Byzantium and the Rise of Russia

The following was written for Professor Alexander Kyrou's Russian History course at Salem State College in the winter of 2009. The book reviewed is John Meyendorff's Byzantium and the Rise of Russia: A Study of Byzantino-Russian Relations in the Fourteenth Century (1981). It is one of two book reviews I completed for the course, the first two I have ever written.

In the tenth century Constantinople was at the apogee of its power, expanding in the Balkans, Italy, and the Middle East. (4) It was in this century that Kievan Rus, under Prince Vladimir, adopted Christianity. From this moment until the Council of Florence in the middle of the fifteenth century, the Russian Church was subordinate to the Byzantine patriarch residing in Constantinople.

During this period, "the metropolitan of Kiev...controlled the only administrative structure...which encompassed the whole of Russia...". (14) Hence, "the influence of Byzantine civilization upon Russia became the determining factor of Russian civilization." (10) Russian literature, art, and architecture all began in imitation of the Greek. (19,20)

The bulk of John Meyendorff's book is taken up with political history however. The most salient theme of the book is Byzantium's role as arbiter of East European conflict in the fourteenth century, with an eye toward preserving the unity of the Metropolitanate of Kiev.

The East European Context

Meyendorff’s narrative begins with the “catastrophes of the thirteenth century” (29) Constantinople was conquered by the Crusaders; Russia was conquered by the Mongols. Both of these events proved less catastrophic than they seemed at first. (30)

Constantinople was lost to the Orthodox church in 1204. However, its ideology was resilient, and Constantinople was reconquered in 1261. (35) Of lasting significance were the diplomatic compromises made during this period. In the West, Byzantium sought to appease Rome, Venice, and Genoa. This involved taking steps toward unification of the Churches in the case of Rome, and Black Sea commercial concessions to Genoa. In the East, Byzantium allied with the Mongols. (36)

Appeasing the Mongols was in the interest of Byzantium. The Mongols had in fact “delayed the fall of Byzantium for two hundred years” (inadvertently) by providing an obstacle to the advance of the Turks. (37) The Mongols were tolerant of the Church in Russia. They believed it provided them with an important diplomatic link to Byzantium. (38-9) Russians also had an interest in appeasing the Mongols, for they provided protection from Western conquerors, sure to impose Latin Christianity. (44) The residence of the metropolitan would shift northeast following the Mongol conquest, a move supported by the Byzantines who considered Western areas in too close contact with Latin Christianity. This would contribute to calls for separate metropolitanates in western regions. (91)

Notably, Byzantine cultural influence now rested entirely on the prestige of Constantinople; the empire’s veneer of strength was dramatically diminished, and diminishing. (46-7)

During this period of crisis for the church and Russia, Lithuania was emerging as a nation-state under Prince Mindovg. Lithuania was a pagan nation caught between a Crusading Western Christianity and the Mongols. As its population increasingly turned to Orthodoxy, the dynasty remained pagan. This is because to have converted to Orthodoxy would have meant subordination to the Metropolitan of Kiev, currently residing in Mongol-controlled Russia. (58) Between the middle of the thirteenth century and the Union of Krewo in the 1380s, Lithuania’s ruling dynasty contemplated two basic courses of action: expansion in the east and conversion to Orthodoxy, or compromise with the West and conversion to Catholicism. The Union of Krewo was something of a middle ground, avoiding political subordination to the Germans, but involving conversion to Latin Christianity. (61)

In 1320, Poland was united with support from the Pope, though German Knights continued to chisel away at Polish territory. In 1333 the reign of Casimir the Great began. It was during his reign that Poland sought to compensate for losses in the West by expanding eastward. This is the origin of “the age-long feud between Poland and Russia.” (62-3) Poland began to replace the Teutonic Knights in the minds of Orthodox East Europeans as the militant imposers of Latin Christianity. (67)

The Byzantine Context

In the 1330s and 40s, a debate took place within the Orthodox Church which culminated, in the late 1340s, in the victory of the “Hesychasts”. Meyendorff concisely summarizes the conflict and its consequences, which were greater centralization of the Church and greater independence from the secular state. Constantinople also became more active in the administration of the Russian metropolitanate. (102, 107)

Meyendorff’s summary would have benefited from at least a suggestion as to how Church policies in Russia would have differed had the Hesychasts not triumphed. Would their opponents have taken a cavalier attitude toward a division of the metropolitanate of Kiev into innumerable conflicting factions? Would there have been a significant contrast in the quantity of Slavic-language translation?

In any case, it is clear that ideologically Hesychasm flourished in Russia. The debate that took place in Constantinople evidently did not take place in Eastern Europe and one surmises that the priorities of Hesychasm were uncontroversial there. Meyendorff writes, “polemical treatises published in the fourteenth century by Palamite theologians are almost totally absent in Russian libraries.” (125)

The acceptance of Hesychast priorities is also reflected in the adoption by the Church in Russia of the Typikon of Jerusalem, which involved striving for uniformity of liturgical practice. (122) And following the Hesychast victory, religious literature began pouring into Russia via the “southern Slavs”, in particular from Bulgaria. In fact, “the ’second South-Slavic’ or ’Byzantine’ influence on Russia has provided enough translations to put Russian monasteries practically on a par with those of Greek-speaking lands.” (119, 125)

Byzantium held a view of Russia as a single nation over which a single metropolitan ought to provide religious administration. In other words, Byzantium predictably resisted what Meyendorff refers to as the “centrifugal” forces, attempting to divide the metropolitanate in a manner analogous to the establishment of the patriarchate in Trnovo, Bulgaria. (34, 87)

Paradoxically, the prestige and influence of the Orthodox Church was expanding even as the Byzantine Empire was being dramatically reduced. Byzantium's import in developments in Eastern Europe is reflected in the frequency with which Constantinople appointed not native Russians but Greeks to occupy the position of Metropolitan of Kiev. (88)

Byzantine Policy in Eastern Europe

In the early fourteenth century, Tver, Moscow, and Lithuania found themselves competing for leadership in Russian territory. Byzantium lent critical support to Moscow in this struggle. This is because its interests were more in harmony with those of Moscow's princes than the princes of Tver or Lithuania. Moscow was a diligent appeaser of the Mongols, and Byzantium considered its interests best served by alliance with the Mongols. In addition, Moscow was deep in Russian territory, cut off from the West. Lithuania was too close to the West; Tver regarded as too rebellious. (156-7)

Constantinople was pragmatic in its approach to the Russian metropolitanate (and much else). When circumstances required it, it divided the ecclesiastical unit. When, in the 1340s, the Mongols began upsetting the delicate balance of power in the Black Sea, a metrolpolitanate of Galicia was established and a metropolitan appointed that appeased both Poland and Lithuania, who had occupied portions of the Galician region. When circumstances permitted, the new metropolitanate was suppressed, the historic one reunited. (159-60)

Frequently backing Moscow, Byzantium sometimes sought to curb Muscovite ambition if it was not in harmony with the preservation of the unity of the metropolitanate. (181) It's support for Moscow was a point of contention among East European leaders. Metropolitan of Kiev Alexis was particularly partial to Moscow's interests, even serving as regent in Moscow beginning in 1359. (185)

In the early 1370s, Byzantium attempted to moderate its "indiscriminate support of Moscow", recognizing it undermined the unity of the metropolitanate. (190) It sought to reconcile the interests of Lithuania, Tver, and Moscow, and succeeded in establishing "what a historian recently called an anti-Tatar alliance...". (198) However, Moscow marched on Tver in 1375 after Tver became involved in a plot that involved Lithuania, the Genoese, and the Mongols. Thus ended the "short-lived attempt of Philotheos to be even-handed in" in the conflict between the two principalities. (198)

In 1375, Bulgarian monk Cyprian was consecrated Metropolitan of Kiev. The following period witnessed the struggle between Byzantium's new desire to unite all Russian lands against the Mongols, and Moscow's parochial inclination to revert to appeasement. Moscow hoped to "use the metropolitanate as an instrument of provincial, Muscovite interests...". (203) While sources are scarce, it is clear the Genoese were politically involved in supporting Moscow's position. (206-7) Complicating matters was the appointment by Andronicus IV of Marcarios as patriarch, "a passive agent of the Genoese...". (208) Constantinople would now be backing Moscow while Cyprian attempted to preserve the metropolitanate.

Cyprian's first battle was with Mityai, the Moscow-backed candidate for metropolitan after the death Alexis, and Pimen, who became metropolitan after the death of Mityai. Cyprian was reduced to metropolitan of Lithuania and Belarus. This changed after the battle of Kulikovo when Grand Prince Dimtrii invited Cyprian to resume overseeing the metropolitanate. Meyendorff speculates that this was reward for having convinced the Polish to refrain from joining the fight at Kulikovo on the side of the Mongols. (225)

In 1382 the Mongols destroyed Moscow. Grand-prince Dmitri again shifted course by resuming a policy of appeasement toward the Mongols and reinstating Pimen as metropolitan, viewed as the legitimate metropolitan by Constantinople and thus the candidate most useful to the Mongols. (227-9) The following decade saw a long struggle between Pimen and Cyprian which ended in the final reinstatement of Cyprian in 1389 as metropolitan of a united metropolitanate by a patriarch that fully backed a policy of ecclesiastical unity. Pimen died.

It was during this period that Lithuania and Poland united. In 1386 the Orthodox Christian king of Lithuania, Jagiello, became Ladislas, Roman-Catholic king of Poland. This was the Union of Krewo, and it removed Lithuania from competition for the heritage of Kievan Rus. (242-3, 245) Cyprian tenaciously maintained relations within Poland and Lithuania despite the Union.

In 1439 the Constantinople-appointed Metropolitan of Kiev, Isidore, signed the Union of Florence. Moscow apprehensively expelled Isidore and elected its own candidate to the metropolitanate. Evidently, Moscow hoped that the Union would ultimately be rejected in Constantinople and Russian ecclesiastical subordination restored. (269) Neither of these things happened.

Meyendorff’s Idiosyncrasies & Conclusion

Meyendorff’s writing contained two curious features which, though they did not deter from the substantive value of the book, I cannot resist noting. First, he uses exclamation points on the following pages: 91; 117; 147; 167; 172; 175; 224; 233; 234; 238; 274. He uses more than one exclamation point on the following pages: 234; 274. In all, Meyendorff uses thirteen exclamation points. (!)

The second grammatical aspect of the book that stood out to me was the unusual quantity of redundancies. I cannot supply a comprehensive accounting, but I can point to the most notable examples. The phrase “and, also,” is used on pages 118 and, also, 145. In addition, he coins the phrases, “indivisibly united” and “emphatically emphasized”, on pages 112 and 118, respectively.

Meyendorff's book is a very rich exploration of Byzantino-Russian relations in the fourteenth century. However, its approach, that of painting the broader East European context of those relations, is overwhelming to the general reader. In particular, without a prior knowledge of Byzantine history, the twists and turns of ecclesiastical policy in what was evidently a tumultuous political period for Constantinople leave the reader searching for continuity. Put another way, the reader feels overwhelmed by the number of variables, and by the pace of their variation.

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