Tikhon

(1866–1925)

   Patriarch.

   Tikhon was born Basil Ivanovitch Belavin, the son of a village priest. He was educated in St Petersburg and was ordained. He rose rapidly in the hierarchy of the Russian Church, becoming Bishop of Lublin in 1897, North America in 1898, Yaroslav in 1907 and Vilna in 1914. He was consecrated Metropolitan of Moscow in 1917 and in the same year, he was elected the first Patriarch of the Russian Church since 1700. He lived in difficult times. In the Revolution, he imposed neutrality on the clergy; later he was arrested for his protest against the confiscation of Church property and in 1923 a schismatic alternative Church was set up by the Soviet government. Despite almost insuperable problems, he continued to conduct services in Moscow and he was held in great affection.

   M. Spinka, The Church in Soviet Russia (1956);

   Prince P.M. Volkonsky, ‘La reconstitution du Patriarcat en Russie: Mgr Tykhon Patriarche de Moscou et de toute la Russie’, Echos d’Orient, xx (1921) [no English translation available].