Avvakum
A Russian archpriest who refused Patriarch Nikon’s changes to the rites, was exiled to Siberia, was heard by the patriarchs at the Moscow council and was banished to Pustozersk. His autobiography states the Old Believers’ case.
Avvakum writes that he was born in the village of Grigorovo, in the country of Nizhny Novgorod, the son of a priest named Peter (Avvakum, Life p. 42). When Nikon ordered the three-finger sign of the cross he gathered passages from the Fathers against it (Avvakum, Life pp. 53–54), and he was sent to Siberia with his wife and children (Avvakum, Life pp. 58–59).
Brought back and set before the patriarchs in Moscow, he defended the two-finger sign as the tradition of the Russian saints, would not be reconciled, and was banished to Pustozersk, from where he wrote to the tsar (Avvakum, Life pp. 120–125). See Nikon’s Reforms and the Old Believer Schism.
In the timeline
- 1652 to 1667, firm dateNikon’s Reforms and the Old Believer Schism
Patriarch Nikon of Moscow brings Russian service books and rites into line with Greek usage. The archpriest Avvakum and others refuse the changes as a break with the faith of their fathers, a council of 1667 anathematises those who resist, and the Russian church divides.
Primary sources
The Life of the Archpriest Avvakum, Written by Himself
- Avvakum, Life p. 42archive.org
- Avvakum, Life pp. 53–54archive.org
- Avvakum, Life pp. 58–59archive.org
- Avvakum, Life pp. 120–125archive.org