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[German Version] (Nov 1, 1844, Khalan, near Kursk – Feb 17, 1925, Prague), pioneer Russian art historian and student of iconography. Kondakov began to teach at the university in Odessa in 1871, went to St. Petersburg in 1888, to Sofia in 1920, and finally to Charles University in Prague in 1922. Of his three-volume iconography of the Theotokos ( Ikonografiia Bogomateri), he was able to publish the first two volumes in 1914/1915 while he was still in St. Petersburg; the third remained in manuscript, kept in the Vatican Library. His incomplete magnum opus on Russian icons ( Russkaia ikona) was…

[German Version] (May 30, 1220, Jaroslav – Nov 14, 1263, Gorodok) was Prince of Novgorod from 1236 and Grand Prince of Vladimir from 1252; he defeated the Swedes on the Neva in 1240 (whence his nickname) and the Knights of the Teutonic Order on the ice of Lake Peipus; in contrast, he submitted to the Tatars whom he saw as less of a threat to Russian Orthodox identity than the Latin West. He died as a monk and has been venerated as a saint since as early as the 14th century. Peter the Great transported his remains to the Lavra in St. Petersburg, which was named after Alexander in 1724. Peter Hauptmann Bibl…

[German Version] (1589, Krempe, Holstein – 1657, Danzig [Gdańsk]), polymath adherent of Socinianism (Socinians). While Ruarus was studying at Altdorf, the physician E. Soner won him to the Socinian cause. After traveling through Denmark, Holland, England, France, and Italy, in 1621/1622 he served as rector of the academy of the Polish Brethren in Raków, near Sandomierz; after further travels, he settled in Danzig in 1631. Coupled with these travels, his extensive correspondence served to propagand…

[German Version] (Čavčavadze, Ilja) (Oct 27, 1837, Qvareli – Aug 30, 1907, Cicamuri), Georgian poet and writer, journalist and politician of royal origins, who was canonized as “St. Ilia the Righteous” on Jul 20, 1987. ¶ After studying philosophy as well as administration and economics in St. Petersburg, he worked as a magistrate in Georgia from 1864, and from 1874 as the chair of the administration of the Bank of the Nobility. In 1906, he was elected to the State Council of the Russian Empire. His verses and …

[German Version] (Mar 25, 1886, Vasilikon, Epirus – Jul 7, 1972, Istanbul). The ecumenical patriarch Athenagoras I (born Aristokles Spyrou) was the son of a physician. After completing his theological studies at the seminary on Halki (1910), he was ordained hierodeacon and assigned administrative duties in the metropoly of Pelagonia. In 1919, after half a year on …

[German Version] This term, first used in the 17th century, denotes the main stream of the anti-Trinitarian movement (Antitrinitarians), moderated in many respects by F. Socinus after 1579. The Socinians explicitly kept the Trinitarian formula in the command to baptize (Matt 28:19). According to the Racovian Catechism, anyone who rejected it could not be a Christian. It was the Early Church’s doctrine of the consubstantiality of the Father and the Son and the personhood of the Holy Spirit that the…

[German Version] (Ger. Gnesen), a town situated roughly 50 km east of Poznań with approx. 50,000 inhabitants, which, as the seat of the first Piaste kings and the center of the archdiocese established in 999, was the cradle of both the Polish state and its church (Poland). The original suffragans Krakow, Wrocław (Ger. Breslau) and Kołobrzeg (Ger. Kolberg) were joined in subsequent centuries by Poznań (Ger. Posen), Włocławek (Ger. Leslau), Płock, Lebus, Vilnius, Łuck and Samogitia. The addition of …

[German Version] (Sep 4 or 16, 1893, Odessa – Dec 4, 1966, Paris) was a Russian Orthodox theologian, forced from his homeland with the White Army, who studied theology in Belgrade from 1921 to 1925 and immigrated to Paris in 1929, where, beginning in 1932, he taught at the Orthodox Theological Institute of St. Serge. He was ordained as a priest in 1940; he led a community in Tunis from 1941–1947, then returned to St. Serge where he was named professor of canonistics in 1950. His main achievement was the rediscovery of the original ecclesiology (Church) which, in …

[German Version] (1478 – Apr 28, 1550, Balga am Frischen Haff [Kaliningrad]), bishop of Samland from 1519. Polentz belonged to the Meissen nobility; after studying in Leipzig and Italy, he was a lawyer in papal and imperial service, before entering the Teutonic Order (Orders of Germany) in 1511 and becoming commander in Königsberg (Krolewiec, Poland) in 1516. Between 1522 and 1525 he ruled the order’s territory of Prussia as the grand master’s deputy. Converted to the Reformation from 1522, he ced…