Orthodox Lithuania

What if Duke Jogaila of Lithuania had followed his mother's wish and married Sofia, daughter of Prince Dmitri of Moscow, and converted to Orthodoxy? Suppose, that, he gets enough Moscovy support to defend the duchy from Teutonic attacks. What would Lithuania look like in this timeline? Would it have become the Third Rome instead of Moscow?
 
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Historically, Lithuanian-Muscovite alliances were highly fragile things. When Vasily came into an alliance with Vytautas through marrying his daughter, that didn't stop Moscow and Lithuania from waging war against each other during both of their lifetimes.

Poland is going to either have Siemowit III on the throne or Jadwiga remaining as King of Poland with the unpopular, but presumably tolerable William of Austria as her consort. Either way, Lithuania is not going to be stable for anytime soon, during the time when the marriage between Sophia and Jogaila was proposed (in 1384), Vytautas was already free from prison and allied with the Knights to try to take the throne for himself, so Poland's role is quite important here. They're probably likely to go neutral, but they could theoretically support one side over the other.

If Dmitry Donskoy dies on schedule in 1389, then Jogaila could theoretically press a claim on Moscow while Vasily I is still young, and thus remove Moscow from the equation to have Lithuania be the sole major force in East Slavic politics, but that's assuming Lithuania has the power to do so.
 
Historically, Lithuanian-Muscovite alliances were highly fragile things. When Vasily came into an alliance with Vytautas through marrying his daughter, that didn't stop Moscow and Lithuania from waging war against each other during both of their lifetimes.

Poland is going to either have Siemowit III on the throne or Jadwiga remaining as King of Poland with the unpopular, but presumably tolerable William of Austria as her consort. Either way, Lithuania is not going to be stable for anytime soon, during the time when the marriage between Sophia and Jogaila was proposed (in 1384), Vytautas was already free from prison and allied with the Knights to try to take the throne for himself, so Poland's role is quite important here. They're probably likely to go neutral, but they could theoretically support one side over the other.

If Dmitry Donskoy dies on schedule in 1389, then Jogaila could theoretically press a claim on Moscow while Vasily I is still young, and thus remove Moscow from the equation to have Lithuania be the sole major force in East Slavic politics, but that's assuming Lithuania has the power to do so.

You seem to be very knowledgeable on this topic, how do you think the Teutonic Knights and the Pope would react to a Lithuanian conversion to Orthodoxy, instead of Catholicism?
 
You seem to be very knowledgeable on this topic, how do you think the Teutonic Knights and the Pope would react to a Lithuanian conversion to Orthodoxy, instead of Catholicism?
Traditionally it is believed that a conversion to Orthodoxy would not have stopped the Teutonic incursions as opposed to Catholicism, but the reality is a lot more muddier than that. The truth is, at that point the Knights cared little about actually converting Lithuania or Lithuanians to any Christianity, their greater interest was expanding their monastic state at the expense of Lithuanian territory and put a pro-Teutonic member of the House of Gediminas at the top in Vilnius. Catholic, Orthodox or non-Christian, it didn't matter much - when Lithuania accepted Catholicism, it took twenty more years for the Lithuanian-Teutonic conflict to conclude.

The reaction of the Papacy is more variable, and potentially more interesting, but most likely inconsequential - at this point in time, Catholicism was too busy having three or four Popes at once, a peripheral pagan state accepting Orthodoxy would be the last thing on their mind.
 
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