Russian Life To-day Part 5

"An English bishop! Do you say it? Only to think of it! And I in my dirty clothes like any common labourer! And I am the Abbot! I beg of you! Oh! yes, I must insist. Do not deny me. Enter my humble house, and let me feel, even if you only take a seat upon a chair for a moment, that I have entertained you!"

Such hospitable intent was not to be withstood, and willingly enough we went with him into his small and, as he said, very humble abode, feeling how very touching and appealing it all was. We entered, our host saying cheerfully, "Be good enough to walk on," and found ourselves in a very bare and cheerless-looking parlour with stiff chairs, with black horsehair seats, round the walls, and a bare table in the centre, upon which stood a conventional and faded little basket of wax-flowers and fruit under a gla.s.s shade. On looking round we saw the good Abbot had disappeared, so we sat down and looked about us, hoping he had not gone off to order food; but in an incredibly short time, as if he had been a "lightning-change artist," he was back again. And what a transformation!

The dirty and faded brown ca.s.sock was gone, and a flowing rich black robe had taken its place, a black mitre with dependent veil was upon his head, a magnificent chain and cross hung from his neck, and, thoroughly satisfied with his change, he looked as though he were saying "Now we meet upon equal terms!" His boyish delight was good to see as he said:--

"Now let me welcome you and greet you!" and he kissed me as other bishops had done.

These embraces are no light ordeal, as the good clergy never shave or cut their hair, and are very heavily bearded. But what of that, if one can feel as I did that day, when driving off and waving our adieux, that one had been breathing apostolic air, and had been very near in the spirit to "Peter and John"?

It only remains to give my experience of a typical parish priest, and then I shall feel that the Russian clergy have been fairly described.

Upon my arrival at the Spa.s.sky Mine, during my first journey in Siberia, in the very heart of the Kirghese Steppes, the manager told me what had pa.s.sed between himself and the parish priest, kept there by his company to minister to the labourers in the smelting works. These were all Russians, though the labourers in the mine itself were chiefly Kirghese and Mohammedans.

"You will be interested to hear that our bishop is coming to see us," he had said by way of beginning.

"Your bishop! Where from and what for?"

"He is coming across the steppes, and from London, to give us services."

"You don't mean to say so!" was the startled exclamation. "I never heard of such a thing! Your bishop, all the way from London, driving night and day for five days across the steppes, to give you twenty English folk your services! Why, our bishop is only two or three days down the river at Omsk, but we could not expect him to come here for us."

"Well, you see," observed my friend, "our English Church does not forget her children, even if they are scattered far and wide. And we shall be glad to see him and receive Holy Communion and have sermons from him about our faith and highest duties."

After a moment's silence the priest looked up suddenly and said:--

"I wonder if your bishop will come to our service on Sunday and join with us in worship? If he will address us how glad we shall be to hear him!"

"He will certainly come, and, what is more, we will all come with him, and we will all be at divine service together for once. Suppose we have our Celebration at 7.30, and you arrange yours for 8.30 instead of 8.15, and we will all come over together? We shall fill our little room, and can't invite others; but we will all accompany the bishop to the church."

[Ill.u.s.tration: _The Russian Priest at Spa.s.sky._]

Next day (Sunday), after our Communion--all the staff received it--we went over, I in my robes, to the church, and were received by the wardens, the choir leading off with a hymn as we entered. The wardens at once conducted me behind the screen where the priest stood before the altar in his vestments, with a boy server on either side beautifully vested, the one in gold and the other in silver tissue.

After bowing to me gravely and reverently, he began the service. Nothing is _seen_ of it by the congregation, and they hear only the voice of the priest, and are told from the other side of the screen what is pa.s.sing within. The Russian Liturgy is full of traditional ceremonies, and rather bewildering, I should think, to an English Churchman; but there is no question as to the great reverence which distinguishes it. The priest confided to his manager afterwards how nervous he felt at celebrating with a bishop at his side, and how anxious he felt to make no mistake. He did not show it, however, and was as reverent and absorbed as any priest ought to be when back again in thought and word and deed in the Upper Room, where, on the same night on which He was betrayed, our LORD left us the memorial of His Pa.s.sion and the Sacrament of His love and grace.

It was touching also to see the little servers struggling between curiosity and the claims of the service, but the latter triumphed; and not till they had taken off their little vestments and stood forth in their ordinary clothes did they permit themselves a good look at their strange visitor, and show themselves ready to have a word or two from him.

The priest, when he had taken an extra little service which some old men had asked for, came over to the manager's house and told me of his work, asked questions, and received little gifts, and told me how inspiring it was to all the Russians to know that their English staff were religious, as well as clever and able men, and glad to have their services when they could.

In one way this priest was not typical, for he was paid his stipend by the company, and not dependent upon his people. In all ordinary parishes this is not the case. The parish priest receives a nominal stipend from public sources, but depends upon his people for the rest. They give small contributions on their name days--a very substantial sum is received on S. John's Day, as a favourite Russian name is Ivan, or John--when the priest comes to bless their house or workshop, or for a marriage, christening, or funeral, or to give the Sacrament in illness.

There is often, usually, indeed, bargaining on all these occasions. A portion of their fruits and crops is claimed. All sorts of contributions are made throughout the year, and, except in town parishes where able clergy have large incomes, given ungrudgingly by their people, the priest and his wife are always trying to get as much as they can for their services, and the people, who are very poor, to give as little.

This cannot lead to good relations between clergy and people, and, as the clergy in the country seldom if ever preach, there is no personal teaching to bring them together. Officially, therefore, it is true to say that the Russians value and reverence the ministry of their parish clergy, while, personally, they do not feel any great interest in them or their families, nor see any reason why they should. And certainly, as a rule--the fault of the system no doubt--they do not love them.

Let me now describe the service which I have mentioned upon a previous page, conducted after the Liturgy was over and the people had been dismissed. The priest told me four old men had asked to have a few special prayers and a reading from the Gospels, and I stayed to share it. The prayers were said, pet.i.tion and response, by all five standing before the screen, after which the four old men, with rough and rugged faces, s.h.a.ggy hair, and wide flowing beards, closed up together, and, as they stood back to back, the priest placed the beautifully-bound copy of the Gospels upon their heads and began to read. The rough faces seemed at once to change their whole expression: their blue eyes sparkled, and there appeared that light upon every countenance which "never was on sea or land," or anywhere else except upon the face of one who is in communion with G.o.d. My thoughts went back to the story of Moses as he came down from Sinai, and veiled his face as he spoke to the people, lest they should find there that which they could neither bear to see or understand. One's thoughts are always going back to scriptural scenes and descriptions when amongst the Russian peasantry.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _S. Isaac's Cathedral, Petrograd._]

FOOTNOTES:

[6] Published by T. Fisher Unwin, Paternoster Square.

CHAPTER V

RELIGIOUS LIFE AND WORSHIP

It is well sometimes to define our terms and phrases, and it is absolutely necessary in this case. What is it that we mean when we speak of the religious life of a people, Christian and non-Christian alike?

Our soldiers have been fighting shoulder to shoulder with Hindoos and Mohammedans, whose British commander, on the eve of their first battle, addressed them in words which ought to be long remembered by those who are working and praying for the hastening of G.o.d's kingdom, appealing to their faith, and reminding them that prayers were ascending from Mosque and from Temple to the G.o.d of all, on their behalf.

The Hindoos and Moslems have their religious life as well as ourselves.

And it behoves us of the Christian Church, especially when such stirring words can be addressed to two Eastern peoples, so widely different in their creeds, to remind them that their prayers are going up to the same "G.o.d of all," to look very earnestly and sympathetically at the religious life and worship of all the different Churches which make up the "Mystical Body of CHRIST and the blessed company of all faithful people."

It is along that way and that alone--the affectionate, respectful, and sympathetic interest in the religious life and worship of those who differ from us and those not in communion with us, that unity lies, and I feel sure there is no other. The religious life of a man, or people, is his life as it is influenced by the creed he professes and the worship he offers.

We are not thinking at the moment of a moral life, for a moral life is led by many who, as they would express it, "make no religious profession." It is open to us to question whether they are not more influenced than they are aware by the religion of those about them, which is in the very air they breathe, for there is such an influence as "religious atmosphere"; or we may think also that they have more religion than they suspect; but they themselves would disclaim all this.

Some live, as John Stuart Mill lived, frankly without religion, yet leading a blameless and irreproachable moral life. Then as a contrast there are the lives of religious people leaving as far as moral values are concerned much to be desired, and probably, in many cases, most of all by themselves.

Religious life, however, is creed and worship translated into daily life and expression, effort and achievement; and accepting that definition I unhesitatingly claim for the Russian people that they are one of the most religious peoples in the world. Their religion is the desire and effort to know G.o.d. "This is life eternal, to know G.o.d, and JESUS CHRIST Whom He has sent." The Russian has not been fully taught as yet the ethical and moral side of this knowing G.o.d, though he is ready for it, but only its mystical side. He seeks the knowledge of G.o.d, quite simply, as a spiritual experience.

It will always be found that when races have received civilization and Christianity suddenly, as the Russians have done, while they astonish and charm by their spiritual fervour and deep earnestness, they disappoint by their want of consistency in moral life. But spiritual fervour and great earnestness arising out of a real need for G.o.d and a deep sense of His meeting that need "fulfilling minds and granting hearts' desires," and a real sense of communion with the Great Eternal in CHRIST in beautiful and uplifting worship, afford the best of all foundations for building up moral conduct permanently and well.

To the Russian, as to the ancient Hebrew, moral law will only lastingly and effectually appeal when prefaced by "G.o.d hath said." His religion is G.o.d; the knowledge of the Most High as revealed in CHRIST. And he is one of the most consistently religious persons in the world, for he must have his religion everywhere, and, just as the Hebrew felt it must be, "when talking with his children, when sitting in his house, when walking by the way, when going to lie down, and when rising up, written upon the posts of his house, and on the gates." The mystical or spiritual temperaments of the two peoples are much the same. Russians have a pa.s.sion for G.o.d. They never want to be away from the sense and consciousness of His presence. Only when they have gained some sense of this spiritual endowment of the Russian race will my readers be able to see where their religious life corresponds with our own, and where it widely diverges from it. We have spoken of this war as a righteous war; the Russians as a religious one! They have brought their religion into it as they have never done into any war before. A Russian officer, for instance, gave a very picturesque account of the great battle of the Vistula last October, and ended with these words: "My company was the first to cross the river, which seemed to boil from the bursting of the sh.e.l.ls. Afterwards nine companies rushed the enemy's position. A priest with long, streaming hair, and holding high a cross amid a hail of bullets, stood blessing the soldiers as they ran past." That is the true Russian, his religion everywhere and in everything. There is nothing in life, throughout the year, however secular it may seem to us to be, which does not have that blessing by the priest. The war has had it from first to last. All through mobilization, in the families from which the bread-winner was to go, there would be special little private services such as I have described in my last chapter. On the day when the conscripts were to depart from the village there would be the Liturgy in church, with all who could be present, and others outside. There would be, it has been described for us, the solemn reading of the Holy Gospel in the open-air, the book resting upon a living lectern; and as they rode away the last thing the departing men would see, as with those nine companies on the Vistula, would be the cross lifted high by a priest, with his long hair streaming over his shoulders, or out upon the wind.

It would be just the same all through the long journeys: the sacred _ikons_ were carried, the priest marched steadily along, or sat in the railway carriages with the soldiers, and always with his cross. The soldiers of course saluted their priests as they saluted their officers, and for a time it was a little puzzling to decide how this salute should be suitably returned in such a war as this. For a priest to raise his hand to his cap did not seem to belong to his sacred office, and so it was decided he should touch his cross instead. Quite apart from the regular and official services, the priest would be always fulfilling his part in bringing G.o.d home to his countrymen, until the very end when he stood blessing them, as we have been told, as they rushed past him to attack, many of them to return no more. There is something very inspiring in the thought that the last earthly object many of them saw as they rushed on to death was the Cross of Him Who had robbed death of all its terrors, and brought Immortality to light.

One of my great reasons for looking to the Orthodox Church of Russia to give us our first opportunity, in seeking to promote the larger unity of Christendom, is, as I had occasion to say at a large public meeting in London last year, that, like ourselves, they wish to have the New Testament sense of the presence of CHRIST. I cannot use any other phrase to express my meaning. It is to me the whole spirit of their worship, not only at the Holy Communion, where one would expect it, but at all the other services as well. Litanies form a very important part of their worship, and as one hears that softly repeated "LORD, have mercy"

(_Gospodi pomilui_) again and again from the choir, it is as if they were all conscious of speaking straight to their LORD with the feeling that He is there Himself to grant their prayer. No other refrain that I have ever heard has the same appealing note of real and moving faith.

I have attended the "all-night service" at S. Isaac's, in Petrograd, on Sat.u.r.days at 6 p.m. It lasts two hours in cathedrals and churches, but all night in monasteries and convents, and some of us going to S.

Isaac's for the first time would almost wish that it could be "all night" there also. The glorious richness of the men's voices, their deep rolling ba.s.ses and sweet tenors, the silvery trebles of the boys--there is no organ or other accompaniment--when heard as a new experience makes one involuntarily think to one's self "I have never heard prayer and praise expressed like this before." Whether one is behind the screen, where I was conducted at once, or standing with the choir before it--there are no seats in a Russian church--noting their picturesque uniforms like those of officers, and their profound reverence, or moving amongst the congregation, and looking towards the screen, the same impression is given everywhere and by every one, "We are praising Thee, O G.o.d, we acknowledge Thee to be the LORD. Thou art the King of Glory, O CHRIST."

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Interior of a Russian Church._]

The screen separates the sacrarium from the body of the church, and is a carved part.i.tion painted and gilded, and in the cathedrals and great churches, is covered with silver and gold _ikons_, often richly jewelled, and with numerous lamps and tapers burning before them. At each side of this screen is a narrow door through which people seem to pa.s.s at will, to and fro, for there is a great feeling of freedom in a Russian church, and every one does just what he feels led to do. No ladies, however, may ever pa.s.s behind. In its centre are folding doors which are only used for ceremonial purposes, and are called "The Royal Gates." In the Liturgy it is a moment of deep solemnity when they are opened wide, and the priest pa.s.ses through carrying the bread and wine for consecration. This is "The Great Entrance." At the evening service on Sat.u.r.day night also there is an entrance, when the deacon carries the Gospels through, before which the gates stand open wide for a little while, and the congregation may look straight through.

Immediately within stands the altar, a perfectly plain, square structure with nothing at all upon it but a large copy of the Four Gospels, and behind it is the seven-branched candlestick. It has an extraordinary effect upon the worshipper who has only just come to Russia when the Royal Gates are thrown open thus, and, with incense filling the air, the seven lamps on the great candlestick come into view. It is for a moment as if one was back in the days of Zacharias and Elisabeth, waiting for him to come forth through the gates to bless us, as he did on that memorable occasion after the announcement of the birth of S. John the Baptist. It is, however, only for a moment that the Temple fills the mind, for on looking up the representation of our LORD is there in the great window above, where He seems to look down upon us in love and blessing, and "The same yesterday, to-day, and for ever," seems to have new and blessed significance.

Russian worship to me is just dominated by the very presence of CHRIST.

All the meretricious surroundings, the lights and glittering and jewelled _ikons_ have not the least power to diminish the joyous, thankful sense of it. He is in the midst of us "gathered together in His Name." Every one seems to feel it, every one seeks to realize it. They are there for that! That is why the beautiful voices keep singing "_Gospodi pomilui_" or "LORD, be merciful to us." We feel it is real worship, and I can only hope that many of my readers who have not had the joy of it in that special way may yet have the opportunity afforded them. There are Russian churches, of course, in England, and I have happily and helpfully worshipped in the Russian church in Paris at 6 p.m. on Sat.u.r.days; but Russian worship can only be truly known and fully shared in Russia.

This "New Testament sense of the presence of CHRIST," as I have called it, is no doubt promoted by the extraordinary veneration given to the Gospels, both in their external and internal form. There is an intense feeling of close personal attention as the deacon carries them through the Royal Gates. They are always beautifully bound, rimmed and clasped with gold or silver, and often sparkling with diamonds and other precious stones. A beautifully bound copy--in ordinary churches the best they have--rests upon the altar, in its very centre, with a silken covering, and when the priest comes to celebrate he first kisses it, and then, lifting it up and setting it upon end, and laying the corporal where it has rested, with the chalice and paten upon it, proceeds to the Liturgy. The consecration takes place on that part of the altar where the Gospels have lain before, and where they will again be laid when the service is over.

The four evangelists always appear painted upon the Royal Gates, together with a representation of the Annunciation, our LORD, and the Holy Virgin, on either side. This is never departed from. In every church which follows traditional lines there are the four huge pillars holding up the whole structure--typifying the four evangelists again.

Upon the roof they are set forth in the four cupolas, which are always there at the corners, while a fifth rising above them typifies our LORD over and above and dominating, yet supported by, them. Then there is nothing in the ordinary services to compare with the reading of the Holy Gospel to the people, nor is any special or private ministration complete without reading some portion of these, the most important parts of the sacred Scriptures.

It is easy to see, therefore, how it comes about that the Russian sense of the living CHRIST is essentially that which is realized by His Apostles and described in the New Testament.