The All-Russian Council of 1917–1918

The All-Russian Church Council (Pomestny Sobor) of 1917–1918 was the most comprehensive church council in Russian history. Meeting in Moscow from August 1917 to September 1918, it restored the Patriarchate after over two centuries of Synodal rule and elected Metropolitan Tikhon (Belavin) of Moscow as Patriarch on November 5/18, 1917 — just days after the Bolshevik seizure of power. The council’s ambitious program of church reform was tragically interrupted by the Revolution.

Tradition: Russian Orthodox (foundational for all branches, including ROCOR)

Background and Convocation

The movement for church reform and the restoration of the Patriarchate had been building for decades (see The Synodal Period). The Pre-Conciliar Commission (Predsobornoe Prisutstvie) of 1906 and its successor body, the Pre-Conciliar Conference (Predsobornoe Soveshchanie) of 1912–1916, had prepared extensive materials for a future council, but the tsarist government had repeatedly declined to permit its convocation.

The February Revolution of 1917 and the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II removed this obstacle. The Provisional Government, while maintaining the Synodal structure, appointed a new ober-procurator (V.N. Lvov, later replaced by A.V. Kartashev, who was given the title of Minister of Confessions) and permitted the convocation of the long-awaited council.

The council opened on August 15/28, 1917 (the Feast of the Dormition of the Theotokos), with the Divine Liturgy in the Dormition Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin; its working sessions met chiefly in the Moscow Diocesan House. It sat in three sessions between August 1917 and September 1918 and was attended by bishops, clergy, monastics, and lay delegates — 564 members in total, of whom the laity formed a majority — making it one of the most broadly representative church assemblies in Orthodox history.

(Evtuhov, “The Church in the Russian Revolution: Arguments for and against Restoring the Patriarchate at the Church Council of 1917–1918,” Slavic Review 50, no. 3 [1991]: 497–511; Destivelle, The Moscow Council (1917–1918))

The Restoration of the Patriarchate

The most momentous decision of the council was the restoration of the Patriarchate, which had been suppressed by Peter the Great in 1700/1721.

The Debate

The question of the Patriarchate was hotly debated. Opponents argued that the Synodal system, while flawed, was more conciliar in nature and that a patriarch might become an autocrat. Supporters argued that the Patriarchate was the canonical norm for autocephalous Orthodox churches, that the Synodal system was a Protestant aberration, and that the Church needed strong leadership in the crisis of the Revolution.

The decisive argument came from events outside the council: on October 25/November 7, 1917, the Bolsheviks seized power in Petrograd. As gunfire could be heard in Moscow during street fighting between Bolshevik and anti-Bolshevik forces, the council voted on October 28/November 10, 1917, to restore the Patriarchate. The urgency of the moment transformed what had been a theological debate into an existential necessity: the Church needed a visible head to face the coming storm.

The Election of Patriarch Tikhon

Three candidates were selected by ballot: Archbishop Antonius (Khrapovitsky) of Kharkov (who received the most votes), Archbishop Arseny (Stadnitsky) of Novgorod, and Metropolitan Tikhon (Belavin) of Moscow. Following ancient precedent, the final selection was made by lot (zhrebiy): on November 5/18, 1917, in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, the Elder Alexy (Soloviev) of the Zosimova Hermitage drew one of the three names from an urn before the Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God. The name drawn was that of Metropolitan Tikhon.

Patriarch Tikhon was enthroned on November 21/December 4, 1917, in the Dormition Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin — the historic site of patriarchal enthronements.

Note for ROCOR history: Archbishop Antonius (Khrapovitsky), the runner-up in the patriarchal election, would later become the first head of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR), presiding over the Karlovtsy Synod from 1921.

(Regelson, Tragediia Russkoi Tserkvi; Pospielovsky, The Russian Church Under the Soviet Regime, vol. 1, ch. 1)

The Council’s Reforms

The council addressed a vast range of topics beyond the Patriarchate. Its decisions, though largely never implemented due to the Revolution, represent the most thorough program of Orthodox church reform in modern history:

Governance Structure

  • The Patriarch: Defined as the first among the bishops, with specific canonical prerogatives but not absolute power. He was to govern in council (soborne) with the hierarchy and with the participation of clergy and laity.
  • The Holy Synod: Reconstituted as an advisory body to the Patriarch, composed of bishops, replacing the state-controlled Synod of the Petrine system.
  • The Higher Church Council (Vysshiy Tserkovny Sovet): A new body including bishops, clergy, and laity, responsible for the Church’s administrative and financial affairs.
  • Regular councils: The council mandated that All-Russian Councils be convened regularly, at three-year intervals, with participation of bishops, clergy, and laity (Destivelle, The Moscow Council (1917–1918), appendices).

Parish Governance

  • The council adopted a comprehensive statute on parishes (Prihodskoy Ustav) that gave parishes legal personality and established parish councils (prihodskie sovety) with significant lay participation in administrative (though not sacramental or doctrinal) matters.
  • This parish statute represented a dramatic shift from the Synodal period, when parishes had little self-governance and clergy were essentially state functionaries.

Role of the Laity

  • The council affirmed the active role of the laity in church governance at all levels — parish, diocesan, and national — a principle rooted in the Orthodox understanding of sobornost (conciliarity).
  • Lay delegates participated fully in the council’s deliberations and votes (except on strictly dogmatic or canonical matters reserved to the bishops).

Other Decisions

The council also addressed:

  • Theological education reform
  • Monastic life and its regulation
  • Missionary work
  • Church courts
  • Relations with other Christian confessions
  • The liturgical calendar — debated in January 1918, after the Bolshevik adoption of the Gregorian civil calendar; on January 30, 1918, the council resolved to retain the Julian calendar for ecclesiastical use
  • The canonization of saints, including the canonization of several new saints
  • Church music and singing

(Destivelle, The Moscow Council (1917–1918), with the council’s definitions and statutes in the appendices; Schulz, Das Landeskonzil der Orthodoxen Kirche in Rußland 1917/18 — ein unbekanntes Reformpotential [Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995])

The Bolshevik Revolution and the Council’s Fate

The council continued its work under increasingly dire circumstances. The Bolsheviks’ hostility to the Church became apparent almost immediately:

  • The Decree on the Separation of Church from State and School from Church (January 20/February 2, 1918): This decree stripped the Church of legal personality, confiscated all church property, banned religious instruction in schools, and effectively declared the Church a private organization with no legal rights. The council condemned this decree as an attack on the Church’s freedom.
  • Violence: During the council’s sessions, reports poured in of churches being desecrated, clergy being murdered, and church property being seized. On January 25/February 7, 1918, Metropolitan Vladimir (Bogoyavlensky) of Kiev was murdered by Bolshevik soldiers outside the Kiev Caves Monastery — the first hierarch to be martyred.

Patriarch Tikhon issued an anathema against those who persecuted the Church (January 19/February 1, 1918), though he later moderated his public stance to avoid providing the regime with a pretext for more severe repression.

The council held its final session on September 7/20, 1918. It had not completed its agenda; many topics remained unaddressed or only partially resolved. The council’s decisions were never fully implemented, as the Soviet regime made their execution impossible.

(Pospielovsky, The Russian Church Under the Soviet Regime, vol. 1, chs. 1–2)

Patriarch Tikhon’s Struggles

After the council’s closure, Patriarch Tikhon faced a series of escalating crises:

  • The Civil War (1918–1921): The Church was caught between the Bolsheviks and the White armies. Tikhon sought to maintain the Church’s independence from both sides, declaring that the Church was “above politics.”
  • The famine and church valuables crisis (1921–1922): During the catastrophic famine of 1921–1922, the Soviet government demanded the confiscation of church valuables (gold, silver, gems from icons and liturgical vessels) ostensibly for famine relief. Tikhon permitted the surrender of non-consecrated items but refused to hand over consecrated liturgical vessels. This became the pretext for a massive campaign against the Church (see Soviet Persecution).
  • Arrest and confession (1922–1925): Tikhon was arrested in 1922 and held under house arrest. Under enormous pressure, he issued a statement in 1923 expressing “repentance” for anti-Soviet actions and declaring his loyalty to the Soviet government. The sincerity and voluntariness of this statement have been debated ever since.
  • Death: Patriarch Tikhon died on March 25/April 7, 1925 — the Feast of the Annunciation — in the Bakunin clinic in Moscow. [Disputed: the announced cause of death was heart failure (Pospielovsky, vol. 1); contemporaries immediately suspected poisoning, a version church historians such as Archpriest Vladimir Vorobiev regard as plausible but unproven, since it was never investigated (Vorobiev interview, Pravoslavie.ru, April 2015)]. He was canonized as a Confessor by the Russian Orthodox Church in 1989.

(Roslof, Red Priests: Renovationism, Russian Orthodoxy, and Revolution, ch. 2; Pospielovsky, The Russian Church Under the Soviet Regime, vol. 1, chs. 2–4)

Legacy and Significance

The All-Russian Council of 1917–1918 remains a landmark in Russian church history for several reasons:

  1. Canonical restoration: It restored the canonical form of church governance (the Patriarchate) after the aberration of the Synodal period.
  2. Conciliar principle: It demonstrated the Orthodox principle of conciliarity (sobornost) in action, with meaningful participation of bishops, clergy, and laity.
  3. Comprehensive vision: Its decisions, taken as a whole, represent the most thorough Orthodox attempt at comprehensive church reform in the modern era.
  4. Tragically unrealized: The council’s program was never implemented, a fact that gives its documents a wistful, prophetic quality — a vision of what the Russian Church might have become had the Revolution not intervened.
  5. Foundational for ROCOR: The council’s restoration of the Patriarchate and its decisions on church governance provided the canonical framework within which both the Moscow Patriarchate and ROCOR understood their respective positions during the years of separation.

See Also

References

  • Destivelle, Hyacinthe, O.P. The Moscow Council (1917–1918): The Creation of the Conciliar Institutions of the Russian Orthodox Church. Edited by Michael Plekon and Vitaly Permiakov. Translated by Jerry Ryan. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2015.
  • Evtuhov, Catherine. “The Church in the Russian Revolution: Arguments for and against Restoring the Patriarchate at the Church Council of 1917–1918.” Slavic Review 50, no. 3 (1991): 497–511.
  • Pospielovsky, Dimitry V. The Russian Church Under the Soviet Regime, 1917–1982. 2 vols. Crestwood, NY: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1984.
  • Regelson, Lev. Tragediia Russkoi Tserkvi, 1917–1945 [The Tragedy of the Russian Church]. Paris: YMCA-Press, 1977. (In Russian.)
  • Roslof, Edward E. Red Priests: Renovationism, Russian Orthodoxy, and Revolution, 1905–1946. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2002.
  • Schulz, Günther. Das Landeskonzil der Orthodoxen Kirche in Rußland 1917/18 — ein unbekanntes Reformpotential. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995.
  • Vorobiev, Vladimir, Archpriest. “Patriarch Tikhon Is One of the Greatest Universal Saints” (interview). Pravoslavie.ru, April 2015.
  • Ware, Timothy (Kallistos). The Orthodox Church. New edition. London: Penguin, 1993.