Глава четырнадцатая. Высокопреосвященнейший владыка 1826 – 1830

What a bliss it is to hear silence after the noisy multi-day holidays have died down! My ears are already ringing, it has become so quiet. God, how good! The river of life, which had been boiling and splashing out of its banks all these days, again entered its usual channel and found a calm flow. Has that changed much? Position in society - yes. Now he is on an equal footing with St. Petersburg Seraphim and Kyiv Evgeniy. As an archbishop he was styled the Most Reverend Bishop, and as a metropolitan from now on they began to style him the Most Reverend. And so it was long, and now it’s six more letters longer. But almost nothing changes in the life schedule. And in Moscow it’s golden autumn. On Samotek, the Trinity Compound is surrounded by the luxury of autumn foliage. The rustle of dry leaves makes the silence even more delightful... How many things had to be postponed during July, August and September! Now it was possible to return to them and catch up. Rising in the dark, at five in the morning, Bishop Philaret slowly read the morning prayer rule. Then, if it was not necessary to hold services in one of the Moscow churches, he went to the house church and celebrated the early liturgy there. Light breakfast and off to work. Secretary Alexander Petrovich reported on the documents received, and Filaret dictated to him what he needed to answer, or put the papers aside for reflection and subsequent decision. Svyatoslavsky diligently read out the resolutions that came from the consistory: in such and such a seminary, to organize the fight against the spread of the harmful habit of smoking tobacco; such and such a prodigal wife should be divorced from her unhappy husband, the husband should be allowed to enter into another marriage, and the wife would have to confess four times a year and not receive communion for seven years; such and such a priest should be fined for a fight inside the church with a sexton, and the sexton should be sent to a monastery; such and such a priest should be defrocked for his violent temper and reading prayers for the health of the Decembrists... It was necessary to give the case episcopal approval or postpone it until a full trial if not enough “evidence” was presented. And the like. And so on until lunch. After lunch, I read books and newspapers and found out what was going on in the world below. Most often by himself, but his vision began to deteriorate, and sometimes Alexander Petrovich would read aloud to him. Then, until dinner, there is a reception of visitors. In the evening after dinner, the bishop sat down again with papers; he had to answer letters, think about and write down new sermons. It was midnight, and the candle was still burning in the window of his office. Only at one in the morning did Filaret perform evening prayers and go to bed, only to wake up four hours later and follow the morning rule: – In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. God, be merciful to me, a sinner. Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, for the prayers of Your Most Pure Mother and all the saints, have mercy on us, amen. Glory to Thee, our God, glory to Thee... - and so on. In November, Metropolitan Philaret read a sermon about the visible and invisible world in the Archangel Cathedral of the Kremlin. On November 20, in the Assumption Cathedral, he pronounced the “Sermon on the day of the accession to the All-Russian throne of the most pious sovereign Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich, in the first year of his reign,” reminding the powers that be that all their greatness is from God and can easily be destroyed if the commandments are not followed. In December, on St. Nicholas’s Day, in the Mariinsky Church of the Imperial Dowager’s House, he delivered “A Sermon on the Name Day of the Most Pious Sovereign Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich,” but in this word there is not a word about the Sovereign, it is addressed to the people who have taken upon themselves the care of the sick. The preacher spoke about the Lord's reward for good deeds, that this reward is immeasurably greater than the deeds themselves. Filaret read the Christmas sermon at the Chudov Monastery: – Oh, how the Son of God humbled Himself in His incarnation!.. It was necessary to choose a people in which He would be born, and He chose for this, of all the nations of the earth, the smallest, not having its own government, many times enslaved and close to new enslavement, once blessed, but already almost rejected... From this it is clear that the Apostle, following the example of Jesus Christ, teaches us not to set ourselves high and not to exalt ourselves any advantages, but to humble yourself both in yourself and before others. He celebrated his forty-fourth birthday on December 26 for the first time in the rank of metropolitan. October, November, December... How I didn’t want to part with the quiet life of Moscow! But we need to go to St. Petersburg for the winter session of the Synod. Try again to test the waters regarding Bible translation. Arriving in the Northern capital, Filaret lived there, too, at the Trinity Compound. It was located on the Fontanka embankment. This place was identified by Peter I in 1714. In the 50s of the 18th century, a large stone house with two wings was built. In 1822 it was completely renovated. Next to the house was the church of St. Sergius of Radonezh. Having settled on Fontanka, Filaret lived here according to the Moscow schedule, violating it only by traveling to meetings of the Synod. In January 1827, he again tried to talk to Metropolitan Seraphim about resuming work on translating the Bible into modern Russian. The ruler of St. Petersburg was angry: – If you insist on continuing the translation of the Holy Scriptures, I will resign! – A translation would be useful for the Church. Our clergy are not yet educated enough to be able to turn to the originals themselves when necessary. However, I have not reached such madness as to consider the service of your Eminence unnecessary for the Church. But the session is over, and you can finally return to dear MOSCOW! And there Maslenitsa is already in full swing, the festivities are fun... It’s hard to watch when they overeat and get drunk to the point of bestiality. – What is the essence of our tables, on which it is difficult to count the different types of food, difficult to guess their composition, difficult to remember the names of the different types of drink? Are they not intricately woven nets that we lay for each other in order to catch us in gluttony, although sometimes subtle, and in drunkenness, although apparently sober? And you won’t notice how you move from eating to gluttony, how simple drinking turns into drunkenness... How many different arts, substances, and tools does a reasonable person use in order to fill a small and senseless belly! How the mind is humiliated when it is exhausted in inventions. So that the tribute daily demanded by the womb, as an inexorable ruler, is brought to him with as much grace as possible and is acceptable to him in as large a quantity as possible! And how the womb curses at this servile mind, putting uncleanliness and stench as the end of all its worries about grace! It is in the Chudov Monastery that Philaret’s magnificent, extremely witty and stern sermon thunders, making one feel ashamed and lower one’s eyes down. - Rise up, unfortunate worshiper of the womb, and if you cannot suddenly lift your eyes above yourself, stand right in front of the mirror and see if the law against servility to the womb is written on you? Don’t you see that above your womb there is a chest in which lives a heart that desires goodness and feels love; that above it still rises a head in which reigns the mind contemplating truth, the mind thinking about probabilities; that under one and the other, as if under heaven and earth hell, a dark womb has been cast down, unable to think or desire? How much insight is needed to notice that it should not rule over the higher regions, but be in service, in contempt? If, on the contrary, you try more and more to please the belly in what it blindly demands, desires for it, imagines for it, then beware that it does not become higher than your head and, with its ugly weight, does not begin to constrain and suppress the noblest actions of the mind and heart. He read this sermon on the day of St. Alexis, which that year fell on the penultimate day of Maslenitsa. Tomorrow is the prayer for Lent. Alas, both now and then people did not understand that Maslenitsa is not to fill one’s belly more fully before fasting, but to begin preparing for a long abstinence. After all, everything meat is already prohibited; the Church, with its regulations, gradually humbles the human flesh. It’s sad to see few people in churches on Maslenitsa, but a lot of people in the squares, where fun is in full swing, in restaurants, in taverns, where a drunken swarm of bees is humming. Lent begins, and the flesh is humbled, albeit belatedly. Christians begin a multi-day trek to the main holiday of the year - Easter. And after Easter, having passed the Lenten test, many again rush into immoderate fun, overeating, drunkenness, and revelry. “Pure joy is a noble and chaste virgin who has a clear conscience as an inseparable companion, which can only be in company with those whose actions are blameless, whose words are modest, and whose intentions are pure and sublime,” Metropolitan Philaret taught in his Easter sermon in 1827 in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin. “If the rude and mad gaiety of the world takes its place, so much the worse.” Heavenly vengeance for insulting heavenly joy sends a curse on all sources of earthly joy. The year 1827 marked the fifteenth anniversary of the Patriotic War and the expulsion of Napoleon. The new emperor dreamed for his part to honor the memory of that victory. He ordered the dilapidated Triumphal Gate, a wooden one, erected on Tverskaya Zastava Square in 1814, to be dismantled and new stone ones to be designed in their place. And during the coronation celebrations, the tsar got acquainted with the progress of the construction of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior on the Sparrow Hills, and was very, very dissatisfied. For almost ten years, nothing has budged there. The church was founded in 1817, but the architect Vitberg continued to develop an economic construction project, according to which the ten million rubles employed in the guardianship council were supposed to buy eighteen thousand landowner peasants with land in Moscow and nearby provinces. The money earned by these peasants was supposed to go to the treasury, and it would release it for the construction of the church. In addition, some of these same peasants were supposed to be used in the construction of the church. And to deliver the stone found by Vitberg in the Vereisky and Ruzsky districts of the Moscow region, it was necessary to establish shipping. However, Vitberg turned out to be not the best leader, and many of his plans did not work out. The peasants were bought, the stone began to be prepared, but they were never able to deliver it to the construction site. 300 thousand rubles ended up in an unknown place. The story is as old as time, and where there is big money, there is big theft. And in 1825, Witberg lost his main patron and godfather - Emperor Alexander. Having learned about the failures of the first years of construction, the new sovereign ordered the work to be suspended and on April 16, 1827, established the so-called “Artificial Committee” under the leadership of engineer-general Karl Ivanovich Opperman, which included prominent architects and engineers - Alexander Alekseevich and Andrei Alekseevich Mikhailov, August Augustovich Montferrand, Vasily Petrovich Stasov, Karl Ivanovich Rossi and others. They all recognized the work as unsatisfactory, the tsar ordered the construction on Vorobyovy Gory, which was already in its infancy, to be completely curtailed, and an investigation began against Vitberg. From that time on, Metropolitan Philaret began to pay more and more attention to projects for the future church. The year 1828 began with joy for Moscow Chrysostom - the highest gratitude was declared to him for compiling a Brief Sacred History, as well as short and lengthy catechisms with the addition of instructions for soldiers. This year began with joy for all of Russia - with the news of the final defeat of Persia and the conclusion of the Turkmanchay Peace Treaty with the defeated country. After the victories of the glorious General Alexei Petrovich Ermolov, he was replaced as commander by General Ivan Fedorovich Paskevich, and under him the Russian troops acted just as successfully, Paskevich managed to take Erivan (Yerevan), then the advanced detachment of General Eristov crossed Arak and entered the territory of Eastern Azerbaijan (these lands, like Western Azerbaijan, now belong to Iran). In mid-October, Eristov took Tabriz, the capital of East Azerbaijan. In 1827, our troops occupied all of Western Azerbaijan, took Ardabil and moved to Gilan. The road to Tehran was open, and if the war continued, Russian troops could capture the city, just as they had recently captured the capital of France. Under these conditions, the Persian government agreed to sign a peace treaty. Alexander Sergeevich Griboedov, a famous playwright and excellent diplomat, who has recently been recruited to serve in Transcaucasia, took part in the development of the agreement. In the village of Turkmanchay on February 10, 1828, Ivan Fedorovich Paskevich and Abbas Mirza met. The terms of the treaty were the most shameful for Persia and the most glorious for Russia. The Persians completely and forever renounced their claims to all lands lying north of the Araks, and from now on only Russia could maintain its military fleet in the Caspian Sea. Persia did not have the right to declare heirs to the throne without the consent of Russia, and our government recognized Abbas Mirza as the new heir to the throne. Russian merchants received the opportunity to free trade throughout Persian territory. In addition, Persia was obliged to pay a monetary indemnity equal to all Russian expenses for the war of 1826–1828. This is the language Russian diplomacy spoke then with its hostile neighbors! The medal for the Persian War was awarded not only to direct participants in the battles, but also to... St. Alexei of Moscow, whose relics had rested in the Miracle Monastery since 1372. On May 28, Metropolitan Philaret placed an elegant cover and medal on Alexei’s shrine. What was the reason for such an unusual award? Saint Alexei, whom Philaret reverently worshiped all his life, inspired Dmitry Donskoy to fight the Horde, he was a constant defender of Rus' from the Horde and was the first to remove the khan’s stable from the Kremlin, building the Chudov Monastery in its place, where he found rest after death. In the speech Filaret delivered on the day of laying the veil and medal on the shrine, one can also find an explanation: “First of all, a word to you today, Saint Alexis, and a word not mine, but the king’s... Accept this silver of memory and honor, this denarius, not only with sweat, but also with blood, worked out for the day of the Persian battle, for the dispenser of it believes that you, too, were not an idle spectator of this battle, but although invisibly, nevertheless really fought before God for the faithful sons of Russia against the treacherous... just like Once upon a time, while still living on earth, you obviously labored for the protection of the Church and the Fatherland from foreigners, either with miraculous prayer or with a conquering word of conviction. Then he began to talk about the benefits that prayers bring to God and the righteous standing at the throne of the Most High: – Where they do not call on God in sorrows, where they do not glorify Him for His good deeds, there a person’s communication with God, the source of all good and all wisdom, is cut off; Consequently, only evil and madness remain for man. This was said for a reason, but because from time to time the idea pops up in society that “God knows our needs, and therefore there is nothing to pray for.” Filaret's sermons were never random; in them he responded to all the ideas that were circulating in society, to all the whirlwinds of minds. Disputes flared up that the existence of humanity in itself is sinful, and therefore there is no need to give birth to children, so as not to multiply sin, and on the birthday of the sovereign in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin, Metropolitan Philaret read a sermon, but not about Nicholas, but about the blessed birth of children in general. With one caveat: “...those who want to have worthy children will act wisely if they first make themselves worthy parents.” Speeches do not stop talking about human freedom, about the need to fight all slavery. There are many who frown at the words “servant of God”: “I am no one’s slave!” And Filaret in the Trinity-Sergius Lavra speaks about the good yoke of Christ. Anyone who does not want to be called a servant of God easily becomes a slave of passions, ambition, pride, people’s fleeting opinions, fashion, and false ideas: “We still hear now the complaint to which the Divine Teacher and Savior of souls responded so long ago—a complaint about the burden of His yoke, about the severity of His teaching, about the difficulties of fulfilling His commandments. On what is this complaint based? What is this difficulty? - without a doubt, most importantly, that the teaching of Christ commands a person to go against certain natural inclinations, to overcome them, to kill, to sacrifice... The truth is not denied that it gives people commandments that are not as light as toys, but as heavy as the yoke with which work animals are burdened... People who are somewhat prudent and not entirely low in feelings, of course, will not dare to declare the requirement that they always be and remain only children, forever busy only with toys... The yoke of Christ is good, and the burden is light, because the more willingly a person bears it, the more good he himself becomes... the easier it becomes for him to fulfill the good commandments, so that, finally, he does the will of the Lord with greater ease and pleasure than his own, and thus the yoke on his shoulder completely disappears or turns into wings that constantly carry him to heaven. Speeches do not stop talking about the glory of man, about the need to achieve this glory in all conceivable and inconceivable ways. An inglorious end - what could be worse. Not becoming famous is the same as not living in the world. And Philaret there, at the tomb of St. Sergius on the birthday of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, reads a sermon based on the words of the Savior from the Gospel of Matthew: “Tune you have received, you have given it” (Matthew 10:8), which means when translated into Modern language: “Freely you have received, freely give.” Fame is the same self-interest. – A selfless mentor is one who, in teaching, instructing and guiding a novice, seeks only his good, and not gratitude, salvation, respect... Try not to be selfish in your affairs, so that the all-good God will increase his selfless grace to you. Not everything is for one’s own benefit or honor, not everything is for reward; do something good for the good itself, for love of your neighbor, for fulfilling the will of God... Do not get carried away by the flow of vanity, do not conform to this age. Once again, Metropolitan Philaret was attacked by Admiral Shishkov and his supporters. Out of resentment, he even submitted a petition to the highest name for dismissal from business, but, as one would expect, did not receive consent. However, as the reason for the petition, he chose the case of the illegal marriage of the imperial aide-de-camp Mansurov, who married his cousin, which was not permitted by the Church, but was permitted by Emperor Nicholas himself. Filaret demanded that the marriage be dissolved, and that the priest who performed the sacrament be severely punished. Having failed to achieve his goal, he wrote to the Tsar that, having “internal shortcomings and bodily weakness,” he was no longer able to head the Moscow department and wanted to retire. Everyone knew perfectly well that the Moscow Metropolitan did not have any internal shortcomings or physical weaknesses. - Well, what should I do with this stubborn guy? - the sovereign was annoyed. He did not give Filaret his resignation, but he did not fulfill the saint’s demands regarding Mansurov, he sent him out of harm’s way and out of sight abroad. And there Mansurov’s young wife suddenly died. That's where it all ended by itself. In 1828 there was Kiriopascha - that rare case when the moving holiday of Easter coincided with the permanent holiday of the Annunciation on March 25. In such years, Orthodox Christians expect special mercies from the Lord. The year 1828, which began with the glorious Treaty of Turkmanchay, continued with a new Russian-Turkish War, which developed very successfully. In the Caucasus and in Turkey itself, Russian troops under the command of Paskevich took Anapa, Kare, Akhaltsikhe, Bayazet. In the Balkans, Vorontsov took the fortress of Varna. Everything indicated that success would continue next year. And so it happened. In 1829, Paskevich, in the direction of Erzurum, inflicted one defeat after another on the Turks, and another general, Ivan Ivanovich Dibich, crushed them in the Balkans near Burgas, Aytos and Sliven, and took Adrianople. The Persians, harboring anger over the defeat from Ermolov and Paskevich, on January 30, 1829, destroyed the Russian embassy in Tehran, brutally killed the thirty-four-year-old Russian ambassador to Persia, the poet Alexander Sergeevich Griboyedov, who was hated for his participation in writing the Turkmanchay Treaty. But seeing how the Ottoman port was bursting at the seams under the blows of Russian bayonets and butts, they were afraid of their own insolence and sent Prince Khosrow-Mirza with a confession and rich gifts. On August 10, Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich, sitting with a menacing look, received him in the Winter Palace. Among the gifts, one of the largest diamonds in the world, the “Shah”, stood out, which once hung over the throne of the Mughals as a talisman. A week after this event in Moscow, Metropolitan Filaret dedicated the laying of the Triumphal Gate on Tverskaya Zastava Square, the current square of the Belorussky Station. This marked the fifteenth anniversary of the end of the European campaign. In his speech, the bishop spoke about the significance of the monuments: – The monument is a silent preacher, who in some respects may be superior to the speaker, because he does not stop the sermon entrusted to him, and thus it reaches the whole people and many successive generations. A monument is a book that does not need to be looked for in the book depository, because it lies on the way; and thus it is read by those who did not think to open it... Thus we already find that there are monuments that are sacred in civil terms... May our most pious sovereign enter through these solemn gates with many children into his first throne city with the glory of victories and with the joy of peace. May the enemy never enter through these gates, and may the intruder never escape through them. Philaret’s word came true: the foreign conqueror never entered Moscow again. Neither through this gate, nor through others. And soon after the laying of the Triumphal Gate, good news came: Russia won no longer in a small war - in Adrianople, Turkey admitted its defeat, agreed to pay a huge indemnity, ceded a significant part of the Black Sea coast, opened the Bosporus and Dardanelles to us, Greece gained independence, and the Danube and Balkan principalities - autonomy, the Serbian principality was formed. The heroes of this war, Paskevich and Dibich, received the rank of field marshal general and were awarded the highest military orders - St. George, 1st degree. In his “Homily on the conclusion of peace with the Ottoman Porte,” Metropolitan Philaret, reflecting on the significance of this victory, said: - So, glory to God in the highest! Peace on Russian land and, through the peacemaking of Russia, peace on the lands of many!.. If the powerful autocrat craved only military victories, then, having placed one foot in Adrianople and the other in Erzurum, he would not have been able to resist taking another step in order to humiliate the high Porte to the ground. But the magnanimous monarch, as he decided at the beginning of the battle, and despite the successes of arms, remained with the initial determination to act not so much with the right of military force, but with the peaceful power of truth... The truth of the treaties was restored and protected; lies against Russians and against Russia are rewarded; Christian peoples under a non-Christian government were given faithful protection... Deeds of truth are prescribed by law precisely because they are a means to peace. Blessed peace, lasting prosperity, true peace can only be achieved through the path of truth... Ah, poor seeker of quick and cheap prosperity! Can you really be envious of cunning, flattery, unjust turns, ill-acquired property, low pleasures, in short, untruth and vice?.. Would it really be pleasant for you to put on beautiful clothes as a sign of your deceptions, build a magnificent house as a monument to your robbery, sit down at a luxurious table and eat the flesh and drink the tears and blood of those ruined by your untruths? Would you really call this well-being? Would you really expect to find peace here, at least for a short time, not to say for a long time?.. Christian! No one, like you, to achieve peace through truth, and bliss through virtue, has such a perfect Ascetic, SUCH a faithful Leader, SUCH a powerful Helper. He alone, more than anyone else, shows you that if the works of righteousness were carried out even through death, they would carry them through until the resurrection into life and until the ascension into glory. The Nicholas era began gloriously! The Filaret era continued gloriously!