Old Believers / Старообрядцы

Old Believers or Old Ritualists are Eastern Orthodox Christians who maintain the liturgical and ritual practices of the Russian Orthodox Church as they were before the reforms of Patriarch Nikon of Moscow between 1652 and 1666. Resisting the accommodation of Russian piety to the contemporary forms of Greek Orthodox worship, these Christians were anathematized, together with their ritual, in a Synod of 1666–67, producing a division in Eastern Europe between the Old Believers and those who followed the state church in its condemnation of the Old Rite. Russian speakers refer to the schism itself as raskol (раскол), etymologically indicating a "cleaving-apart".

Vasilyeva Faina Karpovna, born in 1928. The Old Believer (maskoyka - that's how the Old Believers call themselves in the Vitibshchina). By the way, the dialect of the Old Believers is not Belarusian at all.

"A specialist in weaving since school," recalls Karpovna. In the hut * (Old Believers') we met a lot of self-woven towels, bedding and other things. They even gave us something!

Faina Karpovna tells about the wedding like this. "The dancing was over, I was going home, and they (the groom and his relative) took me away and dragged me, my heel came off, I resisted. And there his parents are already meeting him with bread and salt," Karpovna recalls— "As soon as she found out, she ran for tomorrow, she wanted to break the windows, but how did she do it before?! Shame! Once I spent the night, that's it"! It was called getting married by "withdrawal". "By consent" Faina Karpovets failed.

— And were they treated with prayers?
— Well, what about it?! And from the evil eye and from fright, from all the prayers they knew!

"I saw once again how the village was saved. The hut caught fire, the wind went to the village. One woman took the icon and went around. I don't remember which way I went around. But the wind changed direction. So they were saved.."

Belarus Vitebsk region / Expedition 2021

When we entered the hut, Faina Karpovna was lying in bed. The disease immobilized her.

She was a bit cautious about us at first, just the way all the Old Believers are - those we had a chance to stay at. We had to drive around some of them, as they didn't want to see us even if they were good friends of our own friends. But this happens only in the beginning!

You need to bide your time, let people get to know you, and it turns out that these are the nicest Christians! Very open and simple-minded people! They are always ready to share their food with you, make a gift, and, what is essential - to APOLOGIZE (it's some kind of tradition for them - maybe because they still consider themselves as newcomers and try not to offend the guest).

So did Faina Karpovna. After a while, she told us about her leg conditions, and her caring neighbor. For two more hours we discussed customs of the Old Believers and the local cuisine. Then she recalled her youth and life in the city. And at the end of that conversation, she invited us to have some tea, gave us a rushnik [a ritual cloth embroidered with symbols and cryptograms of the ancient world], and let us go with her radiant smile!