J. Stalin, V. Molotov and others are carrying the coffin with V. Lenin's body.
Moscow. The Red Square. January 27, 1924
There were presented: the AG (Angel-Guardian), the AD (Angel-Destroyer) and witnesses: Michael Kulgitsky, Ivan Ilyin, Vasily Shulgin, Vladimir Mayakovsky, V. Grum-Grzhymailo, Leon Trotsky, Leon Feuchtwanger, Sergius Bulgakov, Alexey Khomyakov, Larisa. Vasilieva, Lasar Kaganovich.
'In the history of the Soviet power the present day is crucial. It separates the old and already closed period, when the Soviet republics, though they acted together but went apart from each other, being engaged in problems of their existence, from the new and already opened period, when an end is put to detached existence of the Soviet republics.
Republics are united into one union state for successful struggle against economic dislocation and the Soviet power thinks not only about its existence but about its development and becoming an important international power, which could influence international situation and change it for the sake of working people' (a fragment from Stalin's report at the 1st Congress of Soviets of the USSR).
'But made his own people to go forth like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock.
And he led them on safely, so that they feared not: but the sea overwhelmed their enemies' (Psalms 78:52-53).
'He that worketh deceit shall not dwell within my house: he that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight. I will early destroy all the wicked of the land; that I may cut off all wicked doers from the city of the LORD' (Psalms 101:7-8).
'Only the Soviet nation will live
An only people of Soviet nation'
(Michael Kulgitsky).
'Europeans need to have bad Russia: barbaric one to civilize it in their own way; having a vast territory to divide it; aggressive one to organize coalition against it; reactionary, religious and corrupting to break into it with propaganda of reformation or catholicity; having ruined economic to pretend to its 'unused spaces', raw materials or at least make profitable commercial treaties or concessions with it' (I. Ilyin).
'Lenin and Trotsky cannot refuse socialism. They must carry that burden to the end. Then SOMEONE will come. He will be truly red by his strength of will and truly white according to his tasks. He will be a Bolshevik by his energy and a nationalist according to his conviction'.
"This is Shulgin's prophesy," the AG said. 'Nationalist' means 'statesman'.
PAGES OF JOSEPH'S LIFE
In 1922 he took part in the 11th Congress of the Russian Communust Party (Bolsheviks), was elected a member of the Central Committee, was elected General Secretary of the Central Committee of the party at the Plenary Meeting.
He took part in the meeting of the 2nd enlarged plenary meeting of the Comintern. He took part in the work of the 12th All-Russian conference of the RKP(B) and spoke at the plenary meeting of the Central Committee of the RCP(B) with a report about relationship between Russian, Ukainian, Byelorussia and Trans-Caucasian Soviet Republics, was appointed head of the commission for uniting Soviet Republics into one Soviet state and was confirmed as a delegate to the 4th Congress of the Comintern.
The Politbureau approved of 'The Main Points of USSR's constitution' on the basis of Stalin's report.
He wrote a project of 'The Declaration of Foundation of the USSR. The 10th All-Russian Congress elected Stalin a member of the All-Soviet Central Executive Committee and a delegate of the RSFSR to the1st Congress of Soviet of the USSR.
He was confirmed as commissar of ethnic issues, spoke at the 1th Congress of Soviets of the USSR on the foundation of the USSR, was elected a member of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR, was elected a member of the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee, took part in the work of the commission of the people's commissariat of national affairs for the foundation of Buryat-Mongol Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic.
He was confirmed as a member of the commission for elaboration of the USSR constitution and made a report at the 12th Congress of the RCP(B) 'On a National Factor in Party and State Development'.
He was elected a member of the Central Committee of the Party, a member of the Politbureau and Orgbureau, was confirmed as General Secretary of the Central Committee, made a report about the USSR constitution at a plenary meeting of the Central Committee, made an appeal in 'Pravda' 'To All Nations and Governments of the World' concerning the USSR constitution, superintended the work of the plenum of the Central Committee, approved of the resolution about party development.
'The present day is a day of new Russia's triumph because it broke chains of national oppression and organized its victory over capital, created the dictatorship of the proletariat, awakened oriental peoples, inspired western laborers, turned the red banner of the party into the red banner of the state, and united peoples of the Soviet republics around this banner so as to unite them into one state, into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics' (J. Stalin, a fragment of his report at the 1st Congress of Soviets of the USSR),
The witness V. Grum-Grzhimailo:
'Russian man is considered as a slave. Others consider him as an anarchist. But he is neither of the two. Russian man is idealist. He is illiterate and ignorant man who cannot understand the word 'ideal' but he is idealist by his nature. Only approaching Russian man from this side, we can understand him�'
We have got used to our disorderly life, and Bismarck was right when he said that all Russian people consisted in the word 'nichego' (never mind). We can easily resign ourselves to shortcomings and deprivations of our life, always having our dreams, goals and feats before us. Without feat there is no goal, and as a consequence, Russian man sinks. On the stage there appear cards, vodka and laziness�'
Instead of the brilliant period of golden age of poetry, art and music, an age of scientific discoveries and industrial achievement will come, and Chekov's characters will find a sense of their existence. The nation will recover from the psychical illness which brought about revolution. Russian energy and spirit that died in the 19th century will be revived together with those things
In this respect the power of Bolsheviks will be decisive. Suppressing private initiative in trade and industry (the struggle against private owners), in peasantry (the struggle against the kulaks), Bolsheviks emphasize the value of this initiative among people, honorable position of such initiators, respect for people who are able to be initiators even after replacement of their power (V. Grum-Grzhimaylo, a prominent Russian metallurgist).
A fragment from Stalin's speech:
'In the past we didn't have and couldn't have our fatherland. But now when we overthrew capitalism and the power belongs to us - now we do have our Fatherland, and we will defend its independence.
Are you ready to see our socialistic Fatherland defeated and lost its independence? If you don't want it you should eliminate our backwardness and develop bolshevist temps of construction in socialistic economic.
We are fifty or a hundred years behind developed countries. We should catch up with them for ten years. Either we will do that, or we will be destroyed.
"Notice it, son of darkness, it is very important: Joseph first writes about 'Fatherland' with a capital 'F'. He means not place or country where man is born, but his Father's House in a worldly and religious sense of word, I.e. he means the House where the laws of Family (Family of Peoples) are at work.
There should be not 'democracy' and 'human rights' but 'brotherhood and love and voluntary service to each other and to the Whole as one organism for the sake of construction of 'bright future' or communism.
All of that is very far from western patterns of socialism; in fact it is an ethic aspect of the Purpose where every part of the Whole doesn't have its fullness of being but has its own function of service or supertask. Mutually helping each other and perceiving historic fortunes, needs and aspirations they voluntarily or not obey the words of the apostle Paul: 'Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ' (Galatians 6:2).
This doesn't imply rights and duties determined by the law but A SENSE OF DUTY. And it is very important.
'We have united our state in such a way that every its part wouldn't be able to fall away without damaging other parts; it wouldn't be able to exist by itself and would inevitably be in bondage to somebody.'
The Family of Peoples corresponds to the Heavenly Purpose. It was not declared openly in the supposedly atheistic state but was implied. And culture of those years was completely religious by its perception of the world and spirit.
It was the first Antivampiria in the world. The principle of mutual service was opposed to the world of competition and mutual gorging. It sounds paradoxical but the first attempt to fulfill the Heavenly Purpose was made in the atheistic state.
We are in one spirit; you understand
There are no divisions in our hearts.'
If you not for us and we are not with you
Then what else shall we do?
Armies and navies were sent by the rich of the world
Against the first republic of workers and peasants.
God damn you, rotten kingdoms and democracies
With your blemish 'fraternite' and 'egalite'.
Here is a very interesting testimony of Joseph's bitter enemy:
'Nine-year period of theological school had a strong influence on his personality and successes. He had learnt Russian at lessons of theological scholasticism. Russian language always was half-foreign, theological and difficult for him. He didn't consider theology as a science which demanded knowing Russian. He studied Russian together with theology. For this reason theological forms and phrases once and for all became forms and phrases of Russian language in his mind. Theological argumentation is always formal; it uses arguments of church authorities, classifies and numbers them' (Leon Tritsky).
"But the main 'church authority' is the Word of the Creator. 'Your ways are not my ways."
The press from time to time renews its supposition that Stalin strives for international revolution. No thought is more fallacious than this one. Exterior affairs are completely submitted to interior ones for Stalin.'
He spoke slowly and cautiously. But in his apathetic voice anger was heard. All his stature first seemed sinister to me and, I think, not only to me. His words were off-topic and didn't answer arguments. But they included a number of insinuations which remained incomprehensible for most of people, and they were addressed to his staff, to people of his apparat.
Stalin instructed them how they should speak to masses where THERE ARE NO LEADERS OF THE PARTY AND WHERE THEY COULD SPEAK IN A LOUD VOICE.'
The witness Leon Feuchtwanger:
'By 1935 all the world admitted that socialism in one country had been formed, and moreover, this country had been armed and ready to repulse any attacks.
What could Trotsky do? A man who formerly could see what wasn't seen by others now couldn't see what was seen to every child.
Food supply was arranged, machinery worked, raw materials were produced in unprecedented amounts, the country was electrified and mechanized. Trotsky was reluctant to acknowledge it. He said that rapid increase and feverish haste of construction will cause fragility of this construction. The Soviet Union, 'Stalin's state' as he called it, sooner or later should collapse even without another's help, and it will surely collapse when it is attached by fascist states.'
'I'm leader of my people
And my people's servant
A poet's word is your resurrection
And your immortality (V. Mayakovsky).
'Mayakovsky was, is and will be the most talented poet of our epoch' (J. Stalin).
"Let's return to the religious issue," the AD said. "Yes, I can perfectly remember all your previous testimonies about 'Russian Church in paralysis', false social preaching, Rasputin, God's punishment, redemption, purification by blood of the Orthodox and new martyrs. Of course, all of that is right but I also have a lot of testimonies: confiscation of church property, shootings of priests, repressions, mockeries and destruction of churches. What will you say to it?"
"I will say nothing, son of darkness, because only God can judge his Church. You will produce these materials at the Judgment, and in the Light of the Truth the meaning of God's wrath, great redemptory and purifying sacrifice, delusion and demonical possession of individual people will become clear.
And also the guilt of Lenin, Trotsky and Kaganovich with so called Jewish Freemasons will be established as well as the reason of fierce opposition to the new power from the side of the clergy
"I'm a simple Joseph's advocate appointed by God. I can only witness, interpret and pray for my client."
"Let's return to facts and testimonies."
"Therefore, one of the first decrees of the people's power had to do with 'separation church from state'".
"You lose sight of the most valuable winning of Russian life, which even by itself can compensate and in a sense justify all our trials. This is liberation of the Orthodox Church from being captured by the State. The Russian Church is now free though it is persecuted. The key to understanding of historical events should be searched in the internal and external destinies of church."
As you can see there is such a point of view, as the priest Sergius Bulgakov witnesses:
"First of all, church commands peoples to be truthful and sincere. And so I must say that not all things are right in the Orthodoxy. The Orthodoxy has an inner illness that weakens it, and the best proof of it is the revolution.
Isn't it a hard evidence of decline in the orthodoxy? Salt lost it strength and for this reason body became to decay.
'Just before the October revolution I happened to hear a confession of my friends. He told with great excitement and tender emotion that when he fervently prayed, an image of God's Mother appeared to him and a voice in his heart clearly said, "Russia is saved." He doesn't know why it happened but that moment was very significant in his life.'
"This is a mystical aspect of the problem, but as for the rest things, church wasn't prohibited officially, and the Church Council was convened."
'Christianity is nothing other than freedom in Christ,' Khomyakov said. 'In church affairs compulsory unity is lie and compulsory obedience is death.'
'Church unity is nothing other than harmony of personal freedoms.' 'Knowledge of the truth is given only by mutual love.'
'Church acknowledges brotherhood but doesn't acknowledge citizenship.'
"As you can see, many people share the viewpoint of purification and renovation. At first the authority granted freedom to the church, but later it began to use a terror against forces that rose against revolution, defending the old 'world of violence, which should be removed by the roots.'
'Orthodox Christians, rise against the power of the red Antichrist! Don't listen to any calls to reconcile with him. There is no peace between Christ and Satan. By the authority given to me by God I exempt all believers from any oath to self-constituted government because Christians are not subjects of Satan.
By the authority given to me by God I bless every weapon taken up against the red satanic power and remit sins of everyone who, being in ranks of insurgent armed forces or a single warrior, will fall on the field of battle for Russian and Christ's cause!' (The pastoral message of The Right Reverend Metropolitan Antonius to all Orthodox Russian people in Russia and Abroad).
Of course, the power sowed its teeth in response. It struggled against church as social institution that served class of exploiters and the House of Romanov, helped to cheat people and kept its values to use them for counter-revolutionary purposes but not as the mystical body of Christ, as it was in the time of early Christians.
Of course, there were demon possessed individuals. In newsreels of that time you can see a lot of demon possessed people who burnt icons, Bibles and destroyed altars, but at that time books by Pushkin, Dostoyevsky and Shakespeare also were thrown into fire as well as sculptures and pictures.
I have no testimonies that Joseph in the early years of the Soviet power took part in the struggle against the church; as a rule, it was Lenin's and Trotsky's initiative.
In one of his notes written in the twentieth years Joseph calls atheistic literature 'antireligious trash'. Knowing Joseph, I can say only one thing: only those who prevented him from doing his Cause became his enemies. His God and his Cause were inseparable.
The church became his enemy only when it opposed his Antivampiria.
In his mind God was punishing and at the same time creative right hand mentioned in the Old Testament, and church was associated with the seminary, 'Jesuitical order' and struggle against the truth.
"Come out of her, my people�"
A fragment from Joseph's conversation with the first delegation of American of workers:
'I must declare that, formally speaking, we don't have such conditions of admittance to the party members, which would demand to have atheistic convictions. Our conditions of admittance to the party are as follows: unconditional submission to resolutions of the party and its bodies, paying dues and membership in one of party's organizations.'
One of the delegates, 'I have very often read that people are excluded from the party for their faith in God.'
Stalin, 'I can only repeat what I have said above about conditions of admittance to the party. We have no other conditions.
Does it mean that that the party's attitude to religion is indifferent? No, it doesn't. We spread and will spread propaganda against religious prejudices. The law of our country says that every person has a right to confess any religion. It is a matter of everyone's conscience. That's why we separated church from state. But after separation of church from state and declaring religious liberty we reserved the right of every citizen to struggle by means of personal conviction, propaganda and agitation against one or other religion.
The party cannot be indifferent to religious prejudices, and it will spread propaganda against those prejudices because it is one of the best ways to undermine influence of reactionary clergy, supporting the exploiter classes and preaching submission to those classes.'
'The Great Britain prime-minister promised to speed up the landing of the allied armies to the seaboard of Germany, and Stalin, sighing with relief, crossed himself.'
'Stalin wasn't an enemy of church as Lenin and other Bolsheviks were. His sometimes poorly and sometimes well concealed disposition to religion came through all his life. Thus, in the early years of revolution when in the country it became possible to publish the church newspaper 'Christian', Stalin was among those who looked upon this fact with favor. But another point of view prevailed - the one that was shared by Nadezhda Krupskaya who struggled against religion.
It was said that at the hardest time of the war he even prayed, and later one of his peace decrees was his command to return a number of values to the church, including relics of saints (L. Vasilieva, The Kremlin Wives)/
A FRAGMENT FROM THE MEMOIRS ABOUT STALIN BY KAGANOVICH
'In his image there was nothing human. Even if he expressed his own feelings, it seemed that it didn't come from the bottom of his heart. His words were as false as camouflage on a tank. But under it Stalin, a piece of steel, was hidden. For some reason I was sure that he would live forever. There was nothing human in him.
He had a special character trait which made me be surprised. He always spoke of God and religion with some respect. At first I thought that it only seemed to us, but later I noticed that my impression was right. He always was very cautious when a conversation turned to this theme. I never managed to determine what his opinion of this problem was. But one thing became clear to me: he has his own special view of this subject. For example, he never said that God didn't exist.'
'At his presence people felt ill at ease. Everybody honored and respected him. I didn't think he enjoyed people's love; he towered over this love. Maybe, it sounds strange but he took a position that was belonged God in the past.'
"Why are you smiling, Positive?"
"Because Joseph made all the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) work for God. About those people Joseph once said the following,
'They pretend they believe in the ideal of socialism in a future classless society. In reality they believe only in organized authority.'"
"OK, I will reveal you the most mysterious mystery," the AD hissed, 'the more so because at the Judgment 'nothing is secret, that shall not be made manifest.'"