ARCHBISHOP SERAPHIM SOBOLEV

Like the holy great martyr Artemius and Emperor Constantine the Great, who were initially “Arian saints” because it was the Arian heretics who first began to venerate them, which was then literally “taken away” by the Orthodox, On February 8, 2002, Seraphim Sobolev was canonized by the Bulgarian Orthodox Old Calendar Church, which is considered schismatic in relation to universal Orthodoxy. On June 3, 2016, Seraphim was glorified by the Bishops’ Council of the Russian Church with the consent of the canonical Orthodox Church of Bulgaria. Thus, Bishop Seraphim shone bright like a diamond in the Communion of Saints, the belief in which is proclaimed in the ancient Symbol of the Holy Apostles.

1 Like John of Shanghai, Serafim Sobolev (1881-1950) was one of those holy bishops who shared the fate of the Russian Orthodox Church during its wanderings in the twentieth century. The humble Church, wandering and without refuge, was born out of the vast and powerful Orthodox Catholic Eastern Greko-Russian Church, as it was called before the Revolution of 1917. It existed in several jurisdictions, and the division was overcome only in the first quarter of the twenty-first century. Seraphim himself, formerly a bishop of the Russian Church abroad, came under the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate after World War II. If we look at this not from the perspective of political expediency, but from the logic of hagiography, it was a prophecy of future reunification.

2 Seraphim was a theologian. He wrote extensively. I must confess back in 1994, it was his books, which were then reprinted in Russia, that taught us seminarians and people who were coming to faith so much. Seraphim was a philosopher. The apocalyptic originality of his thinking lay in his ability to work on understanding Russian ideology and recreating the monarchy in Russia during the Bolshevik rule in the 1930s, when it seemed that no trace of the former Orthodox heritage remained in the USSR itself. He was convinced that the revival of Russia and Russian Orthodoxy should begin with the canonization of Patriarch Nikon (1605–1681) as a saint. He saw him as an example of the supremacy of the sacred authority of the Church over the tsarist power and, at the same time, a prototype of the symphony between the Church and the State, a visionary and miracle worker, a martyr who suffered from the intrigues of the Eastern Patriarchs. Seraphim considered Peter the Great to be the root cause of all the misfortunes of subsequent Russian history. He seemed to consciously ignore the fact that it was Nikon’s deposition by “foreign patriarchs” that shocked Peter and prompted him to move to a collective synodal form of church governance so that no one else could interfere in Russian ecclesial affairs in such a radical way from outside. If there is no single primate, according to Peter’s logic, and governance is collective, then such a collective head cannot be deposed. The Russian patriarchate was titular, while the Eastern patriarchates were either Constantinian or even apostolic, so it was impossible to challenge any possible sanctions imposed by them at that time.

3 Seraphim was a priest and bishop. His path of service began successfully, with appointment after appointment, starting from the moment he was tonsured a monk and then ordained a priest at the St. Petersburg Academy in early 1908. This happened just five years after the canonization of St. Seraphim of Sarov (1754–1833). Thus, Seraphim Sobolev was destined to become one of the first in the Russian Church to receive this newly glorified saint as the heavenly patron of his monastic consecration. The revolutionary events drastically changed his biography. He was one of the bishops who left Russia with the White Army after its defeat in the civil war. In Simferopol, Crimea, he was ordained bishop by Metropolitan Anthony (Khrapovitsky) and briefly headed the Taurida Theological Seminary, becoming its last rector in history before the arrival of Soviet power and its closure. Thus, as rector, Saint Seraphim was the predecessor of Metropolitan Tikhon Shevkunov.

4 Seraphim opposed all distinctive teachings, phenomena, and occurrences contemporary to him in the twentieth century, from sophiology, ecumenism, and Freemasonry to the new style in the calendar and even socialism in all its forms. He was a true “grand inquisitor” of Orthodoxy. It is unlikely that Dostoevsky (1821–1881), in whose year of death he was born, could have imagined that that a person who is very similar in his work to his anti-Catholic, and in fact, anti-church image of the inquisitor, would soon exist and later become one of the Russian saints. Seraphim consulted with the last elders of Optina, and it was precisely the “Optinians” that Dostoevsky contrasted with his fictional character. If the image of the Inquisitor seems too radical to some, let us compare it with Don Quixote as interpreted by Giorgio Agamben. He seems to be sitting in the “cinema of modernity,” and instead of windmills, he attacks the white screens.

6 Seraphim lived for almost seventy years, the last thirty of which he was a bishop. From the point of view of canon law and church practice, his position was exceptional. After all, he headed the parishes of the Russian diaspora in Bulgaria, that is, formally, on the territory of another Orthodox Church. This was far from canonically flawless. But the Bulgarian Church at that time was in a state of turmoil due to the strongest modernist groups in the local community, so it considered the presence of Seraphim and his flock on its territory to be beneficial. It is precisely these two aspects of his biography, conservative theology and high hierarchical ministry, that are usually used to construct his life as a saint in the accounts of contemporary hagiographers.

7 “You have boldness before the Holy Trinity. Therefore, we honor you with a request: deliver us from misfortune, Saint John, you are our glory and our joy," says the Akathist Hymn dedicated to the great ascetic and culture-forming saint of the Bulgarian Church and nation, St John of Rila (876-946). The prayer hymn, written by Seraphim Sobolev, is distinguished by its harmonious structure. Unlike the vast majority of similar hymns by contemporary authors, it is clear and consistent, embodying prayerful experience and theological awareness. The very existence of this liturgical text reveals an important but little-known side of the personality of St. Seraphim Sobolev. He personally met with John of Kronstadt and listened to his advice. John’s heavenly patron was John of Rila. This is how this Akathist came into being — as a sign of gratitude to Bulgaria and in memory of the Kronstadt pastor, whom Seraphim considered a saint, but who had not yet been officially canonized at that time by the Church. Bishop Seraphim sincerely revered and loved the saints. From childhood, he constantly reread the complete collection of the lives of the saints by Dimitry of Rostov, eventually reading this magnum opus dozens of times. This is a tremendous undertaking and, along with posthumous miracles and veneration, one of the remarkable features of Bishop Seraphim’s spiritual journey. Those who visited his resting place in the St Nicolas Cathedral of Sofia even before his canonization were convinced that his tomb was already a place of profound holiness.