AHC/WI: Protestant Russia

With a POD before 1700, make Russia a Protestant state. It doesn't matter if its Lutheran, Calvinist, etc. 1st bonus if it's a whole new Protestant sect. Another bonus if the monarchy subscribes to enlightened despotism.

What do you guys think will happen to European history if this event happens?
 
Nikons attempts at taking power suceeds and tsard regulated to background. Old church supporter movement quelled and russia becomes a theocracy and is protesrant since it spurns original orthodox doctrines.
 
Nikons attempts at taking power suceeds and tsard regulated to background. Old church supporter movement quelled and russia becomes a theocracy and is protesrant since it spurns original orthodox doctrines.

Nikon seems less Protestant and more Counter-reformationist, looking towards the Greek mode instead of the vernacular.

If such terms can even be applied to such a different tradition from the Western Christian one.

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On that note, Russia is of an entirely different tradition. It heeds not the Pope in its affairs, and the Patriarch in Constantinople is more a first among equals than a monarch.
 
A POD way before 1700 is needed. You basically need Cyril and Method to fail. This could give an opportunity for protestantism in Russia. Otherwise it's far too late. Orthodoxy is just a fundamental part of russian identity. Even 73 years of violently antireligious atheist communism could not change it.
 
A POD way before 1700 is needed...Orthodoxy is just a fundamental part of Russian identity. Even 73 years of violently anti-religious atheist communism could not change it.

What he said.

I think that it may be ASB for Russia to be anything but Orthodox.

They have a better chance at being pagans rather than ever giving up the Orthodox religion.


Joho:).



 
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm not aware of any Orthodox countries that converted directly to Protestantism. It really wouldn't make a whole lot of sense. Protestantism was largely a reaction to abuses within the Catholic Church. No Catholicism=No abuses=No reaction. So in order for Russia to become Protestant, they would first have to be Catholic when the Reformation hit. But any POD that would make Russia Catholic would probably be so far back that it would butterfly the Reformation as we know it.

Now, if you wanted a similar movement within the Orthodox world that challenges the power of the church in the same way that Protestantism challenged the Catholic church, that could be plausible. But it probably wouldn't be called "Protestant" and it would look different theologically from OTL Protestantism. I agree with some other posters that Nikon could be a potential spark for such a movement. While Nikon himself was not the kind of person to lead some sort of anti-establishment campaign, the conflict he caused could be a starting point. Let's say the Old Believers retake power somehow and he becomes an outcast. Then he dies suddenly (or is executed) and more radical reformers take the ball and run with it. You could see the beginning of a Russian reformist movement.
 
The level of determinism on this board is too damn high.

It would obviously require a major point of difference, but there must surely have been abuses in the Orthodox Church that people could dislike. Even if the Patriarch was not as powerful as the Pope that doesn't stop him being a figure head for complaints. I'm sure we could get some Russia equivalent of Calvin who is inspire by Luther's ideas and adapts them for a Russian context. Then you need to get a Tsar who embraces it at a later point.
 
The level of determinism on this board is too damn high.

It would obviously require a major point of difference, but there must surely have been abuses in the Orthodox Church that people could dislike. Even if the Patriarch was not as powerful as the Pope that doesn't stop him being a figure head for complaints. I'm sure we could get some Russia equivalent of Calvin who is inspire by Luther's ideas and adapts them for a Russian context. Then you need to get a Tsar who embraces it at a later point.

Objectively, there are huge determinisms. And ignoring them is quite falling into ASB ways. Just consider a few facts.

Orthodoxy is even more distant from Protestantism than Catholicism is.

The cult of holy Images is one important part of Orthodoxy while it was considered heresy by protestant reformers.

To have a favourable ground for protestantism, you need to have reacted a certain threshold of literacy, urbanization and individual freedom. And by that time, Russia was far away from meeting these kinds of prerequisite.

And you have to deal with the fact that russian national identity was built on resistance to non-christian mongols and that, for the common people, this led to having a very strong attachment to orthodoxy, orthodoxy being considered by almost everybody as the only conceivable form of christianism.
 
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