МИССИОНЕРСКАЯ И ПРОСВЕТИТЕЛЬСКАЯ ДЕЯТЕЛЬНОСТЬ РУССКОЙ ПРАВОСЛАВНОЙ ЦЕРКВИ НА УРАЛЬСКОМ СЕВЕРЕ В КОНЦЕ XIX — НАЧАЛЕ XX В.

Abstract

The article analyzes the activities of the literacy schools created by the Ekaterinburg Diocesan Committee of the Orthodox Missionary Society in the Verkhotursky uyezd of the Perm province: their financial and material support, methods of educational work, the level of educational training and material support of teachers. For the spread of Orthodoxy among the settled Mansi, the committee created four schools: in 1887 — in the village of Lacha, in 1888 — in Lopaeva, in 1890 — in Mityaeva, in 1891 — Petrova. “Vogul Schools” worked according to the program of parish schools, which included the study of the following subjects: the Law of God, Church Slavonic literacy, the Russian language and reading of civilian press, arithmetic, calligraphy, church singing. The training lasted three years and was conducted in Russian. The main task of church schools was “awakening in children of sincere love for the Church of God and the development of religious feelings in their souls”. The missionaries were confident in the beneficial and attractive power of Christian ideas, capable of turning the gentiles and “infidels” to Orthodoxy. The government, supporting missionary schools, saw in them a means of spreading the Russian language and integration of the empire’s non-Russian peoples into a single economic and cultural space. In 1907, missionary schools were transferred to the jurisdiction of the Ekaterinburg diocesan school council. At that time, there were 20 students (10 boys and 10 girls) in the Lachinsky school, in Mityaevskaya — 10 (6 boys and 4 girls), in Lopaevskaya — 28 (19 boys and 9 girls), in Petrovskaya — 23 (16 boys and 7 girls). During the school reform of the early 20th century all these schools were closed. Only the Petrovsky school was preserved, which was completed by students and transformed into a parish school. Attempts by the Ekaterinburg branch of the Orthodox Missionary Society to organize schools to teach children of the nomad Mansi failed.