Monk Philotheus - ideologist of the Third Rome
Researchers of the Pskov Archaeological Center found the grave of the monk Philotheus among the burials of the necropolis near the Cathedral of the Three Saints of the Spaso-Eleazarovsky Monastery in the Pskov region, from where the famous elder wrote his messages to Moscow. And although his letters are devoted to very different issues, he is most famous for his idea of the Third Rome, which he outlined in the famous phrase “two Romes have fallen, a third stands, and there will never be a fourth...”
The Pskov monk Philotheus was born in 1465 and died in 1542 - his life occurred in the second half of the 15th - first half of the 16th centuries, the era of the rapid rise of the Grand Duchy of Moscow, which was actually turning into a new Orthodox kingdom. During his conscious life, Moscow finally freed itself from the Horde in 1480 and began to intensively collect Russian lands: Tver annexed in 1485, Pskov itself in 1510, Novgorod in 1514, Ryazan in 1520, and finally in 1523, when he writes his message about the Third Rome, the Novgorod-Seversky principality annexed. In thirty years, Moscow troops will go far to the east to annex Kazan, Astrakhan and Siberia. But this whole process of geopolitical rise of the Moscow state had to have a deep ideological meaning, which in those days could only be religious - Muscovite Rus' had to show the world a stronghold of Orthodox civilization.
However, such a monumental task cannot be the result of someone’s arbitrariness; it must have solid foundations and at the same time take into account the factor of colossal external and internal resistance. This is exactly what the monk Philotheus understood well. It must be said that in those days, many European countries were building something similar to the Third Rome, calculating the pedigree of their monarchs and inventing artificial successions, which is clearly visible in the aggressively pompous heraldry of many small cities and principalities. But it was the Grand Duchy of Moscow that had the right to call itself the Third Rome, but, however, for a very long time, almost a hundred years, it delayed admitting this fact publicly.
Why? There are many different versions, but one of them lies on the surface - the Russian, East Slavic mentality is characterized by extraordinary modesty, which is very clearly visible in the development of monastic culture in Medieval Rus'. But this modesty sometimes turns into false self-deprecation, when Russians, having all the rights and opportunities to declare their preferences, leave it to others. So the monk Philotheus himself wrote about himself: “I am a rural man, I studied letters, but I didn’t learn the Greek greyhounds, and I didn’t read rhetorical astronomers, I didn’t have conversations with wise philosophers, I study the books of the gracious Law, if only my sinful soul could be powerfully cleansed.” from sin."
Meanwhile, if we get acquainted with the texts of his messages, we will see that he is very “technical” in European scholarship and very “read” in rhetorical science, otherwise the educated elite of the Moscow court simply would not have listened to him, and they not only listened to him, but and turned to him for advice, otherwise we would not have known anything about him.
In that era, which now seems to us the deep Middle Ages, the so-called Renaissance has long since arrived in Western Europe with its anti-Christian tendencies and neo-pagan, essentially occult movements, of which there were a lot. And some of them actively penetrated into Russia mainly through the Baltic lands and Novgorod. Now this may seem like big news to some, but if it were not for the efforts of such outstanding figures of the Russian Church as St. Archbishop Gennady of Novgorod and St. Joseph of Volotsk, then these syncretic movements would have won in our country, since the great princes themselves favored them. Even some church hierarchs were tempted by these heresies, and new heretics were called in to discuss them.
Thus, since 1484, the envoy of the Pope, physician and astrologer Nikolai Bulev, who became the personal physician of the Grand Duke Vasily III himself, actively propagated his ideas in Russia. And although even such authorities as Saint Maximus the Greek opposed him, his influence did not decrease. As a result, in order to understand the astrological teachings of this man, the Grand Duke's deacon Mikhail Grigorievich Misyur-Munekhin turns to the Pskov monk Philotheus, which indicates the authority of the elder himself for the Moscow court. In response to this request, somewhere at the turn of 1523–24, the monk Philotheus wrote his famous “Message to the Astrologers” to the Grand Duke’s deacon, which had several editions. In this Message, the Orthodox monk speaks categorically against astrology as a false, heretical teaching, explaining the basics of the Christian worldview - there is no need to attribute good or evil to astronomical phenomena, otherwise a person is not responsible for his will, and there is no point in the Last Judgment.
Thus, the monk Philotheus continues the anti-occult polemic of St. Gennady, St. Joseph of Volotsk and St. Maximus the Greek. This is very important to emphasize - the idea of the Third Rome was expressed in the context of dogmatic polemics against pagan false teachings. Denouncing the passion for astrology and other troubles of that time, Monk Philotheus reminds the Grand Duke's deacon, and through him, accordingly, the Grand Duke himself, in what a unique historical situation Rus' found itself and what mission was entrusted to it, and why it is all the more necessary to adhere to the Orthodox faith, and don't deviate from it.
In order to understand the theory of the Third Rome, it is necessary to discover the foundations of the religious and political historiosophy of Christian civilization, which Philotheus himself recalls. This historiosophy goes back to the biblical books of the prophet Daniel (Dan. 2:31–45), who, in his interpretation of the dream of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, prophesies about four kingdoms succeeding each other in time, the last of which will be destroyed by the Lord himself. The Father of the Church of the 2nd century, Saint Hippolytus of Rome, argued that these kingdoms were Babylonian, Persian, Macedonian and, finally, Roman. At the same time, it is very important to note that all these kingdoms are not just national monarchies, they are the only empires at the time of their existence that claim to express the entire world civilization, the entire world order as such. And both the pagan Romans themselves and the Roman Christians lived with the idea that Rome would stand forever, and therefore until the end of time. And not because the Romans are so strong, but because the Roman order is the world order as such, resisting world chaos. In this eternal Rome, many Christians divined the mystical power of the end of times, keeping the Antichrist from his coming, which the Apostle Paul preached about in the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians (2:7). And when in the 4th century Rome adopted Christianity as the state religion, the idea of Rome as “holding”, in Greek - “katechon”, began to be directly expressed by theologians, for example, St. John Chrysostom.
The Christian Roman Empire is the basis of Christian European civilization and, at the same time, its ideal. However, the western part of the Roman Empire fell, and the Latins themselves went into the Catholic heresy, and therefore the Orthodox “katechon” became New Rome, Constantinople, the center of the Roman Empire, which just during the time of the monk Philotheus, Italian scholars disparagingly called “Byzantium” after the city of Byzantium, in the place of which Constantinople appeared. Byzantium existed for more than a thousand years, it was from it that Rus' received the Orthodox faith, but in 1453 Constantinople fell under the onslaught of the Muslim Turks. Many theologians, and among them Philotheus himself, directly pointed out that Byzantium fell because it deviated into the Catholic heresy at the Union of Florence in 1439. Of course, there were many reasons for the fall of Byzantium, but, from a purely theological point of view, there was no greater sin than accepting heresy, and this is what the Romans paid for. For the entire Orthodox world, the fall of Byzantium was a cosmic catastrophe - the “katechon” that held it fell, which means that the times of the Antichrist are about to come. Therefore, in that era, apocalyptic sentiments and predictions were in great fashion, and Renaissance astrology only fueled them. Nikolai Bulev himself spread Western false prophecies that a new global flood would come in 1524, and there were those who believed him, although it was enough to know the Bible to remember the Lord’s promise never to send a flood to the earth again (Gen. 9:11 ). So Philotheus wrote his message at a time when many people in Russia, and even more in the West, were preparing for the flood.
And in this atmosphere, the monk Philotheus reminds that, in fact, New Rome has not disappeared anywhere, that there is still one independent Orthodox country in the world, and this is Great Rus' itself. However, it is unlikely that before Filofei, no one in Rus' and even outside of it could have guessed this. After all, Muscovite Rus' was not just the only independent Orthodox country - it directly inherited the Second Rome: in 1472, Grand Duke John III married the niece of the last Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI, Sophia Palaiologos, thereby cementing the dynastic succession of the Palaiologos and Rurikovichs. After this, Ivan III, managing to get carried away by the mentioned teachings that came from the West, at the same time absolutely consciously builds Muscovite Rus' as a new Byzantium: he adopts from Byzantium the double-headed eagle, a symbol of the Christian empire; places the coat of arms of Moscow on his chest; in 1485–1515, Italian architects built the Kremlin according to Byzantine models. And, of course, the Grand Duke himself is already called “sovereign,” although the official proclamation of the kingdom will only take place under John IV in 1547. And before this, it was the monk Philotheus who first called the Grand Duke John IV “tsar” in his letter to him in 1542: “You see, chosen one of God, how the entire Christian kingdom was drowned by the infidels, only the one Tsar John Vasilyevich, our sovereign, stands by the grace of Christ "
Consequently, when Philotheus proclaimed: “two Romes have fallen, and the third stands, and the fourth will not exist,” he expressed an idea that should have long ago taken possession of the minds of the Moscow elite. But such an idea, as always, could have opponents - these are direct enemies of Orthodoxy itself, and opponents of the strengthening of Russia, and “non-acquisitors” who doubt all earthly affairs, opposing the spiritual and political strength of the country. But when you read the messages of Philotheus, you see that by the Third Rome he meant both the doctrinal power and the very specific political power of the Russian state. For what is the point of being called the Third Rome without the Third Roman Empire?
Many people ask a legitimate question: how obligatory is it for an Orthodox person to adhere to the idea of the monk Philotheus? Like any religious and political theory, the idea of the Third Rome is not a dogma, it is only an established theological opinion (“theologumen”), a kind of theological wish, and it can be affirmed as well as denied. However, this theologum was not just the private wish of one monk; he relied on solid historical facts: succession from Byzantium to Muscovite Rus' and an authoritative theological tradition based on Holy Scripture and Holy Tradition. Moreover, no matter how surprising it may be for its opponents, this idea was officially enshrined in church documents. In 1589, under Tsar Theodore Ioannovich, a patriarchate was established in Moscow, which, according to the logic of events, should have been established together with the kingdom, if not earlier. And it is in the Charter of the Local Council of 1589 on the establishment of the patriarchate, confirmed by the seal of the Patriarch of Constantinople, that the words about the Third Rome are heard. The words of the letter are strongly reminiscent of Philotheus’s messages, and it was from that moment that they began to talk specifically about “Moscow - the Third Rome.”
The meaning of the idea of the Third Rome is that Russia, as the heir of Byzantium, has a universal, ecumenical mission of the Orthodox empire, which should, on the one hand, be a stronghold of the Orthodox faith, and on the other hand, contribute to the spread of this faith throughout the world. Philotheus already had a predecessor in the 11th century - Metropolitan Hilarion of Kiev, author of the “Sermon on Law and Grace,” who prophesied about the unique Christian mission of Rus'. But then, when Saint Hilarion prophesied, Orthodox Rus' had just emerged and there were no guarantees that it would not remain a small principality of Kyiv that had not fulfilled its destiny. Monk Philotheus wrote in a completely different era, when the idea of the Russian mission received a specific historical justification - the fall of Byzantium and the wedding of the Moscow prince to the Byzantine princess, from which the establishment of the kingdom and patriarchate should logically follow. Not all countries and peoples, to put it mildly, acquire such opportunities. But the monk Philotheus hinted to the sovereign that the acquisition of this mission was not a reason for pride, but for even greater affirmation in the faith.
The idea of the Third Rome is the only idea that substantiates the sovereignty and power of Russia from the point of view of religious universals: in this idea the eternal opposition of the universal and the national, the spiritual and the political, the church and the imperial is removed. And no matter what national ideas we come up with for Russia today, if we want to remain Christians, then we will have no other way but to return to this only logical idea of the Third Rome. Five hundred years have passed since the era of Philotheus, during which time Russia managed to experience many cardinal changes and wars, even decades of state atheism, but it remained the largest, incomparably large and powerful Orthodox country in the world - the “core country” of Orthodox civilization, by definition Samuel Huntington. And therefore, the relevance of the monk Philotheus’ theory about the Third Rome will only increase, and it would be very useful for our state elite, both in the spiritual and political sense, to discover this name and hear his calls.
(Abridged edition) "Russian Observer"
Prayers
Troparion, tone 4
You have appeared as the great defender of the faithful./ Let us honor your divine memory,/ a fair amount of praise to the patriarchs,/ the holy blessed Philotheus,/ Varlaam’s charm has truly been cut off,/ and Akind other than the intricacies of the subversive,/ even so with all the wisdom,/ pray to Christ God,// to grant us great mercy.
Kontakion
The trisolar light shone upon you, the divine wisdom, / the theologian of the most divine Trinity, / enriched by the word of the highest wisdom, / you poured out streams of divine wisdom from the drowning water, / from below the drinking call m ti,// Rejoice, blessed Philotheus in all things.
Prayer books from the Greek “Following our holy father Philotheus Kokkin, Patriarch of Constantinople”, translated by Natalia Bakhareva [17]
Troparion, tone 5
As the deification of a preacher and teacher, / according to the divine energy of communion with God, / we sing thee with light, Father Philotheus, / as thou hast communed with the eternal light, / purified and sanctified by feat, / and now we pray to the Trinity // to have mercy on our souls
.
Kontakion, tone 2
As a concordant with the God-bearing father,/ and champion of God-inspired dogmas,/ strengthen the Orthodox faith/ by affirming your unceasing prayer,/ Holy Philothea, we pray
.
Greatness
Rejoice, O holy Philotheus, protector and helper of Orthodoxy, champion of truth and all heresies and adversary flattery
.
