionally the view of the steppe is diversified by a small forest, bush, or tree. There are villages. Again - not our type, not our species. Something completely different. Clean white houses are surrounded by green gardens; dozens of chicken poxes poured out onto the edge of the village. The further we go, the more the poplars stretch in height; The ever-growing and blooming warm southern sun must be drawing more strongly towards itself. Everywhere there are colorful costumes for men and women. A different speech is heard. Another song is heard, carrying the traditions of its side. How big is the horizon! Our gaze constantly rests either on the mountain or in the forest. Here he glides, unimpeded by anything; only somewhere very, very far away the earth’s plain converges with the edges of the blue heavenly dome. The boundless steppe, filled with the aromas of fragrant meadows and fields, with freedom blowing everywhere, somehow involuntarily, imperceptibly, unconsciously draws you into its open space. I want to jump off the train, throw myself into this vast, enchanting expanse and run, run without looking back wherever my eyes look. The steppe is like a magnet, only not for iron, but for people. How we now understand the little crest who can, with his eyes fixed on the deep southern sky, surrounded by space and breadth, lie motionless in the steppe for hours. How clear even his song, his gentle soul is now clear to us. How clear is the whole way of his life. I remembered the singer of the steppes - Gogol. So it seemed that somewhere among the tall and thick grass the old Cossack Taras Bulba was galloping with his mighty sons, galloping into the free Zaporozhye Sich. Yes, galloping horsemen can often be seen in the distance. We looked greedily at the new country, and we all wanted to say: “So this is what you are, Little Russia!” Little Russia - this very word is already surrounded by some kind of poetic dream, and every Little Russian name has some special poetic connotation in the mind of a Great Russian. Konotop, Nezhin, Poltava - is this the same as Moscow, Tula, Kaluga, Ryazan. No, there is a very special mood associated with the first ones, new and softer. Mounds are very common throughout the fields. Some of them have already been excavated. The scientists who led these excavations disturbed the peaceful peace of those who were there and told us about many of their deeds. And how many other heroes of ancient Holy Rus' sleep under these high mounds, keeping their glorious deeds in grave secrecy? When I peered into these mounds, it seemed to me that here lay grains, holy seed, the “standing” of Rus'. This is the unshakable foundation of Holy Rus'. These are underground springs that feed the modern heroes of Holy Rus' with their life-giving moisture. Finally we reached Konotop, the birthplace of the unforgettable Dragomirov 5. The train changed its direction and carried us west. At the stations, almost all of us ran out onto the platform, admiring the beautiful poplars, and being interested in the “Hochland” that we had never seen. We were extremely interested in kobzars. A deep gray-haired old man. The tall forehead is riddled with deep wrinkles - these eloquent witnesses of both his sorrows and his joys. The whole face bears the imprint of deep thought. In his hands is an ancient, simple, unpretentious kobza instrument with soft, gentle, gentle sounds. A rattling, broken voice sings a song about the past. Then it will intensify, the singer’s eyes will light up, his face will light up, and the kobza, in time with the singer’s inner mood, will speak more quickly and loudly. Then the singer’s voice fades, merging with the surrounding silence. The sounds will drown as if in the unattainable heights of the infinitely blue sky. The smile on your face will fade. The kobza will also be silent. The listeners stand silently around the kobzar, each with his own thoughts in his soul. And if it weren’t for the bell, it seems that the crowd would have stood around the kobzar for a long, long time. Personally, I know nothing better than the music and singing of the kobzar. At train stations we pounced on tempting southern fruits and destroyed them in large quantities, despite the cholera. They also bought various trinkets and learned to speak Khokhlatsky. Soon it began to get dark again. We were supposed to arrive in Kyiv before dark, but we were late with transfers. Experienced people advised us to save our strength for the future and not waste it here in Russia. Therefore, our plans did not include visiting Kyiv. However, everyone wanted to take advantage of the three hours free between trains to see this beautiful city, full of age-old Russian shrines. Those who had been to Kyiv considered it their duty to arouse the curiosity of those who had not seen Kyiv, telling miracles about its amazing beauty. But no matter how desirable it was for many to at least see the famous city from the outside, they had to abandon this pleasure completely. We were approaching Kyiv almost at midnight, and there was no more than half an hour left before the train departed from Kyiv to Odessa. And then they arrived because they gave the driver a tip, and he drove the train with all his might. Luckily for us, there was some very big man riding along, who kept sending a menacing message to the locomotive driver: “Add it up!” We could not see either the bell tower, which during the day is always visible from dozens of miles away, or the magnificent panorama of the city that unfolds before the traveler during the day. Only the lights scattered across the mountain attracted our gaze. Closer to the railway, barely visible in the darkness, was the black laurel - the center of the greatest shrines since ancient times. What the Holy Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius is for Great Russia, the Kiev Pechersk Lavra is for Little Russia. How many thousands and millions of pious people flock here to bow from all over Rus', great and so far, thank God, pious! Saints Anthony and Theodosius of Pechersk can still be called archimandrites of all Rus', just as Saint Sergius is its abbot. The Venerables Mark the Grave Digger, Prokhor the Lebednik, Spyridon the Prosphora Maker, John the Long-Suffering, Alypius the Physician, St. Nicholas the Svyatosha, Nestor the Chronicler stand before us as if alive and draw our hearts to themselves. These are, as it were, eternally unquenchable lamps, our eternal beacons in this troubled sea. And this is the center and source of Russian Orthodoxy and piety now before our eyes. The train flew noisily onto the bridge, slowed down and drove for a long time along the longest bridge. Under our feet in the midnight darkness, somewhere deep below, flowed the beautiful Dnieper, the adornment and pride of Little Russia, forever memorable for all of Rus', “its pure font.” You can experience a lot of thoughts and feelings while looking at the ancient capital city. The old, gray Rus' all comes to mind. Ascetics, princes, heroes, epics and chronicles come to mind. But all this was only supposed to flash before us in a few minutes. Kyiv disappeared from us behind a mountain, and we soon arrived at the station. Here the train was already ready for us, leaving for Odessa. We are again in a beautiful carriage, comfortably accommodated. They even gave the Reverend and Alexei Ivanovich a first-class compartment. We spent almost all of the seventeenth in the carriage. In the open space, among the amenities, we felt great again, especially since we had a great night's sleep and rested from the worries and fatigue of the past day. We drove through Little Russia again, but not like this anymore. There is no longer such a plain here, and forests have begun to appear more often. Only near Odessa did the plain begin again. They whiled away the long day as best they could. It was impossible to get bored in such a big company. Ribeska, canned food, fruits, and berries appeared more than once. We drank tea, read local newspapers, dreamed about the sea and the Turkish region, argued... We ran out to the station, studied the “Jerusalem nobles” who were beginning to come across to us, whom many of us had never seen. His Eminence Bishop sometimes walked around the entire carriage. At the same time, he usually joked: “I’m going to review the diocese.” Apparently, he wanted to personally check if everyone was happy and calm. This day did not last long either. We arrived in Odessa when it was already dark. At the station we were met by the monks of the Ilyinsky Athos monastery, and we all walked on foot to the monastery, located very close to the station. There they took us first of all to the church, which was all illuminated and looked unusually solemn. Here is the meeting of our lord. They performed the usual litia, at the end of which many years were proclaimed to us along with the bishop. The Bishop answered with many years for the brethren of the monastery and made a speech. In his speech, he spoke about the great feat carried out by the monks living in the courtyard, meeting thousands of pilgrims on their way to the Holy Land and Holy Mount Athos. The Right Reverend likened the monks to wise virgins, because no matter what time the groom comes to them in the name of Christ, they are always ready to receive him and the lamp of their hospitality always burns equally brightly. We were belated travelers, having arrived almost at night, and hospitable monks greeted us with lit lamps. The noisy life of the street, which flows past the courtyard church like a deep river, does not in the least disturb the calm prayerful flow of life of the monks. She, like the stars in the sky, constantly shines on an ever-restless, unstable, stormy world. Shine on the world until the end of time... The church in the courtyard was filled with people. There were not only monks here. There were pilgrims here who had arrived earlier than us and were awaiting the departure of the ship. There were also Odessa residents who were attracted to the church by the unusual crowd of people and the unusual celebration. Everyone listened with deep attention to the Bishop’s welcoming speech, which breathed with cordiality and affection. The Bishop ended his speech with a request to the inhabitants of the monastery to take us, distant travelers going to worship the shrines of the East and distant Rome, under their hospitable shelter, and to shower us with holy prayers. The hospitable monks already had everything ready for us: both the table and the house. We were already far from our native places, we had gone one and a half thousand miles, but even here we were greeted by people who were like family. The great virtue is hospitality; everyone who travels needs it. But our Russian pilgrim especially needs it. What would a simple peasant, a simple peasant woman, do if there were no hospitable Athonite farmsteads in Odessa? Imbued with one thought - to go beyond the mountains and seas to venerate the great shrines - the pilgrim, as it were, ceases to live on earth, in the conditions of a civil society. He becomes above it all. All the formalities associated with traveling abroad are completely incomprehensible to the piously-minded soul of a pilgrim. It could very easily happen that the pilgrim would have to return home, and he would return without complaining; He would only say that the Lord did not deign him to bow to His Tomb. And isn’t it strange that an Orthodox Christian, to whom from an early age the shrines of the East are close, dear and like family, should go abroad to venerate these shrines? What could be higher than the service that the Odessa Athos metochions perform with honor and glory? Meet thousands of pilgrims, correct all sorts of formalities for them, which none of them will do without habit and without knowledge, send them to where they strive with all their souls! Pilgrims feel a lot of gratitude, although perhaps they do not express it, to the Athos farmsteads for their necessary and dear help to everyone. That same evening we had to write, or, better said, sign ready-made printed petitions addressed to the Odessa mayor for the issuance of foreign passports to us. A foreign passport... For someone traveling abroad for the first time, this sounds almost proud. Everyone felt somehow elated. Of course. Tomorrow we have to go beyond the “blue sea”, most of whom have not seen any sea since the day they were born. It seemed to everyone that the sea would certainly meet us, if not with a real storm, then certainly with good rolling. They asked if the sea was calm. Experienced people were asked for advice and remedies on how to get rid of the effects of pitching. The agent of the Orthodox Palestine Society, M.I. Osipov, to whom most of these questions were directed, persistently reassured us, assuring us that there would be no trouble. Finally, to the more timid, he recommended the most [effective], in his opinion, remedy against seasickness. You need, he said, to get so drunk that “the land motion exceeds the sea motion,” then you can go safely. Then nothing will happen... Only long after midnight we calmed down, and probably everyone in the depths of their souls more than once asked themselves the question: “What does the coming day have in store for us?..” The next day, June 18, the ship was scheduled to depart at 4 p.m. We had almost the whole day at our disposal. Early in the morning we went to see the city. First of all, of course, we went to the seashore. We walked along clean but sparse streets and passed the famous Alexander Garden, which was rather pathetic in terms of vegetation. And here we are on the seashore. Some kind of boundless plain stretches out before us, as if convex. Whoever remembers how he first saw the sea will agree that the first impression is the impression of some kind of spaciousness, some mighty expanse that beckons to itself, involuntarily prompting thoughts that man was created for freedom, breadth and spaciousness, that man is the pinnacle of creation, the master of the earth. A man lives in a room the size of 10-15 square arshins - his soul is somehow squeezed. And he goes out into the steppe, or onto the seashore - and his soul seems to expand. Perhaps here she mystically comes into contact with eternity. Therefore, when a person looks at the sea, he often wants to remain silent. And there is a reason to remain silent. Look at the mighty scope before you, what power and strength!.. It’s not for nothing that so many of the most sublime and talented pages are dedicated by writers to the sea... We didn’t admire the sea for long, and there was only a patch of sea here. Only to the right did it run away into the vast distance, disappearing behind the horizon. From the seashore we went to the city center, walked along its main streets and boulevards. Odessa makes a strange impression. The city is rich, clean, tidy, and well-maintained. Beautiful buildings, excellent pavements, regular streets, like a chessboard. Drowning in greenery. The streets are bordered by endless lines of tall white acacia trees, blocking the sidewalks from the scorching rays of the southern sun. But there seems to be no spirit in it, no Russian meaning. In beautiful Odessa you somehow feel like a stranger. You walk through the streets. Who doesn't have churches here! Luxurious churches of Mercury, Melpomene, Bacchus, etc., but the churches of God are almost invisible. You approach a Russian Orthodox city - a whole forest of bell towers, golden domes glisten in the sun, crosses glow like stars, you hear the ringing of the invitation. The heart rejoices! One can feel the authentic Russian life. You walk along the streets and there are churches on every street. Passers-by bare their heads and sign themselves with a wide Russian cross. Not so in Odessa. There are few churches, you can’t hear the bells, everyone is going “on business”, there is nothing to cross yourself to... A boring city! There is no Russian soul in him. And you rarely meet a Russian in this international city. But you won’t meet anyone here! And German, and French, and English, and Greek, and Italian, etc. But most of all here, it seems, are Jews: there are signs with Jewish surnames on the houses, and on the streets you constantly meet typical Jewish faces. In such international centers, national divisions are felt much more acutely than in other places. Far from any foreigners, among only the Russian population, it is easy to feel cosmopolitan, it is easy to theoretically talk about the equality of nationalities. But when you have to live among foreigners and put your theoretical beliefs into practice, then theory, when faced with practice, crumbles into dust, and absolutely nothing remains of it. Anyone who has been to the southwestern region has probably noticed that there the Russians seem to be huddling closer to each other, uniting more closely with each other. So, on the very first day, you involuntarily feel more sympathy for your own people than for strangers. At 11 o'clock we were given a reception with His Eminence Archbishop Dimitry of Odessa. At the appointed time we hurried to the archbishop's house. Vladyka graciously received us and talked for a long time with His Eminence Rector and Professor A.I. Vvedensky about various subjects. He recommended that we pay more attention on Mount Athos to the remnants of ancient pure piety. There, he said, there are still many things that have already been forgotten by general church life. For example, the canonical conditions for admission to the clergy are strictly observed there (Ap. Laws 25; First Ecumenical 9; Theophilus 3 and 6) 6, to which, unfortunately, we pay too little attention. He told us that he himself was going to visit Mount Athos. Having received the saint’s blessing for the upcoming journey and chanted “ispolla” to the bishop in unison, we hurried back to the courtyard. On the way we stopped at the cathedral. Odessa Cathedral is very extensive and well decorated. It makes a wonderful impression outside and inside. This is one of the most beautiful cathedrals in Russia. Since the cathedral was gradually decorated, it is distinguished by some mixed architecture. Here, in the cathedral, we bowed to the graves of the famous Odessa saints, the memory of whom will never die in the Russian Church. The archbishops of Odessa are buried here: Innocent, Dimitri and Nikanor. These were all famous scientists and famous leaders, whom one cannot help but honor and imitate. Here we are again in the courtyard. Once again we were treated to a meal. During the meal, toasts were exchanged more than once. It is difficult to describe the hospitality of the Athos people, and it is difficult to thank them for it quite adequately. Having said goodbye to the hospitable monks and thanking them for their love for us, we headed to the steamship Quarantine Harbor, from where ships depart for overseas voyages. Approaching the harbor and looking around the entire Odessa port, you involuntarily become thoughtful. After all, this is a whole Babylon. How many marinas! A whole forest of masts, black thick pipes. Some smoke, others show no signs of life. Barges and boats, large and small, scurry between the steamships. There are dozens of railway lines along the shore itself, even two stories high. People swarmed around one or another part of the port like flies. The steamer leaves there, goods are unloaded here, heavy bales are carried, and they are stored in huge barns. It can be seen that trade in Odessa occurs on an extensive scale. An entire country usually lives on such marinas and ports. Goods flow here like streams into rivers and rivers, and through this mouth their full-flowing river pours into the sea. But water only pours into the river mouth, and both pours out and pours into the trade mouth. In Quarantine Harbor, at the pier of the Russian Shipping and Trade Society, our steamship is almost ready to sail. This is a huge old man “Lazarev”, who, probably, during his many years of life, took and brought back hundreds of thousands, and perhaps millions of pilgrims. Upon entering the ship we receive our foreign passports from the police. Here we are on the ship. Our place is at the bow of the ship. One cannot be delighted with this room. At first it’s as if I can’t believe it: is it really possible to travel in such conditions? Along the walls, under the upper deck, there are two floors of bunks. Each person can occupy no more than an arshin in width. Moreover, to get to your place, you need to climb over all sorts of devices for lowering and raising the anchor. The room does not show any signs of cleanliness, it is even positively dirty, so you are afraid to touch it, lest you leave a reliable mark on your clothes as a keepsake and as a punishment for careless handling of dirty objects. But what to do? After all, we are third-class passengers. And according to Russian steamship rules, a third-class passenger is a creature lower than a person. Therefore, you can seat three passengers in one seat: they will fit somewhere! There can be no thought about space. However, the captain, at the request of the caring M.I. Osipov, provided us, [unlike others], with the entire ship, all its decks, for a day’s stay. Having somehow placed our things, we went up to the deck. Most of the passengers were already here. The terrible long whistles boomed dully and viscously and spread far across the bay. First... Second... Soon the ship will be leaving. M.I. Osipov in a short speech wished us a good journey. The Eminence responded to this: “And three years ago M.I. also saw off the Moscow students, and their voyage, although on an old ship, was quite safe. I hope that [this time] too, with the light hand of M.I., we will sail safely. The old one must be generally more reliable!” M.I. gave us the Gospel in Russian. This is “a farewell message to a Russian pilgrim from the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society,” as printed on the binding. As a parting word and blessing, the Palestinian Society also offers a verse printed on the binding: “The Lord will bless you from Zion, and see the good of Jerusalem” 7 . Although we were not destined to see the good of Jerusalem, we accepted this wonderful parting word with great gratitude. Third beep. The gangway has been tidied up. We are already cut off from our native land. A tugboat begins to pull the heavy steamer out of the cramped harbor. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, our ship departs. The mourners stand in a crowd on the pier, sending their last greetings to those departing, waving their handkerchiefs. Only there is no one to accompany us. M.I. Osipov and several Athonite monks - these are all our guides. The people standing on the pier become smaller and smaller, and the city, not visible from the harbor behind the high shore, opens up larger and larger. The steamer has already been towed to the exit from the harbor. The propeller started working and the ship went faster. Here is a breakwater with a lighthouse standing at its end, and we are leaving Odessa harbor. Odessa can only be seen from the sea, but with every turn of the screw it moves further and further, the houses become smaller. The steamer reached the middle of the bay and turned right, south, across the Black Sea. The city is gradually disappearing from view. We drive past the dacha areas of Odessa, past the Small, Middle and Large fountains. You feel high spirits, you want to go to the open sea... Published according to the publication: From the Academy to Athos. By East and West. Travel sketches. Christian. Sergiev Posad, 1909. Signed: V. T. During his studies at the academy, Vladimir Troitsky visited abroad twice. The pilgrimage to Athos described in these travel notes was made in 1908 as part of a group of students led by the rector Bishop Evdokim (Meshchersky) and professor A.I. Vvedensky. Another trip, this time to Western countries, which V. Troitsky made in 1912, provided material for writing “Letters about the West.” The ship is moving at full speed. The propeller desperately boils the water and leaves a long trail, many miles long, behind the steamer. With its sharp nose it powerfully cuts through the dark blue surface of the sea. Small waves, joking and playing, run towards the steamer, but, punished for their prank by a blow from the steamer's heavy chest, they bounce back with a murmur and splash, scattering with the purest white splashes of the most bizarre and unexpected shapes. Before one wave has time to disintegrate, another is ready, and the steamer, as if not paying any attention to the insignificant waves, raising its head high, obedient to only one rudder, firmly and confidently moves forward and forward. There are also people with a powerful, indestructible spirit. Around them, evil and small, insignificant people make noise and worry, they furiously rush at them, and they, obedient only to a clear conscience and reason, without hesitation, go towards their intended goal, ever forward and forward. And they will never bow to any blows of fate. The world is worth such people. They survive centuries and millennia, powerfully dominating people even from their graves. And who among us does not know such dead people who are still stronger than living people, who are stronger and more powerful even than entire nations?! And there, behind, only a narrow dark gray strip reminds us that somewhere beyond the horizon, fields and meadows, forests and mountains of our great vast Rus' stretch across thousands of miles. But this strip is becoming narrower and narrower, soon a doubt arises whether the land is still visible: some see it, others don’t. We are on the open sea... Look in all four directions: one is entirely sea, near the ship it is blue and gentle, and in the distance it is gray and gloomy. The waves are noisy and rumble - what are they talking about? We are not poets, and we do not understand the language of the sea wave. Here and there the boat sails are still white. Apparently, we are still not far from the shore if even boats dare to come here. And what space! You sit at the very end of the steamship's bow: you can't see the steamer, you can only hear the noise below you. There is nothing ahead. The life-giving sea air rushes towards you like a river, hits you in the chest, and envelops you with spaciousness and freshness. And it seems as if you are no longer an academy student, but a free bird; you just have to flap your wings and you’ll fly off the steamship’s bow and fly forward, playing and swimming in the air waves of the wonderful expanse. Fine!.. Meanwhile, the sun sets lower and lower, until its huge reddish ball rises completely above the sea. Rare long stripes spread from it throughout the sea. The sun is slowly setting. It is like a person about to swim in cold water, as if he is afraid to plunge into the cold depths of the sea. But the edge of the solar disk has already disappeared beyond the horizon, as if drowned in water. Soon only half of it became visible above the sea. Dark shadows lie across the sea. We all look with bated breath at the unprecedented spectacle. Just one small edge remains from the sun. We are waiting - the sun is about to disappear completely. No, it seems to regret the imminent separation from us; appears for a moment from behind the wave, sends farewell greetings - cold greetings! Then the sun suddenly, suddenly disappears imperceptibly. The sea turned black. Where did its pleasant blue color go? Gray gloomy waves rush throughout the sea. It soon became completely dark. The ship lit up. The light bulbs on the masts lit up like stars. It became eerie to look at the sea. It's black, you can't see the distance. It seems that it is not the old playful small waves, overtaking each other, running across the sea plain, but terrible antediluvian monsters showing their black backs. The sea lives - the mysterious world of monsters is constantly drawn before you. It seems that some mysterious giant hand of some monster is about to reach out from the abyss of the sea and grab you. And our ship itself, when you look at it from the bow, looks like a huge monster. Bright electric eyes on the sides, a black mouth breathing smoke, sending sheaves of sparks into the surrounding darkness. A song is heard on the forecastle. Then some sailor, to the accompaniment of a guitar, sings a sensitive song about an unfortunate fireman, about human cruelty and lies. A creepy song in a creepy setting. Some light flashed to the right. Maybe this is the light of a beacon, the last ray from our Motherland. Thus, a good host, seeing off a late guest, will usually open the door for him, take a candle and shine it on him. And again the sea is dark, again it overwhelms with its grandeur, its menacing midnight beauty. In thinking about the sea, you somehow involuntarily merge with the sea, you begin to live the same life with it. It’s as if the whole world has one soul, it lives both in you and in this dark sea - one and everywhere... You even begin to feel it. Here you have it, but for a moment - and it is no longer there. Is the knowledge of the world exhausted by our ordinary organs of perception? It seems not. For a long time we did not want to part with the deck, with the dark sea, but finally we had to go down to the place of our unsightly overnight stay under the bow deck. However, soon we all came to terms with all the inconveniences of the situation and, lulled by the sound of the sea outside the walls of our floating bedroom, tired of the day's labors and worries, calmed down until tomorrow. On the nineteenth we got up and again saw ourselves in the same open sea. From the outside it seemed as if the ship had been standing in one place all night and we had not made a single mile forward. The sun shone cheerfully in the cloudless blue sky and spread affection, warmth and light in all directions. The sea sparkled in the sun and, bathing in its rays, shimmered with countless stripes of gold of all colors and shades. A light sea breeze makes it impossible not only to feel, but also to completely notice any heat. The sea, brightened by the bright daylight, breathes freshness and coolness. Wonderful turquoise everywhere. From the outside it seems that the sea was cleared overnight. And the whole ship looks somehow clean and cheerful. Passengers poured onto the deck. However, you can’t look at the sea for long; it’s almost monotonous. Only connoisseurs of lighting effects can spend days admiring the views of the sea, finding more and more new pictures in the constantly changing tones of light. We are prose writers. Therefore, you involuntarily pay attention to the life of the ship, take a closer look at the passengers around you. An excursion of students from the Krasnoyarsk Theological Seminary is also traveling with us on the ship; they are going to Palestine. Obviously, pilgrimages are beginning to become part of the life of the theological school. But just ten years ago there was no mention of such pilgrimages. How much good will be sown in the souls of young pilgrims. Maybe this journey will give them more than even an entire spiritual (modern) school. In addition to the Krasnoyarsk seminarians, the ship was filled with many young students from the Slavic lands. Before us were all kinds of uniforms, indicating that we belonged to a famous educational institution. There were also students from various women's educational institutions. The southern temperament, the proximity of the homeland, which they had not seen for a long time, the consciousness of freedom from year-long labor and just completed exams - all this provided abundant food for a cheerful mood. There was incessant chatter on deck. They joked, laughed, and told such nonsense that even children would like it. Here and there they began to sing. Everyone had fun. Only the Eminence is sad. He was sad that, thanks to this public mood, it would be impossible to sanctify the first day of our stay at sea with an all-night vigil. Of all the passengers, the most remarkable are, of course, the pilgrims. You will notice them immediately; They seem to have some kind of special stamp on them. They are all focused, not even paying attention to their surroundings. There is no fun for them. They are not at all interested in steamship life. During the long journey to Odessa, they had already managed to concentrate entirely on the thought of the Holy Land. The pilgrims seem to be thoroughly imbued with a pious mood. A whole group of men had gathered on a large closed hatch. With a bright, gentle look, lying down on their bags, they listen attentively to one literate man who, in a loud, solemn voice, reads some kind of edifying book in a loud, solemn voice. He finishes one story, is silent for a few minutes, the listeners, after being silent for a while, make their apt comments about what they read, sigh a little, and the reading continues again. Elsewhere, a group of intelligent Zionist Jews. They started an argument with someone. He argued the religious nature of Zionism, and apparently the student objected to him, resolutely asserting that Zionism had nothing in common with Old Testament Jewry. Zionism is simply a philosophical materialist doctrine, according to which every people can live and develop only in a country that corresponds to its character. And therefore, the Jews will continue to wander, not finding a place for themselves, until they settle in Palestine. Only in Palestine is Jewish life possible. We have a lot of “cool” passengers with us. Two or three at a time they sit on the upper deck and quietly have serious conversations with each other. Most of the people traveling here are business people, and therefore it does not offer anything remarkable to the superficial observer. Meanwhile, the inner world of the “cool” ones is full of big thoughts. Some of them are traveling on very important political matters. The sea is gradually getting boring. There is already a desire to see the land, especially since it should appear soon. Everyone gazes intently at the horizon, looking through binoculars. You don't have to wait long. The land is not far, because we never went far from it. A stripe of indefinite color appears on the horizon, soon the coastal outlines can be distinguished, and in the distance the blue, indistinct outlines of mountains are visible. This is already a foreign country. The steamer goes along the shore, but at a far distance from it. The visible shores are unsightly. There are no forests visible on them, no grass, almost no greenery. Yellowish, gloomy, lifeless rocky mountains almost approach the sea itself and end near it with huge rocks. It is more pleasant to look at the valleys that sometimes go down to the sea. The valleys are completely covered with yellowing grains, and in some places compressed grains are also visible on them. On the shore you can see some majestic huge building of an intricate style. Terraces, terraces, open and closed balconies and balconies, turrets, galleries. From the building towards the sea, among the vast rich flower beds, various fruit trees, flowering bushes and vine clumps, clean paths run down to the sea in intricate snakes, intertwining many times. Some of them end at the very cliff of the rocky seashore, others, passing through valleys and gorges, lead the traveler straight to the sea. On the shore you can see an elegant bathhouse, as if itself bathing in the turquoise gentle waters of the sea. With binoculars you can see a flotilla of boats in the small harbor. From a distance they look like white seagulls swimming in the sea. -What is this? What is it? - everyone asks, looking at the building. “Euxinograd,” answer the people who were here. This is a kind of our native Russian Livadia. Evksinograd is the summer residence of the Bulgarian prince, now the king. Looking at this dacha, everyone sees with their own eyes how quickly the internal power of our brotherly country is growing and developing, now living, after the overthrow of the Turkish fetters, its own independent life, in complete space and complete freedom. May the Lord protect our brotherly people forever. The Slavic soul is not poor, but it has no place in the choir of other peoples living on earth... We are approaching the Bulgarian port city of Varna. Varna is a very ancient city. It was still a Greek colony, one of those numerous Attic colonies that were scattered along the shores of the Black Sea even to our Crimea and the Caucasus. At that time Varna was called Odessus. During Roman rule, the city was sometimes called Tiberiopolis. However, the current name of the city is very ancient. Currently, Varna is the most significant port in Bulgaria, a wonderful outlet from a country squeezed by mountains to God’s open space, freedom and freedom. This is a kind of “window”, only not to Europe, but to the East. Only here will you understand how every country needs such free access to space and freedom. Here, in Varna, is the Bulgarian military port. There are already several small Bulgarian military ships in it. This is the beginning of the Bulgarian fleet. The Bulgarians are going to connect this port with a canal to a deep lake located next to the port and protected by mountains. Then they will have a port completely closed and protected by nature itself, a port of glory. The Bulgarian fleet is small, but even on occasion it can cause a lot of trouble for its neighbor. It is clear that our “brothers” do not sleep, but work tirelessly. They work feverishly and hastily. For some reason they remind me of a young tree whose whole life is happening so vigorously quickly. Since ancient times, Varna has been a fortress and a strategic point. During the Russian-Turkish War it was occupied by Russian troops. Now the fortress is disarmed. Varna has no view from the sea, because almost all of it stands on a flat and low place running down to the sea. Near the pier we met several ships of our Black Sea squadron. Then the Russian sailors made a visit to the Bulgarians. The steamer approaches the stone embankment. An insignificance at sea and a giant in a small harbor, our steamer slowly creeps along the harbor. The usual story of mooring and tying up the ship continued for a long time. Finally we landed. The gangway has been abandoned. There is a large crowd at the pier. Those who meet one of their relatives or friends already bow to them from afar and enter into conversation. The steamer will stay for several hours, and therefore we can go ashore. And here we are for the first time entering foreign soil, although so far only on Bulgarian soil. We have guides from Bulgarians - students of Russian theological schools returning to their homeland. Accompanied by them, we are almost all together and head to the city. A certain oriental tint is already noticeable in the street life of the city. The type of buildings is also different from ours. And the faces of people with some new imprint are not entirely ours. Here we get acquainted with the Bulgarian language primarily through signs. Some signs are very surprising with unexpected content. Here we read: “shapkarnitsa”, “bread-bakery”, “sweet-bakery”, etc. How nice it is that Bulgarians do not have foreign words, but all their native words. If only we could do the same! Nothing makes people closer than language. Native speech in a foreign land makes the heart beat especially strongly, and most of all reminds one of one’s native land. In Bulgaria you understand speech when it is printed, but when you hear lively speech from the lips of a Bulgarian, only individual words are understandable, and the speech seems completely foreign. It is very difficult and almost impossible for a Russian to speak to a Bulgarian. But when you see signs everywhere with Russian letters and almost Russian words, you involuntarily succumb to deception - are you in some kind of Russian city? This illusion is especially complemented by the ranks of constantly meeting military men, dressed entirely in our Russian uniforms. And it seems involuntarily that these are all Russian soldiers, Russian officers, Russian gendarmes. In Bulgaria you feel at home, at least not like abroad. Russian money flows here almost unhindered. Seeing you as Russian, they almost always tell you the price of things in Russian coins. However, we hastened almost immediately to exchange Bulgarian money, so that everyone had a few levs and stotinki. For the first time, it was somehow interesting to hold foreign money in my hands. Everyone looked at them and asked each other about their value. Accounts were often confused, so sometimes others had to take money from us and pay someone else. Arousing everyone's curiosity, we walked through the streets of the city. For the first time we went to the local cathedral. “Sborna ta tsarkva” is almost in the center of the city, on a large square planted with trees. The cathedral is large and makes a very good impression from the outside. But inside the cathedral we were amazed by its modest appearance and the poverty of its furnishings. The old wooden floor, the poor iconostasis, the even poorer altar and the ciborium above it, the old small dented candlesticks, the lack of painting on the walls of the church, the absence of rich vestments on the local icons, the pitiful thin candles (though made of pure yellow wax) - all this was so little consistent with the ideas about the cathedral that had been ingrained in us. The cathedral gives the impression of being abandoned. There is somehow little prayer in the church. They say that Bulgarians do not particularly like to visit churches and even less like to pray. Western negative literature finds many admirers here and is considered, of course, the most intelligent, which one cannot help but imitate. They don’t believe in God in the West, which means we need to do the same. After all, the people there are all enlightened - smart. They will not disbelieve in vain. However, recently the Bulgarian clergy has intensified its religious and educational activities. They say that through printing, preaching and missionary work it is beginning to once again conquer the “unconquered.” God willing. At the altar we met a woman dressed all in black. On his head is some kind of black cap with white piping and the whole suit is somehow original. This is a kind of deaconess. It is the responsibility of persons like her to take care of the cleanliness of the church and church utensils. They also perform some other Christian duties towards their neighbors, as directed by the clergy. This is undoubtedly a remnant of dear early Christian antiquity. You rejoice when you see this sweet and holy antiquity even now, but you also involuntarily grieve when you see how little remains of this antiquity at the present time. The institution of deaconesses was a great, powerful force in the hands of the early Christian Church. A holy woman is the greatest power in the world. That is why, in our troubled times, all Orthodox Churches must take every possible care to restore this institution. Personally, I liked this service at the altar, either directly from a nun, or from an old widow of good behavior. A woman seems to be neater than a man and therefore will always conduct her business better than a man. It would be possible to create this institute here too. There are so many pious people in our parishes who would give their whole souls for the splendor of the church. This is not like the various hired watchmen, churchmen who burn churches, keep everything in terrible disrepair, are almost always drunk, rude, etc. Next to the cathedral is the house of the metropolitan, the “metropolis” with a small garden. They kindly showed us both. Here we also had the opportunity to be quite surprised by the simplicity and even poverty of the furnishings of the metropolitan house. In Russia, you probably won’t find a single poor bishop’s house like this. However, being a bishop is not about gold, glitter and luxury, but about serving Christ with faith and truth. The Metropolitan himself was not at home; he was at the Bulgarian Synod. The Bulgarian Church, as is known, is governed by an independent exarch, but the power of the exarch until recently extended only to the Bulgarians. The Greeks, of whom there are many living in the Bulgarian Principality, until recently maintained ecclesiastical dependence on the Patriarch of Constantinople. There was even a Greek metropolitan in Varna. From the metropolis we walked through the city to the city girls' gymnasium. We were also greeted very kindly there. Almost the entire teaching staff who were at the gymnasium at that time accompanied us throughout all the premises. Those accompanying us gave us all kinds of explanations, of course, in Russian. They all speak Russian fluently. The new huge building of the gymnasium, distinguished by its extreme style and beauty, is beautifully designed. In this regard, the gymnasium could honorably take its place in Moscow. It is well equipped with all kinds of teaching aids; there are even several educational museums at the gymnasium. Along all the corridors and in the classrooms, original pedagogical literature caught our eye. All kinds of posters with various instructions regarding discipline and hygiene hung on the walls almost everywhere. The instructions were very reasonable and appropriate. We Russians should also take care of the same thing. As we later learned, even in Western universities one can find similar announcements. Here are some of these pedagogical rules: “Wipe your obuschata from feces or ashes,” etc. They also showed us a gymnasium with various devices, which seems to be completely unusual for Russian women’s gymnasiums, and yet is of such enormous importance in raising a healthy generation. We inspected this gymnasium with great interest and cordially thanked the kind gymnasium authorities for their attention to us. Walking through the northern part of the city, we noticed that the city was rapidly developing and growing: we constantly came across buildings under construction, sometimes even several in a row. Before evening we came to the city garden, at the entrance to which the announcement read: “It is strictly forbidden to drive dogs,” etc. The huge garden was especially lively that evening. The whole city, young and old, was in the garden. There, Bulgarian sailors honored the Russians and on this occasion two orchestras played: Bulgarian and Russian. Here we could study Bulgarian life in all its breadth and completeness as much as we wanted. Bulgarians and Bulgarian women are tall and beautiful in a special way. They are distinguished by their liveliness and mobility. As evening approached, the garden was beautifully illuminated. In the evening light the trees took on a special shade. Every now and then rockets exploded and, bursting in the heights, fell over the sea in whole cascades of multi-colored lights. Lively speeches everywhere. Music raises the pace of life for everyone. Sellers of newspapers, all kinds of local cookies and sweets, some fruits we have not yet seen, footmen scurrying everywhere with coffee, beer and various soft drinks complement the motley picture of life in the garden. Every now and then applause is heard in honor of the musicians. I must confess that Bulgarian musicians play so well that it is difficult to distinguish them from ours. It’s good to sit in a gazebo at this time, somewhere on a cliff. The sea is in front of you. It seems to breathe tenderness upon you and speak to you in the most sincere way. The countless lights of the embankment are wonderfully reflected in it... Life was in full swing outside the garden. From all sides came the desperate sounds of simple, small orchestras of several people, songs were heard, choral and solo, local songs. I immediately heard something unlike our Russian. There was more noise here - everything somehow went out into the street and advertised itself. It is obvious that the south has an effect, people have a completely different temperament, a different life. The further we went, the noisier it became. The other part of ours inspected the city under the leadership of one nice, helpful, helpful Bulgarian officer. They saw what we saw. They had only one small feature compared to us. In return for their services, they decided to treat the officer to at least coffee or beer. In the East, masses of people engage in “coffee drinking” and “beer drinking.” Sometimes the whole street near an open restaurant is crowded with people. It is impossible to drink coffee or beer here alone. Therefore, they immediately found themselves in a crush. They found out that they were Russians, “fraternization” immediately began, friendly speeches and toasts began flowing, “hurray” for Russia began to ring out, and soon the music began to echo the crowd, forgetting its current repertoire. They say that Bulgarians love Russia “to the point of madness.” This seems to be fair. The mood quickly grew and increased. Finally it threatened to turn into a mighty hurricane. If at this moment the cry had been called: “Let’s go to die,” it seems that everyone would have gone... A lot can be done with such a people. We hurried home, or more precisely, to the ship, which had now become our floating home. It was almost midnight when our ship left Varna. Varna sparkled with lights, long stripes of lights stretched across the sea, and we kept going and going into the darkness of the night. It seemed somehow extraordinarily strange that the ship was leaving at the dead of midnight and in the very dark. After all, you don’t ride on rails, but on an immense water plain. And in addition, the lights on the ship were turned off everywhere, with the exception of the signal lights. An eerie darkness reigned on the ship. It seemed that darkness was driving through darkness, and driving confidently, without any risk, for sure. The ship was guided by a compass. It turns out that in addition to the visible rails, there are also invisible, intelligible lines. These lines, it turns out, are even more accurate than visible, material lines. So, I thought, there are the same lines to Heaven. If only there were more spiritual captains who could carry the passengers of the earth along them. It was not long before night closed our eyes. Everyone talked together for a long time, sharing their impressions and observations. We laughed a lot at the inevitable oddities in the life of every nation. Then, breaking into small groups, they continued to quietly talk about their day. Here and there one could observe how people, leaning on the side and looking into the yawning abyss, fanned by the warm sea breeze, were quietly talking about something. Or they [just] stand there in silence for a long, long time. They do not speak, but each perfectly reads all the thoughts of his neighbor. What is this original mail? This is how in Heaven people will understand each other without words. Some went to bed, while others hurried to record the day's impressions in their memory books. We recorded and photographed all aspects of life. I also wrote a lot. I wrote, among other things, the following about church life in Bulgaria. The Bulgarians have no bishops. All diocesan bishops bear the title of metropolitan. All their metropolitans are elected. Elections are made like this. The Holy Bulgarian Synod indicates a list of candidates it considers worthy to be metropolitans. Candidates may be added to this list by the Holy Synod and at the direction of the people themselves. Of all the candidates, only three are chosen. This “trinity” of candidates is presented to the Synod in order of the majority of votes received. The Holy Synod usually approves the first on the list as the candidate with the majority of votes or, in other words, the majority of supporters and defenders. The number of electors reaches 30 people. An elected metropolitan usually does not move anywhere to another diocese until his death. The archpastor is for the diocese what the groom is for the bride. The choice of an archpastor is a kind of marriage. And according to the commandment of Christ the Savior, marriage is indissoluble. Only some greatest and most vile persistent crime can force, force the authorities to dissolve a marriage. As a result of this order, the flock gets along with their archpastor as with their own father, knows and hears his voice everywhere, loves and appreciates him. And the archpastor can do more for his flock by spending time with them throughout his life. The diocese is governed by the Diocesan Council. The head of the council is, of course, the Metropolitan. The Metropolitan's assistant is Protosingel. In the absence of the metropolitan, he manages the office of the metropolitan, and in his presence he corresponds with minor persons. He is elected metropolitan and approved by the Synod. The housekeeper is approximately our dean. This is a representative of the white clergy. He often plays a prominent role and is a very large valve for the white clergy. It is not always possible to submit a written case to the metropolitan, for many understandable reasons, and sometimes this or that case must definitely be initiated. It is in such cases that they usually go to the steward and report to him about their needs. The housekeeper, as a member of the council, can always initiate any case; No one on the council can slow him down. The secretary is a socialite. His duties are only to run the office of the council. It has no other significance in the Bulgarian Council. He is elected metropolitan and approved by the Synod. Each metropolitan can change his secretary himself. Until about 1899, the council had two more secular members, representatives of the laity. But now they are no longer present on the council. And it’s clear why. Two members from the laity often gave an advantage in deciding various matters over the metropolitan’s party and turned the metropolitan, the owner of the diocese, into a simple assaulter. This constant opposition from the lay members of the council, opposition sometimes clearly ill-intentioned, forced the Bulgarian Synod to ask the laity to leave the councils. The entire Bulgarian Church is governed by the Holy Synod, chaired by the Metropolitan. There is no chief prosecutor in the Bulgarian Synod. The chairman himself communicates directly with all institutions, ministers, the prince, now the king. The benefits and disadvantages of this state of affairs are obvious. The Synod, in relation to others, can truly be a church institution, resolving all issues according to the reason of Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition, without any reinterpretations, stretches, equivocations and hesitations to the right and left. The Bulgarian government, they say, is quite afraid of the Synod. The Synod, acting through the diocesan metropolitans and the entire clergy, can even depose a cabinet it does not like and form a new one almost at its own discretion. The Synod, having such power, can always make a request in the event of a clear violation by the government of certain church laws. The Bulgarian Synod is in the most lively communication with the whole country. Every church-social need, noticed here or there, immediately comes to the Synod through the Metropolitan, and the Synod quickly sends the matter to the appropriate civil institution - to immediately resolve the deficiency. Knowing and seeing the importance of the Synod, the government sometimes tries by all means to ingratiate itself with the members of the Synod, tries to appease them with orders or some gifts. But not everyone and does not always fall for this bait. There have been cases, and cases that are not uncommon, of such gifts being openly returned back. There are also disadvantages to this independent position of the Synod. Life is very changeable. Happiness, luck and strength are sometimes on one side or the other. Therefore, where there is strength, there is victory. And in these latter cases it becomes very, very difficult for the Synod. We need government benefits for the clergy, they say: wait, they don’t have the money themselves. You need this or that, again they often say delicately, but very clearly: “Wait...” The life of the church community is normalized like this. Every community has a so-called church council. It consists of a warden, a cashier, a secretary and two other members chosen by the local church community. Church council members are elected for the year at the beginning of each new year, usually around February. Participating in the elections are: the priest, the teacher, some of the honorary parishioners and former members of the council. Those present can recommend candidates. The metropolitan or his deputy approves the elections. The duties of the council are to take care of the church and the various institutions of the parish church. Church money usually goes to the maintenance of the church itself, the primary school and to help the poor of the parish. It seemed to us that the church council so restricts the activities of the priest that he becomes completely unnoticeable in the church, some kind of pitiful servant-servor of demands, worse than our so-called “early” priests. The clergy, urban and rural, all receive government salaries. Each priest receives at least 20 lev-francs (8 rubles) per month and at most 120 lev-francs (48 rubles). Yes, he will receive approximately the same amount for correcting various needs. The Synod itself has set a tax for services in Bulgaria. It is approximately as follows: for a wedding from 5 to 12 francs, baptism and burial 1 franc, for a prayer to a postpartum wife 20 stotinki (8 kopecks). A deacon is given half as much for his services as a priest. If the priest is given a franc, then the deacon is given half of it, 50 stotinki (20 kopecks). There are no psalm-readers in Bulgaria at all. Their duties in the church are performed by singers, or a public school teacher, or one of the parishioners' literate people. But this order also has its inconveniences. The priest often has to read, sing, and prepare everything he needs for one or another service alone. In Varna there are also charitable institutions at churches. The funds of charitable societies are made up of the usual membership fees and various fees everywhere. In this case, the Bulgarians have another original source. Members of the society have the right on New Year and name day to go with congratulations to parishioners, who, of course, do not remain in debt and give small sums for this. These amounts go to the cash register of the charitable society. There is a “Priestly Friendship” in Varna. The goal of “friendship” is the religious and moral education of the people. “Friendship” publishes leaflets for the people, brochures of various apologetic nature, and books. He is going to publish his own magazine. The society has its own library and reading room. Among the various theological magazines you can find here our magazine “Christian”. The society is undoubtedly nice, and one cannot help but wish it with all our hearts every success, development and prosperity. The Bulgarians also have their own theological seminaries. The structure in these seminaries differs significantly from ours, especially the structure of the Constantinople seminary. First of all, there is no duality in the tasks of the school, which is why our school is now almost completely destroyed. Charitable and almsgiving purposes have been completely banished from the seminary. Only those who will serve the Church first in the rank of teacher and then priest study in [it]. Accordingly, the entire school structure will be completely ecclesiastical. The students are all dressed in duckweed, and do not pretend to be soldiers of all types of regiments and arms. The seminary [holds] daily divine services... [They] usually enter from pro-gymnasiums, in which everyone receives a general civil education. We can still only dream of such an order. There are cases when students of a theological seminary refuse to serve the Church. Then such disobedient people are usually charged the entire fee that was spent on their maintenance. The Bulgarians say: with this money, let someone else get an education, who will become one of the clergy of the Church and serve the Church faithfully. How cute it all is. It wouldn’t hurt to establish the same rules in our country a long time ago. In Bulgaria there are absolutely no candle factories, church printing houses, or production of church utensils. Therefore, all this has to be purchased externally, mostly in Russia. The Bulgarians should certainly have all these very profitable institutions. They would not repent. I grieved a lot for the Bulgarian clergy. As can be seen from the above data, in Bulgaria the parish clergy is in a difficult financial situation. Convincing speeches are now systematically being made about this in the local church press. And in various meetings, congresses and societies, Bulgarian priests make reports and abstracts about their unfavorable economic condition, which generally affects the position of the Orthodox Church in Bulgaria. The fact is that the material insecurity of the clergy encourages the best students of theological schools to leave both these schools and their clergy, and look outside for more favorable conditions for a comfortable existence and the productive use of their talents and strengths. And experience shows that often those who are imbued with an ardent religious feeling, who love the Orthodox Church and its institutions and would like - under different conditions - to serve in the field where their fathers and grandfathers labored, also flee from the clergy. But they are required to perform a feat that, at first glance, seems beyond their strength; they are immediately placed in a financial situation that promises them a series of humiliations and insults that detract from the high rank of priest and create a number of difficult collisions for a fresh moral feeling. And these devoted sons of the Church are not looking for contentment or wealth, but only a comfortable existence, some independence from parishioners in terms of maintenance, and the ability and dignity to fulfill their high duties. After all, life moves forward and places increased demands on modern Church leaders. Now it is no longer possible for the Bulgarian people to be content with the shepherds who were in the country twenty or thirty years ago. Previously, the clergy in Bulgaria were semi-literate and lived a simple, patriarchal life. Of course, this is partly good and at one time was at the level of social conditions and needs. But now, when the Bulgarian people have moved far forward in terms of enlightenment, when socialist and materialist teachings are spreading among them, parish priests need to be higher in education than their flock, they need to read a lot, learn a lot. Not only the Bulgarian intelligentsia, but also the common people now enjoy the fruits of modern culture, which sometimes turn out to be quite harmful. The magazine "Svetnik", through the mouth of one priest-correspondent, bitterly complains that pornographic literature is widely distributed in the cities and villages of Bulgaria, which has a disastrous effect on the morality of young people, open letters with obscene drawings are sold everywhere, and phonographs and gramophones, which have penetrated into the most remote and remote corners of Bulgaria, hum cynical stories and outrageous puns about the priest, his wife and children... There is nowhere to go further in the matter of moral humiliation of the Bulgarian clergy. The Holy Bulgarian Synod must reckon with this evil and is obliged to take measures to curb the abuses that are consciously and intentionally allowed by uncalled “enlighteners” of the people. There are many suitable means for this struggle, but the elevation of the financial position of the clergy can also be beneficial here. Undoubtedly, feeding the clergy from the parish during its centuries-old historical use created an unfavorable view of the priests among the people, and brought to the surface of their mutual relations the scum of popular discontent, embitterment, and humiliation. True, a disdainful attitude towards the clergy and an incorrect view of their feeding from the parish was and remained until recently a private and exceptional phenomenon, but now, when in Bulgaria there is a notorious revaluation of values ​​and the slightest defects in the field of church life are deliberately exaggerated by the enemies of Orthodoxy and are presented on an enormous scale, this mood must be seriously taken into account and taken into account in the matter of protecting church institutions. Therefore, the fewer reasons for dissatisfaction, the better. Thus, the question of material support for the parish clergy in Bulgaria is in all its vitally practical coercion and requires a favorable solution as quickly as possible. Of course, one cannot generally disagree with its presentation and assessment in the local church press and admit that the Bulgarian priests are now really in difficult material conditions. It is enough to look at the official “Church Bulletin”, where long lists of pensions are published for supernumerary priests, for priestly widows and orphans, from which it is clear what meager material support these unfortunate and poor people enjoy. From the dry and official transfer of levs for priestly widows and for elderly shepherds who have served for decades “in teaching and priesthood,” one can see the extreme poverty and dire need of the “Enorian” clergy in Bulgaria, which in their vast majority, obviously, spends all their income from parishioners on rising costs and raising children, and cannot save for themselves or their families in old age or in the event of death no security. It is understandable, then, that the Bulgarian clergy has again intensified their request to the church and civil authorities of the country regarding their material remuneration from the treasury in the interests of the Church and the state. I also grieved for the Bulgarian school. This year a new law on public schools is being introduced in Bulgaria. Its peculiarity is that the clergy is completely removed from the work of public education, and religious instruction is completely expelled from public schools. There is no need to dwell on the dangers of public education without faith in God and without moral education, without the development of religious feeling and outside any influence of the Orthodox Church. The disastrous fruits of such training are known to everyone, both from historical mass examples and from individual specific cases. One must only be surprised that the Bulgarian government and people's assembly, blindly imitating Western European models, ignored the precepts of their native history and did not turn to the past educational activities of the Bulgarian clergy for information. It is also clear that the Bulgarian bishops and priests expressed a strong protest against the new bill on public education. Thus, the priests of the Tsaribrod district, having organized a general meeting, sent their resolution to the chairman of the Bulgarian People's Assembly, in which they condemn the new law as clearly directed against the religious education of Orthodox children, and declare that they consider it necessary to protest before the government and the Synod about the removal of priests from the dear and important matter of public education for them. The priests of the Elena spiritual district, in their protest regarding the new law, stated that the basis of public education should rest on religious and moral principles, and in particular, it is necessary to preserve in school life those holidays that are established by the Orthodox Church. In general, in Bulgaria there is strong excitement among the clergy about the new principles that the government has begun to adhere to in the matter of education. It is even planned to convene a Council of high and low clergy, with the participation of pious Christians, which should proclaim its decision on the position and significance of the Church and clergy in Bulgaria in view of the violation of their historical service to the Bulgarian people and in view of political trends and organizations hostile to the Church. At the same time, it is planned to convene annually priestly congresses of the district clergy to clarify issues of public education in connection with the activities of the Church. Thus, an ominous era of struggle between the Orthodox Church and the state has begun in Bulgaria, threatening many serious complications for local church and social life 8 . And we were also destined to spend almost the whole day with our Bulgarian relatives, although not in Bulgaria anymore, but in Eastern Rumelia 9, united with Bulgaria into one. Our “Lazarev” was parked in Burgas for almost the whole day. The port of Burgas is located in the depths of a rather significant bay, but, obviously, the bay is shallow; the pier itself is very small and poor. The city of Burgas does not represent anything outstanding and wonderful that we could not pass by, that we could not fail to include in our travel diary. Our most provincial town is Burgas. However, one cannot help but notice at first glance, from the very first steps along its nondescript streets, that Türkiye is close! The street physiognomy of the city is completely unusual for us. The streets have become narrow, life has developed on the streets, and not in houses. The streets are dirty and smell desperately of all sorts of spices. The aroma of various spices, which all Eastern people are great hunters, is in the air. The street life of eastern cities is extremely interesting. All the work of the city takes place before you, usually hidden in our basements, kitchens, attics and backyards. Here they sew boots and all kinds of footwear, there they bake bread of all kinds, here they work all sorts of things made of iron, here they produce silver things of very delicate and skillful work, there they roast “ram”, “shish kebab” and various intricacies, etc. On the one hand, this direct effect on your taste is tempting, but on the other hand, it is disgusting. We somehow got used to not seeing the production of everything, we got used to getting everything in elegant stores, from clean hands. In the city one can distinguish two cities - the Turkish one itself and the new, just created Bulgarian one. Work is in full swing everywhere: new pavements are being built, water pipelines are being laid, new buildings are being erected. The port is also busy. Since new buildings are being built in parts in different parts of the city, from the outside it seems that the new city is, as it were, inserted into the old one. A curious feature of new buildings. All of them are certainly [made] according to Western models, with various towers, terraces, ledges, domes. But since the builders could not build these buildings on a large scale, as a result they get a funny look. From the outside they even seem like children's toys. Looking at these buildings, you can clearly imagine the age of the nation that erected them. The nation is still experiencing the days of youth after the days of too long Turkish captivity. The cathedral in Burgas is good. He reigns over the entire city and testifies that this is now a Christian city. The style is purely Byzantine. It is a pity that the cathedral has not yet been completely finished. Extremely poor inside. In the church, we really liked the high canopy-stasidia, located almost in the middle of the church, near the right column. This is the place where the archpastor usually stands when he is present in the church. How good it is. The archpastor must be from the people and always with the people. He should enter the altar, like the Holy of Holies, only to pray. After all, according to our charter, being in the altar is allowed only at certain moments of the liturgical service. But now we have God knows what they’ve made of the altar: there are fur coats, umbrellas, canes, sticks, galoshes, all the clergy and even ordinary laymen... Meanwhile, the priest, even in vestments, is allowed to enter the altar only at certain moments. But the former cathedral of Burgas plunged us into great despondency. Imagine a large wooden barn built in a cross shape. The walls of this cathedral have turned black with time, deteriorated in places and are askew. In the middle of the cruciform structure on the roof you see a small swaying cross made of simple iron rods. Seeing such squalor, we no longer went to the old cathedral. Yes, they made it clear to us not to go there - to expose people’s sore wounds. Walking down the street from the church, we suddenly heard rare strikes on a small church bell, in our opinion a ringing bell. -What is this? Who are they burying? – we ask those accompanying us. “No,” they answer us. “They are calling the Russian bishop.” This is our custom. When a bishop walks down the street, people inevitably call him. We soon became convinced of this ourselves. Here and there, gates began to open creakingly and men, women, and children [began] appearing from them. Those running out into the street looked for their metropolitan, whom they thought they were calling. But the metropolitan was not there. They looked at us in bewilderment and, having followed us far with their eyes, went back to their homes to continue the abandoned work. The priest who saw us off complained very much about poverty. Let us suppose that in the East these complaints are common, but, looking at this priest, it was impossible not to see that truly terrible poverty was oppressing him. Shabby, rough duckweed, dirty look, terrible hands. There is a stamp of suffering on the face. The almost complete absence of any education was striking. A difficult picture... We gave him 10 francs (4 rubles) and thereby gave him the greatest consolation. The Bulgarian clergy always wears black kamilavkas. They don't know any other headdress there. Duckweed and our hat are something most impossible, incompatible, caricatured and simply funny. A hat and cassock, from the point of view of the Eastern clergy, is almost the same as if someone appeared in our society or on the street in an impeccable tailcoat, but without further accessories of the costume. Therefore, there is nothing else that can attract attention abroad than with just such clothes. In this case, the cassock must certainly be black. You can now imagine what a mess many of our “spiritual” pilgrims, especially monks, get into when, in order to hide themselves, they wear colored robes and, of course, hats. They think they are traveling through Russia. And something strange happens: instead of hiding and getting mixed up in the crowd, they expose themselves to everyone, attracting everyone’s attention. Our Eminence knew this well. Therefore, he walked everywhere in a black duckweed, and certainly without a panagia, which in the East is worn only for worship, and in a black kamilavka without crepe. In this attire, he passed as “one of his own” almost everywhere in the East. Even the Greeks, when meeting him, sometimes asked: “Greek?” By the way, in his posture, facial features and general manners he largely resembles a Greek, especially when the southern sun bakes his face. In general, there is little interesting in the city. In such cases, you have to invent activities for yourself. We also set about inventing activities. Some went for a swim, some for a walk in the garden. We wandered through the city streets, taking a closer look at the various street scenes that every eastern or semi-eastern city is always so rich in. In a small area, some enterprising “brother” set up a tent with instant photography. This tent is not complicated. Several stakes. Various dirty rags are thrown over them. That's all. Let's go in... A small group sits down. A strange-looking device is aimed. A photographer without a “spinjack”, covered with huge stains of dirt, even managing to keep his face covered in dirt, takes pictures and retires to some closet. After 2-3 minutes he comes out with the plate, rinses it in a dirtiest bucket of water, almost licks it with his tongue. But as a result of all his manipulations, in 5-10 minutes you can receive a card with an image that is not only several, but also very similar to you. Who can resist the temptation to act in such a situation, and even in a foreign land? We all decided to take pictures together, but when we were seated and set up, we almost destroyed the entire “building” of the photograph: some – the taller ones – touched their heads against the hanging ceiling, others completely moved the very foundations of the photograph, barely fixed in the ground. If the structure collapsed, of course, we would not have died under the ruins, like the Philistines under Samson. If the “building” collapsed, we would only end up in a mass of dirty rags. It was difficult for the photographer to seat us. We laughed endlessly. The good-natured photographer, who had probably never seen such “overseas” guests, also laughed. Even the lazy fat cat woke up and, sitting down in front of the group, began to examine us with increasing attention. Not even a few minutes passed when a goat came into the photo. Obviously, he was attracted here by the noise that was unusual for him here. A lot of grimy guys ran after the goat. The photograph became full of living creatures. The photographer had to say goodbye to his courtesy for a while, use facial expressions, show someone where he shouldn’t, and thus temporarily free his photograph from strangers. However, we finally filmed, and now everyone has a card as a memory of Burgas. This photograph was opened by the Reverend with Professor Alexei Ivanovich and two “bursh” 10, who were the first to take pictures here, under happier conditions than the others. Thus, we saw little in Bulgaria, and even this little we owed to the helpful kindness of the Lazarev, which traveled on a circular flight and took us to all the available ports of the Black Sea, although this was not part of our plans and even went partly against our wishes. Sitting in Moscow, we expected to go straight from Odessa to Constantinople... We visited only two seaside cities in Bulgaria. The cities we saw cannot be called Bulgarian in the proper sense. Bulgaria is inside the country, but here, near the sea, Bulgaria is not pure, but motley, mixed. Along the Black Sea coast, Bulgarians live mixed with Greeks and Turks. In general, the Black Sea is surrounded by a Greek-Bulgarian-Turkish ring. If you travel along the shores of the Black Sea and call at Black Sea ports, you will meet Turks, Bulgarians and Greeks everywhere; You will see them here in Crimea and in the Caucasus. Within Bulgaria, along the shores of the Black Sea, there are especially many Greeks. But no matter how fleeting such a chance acquaintance with Bulgaria was, it nevertheless prompted us to think a lot. A Russian person should never be dismissive or even inattentive towards Bulgaria. Its historical services to Great Russia are very great, and it would be a sin to forget them. True, what we received from Bulgaria were not parliaments, social teachings, and the like. We received from Bulgaria something incomparably more valuable, eternal wealth. The Russian land was baptized by the Greeks, the Greeks were our first bishops. But the Russian land could not have adopted a new faith if there had not been Bulgarian mediation between the Russians and the Greeks. Our ancestors were baptized, and ready-made translations of liturgical and patristic books in the Slavic language arrived from Bulgaria. The Bulgarians lived closer to the Greeks, and by the time our ancestors were just baptized, they had already learned from them the priceless treasures of the Orthodox faith and piety. Russians could receive ready-made Slavic literature and a new Christian complex way of life. For a long time, it was the Bulgarians who fed our ancestors with spiritual food from the rich meal of universal Greek Orthodoxy. From Bulgaria not only translations from Greek were received in Rus', but also [the works of] Bulgarian writers. Cosma the Presbyter, John the Exarch, Blessed Theophylact - especially the latter - took an honorable place in our poor ancient Russian literature. Their works were diligently copied and read by us. From them our ancestors learned the truths of the Orthodox faith. Blessed Theophylact, through his writings, introduced the ancient Russian scribes to the spiritual treasures of the ecumenical saint and teacher John Chrysostom. Ancient Rus' also received “legal books” from Bulgaria. Church laws, according to which the entire life of the Church must necessarily be built, were already determined by Councils in the Greek Church, but for our ancestors, in the words of Metropolitan Kirill II, “The Divine rules for receiving the cloud of wisdom of the Hellenic language.” And in this case, the same Bulgarians helped us. The ancient Kormchii came to us from Bulgaria. One of these Bulgarian Helmsmen in the list of the 15th century is kept in the library of our academy. This is the so-called Joasaph Helmsman, which belonged to Metropolitan Joasaph (rkp. No. 54). Along with canonical monuments, we also received other guiding works from Bulgaria, for example, the Nomocanon of John the Faster, and various collections of Rules. Bulgaria also shared with Russia the “thin Nomokanunians”, who had to be placed on the list of “renounced” books. The Bulgarians also shared their knowledge of the Greek language with our ancestors. Church historians report such facts that Greek bishops, who brought Greek books with them to Rus', invited Bulgarians as translators. That is why some Bulgarian translations of Greek books have their homeland not in Bulgaria, but in Holy Rus'. The Bulgarians endowed Rus' with an unenviable treasure, which they could keep at home. The first Russian heretic Andreyan Skopets, whom in 1004 “Metropolitan Leontes put in prison, reproaching this church laws and bishops and presbyters and monks,” according to our church historians, was a Bogomil, and the Bogomil heresy was in Bulgaria. The first heresy of the Russian Church, therefore, comes from Bulgaria. The Bulgarians lived amicably with our ancestors, sharing everything - good and bad, Orthodoxy and heresy. However, having given us the first reproach of church laws and hierarchy, Bulgaria also provided us with a cure for this heretical illness. Since ancient times, the “Word on Heretics Controversy” by Presbyter Kozma of Bulgaria, directed against the Bogomils, became known in Rus'. This “Word” was almost a kind of manual of accusatory theology in Ancient Rus'; it was used in the fight against the later Strigolniks, Judaizers, etc. Even in 1864, the publisher of the Lay notes that it “can be successfully used in interviews with schismatics of our time” 11 . When you remember all the historical services of Bulgaria to Russia, you find great consolation in the knowledge that Russia, which by the will of fate grew into a great and glorious state, did not turn out to be ungrateful. The Russian Church, upon which the especially abundant grace of God has been poured out, also does not forget the Bulgarian Church; many future Bulgarian church leaders are always studying in our academies. Here they find the warmest, most hospitable welcome. Everyone treats them as if they were their own. It is not for nothing that the Holy Bulgarian Synod thanked our Eminence with a special letter for his fatherly attitude towards the Bulgarian pets. One can say that Holy Rus' will never tire of being kind to its Slavic brothers. But when we brought to mind the events of the last years of Bulgarian church history, talked about these events with the Bulgarians, we involuntarily began to think, even indulge in grief and did not know what to think, what to say. We mean the Greek-Bulgarian feud. Whatever may be said about national Churches, one can never deny that the desire for national church separatism is possible only with a weakening of love for the Church. The solution to all national issues in the Church of God was given once and for all by the Apostle Paul in the words neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian and Scythian, slave and free, but Christ is all and in all (Col. 3:11). If in the Local Churches there lived the consciousness of the close connection of all in the one Church of Christ, then there would be no place for national enmity within the same indivisible Body of Christ. The Church of God does not destroy nationalities; on the contrary, only the universal Church gives meaning to national existence. “Just as an individual personality stops in its development and becomes empty and vulgar when a person makes himself the subject of his activity, so the collective personality of a people only reaches the full development of its talents when it is not an end for itself, but a means for the disinterested fulfillment of Divine plans.” For centuries, various nationalities have been members of the universal Church, but only recently, with the development of indifference to universal unity in the Church of Christ, has the spirit of exclusive nationalism, incomprehensible to the universal consciousness, begun to penetrate into all Orthodox nationalities. The Greek-Bulgarian feud is the fruit of this new sad mood of the Orthodox peoples. Lately we have been talking a lot about the autocephaly of the Georgian Church. A phenomenon of the same order, growing out of the same cooling of Christian souls towards universal unity. The Greek-Bulgarian feud is little known to our general public, and the events of the last 4-5 years are almost completely unknown to them. Behind the noise in our own home, we hardly noticed what was happening next to us in the south. Discord between Greeks and Bulgarians is not a new phenomenon, but it has become especially acute in recent decades. At this time, discord was expressed outwardly in sad phenomena. It is remarkable that in all church discords between the Greeks and Bulgarians, the people, the crowd, take the most active part. Discord is not a matter of hierarchy, but of the crowd, and therefore they are often found in very unsightly forms. On April 23, 1868, when the Bulgarian Metropolitan Hilarion performed divine services in Constantinople, the people present scandalously demanded that the Metropolitan not commemorate the Ecumenical Patriarch during the liturgy. The Turks took advantage of the discord between the two nationalities that were part of their empire: the Sultan approved the provision for the exarchical administration of the Bulgarian Church. An exarch was elected. The Greeks formed a Council in Constantinople in 1872, where there were only Greek hierarchs and not all of them. Nevertheless, the Council sharply condemned national isolation in the Church, the so-called phyletism 12 4, and declared the Bulgarian schism. The Bulgarians established their own church administration, but the Greeks living in Bulgaria remained subordinate to the ecumenical patriarch. Two Orthodox Churches were created on the same territory. In the same city there lived two Orthodox metropolitans - Greek and Bulgarian, who did not communicate with each other. Since 1905, many events have happened, [unexpected] and very sad. The discord was and is fed not only by church interests. A significant, and perhaps even larger, share in this case must be given to socio-economic and political interests. It has long been known that the Turks, Greeks, Serbs and Bulgarians will not divide Macedonia among themselves. Macedonia is a bone of contention between nationalities related both by blood and by Orthodox faith. The church hierarchy is also drawn into political intrigue, which is often more involved in politics than even preaching Christianity. During the Macedonian riots in 1905, the Bulgarian government intercepted some documents that revealed the connection of one Greek metropolitan in Bulgaria, namely Basil of Anchialsky, with the revolutionary Macedonian committees. The Metropolitan, of course, was forced to leave the department. It was a shame that some Bulgarian steamship was not received at the Athens port (Piraeus); they refused to accept Bulgarian goods. National passions flared up. The Patriarch of Constantinople appointed a new metropolitan Neophytos to Anchial and, as they say, did not comply with any necessary formalities. When Neophytos arrived in his cathedral city, the Bulgarians greeted him with stones. There was great unrest. National enmity and anger blinded the Bulgarians, and they even committed blasphemous acts. They say that several Bulgarians dressed a donkey in monastic clothes, put a hood on it and drove it around the city, shouting: “Here is the Greek metropolitan!” Photographs of this blasphemous parody were taken and distributed not only throughout Bulgaria, but even in Constantinople. From that time on, the Bulgarians began to expel all Greek hierarchs and priests from their country. The churches were taken away from the Greek priests on the grounds that these churches were built by the Bulgarians. In some places the Greeks did not give up churches without a fight. The most fierce battles took place in Varna and Philippopolis. In Varna, the unrest turned into a pogrom of Greek shops. In Philippopolis, the Bulgarians took away educational institutions from the Greeks, and the director of the women's gymnasium almost paid with his life for not giving out the keys to the gymnasium buildings for a long time. Currently, there is not a single Greek metropolitan in Bulgaria; Greek priests have also emigrated from here. The Greek inhabitants, willy-nilly, had to submit to the Bulgarian exarch. Schism still weighs heavily on the Bulgarians. And who can say when it will end? The Bulgarians do not pay any attention to the decisions of the Council of Constantinople in 1872 and to their accusation of schism. They calmly arrange their lives, as if nothing had ever happened in the world. They say that the Patriarchate of Constantinople would not be averse to canceling its definition of the Bulgarian schism, but the Patriarchate suffered heavy losses - up to five million francs. If the Bulgarians paid the Patriarchate its losses, the schism would cease to exist. But we, say the Bulgarians, will not give not only five million leva, but also five stotinki. There is another sad phenomenon in Bulgarian church life. Since the 9th century, the Roman high priests had great claims to the Bulgarian Church. Having failed in antiquity, the Latins have renewed their claims in recent times. Now in Bulgaria there are already two Uniate dioceses. Some monsignor recently even officially addressed the Bulgarian Synod with a proposal to bow his head before the Roman throne. Catholic propaganda is unusually strong and intense in the East. Catholic fanatics work there methodically from year to year, they work tirelessly, sparing no expense or effort. How painful it becomes in this case for Holy Rus' and its spiritual leaders, who do not work where our opponents so freely plunder God’s property. And at the same time you involuntarily think: when will our ranks of selfless spiritual workers multiply? When will our mission begin to roar to all corners of the world? In general, today's Bulgaria is far from being the same in church terms as the ancient tales of bygone years speak of. Even at the head of the Bulgarian people, on the throne of Tsar Boris, is a Catholic, now King Ferdinand. Having completely freed himself from Turkey, the Bulgarian prince became king. The newspapers wrote that he was converting to Orthodoxy. After reading this news, we crossed ourselves and said: “Glory to God! Save him, Lord!” Bulgaria knew only Orthodox kings. On the evening of the twentieth of June our ship departed from Burgas. For a long time he could not turn around in the cramped space between the pier and the embankment. Unfortunately, a thick rope broke. It takes a lot of strength to break such a rope. We involuntarily gained respect for “Lazarev”, who tears such ropes as threads. An enterprising Bulgarian, spinning on a boat near the rope, decided to hide a small piece of rope, about an arshin and a half. The captain's assistant demanded that this piece be given back, but when they threw the rope to the Bulgarian, he tied a piece of rope to it in such a way that it immediately came off and fell into the water. “After all, it will get it from the bottom,” noted the captain’s assistant. - He’ll earn a ruble and a half - the rope is expensive. Our steamer walked back and forth for a long time. Its mighty propeller agitated the entire shallow bay; Sand rose from the bottom, and the sea became a dirty milky color. So the shallow human soul is agitated when the deep one remains calm and pure; From the bottom of the shallow soul, whole clouds of lightweight sand, silt and all kinds of dirt soon rise. A small soul is almost constantly dirty and cloudy. Every occasion can be made instructive, and everything can be raised to the Heavenly and spiritual. You can collect spiritual treasure from this material world, as our great hierarch Tikhon of Zadonsk did. Now our ship headed straight to Constantinople. God bless. The soul anticipated the touch of something great. Tomorrow a new ancient world will appear before us. A young woman with purple fingers, Eos, emerged from the darkness. 13 Approaching the Greek world, you involuntarily want to hear the silent sound of divine Hellenic speech. High coastal mountains were outlined in the fog of the lightening horizon. After all, there, to the left, should be Asia! We looked at Asia, but for the life of us, we couldn’t find anything special compared to Europe. A huge reddish ball of the sun floated low over the sea. We seemed to be swimming straight to the shore. Where is the strait? You can't understand anything. We could not notice the strait even when the ship was close to the shore. But then the steamer makes a slight turn to the right, and before us some kind of narrow gap opens up among the mountains, a kind of Daryal Gorge with the sea at the bottom. Scientists say that the strait is of later origin. Once confined to their shores, the waters of the Black Sea broke through a passage in the surrounding mountain range. Yes, the elements were at war here. Only they can tear apart the earth's crust like this, tear up high mountains, and make their way through stone rocks. We are already before the gates of Constantinople. Hierodeacon Zosima of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, who traveled to Constantinople in 1420, traveled for three whole weeks by sea 14, but we sailed in two days. This is what the twentieth century means! Not at all like the fifteenth! High mountains parted before us, and we entered the strait. The ship goes between two mountains. Before us are new views and new moods. I remember the hoary old days. It was not in vain that the ancient Greeks created many myths about the shores of the Thracian Bosphorus. On the European and Asian sides there is one small rock each. These are the mysterious and wonderful Symplegades. According to the ancients, they had the ability to move. As soon as any daring sailor dared to sail into the Black Sea, these two rocks quickly converged, and only one sad memory remained of the strong ship with the brave shipmen. There was no way for anyone to pass between these destructive rocks. The first, and then in a deceptive manner, to slip through this mysterious outpost were the Argonauts, who were traveling with thieves' purposes to Colchis, which was fiery for us and cold for the Greeks - the Caucasus. Since then, the Symplegades, as if admitting themselves defeated by the cunning of people, sank to the bottom and no longer send anyone to the kingdom of shadows, to the gloomy Hades. The parting high cliffs and Sergiev Posad’s brave, but completely ingenuous and good-natured sailors, the “Argonauts,” greeted them sullenly and unfriendly. It was fresh. The early sun not only did not warm us well, but also did not illuminate everything well. Somewhere a completely sleepy rooster sang in a hoarse voice. New artificial destructive Symplegades - Turkish fortifications with terrible weapons - looked at us from the shores. Half-asleep Turkish soldiers can be seen stretching and yawning. The horn is playing. Everything here is calculated and prepared in case of war. Even sights were made. On the mountains, at a certain height, on both sides of the strait, you see large white circles. These are the aiming points. They will shoot at these circles from both sides, and everything that is between them, in the line of crossfire, will die with terrible speed. It seemed to me that here even our village woman, who had never seen a cannon, would be able to shoot and sink those war monsters—ships. A number of fortifications follow each other on both sides. Here it is - the castle with which the Black Sea is tightly locked for our navy! You won’t fool anyone here and you will certainly pay with your life for your daring attempt to slip through the narrow strait. The beginning of the strait is wild and gloomy. Both Europe and Asia are equally unsympathetic here; they seem to look at each other here, look and become fiercely angry. For what? And God knows why. But for thousands of years, there hasn’t been enough major conversation and discord, an age-old dispute between them! We drove for a while. Soon our ship stopped. A steam boat with Turkish officials in fezzes approached us from the shore. How curious it is to encounter this headdress everywhere for the first time. It even gets a little creepy. The shipping documents were presented and a pass was received. After various other formalities had been completed, our steamer moved forward. I wanted to swim to the Asian shore and step on it with at least one foot: I’ve been to Asia! But alas! We didn't succeed. Meanwhile, the harsh shores passed, the same Bosphorus began, about which everyone had heard and read so much, as if about something magical, some kind of country from the Arabian Nights. The steamer sails through the very middle of the turquoise strait. Dachas and villas of the Constantinople nobility and bourgeoisie began to appear on the banks. One can see luxurious gardens, as if dormant in a dark green cypress bed, wide, squat palaces of Turkish original architecture. All this is wonderfully reflected in the water, so you can study the shore without even looking at it. Some buildings literally swim in the turquoise waters of the strait. Everything here speaks of the bliss and peace of the phlegmatic inhabitants. The high, hilly European coast has especially many beautiful places. There are so many luxurious dachas here in the valleys among the hills! The steamer moves quickly in the middle of the strait, and on both sides, as if from a rolling pin, two continuous pictures develop and roll down - very interesting and original. With every turn of the ship, more and more new views open up before you. Before we can stop admiring one view, another appears before our eyes. Here is Buyuk-Dere. Here is the dacha of our ambassador with his palace and a huge park, stretching solidly up the mountain. The huge trees from the ship look like just bushes. What a pity that you can’t see all the inner beauties of this wonderful park behind the trees. Our Eminence was in this park and told a lot of interesting things about it. He even climbed to the highest point of this park, where the Russian meteorological station is located. From this point you can see the whole of Constantinople, the entire strait and the Black Sea with ships sailing along it... The embassy has Russian golden coats of arms. How pleasant they are in a foreign land. There is a Russian “stationary” standing in front of the embassy. The steamer stops opposite the embassy to drop off mail. Russian sailors in their naval suits leave for her in a fragile boat. How beautiful they are, dexterous, agile, clean, tidy. The heart involuntarily fills with pride. We salute the embassy, ​​and I feel that the Motherland at this moment becomes even dearer to me. Further on there are a continuous line of other foreign embassies. The shore is almost entirely built up and is replete with all kinds of buildings. The massive fortress of Rumeli-Gissar stands out sharply from the whole picture on the European coast. Thick square battlements with huge round towers gleam menacingly white against the greenery that surrounds them. In 1452, this fortress was built by Mohammed II and named Baghaz Ketchen, that is, “Turn back!” What oriental despotic self-confidence is heard in this name! Several more similar fortresses are found along the banks of the Bosphorus. Near Rumeli-Gissar is the narrowest place of the generally narrow Bosphorus; they say that the width of the Bosphorus here is less than 1200 meters. Famous generals of ancient times crossed the Bosphorus at this place: Darius, when he went to war against the Scythians, and Xenophon, returning from the Persian campaign. Darius, they say, even built some kind of bridge here. This bridge was hardly beautiful and elegant. And it would be beautiful and majestic to throw a railway bridge here high up, so that it would hang like a thin lace strip in the blue sky above the blue waters of the Bosphorus! Here, according to Greek mythology, the event that gave the name to the strait took place. Do you know, reader, what the word “Bosphorus” means? This name is very unpoetic and even ugly. Bosphorus can be translated as “Cow Ford”. In mythological antiquity, the goddess Io swam across the strait, for some reason taking the form of a cow. Who knows what comes to mind for immortals? And every little thing in their life cannot pass without a trace: it gives a name to earthly things. The goddess decided to take the form of a cow, and so the most wonderful strait was forever called the “Cow Ford”. Let's move on. There are also Sultan's palaces. How good they are! The palaces are made mostly of snow-white marble, unusually artistic, openwork, lace, and stylishly processed. How much human labor was used here! And for what, for what? They show us a palace on the shore, built on the orders of some sultan for some French empress. Looking at this new wonderful palace - the whim of the Sultan, I am even more convinced that this external world with all its complex, seething life is only a reflection, the will of the inner world of man, and at these moments I want to say with some philosophers that only I exist with my thoughts and feelings and that nothing else exists outside of me. All the workers, the various factories, all these ships and machines - they only serve my inner self, my dictates and desires. The further we go, the more colorful and rich in bold patterns the shores become. We entered the strait at sunrise, while everything was still in deep sleep. No movement is visible either on the shore or in the strait. But now the strait begins to gradually come to life. Steam boats are already beginning to scurry along the shores, maintaining communication between the dacha areas and the capital. There are also large ships. Boats, steamboats, and steamships ply the blue waters of the strait in all directions; The air is pierced by the sharp and dull whistles of these water-like cab drivers. And our ship looks the most respectable of all. All this little thing is spinning as if at the feet of our giant! Here comes a boat full of Turks. Everyone is wearing fezzes. From the deck of the ship, they seem to us like fly agaric mushrooms, tightly placed in a basket, only with their caps facing up. Our giant steamship attracts their attention. Dark, beautiful faces are turned in our direction. And we think, not without pride: admire it as much as you like! But the small boat is quickly carrying what must be an important person. A fat Turk with a gray mustache, wearing a fez, casually lounging on a velvet seat, sits in a boat and doesn’t even deign us with his gracious glance. How original all this is and how it all involuntarily attracts our attention! Before us is a completely new world that we have never seen before. And the sea, illuminated by the morning rays of the newly risen sun, gently caresses the shores, splashes along the sides of the ship, scattering thousands of turquoise and golden splashes. Somewhere nearby, a famous Greek hero, they say, ordered the sea to be mercilessly carved out. Maybe sometimes it was worth flogging, but now it is so affectionate, tender and sweet that it is simply barbaric to flog such a sea! Our ship also comes to life. The Turks also crawled onto the deck. They look complacently at their land. This is where we live, they say! They listen to the enthusiastic exclamations of tourists, who sometimes have seen nothing but their own Dmitrov or Mozhaisk districts. The public's delight obviously flatters Turkish pride. There were also several obviously difficult Turkish women sitting on the deck. Shrouded in black from head to toe, they looked remarkably like our nuns. In addition, they had some kind of knuckles in their hands, like our rosary beads. But Turkish women play with them, fiddling with them with their hands because they have nothing to do, or playing with them in every possible way, and the nuns “bow” on their rosary. This “game” would not be to the taste of Turkish women at all. The Turkish women behaved quite freely, but the closer they got to Constantinople, the more serious they became. A girl of about twelve in a European costume was running around the ship. The Turkish ladies caught her and started dressing her in black. The girl is being naughty and not being able to handle it. In vain... Two minutes later the girl was already in all black, from playful and frisky she became a “nun”. “They cut their hair!” – you’ll think so involuntarily; They got their hair cut right there on the upper deck! The ship takes a long time to navigate the strait. A whole hour has already passed. All the time, intense attention begins to tire. I am overcome by impatience - to quickly see the “nail” of the strait - Constantinople. A view of Constantinople should soon open. Now there will be the Golden Horn. The steamer rounds the cape, and almost instantly a marvelous panorama of Constantinople appears before us. Do you remember the poem: A picture of wonderful beauty The pen stops in bewilderment, the hand drops in powerlessness. I would like to say something special, to immediately convey a lot of impressions. Raise your shoulder, swing your feather! But you feel that whatever you say, it will all be pale, weak, and worthless. Describing the appearance of Constantinople is an impossible task for a non-artist and non-poet... And what can be said about this in a short note? It's better not to be ashamed! Some kind of unnaturally colorful mosaic picture stretches across the Golden Horn like an amphitheater. Amazing diversity! Wherever you look, the most bizarre, most diverse buildings are plastered all around you. Let's even look back, and there Scutari, the Asian part of the city, is replete with many quaint buildings. What good are our decadent artists with the diversity of their ugly paintings! There is diversity here, but no less beauty. You don’t know where to stop your gaze, where to direct [it]. No, a person is too small to immediately accommodate the panorama of Constantinople into his consciousness! But little by little the chaos of impressions begins to come into order. First of all, you immediately notice that you are in the center of Islam. A whole forest of minarets, thin, tall, slender, white, gives the whole panorama a special shade. Minarets rise to the sky in all directions, sometimes in whole heaps at once. Here to the left is Istanbul - the Turkish part of the city, located on a peninsula between the Golden Horn and the Sea of ​​Marmara. The top of this peninsula is crowned with the green gardens of the Sultan, with thin, slender cypress trees, and among them, in a white mass, lie the buildings of the Seraglio, where the great treasures of the entire state are kept behind many castles and guards. Access here is terribly difficult. Here you can see a massive mountain of stone with several minarets. This is Sofia! The gaze eagerly rushes to the most sacred building in all of Constantinople. But, God! Why these minarets? I wanted Sophia to dominate the entire city, just as the best churches in our big cities dominate. But this is not here. You won’t even immediately know which of the many mosques is Sofia. Near Sofia there are mosques that are not only very similar to it, but also surpass it in size and impressive appearance. At least it seems so from the outside. In Constantinople you can count almost a dozen Sophias. Saint Sophia seemed to be hunched over under the weight of years, covered with wrinkles, unable to look at the Saracen atheism surrounding her, and she crouched in grief to the damp earth, and she alone cried out her insult, her joyless grief, her burning sadness. Here are Galata and Pera. There is even more diversity here; There is such a crowd of buildings here that you can’t even see the streets from the outside, and the buildings seem to be stuck on top of one another. The whole city seems like one huge pile of stones. The six-story buildings appear to be piled high with colorful boxes. And the Golden Horn... Wide bridges blacken in its depths, it is all crowded with large and small ships to the point of terribly crowded conditions. It seems that only a plate of water can be filled with toy ships, boats, etc., as densely as the Golden Horn is filled with various vessels. There is darkness over the Horn from the steamship smoke, the noise and din of the city, an abyss of all kinds of whistles, squabbles of steamers and boatmen, various loaders, etc. The real Sodom... The massive round tower of Galata reigns over Galata; gloomily and silently she looks at the human bustle at her feet both in the city and in the bay. Constantinople is the point where two worlds, two parts of the world, two cultures and two histories come into contact. It is not for nothing that such a stormy fate befell him. It was as if an old man lay before us, his already decrepit limbs, his weakened arms and legs spread wide across the hills. Is there any place on the entire globe that has such a complex, varied and turbulent history? No, it seems that such a place cannot be found. 26 centuries ago, in the 7th century BC, enterprising Greek Megarian colonists built Byzantium. Even in that ancient times, fate transferred the new colony from hand to hand: either it was with the Spartans, or with the Athenians. But the complex Byzantine history of this colony began in the 4th century. Constantine the Great appreciated the position of Byzantium. Here he moved the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. Byzantium became Constantinople, New Rome, Constantinople. The new capital city quickly began to grow and beautify itself. Christianity shone in him. Saints from all over the universe flocked here, entire Councils met here, the God-speaking Chrysostom and Gregory preached here. Here the fathers put the heretics to shame, here they expounded the Christian faith, clothing it in symbols inspired by God, wonderful in their depth, subtlety and charm of thought and feeling. Religious life so captivates everyone’s attention that even in the markets people argue about whether the Son of God is co-essential or co-essential with God the Father. Since Emperor Justinian, the city has acquired the most beautiful buildings. The eternal Sophia is being created, this miracle of the Byzantine world. Centuries pass over it, entire cultures almost die out, but it, as if eternal, still stands motionless, eloquently telling everyone about the former past of architectural art. From all corners of the universe, people are flocking to Constantinople. All kinds of nationalities collide here: Greeks, Persians, Slavs... A special way of life is created. Political life in Byzantium is especially characterized by the fact that there was no law on succession to the throne. Therefore, palace life is stormy. Conspiracies, murders, intrigues, coups. Scientists imagine in numbers how many emperors were overthrown, how many were killed - the numbers are eloquent! Yesterday's soldier is today becoming an emperor and, instead of soldier's clothing, is dressed in purple. Who was not on the Byzantine throne! People of what nationalities, what social positions! At the same time, aristocratic families constantly suffered from “porphyry disease.” Infinitely eloquent and even more florid Byzantine writers do not find in their rich vocabulary of compliments strong enough and vivid epithets to express their patriotic admiration for the glorious city. These are the expressions in which the Byzantine historian Michael Dukas (Δούκας) pours out his feelings: “Oh, city, city! head of all cities! Oh city, city! the center of the four parts of the world! Oh city, city! Christians - pride and barbarians - humiliation! 15 Oh, city, city! a second paradise, growing in the west, inside full of all kinds of trees laden with spiritual fruits!” How many vicissitudes of time have this city of cities experienced!.. Constantinople was destined to undergo the greatest devastation, and above all from the crusaders in 1204. The magnificent city suffered a lot from the crusaders, who this time behaved like real barbarians. Even our ancient chronicler is outraged by the behavior of the crusaders. This is how our chronicle describes the defeat of Constantinople by the crusaders. “In the summer of 6712, the city and churches were quickly burned, with unspeakable destruction, the number of which we cannot tell; and St. Sophia's porch on the mountain, where the Patriarchs wrote all the writings, the hippodrome (hippodrome) and to the sea. I entered the hail of mud all April on the 12th day. The next morning, the rising sun entered into St. Sophia, and stripped the doors and cut them open, and cut down the silver pillars 12 and 4, and cut down the burden, and stripped a wonderful meal, a precious stone and great pearls, and the price itself was unknown to me; and 40 great cups, like the ones that hung before the altar, and the chandelier, and the silver lamp, as if we cannot tell the number, we took priceless vessels with the holidays; the service Gospel and honorable crosses, priceless icons - all of them are in good shape. The Holy Mother of God, also in Blachernae, where the Holy Spirit is similar to all Fridays, and that one was refreshed. Man cannot name any of these churches, as they are without number. Other churches in the city and outside the city, and monasteries in the city and outside the city - having plundered everything, we cannot tell the number or beauty of them. I peeled the monks and monks and priests and beat them up several times; the Greeks and Varangians were expelled from the city" 16. Since then, Constantinople began to gradually fall into greater and greater decline. Two and a half centuries have passed since the Crusader invasion. The terrible year 1453 came. The sun of New Rome has set. There was no more Constantinople. Instead of Greek Constantinople, Turkish Istanbul appeared. Instead of Hagia Sophia it became “Hagia Sophia”; the crescent soared boldly over the Orthodox shrine of the East, and thin, tall minarets quickly rose at the corners of the wide, monumental Christian church. No more Byzantium! There is Türkiye. Imagine at least partly the centuries-old history of the King of Cities! You will involuntarily be imbued with respect for the old man, who still lies in reproach, and you will involuntarily bow before the face of the gray-haired sufferer... However, the newest best English and German Byzantologists deny the historical nature of the name “Byzantium”. They say there never was either Byzantium or Byzantines. The word “Byzantium” should not be associated with a historical phenomenon, but with a special way of social, church and state life. We should talk not about Byzantium, but about Byzantism. Recently, in a certain part of Russian society and the half-Russian press, a lot of blasphemy has been heard against Byzantineism. Byzantism is often called disparagingly “Byzantine”. Such “scientists” usually explain all the shortcomings of our modern church and even state life by the Byzantine inheritance. They talk about some kind of Byzantine Caesar-papism, although Simeon of Thessaloniki objected to this 17. It is not for us and not here, of course, to defend Byzantineism. But the most important feature of Byzantineism is the penetration of all life with religious principles and interests, this marvelous combination of the Heavenly and the earthly, this is real God-manhood, and not our modern man-deity. Is it really possible to condemn and talk about this way of life with disdain? Let us note that our Ancient Rus' learned only good things from Byzantium. The bad sides of Byzantineism remained alien to Russian life; in particular, Rus' made up for the lack of Byzantineism, according to which succession to the throne was not regulated. Rus' especially firmly grasped precisely that feature of Byzantineism, according to which all life in all its spheres is one piety. Either God or Satan - there was no third point of view. This is what our ancestors thought. The purified Byzantine ideal of personal, family and social life, as it was expressed in “Domostroy” and “Testament of the Fathers” by I. T. Pososhkov - can this ideal be called completely bad, low? Here, only God and the Holy Church are the final judge of all life, and therefore almost all life, carefully coordinated with this ideal, can be called piety. If you impartially think about the everyday ideals of our ancestors and the ideals of our time, then one cannot help but give preference to the former. Now, next to God, along with the Church, there are also various soulless idols. And many don’t even have that. The majority of modern Russian people have long since lost undivided service to God with their entire lives. For many, piety has now turned into “discharging religious duties” or “satisfying religious needs.” Obviously, the highest and most precious thing that a person has on earth is placed in the category of various “needs”. The Christian faith has ceased to be life, but occupies only a small corner of life. Parliaments, newspapers, theaters occupy more place in the lives of many than Christ and the Church. An Orthodox person can look at this state of affairs only with regret, sadness and sadness. The Byzantine and Old Russian way of life is a joy for the Orthodox heart. The old Moscow church-state life always stands before us as a reproach to modern life. There was no state and Church, but only Orthodox church life. Go to the Moscow Kremlin. Nearby are the Faceted Chamber, the Assumption Cathedral, the Patriarchal Court and the Prince's Palace - almost a porch to a porch. There is no struggle, no antagonism here. So it seems that even now, at the right pillar in the cathedral, His Holiness Patriarch Nikon stands in his place, and at the left - the quietest, most pious sovereign, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. The sovereign is wearing completely spiritual church clothes, and he is wearing a hat like a miter. And involuntarily, at this memory, your soul is touched. And now you enter the cathedral, you see - the patriarchal place is empty, the royal place is covered with mourning dusty taffeta. And everything around is so reminiscent of an archaeological museum, where they do not pray to God, but “only see the sights.” I want to cry!.. No, no matter what you say, Byzantism is close and dear to the Orthodox heart. We were better off while we held on to it and lived by it entirely. Now we have lived “in an overseas way”, we have lost Byzantium, and that is why everything has become bad here. An Orthodox person even now thinks that real life is intact only in the East, where Orthodoxy is affirmed by the Holy Patriarchs. It is not for nothing that our ordinary people rush there in huge numbers and not to any fashionable Western resorts and non-resorts and cry there day and night at every shrine. And to this day this world is closer to the heart of the Orthodox than any other world. “Debates about faith,” disputes about “pure alleluia,” about “walking with salt,” about double-fingered or parliamentary debates, stock exchange scams and newspaper chatter with Jewish lies, which many of us are already learning with success - what is closer to the Orthodox heart? Sometimes my playful imagination imagines Odysseus dressed in the uniform of a colonel; he has “Vladimir with swords”, a golden sword “For the capture of Troy”, and Penelope, pulled into a corset, in an ugly hat, dances a mazurka. It turns out to be a caricature. Our artificial forms do not suit the natural human life that we learn from Homer. But no less caricatured is the Orthodox Christian, who has lost the spirit of piety and adopted the entire soulless structure of modern life, hastily tailored according to Western models. An Orthodox monk, an ascetic who lives exclusively by church interests is understandable, but an Orthodox Christian in a Parisian jacket, with a cigarette in his teeth, with a cane in his hands, talking about ministerial crises is a caricature. Unfortunately, we have long been accustomed to seeing such a caricature and little by little we are beginning to get used to it. We choke, but we swallow everything... No, to Byzantium, and in particular to Byzantium, we owe the best pages of our history, and our grief is that behind these living and pious pages, more and more pale and lifeless pages are woven into our history, covered with pale and stunted souls of the West. The ideal of Byzantineism will forever be dear to an Orthodox person! Isn’t it our salvation even in the midst of all modern troubles?.. When publishing this article, materials from the US Library of Congress website were used. “Lazarev” had already approached the shore, dropped anchor, and was immediately surrounded by a whole flock of a kind of cabs, only “water” or “water” ones. A whole flotilla of all kinds of boats, with noise, shouting and swearing from swarthy, tanned boatmen, drove up to the sides of the steamer. The hunt began for the passengers and their luggage. Before the gangplank had even been lowered, several of the most enterprising Turkish drivers had already managed to climb onto the deck, clinging to who knows what. How they don’t fly into the sea is beyond comprehension. Risking their own lives, boatmen eager to make money rush to offer their services to passengers. Dirty, half-naked... Tanned faces, necks, chests sometimes, hoarse voices... The southern temperament also affects them. The noise and din hanging in the air around the ship is indescribable. And everything is in unknown languages, you hear exclamations that are completely unusual for the ear. They snatch luggage from their hands and drag them somewhere, desperately gesturing with their hands. There is a struggle for existence, but it is known: There were more than enough illustrations for this poem. It is impossible to describe them all positively. For a long time we observed wild oriental scenes in sight of Constantinople, until we got the opportunity to leave the ship at the invitation of the same Athonite monks from the Constantinople farmsteads. We go down the side stairs from the ship, sit down in huge boats and, swaying on the blue waves of the Golden Horn, overtaking many boats, we sail to the shores. On the shore, we first find ourselves in the customs house, a barn so dirty and old that it is difficult to even imagine that it is a customs house. Already here we met the famous Constantinople dirty, disgusting, lazy dogs. We crowded around some window - we had to present our passports to the Turk for verification. He took the passports, wrote down our names and surnames in a book lying in front of him in some kind of strange Turkish scrawl for us, put an even more intricate seal on them and returned them to each according to their belongings. From customs, accompanied by monks, we went in a crowd to the farmsteads. The Athonite farmsteads - Panteleimonovskoye, Andreevskoye and Ilyinskoye - are located almost next to each other and not far from the pier. Having rested for just a few minutes, without wasting valuable time in vain, we decided to walk through the city, which had already managed to interest us both in its appearance and in everything that we saw while we were walking from the pier to the courtyard. We have already managed to appreciate in advance the truth of the remark of the 14th century traveler Stefan of Novgorod that “it’s impossible to go to Constantinople, like an oak grove, and without a good leader.” Already those few streets and many alleys that we had just had to go through made us understand perfectly well that without a “good leader” you would get so lost in this oak grove that you would never get out. We considered the remark of Abbot Daniel, though not about Constantinople, to be fair: “It is impossible even without a tongue to experience and see good things in all places.” Yes, “language” was also absolutely necessary for us. We studied many different Basurman languages, both Latin and German, but, thank God, none of us had yet reached the godless Saracen wisdom. Where can I get the “leader” and “tongue”? The monks help us out again. They are jack of all trades. Perhaps, being carried away by modern anti-monastic speeches, some of us once scolded monasticism, but now everyone understood perfectly well that without monks we would be no good. So, we found both “leaders” and “tongues”. Under their leadership, we embarked on a desperate journey through the Tsaregrad oak grove. Well, what kind of oak forest is this? Really, it seems that I never dreamed of anything like this. Narrow, narrow streets with bizarre bends, even narrower, sometimes almost a yard wide alleys, dead ends going in different directions. There are no sidewalks in sight; perhaps only along the widest streets they are found, but even there they are given no more than an arshin, and even less. In Constantinople, all life is on the streets. All the shops are open on the street, almost bales of goods are hanging under the noses of those passing by. Here you will see the production of all kinds of things right before your eyes. People in the most desperately bright and colorful costumes, with monotonous red fezzes on their heads, rush through the streets in whole streams; They walk, of course, all along the street. It is relatively rare to find a solid turban. Its owner is usually elderly and very important. He, perhaps, will not deign you with his glance, but with full consciousness of his dignity, he will slowly and solemnly pass by, smoking his pipe. Here, a terribly ragged and smelly donkey driver, loudly clapping his whip and shouting some unnatural cries of encouragement, drives about five or six donkeys loaded with huge bales. Behind the heavy loads you often don’t even see the donkey itself. Only a donkey's head with classic ears sticks out from the front. The Turks manage to carry even huge long boards crossed on the back of a donkey. That is why it often happens that a driver fills and blocks the entire street with his caravan, and everyone crowds around. If you look too closely, they can smash your entire face into pieces, and stain your dress so much that no laundress can clean it afterwards. Few people travel; most everyone walks. But here, amid the general confusion, rides a shiny European carriage drawn by a pair of black trotters. Some important person must be coming; maybe one of the Europeans, but he travels at a forced pace, otherwise there is no other way. Street noise in Constantinople can positively deafen an unfamiliar person. Everyone seemed determined to make as much noise as their natural vocal abilities allowed. And these abilities among the residents of Constantinople, thanks to constant exercises, are truly brilliant. Everyone screams as if they are being paid for it. And here, occupying almost the entire width of the street, comes a horse-drawn horse. Here you need to constantly call. That is why on horse-drawn horses in Constantinople, in addition to the coachman, there is another person assigned specifically to make calls. And now the horse-drawn horse rides with a desperate ringing, dispersing the living waves of people walking and riding in both directions. Sometimes this “ringer” still has to jump off and run ahead, even dispersing the crowd with sticks. Sometimes, instead of a call from a horse-drawn horse, there is the desperate sound of a piercing horn. Sellers of vegetables and fruits, walking in pairs with their laden donkeys, show positive artistic ability to produce incredible piercing roulades of various tones and shades with their voices, but even these strong sounds, forming at times into an impossible cacophony and amazing dissonances, are completely drowned in the general concert, where they obviously know only one fortissimo, and only occasionally condescend to a simple forte. Add here the pungent smells from all sorts of spices, which Eastern people are big hunters for, whole heaps and clouds of dust, the most pungently stinking dirt, all kinds of mucus and garbage. Finally, don’t forget about dogs, about which you, no doubt, know a lot without us. Learned people say that Constantinople dogs are a special breed. Small, terribly pitiful and inconspicuous, they lie all over the streets, lie right under your feet, sometimes even entire families. It often happens - it has happened to us too - that dogs are stepped on, sometimes very sensitively. She squeals disgustingly, disgustingly, and she continues to lie and sleep, waiting for new courtesy from passers-by. And what scenes have we seen on the streets of Constantinople?! We will never forget them. Here is a Turkish coffee shop. On a wide street it occupies half the street, and in alleys it sometimes extends simply from one wall to another. But the houses in Constantinople are very tall, and have five or six floors. The narrow alley looks exactly like a well, and at the bottom of this well there are low tables with small, mostly wicker, chairs. Most often older people sit here. Some people drink coffee from small cups. Others smoke hookah. Still others play dice or chess. More in the bone. This is the favorite game here. Look how thoughtful they are! Just think, world issues are being solved, or at least close to important scientific discoveries. This is an absolutely incredible scene. Almost in the middle of the street, a little to the side, the Turk placed a huge brazier with coal, put a whole ram on a spit, even with the head, of course, still covered with wool, and calmly roasted it, turning first one side or the other to the fire. Dust flies onto the original roast - nothing! The surrounding dogs show signs of tenderness towards an object that emits such a pleasant and appetizing smell to the entire street. Our Turk is not embarrassed by anything and only exchanges cheerful remarks with the merchants, who, apparently, fully approve of such an impromptu kitchen. Look, they say, we have a face on the product. There is no deception... All this is in the order of things, it cannot be otherwise. About two hours later we again passed by the kitchen that amazed us. The ram was still hanging on the spit, but its whole side had already been cut out; Obviously, the owner sold it to people who were tempted by the mouth-watering smells and lost their peace of mind. Truly wonderful and instructive! But enough about this: you can’t describe everything. “There are many visions in Constantinople, it’s impossible to write them all down,” let’s say in the words of Stefan Novgorod. From Galata, the most crowded and lively part of Constantinople, filled with workers, sailors and traders of all countries, we headed to Istanbul. To get to Istanbul you need to cross the famous Galata Bridge. How beautiful Istanbul is!.. Behind the Golden Horn in all its glory stands Istanbul with its greatest mosques, with protected palaces and gardens and a motley collection of large and small houses. You will involuntarily stop and admire the marvelous picture for a few minutes before setting sail across the Galata Bridge. Indeed, this is swimming, because a whole river of people always crosses the bridge. Red fezzes are more visible. Interspersed between them are other European headdresses. The bridge spans the sea bay, the bridge is very long, wooden and very, very dilapidated. At the entrance to the bridge, several Turks are running around, demanding 18 “wigs” (about 2 kopecks) for crossing the bridge. But, of course, they cannot get it from everyone, and most pass without a ticket. They were somehow afraid to approach us. Our uniform jackets in the Turks must have aroused respect for us, forcing them to assume that our persons were rather important persons with whom it was always unsafe to deal, even if it was to collect legal payment. To put it simply, we in uniform jackets were mistaken for soldiers, and therefore... we were allowed in for nothing. It's fair not to pay to cross this extraordinary bridge; it would even be fairer to charge the Sultan himself for the passage over his magnificent bridge, since this is quite a bold undertaking. Maybe some holey board will fall through, and then you can measure the depth of the Golden Horn. In addition, they say that the fee for crossing the bridge goes to the maintenance of the Sultan’s harems. You must agree, after all this, that it is not at all becoming for a student of a theological academy to give even a two-kopeck subsidy to the Sultan for harems. It would not hurt to open a life insurance office at the entrance to the bridge. It's scary to walk across the bridge. It seems that now you will fall through and swim in the wonderful waves of the Golden Horn. Some boards bend and squeak when you step on them. And under the bridge, as if in hell, people, ships and ships are teeming. On the left side of the bridge there is a whole row of steamship piers; Steamships of all types and sizes are constantly approaching and departing, continuous whistles and the noise of wheels are heard, disturbing the mirror-like calm of the quiet waters of the bay, the air is filled with the stinking, disgusting smell of smoke from bad coal. The bridge was successfully crossed. Let's look back. What a motley picture we see: Galata is spread out below, and Pera, the European part of the city, flaunts above. Buildings are built on top of each other. From the outside it seems that there are no streets or alleys between them. But we have already seen with our own eyes what kind of life is in full swing there. Here we are walking through Istanbul. It's quieter here, fewer people, less traffic. The streets, at least some, are wider and even sometimes lined with trees. Traders sit in the shade of trees, coffee shops are located; even dogs abandon their stoic indifference to the scorching rays of the sun and prefer to lie in the shade. Blindly trusting our guides, we followed them without complaint, no matter what alleys they led us into. And it would not be difficult for our Susanin to lead the evil Poles here somewhere to their destruction. Finally we reached Hagia Sophia. You look and don’t believe your eyes. Is this really the same Sophia that we have heard and read more about than any other church in the world? Some kind of pile of yellow stone, randomly piled up. Traces of destruction are visible in many places. The monument is kept untidy. The overwhelming size of the church is not even visible. However, we have already heard that from the outside, Hagia Sophia makes almost no impression except disappointment. But we also knew no less well that under this pile of stones lies the greatest work of Byzantine architectural genius, which delighted everyone who saw it, starting with our ancient pilgrims. “About St. Sophia, the Wisdom of God, the human mind can neither say nor subtract” (Stephen Novgorod). “It is not powerful to confess her majesty and beauty” (Secretary Alexander, 14th century). “The most wonderful and praiseworthy church of Hagia Sophia is the earthly Heaven, the new Zion, the praise of the universe, the glory of the churches” (Grigorovich-Barsky). “The human mind has changed, having seen such a wonder that you won’t find such a wonder in the sunflower” (Ioann Lukyanov). This is a church around which a whole library of scientific literature has been created. This is a church that has its own long history, decorated with poetic and legendary tales, which the Byzantine ardent imagination was so full of in all centuries. Initially, on this very spot, a church was built in the name of Hagia Sophia (that is, the Wisdom of God) by Emperor Constantine the Great shortly after the First Ecumenical Council. In 358–360 Constantine's son Constantius resumed and expanded his father's construction. In 404 the church was significantly damaged by fire; Theodosius the Younger rebuilt it again, and on January 11, 415, its solemn consecration took place. In the fifth year of Justinian's reign, in 532, a terrible fire, along with a large part of the city, destroyed Hagia Sophia again. Then Justinian decided to build a church that would surpass all the churches in the world in its size and splendor. The task is enormous! But this task was not set for himself by a mere mortal, but by a powerful emperor. He had all the means to carry out a task that was impossible for all other mortals. Justinian collected untold wealth for the construction. The most precious things were collected from all over the empire. The best and rare marble, previously found in pagan temples and public buildings in Rome, Athens, Memphis, Ephesus, Alexandria, Troy, Cyclades and other places, was collected in Constantinople. From February 23, 533 to December 22, 538, 19 to 10,000 people were busy building the church under the supervision of a hundred architects and under the main direction of the famous architects Anthimius of Trallia and Isidore of Miletus. The famous architects forever glorified themselves and their time with the construction of a magnificent building, which was the pride of the Christian Church for almost a millennium and forever remained the greatest work of Byzantine art. The subject of particular surprise and architectural mystery at all times was the dome of this church, about which Procopius says that it “seemed not to be resting on a solid building, but hanging from the sky on a golden chain.” Emperor Justinian himself, who was directly observing the progress of construction work all the time, was delighted when he saw that his great enterprise was so brilliantly carried out in reality. On the day of the consecration of the church, the emperor solemnly exclaimed: Δόξα τώ Θεώ, τώ καταξίσαντί με τοιούτο έργον άποτελέσαι! Νενίκηκα σε, Σολομών! That is: “Glory to God, who has deigned me to accomplish this great deed! I defeated you, Solomon! But the church stood in its original magnificent form for a very short time. 20 years later, on May 7, 559, the church was damaged by an earthquake; The eastern part of the dome collapsed, the magnificent throne and the precious canopy above it, as well as the pulpit, were broken. Another architect Isidore, the nephew of the famous builder, restored the dome in the form in which it now exists. The dome is taller and stronger than before, but, Byzantine historians note, it no longer has that airiness and grace ( τού ). The emperor solemnly celebrated the new consecration of the church on December 24, 563. There were an endless number of extensions and reconstructions of the church in subsequent times - under the emperors Basil the Macedonian, Roman, Vasily the Bulgarian Slayer, Andronikos the Elder and the Younger, John Cantacuzene, John Palaeologus and others. The amendments to the church were of a different nature under the Turkish sultans who already owned it. After the capture of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453, Mohammed turned the Church of Sophia into a mosque and added a minaret to it, and Sultan Selim II added three more minarets in 1573. Magnificent mosaics with Christian subjects were rudely and barbarously covered up. Some of them, however, are still visible through the plaster. The sacred images seem to cry at such a terrible desecration of the Christian shrine and, looking at you from the high ceiling lamps, ask everyone to “reveal” them again to the world... The last restructuring and restoration of Hagia Sophia took place in the middle of the last century, in 1847-1848, under Sultan Abdul-Mecid, and the work was led by the famous architect Fossati. Currently, the appearance of Hagia Sophia is completely different from what it was before. A lot of all kinds of extensions were made to the church on all sides; four huge buttresses support the walls and the dome from the sides and completely disfigure it. Thanks to these extensions, the church becomes somehow invisible and it is difficult to recognize the immortal St. Sophia in it from the outside. The huge courtyard that once was on the western side is no longer attached to the church. Only by more or less plausible restorations by scientists can we now judge the original infinitely beautiful, artistic appearance of Hagia Sophia. And what a mass of memories swarm in your head when you look at Hagia Sophia! After all, this church was the center of the state life of Byzantium and the religious life of the entire Christian East for almost a millennium. “An object of just national pride - Hagia Sophia was in the eyes of the Byzantines the greatest and most magnificent church, the like of which history does not represent, which has never been and never will be since the time of Adam. The miracles of the Roman Capitol, according to Paul Silentiarius 20, were as inferior to her as an idol in comparison with the true God. Surrounded by an aura of the miraculous in its very construction, Hagia Sophia became the ideal of a Christian church, and its name became cherished. An unattainable model for all Greek churches, the Justinian Church became their common mother, the mother of the entire kingdom and the stronghold of faith, the most dear patriotic shrine. On holidays, people gathered there for services, and the king himself and his synclite made ceremonial exits from the palace. In it, on days of national celebrations and difficult trials, they sent their thanksgivings and prayers to God. The so-called litiyas most often came from the Great Church, often led by the emperor and the patriarch, and they usually returned to it from the squares, streets and outskirts of the capital, from its numerous churches and monasteries. In Hagia Sophia, the initiates were hierarchs, judged for their misdeeds, deprived of their rank and restored to it again. In it, the Byzantines elected, proclaimed, crowned, and sometimes overthrew their kings. The rebellious mob, political conspirators and generally persons dissatisfied with the government often gathered in the Great Church, in the vestibules or in its courtyard and turned the Church of the Wisdom of God into a place of agitation, coups d'état and popular unrest, to tame which the high priest of Constantinople more than once had to descend into it from the adjacent patriarchate. Councils on church and general church affairs took place in Hagia Sophia: in the presence of the Tsar and the Patriarch, the Synod and the Synclite, theological disputes were conducted, definitions of faith were drawn up, treaties with foreign sovereigns were sealed, the most important issues of justice and administration were considered and resolved. Offended persons sought justice here for their offenders, persecuted and persecuted sought refuge; oathbreakers and murderers, not excluding kings from among them, openly repented of their crimes from the pulpit of Hagia Sophia, were excommunicated from the Church, subjected to some other penance and received permission from it. In exceptional cases, the entire people solemnly confessed their guilt in the Great Church and were forgiven by its primate. Here the emperors prayed for victory from above to be sent down on their enemies before setting out on a campaign, and here, usually in a triumphal procession, they returned from it to give praise to God together with their people. In the same church they were married, baptized their children, announced their coming of age, elevated them to court dignity; finally, some of the kings near the walls of Hagia Sophia and in it itself found a place of eternal rest next to the patriarchs of Constantinople. In a word, the entire church and civil life of the empire was closely connected with the great church of Constantinople, and in it, as if in a modern parliament, so to speak, the destinies of the Greek people were touched upon and decided for centuries” 21. Here is a concise summary of everything that is found in the Greek writers: the chronicler Theophan, Patriarch Nikephoros, Constantine Porphyrogenitus, Nikephoros Bryennios, Niketas Choniates, Anna Komnena, Simeon of Thessaloniki, George Kedrin and others. In the Church of Sophia, the predominantly solemn rite of the Orthodox Church developed, because here the emperor himself often took part in the liturgical rite with all the splendor of his court etiquette. For example, the emperor took a direct part in the great entrance to the liturgy. Hence the solemnity of this entrance, which brought our ancient pilgrims into indescribable tenderness. Here is what Novgorod Archbishop Anthony (12th century) writes in this case: “Many priests and deacons will bear the gifts of the Lord: then there is crying and tenderness and humility from all the people, not only on the floor (on the floor) in St. Sophia, but also on the floors 22. How then can bishops and popes and deacons have fear and humility and tenderness for that more honest service? What beautiful gift-bearing golden vessels, decorated with stones and pearls, and silver! And how they will carry away the radiant Jerusalem and Ripidi, and then there will be sighing and crying among people for their sins. What kind of mind and what kind of soul is it that will not then remember the Kingdom of Heaven and endless life! Behold, brethren, remembering, let us be jealous of the same service to be with fear, so that we may receive a good life in this age and in the next” 23 . It is known how much space is devoted to worship in the “Ritemonger of the Byzantine Court” (De ceremoniis aulae Byzantinae), attributed, starting with Jacob Reiske, the first publisher of the monument, to Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (912–955). It is also remarkable and very characteristic of Byzantium that elevation to purely secular positions was accompanied by a more or less complex ecclesiastical succession. There were special ranks of elevation to civil positions: the elevation to the rank of Caesar, Novilissimus, Curopalate, Master, Patrician, Anfipata, Zosta Patricia (lady of the court), Prepositus, Protospatharius, President of the Senate, Eparch (something like Oberpolitsmeister), Cuvicularius (bed-keeper), as well as the elevation of clergy to the rank of rector and sinkel. Most of these “ranks” consisted in the fact that those elevated to a certain rank appeared in Hagia Sophia. Here, on the solea, on a special table, he placed the tokens of his new dignity that he had just received from the emperor. The Patriarch read a prayer over them and returned them back to the person who put them, and he put the monetary offering on the table. In addition, those elevated to the rank always partook of the Holy Mysteries. Yes, here, in Hagia Sophia and around it, there was some kind of special life, majestic, solemn, imbued through and through with churchliness. What now? In place of the magnificent churchyard there are some nondescript shacks, and Turkish houses are scattered in disarray around the entire church. On one side there is a shady garden, something like a boulevard. Half-ragged Turks crowd this garden, traders walk around with all sorts of old clothes, trousers, boots, selling bagels. There are also tables here, this is a street coffee shop. In sight of Sofia, we sat down and we sat down at the tables. The Turks began to fuss when they saw such a mass of unexpected visitors. They started serving us microscopic cups of thick, black Turkish coffee. For the first time we tasted this caustic and spicy drink. There were bootblacks walking around. For many of us, they tidied up our dusty and dirty shoes behind our wigs. A gypsy woman came up and began to tell fortunes, quickly, quickly communicating her eloquent and long-memorized prophecies in Greek. We sat for a long time in the shade of the garden, our thoughts were confused - there was no way to reconcile Hagia Sophia and everything that we see around. We were quite ready to repeat the words of our ancient pilgrims. Moscow priest John Lukyanov, who visited Hagia Sophia at the beginning of the 18th century, notes: “We walked and looked and marveled at such beauty, and we ourselves cried out: Lord, Lover of Mankind, how did he give such a beautiful mother of ours to be mocked by the infidels!” The famous Vasily Grigorovich-Barsky more than once interrupts his description of the “great Church of Hagia Sophia” with the following exclamations: “Alas, tearful hearing, not only sight!.. Such and such a great and glorious temple was the Ismailite mosque! Arise, O earth, and see God’s great patience!” We hit the road again. Soon we came to the square so well known to us from history, which in Turkish is called At-Meydan - “horse square”. This is the place where the famous Byzantine hippodrome was located, which replaced the court theaters for the Byzantine court. All the Byzantine nobility, led by the emperor, gathered here, who not only looked at the horse lists, but also took an intimate part in them. There was no end to luxury and splendor here. The breathtaking luxury of clothes, horse gear, and chariots was required as a necessary accessory for spectacles for the Byzantines, accustomed to any splendor. It took a lot of effort to surprise them in this area. Sometimes they were so carried away by the horse races that they left the church, and screams from the hippodrome could be heard into the church during the service. Many passages in John Chrysostom’s conversations become clear, where he complains about the screams coming from the place of spectacles. On this same square, state tragedies such as palace revolutions and coups often took place, which sometimes ended with the square stained with imperial blood. But now everything is quiet around here and nothing reminds of the past. Only three monuments stand in a straight line among the square - the obelisk of Theodosius, the column of Constantine Porphyrogenitus (Porphyrogenitus) and the Snake Column. But what a pitiful appearance all these monuments have and at the same time what a long and glorious history each of them has! The Column of Constantine (10th century) was robbed by the crusaders, and since that time it has fallen into complete decay and desolation, so that you don’t even want to look at it. The Obelisk of Theodosius, which is of venerable antiquity - up to 3,000 years old, however, has been preserved better than other monuments. Ten centuries before Christ, it was carved from a single piece of Egyptian marble by order of Pharaoh Thutmose for the church in Iliopolis. At the end of the 4th century AD, Emperor Theodosius transported it to Constantinople and erected it in its present location. The obelisk is large, up to 14 fathoms in height, all covered with hieroglyphs. The size of the obelisk amazed Hierodeacon Zosima at one time, and he notes on his journey: “And you, man, cannot marvel at this: who erected this? What kind of people were they?” The snake column stands in a deep (up to 3 arshins) hole. Obviously, the level of the area has risen so much over one and a half thousand years. How many buildings were destroyed to gradually form such a huge mound? The column is formed from three intertwined greenish snakes. The top is truncated, leaving 29 rings of snakes. They say that this column is a gift from the Greeks to the Delphic oracle after the war with the Persians; she was the leg of the Pythia's seat. The column was taken to Constantinople by order of Constantine the Great. Currently, although the column has an unusual appearance, it does not make any special impression. In ancient times, she attracted a lot of attention. Her fantastic appearance involuntarily forced the creation of many legends and beliefs. Some legends are also passed down by our ancient Russian pilgrims. So Hierodeacon Zosima writes about this column (Deacon Alexander also agrees with him): “There is a pillar, three heads of aspid copper are woven instead of one head, and the poison of the serpent is imprinted in them: the one who is enmeshed by the serpent inside the city, and they touch fearfully and heal; If you are outside the city, there is no cure.” Here the alteration of the biblical story about the brass serpent in the desert is obvious. Yes, only these few monuments make you carry your thoughts far, far into the gray distance of centuries, imagine everything that these famous monuments witnessed and witnessed. Now the square itself no longer represents anything special, and there is also nothing special on it that comes out of the series of daily events; now it is the most ordinary city square, of which there are many in every city. Little by little they are starting to build up the area of ​​the famous Byzantine hippodrome. Different times, different people, everything different. The racecourse's former glory will never be resurrected. Only in scholarly works on Byzantine studies will they talk about it, and some curious traveler like us will write two or three pages in his travel diary about what was once the center of life of the most original state and its highest metropolitan society. This is how the glory of all earthly glorious deeds passes, passes like smoke disappears in the air!.. There in Istanbul there is also the most remarkable of the Constantinople museums, the Museum of Antiquities, the so-called Ottoman. The Ottoman Museum occupies two very large and impressive buildings, however, not only are antiquities located in the buildings, there are many of them in the garden surrounding the museum. Here, various sculptural images, sometimes quite large, stand and are simply lying around in complete disarray. The statues of the gods present a pitiful sight. How can the anger of the immortals not flare up when their images lie mutilated, sometimes upside down, overgrown with weeds?.. Shame on the Olympians!.. People have stopped revere them. And from the same garden, located on the top of one of the Constantinople hills, through the gap between the shady trees, marvelous views of the Golden Horn, Peru and Galata open up, and the Bosphorus is visible in the distance. The greenery of the trees forms a beautiful natural frame for a bright artistic painting. But in this garden we did not so much look at the pagan gods, shamed by time, as we rested in the shade, because by this time the sun began to get so hot from the cloudless sky that walking in the middle of the hot stone became not particularly pleasant; As soon as you walk a few steps, you feel that you are already sweating. In addition, we were dressed in jackets, and at this time it is inconvenient to walk in them even in our north, not only in Constantinople. At the entrance to the museum, we paid a chirek (about 40 kopecks) and began the review. We expected more from the museum. Just think - the Museum of Antiquities in Constantinople, which itself is nothing more than one huge continuous museum of the East. And there are so many different antiquities around this city on all sides! After all, along the shores of the Sea of ​​Marmara, the Archipelago, along their numerous islands - every step reveals a whole history, a whole era of deep antiquity. Nevertheless, the museum is very poor in antiquities. Many halls stand almost empty, and the entire museum, apparently, bears traces of the fact that it is still being assembled. But still, in the museum we saw a lot of very valuable statues of all sizes and varying artistic merit. How delicate and delicate the marble work of the ancient Greeks is! Cold marble comes to life positively under the immortal chisel of the artist. The thinnest lace seems completely natural here, the folds of clothing seem to have just been made, the faces are alive - and only upon closer examination of the statue do you see that everything here is dead and cold, that before you is marble, and not living people. What a pity that such treasures are in the possession of the Turks... Objects from ancient Greek and Byzantine household life are interesting - this section is perhaps most fully represented in the museum. We also paid attention to the wonderful items of ancient ceramics. There are also several mummies in the museum. But we paid the most attention to the hall of sarcophagi, in particular the sarcophagus of Alexander the Great. This huge sarcophagus, in all fairness, can be put in first place among all the other attractions stored in the [museum]. And this is not because the sarcophagus reminded of Alexander the Great, one memory of whom made Gogol’s famous teacher-hero break chairs in the classroom. No, the sarcophagus will involuntarily attract your attention, even if you did not know who was buried in it. Hardly any of us have seen anything similar in the subtlety of artistic work. The white marble sarcophagus is decorated on all four sides with sculptural images of events from the life of the great commander. These images are so artistically executed that one cannot believe that human art, and even one so ancient, can do this. Yes, we have already become thoroughly weaned from sculpture; it has almost no place in our lives. In our homes we only see plaster dogs and cats. The monuments decorating the “Gogol” or “Pushkin” gardens of our provincial and sometimes district cities, strictly speaking, also have nothing to do with sculpture. In front of such works of sculpture as the sarcophagus of Alexander the Great, you can’t help but gape and stand for a long time. We had to regret that during our tour of the museum we did not have a specialist guide who could turn the dead, silent monuments into living, eloquent history. Our multilingual guides could not replace a living guide. The curators of the museum - the Turks - could tell us only very little. Pointing to some objects, they repeated only one word: “Antyka, antyka!” We knew even without them that everything here is “antyka.” A visit to the museum sufficiently convinced us that archeology among the Turks is in its infancy, and that Türkiye, one must think, owes this to a large extent to foreigners. After all, even Russia established the Russian Archaeological Institute in Constantinople. Currently, in general, European science pays a lot of attention to Byzantium. A whole branch of scientific knowledge was created - Byzantology. Literature [on] Byzantine studies is growing very quickly and exists in all languages. Several special magazines are published. Russian people can note with satisfaction that in this area of ​​scientific universal human achievement, Russian science goes along with Western European science. In the field of Byzantine studies, Russian scientists were accepted into the European scientific family; even Western Byzantologists felt the need to study the Russian language. Russia turned out to be grateful to its spiritual nurse - Byzantium. Byzantology explains a lot to the Russian people and from his native antiquity. In Istanbul, we, of course, only examined from the outside the huge Blue Mosque of Sultan Ahmet next to the hippodrome, with which he wanted to outshine Hagia Sophia, but, of course, did not outshine it, wasting a lot of money. The mosques of Constantinople are very diverse: some of them were Christian churches, others, although built later, do not represent anything special. Much more interesting are those mosques that are built in imitation of Hagia Sophia. There are several such mosques: Valide, Suleymaniye, Bayazeda and others. All of them are huge and magnificent, some even larger than Hagia Sophia. It is absolutely impossible to compare them with our many churches: they are so good. But one thing in Hagia Sophia remains even incomparable, and not just unsurpassed - this is its incomparable dome. The dome forms the sky, and, apparently, Mohammedanism cannot surpass or equal the “heavenliness” of Christianity. The minarets at mosques are especially striking: famous mosques usually have four of them. Thin, thin, going up, you look at them - the hat falls off your head. How were they built? How are they worth? It’s as if three rings are put on a finger - so three narrow galleries at a great height from the ground surround slender pillars of minarets, tapering at the top and ending in a very sharp spear. A thin, tall minaret, whitening among equally tall dark cypress trees, is the same necessary accessory to every Muslim corner as the often clumsy bell tower with a cross is in every Russian village. We pass by the Church of Irina 24, now a Turkish weapons warehouse... How heavy my soul is... I involuntarily want to cry... Tired and as if suppressed by the mass of historical memories of times long past, we returned to the farmsteads. Having borrowed from the monks accompanying us, however, very meager information on Eastern linguistics, along the way we started some contacts with the residents, however, due to the lack of our philological education, our conversation was more often limited to mutual bewilderment and smiles. We learned to understand Turkish money and tried to remember their Turkish names: on-para, irmi-para, besh, ichi, uch, etc. We even started trading along the way. Along the streets, especially closer to the pier, you constantly come across sellers of postcards with views of Constantinople, albums, and photographs. Waving a whole stack of postcards, some seller shouts: “Two kopecks, two kopecks...” Russian money is taken here too. Sellers follow you along entire streets, there is no way to get rid of them. One Jew even accompanied us onto the ship, offering to buy an album, the last one, as he assured. But as soon as the album was bought, at the same moment another, absolutely last one, appeared. This appearance of albums continued until the third ring, when the enterprising merchant took off in a hasty flight. Many even boldly fought off the general company and ventured on independent excursions to the side, for which some paid. The writer of these lines fought off his companions on the Galata Bridge. All around are strangers' faces, strange, incomprehensible speech. I go from memory to the courtyard. But here it seems like you need to turn, and God knows where! All the lanes are so similar to each other. I turn to merchants and passers-by - they don’t understand my languages ​​and just shake their heads. Finally, the policeman, having apparently understood only the word “Athos” from the question in Modern Greek, pointed importantly to a nearby alley. It turns out that the courtyard was almost nearby. Our stay in Constantinople was disappointingly short. We expected to visit here again after visiting Athos. It was impossible to stay in Constantinople, the "Lazarev" would leave - it wouldn't be long until another steamer would come that would call at the Holy Mountain. And therefore it was natural that we decided to go to Athos, and from there return to Constantinople again. True, it's not exactly on the road, but what can you do. A traveler is a forced person, he is a lot connected by various train schedules, flight schedules and the like. But it happened to us again. the eternally truthful word of the Wise One: “Many thoughts are in the heart of a man, but the advice of the Lord endures forever.” 25 We did not have to return back to Constantinople, and therefore we are forced to ask you to forgive us for the brevity of the description of Constantinople. It is as if each of us has a duty to complete our personal acquaintance with Constantinople in the future. Is it really so important to see all the alleys of the Turkish capital, to see all the archaeological ones? attractions? For a person it is enough just to stand on someone else’s soil, and he immediately feels like a participant in a life that was alien to him at another time. Each of us knew a lot in history about the life of Constantinople for entire millennia, knew a lot about the church life of the Ecumenical Patriarchate until its present day, but far from the places where this very life takes place, learning about this life only from weighty volumes of learned works, you somehow have a hard time imagining this whole life. Instead of living people, instead of the wonderful shores of the Bosphorus, only lines and pages rush through my head, so indifferent, so monotonous. When you set foot, even for a day, on the land where the history you studied took place, then somehow a lot becomes clearer, a lot is crowded in your head, asking to come out. This stream of memories flooded into our souls as soon as we calmed down from rushing around the city. We would be completely wrong if we did not share all these memories and knowledge that have come to life in us and have not yet lost their vibrant vitality. However, it is impossible to present all these memories, so we’d better take only a part of them. We were interested, of course, not in the politics of Turkey, not in its public and civil mood. No, we are bored to death with politics even at home. Do you care about Turkish politics when you don’t know how to get rid of Russian politics? Church affairs are another matter. If these matters are uninteresting for many, it is sad, but if they were uninteresting for students of the theological academy, it would be simply terrible. Everyone knows that the Russian Church was subordinate to the Patriarch of Constantinople for a long time, but even when the administrative dependence of the Russian Church ceased, its connection with the Ecumenical Patriarchate was not broken. In the eyes of Orthodox Russian church people, the ecumenical patriarchs have always even had a certain charm. In the old “Historical News” there are touching descriptions of what respectful hospitality our ancient pious ancestors showed to the eastern pillars of the saving apostolic faith, how all of Rus' bowed their heads and knees before them, accepting their saintly blessing. Many in Ancient Rus' shared with compassionate sadness the plight of the saints of the East under heterodox rule. Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, asking the most holy patriarchs about their plight, fell on their chests and shed tears of compassion, asking them to forgive both him and the Russian people for not being able to free them from the Hagaryan yoke. We, accustomed to the dominant position of the Orthodox Church in our Fatherland, are always very sad to remember that the most ancient patriarchal thrones are subordinated to infidels, that in the city of Equal-to-the-Apostles Constantine the ruler is the Turkish Sultan. This state of affairs, of course, leaves some imprint on the entire life of Eastern Orthodox Christians and, in any case, is hardly normal. It is not in vain that every monk bows to the ground every day during evening prayer, saying: “Soon overthrow the blasphemous and godless Hagaryan kingdom and betray the Orthodox Tsar in your hands.” However, anyone who will represent the external situation of the Eastern patriarchates as one continuous oppression from the fanatical Turks will be deeply mistaken. Church life in the East, even in the absence of a dominant position of the Orthodox population, develops quite independently and freely. Even the Byzantine nobleman Luke Notara, during the fall of Constantinople, said: “It is better to have a Turkish turban in Byzantium than a papal tiara.” And these words have a basis. Since the conquest of Constantinople, Turkish laws have been characterized by very wide tolerance towards Christians. Laws, even Turkish ones, are holy; Of course, the executors of these laws were adversaries, but this is always and everywhere. In general, the church life of the Patriarchate of Constantinople was free. The idea of ​​conciliar government did not fade away in it; the canons always retained their legal force. Worship was always performed freely. Turkish tolerance was so wide that the Muslim government did not prevent the patriarch in Constantinople itself from solemnly performing the rite of Orthodoxy, where the Mohammedans were proclaimed both wicked and damned, and anathema was proclaimed to them. Many times this was brought to the attention of the government, but the rite of Orthodoxy was never prohibited. One Western scholar (Pichon) even says that the Christian hierarchy under the Turks acquired more independence and a more sovereign position than it had under the Byzantine emperors: perhaps this opinion is somewhat paradoxical, but one cannot but agree that Turkish rule was favorable for the Greek Church. In fact, what unites the Greeks living under the Patriarchate of Constantinople? Certainly not state unity. They are united by the Orthodox faith and the Church. This explains the authority of the Church and hierarchy for the Greek. The Greek hierarchy enjoys great respect and great authority and influence among the Christian people. Back in the 18th century, one German Ober-Pfarer 26 wrote: “There is no people who have more love and respect for their Church than the Greeks” (Heineccius). Only the patriarchy could be the center of people's life, and therefore the patriarch was a great man in the eyes of the entire large Christian population of the Muslim state. One ancient Greek describes his feelings at the sight of the patriarchy this way. “It’s nice to look at the high cross, which is established on the patriarchate and which is far visible both on land and from the sea. The Patriarchate itself, together with the church, being on the top of Istanbul, and the courtyard surrounded by walls with trees, and the patriarch’s dwelling - all this seemed like a sanctuary. No one will pass before the gate here without putting their hand on their heart, bowing down, and then crossing themselves with the cross on their further journey. The Patriarchal Church shone like the sun in the darkness. From here you are transported in thought to the Divine Himself. [The Patriarch was compared] to God Himself, sitting on His throne. God planted this earthly paradise.” Our famous scientist Professor A.P. Lebedev made the following epigraph to his treatise on the Patriarchate of Constantinople: “One of the main tasks of our work will be the historical life of the Patriarchs of Constantinople, patriarchs - we know this well - often embittered, humiliated, persecuted, expelled and killed; almost in most cases - humiliated, degrading their dignity and dignity, selfish and vicious; let's say, rarely - completely ignorant, barely wandering through the Greek literacy; let's say, even less often - staggering through the streets of the capital with an outstretched hand; living in the dirty and smelly Phanar, not knowing what the palaces of prelates are, but still great in their authority and influential position in the Universal Church" 27 . This central position of the Church and hierarchy in people's life is very noticeable in the East, and Russian people can only envy. In our country, living by church interests, taking part in church affairs - all these are signs of obvious backwardness and reactionaryness. A man from society is ashamed of proving his religion. The observation is well known: the larger a person, the smaller his icons. For the Greek of Constantinople there is nothing like this. He is not at all ashamed of his Church. But in the church life of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, several other very important, characteristic and for us unusual phenomena attract attention. Historians note that for the Greeks, since the time of Turkish rule, the Patriarch of Constantinople became in some way the successor of the Byzantine emperors (Herzberg). Ancient Greek historians (though very ancient) even call the patriarch “autocrat,” just as our Holiness Patriarchs Philaret and Nikon were called “great sovereigns.” The Turkish government recognizes the patriarch's exclusive rights. These rights and benefits are listed by the Turkish government in special charters called “berats”, which each Patriarch of Constantinople receives upon entering the patriarchal see and each bishop upon his consecration. According to these berats, patriarchs and bishops receive rights that they do not have anywhere else. By virtue of these berats, the patriarch and bishops become the head of the Orthodox population not only in church and religious terms, but also in civil, judicial and even police matters. The accepted text of the Berat is very extensive and it is not possible to quote it in full 28 . Let us note its most characteristic and important places. First of all, the berat confirms the complete freedom and independence of the Church in its own external life. The Patriarch, within established limits, manages all matters relating to the faith, together with the Synod, and is an independent (άνεξάρίητος) patriarch over all Turkish subjects from the Greek people living in the capital, suburbs and surrounding areas. He has power over his patriarchate in everything and over everything that in any way depends on it, and must manage all affairs, and in particular religious ones, together with the metropolitans, and no one else is allowed to interfere in these matters. No officer of the police, the Treasury, or any other ministry, shall, contrary to sacred law and all justice, harass or harass with a view to causing nuisance or confusion in the performance of their religious duties. No one should force Christians to convert to Islam. Only the patriarch or the epitropes authorized by him have the right, in accordance with their religion, to give permission and prohibition of marriage to persons belonging to their people. Marital divorce, bigamy and third marriage of widowers are prohibited according to their religion; Consequently, no one is given permission, and those who do so are punished and punished. According to their law, those who have illegally married are deprived of the right to enter the church, therefore any government official or other person in authority is prohibited from forcing priests to perform a Christian burial of persons involved in such lawlessness. At the same time, we involuntarily recall the judgments of our “Orthodox” legislators about mixed marriages, about divorce, about almost the tenth marriage... If only these legislators could learn from the Turks respect for the laws of the Orthodox Church! Whenever it becomes necessary, according to the requirements of their religion, for a priest to be removed and replaced by another, no outsider should interfere with this. The Patriarch and Metropolitan have the unconditional right to excommunicate from the Church for the purpose of correction or punishment, and no one should interfere in their religious affairs. It is much more interesting and very significant that, in addition to such church privileges, the Greek hierarchy in relation to the Greek people has very important rights of a purely civil nature. Thus, the management and direction of Greek schools belongs to the patriarch in the capital, and in the dioceses to the metropolitans and bishops, who take care of finding capable and experienced teachers, ephors (trustees), and maintaining the schools. (Again, a lesson for Holy Rus'!) The Patriarch of Constantinople is in charge of all church property, without exception, belonging to the Orthodox Church. No one should interfere in matters concerning vineyards, gardens, estates, fields, meadows, places of worship, monasteries, chapels, mills and other similar buildings, houses and workshops belonging to churches subordinate to the patriarch, and in general everything that, under the guise of a pious donation (waqf), is brought to the benefit of the churches, including livestock. At the same time, we involuntarily remember Holy Rus': all we talk about is control over church property, or even worse. When the patriarch or metropolitans receive an inheritance in the state, whatever it may be, none of the Turkish officials has the right to interfere with it under the pretext that the general or particular administration of the inheritance is entrusted to them by imperial laws. No complaint on behalf of Muslim qadis and other officials, made in places subject to the jurisdiction of the patriarch and intended to accuse a metropolitan, archbishop or bishop in order to deprive him of his place and expel him, is not taken into account unless it has first been subject to investigation and approval by the patriarch. The Sultan's berats make the patriarch and bishops, as it were, civil rulers. According to the Berats, a person “able to govern, oversee and hold in his hands his fellow tribesmen throughout the entire length of the glorious empire” should be elected to the patriarchate. Everything relating to the governance of the Greek nation throughout the entire empire should fall within the competence of the patriarchal see and the Synod. All Christians, both higher and lower class, in all matters that are subject to the competence of the bishop, must turn to him for permission and not resist his sentences. Here, of course, we are talking about the religious affairs of Greek Christians. But under the concept of religious life it is not difficult to subsume a lot in Christian society, and therefore it is natural that the area of ​​episcopal analysis of legal cases between Christians has expanded significantly. Even in the Byzantine Empire, with the consent of the litigants, bishops could end litigation through arbitration. The episcopal court also had the character of an arbitration court in Turkish times, but in fact this court is not much different from a civil-criminal court. Yes, Christians both respect and value the bishop’s court, preferring it to an external legal civil court. True, Turkish justice must judge the Greeks according to their laws, but it is clear that Turkish judges do not always do this, and often cannot do so due to their ignorance. In addition, in the Turkish court 10% of the amount of the claim is collected, but in the bishop's court this is not the case. And the bishops themselves, remembering the words of the Apostle Paul (see: 1 Cor. 6:1-6), instructed their flock in the sense that they should not go to court before non-believers when there is their own court, a Christian one. The judicial activity of the hierarchy was and is very significant. The patriarchal or episcopal court took place solemnly. We don’t know whether this is practiced now, but it is known that before, if the patriarch or bishop did not find enough specific data to pronounce a certain sentence, then the hierarch-judge on the nearest holiday during the service would announce: does any Christian know anything about a well-known legal case; such a person must declare to the court what he knows, under pain of excommunication 29 . Now the connection between the hierarchy and the people and its influence on them becomes quite clear. After all, what we noted as a feature of the church life of the Orthodox East was also in Ancient Rus', and then the hierarchy was close to the people, connected with them by numerous vital threads and was authority for them. After all, faith cannot only be an accessory to life, it must and can only be life itself. The artificial separation of civil life and church life is deadly for both. Rus' has taken this path of artificial, unnatural and violent separation of what God united since the time of Peter I 30. The Greek Church has not yet experienced this separation, and therefore the hierarchs there are of great importance in life. Bishops are consulted there in matters of inheritance, in matters of guardianship, even purchase and sale. Bishops are advisers and protectors of their flock. Researchers of the fate of the Greek people have different opinions about the peculiarities of the church life of Christians in Turkey. They find that the Greek Church under the rule of the Turks resembles an ecclesiastical state. The body of the Greek Church is recognized by the Porte as a kind of ecclesiastical state located within the Ottoman Empire (Herzberg). The Greek Church and its hierarchy constitute, as it were, a kind of state within a state: one region fits into another, without merging or mixing. In this case, says Prof. A.P. Lebedev, the Greek Church is like the Papal Church, which does not identify itself with those states and peoples among which its representatives operate 31. Of course, this similarity, if it exists, is rather external. The Church of Constantinople was also given the freedom to choose a patriarch. Half a century ago, the procedure for electing a patriarch was significantly changed. In 1858, such a project for electing a patriarch was drawn up. Upon the death of the patriarch, the locum tenens invites all diocesan bishops to cast their vote; the three persons receiving a majority of votes are considered candidates; a special institution, called the Church Council and which also consists of secular persons, finally appoints one candidate and proposes him for approval by the Sultan. When this project reached our famous Metropolitan Philaret, he condemned it because, he said, the patriarch elected according to this project would be “a creature of the laity.” The Holy Synod of Constantinople, having learned the opinion of St. Philaret, insisted that the church-people's assembly rework the project. The new charter, in force since 1860, defines this procedure for electing the patriarch. Upon the death of the Patriarch, the Synod elects a locum tenens metropolitan from among the metropolitans located in Constantinople, and notifies the Porto of this. Invitations are sent to the metropolitans of the patriarchate to send their vote within a certain period (41 days). Members of the Synod and other hierarchs staying in Constantinople also add their voices. The laity, who make up a special electoral assembly, also take part in the election. The members of this assembly are as follows: the three most significant officials of the patriarchate, with the logothete at their head, members of the mixed council, the three oldest civil ranks of the 1st and 2nd classes, two colonels and three civil officials, the governor of Samos, three representatives of the Danubian principalities, four of the most famous scientists, five merchants, a banker, ten artisans, two representatives from the parishes of the capital and 28 from various dioceses. This “secular” electoral assembly can nominate candidates on its own behalf. If a candidate is proposed who does not appear on the lists of candidates indicated by the bishops, he is added to the list only when he is accepted by one third of the ecclesiastical members of the assembly. A list of all candidates is presented to the Porte, which can cross out candidates it does not like. When the list of candidates is submitted, then the Synod and the electoral assembly select three candidates by secret ballot. Then only the spiritual members of the assembly, taking the names of the three candidates, go to the church, where, after invoking the Holy Spirit, a successor to the patriarchal throne is elected by secret vote from the three candidates. Metropolitan Philaret expressed this order of election: “The whole matter of election is included in the order of church rules.” Currently, new fashion orders are being established in Turkey. God knows whether the Greek Church will retain its former freedom, or perhaps the Young Turks, who stand for loud words - freedom, equality, fraternity, will prohibit any [manifestation] of the Orthodox faith, as was done in relation to Catholics in enlightened and free France! Let's wait, see and learn something... Recently, the Porte began to look with displeasure at the privileges of the Greek Church, and although these privileges were approved at two congresses: Paris (1856) and Berlin (1878), it is taking decisive steps to limit them. Sultan Abdul-Hamid at one time took a number of measures to place Christians in the unconditional position of raya (that is, cattle) and infidels (that is, dogs). The entire history of the church life of the Patriarchate of Constantinople over the last quarter of a century is filled with the struggle for privileges and for freedom. In 1880, the Turkish Minister of Justice ordered that the approval of inheritances and the consideration of litigation between Christian heirs should be carried out in Turkish courts, and not be the responsibility of bishops. Turkish judges no longer considered the metropolitan's signature on a will sufficient to confirm its authenticity. Misunderstandings arose between the metropolitans and the judges. In 1882, the Turkish Minister of Public Education found two textbooks used in Greek schools harmful in content and direction - a geography textbook and a Christian Catechism compiled by a professor at the University of Athens, Kyriakos. The Minister demanded that henceforth all programs and textbooks, as well as teaching diplomas, be submitted to the Ministry for review and approval. After the vigorous protest of Patriarch Joachim III, a government inspector was nevertheless appointed for Greek schools. Finally, the Porte decided to curtail the rights of the patriarch and bishops, even changing the form of the berat, precisely by excluding from its text the enumeration of privileges that were not only civil, but also ecclesiastical in nature. Such berates were received in October 1882 by Metropolitan Athanasius of Sisania and in February 1883 by Metropolitan Constantius of Kastaria. A long correspondence between the patriarch and the ministers emerged, occupying 151 printed pages in the book of George Papadopoulo. Seeing that Porta was not convinced by theoretical reasoning, Patriarch Joachim III renounced the see on December 9, 1889, left the patriarchate and settled in his own house on the outskirts of the capital. Throughout the Patriarchate of Constantinople, worship fell silent, but a murmur of discontent arose. Porta was taken aback by surprise. They sent to ask the patriarch to serve on the day of the Nativity of Christ, promising to restore the form of the Berats, but the patriarch, not trusting the Turks, did not serve. Porta was forced to yield, but not for long. Seven years later there was again a conflict between the Porte and the Patriarchate when Türkiye allowed the Bulgarians to install Bulgarian bishops in Macedonia. Patriarch Dionysius V decided to protest. He resigned, but this measure turned out to be of little effect. Then the Patriarch and the Synod decided to try an unusual measure: to close all churches in the Patriarchate of Constantinople and in Macedonia. The government opened the churches with the help of the police, but the churches were empty, the clergy did not want to perform divine services, and in home liturgical meetings prayers were offered throughout the empire for the salvation of the universal Church. Marriages were not celebrated, babies were not baptized, and the dead were not buried. The Porte made minor concessions, but the Synod refused any deals or compromises. Meanwhile, excitement and discontent grew more and more. There were demonstrations with major riots. Finally, the Porte was forced to agree to abandon the matter of limiting the privileges of the Church and the hierarchy. On the day of the Nativity of Christ in 1890, all churches opened and divine services were performed. Porta was defeated. The winners rejoiced. The Patriarch solemnly returned to the Patriarchate among the joyful crowd of the Greek people; shouts of “ζήτω!” (“Long live!”) rushed through the streets of the capital, even breaking into churches. Speaking about the church life of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, we cannot ignore the real representative of the Ecumenical Throne - His Holiness, the Greatest Lord, Prince and Bishop, Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome and Ecumenical Patriarch Joachim III, who occupies the patriarchal throne for the second time 32. Patriarch Joachim is an outstanding personality. Joachim III marked his short-lived first patriarchate (1878–1884), in addition to the already described struggle with the Porte, with very energetic and intense activity for the benefit of the Church. At the very beginning of the patriarchate, Joachim III convened a church-people's assembly (έθνοσυνέλευσις) to discuss the issue of the current situation of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and to find measures to improve church, national and public life. The Patriarch read a wonderful report (ύπόμνημα), where he revealed his views on the upcoming reform of church and public life. The Patriarch described those historical conditions and social trends that led to the distortion of the old testaments and shook the ancient foundations of the Church. The matter can be corrected only by everyone honestly and zealously starting to fulfill their church service. The sacred clergy of the Great Church must realize how high their purpose is and how important their religious, social and moral service is for the entire Orthodox world. The laity must understand that it is impossible to transplant someone alien into the fence of the Church, that their immoderate interference in church affairs can only harm the Church. Only joint activity and reasonable assistance can be beneficial, and only under these conditions will the Church acquire glory and greatness. The strength of the Greeks lies in unanimity and cooperation. Both history and modern life are sufficiently convincing of this. The highest clergy must be at the head of the Church, by virtue of its Divine appointment, and therefore the clergy must be placed at the height of its position. A strict and correct selection of persons appointed to episcopal sees is necessary. There is no place for partiality and extraneous considerations. Bishops must be educated and must be distinguished by Orthodox life. In order for bishops to be able to devote themselves entirely to church service and so that, under the influence of need, they do not betray their archpastoral duty, they must be sufficiently provided for. An epitropy (in our opinion, a committee) should be established to oversee the teaching and educational work in various schools of the Patriarchate. The existing main schools should be the subject of special care, and care should be taken to open several schools for the training of rural priests. Representatives of the Church, together with representatives of the monasteries of the Holy Mountain, must streamline the internal life of these monasteries and their property rights. Every effort must be made to preserve the Athos monasteries - these main centers of true monasticism and nurseries of pious contemplative life. The Greek Church and the Greek people must consider it their direct duty to take care of the prosperity of the Athonite monasticism, which has provided such enormous services to the entire Church. It is necessary to streamline the internal life of all monasteries, put the life of the monks in order, and not allow into the monastery people who go there only because they are unfit for life. The parish clergy must be independent of the people in their material support - the slightest dependence of the pastor on his flock leads to many different evils. In the relationship of a priest to parishioners there should be no place for the words “give and receive.” The new patriarch outlined many other reforms in his report. Already from this report one can see what kind of person Patriarch Joachim III is, what his church and social ideals are. Obviously, the patriarch set himself a very lofty goal: to return the Church to those times when almost all everyday affairs, not only church, but also civil, were administered in the Orthodox East only by church authority, when the patriarch was the unlimited representative not only of the Church, but of the entire people, of the entire national life. It is quite understandable that the Turkish government, animated, as we have seen, at the same time by completely opposite aspirations, could not like the bold and frank undertakings of the enlightened and energetic patriarch. The government entered into a struggle with the patriarch and, in any case, slowed down the implementation of the noble ideal church impulses of His Holiness the Patriarch. But the patriarch remained with the same church ideals, and they formed the basis of all his church and social activities. Joachim III did many good deeds for the Church of Constantinople. He provided schools, built new buildings for them, established a patriarchal library, and established a spiritual almshouse for sick and poor bishops and clergy in the Monastery of the Transfiguration on the island of Prote. He set up a printing house and founded the first official journal of the patriarchate “Εκκλησιαστική A λήθεια” (“Church Truth”), which still exists today. He improved the previous ones and established new charitable institutions in Constantinople. He streamlined church services, formed an epitropy that would promote the introduction of Orthodox ancient Byzantine melodies into the church singing of the East, and would expel Western partes singing, contrary to the spirit of Orthodoxy, by all means. This epitropy even published the church singing magazine “Psalter”, and also organized a special church singing school for training hieropsaltists. The Patriarch improved the financial situation of the Church of Constantinople; he knew how to persuade Greek merchants and bankers to make donations for church needs. “During his patriarchate, the ship of the universal Church truly sailed in a golden sea, thanks to the generous and plentiful offerings for its needs from the loving and faithful sons of the Greek people” (Prof. I. I. Sokolov). Many other important church and social undertakings are due to the initiative of Joachim III. It is remarkable that as soon as the selfless patriarch began any business, both means and people immediately appeared. Apparently, all that is needed is the beginning of a good deed and devotion to it, and God will not leave a good deed without His gracious help. The Patriarch is also very disposed towards the Russian Church, for which he was attacked by extreme Greek patriots and Phanariots. In his struggle with the Porte for the independence of the Church, the Patriarch came into conflict with the Holy Synod and the People's Council, and the matter ended with him abdicating the throne on March 30, 1884, kissing the miraculous icon of the All-Blessed in the patriarchal church, visiting the Church of the Life-Giving Spring and leaving for his home in Vaheochoria, where he lived for some time as a private person. At this time, Joachim III was on pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Soon he decided to completely leave the worldly noise and retired to the earthly monastic paradise - to Holy Mount Athos. Joachim III is a monk, first of all, and loves monasticism, and therefore he retired from the confused hustle and bustle of life to his own people, to where the torch of Orthodox monasticism has been burning brightly since time immemorial. At first the patriarch settled in the Iversky Monastery, but soon settled in complete solitude near the Iversky Monastery. Here the famous hierarch spent many years in monastic simplicity, among the beauties of nature, in view of the gentle blue sea, in view of the precious shrines of monasticism, in the feat of prayer and spiritual contemplation. He did not alienate himself from Athonite life; on the contrary, he completely entered into a life that was native and close in spirit to him. And on Athos the patriarch was not left without activity. He contributed a lot to streamlining mutual relations between monasteries. He built the Church of the Transfiguration at the very top of the Holy Mountain, where [he] himself often climbed to perform divine services. The monks on Mount Athos told us many touching things about the life of the patriarch. The Patriarch did not stand out in any way from among the Athonite monks in appearance. Often on foot, in the clothes of a simple monk, he came to the morning service at some monastery. “When you come,” said one hieromonk, “at matins, you will stand in stasidia. A monk is standing nearby. If you take a closer look, it turns out that this is the patriarch. So you stand next to him. And if you are embarrassed, he himself asks you not to pay attention to his presence.” He stood through the longest Athos services until the end. He lived an unusually simple life. “The patriarch rode around Mount Athos on a simple mule, not shielding himself from the sun in any way. You’ll meet and you won’t know who he is.” In general, we noticed that the Athonite monks cannot forget Patriarch Joachim III and always remember him with love. Their highest praise for a hierarch is to compare him with Joachim. Among the many flattering praises of our Eminence Rector, the highest praise on the lips of the monks was precisely the comparison of him with the patriarch for his feat of prayer and endurance during the difficult journey across the Holy Mountain. Many pilgrims considered it their duty to visit the famous hierarch in his monastic solitude. In 1900, students from our academy also visited the patriarch. The hermit patriarch, as they themselves testify, made an irresistible impression on them with his great fortitude and representative appearance. “His image,” our pilgrims wrote, “will never be erased from our memory, causing comparison with the ancient great ascetics” 33. It is quite natural that the best sons of the Greek Church did not forget their hierarch. The patriarch aroused enthusiasm in many; many had feelings of such deep respect and reverence for him that one Greek writer calls this attitude towards the beloved patriarch man-worship (άνθρωπολατρεία). Joachim III deserved such love due to the high qualities of his soul. This is how Prof. characterizes him. I. I. Sokolov: “This is a noble man, with a great mind, energetic, a lover of science and knowledge, non-covetous, independent, courageous, very courteous, simple, very eloquent, giving his speech such an amazing persuasiveness that captivates everyone and makes them agree with him. And from the outside, Patriarch Joachim is very handsome. He is somewhat plump, tall, has a wide forehead, black eyes that look cheerfully and give his face an expression of calm cheerfulness, a beard covered with silver and white hair. He gives the greatest spiritual pleasure to those present in the church through his performance of divine services. His majestic standing on the pulpit, loud voice, pale face, reverent utterance of exclamations and prayerful mood dispose everyone to demonstrate true and sincere piety" 34 . Patriarch Joachim is distinguished from among the eastern hierarchs by church historical science. Greek scientists Manuel Gideon and prof. speak of him with praise. University of Athens Diomidis Kyriakos, as well as Russian professors I. E. Troitsky and A. P. Lebedev. They say truth always triumphs. This is not an aphorism. The Patriarch lived on Mount Athos, but in the Church of Constantinople many wanted to see him again on the patriarchal throne. Every time the election of a patriarch took place, Joachim was also nominated, even when his successor was elected, but the Porte constantly crossed him out from the list of candidates submitted to it; she saw in him a zealous hierarch who, more than anyone else, could stand for the rights of the Orthodox Church if the government decided to make any attempt on these rights. Joachim's candidacy was put forward during the election of patriarchs in other Patriarchates, for example in Alexandria in 1899. Finally, on May 25, 1901, after the deposition of Patriarch Constantine V, Joachim III was again elected to the See of John Chrysostom. During the election, the unanimity with which the Church of Constantinople longed to have His Holiness Joachim as its primate was revealed. Of the 87 voters, 83 voted for Joachim, and he was elected unanimously by the metropolitans. For a long time Constantinople has not seen such spiritual enthusiasm that gripped the inhabitants at the news of the election of Joachim. This news was greeted with great delight by everyone present in the church. There was a unanimous “ζήτω!”, deputies hugged each other, secular representatives kissed the hands of the metropolitans. A whole storm of popular enthusiasm arose on the street. Strangers conveyed their feelings of joy to each other, many kissed each other as if on Easter. Orthodox residents of Constantinople decorated their houses with flowers and flags, and hung portraits of their beloved hierarch among the greenery and flowers. The reception that the Patriarch received from his flock when he arrived from Mount Athos was something incredible. As soon as the steamship "Crete" approached the Bosphorus, it was surrounded by numerous ships, boats, and boats. There are whole masses of people everywhere. Enthusiastic cries of “ζήτω!” are heard throughout the Bosphorus. in honor of the patriarch. On June 11, the patriarch had a solemn audience with the Sultan and his solemn accession to the patriarchal throne (ένθρόνισις). The people's delight here is beyond description. There is something especially touching about this election. The thought rushes somewhere into the depths of the hoary centuries, when the Churches of God did not know our contemporary discord and divisions between the people and the clergy, bishops and clergy, monasticism and the white clergy, there was, in a word, all that about which our press shouts so much and with such fire of “sacred” empty indignation, which, of course, has nothing to do with the Church of God, which only wants reckless blasphemy of the entire Church. The Church is being reduced to a mere human organization. People who have not seen and do not understand in their hearts anything except political intrigues and scandals, the struggle of petty prides and all sorts of charlatanism, think that in the Church there are only the same petty empty affairs. But when genuine church life begins to flow in full swing, how pitiful, how ugly and caricatured all secular so-called life becomes! No, whoever has tasted the sweet will not want the bitter. Whoever understands the beauty of church life will not be seduced by the brilliance of secular worldly life, the brilliance of a rotten place in the darkness. Various “ungodly bodies” are furiously crying out that monks are not needed in episcopal sees. But a monk has been living on Mount Athos for 12 years. He was chosen as a patriarch - all of Constantinople rejoices, steamships follow him, they cannot live without a monk, and he will not hide from thirsty people even on Athos. The Spirit of God, living in the Church and in all church people, will indicate a husband pleasing to God. The life of our contemporary Ecumenical Patriarch is significant. We cannot do anything better now than to cite an inspired page from the letter of one Russian saint to Patriarch Joachim regarding his return to the Patriarchal throne of Constantinople. “We have waited, as it were, for the return of those ancient times dear to the Christian heart, when the flock was looking for a teacher of a holy man and knew how to find him in distant deserts, when the hierarchs of the Churches knew nothing except the general salvation of souls, and, being in body on earth, did not leave Heaven with their minds; when, alien to any earthly calculation and fear, they calmly walked for the truth into exile and death and, praying for people, cried out with Moses: Forgive them their sin, and if not, then blot me out of Your book (Exod. 32:32). We thought with sadness that those times had passed forever, but now humble holiness is exalted again, Athanasius triumphantly returns to Alexandria, the church of Anastasia resounds again with the word of the god-speaking Gregory, Chrysostom has triumphed over the mental Eudoxia, and the jubilant flock kisses the edges of his hermit tunic. The sacred capital is again enriched from the distant desert, but the Athos desert is not impoverished, because the spirit of the saint and the beauty of the universal Church still remains alien from the world and what is in the world, and still kisses the sacred heights of Athos, ascending from them to the heights of the Heavenly thrones in the tender praise of the Redeemer and in fiery prayer for the well-being of the Saints of God Churches and the union of all. There the holy Angels, the guardians of the Churches, rejoice, here people pray in gratitude, seeing the holy hermit at the top of the church thrones, and in the distance one can hear the plaintive cry of the tempting demons, cast into Tartarus by the saint's prayer and driven far away from the Church, as once the second Athanasius, that adamant of Mount Athos, drove them from his monastery crying: “O woe, he beats us.” Athanasius with his prayer!” This is the current primate of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, our church founder. And I would like to end the speech about him with the words of the same greeting: "May your bishop's power be multiplied, and may your episcopal power be adorned! Will your reign be long-lasting and rich in external glory - then it will spiritually enrich the universe, like the reign of the Great Basil, for in your glory you will teach the conquering human race faith, humility and abstinence. Will your reign be full of sorrows and obstacles to external transformations, but then, like Theodore the Studite, as a voluntary martyr, you will enrich our spirit with the example of the boldness of confession and for a long time you will increase people’s trust in Christ and contempt for external goods. You will again glorify the Holy Church and return the time of Councils, the time of miracles, the time of people’s oblivion of earthly barriers and the time of their common unity in the universal Church.” The Greek Metropolitan Paisios Ligarides said: “If I were asked: what are the pillars of the Church and the state, I would answer: firstly, schools, secondly, schools and, thirdly, schools.” In fact, many share this view. And therefore it is quite natural that if fluctuations are noticeable in both the Church and the state, then this is a clear sign that the pillars have rotted. Everyone's eyes turn to the school. The question of theological school has been on the agenda for many, many years. Recently, people have started talking about him at an accelerated pace and with heightened feelings. Anyone who has observed church and social life in recent years has, we hope, heard so much about theological school that, as they say, his head has gone spinning. Indeed, we haven’t heard or read anything! One writes that in a theological school there should be exclusively secular persons as heads and teachers; Even in a theological academy it is preferable for a secular person to be the rector. Others recommended absolutely wild measures for the religious and moral education of spiritual youth: stop attending divine services, not serve the Presanctified Liturgies, never read prayers - why force them to pray? We need freedom! Instead of all this, allow and encourage visiting theaters, balls, and teach dancing. In the sciences it was also recommended not to bother pupils with the study of “scholasticism”, and scholasticism is, of course, the name given to all theological science and all church knowledge, without which one can hardly be an Orthodox layman, not to mention the clergy. But Russian people passionately love radical thoughts and words, and therefore to this day there are people who are dissatisfied with the theological school because it has not yet thrown out everything spiritual from its everyday life. Naturally, the situation of theological schools in the Orthodox East is extremely interesting and important for us at the present time. The educational system of the Greek theological school is also important because, as will be seen from what follows, it was created not without the influence of our famous Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow. Among the many projects of transformation of the theological school, it does not hurt to look at the project of the famous saint, carried out in the Patriarchate of Constantinople. A typical Greek theological school should be recognized as the school on Fr. Halki, near Constantinople; this is what we will keep in mind; other schools are similar to Khalka. But first let's make a few preliminary remarks. In the Orthodox East there is no spiritual class in our sense of the word. All degrees of hierarchy are available to all people without distinction of their social status. Anyone who can read, write and sing from the church music book, and has completed a course at least in a public school or gymnasium, can join the church clergy, become a deacon and a priest; maybe, if he has talents and a morally high way of life, he can become a hierarch. On the other hand, the village clergy, who are very poorly provided for materially, have children who are not only not members of the clergy, but also illiterate and completely illiterate; such people earn their living through hard physical labor; these are “argats” - laborers or “khamals” - carriers of heavy objects, like our “hookmen” or Caucasian “mushi” 35. In the East there is no such theological school that would be exclusively intended for the children of the clergy. There is a church school there, because it trains only ministers of the Church. The island of Halki with the Theological School visible at the top. An hour and a half boat ride from Constantinople, in the Sea of ​​Marmara, lies the island of Khalki. The island has a wonderful view from the sea. Three mountain peaks, separated by valleys, rise to the sky. Numerous dachas and houses are scattered picturesquely across the plateau. From the north and west the shores fall vertically into the sea, and there is no access to them here. The monastery of St. Spyridon of Trimythous is nestled near the shore. On the rocky steep bank you can see the ancient monastery of St. George. At the other end is the Monastery of the Mother of God, and in it there is a commercial school (in a monastery!). There is also a Turkish military school on the island. On this island is the famous Khalkin theological school of the great Church of Christ. Obviously, in Constantinople they prefer to locate schools away from the noise of the city and from the temptations of the capital. Halki is called the Oxford of Constantinople. Although the island is densely populated, the school occupies a separate hill and is completely secluded. She, like an eagle's nest, whitens on the top of the rock. Already the difficult climb up the mountain inspired one traveler with such beautiful thoughts: “Whoever loves to contemplate can see in such a rise a symbolic image of that invisible labor with which a Christian theologian ascends the mental mountain of possibly accurate and complete knowledge of God, special labor in such moments when the life of some passion tires the moral strength of a pious worker. Thus, the Kingdom of God is in need and the needy delights it (Matthew 11:12).” From the top of the hill there is a stunning view of the neighboring islands, Constantinople, and the ever-interesting and attractive sea. It’s not for nothing that the mountain itself is sometimes called “theater.” This is where the theological school is located; she stands in the middle of the forest. Its inhabitants use mountain, sea, and forest air at the same time. What else do you need? Even in ancient times, the famous Patriarch Photius (9th century) founded the Holy Trinity Monastery here. Now only a small church remains from the monastery. The Khalka school is governed by a charter drawn up under Patriarch Gregory VI in 1867. The earliest charter of the Khalkin school was, among other things, reviewed by Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow, who gave the following review of it: “The organization of the school is unenviable, the management of the school is not very worthy of imitation, the articles on teaching are scanty, but the charter contains remarkable rules regarding piety, morality, deanery, and economy.” The comments of the wise saint were accepted with gratitude when drawing up the current charter. We consider it our duty to introduce the reader to this charter. The school is run by a special committee of bishops - an ephoria, elected by the patriarch and the Synod. The school is managed by the rector (scholararch), who reports to the ephoria, and through it to the patriarch and the Synod. A scholararch is usually an archimandrite, but there are also bishops and even metropolitans who are scholararchs. The current scholar is a metropolitan, a candidate of our academy. Teachers are appointed by the ephoria by agreement with the scholar and approved by the patriarch and the Synod. Teachers are in holy orders. Pupils must be at least 18 years old and not older than 22, however, those who have completed a gymnasium course are accepted up to 25 years of age. Only those who present a certificate, signed by the bishop, of good morals and behavior are accepted into the school. Each pupil must have one of the bishops as a guarantor that he will fulfill with all accuracy all the duties assigned by the charter to the students of the school, and also that upon reaching the age determined by the church canons, he will take holy orders. If a student leaves the school before completing the course or, upon completion, does not take holy orders upon reaching canonical age, then his guarantor must contribute 15 Turkish liras (120 rubles) for each year of study. However, if the student, although not immediately, nevertheless takes holy orders, his guarantor receives the fine back. The school is supported by annual contributions from the Ecumenical Patriarch, bishops of the Ecumenical Throne and voluntary donations from Christians who are lovers of science. Students pay for maintenance, especially since, according to prof. A. A. Dmitrievsky, our famous expert on the Orthodox East, “the contingent of pupils consists mostly of children of secular persons, financially secure, pupils and relatives of diocesan bishops, novices or dokims of wealthy abbots, epitropes and the like, influential persons in the states of the Athos monasteries” 36. The following sciences are taught at the school: hermeneutics (interpretation of Holy Scripture), church history, dogmatic and moral theology, patrolology, Jewish archeology, pastoral theology, homiletics and catechism, liturgy, church law, anthropology, psychology, logic, ethics, history of philosophy, Greek and Latin languages, rhetoric, arithmetic, algebra, geometry, mathematical geography, history, languages: Russian, Bulgarian, Turkish and French, music theory and singing. The school course is seven years; in high school theological subjects predominate. When studying classical languages, students also become acquainted with church writers. Sermons for seventh grade students are delivered in the church in the presence of students and teachers. Speaking about educational life at school, one cannot fail to say at least a few words about exams. Exams at school are particularly solemn. Often the entire Holy Synod, headed by the Patriarch, is present at the final exams. The exam takes the form of an interview: each teacher offers the examinee various questions from each theological science. Then a debate takes place: the examinee defends his essay. Each of those completing the course, a month before the exams, is obliged to submit to the scholar an essay on a theological topic chosen by himself, but approved by the scholar. The essay must be at least a printed page (16 pages). It is this essay that the examinee must defend. Points are not used in school, and the value of success is determined by the words: decent, good, excellent 37 . A diploma of completion of the course is issued only to those who have holy orders, of course, not in a married state, but in a monastic state. Those who complete the course are called “didaskals of Orthodox Christian theology,” which can even be translated as “master of theology.” Of course, the title corresponds too little to reality. “Didascal of Orthodox Christian Theology” essentially corresponds more to our somewhat lower master’s degree, which is called “student of theological seminary.” But we are much more interested in the other side of the structure of the Khalkin school - its educational system. The external structure, the order of life in the Khalkin school is completely monastic, or rather monastic. The day begins at 5 o'clock in the morning, when all students must get up. Matins is celebrated immediately, and students are required to attend divine services every day. After breakfast, from 8 to 12 o'clock, lessons. Lunch and rest until 2 hours. From 2 to 4 there are classes again. At half past five o'clock Vespers, after which they prepare their homework. At 8 o'clock dinner and compline. Every Sunday, the scholar and other teachers take turns delivering teachings in the school church during the service. Both teachers and students come to the service in full, singing and reading. Pupils are confessed and receive the Holy Mysteries at least four times a year: on the Day of the Nativity of Christ, on Easter, on the Feast of the Holy Apostles (June 30) and on Assumption Day. The meals shared between teachers and students are very modest. During meals at a special pulpit, pupils take turns reading mainly the works of St. John Chrysostom. The rector and teachers dine at the same table. Before the start of the meal, the meal is blessed by the rector, and in his absence by the senior teacher. Pupils go for a walk at the same time and all together twice a day; walks take place just along the slope of a hill covered with tropical vegetation, under the supervision of special guards. Of course, no “entertainment” is afforded to those who must always be self-assembled. There are no musical instruments in the school, which, as everyone reliably knows, were invented by the closest descendant of Cain - Jubal (see: Gen. 4:21). Females are not allowed within gunshot of the school. A pupil can have his own books for reading, but books that diverge from the requirements of piety and good morality, as well as those that are contrary to the state structure of the country, are certainly prohibited. We are not talking about smoking tobacco and drinking alcoholic beverages. Appearing to the scholar, the students, before beginning their conversation with him, bow to the ground (“throwing”) and kiss his hand. The same thing happens at the end of the conversation. Students are taught to be truthful in their dealings with everyone. “Disciples should treat each other as brother to brother.” Discords, parties, secret gatherings are, of course, completely unknown. None of the students has the right to arbitrarily make any comments to anyone, even to the very last servant. It is quite clear that, in accordance with the entire structure of school life, the pupils do not wear indecent and for all Orthodox Christians the clothes of our “spiritual” (?!!) youth, who, due to incomprehensible fates unknown to whose will, are dressed in paramilitary uniforms with guards buttons and arouse great surprise even among Western people, as was the case in 1908 at the Moscow Academy under visit by the English Bishop Ingram. No, the students of the Khalkin Theological School are dressed in the only clothes appropriate for a spiritual youth. Their costume consists of a cassock, belted with a black leather belt, and a short duckweed. On their heads they wear a low kamilavka (skufa), under which they match their long hair, according to Eastern custom. They carry a rosary in their hands. They are not afraid, therefore, to be spiritual on the outside; they are not ashamed of their future service, which is what our “spiritual” young men are accustomed to. When you imagine the structure of the Khalkin theological school, you involuntarily begin to envy. How clearly the goals are set there and how directly they are moving towards their implementation! Anyone who wants to be a shepherd of the Church has a real spiritual school in the East, and this school does not chase three birds with one stone, like ours. Who entered the theological school, why and why should he wander through the wild desert of secular life, secular interests and habits? We want to serve both God and the world with one school (called spiritual). Nothing works out, because the Apostle James said: Whoever wants to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God (James 4:4). For our schools, a system similar to Khalkin’s is really just a sweet dream, every minute breaking into an unsightly reality? Let it not be... It was not in vain that the greatest saint of the 19th century, Metropolitan Philaret, said: “The Khalki charter contains remarkable rules regarding piety, morality and deanery.” And prof. A.P. Lebedev, who is difficult to suspect of “monastic”, “clerical”, “Jesuit” and similar tendencies, adds: “Only he will not agree with the great saint in this case, whose moral sense is dulled and perverted” 38. Khalki school is a church school. There is no temporary shelter for people who are strangers and even hostile to the Church. It is only for those who want to give their lives to the Church alone. True, it also happens that a person who graduates from school takes off his duckweed and kamilavka, cuts his hair and enters the University of Athens to study at various faculties. But these are exceptions, and such people do not receive any diploma. Most of the school's students work with honor in the service of the Orthodox Church. It was not in vain that Patriarch Anthimus VII said in 1896 that the Khalkin School was “a life-giving source from which streams of the teachings of the Divine and impeccable faith flowed abundantly to the entire Orthodox people and from which a worthy competition line of Levites drank and in turn gave water to those who were thirsty with the Divine teachings of the sacred gospel.” Before us lies a list of 342 graduates of the Khalkin school course before 1899. And here we see whole rows of names with additions: μοναχός, μοναχός, ίερομοναχός, ίερομοναχός, διάκονος, διάκονος, etc. – 225 deacons alone (that is, hierodeacons, because all are unmarried)! And below, in the notes, you see: μητροπολίτης, μητροπολίτης, α ̉ ρχιεπίσκοπος, ε ̉ πίσκοπος, etc. There are also patriarchs (four) 39 . And if you pick up at least the lists of those who completed the course of the Moscow Theological Academy, it’s rare, not even on every page, that you see a gratifying note: “there is a name in monasticism.” Otherwise all the names mean nothing! First and last name, first and last name! And what these names mean for the Church of God is unknown! This is how the great Church of Constantinople resolves the issue of a theological school. There they understood that the upbringing of a pastor is possible and should take place not in a secular worldly environment with plays, ballets, theaters, masquerades, officer uniforms, parliamentary self-government, but in a church and monastic environment with its services, pious reflections, deeds, spiritual reading, and general brotherly love. What kind of pastoral virtues can the students of our theological schools really learn if they are often afraid and ashamed to put on a surplice, carry a candle during a service, or say a sermon, indignantly reject spiritual clothing, and wear strange-looking secular clothing with pleasure, try to resemble the clergy as little as possible, so as not to be recognized as “revelers.” “If only,” writes Prof. A.P. Lebedev, - by some magic transfer the students of any of our academies to the locked fence of the Khalkin school, then no one in the world would assure them that they were in the so-called “school of the great Church”, and not in a great prison. But we are not Greeks, and we are not Greeks. They, who look to the East, have many things that are different from us, who direct their gaze more to the West” 40. The trouble, however, is that on the issue of theological school we do not even look to the West; after all, even there the theological school is not class-based, but church-based 41 . We, Orthodox Russian people, have created a spiritual school that neither the East nor the West knows, from which we ourselves do not know how to get rid of. Part 8. From Constantinople to Athos How quickly the hour of our too-premature departure from Constantinople came! Athonite monks - may the Lord God bless and reward them! – they took us to the pier, put us in the boats, and we headed to our “Lazarev” standing nearby. Black, tanned boatmen leisurely took us to the ship - as if they did not want to part with us. The boats slowly moved forward, smoothly swaying on the transparent waves of the Golden Horn. Our eyes were riveted on the indescribable panorama of the glorious city that opened before us again... But now we are already on the ship and waiting for its departure. The ship has unloaded and is ready to sail. The composition of passengers changed noticeably, many Turks and other various Eastern people appeared. Vendors of all sorts of local products hang around the deck. Sellers of Turkish delight and other oriental various sweets, up to and including toasted nuts, have an advantage. Sellers pay a significant share of their favorable attention to us, as tourists, although, one must think, we ourselves were not so interesting to them. The already mentioned seller of albums with views of Constantinople paid us especially much attention. Although the seller was wearing a fez, we could easily recognize him as a Jew. A brisk little Jew who spoke Russian (mainly, of course, commercial phrases) relentlessly pushed his albums on us, assuring us that he had the last album left, which is why he was selling it so cheaply: why would anyone want to take it back to shore? But as soon as one of us bought this “last” album, the “even last” one immediately appeared from under the seller’s counter; it was followed by the “most recent” one, etc. There were enough such “last” albums from the nosy seller for almost all of us. We were amazed at the spaciousness of the Jewish floor, and each new “last” album was greeted with friendly, cheerful laughter and almost applause. But this, of course, did not bother the merchant at all. In the last minutes of our ship's stay, the price of the albums fell lower and lower, so that those who had bought the albums earlier had to repent of their haste. The Jew, carried away by the brisk trade, barely had time to jump into the boat when the steamer had already begun to depart. The steamship's propeller began to seethe again, and again we set out to sea from a quiet pier. Our gaze, of course, is entirely directed towards Constantinople. I wanted to forever imprint this wondrous picture in my soul. And this picture looked different in the new evening light. In the morning, Constantinople gave the impression of an old man waking up, and in the evening some gloomy shadows appeared in his picture, and the city looked like a thoughtful old man, dark wrinkles running across his face. The evening panorama of Constantinople is also beautiful, and it’s not for us to describe it... The thought, saturated with the overwhelming impressions of the day, worked, the imagination painted pictures, supplemented reality with aspirations and hidden desires. I thought... Here Constantinople is already the capital of the Orthodox world. Hundreds of churches of God rise in all its ends. The setting sun plays brightly on the golden domes of Constantinople churches. In the clear, serene blue sky, there, high above the city, gilded crosses glow dazzlingly, like stars in the sky, like heavenly lights. Saint Sophia is burning with a whole golden flame. Tomorrow is a holiday, and now they should start the all-night vigil. And then, from the direction of Hagia Sophia, a “boom” of a huge bell, ten thousand pounds in size, swept across the entire Golden Horn, throughout the Bosphorus. The thick octave of the bell of Hagia Sophia freezes in the evening air. The second strike was joined by dozens of brass voices. In the air above the waters of the sea there hung, as it were, a whole sea of ​​sounds of various heights, tones and strengths. These sounds rush from everywhere, merge together and rush, intertwining with each other, to the high heavens as a grateful tribute to God for all the incomparable beauty of the world He created. The bell ringing ended, the ringing began - the same ringing as in Moscow, as in the Lavra of St. Sergius. My God! It seems that Heaven itself has descended to earth. Not the stones, but even the copper spoke to the glory of God! There were even more sounds. The skillful ringing of Hagia Sophia with its “great campaigns” dominates everything. From the Bosphorus comes the ringing sound from the outskirts of the city. There are also several monasteries located there, and they call there. From distant Scutari, a cheerful ringing can also be heard across the strait, and Asia merges with Europe in the service of God. If you listen, you hear ringing from the Princes’ Islands. From there comes the ringing from the bell tower of the Higher Theological School; there is also a beautiful church and ringing bells. This is how the capital of the Orthodox world celebrates the holiday. Imagine, reader, this picture! Imagine that you are sailing on a small boat at this very time to the middle of the strait. What can you feel in this case? As soon as I imagine this picture, my eyes fill with tears of tenderness and delight. The heart skips a beat at the idea of ​​such glory and splendor of God in the place of the present “Turetchina”. And what if it weren’t just an imaginary picture! If only I could see this in reality... I could immediately read “Now You Let Go” and die peacefully, because my eyes would see the glory of the new Israel, the Orthodox world. Why is all this just a dream? But then a sharp ship whistle boldly shatters your dream. You look up. No golden domes are visible. No ringing can be heard. The crescents also shine somehow less brightly. It’s a pity that the longed-for dream was broken... It’s a pity that this beauty of the city and the sea stands without a crown. And I really want to see the dear Orthodox church crown over everything beautiful and glorious in God’s world. Farewell, Constantinople! We are now going to where the Orthodox soul can be satisfied, where nothing will shatter our dreams, but everything, on the contrary, will elevate the soul to the Heavenly heights of the Mountain Worlds, to the glorious and brilliant splendor of God’s Throne. We are going to Holy Mount Athos... The ship turns sharply past the small peninsula on which Istanbul is located. We involuntarily recall the word of the Apostle James: Behold, even the ships of the great, and imprisoned by the cruel winds, turn into a small breadwinner, even as the desire of the ruler desires (James 3:4). The steamer goes around the peninsula. Ildyz-Kiosk can be seen among the greenery. Just on the seashore some walls are white. They say that this is the most terrible Turkish prison, similar to our Petropavlovsk prison. Someone tells various horror stories about this prison, and it becomes creepy to look at it. Hagia Sophia is hidden from view. The steamer quickly passes the small strait between Istanbul and Scutari. For the first time we enter the waters of the ancient Propontis, the Sea of ​​Marmara. The sea is truly marble. The color of its water is incomparable. Here you are especially convinced that our Russian folk expression “blue sea” is not just a poetic metaphor, which in reality can and often corresponds to a sea that is muddy, dirty yellow, gray, and gloomy. Let's admire the sea again. Again it catches up with a whole swarm of wonderful dreams and dreams. But the eyes are still looking for the shores and on the shores they are looking for those places that you know so much about and that you long to see. -Where is Chalcedon? Gentlemen, where is Chalcedon? No, you cannot find Chalcedon on your own. Knowledgeable people point out a bunch of white cubic houses on the Asian coast. Now this village is called Kadikzhoy. So this is where the holy fathers gathered for the Fourth Ecumenical Council!.. The fanatical Dioscorus “struggled” there, but Orthodoxy triumphed even over the fanatics. I wanted to see the church of the Holy Martyr Euphemia, to kiss its sacred threshold, through which the feet of the holy fathers of the Council, Emperor Marcian and his wife, Saint Pulcheria, stepped. Yes, the entire theological dogmatic church thought of the 5th century, which revolved around the doctrine of Christ the Savior, is in one way or another connected with Chalcedon. It was here that the most dear truth for humanity was affirmed for all eternity: in Christ, human nature was unfused and inseparably united with the Divine. “The Passionless One (Christ) united to Himself the impoverished creation,” as the Holy Church sings at Matins on Holy Thursday. You turn your gaze to the European shore. The historical San Stefano is indicated there. How close our troops were to the Turkish capital! The world is completely concluded under the walls of Constantinople. How the immortal word to the ancient Oleg, put by the poet into the mouth of the magician, would be fulfilled: “Your shield is on the gates of Constantinople!” From the ship you can clearly see the wonderful church - a monument to Russian soldiers. And behind us is Istanbul. From the Sea of ​​Marmara it seems like some kind of wonderful island. The wondrous Saint Sophia is again visible in full height. To a traveler sailing from the south, the city immediately reveals itself in almost all its glory. In front of it there are no gloomy shores of the Bosphorus, as at the entrance from the Black Sea, nor do the picturesque but endless suburbs of the capital stretch. The city center, the palace and the Church of the Wisdom of God are immediately visible. Some believe that this was not done without intent. After all, all the people of that distant time, when Constantinople was just being created, approached Constantinople from the south. It is quite natural that it was necessary to give the city the most striking and beautiful view from the south. After all, even in our native Holy Trinity Lavra, the best buildings also face south, towards Moscow, from where most pilgrims approach the monastery. Perhaps this is not in vain and not by chance. And who could approach Constantinople then from the north, from semi-wild Scythia, from the Hyperborean land? Was it worth putting on a charming show for such barbarians? If our distant ancestors flew on their winged boats to Constantinople, it was as enemies, and it was more prudent for them to prepare a gift like “Greek fire” rather than show off the beauty of the city. Many centuries had to pass before such respectable (?) persons as students of the Theological Academy began to arrive from the north. The further we move from Constantinople, the more the view of Istanbul changes. Soon the land disappears - only buildings, palaces and mosques are visible. And it seems as if all these whitening buildings, like in some fairy tale, come straight out of the blue waters of the sea. The buildings of the city began to seem barely noticeable; everything merged into one, as it were, motley carpet. The shores recede into the distance and only a narrow strip, like a frame, surrounds the sea plain. On the left, the Princes' Islands rise in high mountain ranges, but the ship goes quite a distance from them. You can't tell what's there, especially with the naked eye. All the islands merge into one mainland; Only sometimes do straits open between individual islands. From a distance, the islands do not seem to meet the enthusiastic recommendations that each of us has read and heard plenty of. After all, judging by the stories and descriptions, one can imagine the Princes’ Islands as almost an earthly paradise. But from a distance, the forests growing on the islands seem like meadows, the beauties of nature are blurred and even completely unnoticeable. You can't help but feel some kind of disappointment. This is truly where it comes true: seeing, they do not see (Matthew 13:13). And the ship continues to move forward into the open sea. The luxurious evening quickly descended over the darkened waters of the Sea of ​​Marmara, and the early southern night quickly set in. At this time, we remembered those almost “white nights” that we have in Sergievsky Posad in the month of June. As soon as it gets properly dark at eleven o'clock, and if you stay until one o'clock in the morning, you go out into the academic garden - the east is already turning red and brightening, and our incomparable bell tower, going into the heights of heaven, is blushing on the eastern side. And the clock strikes only a quarter past two. Not so in the Sea of ​​Marmara. The sun is quickly setting, and a damp, caressing darkness immediately covers everything around you. Once again we plunged both in thought and body into the enchanting embrace of the southern night. Yes, here at these moments you somehow cannot distinguish between the soul and the body, because you don’t know whether the soul or the body feels the beauty surrounding you. Today is Saturday. We finally decided to serve the all-night vigil at any cost. We set up a table on the upper deck, took out a cross and a Gospel, and lit candles. It’s a pity we didn’t have a bell with us so that we could “strike for the All-Night Vigil” in a very Orthodox way and arrange a real ringing. But even without the gospel, the pilgrims diligently began to gather in the makeshift church. It was touching and gratifying to see how peasant pilgrims gathered from various nooks and crannies of the ship onto our deck. They dressed up, put on cleaner and better clothes, combed their hair. How could it be otherwise: after all, it’s a holiday, a service... We gathered in advance and reverently waited for the beginning of the all-night vigil. Oh, I love that Rus' which, on holiday, still, in the old way, lights a lamp in front of the icons, prays before them and, with the first strike of the bell, hurries to its native and dear parish church! This church does not shine with gold, you can’t hear in it the ugly pretentious and indecent concerts that are now so numerous in our churches, but the souls of those praying sparkle with piety, their eyes burn with zeal and love for God’s church, their hearts glow with holy and pure prayer. I love you, Holy Rus', and I bow to you for your love for God, His holy church, and church holidays! But now another, “cultured” Rus' has been born. As soon as the bell rings for the all-night vigil, she goes to a restaurant to have dinner, and when the great doxology is sung in the churches, she goes to the theater or to a ball, where, in the words of I. T. Pososhkov, “in the ungodly dances she depresses herself so much that she can hardly gather her soul, and, having become so tired, she sleeps even until dinner” 42 . It gets up the next day when good people have long since returned from mass. I don’t want to know this kind of Rus', I don’t like her at all, and I shouldn’t call her Russia! The all-night vigil has begun... You will not forget the all-night vigil on June 21, 1908 for a long time. On the dome of our church, like God’s eyes, bright stars shone in an immense multitude, shimmering with all colors, as if they were alive. Instead of a floor, a dark, mysterious sea swayed beneath us, and there were no walls at all. The priest, Fr. Alexy Rozhdestvensky. The Right Reverend Bishop himself became the head of the crowd. The extraordinary church filled the soul with unprecedented delight. The long-familiar prayers seemed completely new. Involuntarily everyone was overcome with animation. Loud, animated singing rushed over the sides of the ship and disappeared somewhere there, in the darkness of the night. And it seemed as if there, in the waters under the earth, and there, on the mountain in heaven, a solemn all-night vigil was being celebrated. The earthly rejoices in the heavenly, and the heavenly rejoices in the earthly, as it is sung in the akathist to the Most Holy Theotokos. The right hand was raised high with the sign of the cross when the petition was heard: “For His Holiness Patriarch Joachim.” Here it is, universal Orthodoxy, when students of the Moscow Theological Academy joyfully pray for His Holiness the Patriarch of Constantinople! And what did you feel when the servant exclaimed: “For those floating, traveling, the sick, the suffering, the captives, and for their salvation, let us pray to the Lord!” Various “neveglas” condemn Orthodox worship. And how good it is, how modern it is, how it meets all human needs! I thought - here we are sailing, traveling. Now an all-night vigil is being held throughout the entire Orthodox Christian world and prayer is being sent out everywhere for those sailing, traveling and for their salvation. This prayer is offered in Greek, and in Slavic, and in Arabic, and in the language of some Siberian foreigners - and they pray for those sailing and traveling. This means that right now, at this very moment, they are praying for the students of the Moscow Theological Academy, who are also now floating. What a great and saving universal Holy Church of Christ this is! Our worship service brought together almost the entire ship. All the nooks and crannies of the ship were empty. The conversations stopped. Even the infidels who were traveling with us became humble. The ship became unrecognizable. How powerful is the name of God on earth, no matter whose mouth and in what language they pronounce it! Foreigners came to our all-night vigil. I was especially struck by two Turks who stood through our entire service to the end with extraordinary attention and decorum. They involuntarily took my thought back to the times of paganism. It seemed to me that the pagans stood behind Christian services back then and watched everything. Much of what they saw and heard sank deeply into their souls and produced a saving revolution. Oh, if only, I thought, these “pagans” of ours would leave our services with different thoughts and feelings about our God! They served the all-night vigil for a long time and read the akathist beautifully. And I didn’t want to finish, I just wanted to serve all night. The service was very long, so the Greek cassock-bearers did not make it to the end of our all-night vigil. They are not used to long services. The all-night vigil is over. A long line of pilgrims reached out to the bishop to receive his holy blessing. I involuntarily remembered how in good monasteries after the service all the brethren go to receive a blessing from their abbot; so here, too, all the “brothers” received the blessing from our abbot. Yes, Orthodox piety always turns everything into a monastic monastery, even the Lazarev steamship sailing on the Sea of ​​Marmara. So dear is monastic life to the Orthodox soul! You take a closer look at the faces of our random pilgrims. Some kind of feeling of deep joyful satisfaction shone on these faces. Of course! On the ship, in the middle of the sea, we stood at the all-night vigil. We saw our Russian ruler and were honored to receive his holy blessing. Yes, only a pure and humble soul of the people can find joyful spiritual satisfaction in this. Great still is, thank God, our people’s love for the Church of Christ, they firmly believe in their spiritual leaders, they revere the saints. A simple person feels happy if he is privileged to see a bishop and receive his holy blessing. And if the saint says a few kind words, then a good Christian will never forget this. Yes, this is how it should be for everyone. After all, the bishop is the representative of God Himself, in him is the fullness of church grace and all the beauty of church splendor. And one handsome little man stood and spoke to himself: “This is what popovichi means: from a young age they sing in church. See how cleverly they know the entire service without books... And it turns out you can’t live without priests. And he said something else to [himself] for a long, long time... A good peasant. Godly man... The day, unparalleled in its abundance and richness of impressions, made itself felt. As soon as the all-night vigil ended, the legs flatly refused to serve and did not listen to any arguments of reason, but stubbornly repeated their own: “Go to sleep! go to sleep! The tired soul refused to accept new impressions and demanded beneficial rest. Repeating the prayer: “Hear us, O God, our Savior, the hope of all the ends of the earth and those who are in the sea far away; and be merciful, be merciful, O Master, about our sins, and have mercy on us,” repeating this prayer, we departed for the night’s rest. The Right Reverend Bishop, when it was already too late, visited his “diocese,” but this “review of the diocese” was more like how ancient Noah inspected his huge household in a cramped ark. There, clean and unclean animals were probably in the same cramped conditions and, perhaps, with the same comforts as the “diocese” of His Eminence Eudokim, Bishop of Volokolamsk, floating and traveling on the waters of the Sea of ​​Marmara. The “marble” waters gurgled quietly, smoothly and rhythmically behind the walls of the steamer. It was already midnight when we rested in the sweet embrace of Morpheus and plunged from the enchanting sea into an even more enchanting and fantastic sea of ​​dreams. Good night, quiet peace. God's protection over the sleeping earth... ...Above the land, and above the sea, and above our steamship, although inside it, as it were, volcanic forces are working and pushing it forward and forward, pushing it both day and night. The machine does not get tired - it is not allowed to rest until it breaks down... Our peace was short. The dream was rudely interrupted in the most merciless and terrible way. It was barely dawn when the ship approached the entrance to the Dardanelles Strait. This, of course, is not yet a problem. But the trouble arose from the fact that the ship had to stop, otherwise the Turks would have severely punished it. After all, they are the masters here, and for Russians “entry is prohibited” here as “for outsiders.” You need to take a pass from the infidel, and without this pass even an Orthodox ship cannot pass through the narrow strait. To stop the ship, you need to lower the anchor. And as you, indulgent reader, may remember, the anchor chain and all the accessories and devices for lowering the anchor were right under our, so to speak, beds, right next to our feet. Suddenly, a huge sea anchor chain began to rumble “to us sleeping.” Yes, how it rumbled! Truly a hell of a noise. We jumped up from this roar like mad. Before we even had time to dream of anything terrible, we were already awake. But this is not the end of our trials. The chain somehow managed to get stuck, and the anchor did not go to the bottom. The car started working, the machine started knocking - the anchor was being lifted. They raised it... They lowered it again, and again there was a hellish clang and a terrible knock of the chain. And again something got stuck. Yes, they raised and lowered the anchor five times. There’s nothing to talk about about the dream – my whole soul is exhausted. How are the eardrums still intact? Rusty dust from the colossal steamer chain, which was dragged back and forth by machine, filled our entire room. The situation, as you can see, is not particularly pleasant. Many began the new day with words of grumbling and indignation. It was interesting to observe: all you could hear was one of our colleagues grumbling and cursing here and there. If the anchor and the anchor chain had “noble pride,” then they would certainly be offended by the endless, and, moreover, the most poisonous, curses addressed to them and would challenge the scolders to a duel. “Iron, but look how it can upset a person, and an educated one at that,” some said, laughing at their comrades. “Gentlemen,” someone calls, “let’s go up and see the Dardanelles!” - Screw you and your Dardanelles to hell!.. Even if they never existed! They never went to see the Dardanelles, they were offended by them. We limited ourselves to looking out only through the “luminator” (ship window). Not far from the ship you can see a rather monotonous shore. The strait appears to be narrow. Here is the famous town of Gallipoli with the huge production of Gallipoli wooden oil, which in Russia is now so unceremoniously replaced by almost pure kerosene with a screaming inscription: “Gallipolis”. Finally, the steamer lifted its hostile anchor and again set sail along the narrow and long water corridor between Europe and Asia, called the Dardanelles Strait. We calmed down again, although, of course, we could not correct the completely ruined sleep. The sun had already risen high when we climbed up, and also quite high onto the deck. We are already traveling through the waters of the Archipelago 43. What a wonderful day! Clear, sunny. The water is light, light, pale blue. We have never seen such wonderful water. The sea is calm and calm. Although a fresh breeze is blowing, it barely ripples the sea surface. The already bright sea in the distance becomes even paler and completely merges with the blue morning vault of the shining skies. For the life of me, you won’t be able to tell where the sea ends and where the sky begins. The passing clouds look into the transparent waters and are reflected unusually clearly in them. There, in the depths of the sea, it’s like another sky, and it seems that we are sailing between two heavens. The steamer seems to be standing on a huge mirror. You look down and see everything above your head. The light haze that covers the horizon makes the beauty contemplated even more magnificent; it gives it some kind of mystical touch. You look at the splendor of God’s world revealed to your eyes - and your heart either swells so sweetly and sweetly, or overflows with such pure, seemingly unearthly joy. Sometimes I even want to exclaim: why do You, Lord, Creator of heaven and earth, land and sea, why do You reward me so much! Is it really for my sins? For my ugliness, do You show me Your beauty? Where is the end of Your goodness and Your bounties? It seems that the sky and the sea are performing their morning prayer, and it is difficult, impossible even to feel like an outsider here. The sun, the sky, the clouds, the sea, the wind, the students, the priests of God - we all seem to be the closest to each other, the dearest. Various islands are visible on both sides. One is spread out widely with the most bizarre contours of the banks. The other stretches in a narrow stripe. The third rose high above the water surface and descended down to the sea along steep stone cliffs. For the most part, the islands look deserted, completely lifeless and even completely dead. Various travelers whose writings we have read talk too much about these islands. They compare them with what. One with baskets of flowers and greenery floating on the water, the other with groves and gardens flooded with the blue water of the Archipelago. These islands did not make such an impression on us. First of all, they are not green at all, but completely yellow, not affectionate and soft, but stern and gloomy. Only the mountain peaks on them are beautiful, but their beauty is special - austere, majestic. The islands, rather, look like huge piles of gold lying among delicate, blue, flowing turquoise. But what names! Imbros, Lemnos, Samothrace, Thazos. Bizarre tales of ancient poetic Greece crowd into my head at these names. The Thunderer Zeus once quarreled with Hera. She was a grumpy woman! His son Hephaestus, or Vulcan, took his mother’s side. The formidable father was offended, angry, angry, and how he would push his disrespectful son out of his heavenly home. Poor Hephaestus flew. Fell on Lemnos. He was killed painfully, the unfortunate man even broke his leg. He remained lame forever. The poor fellow was received warmly on Lemnos, and he took up blacksmithing. He turned out to be an excellent blacksmith. In the mountains, in dungeons, inside fire-breathing mountains, he started his forges. He built a house for the gods on Olympus. And you can’t count how many different strong things he forged. There was also a forge on Lemnos. Perhaps it was here that Hephaestus forged the scepter for Zeus (he must have been unforgiving!), strong armor for Achilles, a chariot for Helios and other things with which he forever glorified his name and the name of his assistants - the Cyclops. Samothrace... This is where the mysterious cult of the Cabirs, which defies exact science, flourished! This is where the mysteries were no less famous than the Eleusinian ones! Hoary legend says that both Orpheus and Odysseus took initiations into these mysteries. Alexander the Great was dedicated here. And what celebrations there were on this now almost completely lifeless island! But other pictures come to mind. Perhaps, on such a clear day, a small ship cut the waters of the Archipelago, and on this ship was the great Apostle of the Languages, Paul. With a penetrating gaze he looked at the new country for his preaching, at Europe. To the prophetic gaze of the apostle it seemed like a ripe field, and he became its first harvester, in a series of almost countless harvesters. And how many great saints carried these blue waters! They delivered them to the Councils, carried them into exile, returned them to the jubilant flocks, and the sadness of widowhood turned into the joy of meeting the bride and groom, the bishop and the Church. The archipelago is like the central sea of ​​the ancient Christian world. Here every place is dear and rich in memories... The archipelago is like an inland sea of ​​the Christian world. Is there any place where the boats of those who were fishers of men did not pass through its waters (Matthew 4:19)? You can’t help but look at the waves themselves with awe. After all, they were supposed to be sanctified forever by these precious boats. And our ship goes on and on. Through the haze of fog, the outlines of the Holy Mount Athos, long familiar to each of us, are dimly visible. However, the distance to it is still very great. They say we still have to drive five hours. And the soul already longs to see these sacred heights as soon as possible. The pilgrims stand with their faces turned to the Holy Mountain, with their gaze fixed on the Holy Mountain. We strain our eyesight. We take binoculars and telescopes to help - nothing but faint outlines can be made out. The outlines of the Mountain are still so faint and unclear that they merge with the clouds, and it is very difficult to distinguish where the Mountain begins and where the cloud ends. At that moment I remembered picture-riddles, where one image is hidden in another. You look for a long time at the hidden figure with all your eyes, but you still can’t see it. It was the same here: you look at the Holy Mountain, but you don’t see it. They begin to show, and yet you see nothing. It also seemed to me that it was as if some artist had sketched something there in the distant sky and abandoned it. What deep feelings this holy distance with its heights still unknown to us rises from the depths of the soul. The soul is filled with great longing, as if for the city of God, for an earthly paradise. So he is close to us, and so slowly we are approaching him. Nothing can take our eyes away from dear Athos. And I think: will we really be worthy to set foot on his sacred land with our unworthy feet? And the Mountain is getting closer and closer to us. The fog seems to disappear, nothing prevents us from clearly and distinctly distinguishing the outlines of the treasured Mountain. Now Athos stands and towers before us in all its grandeur. The sharp stone peak reaches into the heavenly heights. A light cloud hovers above her. The Mountain stands confidently and powerfully on its wide base, and it seems as if Heaven itself is established on this high pillar. The high, lonely Mountain is like an unshakable eternal beacon for swimmers of the sea of ​​life, raised by misfortunes and storms. Isn’t Athos really the pillar of Heavenly Orthodoxy? Isn’t he a beacon for church Orthodox piety? Yes, a lighthouse and a helm. And monasticism itself, which gave glory to Athos - after all, it is also a pillar, affirmation and leader of the whole world! No matter how much they condemn monasticism, this is still exactly the case and not otherwise. And it is not for any other reason that this is so, but because of the height and purity of the inner ideal of monasticism, because of its self-denial, asceticism, humility, following Christ, because of its highest “Christianity,” because of its even Heavenly quality. At these moments I remember the poems of Svyatogorets. Let the strength fade in prayer, We are not threatened by the darkness of the grave - We are afraid of our sins; We don't waste our lives in balls In noisy toasts and glasses Our speeches are too boring; Poor, sinful, pitiful world! Why don't we honor your idol? In terrible human rage?.. How can we find out, brothers, More beneficial before God?.. In renunciation only strict Maybe like before Lot Modern world (who knows?), It may turn out that it’s worth - Only by strict monasticism!.. We are despicable - thank God! With the most resounding glory of the world: Which of us takes the right path? Oh, look with pure eyes Consider the heavenly path: Against your own will So feast, world, while playing; Disdain us, like the devil, - We'll go to the bliss of paradise Under the cross of sorrows and tears The world will touch us and humble us - Our lot is too despicable; Our modest order is hushed up: In the endless glory of Easter Cry sweet tears Not according to the heart, as well as the light, And insignificant before people! 44 This kind of humility and meekness makes monasticism “a stronghold of the sinful world.” That is why every worldly person rests in a monastery; there is truly human life, but in the world life is dry, heavy and soulless, and it is not entirely human, because a lot of the leaven of the evil one is mixed into it. Athos, by its very position and by its nature, seems to be destined to be a monastic world, an earthly paradise, the consolation of the Orthodox heart. Back in the 14th century, the Byzantine writer Nicephorus Grigora said this about Athos. “Mount Athos is worthy of surprise both because it is distinguished by very well-dissolved air, and because it is decorated with abundant and varied greenery and very generously satisfies the aesthetic sense of its inhabitants. The fragrant smell of flowers emanates from everywhere, as if from a treasury; the purest rays of the sun caress the surface of the Mountain. It is green with various trees, rich in groves and colorful meadows, resounding with the singing of various birds; there swarms of bees fly around the flowers and fill the air with a quiet buzz. All this seems to be woven into one amazing, patterned fabric, delivering pleasure not only in the spring, but at any time and season; all four seasons of the year are combined here into a continuous series of pleasures and delights for man, especially when the morning singing of a nightingale is heard from the middle of the grove, which seems to sing to the Lord along with the monks. The area is irrigated by many sources of natural water: streams quietly and secretly emerge from each other from the bowels of the earth, unite into streams and quietly gurgle, as if they fulfill a special purpose: they provide full opportunity for monks to offer quiet prayers to God. The mountain provides those who wish to lead a heavenly life on earth with great convenience both in terms of peace and food. The sea surrounding the Mountain gives it even more charm and convenience, not allowing it to be completely an island and making it difficult to communicate with the mainland through the narrow isthmus. In a word, signs of virtue are visible everywhere here - both in nature and in the asceticism of the inhabitants.” From ancient times, Mount Athos was chosen as God's special destiny. The beginning of Athonite monasticism goes back so far that science certainly cannot discover it. According to the learned expert on the East, and in particular Athos, His Grace Bishop Porfiry (Uspensky), back in 676, Emperor Constantine Pogonatus gave the Holy Mountain to the monks. It is reliably known that under Emperor Basil the Macedonian (867–886), Athos already belonged to the monks. Just think - for almost one and a half thousand years Mount Athos has been consecrated by monastic deeds! The number of Athonite monks was sometimes very large. What a host of ascetics glorified this Mountain with their day and night prayer works! How, then, is it possible not to call her a Saint? In ancient times, our Slavic ancestors also settled on Athos, who at that time occupied almost the entire Balkan Peninsula. From Mount Athos the tonsure candle of Russian monasticism was lit. From the Mount Athos monasticism shone forth in the Kyiv mountains. Fire, ignited by fire, does not reduce the flame of this fire; so the monasticism of Athos, which gave rise to Russian monasticism, did not fade away. Only monks have lived on Mount Athos for a thousand years. Athonite life, special in all respects, was created - Athonite charters, Athonite services, chants, monastic rules. Infidel Turks have ruled the East for almost five hundred years - Athos still lives in its own way. For him there seems to be no state, social issues, capitalism and the proletariat, international law and many other rights. For Athos there is the Church of God, serving God, saving the soul, fighting sin and other human responsibilities. It is not for nothing that in the old years there was an article about Athos under the title “Monastic Republic” in one secular magazine. Let’s say it’s not a republic, but a special little world, dear to both the monks themselves (we know from direct acquaintance) and the entire Orthodox world. There are no pranks and troubles here, The bellies of cattle are sacrificed here; We hide in a cell as if in heaven; We are sad with a sad bird, But now we are already close to Athos. God! What a Mountain! How insignificant we all are before her. It stands as a centuries-old stronghold 45. Huge gorges, like majestic folds of a mountain giant’s clothing, descend along the slopes of the Mountain to the sea itself. Terrible beauty! And what storms rush to this Mountain. Entire masses of sea water rush into battle with age-old rocks. The sea, as it were, is not content with the limits assigned to it, the boundaries indicated to it - the sea does not want to obey the commandment of God: You will come to this and will not pass, but your waves will be broken within you (Job 38:11). Isn’t it so violent and the waves of the sea of ​​life rush towards all the eternal strongholds of Christian life, which, according to Christ’s promise, even the gates of hell cannot overcome? These furious waves do not hear the word of Christ and eternally beat against the rock of the Church of Christ, wanting to destroy it. But may the sea of ​​life and your sinful waves be crushed within you! Many of the passengers pray, others reverently cross themselves. There someone sang the glorification of the Mother of God. The weak and uncertain voice was joined by several more voices. New voices are joining them. The singing becomes strong and powerful, captivating and captivating almost everyone. Soon almost the entire ship is singing. What a wonderful and stunning picture! The monks traveling with us on the ship point out somewhere the Lavra of St. Athanasius. It is barely visible, but this is the largest, oldest Athonite monastery. The fathers of Athonite monasticism labored there: Athanasius, Peter and others. Our steamer is approaching very close to the high southeastern tip of Athos. This is the harshest part of the Holy Mountain. It’s as if one solid gray stone emerges from the depths of the sea and rises to the heavens. It's even getting creepy. Stone cliffs seem ready to collapse into the sea every minute. And then what will remain of our “Lazarev” and of all of us? “Lazarev” seems like a chip in comparison with the Mountain. Or maybe we should be drowned in the depths of the sea, so that we would not trample with our unworthy feet the sacred heights, fertilized with the tears and sweat of the monks?! We raise our heads up to see the Church of the Transfiguration of the Lord. It is difficult to see him among the stones. It is as if he is already in heaven and appears on his foundation as a small quadrangular stone. The comparison of the Mountain with a lighthouse can be continued. Just as at the top of a lighthouse there is a bright, strong lantern, so from the top of Mount Athos the holy church of God shines on all sides. And who built this church? His Beatitude Patriarch Joachim, during his 15-year stay on Athos. Glory and praise to the most blessed patriarch! Before our eyes, the entire bulk of the Holy Mountain seems to be constantly turning by itself. Every minute more and more new, unexpected mountain views are opening up, striking in their austere beauty. These views are charming and amazing. I can't take my eyes off them. You are imbued with some unprecedented reverence and delight. Here, as if inanimate nature itself, with its menacing appearance, wants to remind you that you are approaching an extraordinary place. And these steep cliffs - don’t they represent that difficult-to-climb mountain of virtues, the Mountain of the Lord, to which the earthly traveler who seeks the Mountain City must climb throughout his life? He must climb rapids and cliffs all the time. He is constantly in danger of falling off and flying down. All his previous labors that he endured while climbing the mountain were in vain. Below, death awaits him in the depths of the sea; it will break on the coastal sharp stones and cliffs. Beware, traveler! Look at Heaven, but don’t look down, otherwise your heart will be confused and hell will swallow you alive. The steamer goes around the Holy Mountain, goes along the Athos Peninsula. A different, even more charming view of Mount Athos immediately opens up for many miles. The entire slope is richly covered with wonderful vegetation, and in the greenery you can see little white monastic monasteries everywhere. Here, at an altitude of more than 150 fathoms, like a swallow’s nest, Karulya clung to the cliff. Only by using ropes can you go down to it through various abysses and rapids. And experienced people have a hard time getting here, and for inexperienced and newbies getting here is almost completely unthinkable. How scary it must be to live here: huge gray rocks hang over your head, below - there, far, far away, the angry sea is noisy, groaning, bubbling and seething. A narrow, small strip of undeveloped land, or rather, blasted and leveled rocks, is the only place for walking and recreation for those living here. Mostly Russian monks live in this harsh and terrible place. You would guess this yourself if no one even told you anything. Everywhere you see wooden log huts with three windows on the front side, with shutters painted in bright colors, with wooden roofs on two slopes. How familiar these huts are to us! It’s as if they were transported here by some unknown force through the air on a magic carpet from our Mother Russia. What strength of character the inhabitants of these cells, our dear brothers, have! I can’t even believe that Russians can live like this. What a feat - to spend entire years almost hopelessly in cells! What heights of spirit, how much selflessness is required for this! Life is spent there in complete silence - all worldly concerns are put aside there. Yes, such a life is not for many. “But,” as Metropolitan Philaret says, “a visit to silence should be desirable for everyone. He who does not abolish himself at least once a day, even for a short time, from all external earthly occupations, cares, addictions, and does not bring his soul into reverent silence before God: he has not yet learned the path of peace for his soul” 46 . How I wanted to “abolish myself” even for a few days here in Karulya, to leave everything and be enriched by silence alone! What a pity that we won’t have to be in Karula. And you shouldn’t come here in a crowd of 40 people. No, you need to come here alone. Perhaps the Lord will someday bring us to live in Karula among its stern silence and stern-looking, but gracious and infinitely affectionate holy inhabitants from the inside. Here the monastery of St. Anna is located on a steep slope. Further on you can see, like islands among the greenery of forests, the monasteries of St. Paul, Dionysiat, Grigoriat. But what is this strange building? Some kind of miracle of construction art. On the cliff of a high cliff rise high, high, almost square walls. It’s like some kind of battle tower stands on a rock. Yes, this is indeed a loophole, a fortress, only against the prince of this world, the spirit of wickedness in high places. This is the Simon-Petersky Monastery. And how many individual cells are scattered throughout the Mountain! The whole Mountain is replete with them. The spirit of solemn silence and contemplative prayer emanates from the entire Holy Mountain. One would like to sing the stichera from the service to all the saints of Athos: “Rejoice in the Lord, holy Athos, the mental Mother of God and the red paradise: behold, in your foothills the ever-blooming and all-fragrant trees have flourished, and in your bountiful and seaside trees, boundless and blessed-leaved trees have grown, bearing immortal fruits of the spirit, the venerable the sanctified and sanctified assembly of all, now presented for praise. Therefore, the hermits and hostels who are in you have gathered, celebrate joyfully, and cry out with gratitude to your Lady and Overseer: I magnify You, the Mother of God, who magnified me, and who gave my child to the heavenly fathers, whose prayers cover their entire lives, and from Your Son they receive great mercy.” How many of these ever-blooming crins are before our eyes, and we can already feel their fragrance! In some places you can see the remains of former buildings, perhaps entire monasteries. These are all visual monuments to the sometimes long-suffering history of the Holy Mountain. Trials were also sent to the Holy Mountain, often difficult, but the Mountain still passed through them. Nothing destroyed the ever-blooming and fragrant krins on it - the monks of God. We believe that the Holy Mountain will stand for centuries. It is impossible to imagine the Orthodox Church without it! Our ship sailed for a long time along the western shore of Athos. It seemed that the shore was very close, but we already knew how easy it is to make a mistake in the sea when determining the distance. It seemed to us that we could reach the shore with our hat; it seemed that you could reach the shore with a stick, but it was almost ten miles away from us. When we sailed near the Holy Mountain, open from the base to the top, all its most hidden corners were visible to us. While traveling along the Mountain itself, everything drowns and hides in gorges and abysses, behind forests. Here we drove, as it were, near a high, high wall, on which various monasteries of the Holy Mountain were located. At this time, I still remembered from my childhood how we memorized various cities, rivers, mountains, etc. using a geographical map on a wall. So here, before our eyes, there was, as it were, a map, only not a paper one, but a real, real one. All this time I don’t even want to look at anything except the wondrous beauties of Athos, which we used to sing about: Now we directly admire these beauties, before our eyes is an earthly paradise. However, I have to ask the reader for forgiveness: I will not have enough time or skill if I tell in detail what I and my comrades felt at the sight of Mount Athos. It seemed that we were sailing to Heaven itself. The soul ascends from the earth; Tears of tenderness well up in my eyes. I want to bow to the ground before the Holy Mountain, bow to all its ascetics, and fall into the dust before them. Finally, the steamer stops opposite the Daphne pier. This name was borrowed from ancient times, from the goddess Daphne. But let’s not talk about the pagan goddess, because it’s disgusting to talk about her here. The boats arrived and we landed on the pier - alas! - into Turkish. The Turkish flag with a crescent also flies on the Holy Mountain. How nice it would be to enter the land of Athos for the first time right in the monastery! More reverence would then be felt upon first touching the holy land. After a [short] wait we settled into two large boats. The boats were tied with ropes to a small steam launch. It was difficult for this boat to carry such a heavy load, and besides, the ripples were quite strong. We moved slowly. Several Athonite monks were traveling with us, who had come to meet the Right Reverend Bishop. There was also a Turk in a fez. It was some customs official who was traveling with the pious intention of looking at our baskets and suitcases, which, however, he still failed to do. With his presence, he clearly emphasized that we were within the Ottoman Empire. We swam in reality “on the blue waves of the ocean.” I wanted to put my hand over the side of the boat into the water to see if it would turn blue. The sea was so brightly colored! The wave, breaking against the side of the boat, turned into some unusually beautiful, white-white, silvery splashes and, falling into the sea, foamed and swirled there for a long time, as if it were some kind of “fizzy” water. You need to be an extraordinary artist and master of the pen to describe the beauty of the water near Athos. You will write many pages, but still you will not write what you see. Lord, how omnipotent You are, and how poor and pitiful we are! We cannot even describe the insignificant sparkle of Your beauty that fell from the heights of Heaven to earth. And even more so to create them. How rightly did those natural scientists act who did not pronounce the name of God without deep reverence, or even pronounced it only with their heads uncovered! A path runs along the nearby shore; several pilgrims wander along it. We forgot to say goodbye properly to Lazarev. Let's look back. How unfortunate he is! Quite small, it is unnoticeable near the Mountain. So insignificant are human deeds compared to the great deeds of God’s omnipotence! Farewell, Lazarev! Happy sailing!.. Exact quote: When he goes around the country, he will increase his cunning (Sir. 34:10). – Approx. ed. Reverend Arseny with students to Palestine (1900) and Rev. Evdokim with students to Palestine, Egypt and Greece (1905). The rector of the Moscow Theological Academy from 1903 to 1909 was Bishop Evdokim (Meshchersky) of Volokolamsk, later Metropolitan of Nizhny Novgorod. In 1922, he deviated from Renovationism and was one of the founders of the Renovationist schism. Retired since 1924. Spiritual writer. He died in 1935 in Moscow. – Approx. ed. By publishing this work, we put all the profits from the publication into a special “pilgrimage” fund, from which student excursions will mutually take. R.A.E.E. Dragomirov M.I. (1830–1905), Russian military theorist and teacher, infantry general. Participating in the Russian-Turkish war of 1877–1878. successfully led the actions of Russian troops during the defense of Shipka. Since 1903, member of the State Council. – Approx. ed. These rules concern the impeccability and purity of persons promoted to the priesthood. – Approx. ed. By the way, we note that after this verse there is a strange quotation - Isa. 127.6; instead of Psalm 127 [and verse], a non-existent chapter of the prophet Isaiah is indicated. Church newsletter. No. 4. pp. 118–119. Eastern Rumelia is the southern part of Bulgaria, which belongs to the Ottoman Empire. Note – ed. Bursch (German) – guy. – Approx. ed. Orthodox interlocutor. 1864. T. 1. P. 485. Philetism (from the Greek prefix φιλ - to love and έθνος - people, tribe) is the tendency of Local Churches to sacrifice cathedral interests to national-political ones. In 1872, the Patriarch of Constantinople declared phyletism a heresy in connection with the Bulgarian schism. – Approx. ed. A frequently repeated line in Homer's poem "The Odyssey", a symbol of the beginning of a new day. – Approx. ed. “We went to the sea, and walked along the sea for 3 weeks, always with the need to die at the mouth of Tsaregradsk. Sometimes a great futrin arises and a great horror arises, even before Philip’s spell happens.” In the original there are difficult to convey words of florid language: καύχημα καί αφανισμός. Complete collection of Russian chronicles. T. 3. pp. 28–29. For many, the word “Byzantine” now serves as a shield with which they protect themselves from various objections. If you don’t like something in the Orthodox faith, for example, monasticism, it’s worth saying: this is not “pure Christianity,” but Byzantineism! - and monasticism was overthrown. Such a disdainful attitude towards “Byzantine”, even without knowledge of “Byzantine”, comes, they say, from Voltaire. Even a kind of “Byzantine Orthodoxy” appeared, as if there were as many Orthodoxies as there were many newspapers in the world. Wigs – (παρέχον) to give, to present from one’s own means. – Approx. ed. However, scientists determine the time of construction of the church quite differently. Paul the Silentiary left a description of the Church of Hagia Sophia even in verse; its description (ίίκφρασις του ναοΰ της αγίας Σοφίας) consists of 1029 VERSES. Cathedral Officials and features of service for them. M., 1907. pp. 17–19. This remarkable dissertation perfectly depicts the significance of Hagia Sophia of Constantinople and for Rus'. See special: Ch. II. pp. 12–32. The pilgrim calls the upper side galleries "polatii". The Greeks more often called them γυναικεία or κατηχουμεΐα. Mostly women stood there, starting with the empress herself. Journey. Ed. Archaeogr. com. St. Petersburg, 1887. Stlb. 23–24,76–77. The Church of St. Irene in Constantinople was dedicated to the Divine World. – Approx. ed. Exact quote: Many thoughts are in the heart of a husband; But the counsel of the Lord endures forever (Prov. 19:21) - Note. ed. Priest (German) – Approx. ed. Prof. A. P. Lebedev. History of the Greco-Eastern Church under Turkish rule. 2nd ed. St. Petersburg, 1904. P. 188. See the text of the berat given in 1901 in the article by prof. I. I. Sokolova. Wanderer. 1901. No. 8. pp. 166–178. Prof. A. P. Lebedev. Quote op. P. 119. In our country, usually the same people point out the lack of authority and unpopularity of our hierarchy and at the same time create projects according to which the Church would be more and more disconnected from the life of the people. Prof. A. P. Lebedev. Quote op. P. 121. We will provide brief biographical information, brief because we are interested not in years, but in faces. Joachim III was born on January 18. 1834 in the village of Vatheochoria, on the Bosphorus, near Constantinople, from middle-class parents. Having received an education in the schools of Constantinople, he became a monk and became a deacon under one of the bishops of Romania, and then a hierodeacon at the Greek Church in Vienna. Patr. Joachim II brought the young hierodeacon closer to him and made him the second deacon of the Patriarchate. On March 3, 1863, Joachim was elevated to the rank of archimandrite and appointed to the honorary position of the great protosyncellus of the Patriarchate, who is the main assistant to the Ecumenical Patriarch in managing the diocese. On December 10, 1861, Joachim was made metropolitan of Varna, where he remained until January 9, 1874, when he was moved to Thessalonica. Metropolitan Joachim showed outstanding church and social activity, why on October 4. In 1878, he was unanimously elected to the patriarchal throne, as being completely worthy in intelligence and experience to rule the helm of the great Christian Church, which was then in a difficult situation. In the land of sacred memories. Holy Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius, 1902. pp. 133–134. Wanderer. 1901. No. 8. P. 182–183 Prof. A. A. Dmitrievsky. Proceedings of the Kyiv Theological Academy. 1891. T. 3. pp. 136–137. The influence of Metropolitan is noticeable here. Filaret, who wrote: “Determining the success of students by numbers and points is a strange transformation of the mental into the mechanical. This transformation of reasonable evidence about the intelligent actions of students into wordless numbers, which decide the student’s fate by addition and subtraction, cannot be considered satisfactory.” Metropolitan Filaret did not approve of the ticket exam either. “Science is thrown,” he said, “into the air in disarray on tattered rags. This method deceives itself... The truth can better be revealed when the tester comes out of enslavement to tickets.” Prof. A. P. Lebedev. History of the Greek-Eastern Church. P. 476. Εκκλησιαστική A λήθεΐ 3.1899– ° 47. Σελ . 437–442, ° 50. Σελ. 465–470. Prof. A. P. Lebedev. Quote op. P. 460. There will be a special talk about Western schools in the future. But let us quote here what our academy professor V.A. Sokolov says about Catholic students: “Catholic seminarians and students walk around the city in orderly lines, in pairs, accompanied by one of their guards or mentors. Observing these young men, I involuntarily marveled at the discipline reigning over them, their exemplary behavior during divine services and their remarkable, apparently completely sincere and ardent piety. Try dressing our students of theological academies in robes and leading them through the streets in pairs! It is difficult to even imagine what desperate protest and what serious difficulties this attempt would encounter. And the Catholic student willingly submits to all this, because he values ​​his spiritual title and is proud of his cassock, like an officer in his uniform... He wears his cassock with pride and will go anywhere in it without embarrassment.” Trip to Rome for Easter of the Jubilee Year. Holy Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius, 1902. pp. 25–26. I. T. Pososhkov. A father's will to his son. M., 1873. P. 97. “And their life is not Christian, but most pagan.” – continues Pososhkov. Archipelago - a name proposed in the 13th century. Venetians for the Aegean Sea. – Approx. ed. We borrow these and similar verses from the poem “Our Easter” by Nicodemus the Holy Mountain. Poems. T. 4. St. Petersburg, 1866. pp. 104–114. The height of the mountain is more than 2000 meters, that is, almost 2 miles. Metropolitan Filaret. Word on the renovation of the ancient church in the Gethsemane monastery - September 28, 1844.