ON AFANASY KHOLMOGORSKY’S PARTICIPATION IN CASES OF PETER ARTEMYEV AND GRIGORY SKIBINSKY
T.V. Panich
Institute of History SB RAS, Novosibirsk, Russian Federation
Keywords: XVII century, Archbishop Afanasy Kholmogorsky, Peter Artemyev, Grigory Skibinsky, church court
Abstract
The article discusses the participation and role of Archbishop Afanasy, a prominent hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, in the cases of two representatives of Russian culture of the second half of the XVII century - Peter Artemyev and Grigory Alekseevich Skibinsky. Both converted to the Catholic faith for the opportunity to study at universities in Europe, and after returning to Moscow faced persecution by the church authorities. The research material is a set of documentary and literary-journalistic texts representing a dossier on both church apostates (manuscripts of the late XVII - early XVIII centuries). The study concludes that Afanasy Kholmogorsky, despite his great distance from Moscow events, showed great interest in them and played a role in the affairs of both “apostates from piety”. Although the degree of his involvement was different in each cases. He carried out the supervisory and educational functions assigned to him by the church court in the case of Artemyev, who was exiled to Kholmogory. According to the archbishop’s replies included in the dossier, he regularly informed Patriarch Adrian about his conversations with Artemyev, a prisoner in Kholmogorsky prison, and expressed his negative opinion about the freethinker. Afanasy Kholmogorsky’s interest in the documents on the case of Grigory Skibinsky is evidenced by a note in the posthumous inventory of his library indicating that it contained some materials related to Skibinsky (at least there was his «penitential petition» addressed to Patriarch Adrian about the possibility of returning to the Orthodox Church). The author suggests that Afanasy Kholmogorsky could have become acquainted with Skibinsky case while being in Moscow for church business in 1697-1698. The archbishop’s interest in these materials may be related to the preparation of an extended edition of the book «The shield of faith» by Euphemy Chudovsky, as its curator and editor of the main text was Afanasy Kholmogorsky. Some materials related to cases of Peter Artemyev and Grigory Skibinsky were included in the additions to «The shield of faith».
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