4. 1985
F
ROM THE NEWSPAPER
RUSSKII PUT’
, P
ARIS
-N
EW
Y
ORK
Readings on Reading, Andrey Belov, Munster: Poisk Publishers
The author’s premise is that the Bible is first and foremost a work for literary historians, like The Divine Comedy or The Lay of the Host of Igor. Accordingly he awards pride of place in Bible study to human knowledge—philology, history, and archaeology. This aggregate of sciences Belov calls “Biblical criticism” and this approach defines his reading of the Bible. Moreover, he considers it permissible to advocate a curious view which is profoundly at variance with the position of the Church. According to Orthodox doctrine, the Bible is the Word of God. That is, it is the only book in the world whose author is God Himself. The role of the person who wrote down the text, whether a prophet or an apostle, was merely to register in human language the divine revelation communicated by the Holy Spirit. Andrey Belov, however, has his own ideas about this.
In Orthodoxy there is a definite intellectual discipline whose basis is that Holy Scripture may be interpreted only in accordance with the sacred tradition of the Church and in agreement with the opinion of the Holy Fathers. The Nineteenth Rule of the Sixth Ecumenical Assembly reads: “Primates of churches should … teach all the clergy and people the words of piety, selecting from Divine Scripture the understanding and discourse of truth and not transgressing the already established boundaries and customs of the God-bearing Fathers; and if the word of the Scriptures shall be examined, then not otherwise than that it be expounded as it was expounded by the luminaries and teachers of the Church in their writings … in order not to depart from what is meet.”
This is not “narrowness,” not “despotism,” but acknowledgment of the divinely inspired nature of Holy Scripture. Accordingly, all researches which are not sanctioned by the Church are without foundation and harmful.
Andrey Belov, the author of this questionable book, proceeds from different premises. For exegesis of biblical texts he adduces, alongside such Holy Fathers as St. John Chrysostomos and Grigoriy Nissky, the teachings of such heretics condemned by the Church as Feodor Mopsuetsky, Pelagius, and even modern freethinking philosophers of the like of Archpriest Sergey Bulgakov, Nikolai Berdyaev, and Vladimir Soloviov whose authority can in no wise be ranked alongside the authority of the Fathers of the Church. Belov goes even further, drawing on the arguments of Catholic and Protestant theologians and sometimes even of natural scientists—physicists, biologists, and such like.
Books of this kind are harmful and damaging for the Orthodox mind and can be welcomed only by people profoundly hostile to true Orthodoxy. Any person who puts his trust in the ideas expounded by Andrey Belov will fall into the embrace of anti-Christianity, which is worse even than “pure” atheism.
Archimandrite Constantine (Antiminsov)
5. 1985, Jerusalem
L
ETTER FROM
M
OTHER
I
OANNA TO
F
ATHER
M
IKHAIL IN
T
ISHKINO
Dear Mishenka,
I have been sent your book Readings on Reading. The title seems ill-chosen. I have started reading but it is a slow business. I have to use a magnifying glass because my eyes are now quite hopeless. It is interesting to read. It reminds me of our elder, and how well he said, “To whom wisdom is not given let him not speak words of wisdom, but read in simplicity; but whoever has been given understanding, let him discourse on reading.” The Bible is a book of unbounded profundity, but each person draws from it in accordance with his faculties. The elder, although in old age he became very mild and deprecated his ego as much as is possible, in his younger years was an educated man with particular opinions and judgments. I remember him from the Religio-Philosophical Society, and he was excellent in conversation and debating with the greatest minds of our time.
Your book deepens and extends understanding of the Bible. It is audacious and in part impertinent. I am surrounded in the main by people with little education, meek, mainly with a monastic vocation, and monasticism in our times is in prayer, it seems to me, and not in teaching. There are no teachers now in the sense that was understood by the medieval Church. Those were learned theologians, interpreters, and translators, but today’s are in the main conservators. If the present Russian regime has not completely crushed Orthodoxy, then that is to the credit not of learned theologians but of obscure old women and loyal priests who have professed Christ even unto death. As if we do not know that an army of them has perished in this battle.
Perhaps the times are changing and we should now be thinking not only of preservation but also of more profound understanding. Your critical thoughts about the patriarchs, the examination of their deeds from the standpoint of modern morality, stirred me greatly. Your thinking about the evolution of the idea of God in history—where did you get that from, is it something you have discovered yourself?—seems to me in part seductive and in part engrossing.
You also write, or rather provide a quotation to the effect that, in the last days there will begin an “unprecedented abuse—of matter by man.” Where this comes from is not indicated in the book. The thought, however, is in itself extremely profound: all those robots, machines for supporting human life when a person is already dead, artificial organs, and almost conception in test tubes,—are so difficult to take in and evaluate from a Christian viewpoint. Moreover, my head is no longer as clear as it was when I was young. It seemed to me also that the book’s bibliography is not very well compiled, or is that my eyesight? Reading it with a magnifying glass is torture.
It is a very substantial book. I’m quite amazed that in your village you manage to maintain such a high level, although we have long understood that we should stay where we have been placed and all that is needed will come of its own accord.
Heartfelt greetings to your family. I will not send the icon. I just cannot work anymore. May God bless you.
With love,
Ioanna.
6. April, 1985
F
ROM A NOTE FROM
E
FIM
D
OVITAS TO
N
IKOLAI
I
VANOVICH
L
AIKO
Dear Nikolai Ivanovich,
In compliance with our agreement I have to inform you that since the New Year I have performed four rites of baptism: I have christened my newborn son, Isaac; the newborn daughter of the local doctor, Andrey Yosifovich Rubin; the cousin of our parishioner, Raisa Semyonovna Rapaport, at the age of 47 years; and a young Japanese student at the local university (Yahiro Sumato).
The congregation is increasing not only as the result of newly baptized infants and adults, but also with the appearance of new immigrant families, the Lukovich family from Belorussia and a young couple from Leningrad whose name is Kazhdan. The wife is Jewish and the husband is as yet unbaptized but inclined to adopt Christianity. These additions gladden me and give grounds to hope that the Be’er Sheva community will grow and strengthen.
There are of course difficulties and, mindful of our talk, I would like to ask you to find resources for mending the roof. Our district does not have a great deal of rain, indeed, on the contrary, annual rainfall is below the average for the country as a whole, but a single downpour can spoil a modest fresco. Andrey Rubin, the best qualified of our parishioners, assesses the work at around 5,000 shekels. We also need to repair the porch. We have partly mended it through the efforts of parishioners, but one of the supports needs to be replaced and that is something we cannot do with our own hands.