Relaţiile bisericii ortodoxe din Transilvania cu Rusia în secolele XVII-XVIII
The relations of the Orthodox church from Transylvania with Russia in the 17th-18th centuries

Summary/Abstract: With the beginning of the 17th century, in order to counteract the proselyte action of the Protestant princes of attracting the Romanian people to Calvinism, the Orthodox Metropolitan of Transylvania, Ghenadie, initiated the first relations with the powerful Orthodox Church of Russia. Consequently, in 1628, three monks from the Prislop monastery left for Russia, but they were stopped at the frontier locality of Putivlia, where they received the czar’s gift. In 1629, the Metropolitan Longhin Brancovici also made there a halt, accompanied by some servants, and received a gift from the czar in his turn. On 26 August 1645, the new Orthodox Metropolitan of Transylvania, Ilie Iorest,was admitted in audience by the czar of Moscow, to whom he offered pieces of St. Dumitru’s relics as a gift. The sovereign of Russia offered him in exchange some other gifts. On the 26 December 1651, the Metropolitan Sofronie of Lipova, with the seat at the Hodoş-Bodrog monastery, obtained an audience to the czar Alexei Mihailovici. On this occasion, he obtained pecuniary aids for the restoration of his monastery and religious books. Another Orthodox hierarch from Transylvania accepted in audience by the czar on 31 May 1668, was Sava Brancovici. He received gifts in money and objects. In the last decade of the 17th century, the priest Oprea, and then, the archpriest Vasile Hoban, both ministers of the St. Nicolae Church in Scheii Braşovului, left for Moscow too. In the 18th century, the most notable is the travel to Petersburg of the archpriest Eustatie Vasilievici from Braşov, in 1743, who was allowed by the czarevna Elisabeta Petrovna to carry out a financial collect in several towns (13,000 fls., the sovereign’s donation being of 2500 roubles) and approximately 50 religious books. Last but not least, the travels of the archpriest Nicolae Pop from Balomir, in 1749, and of the priest Nicodim from Alba, in 1751.

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