Russian Mystics: Volume 26

by Sergius Bolshakoff, Thomas Merton (Introduction)

Overview

A panorama of Russian Christian spirituality, richly illustrated with passages from formative works.

"The author of this unusual book has given it much too modest a title. It is in fact not only an introduction to the lives, the spirituality and the writings of the great mystics, many of whom are unknown in the West, but it is also at the same time a clear and practical outline of Russian monastic history. The journey which the reader now begins is not without excitement, for it takes him into new territory, the silence of the great Russian forests. . ."
         ~ Thomas Merton, in the Preface

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780879079260
Publisher:	Liturgical Press
Publication date:	05/01/1976
Series:	Cistercian Studies , #26
Edition description:	Illustrated
Pages:	334
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.75(d)
Age Range:	1 - 17 Years

About the Author

Sergius (Serge) Bolshakoff (1901-1990), both the author and the translator of Russian Mystics, was born in Saint Petersburg in 1901 and died in retirement at the Cistercian abbey of Hauterive, Switzerland, in 1990. His life spanned not only the Russian Revolution and the fall of Communism, but also the Christian Ecumenical Movement, in which he took an active role. Dedicated to the cause of Christian unity throughout his life and intimately familiar with the Orthodox, the Roman Catholic, and the Anglican traditions and their monastic expressions, he was personally acquainted with the great leaders of the ecumenical movement: Pope John XXIII, the Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras, Archbishop William Temple of Canterbury, and the abbé Paul Couturier. Exiled from his homeland for most of his life, he lived in England—where he received a doctorate in philosophy from Christ Church, Oxford —or France and traveled and wrote extensively. 

Thomas Merton (1915-1968), Catholic convert, Cistercian monk and hermit, poet, contemplative, social critic, and pioneer of interreligious dialogue, was a seminal figure of twentieth-century American Christianity.

Table of Contents

Contents
Preface by Thomas Merton   ix
Introduction   xix
1   Russian Monasticism to the End of the fifteenth Century   1
2  St Nilus of Sora   18
3  Russian Monasticism in the Sixteenth, Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries   39
4  St Tikhon of Zadonsk   61
5  Archimandrite Paisius Velishkovsky and his Disciples   79
6  Russian Monasticism in the Nineteenth Century   99
7  St Seraphim of Sarov   133
8  Bishop Ignatius Bryanchaninov   144
9  The Startzy of Optino   164
10  Bishop Theophane the Recluse   196
11  Russian Monasticism in the Twentieth Century   222
12  Russian Mystic in the Twentieth Century   244
Conclusion   272
Selected Bibliography   285

Editorial Reviews

[Bolshakoff has written] . . . essentially a history of the great personalities of Russian monasticism—a study of memorable saintly figures whose spiritual lives characteristically varied from their Western counterparts.
Parabola


. . . an introduction to the lives, the spirituality, and the writings of the great Russian mysticsÉit can also serve as an outline of Russian monastic history.
Theology Digest

From the Publisher