Each and everyone of us has been aware, sooner or later in life, of an urge for being left completely alone. The urge could be prompted by an unconscious desire to get to know one's own self and what one really wants in this life. For hundreds, if not thousands, of "solitude seekers" over the centuries the ultimate bliss was attainable in the seclusion of a monastic cell-a place where one's exhausted soul finds a compassionate listener and Interlocutor Divine... Pages. 89 By Kseniya DYADКОVA, science editor, Nauchnaya Kniga journal This line of human reasoning and logic is discussed in one of the latest NAUKA publications - a book called "Monasticismand Monasteries in Russia. XI - XX: Historical Essays" which came out at the end of the year 2002. The book is a collection of articles by staff of the Center for History of Religion and the Church of the RAS Institute of Russian History. And it goes without saying that there has been any number of books in this country on various aspects and activities of the Russian Orthodox Church. Most of them, however, focused on just one historical period, event or problem. But this time around the aforesaid monograph, thanks to a lucky choice of the surveys, follows what one could call a single line of narration which helps the reader to see a comprehensive picture of the history of Russian monasticism and monasteries. The story begins from the very beginning until the closure of all monasteries in the years from 1917 to 1938, and their gradual recovery that has been going on since 1943 (during the Great Patriotic War with Nazi Germany). The monograph examines the key stages in the lives of Russian cloisters, starting with their original introduction to Rus. After the earliest monastic-ism of St. Anthony of Egypt (later 3rd-early 4th centuries) the system and doctrine found its way to Kievan Rus shortly after its formal adoption of Christianity - its "Baptism" in 11th century. And the most famous symbol of that time was the ... Читать далее