Villain or Victim? The Faith-Based Sobriety of the Factory Worker Petr Terekhovich in Soviet Russia, 1925–1929

Abstract

Any meaningful attempt to understand how the Soviet system evolved and ‘worked’ must take into account not only those who conformed ideologically, but also those who actively embraced alternative frameworks of meaning. This paper centres on the experience of a young factory worker, Petr Terekhovich, who, in the mid-1920s, abandoned ‘godlessness’ to devote himself to the charismatic lay preacher, Brother Ioann Churikov, and to a highly ascetic, scripture-based form of sobriety. Drawing largely on archival materials, it seeks to understand Terekhovich's story as a case study of religious struggle, belief and activism, an account of persecution by atheist officials, and ultimately, a narrative of resistance, spiritual freedom and self-determination under Soviet rule.

Notes

Research for this essay was conducted with the generous support of a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any view, findings, and conclusions expressed here are solely the author's and do not necessarily reflect those of the NEH.

¹ Churikov's followers were referred to alternately as ‘churikovtsy’ or ‘trezvenniki’ (teetotalers or ‘sober ones’). I will refer to them in this paper by the latter term, as it was the more common.

² Unfortunately, it remains unclear how many physical copies were produced, or how widely they circulated. My own copy was given to me by Sergei Palamodov, a member of the trezvenniki community in St Petersburg today; a copy has also been archived by the Museum of Religion in St Petersburg, in a file of materials also donated by contemporary followers of Brother Ioann. A copy can now be found in Gosudarstvennyi Muzei Istorii Religii (hereafter GMIR), Koll. I, op. 4, ‘materialy o trezvennikov’, d. 47.

³ In the many decades since Churikov's death in the early 1930s, an irreconcilable split has developed among his followers between those who revere him as a righteous believer, and those who consider him to be the Second Coming. The community of trezvenniki known today in St Petersburg as the ‘Pravoslavnoe obshchestvo khristiyan trezvennikov Ioanna Churikova’ (Society of Orthodox Christian Followers of Brother Ioann) has experienced a measure of reconciliation with the Russian Orthodox Church, with the help of local clergy—especially Father Aleksandr Sorokin, and the late Metropolitan Ioann (Synchev). The other group, known as the ‘Obshchestvo dukhovnykh khristiyan-trezvennikov Brattsa Ioanna Churikova’, is centred in Vyritsa, and has no ties to the Russian Orthodox Church. On the split, see Saperova (2010).

⁴ Recent studies of Churikov before the revolution (in English) include those by McKee (1999, pp. 212–33), Clay (2001, pp. 38–69), Steinberg (2002, pp. 228–30) and Herrlinger (2007, ch. 5).

⁵ No reliable figures exist for the total number of trezvenniki. Newspaper accounts from 1916 suggest as many as 100,000 (Abramov 1916, p. 2). However, Churikov himself alleged in 1918 that he had some 50,000 followers (GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 278, l. 63). By the end of the 1920s, ‘godless’ activists estimated 3,000–4,000 (Elyashevich 1928, p. 71). According to the trezvennik, I. Smolev, so many people attended Churikov's besedy in the mid-1920s that the room in the main building of the commune at Vyritsa could not hold everyone, so in the summer, some followers would listen through the windows, and in the winter, they would listen by radio (Smolev 1958, p. 6). On the size of the crowds also see Marovskii (1924).

⁶ These are all common themes in his public besedy. The texts of many of Churikov's besedy from 1910–1912 were recorded by the former Tolstoyan Ivan Tregubov, and can be accessed at: http://trezvograd.ru/besedi/Contents.htm, accessed 21 July 2013; and http://trezvost.com/Conversations/Contents.htm#1911, accessed 21 July 2013. See also, Afanas'ev (1995).

⁷ For other testimonies by trezvenniki, see Palamodov (2011). See also GMIR, f. 13 [Ivan Tregubov], op. 1, d. 349; and f. 2, op. 17, d. 363; and the pamphlet, Dukhovnyi partizan, published in December 1911. The full title translates as ‘The Spiritual Partisan against Debauchery and Drunkenness ([and] Defender of Christianity), Brother Ioann Alekseevich Churikov: a Response to the Hieromonakh by Davydov and Frolov’. It has been recently republished by Churikov's present-day followers in St Petersburg, available at: http://www.trezvograd.ru/partizan.htm, accessed 21 July 2013.

⁸ The fullest statement of the Orthodox Church's response to Churikov and the trezvenniki can be found in Veniamin (1911).

⁹ For an extensive discussion of the pre-revolutionary debates among members of the medical and psychiatric community, see Tregubov (1912).

¹⁰ It is hard not to read Ermolova's impressions as the ethical equivalent of those who, during the Soviet period, received glory because of their devotion ‘to the people’.

¹¹ Here I am paraphrasing an observation by Jochen Hellbeck with respect to the relationship of some Soviet citizens to the ‘totalitarian’ state (Hellbeck 2000, p. 234).

¹² See O. Bogdanova's testimony in Zhurnal Bich (1926), a copy of which can be found in GMIR, f. 2, op. 17, d. 363, l. 16ob.

¹³ See Dmitriev (1966).

¹⁴ The main founder of a trezvennik youth group in Petrograd in 1919, Ivan Smolev, later wrote about how the young trezvenniki would perform their obligations to the state as a brigade just like the komsomoltsy and evangelical Christians did—collectively hauling firewood, unloading barges, cleaning streets—but that whereas the komsomol sang songs, the trezvenniki sang religious poems.

¹⁵ There is no evidence that Terekhovich ever had any relationship with the remaining Orthodox clergy. Although Churikov might have briefly allied with members of the Living Church which tried to bridge the differences between Orthodoxy and Soviet socialism, he soon split with it, in part because of its refusal to eliminate wine from the communion rite.

¹⁶ GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 278, l. 55; letter dated 1 August 1929.

¹⁷ GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 367, l. 58ob.

¹⁸ GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 363, l. 24.

¹⁹ One of the main charges was that during their attempts to heal others of alcoholism, the ‘guilty’ had administered sugar, incense and lamp oil, which amounted to ‘criminal magic/witchcraft’. GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 278, l. 38ob.

²⁰ GMIR, f. 13, op. 17, d. 88, l. 3.

²¹ GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 278, l. 23; also see ll. 46–48.

²² GMIR, f. 2 [‘Sekta trezvenniki’ Bonch-Bruevich V.D.], op. 17, d. 84, l. 4.

²³ The shift corresponds with the stepping up of temperance efforts under the banner of the newly founded ‘Society for the Struggle against Alcoholism’, which had the support of not only the medical community, but also military leaders (such as Nikolai Podvoisky and Marshal Budenny) and artists like Mayakovsky.

²⁴ Other anti-Churikovtsy publications at the time included Petrov (1929).

²⁵ GMIR, Koll. I, op. 4, d. 49.

²⁶ GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 367, l. 58ob.

²⁷ See, for example, Rostovtseva (1928, p. 5) and Kii (1929, p. 6).

²⁸ Tsentral'nyi Gosudarstvennyi istoricheskii arkhiv v S. Peterburge (hereafter TsGIA SPb), f. 680, op. 4, d. 6. Although the Leningrad Circuit Court first found in favour of Brovina in May 1928, Churikov's obshchestvo appealed to a higher court, which overturned the first decision on the basis of inconclusive evidence.

²⁹ ‘Dvadtsat’ “Apostolov” ozhidayut bozh'ego tsarstva', Severnaya pravda, 6 September 1929, p. 4.

³⁰ Some 1,200 trezvenniki signed a petition demanding Churikov's release and another 1,800 signed a second. GMIR, f. 13, op. 17, d. 367, l. 50–50ob.

³¹ GMIR, f. 13, op. 1, d. 278, l. 55.

³² See Smolev (1958, p. 23).