On the Road to the National Identity – from Tentative Steps to Achievements. Several Events from the History of Slavophilism

Abstract

The article researches a number of issues related to the Slavophile worldview in the 1840s–1880s and their work aimed at the development of the national consciousness in the Russian society: their attitude to Peter the Great’s reforms, to the Slavic world and to the revolution. The article also examines the role the Slavophiles had played in the development of the Orthodox outlook in the society and the foundations of the future Church structure, and their attitude to the slogan “Orthodoxy. Autocracy. Nationality”. It also considers the attitude to Slavophiles among the government circles and the so-called “German Party” at court. The article disputes the widespread opinion of the Slavophiles denying the existence of historical prerequisites that had caused the reforms of Peter the Great, and hankering after Russia’s return to pre-Petrine traditions. The desire of the “Moscow Party” for the development of the national culture and the formation of the national consciousness caused the constant opposition on the part of apologists of the European cosmopolitanism. The opposition was all the stronger because it formed a signifi cant part of the entourage of Nicholas I (and then Alexander II) and the St. Petersburg aristocracy. At the same time, Khomyakov and his associates tended to avoid alliances and patronage that could damage their independence. The so-called “German Party” at court did not limit its actions to vigorously defending the interests of the Baltic nobility, but actively struggled against any attempts to form the national consciousness. A consistent opponent of the Slavophiles, for decades it had enjoyed the constant support of the Third Department, as well as a number of ministers. And it was none other than the Third Department, that since the beginning of the 1840s had organized press campaigns to discredit the “Moscow Party” and general supporters of the development of inter-Slavic communication. To limit the infl uence of the Slavophiles, their opponents resorted to the active use of censorship, including its spiritual kind. With the Slavophiles being staunch opponents of the revolution, which they viewed as a distorted form of the religious consciousness, their enemies often sought to represent them as revolutionaries in the eyes of the supreme power and the society. The Slavophiles considered the establishment of an advisory Zemsky Sobor in Russia to be the only alternative to the future revolutionary catastrophe. This authority was meant to embody their ideas about the common people as a source of power.