Colonel V. A. Pashkov and the Late Nineteenth-Century Protestant Movement in Russia, Jan M. Surer, 1999

e more demonstrative in their rejection of 1 For one story, see D. I. Skvortsov, Pashkovtsy v Tverskoi eparkhii, Tver, 1893, pp. 10-16. According to J. S. Curtiss, Skvortsov was "the chief Orthodox missionary." See Curtiss, Church and State in Russia 1900-1917 . Octagon Books, New York, 1965 (originally copyright 1940), p. 166. Orthodox missionaries, at least in the context of sectarianism, were those whose mission was to counteract sectarian activity. Skvortsov based this account of Pashkovism on court proceedings against sectarians in Tver province begun in 1888, at which he was present as an expert. 2 For these specific cases, see Skvortsov, pp. 25-35. 62 Orthodoxy and therefore more "sectarian." 3 Burov (see Chapter 3, note 54), as we have seen, "hew[ed] to pieces an image he had." 4 The collegiate secretary in Tver put away his icons and adorned his walls with Scripture texts. 5 Skvortsov reproduces the statement of faith of one Tver resident, Mikhail Ivanov, who systematically lists the reasons for his separation from the Orthodox Church. After comparing church practices with his study of the Bible, he considered infant baptism, mediators other than Christ, communion as practiced by the Orthodox, Catholic, and Lutheran churches, and the practice of confession all to be unscriptural. 6 All those who heard Pashkov's sermons or read his publications did not necessarily adopt an identical doctrine. In examining the Bible for themselves, they sometimes arrived at different interpretations which could resemble other forms of sectarianism more than Pashkovism. In one instance, Golos reported adherents in the villages of Novo-Siverskaya and Izhorki who spoke of Pashkov's visits to them in the capital where they worked as cabdrivers in the winter. All spoke of him with great praise. Among the participants in their weekly gatherings in their villages were " skakuny [jumpers]", whose worship practice seems to have been like that of other 3 Heier, p. 123. 4 Letter from Pashkov to Dr. Baedeker, September 1885, PP 2/l/b/131. 5 Skvortsov, p. 26. 6 Skvortsov, pp. 20-23, n. 1. 63 indigenous minor sects. 7 . V. K. Syutaev, who was probably exposed to Pashkov's ideas, repudiated the church and came to a Tolstoyan rejection of courts, the military, and government authority. 8 The readiness of the peasants to diverge from Orthodoxy was a tendency to which Pashkov's teachings simply provided additional impetus. Pashkovism had been preceded by centuries of religious dissent against the Orthodox Church, beginning with the seventeenth-century schism which had produced numerous offshoots such as the Old Believers, the Flagellants (Khlysty), and the Castrates ( Skoptsv ). The 1860's and 1870's witnessed a marked increase in sectarian activity, however. 9 According to A. S. Prugavin, a populist student of sectarianism, the rationalistic sects (as opposed to the mystic sects) especially flourish