Russian Bishops and Church Reform in 1905

By: Fr. John MeyendorffRead time: 22 mins3690 Hits

Russian Bishops and Church Reform in 1905

by Fr. John Meyendorff

In principle and in law, the reforms of Peter the Great attempted to integrate the religious functions of Russian society with the centralized imperial administration. Thus, Russian Orthodoxy was considered not really as a “church,” enjoying a degree of autonomy, but merely as a body of beliefs shared by the emperor’s subjects and requiring state- sponsored social and educational services. Its new organizational structure was designated as the Department of Orthodox Confession (Vedomstvo pravoslavnogo ispovedaniia).

Obviously, Peter’s system did not adequately express the traditional Orthodox conception of the Church. Even the Byzantine medieval pattern, enshrined in the Orthodox canonical collections, presupposed a “symphonic” relationship between the empire and the priesthood, not – the absorption of the latter by the state.[1] Whatever might be said of the Byzantine pattern’s practical application in Muscovite Russia (where the power of the tsar was in fact more arbitrary than that of the Byzantine basileus), this idea of “symphony” implies a theological distinction between the ultimate functions of Church and state: only distinct realities can function “symphonically”; a department is simply a cog in the state machinery.

Many serious historical studies assume that the Russian clergy lived largely in ignorance of the system’s inadequacies, and instead, clergymen supposedly enjoyed a privileged position and opposed any reform of the status quo. The superficiality of this stereotyped notion can easily be demonstrated by examining the statements of bishops in a most significant publication, the three volumes of their official Replies (Otzyvy) to an inquiry addressed to them on July 27, 1905. The Holy Synod had asked the Orthodox hierarchy to describe those features of Russian Church life which in its view needed reform or alteration.[2] Despite the brief time allowed for preparing their answers (by December 1905), the bishops replied punctually. Their comments thus represent a spontaneous, sometimes improvised, reaction to a sudden opportunity for free discussion. The overprocurator had expected the bishops to hold conservative views: one does not normally expect from them revolutionary – or even reformist – thought. Nevertheless, with near unanimity the Russian prelates favored reforms and, even more importantly, they achieved a significant theological and ideological consensus about the principles for greater independence which they considered desirable for the Church.

This consensus indicates that independent thought – an important condition for spiritual freedom- had remained alive even within the rigid framework constructed for Russian Orthodoxy by Peter and his successors. Moreover, the Replies disclose the educational and intellectual background of their authors, their spiritual genealogy in the preceding decades and even centuries, and their remarkable willingness to recognize and grapple with the theological and canonical issues of the day, including the problems of the lower clergy and laity. Nearly unanimously they demanded the convocation of a church council, proposed innovations for both provincial and central church administration, and foresaw for the clergy a greater role in the country’s social and political life.

Farsighted and educated churchmen, including lay professors in the ecclesiastical academies, had always regarded Peter’s reformed church as abnormal and canonically unjustifiable. Many shared the distaste of the Petrine system expressed by the authoritative Metropolitan Filaret (Drozdov, 1782-1867) of Moscow. The Replies show that generally by the beginning of the twentieth century, the Orthodox hierarchy shared the optimistically reformist mood of the intelligentsia. Churchmen widely accepted A.S. Khomiakov’s idea of sobornost‘ as the necessary framework for any possible schemes of reform. These attitudes help explain the several formal steps taken toward church reform in 1904-5. Hence the impetus did not result from any spectacular revolutionary upheaval, but rather from a convergence of opinion among bishops, the intelligentsia, and the leading elements of the clergy. Divergent opinions, of course, soon appeared, but the original reform impulse contained the remarkably uniform view of all these groups.[3]

Under pressure from public opinion, particularly from the zemstvo congress held in November 1904, the government enacted a decree on religious toleration abolishing many of the restrictions for non-Orthodox religions. The newly permitted toleration of other churches sharply emphasized how severely the state ruled and controlled the “privileged” official religion, and the indignation provoked by this realization led to the publication of three important statements. As it turned out, these statements proved to be the first steps leading to the council of 1917-18. Political obstacles, however, created delay.

Metropolitan Antonii (Vadkovskii) of St. Petersburg produced the first statement in the form of a memorandum (zapiska) to the tsar and the Committee of Ministers, requesting “a special conference of representative of the Church’s hierarchy, with the participation of competent persons from the clergy and the laity.” No government official was to be included. The conference would devise proposals providing the Church with autonomy and the “right of initiative,” guarantees of “freedom from any direct State or political mission,” and the freedom to administer its “internal affairs.” Metropolitan Antonii also favored granting the parish the status of “legal person” with the right to own property, while deeming it appropriate for the clergy to participate in zemstvo activities. One or more bishops were to hold seats in the State Council and have direct access to the Committee of Ministers.[4]

The memorandum’s moderate tone and demands reflected more than a desire for greater independence; it expressed the hierarchy’s dissatisfaction with the overprocurator of the Holy Synod, who controlled all access to the tsar and his government. By its nature, a truly independent Church should have the right to speak for itself.

S. Iu. Witte, the chairman of the Committee of Ministers, sponsored a second statement on church reform presented to a special Conference on Ecclesiastical Affairs under the Committee of Ministers. Encouraged by Witte’s sympathy, liberal academy professors had drafted a statement which was much more radical than Antonii’s note. Labeling the Church’s dependency “unlawful” (nezakonyi) since it kept Orthodoxy “in a state of paralysis,” the Witte-sponsored memorandum went on to argue that sobornost‘ required lay participation in an eventual council and even in the election of candidates for the clergy.[5]

Finally, a third document, a liberal manifesto signed by thirty-two priests of the capital and representing the opinion of leading married clergy, demanded the convocation of a council with an unspecified agenda, which, however, could include such items as the election of bishops by their dioceses. [6]

Emboldened by public opinion and led by Metropolitan Antonii, the Holy Synod requested the tsar to authorize a “local,” that is, a national, council of bishops. According to canons 4 and 5 of the Council of Nicaea, it was to be held semi-annually, but in Russia none had met in two hundred years. Acting upon Overprocurator K.P. Pobedonostsev’s advice, Nicholas II refused to grant the Synod’s request. Meanwhile, the old overprocurator attempted to delay the reform movement by insisting that the bishops be consulted about the issues. He expected no opposition from a presumably docile and reactionary episcopate to any departure from existing practice. Such is the origin of the Replies. The responses actually reached St. Petersburg after the momentous revolutionary events of fall 1905, including the dismissal of Pobedonostsev. In January 1906, a preconciliar commission, whose existence implied the restoration of sobornost’ in the Russian Church, began to prepare for a national council. Many of the most influential bishops expected it to meet after Easter 1906.[7]

The bishops’ Replies included a number of important topics, especially the composition of the future council. Essentially the debate centered on the possible extension of voting rights beyond the bishops to the clergy and laymen. The bishops’ ideas reflected the view frequently appearing in the press.[8] They also discussed the merits of decentralized ecclesiastical administration, the reform of central administration and the possible restoration of the patriarchate, and the extent of competence of ecclesiastical courts (particularly in marital affairs). Given the prominence of lower clergy and laymen in discussions about reform, it is perhaps not surprising to see the bishops deliberating the virtues of regular assemblies of clergy and laity and the degree to which the clergy should be encouraged to take a more active part in the life and responsibilities of society. The parish (as the nucleus of the Church) and its canonical and legal status also came under the bishops’ close scrutiny. Several areas, such as church property (its acquisition and alienation), theological education, and liturgical practice and church discipline, held special interest for the bishops. A large majority voiced dissatisfaction with the inaccessibility of much of the liturgical rites in the mass of the faithful, with a minority suggesting that the texts be translated from Church Slavonic into modern Russian. Nearly every bishop demanded modifications for achieving the congregation’s fuller participation in liturgical worship.[9]

The bishops did not deal directly with the problem of Church-state relations, but that issue appears clearly in the background, particularly in relation to proposed decentralization, the reform of church courts, and the participation of clergymen in society. Since a full analysis of the Replies would require more space than is available here, only a few brief remarks on these three areas can be offered. These, however, may suffice to encourage others to make fuller use of the abundant materials found in the Replies.

The creative and canonical discussions of reform naturally focused on institutions. Only three bishops believed that the existing system of church administration should continue unchanged. Apparently their conservative reaction reflected a fear of reform in the midst of revolutionary unrest. Bishop Lavrentii of Tula, one of the three conservatives, declared that “division of the church-as well as that of the state- can in no case be approved, especially in the present moment of trouble.”[10]

The rest of the Russian episcopate unanimously favored the establishment of ecclesiastical provinces headed by regional metropolitans and with regional synods of bishops having autonomy. Undoubtedly the unpopularity of the centralized synodal bureaucracy headed by a lay overprocurator accounts for this remarkable consensus; yet the bishops also wished to restore a system more in conformity with canon law and church tradition. Certainly the historical studies of the early Church and its ministries published by the ecclesiastical academies gave the bishops (or the commissions appointed to draft the Replies) material which they utilized.”[11] The responses generally asserted that ecclesiastical provinces would give the Church more independence, while reorganization would allow it to practice regular conciliarity (sobornost’), an objective less easily realized on the national level.[12]

Each ecclesiastical province was to have a canonically based synod, empowered to elect bishops and hear complaints against them. Such complaints, if serious enough, could lead to a bishop’s deposition. The crucial issue implied in decentralization was the Church’s dependence on the state: since Peter I, all bishops had been appointed by a decree of the Holy Synod, which was, in fact, an organ of the state. On this point, several bishops quoted apostolic canon 30,[13] which considers invalid any episcopal appointment “by worldly rulers”; interpreted literally, it would actually mean that all the episcopal appointments since Peter were invalid! Few, however, advocated that it be so applied.

Thus, while basing their proposals on ancient canonical tradition, the Replies had to avoid unrealistic and artificial attempts at copying the structure of the early Church, which existed under different historical conditions. Several influential bishops were aware of this fact and pointed to the twentieth-century requirement of the Russian Church: reestablishment of canonical norms, not slavish imitation of ancient structures.”[14] The old and respected- Metropolitan Flavian of Kiev summarized the problems and goals of the projected reform in four points.

  1. Dioceses closely tied to the central administration in St. Petersburg are actually isolated from each other and are unable to meet regional pastoral problems.
  2. Conciliarity (sobornost’) must first be practiced in regions and “neighborhoods,” that is, in the ecclesiastical provinces presided over by their metropolitans.
  3. The existing centralized bureaucracy has assumed a power which canonically belongs to the bishops of a region meeting in council.
  4. Reform would allow the creation of smaller and more numerous dioceses (in each uezd), thereby enabling bishops to be effective pastors of their flocks, not inaccessible high administrators.[15]

On this last point Archbishop Antonii of Volyn’ suggested that “auxiliary” bishops-an institution borrowed recently from Western Christianity-be suppressed and more numerous and smaller dioceses be established. [16]

A substantial number of Replies suggested that, in addition to the presiding metropolitan and bishops, the provincial councils include clergy and laity although some wished to grant them only a consultative role.[17] Antonii of Volyn’ protested virulently against any “democratic” participation by clergy and laity in councils, but his remarks are exceptional.[18] Clearly, the pattern of debate about provincial councils conforms precisely to that surrounding the composition of a national council for the entire Russian Church-a debate then going on in the theological periodicals.

The Replies also include specific plans for the future ecclesiastical provinces, the number of which varies in the proposals from seven to fifteen. Those who favored seven provinces followed obvious geographic, ethnic, and historical divisions.[19] Such provinces were to include the northwest (St. Petersburg), central Russia (Moscow), the South (Kiev), the Caucasus (Tiflis), Belorussia, the East (Kazan), and Siberia. Other bishops recommended further subdivisions of these vast areas.

The plans for ecclesiastical regionalism could not ignore the national diversity of the Russian Empire. In 1905 national awareness had not yet become a critical issue, but it appears in some of the Replies. As a Russian nationalist, Stefan of Mogilev mentioned the danger of Georgian separatism as a disadvantage of regionalism (which he otherwise supported) and suggested that the future “metropolitan of the Caucasus, exercising jurisdiction in areas distinct from those of the catholicos (national patriarch) of Georgia, always be a Russian.[20] The bishops of Belorussia and the Ukraine refer in passing to the need for preserving a unified “Russia.” However, an opposite trend also found free expression. The exarch of Georgia openly claimed that traditional autocephaly (i.e., complete independence) should be restored to the Georgian Church. In his view, religious independence would not lead to political separatism.[21]

A further proposal for autonomy came from Tikhon, bishop of the Aleutian Islands and North America (and future patriarch of Moscow), who suggested that a separate (autocephalous) church in America be created.. He argued that the Russian bishop of this diocese finds himself under completely different political conditions, for he is the head of a multinational religious body which includes not only Russian and Carpatho-Russian immigrants, but also Aleuts, Indians, Eskimos, as well as Serbs, Syrians, Greeks, and others.[22] Tikhon’s project, which displayed a remarkable perception of the situation, subsequently served as an authoritative pattern for the creation of the American autocephalous church in 1970.

With the exception of only four bishops, the entire Russian episcopate in 1905 demanded restoration of the patriarchate suppressed by Peter the Great. Three of the dissenters apparently feared any substantial reform, including a council, in a revolutionary atmosphere.[23] The fourth, Paisii of Turkestan, belonged to the opposite extreme. He was afraid that a patriarch might be more easily controlled by the state than a collective body, and consequently he defended a collegiate and elective principle for all levels of church administration.[24]

While defending a restored patriarchate, the majority of bishops criticized the “synodal” regime as uncanonical and contradicting the principle of sobornost’. A patriarch responsible for a conciliar form of government would assure the Church’s independence from the centralized state bureaucracy.[25] Beyond these basic arguments, some Replies also reasoned that Orthodox tradition requires every national Church to be led personally by the bishop of its major city: among the Orthodox Churches, only the Russian Church since Peter I lacked this personal leadership.

However, the near unanimity in favor of the patriarchate did not extend to the description of the patriarch’s role and responsibility. I. Sokolov, a learned historian of the patriarchate of Constantinople whose opinion on the canonical aspect of the projected reforms had been requested by the metropolitan of St. Petersburg, took the view that a patriarch acted as the head of a council.[26] The vast majority of the bishops, however, described the patriarch as only the “first among equals,” so that the council of all the bishops would be the supreme authority, able to pass judgment upon the patriarch himself. [27] No unanimity emerged either among the bishops or in the Church as large on the issue of the future council’s composition, Some favored a purely episcopal assembly; others insisted that it also include clergy and laity.

Clearly the Replies could not address or solve all problems of central church authority; they merely anticipated later discussions on the meaning of sobornost’ and its possible institutional expressions which took place in the preconciliar meetings and in the ecclesiastical journals between 1905 and 1917. The solution finally accepted at the council of 1917-18 clearly determined that the patriarch was to be responsible to a council composed of bishops, clergy, and laity. However, the statute of 1917 also safeguarded the bishops’ particular role by giving them a collective veto power over all the council’s decisions. This solution (which resembles a sort of parliamentary bicameralism) was anticipated :in the Reply by Archbishop Sergii of Finland (the future locum tenens and patriarch) when he suggested a procedure for patriarchal elections. Three candidates for patriarch were to be nominated respectively by the house of bishops, by the “lower” house of clergy and laity, and by the tsar, The patriarch would then be designated by lot. [28] It is worth noting that Patriarch Tikhon’s election in October 1917 was accomplished by lot after nominations by the entire council (bishops, clerlgy, and laity, but not the tsar!).

Obviously in 1905 no bishops foresaw either the end of the monarchy or the separation of Church and state. Most of the Replies desired a benevolent, liberal Russian state in which the restored patriarchate would play an independent and socially meaningful role. The vast majority believed St. Petersburg would be the patriarch’s normal residence. Only two bishops thought Moscow, the historic see of former Russian metropolitans and patriarchs, should again become the religious capital of Russia. [29]

An inevitable consequence of the system which reduced the clergy to a closed caste (soslovie) was that the priest’s role in Russian society became almost exclusively cultic. The formal administrative obligations to register births and marriages and a limited participation in the state educational system could not provide the clergy with a significant social function. Actually, there is some connection between contemporary Soviet legislation restricting the Church to “cultic” activities and the requirements of the Petrine system. The pre-Revolutionary Russian clergy’s strong sense of being social outcasts certainly influenced, directly or indirectly, some of the demands and suggestions voiced in the Replies. Eventually this social question became the central issue and dominated the debates during the council of 1917-18. For this reason, too, most members of the council vigorously defended the recently developed system of prochial schools as a means for integrating Church and society more harmoniously, despite the fact that both the Duma and the Provisional Government considered these schools outdated and financially cumbersome. Another aspect of this same phenomenon can be seen in the “renovated” or “living” church of the 1920s, which to a large extent became a movement of “white clergy” and some socially oriented intellectuals against the most ascetic ideals represented by the monastically inclined episcopate. Only Antonii (Khrapovitskii) of Volyn’ stood athwart this drive for greater social participation. His vituperative Reply in 1903 against “progressive,” “republican,” and “democratic” priests not only reflected his conservative ideology (in which he was not very consistent) but also his personal aristocratic background (quite exceptional among the bishops). He despised the clergy as a caste, but in this he stood very much alone.[30]

On the whole, the bishops in 1905 succeeded in avoiding such extreme positions and expressed only theological and pastoral considerations. A majority demanded that the clergy be given a voice in the political and social life of Russia, not as spokesmen for class interests but as witnesses of Christ’s message. As citizens, it was thought members of the clergy should be given the right to participate in elections to the zemstvo, the city duma and the State Duma.[31] Election to such assemblies would assure that a responsible and articulate voice of the Church was heard.[32] These demands had already been presented in the memorandum of Antonii of St. Petersburg mentioned earlier. He had suggested that the patriarch and some bishops be ex officio members of the State Council.

While generally advocating a greater social role for the clergy, several bishops also warned against the dangers of politics, quoting ancient canons prohibiting the assumption of direct political power and legal financial responsibilities by priests. If elected to legislative bodies, they were to contribute to debates dealing with church building, education, welfare, and morality. Clergymen were not to participate in politics as such.[33] Interestingly enough, Bishop Evlogii of Kholm, subsequently a prominent and very active member of the State Duma, was among those who gave such warnings. Actually, the bishops were aware of the difficulty of precisely demarcating those “politics” forbidden to the clergy from those “social responsibilities” which are an unavoidable part of the Church’s function. Clearly, but understandably, they lacked practical experience in such matters.

The content of the Replies by the Russian Bishops in 1905 can be analyzed and criticized from different angles. From a theological standpoint, for example, the issue of the respective roles of bishops, lower clergy, and laity at a council, as it was discussed in the Replies, cannot be truly solved without first establishing basic ecclesiological presuppositions on the nature of local Churches (or dioceses), the manner of electing bishops, and the nature of the episcopal ministry. The notion of sobornost’ is much too vague and. insufficient to give an answer to concrete ecclesiological issues – the ecclesiological ideas underlying the Replies would thus require a separate study. Similarly, the influence exercised by the prevailing trends in social thought – toward liberal democracy, romantic “populism” (norodnichestvo), and conservatism- need serious analysis. Finally, the collection of the Replies is of undeniable historical importance for the picture it gives of all the major personalities of Russian Church history in the revolutionary and post-revolutionary era: Tikhon (Bellavin) bishop of the Aleutian islands and North America, who became the first patriarch (1918-23); Sergii (Stragorodskii), archbishop of Finland, the future locum tenens, (192643) and patriarch – (1943-44); Evlogii (Georgievskii), bishop of Kholm, later metropolitan of Western Europe (1922-46) and leader of the influential Russian Orthodox community in Paris; Antonii (Khrapovitskii), archbishop of Volyn, later metropolitan of Kiev, and eventually the head of the “Russian Orthodox Church in exile” in Sremski Karlovci, Yugoslavia; and many others. It should be noted that most of the Replies reflect the work of commissions established in dioceses, some of which, especially those working in such intellectual centers as St. Petersburg, Moscow, Kiev, and Kazan, where the local bishop could utilize the resources of the theological academies, have produced reports of great scholarly interest. Elsewhere, the work of the commissions reflects the trends among provincial clergy and church leadership.

All these elements contribute to making the collection of Replies probably the most representative and comprehensive document on the Russian Church’s condition in the Old Regime’s last years.

 

FOOTNOTES

A lecture delivered during a Conference on Russian Orthodox under the old Regime at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minn., in April 1976, and published in R. L. Nichols and Th. G. Stavrou, Russian Orthodoxy under the Old Regime, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis. 1978, pp. 170-182. Reprinted in J. Meyendorff, Catholicity and the Church, St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1983, pp. 143-156.

 

1Cf. P. Dvornik, Early Christian and Byzantine Political Philosophy: Origins and Background, Dumbarton Oaks Studies, no. 9 (Washington. D.C., 1966) 1966) I-II; also my article “Justinian, the Empire and the Church,” Dumbarton Oaks Papers, XXII (1968) pp. 45-60; repr. in John Meyendorff, The Byzantine Legacy in the Orthodox Church, St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, Crestwood, NY, 1982, pp. 43-66.

2. Otzyvy eparkhial’nykh arkhiereev po voprosam O tserkovnoi reforme, 3 vol, (St. Petersburg: 1906) and Pribavleniia (Supplement).

3. For a general review of the events see A. Bogolepov, Church Reforms in Russia, 1905-1918 (Bridgeport, CT: 1966: reprinted from St Vladimir’s Seminary Quarterly, 1965); cf. also J.S. Curtiss, Church and State in Russia: The Last Years of the Empire, 1900-1917 (New York: 1940, reprinted 1965); James Cunningham, A Vanquished Hope: the Movement for Church Renewal in Russia, 1905-1906, Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1981.

4. Metropolitan Antonii’s zapiska was published in Slovo, 28 March 1905, and reprinted in I.V. Preobrashenekil, cd., Tserkovnaia reforma: sbornik statei dukhovnoi i svetskoi periodicheskoi pechati po voprosu o reforme (St. Petersburg, 1905) pp. 133-36.

5. Text in Slovo, 28 March 1905.

6. Text in Tserkovnyi vestnik (1905) p. 11; reproduced in Tserkovnaia reforma, pp. 1-6.

7. Otzyvy eparkhial’nykh arkhiereev, III, 276. This was the opinion of Sergii (Stragorodskii), archbishop of Finland.

8. Cf. Paul Valliere’s study on “The Idea of a Council in Russian Orthodoxy in 1905,” Russian Orthodoxy under the Old Regime, eds. R.L. Nichols and -G. Stavrou (Minneapolis, MN. Ur,iveraity of Minnesota Press, 1978).

9. This aspect of the Replies will not he discussed here; the liturgical and disciplinary reforms suggested by the bishops are particularly emphasized in the only (and very brief) existing survey of the Replies by N. Zernov, “The Reform of the Church and the Pre-revolutionary Russian Episcopate,” St. Vladimir’s Seminary Quarterly 6 (1962) 3:128-38 (originally published in N. Berdiaev’s periodical Put,’ Paris, 1934). 

10.Otzyvy, 3, 387.

11. The books most frequently quoted are A.P. Lebedev, Dukhovenstvo drevnei vselenskoi tserkvi (Moscow, 1905) and P. Gidulianov, Mitropolity v pervye tri veka khristianstva (Moscow, 1905), the second study being the much more substantial. The various ecclesiastical periodicals also devoted numerous articles to the issue during the period 1904-17.

12. Cf. Nikanor of Perm, Otzyvy, 2, 389.

13. For example, Konstantin of Samara, ibid., 1, 431.

14Cf. the opinion of Professor A. Brilliantov, included the remarks of St. Petersburg Metropolitan Antonii, ibid., 3, 117; and Sergii of Finland, 3, 227.

15. Ibid., 2, 103.

16. Ibid., 1,122.

17. Stefan of Mogilev, ibid., 1, 99-100; Simeon of Ekaterinoslav 1 ,77; Flavian of Kiev, 2, 75.

18. Ibid., 1, 112-20.

19. Cf. the Replies from Kursk, Perm, Volyn, Grodho, Olonets, Tomsk, Riazan, and America.

20. Ibid., 1, 97.

21. Ibid., 3, 510. Georgia, a country christianized in the fourth century, has been led by a “catholicos” since the sixth century. Political annexation by Russia early in the nineteenth century was followed by the suppression of this Georgian national patriarchate and the appointment of a Russian “exarch of Georgia.”

22. Ibid., 1, 531.

23. Parfenii of Podolsk, ibid., 2, 490; Lavrentii of Tula, 3, 381-82; Dimitrii, auxiliary of Podolsk, 2, 491.

24. Ibid., 1, 50~32,

25. See particularly the Replies from Ufa, 2, 54-55; Pskov, 2, 205-06; Kiev, 2, 103; Moscow, 3, 253-55; Warsaw, 2, 273; Riasan, 3, 577; Volyn’, 3, 186-94; Orenburg, 2, 146-47; Kholm, 2, 466; and America, 1, 330.

26. Ibid., 3, 128-29.

27. Cf., for example, the Replies from St. Petersburg, 3, 86; Moscow, 3, 256; Kaluga, 1, 29; Viatka, 2, 509; Kholm, 2, 466; Stavropol, 2, 261; Finland, 3, 260, 270; Orel, 1, 521; Orenburg, 2, 148; Irkutsk, 2 227.

28. Ibid,, 3, 270.

29. Ibid., Tambov, 3, 318; Finland, 3, 269.

30. Ibid., 1, 112-120.

31. Ibid., Chernigov, 1, 111.

32. Ibid., Polotsk, 1, 137; Khar’kov, 1, 20; Kaluga, 1, 33; America, 1, 545.

33. Ibid., Voronezh, 1, 45; Novgorod, 2, 20; Kholm, 2, 489; Kazan, 3, 436.