Release:
2024. Vol. 10. № 4 (40)About the author:
Anna A. Bushueva,Lecturer-Researcher, Assistant, Department of History and Documentation, Kurgan State University, Kurgan, Russia; anna_b2022@mail.ru, https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1100-8561
Abstract:
This article explains the genre specificity of texts that arose as a result of priests’ and laity’s religious ideas interaction which lies on the border between folklore, church journalism, and publicist articles in late 19th–early 20th c. media. The author analyses the relationships, ranging from conflict to agreement, which consititute the diverse functions and meanings of these texts. The results have revealed what the types of blasphemous acts within the boundaries of genre logic subject to divine punishment and who was condemned to a “miraculous” death (their gender, age, social origin, nationality, and religious status). Based on the motive for the crime indicated in the sources, their classification is proposed. The first category includes stories about disrespect for shrines and church rituals, manifested in an everyday context, often without malicious intent, due to frivolity, aggravated by intoxication: e. g., defamation of icons, priests, violation of fasts or holidays, theft of church property. The second category includes public atheistic performances, whether verbal (preaching the non-existence of God) or physical (shooting at icons). The third category includes Old Believer criticism of Orthodox church teaching and its shrines. The fourth category includes stories of “betrayal” of God and the church, retreat from service for the sake of earthly well-being and self-interest. All categories share doubt in God’s power, openly and fearlessly expressed in front of numerous witnesses. With the “unnatural”, sudden, and painful death of blasphemers in the end of each story, God refutes doubts in his ability to carry out immediate retribution and earthly judgment. In general, blasphemy can be read as an ordinary action of a person who existed outside the boundaries of the strict ideas of the clergy about the sacred and inviolable, or as a conscious protest against the divine and/or the social structure associated with it, a form of emancipation.Keywords:
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