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The Antireligious Museum: Soviet Heterotopia between Transcending and Remembering Religious Heritage

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Book cover Science, Religion and Communism in Cold War Europe

Part of the book series: St Antony's Series ((STANTS))

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Abstract

During the years following the establishment of the Soviet Union Bolsheviks, efforts to eradicate religion highlighted the old cults, against which the atheist heroes and the supremacy of the secular worldview shone all the more brightly. Institutions that preserved religion even as they were devoted to destroying it—the so-called antireligious museums, also known as ‘Museums of Atheism’—were characteristic landmarks in every major city of the USSR until the late 1980s. Using the case of the Museums of Atheism, this chapter assesses the specific transformation of belief imposed by state-sponsored atheism in the broader transnational context of religious reinforcement and dislocation of belief during the last decades of the twentieth century.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    M. Weber (1994) ‘Wissenschaft als Beruf: 1917/1919’ in: Studienausgabe der Max-Weber-Gesamtausgabe (Tübingen: Mohr), vol. 17, pp. 1–25, p. 9.

  2. 2.

    See, for instance, J. Anderson (1994) Religion, State, and Politics in the Soviet Union and the Successor States 1953–1993 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press); S.P. Ramet (1993) Religious Policy in the Soviet Union (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).

  3. 3.

    See N.N. Zlatsen and E.N. Demina (1990) Muzei SSSR, Spravochchnik (Moscow: Ekonomika).

  4. 4.

    N.V. Gogol’ (1831) ‘Noch’ pered Rozhdestvom’, in: Vechera na khutore bliz Dikan’ki (Evenings on a Farm near Dikan’ka). V. Evseev (1976) ‘Dikan’ka dalekaya i blizkaya’, Nauka i religiia 6, 13–27, 13. See also K. Stepin (1976) ‘Taina komnaty No. 101’, Nauka i religiia 6, 17–20.

  5. 5.

    M.S. Butinova and N.P. Krasnikov (1965) Muzei istorii religii i ateizma (Leningrad: Lenizdat), p. 8; M.E. Kaulen (2001) Muzei-khramy i muzei-monastyri v pervoe desyatiletie Sovetskoi vlasti (Moscow: Luch), p. 135.

  6. 6.

    M. Halbwachs (1992) On Collective Memory (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press), p. 85.

  7. 7.

    See ‘Instruktsiia Kollegii po delam muzeev i okhrane pamyatnikov iskusstva i stariny Narodnogo Komissariata po prosveshchcheniiu ot 3 yanvarya 1919’. Revoljutsiia i tserkov‘1, (1919), p. 30. See B. Kandidov (1929) Monastyri-Muzei i antireligioznaya propaganda (Moscow: Bezbozhzhnik).

  8. 8.

    Dekret SNK RSFSR (20 April 1920) ‘Ob obraščenii v muzej isoriko-chidožestvennych zennostej Trioce-Sergievoj Lavry’, Sobranie uzakonenij i rasporjaženij rabočego i krest’janskogo pravitel’stva, 27, 133.

  9. 9.

    O.N. Kopylova (2000) ‘Istorija Svjato-Troickoj Sergievoj Lavry i Moskovskoj Duchovnoj Akademii v dokumentach Gosudarstvennogo Archiva Rossijskoj Federacii’, in: Tezisy dokladov 2 meždunarodnoj konferencii ‘Troice-Sergieva Lavra v istorii, kul’ture i duchovnoj žizni Rossii’ (Sergiev Posad), pp. 6–7.

  10. 10.

    P.A. Florenskii (1993) ‘Khramovoe deistvo kak sintez iskusstv’ in: Florenskii, Izbrannye trudy po iskusstvu (St. Petersburg: Mifril, Russkaya Kniga), p. 289.

  11. 11.

    Ibid.

  12. 12.

    See I.V. Tarasova and G. A. Chenskaya (2002) ‘Iz istorii muzeinogo dela v Rossii: Muzei tserkovno-arkheologicheskii i antireligioznyi’, Trudy Gosudarstvennogo muzeya istorii religii 2, 17–30.

  13. 13.

    See B. Kandidov (1929) Monastyri-Muzei i antireligioznaya propaganda (Moscow: Bezbozhnik), p. 121.

  14. 14.

    See B. Kandidov (1929), p. 180.

  15. 15.

    M. Foucault (1986) ‘Of Other Spaces’ (trans. J. Miskowiec), in: Diacritics (16), pp. 22–27, 24.

  16. 16.

    K.J. Pazzini (1989) Bilder und Bildung (Hamburg: LIT), p. 124.

  17. 17.

    See ‘Protokoly plenarnykh zasedanii 1–5 dekabrya 1930 g’. (1931) in: Trudy Pervogo, Vserossiiskogo muzeinogo sezda. Vol. 1, ed. Luppola I.K., p. 9.

  18. 18.

    Kandidov (1929), pp. 126–130.

  19. 19.

    Ibid., p. 175.

  20. 20.

    Cf. the list of exhumations of the People’s Commissariat for Justice in: Kandidov (1929), pp. 216–227.

  21. 21.

    Robert H. Greene (2010) Bodies Like Bright Stars: Saints and Relics in Orthodox Russia (Illinois: DeKalb), p. 146.

  22. 22.

    N.A. Semaško (1922) ‘Nauka I sharlanstvo. O vystavke “moshchei”’ in: Revoliutsiia i tserkov’ (1/3) 30–32, 30.

  23. 23.

    A.V. Kondratov (1968) ‘Nauchno-ateisticheskaia i antireligioznaia propaganda v kraevedcheskikh muzeiakh’, in: Trudy nauchno-issledovatel’skogo instituta muzeevedeniia i okhrany pamiatnikov istorii i kul’tury. Vypusk 21. Moskva, pp. 3–72, 33.

  24. 24.

    For the tripartite structure of the Kunstkammer see H. Bredekamp (1993) Antikensehnsucht und Maschinenglauben. Die Geschichte der Kunstkammer und die Zukunft der Kunstgeschichte (Berlin: Wagenbach), p. 88.

  25. 25.

    F. Bacon (1857) ‘Of the Proficience and Advancement of Learning Divine and Human’ in: Works (ed.) James Spedding, vol 3. (London: Longman), p. 330.

  26. 26.

    Tarasova and Chenskaya (2002), p. 24. See also V.N. Mordvinova (1930) Muzei Moskvy i Moskovskoi oblasti (Moscow: Gosizdat RSFSR), pp. 38, 41.

  27. 27.

    See Rossiiskaya muzeinaya entsiklopediia (2001). Vol. 1 (Moscow: Progress), p. 229.

  28. 28.

    V. Bonch-Bruevich Vladimir to N. Khrushchev, letter dated 12.6.1954, in: Archive of Academy of Sciences of Russian Federation, Saint Petersburg branch (Arkhiv RAN): fond 221, Op. 2, d. 255, l. 14.

  29. 29.

    See D. Pospelovskii (1995) Russkaia Pravoslavnaia tserkov’ v XX veke (Moscow: Respublika), p. 283.

  30. 30.

    See M. Shakhnovich (2007) ‘Kak zakryvali Leningradskii Muzei Istorii Religii AN SSSR (1946–1947)’, Istoriia Peterburga 5, 13–17.

  31. 31.

    See Report for 1970, in: Central State Archive of Literature and Art St. Petersburg (TsGALI), fond 195, op. 1, d. 443, l. 8.

  32. 32.

    M.S. Butinova and N.P. Krasnikov (1965) Muzei istorii religii i ateizma. Spravochnik-putevoditel’ (Moscow, Leningrad: Nauka), p. 187.

  33. 33.

    Reports on extra-museum activity, in TsGALI, fond 195, op., 1, d. 274, l. 2–30.

  34. 34.

    See P.F. Filippova (1974) ‘Propaganda ateizma na materialakh kul’tovykh pamiatnikov’, Nauchno-ateisticheskaya propaganda v muzeiakh 1, 17–20.

  35. 35.

    Minutes of the meeting of the advisory board of the museum from 17 November 1971, in TsGALI, fond 195, d. 469, l. 9.

  36. 36.

    See G. Proshin (1987) Muzei i religiia (Moscow: Sovetskaya Rossiia), p. 208.

  37. 37.

    See Ya.I. Shurygin (1987) Kazanskii sobor (Leningrad: Lenizdat), p. 111.

  38. 38.

    M. Bach, quoted in M.R. Elliott (1983) ‘The Leningrad Museum of the History of Religion and Atheism’, Religion in Communist Lands, 11:2, 127.

  39. 39.

    M.R. Elliott (1983), 128.

  40. 40.

    Conversation with the contemporary witness Marianna Shakhnovich, on 17 April 2008.

  41. 41.

    G. Proshin (1981) ‘Novaya ekspozitsiia Muzeia istorii religii i ateizma (Ot metodologii k praktike)’, in: Muzei v ateisticheskoj propagande. Sbornik nauchnykh trudov (Leningrad: GMIRiA), p. 43.

  42. 42.

    See Proshin (1987), p. 212.

  43. 43.

    A. Skvortsov (2002) ‘Delo Bozhie na zemle. Pamyati Vladislava Nikolaevicha Sherdakova’, Podem 1.

  44. 44.

    See A. Greeley (1998) ‘Religiöses Wiedererwachen in Russland?’ in: D. Pollack, I. Borowik and W. Jagodzinski (eds.) Religiöser Wandel in den postkommunistischen Ländern Ost- und Mitteleuropas (Würzburg: Ergon), p. 539.

  45. 45.

    See C.Y. Glock and R. Stark (1965) Religion and Society in Tension (Chicago: Rand McNally).

  46. 46.

    See T. Luckmann (1974) The Invisible Religion (New York: Macmillan).

  47. 47.

    See J. Thrower (1992) Marxism–Leninism as the Civil Religion of Soviet Society (Lewiston: Mellen Press), p. 164.

  48. 48.

    See Luckmann (1974).

  49. 49.

    D. Hervieu-Léger (2000) Religion as a Chain of Memory (Cambridge: Polity Press), p. 132.

  50. 50.

    P. Nora (1990) Zwischen Geschichte und Gedächtnis (Berlin: Wagenbach Klaus), p. 21.

  51. 51.

    E. Sturm (1991) Konservierte Welt: Museum und Musealisierung (Berlin: Reimer), p. 55.

  52. 52.

    Hervieu-Léger (2000), p. 82.

  53. 53.

    Ibid., p. 125.

  54. 54.

    Ibid. p. 141.

  55. 55.

    See N. Mitrokhin (2003) Russkaya partiia: Dvizheniie russkikh natsionalistov v SSSR 1953–1985 gody (Moscow: NLO).

  56. 56.

    R. Gries (1997) ‘“…und der Zukunft zugewandt” oder: Wie der DDR das Jahr 2000 abhanden kam’ in: E. Bünz, R. Gries and F. Möller (eds.) Der Tag X in der Geschichte: Erwartungen und Enttäuschungen seit tausend Jahren (Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt), pp. 309–378.

  57. 57.

    Ioann Mitropolit Sankt-Petersburgskii i Ladozhskii (1992) ‘Boites’ lozhnykh prorokov. Sovetskaya Rossiia’, 29 August.

  58. 58.

    See D.J. Furman (1998) ‘Religion und Politik im postkommunistischen Russland’ in Pollack, (Borowik and Jagodzinski 1998), p. 503.

  59. 59.

    M. Schulze Wessel (2006) ‘Die Nationalisierung der Religion und die Sakralisierung der Nation im östlichen Europa’ in: M. Schulze Wessel (ed.) Nationalisierung der Religion und die Sakralisierung der Nation im östlichen Europa (Stuttgart: Steiner Verlag), p. 7.

  60. 60.

    Y.J. Milton (1957) Religion, Society and the Individual (New York: Macmillan), p. 9.

  61. 61.

    M. Epstein (2001) ‘Ateizm—eto dukhovnoe prizvanie. O Raise Gibaidulinoj’, Zvezda 4, 159–174, 174.

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  1. Universität Ulm, Ulm, Germany

    Igor J. Polianski

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  1. University of Oxford, St Antony’s College, Oxford, United Kingdom

    Paul Betts

  2. All Souls College, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom

    Stephen A. Smith

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Polianski, I.J. (2016). The Antireligious Museum: Soviet Heterotopia between Transcending and Remembering Religious Heritage. In: Betts, P., Smith, S. (eds) Science, Religion and Communism in Cold War Europe. St Antony's Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-54639-5_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-54639-5_11

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