The Religious Spirit of the Slavs

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the Slavs (1916)
by Nikolai
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Title: The Religious Spirit of the Slavs (1916) Sermons On Subjects
Suggested By The War, Third Series
Author: Nikolai Velimirovic
Release Date: September 7, 2004 [EBook #13388]
Language: English
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RELIGIOUS SPIRIT OF SLAVS ***

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*St. Margaret's, Westminster*
SERMONS ON SUBJECTS SUGGESTED BY THE WAR
THIRD SERIES
*THE RELIGIOUS SPIRIT OF THE SLAVS*
THREE LECTURES GIVEN IN LENT, 1916
BY
The Rev. FATHER NICOLAI VELIMIROVIC
Priest of the Serbian Church, and Professor of Theology in the
University of Belgrade
I. SLAV ORTHODOXY II. SLAV REVOLUTIONARY
CATHOLICISM III. THE RELIGIOUS SPIRIT OF THE SLAVS
1916

I
SLAV ORTHODOXY
The Holy Synod and Tolstoi.
When Count Tolstoi was excommunicated by the Holy Synod of
Russia because "he preached the teachings which are contrary to the
Christian faith," the world was divided in opinion and sympathy into
two parts. The partisans of Tolstoi were in the majority in the Western
world; those of the Holy Synod in Russia and the Orthodox East. Yet
Holy Russia rejected Tolstoi with much more compassion than Western

Europe approved of him. It was a human tragedy which is not often
repeated in history and was understood only by Russia. The conflict
was more stern than appeared on the surface. The problems in question
meant not less than the dilemma: either the Christian world was to
continue or it must return to the starting point of human history and
begin all anew. A little blade of grass in the field said to its green
neighbours: "Why do we grow up? It is nonsense and pain. In growing
up we grow in complications, which enhance the darkness and pain of
our lives. I propose, therefore, to go back into seeds, from which we
have grown big and unhappy."
So spoke one blade of grass to the field. And the field replied:
"Although perhaps we are growing in nonsense and pain, still we
cannot return, we must grow and go our way in the belief that we are
not mistaken."
That is the simile of Tolstoi and the Holy Synod.
A Circle or a Drama.
Tolstoi perceived life as a circle, with the beginning everywhere and
with the end everywhere. The Holy Synod, representing Slav
Orthodoxy, perceived life as a drama with a beginning and an end in
space and time. From his point of view, Tolstoi thought it possible for
mankind to stop a mistaken course of things and to begin anew, to cast
away all the burdens of culture, of State, Church, militarism, worldly
ambitions, the vanities of towns, to draw the curtain on the past and to
come back to the field and forest, to plough and sow, to listen to the life
of Nature and to live with Nature and God in unison.
The Holy Synod, from their point of view, thought that the past is the
very foundation of the present and future, and that in separating us from
the past we were as an uprooted plant, condemned to inevitable death,
while in continuing the world-drama we are going the only possible
way. The beginning of sin in this drama is in Adam, the beginning of
salvation is in Christ. We cannot live without taking notice even of the
life of Adam and without connecting our life with Christ's. And all the
other millions of human beings between those two milestones, between

Adam and Christ, and Christ and us, are greater or smaller foundations,
or conditions, or even disturbances of our own life.
"My understanding is against your traditions," said Tolstoi.
"Our traditions are against your understandings," replied the Holy
Synod.
But that was not all.
The difference existed also in views on

HAPPINESS AND ATONEMENT.
Tolstoi was much troubled by the suffering of men. He himself saw,
felt and described an immense amount of this suffering in various
forms. The problem of happiness was his most cherished problem. He
believed that men can be made happy in this life, and even more--that
they are created in order to be happy. He refused quite definitely the
idea of atonement as inconceivable and contrary to the idea of God.
Human life has been normal and happy as long as men lived