as a Prophet not in His Own Country

This article discusses the justification by Anton Kartashev, a Russian emigrant historian, theologian, and public figure for the ideal of Holy Rus’, which was supposed to serve as a religious basis for the creation of the cultural and historical identity of the representatives of the “second wave” of emigration from the Soviet Union during the Second World War. In the case study, the author of the article applies methods of “personal history” and “new intellectual history” to both historical works and such ego documents as letters published and stored in the Bakhmeteff Archive of Russian and East European Culture at Columbia University. Considering the genesis of the concept of Holy Rus’ in the publications of Karashev before the war, the author of the article shows the influence on the content of the political views of the public man who followed the principles of centrism, intransigence, and non-precondition. Along with this, the article reveals the links between the historical and cultural, canonical and dogmatic justifications of the ideal in his narratives which were constructed as the Hegelian triad: thesis – antithesis – synthesis. Kartashev represented the process of transformation of the emerging symphony of church and state in Ancient Rus’ and Muscovite State through its denial in the laic culture of the Russian Empire after the Petrine reforms into a new desired symphony of church and society. The central place in the article is occupied by the characteristics of changes among Russian émigrés at the end and after the Second World War and by the explanation of the impact of these changes on the motivation of Kartashev to present his vision of the ideal of Holy Rus’ in a form of a book. As a result of studying the long process of preparing the edition and the subsequent reviewing and discussion of the book, it is shown that this ideal was perceived ambiguously. Such perception of Kartashev’s book was influenced by

The answer to these questions will be given in this research with reference to the publication of the book Vossozdanie Sviatoi Rysi (Recreation of Holy Rus'), written by the historian, theologian, and public figure Anton Kartashev (1875Kartashev ( -1960, who belonged to the post-revolutionary Russian emigration. Published in 1956, the book summarized the ideas he expressed in articles throughout the 1920s and 1930s. This circumstance requires a genetic study of the process of developing a set of ideas included in it to understand their partial transformation as a result of a change in specific historical contexts when the book was published after the Second World War.
The methodological basis of the research can be defined as a case study, conducted at the intersection of the "personal biography" and "new intellectual history. " To overcome the dichotomy of existential and social biographism, a synthetic model of intellectual biography was used, developed based on the typology of scholarly biographies proposed by Donald A. Walker [Walker]. The types of biographies he singled out were synthesized to provide a multifaceted view of the life of Kartashev. Considering the historian as an active subject of his destiny, when studying his actions/events, it was necessary to understand his motivation and define his creative style of activity.
In the "post-revolutionary" period considered in the article as a gap determined by the external conditions of existence (emigration as a result of the defeat of the White movement in the Civil War in Russia) and as a desire to preserve the succession/development of intellectual activity, but transformed under the influence of this gap, it was important to determine the events/reasons that caused a change in the relationship between the political, social, religious, and professional activities of Kartashev, who was a professor at SSOTI in Paris for 35 years. Thus, his "situational biography" is reconstructed in the article, taking into account the complex correlation of various contexts that have their own dynamics of internal conflicting development. It allows the author to consider those "challenges" of the external environment,that Kartashev gave an "answer" to with his actions in a specific historical situation.
Last but not least, the "bibliographical biography" of the historian is recreated using narratological techniques from a post-structuralist perspective. This means that in the relevant sections, the deconstruction of historical narratives is carried out taking into account the author's position ("narrator's voice") and the appeal of these narratives to readers, i. e., the direction of communication between the narrator and the "implied reader, " whose purpose was the formation of a certain reader's identity. At the same time, both positive perception and rejection (criticism) of Kartashev's latest works by those whom he addressed are revealed. When analyzing acceptance/rejection, it is important to determine the epistemological, aesthetic, and ideological criteria1 by which historical narratives were accepted or rejected, because behind them lie positive grounds for affirmation of the reader's identity in a changing time.
* * * For the first time, Kartashev used the concept of "Holy Rus' , " which was central to his historical articles in emigration, in 1923 in his article Koren' russkogo natsional'nogo (Root of the Russian National [Character]) [Карташев, 1923a, c. 19]. He borrowed it from his colleague in the Russian National Committee, Evgeny Anichkov, who opposed the concept of "sobornost'" (spiritual community of jointly living people) proclaimed by Alexey Khomyakov as the unifying national principle of Russian civilization to the divisive party spirit [Аничков, с. 16]. Kartashev recognized the possibility of combining this "root of national vitality" with humanism and "enlightenment, " warning at the same time both against such extreme of humanism as laicism (non-religious culture), and against the extremes of the religious principle -clericalism and obscurantism [Карташев, 1923a, с. 20]. Thus, the concept of Holy Rus' as the basis of national self-consciousness turned out to be inextricably linked with other ideologemes formulated for the committee members by Kartashev: centrism, intransigence, and non-precondition (nepredreshenchestvo) [Егоров]. Centrism supposed, on the one hand, dissociating itself from the "lefts, " who, following the Smenovekhists (smenovekhovtsy), were ready to reconcile with the Bolsheviks under the pretext of normalization of the Soviet regime. On the other hand, the "rightists, " who advocated the simple and full restoration of the pre-revolutionary monarchical order. Intransigence in the fight against the Bolsheviks justified activism, which involved the use of all available forms of countering them, up to individual terror [Карташев, 1923b]. Finally, non-precondition in regard of the future political system in Russia after the collapse of Bolshevism left a place for a monarchy. In this time, for Kartashev, the renewed monarchy was more favorable for the implementation of the principle of theocracy, which he opposed to the apoliticalism of the ROC, proclaimed by Patriarch Tikhon (Belavin) in 1918 [Карташев, 1922a].
Already as a professor at the SSOTI, founded in 1925 in Paris, Kartashev returned to the idea of Holy Rus' in the first volume of the Pravoslavnaia Mysl' (Orthodox Thought), published in 1928. In it, he developed the thoughts put forward in the article Smysl Staroobriadchestva (Meaning of the Old Believers Movement, 1925) about the influence of national psychological type on the perception and experience of Orthodoxy by Russian people. Later he summarized his vision of Russian religious psychology in the article Russkoe khristianstvo (Russian Christianity, 1936). Eschatologism and asceticism were recognized by him as its distinctive features. At the same time, Kartashev emphasized that the apocalyptic worldview of the Russian people did not give rise to a passive expectation of Doomsday but created a desire to build a Christian kingdom on Earth. Asceticism, in contrast to the Monophysitic denial of this world, which often reached in Eastern monasticism, manifested itself among the Russian people in a craving for ascetic piety, which permeates all earthly life. In the article and pamphlet on Holy Rus' , Kartashev specified these provisions concerning the dialectical development of the theocratic ideal.
Possibly, a reminder of this concept was Alexander Solovyov who offered an outline of this religious and social idea in Russia in his article [Соловьев]. It is not known whether Kartashev was familiar with it, but a comparison of the narratives of these works allows us to better understand the structure of his historical and religious discourse and see the canonical foundations of the ideal. Solovyov constructed his historical narrative as the deployment of a dualistic opposition between the messianic idea of universal theocracy (Third Rome) and the idea of humility and repentance, flight from the state, rejection of the evil of this world and struggle with it (Kitezh City). In contrast to the antagonistic dualism of the predecessor's article, Kartashev's narrative was a modification of the Hegelian triad: thesis -antithesis -synthesis. The thesis was the adoption of Christianity under the Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir, the antithesis was the establishment of Laic statehood and culture under Peter the Great and his followers, and the synthesis should be the fecundation by the Church of this culture (otsercovlenie kul'tury) through the active "molecular" affirmation of Orthodox ideals by believers in everyday life. In the second half of the 1930s, when Kartashev became close to the Russian Labor Christian Movement [Базанов, c. 126], in several articles about Prince Vladimir, he strengthened the characteristics of the social significance of the Christianization of Rus' [Карташев, 1938a; Карташев, 1938b]. It is also easy to see that, unlike the Eurasians, with whom he collaborated for a short time in the early 1920s [Карташев, 1922b; Карташев, 1923c], Kartashev did not deny the importance of the humanistic values of the secular culture brought to Russia as a result of the reforms carried out by emperor Peter the Great.
In the article about the fate of Holy Rus' , Kartashev outlined the canonical basis of this ideal, to the development of which he then repeatedly returned. It was the concept of "symphony" formulated in the sixth novel of the Byzantine emperor Justinian the Great. Accepting with reservations the idea of the separation of church and state and noting the reduction in the state functions in recent history, the historian argued the need for a new form of symphony -between church and society, which, in contrast to theocracy, which assumed an external symphony of church and state, he called Christocracy. Thus, he canonically substantiated the idea of the fecundation of culture by the church, a special role in the implementation of which he assigned to the laity, united in religious brotherhoods. Behind these ideas, one can see his own experience of participating in the Brotherhood of Saint Sophia and his distrustful attitude towards the conservative-minded hierarchy, which found itself in the jurisdiction of the ROCA.
As a condition for the implementation of the symphony of the church with elements of the public, Kartashev recognized the rule of law, under which the free activity of citizens and the church as a self-governing organization is guaranteed. He initially opposed the idea of the rule of law state to the totalitarian dictatorship of the Bolsheviks, and since 1933 also to the practice of church management by the National Socialists in Germany, whose pagan nationalism, like the propaganda of the pagan ideal of the Third Rome in fascist Italy, was considered by him a threat to Christian civilization in Europe [Карташев, 1934, c. 9-10].
Kartashev called the Chalcedonian ὅρος about the God-human nature of Christ the dogmatic basis for the principle of the symphony. By analogy with it, he believed that the principle of the symphony spoke of the irrationality and uncertainty of the boundary line between church and state, of their antinomic "non-merging" and "inseparability. " The understanding of this dogmatic antinomy determined a rather paradoxical fact of his biography: being a champion of the messianic role of the ROC for Eastern Orthodoxy, he actively participated in ecumenical activities. True, the path toward ecumenical movement in emigration was winding -from participation in the anti-Catholic Eurasian collection Rossiia i Latinstvo (Russia and Latinism) through benevolent correspondence with Belgian Cardinal Mercier to the meetings with Catholics and Protestants who supported his anti-communist speeches, and lastly to participation in the Anglican-Orthodox Brotherhood of St Alban and Rev. Sergius of Radonezh.
Speaking at the Congress of the Brotherhood in 1931, Kartashev familiarized Anglicans and Anglo-Catholics with his ideas about the transformation of the "symphony" as a result of the separation of church and state. Negatively evaluating the period when the ROC was administered by the Holy Synod in the Russian Empire, he again emphasized the importance of freeing it from state guardianship and restoring its independence. According to the historian, the independent existence of the ROC from the state and narrow national interests opened for it, if Russia were liberated from the "yoke of Bolshevism, " prospects for its free "sisterly communion" with autocephalous Orthodox churches, and then with representatives of other confessions [Kartashoff, 1931]. Therefore, when Fr. Sergius Bulgakov proposed to carry out a partial intercommunion of the Orthodox and Anglican members of the Brotherhood, Kartashev supported him. In contrast to Fr. Georges Florovsky, another colleague from the SSOTI who spoke out against this idea, in 1934, Kartashev placed his article on the pages of the Sobornost' magazine [Kartashoff, 1934], in which he developed the provisions of Bulgakov expressed in the article U Kladezia Iakovlia (Around Jacob's Well) published in the ecumenical collection Khristianskoe Vossoedinenie (Christian Reunification) [Булгаков]. The following year, when the controversy around the idea of communion in the sacraments of the members of the Brotherhood was still going on, Kartashev again supported the Dean of the SSOTI in the article Intercommunion and Dogmatic Agreement   [Карташев, 1937], which was conceived as a manifestation of solidarity with Bulgakov, and in which Florovsky did not participate [Arjakovsky,.
Thus, in the 1920s-1930s in several articles, Kartashev developed and refined his understanding of the theocratic ideal, which was only outlined in his pre-revolutionary journalism and finally took shape in the post-war years in the work Vossozdanie Sviatoi Rusi in 1956. In the spiritual experience of the Russian religiously thinking intelligentsia of the late nineteenthearly twentieth centuries, he saw the guarantee of the restoration of Holy Rus' , the implementation of a new "symphony, " which he understood as the fusion of the church with the soul of the nation and its culture. The transformed "symphony, " in his opinion, was to become the entelechy of a revived Russia, which should thereby set an example for the whole world. In this interpretation, he contradicted Florovsky, disagreements with whom were still latent. The discrepancy in views hidden at that time between the "older" and "younger" generations of the Russian Orthodox "school of Parisian theology" resulted in a clear demarcation between them on the pages of Kartashev's book.
According to the author's correspondence, the manuscript of the book was written at the end of the Second World War, but he was able to publish it only in 1956. The reasons that determined his motivation to promote the publication and the complex ups and downs of this process were born by the new international situation after the war and, as a result, the changed position, composition, and mood of Russian emigrants. The contribution of the Soviet Army to the victory of the anti-Hitler coalition, which promoted the comprehensive increase in the international prestige of the USSR, gave rise to the mood of "Soviet patriotism" among the partakers in the "first wave" of Russian post-revolutionary emigration. This mood alarmed Kartashev, who soon after the war reminded his former ideological combatants of the need to follow the principle of intransigence in relations with the Bolsheviks [Карташев, 1947]. This principle for a short time became the basis for the resumption of his cooperation with the "Union of Struggle for the Freedom of Russia" organized by Serge Mel'gunov. However, another political trend after the war was the strengthening of the "leftists" (Republicans and Socialists) among Russian emigrants, supported in their separatist aspirations by American patrons. A similar intention, as it seemed to Kartashev, captured his colleague as well. Such vision of the situation by the historian led to their disengagement and Kartashev's gradual departure from the propaganda and publishing activities of the Union [Карташев, 2019a, с. 197-199, 201-202]. On the contrary, the emergence of a "rightwing" Russian political committee established under the chairmanship of Boris Sergievsky in New York in 1953 as a counterweight to the "left" wing of Russian emigrants who moved from Europe to the United States, met with his support. With the leaders of the committee (in addition to long-standing friendly relations with Ariadna Tyrkova-Williams), he was brought together by the promotion of the religious principle of Orthodoxy in the restoration of liberated Russia and the anti-socialist orientation of the manifesto of the newly formed organization [Карташев, 2019b, с. 242-243]. Thus, Kartashev again found himself in his pre-war position of intransigence and centrism. True, the great power inspiration and nationalism which characterized his newly acquired ideological position forced him to abandon the third principle -non-prediction. Speaking in favor of a constitutional monarchy, he considered it possible after the collapse of the Bolsheviks, which Kartashev was still sure of, to use for the transition to the rule of law the methods of a "talented, Christian" dictatorship, like those established by Franco in Spain or Salazar in Portugal. These dictatorships were opposed to that of Hitler in Germany and Mussolini's in Italy. Such highly dubious provisions were included by him in the final version of the book on the recreation of Holy Rus' [cf. : Карташев, 2019b, с. 242; Карташев, 1956, с. 61-64].
However, Kartashev's drift to the right was not unlimited, as evidenced by his perception of relations between ecclesiastical jurisdictions in Russia and exile. On the issue of returning the parishes of the Western European Exarchate under the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate initiated at the end of the war by Metropolitan Evlogii (Georgievsky), he, together with his colleague from the SSOTI Vasily Zenkovsky, opposed this step. When this brief return was denounced after the death of the Metropolitan by his successor Archbishop Vladimir (Tikhonitsky), Kartashev supported his decision, as well as his subsequent attempts in the late 1940s to reunite with ROCA, headed by Metropolitan Anastasy (Gribanovsky) [Карташев, 2016, c. 186-187; Карташев, 2018b, с. 302-303]. However, Kartashev considered such reunification to be canonical only under the omophorion of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Recognizing, as before, it was precisely the "Karlovites" (karlovchane) who were responsible for the church schism in emigration that occurred at the end of the 1920s, he strove on the pages of his book about Holy Rus' to dissociate himself from their most prominent publicist, Fr. Konstantin (Zaitsev) [Карташев, 2019c, c. 301]. Thus, the latter's views on the restoration of the old pre-revolutionary monarchical order in Russia marked the most "right" edge, relative to which the position of Kartashev had to remain centrist.
However, in the last book's section, entitled "Disengagement, " the author not only dissociated himself from the reactionary intentions of Zaitsev but also drew a line of demarcation between himself and some colleagues in the SSOTI. The basis for the "friendly disengagement" with Bishop Cassian (Bezobrazov) was the emotional expression of the religious worldview: if Kartashev was optimistic about the possibility of transforming the state and public life by the Church even in this world, then Cassian was a pessimist in this regard [Кассиан, с. 13]. Even more significant were the disagreements with representatives of the younger generation of SSOTI professors. One of Kartashev's disciples, Fr. Schmemann, under the influence of Fr. Florovsky, criticized the theocratic concept of the teacher. These disagreements between the older professors' generation and the younger ones, who were formed in conditions of emigration, became obvious after Alexander Schmemann and Sergei Verhovskoy, following Gerges Florovsky, moved to the United States from France. Like their "leader, " they became professors of St Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary in New York [Прот. Александр Шмеман. Прот. Георгий Флоровский, c. 116, 127, 130, 132-136]. Their advance was part of the overall process of moving not only a significant part of Russian emigrants but also their political, cultural, and religious centers from the Old to the New World. This process started at the beginning of the war and intensified with its end.
Another important process among emigrants, which influenced Kartashev's motivation to promote the publication of his book on Holy Rus' , was a significant replenishment of its ranks at the expense of "displaced persons. " Although he acknowledged that there were "adventurous elements" among them, their anti-Sovietism, against the backdrop of the increased "Soviet patriotism" of some of the post-revolutionary expatriates, was deeply sympathetic to him. Carefully observing their political moods and organizational activity, Kartashev noticed that their leaders were repeating the mistakes that he and his associates had to go through shortly after the defeat of the White movement [Карташев, 2018a, с. 299-300]. Therefore, his appeal to the publishing house "Posev, " created by the expatriates of the "first wave," but actively engaged in propaganda work among the refugees and defectors that make up the "second wave, " with a proposal to publish the book was quite logical. Given this circumstance, the author's intention can be characterized as a desire to remind those who found themselves in exile after the Russian Revolution in 1917 of unchanging principles, as well as to acquaint newcomers with a cultural and historical ideal, the existence of which they did not know because they had been brought up in an atheistic state. For them, acquaintance with such an ideal could serve to form the religious foundation of their cultural and historical identity. However, for representatives of the "Posev" publishing house, who were guided by the interests of their readers, such a formulation of the question did not have much significance. As Kartashev's wife noted, they "could not digest either its title, Recreation of Holy Rus', or some parts of its content" [Карташева]. For Russian "displaced persons" the disagreements with opponents, so important for the author, were incomprehensible and too complicated, and therefore more reminiscent of the internal squabbles of representatives of the "first wave" of Russian post-revolutionary emigration. Therefore, the "sowers" (posevshchiki), according to Kartashev, "promised to put the book at the tail of the queue. Nevertheless, they expressed a desire to reduce the polemical element, that is, to impoverish and castrate the book" [Карташев, 1937-1967]. Such a reduction was unacceptable to him. As a result, after two years of waiting, Kartashev decided to refuse their services. Since he was sure that the book would be perceived as a "reactionary" one by the American curators of the SSOTI 2 , who were establishing relations with the Moscow Patriarchate, he did not even try to offer it to the YMCA-Press publishing house in Paris. As a result, it was published thanks to the help of his old friends, the brothers Georgy and Evgeny Novitsky, who moved to the United States at different times. They were able to collect the necessary amount by subscription among Russian emigrants in America, and a specially created publishing committee, headed by a former student of Kartashev, Bishop Sylvester (Kharuns), organized the publication "without their own censorship" [Карташев]. 2 The same, apparently false, premise was the basis for Kartashev's suspicion that his colleague, the Dean of the SSOTI, Fr. Vasily Zenkovsky, who was originally given the manuscript for publication in the Orthodoxy and Modernity series, refused to publish it not because of a lack of funds, but out of a desire not to quarrel with the American curators of the institute [Карташев, 2019c, с. 298]. In his memoirs, Zenkovsky noted this "pointed political suspicion" characteristic of his colleague, even "spy mania", which he considered because of the influence of his wife, "a clever, but not very intelligent woman" on him [Зеньковский, 1951-1963].
The release of the book caused some responses in the form of reviews. If Zenkovsky briefly outlined its main provisions with obvious sympathy, emphasizing the author's special tone in substantiating the theocratic ideal [Зеньковский, 1956], then Bishop John (Shakhovskoy), noting Kartashev's belonging to the "prophetic" type of the Russian intelligentsia, was more critical. Relying on the psychological interpretation of his justification for theocracy as a manifestation of guilt for the "rocking of the building" of the Russian Empire on the eve of the revolution, the bishop argued that the author put forward a "controversial and insufficiently developed idea" of evading civic activity as a "sin against the incarnation" (italics by Bishop John. -A. A.). In addition, he stood up for the students of Kartashev, to whom, as the bishop believed, the teacher was unfair [Иоанн]. However, Schmemann and Verhovskoy were ready to stand up for themselves. At a symposium specially held in New York on January 23 and 30, 1957, they defended their views [Полторацкий]. Georgy Novitsky, who opened the first meeting, highly appreciated the style of the book, in which the author "rises to the heights of the language of the Old Testament prophets. " However, Professor Alexander Bogolepov and Alexander Schmemann, who spoke after him, were unanimous in recognizing the impossibility of applying the Chalcedonian dogma "by analogy" to characterizing the relationship between church and state. In contrast to Bogolepov, who recognized the significance of such Kartashev's provisions as fidelity to the principle of sobornost' restored by the 1917-1918 Local Council of the ROC, recognition of the social role of the church and the special responsibility of the laity (here he was supported by Archpriest Alexey Ionov, who also pointed out that the author "speaks as a prophet"), Schmemann was more inclined to argue with his teacher "in full voice. " Following his companion, Verhovskoy pointed out the fallacy of the teacher's dogmatic premise and the groundlessness of his accusations of political and social passivity addressed to the Russian Students Christian Movement's members.
Mikhail Polivanov and Prince Serge Obolensky responded to the book in secular magazines. The former in Novyi Zhurnal (New Review) contrasted Kartashev's theocratic ideal of Holy Rus' , which assumed submission to power, with the idea of holiness based on personal freedom, the religious and historical justification of which was offered to American readers shortly before by George Fedotov in his book Russian Religious Mind: Kievan Period [Поливанов]. In contrast to the liberal-democratic position of the author of the review in Novyi Zhurnal, Obolensky supported the main provisions of the book on the pages of the Vozrozhdenie (Revival) magazine, criticizing Kartashev rather for trying to present the fulfillment of the theocratic ideal in a "religiously indifferent, formally democratic state. " Such an approach, according to the reviewer, did not correspond to the historical tradition and the current situation in Russia, where, as it seemed to him, the religious feelings of the common people were being revived after the Second World War. The latter allowed Obolensky to oppose the pessimism of Kartashev, who "mourned the disappearance of the anointed tsar, " with an optimistic belief in the necessity and possibility of his return after the collapse of the communist regime [Оболенский].
Thus, Kartashev returned to his theocratic ideal of Holy Rus' after the Second World War, suggesting that it could serve as a religious and historical basis for the formation of the identity of the representatives of the "second wave" of emigration from the Soviet Union. However, a study of the specific conditions of the long process of publication and subsequent discussion of the book shows that this attempt failed. This result was due to changes among the Russian exiles that took place after the war. After the end of the war, the traditional divisions of postrevolutionary expatriates were supplemented by new ones, generated by the spread of "Soviet patriotism" in their midst, by the replenishment of their ranks at the expense of "displaced persons," by the divergence in the perception of life prospects among representatives of the "older" and "younger" generations of emigrants. As a result, despite the rather benevolent reviews of the book, its prophetic pathos did not captivate most of the participants in its discussion, who emphasized their disagreement with both the political and religious-dogmatic substantiation of the ideal put forward by the author.