This is neither an academic, nor a polemical article (though it becames that a little bit at the end), nor a history of this teaching in the East, this is merely a very shallow overview of what Old Believers had to say about it. So with that it mind, one should start by mentioning the book called The Tablet (Skrizhal') published by Patriarch Nikon. It included a work by a Greek with Protestant education (it should be menioned that the 17th and 18th centuries were marked by presence of a Catholic-leaning party on one side, and a Protestant-leaning party on the other), translated by the infamous Arsenius the Greek, which Nikon got through Patriarch Paisius of Jerusalem, as well as a reply by another Patriarch Paisius of Constantinople to certain questions that Nikon had.
To make a long story short, the book included anti-immaculist theology (i.e. she was purified at the Annunciation), which one of the leaders of the early Old Believer movement priest Nikita (Necetas), who recieved the nickname Pustosvyat, which literally means 'empty (i.e. fake\vain\false) saint', thought to be blasphemous. He was outraged and so wrote directly to the Czar Alexei the following words: "Our most pure and most holy Lady Theotokos... did not have the original stain, for she recieved a sanctification and was prepared to become a dwelling of God even in the womb of her mother". The Big Moscow Council of 1666 sought to publish a reply. The first choice for the role of the refuter fell on Paisios Ligarides, titular Metropolitan of Gaza, who was in Moscow at the time. Surisingly he started to defend Nikita and so the Council had to pick another person to write the refutation. This person was Simeon of Polotsk. He wrote a book titled The Rod of Ruling (Zhezl Pravleniya), which was officialy approved by the Council. Interestingly enough, though it does speak in favour of Nikon's reform, it once again defended not only the teaching of Mary's pre-purification but also of her Immaculate Conception, despite the author's Protestant leanings in other respects. One of the late Old Ritualist polemicist Melnikov pointed out an inconsistency in his "Wandering Theology)" (Bluzhdayusheye Bogosloviye), since the Council approved two books with opposed theological views (we will translate some parts from Melnikov's works later). The highly complex and fascinating relationship between the Russians and different theological parties within the Greek circles deserves a separate article, so we shall leave it at that, though of course one can just call it "Latin captivity" and brush this whole period of Church history aside.
Of course this issue was overshadowed by other questions, related to first and foremost the new rituals as well as different ecclessiologies of different groups of Old Believers. However, one can almost safely say that until the second half of the 20th century, most of them accepted the fact that the Most Holy Theotokos was conceived without blemish of the original sin. As the so-called Nikonian church drifted further and further away from the belief in the Immaculate Conception and then from the pre-purificationist position in general, some Old Believers felt it necessary to mention this issue in respect to their differnces with the "State Church". One of them was Paul of Belaya Krinitsa, canonized by the Russian Orthodox Old Rite Church in 2004, and who was one of the two monks responsible for converting Metropolitan Ambrose, the founder of Belokrinitskaya hierarchy. In order to do everything "by the books", Paul decided to aquire an official status for the monastery (though the monastery was granted all religious freedoms already by Joseph II), where the future Metropolitan would live. In turn, to do that he had to write the Rule of this monastery. Perhaps, for the sake of not writing two books, Monk Paul included not only regulations of the monastery but also the teachings of the priest-accepting Old Believers. On September 6th, 1844 the monks recieved an official approval from Ferdinand of Austria to bring in Ambrose and establish their hierarchy. Among other things, the Rule included the following passage about the Most Blessed Virgin (the wording might seem strange but it's only because it's quite difficult to translate late Church Slavonic as it gets pretty "baroque"):
We confess and exolt the Most Holy Theotokos and Ever-Vigin Mary to be truly holier than the cherubim and the seraphim [St. John of Damaccus and other aforementioned Holy Teachers], to be transcending heavens and to be above all creatures, as the one, who gave birth in the flesh to the one of the Trinity, Christ our God, who for our sake came down and became man for our salvation. She is not only the one who in her current blessed state [Menaion Reader, December 9] (according to holy theologians) we confess to be clean and most-pure but we also believe that she was a virgin before the birth, virgin during the birth, and she remains a virgin after the birth; just as the almighty God created a material heaven that is pure incomprehensible to nature with His word ["Pearls" (Margarit - Μαργαρίται), 2nd sermon on the incomprehensible], a word that is pure, the same way God prepared for His only-begotten Son, His Word, an animate heaven, which is pure and untouched whatsoever by any stain on earth for His incarnation, i.e. our Most-blessed Lady Theotokos and Ever-virgin Mary [Menaion Reader, Sermon for the Conception of the Most Holy Theotokos, Dec. 9], which is clean from the seed and before her conception pre-purified and sanctified. Therefore she is the only one, who was preselected before birth and foretold by the prophets, Mother of the Creator of the universe, not only untouched by the original stain [Same sermon] but like heavens remained pure and very good (sounds much better in Slavonic - but it is a hint at Genesis). The Holy Ghost himself testified of her in the Canticle of Canticles in the following manner: "Thou art all fair, O my love, and there is not a spot in thee" and again with astonishment: "Who is she that cometh forth as the morning rising, fair as the moon, bright as the sun" [Cant. 4:7 and 6:9].
One can, perhaps, say that they wrote this, because they wanted to please the Catholics but a) it was written before the proclamation of the dogma, b) Old Believers would not write heresy just to please someone, especially when they could have chosen not to write anything. It is much more accurate to see this in the context of a very robust and "maximalist" Mariology before it was watered down by either Protestant influences, misunderstandings or blind opposition to anything Catholic (if Catholics teach X, we will teach Y). Either way, at that point it was still not a point of disagreement between Old Believers and Nikonians or Catholics. It is interesting, however, how differently theological changes can occur with a progressive development, i.e. from simple to more detailed/nuanced/complex, and a regressive development, i.e. from complex/detailed to broad/vague/minimalistic. What I mean is that progressive development bring about new and deep understanding of a certain theological issue, one can say it's a blossiming of a seed into a full plant that brings about fruit. Regressive development brings about plucking out of that plant, leaving only the roots in hope that the plant will grow in a manner the farmer will be more sympathetic to. Backing out on later dogmatic development often leads to backing out on things considered solid previously, i.e. leads to revisionism, whether in its modernist or tradinationalist mode.
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| Arseny Shvetsov (Arsenius of Ural) |
Let's look at other work, published after the proclamation of the Immaculate Conception as a Catholic dogma and publication of Ineffabilis Deus by Blessed Pope Piux IX. This work, unlike the Rule, is a polemical one and directed against various attacks on the newly-formed hierarchy, hence the name of the book: "The Truth (Validity) of the Old Ritualist Hierarchy against the Attacks Directed at Her" by Arsenius of Ural (rus. Arseny Uralsky). This work will serve both as an example of how some Old Believers started to be more careful with proclaiming this teaching due to outside pressure and, at the same time, an example of how Mary's pre-purification was still obvious and was in fact considered a dogma of the Church (which can no longer be said these days, unforetunately). Before getting into the work itself, a tiny biographical information about Arsenius is in order. Onisim Shvetsov (his original name) was born in 1840 in Vladimir Guberniya (Governorate) in a family of the so-called Netovtsy Old Believers. The central teaching of this group was the belief that after the coming of the Antichrist, grace, i.e. valid sacraments, were taken away and so the only way to be saved was through the mercy of God or, as they say, mercy of the Saviour (Spasova milost'), hence their other name: Spasovtsy (Saviourites). They also differed from other Old Believers in that they did not believe in re-baptising, which most other priestless Old Believers practised, even if the person was baptised through three immersions. As a young adult he started working as a supercargo for employers, who had a library. After reading many books from that library he eventually became conviced that the position of the priesltess Old Believers was false. In 1865 he was accepted into the Belokrinitskaya group by Archbishop Anthony (Shutov), who was the first Archbishop of Moscow (Arnesius considered him a saint and wrote his biography). He then worked as a secretary of the archbishop until '81. He converted his parents and then his villagers to his faith and then left for Romania in '83, where he wrote the work we will look at shortly. On his return to Moscow in '85 he was first tonsured a monk with a name Arsenius by the second archbishop of Moscow Sabbatius and shortly upgraded to a priest-monk. In '97 he became a bishop of Ural. He reposed in 1908. In 2008-2011 he was canonized as a saint (holy hierarch) by the Russian Orthodox Old Rite Church.
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| Arsenius in 1903 |
Arsenius starts by listing various attacks on the Rule of Belaya Krinitsa monastery. One of the points brought up by the critics or, to be percise, Nikolay Subbotin, professor of the Moscow Theological Academy, who wrote the History of the Belokrinitskaya hierarchy, was the fact that they listed the Immaculate Conception as a dogma even before Catholics proclaimed it as such. Here Arsenius mentions that one of their local concils had already dealt with the issue, although not because it was a heresy of some kind but, apparently, only to due its ambiguity. It should be said that Subbotin did not just think it was premature to talk about the Immaculate Conception, it was on his list of heretical ("Non-Orthodox") teachings he found in the Rule. A little further in the book, he defends it first by refering to the previously mentioned Skrizhal':
In the commentary on More honorable than the cherubim in the verse "Who without corruption gave birth to God the Word" it says: "The Virgin did not give birth with corruption, but the Holy Ghost came upon her and purified her with the word of the Archangel Gabriel, for the original stain was on her". It was against such a highly audacious attack against the dignity of our Most-pure Theotokos, our fathers protested, and we protest as well.
So far so good. However, later, due to the lack of writing on predestination among the Easterners (at least that's my personal theory), Arsenius has to resort to performing verbal acrobatics, which gets a little confusing. Nevertheless, he goes on to say the following:
However, neither the maculists (skverniteli - sounds like another word: oskverniteli, which means 'defilers'; thus, this seems to be both a neutural label for a theological position and, at the same time, refers to the fact that such position is blasphemous), nor us, the sincere confessors and venerators of her purity, did not give our difference enough clarity for either of the sides to be finally conviced that it is wrong. We believe that here one should make a distinction between two sides (of the issue): 1. not complete non-partisipation (nebezprichastnost' - Russian double negatives are at times confusing for Russians too) of Virgin Mary, along with the rest of the humanity, in the loins of the forefathers, to the original sin; 2. personal non-partisipation in this sin by the Theotokos, as she is "truly" (this is how that line from Άξιον εστίν reads in the old Slavonic translation, instead of the later "without comparison") "more honorable than the cherubim and more glorious that the seraphim" <...> Ever-Virgin in the loins of Adam and Eve was not a complete non-partaker in their eating from the tree; then, having been pre-purified by the Spirit, she became higher than the heavens and purer than rays of the sun. This is a dogma that is undisputed in the whole of the Christian oecumene. There only remains to determine the exact time of Theotokos' pre-purification by the Spirit <...> We also believe that the dignity of the Theotokos does not require defining the exact time of her pre-purification and there is no need for such definition to be made into a dogma. We shall not have any doubts in confessing that the pre-purification was being prepared for centuries during the course of whole centuries in the loins of a whole number of holy forefathers and finally completed in the good news brought by the angel to Joachim and Anna.
Well, the overall position seems to be clear: Mary was pre-purified, though we don't exactly know when; saying it happened at the Annunciation is blasphemous but, at the same time, we shouldn't define the exact time, though, apparently, we know for sure that it happened before her birth and that it was a century-long process, which ended at the annunciation to her parents. Don't be too specific though! Notice also the way Arsenius mentions the issue of making it into a dogma. And herein lies the irony. Many people, who discuss this topic have to eventually accept Immaculate Conception as a possibility, since their arguments against it also undermine the pre-purification (that's why so many Eastern Orthodox don't even know about the pre-purification), and so they proclaim: Why define it though? A better question would be: Why define anything, why having your tongue cut off for some nuances about the two wills, why can't we have peace in the Middle East? Well, that's a topic for a different article.
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| Nativity of the Theotokos (Old Believer icon, Mstyora, 20th c.) |
Arsenius finally has to wash his hands in front of Subbotin and the Nikonians to show that the Old Believers are not like those Catholics. Thus, he gives reasons as to why the Catholic Church did a bad bad thing by defining the exact time of Mary's pre-purification (prepare to go 'huh' and "say whaaa?"):
1. This issue can be left to personal freedom without any harm to the unity of faith; 2. Canonisation (dogmatisation) should not touch such details of faith, the universal acceptance of which is necessarily binding on all of Christianity, and equals to puting on the Church a yoke foreign to it in spirit; 3. Catholicism by itself had no right to put forward a new dogma before the universality; 4. Most importantly, a pious belief of Catholicism in the Immaculate Conception of Ever-Virgin Mary was turned by the pope into a tool for a final taking away of freedom from Catholicism itself and to a pronouncing in a similar fashion himself as an unconditional lord of not only Rome but of the whole of humanity, not only of Heaven and Hell but also of the consciences of the whole humanity; However, we are not ashamed of agreeing with the papists in confessing the Most Holy Theotokos as "more honorable than the cherubim and truly more glorious than the seraphim", for it so, and to her is our amen, and in (confessing) of the sinlessness of her venerable and glorious conception, in so far as they accept, along with Eastern Orthodoxy, her not-complete unpartisipation in the original sin in the "loins of the forefathers" as well as the sinlessness of her conception, prepared by the Holy Ghost through pre-purification.
Instead of commenting on this (since I think both the Orthodox and Catholics can say a lot about these points without my help) I will simply ask: what does this stuff about conscience sounds like? Does this not sound like utter liberalism? And yet this is exactly where the nuanced beliefs lead unless you are standing on a firm ground and trust in the infallability of the Church or, more presicely, its ability to develop dogmas and define truth clearly. I am not trying to be mean here or condescending; on the contrary, I immensly respect Arsenius and anyone who struggles with these issues; and despite what he says about the pope I really appreciate his respectful tone towards the Catholics and Nikonians (though maybe it doesn't come through in English). As said earlier, one can be a modernist or a traditionalist but once you leave truth to personal conscience - all hell migh break lose. That's not to say that Church has to define every little detail of belief at all times, conserning all issues but that is a matter of prudence not of some principal. It is interesting and almost not suprising, how the dissident intellegentsia of the Soviet Union looked at the Old Believers as some free-thinkers, pre-modern liberals, who fought for freedom of thought and expression (see, for example,
this famous poem). One might argue for the number of fingers, use of a certain language or a strict adherence to the Typikon or even percise theological phrasing, superiority of one theological tradition over the other but then completely "lose it" on the issues that he or she is not emotionally invested in or that are subjectively of no or secondary significance to a given individual. One and the same person can say: I think one has to believe in venerating icons but not in venerating the Eucharist, one has to believe in the two wills but not in the moment of pre-sanctification of Mary, one has to accept the reality of Hell but we are so weak that strict adherence to the words of Jesus, say, on marriage is too much and we need economia (which most often leads to lawlessness when it's misapplied from practice to actual moral issues of ontological significance). In short, relativism and indifferentism is not only the scourge of some modernists but also of the most strictest old-calendarist unusual-name-having archeodox desert-living self-burning prostration-making elders on Mount Athos-Valaam.
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