Page:The Greek and Eastern churches.djvu/475

Rh Others, taking a more moderate course, but influenced by the same principles, fled from the contaminated haunts of civilisation and buried themselves in deep recesses of the forests. In 1850 Nicolas had the cells of the forest dissenters destroyed. The Strànniki, or "Runners," refused to have any fixed abode in this world of Antichrist. They were pilgrims and strangers, constantly running from place to place. Fortunately there were lay brothers living in the towns and villages and working at trades, from the proceeds of which the élite were supported during their peripatetic life. The Theodosians would not eat or drink with the profane. Another sect, the Pomortsky, were more liberal. They would not pray for the "imperator," for that would be to make the tsar Antichrist. But they would pray for the "tsar" under this more modest title. In the present day many of the Old Believers of the "no-priest" party are less rigid than formerly. They will permit marriage as a civil bond; but, since it is not a sacrament, they hold that its continuance is subject to mutual consent.

Too much importance has been given to the vagaries of the more extravagant sects which are not reckoned as part of the Raskol. Similar phenomena have appeared in America, and yet we do not regard them as characteristic of American religion. The same must be said of those who went into the opposite direction to the ascetics, and practised free love "on principle." The Shakouni or "Jumpers," the dervishes of Christendom, cannot be regarded as Christian at all if they are guilty of the practices with which they are charged. The performance from which they derive their name may be childishly innocent, although it borders on insanity and has no real religion in it. They stand in circles, men and women facing one another, and jump, panting, sobbing, shouting, screaming they jump higher and higher, each one striving to be the highest jumper; when the excitement is most intense they break up and take their own courses, some whirling madly round, others standing transfixed as in catalepsy. The common belief is that an indescribably shameless scene follows.