Kolchev is the confessor of Empress Maria Feodorovna. "the confessor of the empress." Official confessors of Russian emperors
The last official royal confessor since 1914 was Archpriest Alexander Petrovich Vasiliev(1868-1918), presbyter of the court cathedral of the Holy Image of the Savior Not Made by Hands in the Winter Palace (later he was rector of the Church of Martyr Catherine in Ekateringof, arrested and shot on September 5, 1918 along with the entire clergy of the Catherine Church).
But due to the illness of Archpriest Alexander Vasiliev, he became the de facto confessor during the Family’s imprisonment in Tsarskoe Selo. Mitred Archpriest Afanasy Ivanovich Belyaev(1845-1921), rector of the Tsarskoe Selo Fedorov Sovereign Cathedral, as well as the garrison priest of Tsarskoe Selo. The imperial family knew him for a long time. On March 29, 1917, the Emperor writes in his diary: "... They serve in our camp church, Fr. Afanasy Belyaev, due to the illness of our confessor Fr. Vasilyeva, deacon, sexton and four singers, cat. They do their jobs very well...."
From the emperor's diary about the Holy Week of Lent:
March 30th. Thursday. ... At 10 o'clock we went to mass, at which many of our people received communion, ... At 6 o'clock. Let's go to the service of the 12 Gospels, Fr. Belyaev, a fine fellow, read them alone.
March 31st. Friday. ... At 2 o'clock the shroud was taken out. Walked and worked by the ferry. At 6½ we went to the service. In the evening we confessed to Fr. Belyaeva.
April 1st. Saturday. ...At 9 o'clock. We went to mass and partook of the Holy Mysteries of Christ with our retinue and the rest of the people. ... At 11½ we went to the beginning of the midnight office.
April 2nd. Bright Sunday of Christ. Matins and mass ended at 40 o'clock. We broke our fast with everyone, 16 people in total.
In the surviving diary of Archpriest Afanasy Belyaev there is a valuable description of the confession that the Emperor mentioned:
" March 31. At 1.30 I received a notification that I was expected at 5.30 in the children's half to confess and prepare the sick three princesses and the former heir for Communion. The hour for confession of the royal children had come. What amazing Christian decorated rooms. Each princess has a real iconostasis in the corner of the room, filled with many icons of different sizes depicting especially revered saints. In front of the iconostasis is a folding lectern, covered with a shroud in the form of a towel; prayer books and liturgical books, as well as the Holy Gospel and a cross are placed on it. The decoration of the rooms and all their furnishings represent an innocent, pure, immaculate childhood, ignorant of everyday dirt.
To listen to prayers before confession, all four children were in the same room, where the sick Olga Nikolaevna was lying on the bed. Alexey Nikolaevich was sitting in an armchair. Maria Nikolaevna was reclining in a large chair, which was arranged on wheels, and Anastasia Nikolaevna easily moved them.
I won’t say how the confession went. The impression that came out was this: God grant that all the children would be as morally high as the children of the former tsar. (...)
It's 20 minutes to 10 o'clock. went to Their Majesties' chambers. There, the female servant led us into the bedroom and pointed to a small room in the corner - a chapel, where the confession of Their Majesties would take place. There was no one in the room yet. No more than two minutes passed, the former sovereign, his wife and Tatyana Nikolaevna entered. The Emperor greeted, introduced the Empress and, pointing to his daughter, said: “This is our daughter Tatyana. You, father, begin to read the prayers prescribed before confession, and we will all pray together.”
The chapel room is very small and is hung and lined with icons from top to bottom, and lamps are burning in front of the icons. In the corner, in a recess, there is a special iconostasis with chiseled columns and places for famous icons; in front of it there is a folding lectern, on which is placed an ancient altar Gospel, a cross, and many liturgical books. I didn’t know where to put the crosses and the Gospel I had brought, so I immediately placed them on the lying books.
After reading the prayers, the sovereign and his wife left, Tatyana Nikolaevna remained and confessed. The Empress came for her, excited, apparently having prayed earnestly and deciding, according to the Orthodox rite, with full consciousness of the greatness of the sacrament, to confess her heart disease before the Holy Cross and the Gospel. After her, the sovereign also began confession.
The confession of all three lasted an hour and twenty minutes. Oh, how incredibly happy I am that by the grace of God I have been honored to become a mediator between the King of Heaven and the earthly. (...) After reading the prayer of permission and kissing the Cross and the Gospel, with my inept word of consolation and reassurance, what kind of consolation could I pour into the heart of a man who was maliciously removed from his people and was completely confident until now in the correctness of his actions, tending towards the good of his beloved homeland? "(http://www.pravoslavie.ru/95392.html)
On July 30, 1917, on the eve of the departure of the Family from Tsarskoye Selo, a prayer service was served before the icon of the Mother of God “The Sign”. Who served - Fr. Alexander Vasiliev or Fr. Afanasy Belyaev - it is not known for sure (although O.A. Belyaev has a record of this day), it is possible that both were together.
In Tobolsk performed divine services for the royal family priest Alexey Vasiliev(+1930), rector of the Annunciation Church, located not far from the governor’s house, where the royal family was housed.
The royal family had a very good, trusting relationship with priest Alexy Vasiliev.
From the Tsar's diary:
August 27th. Sunday. ... At 11 o'clock. mass was served. We all really like the priest who serves with us; four nuns sing.
September 8th. Friday. For the first time we visited the Church of the Annunciation, where our priest has been serving for a long time.
October 21. Saturday. ... At 9 o'clock. there was an all-night vigil, and then we confessed to Fr. Alexey. ...22 of October. Sunday. At 8 o'clock. We went to mass and the whole family received Holy Communion. secrets Such spiritual comfort during these times!
The Empress in a letter to A. Vyrubova dated December 20. 1917 also speaks warmly of priest Alexy Vasiliev: “The priest is very good, devoted. It’s strange that Hermogenes is a bishop here, but now he is in Moscow.”(Vladyka Hermogenes was in Moscow at the Local Council of 1917-1918)
From the memoirs of Pankratov, commissar of the Provisional Government under the Special Forces Detachment, which “guarded” the royal family:
“The distance from the governor’s house to the Church of the Annunciation did not exceed 100-120 fathoms, and it was necessary to cross the street, then pass through the city garden and again cross another street. During the passage of the former royal family to the Church of the Annunciation, this path was guarded by two chains of soldiers from our detachment, placed at a considerable distance from the path, and the passage through Svoboda Street was guarded by denser chains of riflemen, so that from the crowd of curious people, which at first gathered about a hundred people, -or didn’t throw something away. It was agreed with the priest of the Annunciation Church that the mass for the former royal family would take place before the general mass for the parishioners, that is, at 8 a.m., and that during this service only priests, the deacon, the church guard and choristers would be allowed into the church. The choir of the latter was found by Colonel Kobylinsky. The choir is small, but well organized by regent Pavlovsky.
One of the next Saturdays, Nikolai Alexandrovich was informed that tomorrow mass would be celebrated in the church, and that it was necessary to be ready by eight o’clock in the morning. The prisoners were so pleased with this news that they rose very early and were ready even at seven o'clock. When I arrived at 7 1/2 o'clock in the morning they were already waiting. About 20 minutes later the officer on duty told me that everything was ready. I convey this through Prince Dolgorukov to Nikolai Alexandrovich. It turned out that Alexandra Fedorovna was not ready yet, or rather, she decided not to walk, but to ride in a chair, since her legs hurt. Her personal valet quickly wheeled the chair out to the porch. The whole family came out, accompanied by a retinue and employees, and we moved to the church. Alexandra Feodorovna sat down in a chair, which was pushed from behind by her valet. (....) Finally we are in the church. Nikolai and his family took a place on the right, lined up in the usual line, with the retinue closer to the middle. Everyone began to cross themselves, and Alexandra Fedorovna knelt down, her daughters and Nikolai himself followed her example. (....) After the service, the whole family receives prosphora, which for some reason they always passed on to their employees. (....)
During a prayer service on December 6, when the entire family of the former tsar was in church, the deacon suddenly, for no apparent reason, loudly proclaimed the long-term health of “their majesties the Emperor, the Empress,” etc. and leads everyone present to extreme amazement and indignation, especially some of the team. ... Since this happened at the very end of the prayer service, I immediately approached the deacon and asked: by whose order did he do this?
“Father Alexei,” he answered.
I also call the priest, who came out of the altar to me in half-robes. We were surrounded by indignant soldiers and curious retinues.
“What right did you have to give such orders to Father Deacon?” - I say to the priest.
- What’s wrong with that? - he answers somehow defiantly.
This outraged me extremely and even frightened me: two soldiers stood next to me, very excited, and one even muttered rudely: “For his braids, get out of the church...” “Leave me alone,” I decisively stopped him.
“If so, Father Alexei, then know that you will no longer serve for the family of the former tsar,” I told the priest.” ( V.S. Pankratov. With the Tsar in Tobolsk.)
Here, probably, there is an error in Pankratov’s memory - according to the emperor’s diary and the recollections of other eyewitnesses, many years in the pre-revolutionary form with the title of Their Majesties, Deacon Alexander Evdokimov, with the blessing of priest Alexy Vasiliev, proclaimed on December 25, after the Christmas liturgy, during a prayer service before the miraculous Abalak Icon of God Mother "The Sign", brought the day before from the Abalak monastery. Both the deacon and the priest were placed under house arrest, subjected to interrogation and threats. The Tobolsk ruler Hermogenes (Dolganev) rescued them and sent them to the Abalak monastery for a while, until passions subsided.
From the emperor's diary:
December 6th. Wednesday. My name day was spent calmly and not like previous years. At 12 o'clock a prayer service was served...
December 25th. Monday. We went to mass at 7 o'clock. In the dark. After the liturgy, a prayer service was served before the Abalak Icon of the Mother of God, brought the day before from a monastery 24 versts from here. ...
December 28th. Thursday. ... We learned with indignation that our good Fr. Alexey is being dragged into the investigation and is under house arrest. This happened because at the prayer service on December 25, the deacon remembered us with the title, and in the church there were many riflemen of the 2nd regiment, as always, and from there the fuss started to burn, probably not without the participation of Pankratov and his associates.
1st of January. Monday. At 8 o'clock we went to mass... Mass was served by another priest and deacon.After the removal of priest Alexy Vasilyev, services for the royal family were performed by Archpriest Vladimir Alexandrovich Khlynov(1876-after 1932), rector of the Tobolsk Sophia-Assumption Cathedral. In the 1920s, he was in Solovki at the same time as priest Mikhail Polsky, later protopresbyter of the ROCOR, who in his book about the new martyrs cited Archpriest Vladimir Khlynov’s story about the Emperor. From the context, however, it is not entirely clear whether the priest M. Polsky heard this story himself directly from the narrator or in someone’s broadcast, from a “third party” - some, let’s say, inconsistencies force us to assume the latter. Much in the story seems to have been “thought out” either by the author himself, or by those who retold it, but, nevertheless, the story is quite interesting, I will give its main part:
“In Solovetsky imprisonment was the rector of the Tobolsk Cathedral, Archpriest Fr. Vladimir Khlynov, who performed services for the Tsar and His Family in the governor's house and was the confessor of Their Majesties.
According to his testimony, the Emperor told him, among other things:
- I can’t forgive myself for giving up power. I never expected that power would fall to the Bolsheviks. I thought I was handing over power to the people's representatives...
The archpriest's father was convinced that this experience was the most painful for the Emperor and predominantly haunted him during the days of his imprisonment and perhaps was recognized by him as some kind of sin, the severity of which he wanted to get rid of.
The empress was seriously ill with others. It was difficult for her to forgive injustice towards her. She was tormented by society's misunderstanding and slander against her.
- Everyone was talking about me: Germans, Germans...
According to the archpriest’s father, the Empress was tormented by the thought that such prejudice against her had never dissipated in Russian society and had triumphed.
At first, the Royal Family went to services in the Cathedral. And she and all the people were pleased with it. But one day the cathedral protodeacon, on a royal day, at the end of a prayer service, proclaimed many years to the Tsar with his full title. This circumstance greatly upset the Emperor. After the service, coming home, the Emperor said: “Who needs this? I know very well that they still love me and are still faithful to me, but now there will be troubles and they won’t let me into the cathedral anymore”...
That's what happened in the end. But thanks to this, Fr. the archpriest was invited to the house to perform services and became better acquainted with the Royal Family (....)
Another important fact. The Emperor, in the very first days of his acquaintance with Fr. archpriest, asked him to convey to Bishop Hermogenes, ruling in Tobolsk, his bow to the ground (this is exactly how the Sovereign put it) and a request to forgive him, the Sovereign, that he was forced to allow his removal from the see. There was no other way to do it. But that he is the Sovereign, I am glad that he has the opportunity to ask for forgiveness for everything.
As already described ahead, Hermogenes, Bishop of Saratov, wrote a letter to the Emperor directly, bypassing the Synod, and for this he should have been formally punished.
Now Bishop Hermogenes was touched to the depths of his soul, he himself sent the Emperor, through the archpriest’s father, a prostration and a prosphora and asked for forgiveness.
So the Tsar and the bishop, shortly before the martyrdom of both, overcame the former misunderstanding with deep humility and love.” ( M. Polsky, protopresbyter. New Russian martyrs. M. 2004, reprint ed. Volume 1: Jordanville, 1949. Volume 2: Jordanville, 1957.)
From the Tsar's diary:
They sang at both services, since choristers cannot sing four times a day. ...
March 7/20. Wednesday. Finally, after a two-month break, we got back to church for the presanctified liturgy. The priest, Father Vladimir Khlynov, served, not Father Alexei. They sang ordinary singers, familiar and beloved tunes. The weather was great; In total, we spent four hours in the air.
March 9/22. Friday. Today is the anniversary of my arrival in Tsarskoye Selo and my imprisonment with my family in the Alexander Palace. You can’t help but remember this past difficult year! What else awaits us all? Everything is in the hand of God! Our only hope is in Him. At 8 o'clock we went to mass. We spent the day as usual. We had dinner at 7 o'clock, then there was Vespers and after it confession in the hall - the children, the retinue, the people and ours.March 10/23. Saturday. At 7½ we went to mass, at which we communed the Holy Mysteries of Christ with all of us. The choir sang amazingly. ... At 9 o'clock there was an all-night vigil at home. I really wanted to sleep.
Annunciation. We didn’t get to church on such a holiday; we had to get up early, because at 8 o’clock the priest came and served mass without singers. Alix and her daughters sang again without any rehearsal.
Send to Ekaterinburg Nicholas II, Alexandra Feodorovna, leader. Princess Maria, Doctor E. Botkin and several servants took place on April 13, 1918. They were brought there on April 17, on Holy Tuesday of Holy Week, and placed in the house of engineer Ipatiev. " The house is nice and clean"- wrote the Emperor.
How the Tsar happened to celebrate his last Easter, we read in his diary:
20 April. Great heel. ... In the mornings and evenings, like all these days here, I read the corresponding Holy Gospels aloud in the bedroom.
April 21. Holy Saturday. ...At Botkin's request, a priest and deacon were allowed in at 8 o'clock. They served Matins quickly and well; It was a great consolation to pray even in such an environment and hear “Christ is risen.” Ukrainians, the assistant commandant, and guard soldiers were present.
April 22. Bright Resurrection of Christ. ... In the morning they said Christ to each other and ate Easter cake and red eggs over tea - they couldn’t get Easter.
On May 10, the family was reunited - Tsarevich Alexei and the Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana and Anastasia were brought from Tobolsk.
From the Tsar's diary:
May 20. Sunday. At 11 o'clock We had a mass service; Alexey was present, lying in bed. ...
May 31. Ascension. In the morning they waited a long time, but in vain, for the priest to come to perform the service; everyone was busy with churches. ...
June 10th. Trinity day. ... at 11½ the real mass and vespers were served, ...
This is the last surviving mention of the service in the emperor's diary.
But in the book of the tutor of Tsarevich Alexei Pierre Zhilard, who shared the imprisonment of the royal family in Tsarskoe Selo and in Tobolsk, it says: “I met with father Stroev, who was the last to perform divine services in the Ipatiev House on Sunday, the 14th, that is, two days before the terrible night." (P. Zhilyar. Emperor Nicholas II and his family, Chapter XXI) and "On Sunday, July 14, Yurovsky ordered to call priest, Father Stroev, and allowed the service to be performed." (Ibid., Chapter XXII)
For three months in Yekaterinburg, the royal family was never allowed to go to church.
I have not yet been able to find out anything about the priest Stroev, who performed services for the royal family in Ipatiev’s house.
Current page: 1 (book has 29 pages in total) [available reading passage: 17 pages]
Alexander Bokhanov
MARIA FEDOROVNA
Review all my goods
Tell me - or am I blind?
Where is my gold? Where's the silver?
In my hand there is only a handful of ashes!
And that's all flattery and entreaty
I begged from the happy ones.
And that's all I'll take with me
To the land of silent kisses.Marina Tsvetaeva
Preface
This book is about an amazing woman who lived a great life, similar to both a fairy tale and an adventure novel - Empress Maria Feodorovna (1847–1928). Daughter-in-law of Emperor Alexander II, wife of Emperor Alexander III, mother of Emperor Nicholas II.
Having become the Russian Empress in 1881, Maria Feodorovna carried the heavy burden of her Tsar's title with amazing courage and truly royal dignity until her death. This short, graceful woman showed the world an imperishable example of serving Russia, proving more than once in practice that she was ready to sacrifice her own life in her name...
Her childhood name was Dagmar (full name Maria Sophia Friederike Dagmar), and she came from the royal house of Schleswig-Holstein-Sondenburg-Glücksburg, whose representatives had been on the Danish throne since the beginning of the 17th century. Growing up in the modest seclusion of little Denmark, the beloved daughter of King Christian IX was destined to become the Empress of the world's largest Empire, to find herself at the forefront of world events.
For most of her earthly existence, Empress Maria remained at that social height where the destinies of states, empires and peoples were decided. And she fully felt the inexorability of the passage of time, becoming in the 20th century one of the first victims of the merciless “wheel of history.” Providence created for her a great and unique destiny, which absorbed and intricately mixed sincere joy and genuine grief, heartfelt happiness and unbearable pain, bright hopes and dark disappointments, enthusiastic triumphs and great downfalls. She experienced admiring human worship, but also the bestial hatred of the crowd.
Maria Feodorovna knew what it meant to sincerely love and be loved in the same way. As a mother and as a secular woman, she had such joys and riches from earthly blessings that not every person can imagine. But she also had to go through terrible trials: seeing off her husband and two sons on their last journey, mourning the death of other sons and five grandchildren.
Empress Maria was well known and honored by the most influential royal and aristocratic dynasties of Europe; she was closely related to many ruling houses. Her brothers, sisters, cousins, nieces and nephews bore the titles of kings and queens, and had the highest family titles. Maria Feodorovna's elder brother Wilhelm ruled from 1863 in Greece under the name of King George I. Another brother, Frederick, wore the crown of the Kingdom of Denmark from 1906, and sister Alexandra from 1901, as the wife of King Edward VII, had the title of Queen of Great Britain and Ireland. Maria Feodorovna's younger sister Tira (Tyura) was married to Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, and her brother Waldemar was married to Princess Maria of Orleans, the eldest daughter of the Duke of Chartres.
After the assassination of Nicholas II and his family in the summer of 1918, Maria Feodorovna remained the only and last living embodiment of the once great and, as it seemed, indestructible Empire of the Tsars, with which she was inextricably linked for more than half a century. And this once mighty kingdom, which became her second home, disappeared from the face of the planet during her lifetime, turning into only a majestic and colorful imprint of a bygone time.
At the end of her days, she not only lost royal luxury and honor. The whole world, which was understandable and familiar to her, collapsed, and she was destined to live out her life in a completely different world than the one where she was born, raised and whose impressions she lived until old age.
This woman, mother, empress had to experience in her lifetime such bitter feelings and hopeless suffering that others would not have been able to endure. More than once I had to overcome life's milestones when the desired deliverance from the hopeless torment of everyday life could only be non-existence. But this little woman was able to overcome the seemingly insurmountable, learned to find a ray of light of hope even in the impenetrable darkness of the surrounding reality.
She endured. She survived. Until the last hour of her earthly life, she remained a Russian queen, who retained in her heart compassion for human grief, love for Russia, faith in God and hope in His mercy.
Chapter 1
Care
Maria Fedorovna lived eighty years and eleven months. The Empress was born on November 14 (26), 1847 in Copenhagen. She passed away on October 13, 1928, far from Russia, in a small two-story villa in Klampenborg, a suburb of Copenhagen.
A week before, the Empress's condition began to deteriorate noticeably. Despite this, she continued to be interested in events until the last day and asked to read Danish newspapers to her regularly. She was visited daily by her younger brother, Prince Valdemar of Denmark, and her younger sister, Princess Tyra (Tyra), the Duchess of Cumberland. I stopped by to visit my old aunt and nephew, the Danish King Christian (Christian) X, who by that time had been on the Throne for more than sixteen years.
The Russian Tsarina invariably rejoiced at meeting her relatives and, despite her weakness, willingly talked with them about endless family topics. She remembered all her many nephews and nieces and always lively discussed the affairs and concerns of the younger representatives of the Danish Royal House.
On October 12, Maria Feodorovna began to quickly weaken and in the afternoon, October 13, she fell into oblivion. At the beginning of the fourth hour, the royal physician Morten Knudsen announced to his relatives that death could occur any minute. At times the dying woman came to her senses, looked tenderly at those around her and uttered separate, poorly distinguishable words.
At 19:18 on October 13, 1928, the Empress breathed her last and fell into eternal sleep. Death occurred, according to the doctors, “from weakness of the heart.” A few minutes later, the confessor of the Empress, the rector of the Church of St. Alexander Nevsky in Copenhagen and the confessor of the deceased, priest Leonid Kolchev (1871–1944), entered the room, folded the hands of the deceased on her chest and read the departure prayer.
In recent days, her daughters, the eldest Ksenia and the youngest Olga, were constantly on duty at the dying woman’s bedside. The Grand Duchesses deeply revered their mother all their lives, and her death was a grave shock for them. Disdaining secular conventions and not embarrassed by those present, they sobbed bitterly.
Refugee life scattered the sisters; They have seen each other quite rarely in recent years. Olga lived almost continuously at Villa Vidøre, performing the role of nurse, nurse and confidante with “dear Mom.” Olga’s second husband, the former captain of Her Imperial Majesty’s Life Guards Cuirassier Regiment Nikolai Kulikovsky, was here all the time, whom the crowned mother-in-law, despite his humble origins, valued and respected as an honest, kind and open person.
Of course, the marriage of the Tsar’s daughter to a simple officer unwittingly created delicate situations. Maria Feodorovna and her children had to meet with members of the Royal Houses, attend aristocratic meetings and receptions, and access to this reserved high society world was denied to the Empress’s rootless son-in-law once and for all. In the “blue blood corporation”, a person’s spiritual sympathies and personal qualities could not determine a person’s status. Maria Fedorovna never doubted that dynastic etiquette is inviolable and does not tolerate any compromise.
Grand Duchess Olga fully felt the impact of this soulless principle, and Maria Feodorovna knew this well. Having married, at the insistence of her mother, in 1901 at the age of nineteen the high-born Prince Peter of Oldenburg, the porphyry daughter of Tsar Alexander III suffered a difficult fate. For fifteen years Olga Alexandrovna suffered and suffered, enduring the complete indifference of her husband, who was only interested in card games and friendly feasts. She was deprived not only of a full-fledged marriage, the great joy of motherhood, but did not even feel friendly disposition on the part of the prince. Only fifteen years later there was a break.
When in 1916 Olga announced her desire to connect her life with the adjutant of her nominal prince-husband, no one from the Romanov family had a single word of condemnation of the emerging misalliance. The mother approved of this decision and was happy for her youngest daughter, who finally knew true love and the joy of motherhood. In December 1916, Maria Fedorovna wrote to Nicholas II from Kyiv: “It’s such a joy to see her beaming with happiness, thank God... And he is very sweet, natural and modest.”
Olga Alexandrovna's children, two playful, strapping boys Tikhon and Gury, brought the old Empress many pleasant moments in the last years of her life. Although they often made noise beyond all measure, which sometimes irritated and unnerved, the grandmother was not angry with them.
Maria Fedorovna’s eldest daughter, Ksenia Alexandrovna, lived almost constantly in England. For a long time, the mother believed that Ksenia’s family happiness was firmly established, although at first she did not have any special affection for Ksenia’s chosen one, Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich, who was his wife’s cousin. Then everything somehow took shape, and the mother-in-law, if she did not fall in love with her son-in-law, showed obvious favor towards him.
Ksenia and Alexander Mikhailovich (“Sandro”) had seven children: daughter Irina and sons Andrei, Fedor, Nikita, Dmitry, Rostislav, Vasily. They all escaped death in Russia and left there with their grandmother, whom they rarely saw afterwards. Some had already started their own families and had children, so Maria Feodorovna managed to live to see the birth of several great-grandchildren.
Ksenia's happiness was complete, but short-lived. Her husband, a restless, ambitious and pretentious man, in one of his many wanderings around the world met a certain lady who charmed him. He forgot about his origin, about his duty, about his wife, about his children, about Russia. For several years he was burning with passion and was even going to leave everything behind and go with his beloved to live in Australia. But the latter had enough prudence not to approve of this grand-ducal recklessness.
In the end, the “unique Sandro” told everything to Ksenia Alexandrovna, for whom this was a terrible blow, since she loved her husband deeply and sincerely. There were unpleasant explanations, but in the end they decided to leave everything as before and outwardly maintained the appearance of family well-being for almost ten years.
The revolution destroyed this tortured union. In exile, they lived separately without hiding; the wife is in England, the husband is in the south of France. They protected the peace of their “dear mother” by not revealing to her the reasons for this situation. It remained unclear how much Maria Fedorovna was privy to the drama of Ksenia’s family life and whether she was privy to it at all. In exile, Sandro showed no interest in his mother-in-law and saw her on her deathbed only many years after the separation.
Until the end, several persons from the former entourage of the once brilliant Imperial Court were with the Empress: maid of honor Countess Z. G. Mengden (1878–1950), Prince S. A. Dolgoruky (1872–1933), maid S. G. Grunwald, more than thirty served the deceased faithfully for years and became indispensable to her.
Here, in the villa, two tall bearded men, the last loyal Life Cossacks, who had been under the Empress for almost fifteen years, kept their constant watch: K. I. Polyakov (1879–1934) and T. K. Yaschik (1878–1946 ). That day, tears constantly flowed down the faces of these already middle-aged Russian soldiers, selflessly devoted to “Mother Empress.” Thus, faithfully, faithfully and to the end, according to the commandments of their ancestors and according to the will of the Lord God, their fathers and grandfathers served the Kings before them.
Others did not hide their sad feelings either. The loss was great and irreparable for everyone who knew Maria Fedorovna, and not only out of a sense of duty, but also at the call of their hearts, those who followed her into exile, dooming themselves to a difficult lot in an unfamiliar country, where they were needed by no one except the one to whom they owe were faithful until their last breath.
News of the sad event spread quickly. A few minutes after the death, Radio Copenhagen broadcast an emergency message, after which it stopped broadcasting for the rest of the day. Less than half an hour had passed when a car with King Christian X of Denmark and Queen Alexandrina, née Princess of Mecklenburg, arrived at Villa Vidøre. In a small living room on the ground floor they expressed their condolences to the Grand Duchesses.
That same evening, a memorial service was celebrated in the Russian church in Copenhagen, which was attended by the entire Russian colony. King Christian initially did not want to give a solemn official funeral to “Empress Dagmar”, the oldest representative of the Danish Royal House. He feared "political complications." However, the grief in Denmark became so universal that the King had to yield. A four-week mourning period was declared in the country.
All Danish newspapers published extensive obituaries containing many heartfelt words about the deceased. The widespread "Nationaltidende" exclaimed on October 14: "Denmark mourns today its intelligent and courageous daughter."
On the day of her death, in the evening, relatives and friends gathered for a litany in the Empress’s bedchamber. The body of the deceased, covered with flowers, still rested in bed, on whose knees, with tears in their eyes, were her daughters, Ksenia’s youngest son Vasily Alexandrovich, and those close to her, praying. Also present were the Danish King Christian X, Prince Valdemar, Prince George of Greece (nephew of Maria Feodorovna), the Duchess of Cumberland, and the princes and princesses of the Danish Royal House.
The death of the Russian Empress, who occupied a prominent place in the European dynastic hierarchy, did not go unnoticed in other countries. In addition to the Danish Court, mourning was declared at the royal houses of London and Belgrade.
The largest European newspapers published obituaries and memorial articles, speaking with sympathy about the deceased, who personified an entire era of European history and survived terrible adversity. The Paris Ecode Paris wrote: “France must honor the memory of its great friend, as well as this mournful mother, worthy of endless regret.”
The English Daily Telegraph stated in an editorial: “The Empress Maria Feodorovna has been our guest so often and demands such attention to herself as the sister of the late Queen Alexandra that the news of her death should cause grief among the English and remind them again of the bitter tragedy Romanov dynasty".
The most powerful shock, the greatest bitterness, the news of the death of Maria Feodorovna resonated in the souls of hundreds of thousands of Russians who survived the bloody whirlwind of the revolution and whiled away their days in almost all countries of the world. In Orthodox churches all over the world, from Tokyo and Shanghai to New York and Buenos Aires, memorial services were served and funeral candles were lit.
Russia, the country that remained to live in the hearts and souls of people, said goodbye to its Queen. And although the Kingdom of the Double-Headed Eagle did not exist for more than ten years, there were no thrones and crowns left, which were desecrated and destroyed by the merciless “life improvers,” but the Queen was there, being a memory and hope for the Russian people. Priest Leonid Kolchev expressed the bitterness of Russian hearts from the irreparable loss in heartfelt words: “The pure wax burned out, the flame went out. The life of our dear Mother Empress is over. Many millions of Russian children were left orphans.”
The entire press of the Russian diaspora, regardless of political leanings, responded to the death of the Last Empress. One of the most influential and widely circulated emigrant newspapers, “Vozrozhdenie,” published in Paris, wrote in its editorial: “With the death of Empress Maria Fedorovna, a great period of Russian history ended; in Denmark, in a modest villa guarded by the last Life Cossack, above all our struggle, beyond all our policies and tactics, above all of us, as a living symbol of the former Empire, the last Russian Empress remained in modesty and silence, and her death seems to let her down a mourning feature of that part of history that was broken and scattered by the revolution.”
The center of refugee Russia was France and its capital, where services were particularly solemn and crowded. In the main Orthodox church in Paris, the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral on Daru Street, memorial services went on almost continuously. Representatives of the most famous aristocratic families, officers and dignitaries, former officials of the former imperial court came here to pay their last tribute to their crowned compatriot, to pray for the repose of her soul: chamberlains, ladies-in-waiting, chamberlains, equestrians and others who miraculously escaped reprisals in their homeland. Here one could also see political figures, people of science, art, and literature.
The entire Daru Street was full of people and crowded with cars from morning until late evening. People said goodbye not only to the Tsarina, but also to their past, to youth, dreams, to everything that made up the meaning of their life there, in their now distant and lost homeland, and that helped them live here, in strangers and so unpleasant for the Russian soul "European Palestines". Time did not spare anyone or anything. It was inexorable and carried away the images, sounds and sensations of the now legendary country of Russia further and further. The most majestic reflection of that lost world was the late Queen.
With tears in their eyes, two famous ladies, who at one time brought a lot of grief to Maria Feodorovna, also fervently prayed in the Orthodox churches of Paris. One of them is the youthful passion of the Empress’s eldest son, then Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich, the famous ballerina Matilda Kshesinskaya (1872–1971), by this time she had already managed to become related to the Russian Imperial House, having married in 1921 the cousin of Nicholas II, Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich.
The other is Natalya Sergeevna Brasova (née Sheremetyevskaya, 1880–1952), back in 1912 she became the morganatic wife of the Empress’s youngest son, Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich. After the revolution and the murder of Mikhail, Brasova left Russia, raised her son George, the grandson of the Empress, but Maria Feodorovna for a long time could not even hear the name of “this woman,” although her grandson was once introduced to her by her son Mikhail.
However, the meeting still took place. While in England in 1923, the Empress could not refuse to receive the one who brought her so much worry. On April 17 (April 30), 1923, Maria Feodorovna wrote in her diary: “At 11, I received Brasova with her little son, who is now 12 years old. He has grown a lot since I last saw him. He is such a sweet boy, but he is not at all like my dear Misha. Their visit was a huge emotional shock for me! But she was sweet and modest, and they both gave me a small Easter egg made from old Russian porcelain.” This was the first and last meeting; Brasova did not come to Denmark for the funeral of her strict mother-in-law...
In Russian houses, in Russian restaurants and clubs, all these days there was a lot of talk about the deceased. Memorable evenings and conversations were held. We recalled various pages in the life of this Danish princess, who had become so dear, so Russian, so at home.
Newspapers published a terrible photograph: Maria Fedorovna in a coffin. A small, thin woman, wearing a white headdress, from under which once black, now almost gray curls protruded, with a cross in her hands folded on her chest. She has changed little; the facial features were piercingly familiar and remained the same as twenty or thirty years ago. The image of this woman in Russia was known to everyone, young and old.
Her portraits adorned the walls of educational institutions, many public places, the windows of fashionable stores, and the pages of expensive albums on the history of Russia and the Dynasty. They were constantly published by the most widespread newspapers and magazines. It was not surprising that in a poor house of a tradesman, in a godforsaken hole, some Tsarevokokshaisk, or in an unprepossessing peasant hut, in a prominent place, in the red corner, under the traditional icons of St. Nicholas and the Mother of God of Kazan, there hung a portrait of the Empress , cut out from an illustrated magazine. She was known and loved.
The Russian people took this love into exile, and the last weeks of October 1928 became the days of its memory. The old people with tears in their voices talked about the details of her coronation, personal meetings with her and her unforgettable husband Emperor Alexander III. With spiritual trepidation, for the umpteenth time, we admired the courage of the Empress during the difficult years of revolutionary turmoil, the firmness of her will and principles. The story that happened in the spring of 1918, when Crimea, where Maria Fedorovna was under Bolshevik arrest, was occupied by the Germans, was passed down from mouth to mouth.
Emperor Wilhelm II sent his representative Baron Stolzenberg, who invited the Empress to freely leave the dangerous place and move to Denmark with the help of the German authorities. And then the old woman, who had endured a lot of humiliation and insults from her former subjects, who had almost killed her and her loved ones, exclaimed with truly royal grandeur and dignity: “Help from the enemies of Russia? - Never!" These words became popular and remained forever in the chronicle of Russian courage and self-sacrifice.
All Russian refugees had a hard time in a foreign land. But no one knew, no one heard how hard it was for the Queen - a mother and widow who had lost her throne, children and was unable to even pray at the graves of her loved ones. Since everything ended so abruptly and irrevocably on March 2, 1917, when her Nicky abdicated power, life has turned hopelessly upside down. Everything around began to crumble before our eyes, and sometimes there was not enough strength and desire to move forward; there was no air to breathe deeply. Some terrible dream suddenly became a reality. Years passed, but the terrible vision did not pass. And people have changed so incredibly. She was sometimes rude to those who only yesterday had been servile; she encountered cold disdain where until recently she had only met with deep respect.
Even relatives began to treat differently. When in May 1919, after a five-year break, Maria Feodorovna found herself in London, she realized with bitterness that they, the Romanovs, were no longer needed by anyone and had become a burden to everyone. No, her sister, the English Queen Widow Alexandra, her “dear Alyx,” remained the same as always: kind, affectionate, caring. But she was already old and sick, removed from almost everyone and everything, whiling away her days with her daughter Victoria, a bilious old maid. Maria Feodorovna’s nephew, King George V, showed no interest in the refugee and several times demonstrated cold indifference, although previously he had always treated her with constant respect. Now, as Alix explained to her, trying to shield her son, “the political situation was very difficult.”
The Exiled Queen also encountered a cool reception upon her arrival in Denmark, where her other nephew, King Christian X, was even less inclined to show his aunt special attention. At the beginning there were unpleasant explanations and disagreements, but in the end Maria Fedorovna became accustomed to her fate and humility took possession of her soul. She did not complain to anyone or complain about anyone.
The years of exile, the new world of people, things and situations could not help but influence the Empress’s views, which she always changed with great difficulty. But it was necessary to be able to perceive in a new way what previously seemed “clear once and for all.”
And perhaps the most remarkable transformation concerned her attitude towards her daughter-in-law, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. In emigration, Maria Fedorovna no longer perceived her the same way as before. Displeasure and irritation are gone. Now it's all gone. No more reproach, no more ambiguity.
When Maria Fedorovna read the book of Alexandra Fedorovna’s friend Mrs. Lily Dehn “THE REAL TSARINA”, published in London in 1922, much was revealed differently. She saw the Daughter-in-law as she had never known before - a great and courageous Wife, Mother, Empress. Maria Fedorovna knew how to appreciate nobility, honor, devotion, and now she was able to appreciate Alyx, who had to endure such torment and suffering, in comparison with which her own were worth little...
Having ceased to be a Tsarina for the “royals,” Maria Fedorovna remained such for the Russians, who greedily hung on her every word. The Tsarina’s dying wish, published in newspapers, made a great impression on the Russian diaspora, that after the destruction of Soviet power, her body would be transported to St. Petersburg and buried next to the grave of Emperor Alexander III.
Even earlier, her decision not to recognize Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich, who declared himself as such in 1924 in Paris, was discussed for a long time.
The question of the legitimate successor of Emperor Nicholas II split the emigration and led to many years of tedious litigation and bickering. Two main “parties” were formed - “Kirillovtsy” and “Nikolaevtsy”. The first grouped around Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich, and the second defended the rights of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich.
In the fall of 1924, a letter from Empress Maria Feodorovna addressed to Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich appeared in print, causing a great resonance: “There is still no accurate news about the fate of My beloved Sons and Grandson, and therefore I consider the appearance of a new Emperor premature. There is not yet a person who could extinguish the last ray of hope in Me... If the Lord, according to His inscrutable ways, was pleased to call to Himself My beloved Sons and Grandson, then I, without looking ahead, with firm hope in the mercy of God, believe that The Sovereign Emperor will be indicated by Our fundamental Laws in alliance with the Orthodox Church together with the Russian People. I pray to God that He will not be completely angry with Us and will soon send Us salvation in ways only known to Him.”
Respect for the Empress was so great that no one dared to publicly criticize her position, although she seriously shook the position of the “Kirillovites”...
The main mourning ceremonies took place in Denmark, and the funeral order was determined by King Christian X. Relatives and famous figures from the Russian diaspora began to come to Copenhagen: Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich (son-in-law of the deceased), Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich, Grand Duchess Maria Pavlovna (the Younger), Prince imperial blood Gabriel Konstantinovich, several other members of the overthrown dynasty; head of the Russian church administration abroad, Metropolitan Evlogy (1868–1946), former prime minister A. F. Trepov (1862–1928), representatives from various officer associations and emigrant unions.
Persons of royal blood also arrived: the nephew of the late King of Norway Gaookon (Haakon) VII, Crown Prince Gustav Adolf of Sweden, the sons of the English King George V: the Duke of York - the future King George VI, the father of Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Wales - the future King Edward VIII, King Albert I of Belgium and others.
On October 16, the coffin with the body of the Empress left the Vidøre Villa. The Empress began her last journey, the route of which no longer depended on her will.
It was a warm, quiet and sunny day. There was almost no wind; quite a rare case for autumn Denmark, constantly blown through by the winds of the cold seas. Shrouded in a crimson-golden veil, Klampenborg saw off his old-timer, a man who had recognized and fallen in love with this metropolitan suburb long ago, many decades ago, when there was no cinema, no telephone, no electricity, no cars, but these shady and almost deserted on weekdays were days of alleys, these well-groomed lawns, bright flower beds, villas surrounded by greenery.
As a young girl, on the threshold of her youth, she visited here with her parents and brothers and sisters. Here they played under the shade of old linden trees and took sea baths, recommended by doctors who believed that the Princess, due to the fragility of her physique, should definitely engage in hardening. She was too careful not to follow the recommendations of her elders, but also too capricious to obey meekly. She always swam with great joy, quickly learned to swim well, and at the age of sixteen she could already swim quite far.
She brought her husband, Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich, to Klampenborg when she first returned from Russia to her parents’ home after the wedding. This happened in the summer of 1867. They spent joyful hours together, swimming in the sea and relaxing on the shore. And the husband, who grew up among the impressive landscape and landscape parks of Tsarskoe Selo, Peterhof and Gatchina, well familiar with the almost virgin nature of the Russian plain, was fascinated by the appearance of Danish “ruralism”, the harmony of natural beauty and the work of human hands.
The Tsarevich wrote to his mother Empress Maria Alexandrovna in August 1867: “This is a lovely place. The entire road that runs from Copenhagen along the seashore is lined with dachas, and a ton of people live here. This road continues, I’m sure, for about 10 miles, and everything is one dacha after another, and there are some very nice dachas. On Sundays, all of Copenhagen comes to Klampenborg, where there are balls and entertaining evenings.”
Here, in Klampenborg, ten kilometers north of the center of Copenhagen, Empress Maria Feodorovna with her older sister and closest friend, Queen Alexandra of England, after the death of her father King Christian IX in 1906, decided to purchase their own residence. Visiting Denmark, it was now too difficult for them to stay in the official royal residences, in those places, within those walls, where everything was covered with memories, where every thing, every room reminded of dear parents, of sweet-sorrowful, forever-gone events and images of the past. , but an unforgettable past.
In half with Alexandra, Maria Fedorovna bought the Videre villa. All silver, porcelain, tablecloths and even bed linen were marked with the monogram of both owners until the end of Maria Feodorovna’s life. 1
Soon after the death of Maria Feodorovna, Villa Videre was sold and over time it housed a hospital.
The Queen of England completely trusted the taste of her younger sister, and Maria Feodorovna put all her temperament and maximalism into the equipment and decoration of her first (and last) home in Denmark. For the premises, the best damask fabric of various colors was purchased, exquisite furniture was purchased in the style of Louis XVI and, of course, in the “Jacob” style so beloved by the Queen; The best craftsmen - builders and cabinetmakers - were invited. And she delved into everything, everything interested her.
She reported to her son Emperor Nicholas II on September 9, 1906: “We were in our house Hvidore twice... We were delighted with it: such a wonderful view, right on the sea, such a beautiful little garden, a lot of flowers, just lovely. The house is not yet finished at all. We chose different materials for the rooms, and I think it will be amazingly cute and cozy.”
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The Emperor, who possesses the All-Russian Throne, cannot profess any other faith than the Orthodox 728.
The relationship between Russian autocrats and the Orthodox Church had its own, very dramatic history. It should be borne in mind that all Russian monarchs were religious people, but they treated the Orthodox Church as an institution of power differently.
In the first quarter of the 18th century. Peter I managed to subjugate the Orthodox Church, making it part of the state mechanism. As a result, clergy actually turned into civil servants. This decision is not related to the personal religiosity of the monarch. It was a political decision. Therefore, throughout the XVIII - early XX centuries. Church structures were integrated into the bureaucratic system of the Russian Empire.
The process of subordinating the church to the state was accompanied by the bureaucratization of its structures and the gradual loss of the moral authority of the clergy in the eyes of the people. It is absolutely no coincidence that in the great Russian literature of the 19th century. There are very few positive images of priests. The artists also paid tribute to anti-religious propaganda. Suffice it to recall the paintings of V.G. Perov “Monastery Meal” and “Religious Procession for Easter”. Nevertheless, it was the Orthodox faith that cemented the integrity of the Empire, and the Russian monarchs actually determined the strategy of church influence on the soul of the people. Therefore, it is not without interest to assess the level of personal religiosity of the Russian monarchs, which was formed not without the influence of the royal confessors.
It should be noted that demonstrative disregard for national-religious traditions on the part of monarchs was rare and ultimately cost them dearly. Thus, Peter III, the grandson of Peter I, showed in every possible way his disdain for Orthodox rituals. In the court environment, decades later, all sorts of stories circulated about this. In the 1860s. Minister of the Imperial Household V.F. Adlerberg “said that he heard from Emperor Alexander Pavlovich how there was a Lutheran Church of Peter III in the Winter Palace” 729. It must be admitted that the sources of this information are very authoritative. The pragmatic Catherine II actively used the “religious factor” in the process of preparing the coup, emphatically demonstrating her commitment to the ideals of Orthodoxy.
Nevertheless, after the accession of Catherine II in 1762, no religious fanaticism was observed at the Russian Imperial Court. Which is very typical for the 18th century, which went down in European history as the Age of Enlightenment, heavily mixed with atheism.
However, in the 19th century. the situation has changed. It should be noted that the home education system of Russian monarchs and grand dukes assumed their compulsory and traditional religious education in childhood. At the same time, the level of religiosity of individuals of the Imperial family, naturally, turned out to be different, although throughout life with all its dramatic collisions it could change in one direction or another.
Despite their exceptional position, the Russian monarchs, of course, remained people who distinguished between personal religiosity and the religious policy of the empire at the head of which they were. Speaking about the level of religiosity of members of the Imperial Court, it is also necessary to distinguish between the personal religiosity of the emperors and the established, very stable religious practice of the Supreme Court. Until the last quarter of the 19th century. The religious practice of the Imperial Court remained within the framework of formal religious traditions that had developed under Catherine II.
For courtiers in the first quarter of the 19th century. In general, there is a formally skeptical attitude towards religion, characteristic of the 18th century. Of course, this was influenced by the upbringing of Alexander I in the spirit of the cosmopolitan educational ideas of J. - J. Rousseau and Voltaire.
The religious education of Alexander I in his childhood was led by Archpriest A.A. Samborsky. Judging by the memoirs of his contemporaries, he was a rather secular man, devoid of deep religious feelings. Archpriest Andrei Afanasyevich Samborsky (1732–1815) not only taught the future Alexander I the basics of Orthodoxy, but also became his first confessor.
A.A. Samborsky.
V.L. Borovikovsky. Late 1790s and.
Speaking about the confessors of the Russian emperors, it should be borne in mind that according to the tradition that developed towards the end of the 15th century, the rectors of the Kremlin Annunciation Cathedral became the confessors of the Russian tsars, and then the Russian emperors. Although during the imperial period of Russian history confessors lived in St. Petersburg, according to tradition, the protopresbyter of the Great Court Cathedral in the Winter Palace simultaneously headed the Annunciation Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin, being the confessor of the imperial family.
As a rule, the confessors of Russian emperors were widely educated people who lived in Europe for a long time. A.A. was no exception. Samborsky. Having graduated from the Kyiv Theological Academy in 1765, he, by the will of Catherine II, was sent to England to study agronomy. At the same time, he was given the responsibility of conducting church services at the Russian embassy in London. In 1768 he married an Englishwoman, whom he converted to Orthodoxy. In 1868, he was officially appointed to the post of priest at the embassy church. Along with services in Russian, he performed services for Greeks and English sympathizers with Orthodoxy in Greek or Latin. Samborsky stayed in England for 15 years. In 1780, Empress Catherine II recalled Samborsky to Russia.
In 1781, he was included in the retinue of the heir Pavel Petrovich during his trip to Europe. At the end of the “Count of the North”’s journey, Samborsky was awarded a diamond cross on a blue ribbon by Catherine II. In 1785, Samborsky was appointed mentor in the Law of God and confessor to the Grand Dukes Alexander and Konstantin Pavlovich. Later, he held the same rank under the Grand Duchesses, the daughters of Paul I. When the majestic St. Sophia Cathedral was erected in Tsarskoe Selo in 1788, Samborsky became its first archpriest.
His work was highly appreciated. In 1799, Samborsky was awarded the Order of St. Anne, 1st degree. In the same year, he was appointed confessor to the Grand Duchess, Archduchess Alexandra Pavlovna of Austria, with whom he remained until her death in 1801. He was not forgotten and after the death of Paul I. Samborsky was awarded the diamond signs of the Order of St. Anne and allowed to live in Mikhailovskoe palace "at rest".
Liturgical device from the camp church of Alexander I. Russia. Around 1812
The influence of the priest-agronomist Samborsky affected the ecuministic hobbies of Alexander I. As a result, the emperor, brought up in the traditions of the encyclopedists, became, in fact, a cosmopolitan, remaining the Orthodox monarch of the Orthodox Empire. This was manifested in various actions. It is known that the emperor for a long time maintained relations with Baroness V. - J. Krüdener, who preached the idea of merging the Orthodox and Catholic churches. In 1813, the emperor visited the community of Moravian brothers in Germany. Since 1812, he begins to systematically read the Bible and sends his sister Ekaterina Pavlovna a list of “mystical literature” 730. All these hobbies were very far from canonical Orthodoxy.
A.A. Samborsky was the confessor of Alexander I from 1785 to April 3, 1808, that is, he held this position for 23 years. After the decrepit Samborsky left office, his place under the emperor was taken by Pavel Vasilyevich Krinitsky (1752–1835). He came from the nobility of the Chernigov province and received his education at the Chernigov gymnasium and the Kyiv Theological Academy. After completing the course, Krinitsky taught poetry and Greek for some time at the Chernigov gymnasium. However, in 1783 his life changed dramatically as he was sent as a priest to Paris, where he stayed until 1791 and witnessed the beginning of the French Revolution. Upon returning to Russia, from 1793 to 1795 he was a teacher of law at the Academy of Arts.
Emperor Alexander I before leaving St. Petersburg on September 1, 1825 G.G. Chernetsov. 1825
In 1799, the court career of P.V. began. Krinitsky. He was appointed teacher of the law to the younger children of Emperor Pavel Petrovich and archpriest of St. Sophia Cathedral. In the expenditure documents of Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich, the name of Krinitsky was first mentioned in 1801, when by order of Empress Maria Fedorovna “he was under
Their Imperial Highnesses the Grand Dukes, confessor and teacher of the law, Archpriest Pavel Krinitsky" is given "a grant of 100 rubles." 731.
It was P.V. Krinitsky became the first teacher of the law of the future Emperor Nicholas I. It is curious that the sacrament of confession at the Imperial Court was a “paid service.” At least, the financial documents directly state that in addition to the salary in March 1810, “the confessor, Archpriest Pavel Krinitsky,” was given “200 rubles for confession” 732. Systematic studies of the Law of God began with Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich in the autumn of 1802.
Gradually, Krinitsky took over all the positions of the decrepit Samborsky. In December 1803 he was included in the court church, and on January 27, 1806 he was appointed senior over the court clergy. And finally, on April 3, 1808, he was appointed royal confessor and member of the Holy Synod. Thus, in 1808, Alexander I got a second confessor.
After 1815, a new clergyman appeared near the royal family - Nikolai Vasilyevich Muzovsky, he became the confessor of Nikolai and Mikhail Pavlovich. As a result, until 1825, Krinitsky remained the confessor of Alexander I, Empresses Elizaveta Alekseevna and Maria Feodorovna, and Muzovsky was the confessor of the “younger” Grand Dukes - Nicholas and Mikhail. At the same time, undoubtedly, the decisive word in resolving “personnel issues” in the affairs of the court clergy was played by Alexander I and the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna. It is noteworthy that Krinitsky remained the confessor of the dowager empress until her death in 1828, and after that he continued to be officially called “the former confessor of the late empress” 733.
At the time of the coronation of Nicholas I in August 1826, the “Chamber-Fourier Journal of the Highest Court of both halves” recorded the division of powers between the priests as follows: among the clergy present at the coronation, “Their Imperial Majesties Protopresbyter Krinitsky” and “His Imperial Majesty’s confessor Archpriest” are mentioned Muzovsky" 734.
The formal religiosity of the Highest Court was also manifested in the appearance of Nikolai Pavlovich’s confessor, Nikolai Vasilyevich Muzovsky 735. In his appearance he bore little resemblance to an Orthodox priest. In 1817, he walked “in black clothes, in a white tie and without a beard,” and, according to contemporaries, “it was difficult to recognize ... our Orthodox priest” 736.
Device for communion. 1820s and.
Along with church services, baptisms, weddings and other things, one of his duties was to convert German princesses who married the Grand Dukes of the House of Romanov to Orthodoxy. When the future wife of Nicholas I arrived in Russia in 1817, the confessor “had to constantly be in the princess’s reception room, taking advantage of every free hour to help her memorize the Creed” 737.
It must be admitted that the formal approach of N.V. Muzovsky's approach to issues of faith made the transition from Protestantism to Orthodoxy a difficult ordeal for the Prussian Princess Charlotte. Many years later, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna recalled that “Priest Moussovsky, who introduced me to the dogmas of the Greek Church, was supposed to prepare me to accept
Holy Mysteries; he was a wonderful man, but far from eloquent in German. This was not the kind of person I needed to shed peace into my soul and calm it in confusion at such a moment” 738. The very procedure of joining Orthodoxy made a grave impression on both the Prussian princess and her retinue: “With half a sin, I read the Creed in Russian; next to me stood the abbess in black, while I was dressed all in white, with a small cross around my neck; I looked like a victim; I made such an impression on our entire Prussian retinue, who looked with compassion and with tears in their eyes at the participation of poor Princess Charlotte in a church ceremony, naturally strange in the eyes of Protestants” 739.
For a Protestant, adapting to a religion that was new to her was difficult. Not only because of the inevitable spiritual turning point, but also because of the peculiarities of everyday ritual. For the Orthodox Grand Duchess Alexandra Feodorovna, formerly Princess Charlotte of Prussia, the need to stand on her feet for long services seemed extremely difficult. Many years later, Alexandra Feodorovna recalled her first visit to Moscow: “I had to lie in bed and then on the couch for several days; My legs were so tired from kneeling that I could hardly even move them” 740.
Thus, we can state that, firstly, during the reign of the “Westernizer” Alexander I, the religious life of the Russian Imperial Court fully reproduced the traditions of formal religiosity that had developed in the 18th century. Secondly, Emperor Alexander I after 1815 was largely dominated by ideas related to the desire for a merger of the Catholic and Orthodox churches. Thirdly, both confessors of Emperor Alexander I were widely educated people who served for a long time at Orthodox churches in Europe. It was also important that the appearance of the royal confessors was far from the canonical image of a Russian Orthodox priest.
Nicholas I, having become emperor in December 1825, being Orthodox by birth and upbringing, over the 30 years of his reign went through a serious spiritual and religious evolution associated with a gradual abandonment of formal religiosity.
The future emperor began to be taught prayers and baptism in February 1803, when he was in his eighth year 741. The main teachers who instilled religiosity in the children's soul were educators, oddly enough, who professed Protestantism and Lutheranism, which, of course, left its mark on the personal religiosity of the children.
If in the second half of the 1820s. young Nicholas I was a fairly formally religious person, then from the beginning of the 1830s. his personal religiosity takes on more spiritual forms. The spiritual transformation of Nicholas I is closely connected with the formation of his own power scenario, based on national traditions and the denial of Western religious and political practice.
Sometimes the actions of Emperor Nicholas I were so out of line with the usual patterns of behavior that it literally caused confusion among the courtiers. But over time, they lined up in a line of behavior that formed a nationally oriented scenario of power. And the most important part of the new scenario of power was the sincere Orthodox religiosity of Nikolai Pavlovich.
Thus, memoirists mention that sometimes during the service, Emperor Nicholas I stood in front, next to the choir of singers and sang along with them in his beautiful voice. One of the daughters of Nicholas I recalled that “for the Pope it was a matter of habit and education to never miss the Sunday service, and he, with an open prayer book in his hands, stood behind the singers. But he read the Gospel in French and seriously believed that the Church Slavonic language was accessible only to the clergy. At the same time, he was a convinced Christian and a deeply religious person, which is so often found among people of strong will.” 742 This is a very revealing quote. Indeed, a sincerely believing Orthodox monarch reading the Gospel in French is a kind of symbol of the turning point processes that Nikolai Pavlovich began.
One of the old Orthodox traditions that existed at the royal court since the times of Muscovite Rus' was the practice of making “ancestral” icons. A “measurement” was taken from newborns, a piece of board was cut along its length, and on it the icon painters painted the face of the saint on whose day the royal baby was born. Nicholas I mentioned in his notes that he preserved this custom for his children, and “the Empress gave each newborn an icon of his saint, made according to the child’s height on his birthday” 743. It is noteworthy that in his spiritual will, drawn up in 1844, Nikolai Pavlovich also mentioned his “ancestral” icon, deciding its fate: “The image of the Wonderworker Nicholas, as tall as I was at birth, must always remain in Anichkovo” 744. When in 1857 Alexander II had a son named in honor of Sergius of Radonezh, immediately after his birth the famous icon painter Peshekhonov was commissioned to create an image of the Venerable Sergius of Radonezh “in the height of His Highness, as required by ancient pious custom” 745 .
It is curious that in the Great Church of the Winter Palace, services were also held for “political” reasons. During the reign of Nicholas I, every year on December 14, a divine service was held, to which only persons involved in the events associated with the suppression of the Decembrist uprising in 1825 were invited. After the service, everyone was allowed to kiss the hand of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna and kiss the emperor, as on Easter.
It is noteworthy that the tradition of services in memory of the events of December 14 was preserved under Alexander II, although only on anniversary dates. For example, on December 14, 1875, in memory of the 50th anniversary of the events on Senate Square, a gala dinner was held, to which the remaining participants in the events were invited, including princes A.A. Suvorov, V.F. Adlerberg, R.E. Greenwald. At this time, the uniform of Nicholas I was brought to the Winter Palace in the form of the Life Guards Izmailovsky Regiment, in which the emperor was on that tragic day. Naturally, the old people remembered the events. Alexander II, who was 7 years old in December 1825 746, also found something to tell his sons about.
From the first half of the 1830s, when the process of formalizing his “scenario of power” was completed, Nikolai Pavlovich emphasized his “Russianness” in every possible way. Along with the introduction of the Russian language into everyday court life (he spoke Russian “even with women (a hitherto unheard of thing at the Court)”), he was the first to introduce into fashion “the habit of singing holiday troparia and even the entire mass together with the choir in church - these are some little things; but the fashionable ladies of Alexander’s time tell what an impression it made, how it surprised, how it seemed strange, bizarre, and what a revolution it made in the living rooms, and subsequently in family life, and in education, and little by little it awakened popular feeling” 747.
It should be emphasized that the faith of Nicholas I was completely sincere, and he consciously “pulled” his Court towards sincere and reverent Orthodox religiosity. Freilina A.F. Tyutcheva recalled that on major holidays and special celebrations, services were held in the Great Church of the Winter Palace. At the service, the men were in full dress uniform, with orders, the ladies were in court costumes, that is, in warriors and sundresses with a tren embroidered with gold, which made a majestic impression.
However, the ritual religiosity of the Imperial Court, naturally, was far from manifestations of the common folk traditions of Orthodox piety. Slavophile maid of honor A.F. Tyutcheva mentioned that she did not dare to kneel, as she was used to, or bow to the ground, “since etiquette did not allow such manifestations of piety. Everyone stood straight and stretched out... The members of the imperial house, however, behaved exemplary in the church and seemed to pray with true piety. Emperor Nicholas stood alone in front, next to the choir of singers and sang along with them in his beautiful voice” 748.
Under Nikolai Pavlovich, new court cathedrals began to be built. Lovingly developing Peterhof Alexandria, Nicholas I ordered the construction of a home church near the Cottage. It was built in the then fashionable Gothic style and was called the Chapel of St. Alexander Nevsky. In July 1834, services began there. They had a family, intimate character. In addition to members of the Romanov family, only close relatives and courtiers were invited to serve on special lists. Under Nicholas I, an exception was made only for cadets. In Tsarskoe Selo in 1825–1827. Chapelle 749 was built in the Alexandrovsky Park in the Gothic style. In the arched vault of Chapelle they made the entrance to the apartment of the confessor of Emperor N.V. Muzovsky.
Nicholas I paid great attention to the religious education of his children. Following tradition, he personally chose the candidacy of a teacher of the law for his eldest son, Tsarevich Alexander Nikolaevich. He became Doctor of Theology G.P. Pavsky.
Gerasim Petrovich Pavsky graduated from the St. Petersburg Theological Academy with the title of master in 1814. In the same year he occupied the department of Jewish language at the academy. In 1815, Pavsky received the position of priest at the Kazan Cathedral in St. Petersburg. In 1817, he was appointed a teacher of the law at the Tsarskoye Selo Lyceum, and in 1821 Pavsky received the degree of Doctor of Theology and was highly awarded the Order of St. Vladimir, IV degree. At that time he was only 34 years old. The career rise of the young theologian did not end there. After the opening of St. Petersburg University in 1819, the trustee of the Educational District S.S. Uvarov provided Pavsky with the chair of theology. And at the academy, and at the lyceum, and at the university, the lectures of the talented theologian aroused general interest. Therefore, it was no coincidence that he entered the circle of teachers of Tsarevich Alexander Nikolaevich, who were selected by V.A. Zhukovsky. On behalf of Emperor Nicholas I, Pavsky drew up a program for teaching the Law of God, according to which he began his studies with the Tsarevich on November 30, 1826.
He began his studies with the study of the Lord's Prayer, in relation to the ideas of an eight-year-old student. While teaching the Tsarevich, Pavsky compiled two manuals (“Outline of Church History” and “Christian Teaching in a Brief System”), which were published in a limited edition.
To the royal parents and leaders of the educational process of Tsarevich V.A. Zhukovsky and K.K. Merder liked Pavsky. This is evidenced by an entry in the diary of the Tsarevich’s tutor K.K. Merdera: “February 2, 1829. In the evening, Their Majesties were present at the examination in the Law of God. The Grand Duke was especially distinguished; all his answers were excellent and proved the great correctness of his judgments.” According to the results of the exam, Nicholas I “declared complete pleasure” to Father Pavsky 750.
Soon Pavsky began teaching the Law of God to the daughters of Nicholas I - Maria, Olga and Alexandra. In addition, it was included in the Great Cathedral of the Winter Palace. And finally, the peak of Pavsky’s court career was his appointment as confessor of all high-ranking students. He was repeatedly noted and awarded (a diamond pectoral cross, diamond signs of St. Anne of the 2nd degree, the Order of St. Vladimir of the 3rd degree and two more diamond rings). Pavsky worked at the Imperial Court for 9 years. Such noticeable successes gave rise to envy among church hierarchs.
In 1835 a scandal broke out. The reason for it was Pavsky’s “notes and manuals” prepared for the Tsarevich. He was accused of mistakes, dishonesty and bad intentions. In the diary of A.S. Pushkin in February 1835, an entry appeared: “Filaret 751 denounced Pavsky as if he were a Lutheran. Pavsky was dismissed from the Grand Duke. The Metropolitan and the Synod confirmed Philaret’s opinion. The Emperor said that in spiritual matters he is not a judge; but tenderly said goodbye to Pavsky. It’s a pity for the smart, learned and kind priest! They don’t like Pavsky” 752.
Nevertheless, Pavsky retained the goodwill of Nicholas I, since only with his knowledge could Pavsky be appointed to the post of priest of the Tauride Palace, retaining all the rights and benefits of his service.
Since the Tsarevich lost not only his teacher of the law, but also his confessor, the question arose about his replacement. This problem was again solved personally by Emperor Nicholas I. The initiator of the “Pavsky case,” Moscow Metropolitan Filaret, drew the emperor’s attention to the young priest Vasily Borisovich Bazhanov.
By 1835 V.B. Bazhanov was already considered an experienced teacher. After graduating from the Theological Academy in 1823 with the title of master, he taught the Law of God in the Second Cadet Corps until 1827, and after Pavsky left the university, he took over the department of theology from him. At the same time, he taught at the Main Pedagogical Institute and at the 1st Gymnasium. It was at the gymnasium that Nicholas I came to Bazhanov’s lesson. It took the Emperor 15 minutes to form an opinion about the priest, after which he left. According to Bazhanov’s recollections, the emperor, upon returning to the palace, announced that he had finally found a teacher of the law for the heir. Naturally, not everyone greeted this appointment with kindness. The maid of honor of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna noted in her diary: “They exchanged a hawk for a cuckoo” 753.
Here it would be appropriate to refer to the opinion of A.S. Pushkin, he, being a close friend of V.A. Zhukovsky, personally knew G.P. Pavsky (1787–1863), and V.B. Bazhanov (1800–1883). He called the first “smart, learned and kind priest,” and the second, a “very decent” man 754. Thus, we can state that the growing Tsarevich had competent and worthy priests as teachers of the law and confessors.
It is also very important that Nicholas I personally introduced his children and grandchildren to family and religious traditions. The grandchildren of Nicholas I, including the future Alexander III, were baptized by the confessor of Emperor Nicholas Pavlovich, Protopresbyter Muzovsky 755. The growing grandchildren fulfilled all the required religious duties: on the eve of Sundays, royal days and major holidays they were taken to the all-night vigil, and on Sundays and holidays they listened to mass in the Small Church of the Winter Palace in the presence of the king and parents 756.
Nicholas I and his parents, Tsarevich Alexander and Tsarevna Maria Alexandrovna, instilled in their children a serious attitude towards religious rites through their attitude in church services. The memoirist wrote with respectful surprise: “The crown princess’s face expressed complete concentration. She was accompanied by all the children, even the smallest one, who was not yet three years old and who stood silent and motionless, like the rest, throughout the entire long service. I never understood how it was possible to instill in these very young children a sense of decency that could never be achieved from a child of our circle; however, it was not necessary to resort to any measures of coercion in order to accustom them to such ability to control themselves; they perceived it with the air they breathed” 757.
That is the view of a close but outside observer. The children, of course, were taught order. Emperor Nikolai Pavlovich closely monitored order in the church, paying attention to the smallest details, including the behavior of his grandchildren. Thus, in 1852, Nicholas I, carefully observing his grandchildren at the service, expressed his opinion to the chief educator of his grandchildren, General N.V. Zinoviev that “they stand at mass very well, but that their shoulders are held incorrectly and their heels are not together” 758. These “heels are not together” in relation to the little grandchildren 759 are truly amazing, depicting in their entirety the character traits of Nicholas I.
The personal religiosity of the Russian emperors, of course, also had a political component. Constant demonstration of commitment to the Orthodox shrines of Rus' was an important and obligatory part of their public image. Thus, in the Romanov family, until 1917, the custom was preserved when visiting Moscow, literally first of all to visit the icon of Our Lady of Iveron, and then the relics of Moscow saints. In October 1831, while visiting Moscow, Nicholas I and Tsarevich Alexander Nikolaevich, who was then 13 years old, immediately upon arrival went to venerate the tomb of Metropolitan Alexy 760. 20 years later, in September 1851, when Tsarevna Maria Alexandrovna arrived in Moscow, she herself took the children to the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, where they celebrated mass in the Trinity Cathedral, and then prayed in front of the shrine of St. Sergius of Radonezh. The mother and children visited the Gethsemane monastery and went to Rostov to worship St. Dmitry of Rostov 761. In the summer of 1855, Alexander II, who had not yet been crowned, visited the ancient capital for the first time as emperor. One of the days of a very intense visit was dedicated to the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, where Alexander II and Empress Maria Alexandrovna prayed earnestly at the relics of St. Sergius 762.
Visiting Moscow religious shrines made a great impression on children’s souls, since “it was customary to venerate the relics immediately upon arrival; one of the five monks constantly praying there lifted the lid of the coffin” 763.
However, the daughter of Nicholas I, Olga Nikolaevna, assessed the nature of the religious education of the royal children as quite formal. She explained this by the fact that “we were surrounded by Protestant educators who were barely familiar with our language and our church” 764. At the same time, it should be noted that the educational process in the royal family provided for a significant difference in the training of the crown prince and his sisters.
The fact is that, according to established practice, the daughters of Russian emperors sooner or later became spouses of Protestants. Perhaps that is why their introduction to the Orthodox religion was, perhaps, of a formal nature.
Nicholas I did a lot to change the religious life of the Russian imperial court, but it must be admitted that he never managed to change the formal attitude towards the Orthodox canons in the courtly aristocratic environment. Magnificent services in palace house temples for the most part were only a necessary part of magnificent palace ceremonies. They lacked the most important thing - sincere faith. In fact, court religious services had the character of a secular ceremony.
The personal authority of the emperor and his religiosity certainly disciplined those present in the Great Church of the Winter Palace. As mentioned by A.F. Tyutchev, “everyone stood straight and stretched out,” “members of the imperial house... behaved in the church approximately” 765. Absence from church services or tardiness was severely and immediately suppressed by Nikolai Pavlovich. For example, in April 1834, chamber cadet A.S. Pushkin violated etiquette by not appearing at the court church “neither for Vespers on Saturday, nor for mass on Palm Sunday.” After this, he immediately received an order to appear for an explanation. The poet himself wrote: “However, I did not go to the hair washing, but wrote an explanation” 766.
But even under the formidable emperor, during long services, the great princes periodically managed to jump out of the church for a “smoke break” on the church stairs. Therefore, on April 28, 1847, the highest decree was issued on a categorical ban on the use of “tobacco in churches during services.” After the death of Emperor Nicholas I, the entire strict order was very soon violated: “Everyone could be late, skip service at will, without being obliged to give an account to anyone” 767.
Like every Orthodox Christian, Nikolai Pavlovich periodically confessed to his confessor N.V. Muzovsky (1772–1848). He “received” it from his mother and older brother Alexander I, whose memory Nikolai Pavlovich deeply honored. However, apparently, Muzovsky’s appearance and personal qualities were disgusting to Nicholas I. This is indirectly evidenced by his words spoken in 1848 after Bazhanov’s appointment to replace the deceased Muzovsky. After his first confession with his new confessor, Nicholas I told his family that he was “confessing for the first time in his life.” Bazhanov himself wrote that he did not know what these words meant, but suggested that “the sovereign did not confess his sins to his confessors, and his confessors did not ask him questions, but only read prayers before and after confession” 768 .
The personal preferences of Nicholas I are also evidenced by the fact that in 1841 it was V.B. Bazhanov, and not Muzovsky, is entrusted with introducing the future Empress Maria Alexandrovna to the sacraments of the Orthodox Church. Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, involuntarily comparing what was happening, noted that “the confirmation of my daughter-in-law, the crown princess, took place under completely different conditions: she found here a wonderful priest who explained to her word by word all the dogmas and rituals of our church...” 769. However, in the will drawn up by Nikolai Pavlovich in 1844, “a separate clause” expresses gratitude to the “spiritual father” Muzovsky “for his faithful long-term service; having respected him sincerely” 770.
We can assume that Muzovsky initially did not suit the tsar, but removing him from office meant going against the will of Alexander I, whose memory was honored by Nicholas I. As a result, only after Muzovsky’s death in 1848 did V.B. Bazhanov became the confessor not only of Tsarevich Alexander Nikolaevich, but also of Nicholas I.
Contemporaries repeatedly noted the deep personal Orthodox religiosity of Nicholas I. Thus, Countess A.D. Bludova wrote that “Nikolai Pavlovich is the most Orthodox sovereign who has reigned over us since the time of Fyodor Alekseevich” 771. In this context, the phrase of Nicholas I, which he uttered during his dying conversation with V.B., sounds especially significant. Bazhanov about faith: “I am not a theologian; I believe like a man” 772 . And this strong peasant Orthodoxy adds a new important touch to the appearance of the autocrat Nicholas I.
Alexander II's attitude to religion did not go beyond the generally accepted boundaries of his circle. He was, of course, a believer who performed all the obligatory rites of the Orthodox Church. But his religiosity is akin to the religiosity of Alexander I: formal faith, but without deep religious feeling. Unlike his father, he was completely calm about violations of discipline during church services. Alexander II did not like Moscow, did not like being reminded that he was born in the Chudov Monastery of the ancient capital. He is a “Westerner” and felt better in some Ems and in Prussia in general... 773
In the family of Alexander II, the true bearer of Orthodox religiosity was, oddly enough, Empress Maria Alexandrovna. The poor German princess, who became the crown princess and then the empress, accepted the Orthodox canons with all her heart. According to the testimony of the teacher of the royal children, A.F. Tyutcheva, “the soul of the Grand Duchess was one of those that belong to the monastery” 774.
In the early 1850s. the grandchildren of Nicholas I began to be consistently included in the system of religious education. For the eldest son of Tsarevich Alexander, Grand Duke Nikolai Alexandrovich, lessons in the Law of God began on November 2, 1850. These lessons were taught by Bazhanov, he was confirmed in office on January 20, 1851, with a payment of 285 rubles. in year. He received the same amount for teaching all the other children of the Tsarevich. At the beginning of 1851, when Grand Duke Nikolai Alexandrovich was eight years old, Bazhanov began preparing the boy for his first confession and Lent 775. In 1853, Bazhanov prepared the already eight-year-old Grand Duke Alexander Alexandrovich, the future Alexander III, for his first confession.
It should be noted that the candidacy of V.B. Bazhanova's role as a teacher of the Law of God under the children of Alexander II was not undisputed. Empress Maria Alexandrovna wanted to choose a teacher of the law for her eldest son herself, even going against tradition. Therefore, in the early 1850s. The confessor of Princess Olga Nikolaevna of Württemberg, Archpriest I.I., was considered as a possible candidate for teacher of the law. Bazarov. The main reason for this decision was that Bazhanov held numerous other positions and could devote only a small amount of his attention to children. And the Empress needed a confessor all the time. She wrote to Olga Nikolaevna about Bazarov: “...We will accept him with open arms.
But if even the slightest share of Protestantism has sunk into him, then we will not understand each other. I really value the educational part (which, alas, Bazhanov neglects) ... I had not yet said anything to Bazhanov before receiving an answer. I believe that he himself will understand that he does not have enough time for this... isn't he being too soft? But for children, first of all, I need warmth” 777. However, for a number of reasons, the option with I.I. Bazarov did not pass, and teaching remained with Bazhanov; the tsars “deeply respected him as their long-term confessor and did not want to offend or even upset him” 778.
But Maria Alexandrovna, without realizing her plan for her eldest son, nevertheless realized it for her younger sons. Bazhanov was released from training, and in 1859 the teaching of the Law of God was entrusted to Archpriest Rozhdestvensky, who served at the church of the Mariinsky Palace, while simultaneously teaching the Law of God to the children of Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna. N.V. Rozhdestvensky was transferred to the Small Church of the Winter Palace and assigned to it above the staff 779. For such an appointment N.V. Rozhdestvensky was prompted by the cooling of his relationship with the mistress of the Mariinsky Palace, Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna. This is due to the fact that the priest refused to secretly perform the wedding ceremony of the daughter of Nicholas I and Count Stroganov. Later N.V. Rozhdestvensky became rector of the Small Church of the Winter Palace, a member of the Holy Synod and confessor of Empress Maria Alexandrovna. Since 1866 N.V. Rozhdestvensky was appointed to the position of teacher of the Law of God and confessor of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, and when Grand Duke Pavel Alexandrovich grew up, he became his confessor 780.
It must be said that the royal children sincerely fell in love with N.V. Rozhdestvensky. After coming of age, Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich asked his mother, Empress Maria Alexandrovna, to give Ivan Vasilyevich a beautiful pectoral cross. The Empress herself chose the stones for the cross and ordered its design. In January 1876, one of the ladies-in-waiting of Empress Maria Alexandrovna, at the request of Sergei Alexandrovich, bought material for I.V.’s cassock. Rozhdestvensky. Apparently, the priest was able to establish with his spiritual sons that subtle spiritual connection that makes religion a religion. After confession in February 1876, Sergei Alexandrovich wrote in his diary: “Ivan V. spoke so well to me!” 781
At the same time, I.V. Rozhdestvensky could also be strict with his charges. The same Sergei Alexandrovich was severely scolded by his confessor for the fact that his ward missed the all-night vigil during Maslenitsa (February 2, 1877).
I.V. died Rozhdestvensky in 1882. The blow happened to him a few days after the death of Emperor Alexander II from grief and terrible shock, since when the dying sovereign was brought to the palace, it was Ivan Vasilyevich Rozhdestvensky who communed the Holy Mysteries of the dying emperor 782.
It is also noteworthy that when in the early 1860s. When Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich began to teach a “university course”, such priceless treasures as the original Ostromir Gospels and Nestor’s chronicle “The Tale of Bygone Years” 783 were used as “educational aids”. Professor Buslaev of Moscow University recalled: “I will never forget with what pleasure I read to him about the Ostromir Gospel, about the Izbornik of Svyatoslav and about the magnificent miniatures of the Siya Gospel from the precious manuscripts that were delivered to us for lectures from the St. Petersburg Public Library, from the Moscow Synodal and with far North, from the Siysk Monastery"™.
The educators of the children of Emperor Alexander II left diary entries that mention episodes of the daily religious life of the royal sons. So, in March 1862, Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich (15 years old) “took Vasily Borisovich (Bazhanov. - I. 3.) cloth for the cassock as a gift from the empress” 785. In April 1862, on the eve of Easter celebrations, early in the morning the children went “to the half of the Grand Duke and Heir for confession. They returned back at 10 minutes past eight, which, it seems to me, is too soon for confession.” After that, they went “to their parents to read books of spiritual content with the empress” 786. The next day, the boys, following tradition, painted eggs. And finally, on Saturday, April 7, 1862, the teacher “At half past eleven... woke up the Grand Dukes to go to matins. We broke our fast with the sovereign at about half past four.
Having returned back, we immediately went to bed” 787. This is how Easter 1862 passed for the boys.
Easter, like everywhere else in Rus', is a special holiday. Of course, traditional gifts in the form of Easter eggs were presented. If someone from the family was absent from the Winter Palace, then gifts were necessarily sent to them at their place of stay. For example, on Palm Sunday 1865, Alexander II sent a courier to Nice to Empress Maria Alexandrovna with Easter gifts. On Easter night 1865, the emperor himself was working as usual. First, with his three sons and all members of the Romanov dynasty, he attended the solemn bright matins in the Great Church of the Winter Palace. After Matins, he, according to tradition, celebrated Christ with the noble persons present and with representatives of the guards regiments. The breaking of fast breakfast, as always, took place in the Golden Drawing Room of the Winter Palace. According to the tsar himself, he “returned to his office tired after the celebration of Christ with 416 faces, which, as he put it, made him dizzy” 788.
Memoirists unanimously note that religious life in the Winter Palace under Emperor Alexander II was concentrated around his wife, Empress Maria Alexandrovna. As Count S.D., who knew Maria Alexandrovna well, wrote. Sheremetev: “We must admit that she studied everything Russian, and above all Orthodoxy, with full consciousness and conviction. Her conversion to Orthodoxy was not a mere formality. She had such leaders as Metropolitan Filaret, such friends as V.D. Olsufiev, when she was still crown princess, had such admirers as Nicholas I” 789. Perhaps, since Catherine II there has not been an empress who has so deeply studied “our faith, our system and our people. She left a major mark that was reflected on her children and gave them something that is so absent in other family members of other generations... The reflection of the mother should be sought in the children of Emperor Alexander II. She raised a “Russian”, honest generation” 790.
The Orthodox religiosity of Empress Maria Alexandrovna could not but influence the formation of the sincere religiosity of her children. Alexander III recalled: “Mom constantly took care of us, prepared us for confession and fasting; by her example and deeply Christian faith, she taught us to love and understand the Christian faith, as she herself understood. Thanks to Mama, we, all the brothers and Marie, became and remained true Christians and fell in love with both the faith and the Church” 791. After the death of his mother, Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich wrote to his younger brother: “If we were talking about the canonization of my mother, I would be happy, because I know that she was a saint” 792. This is how the eldest son appreciated his mother’s role in the formation of his sincere Orthodox religiosity.
It should also be noted that the “circle” of Empress Maria Alexandrovna was the center of court Slavophiles. Great influence on the empress in the second half of the 1850s–1860s. had her maids of honor A.F. Tyutchev and A.D. Bludova. According to memoirists, Antonina Bludova was nicknamed “the gendarme of Orthodoxy” at court 793.
At the end of the reign of Alexander II, a “personnel reserve” was identified for the position of the royal confessor, since the confessor Bazhanov had already reached a very advanced age. Ivan Leontyevich Yanyshev was chosen as a successor to the position of confessor. He was born in 1826 in the Kaluga province into the family of a deacon. Yanyshev completed his course at the St. Petersburg Theological Academy with a bachelor's degree in physical and mathematical sciences. In 1851 he was assigned as a priest to the Orthodox Church in Wiesbaden. In 1856, Yanyshev was transferred to St. Petersburg University as a professor of theology and philosophy. In 1858, he was again sent on a business trip abroad, appointing him as a priest in the Russian mission church in Berlin. Then - again to Wiesbaden, where he worked from 1859 to 1864. All this time, Yanyshev was quite actively engaged in scientific work.
Court career of I.L. Yanyshev’s teaching began in 1864, when he was invited to Copenhagen to teach the Law of God to the bride of the Russian Tsarevich, Princess Dagmar. This happened when Nikolai Alexandrovich, who was seriously ill, considered it necessary to personally meet with Yanyshev, with whom he “talked for a long time... about the upcoming task and was quite pleased with the attitude of the scientist-theologian towards such an important matter” 794. After Dagmar turned into Crown Princess Maria Feodorovna in 1866, Yanyshev’s services were not forgotten, and he was appointed rector of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy (1866–1883).
It was Yanyshev who, in his sermons from the church pulpit, interpreted the great reforms of Alexander II. When the bride of Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich, the Danish princess Dagmar, arrived in Russia in the fall of 1866, I.L. Yanyshev prepared her for the ceremony of anointing, and Empress Maria Alexandrovna taught her how to approach icons and pray. On October 12, 1866, a confirmation ceremony took place in the Great Church of the Winter Palace, and the Danish princess Dagmar received a new name - Maria Feodorovna 795. The rite of anointing was performed by Metropolitan Isidore in the Great Church of the Winter Palace. During the ceremony, the princess wore a simple white dress with a train, without jewelry. The Empress Maria Alexandrovna herself acted as a witness 796. In 1874, Yanyshev was called to participate in affairs on the Old Catholic Question as an official representative of the Russian Church at the Bonn Conference. It was he who preached a sermon on March 2, 1881 over the tomb of Alexander II, killed by terrorists. Judging by Bogdanovich’s memoirs, this speech made a great impression on those present: “The Emperor did not die - he was killed! Killed! - he shouted to the whole church. These words were met with muffled sobs." 797
Alexander III became the successor of the Orthodox tradition on the Russian imperial throne. Part of his “power script” was an emphasis on “nationality”, closely connected with his sincere Orthodox religiosity.
The tsar’s “peasant” appearance was organically combined with his deep Orthodox religiosity. Contemporaries emphasized that the personal religiosity of Alexander III was of a private nature, but the sincerity of his religious feelings was completely obvious to those around him. Describing the events of the summer of 1877, one of the teachers of the royal children, after talking with the future emperor, noted for himself that the crown prince seemed to him very reasonable, patriotic, knowledgeable in Russian history and very religious 798 .
Alexander III's long-time comrade-in-arms, Count S.D. Sheremetev recalled that when in the early 1870s. Tsarevich Alexander Alexandrovich invited him to swim, then he saw on the chest of the Grand Duke many icons and among them a cross 799. The count aloud expressed his surprise, since such a manifestation of religiosity was not accepted in the aristocratic environment. Subsequently S.D. Sheremetev explained what he saw by the Russian nature of Alexander III, for whom the cosmopolitanism of his father was completely alien.
This manifested itself in both big and small ways. Thus, Alexander III, unlike his father, loved Moscow. He often said that his long-standing desire was to live in Moscow, spend Holy Week there, talk and celebrate Easter in the Kremlin 800. It was Alexander III who initiated the beginning of the “imperial series” of annual Easter eggs made by masters of the Faberge company. It was Alexander III who began the tradition of the annual Easter celebration of Christ not only with his retinue, but also with servants and lower ranks of security. In his dressing room in the Anichkov Palace, a lamp was always burning in the corner in front of the icons with hanging Easter eggs 801.
Alexander III knew the details of Orthodox rituals well, he understood the symbolism of the Orthodox Church. Therefore, his Orthodoxy is the confession of the Russian person. He felt and realized that without him it was impossible to be a completely Russian person, that renunciation of Orthodoxy was tantamount to renunciation of Russia, its spirit, its history, its traditions, its strength 802.
Under Alexander III, the Winter Palace remained only a ceremonial residence, since the tsar did not live there. He continued to live in the Anichkov Palace, where he settled back in 1866 after his marriage. It is noteworthy that in 1865–1866, on the eve of the crown prince’s wedding, the Anichkov Palace church was built. Gradually it was replenished with ancient icons collected by the crown prince. Special bells were ordered for the belfry, repeating the famous Rostov ringings. Even a simple army regimental priest served as a priest in the Anichkov Church; fate brought him together with the Tsarevich during the Russian-Turkish War of 1877–1878. Moreover, everyone living in the palace had the right to go to the church of the Anichkov Palace: servants, coachmen, old non-commissioned officers. According to contemporaries, “in the church of the Anichkov Palace one could feel that warmth that was completely absent in the Small Church of the Winter Palace; there were not official people, not a retinue, but commoners, and they valued this right... there was something patriarchal in this joint prayer, something sharply different from the usual palace order” 803.
The same memoirist, talking about the grand entrance in the Winter Palace on January 6, 1891 on the occasion of the next ceremony of blessing of water on the Neva, described the church service as follows: “The service is wonderful, the singing is impeccable, the church is full, the maids of honor to the right, the courtiers to the left.... A crowd of indifferent, the diplomatic corps with its ladies in the windows of the Nicholas Hall. Binoculars are pointed at the Neva. Spectacle" 804.
Alexander III also lovingly furnished the church of the Gatchina Palace, where he moved with his entire family at the end of March 1881. It should be noted that the palace Gatchina Church in the early 1880s. it looked like either a living room or a passage room, which was facilitated by stairs on both sides and the complete absence of icons, except for the most necessary ones, on the iconostasis. Little by little, Alexander III personally began decorating the church. He hung all the icons presented to him in the church, some with his own hands. The church was decorated with Easter eggs, and painting was resumed there. A “royal place” appeared in the church. As a result, after a few years the church really looked like an Orthodox church. It became warmer, and the Protestant shade completely disappeared. Count S.D. Sheremetev emphasized that Alexander III “loved to flaunt his knowledge of church regulations, although sometimes he was mistaken, he always valued church splendor and was a deeply religious (Orthodox) person without any shadow of hypocrisy” 805.
Such close attention of Alexander III to his house churches surprised even the priests. Count S.D. Sheremetev cites the statement of the Tsar’s confessor, Yanyshev, about the fact that the Tsar “in general loves icons so much.” In turn, the count expressed bewilderment at the “surprise” of Yanyshev, his S.D. Sheremetev called “two-faced Janus” 806.
Alexander III had ambivalent views on some court churches. In Peterhof, in Alexandria Park during the reign of Emperor Nicholas I, designed by architect K.F. Shinkel built the court chapel of St. Alexander Nevsky in the then fashionable Gothic style. Alexander III knew this church from childhood. However, when his architectural and religious preferences were determined, he did not hide the fact that he did not like the church in Alexandria, since it was built on the model of a German church. At the same time, he liked the Livadia Church 807, maintained in strict Orthodox architectural traditions. In addition, the memories of his mother, who also loved and especially cared for this church 808, were dear to him.
Funeral cross with the image of Alexander III. 1899
It is noteworthy that under Alexander III the Imperial Court began to more strictly follow the traditions of Orthodox ritual. This is largely due to the influence of the Chief Prosecutor of the Holy Synod, K.P. Pobedonostseva. Thus, he managed to achieve a decision to completely stop theatrical performances in St. Petersburg during Lent. The ban on secular entertainment was also observed in the imperial family. Even the little Grand Duchess Olga had her dancing lessons canceled during Lent 809.
It should be emphasized that Alexander III managed to convey his sincere Orthodoxy to children. Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna recalled how her family and retinue gathered for Easter Matins in the palace church of the Gatchina Palace. On the one hand, everyone strictly followed the rules of etiquette: on the head was a kokoshnik studded with pearls, an embroidered veil to the waist, a sundress made of silver brocade and a cream satin skirt. On the other hand, despite the inevitable court formality, the religious feeling was preserved in full: “I don’t remember that we felt tired, but I remember well with what impatience we waited, with bated breath, for the first triumphant exclamation of “Christ is Risen!”” 810 .
V.B. Bazhanov, who took the position of confessor of the imperial family under Nicholas I in 1848, remained in this post until his death in 1883, already under Alexander III, that is, he held it for 35 years. For a long time, he taught the Law of God to the younger children of Nicholas I and all the children of Alexander II. It was not without his influence that Alexander III developed strong moral views. It was in religion that Alexander III sought moral support, sometimes making very difficult, fateful decisions for Russia. One of the memoirists cited the words of the emperor: “When something bothers me and I feel that human strength cannot get out of a difficult state of soul, it’s worth remembering the words of the Gospel “Let not your heart be troubled, Believe in God and believe in Me,” and that’s enough, to come to your senses" 811.
During the reign of Alexander III, the court career of Ivan Leontyevich Yanyshev began. In 1883, after the death of the confessor of the royal family, V.B. Bazhanov, he was appointed “confessor of Their Imperial Majesties, head of the court clergy and protopresbyter of the Bolshoi Cathedral in the Winter Palace and the Moscow Annunciation Cathedral.” However, neither memoirists nor other sources mention any special spiritual closeness between the deeply and sincerely believing king and his confessor. At the Court, Yanyshev was only a dignitary in a cassock, conscientiously fulfilling all his duties.
When Alexander III died in Livadia in October 1894, his confessor Yanyshev was next to him. But at the same time, the famous Fr. John of Kronstadt, he is known not only as a brilliant preacher, but also as a healer. On October 10, 1894, Alexander III received Fr. John of Kronstadt. According to a contemporary: “When he came to him, he said: “Great Sovereign, what are you sick with?” They prayed together, the Emperor knelt down. Father John ran his hand over the sore spots and did not cause pain. The Emperor was very touched" 812. Apparently, the king was clutching at straws, since the doctors had already sentenced him, and he relied only on the priest-healer. Alexander III died on October 20, 1894.
Nicholas II was one of the most religious Russian monarchs, which is connected not only with his spiritual upbringing, but also with life circumstances that often forced him to seek solace in religion. As emperor, he strictly fulfilled all obligations associated with the usual series of palace services and ceremonies. His personal religiosity was manifested in the sincerity of his faith. The home iconostasis, located in the royal bedroom, was amazing in the number of icons.
In the second half of the 1870s. The question of a teacher of the law for the future Nicholas II was being resolved, and the situation of the 1850s was repeated, when Empress Maria Alexandrovna tried to invite a teacher of the law for her children “from the outside.” In 1875, Alexander III and Empress Maria Fedorovna, bypassing the “traditional” Bazhanov and Yanyshev, tried to invite Archpriest N.V. to take the place of the teacher of the law for the royal children. Rozhdestvensky, “whom they loved and with whom they willingly talked.” Count S.D. Sheremetev recalled: “...There was a need for a teacher of the law for Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich, and the parents chose Archpriest Rozhdestvensky and in my presence asked him very convincingly to take on this responsibility, but Rozhdestvensky, citing illness and loss of strength, did not find it possible to accept this proposal . His parents convinced him for a long time... in reality, Rozhdestvensky did not live long and opened the path for I.L. Yanyshev (Two-faced Janus)" 813.
In citing this quote, it should be clarified that Rozhdestvensky nevertheless briefly became the confessor of the future Nicholas II. According to established tradition, in 1875 the boy Nikolai, who was seven years old, had his first confession. N.V. became his confessor. Christmas. February 12, 1877 “The whole family communed, and Niki, who confessed for the second time to Ivan V. Then they all drank tea together” 814. After the death of I.V. Rozhdestvensky in 1882, Nika’s confessor for some time was the elderly Bazhanov, in 1883 he was replaced by Yanyshev.
Ivan Vasilyevich Rozhdestvensky (1815–1882) was loved by many. Archpriest, member of the Holy Synod, rector of the Small Church of the Winter Palace, preacher, he was born in the village of Bogoyavlensky Pogost, Vyaznikovsky district, Vladimir province, on January 18, 1815, in the family of a priest. He graduated from the St. Petersburg Theological Academy at the age of 22 in 1837 with a Master of Theology. In the 1840-1850s. he taught the Law of God in the St. Petersburg cadet corps, rightly considered one of the most talented teachers. In 1859, he became a teacher of the law for the children of Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna and, on her recommendation, in 1859 he was transferred to the Big Court, where he began to teach the Law of God to the children of Alexander II, and in 1862 he was appointed archpriest of the Small Church of the Palace. The entire royal family fell in love with the new mentor. So Alexander III personally knew Archpriest Rozhdestvensky since 1859.
After I.V. Rozhdestvensky refused to take the place of the teacher of the future Nicholas II, this place was taken by Yanyshev. When Tsarevich Nikolai Alexandrovich began studying the sciences at the university course, Yanyshev continued his teaching career under the Tsarevich, teaching him a course in canon law in connection with the history of the church, as well as theology and history of religions.
Over time, the religiosity of Nicholas II began to acquire features of religious fatalism. Nicholas II constantly mentioned that he was born on the day of Job the Long-Suffering and that the end of his reign would be tragic. The starting point for the emergence of this feeling can be considered the Khodynka disaster, which occurred in May 1896 during the coronation in Moscow. It should be noted that in this difficult situation, when he was offered various solutions - from declaring mourning for the dead to “continuing the banquet” - the king’s confessor, Fr. Yanyshev behaved completely passively. As an influential official of the Ministry of the Imperial Household B.C. recalled. Krivenko, after Khodynka he “rushed to the sovereign’s confessor, Fr. Yanyshev, begging him to go to the sovereign and insist on canceling the holidays. The protopresbyter sighed, spoke evasively, and answered the question decisively presented: how can he bother the sovereign with such statements? This is how the tsar’s confessor formally understood his duties, and Yanyshev was reputed to be a highly educated man who had lived abroad for many years” 815.
It should be noted that not only Nicholas II was “programmed” for a tragic death, but Empress Alexandra Feodorovna was also convinced of the same, as evidenced by the episode that occurred during the Sarov celebrations in July 1903. There Nicholas II met with the holy fool Pasha of Sarov . There were many rumors about their meeting. Artist V.P. Schneider, a participant in the Sarov celebrations, recalled her conversation with the Empress on this matter: “Much later, at one of the receptions, when the Empress talked to me for a long time, the conversation turned to holy fools.
Archpriest John Yanyshev
The Empress asked me if I had seen Pasha of Sarov? I said no. "Why?" - “Yes, I was afraid that, having read in my eyes, as a nervous person, a critical attitude towards her, she would get angry and do something, hit, etc.” And she dared and asked if it was true that when the Emperor wanted to take some jam for tea, Pasha hit him on the hand and said:
“You don’t have anything sweet, you’ll eat bitter things all your life!” "Yes it's true". And thoughtfully the Empress added: “Don’t you know that the Emperor was born on the day of Job the Long-Suffering?” Then they talked about the foolish Burgundian princesses (Elsa, Lostrip), the elders of Grundwald, and so on.” 816.
After the Alexander Palace of Tsarskoe Selo became the permanent residence of the family of Nicholas II at the end of 1904, the question arose about a place for prayers for the imperial family, because the emperor, as we have already mentioned, during the revolution had to sharply limit his movements outside the territory of the imperial residences.
It should be noted that formally there was no house church in the Alexander Palace. However, back in the 1840s. a house church was formed in several rooms of the palace. This was due to the tragedy experienced by Nicholas I in 1844. The fact is that on June 24, 1844, in the office of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna (the wife of Nicholas I), the daughter of Nicholas I, Alexandra Nikolaevna, died of transient consumption. After her death, a palace prayer room was installed in the empress's office. Architect D. Efimov rebuilt the interior of this room. In the place where the bed stood, a small chapel was erected. The iconostasis with personal icons of Princess Alexandra Nikolaevna rested on panels made from her own bed by the Gumbs brothers. The center of the chapel was a portrait icon depicting the deceased in the image of St. Queen Alexandra. Under Nicholas I, memorial services for the Grand Duchess were held here. An antechamber was set up in the next room. This memorial complex remained in the palace until the end of the 1920s.
However, Nicholas II considered it necessary to build “his own” house church in one of the palace state halls. In this room, first his bedroom was located, then the state hall and, finally, the crimson living room of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. A traveling iconostasis of Alexander I was installed here, which accompanied him during his campaigns abroad in 1813–1814. The iconostasis consisted of six woven panels mounted on a folding screen 817. The light iconostasis was transported under Nicholas II to Livadia and Spala. In front of the iconostasis there were four chairs in a row for the princesses, an armchair for Nicholas II and a chair for Tsarevich Alexei.
Alexander Palace. Bedroom of Emperor Nicholas II and his wife. Photo from the 1930s.
Alexander Palace. Icon in the bedroom of Tsarevich Alexei. Photo from the 1930s.
For Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, a small separate chapel was built in the same hall with icons on the walls, where a couch and a lectern were placed for her. Of course, the meager church surroundings did not fit well with the secular interiors of the state rooms of the Alexander Palace. Therefore, when in 1913 the Fedorovsky Cathedral was erected near the Alexander Palace, it became the home church of the imperial family.
According to contemporaries, Nicholas II was well versed in theological problems and knew Orthodox rituals well. Protopresbyter of the Russian Army and Navy Fr. Shavelsky, who was at Headquarters from 1914 to 1917 and personally observed the tsar, recalled: “In church history, he was quite strong, as well as in relation to various institutions and rituals of the church.... The sovereign easily understood serious theological issues and, in general, correctly assessed modern church reality, but he expected measures to correct it from “specialists” - the chief prosecutor of the Holy Synod and the Holy Synod itself” 818; “The Emperor always listened to the divine service with attention, standing straight, without leaning his elbows and never crouching on a chair. Very often he made the sign of the cross, and while singing “Thee” and “Our Father” at the liturgy, “Glory to God in the highest” at the all-night vigil, he knelt down, sometimes bowing earnestly to the ground. All this was done simply, modestly, with humility. In general, it must be said about the sovereign’s religiosity that it was sincere and lasting. The Emperor was one of those happy natures who believe without philosophizing or getting carried away, without exaltation, as well as without doubt. Religion gave him what he most sought - peace. And he treasured this and used religion as a miraculous balm that strengthens the soul in difficult moments and always awakens bright hopes in it” 819.
The emperor's religiosity was noted by everyone around him. General Yu.N. Danilov recalled that “Emperor Nicholas was a deeply religious man. In his personal carriage there was a whole chapel of images, icons and all sorts of objects related to the religious cult. When inspecting troops going to the Far East in 1904, on the eve of the review he prayed for a long time in front of another icon, with which he then blessed the unit leaving for the war.
While at Headquarters, the sovereign did not miss a single church service. Standing in front, he often crossed himself with a wide cross and at the end of the service invariably came under the blessing of the protopresbyter, Fr. Shavelsky. Somehow especially, in a churchlike way, they quickly hug each other and each lean towards the other’s hand” 820.
Speaking about the religiosity of the last Russian emperor, one cannot fail to mention his wife, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna. It should immediately be noted that, along with personal relationships, religion became one of the strong foundations of their marriage.
The need to change religion, obligatory for the wife of a Russian monarch, for a long time made the Protestant Princess Alyx of Darmstadt hesitate. However, after she decided to accept the marriage proposal of the heir to the Russian Empire, she wholeheartedly accepted Orthodoxy.
According to established tradition, the royal confessor, Fr., was sent to the bride in England. Yanyshev, in order to prepare her for the transition to Orthodoxy. This event was discussed in detail in St. Petersburg living rooms. Thus, in June 1894, the diary of General Bogdanovich recorded: “They say that Alice is under the influence of the pastor, that Yanyshev, sent to instruct her in the Orthodox faith, made little impression on her, that she does not give in to his convictions. Yanyshev is a scientist, a cold theologian, he cannot influence the soul. They say about her that she is cold and reserved” 821. This was only the beginning of all sorts of gossip that trailed Alexandra Fedorovna throughout her life.
In the diaries of Nicholas II, the entire “circle” of religious duties of the imperial couple was repeatedly recorded. In 1895, the young couple went through it together for the first time. On January 1, 1895, the uncles of Nicholas II - “Misha, Vladimir, Alexey and Aunt Michen” - came to mass for mass. One of the obligatory ceremonies for the imperial family was the annual blessing of water on the Neva. To carry it out, a tent with a platform was erected opposite the Jordan (Embassy) entrance of the Winter Palace, and a silver cross was solemnly lowered into the hole. The diary of Nicholas II describes this event as follows (January 5, 1895): “...We had to go to Vespers with the Blessing of Water.
Alyx was present for the first time during the sprinkling of the entire house of St. water." January 6, 1895: “Crowds of people stood on the streets in the morning, probably waiting to leave for Winter; there the usual blessing of water took place in Jordan without the participation of troops.”
On January 19, 1895, the young emperor and husband showed his wife icons and dishes in the Concert Hall of the Winter Palace. After that, he “showed Alika the Small Church” of the Winter Palace. Since mourning for the deceased Alexander III was observed at the Court, Maslenitsa festivities were canceled in 1895, and on February 13, Nicholas II wrote: “This year there is no difference for us between Maslenitsa and Lent, everything is also quiet, only now, of course, twice we go to church. The mood is such that I really want to pray, it just asks for it - in church, in prayer - the only greatest consolation on earth!” This is a very rare and indicative emotional outburst for an extremely reserved king. On February 17, 1895, Nicholas II and Alexandra Fedorovna confessed “in our bedroom after common prayer” by Fr. Yanyshev.
In March-April 1895, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna took part in church services associated with Orthodox Easter for the first time. On March 4, the couple “went to the all-night vigil with the veneration of the Holy Cross.” The next day we took part in mass. On March 25, we went to the all-night vigil and received willows. On March 26 we attended mass. On March 27, “we attended the evening service.” Since no one had canceled his work, and Nicholas II had not yet developed a strict rhythm of his “studies,” then on that day he “had to take care of business in the evening, because he lost an hour because of church.” On March 28, the couple attended mass and evening service. On March 30 they “went to the 12 Gospels.” On March 31, “the removal of the shroud took place.” On April 1st we went to mass. On this day, Alexandra Fedorovna “was busy painting eggs with Misha and Olga,” and in the evening – “mutual gifts and various surprises in the eggs. At 11.50 we went to matins, for the first time in our home church.” On April 2, Sunday, Easter came with a long service and breaking the fast.
The sincere and exalted religiosity of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna went far beyond the framework generally accepted at the Imperial Court. Researchers note a clear hereditary predisposition of Alexandra
Fedorovna to religious mysticism. This is usually associated with the fact that among her distant ancestors is Saint Elizabeth of Hungary. The mother of the future empress, who died early, had a long-term friendship with the famous theologian David Strauss. Increased religiosity, turning into mysticism, was also characteristic of the empress’s elder sister, Grand Duchess Elizabeth Feodorovna 822. This predisposition to religious mysticism led to the perception not only of the dogmas of Orthodoxy, but also of its entire ritual, mystical side.
People who knew the empress well noted her craving for religiosity, characteristic of pre-Petrine Rus', with veneration of elders and holy fools 823. It should be noted that the official church did not approve of such religiosity, regarding it as “an extreme and even painful form of Orthodoxy.” This was manifested in an insatiable thirst for signs, prophecies, miracles, searching for holy fools, miracle workers, saints as bearers of supernatural power 824.
It was the empress who initiated the procedure for canonization of Seraphim of Sarov in 1903. This happened under tragic circumstances for her. Alexandra Feodorovna gave birth to four daughters in a row, and the question of succession to the throne was very acute for her. Therefore, the psychic Philip was invited to St. Petersburg from France, who guaranteed the birth of a boy to the imperial couple. However, instead of the expected boy, the empress ended up with a frozen pregnancy, and she had to explain to the whole country why the officially promised child was not born. However, even under such tragic circumstances, Alexandra Fedorovna did not lose faith in Philip. The Russian spiritual hierarchs took advantage of this. At the dacha of Grand Duke Peter Nikolaevich, near Peterhof, a meeting took place between the Martinist Philip and Fr. John of Kronstadt. It was he who suggested to Philip the idea of canonizing Seraphim of Sarov, linking with this the birth of a boy in the royal family. Philip completed his task, and Seraphim of Sarov, despite the resistance of the Chief Prosecutor of the Holy Synod K.P. Pobedonostsev was canonized. And in the summer of 1904, Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich was born into the royal family. It is with this that the appearance of a large portrait of St. Seraphim in the office of Nicholas II 825 is connected.
Seraphim of Sarov became known in the royal family back in the 1860s. According to family legend, when Alexander II’s daughter Maria 826 fell ill in 1860, someone suggested inviting a healer from the Diveyevo community, Glikeria Zanyatova. She covered the girl with a piece of the mantle of Seraphim of Sarov, and the girl recovered 827.
It is noteworthy that during the Sarov celebrations, apparently “at the instigation” of Alexandra Feodorovna, Nicholas II “really wished that the life physician Velyaminov would register cases of healing, of which there were many, there was the sight of the blind, the walking of the paralytic, etc. Velyaminov he flatly refused to register, saying that all these cases could be explained by nervousness, and he would only give his name if the legless man grew a leg.”828
Over time, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna became well versed in Russian Orthodox literature. The basis of her personal library was made up of religious books and, above all, the works of the church fathers. Over time, the empress even learned to parse religious texts in Old Church Slavonic. According to a contemporary, “Her Majesty read a lot, she was mainly interested in serious literature. She knew the Bible from cover to cover.”829 Like the Russian queens of the pre-Petrine period, Alexandra Feodorovna’s favorite pastime was embroidering airs and other church accessories 830.
However, for all the religiosity of the imperial couple, the royal confessors actually had no influence on them. The presence of an official confessor and periodic confessions were formal and did not affect their souls. Unfortunately, it must be admitted that the appearance of Rasputin near the royal couple is associated not only with the illness of Tsarevich Alexei, but also with the lack of spiritual authority near the royal family. The fact is that Fr. Yanyshev, who began his court career under Alexander II, had already become decrepit and could not touch the soul of the empress.
Therefore, Alexandra Feodorovna, having an official confessor, began searching for a spiritual hierarch who was authoritative for her. Feofan of Poltava (Vasily Dmitrievich Bystrov) 831 became such an unofficial confessor of Alexandra Feodorovna. His acquaintance with the royal family usually dates back to 1905. Archimandrite Feofan not only conducted spiritual conversations with the empress, but also served in the house church of the Alexander Palace. At the same time, Alexandra Fedorovna and her daughters sang the entire liturgy in the choir. He confessed to the entire royal family. It should be noted that it was not without his approval that G.E.’s court career began in the Alexander Palace. Rasputin. This situation with the presence of “official” (I.L. Yanyshev) and “unofficial” (V.D. Bystrov and G.E. Rasputin) confessors remained at the Imperial Court until the summer of 1910.
Several important events occurred in the summer of 1910. Firstly, the “official” confessor of the royal family, Yanyshev, died, and formally the position of the royal confessor was vacant. According to one of his contemporaries, “the famous protopresbyter John Leontyevich Yanyshev, who as a talented rector of the academy (1866–1883), as a scientist, as a brilliant preacher, left a great memory of himself and at the same time as protopresbyter (1883–1910) and the administrator is a bad inheritance... The court clergy, despite excellent material support and all the exceptional advantages and benefits of their position, shone with the lack of talents, talents, and outstanding persons among its members. In general, perhaps never before has its composition been as weak as at this time: there was no one to replace Ivan Leontyevich. Meanwhile, even during his lifetime, deputies were needed; In recent years he has become weak and blind. Therefore, even during his lifetime, he had to transfer to others the duties of the royal confessor and teacher of the law to children” 832.
Secondly, by 1910, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna had decided on the candidacy of her “unofficial” confessor. Despite the fact that in 1909 Archimandrite Theophan was consecrated as bishop and his appointment to the post of rector of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, the influence of G.E. Rasputin, who did not hold any official positions at the Imperial Court, became unconditional. Bishop
Feofan tried to fight, but the outcome of this struggle was his removal from St. Petersburg to the Tauride See in 1910. Bishop Feofan tried to fight Rasputin later. In 1911, he invited the church hierarchs to address a collective letter to the tsar, the purpose of which was to open his eyes to Rasputin. However, the hierarchs refused to agree to this, citing the fact that Theophanes is the empress’s confessor and this is his personal duty. And Feofan went to the end. In the fall of 1911, he achieved a personal audience with Alexandra Feodorovna in Livadia. The meeting lasted an hour and a half. However, the interlocutors did not understand each other, and soon Bishop Feofan asked to be transferred to Astrakhan, away from the royal palace in Livadia...
Thirdly, in 1910, after the death of I.L. Yanyshev, all the positions he held were divided between four priests:
– Pyotr Grigorievich Shavelsky became protopresbyter of the army and navy;
– the confessor of the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna, Peter Afanasyevich Blagoveshchensky, was appointed head of the Court clergy;
– Archpriest Nikolai Grigorievich Kedrinsky became the confessor of the imperial family;
– teacher of the law to the royal children – Archpriest Alexander Petrovich Vasiliev.
Overall these were rather weak appointments. Protopresbyter of the Army and Navy G.P. Shavelsky turned out to be the strongest candidate on this list. He enjoyed authority among officers and soldiers. Nicholas II, having taken the position of Supreme Commander-in-Chief in August 1915 and living almost constantly at Headquarters, treated this man with respect. It should be noted that P.G. Shavelsky was not a stranger to the army. He took part in the Russo-Japanese War and “in action” near Liaoyang as a priest of the 33rd East Siberian Rifle Regiment, he was shell-shocked.
Tsarevich Alexei with his father Alexander (Vasiliev). Photo 1912
Head of the Court Clergy P.A. At the time of his appointment, Blagoveshchensky was a frail 80-year-old man, losing his memory, and he was more concerned about material wealth than about court service.
Archpriest A.P., teacher of the law to the royal children. Vasiliev at the time of his appointment did not have the necessary influence and was limited only to training sessions “on the subject”. When Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich grew up, he, like his ancestors, began to be taught the Law of God. In the 1915/16 academic year, Tsarevich Alexei’s schedule included three lessons of the Law of God per week.
The royal confessor always occupied a special position in the court hierarchy, since he accepted the confession of the kings. According to G.P. Shavelsky, Archpriest N.G. Kedrinsky “even under Yanyshev became a confessor due to some incomprehensible misunderstanding” 833. N.G. Kedrinsky had a diploma from the St. Petersburg Theological Academy and a long history of court service, which he entered through “capture” by marrying the daughter of the presbyter of the Winter Palace Cathedral, Archpriest Shchepin. Shavelsky characterizes him as “a type of simpleton, kindly at heart, but on his own mind, rather cunning and narrow-minded” 834.
Tsarevich Alexei with teachers, including Father Alexander. Sleeping. Photo 1912
This appointment, which took place in 1910, was, of course, not accidental. At this time, the influence of G.E. Rasputin and A.A. Vyrubova's influence on the royal family has already become quite significant. Rasputin was already the de facto and highly respected royal confessor. In this situation, the appointment of N.G. Kedrinsky was nothing more than a formality, since the place of the royal confessor was actually firmly occupied by Rasputin. Apparently, this situation suited Nicholas II and his wife quite well. The diary entries of the tsar testify to how differently the royal family treated Rasputin and Kedrinsky. On the one hand, on January 13, 1913, Nicholas II briefly records: “Received Kedrinsky”; “At 10 o'clock. confessed to Fr. Kedrinsky" (April 10, 1913). On the other hand, on January 18, 1913, Nicholas II wrote: “At 4 o’clock they received good Gregory, cat. We have an hour left with 1/4.”
Apparently, the fate of Fr. Kedrinsky made up her mind in the fall of 1913. At least already in October 1913, Nicholas II and his family confessed to Fr. Vasiliev “in the chapel” (October 20, 1913). By the highest decree of February 2, 1914 N.G. Kedrinsky is removed from the post of official royal confessor. The removal was “sweetened” by his appointment to the post of assistant head of the Court Clergy. It should be emphasized that the fact of the removal of the royal confessor by the Highest Decree had no precedents, at least in the imperial period of Russian history. It is noteworthy that Alexandra Fedorovna in personal correspondence after 1917 called A.F. Kerensky "Kedrinsky".
The reason for this decision, which violated all court traditions, was the behavior of Fr. Kedrinsky. According to Shavelsky’s memoirs, “there were no scientists or social merits behind him. His underdevelopment, tactlessness and angularity provided food for endless conversations and ridicule. It would be difficult to find a more unsuccessful “royal” confessor. The Court soon realized this, for it was difficult not to understand him. The courtiers treated him with ridicule. The king and queen tolerated him. But their patience has come to an end.”
As a result, the confessor of the family of Nicholas II since February
1914 became Fr. Vasiliev. Alexander Petrovich Vasiliev was born into a peasant family living in the Smolensk province. He completed the course at the St. Petersburg Theological Academy in 1893, but did not receive an academic degree as a candidate of theology. He began his career in the Church of the Holy Cross Community of Sisters of Charity in St. Petersburg, taught the Law of God in several gymnasiums and preached a lot among the workers of the Narva region. Before his appointment to the Court, he enjoyed fame in St. Petersburg as an excellent people's preacher, efficient teacher of the law and beloved confessor. Excellent spiritual qualities, kindness, responsiveness, simplicity, honesty, zeal for the cause of God, and friendliness endeared him to both his students and his flock. In addition, Father Vasiliev could not be denied not only his intelligence, but also a certain talent 835.
Immediately upon appointment to such an honorable position, Fr. Vasiliev had to determine his attitude towards Rasputin.
He, of course, understood that his career directly depended on this attitude. Only with a certain loyalty to Rasputin could he retain his position. At the same time, on about. Vasiliev was put under pressure by numerous opponents of Rasputin, trying to take advantage of his new position.
Naturally, being a member of the royal family since January 1910, by February 1914 Vasiliev was aware of the “court alignments.” In addition, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna greatly appreciated him. In her letters, she periodically mentions the sermons of Archpriest Vasiliev, giving them the highest rating.
Apparently, Vasiliev was quite loyal to Rasputin. Shavelsky talked with him on this topic. In a conversation that lasted more than three hours, Shavelsky understood from Vasiliev’s words that “Alexandra Fedorovna considered Rasputin not only a folk healer, but also a spiritual authority: He (Rasputin) is not at all like our metropolitans and bishops. You ask their advice, and they answer: “As your Majesty wishes!” Am I really asking them to find out what I want? And Grigory Efimovich will always say his own, persistently, commandingly” 836. The basis of this imperiousness was Rasputin's sincere faith in himself 837. According to the memoirs of G.P. Shavelsky, “Fr. Vasiliev did not deny either Rasputin’s closeness to the royal family, or his enormous influence on the Tsar and Tsarina, but explained this by the fact that Rasputin is truly a person marked by God, especially gifted, possessing a power that is not given to ordinary mortals, which is why his closeness to the royal family and his influence on it are completely natural and understandable. O. Vasiliev did not call Rasputin a saint, but from his entire speech it appeared that he considered him something of a saint.”
From this conversation G.P. Shavelsky was firmly convinced that, despite all the positive qualities of the official royal confessor G.E. Rasputin “is actually the unofficial confessor and mentor in the royal family, a person who enjoyed such undeniable authority in it that no talented, most educated archpriest enjoyed it. Yanyshev, nor all three of his deputies together... Rasputin became, as it were, the chief confessor of the royal family. After a brief confession of a few minutes with his confessor, in the first week of Lent in 1916, the Emperor had a spiritual conversation with the “elder” Grigory Efimovich for more than an hour.” The diaries of Nicholas II contain many references to Rasputin’s visits to the Alexander Palace.
In conclusion, we can state that the religious traditions that existed in the royal family throughout the 19th century. changed. These changes began during the reign of Nicholas I, who laid the foundations of the “national model” of reign. The reigns of Alexander III and Nicholas II gave new impetus to the development of this model. However, if the Orthodox religiosity of Alexander III became an organic part of domestic politics, then the religiosity of his son not only did not go beyond the scope of his “closed” personal life, but also led to the creation of a crisis internal political situation, when the liberal opposition managed to successfully play the “Rasputin card”, discrediting the Tsar’s family.
The role of royal confessors throughout the 19th century. did not go beyond strictly defined service boundaries. They performed all the necessary services at court, were engaged in administrative, scientific and pedagogical activities, but did not have a serious influence on the souls of the kings. Only Rasputin, who managed to become the actual confessor of the royal family, had an effective influence on the spiritual life of the entire royal family. The nature and extent of its influence are beyond the scope of this work and therefore are not considered. However, it is worth noting that as soon as Rasputin acquired this influence, violating the established rules, a fierce struggle between court groups immediately began both to gain influence over Rasputin himself, and for the complete elimination of this influence, which resulted in the murder of Rasputin in December 1916.
Official confessors of Russian emperors
Accusations of the Emperor for the murder of St. Philip (although it would be more correct to talk about the order to kill the saint) go back to four primary sources:
- chronicles;
- memoirs of foreigners I. Taube and E. Kruse;
- the works of Prince A. Kurbsky;
- Solovetsky’s “Life”.
It should be said that all the compilers of these documents, without exception, were political opponents of the Tsar, and therefore a critical attitude to these sources is necessary.
Chronicles.
Thus, the Novgorod Third Chronicle, in the summer of 7077, reports the strangulation of St. Philip, calls him “the wonderworker of all Rus',” that is, the chronicler speaks of him as an already canonized saint. This indicates that the chronicle record was compiled several decades after the events described. The Mazurin Chronicle for 1570 (vol. 31 PSRL, p. 140), reporting the death of Metropolitan Philip, directly refers to his “Life”, which was compiled no earlier than the very endXVIcentury. The difference between the event and the chronicle record is about 30 years!
Memoirs.
“The memoirs of Taube and Kruse are verbose and detailed, but their clearly libelous nature places them outside the brackets of reliable sources. Serious scientific researchers do not consider them as such. Thus, a leading expert on Russian history of this period, R. G. Skrynnikov notes: “Eyewitnesses of the events, Taube and Kruse, four years after the trial, compiled a lengthy, but very tendentious account of the events.” In addition, the moral character of these political scoundrels, stained by numerous betrayals, deprives them of the right to be witnesses in the court of history, or in any other court.
Works of Kurbsky.
The same can be said about Prince A. Kurbsky. As the commander of the Russian troops in Livonia, he entered into an agreement with the Polish king Sigismund, and betrayed him during the fighting. For this he was rewarded with lands and serfs in Lithuania. Personally commanded military actions against Russia. Polish-Lithuanian and Tatar detachments under his command not only fought on Russian soil, but also destroyed Orthodox churches, which he himself does not deny in his letters to the Tsar. As a source of information about events in Russia after 1564, he is unreliable not only due to his sharply negative attitude towards the Emperor, but also simply because he lived on the territory of another state and was not an eyewitness to the events. On almost every page of his writings there are “errors” and “inaccuracies,” most of which are deliberate slander.
Life of Saint Philip.
It is unfortunate, but the “Life” of Metropolitan Philip raises many questions. It was written by opponents of King John after his death and contains many factual errors. R. G. Skrynnikov points out that “The Life of Metropolitan Philip” was written ... in the 90sXVIcentury in the Solovetsky Monastery. Its authors were not eyewitnesses of the events described, but used the memories of living witnesses: Elder Simeon (Semyon Kobylin), the former bailiff of F. Kolychev and the Solovetsky monks who traveled to Moscow during the trial of Philip.” (Skrynnikov R. G. Philip Kolychev // Saints and power. - L., 1990. P.216-217.)
Thus, the “Life” was compiled from the words of 1) the monks who slandered the saint; their slanderous testimony played a decisive role in the condemnation of Metropolitan Philip; 2) the former bailiff Semyon Kobylin, who guarded the saint in the Adolescent Monastery and did not fulfill his direct duties, and perhaps was involved in the murder. Is it reasonable to take the words of these people on faith, even if these words have taken the form of life? Their attitude towards the Sovereign and their desire to shield themselves and expose others is quite understandable. The text of the life, compiled by slanderers and accusers of Metropolitan Philip, contains many oddities. It “has long puzzled researchers with its confusion and abundance of errors” (Skrynnikov). For example, the life tells how the tsar sent the severed head of his brother, Mikhail Ivanovich, to the saint who had already been removed from the pulpit, but was still in Moscow. But the okolnichy M.I. Kolychev died in 1571, three years after the events described. It is also surprising that the life conveys in detail the conversation between Malyuta and St. Philip, and also talks about how Malyuta allegedly killed the holy prisoner, although the authors of the text of the “Life” themselves claim that “no one witnessed what happened between them.” (Fedotov G.P. Saint Philip, Metropolitan of Moscow. - M., 1991. P. 80-81; Venerable Abbot Philip. // Solovetsky Patericon. - M., 1991. P. 64; Life of St. Philip, Metropolitan of Moscow. // Bekhmeteva A. N. Lives of the saints. - M., 1897. P. 61; Fedotov G. P. Op. cit. pp. 82-83.)
The unreliability of some episodes described in the Life is pointed out not only by secular, but also by Orthodox researchers. Thus, G.P. Fedotov, assessing the dialogues presented in the Life, emphasizes that the speech of St. Philippa "is precious to us, not as an exact recording of the words of the saint, but as an ideal dialogue... since it does not have the character of authenticity." And he adds that too much in these memorable words belongs to the eloquent pen of the historian Karamzin.
In order to protect themselves, the compilers of the “Life” indicate those who ordered the slander against Saint Philip. These are “The malice of the accomplice Pimen of Novgorod, Paphnutius of Suzdal, Philotheus of Ryazan, siggel of Blagoveshchensk Eustathius.” The latter, the confessor of Uary, was a “whisperer” against St. Philip before the king: “continuously and secretly speaking speeches unlike the king against St. Philip." About Archbishop Pimen, “Life” says that he was the first hierarch of the Russian Church after the Metropolitan, who dreamed of “delighting his throne.” To condemn and depose St. Philip, they held this “council”, which, according to Kartashev, became “the most shameful of all that have ever taken place throughout Russian church history.”
G. P. Fedotov, despite all his prejudice against the Tsar, noted: “The holy confessor had to drink the whole cup of bitterness: to be condemned not by the arbitrariness of a tyrant, but by the council of the Russian church and slandered by his spiritual children.” (Fedotov G.P. Saint Philip, Metropolitan of Moscow. - M., 1991. P.78.)
Thus, the names of the enemies of Saint Philip, both those who slandered him and those who ordered the slander and condemned him, are well known. As for the Emperor's attitude towards St. Philip, then from the “Life” it becomes clear that the Tsar was deceived. As soon as he was convinced that “he had lied against a saint with wickedness,” he immediately subjected the slanderers to disgrace and exile. Saint Demetrius of Rostov, the compiler of the last canonically impeccable text of the Four Menaions, does not mention that the Tsar was in any way involved in the death of the metropolitan. In addition, Kurbsky indicated that the Tsar “would have sent before him (Metropolitan Philip) and asked for his blessing, also for a return to his throne,” that is, he made a request to return to the metropolis.
Nikolay Nevrev. "Metropolitan Philip and Malyuta Skuratov" (1898)
Conclusions.
Sources “testifying” to the murder of St. Philip by Grigory Lukyanovich Skuratov-Belsky, on the orders of the Tsar, were compiled in an environment hostile to the Tsar and many years after the events described. Their compilers write from hearsay, have a pronounced rejection of the centralization policy pursued by the Moscow government and willingly repeat rumors discrediting the Moscow Sovereigns. These primary sources are too biased and unreliable. They must be subjected to critical analysis. Moreover, the facts themselves: the trial of the saint, his defrocking, exile and martyrdom are not subject to the slightest doubt.
However, the accusation against Tsar Ivan the Terrible that all this was done at his direct command does not have any serious basis. Unbiased and serious scientific research is necessary to reveal the truth. Moreover, it is necessary to analyze the relics of St. Philip for poison content. I would not be at all surprised if the poison is discovered, and it will be the same poison that was used to poison Tsar John Vasilyevich and almost his entire family.
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