SLAVOPHILE MOVEMENT

SLAVOPHILE MOVEMENT. An intellectual movement during the 1840s and 1850s in Moscow, existing side by side with Westernizing and nationalistic movements, which idealized as supreme the historical role of Orthodoxy and Russia. Among its adherents were A. Khomiakov (q.v.), I. and P. Kireyevsky, C. and I. Aksakov, and G. Samarin. Their interests were broad, including theology, philosophy, history, politics, etc.; in each field, they made an impact that lasted. Although the Slavophiles were romantics of sorts, drawing a strict dichotomy between idealized things Russian and the profane non-Russian, they were not influenced by German romanticism and pantheism as were many of their contemporaries. Their foundations were in Orthodox tradition, their endeavor paralleled that of the non-possessors and more recently Paisii Velichkovsky in monasticism (qq.v.), and their effort should not be considered in complete isolation from other contemporaneous developments.

Aside from influencing later intellectual lights who considered the Slavophiles their forbears-from Dostoevsky (q.v.) to recent samizdat writers-one can point to concrete accomplishments that permanently changed 19th-c. Russia for the better. First, they articulated a vision of human peace and harmony that begins with the family, and that they thought should be expressed in all greater social institutions. Khomiakov, in a brilliant theological essay, showed that love in catholicity (q.v.) or sobornost is the heart of the unity of the Church and comes directly from God (q.v.). Samarin took the vision sociologically and applied it to the emancipation of the serfs in Russia and in the borderlands. I. Kireyevsky explained the philosophical underpinnings of sobornost and set the agenda of philosophical problems for the coming century of Russian philosophy. In spite of their zealous nationalism and belief in autocracy, the Slavophiles were strictly censored during the reign of Tsar Nicholas I, and were not extensively published until the reign of Tsar Alexander II.