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Rev. Robert M. Russell 157
Religious Life in Russia
As to practical Christian living, it has the same general features in
the Greek Church as in the Roman Catholic Church. The morality of
Russia parallels in many ways the morality of countries tvhere
the Church of Rome is supreme. The mass of the people are contented
with an ordinary morality, while the monks are supposed to aim at
higher degrees of piety. The monastic system, which originated in
the east (in Egypt), and continues to this day, has not developed into
great monastic orders as in the western or Roman Church. The people
are generally ignorant of the deeper truths of the Gospel. The circula-
tion of the Scriptures among the people is not encouraged, although
the Greek Church has never prohibited the reading of the Bible in the
common tongue to the people. Indeed Alexander I, by a decree Of
January 14, 1813, allowed the British and Foreign Bible Society to
establish a branch at St. Petersburg. It is recorded that through the
labors of this society nearly five hundred thousand copies of the New
Testament and Psalms were scattered in thirty-two languages all over
the empire, and read with great avidity. A traveler wrote, "Except
in New England and in Scotland, no people in the world, so far as
they can read at all, are greater Bible readers than the Russians."
A priest told this traveler, "Love for the Bible and love for Russia go
with us hand in hand. A patriotic government gives us the Bible; a
monastic government takes it away." As the result of the policy of
Alexander I, it could be said that the Bible drove the Jesuits from
Russia, who indeed opposed it with all their might. But in 1825,
Nicholas, under the influence of the monks or black clergy, placed the
Bible under ban, and replaced it by an official book of the saints.
Alexander II, the emancipator of the serfs, also emancipated the
Bible, and restored in part the liberty of the Bible Society, but re-
stricted it to the Protestant population. The printing and circulating
of the Bible in the Russian language, and within the Orthodox Church,
has been under the exclusive control of the Holy Synod of St. Peters-
burg. The result of distributing the Bible has, however, been rela-
tively small since the larger part of Russia’s population can neither
read nor write. Under such conditions morality must be low, and as
far from a true obedience to God in social and civil life as is the
spectacular worship of the churches from spiritual worship.
Modem Need and Opportunity
A state church is always likely to be a persecuting church. When
linked to the throne, the church is always used to enhance the power
of political government. This has been signally true of Russia. The
Greek Church has been trained to the support of the oligarchy. By
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