Борьба за «Подъярёмную Русь»: переход в православие военнопленных русинов в Омске (1915 -1917)

Abstract

The article examines an understudied aspect of religious life in Omsk during the First World War, associated with mass conversion to the Orthodoxy of Rusin prisoners of war – former soldiers and officers of the Austro-Hungarian army. The research is based on the materials from the journal Omskie Eparkhialnye Vedomosti and the registration records of the birth books of Omsk Orthodox churches for 1915–1917. The combination of the anthropological approach with the problem-chronological and historicalcomparative methods allowed a thorough investigation of the phenomenon of mass conversion of Rusin prisoners of war to Orthodoxy, linking it with the specific historical situation and the personalities of church hierarchs who served in Siberia. The authors argue that the “Omsk phenomenon” of Rusins’ joining Orthodoxy was conditioned by the ascetic activity of the missionaries from the Omsk and Pavlodar dioceses, lead by Bishop Sylvester (Olshevsky). However, it should be emphasized that the dynamic development of this process was ensured by the official ideology based on Orthodox values, which dominated in the Russian Empire. The ideological factor of the conversion to Orthodoxy was decisive for the Rusins, who were attracted by the Orthodox empire, the “state of the Russian people”. The fall of the monarchy as a result of the Russian Revolution changed the paradigm of the country’s development and immediately put an end to the massive conversions of Rusins to Orthodoxy in Omsk. The article may be of interest to researchers of the history of Rusins, military and social history, as well as national and religious politics.