Nikon (Russian: Ни́кон, Old spelling: Нїконъ), born Nikita Minin (Никита Минин; 7 May [O.S. 27 April] 1605 – 17 August [O.S. 7 August] 1681) was the seventh Patriarch of Moscow and all Rus' of the Russian Orthodox Church, serving officially from 1652 to 1666. He was renowned for his eloquence, energy, piety and close ties to Tsar Alexis of Russia. Nikon introduced many reforms, including liturgical reforms that were unpopular among conservatives. These divisions eventually led to a lasting schism known as Raskol (schism) in the Russian Orthodox Church. For many years, he was a dominant political figure, often equaling or even overshadowing the Tsar. In December 1667, Nikon was tried by a synod of church officials, deprived of all his sacerdotal functions, and reduced to the status of a simple monk.
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👉 Patriarch Nikon in the context of Christianity in Russia
Christianity in Russia is the most widely professed religion in the country. The largest tradition is the Russian Orthodox Church. According to official sources, there are 170 eparchies of the Russian Orthodox Church, 145 of which are grouped in metropolitanates. There are from 500,000 to one million Old Believers, who represent an older form of Russian Orthodox Christianity, and who separated from the Orthodox Church in the 17th century as a protest against Patriarch Nikon's church reforms.
The Catholic Church estimates that there are from 600,000 to 1.5 million Catholics in the country, exceeding government estimates of about 140,000. There is one Catholic Archdiocese, Mother of God at Moscow, with three suffragan dioceses (Saint Clement at Saratov, Saint Joseph at Irkutsk, Transfiguration at Novosibirsk) and the Apostolic Prefecture of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. According to the Slavic Center for Law and Justice, Protestants make up the second or third largest group of Christians in Russia, with approximately 3,500 organizations and more than 1 million followers. A large number of missionaries operating in the country are from Protestant denominations.
Patriarch Nikon in the context of Avvakum
Avvakum Petrov (Russian: Аввакум Петров; 20 November 1620/1621 – 14 April 1682; also spelled Awakum) was a Russian Old Believer and protopope of the Kazan Cathedral on Red Square who led the opposition to Patriarch Nikon's reforms of the Russian Orthodox Church. His autobiography and letters to the tsar and other Old Believers such as Feodosia Morozova are considered masterpieces of 17th-century Russian literature.
Patriarch Nikon in the context of Great Moscow Synod
The Great Moscow Synod (Russian: Большой Московский собор, romanized: Bol'shoy Moskovskiy sobor) was a Pan-Orthodox synod convened by Tsar Alexis of Russia in Moscow in April 1666 in order to depose Patriarch Nikon of Moscow.
The council condemned the famous Stoglav of 1551 as heretical, because it had dogmatized the Russian church's rituals and usage at the expense of those accepted in Greece and other Eastern Orthodox countries. This decision precipitated a great schism of the Russian Orthodox Church known as the Raskol. Avvakum and other leading Old Believers were brought to the synod from their prisons. Since they refused to revise their views, the Old Believer priests were defrocked, anathemized and sentenced to life imprisonment in distant monasteries.