Foreigners testified that there was an abundance of fornication and adultery in Russia. Of course, both the church and secular authorities tried to fight this. However, the temptations of lust were often stronger than any prohibitions.
Mired in fornication
With the Baptism of Rus, the relationship between a man and a woman, until then subject to free morality, began to be regulated by Christian ethics. Fornication, according to the biblical commandments, was classified as one of the most serious human sins. “Do not be deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor little ones (mongers), nor sodomites … will not inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor. 6: 9-10).
However, the threat of being rejected by the Lord himself did not stop lovers of carnal pleasures. Love passions flared up with special force on the night of Ivan Kupala. The church documents recorded "godly games", in which "there is a great fall for the man and the boy on the wobbling of women and girls."
The Russian historian Ivan Vasilevsky, who worked at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, drew attention to the fairly free morals in a seemingly pious Russian society: these are not only examples of extramarital affairs, but also cases of mortgaging wives for temporary use, and prodigal cohabitation with sisters, mothers and daughters. “How these features were combined with devotion and strict observance of fasts is difficult to understand,” the historian reflected.
According to another historian Nikolai Kostomarov, although fornication was legally equated in Russia with such crimes as theft and robbery, in practice it was rarely prosecuted. Representatives of the nobility, who did not hesitate to have mistresses or use maids to satisfy their sexual needs, were especially addicted to this vice. Kostomarov focuses on the fact that a man who committed the sin of fornication was subjected to less censure in society than a woman.
Foreigners who visited Russia in the era of Ivan the Terrible left us in our memories many examples of intemperance, mostly male. Thus, the English diplomat Giles Fletcher noted that the entire Moscow state was filled with fornication, but there was no real law that could curb this sin.
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The epistle to Ivan IV, attributed to Metropolitan Daniel, focuses on such deplorable phenomena as the condemnation of marriage and approval of sodomy. The author of the message asks the tsar to find an opportunity to eradicate the vile vice of which the boyars, the governors, and the people close to the royal court are guilty.
There is no information about the reaction of Ivan the Terrible to the message, but it is known that the rulers in Russia still tried to fight fornication. Perhaps the first in this row can be put Princess Olga, who in 953 issued a decree on monetary or material compensation for the bride's lack of virginity. And in 967, Olga's son, Prince Svyatoslav, proclaimed that from now on, depriving a woman of her innocence is the direct responsibility of her husband.
Catherine II also tried to moderately fight the irrepressible human passions. In her Deanery Charter, published in 1782, she prohibited the use of public baths as places for which the infamous "hotbeds of debauchery" was entrenched.
Not only rulers, but also people from the people were worried about the moral character of their subjects. The Dutch mercenary in the Russian army Ludwig Fabricius, describing the life in the army of Stepan Razin, noted that the ataman tried to completely eradicate from his charges not only theft and swear words, but also the sin of fornication. How did he punish the fornicator? They tied a shirt over his head, poured more sand into it and threw the sinner into the water.
Not only by prayer
From the first centuries of Christianity in Russia, the Church has firmly taken up the morality of her children. Any manifestation of sensuality and sexuality was tabooed. Women were forbidden to wear provocative outfits, make up and raise their eyebrows, "in order to seduce people into the destruction of bodily sweetness." Innocence was recognized as the main moral virtue of an unmarried girl, and fidelity to her husband was recognized for wives.
The Church, of course, could not prohibit sexual relations, but limited them to the framework of legal marriage. Moreover, the intimate relationship between husband and wife had to take place only in one position - "missionary". The strictest taboo was imposed on the standing position. It was, as expected, difficult to get pregnant in her, so she was considered "not for childbirth, but only for the sake of weakness."
The Church tried to combat sexual licentiousness in more radical ways. In the Cathedral Code of 1649, it was said that those wives who survive children in fornication "should be executed by death without any mercy" - so that others would not be accustomed to commit such a "bad deed."
The religious publicist Maxim the Greek denounced fornicators extremely harshly in his texts. Especially hit those who were caught in the sin of Sodom. He offered to execute them by burning and give them eternal anathema. However, it is not known for certain whether such an extreme measure has ever been implemented in practice.
The German traveler and geographer Adam Olearius noted in his notes that in Russia adultery was also called fornication. Both sins were not punished by death. If the wife was convicted of treason, then she was supposed to be punished with a whip, after which the sinner had to sit for some time in the monastery on water and bread.
Those who could not resist the temptation of fornication were often subjected to penance with the obligation to observe fasting for several years (sometimes up to fifteen), or they were charged a monetary fine. There were cases when parents, trying to forestall the possible sin of fornication of their daughter, gave her in marriage before the onset of fifteen years as an adult man.
The penance collections of the 17th century reveal before us lists of questions that the priests asked their wife and husband in confession, inquiring about the secret. For example, does "fornication in an obscene nature" happen, do they take off their pectoral crosses, hang icons while fulfilling their conjugal duty, or does the relationship take place in unnatural positions. The people, as always, reacted to this with the proverb: "Sin is as long as your legs are up, but if you put your feet down - so God forgave!"
But even those who burdened themselves with the grievous vice of fornication in the eyes of the clergy deserved condescension. The Monk Nikon of Radonezh reminded that purity is returned by repentance: “An ordinary doctor can no longer heal, but only the Lord resurrects with His touch: maiden, rise! And virginity returns, like Mary of Egypt, the gospel harlot and others … The Lord is all possible."
The Church has always considered the struggle with the demon of fornication as one of the most difficult tasks for the believer. This confrontation lasted from the moment of early adolescence of a person to his deep maturity, and not always won out of it. The clergy preached that fasting and repentance were not enough to attain chastity, that persistent prayer and "divine contemplation" were also needed. As the Monk John Cassian wrote, "most of all one must have deep humility, without which victory over any passion cannot be won."
Taras Repin
