It is an honor to be part of this panel. My regard for Paul Robert Magocsi’s scholarship is a matter of record. As I have written elsewhere, “[Magocsi’s] work will remain foundational for years to come, especially as he has always seen the big picture of European history. And because his scholarship is so pivotal—and comprehensive—it will be read continually far outside the circle of ‘insiders’” (Galadza Reference Galadza2015, 31).
With Their Backs to the Mountains is another example of pivotal and comprehensive scholarship. Of course, no volume attempting to review millennia of history, however lengthy, can ever be comprehensive enough, and I will be discussing some of the lacunae. But as the person invited to speak on the religious and theological issues raised in the book, I am happy to note that Magocsi has again shown due regard for the religious domain of the human experience—a key aspect of Carpatho-Rusyn identity viewed historically.
In Aristotelian fashion, my remarks will be presented in two sections: the material and the formal. The material section will note some of the flaws related to facts or emphases. The formal section will address several theological or ethical questions that derive from Magocsi’s promotion of the Carpatho-Rusyn cause.
Before I continue, however, I should note my appreciation for Magocsi’s promotion of Carpatho-Rusyn identity. I would even bolster his assertion that Carpathian Rus’ is both real and imagined by suggesting that precisely because it is and has been imagined for so long—and not as a delusion but as a grounded aspiration—it is real (Magocsi Reference Magocsi2015, 407).Footnote 1 And the aspiration is founded on objectively identifiable characteristics, giving it a primordialist underpinning. In any case, if there is anyone that should appreciate the constructivist approach to nation-building, it is those of us who are of Ukrainian background, especially Galician-Ukrainian background, whose own grandparents or great grandparents identified themselves precisely as Rusyns.
Material Dimensions
Without doubt the most flawed part of the book as regards religion is the three-page gray text box entitled “Christianity Becomes ‘Our’ Religion” (Magocsi Reference Magocsi2015, 37–39). In Magocsi’s defense, I should note that he admits that he is relying on the formulations of another author. Unfortunately, that author has collapsed religion into folklore, and then identified most of this folklore with Carpathian-Rus’, even though it is shared by a broad range of East Slavs, in particular Ukrainians, as far east as the Poltava and Zaporizhzhia regions. Most disturbingly, the author traces these developments to Saints Cyril and Methodius. This is not the kind of writing that one has come to expect from Magocsi. Fortunately, however, it is not his text.
The reference to “our religion” evokes the question of religious practices that are truly distinctive, or at least more characteristic, of Carpatho-Rusyns. Among these is their plain chant—prostopinije. It certainly deserves far more attention than this volume has accorded it. Not only is prostopinije a gem when sung well, at the parish level it has often determined ecclesial affiliation. In the past, communities would enter or leave church jurisdictions in no small part because of the use or nonuse of prostopinije. (With Their Backs to the Mountains at least notes this fact in the one passing reference to it on page 246). Historically then, for Carpatho-Rusyns prostopinije could be almost as fundamental as language. Yet, not only is its mention restricted to the aforementioned passing reference (misspelled at that), but the name of Ioann Bokshai, prostopinije’s musical architect, appears nowhere in the book.
In the section entitled “The Fall of Constantinople and the Decline of Orthodoxy” we learn that at the time of Byzantium’s fall the “Eastern-rite Christian inhabitants of northeastern Hungary were within the jurisdiction of the Orthodox Eparchy of Mukachevo” (Magocsi Reference Magocsi2015, 70–71). This spurs the reader to hunt for information on the history of this Orthodox jurisdiction. Unfortunately, one finds almost nothing except for a reference to the St. Nicholas Monastery in Mukachevo, which served as the eparch’s headquarters. From elsewhere we know that the first historical document to mention a bishop of Mukachevo dates from 1491 (Pekar Reference Pekar1992, 14; Blazejowskyj Reference Blazejowskyj1990, 242). It refers to a certain “Ivan” as the eparch. The next Orthodox bishop of whom we know does not appear in any historical records until 1551. It would seem that these kinds of lacunae deserve mention, if only because of the Carpatho-Rusyns’ insistence that they trace their Christianization to Cyril and Methodius. Similarly, in view of this insistence, it seems almost suspicious that Magocsi makes no reference to the claim of other scholars that in the mid-11th century, Anastasia, the daughter of Yaroslav the Wise, married the Hungarian King Andraś I, and apparently brought with her (from Kyiv) monks who settled on Monk’s Hill (Černeča Hora) the eventual site near Mukachevo of the famed monastery and eparchial see (Pekar Reference Pekar1992, 13). Even if these claims should be considered dubious (though I am hardly competent to venture an opinion on the claims), they certainly deserve discussion as they suggest a crucial and early religious link between Kyiv and Mukachevo.
Finally, as regards material points, pages 85–86 provide us with another text box that requires a fair amount of tweaking. First, not all Rusyn Orthodox commemorate the Patriarch of Constantinople. In the homeland, almost none do. As regards the filioque, the Holy Spirit does not “descend,” but rather “proceeds” from the Father “and the Son.” Finally, referring to the Gregorian calendar as a “Roman-Rite accretion” should be nuanced in view of its acceptance by Protestants.
Notwithstanding the aforementioned, Magocsi must be commended—in addition to everything else—for providing a wealth of information on ecclesial realities. In particular he has done painstaking work to create two maps that illustrate the location of religious institutions. Map 26 (Magocsi Reference Magocsi2015, 226) is especially valuable owing to its uniqueness as a fully ecumenical portrayal.
Formal Dimensions
In Chapter 29, “The Post-Communist Prešov Region and the Lemko Region—Slovakia and Poland,” there is a sub-section entitled: “The Greek Catholic Church: A Positive or Negative Force?” The reference is to the Church in Slovakia, and is indicative of Magocsi’s marked appreciation for the Greek Catholic Church as illustrated in other parts of the book. In this sub-section, however, we read: “Its hierarchs transformed the Greek Catholic Church into a Slovak institution, not only in name, but also by replacing Church Slavonic with Slovak in the liturgy and homilies” (Magocsi Reference Magocsi2015, 384). Magocsi continues his criticism:
In many ways, the post-1989 era seemed to be a return to the past. In the nineteenth century, a small group of patriotic priests were faced with the overwhelming threat of magyarization favored by their own Greek Catholic hierarchs; now at the end of the twentieth century a new generation of patriotic Carpatho-Rusyn priests… have felt obliged to resist the slovakization of the Prešov Greek Catholic hierarchy (384).
These few passages summarize the theological and pastoral problem of almost every Eastern Church, that of the Carpatho-Rusyns included. Many of them, whether Greek, Russian, or Ukrainian, have floundered in their Christian mission because of their inability to transcend cultural Christianity—a phenomenon, which, with the demise of Christendom, has been exposed for all its futility.Footnote 2 Consequently, the ability of the Slovak Greek Catholic—as well as Hungarian Greek Catholic and Byzantine-Ruthenian Catholic Churches—to transcend Carpatho-Rusyn identity has ultimately brought them unique vitality, at least religious vitality. Those familiar with the ecclesial institutions in Prešov or Hajdúdorog can attest to this. The Slovak and Hungarian Greek Catholic Churches have managed to embody an effective universalism, without which no Church can remain a Christian institution.
One may ask, what then is the place of Carpatho-Rusyn culture within this universalism? The question takes on particular coloration and complexity because of the absence of Rusyn statehood, more specifically, the lack of international borders. From a Christian perspective this absence, on the one hand, places an obligation on the international community to defend the Rusyn patrimony and its legitimate institutions, but it also means that the Church will always be required to prioritize its work in ways necessitating a painful forfeiting of certain cultural goods. One may bemoan ethnic assimilation, but one must recall that there is also spiritual and moral assimilation, and that a Christian body is primarily obliged to guard against the latter.
Much more can and should be said about this issue narrowly defined, but I must now turn to a related question: the present status of the Greek Catholic Mukachevo Eparchy and what it symbolizes. In view of Magocsi’s concerns about the lack of Rusyn identity in the Prešov Eparchy, the question of Mukachevo deserves comment. I would suggest that in spite of the tepid interest in Rusyn identity in the latter Eparchy, Carpatho-Rusyns should realize how significant the Vatican’s removal of Mukachevo from the jurisdiction of the Synod of the Ukrainian Greco-Catholic Church based in Kyiv is. For a Church of the same Byzantine tradition located within the same borders of a sovereign country to constitute a distinct jurisdiction is a rarity indeed. It is almost the ecclesiastical analogue of having a “republic” “under the international control of the European Union.”Footnote 3 Again, Carpatho-Rusyns may complain that this distinct status of the Mukachevo Eparchy has not borne fruit—whether culturally or linguistically—but that is another question. The distinct status is codified in ecclesiastical law, and the potential for the Carpatho-Rusyn cause remains significant.
Finally, I come to what for many decades has been—and certainly today remains—the most neuralgic question regarding Carpatho-Rusyn identity: the relationship with the Ukrainian state and, in one sense, nationally conscious Ukrainians in general. This, of course, goes way beyond religious questions, but because it includes a religious dimension—and certainly an ethical one—it deserves comment here. The religious dimension pertains to the activities symbolized most recently by Archpriest Dymytrii Sydor and his sympathizers. To Magocsi’s credit, he has expressed his concern with these activities, but the broad issue that remains is the following: Does one ethno-national community have the right to restrict another ethno-national community in the interests of protecting itself? Until the recent annexation of Crimea and war in Eastern Ukraine, one could argue that Ukrainian apprehensions were alarmist. And while a priori “political Rusynism” should be considered a legitimate cause, its morphing into political muscophilism, at least at the present moment in Ukrainian history, understandably raises ethical concerns.
Before concluding, I wish to draw attention to what is certainly the most enduring religious, theological, and ethical dimension of Magocsi’s book: its honesty. Every time that one begins to sense that the author may be veering in the direction of partisan scholarship, he returns to the path of objectivity and fairness. An impressive feat indeed! This is typical of Magocsi—a Rusyn who has done more for the Ukrainian cause than many Ukrainian organizations. May you live long enough, Bob, to see your honesty fully reciprocated!
