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Russian Old Believers in Twentieth Century Riga
Adaptation, Preservation, and Relations with the State
.
Roy Robson
Associate Professor
University of the Sciences in Philadelphia
STG 2004-2005
Latvia
.
Topic of Research and Countries Visited
My work in Riga was part of a project studying Russian Old Believers in Latvia and their relationship with the state during the twentieth century. Having done research at both the Old Believer community and the Soviet-period archives during a previous trip, my goal was to gather archival information regarding the Riga Old Believer community’s interaction with political authorities in the period 1900-44.
.
Relevance and Contribution to the Field
This project analyzes both the internal development of Russian Old Believers in Riga and their relationship to the state in the twentieth century. Old Believers are the most established group of Russians in Latvia, with their center at the Riga Grebenshchikovskaia Old Believer Community (RGSO). For this reason, studying how Old Believers have interacted with diverse governments (Russian, Latvian, German, and Soviet) can help scholars to understand how minority groups have developed strategies for self-preservation and adaptation in Eastern Europe. Likewise, the analysis will provide historical perspective for policy debates on minority relations in Eastern Europe.
.
Investigating the Old Believers of Riga has a number of benefits for both the study of religion and the analysis of ethnic minority life in Latvia. Persecuted for most of their history, Old Believers have rarely kept records of their community history. In Riga, however, the Old Believer community has been able to maintain detailed documentation for much of its existence. I am reconstructing its history using primary documents—a task almost impossible for any other Old Believer community in Europe. (The Russian State Library, for example, has the records of Moscow’s Rogozhskoe community, but its internal documents for the post-1917 era are woefully incomplete.) This project, therefore, offers a longitudinal study of one minority group in depth. It will be the most substantial western-language scholarly study of the Old Believers in Latvia.1
.
Summary of Approach and Methodology
As a scholar of the Old Belief, I have been keen to analyze how its internal patterns of belief and practice (including religious rituals) have been connected to external relations with the state and society. To that end, I have looked for ways in which the Old Believer experience as a religious community had an impact on the way the faithful interacted with the outside world. In other words, have Old Believers use the language of ritual and belief when adapting to or eschewing modern life? Have they understood state and society through the lens of Old Believer rituals, theology, and manner of living?
.
I have worked previously at the Latvian State Archive (Latvijas Valsts arhīvs or LVA), which holds material on the Soviet period. For this trip, then, I have concentrated on files available at the Latvian State Historial Archives (Latvijas Valsts vēstures arhīvs, or LVVA). Though right next door to each other in central Riga, each archive has a separate organization, reading room, and system of finding aids.
.
Research Findings and Preliminary Conclusions
The LVVA’s holdings related to twentieth-century Old Belief fall into two groups—official records (especially secret police files) from 1900-17 and material on both internal and external activities of Old Believer communities during the national period (1917-1941). Unfortunately, the LVVA’s holdings for the Nazi period are quite thin, precipitating a trip to the Bundesarchiv in Berlin for more information on the years 1941-44. For the national period, the 1920s, the LVVA’s collections are remarkably strong. The all-Latvian organization of Old Believers had met regularly in the national period and its minutes (both published and manuscript) can help us to understand how a previously persecuted group sought to create an identity in the new republic, take advantage of economic and social aid provided by the state, yet still retain a distinctive (and rather detached) identity as Old Believers.2 Likewise, files related to the education of Old Believers help to illustrate how Old Believers sought to develop their own schools (with Russian as the primary language and Old Believer catechistic training) while receiving state sponsorship and funding.
.
This pattern—trying to retain communal control over relevant issues while still garnering state support—seems to have been the modus operandi for Riga’s Old Believers from the imperial through the Soviet periods. Astonishingly, the Old Believers in Riga were able to maintain a working church, support a poorhouse, and sustain Old Believer schooling from 1866 to 1944. Even during the Nazi and Soviet periods, Old Believers were able to adapt to changing political environments while simultaneously retaining a reputation as traditionalist Orthodox who shunned change at any level.
.
By analyzing the forms of self-preservation used by the Old Believers, we can begin to understand the historical processes at work in minority communities throughout the Baltic States. The Riga Old Believer community has been particularly adept in its adaptation to change. For example, while the communists regularly shuttered churches, the RGSO never had to close. Why? Apparently, the Old Believers in Riga took a conciliatory stance after the Soviet takeover of Latvia. On 5 May 1948, the Council of Old Believers in Riga offered a proclamation “on the recognition of Soviet power as divinely-established and on the fulfillment of prayers in the temples for Soviet power on state holidays.”3 This statement echoed the Russian Orthodox Patriarch Sergei’s well-known1927 proclamation accepting Soviet power. Yet, given the Riga Old Believers’ millenarian ideology (holding that the Antichrist ruled all secular life) the statement may also be interpreted as a sly maneuver—a lie—by the Old Believers rather than the recognition of communist rule.
.
Suggestions for Future Research
My work on the Old Belief brings up questions about the role of the state in traditional communities. I hope that new research will take on these questions in other times and places. Did Old Believers self-consciously adapt to rapid changes in political environment? Did they use their religious views as lenses for understanding outside forces? If so, how?
.
Recommendations for the US Policy Community
In addition to its place in the study of Old Believers, I hope my findings will have an impact on the study of Russian minorities in the Baltic States. On the one hand, Baltic governments want to promote their own ethnic heritage and downplay Russian influences, which are seen as remnants of Soviet rule. On the other hand, ethnic Russians believe that they do not receive equal political or social rights, simply because of their heritage.4 This issue has spread from internal politics into international affairs, especially as Russia sees itself as a champion of ethnic Russian minorities in its “near abroad.” For example, recent developments in Latvian education reform, language policy, and its inclusion into the European Union (as of 2004) have all touched on Russian minority issues. The United Nations weighed in on the subject in December 2003, criticizing Latvia for its handling of Russian minority education, noting that Latvia needed to maintain “a close dialogue with... schools and local communities” in order to create a unified citizenry and to insure the rights of minority Russians.5 .
My project investigates, from a grassroots level, the history of one such Russian community. The final product will illustrate how an ethnic group survived inside a largely foreign culture (whether that be Latvian, Nazi, or Soviet). This will, I believe, provide scholars, government officials, and non-governmental organizations a basis for the creation of a historically appropriate response to the minority problem in Latvia, one which threatens the stability and security of that strategic region. .
1 During the Soviet period, scholars did publish research regarding the Riga Old Believer books and folklore. They did not, however, study the political and social aspects of the Riga community. See, for example, G.B. Markelov, “Poezdka za rukopisiami v Latviiu,” Trudy otdela drevnerusskoi literatury 31 (1973): 371-372 and G.B. Markelov, “Staroobriadtsy v Latgalii—tri portreta” in N. N. Pokrovskii and R. Morris, eds. Traditsionnaia dukhovnaia i material’naia kultura russkikh staroobriadcheskikh poselenii v stranakh Evropy, Azii, i Amerikii (Novosibirsk: Nauka, 1992), 145-150. See also V. V. Preobrazhenskii, Russkie v Latvii (Riga: Izd. Kom. po ustroistvu “D.R.K.,” 1933); and T. Feigman, Russkie obshchestva v Latvii, 1920-1940 gg., (Riga: Latviiskii universitet, 1992). Russkie v Latvii: istoriia i sovremennost’ (Riga: “Lad,” 1992) has a rather complete bibliography. Only one article has been recently published on this subject but it uses little primary-source material: Aleksij Zhilko and Èduard Mekšs, “Staroobriadchestvo v Latvii: vchera i segonia” Revue des études slaves, LXIX (1-2) 1997: 73-88.
2 See, for example, LVVA fond 1370.
3 LVA, fond 1448, opis’ 1, delo 46, list 51.
4 A recent analysis is Pål Kolstø, et al., Nation Building and Ethnic Integration in Post-Soviet Societies (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2000), which I reviewed in Canadian Slavonic Papers 44, no. 3/4 (Sep-Dec 2002): p. 303-304. Kolstø’s work emphasizes a political-science approach.
5 United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, Sixty-third Session, 4-22 August 2003, “Concluding observations of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination: Latvia. 10/12/2003. CERD/C/63/CO/7,” 4. A recent article in a Russianlanguage newspaper published in Riga adds its opinion, claiming that Russian Latvians are “Russians, not Russian Speakers!” Russkoe slovo 115: February 2005, 3.
.
Roy Robson
Associate Professor
University of the Sciences in Philadelphia
STG 2004-2005
Latvia
.
Topic of Research and Countries Visited
My work in Riga was part of a project studying Russian Old Believers in Latvia and their relationship with the state during the twentieth century. Having done research at both the Old Believer community and the Soviet-period archives during a previous trip, my goal was to gather archival information regarding the Riga Old Believer community’s interaction with political authorities in the period 1900-44.
.
Relevance and Contribution to the Field
This project analyzes both the internal development of Russian Old Believers in Riga and their relationship to the state in the twentieth century. Old Believers are the most established group of Russians in Latvia, with their center at the Riga Grebenshchikovskaia Old Believer Community (RGSO). For this reason, studying how Old Believers have interacted with diverse governments (Russian, Latvian, German, and Soviet) can help scholars to understand how minority groups have developed strategies for self-preservation and adaptation in Eastern Europe. Likewise, the analysis will provide historical perspective for policy debates on minority relations in Eastern Europe.
.
Investigating the Old Believers of Riga has a number of benefits for both the study of religion and the analysis of ethnic minority life in Latvia. Persecuted for most of their history, Old Believers have rarely kept records of their community history. In Riga, however, the Old Believer community has been able to maintain detailed documentation for much of its existence. I am reconstructing its history using primary documents—a task almost impossible for any other Old Believer community in Europe. (The Russian State Library, for example, has the records of Moscow’s Rogozhskoe community, but its internal documents for the post-1917 era are woefully incomplete.) This project, therefore, offers a longitudinal study of one minority group in depth. It will be the most substantial western-language scholarly study of the Old Believers in Latvia.1
.
Summary of Approach and Methodology
As a scholar of the Old Belief, I have been keen to analyze how its internal patterns of belief and practice (including religious rituals) have been connected to external relations with the state and society. To that end, I have looked for ways in which the Old Believer experience as a religious community had an impact on the way the faithful interacted with the outside world. In other words, have Old Believers use the language of ritual and belief when adapting to or eschewing modern life? Have they understood state and society through the lens of Old Believer rituals, theology, and manner of living?
.
I have worked previously at the Latvian State Archive (Latvijas Valsts arhīvs or LVA), which holds material on the Soviet period. For this trip, then, I have concentrated on files available at the Latvian State Historial Archives (Latvijas Valsts vēstures arhīvs, or LVVA). Though right next door to each other in central Riga, each archive has a separate organization, reading room, and system of finding aids.
.
Research Findings and Preliminary Conclusions
The LVVA’s holdings related to twentieth-century Old Belief fall into two groups—official records (especially secret police files) from 1900-17 and material on both internal and external activities of Old Believer communities during the national period (1917-1941). Unfortunately, the LVVA’s holdings for the Nazi period are quite thin, precipitating a trip to the Bundesarchiv in Berlin for more information on the years 1941-44. For the national period, the 1920s, the LVVA’s collections are remarkably strong. The all-Latvian organization of Old Believers had met regularly in the national period and its minutes (both published and manuscript) can help us to understand how a previously persecuted group sought to create an identity in the new republic, take advantage of economic and social aid provided by the state, yet still retain a distinctive (and rather detached) identity as Old Believers.2 Likewise, files related to the education of Old Believers help to illustrate how Old Believers sought to develop their own schools (with Russian as the primary language and Old Believer catechistic training) while receiving state sponsorship and funding.
.
This pattern—trying to retain communal control over relevant issues while still garnering state support—seems to have been the modus operandi for Riga’s Old Believers from the imperial through the Soviet periods. Astonishingly, the Old Believers in Riga were able to maintain a working church, support a poorhouse, and sustain Old Believer schooling from 1866 to 1944. Even during the Nazi and Soviet periods, Old Believers were able to adapt to changing political environments while simultaneously retaining a reputation as traditionalist Orthodox who shunned change at any level.
.
By analyzing the forms of self-preservation used by the Old Believers, we can begin to understand the historical processes at work in minority communities throughout the Baltic States. The Riga Old Believer community has been particularly adept in its adaptation to change. For example, while the communists regularly shuttered churches, the RGSO never had to close. Why? Apparently, the Old Believers in Riga took a conciliatory stance after the Soviet takeover of Latvia. On 5 May 1948, the Council of Old Believers in Riga offered a proclamation “on the recognition of Soviet power as divinely-established and on the fulfillment of prayers in the temples for Soviet power on state holidays.”3 This statement echoed the Russian Orthodox Patriarch Sergei’s well-known1927 proclamation accepting Soviet power. Yet, given the Riga Old Believers’ millenarian ideology (holding that the Antichrist ruled all secular life) the statement may also be interpreted as a sly maneuver—a lie—by the Old Believers rather than the recognition of communist rule.
.
Suggestions for Future Research
My work on the Old Belief brings up questions about the role of the state in traditional communities. I hope that new research will take on these questions in other times and places. Did Old Believers self-consciously adapt to rapid changes in political environment? Did they use their religious views as lenses for understanding outside forces? If so, how?
.
Recommendations for the US Policy Community
In addition to its place in the study of Old Believers, I hope my findings will have an impact on the study of Russian minorities in the Baltic States. On the one hand, Baltic governments want to promote their own ethnic heritage and downplay Russian influences, which are seen as remnants of Soviet rule. On the other hand, ethnic Russians believe that they do not receive equal political or social rights, simply because of their heritage.4 This issue has spread from internal politics into international affairs, especially as Russia sees itself as a champion of ethnic Russian minorities in its “near abroad.” For example, recent developments in Latvian education reform, language policy, and its inclusion into the European Union (as of 2004) have all touched on Russian minority issues. The United Nations weighed in on the subject in December 2003, criticizing Latvia for its handling of Russian minority education, noting that Latvia needed to maintain “a close dialogue with... schools and local communities” in order to create a unified citizenry and to insure the rights of minority Russians.5 .
My project investigates, from a grassroots level, the history of one such Russian community. The final product will illustrate how an ethnic group survived inside a largely foreign culture (whether that be Latvian, Nazi, or Soviet). This will, I believe, provide scholars, government officials, and non-governmental organizations a basis for the creation of a historically appropriate response to the minority problem in Latvia, one which threatens the stability and security of that strategic region. .
1 During the Soviet period, scholars did publish research regarding the Riga Old Believer books and folklore. They did not, however, study the political and social aspects of the Riga community. See, for example, G.B. Markelov, “Poezdka za rukopisiami v Latviiu,” Trudy otdela drevnerusskoi literatury 31 (1973): 371-372 and G.B. Markelov, “Staroobriadtsy v Latgalii—tri portreta” in N. N. Pokrovskii and R. Morris, eds. Traditsionnaia dukhovnaia i material’naia kultura russkikh staroobriadcheskikh poselenii v stranakh Evropy, Azii, i Amerikii (Novosibirsk: Nauka, 1992), 145-150. See also V. V. Preobrazhenskii, Russkie v Latvii (Riga: Izd. Kom. po ustroistvu “D.R.K.,” 1933); and T. Feigman, Russkie obshchestva v Latvii, 1920-1940 gg., (Riga: Latviiskii universitet, 1992). Russkie v Latvii: istoriia i sovremennost’ (Riga: “Lad,” 1992) has a rather complete bibliography. Only one article has been recently published on this subject but it uses little primary-source material: Aleksij Zhilko and Èduard Mekšs, “Staroobriadchestvo v Latvii: vchera i segonia” Revue des études slaves, LXIX (1-2) 1997: 73-88.
2 See, for example, LVVA fond 1370.
3 LVA, fond 1448, opis’ 1, delo 46, list 51.
4 A recent analysis is Pål Kolstø, et al., Nation Building and Ethnic Integration in Post-Soviet Societies (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2000), which I reviewed in Canadian Slavonic Papers 44, no. 3/4 (Sep-Dec 2002): p. 303-304. Kolstø’s work emphasizes a political-science approach.
5 United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, Sixty-third Session, 4-22 August 2003, “Concluding observations of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination: Latvia. 10/12/2003. CERD/C/63/CO/7,” 4. A recent article in a Russianlanguage newspaper published in Riga adds its opinion, claiming that Russian Latvians are “Russians, not Russian Speakers!” Russkoe slovo 115: February 2005, 3.
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