Russian Baptists and spiritual revolution, 1905-1929

Abstract

Heather J. Coleman. Russian and Spiritual Revolution, 1905-1929. Indiana-Michigan Series in Russian and East European Studies. Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 2005. xiv, 304 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Photographs. $42.50, cloth.1The collapse of Soviet Union led to a mass religious awakening, which included a rise of evangelical Christianity among many disoriented and confused Soviet citizens who lost their identity and had problems with their adjustment to new post-Soviet realities. As a reaction to this new popular interest in evangelical Christianity during 1990s, post-Soviet historians turned their focus to history of Russian and Ukrainian evangelicals and produced very good studies based on serious archival research. Heather Coleman's book is an important addition to this new trend in post-Soviet historiography of 1990s. Coleman devotes her study to a history of Russian and Evangelical Christians from 1905 (the year when main restrictions were lifted against religious minorities in Russian Empire) to 1929, i.e., when Stalinist state began official persecution of religious groups and, in fact, outlawed Soviet evangelicals. Coleman's book explores period of Russian revolutions, fall of Romanovs, and birth of Soviet society through the prism of Baptists (p. 2). According to Coleman, the serve as an especially fruitful case study for exploring fundamental issues in modern Russian history, including emergence of new social and personal identities, creation of a public sphere and civic culture, debates over notion and nature of citizenship, and way in which religious ideas and ideas about religion were implicated in modernization process (pp. 3-4).In first part of her book Coleman analyzes development of Russian organization and community. She begins with Shtundist (Stundist) movement, moves to events of Revolution of 1905, and then to formation of two separate Russian evangelical unions-the and Evangelical Christians-in 1909. Using a wide variety of primary sources (evangelical periodicals, Baptists' letters and memoirs) to analyze conversion narratives and social experience of new Russian and Ukrainian Baptists, Heather Coleman explains unprecedented growth of evangelical movement after 1905.The second part of book deals with problems of the Baptist identity in Russian society between 1905 and 1917. Legal existence of evangelical communities was a real challenge to police and Orthodox Church. Orthodox missionaries had to confront spread of evangelical movements and considered both as their main ideological opponents and as agents of German faith (pp. 92-108). In contrast to theses stereotypes, Russian emphasized their Russian national identity and demonstrated their Russian patriotism. …