The Tradition of State-Church Relations in the Russian History
The relations between the State and the Church are determined by the Byzantine tradition of “symphony” which is applicable not only to the Russian State but to all East Orthodox Churches. According to Meyendorff, the great dream of the Byzantine civilization was a Universal Christian society administrated by the emperor and spiritually guided by the Church. This was the following of the ideas of Emperor Justinian, “there are two great gifts which God … has granted from above: priesthood and imperial dignity. The first is a servant to divine powers; the second directs and administrates human affairs”.
The political ideal of symphony was introduced to Russ-lands through links with the Byzantine Empire. The orthodoxy has been supported by the state since the baptism of the Kievan Rus in 988. However, Church-State relations never reached this symphonic ideal.
Historical examples show the difficulties and to some extent even rivalry between these two entities within one state. There have been tensions between the Tsar and the Church when Ivan the Terrible and Metropolitan Phillip had struggled for opposition to his oprichnina, which was designed to fight possible enemies of the Tsar’s power. Some historians consider this period as the best example of caesaropapism in Russian history, before Peter the Great.
Under Peter the Great, the parity with regard to the role of the Church and civil power in the destiny of the country ended definitively. The Church was fully subjugated to the state: financially and administratively. It was completely deprived of freedom of existence; and above all - the Patriarchate had been abolished.
However, Professor Petro argues that even after 200 years of subjugation to the Imperial power, Orthodox prelates did not forget the symphonic ideal. There was an attempt to rebuild the pre-Petrine way of cooperation of two powers – divine and human – in the XX-s century, when Russian civil society helped to restore the autonomy of the church Historians argue that the ROC has actually never been separated from the state. While the separation of the Church was guaranteed by the Soviet Constitution, the regime regulated and controlled the Patriarchate and its followers. Thus, this type of separation could be considered as suppression of one power by another; or separation in a negative sense.
To estimate application of the symphonic ideal in recent Russian history, it is vital in what way one interprets symphony – cooperation or interosculation. If we argue that symphony is a cooperation of the two entities for the sake of believers, who live in a secular state, it would be one case; another situation occurs if both authorities are in the hand of one person, i.e., theocracy, which actually never occurred in the Russian history. In the modern Russian State, the representatives of the ROC tend to believe that the symphonic ideal is incompatible with a modern secular state.
Knox also states that, symphonia is not possible in a modern democratic state for two principal reasons. In symphonia, one church is not a part of civil society. It does not coexist with other social organizations. Instead, the church is situated in the political sphere, influencing state policies, while the state is guided by virtue of the custody of that church. Obviously from the first viewpoint there exists a certain level of cooperation between state and church in the contemporary Russian Federation. However, one should consider it in a wider sense. The Russian Orthodox Church supports Russian foreign policy interests within the international scene. The evidence for this will be demonstrated later in the paper.
According to Cem Oguz, Russian’s foreign policy humiliation, such as in the Bosnia and Herzegovina war, as well as in Kosovo, had important repercussions for its internal politics. He argues that the imperialist inclinations still exist among Russian politicians. Some scholars call it “authoritarianism with great pretensions and few resources.” Challenges spawned from the dissolution of the USSR, have concerned Russian politicians, for whom the memory of the great and powerful Russian state is still alive along with the intention to restore the unity of these states. Oguz mentions: “ambitious national aspirations have revolved around the concept of derzhavnost and are supposed to be achieved today through an inevitable turn toward Slav and Orthodox emphasis in its foreign policy”.
Additionally, Knox states that Orthodoxy as such can be considered as an ideology of Imperium (imperial power), thus there cannot be a real division of power between state policies and church policies. Generally, the role of churches in post-communist states is significant. Even though no country of the former USSR has established a state church, religion has had a significant influence upon politics in the region. The extent of the Moscow Patriarchate’s presence in the political sphere is central to the understanding of the extent of Orthodoxy’s influence in Post-Soviet Russia. It is useful to look at the legal pattern of the State-Church relations during the last 20 years of the Russian history, since this period is of the greatest relevance with regard to the current state of affairs.
Tags: Church Relations, Church-State, Political, Politics, Russian History