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http://www.unicorne.org/orthodoxy/ar...shevchenko.htm

Taras Shevchenko and Ilya Chavchavadze: Christian Visionaries



The Reverend Father Ihor Kutash has raised a very interesting and important topic in his article on Taras Shevchenko as an Orthodox Christian.

Of all Ukraine's national poets and writers, Shevchenko occupies a special place in the hearts and minds of her people.

It is a rare Ukrainian home indeed that does not have a picture of Shevchenko, often with a "rushnyk" or embroidered towel-mantle over it, and a copy of his collection of poems known as the "Kobzar" displayed prominently.

Those of us who attended Ukrainian school will remember memorizing his poems and participating in the recitals of his work for "Concerts" in his honour around March 9, the date of his birth.

And who can fail to shed a tear, even in secret, during the singing of his Zapovit or Testament: "When I repose, bury me in a grave, in the midst of a wide steppe, in beloved Ukraine!"

Born a serf in the early nineteenth century, Taras was heir to the rich Ukrainian folkloric culture of the Kozak heritage in Zvenihorod and Kyiv. He lived that heritage until it breathed through his soul and heart.

The Ukrainian history of the Kozaks and their national aspirations and popular struggles on behalf of the people became one with his own visionary spirit.

Taras was always honoured as a national prophet, someone who effectively articulated the suffering of the people, drew attention to its root cause and then inspired them toward liberation.

It was inevitable that his charismatic vision drew so much from his deep spiritual life and his closeness to Christ, Crucified and Risen.

Shevchenko early became acquainted with the Psalms and their prophetic utterances. He was often occupied as a Psalm-reader at funerals.

The tradition was, and still is, to read the Psalms constantly, throughout the night, over the body of the reposed until the day of burial.

Shevchenko knew the Psalms by heart, an old Ukrainian tradition practiced especially by the Kozaks. He included phrases from the them at the beginning of his poems and even wrote paraphrases of the psalms himself.

Metropolitan Ilarion Ohienko wrote a marvellous book on the religious spirit of Shevchenko.

My favourite quotations that the Metropolitan-scholar highlights include a line that Shevchenko wrote when in Vilnius in Lithuania.

The miraculous Icon of "Ostra-Brama" or "of the Sharp Gate" stood above a gate over a street.

People would always remove their hats, known then as "breaking one's cap," and bow to the Icon as they would pass.

Shevchenko once noticed some Polish students who kept going back and forth under the gate and would not take off their hats.

In response, Shevchenko angrily wrote, "And those "Liakh" (Polish) students who would not break their caps to the Mother of God of Ostra-Brama . . . but, you know, one can always recognize an idiot by the way he walks!"

In another poem, Taras describes a Ukrainian officer who is despondent and is about to commit suicide.

The officer is out in a field near Kyiv, about to shoot himself, when he noticed the glimmer of the golden domed Churches of "our Holy and Great Kyiv."

So in awe is he by the spiritual peace of those Churches and of Kyiv as a whole, that the officer puts away his pistol, blesses himself with the Sign of the Cross, and walks into the city.

Shevchenko, in his letters, also wrote about how he "couldn't take" the Russian melodies that were being forcibly introduced into Ukrainian Churches.

Clearly, Shevchenko knew and appreciated well his Kyivan Christian heritage. His love for the Mother of God and for her "martyred Son" was also great. Ohienko shows how in his poem "Maria," Shevchenko based himself and his views on the perpetual Virginity of the Mother of God on a bad translation of church service books that abounded in his time.

A poet is always entitled to some licence and poetry is not the same as theology. In any event, a theologian he was not, nor is this a prerequisite for being a pious Orthodox Christian or even a saint.

Shevchenko's intimate familiarity with the Church services is seen in his writing of secular "Akathists." The Akathist is an Eastern liturgical and devotional church service that is, ideally, composed of 144-150 praises. It is like a "mini-psalter" in honour of the Holy Trinity, our Lord Jesus Christ, the Mother of God and the Saints.

Shevchenko treated it like a literary genre and, as in one example, wrote one in honour of a (living) benefactor of his.

His suffering as an orphaned serf, a Siberian exile and the many other Crosses he was obliged to bear, together with his visionary poetry, made him Ukraine's singular Bard and Prophet of national (and spiritual) liberation.

When the Ukrainian Orthodox Church separated from Moscow in 1921 in Kyiv, the tradition was established to serve a requiem Panakhyda service to Shevchenko after each and every Divine Liturgy. These were often done before pictures of Shevchenko. Some have remarked that he almost had the status of a national saint.

Shevchenko would certainly not be the first Christian and national leader to be so honoured.

During the Kozak Era, the Hetmans, Bohdan Chmelnitsky and Bayda-Vyshnevetsky were both seriously considered for glorification as Orthodox national saints (see Vadim Scherbakivsky, "The History of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church").

The Georgian Orthodox Church has glorified its Taras Shevchenko in the person of Saint Ilya Chavchavadze a saint and a martyr.

A writer and church activist, Ilya was targeted by the Russian secret police, who shot him in 1907. St Ilya fought against Russification and for the resurrection of Georgian independence and freedom.

It is my personal view that there is nothing preventing the eventual glorification of the deeply pious Orthodox Christian, Taras Shevchenko, as a Saint of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

He embodies the spirit of Kozak Ukraine and calls to mind the greatness of Ukraine's glorious past. His poetry constantly re-ignites the fervour of the Kyivan Christianity of our ancestors in our hearts and minds.

One could argue, as others have, that he is already given the veneration due to a saint. It would be up to the Ukrainian Church and people to affirm him publicly as a passion-bearer, a saint and a prophet.

For the time being, we should all be very scrupulous about observing his annual commemoration with a Divine Liturgy and a Panakhyda, along with the usual public celebrations in his honour.

After reading his poetry, especially his spiritual poetry, who can resist looking long and lovingly at his portrait into those heavy-set eyes in which there is lit a truly Christian flicker of true hope in the glory of the Resurrection of Christ and the Justice and Mercy of God!

Holy Servant of God and Prophet of Ukraine, Taras, and Holy St Ilya of Georgia, pray unto God for us!

Dr. Alexander Roman alex@unicorne.org