Middle Assumption Monastery

There are several versions of the founding date of the monastery.

According to researchers of the Saratov Old Believers Ivan Dobrotvorsky and Nikolai Sokolov , with reference to the documents that were not preserved to our days in the archives of the brotherhood of the Holy Cross, the foundation of the monastery was 1783 ^[1] . According to information from the collection of works of the former Saratov bishop Jacob (Vecherkov) “On the split of the Beglopopovitsky sect in the Saratov province” the monastery was founded in 1782 ^[1] .

However, according to the superior of the nun Feofania, preserved in the inventory of the monastery, compiled at the request of the authorities in 1827, the monastery began in 1762 and was released from Poland by the nun Anfisa "at the end of the settlement Mechetna , on its land" ^{[2] [3]} . Originally the monastery was called by the name of the founder Anfisin monastery.

The initial place chosen for the monastery turned out to be unfortunate: with each strong spill of Irgiz, the chosen territory was almost completely flooded ^[4] . In 1786, with the permission of Ivan Ilyich Ogarev, director of the Saratov economy, the hermitage was transferred to the so-called Gorshenin Luka, a small but beautiful tract on the bank of Irgiz, one and a half versts from Mechetnaya Sloboda ^[4] , in the area of ​​the modern village of Davydovka ^[5] . Unlike the neighboring Pokrovsky nunnery, the Anfisin skete was built up in disarray: a bunch of small wooden houses scattered without any order over the territory that was not fenced off with a fence, a fence, or an earthen rampart. For a long time, residents of the monastery sent daily worship in the so-called “cross” cell of the prioress, and only in 1796 a chapel was built in the name of the Dormition of the Mother of God . From that time on the feast day and the monastery became known as the Assumption Monastery ^[4] .

By this time, the Irgiz monasteries found all-Russian fame and became one of the leading centers of Old Believers in the country. And although the women's monasteries did not become as remarkable for the Old Believers' spiritual life ^[2] , but they also received a lot from the fame and income of the monasteries.

In 1816 there was a fire, and the monastery was completely burned out. Governor A. Panchulidzev , who was very patronizing about the Old Believers, did not find any obstacles for his rebuilding, and the nuns had enough money to build a new skete on the lands of the Middle Nikolsky monastery , two versts from it in a year ^[6] .

Nuns and Belitsa lived in the monastery, and there were many schemnits among the nuns. Irgiz women's monasteries, unlike men's, did not adhere to the common-principle. The monastery consisted of several communities connected by the unity of the monastic statute and the subordination to the superior. Each such community was headed by a well-to-do nun who kept the poorer nuns and dwellers as evangelical daughters. The members of such a community depended solely on such an evangelical mother and abbess, not being in any way connected with the evangelical mothers of other communities ^[7] .

Every newly-minted woman had to choose an evangelical mother for herself and pay a certain amount, usually not less than 100 rubles, in favor of the community and the shearing community. If the evangelical mother did not have free premises in the cells, then a new one was built at the expense of the newcomer. Only large cross cells of the Mother Superior and the Chapel were considered to be general monastic. Each cell had a yard with outbuildings, some also had a garden ^[7] .

From the number of communal mothers 12 cathedrals were selected. Usually among those who had more evangelical daughters, this served as a kind of recommendation of their dignity. The number of evangelical daughters and novices for each communal mother ranged from 2-3 to 20, and the superior had most of them ^[7] . According to the surviving information from the Cathedral Old Monastery, the largest number of evangelical daughters, 25, was Alexandra of the Urals, who lived 25 years in the monastery. The rest of the number of Evangelical daughters was less: 10 in Tarsila Sapozhnikova, 15 in Eupraxia Don and Anfisa Black, 20 in Dostifei Gavdeina, Manefa Don and Elizabeth Ural ^[8] .

In relation to her gospel daughters, the communal mother enjoyed the right of first punishment: she could bow down, give “hard work” to obedience, for major crimes, in agreement with the prioress, she could send out of the monastery altogether. Since there was no common meal, the communal mother had to take care of the food of her community. The source of funds was personal labor and alms ^[8] .

Without their land, the wanderers could not engage in farming, so they turned to horticulture, which they were able to establish very well. Under an agreement with the Nikolsky Monastery, the skitters used 17 acres of land for their gardens, and the collected vegetables, herbs and melons were partly supplied to the monastery in exchange for bread and wood for heating and buildings ^{[8] [9]} .

Nuns and Belitsa lived in the monastery, and there were many schemnits among the nuns.

The nun’s clothing was a sundress, over which was put on something like a robe with a small stand-up collar of black matter. At the neck, a round casting was tied, like in monks, with a red vypushkoy on the board or one color with a cape - the so-called mantle. In addition, a round cap was worn without a band, sewn of fine black matter. Behind it was connected with a round one, shorter than the first one, with a black-edged collar, a bib was attached to it, in the form of a secular shirtfront without fees. All these three connected things were called "apostolic" and relied on to wear constantly. In addition, on the heads of the nuns were black scarves, tied under the chin, the edges of the scarf, walking on the shoulders and around the neck, on a round collar, should have been dismissed. Faces were covered with black covered with so-called "basting." Belitsy adhered to the same color and covered their heads with black or dark scarves ^[10]

Church services in the monastery were somewhat different orders than in the male. Hieromonks and priests sent from monasteries performed worship only on major holidays. On ordinary days, they were replaced by the ushers, who took turns sending services at the chapel. In this case, the gospel was always read by the superior. On weekdays, communal mothers often sent services in their "cross" cells. There were no liturgies for the absence of an altar in the chapel ^[11] .

Memorial services and commemorations of the departed were made by the nuns themselves, often they also buried their sisters without priests who buried the dead in absentia ^[11] .

After Anfisa in 1803–1806, the monastery was ruled by the nun-monk Anisya, the mother of a wealthy merchant Peter Sapozhnikov, later buried in the Middle Nikolsky monastery , and her son erected a marble monument above her grave that cost more than 30 thousand rubles ^[12] .

She was replaced by nun-schimnitsa Gavdel. Later, the monastery was managed by nun Kapitolina (who had evangelical daughters), nun-shimnitsa Alevtina Don (25 evangelical daughters), nun-shimnitsa Kapitolina Don and Feofania Ural (30 Evangelical daughters each) ^[13] .

One of the most difficult and unresolved issues in historiography is the question of the morality of the inhabitants of the Old Believer monastery. In part of the sources, it is noted that the life of the nuns of the monastery was far from ascetic , that, contrary to the monastic status, there was both drunkenness and depravity in the monastery.

Hieromonk Arseny wrote ^[14] : “Illegal relations of monks with nuns and their usual stay together did not put them in a shameful life; all sorts of holidays nuns and novices are in the monastery under the pretext of a pilgrim. And they allow themselves to spend the night in common cells with monks, and kliroshanki - from the klirosskis and enjoyed drinking in unreasonable degrees, and then the monks with the klirozskie, on the contrary, in a convent without any gap, day and night. Many monks were married and had their wives in monasteries. ”

Bishop Jacob (Vecherkov) in her memorandum to the Synod cited numerous examples of violation of monastic vows: the nun of the Glafira monastery was accused in connection with the monk Ephraim, with whom she lived, the nun Sevastyana was accused in connection with the monk Josaph ^[15] and so on.

At the same time, the investigation carried out by Saratov governor A. B. Golitsyn after an anonymous letter in which the abbot of the Middle Nikolsky monastery Tarasiy was accused of “lusting contact” with the prioress of the Assumption monastery Feofania ended in nothing, without finding evidence of this ^[16]

Already at the end of the 19th century, there was an obvious non-neutrality of publications with similar facts, in particular, the articles of Ivan Dobrotvorsky , which became the primary basis for many such statements ^[17] :

“Tendency is their main drawback. A preconceived idea comes through on every page, shines through like a new patch on old clothes. To the author, no matter what, I want to prove that in the schism - everything was bad, in Orthodoxy it was good. ”

Modern scholars of the history of the Irgiz monasteries mainly consider the information about the numerous sins of monks and nuns to be an exaggeration and part of the anti-schismatic propaganda, noting that information about them appears only in late 19th century sources, published by the Synodal Church ^[18] , and not supported by archival documents ^[19] .

In 1827, according to the demands of the provincial authorities, the abbess of the monastery was compiled. According to it, in the monastery there were 89 yards, enclosed with wattle fence and planks, in which there were 145 wooden cells covered with wood and straw. The monastery occupied a territory of five dessiatines, and vegetable gardens and melon fields occupied even twenty dessiatines. The chapel is wooden, with a bell tower of seven bells, inside the icons and decorations worth about fifteen thousand rubles ^[20] . About 600 nuns and novices lived in the monastery ^[5] .

From about this time, the state, provincial and church authorities began a new phase of persecution of the Old Believers, primarily at the Irgiz monasteries , as their main spiritual center. The Assumption Monastery, among others, was repeatedly asked to go into common faith , but the nuns always refused.

The governor of Saratov, Prince A. B. Golitsyn, in a report in 1828 wrote that the Irgiz women's monasteries have nothing like monasteries, everywhere "apparently perfect disgrace." He counted 128 monks in the monastery and 174 Belitsa, and noted that such a population, combined with free access to any cell, “clearly forms the extent to which depravity is allowed in these habitats — depravity, only intolerable in civilian condition and entailing destructive consequences ” ^[21] . However, the further rule of Golitsyn had no effect on the monastery.

But already in 1833, the Ministry of the Interior sent an official to Irgiz for special assignments from Arsenyev to work out a plan for the destruction of the split here. Arsenyev’s proposal included the complete abolition of nunneries ^[22] . However, the province at that time was headed by F. Pereverzev , quite condescending about the Old Believers and again the threat passed the monastery. With the permission of the authorities, the monastery is even surrounded by a wooden fence ^[23] .

But the next governor, Alexei Stepanov, again launched an attack on the monastery. Traveling around the province entrusted to him, he drove into the Assumption Monastery, where he again offered to go into common faith . And again the nuns refused. Soon the governor ordered to expel from the monastery all those who lived in it with expired and invalid passports . The abbess Feofania refused to execute the order, stating that she could not force those who did not want to leave. To which the governor sent the mayor, who in June 1836 removed similar residents of the monastery by force. Feofania immediately resigned from the position of superior of the “due to illness”. At the request of the governor, a new superior was chosen, who, however, did not want to rule. The nuns had to beg Theophania to return, to which she eventually agreed ^[24] .

But soon a decree was issued by the committee of schismatics to convert the Middle-Nikolsky Monastery into a single faith, one of the points of which was: “women who arbitrarily settled on the land of the Middle Monastery and called their dwellings a convent to be transferred to Pokrovsky Monastery, leaving them to sell and sell houses during 1837 " ^[25] . The emperor approved the decree, and the governor immediately began to implement it, but the nuns refused to allow the authorities to visit the chapel ^[26] .

The authorities, engaged in the unfolding situation around the Middle Nikolsky Monastery, left this resistance without consequences, and when the situation was resolved, the frightened nuns decided to submit. The nuns, who lived in the monastery on passports, were supposed to go to permanent residence, and those assigned to the monastery after the audit moved to the Pokrovsky monastery , there were only 13 of these people ^[27] . The cells were to be dismantled and sold before 1838 ^[28] . The priest Derzhavin and the monastic of the faith Ignatius, sent by the new priest of the Nikolsky monastery Zosima, took icons, books and utensils from the chapel, and sealed the chapel itself ^[28] .

The sale of the cells was carried out with numerous violations: the police evaluated them cheaply and sold them at the lowest price, and the buyers were Orthodox priests from neighboring villages. Archimandrite Zosima, stating that 11 cells were built at the expense of Nikolsky Monastery, presented the rights to them and received them without hindrance. Feofania appealed to the new governor Bibikov , but it took a long time before justice was restored to any degree.

• Dobrotvorsky, I.M. Historical information about the Irgiz pomnostaobryadryadcheskih monasteries before turning them to common faith // Orthodox interlocutor : journal. - 1857.
• Kargin, Yu. Yu. Irgiz monasteries // Balakovo Folk Encyclopedia. - Privolzhsk. publishing house, 2007.
• Lebedev, A. A. To the history of Old Believers on Irgiz. - M. , 1911.
• Monasteries of the Samara Region (XVI — XX centuries): Handbook / Comp.: BC Block, K.A. Katrenko. - Samara : Samara House of Press, 2002. - p. 100. - 216 p. - 1000 copies - ISBN 5-7350-0350-X .
• Naumlyuk, A. A. Old Believers' Center on Irgiz: appearance, activity, relationship with the authorities. - Saratov: Scientific book, 2009. - 100 p. - 400 copies - ISBN 978-5-9758-1147-9 .
• Соколов, Н. С. Раскол в Саратовском крае. Опыт исследования по неизданным материалам. — Саратов , 1888. — С. 86. — 480 с.