Military priests in battle formations
Celebration of all celebrations is called Easter believers. For them, the Resurrection of Christ is the main holiday of the Orthodox calendar. For the sixth time in a row in its modern stories The Russian army celebrates Easter, overshadowed by military priests who appeared in units and formations after a ninety-year hiatus.
At the root of the tradition
The idea to revive the institute of military priests in the Russian army arose among the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) in the mid-nineties. It did not receive much development, but the secular leaders as a whole positively assessed the initiative of the Russian Orthodox Church. The benevolent attitude of society towards church rites and the fact that, after the liquidation of the staff of political workers, the education of personnel lost a distinct ideological core, had an effect. The post-communist elite could not formulate a new bright national idea. Her search led many to a long-known religious perception of life.
The initiative of the ROC choked up mainly because there was not the main thing in this story - military priests themselves. The priest of the usual parish did not fit the role of, for example, the confessor of the desperate paratroopers. There must be a man of their environment, respected not only for the wisdom of the religious sacrament, but also military valor, including, at least, for the obvious readiness for feat of arms.
This was the military priest Ciprian Peresvet. He himself formulated his biography as follows: first he was a warrior, then a cripple, then he became a priest, then a military priest. However, Cyprian leads the count of his life only from 1991, when he took monastic vows in Suzdal. Three years later he was ordained a priest. The Siberian Cossacks, reviving the familiar Yenisei district, elected Cyprian as a military priest. The story of this devotee of God deserves a separate detailed story. He passed both Chechen wars, was captured by Khattab, stood at the firing line, survived after wounds. It was in Chechnya that soldiers of the Sofrinsky brigade for courage and military patience called Cyprian Peresvet. He also had his call sign “YAK-15”, so that the fighters knew: the priest next to them. Supports them with soul and prayer. Companions-Chechens called Ciprian Peresvet their brother, sofrintsy - Batey.
After the war, in June, 2005 in St. Petersburg, Cyprian will take the veil in the Great Sheema, becoming the elder, the schema heir to Isaac, but in the memory of Russian soldiers he will remain the first military priest of the new time.
And before him - a large and fertile history of the Russian military clergy. For me and, probably, for the Sofrintsy, it starts from 1380, when Reverend Sergius, abbot of the Russian land and the Wonderworker of Radonezh, blessed Prince Dmitry for the battle to liberate Russia from the Tatar yoke. He gave him to help their monks - Rodion Oslabyu and Alexander Peresvet. This Peresvet will be released later on the Kulikovo field to fight with the Tatar hero Chelubey. With their deadly fight, the battle will begin. Russian army will break the horde of Mamai. This victory people will associate with the blessing of St. Sergius. The monk Peresvet who has fallen in combat will be canonized. And we are the day of the Kulikovo battle - September 21 (September 8 on the Julian calendar) we call the Day of Military Glory of Russia.
Between two Peresveta six more centuries. Much of this time together - the arduous service to God and the Fatherland, pastoral feats, grand battles and great upheavals.
According to the military regulations
Like everything in the Russian army, military spiritual service first found its organizational structure in the Military Code of Peter I from 1716. The emperor reformer considered it necessary to have a priest in every regiment, on every ship. The clergy of the sea were predominantly hieromonk. At their head was placed ober-hieromonk fleet. The clergy of the ground forces were subordinate to the field chief priest of the army, and in peacetime - to the bishop of the diocese, on whose territory the regiment was stationed.
By the end of the century, Catherine II, at the head of the military and naval clergy, placed a single chief priest of the army and navy. He was autonomous from the Synod, had the right to report directly to the Empress and the right to communicate directly with the diocesan hierarchs. For the military clergy established a regular salary. After twenty years of service, the priest was charged a pension.
The structure received a finished look and logical subordination in a military way, but was corrected for a whole century. So, in June 1890, the emperor Alexander III approved the Regulation on the management of churches and clergy of the military and maritime departments. He established the title of “protopresbyter of the military and maritime clergy.” All churches of regiments, fortresses, military hospitals and educational institutions (except for Siberia, in which the clergy of the military clergy were subordinate to the diocesan hierarchs) belonged to his jurisdiction.
The farm turned out solid. The Office of the Protopresbyter of the Military and Navy Clergy included 12 cathedrals, 3 house churches, 806 regimental, 12 serfs, 24 hospital, 10 prison, 6 port churches, 34 churches at different institutions (407 churches, NIX), NIX, NIXX, NIXX, 106 church, 337, 2 serfs protodeacon, 55 deacons, 68 psalm-readers (total - 569 clerics). The Office of Protopresbyter published its own journal, The Messenger of Military Clergy.
The Highest Regulations determined the service rights of the military clergy and the salaries of the content. The chief priest (protopresbyter) was equated to the lieutenant general, the chief priest of the General Staff, the guard or grenadier corps to the major general, the archpriest to the colonel, the head of a military cathedral or church, and the divisional dean to the colonel. The regimental priest (equal to the captain) received an almost complete captain's ration: his salary in the amount of 366 rubles per year, the same number of canteens, was provided for extra years, which reached (for 20 years of service) up to half of the established salary. Equal military salary was respected in all spiritual ranks.
Dry statistics gives only a general picture of the priesthood in the Russian army. Life brings its bright colors to this picture. Between the two Peresveta were war, heavy battle. There were their heroes. Here is the priest Vasily Vasilkovsky. His feat will be described in the order of the Russian army No. 53 of March 12 of 1813 of the year commander M.I. Kutuzov: “19 of the Egersky regiment, priest Vasilkovsky in the battle of Maly Yaroslavl, being ahead of the riflemen with the cross, with sensible instructions and personal bravely encouraged the lower ranks to fight without fear for Faith, the Tsar and the Fatherland, and he was severely wounded in the head with a bullet. In the battle of Vitebsk, he had the same courage, where he received a bullet wound in the leg. I gave the Emperor the Emperor the Emperor, and His Majesty gave the highest order to award him the Order of the Holy Great Martyr and Victorious 4-class Victor.
This was the first case in history of awarding a military priest with the Order of St. George. Father Vasily will be awarded the order on March 17 of the year 1813. In the autumn of the same year (November 24) he will die in a foreign campaign from his wounds. Vasily Vasilkovsky was only 35 years old.
Let's jump over a century into another great war - the First World War. This is what the famous Russian military leader, General A.A., wrote about that time. Brusilov: "In those terrible counterattacks among the soldier's tunic, black figures flashed - regimental priests, tucking their robes, in rough boots, went with the soldiers, encouraging the timid with simple gospel words and behavior ... They remained there forever, on the fields of Galicia, without separating from the flock."
For the heroism shown during the First World War, around 2500 military priests will be honored with state awards, will hand 227 gold pectoral crosses on the St. George ribbon. 11 people will be awarded the Order of St. George (four people - posthumously).
The Institute of Military and Maritime Clergy in the Russian army is liquidated by order of the People’s Commissariat for Military Affairs on January 16, 1918. 3700 priests will be fired from the army. Many are then repressed as class-alien elements ...
Crosses on buttonholes
The efforts of the Church yielded results by the end of the zero. Initiated by priests in 2008-2009, sociological surveys showed that the number of believers in the army comes to 70 percent of personnel. This was informed by the then Russian President Dmitry A. Medvedev. With his instructions to the military department, a new time of spiritual service in the Russian army begins. This instruction the president signed on July 21 of the year 2009. He ordered the defense minister to take the necessary decisions aimed at introducing the institute of military clergy in the Russian Armed Forces.
In carrying out the president’s instructions, the military would not copy the structures that existed in the tsarist army. They will begin by creating a department for working with religious servicemen in the Main Directorate of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation for work with personnel. 242 positions of assistant commanders (chiefs) for work with religious servicemen, replaced by clergymen of traditional religious associations of Russia, will be introduced into his staff. It will happen in January of 2010.
For five years, it was not possible to fill all the proposed vacancies. Religious organizations even in abundance presented their candidates to the Department of Defense. But the bar requirements of the military was high. For work in the army on a full-time basis, they have so far adopted only the 132 clergyman - 129 Orthodox, two Muslims and one Buddhist. (I note, by the way, in the army of the Russian Empire, too, they were attentive to believers of all denominations. Several hundred chaplains edged Catholic servicemen. In national-territorial formations, such as the Wild Division, the mullahs served. The Jews were allowed to visit territorial synagogues.)
High requirements for the priesthood probably matured from the best examples of spiritual shepherding in the Russian army. Maybe even from those that I remembered today. At least, priests are being prepared for serious trials. Their robes will no longer unmask the priests, as it happened in the battle formations of the unforgettable Brusilov breakthrough. The Ministry of Defense, in conjunction with the Synodal Department of the Moscow Patriarchate for interaction with the Armed Forces and law enforcement agencies, developed the “Rules for wearing uniforms by the military clergy”. They were approved by Patriarch Kirill.
According to the rules, military priests “when organizing work with religious servicemen in conditions of military operations, during a state of emergency, eliminating accidents, natural hazards, disasters, natural and other disasters, during exercises, exercises, combat duties (combat service)” To wear not a church vestment, but a field military uniform. In contrast to the uniform of military personnel, it does not provide for a shoulder strap, sleeve or lapel badges of the corresponding kind of troops. Only buttonholes will decorate orthodox crosses of dark color of the established sample. When performing worship in the field, the priest must wear a stole, guards and a priestly cross over the uniform.
The base of spiritual work in the troops and the navy is being seriously updated. Today, in the territories under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Defense alone, there are more than 160 Orthodox churches and chapels. Military churches are being built in Severomorsk and Gadzhievo (Northern Fleet), on aviation base in Kant (Kyrgyzstan), in other garrisons. The Church of the Holy Archangel Michael in Sevastopol, the building of which was previously used as a branch of the Museum of the Black Sea Fleet, again became a military. Defense Minister S.K.Shoygu decided to allocate rooms for prayer rooms in all formations and ships of the first rank.
... The military spiritual ministry is writing a new story. What will it be? Certainly decent! The traditions established over the centuries that have melted into a national character require this - heroism, resilience and courage of Russian soldiers, diligence, patience and selflessness of military priests. In the meantime, military churches have a great Easter holiday, and the collective communion of warriors - as a new step in the readiness to serve the Fatherland, Peace and God.
At the root of the tradition
The idea to revive the institute of military priests in the Russian army arose among the hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) in the mid-nineties. It did not receive much development, but the secular leaders as a whole positively assessed the initiative of the Russian Orthodox Church. The benevolent attitude of society towards church rites and the fact that, after the liquidation of the staff of political workers, the education of personnel lost a distinct ideological core, had an effect. The post-communist elite could not formulate a new bright national idea. Her search led many to a long-known religious perception of life.
The initiative of the ROC choked up mainly because there was not the main thing in this story - military priests themselves. The priest of the usual parish did not fit the role of, for example, the confessor of the desperate paratroopers. There must be a man of their environment, respected not only for the wisdom of the religious sacrament, but also military valor, including, at least, for the obvious readiness for feat of arms.
This was the military priest Ciprian Peresvet. He himself formulated his biography as follows: first he was a warrior, then a cripple, then he became a priest, then a military priest. However, Cyprian leads the count of his life only from 1991, when he took monastic vows in Suzdal. Three years later he was ordained a priest. The Siberian Cossacks, reviving the familiar Yenisei district, elected Cyprian as a military priest. The story of this devotee of God deserves a separate detailed story. He passed both Chechen wars, was captured by Khattab, stood at the firing line, survived after wounds. It was in Chechnya that soldiers of the Sofrinsky brigade for courage and military patience called Cyprian Peresvet. He also had his call sign “YAK-15”, so that the fighters knew: the priest next to them. Supports them with soul and prayer. Companions-Chechens called Ciprian Peresvet their brother, sofrintsy - Batey.
After the war, in June, 2005 in St. Petersburg, Cyprian will take the veil in the Great Sheema, becoming the elder, the schema heir to Isaac, but in the memory of Russian soldiers he will remain the first military priest of the new time.
And before him - a large and fertile history of the Russian military clergy. For me and, probably, for the Sofrintsy, it starts from 1380, when Reverend Sergius, abbot of the Russian land and the Wonderworker of Radonezh, blessed Prince Dmitry for the battle to liberate Russia from the Tatar yoke. He gave him to help their monks - Rodion Oslabyu and Alexander Peresvet. This Peresvet will be released later on the Kulikovo field to fight with the Tatar hero Chelubey. With their deadly fight, the battle will begin. Russian army will break the horde of Mamai. This victory people will associate with the blessing of St. Sergius. The monk Peresvet who has fallen in combat will be canonized. And we are the day of the Kulikovo battle - September 21 (September 8 on the Julian calendar) we call the Day of Military Glory of Russia.
Between two Peresveta six more centuries. Much of this time together - the arduous service to God and the Fatherland, pastoral feats, grand battles and great upheavals.
According to the military regulations
Like everything in the Russian army, military spiritual service first found its organizational structure in the Military Code of Peter I from 1716. The emperor reformer considered it necessary to have a priest in every regiment, on every ship. The clergy of the sea were predominantly hieromonk. At their head was placed ober-hieromonk fleet. The clergy of the ground forces were subordinate to the field chief priest of the army, and in peacetime - to the bishop of the diocese, on whose territory the regiment was stationed.
By the end of the century, Catherine II, at the head of the military and naval clergy, placed a single chief priest of the army and navy. He was autonomous from the Synod, had the right to report directly to the Empress and the right to communicate directly with the diocesan hierarchs. For the military clergy established a regular salary. After twenty years of service, the priest was charged a pension.
The structure received a finished look and logical subordination in a military way, but was corrected for a whole century. So, in June 1890, the emperor Alexander III approved the Regulation on the management of churches and clergy of the military and maritime departments. He established the title of “protopresbyter of the military and maritime clergy.” All churches of regiments, fortresses, military hospitals and educational institutions (except for Siberia, in which the clergy of the military clergy were subordinate to the diocesan hierarchs) belonged to his jurisdiction.
The farm turned out solid. The Office of the Protopresbyter of the Military and Navy Clergy included 12 cathedrals, 3 house churches, 806 regimental, 12 serfs, 24 hospital, 10 prison, 6 port churches, 34 churches at different institutions (407 churches, NIX), NIX, NIXX, NIXX, 106 church, 337, 2 serfs protodeacon, 55 deacons, 68 psalm-readers (total - 569 clerics). The Office of Protopresbyter published its own journal, The Messenger of Military Clergy.
The Highest Regulations determined the service rights of the military clergy and the salaries of the content. The chief priest (protopresbyter) was equated to the lieutenant general, the chief priest of the General Staff, the guard or grenadier corps to the major general, the archpriest to the colonel, the head of a military cathedral or church, and the divisional dean to the colonel. The regimental priest (equal to the captain) received an almost complete captain's ration: his salary in the amount of 366 rubles per year, the same number of canteens, was provided for extra years, which reached (for 20 years of service) up to half of the established salary. Equal military salary was respected in all spiritual ranks.
Dry statistics gives only a general picture of the priesthood in the Russian army. Life brings its bright colors to this picture. Between the two Peresveta were war, heavy battle. There were their heroes. Here is the priest Vasily Vasilkovsky. His feat will be described in the order of the Russian army No. 53 of March 12 of 1813 of the year commander M.I. Kutuzov: “19 of the Egersky regiment, priest Vasilkovsky in the battle of Maly Yaroslavl, being ahead of the riflemen with the cross, with sensible instructions and personal bravely encouraged the lower ranks to fight without fear for Faith, the Tsar and the Fatherland, and he was severely wounded in the head with a bullet. In the battle of Vitebsk, he had the same courage, where he received a bullet wound in the leg. I gave the Emperor the Emperor the Emperor, and His Majesty gave the highest order to award him the Order of the Holy Great Martyr and Victorious 4-class Victor.
This was the first case in history of awarding a military priest with the Order of St. George. Father Vasily will be awarded the order on March 17 of the year 1813. In the autumn of the same year (November 24) he will die in a foreign campaign from his wounds. Vasily Vasilkovsky was only 35 years old.
Let's jump over a century into another great war - the First World War. This is what the famous Russian military leader, General A.A., wrote about that time. Brusilov: "In those terrible counterattacks among the soldier's tunic, black figures flashed - regimental priests, tucking their robes, in rough boots, went with the soldiers, encouraging the timid with simple gospel words and behavior ... They remained there forever, on the fields of Galicia, without separating from the flock."
For the heroism shown during the First World War, around 2500 military priests will be honored with state awards, will hand 227 gold pectoral crosses on the St. George ribbon. 11 people will be awarded the Order of St. George (four people - posthumously).
The Institute of Military and Maritime Clergy in the Russian army is liquidated by order of the People’s Commissariat for Military Affairs on January 16, 1918. 3700 priests will be fired from the army. Many are then repressed as class-alien elements ...
Crosses on buttonholes
The efforts of the Church yielded results by the end of the zero. Initiated by priests in 2008-2009, sociological surveys showed that the number of believers in the army comes to 70 percent of personnel. This was informed by the then Russian President Dmitry A. Medvedev. With his instructions to the military department, a new time of spiritual service in the Russian army begins. This instruction the president signed on July 21 of the year 2009. He ordered the defense minister to take the necessary decisions aimed at introducing the institute of military clergy in the Russian Armed Forces.
In carrying out the president’s instructions, the military would not copy the structures that existed in the tsarist army. They will begin by creating a department for working with religious servicemen in the Main Directorate of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation for work with personnel. 242 positions of assistant commanders (chiefs) for work with religious servicemen, replaced by clergymen of traditional religious associations of Russia, will be introduced into his staff. It will happen in January of 2010.
For five years, it was not possible to fill all the proposed vacancies. Religious organizations even in abundance presented their candidates to the Department of Defense. But the bar requirements of the military was high. For work in the army on a full-time basis, they have so far adopted only the 132 clergyman - 129 Orthodox, two Muslims and one Buddhist. (I note, by the way, in the army of the Russian Empire, too, they were attentive to believers of all denominations. Several hundred chaplains edged Catholic servicemen. In national-territorial formations, such as the Wild Division, the mullahs served. The Jews were allowed to visit territorial synagogues.)
High requirements for the priesthood probably matured from the best examples of spiritual shepherding in the Russian army. Maybe even from those that I remembered today. At least, priests are being prepared for serious trials. Their robes will no longer unmask the priests, as it happened in the battle formations of the unforgettable Brusilov breakthrough. The Ministry of Defense, in conjunction with the Synodal Department of the Moscow Patriarchate for interaction with the Armed Forces and law enforcement agencies, developed the “Rules for wearing uniforms by the military clergy”. They were approved by Patriarch Kirill.
According to the rules, military priests “when organizing work with religious servicemen in conditions of military operations, during a state of emergency, eliminating accidents, natural hazards, disasters, natural and other disasters, during exercises, exercises, combat duties (combat service)” To wear not a church vestment, but a field military uniform. In contrast to the uniform of military personnel, it does not provide for a shoulder strap, sleeve or lapel badges of the corresponding kind of troops. Only buttonholes will decorate orthodox crosses of dark color of the established sample. When performing worship in the field, the priest must wear a stole, guards and a priestly cross over the uniform.
The base of spiritual work in the troops and the navy is being seriously updated. Today, in the territories under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Defense alone, there are more than 160 Orthodox churches and chapels. Military churches are being built in Severomorsk and Gadzhievo (Northern Fleet), on aviation base in Kant (Kyrgyzstan), in other garrisons. The Church of the Holy Archangel Michael in Sevastopol, the building of which was previously used as a branch of the Museum of the Black Sea Fleet, again became a military. Defense Minister S.K.Shoygu decided to allocate rooms for prayer rooms in all formations and ships of the first rank.
... The military spiritual ministry is writing a new story. What will it be? Certainly decent! The traditions established over the centuries that have melted into a national character require this - heroism, resilience and courage of Russian soldiers, diligence, patience and selflessness of military priests. In the meantime, military churches have a great Easter holiday, and the collective communion of warriors - as a new step in the readiness to serve the Fatherland, Peace and God.
Information