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1. Older Rosicrucians Shortly before the Thirty Years’ War (1618–48), among Tübingen student friends of J. V. Andreae (1586–1654), who later became general superintendent and court preacher, there appeared two anonymous Rosicrucian manifestoes— Fama Fraternitas (Account of the brotherhood, 1614) and Confessio Fraternitatis (Confession of the fraternity, 1615)—followed by Chymische Hochzeit Christiani Rosencreutz (The chemical wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz, 1616), now known to have been written by Andreae. These are the first traces of the repo…

[German Version] (Jun 16, 1871, Livny, gouvernement Orël – Jul 12, 1944, Paris) left the seminary in 1888, studied economics, and became an adherent of Marxism. His anthology From Marxism to Idealism ( Ot marksizma k idealizmu), 1903, provided the motto for the shift in direction of a part of the leftist intelligentsia. From 1901 to 1908, he was professor of national economics in Kiev and Moscow; he belonged to the Duma as an independent “Christian…

[German Version] (prior to 1914: Steppuhn, Friedrich August; Feb 18, 1884, Moscow – Feb 23, 1965, Munich), Russian philosopher, cultural sociologist, and journalist. The son of an East Prussian merchant, he was confirmed in the Moscow Reformed congregation; in 1900 he became a Russian citizen. From 1903 to 1910, he studied philosophy in Freiburg and Heidelberg, with a dissertation on V. Solovyov’s philosophy of history, under W. Windelband. In 1901 he became co-editor of the international philosophical periodical Logos. He served as a Russian officer in World War I; in 19…

[German Version] (Feb 19, 1893, St. Petersburg – Dec 17, 1964, Paris), Russian philosopher and theologian. After earning his Lic.iur. in 1913, he studied philosophy at Heidelberg in 1913/1914. He lectured at the universities of Perm (1918) and Vladivostok (1919–1922). In 1925 he was cofounder of the Institut de Théologie Orthodoxe Saint-Serge in Paris and became its professor of philosophy and denominational studies. He was the most prominent student of S.N. Bulgakov and promoter of his works. He …

[German Version] (Jan 9, 1882, Yevlakh, Azerbaijan – Dec 8, 1937, St. Petersburg), Russian polymath: physicist, philosopher of religion, art ¶ theorist and historian. An Orthodox priest (1911), associate professor in the Moscow Spiritual Academy (1914–1919) and professor in the Higher State Workshops for Arts and Technology (1921), he taught and conducted research in the field of natural and technical sciences in the USSR until his imprisonment in 1933. He suffered martyrdom in 1937. His major work, Stolp i utverždenie istiny (1914), seeks to establish intellectual harmony …

[German Version] (Veneration of the name of Christ, in the East). Within the Hesychast practice of prayer (Hesychasm; see also Prayer X) there grew up the tradition of the continually repeated Jesus prayer: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.” According to the Philocalia (1782) it serves, together with breathing techniques, to implant the name of Jesus in the heart (Prayer of the Heart) in order to attain sight of God and peace of the soul (ἡσυχία/ hēsychia). The Russian Pilgrim (anonymous, 1884) repeats it daily up to 12,000 times. The so-called Hesychas…

[German Version] In the West, the liturgical and doxological veneration of Sophia as the personified wisdom of God (Prov 8; Wis 8; Sir 24), still found in Alcuin’s church poetry, was gradually relegated to a mystical and esoteric fringe ( J. Böhme, New Age); in Russian Orthodox piety, however, Sophia remained a living reality in the church – in liturgical lections and hymns, and above all in church dedications and iconography. The earliest Russian churches were dedicated to St. Sophia – for exampl…