The Religious Schism

The attitude of the Muscovites toward Kyivan Orthodoxy is fully apparent in their insistence on the rebaptism of the Ruthenian Orthodox in their state. The Orthodox council of 1620 issued a pastoral letter entitled “Ukase on How to Investigate and on the Belarusians Themselves,” which ordained the rebaptism not only of non-Orthodox but also of Orthodox Ruthenians in Mus­covy.

The “Ukase” led to the mass rebaptism of Orthodox Ruthe- nians who crossed the Muscovite border and entered the tsar’s service between the 1620s and 1640s. Before rebaptism the con­verts were ordered to read (or have read to them, if they were illiterate) the text of an oath very similar to the one administered to those who entered the tsar’s service. The convert promised to sacrifice his life, if necessary, for the Orthodox faith and the health of the tsar. He also swore not to leave the Muscovite state, not to return to his former faith, and not to instigate any treason in his new country.¹⁴

The “Ukase” and the policy promoted by it treated Orthodox Ruthenians not only as foreigners (inozemtsy) but also as either non-Christians or not entirely Orthodox (even those whose bap­tism was considered impeccable were allowed to join the Musco­vite church only after making an act of contrition). But what was the reaction of those who accepted a second baptism, contrary to the laws of the church? Did they protest or call upon their fellow Christians and Eastern Slavs to come to their senses? We know of no such instances.

The vast majority of them were registered by Muscovite scribes as “Cherkasians” (meaning “Cossacks”) in the Muscovite “table of ranks” and received a stipend commensurate with their status. But once they realized that non-Orthodox converts were getting a stipend twice as large for full rebaptism as the one paid to the Orthodox joining the Muscovite church by confirmation, more than half the Cossacks declared themselves non-Orthodox “Poles.” Since the Muscovite scribes did not distinguish between Catholics and Uniates, the Cossack declarations, claiming either real or only imagined connection to the Union, were readily accepted. Moreover, declaring oneself a “Pole” entailed a larger salary for joining the tsar’s service, because nobles, whom the Muscovite scribes usually treated as ethnic Poles, were paid better than rank-and-file Cossacks.

One of the former “Cherkasians” even proclaimed himself a noble of Jewish faith and descent and was registered as such by the Muscovite authorities upon his baptism. It would appear that the Cossacks (because of whom the ukase of 1620 had been adopted—it was also known as the “Ukase on the Baptism of Latins and Cherkasians”) did not mind rebaptism as long as they were well paid for it. Besides, quite a few of them were joining the Muscovite service because they were married to Russian wom­en whom they had met during the war, and ratification of their Orthodoxy by the local church also meant the recognition of their marriages, followed by integration into Muscovite society, sometimes with noble rank.¹⁵

The rebaptism of the Ukrainian Cossacks in Muscovy shows vividly that, while the Ruthenian Orthodox hierarchs could ob­tain alms by stressing religious affinity in their letters to the tsar and the patriarch of Moscow, the Muscovite authorities were by no means persuaded that they belonged to the same faith. Even if properly baptized, the Ruthenian Orthodox were tainted in the eyes of the Muscovites by their allegiance to a non-Orthodox ruler and everyday contact with the non-Orthodox.

What about the argument of ethnic affinity advanced by the Lviv brotherhood and its biblical interpretation presented by Metropolitan Boretsky in his story of Joseph and Benjamin? Here it would appear that the Ruthenian Orthodox had even less chance of being heard, or, if heard, of being understood. With regard to Orthodoxy, while they disagreed, at least they spoke the same language and used the same vocabulary. When it came to nationality, the Muscovites apparently lacked the language and vocabulary to deal with the issue. The Muscovite language of the time lacked terms not only for such Ruthenian phenomena as “church brotherhood” and “Uniates” but also for “nation.” As noted above, the term narod, which served to render that concept in Ruthenian, meant just a group of people in Russian. Thus we know of no Ruthenian letter touching upon the national theme that was mentioned or acknowledged by the Muscovite side in any way.

In official correspondence, reference to the Ruthenians was made predominantly in political rather than national or religious terms, and they figured either as Poles or as Lithuanians. The Muscovite scribes who conducted negotiations and disputes with Lavrentii Zyzanii referred to his Ruthenian language as “Lithu­anian.” An exception was made only for the Cossacks, who were called “Cherkasians,” but, as noted, this was a social rather than an ethnic or national designation. The situation was somewhat better with regard to ecclesiastical texts. There, as the title of the ukase of 1620 makes apparent, the term “Belarusians” was used to denote the Ruthenian population of the Commonwealth. But was it an ethnonational or an ethnoconfessional term? Its use in combination with the term “Cherkasian” indicates that it was not a marker of social status or identity.

The context in which it appears in ecclesiastical documents indicates that it was used to designate the Orthodox population of the Commonwealth. It could also be applied to Uniates, but Uniates often fell into the category of “Poles,” the term used to denote either nobles or Catholics and Protestants of the Com­monwealth irrespective of national background. Thus “Belaru­sian” was primarily an ethnonational term. It served an import­ant purpose in distinguishing the East Slavic population of the Commonwealth from its Polish and Lithuanian neighbors. At the same time, it distinguished that population from the East Slavic inhabitants of Muscovy. The invention of a special term for the Ruthenian population of the Commonwealth, the treatment of that population as not entirely Christian, and the reservation of the term “Rusians” for subjects of the Muscovite tsar indicate that although the Muscovite elites recognized the Ruthenians as a group distinct from the Poles and Lithuanians, they also made a very clear political, religious, and ethnic distinction between themselves and their relatives to the west.