The People’s Commissariat of Property of the Republic and the Clergy of the Court during First Months of Soviet Power (Based on the Materials of the Central State Archive of Literature and Art of St Petersburg)

Abstract

Despite the abundance of researches into the question of the relationship between the Soviet government and the Orthodox Church, there still remain unexplored lacunae. One of them is the relationship of power with the clergy of the Court. The clergy, which was part of the Ministry of the Imperial Court, was abolished in January 1918, a few days before the Decree on Separation of Church from State was issued. This chronological discrepancy had its own reason. First of all, the clergy was connected with the fate of the Ministry, and, like a number of its subdivisions, fell under the control of the People’s Commissariat of Property of the Republic. Despite the generally accepted opinion about the exceptionally consistent anti-religious policy of the authorities, in March 1918 the leadership of the People’s Commissariat of Property issued a decree on the return to the clergy of part of the capital alienated by the January decree. This article examines this document and its appendices, which were not previously published, and also analyzes the possible reasons for the emergence of such a document, which contradicts the general course aimed at combating the church and religion carried out at that time on the national level.