From Schism to Edinoverie: The Motivation of the Religious Choice of the Old Believers in the Second Half of the XIX — Early XX Century

The study examines the main aspects of the Old Believers' polemic with the Edinoverie in the second half of the XIX — early XX century. The main content of the work is the analysis of the religious motivation of those Old Believers-schismatics who decided to join the Russian OrthodoX Church on the terms of the rules of Metropolitan Platon (Levshin) of Moscow. Among the most important reasons that largely determined the confessional choice of edinovertsy were the possibility of canonical unity and liturgical communion with the Church while preserving the traditional religious way of life, the inferiority of the priestly hierarchy or its complete absence, as well as the deformation of pre-Canonical rites and the lack of sacramental content of worship in Old Believers’ concordances. Archival documents, materials of the OrthodoX Church and church missionary literature of the Russian periodicals were used as sources in the article.