The news we received from our Vilnius correspondents and published in issue No. 172 of the “Moscow News” could not fail to astonish us with its strangeness. Until now, one of the most important questions concerning the government in the interests of national policy was the admission of the Russian language for use in various faiths recognized by our laws, but now, if we are to believe the aforementioned news, this question has suddenly been distorted, and the discussion is, on the contrary, about the prohibition of the Russian language. The best possible way to avoid the adoption of this measure, which, apparently, has been placed on the immediate agenda, is being sought.
In principle, the government has long predetermined the resolution of this issue. Back in the previous reign, according to the thoughts of the currently reigning Sovereign Emperor, who oversaw military educational institutions, the teaching of the law of God in Russian was introduced for students of the Roman Catholic faith. True, this was only the beginning, but undoubtedly it was not initiated to remain a needless and fruitless attempt, but rather to acquire real significance in the future. The events of our time have revived this important state idea, which contains the secret of a just resolution, unaccompanied by any upheavals, equally conservative and liberal, of a whole knot of questions that introduce confusion into our state life. Unfortunately, ignorance, prejudice, and deception, which play such an active role in everything here, raised one difficulty after another, entangling and delaying a matter that is, in itself, clear and straightforward.
The matter, however, was gradually being unraveled; unreasonable stubbornness on one side, intrigue and deception on the other, were losing ground. Although slowly, the matter was still moving forward. The government was taking measures one after another, indicating the importance it attaches to this issue. It is certainly regrettable that these measures often have a character of randomness and are insufficiently coordinated with each other, and therefore are not sufficiently secured in their success and not protected from opposition by parties that do not favor them. But there can be no doubt about the general direction of these measures. The government is now more concerned than ever before with the affirmation of the state unity of Russia and the cessation of those false national claims that have developed mainly from the unnatural prohibition imposed on the Russian language. To remove the reasons that constrain its use, to grant the right to all Russian subjects and to everything that is permitted and recognized by Russian laws – this is the goal that, despite all the fluctuations, delays, and contradictions in implementation, is clearly expressed in the overall government program. As for the Western region, the government acted there most decisively regarding the language. The Polish language, which clearly appeared as a symbol of rebellion, was strictly prohibited along with other rebellious demonstrations. The Polish language was expelled not only from official communications but also from private conversations in public places. However, the government could not fail to realize that such measures taken against the Polish language could only have temporary or palliative significance.
There is no doubt that the Polish language has no right to recognition in the Western region and that there is no need, for the convenience of the populations, to allow its official use in schools, in administration, or in court. There is no Polish people in this region, nor has there ever been, and only a sad misunderstanding was to blame for this region being considered Polish. But to truly resolve the issue, it is not so much a matter of prohibiting the use of the Polish language as it is of ensuring that the use of the Russian language is not subject to prohibition. Meanwhile, it turned out that the government was simultaneously prohibiting the Polish language and making it a necessity, while at the same time legitimizing Polish national institutions within the Russian state. In the Western region, there are about three million inhabitants of the Roman Catholic faith; these people, as well as followers of other recognized faiths, have been deprived of the right to Russian nationality, or, which is the same, to the Russian language, in one of the most important spheres of public life – the church! And since Poland once ruled in the Western region of Russia, the Roman Catholic institution, in the absence of the Russian language, inevitably became a national-political Polish institution.
The masses in the Western region are completely alien to the Polish language, and a significant part of its Roman Catholic population knows no other language but Russian; nevertheless, due to the prohibition on the Russian language, all local Catholics were forced to consider themselves Polish nationals, and thus, from generation to generation, the specter of the Polish question, which has caused so much suffering to this unfortunate region, has grown. The entire task is simply to return the church institution recognized by our legislation to its exclusively ecclesiastical character and to free it from the admixture of a national principle, which cannot be recognized by Russian legislation and which, in essence, is nothing but a betrayal of the Russian state. But to achieve this goal, there is no other way than to lift the unnatural prohibition on the Russian language and grant the right to it to all institutions legally existing within the Russian state.
Having adopted a national program as the basis of its policy, setting the assurance and strengthening of the state unity of Russia as its highest task, the government could not help but embark on the aforementioned path. In recent years, as mentioned above, a whole series of measures have been adopted in this direction. The teaching of the Roman Catholic law of God is already being conducted in all educational institutions in Russian; the Russian catechism of this faith, initially permitted only for lithographic reproduction, was finally allowed for printing after some incomprehensible fluctuations. The so-called Rubricella have been translated into Russian, printed, and distributed to parishes; a Roman Catholic Ritual, or Prayer Book, with an additional Russian text was printed, although not distributed but hidden in the basement; recently, the printing of the Roman Catholic prayer book in Russian has been completed. The question was about introducing the Russian language into those parts of the Roman Catholic liturgy that are called additional and are conducted not in Latin but in the vernacular. It is quite natural that all these printed prayer books and liturgical texts, not only stored in basements but also released for their intended purpose, cannot lead to anything if the Polish language remains the mandatory organ of the Roman Church among populations that are not Polish at all. The matter is not about prayer books, which anyone can have for their use in any language, but about the organ of public prayer and preaching. It is quite natural that the government’s assumptions in this regard were met with increased resistance from the Polish party, which understands very well the essence of the raised question. The public is aware of the response given to the Ministry of Internal Affairs by the Roman Catholic college based on explanations provided to it by the diocesan authorities.
The Polish party has set all its springs in motion. There is a monastic order abroad, consisting almost exclusively of Poles, funded by subsidies from Polish magnates and known as the Brotherhood of the “Resurrection” (of Poland?). These Resurrection brothers, fearing, in light of certain signs, that the Pope might realize the incorrectness of his church affairs in Russia and might decide to assist in bringing them into a more normal state, intensified their activities and managed to once again cloud the minds in Rome, apparently not losing hope of doing the same in Petersburg, as can be concluded from a statement published in some foreign clerical newspapers and personally addressed to us by the head of this order, Father Kayević.
No matter how detestable the measures aimed at introducing the Russian language into the religious use of Russian Catholics were for the Polish party, they were not very worried about them as long as the matter was limited to the teaching of the law of God in schools and the translations of prayer books. The entire strength of the question lies in whether the Russian language will penetrate public worship and preaching among Catholics and whether the connection that makes Catholicism a Polish national institution will be severed. Without this, all other measures must remain fruitless attempts that will not change anything substantially. The critical period will pass, other circumstances will arise, and all these translated books will disappear by themselves, along with Russian signs on shops in Vilnius and with circulars from governors prohibiting the use of the Polish language in public places. This is what the Polish party thinks, and it is not mistaken, at least in the respect that the Polish principle, constrained and driven inward, will not disappear and will not lose its strength until the false identity of it with the religious institution, which gives it a real basis and legal right to exist, is destroyed. The entire national question in the Western region essentially boils down to this. One cannot expect that the diversity of faith in a state as vast as Russia, open on all sides and in continuous communication with the rest of the world, will cease; but the security of Russia, both internal and external, urgently requires that no religious institution permitted by it be at the same time a national or political institution. This question cannot now fail to present itself in all its clarity to both sides. We are informed from Kyiv that the local administration is completely convinced of the necessity of a complete and effective, not fictitious, resolution of this question. There, it is believed that with the introduction of the Russian prayer for the Sovereign, the introduction of the Russian language into all other parts of the additional liturgy, as well as into preaching, should immediately follow.
Our Vilnius correspondents wrote to us shortly before the last, so strange, news they reported that the local administration had strongly opposed the incorrect statement of the Roman Catholic college that there are few Catholics speaking Russian in the Western region. Considering some unfounded objections, the Vilnius administration rightly noted that the Russian language “should be viewed as one of the branches of the Slavic language, which has already been permitted with the Pope’s permission in worship.” They further pointed out, as our correspondents reported, the following: “The necessity of introducing the Russian language into Catholic worship is also proven by the experience of the past. The development of the local population’s inclination towards Poland has largely depended on the use of the Polish language in Catholic worship, as for the masses, religion and language are the only assimilating principles. These same principles must be used as much as possible now in the matter of Russification of the Western region, and by introducing the Russian language into all additional worship in churches instead of Polish, the significance of it in the eyes of the people will be elevated and the kinship of the population of this region with the rest of Russia will be strengthened.”
What could be fairer than these words? What could be more decisive in their tone? And suddenly it turns out that in Vilnius, in the end, the viewpoint consistent with the aforementioned statement of the Polish clerical party, made through the mediation of the St. Petersburg Roman Catholic college, has triumphed! And this at the very time when the best sentiments prevailed among some members of the Roman Catholic clergy in the Western region, and some pastors, contrary to the still strong dominance of the Polish party in their sphere, followed the prompting of conscience and duty and addressed their flock in the language of their actual, not fictitious homeland!
The essence of the latest news from Vilnius lies in the Belarusian dialect. A few years ago, we had a question about the Little Russian language, in contrast to Russian; does it now come time for Belarusian?
Let us imagine that due to some coincidence, the matter in question, under the given circumstances, fell into the hands of people from the Polish party; what could they do in light of the recognized necessity by the government to separate Catholicism from Polonism, in the false identification of which lies the very life force of this fateful and bloody historical error called the Polish question? Nothing other than to create an indefinite and dubious situation in which the principle to be eradicated would remain hidden without disappearing. They could think of nothing better than to raise the question of the Little Russian or Belarusian dialect instead of the Russian language. This would save the foundation of the Polish question for the future; on the other hand, it could sow confusion in the very depths of Russian nationality. Instead of heterogeneous elements in terms of the common nationality of the state, the question of the very nationality of the Russians would be raised, and its internal unity would be called into question: what could be more desirable from the opposing point of view? Instead of a single Russian nationality, equal to the Russian state, there would appear Muscovites, Belarusians, Ukrainians, and if the matter were successfully taken up due to deception, then Russia, instead of implementing its national program, would have to entangle itself in internal contradictions and misunderstandings. This is indeed an excellent maneuver from the perspective of opposing parties!
The Belarusian language is a novelty. It still needs to be created before we can speak of it. There is not a single language in the world that does not represent more or less noticeable features in the vernacular of local populations. Of all languages, Russian, however, despite the vastness of the space and the diversity of the localities where it is spoken, is distinguished by the greatest uniformity, so that the largest discrepancies in it are less significant than the smallest features in the local dialects of Germany, France, England, Italy, etc. Compared to the major features of local dialects of other languages, even the Polish language represents a relatively insignificant feature compared to Russian. As for the Belarusian dialect, it is simply a peculiar way of pronunciation, with the most negligible lexical nuances that are found everywhere in Russia and which equally belong to the general type of the Russian language, although not all can claim acceptance into the general literary language. In many cases, the difference in the Belarusian dialect is nothing more than a difference in general oral pronunciation compared to written spelling. We do not speak as we write, and if we were to record our spoken language with all its nuances, we ourselves would hardly recognize it. The Belarusian dialect is heard not only on the Neman or Pripyat – it sounds almost throughout the Smolensk province and approaches Moscow itself. In some cases, the Moscow pronunciation is more similar to the Belarusian dialect than, for example, to the vernacular in the Yaroslavl or Kostroma provinces. Finally, has it ever been heard that a visitor from Moscow or Petersburg had to learn some Belarusian language in the Minsk or Grodno provinces in order to be able to communicate with the local people? World intermediaries arriving there from Kursk or Kostroma find it just as easy to communicate with the peasants as they do at home, where the simple and illiterate people also speak in their own way. We do not deny that the Belarusian dialect can be inflated into a separate language with some effort. But the same can be done with the features of the vernacular Kostroma or Ryazan dialects: it is only necessary to artificially select and develop everything that represents some difference and introduce into the local dialect phrases and turns from another language. The only difference is that regarding the Belarusian dialect, this last procedure is more convenient and easier due to the presence of the Polish language, which, in these places where it has dominated, has not remained without some influence on the Russian language of the local populations.
With what purpose and in what sense would they introduce the Belarusian dialect into public worship and preaching? How to define this dialect, which varies by locality in the vernacular, which has neither grammar nor writing? Is it required that the preacher adapt his pronunciation to that of the peasants, or that the words be written as they are pronounced, without adhering to orthography?
We have before our eyes a Roman Catholic prayer book translated by the Vilnius prelate Nemeksha; it is pure Russian, and at the same time, it is purely Belarusian. To make it more Belarusian, is it necessary, for example, to depict, instead of the form хожу, how Belarusians pronounce it and how we partly pronounce it in Moscow, хажу or instead of он to use ён? If this is allowed, then in editions intended for popular reading in the Ryazan province, one must write чаво instead of чего, and in the Kostroma province – быват instead of бывает. A literarily educated person, addressing the simple people, must adapt to their understanding, but this does not mean that it is necessary to mimic the peasant.
If prayer and preaching in Roman churches here must mimic the simple Belarusian dialect, presenting it as a separate language, different from Russian, then there is no reason not to demand the same from the local Orthodox clergy. Orthodox Belarusians, like Latin Belarusians, live together and speak completely alike. If it is deemed necessary for greater edification to use the vernacular of the Belarusian in preaching, then it will be necessary to mimic this dialect for the Orthodox Belarusian as well. In such a case, one must be concerned with compiling a Belarusian grammar, unifying and developing the features of this dialect and introducing it as an organ of instruction in all schools and across all subjects. It must start with a school reform – this will be, at least, consistent.
In essence, however, the proposal to introduce the Belarusian dialect instead of the commonly used Russian language can have only one practical result: the matter will slip away from the reform that the government rightly recognizes as useful and necessary, and the question will be buried and erased. Under the guise of the supposedly Belarusian dialect, the priests, remaining vessels of Polish patriotism, will all the more zealously support the Polish element, mixing it with the local Russian: who will take it upon themselves to control the disorganized and unregulated, illiterate vernacular? Who will determine the degree of foreign admixture that can be stirred up and enhanced in it? With what circulars will the governor’s office designate the character of the so-called Belarusian dialect? To whom will it prescribe to stop the priest where he strays too far from the prescribed bureaucratic type of language or strays too much into the Polish element? Meanwhile, the most conscientious of the local Roman Catholic clergy, who have already begun to speak Russian in church, will be shamed due to their expressed loyalty to their civil duty. The recognized non-Orthodox faith will continue to remain a secret political organization and will continue to produce in its depths that moral poison which has already caused so much suffering and destroyed so many generations. The shell will remain undetonated, and the government’s assumptions will be deceived. And the bad parties will take advantage of the sown seed of new discord and will certainly not miss the opportunity to spread among the local populations a sense of division regarding the Russian people.
We dare to think that it is much better to leave the matter of the Russian language entirely than to lead it down such a path.
First published: “Moscow News”. August 9, 1869, No. 175.
Katkov Mikhail Nikiforovich (1818 – 1887) – Russian publicist, publisher, literary critic.