Avvakum Petrov
The Burning of Avvakum (1897), by
Grigoriy Myasoyedov
born 1620/1621, Grigorovo, Russia
died April 14, 1682, Pustozersk
archpriest, leader of the Old
Believers, conservative clergy who
brought on one of the most serious
crises in the history of the Russian
church by separating from the Russian
Orthodox church to support the “old
rite,” consisting of many purely local
Russian developments. He is also
considered to be a pioneer of modern
Russian literature.
Avvakum Petrov (Russian: Аввакум
Петров) (November 20, 1620 or 1621 –
April 14, 1682) was a Russian protopope
of Kazan Cathedral on Red Square who led
the opposition to Patriarch Nikon's
reforms of the Russian Orthodox Church.
His autobiography and letters to the
tsar, Boyarynya Morozova and other Old
Believers are considered masterpieces of
17th-century Russian literature.
Starting in 1652 Nikon, as Patriarch of
the Russian Church, initiated a wide
range of reforms in Russian liturgy and
theology. These reforms were mostly
intended to bring the Russian Church
into line with the other Orthodox
Churches of Eastern Europe and Middle
East. Avvakum and others strongly
rejected these changes. They saw them as
a corruption of the Russian Church,
which they considered to be the "true"
Church of God. The other Churches were
more closely related to Constantinople
in their liturgies and Avvakum argued
that Constantinople fell to the Turks
because of these heretical beliefs and
practices.
For his
opposition to the reforms, Avvakum was
repeatedly imprisoned. For the last
fourteen years of his life he was
imprisoned in a pit or dugout (a sunken,
log-framed hut) at Pustozyorsk above the
Arctic Circle before finally being
burned at the stake[1] The spot where he
was burned is now marked by an ornate
wooden cross. Groups rejecting the
changes continued, however, and they
came to be referred to as Old Believers.
Avvakum's colourful autobiography
memorably recounts hardships of his
imprisonment and exile to the Russian
Far East, the story of his friendship
and rupture with the Tsar Alexis, his
practice of exorcising demons and
devils, and his boundless admiration for
nature and other works of God.
