Sect of Skhariya the Jew
Ideology | Defunct
1468 CE to 1515 CE
The Thought of Skhariya the Jew, much more commonly known in the church terminology as the Heresy of the Judaizers or Zhidovstvuyushchiye, is a religious concept that exists in Novgorod the Great and Grand Duchy of Moscow in the second half of the fifteenth century and markd the beginning of a new era of schism in Russia.
Some scholars consider it to have developed from the earlier Strigolniki religious concept that also had developed in Novgorod in the fourteenth century.
Initially popular among high-ranking statesmen and even the royal court, the concept is persecuted by hegumen Joseph Volotsky and Archbishop Gennady of Novgorod.
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The term Zhidovstvuyushchiye (Heresy of the Judaizers), as it is known in the sources, is derived from the Russian word zhid, from Judea, an older Russian term for Jew which is now considered pejorative.
Zhidovstvuyuschiye may be loosely translated as "those who follow Jewish traditions" or "those who think like Jews".
Hegumen Joseph Volotsky, the main critic and persecutor of this thought, considers the founder of this religious movement to be a certain Skhariya (a.k.a. Zakhariya, Skara).
This is Zacharia ben Aharon ha-Cohen, a scholar from Kiev brought to Novgorod by Mikhailo Olelkovich from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1470.
Zacharia has translated a number of Hebrew texts on astronomy, logic and philosophy.
Their nickname arbitrarily presupposes their adherence to "Judaism", even though most of Skhariya's followers had been ordinary Russians of Russian Orthodox faith and low-ranking Orthodox clergy and have never confessed Judaism.
Almost all we know about their religious beliefs is found in accounts left by their accusers (a not uncommon phenomenon in medieval heresies).
This makes it difficult to determine the true beliefs of the adherents, since the aim of the accusers was to blacken the name of the "sect" and crush it.
According to most accounts, the Sect of Skhariya renounced the Holy Trinity and the divine status of Jesus, monasticism, ecclesiastic hierarchy, ceremonies, and immortality of soul.
Some adherents even professed iconoclasm.
The adherents also promoted the idea of "self-authority", or the self-determination of each individual in matters of faith and salvation.
Priests Denis and Aleksei are considered ideologists of this heretical movement.
The Sect of Skhariya the Jew will spread over Moscow in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century.
In 1480, even Grand Prince Ivan III himself invites a few prominent adherents to visit the city.
The Grand Prince's seemingly strange behavior can be explained by the fact that he has sympathized with heretics’ ideas of secularization and the struggle against feudal division.
Thus, the Judaizers enjoy the support of high-ranking officials, statesmen, merchants, Yelena Stefanovna (wife of Ivan the Young, heir to the throne) and Ivan's favorite deacon and diplomat Feodor Kuritsyn.
The latter even decides to establish his own club in 1485 that later will be considered heretical.
Kuritsyn, who is against monasteries and monasticism, expresses ideas about freedom of human will ("autocracy of the soul"), which he interprets in a much broader sense than orthodox theology allows.
Despite the growing popularity of this religious movement in Novgorod and Moscow, Ivan III is wary of the fact that it could irreversibly infiltrate broader masses of ordinary people and deprive him of ecclesiastic support in his foreign policy.
Indeed, a denial of the Trinity and the divinity of Christ will destroy Christianity, while the adherents' opposition to the clergy and the secular authorities will undermine the entire society.
This makes Ivan III renounce his ideas of secularization and ally with the clergy.
The struggle against the adherents of Skhariya the Jew is led by hegumen Joseph Volotsky and his followers (Josephinians) and Archbishop Gennady of Novgorod.
Gennady is from the Gonzov boyar clan of Moscow and was, prior to his archiepiscopate, hegumen of the Chudov Monastery in the Moscow Kremlin.
His immediate predecessor in Novgorod, Sergei, had served less than a year and had been recalled and confined to the Chudov Monastery apparently due to mental illness.
Gennady had been named Archbishop of Novgorod in Moscow and placed in office on December 12, 1484, the first Novgorodian prelate not chosen by lots since 1359.
He had arrived in Novgorod in January 1485 with the task (as had been Sergei's) of bringing the newly conquered Novgorodian church (the city had been brought under direct Muscovite control only in 1478 and the last locally elected archbishop, Feofil, had been removed only in 1480) more in line with Muscovite ecclesiastical practices.
He faces opposition from the local clergy by his commemoration of several Muscovite saints, but deals with this opposition by including several local saints in his commemoration.
Gennady's main difficulty during his archepiscopate, however, is rooting out the Judaizer heresy from Novgorod and also Moscow, where it had spread when several Novgorodian clergymen were transferred to the capital.
He is said to have borrowed methods from the Spanish Inquisition, admiring how the King of Spain had dealt with heterodoxy in his kingdom, and he burns several heretics with the support of the grand prince and metropolitan.
After uncovering adherents in Novgorod around 1487, Gennady had written a series of letters to other churchmen over several years calling on them to convene sobors ("church councils") with the aim "not to debate them, but to burn them."
Such councils have been held in 1488 and 1490.
The councils have outlawed religious and non-religious books and initiated their burning, sentenced a number of people to death, sent adherents into exile, and excommunicated them.
In 1491, Skhariya the Jew is executed in Novgorod by the order of Ivan III.
More adherents are executed with Gennady's approval, including archimandrite Kassian of the Iuriev Monastery (who had allowed a number of adherents to hide there), Nekras Rukavov (they first tear out his tongue, then burn him at the stake), a Pskovian monk, Zakhar, and others.
The Novgorodian Fourth Chronicle notes that Gennady also helped pay for one third of the reconstruction of the current Detinets or Kremlin walls between 1484 and 1490.
Feodor Kuritsyn's name is last mentioned in 1500, when Ivan III gradually changes his attitude towards heretics thanks to hegumen Joseph Volotsky, who had been Kuritsyn's staunch opponent.
The tsar's leniency gives way to persecution, which will put an end to activities of Kuritsyn's club.
Ivan III, however, spares Kuritsyn due to Volotsky's obvious exaggerations in his accusations.
Ivan the Young, Ivan's son with Maria of Tver, had died in 1490, leaving from his marriage with Helen of Moldavia an only child, Dmitry the Grandson.
The latter had been crowned as successor by his grandfather on February 15, 1498, but Ivan later reverts his decision in favor of Sophia's elder son Vasily, who is ultimately crowned co-regent with his father on April 14, 1502).
The decision is dictated by the crisis connected with the Sect of Skhariya the Jew, as well as by the imperial prestige of Sophia's descendants.
Dmitry the Grandson is put into prison, where he will die, unmarried and childless, in 1509, already under the rule of his uncle.
The Grand Duke is increasingly aloof from his boyars, who are no longer consulted on affairs of state.
The old patriarchal systems of government have vanished.
The sovereign has become sacrosanct, while the boyars are reduced to dependency on the will of the sovereign.
The boyars naturally resent this revolution and struggle against it.
Moscow has experienced an impressive building campaign directed by Italian artists and artisans during the long reign of Grand Prince Ivan III.
Additional Russian church councils directed against the heresy of the Sect of Skhariya the Jew had been held in 1494 and 1504.
Diak (secretary) Ivan-Volk Kuritsyn, Dmitry Konoplev and Ivan Maksimov had in 1504, been burned at the stake.
Following the conversion to Judaism of a few high officials, the Russian government on December 27, 1504, expels “proselytizing” Jews from Moscow and ...
…Kiev.
Some of the adherents of the Sect of Skhariya the Jew had remained under the protection of Yelena Stefanovna and her son Tsarevich Dmitry, the grandson of Ivan III).
However, in 1502 Dmitry had been stripped of his title (it had been transferred to Vasili the son of Ivan III and Sophia Paleologue).
Ivan III dies on October 27, 1505; his eldest son succeeds him as Vasili III.
Yelena and Dmitry are arrested and imprisoned in 1505, leaving the adherents vulnerable to attacks from the authorities.
Other adherents are banished, imprisoned, or excommunicated.
Feodor Kuritsyn's adherents' club has ceased to exist.