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Within some of the most prominent Greek and
South Slav monasteries in Byzantium and at Mount Athos, a new mystic theory
started to be shaped. Known under the name of "Isikhiya," it
propagated moral self-perfection which, if thoroughly and sincerely practiced,
could bring the man during his life-time to total perfection, in other words it
would enable him to become divine (bozhestvo), to achieve sainthood.)?) The
followers of this new trend insisted that monks must not possess any valuable
item or property, that they must work to feed themselves and not live from the
work of somebody else, and that their prayers should not follow the ceremonial
pattern but consecrate heir time to meditation and individual internal prayers.
Most of them were too intellectuals within their monastery and as such they
developed a very high literary style, especially when writing biographies of
the saints. While the new approach to monastic life was debated chiefly between
the two ardent and able opponents: The abbot Iosif of the famous Volokolamski
Monastery, defending the official position of the church that monasteries are
the main pillars of the state and as such must be assisted to survive, and Nil
Sorski the head of ascetic monks, who left Kirillo-Beloserskii monastery, and
went to Mount Athos where he learned about the mystic theory of :isikhiya"
and became its fervent supporter and propagator. A new style of writing was
soon introduced to Russia and abundantly used in their literature until the end
of the 16 The century. Cultural relations, and particularly literary exchanges,
between the South Slavs and the Russians considerably expanded between the 11
The and the 16 The centuries. At the end of the 14 The century starts again a
long period of particularly strong literary influence exercised by south Slavs,
and especially by the Serbs, over the Russian literary life. Under Tsar Dushan
Serbia got rid of Byzantine tutelage, became powerful country, spread its
influence to the Mediterranean and Adriatic seas and got in touch with the
western countries and their civilizations. Very progressive, as we would say
today, Dushan did very much for the Serbian literature to achieve its golden
age (renaissance). The greater part of newly translated books are of Serbian
origin or retranslated from Serbian. The Russian authors or translators copy
even the agyographic style, so typical of the Serbian 14th century literary
works. The emerging new Russian center, Moscow, was particularly receptive to
the Serbian influence. At that time all Orthodox Slavs and the Bulgarians
shared just one literary language - the old church Slavic and just one
alphabet, the Cyrillic. The ancient authors, Serbian or Russian, once they had
written their work or had made a translation form a foreign non-Slavic
language, it could be read in Kiev, Moscow or Serbia. It is not surprising the
most of the literature of that time, was written in The same language over the
entire Slavic Orthodox world. Two prominent men who played an important role in
spreading Serbian influence and the new Style in Russia, and also whose works
were amongst the most important Russian literary products of that period, were
Kiprian and Logofet, both of Serbian origin.
Kiprian managed to become Russian archbishop as we have seen, but is better
known as an author of dealing with the devastating consequences of the invasion
by the Tatar and for writing the biography of the famous archbishop Peter, and
for initiating and writing the first Moscow Chronicle which included also for
the first time, all Russian lands. The latter gives the survey of all major
events during the last hundred years from an outsiders and not the all-Russian
point of view, and as such represents the history of Russia during that period.
In the same chronicle archbishop Kiprian deals with some moral characteristics
which adorn Russian rulers and recommends them to refrain from drinking
alcoholic beverages.
Things began to change when in the 16th century a national literary language
appeared in Russia developing gradually from spoken dialects. With time the
difference increased, and if we take into consideration the changes in the
alphabets that also occurred during this period, we can speak today of
different languages, Russian, Ukrainian, Serbian, etc. The flow of literature
and art was mainly from the Balkans to Russia, but there were also a few
instances in which Russian manuscripts found readers among the South Slavs.
Some Russian biographies (zhitia) and stories about the life and work of
saints, the chronicles, "The Be' - a collection of sayings of proverbial
nature, and some other works were recorded in the South Slavs' documents.
The writing of chronicles, as we know, was highly developed in ancient Russia
and usually interestingly presented. The common ancestry, language and religion
were sufficient to make them worthy of and pleasing for any Slavic reader. The
invasion of the Balkans by the Turks, which threatened to completely annihilate
the local population, resulted in migration of entire population of the
provinces. The Serbs were hit hardest; their monasteries were ransacked or
burned. Some Serbs went to Russia in search for new work and homes. In many
instances they were learned monks, considered at that time to be highly
educated, who specialized as writers, chroniclers, iconographers, miniaturists,
craftsmen, etc. In the 15th century the writers brought to Russia changes in
orthography and style which were enthusiastically accepted and introduced into
the Russian written language, known as "Poluustav," (Half-ustav). The
ancient Russian chronicles were hand written with vertical and rather square
letters, which looked much like printing. This manner of writing was called
"Ustav," the same word presently means regulations, or statutes, and
the original "Ustav" was a set of regulations that governed the
writing
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