The Phenomenon of Mistrust in Church-State Relations of the Russian Empire in the 1860–1870s. Conflicts between the Consulate and the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission in Jerusalem

The history of the Russian presence in Palestine has received a worthy coverage in the literature. In recent years, there has been an active surge of interest in this topic. At the same time, some aspects of the relationship between the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission and the Consulate in Jerusalem remain insufficiently studied. The article analyzes the three most acute conflict situations that took place in the history of the Second, Third and Fourth Missions in Jerusalem: under Bishop Kirill (Naumov) in 1857–1862, Archimandrite Leonid (Kavelin) in 1864–1865 and under Archimandrite Antonin (Kapustin) in 1879–1881. The corpus of published documents from the funds of the Foreign Policy Archive and other archives makes it possible to identify the positions of the conflicting parties and trace the main processes of the development of crisis situations. For the first time, documents from the funds of the Department of Manuscripts of the Russian National Library are being introduced into scientific circulation. The study of the correspondence between the consuls and the members of the Palestinian Committee who stood behind them, as well as the heads of the Russian ecclesiastical missions, revealed the hidden causes of the conflicts. Secular in nature, the Palestinian Committee became the sole steward in the construction and management of all Russian religious buildings in Palestine. At the same time, the Spiritual Mission lost all means of influencing the numerous pilgrims from Russia. The Jerusalem consulate, being the official representation of the Foreign Ministry, in fact acted as an agency of the Russian Society of Shipping and Trade. In all conflict situations, the Consulate enjoyed the support of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Holy Synod practically did not take measures to protect the mission. Two chiefs of the mission, Bishop Kirill (Naumov) and Archimandrite Leonid (Kavelin), were removed from their posts due to the intrigues of the consuls. Archimandrite Antonin (Kapustin) retained his post only by accident due to the intercession of influential nobles. All conflict situations were based on the deep distrust of secular institutions in the spiritual authorities. These manifestations of mistrust were especially vividly manifested in the Holy Land.

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