Gennady of Novgorod

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.

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.