The contribution of M. I. Osipov, the clerk and treasurer of the Imperial Orthodox Palestinian Society, and Archimandrite Antonin (Kapustin), the head of the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission, in spreading Russian Orthodox editions in the Holy Land (the late XIX - early XX century)

Abstract

The number of pilgrims willing to visit the Holy Land has increased by the late XIX century. There was a need to provide them with Russian-language Orthodox publications during the pilgrimage. The study considers the activities of the Imperial Orthodox Palestinian Society members being solved this task, Mikhail Ivanovich Osipov and Nikolai Grigorievich Mikhailov. The author got known about their joint cooperation with the head of the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission in Jerusalem, Archimandrite Antonin (Kapustin), based on materials stored in the Russian Ecclesiastical Mission Archives in the Holy Land. His main objective was to promote the Orthodox pilgrimage to the Holy Land (Jerusalem, Palestine) and to distribute the Orthodox publications in Russian. As the research results it became known what books the book-icon shops of the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society were aquisited to help pilgrims; under what customs rules it was permissible to transport book loads from Odessa to the Holy Land.