Panel: POLITICS, SOCIETY AND RELIGION IN RUSSIA: TRANSFORMATIONS SINCE 2022



1150_2.5 - FROM STALIN TO PUTIN: ORTHODOX EPISTEMOLOGY AND THE RECONFIGURATION OF RUSSIAN PRAVOSLAVIE IN SERVICE OF STATE PROPAGANDA

AUTHORS:
Gabunia A. (KU Leuven ~ Leuven ~ Belgium)
Text:
This paper examines how Orthodox theology was progressively recontextualized from the Stalin era to the Putin period, functioning as one of the central elements of state propaganda. While conventional analyses emphasize the political instrumentalization of the Russian Orthodox Church, this study adopts a systematic theological perspective and argues that the transformation is fundamentally epistemological. It examines how theological categories are reconfigured into ideological constructs that sustain the hegemonic language of the Russian state within the ideological doctrine of Russkiy Mir. As a result, theology is transformed into a theopolitical discourse that legitimizes state power and presents political claims as expressions of sacred truth. The study demonstrates how the Russian state enforces what is here termed authoritarian perspectivism, a system in which a single ideological viewpoint claims absolute theological certainty and dismisses alternative interpretations as hostile and illegitimate. By interpreting the 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine through this closed interpretative framework, the Russian state provides a metaphysical sacralization of political ideologies and actions, making it more complex to challenge them without appearing to challenge the faith itself. The analysis draws on Soviet archival materials together with official publications, particularly the Journal of the Moscow Patriarchate and Bogoslovskie Trudy. These sources reveal strong rhetorical continuity between the Soviet-era religious discourse and post-Soviet theological language, demonstrating that the religious narrative visible in the war against Ukraine reflects a longer historical trajectory in which Orthodox theology has been repeatedly rearticulated to legitimize state power.