"Exhortations to the old believers" by the parish priest V. Ya. Smelov
Abstract
This article publishes several reports on the exhortations of the parish priest of the village of Gryaznukha of Kazan Diocese, Vasily Yakovlevich Smelov, to his parishioners, who are accused of deviating from the Old Belief (Spasovo denomination). Texts of exhortations date to 1857 and 1858. In conditions when the transfer of Orthodox believers to other faiths was prohibited, the responsibility for the return of those who refused to go back to Orthodoxy was associated with parish priests and pious people, who were to exhort the accused. In this situation was V. Ya. Smelov. The spiritual consistory required from him regular reports on the results of exhortations. The logic of the parish priest’s exhortations with Old Believers is quite typical for polemic conversations. However, their content is unique, as V. Ya. Smelov, guided by the book tradition of Old Believers, tried to formulate polemic arguments of his own. In addition, the exhortation reports also refl ect certain religious views on the Orthodox parish and the Church of the Old Believers of Spasovo denomination, which is still poorly studied in historiography.
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