The Clergy versus the Church in 1917–1918

Abstract

P.G. Rogoznyi examines the mass character of insubordination to ecclesiastical authorities in monasteries, participation in the revolution of clergymen and the minor orders, and the relationship of religion to revolutionary monarchism and the newly labeled in April 1917 “ecclesiastical Bolshevism.” This phenomenon labeled as Bolsheviks or Leninists all those lower orders and clergy opposed to the church hierarchy. Biographical material on the colorful career of Mikhail Galkin illustrates the shifting labels and allegiances within the Church during the Revolution. These topics are taken beyond October into the first months of the Soviet era. We learn that state vs. clergy or Church is a far too simplistic paradigm during the revolutionary years.