Gail-Lenhoff - Christian and Pagan Strata in the East Slavic Cult of St. Nicholas - The Slavic and East European Journal, Vol. 28, No. 2 (Summer, 1984), Pp. 147-163

8/7/2019 Gail-Lenhoff - Christian and Pagan Strata in the East Slavic Cult of St. Nicholas - The Slavic and East European Jour

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American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages

Christian and Pagan Strata in the East Slavic Cult of St. Nicholas: Polemical Notes on BorisUspenskij's Filologieskie Razyskanija v Oblasti Slavjanskix DrevnostejAuthor(s): Gail LenhoffSource: The Slavic and East European Journal, Vol. 28, No. 2 (Summer, 1984), pp. 147-163Published by: American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European LanguagesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/307702 .Accessed: 22/03/2011 13:19

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CHRISTIAN AND PAGAN STRATA IN THEEAST SLAVIC CULT OF ST. NICHOLAS:POLEMICAL NOTES ON BORIS USPENSKIJ'SFILOL GICESKIERAZYSKANIJAV OBLASTISLAVJANSKIXDREVNOSTEJGail Lenhoff, University of Pennsylvania

For some time now we have known that the richness, as well as the com-plexity of Slavic folk culture must be attributed, in part, to the phenom-enon of dvoeverie, the commingling of pagan and Christian traditions.Forays into one sphere sooner or later lead to the other. Such is the under-lying premise of Boris Uspenskij's philological investigation of St. Nicho-las' veneration among the Eastern Slavs.' The ultimate object of the studyis to uncover the pagan elements that characterize the saint's Slavic image,to divest St. Nicholas of Christian overlays and arrive at a pagan culturalstratum. Two initial chapters isolate instances of Christian contamination,documenting an alleged tendency to confuse St. Nicholas with figures suchas God, Christ, or the Archangel Michael. The final chapter, and by far thelongest, traces a network of pagan contaminations, centering on the con-nections between the cult of St. Nicholas and the pagan cult of Volos(Veles), Slavic god of the herd. The central thesis is that for the EasternSlavs St. Nicholas replaced Volos, and therefore that the saint functionedas a hypostasis or equivalent to the god; Volos, in turn, represents a trans-formation of the archetypal dragon in Indo-European mythology, theopponent of the Thunder god. Uspenskij's monograph displays encyclo-pedic erudition in the sphere of popular Slavic culture and testifies to theauthor's talent for original theories and bold generalizations. Yet in certainrespects his thesis and the scholarly apparatus that supports it are typical ofcurrent studies seeking to reconstruct pre-Christian Slavic beliefs. On thisoccasion I should like to point out several problems which inhere in suchan approach. The remarks that follow are intended primarily to encouragefurther discussion; they represent, not so much a review, as an essay incritical dialogue.A major obstacle to the reconstruction of Slavic antiquity is the scarcityof primaryevidence. Scholars tend to compensate for the dearth of materialSEEJ,Vol.28, No. 2 (1984) 147


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148 Slavic and East EuropeanJournalby projecting patterns or archetypes of Indo-European mythology ontoSlavic mythology, and also by projecting Slavic folklore gathered in thepost-Christian (and, more often than not, the post-Petrine) era back ontothe tabula rasa of Slavic antiquity. But a theoretical model and scatteredlate ethnographic data are not the most reliable means of reconstructingsocial and cultural sytems. The initial two chapters of the monograph, deal-ing with popular veneration of St. Nicholas, provide ample illustration ofwhat may happen when generalizations are drawn on the basis of limited oratypical samples, and/or axioms whose universality can be questioned onthe basis of what we do know about operative cultural systems in theperiod.

Let us consider the claim that the Russians confused St. Nicholas withthe figures of God the Father and Christ the Son (6-14, and passim). Sev-eral witnesses are cited, yet the majority are foreign travellers-many ofthem from Protestant countries-who are describing an alien societywhich they may have known only superficially. Is it any wonder that, say, aGerman Lutheran visitor might feel ill at ease with the cult of the saints,that he would express shock at the veneration of St. Nicholas or confuse itwith the worship of graven images? Countering their testimony is, amongothers, that of Sigmund von Herberstein's Rerum Moscoviticarum Comen-tarii, which Uspenskij does not cite, although many of the important latermemoirists (including Guagnini, who is cited) are known to have basedtheir descriptions on it.2 Herberstein writes that the Russians "revere St.Nicholas who lies at Bari in the kingdom of Naples above all other saints."3Native Russian testimony tends to be late and eccentric. One monk whocharges his countrymen with venerating St. Nicholas "aki Boga" (6) is iden-tified as a follower of the heretic Fedor Kosoj; his allegations appear tohave been extracted from a polemic against mainstream (and presumably"popular") Orthodox practice. One suspects that his remarks should betaken with a certain scepticism. A second Russian witness, Bishop Tixon ofVoronez and Elec, reports in the year 1871 that he has discovered aseventy-year old priest who lacks the slightest conception of Christ the Sav-ior and venerates St. Nicholas as God (6). What segment of the East Slavicpopulation can such a case claim to represent? Uspenskij does not seem tobe arguing that Nicholas and God were routinely confused by the clergy;clearly the priest in question constitutes an exception to the rule, someonewritten up as a curiosity in the Orlov Episcopal Gazette. If the author isattempting to argue by analogy that because such a priest could be foundsimilar misconceptions must have been widespread among the lay popula-tion, he has provided only the most circumstantial evidence, which is by faroutweighed by the many legends of the medieval period portraying St.Nicholas as a particularly important saint.The testimony of witnesses, here and elsewhere in the study, is buttressed


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The Cultof St. Nicholas 149by arguments based on the premise that contiguity indicates confusion andeven equivalence. Several pages of examples of syntactic contiguity (7-9)reveal St. Nicholas' name alongside that of Christ and the Virgin Mary "aspart of a unit," evidencing, according to the author, a kind of equivalencein the popular tradition. Yet standard Orthodox prayers, including thebenediction recited at the close of every Divine Liturgy,4list Christ, Mary,and the saints exactly as they are listed in the folk prayers and songs. Thus,syntactic parallelism is not to be taken as an index of confusion in and ofitself. In isolated cases a literal translation of a text might conceivably sug-gest that the speaker has in some way equated St. Nicholas and God. Forexample, the excerpt from the religious poem proclaiming that "SvjatiterMikola, silen Bog nas" (10) would seem to translate as "The HierarchMikola is our strong God." But three variants provided in collections ofduxovnyestixi create a broader context:(1) MHcKOJaMyAOTBopeuBoroM cHJIeH/OHBCeMCBHTbIMOMOLHHHUK.(2) MHKOJiaCBRTHTenjboroM cHJIeH.(3) ABocb HHKOJnaBoroMcHnjeH.The phrase "Bogom silen" echoes the wording of II Corinthians 10:3-4,where Paul writes, "For though we live in the world, we are not carrying ona worldly war, for the weapons of our warfare are not worldly but havedivine power (Or9zit ... ne plotskaja, no silna Bogom). We can follow aprogressive syntactic confusion in the course of which "Bogom silen"becomes "s Bogom silen" and eventually "silen Bog" as it reads in thevariant cited by Uspenskij. But what does syntactic corruption of this sortprove? In every case Nicholas is placed in his proper ranking, that of asaint or holy hierarch who is endowed with divine powers of intercession.As Fedotov points out, certain variants risk confusion, but ultimately theverses testify merely to Nicholas' special position among his peers.6Another example of contiguity being taken for equivalence is the follow-ing charm:CnymuaeTcA c He6e HHKcojiai cKopbli nOMOoLHHK c RByHaAeCATH yqeHHKaMH, caA)nj HHKojnaeHa TpH neIuepbl KaMeHHbll, eMJneT HHiojiae CKOpbliinOMOIHHKTpH jiyKa 30JIOTonoJIOCbleHTpH cTpeibl 3onoTornepbla, cTpenaeT HHKoIae H c6eperaeT MeHHp[a6a] B[oIKHr] H[MIpeK] OTnopMeHHKaOTnopqeHHUbl, OTKOJIyHa H OTKOJIayHbH12-13)(Nicholas, the swift intercessor, descends from the heavens together with the twelve apostlesonto three stone caves; Nicholas, the swift intercessor,takes up three golden-striped bows, andthree gold-feathered arrows; Nicholas shoots and guards me (say the name), God's servant,from any man or woman who would cast an evil eye or spell upon me.)Uspenskij argues that because Nicholas has assumed Christ's place at thehead of the twelve apostles this charm reflects a "typical transference ofChrist's features onto Nicholas" (12). But there is a simpler explanation forthe contiguity. St. Nicholas and the twelve apostles are customarily com-


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150 Slavic andEast EuropeanJournalmemorated together at weekly Thursday services.7 To be sure we cannotrule out potential misinterpretations. Still, the fact that Nicholas is ad-dressed, not as a Savior, but as a "swift intercessor,"a title which Christnever holds, suggests that his status here rests on Orthodox tradition.A third premise advanced initially in the discussion of iconographicalevidence for the equating of St. Nicholas and God or Christ is that identityof "function" predicates identity or merger (slijanie) of person. This suppo-sition is subsequently of central importance to the thesis that St. Nicholasand Volos are equivalent. For Uspenskij the fact that two figures occupyparallel positions in a picture means that they fulfill parallel and thereforeequivalent functions (22-24). His primary illustrations involve icons knownunder the title of "Deesis," a word meaning prayer or petition in Greek. ADeesis icon generally contains three figures (though more are permissible):the central figure is portrayed full-face, and the figures on either side areturned, as though in prayer or supplication, toward the figure in the center.Early Deesis icons show Christ flanked by the Archangels Michael andGabriel, places occuped in later icons by John the Baptist and Mary.8Uspenskij draws our attention to the fact that some Russian icons show St.Nicholas together with Mary, and concludes that in such a case St. Nicholasis equivalent to John the Baptist because, by filling his position, he per-forms his function. On somewhat more tenuous grounds he argues thatGabriel and Michael correspond iconographically to Mary and John theBaptist, and therefore that the replacement of the latter with St. Nicholassuggests an equivalence between Nicholas and Michael (23-24).It should be pointed out, in the first place, that a wide variety of saintsmay occupy positions on either side of Christ in both Slavic and non-SlavicDeesis compositions.9 The reason is that all saints and angels function asintercessors;therefore the equivalence of, say, John the Baptist and Michaelor of St. Nicholas and Michael is absolutely unmarked.?0In the secondplace iconographic conventions may be interpreted as contradicting theclaim of equivalence. Deesis compositions most frequently place St. Michaelto the left of Christ; when both archangels are shown together with Maryand John the Baptist, Mary and Michael are invariably to the left, whileJohn and Gabriel occupy the positions on the right. If Nicholas is replacinganyone, then, he is replacing the John/Gabriel configuration and not tak-ing the place of the Archangel Michael.As evidence that St. Nicholas and the Archangel Michael sometimes per-form the functions of Christ himself, Uspenskij cites several icons andarcheological relics which seem to him to suggest confusion. Two iconspainted in Pskov feature border figures of the saints, among which St.Nicholas occupies the central position. But both icons portray the subjectof the Anastasis (Voskresenie), featuring a large, central figure of Christ,which would seem to preclude the possibility of any functional confusion


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TheCult of St. Nicholas 151with St. Nicholas." Similar borders may be found in early Greek icons,such as the late twelfth-century Crucifixion scene where St. John the Bap-tist rather than St. Nicholas occupies the upper "marginal"position.'2 TwoRussian bronze castings from the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries arelikewise interpreted as illustrations of archaic Deisis compositions featur-ing St. Michael in the central position that should, by rights, belong toChrist (25). But archeologists have been reluctant (and, in fact, unable) toconclusively identify this figure due to certain peculiarities of the image (itis turned, not to the front, but sideways, and clad in a diaphanous robe,bearing in its hands a kind of wreath) and the lack of an inscription.13Rybakov, among others, regards it as an image of Nike, Greek goddess ofvictory, which may have been taken for an image of one archangel.'4In anycase, neither the bronzes nor the icons are Deesis compositions.'5 One finalexample concerns an icon showing St. Nicholas, flanked by small figures ofChrist and Mary, and holding an open Gospel labeled "Evangelie otNikoly." But though Uspenskij identifies this icon as constituting a depar-ture from canon (16), its subject is the commonly depicted "Nicaean Mira-cle." According to legend St. Nicholas was stripped of his episcopal officefor slapping the heretic Arius at the council of Nicaea; he later had a visionof Christ and Mary handing him the insignia of a bishop (the omophorionand the Gospel), signifying that his rank had been restored by heavenlyintervention. The open Gospel contains the passage from Luke 6:17, whichis prescribed for reading on St. Nicholas' feast day (6 December), and notsome apocryphal "Bible" equating the saint with Christ.16 To read anequivalence between God and Nicholas is to misread the icon.Did such misreading actually occur? It is possible, but we simply do notknow. In the absence of proof, we have little recourse but to rely on thetheological system which dictates the conventions. There are also soundtheological reasons for rejectingthe premise that isomorphic pictorial func-tions, as Uspenskij defines them, may be read as evidence of a single proto-typical person. Eventually the argument turns in on itself, rendering thetheological canon-and the deviations from it-essentially meaningless. Ifthe images of SS Nicholas, John, and Michael are hypostases of Christbecause they fill a single iconographic slot, then by the same reasoningmight not Mary and Gabriel, say, be viewed as hypostases of a single per-son? As Uspenskij sees it, Mary and Gabriel would be "equivalent" in aDeesis icon. To accept such a conclusion, of course, we would have todiscount or to overlook contradictory iconographic evidence, such as iconsof the Annunciation where Gabriel and Mary appear simultaneously inhighly differentiated functions. The point is that parallel pictorial functionsmay often be explained by the fact that the persons depicted belong tocommon categories. Thus two persons who are otherwise highly differen-tiated may, on occasion, perform a similar function which is reflected in an


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152 Slavic andEast EuropeanJournaliconographic subject. But to speak of "slijanie" here is somewhat far-fetched.

The failure to distinguish between equivalence and the performance ofcommon, but unmarked functions becomes particularly troublesome whenthe author attempts to demonstrate that the image of St. Nicholas wascontaminated by the image of St. Michael, and that this contamination wassignificant for the Eastern Slavic cult of Nicholas. Here are some of theprimary functions that the two perform in common. Both act as interces-sors between this world and the next. St. Michael sometimes figures in EastSlavic folklore as the head (nacal'nik)of Paradise, and St. Nicholas is some-times depicted as one who holds the keys to the heavenly kingdom or whoguides the souls of the departed to the other world. St. Michael is one ofthe saints who battles dragons (in some variants, snakes), and St. Nicholasis connected with snakes in folklore. He is said to protect the believer fromsnakebite, but also to send benevolent serpents with good tidings. There isa superstition among Russian sailors, for example, that snakes observed inthe water should be hauled on board ship and fed in the event that they aremessengers from St. Nicholas, patron of sailors (79). Both saints are knownas healers and, more surprisingly (to the author), both are invoked for helpin military enterprises. To illustrate that St. Nicholas was a patron of mil-itary affairs, Uspenskij cites a lament chanted for recruits:j,a xpaHHT Te6a MHKona MHoroMHJIocJIHBOA,H OT 6ypH Aa xpaHHT Te6a - OT niaapbi,H OTxonoga Te6l Aa OH OTr6noaa,

OT TbIKOB-nHHKOB eAb OH ga OT3aTbIJIbHHKOB!Bo 6o0o aa coxpaHHTOH CHenpHUTeneM,OTopyKCbHuaeAb OHAa3aBoeHHoro;H OTHCKpbICOXpaHHT O6S TpecKyqei,H OT3Toro OrHS aaOHOTnsImero.BnepeAnH OHMHKOna HTTOMepe,Ho3aaHaa OHMHKonjaMeCoMeie,IIocTOpOHba OHMHKOnarHeMnaJnT;TyqHHeT,a 6bIBKaKpoM rpeMHT,rpoMy HeT, a HCKpbICbInJTOTCI.29)

(May the most merciful Mikola guard thee from storms; may he guard thee from blizzards,from cold and from hunger, from jabs and kicks and blows to the back of the head; may heguard thee in battle from the enemy, from the weapons of war and from the crackling spark,and from the burning fire. Mikola holds a shield before thee; Mikola hews [at the enemy] witha sword behind thee; Mikola burns [the enemy] with fire at both thy sides. There is no cloud,yet thunder seems to sound, no thunder,yet sparks fly.)Noting that this and other folk references to Nicholas as a "leader of theheavenly powers" would be more appropriate to Michael, Uspenskij sug-gests that contamination between the two may explain Nicholas' status as a"national saint, the protector of the Russian people which corresponds to


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The Cultof St. Nicholas 153the image of the Archangel Michael as the Leader of Israel"(29).The potential implications of such a discovery are of cardinal importancefor the understanding of Russian folk-and religious-culture. But can wereally say that Nicholas and Michael have been contaminated on the basisof the evidence presented here, and even if we agree that contamination hasoccurred, how widespread is it? These are the questions which must beborne in mind as we weigh the data and the arguments. Some of the func-tions shared by Nicholas and Michael must be ruled out as unmarked, forthey are shared by most or all of the saints, among them the role of inter-mediary between this world and the next, and the ability to facilitate heal-ing (not a universal saintly attribute, but a very common one). Other func-tions are poorly attested for one or both saints. For example, while St.Michael and St. Nicholas do sometimes appear in folk narratives as theguardians of the pearly gates or the keeper of heaven, it is St. Peter who ismost strongly associated with the heavenly gates in both Western and East-ern lore.17By the same token, St. Michael's status as commander-in-chiefof the heavenly forces, like his renown as a slayer of dragons, places him ina category closer to such militarysaints as George or Demetrius of Salonikain Slavic and Western lore. That St. Nicholas is associated with benevolentsnakes, as well as snakes that threaten to bite, further testifies to the dis-crepancy between the functions of one saint and the other.Another telling counterargument involves the social system of pre-Revolutionary and medieval Russia. St. Michael, as we have seen, wasnationally venerated as the patron of royalty, whereas St. Nicholas was thechampion of the lower classes.'8 Thus their parallel function-protection inbattle-appears to be of lesser significance than the class distinctionbetween the upper and lower ranks of the military. A prince or noblemanwould more readily call upon St. Michael or perhaps St. George to aid himin battle; a peasant recruit, on the other hand, would naturally call uponSt. Nicholas here and in a variety of other situations. What Uspenskij viewsas an equivalence of functions, then, may more plausibly be regarded as afunctional overlap, one attributable to Nicholas' unusually broad range offunctions rather than to any special confusion between Nicholas andMichael. The fact that the two are differentiated both by their primaryattributes (Michael is an archangel and Nicholas a bishop) and by theirappeal to discrete social classes would seem to militate against the conclu-sion that Nicholas is nationally revered because of an ancient confusionwith Michael. Even had Uspenskij shown that significant contaminationoccurred, Nicholas would still enjoy his special status despite that contami-nation by virtue of the belief that he is particularly concerned with thewelfare of the destitute and underprivileged.'9Perhaps the most serious flaw in Uspenskij's arguments derives from hisfailure to give due consideration to the intrinsic complexity and generative


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154 Slavic andEast EuropeanJournalproperties of St. Nicholas' cult as it was initially received by the Slavs. Thatheritage, after all, contains its own pagan strata which may reflect Indo-European mythology, but not necessarily the mythology of the Slavs.Regarding this heritage as "entirely obvious" (3) Uspenskij fails to outlineit, concentrating instead on a mythological model by which Volos and hisantipode, the god Perun, are related to an ancient Indo-European mythicalpair: a dragon and thunderbearing god who fights the dragon. The EastSlavic transformation of this myth also involves a dispute between aThunder god (Perun) and an opponent (Volos), but the dispute is over theownership of cattle. This comparative mythological model, developed by V.V. Ivanov and V. N. Toporov,20 s projected onto the Christian God and thesaints who took over the functions originally performed by Perun andVolos. God, Elijah the Prophet, and St. George, among others, are seen asfunctional replacements for Perun, and therefore as transformations orhypostases of the primordial Indo-European Thunderbearer. SS Blasius,Florus, Laurus, and Nicholas appear to have taken the place of Volos, andare therefore viewed as hypostases of the Thunderbearer's enemy, the pri-mordial dragon. Once this fundamental myth has been laid out, Uspenskijproceeds to explore the bond between Nicholas and Volos, pointing outfunctions and images which the two have in common.

Ideally, Uspenskij would have isolated and "removed" all of the exclu-sively Christian strata in his comparison of Nicholas and Volos in order toarrive at the pagan cultural substratum. The problem is that a good deal ofthe functions and images which Nicholas supposedly acquires from thepagan god Volos could have been generated by the Greek Orthodox tradi-tion itself, via the translated vitae of St. Nicholas, the iconographic depic-tions of the saint's life, the translated prayers, the hymns and other compo-nents of the saint's service. In other words, they need not be accounted forby Eastern Slavic pagan lore, and consequently may not reflect East Slavicpagan cultural strata.Consider, for example, the function of patronizing livestock. Volos' statusas the patron of cattle is attested in the few extant written references to thegod (the Primary Chronicle and the vita of St. Vladimir, among others).There can be no question that Nicholas, too, is invoked in matters concern-ing the welfare of livestock, and that like Volos, Nicholas was asked toensure a good harvest. Uspenskij cites the following harvest ritual to sub-stantiate the claim of contamination. It was recorded in the &erepovecuezdof Novgorod gubernija; the phrase "Volosova boroda" ("Volos' beard")refers to a handful of wheat or rye set aside and usually bound or plaited.One peasant calls for another to "Vertiborodu Volosu." At this command,the second peasant walks three times around a pile of wheat that has beenleft on the field, then seizes thirty ears with his sickle and chants:


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The Cult of St. Nicholas 155EnarocnoBH-KaMeHS, ocnoaH,,,a 6opoJy BepTeTb:A naxapIo-TocHna,A ceBuy-ToKoposaHi,A KOHK)-TO ronOBa,A MiKyie - 6opoAa>>. (52)

(Bless me, Lord, to turn the beard; [may] the plowman have strength, the sower-a loaf, thehorse-a head, and Mikula-a beard)The names Volos and Nicholas are clearly equivalent in this ritual. Parallelrituals have been recorded, however, which indicate that Nicholas is onlyone of several possible Christian equivalents for Volos in this ritual. InKursk and Voronez, the peasants bind Elijah's beard to thank him for giv-ing them the fruits of the harvest; oats may be left on the field for the"beard" of Christ.21

It is difficult to account for such overlapping functions on the part offigures who, in East Slavic folklore (as Uspenskij points out) may bedepicted as antipodes and who fit on opposite sides of the mythologicalmodel (Christ and Elijah are identified as hypostases of the Thunderbearer).Consulting the service to St. Nicholas, however, we find that he is repeat-edly called the "good Shepherd of his spiritual flock," and compared toChrist, who is also equated with pastoral functions.22 Nicholas is also com-pared to a gardener in Christ's vineyard and to the servant who "sowed"his master's talent and reaped a fivefold harvest.23 The standard vita callsthe saint "a second Elijah" for rebuking the heretic Arius at the Council ofNicaea, and launches into an extended simile in which the image of Nicho-las returning to his flock is combined with a comparison of the saint to afarmer:. . . just as a wise farmer uses his whetstone on the threshing-floor to clean his harvest, gather-ing the best and rubbing away the chaff, so has the wise St. Nicholas filled Christ's threshing-floor and spiritual granary with good fruits, scattering the empty chaff of the false heresiesand shaking it far from God's good wheat: for this reason the Holy Church calls him thewinnow who has scattered the chaff-like teachings of Arius.24St. Nicholas is also said to have saved his countrymen from famine byappearing in a vision to an Italian merchant and offering three gold piecesas surety if the man would consent to sail his grain-laden ships to Myra andsell the contents to the starving population.25 Thus, the Christian contextmight easily have inspired the lore about Nicholas, and it provides anexplanation for the coupling of the saint with other figures that would beproblematic if explained merely in terms of the mythological Thunder-bearer/dragon model.

Apart from Nicholas' connection with cattle and agriculture, Uspenskijpoints out a series of supposedly pagan attributes which, however, are also


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156 Slavic and East EuropeanJournalwell attested in common Christian lore. The identification of Nicholas withgold and the attainment of wealth may be due to his status as a "bogato-davec."26 Perhaps the most famous episode in his vita and one invariablydepicted on icons tells of how he saved three young virgins from prostitu-tion by tossing bags of gold into their impoverished father's window so thatthe man might use the money for the girls' marriage doweries.27 Nicholas isalso addressed as a "shining luminary," "a radiant sun," and a "bright trea-sure," all traditional Christian epithets for saints, and frequently depictedas one who stands surety for debtors.28 The legends of Nicholas as a healerand as one who is connected with the other world also have Christianantecedents. Many episodes in the saint's life, not to mention posthumousmiracles, involve his powers (or the powers of his tomb or relics) to healthe sick; on one occasion he resurrects a sailor who has fallen to his deathfrom a high mast during a violent storm.29 That the populace would invokethe aid of Nicholas for young military recruits would correspond to hisoffice, where he is asked to deliver supplicants from "bonds" and from thesword, and may also refer to the episodes in his life where he intercedes onbehalf of prisoners who have unjustly been condemned to execution.30The saint's attributes are, perhaps, best summarized in the traditionalprayer (which has more than a passing resemblance to the recruit's lamentcited above), where Nicholas is addressed as:. . . swift helpmeet, fervent intercessor, most good Shepherd who delivers his spiritual flockfrom all manner of misfortunes . . . the source of miracles, the feeder of the hungry, the joy ofthe sorrowful, the clother of the naked, the healer of the sick, the guide of the seafarer, theliberator of prisoners, the feeder and intercessor for widows and orphans, the guardian ofpurity, the meek teacher of children, the buttress of the aged, the comfort of the laborer, theabundant wealth of the poor and unfortunate . . .and is requested to:. . . keep us, like a vigilant and good Shepherd, from all enemies, from pestilence, from earth-quake, from hail, from hunger, from flood, from fire, from the sword, from the invasion ofenemy nations and in all sorrows and troubles.. 31

As we see, it is a simple matter to describe Nicholas' functions and toaccount for them in the common Christian tradition. When it comes todescribing the attributes of Volos, however, a series of tangled, hypotheticalrelationships must be posited in many instances merely to show that thegod (or some prototype) might have fulfilled similar functions. The task isso complex that the author never demonstrates how Volos' functions condi-tion or precede the functions of Nicholas. Uspenskij's failure to shape anargument out of the mass of data mobilized for this purpose is perhaps bestillustrated by following the exposition of one section.Section 3.1, for example, is entitled "Volos and the World Beyond the


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The Cult of St. Nicholas 157Grave."It begins with the citation of an ancient Czech proverb that speaksof going "k Velesu za more" (56). Here, the phrase is interpreted as mean-ing to go to Veles' world beyond the grave which, to Uspenskij, suggests anassociation between Veles (Volos) and death. To scholars like Sreznevskij,in contrast, the phrase suggests a land beyond the sea which is equivalentto the land of the sun commonly described in Slavic and Indo-Europeanfairy tales, and reflects an association between Volos and the sun godApollo.32 Still others contend that the land beyond the sea is actually thespring sky, and equivalent to a "blessed land of radiant gods washed by theocean of clouds."33Since all of these associations, though disparate, arepredicated on the basis of one and the same proverb, its value as evidenceof Uspenskij's thesis is substantially diminished. So, too, the fact that theexpression was used by Western Slavs but not, apparently, among the EastSlavs suggests that it is not as significant (pokazatel'no) as the authorwishes to imply.By way of demonstrating that the associations may be valid for the East-ern Slavs, Uspenskij refers us to the Ukrainian legends which portray St.Nicholas as a ferryman who conveys the souls of the departed across abody of water separating this world from the world beyond the grave. Hada genetic relationship been firmly established between Nicholas and Volos,this fact would be meaningful, but such is not the case. Even were we togrant the author this cardinal point, it would be controverted by his subse-quent admission that the devil, too, is portrayed by the Ukrainians as aferryman of souls. For Uspenskij the common function indicates "a bifur-cation of Volos' image in the Christian perspective" (57). To accept theclaim, however, is also to accept a reconstructed religious-mythological sys-tem in which the image of Nicholas is seen as the functional equivalent ofboth God and the Devil-as is the image of Volos.The figure of the ferryman leads the author to the Indo-European imageof the world beyond the grave as a "pasture where one of the gods herdsthe souls of the dead" (57). Leaving aside the problem of whether or notVolos and Nicholas may both be said to "ferry" the dead souls into thisrealm, Uspenskij proceeds to claim that Volos' image as god of the herd"corresponds" to the image of the god who herds the souls in the otherworld without, however, specifying which Indo-European myth he has inmind. According to the mythology of the Greeks, for example, the journeyacross the waters of oblivion leads to a place of judgment: the souls of thedead either remain in Hades or are sent on to Elysium. Elysium, describedby Homer as a meadow beyond Ocean and by Virgil as a green valleylocated in the lower world, seems to be the image to which the author isreferring. In Elysium, however, as in Hades, the souls of the dead retaintheir human form.34 In the Greek, as well as the Indian, Egyptian, Persian,and Norse traditions, there is no mention of dead souls being herded in any


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158 Slavic andEast EuropeanJournalbut the most metaphorical sense of the word. Nor are they conceptualizedas cattle, although the meadow or valley is pictured as crowded with thesouls of the blessed. For lack of context, therefore, the association betweenVolos and the other world described here seems to rest on a highly tenuousassociation based on the equation of supervision or direction with the spe-cific function of herding.

Apparently for the purpose of concretizing the metaphor and relating itto the culture of the Eastern Slavs, Uspenskij offers various examples ofrituals in which cattle are associated in some way with death. Severalscholars have theorized, for example, that the word trizna may be etymo-logically related to triz', and that the etymological connection, in turn,suggests that the commemoration of the dead involved the sacrifice of athree-year old (trizyj) animal (57).35Customs such as the presentation of acow to a poor person or a monastery in the name of a deceased relative(Uspenskij regards this as equivalent to "sacrifice"in the literal sense of theword) may go back to the trizna and, if so, would confirm the etymologicalconnection. The link between cattle and death may also be reflected incertain folk customs associated with Holy or Great Thursday of PassionWeek. The sixteenth-century Stoglav condemns the practice of burningstraw and calling up the dead on Holy Thursday, a practice which, forUspenskij, "corresponds formally and functionally" (141) to the later prac-tice of "calling" domestic livestock on the same day. The housewife wouldclimb onto the cabinet attached to the stove (the golbec), open the stovepipe and call each animal by name; the man of the house, standing insidethe stove, would "answer" for each. Other related practices include theinvitation of the Frost to eat kisel', and, in some regions, the laying of aspecial table for cattle, as well as the ritual slaughter of cattle often reservedfor Holy Thursday (Uspenskij sees the slaughter as a relic of sacrifice toVolos, 141).These conclusions might be far more convincing if the etymologicalconnection of trizna with triz' were universally or commonly acknowl-edged. In fact, the word is customarily translated (in this context) as afuneral feast. If three-year old animals were sacrificed at funerals, or onother occasions (and no evidence of actual sacrifice is supplied here), thepractice might well represent the influence of the Old Testament, for theearliest references to the sacrifice of three-year old animals in the Izbornikiof 1073 and 1076 concern sacrifices performed by the patriarch Abraham.36Furthermore, to equate Volos with the dead on the grounds that he was thegod of the herd and that cows were associated with death is a syllogismwhich only follows in the event that cows were always equated with death.But, in fact, the very rituals that Uspenskij describes as taking place onHoly Thursday link cows to life and fertility. The calling of livestock, thesetting of a table for animals, and the invitation extended to the Frost are


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The Cult of St. Nicholas 161NOTES

1 Boris Andreevic Uspenskij, Filologiceskie razyskanija v oblasti slavjanskix drevnostej(Relikty jazycestva v vostognoslavjanskomkul'teNikolaja Mirlikijskogo)(Moscow: MoscowUniv. Press, 1982). Hereafter all citations will be given in the text.2 Sigmund von Herberstein, Descriptionof Moscow and Muscovy 1557, ed. B. Picard, trans.J. Grundy (London: J. M. Dent, 1969), 4.3 Von Herberstein,94.4 Prayerbook(Jordanville, New York:Holy Trinity Monastery, 1960), 127.5 G. Fedotov, Stixi duxovnye(Paris:YMCA Press, 1935), 61-62.6 Fedotov, 61-62. Fedotov does not hesitate to single out instances where he feels thatcontamination of persons does exist, as in the confusion between Mary and St. Sophia orthe Trinity(Troica), which were sometimes taken for synonyms because of the coincidencein gender and the more abstract nature of the concepts of Sophia (= Wisdom, the HolySpirit) and the Trinity(see 19-21, 26-27).7 Konstantin Nikolskij, Posobie k izuceniju Ustava Bogusluzenija Pravoslavnoj Cerkvi, 6thed. (St. Petersburg:Gosudarstvennaja tipografija, 1900), 492.8 On the "Deesis" icon see V. I. Antonova and N. E. Mneva, Katalog drevnerusskoj ivopisi,2 vols. (Moscow: Iskusstvo, 1963) 1:65. See also N. P. Kondakov, Arxeologiceskoepute-gestviepo Sirii i Palestine (St. Petersburg, 1904), 85; and Hippolyte Delehaye, Les legendesgrecques des saints militaires (Paris: Picard, 1909), 83 on the origins and history of thesubject.9 Greek Deesis icons preserved in the cloisters of Mount Athos, for example, show Christflanked by SS George and Paul (1423-25) or by SS Nicholas and John the Baptist (c.1530). See plates 100 and 101 in Paul Huber, Heilige Berge: Sinai, Athos, Golgota-Ikonen, Fresken,Miniaturen Zurich:Benziger, 1980).10 Uspenskij's attempts to interpret the "semantic motivations" of the parallelism he seesbetween John and Michael are somewhat unorthodox. He argues that both are "fore-runners" of Christ, John on earth and Michael in heaven: because both have in somesense prepared Christ's place, he reasons, both function as proxies (zamestiteli) for God(24). Since Christ and God are, by Christian dogma, one essence and uncreated, however,Michael cannot be said to "precede" Christ in heaven or any place else. On the otherhand, a parallel between John the Baptist and Gabriel might well be predicated sinceboth announce Christ's coming: John in the wilderness and Gabriel to Mary. That mayexplain why they are paired to Christ's right.11 These icons are reproduced in 2ivopis' drevnego Pskova XIII-XVI veka, ed. and com.A. Ovcinnikov and N. Kisilov (M: Goznak, 1971), plates 28 (XIV c., State RussianMuseum) and 40 (XV c., Pskov Museum).12 Kurt Weitzmann, TheIcon: Holy Images-Sixth to FourteenthCentury(New York:GeorgeBraziller, 1978), plate 26. Weitzmann points out that St. Catherine occupies the lowercentral position on the icon's margin and concludes that it may have been made for Sinai(90).13 The bronzes are pictured and their complex history discussed by N. G. Porfiridov in"Istorija odnogo izobrazenija v drevnerusskom iskusstve," Drevne-russkoe iskusstvo:zarubelnyesvjazi (M: Nauka, 1975), 119-24.14 B. A. Rybakov, RemeslodrevnejRusi (M: AN SSSR, 1948) 530. Porfiridov reminds us thatMichael was the patron of princes and warriors in medieval times which may explain theassociation between the archangel and the goddess of victory ("Istorija odnogo izobra-zenija," 122).15 The central image of one bronze (the other is broken) is surrounded by small foliadepicting Christ (above), an unidentified angel (below), Mary (right), and John theBaptist (left). These figures are primarilydecorative; they occur in analogous positions in


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162 Slavic and East European Journalmany iconographic subjects. The pre-revolutionary archeologist A. A. Spicyn identifies astone piece with the same subject as an "archangelfrom a depiction of the Annunciation"in "Nekotorye novye priobretenija Saratovskogo muzeja," Izvestija imp. Arxeologikeskojkommissii 53 (1914), 100 (plate 30). Here, of course, the archangel in the central piecewould be Gabriel, rather than Michael. These instances seem to fall into the categorywhich Uspenskij labels "quasi-deesis" (16). But the term is misleading. Neither thebronzes nor the marginal rows of saints depicted on Anastasis icons constitute a Deesiscomposition in the iconographical tradition.16 Plate 95 of Antonova and Mneva (Katalog 1) reproduces this icon as does the twelve-volume Istorija russkogo iskusstva, ed. I. E. Grabar'et al. (M: AN SSSR, 1953-55) 11:355and Zivopis'drevnegoPskova. . . (here the Gospel inscription can be read with a magnify-ing glass), plate 10. In Zivopis' velikogo Novgoroda: XV vek (M: Nauka, 1982) E. S.Smirnova, V. K. Laurina, and E. A. Gordienko reproduce the Gospel inscription anddiscuss analogies for Tver' con-painting (199-200). A Cypriot precedent is cited by E. S.Smirnova in Zivopis'velikogo Novgorod:Seredina XIII-nacalo XV veka (M: Nauka, 1976),202-3. The "Nicaean Miracle" is given in its earliest form by Gustav Anrich, ed. andcom. in Hagios Nikolaos: Der Heilige Nikolaos in der griechischen Kirche: Texte undUntersuchungen, vols. (Leipzig-Berlin: B. G. Teubner, 1913-17) 11:393-94(commentary).17 See Uspenskij's "Excursion IV: Nikola and Petr: Some Common Characteristics,"125.18 See Uspenskij's section 2.3 "Nikola as a Folk Saint,"55.19 In Nastol'najakniga dlja svjascenno-cerkovno-slu1itelejXarkov: tip. Gubernskogo Prave-lenija, 1900) S. V. Bulgakov writes:"Russians venerate St. Nicholas with particularfervorand direct their prayers most frequently to him. He is an intercessor for all sorrows andtroubles and his icon may be found in virtually every peasant home .... The simple folksay, 'We have no champion but Nikola,' 'Ask Nikola and he will tell the Savior' and thename of Nicholas is one of the most commonly invoked among us" (446).20 V. V. Ivanov and V. N. Toporov, Issledovanijav oblasti slavjanskix drevnostej.Leksiceskie ifrazeologiceskie voprosyrekonstrukciitekstov (M.: Nauka, 1974).21 A. N. Afanas'ev, Poetideskie vozzrenija slavjan na prirodu. Opyt sravnitel'nogoizueenijaslavjanskix predanij i verovanij v svjazi s mifideskimi skazanijami drugix rodstvennyxnarodov,3 vols. (M.: Soldatenkov, 1865-69), 1:698.22 All citations from the office are taken from Akafist svjatitelju Nikolaju Mirlikijskomueudotvorcu(Kiev: Tip. Kievope&erskojavry, 1861), which contains the entire service;hereand in citations of other early editions I have given the numerical equivalents for thetraditional pagination (i.e., cyrillic letters). Also testifying to similar epithets and meta-phors is the "Sluiba (stixiry i kanon) 9ogo maja na perenesenie mo?sej sv. NikolajaArxiepiskopa Mir-Likijskogo ~(udotvorca iz Mir v Bar-grad (1087)," which is printed inArchimandrite Leonid, ed. Posmertnye cudesa svjatitelja Nikolaja arxiepiskopaMir-likij-skogo eudotvorca, Pamjatniki drevnej russkoj pis'mennosti i iskusstva (Hereafter, PDPI),vyp. 72 (St. Petersburg:tip. Balaseva, 1888), 62-74.23 Akafist, 11 recto (the scripturalallusion is to Matthew 25:15-30); Slutba, 63.24 Kniga litij svjatyx (M.: Sinodarnajatip., 1805) 41 verso(6 December, o.s.). The metaphoris Biblical: cf. Matthew 3:10-12 and Luke 3:17). The standard vita is based primarily onthe tenth-century life composed by Simeon Metaphrastes, published in Anrich, HagiosNikolaos I: 235-67. Another translated version widely attested in medieval Russian manu-scripts is based on the more ancient vita of St. Nicholas, Archimandrite of Sinai (part ofwhich was borrowed by Simeon Metaphrastes). See Anrich 1:1-65 for the text and 11:5-6on the Russian translation. See also, in this connection, Archimandrite Leonid, ed. Zitie icudesa sv. Nikolaja Mirlikijskogo i poxvala emu, PDPI, vyp. 34 (St. Petersburg: Tip.Balaseva, 1881) and V. 0. Klju6evskij, Drevnerusskie ;itija svjatyx kak istorilceskijistoenik (M.: Tip. Gra6eva, 1871), 217-19 and 453-59.25 Anrich, Hagios Nikolaos, I, 252.


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The Cult of St. Nicholas 16326 Akafist, 17recto.27 Anrich, Hagios Nikolaos, I, 239-42.28 Akafist, 1 recto, 2 recto, 36 recto.29 Anrich, Hagios Nikolaos, I, 244.30 Akafist, 50 recto;Anrich, Hagios Nikolaos I, 252'62.31 Akafist, 61 recto and verso.32 I. I. Sreznevskij, "Ob obozanii solnca u drevnix slavjan,"Zurnal Ministerstvanarodnogo

prosvesgenija,7, 51 (1846), 52-54.33 Afanas'ev,Poeticeskie vozzrenija .., 1:694.34 Oskar Seyffert, Dictionaryof Classical Antiquities,rev. and ed. Henry Nettleship and J. E.Sandys (New York:World, 1956), 212.35 Uspenskij cites O. N. Trubacev, "Sledy jazycestva v slavjanskoj leksike. 1. Trizna.2. Peti.3. Kob'," Voprosy slavjanskogo jazykoznanija 4 (1959), 135, and V. N. Toporov, "Ksemantike troicnosti (slav. *trizna i dr.)"in Etimologija. 1977 (Moscow, 1979), 3, 11.36 In fact, Nicholas is called a "second Abraham" in his service with reference to a meta-phorical sacrifice (Akafist, 26 verso). On the linguistic evidence see Max Vasmer, Russ-isches Etymologisches Worterbuch, rans. and supplemented by O. N. Trubacev, 4 vols.(Heidelberg: Carl Winter, 1950-58, rpt.: M.: Progress Publishers, 1973) IV: 102. Vasmercites Miklosich, Jagic, Sobolevskij and others who all relate trizna to travit',and define itas a "contest, feat, reward or funeral banquet."It is thought that the funeral banquet mayhave been followed by some sort of military exhibitions or games. See also GrigorijD'jacenko, Polnyj cerkovno-slavjanskij lovar'(M.: Tip. Vil'de, 1900), 732; I. I. Sreznevskij,Materialy dlja slovarja drevnerusskogo azyka po pis'mennympamjatnikam, 3 vols. (St.Petersburg: Tip. Imp. Akademija nauk, 1893-1912) III: column 997; and N. M. Sanskij,V. V. Ivanov, and T. V. Sanskaja, Kratkij etimologiceskij slovar'russkogojazyka, 2nd ed.(M.: Prosvescenie, 1971), 451.37 V. K. Sokolova, Vesenne-letniekalendarnye obrjady russkix, ukraincev i belorusov (M.:Nauka, 1979), 107-8.38 S. V. Maksimov, Necistaja, nevedomaja i krestnaja sila (St. Petersburg: Golike andVilborg, 1903), 396.39 Most of the Eastern Slavs celebrate the day of the dead on the Tuesday following St.Thomas' Sunday, which is known as Radunica,although in certain regions of the Ukraineit is celebrated on the Thursday of Holy Week (as opposed to Holy Thursday, whichprecedes Easter). Radunica is generally believed to be a relic of the pagan funeral feasts(i.e., the trizna). All sorts of foods are prepared. Eggs and other delicacies are buried;honey, tea, wine, and vodka are poured on the ground so that the deceased, who arecalled by name, may partake of the banquet. "In treating the dead," writes Maksimov,"the peasants do not forget to treat themselves, of course, so that toward the end of thememorial prayers there are generally a lot of drunken people in the cemetery who arescarcely able to stand; not being in any condition to find their way home, many get lostamong the crosses marking the graves" (Necistaja sila ..., 426). See also Sokolova,120-23.

40 Even scholars who decidedly reject this model nevertheless draw on it. See, for example,the discussion of Volos in B. A. Rybakov's Jazydestvodrevnixslavjan(M.: Nauka, 1981),421-31.

Documents

Gail-Lenhoff - Christian and Pagan Strata in the East Slavic Cult of St. Nicholas - The Slavic and East European Journal, Vol. 28, No. 2 (Summer, 1984), Pp. 147-163