The ''Book of One Hundred Chapters'', also called ''Stoglav'' (''Стоглав'') in

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

("Hundred chapters"), is a collection of decisions of the Russian church council of 1551 that regulated the

canon law Canon law (from , , a 'straight measuring rod, ruler') is a set of ordinances and regulations made by ecclesiastical jurisdiction, ecclesiastical authority (church leadership) for the government of a Christian organization or church and its membe ...

and ecclesiastical life in the

Tsardom of Russia The Tsardom of Russia, also known as the Tsardom of Moscow, was the centralized Russian state from the assumption of the title of tsar by Ivan the Terrible, Ivan IV in 1547 until the foundation of the Russian Empire by Peter the Great in 1721. ...

, especially the everyday life of the Russian clergy. The book is shaped in the form of answers to some 100 questions posed by

Ivan IV of Russia Ivan IV Vasilyevich (; – ), commonly known as Ivan the Terrible,; ; monastic name: Jonah. was Grand Prince of Moscow and all Russia from 1533 to 1547, and the first Tsar and Grand Prince of all Russia from 1547 until his death in 1584. ...

. A constant theme running through the chapters is the Byzantine '' symphonia'' (harmony) between the ' priesthood' and the ' kingdom'. The ''Book of Hundred Chapters'' canonized the native Muscovite rituals and practices at the expense of those accepted in

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

and other Eastern Orthodox countries. As a result this church code was never accepted by the Russian monks residing on

Mount Athos Mount Athos (; ) is a mountain on the Athos peninsula in northeastern Greece directly on the Aegean Sea. It is an important center of Eastern Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodox monasticism. The mountain and most of the Athos peninsula are governed ...

. In the mid-17th century, the

Old Believers Old Believers or Old Ritualists ( Russian: староверы, ''starovery'' or старообрядцы, ''staroobryadtsy'') is the common term for several religious groups, which maintain the old liturgical and ritual practices of the Russian ...

championed the ''Stoglav'' in order to undermine

Patriarch Nikon Nikon (, ), born Nikita Minin (; 7 May 1605 – 17 August 1681) was the seventh Patriarch of Moscow and all Rus' of the Russian Orthodox Church, serving officially from 1652 to 1666. He was renowned for his eloquence, energy, piety and close t ...

's authority and his ecclesiastical reforms. The Great Moscow Synod of 1667 condemned the ''Stoglav'' and its practices as heretical and banned the book from usage for 200 years. This contributed to a great

schism A schism ( , , or, less commonly, ) is a division between people, usually belonging to an organization, movement, or religious denomination. The word is most frequently applied to a split in what had previously been a single religious body, suc ...

of the Russian church known as the Raskol. There are at least 100 manuscripts of the ''Stoglav'', all of them produced by the Old Believers. The official church historians of the 18th and 19th centuries (such as Platon Levshin) discarded these texts as spurious. Their authenticity was reasserted by historian Ivan Belyayev in 1863.

References

{{reflist Russian Orthodox Church in Russia 1551 in Russia 1551 books Canon law of the Eastern Orthodox Church History of the Russian Orthodox Church it:Stoglav