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Cultural Reforms in Peter I's System of Transformations

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Cultural Reforms in Peter I's System of Transformations CULTURAL REFORMS IN PETER I’S SYSTEM OF TRANSFORMATIONS CULTURAL REFORMS IN PETER I’S SYSTEM OF TRANSFORMATIONS V. M. Zhivov 1. CULTURAL REFORMS AND SEMIOTIC PROPAGANDA The Petrine reforms brought about a break in Russian cultural and political consciousness that was no less acute than those in the state structure and in economics. The goal of the Petrine reforms was not only the creation of a new army and navy, a new state administrative apparatus and new industries, but also the creation of a new culture; cultural reforms took up no less a place in Peter’s activities than reforms of a more obviously pragmatic character. The change in clothing, shaving of beards, renaming of state offi ces, instituting of “assemblies” (assamblei), and the constant production of various kinds of public spectacles were not accidental byproducts of the era of transformations, but a most essential part of state policy aimed at reeducating society and establishing a new conception of state power. It was not by chance that Feofan Prokopovich wrote in the “Truth of the Monarch’s Will,” an apologia for Petrine autocracy and the reforms, that “A sovereign monarch can lawfully demand of the people not only whatever is necessary for the obvious good of his country, but indeed whatever he pleases, provided that it is not harmful to the people and not contrary to the will of God. The foundation of this power, as stated above, is the fact that the people has renounced its right to decide the common weal in his favor, and has conferred on him all power over itself: this includes civil and ecclesiastical ordinances of every kind, changes in customs and dress, house-building, procedures and ceremonies at feasts, weddings, funerals, etc., etc., etc.”1 Setting forth the theory of the social contract after Hobbes and Pufendorf,2 Prokopovich specially underscores the monarch’s right to make cultural (semiotic) innovations. But European theoreticians of absolutism had no need to make such declarations, and comparing their arguments to those of — 191 — V. M. ZHIVOV Prokopovich indicates that cultural transformation was assigned a unique role in the Petrine transformation that had no direct analogies in Europe. Peter saw a guarantee of the new order’s staying power precisely in cultural transformation. The new culture was negatively juxtaposed to the old. From Peter’s perspective, traditional culture was considered ignorant, barbarous, and even as “idolatry.”3 From the perspective of traditional culture, the new culture appeared to be demonic, the kingdom of the Antichrist, and the creators of the new culture were unquestionably aware of this.4 In the context of this opposition, propaganda took on prime importance as a basic way to establish the new culture. This propaganda was called upon to fulfi ll two purposes: to inculcate new cultural values, and to discredit the old ones. This propaganda had to reach the masses, and this is what motivated the predilection for grand ritual and spectacle; in the framework of traditional culture, only this kind of propaganda could be eff ective and infl uence mass psychology. Other forms of propaganda, say, distributing political pamphlets, that were so signifi cant for the England of Peter’s day, could only be of peripheral importance in Russia. As far as we can judge from the surviving evidence, neither Stefan Iavorskii’s “Speech on the Antichrist” nor Feofan Prokopovich’s “Truth of the Monarch’s Will” and “Investigation of the Pontifex” had a comparably broad resonance either in the capitals or the provinces. Public ceremonies were a diff erent matter. Insofar as traditional culture had a most intimate connection with rituals,5 innovations in this area were a crucial component of cultural transformation, transmitting all of the basic ideas of the cultural reform. It was precisely for this reason that Prokopovich emphasized the emperor’s right to introduce changes in this sphere. At the same time, in the framework of traditional culture ritual had al- ways been tied to religious values. Ritual and faith were completely allied. In pre-Petrine Rus ̀ Orthodoxy was unthinkable without the liturgy, and popular magic—without corresponding magical rites. Moreover, when taking part in rituals, a Russian not only manifested his or her faith, but also revealed its content, so that participation in an altered ritual necessarily meant a change in faith itself (the clearest and most famous example of this process was the schism). The new rituals therefore gave birth to a new faith, and the new order propagandized by the new rituals became fi xed not so much via new convictions as by practice (“conversion” in the etymological sense), even if through coercion. Choice between the new and old culture became something of a religious decision that obligated a person for his or her whole life. Becoming part of the new culture served as a magical rite of denying traditional spiritual values and accepting totally opposite new ones. This is precisely how Prince — 192 — CULTURAL REFORMS IN PETER I’S SYSTEM OF TRANSFORMATIONS I. I. Khovanskii looked upon his induction into Peter’s All-Jesting Council, for example: They took me to Preobrazhenskoe and in the central court Nikita Zotov consecrated me as metropolitan, and they gave me a panchart (stolbets) for renunciation, and I repudiated [my faith] in accordance with this writing, and during this renunciation they asked me ‘Do you drink?’ instead of ‘Do you have faith?’ And by this renunciation I ruined myself more than by shaving my beard, because I did not protest, and it would have been better for me to have accepted a crown of martyrdom than to have made this renunciation.6 Thus, accepting Petrine cultural innovations had the character of entering a new faith, and obliged a person to have a positive attitude toward an entire complex of changes, from the cult of Peter himself to the reorganization of the state administration. Acceptance of Petrine culture thus turned out to be a pledge of loyalty to all of the changes being implemented, something like that “spilt blood” which Peter Verkhovenskii (of Dostoevskii’s Demons) used to cement his cell of fi ve “into one knot.” It is indicative that F. I. Strahlenberg, who listed all of the accusations that Peter’s opponents brought against him, began with his creation of the All-Jesting Council and its blasphemous ceremonies; according to Strahlenberg, it was precisely these ceremonies that served as Peter’s original means of threatening Russian society, forcing the young tsar’s more reasonable advisors to be silent and paving the way for the violent changes that were destroying the country: “People in the city of Moscow were so terrifi ed that no one dared to say anything openly critical of the tsar or his favorites.”7 This religious and semiotic aspect is extremely important for under- standing the nature of the “Europeanization” which is associated with Peter’s transformative program. Of course, the European customs and institutions that were being transferred to Russia had no organic pre-history there, and this alone fundamentally distinguished them from their European coun- terparts. Yet the means by which Peter inculcated European civilization involved something more. When, for example, the Great Embassy arrived in Leiden in April, 1698,8 one of the places that the tsar and his cohort chose to visit was an anatomical theater; when the tsar’s companions were unable to hide their disgust at the spectacle of a dissected human body, the tsar forced them to rip the corpse’s muscles with their teeth.9 This was in punishment for their “unenlightened” feelings and to make them appreciate that they had to assimilate European practices whether they liked it or not. And when he returned to Moscow Peter created an anatomical theater there as well. As — 193 — V. M. ZHIVOV Korb reports, on February 7, 1699, “Dr. Zoppot began to practice anatomy in the presence of the Czar and a great number of Boyars, who, to their disgust, were coerced by the Czar’s commands.”10 This particular example clearly shows that Europeanization bore a pri- marily semiotic function; the anatomical theater was clearly of symbolic rather than pragmatic value. Peter demanded that his subjects overcome themselves, that they demonstratively reject the ways of their fathers and grandfathers and accept European practices as rituals of a new faith; understandably, over coming fear and disgust were natural components of a ritual of initiation, and the anatomical theater was perfect for this role. To a greater or lesser ex tent, elements of this kind were also present in the tsar’s other European innovations, and comprise exactly that which diff erentiated Peter’s measures from other European models. They also constitute the specifi c nature of Petrine Europeanization when compared to the European infl uences under previous tsars. The semiotic (ritual) propaganda of the new Petrine culture was imple- mented in various forms. Church rituals underwent certain changes, various civil ceremonies that came together as a special “civil cult” took on a systematic mass character, and rituals and spectacles of a parodic, blasphemous type became widespread. Each of these innovations was motivated by particular political and cultural ideas. Obviously, each of these forms of semiotic activity was adapted to express diff erent particular ideas, but in view of the fact that all of these ideas were part of a single larger complex, all of these spheres of semiotic activity were interwoven; the church cult overlapped with the civil and civil ceremonies carried over into the parodic and blasphemous. A survey of all of these forms of semiotic innovation, however superfi cial, will allow us to clarify this larger complex, and therefore the content of Peter’s cultural reform.
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