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Religion, Ethnicity, and Empire on the Margins of Tsarist Russia

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Religion, Ethnicity, and Empire on the Margins of Tsarist Russia Nicholas B. Breyfogle. Heretics and Colonizers: Forging Russia's Empire in the South Caucasus. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005. xvii + 347 pp. $49.95, cloth, ISBN 978-0-8014-4242-1. Reviewed by Chris J. Chulos Published on H-Gender-MidEast (September, 2006) The dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 frontier regions in Eurasian historical develop‐ and the subsequent liberalization of archives led ment, the characteristics of nineteenth-century to an upsurge in research on religion that was ac‐ popular religiosity and peasant life, and the companied by the nearly miraculous revival of changing parameters of identity" (p. 3). Breyfogle the Orthodox Church after seven decades of athe‐ traces the nineteenth-century history of three "in‐ ist rule. Western scholars and graduate students digenous" sectarian groups--Dukhobors, turned their attention to the neglected topic of Molokans, Subbotniks--who separated from the "lived Orthodoxy," while Russian ethnographers, Orthodox Church in the eighteenth century. At folklorists, and historians of religion sought to de‐ times subjects of shifting tsarist religious and fine the role of the historically dominant faith as colonial power, Dukhobors, Molokans, and Sub‐ inseparable from Russian national identity. A botniks gradually developed a strong sense of in‐ third formidable group of students and scholars dependence that reached a climax in the looked beyond the dominant Orthodox faith and mid-1890s when they used their pacifism to op‐ instead sought peripheral experiences of religious pose Russian authorities. The reign of Tsar and ethnic minorities beyond the main reaches of Alexander I (1801-25) was characterized by tolera‐ the Slavic parts of the empire. Nicholas Brey‐ tion of these sectarian groups as long as they did fogle's Heretics and Colonizers presents a conun‐ not actively proselytize among the Orthodox. Not drum--the use of ethnically Russian sectarians by satisfied with the policy of toleration, while tsarist authorities to facilitate the colonization of searching for a way to resolve the problem of the Caucasian margins of the empire. multiconfessionalism in an empire of a single Breyfogle's main thesis, in an engagingly writ‐ state church, Tsar Nicholas I (1825-55) banished ten book, is that "sectarian migration to Transcau‐ Dukhobors, Molokans, and Subbotniks to the pe‐ casia provides a window onto the growth and in‐ ripheries of the empire in what Breyfogle percep‐ ternal functioning of the tsarist empire, the role of tively calls "unintentional colonialism" (p. 19). The legal basis of internal exile was the Edict of 1830, H-Net Reviews whose main objectives were to weaken religious characteristic. Could ethnically Russian sectarians dissent in the "heartland" by exiling and isolating be considered fully Russian in the imperial sense? sectarians to the Transcaucasian region; engage Ethnicity and religion aside, beginning in the these sectarians in activities beneficial to the em‐ 1880s sectarians themselves refused to fulfill the pire; and initiate the colonization of Transcauca‐ fundamental military service obligation that had sia. Unexpectedly, before the edict could be car‐ been part of Alexander II's attempt to democra‐ ried out, the vast majority of sectarians voluntari‐ tize the army. Pacifist sentiments were deeply em‐ ly chose to resettle in Transcaucasia to join family bedded in Dukhobor belief, but the death of their members who had already moved, to enjoy reli‐ long-time leader, L. V. Kalmykova, in 1886, raised gious freedom far away from Russian political larger issues of the spiritual direction of believers. and religious capitals, to seek economic fortune, Having left no heir nor made any designation for and to follow their curiosity about the new terri‐ succession, Kalmykova's death set off a crisis of tory. Among the unintended consequences of in‐ leadership. The result was a splintering of the ternal exile, the most important in religious terms Dukhobors into two main groups, both claiming a was the spread of sectarian belief along the routes blood connection to Kalmykova and both exhibit‐ leading to Transcaucasia and the transformation ing strongly pacifist tendencies. Their refusal to of group identity. fulfill their military service obligation was ex‐ The middle section of the book adeptly treats pressed in fery burnings of guns and led to harsh aspects of sectarian life in their new "homeland" injunctions by the tsarist authorities and wide‐ and includes an ambitious consideration of their spread instances of physical abuse of Dukhobors. impact on local ecology. Higher death rates among Once agents of the tsarist colonial effort, sectarians, adaptation to local climate as well as Dukhobors became enemies of the state whose animals and insects that harmed their crops, and emigration to Canada in the late 1890s signaled new economic activities specific to the region the miserable failure of an important aspect of (namely nonagricultural activities and commer‐ the tsarist colonial effort. cial livestock) altered the traditional way of life Any book claiming to be about Russian peas‐ sectarians brought with them. By the 1850s, the ants requires a definition of the peasantry and a sectarians were established enough to provide es‐ discussion of typicality of experience, neither of sential secondary support to the Russian army which Breyfogle ventures to give despite the ex‐ during the Crimean War (1853-56) and then again tensive literature on both topics. Following tsarist during the Russo-Turkish War (1877-78). The rela‐ social categorizations, Breyfogle describes his sec‐ tively positive relations between sectarians and tarian subjects as peasants, but certainly these tsarist authorities were encouraged by the liberal‐ peasants were not typical in their levels of litera‐ izing policies of Tsar Alexander II (1855-81), espe‐ cy, entrepreneurial activities, and mobility (re‐ cially as they impacted religious dissidents. The gardless of the often forced nature of their move‐ assassination of Alexander II put an abrupt end to ment). Most Russian peasants not only made sure most progressive tendencies in elite government to give, at least, the appearance of being Orthodox circles as Alexander III (1881-94) embarked on his Christians in good standing, they remained Russification campaigns that were continued by strongly rooted to their natal villages and ven‐ his ill-fated successor, Nicholas II (1894-1917). tured away for brief trips to local markets and Crucial to the relationship were the contested fairs. Many aspects of their peasantness were lost meanings of Russian ethnicity and its dependence once Russian peasants began to engage in non-tra‐ upon Orthodox Christianity as a fundamental ditional labor away from their natal villages. 2 H-Net Reviews More problematic is the implication through‐ early stages of application in Russia. As a result, out Breyfogle's narrative that religious life in Breyfogle misses an opportunity to argue the va‐ nineteenth-century Russia was characterized by lidity of applying the fndings of regional studies conflict with authorities or among group mem‐ to the Russian whole, although he asserts this va‐ bers. Continuities that provide bridges from gen‐ lidity repeatedly. It would have been a far more eration to generation and place to place fall into persuasive response to the prevailing prejudicial categories of sectarians' self-perceptions of being preference given to a few regions (mostly St. Pe‐ colonizers or victims of the imperial machinery. tersburg and Moscow) that frequently urges prej‐ Although these were crucial to the historical de‐ udices against the diversity of experience even velopment and emergence of group identity of the among ethnic Russians within the European part Dukhobors, Breyfogle offers little sense of the of the empire. "normal" everyday "lived" religious experience. These shortcomings, important as they are, Conflict between oral, subordinate, and marginal‐ do not diminish the contribution that Breyfogle ized groups and their literate superiors is appeal‐ makes to the feld of religious history, empire, and ing to historians because it is more likely to be national identity in Russia. Instead, they serve as preserved in historical records than the mundane provocative arguments about the most controver‐ and ordinary way of life that ethnographers have sial aspects of contemporary Russian studies. helped to ossify in museum-like form. But what was Dukhobor religious practice like, and what different roles could women adopt in sectarian groups? Aside from what Breyfogle tells us about essential beliefs that motivated action or about the succession crisis following Kalmykova's death, not much is revealed about praxis or the progres‐ sive attitudes toward women. To assert that sectarian and peripheral expe‐ rience is central to our understanding of empire and national identity in Russia presents an inver‐ sion of the paradigm. Extrapolating from sectari‐ an experience on the imperial margins reveals less than Breyfogle claims about Russianness in the dominant Slavic parts of the empire that was overwhelmingly Orthodox Christian. The sectari‐ an experience on the imperial margins and the use of sectarians by tsarist authorities to colonize geographic peripheries resembles a long-standing tradition of exiling undesirable elements from the political centers. The peripheral experience that Breyfogle describes pays little attention to the Caucasian peoples, societies, and cultures with which transplanted sectarians interacted. And, f‐ nally, Breyfogle does not place his study in the methodological context of regional specialists and microhistorians whose theories are still in the 3 H-Net Reviews If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the network, at https://networks.h-net.org/h-gender-mideast Citation: Chris J. Chulos. Review of Breyfogle, Nicholas B. Heretics and Colonizers: Forging Russia's Empire in the South Caucasus. H-Gender-MidEast, H-Net Reviews. September, 2006. URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=12248 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 4.
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