Old Believers and Old Believers, who are they? How do Old Believers actually differ from Orthodox Christians? How do Old Believers differ from Orthodox Christians?

More than three centuries have passed since the church schism of the 17th century, and most still do not know how the Old Believers differ from Orthodox Christians.

Terminology

The distinction between the concepts of “Old Believers” and “Orthodox Church” is quite arbitrary. The Old Believers themselves admit that their faith is Orthodox, and the Russian Orthodox Church is called New Believers or Nikonians.

In the Old Believer literature of the 17th - first half of the 19th centuries, the term “Old Believer” was not used.

Old Believers called themselves differently. Old Believers, Old Orthodox Christians...The terms “orthodoxy” and “true Orthodoxy” were also used.

In the writings of Old Believer teachers of the 19th century, the term “true Orthodox Church” was often used. The term “Old Believers” became widespread only towards the end of the 19th century. At the same time, Old Believers of different agreements mutually denied each other’s Orthodoxy and, strictly speaking, for them the term “Old Believers” united, on a secondary ritual basis, religious communities deprived of church-religious unity

Fingers

It is well known that during the schism the two-finger sign of the cross was changed to three-finger. Two fingers are a symbol of the two Hypostases of the Savior (true God and true man), three fingers are a symbol of the Holy Trinity.

The three-finger sign was adopted by the Ecumenical Orthodox Church, which by that time consisted of a dozen independent Autocephalous Churches, after the preserved bodies of the martyrs-confessors of Christianity of the first centuries with folded fingers of the three-finger Sign of the Cross were found in the Roman catacombs. There are similar examples of the discovery of the relics of saints of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra.

Agreements and rumors

The Old Believers are far from homogeneous. There are several dozen agreements and even more Old Believer rumors. There is even a saying: “No matter what a man is, no matter what a woman is, there is agreement.” There are three main “wings” of the Old Believers: priests, non-priests and co-religionists.

Jesus

During the Nikon reform, the tradition of writing the name “Jesus” was changed. The double sound “and” began to convey the duration, the “drawn-out” sound of the first sound, which in the Greek language is indicated by a special sign, which has no analogue in the Slavic language, therefore the pronunciation of “Jesus” is more consistent with the Universal practice of sounding the Savior. However, the Old Believer version is closer to the Greek source.

Differences in the Creed

During the “book reform” of the Nikon reform, changes were made to the Creed: the conjunction-opposition “a” was removed in the words about the Son of God “born, not made.”

From the semantic opposition of properties, a simple enumeration was thus obtained: “begotten, not created.”

The Old Believers sharply opposed the arbitrariness in the presentation of dogmas and were ready to suffer and die “for a single az” (that is, for one letter “a”).

In total, about 10 changes were made to the Creed, which was the main dogmatic difference between the Old Believers and the Nikonians.

Towards the sun

By the middle of the 17th century, a universal custom had been established in the Russian Church to perform a procession of the cross. The church reform of Patriarch Nikon unified all rituals according to Greek models, but the innovations were not accepted by the Old Believers. As a result, New Believers perform the anti-salting movement during religious processions, and Old Believers perform religious processions during salting.

Ties and sleeves

In some Old Believer churches, in memory of the executions during the Schism, it is forbidden to come to services with rolled up sleeves and ties. Popular rumor associates rolled up sleeves with executioners, and ties with gallows. Although, this is only one explanation. In general, it is customary for Old Believers to wear special prayer clothes (with long sleeves) to services, and you can’t tie a tie on a blouse.

Question of the cross

Old Believers recognize only the eight-pointed cross, while after Nikon’s reform in Orthodoxy four and six-pointed crosses were recognized as equally honorable. On the crucifixion tablet of the Old Believers it is usually written not I.N.C.I., but “King of Glory.” Old Believers do not have an image of Christ on their body crosses, since it is believed that this is a person’s personal cross.

A deep and powerful Hallelujah

During Nikon's reforms, the pronounced (that is, double) pronunciation of “halleluia” was replaced by a triple (that is, triple). Instead of “Alleluia, alleluia, glory to you, God,” they began to say “Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, glory to you, God.”

According to New Believers, the triple utterance of alleluia symbolizes the dogma of the Holy Trinity.

However, Old Believers argue that the strict pronunciation together with “glory to Thee, O God” is already a glorification of the Trinity, since the words “glory to Thee, O God” are one of the translations into the Slavic language of the Hebrew word Alleluia (“praise God”).

Bows at the service

At services in Old Believer churches, a strict system of bows has been developed; replacing prostrations with bows from the waist is prohibited. There are four types of bows: “regular” - bow to the chest or to the navel; “medium” - in the waist; small bow to the ground - “throwing” (not from the verb “to throw”, but from the Greek “metanoia” = repentance); great prostration (proskynesis).

Old Belief, or Old Believers, is a unique phenomenon. Both spiritually and culturally. Economists note that Old Believer communities abroad are often more successful than the local population.

1. The Old Believers themselves admit that their faith is Orthodox, and the Russian Orthodox Church is called New Believers or Nikonians.

2. Until the first half of the 19th century, the term “Old Believer” was not used in spiritual literature.

3. There are three main “wings” of the Old Believers: priests, bespopovtsy and co-religionists.

4. In the Old Believers, there are several dozen interpretations and even more agreements. There is even a saying: “No matter what a man is, no matter what a woman is in agreement.”

5. The Old Believers do not have an image of Christ on their pectoral cross, since this cross symbolizes a person’s own cross, a person’s ability to perform feats for the faith. A cross with an image of Christ is considered an icon; it is not allowed to be worn.

6. The largest place of compact residence of Russian Old Believers in Latin America is Colonia Russa or Massa Pe. About 60 families, or about 400–450 people, live here, there are three cathedrals with three separate prayer houses.

7. The Old Believers retain monodic, hook singing (znamenny and demestvennoe). It got its name from the way a melody is recorded using special signs - “banners” or “hooks”.

8. From the point of view of the Old Believers, Patriarch Nikon and his supporters left the church, and not vice versa.

9. Among the Old Believers, the religious procession takes place according to the sun. The sun in this case symbolizes Christ (the giver of life and light). During the reform, the decree to perform a religious procession against the Sun was perceived as heretical.

10. In the first time after the schism, there was a habit of recording as “Old Believers” all the sects that arose at that time (mainly of the “spiritual Christian” direction, like the “Eunuchs”) and heretical movements, which subsequently created a certain confusion.

eleven . For a long time, among the Old Believers, doing careless work was considered a sin. It must be admitted that this had the most favorable effect on the financial situation of the Old Believers.

12. The Old Believers-“Beglopopovtsy” recognize the priesthood of the new church as “active”. The priest from the new church who went over to the Old Believers-beglopopovets retained his rank. Some of them restored their own priesthood, forming “priestly” concords.

13. The priestless Old Believers consider the priesthood to be completely lost. A priest from the new church who went over to the Old Believers-bespopovtsy becomes a simple layman

14. According to the old tradition, there are only part of the sacraments that can only be performed by priests or bishops - everything else is available to ordinary laity

15. A sacrament available only to priests is marriage. Despite this, marriage is still practiced in Pomeranian concord. Also, in some Pomeranian communities, another inaccessible sacrament is sometimes performed - communion, although its effectiveness is questioned

16. Unlike the Pomeranians, in the Fedoseyev agreement, marriage is considered lost, along with the priesthood. Nevertheless, they start families, but believe that they live in fornication all their lives.

17. Old Believers are supposed to say either a triple “Hallelujah” in honor of the Holy Trinity, or two “Hallelujahs” in honor of the Father and the Holy Spirit, and “Glory to you God!” in honor of Christ. When the reformed church began to say the three “Hallelujahs” and “Glory to you God!” Old Believers believed that the extra “Hallelujah” was pronounced in honor of the devil.

18. Among the Old Believers, icons on paper (as well as any other material that can easily be damaged) are not welcome. On the contrary, cast metal icons became widespread.

19 . Old Believers make the sign of the cross with two fingers. Two fingers are a symbol of the two Hypostases of the Savior (true God and true man).

20. Old Believers write the name of the Lord as “Jesus.” The tradition of writing the name was changed during the Nikon reform. The double sound “and” began to convey the duration, the “drawn-out” sound of the first sound, which in the Greek language is indicated by a special sign, which has no analogue in the Slavic language. However, the Old Believer version is closer to the Greek source.

21. Old Believers are not allowed to pray on their knees (bows to the ground are not considered such), and they are also allowed to stand during prayer with their hands folded on their chest (right over left).

22. Old Believers, non-priest hole-dwellers, deny icons, pray strictly to the east, for which they cut holes in the wall of the house to pray in the winter.

23. On the crucifix tablet of the Old Believers it is usually written not I.N.C.I., but “King of Glory.”

24. In the Old Believers of almost all agreements, the lestovka is actively used - a rosary in the form of a ribbon with 109 “beans” (“steps”), divided into unequal groups. Lestovka symbolically means a ladder from earth to heaven. Lestovka.

25. Old Believers accept baptism only by complete threefold immersion, while in Orthodox churches baptism by pouring and partial immersion is allowed.

26. In Tsarist Russia there were periods when only a marriage (with all the ensuing consequences, including inheritance rights, etc.) concluded by the official church was considered legal. Under these conditions, many Old Believers often resorted to a trick, formally accepting the new faith for the duration of the wedding. However, it was not only the Old Believers who resorted to such tricks at that time.

27. The largest Old Believer association in modern Russia - the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church - belongs to the priests.

28. The Old Believers had a very ambiguous attitude towards the kings: while some strove to write down the next persecuting king as the Antichrist, others, on the contrary, defended the kings in every possible way. Nikon, according to the ideas of the Old Believers, bewitched Alexei Mikhailovich, and in the Old Believer versions of the legends about the substitution of Tsar Peter, the true Tsar Peter returned to the old faith and died a martyr’s death at the hands of the supporters of the impostor.

29. According to economist Danil Raskov, Old Believers abroad are somewhat more successful than natives, since they are more hardworking, capable of performing monotonous and complex work, are more focused on projects that require time, are not afraid to invest, and have stronger families. One example: the village of Pokrovka in Moldova, which, contrary to general trends, has even grown somewhat as young people remain in the village.

30. Old Believers, or Old Believers, despite the name, are very modern. They are usually successful at work and united. Old Believer books can be read and downloaded on the Internet, and large movements, for example the Old Orthodox Church, also have their own websites.

P.S. The author mixed lard, honey, shit and bees into one pile, but this is also the official point of view that Old Believers are Old Believers, which, of course, is a lie. I join the opinion of those commenting: From the comments:
- Old Believers and Old Believers are completely different concepts. And there is and cannot be anything in common between them. The old tribal faith and the old rite of worship of the Jewish "god". Feel the difference and stay healthy.
- Orthodox are those who glorify the Rule. But do Christians glorify the Rule? And they don’t even know what it is.
- Old Believers are not Christians at all, they are people of a Vedic, pre-Christian worldview, and Old Believers are pre-reform Christians.
- There are Christian Old Believers and there are Orthodox Old Believers (called today pagans due to ignorance of the very meaning and original source of this word in the Slavic-Aryan understanding).
As for the Old Believers, there is already evidence of their unification with the Orthodox Old Believers during the time of their physical destruction under the Second World War.Etra and his father Alexei (about 9 million people were destroyed by sword and fire).
So, the Old Believers are practically the only ones who still preserved the customs of our ancestors (clothing, singing, beards - a symbol of connection with ancestors, long hair on the head - a symbol of connection with the cosmos, independence in thinking and much more).
And yet, the Christian Church was previously called Orthodox, and only in the 20th century it decided to appropriate the ancient name of the Russian faith - ORTHODOXY.

And, about the cross: by continuing to wear the crucified Christ around your neck, you are like accomplices in his execution!!! What, they didn’t know, or were you told otherwise? Know: by voluntarily taking upon yourself the guilt of the murderers of Jesus, you only freed them from responsibility and allowed them to continue to commit their atrocities with impunity. And remember, when you hang a crucifix on a baby’s chest, you get in touch with energy...with negative information.
The cross is like a connection between the higher and the earthly - without any crucifixions.

More than three centuries have passed since the church schism of the 17th century, and most still do not know how the Old Believers differ from Orthodox Christians.

Terminology
The distinction between the concepts of “Old Believers” and “Orthodox Church” is quite arbitrary. The Old Believers themselves admit that their faith is Orthodox, and the Russian Orthodox Church is called New Believers or Nikonians. In the Old Believer literature of the 17th - first half of the 19th centuries, the term “Old Believer” was not used. Old Believers called themselves differently. Old Believers, Old Orthodox Christians...The terms “orthodoxy” and “true Orthodoxy” were also used.
In the writings of Old Believer teachers of the 19th century, the term “true Orthodox Church” was often used. The term “Old Believers” became widespread only towards the end of the 19th century. At the same time, Old Believers of different agreements mutually denied each other’s Orthodoxy and, strictly speaking, for them the term “Old Believers” united, on a secondary ritual basis, religious communities deprived of church-religious unity

Fingers
It is well known that during the schism the two-finger sign of the cross was changed to three-finger. Two fingers are a symbol of the two Hypostases of the Savior (true God and true man), three fingers are a symbol of the Holy Trinity.
The three-finger sign was adopted by the Ecumenical Orthodox Church, which by that time consisted of a dozen independent Autocephalous Churches, after the preserved bodies of the martyrs-confessors of Christianity of the first centuries with folded fingers of the three-finger Sign of the Cross were found in the Roman catacombs. There are similar examples of the discovery of the relics of saints of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra.

Agreements and rumors
The Old Believers are far from homogeneous. There are several dozen agreements and even more Old Believer rumors. There is even a saying: “No matter what a man is, no matter what a woman is, there is agreement.” There are three main “wings” of the Old Believers: priests, non-priests and co-religionists.

Jesus
During the Nikon reform, the tradition of writing the name “Jesus” was changed. The double sound “and” began to convey the duration, the “drawn-out” sound of the first sound, which in the Greek language is indicated by a special sign, which has no analogue in the Slavic language, therefore the pronunciation of “Jesus” is more consistent with the Universal practice of sounding the Savior. However, the Old Believer version is closer to the Greek source.

Differences in the Creed
During the “book reform” of the Nikon reform, changes were made to the Creed: the conjunction-opposition “a” was removed in the words about the Son of God “born, not made.” From the semantic opposition of properties, a simple enumeration was thus obtained: “begotten, not created.” The Old Believers sharply opposed the arbitrariness in the presentation of dogmas and were ready to suffer and die “for a single az” (that is, for one letter “a”). In total, about 10 changes were made to the Creed, which was the main dogmatic difference between the Old Believers and the Nikonians.

Towards the sun
By the middle of the 17th century, a universal custom had been established in the Russian Church to perform a procession of the cross. The church reform of Patriarch Nikon unified all rituals according to Greek models, but the innovations were not accepted by the Old Believers. As a result, New Believers perform the anti-salting movement during religious processions, and Old Believers perform religious processions during salting.

Ties and sleeves
In some Old Believer churches, in memory of the executions during the Schism, it is forbidden to come to services with rolled up sleeves and ties. Popular rumor associates rolled up sleeves with executioners, and ties with gallows. Although, this is only one explanation. In general, it is customary for Old Believers to wear special prayer clothes (with long sleeves) to services, and you can’t tie a tie on a blouse.

Question of the cross
Old Believers recognize only the eight-pointed cross, while after Nikon’s reform in Orthodoxy four and six-pointed crosses were recognized as equally honorable. On the crucifixion tablet of the Old Believers it is usually written not I.N.C.I., but “King of Glory.” Old Believers do not have an image of Christ on their body crosses, since it is believed that this is a person’s personal cross.

A deep and powerful Hallelujah
During Nikon's reforms, the pronounced (that is, double) pronunciation of “halleluia” was replaced by a triple (that is, triple). Instead of “Alleluia, alleluia, glory to you, God,” they began to say “Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia, glory to you, God.” According to New Believers, the triple utterance of alleluia symbolizes the dogma of the Holy Trinity. However, Old Believers argue that the strict pronunciation together with “glory to Thee, O God” is already a glorification of the Trinity, since the words “glory to Thee, O God” are one of the translations into the Slavic language of the Hebrew word Alleluia (“praise God”).

Bows at the service
At services in Old Believer churches, a strict system of bows has been developed; replacing prostrations with bows from the waist is prohibited. There are four types of bows: “regular” - bow to the chest or to the navel; “medium” - in the waist; small bow to the ground - “throwing” (not from the verb “to throw”, but from the Greek “metanoia” = repentance); great prostration (proskynesis). Throwing was banned by Nikon in 1653. He sent out a “memory” to all Moscow churches, which said: “It is not appropriate to do throwing on your knees in church, but you should bow to your waist.”

Hands cross
During services in the Old Believer church, it is customary to fold your arms with a cross on your chest.

Beads
Orthodox and Old Believer rosaries are different. Orthodox rosaries can have a different number of beads, but most often they use rosaries with 33 beads, according to the number of earthly years of Christ’s life, or a multiple of 10 or 12. In the Old Believers, almost all agreements actively use the lestovka - rosary in the form of a ribbon with 109 “beans” ” (“steps”), divided into unequal groups. Lestovka symbolically means a ladder from earth to heaven.

Full immersion baptism
Old Believers accept baptism only by complete threefold immersion, while in Orthodox churches baptism by pouring and partial immersion is allowed.

Monodic singing
After the split of the Orthodox Church, the Old Believers did not accept either the new polyphonic style of singing or the new system of musical notation. Kryuk singing (znamenny and demestvennoe), preserved by the Old Believers, got its name from the method of recording a melody with special signs - “banners” or “hooks”.

(OLD BELIEVERS)- the general name of followers of religious movements in Russia that emerged as a result of church reforms carried out by Patriarch Nikon (1605-1681). S. did not accept Nikon’s “innovations” (correction of liturgical books, changes in rituals), interpreting them as Antichrist. S. themselves preferred to call themselves “Old Believers,” emphasizing the antiquity of their faith and its difference from the new faith, which they considered heretical.

S. was headed by Archpriest Avvakum (1620 or 1621 - 1682). After condemnation at the church council of 1666-1667. Avvakum was exiled to Pustozersk, where 15 years later he was burned by royal decree. S. began to be subjected to severe persecution by ecclesiastical and secular authorities. Self-immolations of Old Believers began, which often became widespread.

At the end of the 17th century. S. divided into priests And Bespopovtsy. The next step was the division into numerous agreements and rumors. In the 18th century many S. were forced to flee outside Russia to escape persecution. This situation was changed by a decree issued in 1762, which allowed the Old Believers to return to their homeland. From the end of the 18th century. two main centers of Old Believer communities emerged - Moscow, wherebespopovtsylived on the territory adjacent to the Preobrazhenskoe cemetery, andpriests- to the Rogozhskoe cemetery, and St. Petersburg. At the end of the 19th century. The main Old Believer centers in Russia were Moscow, p. Guslitsy (Moscow region) and Volga region.

In the first half of the 19th century. pressure on the Old Believers increased. In 1862Belokrinitsky hierarchycondemned the ideas of the reign of the Antichrist in her “District Message”.

During the years of Soviet power, S. continued to be persecuted. Only in 1971 did the Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church lift the anathema from the Old Believers. Currently, there are S. communities in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, the Baltic countries, South America, Canada, etc.

Literature:

Molzinsky V.V. Old Believer movement of the second half of the 17th century. in Russian scientific-historical literature. St. Petersburg, 1997; Ershova O. P. Old Believers and power. M, 1999; Melnikov F. E. 1) Modern requests for the Old Believers. M., 1999; 2) A brief history of the Old Orthodox (Old Believer) church. Barnaul, 1999.

In recent years, our country has been growing interest in the Old Believers. Many both secular and ecclesiastical authors publish materials devoted to the spiritual and cultural heritage, history and modern day of the Old Believers. However, he himself phenomenon of the Old Believers, his philosophy, worldview and terminology features are still poorly researched. About the semantic meaning of the term “ Old Believers"read the article" What is Old Believers?».

Dissenters or Old Believers?

This was done because the ancient Russian Old Believer church traditions, which existed in Rus' for almost 700 years, were recognized as non-Orthodox, schismatic and heretical at the New Believer councils of 1656, 1666-1667. The term itself Old Believers" arose out of necessity. The fact is that the Synodal Church, its missionaries and theologians called the supporters of pre-schism, pre-Nikon Orthodoxy nothing more than schismatics and heretics.

In fact, such the greatest Russian ascetic, Sergius of Radonezh, was recognized as non-Orthodox, which caused an obvious deep protest among believers.

The Synodal Church took this position as the main one and used it, explaining that supporters of all Old Believer agreements without exception fell away from the “true” Church because of their firm reluctance to accept the church reform that they began to put into practice Patriarch Nikon and continued to one degree or another by his followers, including the emperor Peter I.

On this basis, everyone who does not accept the reforms was called schismatics, shifting onto them responsibility for the split of the Russian Church, for the alleged separation from Orthodoxy. Until the beginning of the 20th century, in all polemical literature published by the dominant church, Christians professing pre-schism church traditions were called “schismatics,” and the very spiritual movement of the Russian people in defense of paternal church customs was called “schism.”

This and other even more offensive terms were used not only to expose or humiliate the Old Believers, but also to justify persecution and mass repressions against supporters of ancient Russian church piety. In the book “The Spiritual Sling,” published with the blessing of the New Believer Synod, it was said:

“The schismatics are not the sons of the church, but sheer heedless ones. They are worthy of being handed over to the punishment of the city court... worthy of all punishment and wounds.
And if there is no healing, there will be death.".

In Old Believer literatureXVII — in the first half of the 19th century, the term “Old Believer” was not used

And most of the Russian people, without meaning to, began to be called offensive, turning things upside down. the essence of the Old Believers, term. At the same time, internally disagreeing with this, the believers - supporters of pre-schism Orthodoxy - sincerely sought to achieve an official name that was different.

For self-identification they took the term “ Old Orthodox Christians"—hence the name of each Old Believer consensus of its Church: Ancient Orthodox. The terms “orthodoxy” and “true Orthodoxy” were also used. In the writings of Old Believer readers of the 19th century, the term “ true orthodox church».

It is important that among believers “in the old way” the term “Old Believers” was not used for a long time because the believers themselves did not call themselves that. In church documents, correspondence, and everyday communication, they preferred to call themselves “Christians,” sometimes “Old Believers.” The term " Old Believers”, legalized by secular authors of the liberal and Slavophile movement in the second half of the 19th century, was considered not entirely correct. The meaning of the term “Old Believers” as such indicated the strict primacy of rituals, while in reality the Old Believers believed that the Old Faith was not only old rituals, but also a set of church dogmas, worldview truths, special traditions of spirituality, culture and life.

Changing attitudes towards the term “Old Believers” in society

However, by the end of the 19th century, the situation in society and the Russian Empire began to change. The government began to pay great attention to the needs and demands of the Old Orthodox Christians; a certain generalizing term was needed for civilized dialogue, regulations and legislation.

For this reason, the terms " Old Believers", "Old Believers" is becoming increasingly widespread. At the same time, Old Believers of different consents mutually denied each other’s Orthodoxy and, strictly speaking, for them the term “Old Believers” united, on a secondary ritual basis, religious communities deprived of church-religious unity. For the Old Believers, the internal inconsistency of this term consisted in the fact that, using it, they united in one concept the truly Orthodox Church (i.e., their own Old Believer consent) with heretics (i.e., Old Believers of other consents).

Nevertheless, the Old Believers at the beginning of the 20th century positively perceived that in the official press the terms “schismatics” and “schismatic” began to be gradually replaced by “Old Believers” and “Old Believer.” The new terminology did not have a negative connotation, and therefore Old Believers' consent began to actively use it in the social and public sphere.

The word “Old Believers” is accepted not only by believers. Secular and Old Believer publicists and writers, public and government figures are increasingly using it in literature and official documents. At the same time, conservative representatives of the Synodal Church in pre-revolutionary times continue to insist that the term “Old Believers” is incorrect.

"Recognizing existence" Old Believers", they said, "we will have to admit the presence of " New Believers“, that is, to admit that the official church uses not ancient, but newly invented rites and rituals.”

According to the New Believer missionaries, such self-exposure could not be allowed.

And yet, over time, the words “Old Believers” and “Old Believers” became more and more firmly rooted in literature and in everyday speech, displacing the term “schismatics” from the colloquial use of the overwhelming majority of supporters of “official” Orthodoxy.

Old Believer teachers, synodal theologians and secular scholars about the term “Old Believers”

Reflecting on the concept of “Old Believers,” writers, theologians and publicists gave different assessments. Until now, the authors cannot come to a common opinion.

It is no coincidence that even in the popular book, the dictionary “Old Believers. Persons, objects, events and symbols” (M., 1996), published by the publishing house of the Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church, there is no separate article “Old Believers” that would explain the essence of this phenomenon in Russian history. The only thing here is that it is only noted that this is “a complex phenomenon that unites under one name both the true Church of Christ and the darkness of error.”

The perception of the term “Old Believers” is noticeably complicated by the presence among Old Believers of divisions into “agreements” ( Old Believer churches), who are divided into supporters of a hierarchical structure with Old Believer priests and bishops (hence the name: priests - Russian Orthodox Old Believer Church, Russian Ancient Orthodox Church) and on those who do not accept priests and bishops - non-priests ( Old Orthodox Pomeranian Church,Hourly Concord, runners (wanderer consent), Fedoseevskoe consent).

Old Believers—bearers of the old faith

Some Old Believer authors They believe that it is not only the difference in rituals that separates the Old Believers from the New Believers and other faiths. There are, for example, some dogmatic differences in relation to church sacraments, deep cultural differences in relation to church singing, icon painting, church-canonical differences in church administration, holding councils, and in relation to church rules. Such authors argue that the Old Believers contain not only old rituals, but also Old Faith.

Consequently, such authors argue, it is more convenient and correct from the point of view of common sense to use the term “Old Belief", unspokenly implying everything that is the only true thing for those who accepted pre-schism Orthodoxy. It is noteworthy that initially the term “Old Belief” was actively used by supporters of priestless Old Believer agreements. Over time, it took root in other agreements.

Today, representatives of New Believers churches very rarely call Old Believers schismatics; the term “Old Believers” has taken root both in official documents and church journalism. However, New Believer authors insist that the meaning of the Old Believers lies in the exclusive adherence to the old rituals. Unlike pre-revolutionary synodal authors, current theologians of the Russian Orthodox Church and other New Believer churches do not see any danger in using the terms “Old Believers” and “New Believers.” In their opinion, the age or truth of the origin of a particular ritual does not matter.

The Council of the Russian Orthodox Church in 1971 recognized old and new rituals absolutely equal, equally honest and equally saving. Thus, in the Russian Orthodox Church the form of ritual is now given secondary importance. At the same time, New Believer authors continue to instruct that Old Believers, Old Believers are part of the believers, seceded from the Russian Orthodox Church, and therefore from all Orthodoxy, after the reforms of Patriarch Nikon.

What is the Old Believers?

So what is the interpretation of the term “ Old Believers» is most acceptable today both for the Old Believers themselves and for secular society, including scientists studying the history and culture of the Old Believers and the life of modern Old Believers churches?

So, firstly, since at the time of the church schism of the 17th century the Old Believers did not introduce any innovations, but remained faithful to the ancient Orthodox church tradition, they cannot be called “separated” from Orthodoxy. They never left. On the contrary, they defended Orthodox traditions in their unchanged form and abandoned reforms and innovations.

Secondly, the Old Believers were a significant group of believers of the Old Russian Church, consisting of both laity and clergy.

And thirdly, despite the divisions within the Old Believers, which occurred due to severe persecution and the inability to organize a full-fledged church life over the centuries, the Old Believers retained common tribal church and social characteristics.

With this in mind, we can propose the following definition:

OLD BELIEF (or OLD BELIEF)- this is the general name of the Russian Orthodox clergy and laity seeking to preserve the church institutions and traditions of ancient Russian Orthodox Church andthose who refusedaccept the reform undertaken inXVIIcentury by Patriarch Nikon and continued by his followers, right up to PeterIinclusive.

Material taken here: http://ruvera.ru/staroobryadchestvo