Modern Saints and Seers. Jean Finot
became proverbial. In the village of Orlovka they were exposed to most cruel outrages, the inhabitants having been stirred up against them by the priests and officials. They were spat upon, flogged, and generally ill-treated, but never ceased to pray, "O God, help us to bear our misery." Their meekness at last melted the hearts of their persecutors, who, becoming infected by their religious ardour, went down on their knees before those whom they had struck with whips a few minutes before.
CHAPTER VIII
THE SPIRITUAL CHRISTIANS
The Slavonic atmosphere exhales an intense longing for the ideal and for heaven. Often a kind of religious ecstasy seems to sweep over the whole length and breadth of the Russian territories, and Tolstoi's celebrated doctrines reflected the dreamy soul of the moujik and the teachings of many Russian martyrs. It would, however, be a mistake to suppose that it is only the peasants buried in the depths of the country who provide favourable soil for the culture of the religious bacillus. It is the same with all classes—merchants, peasants, labourers and aristocrats.
The working-classes, especially those of the large towns, usually offer more resistance to the influence of religious fanatics, but in Petrograd and Moscow they are apt to follow the general current. Lack of space forbids us to study in all their picturesque details the birth and growth of religious sects in these surroundings. We must confine ourselves to one of the more recent manifestations—that of the mysterious "spiritual Christians."
In 1893, a man named Michael Raboff arrived in St. Petersburg. Peasant by birth, carpenter by trade, he immediately began to preach the tenets of his "spiritual Christianity." He became suspect, and with his friend Nicholas Komiakoff was deported to a far-distant neighbourhood; but in spite of this his seed began to bear fruit, for the entire district where he and Komiakoff were sent to work was soon won over to the new religion. The director himself, his wife, and all his workmen embraced it, and though the workshops were closed by the police, the various members distributed themselves throughout the town and continued to spread Raboff's "message." Borykin, the master-carpenter, took employment under a certain Grigorieff, and succeeded in converting all his fellow-workers. Finally Grigorieff's house was turned into a church for the new sect, and an illiterate woman named Vassilisa became their prophetess. Under the influence of the general excitement, she would fall into trances and give extravagant and incomprehensible discourses, while her listeners laughed, danced and wept ecstatically. By degrees the ceremonial grew more complex, and took forms worthy of a cult of unbalanced minds.
At the time when the police tried to disperse the sect it possessed a quite considerable number of adherents; but it died out in May, 1895, scarcely two years after its commencement.
The "spiritual Christians" called themselves brothers and sisters, and gave to Raboff the name of grandfather, and to the woman Vassilisa that of mother. They considered themselves "spiritual Christians" because they lived according to the spirit of Christianity. For the rest, their doctrine was innocent enough, and, but for certain extravagances and some dangerous dogmas borrowed from other sects, their diffusion among the working-classes of the towns might even have been desirable. Sexual chastity was one of their main postulates, and they also recommended absolute abstention from meat, spirits, and tobacco. But at the same time they desired to abolish marriage.
When the police raided Grigorieff's workshops, they found there about fifty people stretched on the ground, spent and exhausted as a result of the excessive efforts which Raboff's cult demanded of them. At their meetings a man or woman would first read aloud a chapter from Holy Scripture. The listeners would make comments, and one of the more intelligent would expound the selected passage. Growing more and more animated, he would finally reach a state of ecstasy which communicated itself to all present. The whole assembly would cry aloud, groan, gesticulate and tear their hair. Some would fall to the ground, while others foamed at the mouth, or rent their garments. Suddenly one of the most uplifted would intone a psalm or hymn which, beginning with familiar words, would end in incoherency, the whole company singing aloud together, and covering the feet of their "spiritual mother" with kisses.
CHAPTER IX
A LABORATORY OF SECTS
We will now travel to the south of Russia, and examine more closely what might be called a laboratory of sects, or in other words a breeding-ground of religions whose idealism, whether foolish or sublime, is often sanctified by the blood of believers, and descends like dew from Hermon into the midst of our busy civilisation.
The mystical tendencies of the popular soul sometimes develop in a fashion little short of prodigious, and to no country do we owe so many remarkable varieties of religious faith as to that portion of Russia which lies between Kherson and Nicolaïev. There is seen in full activity the greatest religious laboratory in the world; there originate, as a rule, the morbid bacilli which invade the rest of Russia; and there do sects grow up like mushrooms, only to disappear with equal rapidity.
An orthodox missionary named Schalkinsky, who was concerned especially with the erring souls of the region of Saratov, has published a work in which he gives a fantastic picture of the events of quite recent years. He was already the author of several books dealing with the sect of the bezpopovtzi, and his high calling and official position combine to give authority to his words.
When we consider the immense variety of these sects, we can easily imagine what takes place in every small village that becomes possessed of the craving for religious perfection. Prophets, gods and demi-gods, holy spirits and apostles, all kinds of saints and mystics, follow thick and fast upon one another's heels, seeking to gain the ascendancy over the pious souls of the villagers. Some are sincere and genuinely convinced believers; others, mere shameless impostors; but all, manifesting the greatest ardour and eloquence, traverse the countryside, imploring the peasants to "abandon their old beliefs and embrace the new holy and salutary dogmas." The orthodox missionaries seem only to increase the babel by organising their own meetings under the protection of the local authorities.
Some of the sectarians will take part in public discussions, either in the open air or in the churches, but most of them content themselves with smiling mockingly at the assertions of the "anti-Christian faith" (i.e. the orthodox official religion). With the new régime conditions may undergo a radical change, but in former times religious doubts, when too openly manifested by the followers of the "new truths," were punished by imprisonment or deportation.
Sometimes the zeal of the missionaries carried them too far, for, not content with reporting the culprits to the ecclesiastical authorities, they would denounce them publicly in their writings. The venerable Father Arsenii, author of fifteen pamphlets against the molokanes, delivered up to justice in this way sufficient individuals to fill a large prison; and another orthodox missionary crowned his propaganda by printing false accusations against those who refused to accept the truth as taught by him.
In a centre like Pokourleï, which represented in miniature the general unrest of the national soul, there were to be found among the classified sects more than a dozen small churches, each having its own worshippers and its own martyrs. An illiterate peasant, Theodore Kotkoff, formed what was called the "fair-spoken sect," consisting of a hundred and fifty members who did him honour because he invented a new sort of "Holy Communion" with a special kind of gingerbread. Another, Chaïdaroff, nicknamed "Money-bags," bought a forest and built a house wherein dwelt fifteen aged "holy men," who attracted the whole neighbourhood. Many men in the prime of life followed the example of the aged ones, and retired to live in the forest, while women went in even greater numbers and for longer periods. Husbands grew uneasy, and bitter disputes took place, in which one side upheld the moral superiority of the holy men, while the other went so far as to forbid the women to go and confess to them. One peasant claimed to be inspired