Uniate Convents of the Kyivan Metropolitanate in the Early Modern Period. Between the Byzantine-Ruthenian Identity and Latin Influences

Abstract

Eastern models of monastic life spread to Ukrainian and Belarusian lands from Byzantium. Thefirst female Orthodox monasteries in Kyivan Rus appeared shortly after the adoption of Christianityby Prince Volodymyr the Great (988). Instead, the first women’s Uniate monasteries appearedin the Rzeczpospolita after 1596, when most of the hierarchs of the Kyiv Orthodox Metropolisconcluded a union with the Roman Church in Brest, founding the Uniate Church. The “cradle”of the Uniate monasticism is considered to be the Trinity Monastery in Vilnius. Its nuns were involvedin the foundation or reform of a number of monasteries in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.Favorable circumstances for the Uniate Church and its monasticism came only at the end of theseventeenth – beginning of the eighteenth century. At this time, we record about 30 cells. The great territorial changes that occurred in the Uniate Church required the unification of theliturgical sphere. Also, the Church needed to more clearly define its identity in matters of doctrineand organization. These and other factors caused Metropolitan Leo Kiszka to convene a councilin Zamość in 1720. This council also paid attention to the problems of women’s monasteries. Itsdelegates raised the issues of observance of the vow, control of the bishop over the monasteries,novitiate and profession, dowry of candidates, election of the abbess, education of girls in themonastery, competence of monastic confessors. The decisions of this assembly on female monasticismtestify to the influence of both Eastern and Western traditions. Its fathers preserved the mainprinciples of monastic life inherent in the Christian East: the independence of monasteries, theirsubordination to the authority of the local bishop, and the election of the abbess by the community.However, Zamoyski resolutions also adopted some models approved by the Council of Trent, aswell as papal constitutions and Latin canon law (enclosure, magister novitius, etc.).During the eighteenth century, the Eastern tradition was preserved in the monasteries of theKyivan Uniate Metropolitanate. Some changes made by the Zamoysky Council were not intendedto depart from the Eastern tradition, but only to improve the functioning of the monasteries undernew conditions. Rather, these changes were adopted in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, where nunnerieshad long been developing the Uniate tradition, which contained certain Latin borrowings.Instead, in the monasteries of Lviv and Przemyśl dioceses certain changes will be obvious only atthe end of the eighteenth century.