The Decree on Separation of Church from State and School from Church (russian: Декрет об отделении церкви от государства и школы от церкви) is a
legal act adopted by the
Council of People's Commissars
The Councils of People's Commissars (SNK; russian: Совет народных комиссаров (СНК), ''Sovet narodnykh kommissarov''), commonly known as the ''Sovnarkom'' (Совнарком), were the highest executive authorities of ...
of the
Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Russian SFSR or RSFSR ( rus, Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, Rossíyskaya Sovétskaya Federatívnaya Soci ...
on January 20 (February 2), 1918 came into force on January 23 (February 5) of the same year, on the day of official publication.
[ДЕКРЕТ от 23 января 1918 года ОБ ОТДЕЛЕНИИ ЦЕРКВИ ОТ ГОСУДАРСТВА И ШКОЛЫ ОТ ЦЕРКВИ](_blank)
/ref> It installed the secular nature of the state power, proclaimed the freedom of conscience
Conscience is a cognitive process that elicits emotion and rational associations based on an individual's moral philosophy or value system. Conscience stands in contrast to elicited emotion or thought due to associations based on immediate sens ...
and religion
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, ...
; religious organizations were deprived of any property rights and the rights of a legal entity. It laid the foundation for the deployment of atheistic propaganda and atheistic education.[''Синельников С. П.']
Отмена православного образования в Советском государстве в 1917—1929 годах
// Журнал « Вестник церковной истории», 24 апреля 2013
The Decree was superseded by the a law of the Supreme Soviet
The Supreme Soviet (russian: Верховный Совет, Verkhovny Sovet, Supreme Council) was the common name for the legislative bodies (parliaments) of the Soviet socialist republics (SSR) in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) ...
of the RSFSR
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Russian SFSR or RSFSR ( rus, Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, Rossíyskaya Sovétskaya Federatívnaya Soci ...
in 25 October 1990,[ДЕКРЕТ от 23 января 1918 года Об отделении церкви от государства и школы от церкви](_blank)
/ref> and further superseded in the Russian Federation
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...
in 1997.
Contents
The short edict is composed of 13 diktats regarding religion's role within Soviet sociocultural and political spaces. The edict was first published in ''Sobranie Uzakonenii i Rasporiazhenii Rabochego i Krestianskogo Pravitelstva'' (Collection of Legislation and Orders of the Workers 'and Peasants' Government) in 1918 and solidified that Soviet Russia was to be a non-religious or secular
Secularity, also the secular or secularness (from Latin ''saeculum'', "worldly" or "of a generation"), is the state of being unrelated or neutral in regards to religion. Anything that does not have an explicit reference to religion, either negativ ...
society. Further, while religious observation was technically allowed (No.3), those practicing could not threaten the public and "''disturb the public order''" (No.5) by showing their religious affiliations.
Religious Institutions themselves had their social influence
Social influence comprises the ways in which individuals adjust their behavior to meet the demands of a social environment. It takes many forms and can be seen in conformity, socialization, peer pressure, obedience (human behavior), obedience, lead ...
retracted, religious teachings in public and private classrooms now banned (No.9) and were now responsible for their own well-being, no longer being financially supported nor institutionally protected by local or state government (No.10). No. 12 and 13 denounced religious bodies from any type of land or property ownership in accordance with Soviet law at the time, while No. 4 through 8 further separated religious worship from official and public spaces, while also consolidating civic authority. No. 2 forbade state-sanctioned, special treatment of persons or Institutions based on religious affiliation, such a relationship called "Symphonia
Symphonia ( Greek ) is a much-discussed word, applied at different times to the bagpipe, the drum, the hurdy-gurdy, and finally a kind of clavichord. The sixth of the musical instruments enumerated in Book of Daniel, (verses 5, 10 and 15), tran ...
" or "Caesaropapism
Caesaropapism is the idea of combining the social and political power of secular government with religious power, or of making secular authority superior to the spiritual authority of the Church; especially concerning the connection of the Chur ...
" and prior to the Soviet secularization campaigns, served as the premiere model for Church-State relations for Orthodox Russia.
The decree was created by a special commission which included: People's Commissar of Justice Pyotr Stucka, the People's Commissar of Education, Anatoly Lunacharsky
Anatoly Vasilyevich Lunacharsky (russian: Анато́лий Васи́льевич Лунача́рский) (born Anatoly Aleksandrovich Antonov, – 26 December 1933) was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and the first Bolshevik Soviet People's ...
, a member of the board of the People's Commissariat of Justice Pyotr Krasikov, Mikhail Reisner
, birth_date =
, birth_place = Vileyka, Vilna Governorate, Russian Empire
, death_date =
, death_place = Moscow, RSFSR, Soviet Union
, spouse = Ekaterina Aleksandrovna Reisner
, partner ...
who was a well-known lawyer and professor of law at St. Petersburg University and a former Orthodox priest turned atheist, Mikhail Galkin.
The edict was signed by Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 19 ...
under his real last name Ulyanov who acted as Chairman of Sovnarkom
The Councils of People's Commissars (SNK; russian: Совет народных комиссаров (СНК), ''Sovet narodnykh kommissarov''), commonly known as the ''Sovnarkom'' (Совнарком), were the highest executive authorities of ...
, or The Council of People's Commissar. His signature is joined by eight others: N. Podvoisky, V. Algasov, V. Trutovsky, A. Schlichter, P. Proshian, V. Menzhinsky, A. Shlyapnikov, G. Petrovsky and the manager of the affairs of the Council of People's Commissars V. Bonch-Bruyevich.
References
Literature
* ''Dobronovskaya А. P.'' Отделение церкви от государства в Енисейской губернии (1920—1922 гг.) // Сибирь в XVII—XX веках: Проблемы политической и социальной истории: Бахрушинские чтения 1999—2000 гг.: межвуз. сб. науч. тр. / под ред. В. И. Шишкина. — Новосибирск: Новосибирский государственный университет, 2002.
* ''Rassylnikov I.A.'' Принцип «отделения школы от церкви» как необходимый признак светского государства и его значение в условиях правовой реформы // Правовые реформы в России. — Ростов-на-Дону: Изд-во СКАГС, 2004. — С. 124—129.
* {{cite book, author = Соколов А. В. , url = https://disser.spbu.ru/disser2/disser/Sokolov_diss.pdf , title = Государство и Православная церковь в России, февраль 1917 — январь 1918 гг. Диссертация на соискание ученой степени доктора исторических наук , location = СПб., year = 2014 , ref = Соколов
External links
Decree on Separation of Church and State
at the Marxists Internet Archive
Marxists Internet Archive (also known as MIA or Marxists.org) is a non-profit online encyclopedia that hosts a multilingual library (created in 1990) of the works of communist, anarchist, and socialist writers, such as Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels ...
ДЕКРЕТ ОБ ОТДЕЛЕНИИ ЦЕРКВИ ОТ ГОСУДАРСТВА
// Древо. Открытая православная энциклопедия
''Elizabeth Sewell''. Comparative characteristics of the secular state and equality of religious organizations
Atheism
Religion in Russia
Anti-religious campaign in the Soviet Union
Soviet decrees
Secularism