Slavenko Terzic: “There is no Europe without Russian civilization”
Relations between Russia and Serbia have a centuries-old history. Even in the time of Catherine II, many Serbs who lived in Austria on the border with Turkey, the territories, moved to Russia, founding New Serbia and Slavyanoserby. Russia has always supported the Christian peoples of the Balkan Peninsula in their liberation struggle against the Turkish yoke. Russian-Turkish wars of the XIX century led to the liberation of these peoples from the rule of Porta. And this is a great merit of Russia.The bloody twentieth century, which began in World War I, led both Russia and Serbia to its Golgotha. And just as Russia once stood up for Serbia in this war, Serbia after a few years accepted the Russians, who managed to escape from the revolution, and provided them with shelter. These were short years of respite, and then the Second World War began ...
Today, Serbia is a country that has not joined the Euro-sanctions against Russia, a country in which they know and love Russia. About the ways of development of the Slavic civilization, about what the history teaches us, about the revival of spiritual and cultural values, about age-old friendship and fraternal love between our peoples, we talk with a wonderful person - a scientist-historian, professor, full member of the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences - Serbian Ambassador to Russia Slavenko Terzic.
- Mr. Ambassador, you took office when Russia was at the top of its political glory. But it took only two years - and everything changed. Russia is experiencing tremendous, if not yet military, then moral, intellectual and spiritual pressure. How do you work on this post and how do you assess Russia today?
- First, I want to thank you for your kind words. It is a great honor for me to be the representative of my Serbia in this great Slavic Orthodox state - Russia. Indeed, two years have passed since I handed over my credentials to President Putin (it happened on January 24 2013). What can I say as a historian? It seems to me that the story began to move very quickly! Therefore, some changes or events, which, for example, in the XVII or XVIII century, had to wait fifty years, today, according to the sensations, last one or two months! This is a process of accelerating historical events! ..
Yes, it is true: during these two years that I am here in Moscow, a lot has changed in the world. But as for the Russian-Serbian relations themselves, nothing has changed in them. And thank God that this is so! This means that our relations are developing on deep and broad historical foundations, on the traditional friendship of our peoples, as was almost always the case (as we know from handwritten sources, from the end of the 12th or early 13th century). At that time, our famous saint Savva of Serbia met the monks of the Russian monastery on Mount Athos.
I can even say that in these two years, relations between Serbia and Russia have risen to a higher level: we had many meetings at the level of the presidents of our countries, prime ministers, ministers, not to mention lower officials.
16 of October last year, President Putin visited Serbia and, despite all the tremendous noise around this event, which rose in Europe, he was not only met at the highest level, but was fraternally received by the Serbian people - warmly, cordially, sincerely. You should have seen the faces of the people who met him! I myself was at the gallery, near which the parade of our armed forces was taking place: I saw flags and slogans, I heard what people were saying, I also paid attention to how many people were present: according to rough estimates, there were 100 – 150 thousand people, and maybe more. But besides this, I noticed that near the place where the parade took place, there were several tens of thousands of people on the walls of our Kalemegdan fortress who watched everything happening from afar.
So the meeting of the Serbs of President Vladimir Putin on October 16 is an illustration of the nature of our relations today.
A little later, on November 16, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia also paid an official visit to Serbia. Conversations were held between the Patriarchs, and then His Holiness, together with our President Nikolic and Patriarch Iriney, took part in the opening of the monument to Nicholas II in the old center of Belgrade.
As you know, Nicholas II for us, for the Serbian people in general, is a hero. He helped Serbia a lot not only at the beginning of the First World War, but also later, during the whole of this war. In Belgrade, there is a street named after Nikolai Romanov, before the cemetery was a monument to him. And now in the very center of Belgrade, opposite the Presidential Chamber, there is a new monument to Nicholas II. And this is also proof, not only of political and economic, but also of the deep spiritual closeness of our peoples.
As for Russia's position in the world and in Europe in general, for me, as a historian, there is nothing unexpected in what happened.
As you know, the beginning of the XIX century was marked by the aggression of Napoleon and most European countries against Russia, then there was the Nazi aggression 1941 of the year. And the stereotypes of Western society, based on incomprehensible Russophobia, unfortunately, continue to operate to this day.
They are based primarily on prejudice towards Russia as a great Slavic Orthodox country. But, it seems to me, their roots may lie even deeper: to the heritage of Byzantium, to the Orthodox civilization.
I want to give one example. In 1844, the famous poet Fedor Tyutchev (he was then ambassador to Bavaria, and Bavaria was an independent state) in Munich met and argued with the famous Bavarian historian Fallmerayer, who believed that the legacy of Byzantium was especially dangerous for all of Europe. And he even said (Tyutchev writes about this) that the legacy of Byzantium is still alive not only in Russia, in Moscow as in the Third Rome, but even under the roof of the Ottoman Empire, in Constantinople itself. And Fallmerayer adds that Europe must prepare for a "decisive battle with the heirs of Byzantium." And if Europe does not want, then the Germans must do it.
- But why? Why this "fear of Byzantium"? After all, we know the Christian traditions of "beautiful France", the "keeper of the Christian civilization" of Germany ...
“It seems to me that this began to happen after the so-called“ great schism ”, or the division of the single Church into Eastern and Western. Remember the famous Crusades to Constantinople, to Jerusalem: what terrible, monstrous plunders were going on there ... Beginning of the XIII century, 1204 year: Constantinople was completely plundered, the Byzantine sovereign fled to Nicea, the Patriarch also fled to Nicea.
Unfortunately, in the Western Christian world, besides, above all, intellectuals who work to build a positive, few people respect the heritage of Byzantium - the empire that for more than a millennium united huge parts of Europe and Asia and was the heir of a Christian, Greek civilization.
After all, only thanks to the intelligentsia, which after the fall of Constantinople emigrated to Italian cities, only the Renaissance humanism could have appeared. So, the humanism of the Renaissance has support in this old Byzantine-Greek civilization.
But despite all this, especially in the Balkans, we see an incomprehensible opposition to everything that happens in the Byzantine civilization, and, as it can be said today, in the Slavic-Orthodox civilization.
Therefore, I would say, the roots of this Russophobia are located very deeply, and we see today that almost every time it is repeated again: “Russia is the aggressor!”, “Russia threatens the whole of Europe!” This has happened many times in the 19th century.
I can also remind you of the first occupying Austro-Hungarian governor of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Benjamin von Kallai, who wrote his opening remarks and called it “Hungary on the border of East and West”. In it, he develops a thesis in the Eastern spirit, which is distinguished by a tendency both to despotism and to some other evils, and in the Western spirit, which has roots in Rome, which distinguishes the rule of law, the legal state, and so on.
I am truly sorry that these old stereotypes still operate in the modern world. And in this I see the root of modern Russophobia.
In addition, there are more similar facts testifying to the same: we know that for the last twenty or more years only one state has existed on the world scene. You know that Francis Fukuyama proclaimed "the end of world history." But history is constantly changing: there will always be a multipolar world, there will always be various centers of influence. And history itself has always moved by treaties or agreements between great states concluded on the foundations of international law and on the foundations of the world order.
And it seems to me that if we are thinking about our future today, we should also think about how, what way to reach (especially between large states) agreement of this type: on what basis will our world develop in general?
- The general foundations of the world order are a great idea, but, as one of the political scientists noted, it is different for everyone. For many of our readers, the unhealing wound is the events that Russia experienced with Serbia, which was bombarded in the center of Europe almost at the beginning of the “enlightened 21st century”. If today, as they say in the West, Russia is the “evil empire”, then in those years Serbia was called such.
I would like in our conversation to pay attention to the youth: young people usually do not remember the lessons of history very well, their youth is fixed on the future. But you can not build a present without the past. How do young people feel about their history in Serbia?
- Thank you for paying attention to the events in Serbia, especially in Old Serbia, the center of which is Kosovo and Metohija. It seems to me that, as in the rest of the world, young people in Serbia are confident that everything begins with its generation. But for a wise man it is obvious that heredity always exists: nothing and nothing begins “from us”. Without this heredity, there is no development, neither society, nor state, nor civilization. And the heritage of ancestors is the basis of our future. And without respect for our ancestors, we cannot expect that our heirs will respect us!
As for the events in the former Yugoslav expanse, I have been coming to Russia for 20 – 30 years already, and I remember that somehow in the 90-e years I spoke with one of my acquaintances. He argued that in some sense we are to blame for the fact that “we are not able to talk with Western partners,” and so on. And he said that Russia should not quarrel with Serbs for the sake of Serbs.
We didn’t even hope that she would quarrel, but then I said such a phrase (and not only did I think so then, but many others): “What is happening now is waiting for you: sooner or later, through ten or twenty years later ... "Because the main goal for them is, of course, Russia! I would call this threat a special front, from the Baltic to the Mediterranean, which moves from the East.
Unfortunately, many did not understand this then and did not realize it, but today, perhaps, much has become clear.
I remember, for example, a wonderful interview with the philosopher Zinoviev, or Solzhenitsyn’s speech, or the speech of my good friend Natalia Alekseevna Narochnitskaya and many other clever Russian people who talked about this and wrote about it. We have translated the book “Russia and Russians in World History” by Natalia Narochnitskaya in Serbia. She is there beautiful, clever, deeply explained everything.
So the young people in Serbia before the 1999 bombing of the year, I would say, had great illusions that Europe and the Western world are waiting for us to make us happy, rich, more beautiful. But after 1999 of the year, after this barbaric aggression of nineteen strong states against the then Yugoslavia (and, above all, against Serbia), it became clear to our young people that the issue turned out to be more complex and deeper.
Young people today are also feeling the consequences of this bombing: it is not only the destruction of buildings that can be built again. This is, above all, the destruction of our monuments, our most beautiful and oldest churches in Kosovo and Metohija.
And I would say that there is some kind of direct relationship between the fate of Russia and the fate of Kosovo and Metohija, the fate of Old Serbia.
By the way, at the end of the XIX century, almost the same thing was happening today. Within the borders of the Ottoman Empire, Albanians attacked our Serbian houses, churches, and monasteries, robbed and killed. The Russian Empire then had an embassy in Kosovska Mitrovica: the first Russian consul, Grigory Shcherbina, was killed in Prizren, the former capital.
There were many more Russian consuls, but I would like to highlight the name of Ivan Stepanovich Yastrebov, who wrote several excellent books, for example, “Old Serbia and Albania” (this book must be read!) Or “Customs and songs of Turkish Serbs”. In addition, he collected a lot of old handwritten documents and handed them over to the government of Serbia.
During these most difficult times of the end of the 19th century there was a danger that the High Decani monastery (which still exists) would become completely empty, and then Russian monks came here from Holy Mountain Athos. After a while, the monastery began to flourish. The Brotherhood of the Decany Monastery was formed there, a lot has been written about this: one of my colleagues, for example, wrote the book “The Decansky Question”.
Therefore, the essence of the whole question is broader - it is a question of the fate of Orthodoxy, the fate of the Orthodox population, the fate of the Slavic Orthodox population, and in the end it is a question of the fate of the Christian population and, if you like, the European Christian population, because I consider Russian civilization or Serbian civilization European civilization in the broad sense of the term.
For there is no Europe without Russian civilization. There is a western Christian part of Europe, there is an eastern Christian part of Europe. We are part of this Eastern Christian civilization, which also belongs to Europe. And I think that the authors who want to limit the western Christian part of Europe simply to use the term “Europe” make a big mistake. Europe is a broader concept, both philosophically, geographically and culturally.
- Today, Russia is experiencing its “Kosovo”, if you can say so, because our main shrines, the founders of Christian Orthodox shrines, are, first of all, Kiev and the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra. From there went all the Holy Russia, baptized by holy Prince Vladimir. And the anniversary year that we are celebrating today - the millennium of the death of the holy prince Equal to the Apostles - is essentially experienced by us as a tragic year. With bitterness and grief we observe what is happening today in Ukraine and, above all, what is happening with historical memory.
In your opinion, is it not time today to unite the Slavic forces in order to resist, above all, intellectual aggression - the one that lives in the minds?
- Yes, yes, this is a very important issue, and not only today. It has been very important for centuries. I want to emphasize once again our deep ties with the Russians: Pakhomiy Serb is one of the authors of the Life of St. Sergius of Radonezh. And not only Pakhomiy Serb, there are many others ...
But the idea of uniting the Slavic world is already quite old. It was especially relevant in the middle of the XIX century. I just want to remind you of the Kireevsky brothers, the Aksakovs brothers, Khomyakov, Maikov, Pogodin, Lamansky, Alexander Fedorovich Hilferding, who was the first Russian consul in Sarajevo. And in the end, Fyodor Dostoevsky also wrote about this. This idea - the unification of the Slavic world - is directly expressed at the first Slavic congress in Prague in 1848, and then, maybe, on a larger scale, it was voiced at the big Moscow and St. Petersburg congress of 1867, when the Manezh was organized a large exhibition in which every Slavic people presented their clothes, objects of their national life. And the biggest delegation there was a Serbian ...
In 1867, the Russian Tsar Alexander II received this Serbian delegation together with Gorchakov. Few people know that after the 1867 of the year, after meeting with the Serbian delegation, the famous Russian composer Rimsky-Korsakov wrote “Fantasy on Serbian themes”.
But the idea of Slavic unification has its ups and downs. For example, before the great Russian-Turkish war of 1877 – 1878, it was as if such a strong recovery: the Slavic committees were organized (first of all, the Moscow Slavic Committee, then the St. Petersburg), then their branches throughout Russia. There were deep connections with intellectuals in Vienna, Sarajevo, Belgrade ... In my opinion, 7 cities in the Balkans were involved in this. But after the “Eastern crisis”, after the Russian-Turkish war, after the liberation of Bulgaria, this idea somehow began to decline.
At the beginning of the 20th century, it appeared again: in the form of “non-Slavonicism”, in a completely different ideological notion. And during World War II, it was in 1945.
In 90, this idea was revived again, but for some reason between the Slavs (by the way, Pushkin wrote about it, and other authors) it is difficult to do! The idea of close relationships, which are based on cultural and spiritual affinity, somehow finds it difficult to find its way! It seems to me, using modern terminology, that the unification of the Slavs is a normal kind of integration of the Slavic peoples, which should not interfere with anyone. Therefore, the Slavs should not unite "against someone," but only in order to get to know each other more.
I know how well the Serbs are familiar with Russian culture, Russian art, Russian poetry. Even in elementary school, we knew some Russian poems by heart - we read both Yesenin and Pushkin ... All Russian literature, all the classics were translated into Serbian as early as the XIX century! But the Russian people know very little, for example, about the history of Serbia, about the history of our culture, civilization, our Church. Therefore, such Slavic exhibitions, mutual conferences, meetings, especially young people, are very necessary for us today, they can only play a positive role in uniting, above all, Slavic peoples, and then in the unification of the whole Christian world and, finally, the whole world.
- Many Russian people are familiar with the famous "Holy Savva idea." This idea permeates not only the entire Serbian, but in part even the Slavic epic. We in Russia also have something similar, therefore, when we speak about the unification of the Slavs, we mean first of all the unification in the spirit: for the sake of what are we united. And when we remember Kosovo, the Kosovo battle and Prince Lazarus, we mean the highest, spiritual values. Perhaps these values are incomprehensible to today's Europe, which basically builds its life on practical principles and forms a population of a certain (practical) type, certain bio-robots. How do you think we can stand against it today? In Russia today after the "Babylonian captivity" the Church is being reborn, but in Serbia, probably, there was no such long break in the church tradition?
- There was no such long! But I am very grateful to you for your interest in the topic of Kosovo and Metohija. I very much hope that you will continue to pay attention to the fate of the entire Slavic world in the Balkans, in the south-east of Europe.
You raised a very important, I would say, deeply philosophical, even spiritual theme. This is an old question of the relationship between matter and spirit. Already classical German philosophy - Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel (especially Hegel, who was very popular among philosophers in nineteenth-century Russia) - always believed (as, incidentally, Russian philosophical thought), that spirit is the essence of history, the essence of civilization. And the history of the spiritual life is the history of the civilization of one people.
I often meet with His Holiness Patriarch Kirill in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and read his books (now, for example, I am reading his book devoted to thinking about freedom). This is a very intelligent, very educated person. And he always reminds us of the importance of moral and spiritual values to us today.
About twenty years ago a scientific meeting of Serbian, Croatian and German historians took place. As part of it, we met with one German bishop, Homeyer (he had already passed away). And then he noted one thing that I still like: in the anthropological, moral resources of Eastern Christianity, there are foundations of moral regeneration for the whole of Europe. I really liked this idea.
Therefore, today, for every person who is familiar with the history of civilizations, it is important to remember that the spiritual life is both the essence of history and the essence of human life. Unfortunately, along with this philosophical historical concept, we have a vulgar materialistic concept: that only material values, money, property are important. I do not want to say that all these are not important things, but I emphasize: the history of mankind shows that only spiritual forces are the driving forces of history.
And at the moment we see the crisis of that civilization, which is based on vulgar materialistic values. Conversely, the rise of those civilizations that believe that spiritual values are very important. This, for example, is not only Eastern civilizations, but even the Muslim world. Although I deeply disagree with radical Islam, which distorts everything that is the essence of Islamic civilization, one cannot deny the values and achievements of this civilization, especially Arabic Islam: its influence on arithmetic, geography, and many other achievements. But it is obvious that only spiritual goals can be the motive for change and advancement. And even the Western authors themselves testify to this. For example, Huntington, in his book “The Clash of Civilizations,” asserts what is visible in all respects: the Western Christian world, as it were, follows the path of gradual withdrawal from the world scene. Of course, this is not a question of a year or two, but on a historical scale this will occur.
If we consider the famous philosophy of history, for example, Nikolai Danilevsky or, for example, Oswald Spengler, or the famous British historian Arnold Toynbee, then every civilization is born, rises, has its “top” and gradually leaves the stage of history. It does not leave at all, but some of its parts become fragments of some other civilizations. Therefore, the spiritual world is very important today. And when I recall the phrase of Dostoevsky that “beauty will save the world”, now it can be rephrased like this: “culture and spirit today can save the world”.
- You remembered Dostoevsky, but I immediately came to mind his "Demons". Dostoevsky was in many ways a prophet: he predicted to Russia those "demons" who came and staged here what happened in the seventeenth year. Only recently we celebrated the centenary since the beginning of the First World War, and we will soon celebrate the centenary of the Russian revolution, this tragic page, probably, not only in the history of Russia, but also of all human civilization.
And I remembered Vladyka Nikolai (Velemirovich), whom we Russians deeply honor. Vladyka Nicholas addresses with pain from emigration, including to young people: have we preserved this heritage that we were called upon to preserve, in spite of these "demons"? But they again appear "on the surface"!
You just said that civilizations are leaving, but it seems to me that modern “civilization” will try to take as many corpses as possible with it. What is worth, for example, America, which, as many say today, is agonizing, but it can still cause a lot of trouble ... How do you think, as the Serbian ambassador to Russia, to rally and rethink our own history?
- Thank you for remembering Nikolai (Velemirovich) or, as we call him, Nikolai Ziczky. The fact is that at one time he lived in the Zica monastery, which is the first capital of our autocephalous archdiocese.
By the way, I want to inform you that this May 28 will be the presentation of the Monastery Ziczha here, in Moscow, in the House of Gogol. And there will be an exhibition of icons of this school of icon painting.
I am a foreigner, but I feel at home here, just like in Belgrade. And I see this sincere deep revival of Russia: the moral revival, and Russian culture, and Russian civilization.
During the first week of Great Lent on Sunday, a large Liturgy was held in honor of the Triumph of Orthodoxy in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, which was attended by the ambassadors of Greece, Bulgaria, Montenegro, Belarus, Cyprus, Armenia, and I, as the ambassador of Serbia, I think the ambassador of Lithuania. I am standing in this huge beautiful temple and I think: “What a miracle! How Russia was revived again! ”And indeed, there was once a temple built in honor of the victory over Napoleon, then people came who destroyed it completely, and, behold, this temple was revived again in all its monumentality and beauty! Just standing, looking and thinking: what miracles are happening in Russia! I am very happy about this ...
I often watch the “Spas” TV channel, there are a lot of good programs about the role of the Russian Orthodox Church today, its social service, its role in educating young people, and so on.
You hear, of course, the frequent speeches of President Vladimir Putin, who insists on historical self-awareness, on tradition, on the moral values of the past, on a single history textbook, on an objective interpretation of national history. I think all this is very important.
Last year you had a year of culture, this year is a year of literature: this is also very important, especially in the light of the “material world” that we just talked about.
Literature, culture - all this can be a way out of the crisis, because the crisis is, first of all, spiritual, it has deep spiritual roots. This is a crisis of spirit, spiritual and moral values.
Therefore, I want to hope that this whole struggle that is taking place before our eyes is only a stage on the path of a true deep revival of the power of Orthodox Russia. And if Russia itself is a strong, powerful, deep Orthodox state, then other Slavs, especially Orthodox Slavs, will be easier.
- You said that the Pan-Slavic (Pan-Slavic) idea experienced its ups and downs, that its peak fell on the Russian-Turkish 1877 – 1878 war. Do not you think that the failure of Russian diplomacy at the Berlin Congress, unfortunately, just served the fact that this idea began to decline, which as a result led to the First World War? Let us recall, for example, the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina ... Nevertheless, now European countries are trying to impose responsibility for the First World War on Serbia and Russia, although Serbia has just suffered greatly in this war.
In this regard, the question of assessing the current situation. We see that even now this idea is not the leading one; moreover, some eastern states (even fraternal Montenegro once were to us), unfortunately, have joined the sanctions against Russia. And only Serbia, despite the enormous pressure exerted by both America and the European Union, is still worth it (and we hope it will survive) and represents an outpost of friendship and fraternal relations with Russia.
- Yes, it is true: Serbia has not joined and will not join the sanctions against Russia. As for Russian diplomacy and the “Eastern crisis”, I want to stand up a little to protect Russian diplomats, especially Gorchakov.
I myself have studied this historical period, and all this is very close to me.
Gorchakov was a brilliant diplomat, but he himself believed that the uprising in Bosnia and Herzegovina was not ripe. As for the Serbian-Turkish war and the Russian-Turkish war, both Russia and the Slavic world are not yet ready. I read and researched both your and our archives. I watched the documents for 4 – 5 years before the “Eastern crisis”. He is very wise, brotherly advises the Serbs: "you are not yet ready for war."
And, indeed, we received a terrible defeat, and only Russia saved us, and without this, perhaps the Turks would have entered Belgrade. “You are not ready for war, we know the condition of your army, let your brothers in the Ottoman Empire wait a bit: the time will come for the war!”
It was a very wise policy, but, unfortunately, Gorchakov was already in years ... There, too, there was an internal struggle: in the political circles of Russia, there was often an internal struggle, which was most clearly manifested in the 19th century. There the German clan, the French, the British, and so on fought. And supporters of a radical solution to the crisis in the Balkans then won. And Gorchakov, it seems to me, later joined them.
But here is the point: then an agreement was signed between Russia and Austria-Hungary, Russia agreed to the occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. And it was a mistake! But Gorchakov unwittingly went for it - this is clear, this is obvious. And when this war began, despite the fact that it certainly had great goals, supporters of a radical solution to the "Eastern crisis" did not take into account (as Gorchakov himself) sufficiently the resistance of the western side. Gorchakov was very afraid of the resistance of this general coalition against Russia, as it was in the Crimean War. He wanted to avoid it.
And then, Russia suffered huge losses in this war: more than 300 thousand people died for the liberation of Bulgaria. 3 March 1878 was signed in San Stefano (a small town near Constantinople), but, despite the huge sacrifices, Great Britain and Austria-Hungary, with the support of Germany, immediately raised the issue of revising this agreement and all the results of the Russian-Turkish war.
Therefore, I would not blame, perhaps, only Russian diplomacy. Tsarist diplomacy in Russia was very professional, very high quality. Russia had very educated diplomats. For example, the Hawks, who was a consul in Prizren: he knew all European languages very well and mastered Persian, Ottoman-Turkish, Arabic, and then studied Albanian and Serbian. Maybe not all were just such, but still very educated people.
Maybe this group, which defeated Gorchakov then, finally realized that Gorchakov was right.
Now - as for Montenegro. This is another question, a very sad question for the entire Serbian people and for the Slavic Orthodox people in general.
The fact is that the same process that is now underway in Montenegro, is happening in Ukraine. It is a process of moving away from your traditional historical identity, from what you have been for centuries, the process of imposing some kind of new identity.
- But this is not the whole nation?
- Of course, I'm talking about the regime, about power. But we know that in Montenegro for about ten years there is a project that is called (as I read at some American agency) the “new identity of Montenegro”. This is a very dangerous process that causes clashes, division between one people. It is like a new interpretation of history, a departure from the traditional scientific interpretation of history and the invention of a new history. Say, Montenegrins are not Serbs, and not Slavs, but, maybe, people of some old-Balkan origin. But this now has no objective scientific historical base.
I often watch on TV news about the situation in Ukraine and, frankly, there are many similarities here: this is the preparation of the same process as in today's Montenegro. But I hope sincerely that this is a passing moment in the history of our peoples, and I hope that we will again return to our true roots — spiritual, historical, and our cooperation.
We have the following proverb in Serbian: “Whoever does not want a brother to have a brother, a foreigner will be master”. This is a very wise proverb of the people, and we must learn from the experience of our ancestors. Therefore, we need to know our history.
There is almost nothing new in what is happening today! To the one who knows the story, this is completely understandable: all this has already happened ...
For example, I remember a historical map that was published in Vienna sometime after the annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, if I'm not mistaken, in 1909 in the magazine Ukrainishe Rundschau: a large map of the so-called “Great Ukraine”. On it, Ukraine stretches right up to Astrakhan ... And yesterday I heard that some kind of agency was created to “modernize Ukraine”, that the former vice-chancellor of Austria is the director of this agency. And besides him, there are also such serphobes as, for example, Andre Levy (supposedly a French philosopher), Bernard Kouchner, who, as you know, led the operations in Kosovo and Metohija, which did everything against the Serbs, almost annihilated before his eyes the entire cultural heritage of the Serbian people in Kosovo and Metohija, as well as the deportation of almost 300 thousands of Serbs from Kosovo and Metohija. But now they want to "modernize" another state.
“I would cite the recent words of our president here:“ These are all some revanchist things that do not pass and will not pass! ”So said Vladimir Putin in an interview about the“ return of the Crimea ”.
Of course, maybe we still do not see real revanchism, but still the time to “collect stones” is coming.
- Yes, the fact that the spirit of revanchism and revisionism is present on the scene of Europe is true.
- You are right, history repeats itself. And for them too. But they, unfortunately, do not draw conclusions. What is the recent anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz? It turns out that the Russians did not even take part in it!
Mr. Ambassador, let me ask you some personal questions. You are engaged in history, and literature, and, probably, write a lot. We are interested to know what you are working on right now.
- Yes of course. You know that I am a historian, a scientist, I have worked all my life in the Serbian Academy of Sciences, for more than a few years I headed the Institute of History of the Serbian Academy of Sciences. In 15, the book “Russia and the Serbian Question at the Beginning of the XIX Century” was published, then a large book was published, which is now being translated into Russian, “Old Serbia: a drama of one civilization”. Now I am writing a book on a topic about which we have already said: “Russian Slavophiles and Serbs in the 19th century”.
I consider Slavophilism and Pan-Slavism as a cultural-philosophical system in Russian social thought. First of all, Slavophilism as an instrument of foreign policy of the Russian Empire of the second half of the XIX century.
Although I have already collected a lot of material, to be honest, there is almost no time to write. I collect books here: I already have almost 400 books in Russian, and in Belgrade, in my library, maybe thousands. I collect books and work a little in the archives.
The role of the Serbian ambassador (and the ambassador in general) in such a world capital as Moscow is very responsible, it takes a lot of time and there is almost no opportunity to pursue serious science. How can I read books. Recently I read a very good biography of Konstantin Leontyev, and before that I had read almost all of his writings: “Byzantinism and Slavism”, “The Recluse's Notes” and so on. It seems that he was buried in Sergiev Posad, but he read somewhere that his grave was destroyed after the revolution, and now it seems to have been restored.
- The Orthodox Society "Radonezh" had the honor to recreate this grave in the Chernigov monastery at the Trinity-Sergius Lavra.
- It was a great man! Now I read the memoirs of Tyutchev's daughter, who was the Queen's maid of honor. A few years ago I read a book of Tyutchev's Biography of Vadim Kozhinov that I liked very much. It was very seriously written.
The Institute of Russian Civilization and its head, Oleg Platonov, presented me with almost 30 books from the publication of this Institute - these are excellent books of Russian cultural heritage, Russian philosophers and writers. Actually, I was surprised when I learned how many good books Oleg Platonov managed to publish in such a short time!
I continue to do science, but in these two years I am not as serious and not as deep as I did before coming here.
In any case, living in Moscow, a person can not deal with. Here you can feel great spiritual energy: I visit your museums, galleries, concert halls, palaces. Of course, it is impossible not to think about the meaning of history. Therefore, the very fact that I am here causes me to think broadly about the meaning of history, about Russian-Serbian relations. As a simple person, I simply believe in the future of relations between the Russian and Serbian peoples!
“Thank you, Mr. Terzic, for taking the time to do such an extensive interview.” I hope that our great spiritual patrons, on both sides, pray for us in Eternal Heavenly Serbia and in Heavenly Russia. That, as they are there together, so here both our countries and our peoples will be together. Fraternal Serbia has never forgotten Russia, and I think that if Russia once (and in some part) forgot Serbia, then it paid for it at a high price, as we see it today.
As for us, Orthodox journalists, we are trying every day to inculcate this love, this feeling of closeness, unity of our peoples in the main thing that we have, what unites us - in Orthodoxy. And we hope that the Lord will bless both our peoples, and our countries, and our sincere undertakings.
- God forbid! It was a great pleasure for me to talk to you. I hope that you will continue to turn your attention to Serbia, the Balkans, the Slavic Orthodox people in the Balkans.
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