Jurodiwy
The Jurodiwy (юро́дивый) is the Russian variant of the fool in Christ . The role can be traced back to the Middle Ages in Russian cultural and intellectual history .
The Jurodiwy is traditionally an eccentric figure who stands outside of conventional society. Jurodiwy's craziness is ambiguous and can be both real and simulated. He (or she) is believed to be divinely inspired and therefore able to speak truths that no one else could. Usually these truths are revealed in the form of parables or indirect allusions. He had a special status with respect to the tsars , as he was not under earthly control or jurisdiction.
The Russian Orthodox Church counts over thirty Jurodiwye among its saints . The most famous of them is St. Basil , the namesake of St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow . Among the western saints, Francis of Assisi has the traits of jurodiwy .
More Jurodiwy
Jurodiwy in art and literature
Jurodiwy has been particularly present in literature and art since the 19th century. Well-known examples are the fool in Pushkin's Boris Godunov and Prince Myshkin in Dostoyevsky's Idiot . A similar figure can be found in Nikolai Leskow's story The Juggler Pamphalon (1887). The composer Dmitri Shostakovich and the pianist Maria Yudina were cited as 20th century examples of this type.
Films that feature a Jurodiwy type include the Western Miles of Fire and At Home Among Strangers , in which the character of Kayom can be viewed as Jurodiwy.
literature
- Christian Münch: In Christ foolish Russia. On the interpretation and meaning of the ›jurodstvo‹ in the cultural and social context of the tsarist empire (research on the history of the church and dogma. Vol. 109). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2017, ISBN 978-3-525-56427-1 . ( Open Access ).
- Christian Münch: freedom of fools for God's sake. The striving for freedom of the “jurodiwye” in Russia . In: Spirit and Life. Journal for Christian Spirituality 92 (2019), Issue 1, pp. 45–54.
- HG Petzold: God's holy fools . In: Hochland , 1968, No. 2, pp. 97-109.
- HG Petzold: To the piety of holy fools . In: The Unity of the Church . Festschrift for Peter Meinhold, ed. v. Lorenz Hein. Franz Steiner Verlag, Wiesbaden, pp. 140–153.
- Svitlana Kobets: From the Tabennisi nunnery to Pussy Riot: female holy fools in Byzantium and Russia . Canadian Slavonic Papers 60, no. 1–2 (2018) ( link )