What is the difference between nationality and nationality. Nation, people, nationality: a brief explanation of the concepts

With the adoption of the so-called of the national Constitution of the Russian Federation, its inspirers and organizers, cleverly using the cheating techniques of station thimbles, managed to deceive millions of Russian and non-Russian people, destroying a great power - the USSR. In parallel with the planned replacement of the bloody communist regime with a democratic regime of genocide of Russians, many false scientific institutes, schools, and communities appeared in Russia. They were tasked with developing “new,” post-Marx and post-Soviet views on known scientific truths. The goal of their activities was to distort and suppress the enormous experience of the Russian historical and cultural heritage, and to denigrate the Orthodox faith of the Russian people. The main method is banal demagoguery masquerading as science. Particular attention was paid to national relations. Thus, according to the customers of scientific mirages, it will be easier to achieve the fulfillment of their cherished dream - to completely suppress the national self-awareness of the Russian people and turn the Russian people into “Ivanovs who do not remember their kinship” and who do not value their Fatherland. Then, completely deprive them of their homeland, turn them, first in theory, and then in practice, into a kind of “ethnic monolith - a single nation” without distinction of nationalities, which can be managed like a herd of impersonal sheep - individuals. Today, some Russian people, including members of the Union of the Russian People, have fallen into the Pharisaic trap and are so confused that they have already begun to doubt the existence of the Russian people, and openly declare that they need to be “formed anew”! The words of the Hieromartyr John (Vostorgov) involuntarily come to mind: “We are alive. Our God is alive, Russia is alive, the Russian people are alive and will be alive! They gathered early to divide his vestments, they began to bury him early!”

There is only one main reason for this confusion. Instead of the teachings of Christ, the Marxist-Leninist theory, created by the bionegative founders of the misanthropic crowd of Christ-fighters, still sits firmly in their heads. Therefore, analyzing the foundations of the ideology of the Union of the Russian People, we would like to draw the attention of the Allies, as well as everyone who holds our Fatherland dear, to the way in which some scientific concepts turn into tools for the ideological and political fooling of the peoples of Russia.

After we have briefly defined the approach to understanding the foundations of Russian nationalism as a phenomenon of Russian self-awareness and the ideological and political practice of the Union of the Russian People, it is necessary to more accurately define the terminology that is now often used. The fact is that inaccuracy (as well as scientific and political dishonesty) in the definitions of such widely used concepts as people, nation, ethnicity and race provides a significant opportunity for terminological manipulation and artificial discrepancies in ideological concepts related to our topic - clarifying the foundations of the ideology of the Union of the Russian People. Trying to isolate from the existing variety of definitions those that, in our opinion, are most acceptable, we are fully aware of the correctness of Metropolitan John (Snychev) who correctly asserted that no one has yet given an accurate definition of a nation (1). The same can be said about the definition of the concept of “people”. Therefore, we will limit ourselves to a brief listing and analysis of the most common and accepted concepts. Since there are a great many definitions of these, we will select for our purposes only a few of the most typical ones, selecting them according to the principle of historical consistency and prevalence. Let's start with the word nation, which has been used more and more widely in recent years and with an ever-increasing political component.

This is the definition of a nation given by one of the largest ideologists of Russian nationalism, Prof. P.I. Kovalevsky in his work “Russian nationalism and national education in Russia” (1912). He writes: “What is a nation? A nation is a group of people occupying a certain territory on the globe, united by one spoken language, professing the same faith, experiencing the same historical destinies, distinguished by the same physical and mental qualities and which created a well-known culture (2). A little further, the author explains the main difference in the concept of a nation from the concept of a people, without giving this concept a detailed definition. “In the Russian language there are the words “people”, “narodnost”, “folk”. This is not the same as nation, nationality, nationalism. It's either more or less. The word “Russian people” denotes either the composition of the inhabitants of the entire Russian state, and then this state concept includes the 150 nations that make up the Russian Empire, or the words “Russian people” denote an estate, a class of people, a simple class of population (3). For a full-blooded concept of a nation, here, according to P.I. Kovalevsky should “add nobles, clergy, merchants, etc.” (4). In the work “Liberal and Social Democracy” L.A. Tikhomirov does not separate the people as a “simple population class” from other classes and from this point of view does not make a distinction between the concepts of “people” and “nation”. He gives the following explanation of the word “people”: “What is a people itself? The concept of it can be approached from two very different points of view. Every people, firstly, represents something historical as a whole, a long series of successive generations that have lived for hundreds or thousands of years hereditarily transmitted common life. In this form, a people, a nation represents some socially organic phenomenon with more or less clearly expressed laws of internal development. In this form, a people, a nation, at the same time constitutes an undoubted scientific fact. All of our science of the 19th century knows only this people , tells us only about him" (5). Precisely separating politics from science and scientificism, which serves deceitful politics, L.A. Tikhomirov further notes: “But politicians and the democratic trend consider the people not in this form - a historical, socially organic phenomenon, but simply in the form of the sum of the existing inhabitants of the country. This is the second point of view, which considers a nation as a simple association of people united in a state because they wanted it, living according to the laws that they like, and arbitrarily changing, whenever they please, the laws of modern life" (6).

L.A. Tikhomirov’s remark regarding the substitution in the concept of nation and people of a “historical, socially organic phenomenon” with “the sum of the existing inhabitants of the country” is extremely important for us. It is a methodological basis for separating the ideology of democratic deception from the ideology built on scientific knowledge and Orthodox truth when assessing all the various “projects, concepts and doctrines” currently appearing in abundance, new in appearance, but surprisingly similar in content for the development of Russia . When forming, studying and evaluating the ideology of the Union of the Russian People, this remark should be taken into account with special attention in order to avoid the danger of ideological deception. In the same way, one should keep in mind another important condition that made the Russian people the Great Russian people - the Orthodox faith. We read about this from Metropolitan of St. Petersburg and Ladoga John (Snychev). He writes: “The concept of “people” in relation to the national community is a higher concept, not material, but spiritual, and it alone is not enough to create a collective spiritual organism, so strong and tenacious that no troubles and misfortunes (and how many of them there were) over ten centuries of our history) could not destroy and exterminate it. Initially, the unity of blood, the common origin of the Slavic tribes, with all their significance, could not give this collection the necessary vitality and strength. Only when the soul of the people - the Church - gathered the Russian people around itself , when Russia overcame the lack of state unity, which gave rise to ulcers and cracks of strife in the people's body, when, throwing off the heterodox Tatar-Mongol yoke, Russia united under the scepter of the Russian Orthodox Sovereign - then the Russian people rose to their full mighty height on the historical stage. conciliar, sovereign, open to everyone. Realizing the purpose and meaning of his existence. From that moment on, the meaning of Russian life was finally and forever focused around Divine service in the highest and purest meaning of the word - serving God as the focus of Good and Truth, Beauty and Harmony, Mercy and Love. The purpose of people's life was finally determined as the task of preserving this meaningfulness of personal and social existence in its intact fullness, testifying to it to the world, protecting it from encroachment and distortion" (7).

As we can see from the above explanations, there is no special difference from a scientific point of view between the concepts of “people” and “nation” by Russian scientists P.I. Kovalevsky and L.A. Tikhomirov is not made, but the “historical whole” and “historical destiny” are emphasized when defining both concepts. In turn, Metropolitan John, without showing that the Russian nation was born from the Russian people thanks to the Orthodox faith, especially emphasizes its role in the formation of the Russian people on the “historical stage” as a conciliar, sovereign and spiritual concept.

There is no doubt that nations and, in particular, the Russian nation go through a long path of historical formation. This can be learned from many works of domestic and foreign researchers. Many of them come to the conclusion that a lot of time must pass for the nation to find itself. As for the Russian nation, we can agree that it was formed and defined in Russia by the era of Peter 1. “The Great Russian nation, torn apart by invasions and rebellions, finally ripened, like bread ripens, despite storms and adversity. The race is physically and spiritually not at all immediately. Sometimes its growth is delayed for a long time. Admixtures are rejected, improved or kill the breed. The main type struggles with variants, but in the end the time comes when nature's plan is realized, the breed has matured! A solemn moment, as in the life of an individual. A mature nationality represents genius of the people,” wrote O. Menshikov (8). Taking into account the modern experience of political practice, which was acquired during the 18th-20th centuries, including the artificial creation of states by force (USA, Israel), the artificial politicization of unresolved national issues regarding peoples who do not have their own statehood and live in the territories of other countries , as well as the no less artificial involvement of the national culture of peoples in global political processes, the definition of P.I. Kovalevsky, which has retained its correct scientific basis, can only be slightly clarified. The following should be added to it: a nation is a group of people occupying a certain territory on the globe (having its own state with historically established borders), united by one spoken (and state) language, professing the same faith, experiencing the same historical destinies , characterized by the same physical and mental qualities and which created a well-known (highly developed) culture.

Then, affirming the concept of “nation” in general and the concept of the Russian nation, we will be able to say that the Russian people and the Russians, who form the physical and spiritual basis of the Russian nation, gather other peoples around themselves, allowing them to completely merge with them in state terms . Based on this definition, we can argue that the Russian nation is not at all a multi-tribal gathering that agreed to live together as long as it is beneficial to everyone and invented general temporary rules for this. “Russia,” wrote S.A. Khomyakov on this issue, “brought many different tribes into its great bosom: Baltic Finns, Volga Tatars, Siberian Tungus, Buryats, etc., it received its name, existence and meaning from the Russian people (t i.e. from the members of Great, Little and White Russia). The rest must merge with it completely: the rational ones, if they understand this necessity; the great ones, if they unite with this great personality; the insignificant ones, if they decide to retain their petty originality" (9). I. Ilyin pointed out that the formation of the Russian nation proceeded not only through “the introduction of various tribes into the great bosom of Russia,” but also through heterodox beliefs. In his work “The Dangers and Tasks of Russian Nationalism” he wrote: “A nation, as a unity of people with a single national act and culture, is not determined by belonging to a single church, but includes people of different faiths, and different confessions, and different churches. And nevertheless, the Russian national act and spirit was nurtured in the bosom of Orthodoxy and historically determined by its spirit..."(10).

In other words, based on the above definition, we can also say that the Russified, indigenous and non-indigenous peoples of Russia, who became close to the Russian people in spirit, and many in blood, who made their sincere contribution within their power to the construction of the Russian state and from ancient times those who live with the sovereign Russian people in friendship and harmony, even if they have not converted to the Orthodox faith, but treat it not only with respect, but also share its moral Christian principles - can be counted among the Russian nation (11). It should not be forgotten that such an approach, while historically, morally and spiritually correct, will seriously limit the possibility of interpreting the concept of “nation” for separatist and globalist purposes. This approach will make it possible to highlight in this concept the qualities of unity and spiritual closeness inherent in the indigenous peoples of Russia, the desire of the Little Russians, Belarusians and small peoples of Russia to unite under the auspices of the sovereign Russian people (Great Russians), and not to scatter among the national-dwarf state formations of the native model, demonstrating their imaginary nationality , but being actually weak and uncultured. Not to mention the fact that they are completely unprotected from a military point of view. “The right of nationality exists truly only for those peoples who, using experience, have the opportunity to preserve it, and that the right of improvement is taken into account for the establishment of security, and not for any vainglorious extension of the boundaries of the state. Thus, tribes subject to a large state who, due to their weakness, cannot enjoy independent political independence and who, therefore, must necessarily be under the authority or protection of one of the large neighboring states, cannot be protected by the right of nationality, because for them it is imaginary and non-existent. nations located among the great ones always serve as a field for military actions, devastation and disastrous influences of all kinds, and therefore it is more beneficial for themselves when they unite in spirit and society with a large state and completely merge their nationality with the nationality of the ruling people, constituting with it only one people and ceasing to carelessly dream about something impossible and unrealizable,” - this is how Prof. P. I. Kovalevsky (12). A century later, we find a similar opinion in the Chairman of the Union of the Russian People L. G. Ivashov, who indicated in his report at the II Congress of the RNC in 2006 that even at the level of their region of compact residence, with all the good wishes of the national elites, the latter are unable to maintain the unity of the territory of their residence, the economic independence and cultural independence of their peoples. It should be realized that many small peoples, as a rule, due to the peculiarities of their national character, spiritual weakness and intellectual unpreparedness, including an elementary inability to perform civilized work, are all the more unable and unwilling to bear the burden of responsibility for the fate of the vast Russia on an equal basis with the Russians.

As for the concept of nationality, which is used by Prof. P.I. Kovalevsky in this case, it has several meanings. Two of them are the most common and practically applicable. Firstly, the word nationality is used as a complete synonym for the word people, or as a people at an early stage of its development. Secondly, as a combination of a number of qualitative characteristics that distinguish this or that people. When we say “Nationalism” in relation to the use of this word as the third component in the formula of the foundations of Russian statehood: “Orthodoxy. Autocracy. Nationality”, as well as regarding its connection with its two other components, then, in a broad sense, we mean its second meaning. That is, the Russian nationality with the physical and spiritual qualities inherent only to the Russian people, which distinguish and distinguish it as a sovereign people, of the Orthodox faith, racially homogeneous, culturally united, having ancient roots and a historical right to its native land and its own Russian statehood. At the same time, for our narrower tasks, from the entire diverse range of sensory, spiritual, business, cultural and physical characteristics of the Russian people, we single out only those that have a specific application to the issue that interests us: the people’s attitude to faith, to the state and national structure of Russia.

It should be especially emphasized here: in Imperial Russia there were other and much more acceptable conditions for the development of the Russian people and the formation of the Russian nation. The triune formula of the foundations of Russian statehood, “Orthodoxy. Autocracy. Nationality,” adopted in 1832 in a country where, along with the Russian people, 150 large and small nations lived under the single sovereign hand of the Russian Emperor, was not born out of nowhere (13). Moreover, not out of a desire to crush other peoples and their faith. There was no need for this. This is known to anyone who is familiar with the history of the development of the Russian state not from Masonic, but from Russian sources. Today, the democratic form of government, in contrast to the autocracy that united all the peoples of Russia, significantly erodes the unity of the nation, makes it politically loose and ideologically fragmented - it does not consolidate, but denationalizes it. Indeed, in the very idea of ​​liberal democracy (as well as in the political practice of the historically alien federal structure artificially invented for the dismemberment of Russia) in the form of artificial equality of all, regardless of anything, but for its own sake and even to the detriment of others and the common cause, there is an ideological basis ( and in the republican state system - the political basis) for denationalization, separatism and the collapse of Russia. Therefore, in our time, we should rather talk not about development, but about the preservation of that national baggage that has miraculously not been wasted, although it has been severely damaged by the post-monarchical regimes that forcibly seized power in the Russian Empire and illegally retain it to this day.

Now let's turn to how Prof. I. Ilyin sees the process of the birth of a nation, emphasizing its socio-cultural component. People have to live on earth, he writes in his book “The Path of Spiritual Renewal,” in such a way that “everyone is hidden behind his body, everyone feels only themselves, everyone is strangers to each other and is in mental and physical loneliness... But along with it a powerful creative unity of people arises in a common and jointly created womb - in a national spiritual culture, where we are all one, where all the property of our homeland (spiritual, material, human, natural, religious, and economic) is the same for everyone us and what is common to all of us: creators of the spirit, and “workers of culture,” and creations of art, and homes, and songs, and temples, and language, and laboratories, and laws, and territories... Each of us lives by all of this, physically nourished and mentally nurtured, protected by others and protecting others, receiving and accepting gifts in a universal mutual exchange. In life and in the fabric of our society we are all one, and in its spiritual treasury the best that is in each of us is objectified. Her the creatures populate, enrich, and creatively awaken the personal spirit of each of us; What the homeland does is that the spiritual loneliness of people recedes into the background and gives primacy to spiritual unity and unity. This is the idea of ​​the native nation (14). It is quite clear that the spiritual unity of a nation, born in a national spiritual culture, cannot grow in a low and undeveloped culture. Therefore, in the definition of prof. P.I. Kovalevsky, we believe it is necessary to clarify: in addition to other integral criteria for defining a nation, only those people who managed to create a highly developed national culture can be considered it.

In general, this approach, inherently aimed at strengthening the unity of the nation, is associated with the possibility and necessity of the birth, and in our case, the revival of the autocratic state structure of Russia. Showing the inextricable connection between the monarchical state, the nation and national politics, which is realized in its entirety precisely under the monarchical system, L.A. Tikhomirov in his work “The Labor Question and Russian Ideals” wrote: “...In the idea of ​​Monarchy lies precisely the direct connection with the nation. Hence, “Monarchy itself,” the scientist continued to develop his thought, “is possible only in a nation (which Tikhomirov, as we have already noted, did not separate from the concept of a people who have reached a “socially organic” level of development. - S.B.) , i.e. in a society with an established logic of development, with a well-known successive tradition, with what constitutes the “spirit of the people.” Monarchy is possible only in a society that has already acquired an internal logic of development. Its policy, therefore, can only be based on the implementation of the goals of this successively developing whole, that is, it must necessarily become national, and if it does not, then the monarchy becomes unnecessary for a given society and is even impossible for it "(15). Separating the monarchy from democracy and showing the significant difference between a monarchy based on a nation as a society formed as a result of the natural historical continuity of many generations and democracy, he, citing specific examples, added: “Any random rabble of people can form a state on democratic principles” (16). One can only ask the question. : Why should the Russian people and Russia, which has a centuries-old tradition of autocratic statehood behind it, become like “every rabble”, rejecting its rich historical heritage? Who needs all this?

It is not by chance that we paid attention to how the listed authors understand the moment and method of formation of a nation, as well as what essential characteristics they highlight for its definition. This approach allows us to better understand and affirm that the idea of ​​a nation should include a centripetal state idea that unites it while simultaneously preserving national identity and dissimilarity from other nations. It is this unifying idea that should be reflected in a conscientious definition of a nation. If we analyze other sources: the Marxist-Leninist and post-perestroika, democratic period, we will be convinced that significant ideological changes have occurred in the understanding of the definition of a nation. “Science on demand” has developed other criteria and a different approach. Because the goal was different.

The founder of this approach was the well-known leader of the world proletariat, Blank, who received the revolutionary nickname Lenin and wrote many books and articles on the national question that were destructive for Russia, which were the basis for the genocide, first of all, of the Russian people he hated. Two of his most harmful works for Russia on the topic of interest to us are the work “On the Right of Nations to Self-Determination” and the second work, “Critical Notes on the National Question.” Both of them were directly aimed at the destruction of the national Imperial Autocratic Russia, at the rise of peripheral anti-Russian nationalism and separatist sentiments. In essence, Lenin divided the Russian nation and Russia into numerous nations, thereby equating the Russian people who formed this nation with all others, including small peoples who played minor (and not always positive) roles in the formation of the Russian state. He then declared that they had the right to self-determination and even to secede. In this way, the ideological mechanism for the collapse of Imperial Russia was launched, which was subsequently implemented in the political practice of the Bolsheviks. Since the stages of this revolutionary path of dismemberment of the Russian Empire by the Bolsheviks are quite well known to everyone, there is no need to dwell on this issue. Let us only note that this idea was key to Lenin’s plan for destroying the autocratic state system and transforming it into a federation of republics, where the result of breaking the established state imperial organism was the establishment and consolidation of the power of foreigners through the idea of ​​​​the equality of nations. After power was seized, the right of nations to secede was left by the Soviet leaders as a carrot dangled in front of the donkey's face, which he would never reach.

Therefore, in the dictionaries of the Soviet period, regarding the concept of nation, we do not find a serious emphasis on self-determination up to and including secession.

Here is the definition given by the Great Soviet Encyclopedia: “A nation (from Latin natio - tribe, people), a historical community of people that takes shape during the formation of a common territory, economic ties, literary language, some features of culture and character that constitute its characteristics. "The truly scientific theory of N. was created by K. Marx and F. Engels and developed by V. I. Lenin. According to this theory, N. arises as a new socio-historical phenomenon during the period of overcoming the feudal fragmentation of society and strengthening political centralization based on capitalist economic ties." .

In the Large Legal Dictionary we read: “Nation (lat. natio - tribe, people) - 1) in the theory of law - a historical community of people that takes shape in the process of forming a commonality of their territory, economic ties, language, some features of culture and character that make up it signs. In some cases, a synonym for N. is the concept of “people”; 2) in the constitutional law of English- and Romance-speaking countries - a term that usually has the meaning of “state”, “society”, “the totality of all citizens”.

In I. Ozhegov’s “Dictionary of the Russian Language” we find: “A nation is a historically established stable community of people, formed in the process of forming a common territory, economic ties, literary language, cultural characteristics and spiritual appearance.” (Ozhegov S.I. Dictionary of the Russian language, M. 1991).

"Large Explanatory Dictionary of the Modern Russian Language" D.N. Ushakova defines the concept of a nation as follows: “Nation (Latin natio). 1. A historically established stable group of people that arose on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life, as well as on the basis of a national culture specific to a given ethnic group, voluntarily and naturally accepted by all national interest formed on its basis. 2. State, country."

"People - 1. A population united by belonging to one state; residents of a country. 2. The same as a nation, nationality, nationality. 3. People."

The largest in Russian lexicographical practice, “Big Dictionary of Foreign Words” (A.N. Bulyko, M., 2007), considers nation, tribe and people as having the same root in the meaning of the word and actually puts an equal sign between them: “Nation (lat. Natio = tribe, people) - a historically established stable community of people that arose on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life, culture and character traits"

If we compare these definitions with the one given by Stalin in his work “Marxism and the National Question,” written in 1913, we will understand that the basis for the above definitions of a nation is not the Leninist idea of ​​a nation for self-determination up to the point of secession, but the Stalinist definition of a nation. “A nation,” Stalin wrote, “is a historically established stable community of people that arose on the basis of a common language, territory, economic life and mental makeup, manifested in a common culture” (17).

The new “post-perestroika period” - the period of implantation of the liberal idea in the form of a republican-democratic form of government in Russia, gave seemingly different options for defining the concept of “nation”. Something like “songs about the main thing” on the modern degraded stage, where Soviet songs are sung, since current artists are not able to come up with anything new and nationally meaningful. Exactly the same phenomenon is observed in “democratic” science, paid for by foreign grants. A whole network of research centers, institutes, and non-profit organizations has been formed that are searching for a new ideology for Russians. Scientists serving the regime have been specially raised. The development of “new views” on national relations occupies a very important place in their activities. Among such developments of “new national concepts” and, therefore, among new options for interpreting the concept of “nation,” several of the most widely propagated stand out. They all pursue one goal, anti-Russian and anti-people in its content - to turn the Russian idea either into a national project or into a doctrine - it doesn’t matter. The main thing is not to let the Russian people feel like the Great Sovereign Russian People - the Russian Nation. At the same time, the main efforts were initially aimed at ensuring that the Russian people stopped feeling like a sovereign state-forming people. Now many biased scientists do not deny this (because it looks very stupid), but they try to put the process into forms that prevent its essence from being revealed. In all new projects of this kind, the word “Russian” is present, where they “preaching slogans of non-Russian origin,” as V. Rozanov rightly noted, “refer to the Russian people” (18), camouflaging the main thing: let the Russian people, seemingly formally dominate ( in number), carries out a kind of leadership of all other peoples in a single impulse of national unity, which is falsely presented as the task of national revival. Even if he thinks that he is dominant. The main thing is that the Russian people do not think that they should be RUNNING. The fact is that even in a situation of informal domination, even if its sovereignty is recognized, the Russian people will remain only the leader of other peoples who will have the same, but not deserved, rights as the Russians. That is, in the continuation of Lenin’s anti-people and anti-Russian policy, these foreign peoples will be “self-determining nationalities, and therefore forever alien to the ruling people, and all the latter’s domination is reduced to “leadership.” Of course, in such a formula, Russia ceases to reign, wrote O. Menshikov before the Bolshevik revolution. The Russian kingdom is turning into Russian guardianship, or even less into Russian guardianship over foreigners..." (19). In our current situation, the situation is even worse. The Russian kingdom must still be returned, and the Russian people should again remember their real place in state structure of Russia and feel like a RUNNING PEOPLE.

To prevent this from happening, to prevent the oppressed spirit of the Russian people from being revived, a lot of anti-Russian multivariate work is being done in the ideological sphere to design a non-Russian future for Russians.

Option one, “cathedral”. His task is to design the development of the Russian nation in line with the ideas of the “National Council Project”, where “The concept of “Russian” (“Russian”) is the name of the United Nation, which is understood as a political nation that includes representatives of all ethnic groups (peoples) living in the territory Russia"(20). Then the term “interethnic relations” is proposed to be replaced with the term “interethnic relations”, and the Leninist principle of “Equality of Peoples”, intended to fragment Russia through the artificial incitement of separatist sentiments among small peoples, is proposed to be replaced with a new anti-Russian version - the principle of equality of citizens, regardless of their ethnicity accessories(21).

That is, the organizers of “conciliar Russian life” propose, in essence, to level the Great Russian people in an ethnic hodgepodge with other peoples of Russia, deprive them of high spiritual qualities, reduce them to a biological community - an ethnic group and, thus, put them on the same level as any a handful of insignificant nationalities or a separatist ethnic clan, giving them the same civil rights as the Russians, and deliberately forgetting about the historically, morally and materially incomparable difference of their people's material and spiritual contribution to the construction of the Russian state. What is this if not a humiliation of the national dignity of the Russian people, which should be prosecuted by law in the Russian Federation? What is this if not a hidden call to incite ethnic hatred between the indigenous peoples of Russia, fraught with a struggle for Lenin’s “right of nations to self-determination, even to the point of secession,” which is known to us for its disastrous consequences for Russia?

Option two is “project Russia”. For the anonymous authors of this project, the topic of the Russian nation does not exist at all. Judging by what they have written and disseminated, they strongly hate the Russian people and Russia. “Nationality does not matter in our topic,” they write. For them, Russia is not a beloved Motherland, but a certain territory where a “situation of rat kings” reigns. The Fatherland, dear to the heart of every Russian person, in their eyes is a “giant community of street children,” whose population consists of “philistines,” “snails,” and “princes,” and “Russia itself is a beehive or an anthill.” What kind of Russian nation can we be talking about here? All this pathological Russophobia, expressed in love for animals and insects, is crowned with the idea of ​​endowing the Russian people with an “improved monarchy”, since democracy, which has been persecuting Russia for the second decade, has today discredited itself (22).

Option three is “doctrinal.” Its task is also to show and propose ways for the future development of Russia. This is what its authors write in their theses of the “Russian Doctrine” regarding the understanding of what the Russian nation is in section “2. Spiritual and political nation”: first, we need to restore an accurate idea of ​​ourselves as a nation, not based on an abstract universal understanding, and from our own history - precisely on the basis of the experience of the “Russian nation” we will be able to truly, in our own way, truly deeply comprehend what a “nation in general” is. The Russian doctrine offers its own vision of national history and considers it necessary to accept a consistent official concept of the history of the Fatherland, without which it is impossible to move confidently into the future."

Then follows the definition of a nation: “2. A nation is a force field of history that holds within itself various ethnic and social groups, giving them unity and not allowing them to disintegrate. A nation initially, at the moment of its inception, is a tribe endowed with properties and qualities that allow them to unite other tribes and groups, forming on the basis of this cohesion hierarchical structures, historically stable statehood; then, at the next stage of its formation, the nation, which already has its own state, appears as the core of an expanding culture and statehood, a developing circle of cohesion, which includes more and more new and "new parts that did not previously belong to this community. Thus, the nation appears as a self-expanding social organism capable of supra-tribal solidarity."

The end of the section explains to us who the Russians are and what their place is in national Russia: 7. Russians in a supranational union with ethnic minorities - this is the exact formula of historical Russia, which embodies the paradox of a supranational nation. Moreover, this formula of the Russian supernation does not mean “narrow nationalism” at all, but quite the contrary, it excludes it. Because it is precisely this formula that makes it possible to think of Russia not as an international, but as a voluntary super-tribal coalition of peoples" (23).

From this “their vision of national history” it is well clear that the authors of the “Russian Doctrine” (as well as the organizers of the “conciliar project”, coupled with the anonymous creators of the “Russia project”) were able to discern in “historical Russia” not a Russian nation formed through the efforts of Russian people, but something phantom - a supernation from a cathedral of tribes and a coalition of peoples. Obviously, from this point of view, it was easier for new non-Russian scientists to fulfill the order to develop an ideological basis for the planned tearing of Russia into pieces and keeping the Russian people in obedience.

This kind of “supra-national trickery” makes the authors of the doctrine and other projects look like clever jugglers of the verbal genre, but does not do them any credit as scientists. One gets a distinct feeling that the seventy developers of the anti-Russian and anti-people doctrine, burdened with scientific titles, skipped classes in secondary school and at the institute. As a result, they apparently failed to become acquainted with the works of Russian scientists, Russian literary classics, Russian historians, Russian saints, whose names are known throughout the civilized world.

It is not surprising that the authors of the non-Russian doctrine want to legitimize their eight-hundred-page opus, which they first presented not in Russia, but on the island of Corfu! Their desire is quite understandable. Otherwise, such a supranational approach to history simply cannot survive in national Russia. Therefore, its authors consider it necessary to “accept a consistent official concept of the history of the Fatherland, without which it is impossible to move confidently into the future.” Well, what kind of Russian would want to move into such a supranational future voluntarily, where Russia is not his native Fatherland, but a “country of tradition”, “a council of tribes and faiths”, where the Russian nation, it turns out, needs to legislate “the possibility of transition from a secular state regime to a confessional (following the example of Israel, Thailand, Mauritania, Jordan, etc.)? (See paragraph 3 in the “Russian Spirit” section). Apparently, the authors prefer the ideals of the state structure of the Semitic-Hamitic area and Southeast Asia, and not the foundations of the Russian state system, clearly expressed in three historically integral elements of the thousand-year-old Russian statehood: in “Orthodoxy. Autocracy. Nationalities" - in the Russian idea, and not in the anti-Russian doctrine.

It is quite understandable that ordinary people who are not specifically involved in issues of state development in Russia, who do not know the history of the Fatherland professionally, who trustingly perceive demagoguery as a desire to lead their homeland out of crisis, are unable to understand all this maliciously created ideological chaos. It is extremely difficult to guess in it the dream of a hidden cosmopolitan about the complete collapse of the national state, which to this day, according to the instinctive attitude of the Russian people towards it and the spirit of the people, remains Russian. But the enemies of Russia have time, money and a passionate obsession, passed on to them from their non-Russian godless ancestors, to destroy national Russia and the Russian people, which greatly interferes with their plans to conquer the world.

All these pseudoscientific, conciliar-doctrinaire researches have the support not only of senior government officials who advocate the transformation of the Russian nation into the “Russian nation of the 21st century,” but also among custom scientists and encyclopedists (24). This, using the Marxist-Leninist terminology well mastered by new non-Russian scientists, is the very basis above which all these superstructural projects for the future Russia, not in Russian, rise.

Here, for example, is what we read in the Great Encyclopedia of the Russian People on the issue that interests us.

"A nation, a people united in a state with a common faith or ideology, speaking the same language, having a common territory, economy, culture, psychology and worldview. A nation arises on the basis of the main, state-forming people, around which the consolidation of other related and unrelated tribes takes place , races, peoples and nationalities, over time forming, together with the main people, a common monolith. The main people and tribes rallied around it create a state and culture. The Russian nation was formed on the basis of the Russian people. But in the process of historical development, many elements from surrounding ones merged into it its Western and Southern Slavs, Germanic, Finno-Ugric and Turkic-speaking peoples. Orthodoxy became the spiritual basis of the Russian nation, which transformed the culture of the Russian people" (p. 482). And a briefer definition, which is placed in the article “The People”: A people united in a state with a common faith or ideology is called a nation (p. 469).

Since such approaches are widespread today, including in the national projects mentioned earlier, we should briefly dwell on this definition in order to learn to distinguish between modern, multi-level and multi-layered methods of non-scientific definitions.

As can be seen from the above definition of a nation, there are three main characteristics of a nation, in contrast to a people that does not have them or does not have them in full. This is the unification of the people into a state; presence of the main people; the creation of culture by the state-forming people and the “peoples and tribes rallied around them.” At the same time, two, at first glance, insignificant clarifications are placed in the definition of a nation, and the most important element, without which a nation in general represents a chaotic gathering of people who have come from nowhere, is simply removed. “A nation, a people,” the author writes, “united in a state with a common faith or ideology (our italics - S.B.). From this “or” it follows that the faith of the people during the formation of a nation is not a prerequisite for this, but a long-term the historical path that it goes through, passing on from generation to generation the faith of its fathers before becoming a nation, seems to be of no use to it. That is, for the formation of a nation, the traditional and historically inherent religion of the people is not necessary? It is enough to arm the people with ideology and a nation will be made . So far, however, no one has ever done this in life. A nation has not yet grown from ideology on the globe. But, judging by the various theories for Russians that have spread in recent years, I would really like this. Then it would not matter what lies at the basis of the formation nations, the Orthodox religion, Muslim religious dogmas, the voodoo cult, the Talmud, the Russophobic “Russia project” or the same “Conciliar project of the State of a single nation" coupled with the “Russian doctrine". Then a rapidly changing element of ideology can be freely inserted into the very concept of a nation (for example, changing the monarchical ideology to Marxist-Leninist or liberal) and thereby change the ideological vector of the concept itself depending on the political situation. Then the thousand-year tradition of Russian monarchical sovereignty, which forms the most important basis of Russian state identity, can be quickly replaced, for example, by the liberal-democratic idea of ​​universal global ideological equalization, and the concepts of the Russian nation and the Russian people are deprived of their unique historical, cultural and other properties. The Decembrist P.I. defined the concept of people in a similar way. Pestel. “The people, in his opinion, is the totality of all those people who belong to the same state, who constitute a civil society whose purpose of existence is the well-being of each and every one” (25). The compilers of the dictionary-reference book “Nations and Ethnicities in the Modern World” (vol. 2007). “A nation,” writes the author of the article, Doctor of Philology M.N. Rosenko, “is a type of ethnic community at the level of industrial civilization (capitalist and socialist socio-economic formation)” (26). Even with the titanic work of the Soviet propaganda organs and democratic media, the destruction of the concept of people and nation as a historical category has not yet occurred.

It is not clear how the authors of the “Fundamentals of the Social Concept of the Russian Orthodox Church” missed this, unequivocally asserting that “in the modern world the concept of “nation” is used in two meanings - as an ethnic community and as a set of citizens of a certain state. The relationship between the Church and the nation should be considered in in the context of both the first and second meanings of this word."

The definition of a nation, included in the Great Encyclopedia of the Russian People (M., 2003), also lacks the same component that is most important for understanding the essence of the issue. Historical. It is reduced by the author to “the consolidation of other related and unrelated tribes, races, peoples and nationalities around the state-forming people” over time, which is not at all a historically complex process of nation formation. In any case, the Russian nation was certainly not born as a result of the “consolidation (i.e., unity - S.B.)... of races,” the mention of which in the definition comes even before the mention of peoples and nationalities. How could there be such a racial mixture in the history of the Russian people during the formation of the nation, if it is reliably known that the Russian people came with their historical roots from the Slavic race, which, in turn, was part of the Aryan? And in the history of mankind, nothing like this has yet happened to other nations. With this approach, one can easily imagine that after some time it will suddenly turn out that the Russian nation, along with Slavic roots, has, for example, Semitic ones. Or Hamitic. In any case, this encyclopedic definition does not exclude such a possibility. Perhaps, guessing this, the author, a few lines below, when characterizing the Russian nation, no longer mentions races.

It should be noted that exactly the same thing happens with the word “economy” in the mentioned Encyclopedia, which is attached to the definition of a nation as one of its elements. Its use instead of the phrase “national economy” does not focus on the assimilation of the special characteristics of this or that nation, and not even on the unification of the concept, but on the contrary, it forces one to think in the opposite direction, to see in all globalist nations the same thing to the detriment of the national. The author, wittingly or unwittingly, loses sight of the fact that the economy is a common international system of anti-national economic relations, identical in essence and specially created for all states and peoples. Its goal is to manage the national economy of countries through their destruction, through their involvement in a single global system called the “economy.” This economy has only one goal - making a profit by a non-national group of people, regardless of their citizenship and location, by pumping out the natural resources of national states and the inadequately paid labor of their peoples.

It is quite clear that neither the “super-tribal consolidation of peoples” nor the “consolidation of tribes” is clearly insufficient for the birth of a nation, which must have a single historical and religious spirit of the sovereign people. For the formation of the Russian nation, it took many centuries of hard work by the sovereign Russian people and the Russification of the indigenous peoples who had inhabited Russia since ancient times. It was precisely in the process of Russification that those same physical and mental qualities that P.I. Kovalevsky mentions in his definition of a nation took shape. It is quite obvious that this process has an essential difference from consolidation, i.e. cohesion, from a coalition, i.e. - unification, union (according to “their vision” by the authors of the “Russian Doctrine” of the “national history of Russia”), as well as from assimilation, i.e. likening. All these processes, which are often deliberately confused with Russification, thus replacing the essence of the matter, have a different historical, psychological and physical nature. Where Russification does not produce the desired results, other measures must be used to achieve Russia’s interests, which are directly related to the “reign of the Russian tribe” (27). Then Russia will remain indivisible and strong. “It is not enough to defeat the enemy,” O. Menshikov rightly wrote, advocating for the Russian Empire, “we need to bring the victory to the end, until the danger completely disappears, until non-Russian elements are transformed into Russians” (28). You need to know, remember and feel this. In order not to invent, like the same authors of the “Russian Doctrine,” that “many foreigners, as they realized their citizenship to the Russian state, began to call themselves “Russians.” How to explain to such people that “foreigners,” that is, foreigners in Russia began to call themselves Russians not because they “realized their citizenship to the Russian state,” but because, first of all, they became Russian in spirit - in the Orthodox faith and in the Russian way of life. After all, for this you need to at least know that citizenship in the Russian Empire was not determined in accordance with nationality, but with religious affiliation. We are not even talking about the fact that we should remember that from the Baptism of Russia the Orthodox faith was the spiritual basis of its Autocratic statehood. However, as the first Russian Tsar, Ivan Vasilyevich the Terrible, said: “About godless people , what do you say!” They first need to be baptized and Russified.

Linking the tasks of realpolitik with the formation of a nation, L.A. Tikhomirov, like many Russian scientists, especially emphasized its historical aspect, the transfer of the historical experience of the nation from generation to generation for the sake of the development of the nation itself. “Only that which is useful for the historical destinies of the nation can be truly useful for the present, and, conversely, everything useful for the historical destinies of the nation is certainly, one way or another, useful for the current day. Sometimes, in the interests of the future, some generation has to bring great benefits in the present sacrifice... But if this constitutes a sacrifice for him in the material sense, then in the moral sense it is not a sacrifice, but an acquisition, for on this sacrifice the people develop their strength of spirit. The solidarity of individual generations in the integral life of the nation is the basis of politics, because this feeling is soul of the nation. Until this feeling of solidarity of the whole with individual generations does not exist in people, they are not yet a people, not a nation" (29).

To discard or push into the background the historical aspect in the formation and development of a nation, as we see in the mentioned Encyclopedia, means to see it outside its history and to denationalize, thus unfairly likening the Russian nation to “any random rabble” that cannot form the highest, God-established form of government - monarchy, but only democracy, about which the holy righteous John of Kronstadt said: “Democracy is in hell.”

If we turn to the article “People” in the same Encyclopedia, we will see that a similar picture has emerged here. From this article we learn that “a people, a historical community of people, united into a spiritual whole by sacred concepts - land, language, blood, faith. It is these sacred concepts in indissoluble unity that transform large groups of people into a people. Isolation of one or more from the sacred unity elements violates the spiritual integrity and leads to the death of the people. The loss of faith makes the people spiritless, the loss of the land deprives them of the basis of existence. The loss of the language destroys the culture. The dilution of blood with the blood of other peoples leads to national degradation and the death of national feeling, the death of national consciousness..." As you can see, there is practically no difference in the approach to defining a nation and a people (30). Both definitions are ahistorical. Although the people are spoken of as a historical community, historical roots, obviously for the same reason as in the case of the definition of the concept “nation,” do not play a significant role for the author. The main emphasis in this definition is on other “elements,” leaving the possibility of seeing in the people Pestel’s ahistorical “totality of all those people who belong to the same state” (31).

In fact, the concept of “people” in relation to the national community is a higher concept, not material, but spiritual, and it alone is not enough to create a collective spiritual organism, so strong and tenacious that no troubles and misfortunes (and how many of them there have been) ten centuries of our history) could not destroy and exterminate it. Initially, the unity of blood, the common origin of the Slavic tribes, for all their significance, could not give this collection the necessary vitality and strength. Only when the soul of the people - the Church - gathered the Russian people around itself, when Rus' overcame the lack of state unity, which gave rise to ulcers and cracks of strife in the people's body, when, throwing off the heterodox Tatar-Mongol yoke, Russia united under the scepter of the Russian Orthodox Sovereign - then the Russian people rose to their full mighty stature on the historical stage. The people are conciliar, sovereign, open to everyone. Realizing the purpose and meaning of his existence. From that moment on, the meaning of Russian life finally and forever focused around Divine service in the highest and purest meaning of this word - service to God as the focus of Good and Truth, Beauty and Harmony, Mercy and Love. The purpose of people's life was finally determined as the task of preserving this meaningfulness of personal and social existence in its intact fullness, testifying to it to the world, protecting it from encroachment and distortion" (32).

Even a cursory analysis of the given definitions of domestic authors of different generations and encyclopedic publications of different periods gives us the opportunity to draw a very clear conclusion. With the beginning of the Bolshevik-Soviet period, the idea of ​​peoples and nations as historical categories gives way to the formulation of concepts about them as political categories, or rather, politicized and ideologized.

It remains only to briefly compare, from the point of view of etymology, the two concepts of people and ethnicity in order to understand why we are so insistently asked to mix them up or look for the difference. As the authors of the “Fundamentals of the Social Concept of the Russian Orthodox Church” write, explaining the etymology of the concept of “people”: “In the Old Testament, the words am and goy are used to designate the concept of “people”. In the Hebrew Bible, both terms received a very specific meaning: the first was the people of Israel, God's chosen; second, in the plural (goyim), - pagan peoples. In the Greek Bible (Septuagint), the first term was rendered by the words laos (people) or demos (people as a political entity); the second - by the word ethnos (nation; pl. ethne - pagans )". It follows from this that the use of this concept (which is based on physical elements that unite people into a single group), often wittingly or unwittingly, separates and absolutizes the tribal, clan and racial roots of the people to the detriment of its spiritual qualities. No matter how scientists define the concept of ethnicity, it historically carries in itself, first of all, the meaning of a human community of pagan goyim, united by blood, and not at all of a people who know the true God. According to the Talmud, goy is a completely humiliating name for a non-Jew, who, as L. Tikhomirov writes, referring to the author of the history of Jews G. Graetz, constantly heard “that he is the pearl of creation, the only person in the true sense of the word (33). Isn't that the point?

Concluding the brief analysis, it remains to add that even expanding the source base and increasing the scope of the review of the subject of interest to us, we will not find anything fundamentally new. One can only regret that the sources that have appeared in recent years, even positioning themselves as scientific, Russian and patriotic and, moreover, declared as encyclopedic, in essence do not differ from the definitions that we had during the period of the dominance of Marxist-Leninist ideology. Unless the words have been updated.

Definitions of this kind have a completely conscious and sought-after practical result. Relying on them, one can, without hesitation, create artificial nations from peoples like from a Lego set. We have already given an example of this - this is the “National Council Project”, the Russophobic ideological basis of which is the idea of ​​​​the possibility of turning the Russian people and the Russian nation into a kind of “single nation” without nationality within the framework of the “State of a single nation” (34), or, for example ( if this cannot be pushed through), with a different form of power - an “improved monarchy” (35). All these definitions are in shameless contradiction with the true understanding of the nation as a historically integral living organism striving to strengthen its spiritual, as well as cultural, physical, economic and military unity. Being expressed by people representing science, being included in encyclopedic publications that are intended to become a guide in practical matters, these definitions cause significant harm to the Russian nation. The cosmopolitanism hidden in them (in the service of globalization), which is opposed in the process of nation formation to the natural law of Russification of the indigenous and non-indigenous inhabitants of Russia as the main condition for their natural union with the sovereign Russian people, or other varieties (their name is legion) of anti-national and anti-Russian ideas - all they have the same goal. All of them orient the Russian people not towards unity with those who sincerely want to live in a single and indivisible Russian state, but towards denationalization and state disintegration of Russia. This is their main goal and the most serious danger to the ideology of the Union of the Russian People. A danger that must always be kept in mind by both the Allies and all Russian people.

The use of such definitions as people and nation in the ahistorical context offered to us, first of all, cannot in any way meet the interests of the revival of the traditional state system in Russia - the Russian Autocratic Kingdom. “The confession of the Russian national party is based on the following three provisions: Autocracy, Orthodoxy and Russian autocracy. At first glance, these three provisions, especially the first, seem somewhat backward and outdated. However, these provisions were not taken by chance and not out of whim, but based on historical data... The history of Russia has a very instructive meaning in its real historical destinies. And whoever takes the trouble to refresh it in his mind and think a little will clearly see that Autocracy. Orthodoxy and the indivisibility of the Empire are not empty sounds and not a manifestation of predatory despotism and violence, but wholly and essentially stem from the properties and character of the nation itself (our italics - S.B.) and are based on its historical destinies... These three main provisions of the existence of the Russian state were confessed back in the days of Muscovite Russia . A contemporary of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, Yuri Krizhanich, affirms the following foundations of the state: “The Orthodox Faith, complete self-control (Autocracy), the inseparability of royalty and protection from foreign ownership, locking the boundaries and preventing idle and idle living” (36).

All ahistorical definitions of the concepts “nation” and “people”, to varying degrees and from different sides, are united by one O: their veiled pro-globalist characterization of the nation as a category of unnatural emergence. After all, then it is supposedly possible to create a nation or people artificially, bringing together races, peoples, nationalities, tribes and ethnic groups. It is quite clear to us whose order this is.

In conclusion, something else should be said. The Holy Scripture gives us for guidance such concepts as clan, tribe, tribe and, as a derivative of the close root word clan, the word - people - that is, what was born on a certain earthly space (37). We encounter such concepts throughout his text (Gen. 11:1-8; Sol. 8:14 Jer. 52:15; Matt. 12:21; Eph. 3:15; Ps. 40.9; Matt. 28 :19; Matthew 25:31; Mark 8:1; Rev. 18:4; Rev. 5:9, etc.). Words so widely used in our time as ethnos, race, nation, highlighting in them primarily common physical characteristics, their artificial unification through confusion into a kind of ahistorical and supranational monolith of a “single nation” with the abolition of the national identity of the people is how Metropolitan John (Snychev) rightly shows, from the point of view of a Christian, one of the forms of fighting against God. “The fact is,” writes the Bishop, “that the division of the once united humanity into various races and tribes occurred at the direct command of God (see Gen. 11:1-8). Moreover, the Orthodox Church teaches that each people as a collective personality has its own special Guardian Angel. The secret of nationality is rooted in the mystical depths of people's life, being one of the most important fundamental principles of human existence, the guarantee of that spiritual unity, without which the very existence of a people, society, and state is unthinkable" (38). Whether the false organizers of people's destinies, learned executors of other people's orders, planners or doctrinaires want it or not, peoples in that internal, essential form, in which the Lord laid the divine foundation, will exist until the Second Coming. And Jesus Christ will judge the nations according to their deeds: “We know that the Messiah is coming, the spoken Christ...” (John 4:27), - this is what the Holy Scripture tells us. “He will judge the world according to righteousness, and the nations according to His truth” (Ps. 95:13).

In addition, the terms mentioned are scientific and for this reason alone are a product of human thought. They are still very controversial because they are difficult and sometimes impossible to define accurately. Their use in the field of ideology and politics must be done with extreme caution. The ambiguity and misunderstanding that arise from their constant and thoughtless use, as well as from deliberate misinterpretation, turn these words into a weapon of ideological hypocrisy and outright lies, which have dire political and state consequences. Therefore, for us, the Allies, their use in ideological work must be extremely careful and restrained. From the point of view of political practice, perhaps it would be more appropriate, clearer and more correct to talk more about the Russian people, thereby emphasizing its historical significance and the decisive role of Russian people in the life of Russia. It is not for nothing that the founders of the Union gave it the only correct name - the Union of the Russian People.
Sources and literature used:

1. Metropolitan John. Cathedral Rus', St. Petersburg, 1995, p. 201.
2. P. I. Kovalevsky. "Russian nationalism and national education in Russia." St. Petersburg, 2006, p. 33.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid., p. 35.
5. L. A. Tikhomirov. Liberal and social democracy // Russia and democracy. M., 2007, p. 120.
6. Ibid.
7. Metropolitan John. Be Russian! Overcoming turmoil. St. Petersburg 1996, p. 10.
8. M. O Menshikov. Letters to the Russian nation. M., 2002, p. 151.
9. S. A. Khomyakov. Works, vol. 1, p. 27 // Quote O: P. I. Kovalevsky "Russian nationalism and national education in Russia." St. Petersburg, 2006, p. 122.
10. I. Ilyin. Dangers and tasks of Russian nationalism // About the coming Russia, Jordanville, USA, 1993, p. 272.
11. D. A. Khomyakov, the author of the study “Orthodoxy. Autocracy. Nationality,” which is directly devoted to the issue of interest to us, noted that in the triad Orthodoxy is not dogmatic, but everyday in nature. Hence the respectful attitude of non-Christians towards the Orthodox faith of the Russian people, which can be respected even by non-Christians. “This, so to speak, is the internal guarantee of the life of the Russian people, and it is quite possible to honor it and even to accommodate it, while remaining in the area of ​​personal conscience a perfect and irreconcilable opponent of “church-dogmatic Orthodoxy.” See D. A. Khomyakov.” Orthodoxy. Autocracy. Nationality". M, 2005, pp. 16-17.
12. P. I. Kovalevsky "Russian nationalism and national education in Russia." St. Petersburg, 2006, p. 123.
13. Nationalities that make up Russia: Abadzekhs, Abkhazians - 59469, Avaro-Indians - 208041, Avars, Aderbeijans - 566229, Adjarians, Ains - 1434, Alatirs, Aleuts, Arabs, Armenians - 985022, Balkars, Bambakis, Barabins, Bashki ry - 1297098 , Besingievtsy, Beslenevtsy, Bulgarians - 170170, Buryats - 288734, Belarusians, Aoguls, Vods, Votyags - 400394, Gal-gai, Gilyaks - 9169, Greeks - 149892, Golds, Georgians - 814892, Gurians, Dagestanis, Dargins - 121375, Danes , Dzherakhs, Digorians, Dungans, Jews - 5021476, Yeniseis (Kumandians, Turks, Kyzyls, Sagais, Kai-bals, Beptirs, Karagossians, Seyots, Urakhanians) - 37721, Zhmud - 444921, Ziryans - 138225, Izhorians, Ingush, Hindus, Imeretians - 270513, Italians, Kabardians - 84093, Kazikumukhs - 88190, Kalmyks - 181669, Kamchadals - 3978, Karaites, Karakalpaks - 93215, Karapapakhs - 29878, Karakirghiz - 201579, Karachais - 268 47, Karelians - 196615

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The concepts of “people” and “nation” are often equated. Many dictionaries consider them synonyms. But the people and the nation are not at all the same thing: they are phenomena related to different social spheres. How are they different? Let's try to understand this confusing issue.

Definition

People- a collection of people with a common origin, common traditions, language, and culture.

Nation- a community of people connected by political and economic interests that is already part of a state or strives to create one.

Comparison

People arises during the transition from primitive society to class society. Nation formed with the advent of capitalism in Western Europe.

The concept of “people” appeared in Russia much earlier than the concept of “nation” and was used mainly in relation to the inhabitants of our country. The word "nation" was presumably borrowed from Poland during the Peter I era and was used to discuss relations with foreign powers. A clear shade of foreignness, “foreignness” was inherent in him until the end of the 19th century. Nation at that time meant the nobility, then a sovereign state, power, empire.

The essence of the concept people lies in spontaneous ethnic processes that do not always depend on the consciousness and will of people. Nation It is closely connected with national movements that have a specific program, with the activities of a group of individuals aimed at achieving certain goals (most often political). The nation in this case acts as a social (political) force that must be taken into account.

A people is a collection of people whose community is based on a single blood origin, special traditions and customs, and way of life. The nation is based on common market and economic ties and follows the same civil laws. Common language, common culture – heritage people, and the common territory and unity of economic life are closer to the concept nation. A nation manifests itself through a system of public institutions, in particular through the state.

It turns out that the people create the state, and then the state, having strengthened and expanded, artificially forms a nation (analogous to the people). At the heart of a nation is the principle of citizenship. The people are an organic whole, the nation is an artificially constructed rationalistic mechanism. The nation nullifies everything that is original, ethnic, and traditional. The people who build the state and are the core of the nation lose their ethnicity, because the living processes of linguistic evolution, traditions, and customs in the state acquire one fixed form. Not all representatives of the very people who served as the basis for the creation of the national state may be part of the nation. A frequent price for the formation of a nation is split and confrontation within the people.

Conclusions website

1. Concept people arose much earlier than the concept nation. The word “nation” in Russia was first used only in relation to foreigners.
2. The people are the primary, natural, natural, real formation. Nation is secondary, rational, artificial, abstract.
3. The word “nation” is closely connected with the state mechanism, with social (mainly political) movements that have a certain program and move towards their goals. The people are a more spontaneous, uncontrollable concept. A nation is a political phenomenon, a people is a sociocultural phenomenon.
4. A nation is an analogue of a people that is artificially formed by the state.
5. A nation needs schools, universities, a literary language and, finally, its own state. The people can exist without all this.
6. The people are the people, the nation is the principle that dominates the people, the ruling idea.
7. The creation of a nation is often associated with a split and confrontation within society.

The Slavs are one of the largest groups of peoples, similar in their common genesis and related languages. Today they inhabit the lands of Central and Eastern Europe and occupy the territories of Siberia and the Far East. Along with all the similarities, the Slavic peoples have fundamental differences in some respects.

Genetically opposite groups

About eight thousand DNA samples from fifty Balto-Slavic peoples were submitted for a thorough analysis. Among them were the brightest representatives of the population - Belarusians, Russians, Ukrainians, Kashubians, Poles, Czechs, Bulgarians, Bosnians and Latvians with Lithuanians. Several genetic systems helped to create a reliable picture: mitochondrial DNA (maternal), Y chromosome (paternal) and autosomal DNA (whole genome analysis).

The results of the study confirmed the similarities between the Eastern Slavs. Russians of the central and southern regions form a single group with Ukrainians and Belarusians. However, the Northern Russians stand out noticeably from the rest of the Eastern Slavs. In genetic terms, they are significantly closer to the Finno-Ugric peoples.

Of the Western group, the Poles are more similar to the Eastern Slavs. But Czechs and Slovaks are genetically biased toward Western European populations, in particular, Germans. The southern and eastern regions - Croats, Bosnians, Macedonians and Bulgarians - are close to their non-Slavic neighbors in the Balkans. The study showed that they are more related to Greeks, Hungarians and Romanians.

The Baltic peoples, including Latvians and Lithuanians, are similar not only to Belarusians, but also to Estonians, who speak the language of the Finno-Ugric group. At the same time, similarity in genetic characteristics to the Mordovians and other Volga peoples was discovered.

Populations were compared in three aspects: geography, genetics, and language. As it turned out, the closest relationship is observed between territorial location and genetic characteristics. Scientists agreed that when distributed across European lands, the Slavic peoples assimilated the local populations that occupied these territories even before their appearance. They brought language with them, at the same time absorbing someone else's gene pool. Thus, the Eastern and Western Slavs formed a single community, and the southern group acquired greater similarities with representatives of the Balkans.

Linguistic differences of the Slavs

Spoken languages ​​are more similar to each other than Germanic and Romance. But although they have common features in the grammatical and phonetic aspects, they are strikingly different.

The difference between Slavic languages ​​mainly lies in writing. In Czech, Polish and Slovak it is based on the Latin alphabet. This is due to Catholic influence. The use of Cyrillic in Russian, Bulgarian and Macedonian is due to the influence of the Orthodox Church. And only the Serbo-Croatian language is based on two alphabets.

In individual Slavic languages, there is a variety of stress positions. In Czech it falls on the first syllable, in Polish it falls on the next syllable after the last. In Bulgarian and Russian the stressed position is variable.

In the grammatical aspect, Bulgarian and Macedonian stand out among the Slavic languages ​​due to differences in the system of noun inflections. In addition, only they actively use the article.

Religious differences

Before the adoption of Christianity, the main deity of the Eastern Slavs was Perun. Many scientists agree that he was often called Svarog. It was believed that God was pursuing evil spirits that might be hiding in a human home. They appeased Perun by sacrificing animals and people.

Instead of pagan temples, the Eastern Slavs built temples and temples, where all rituals were carried out. At the same time, the ancestors worshiped Veles and had a clear idea of ​​“heaven” and “hell.” The Eastern Slavs have a pronounced cult of the earth. Instead of priests, the rites were performed by the oldest men in the family.

Today, about 80% of Russians and Belarusians are Orthodox. Among Ukrainians, more than 76% adhere to this religion.

The Western Slavs worshiped Perkūnas. According to legend, the horseman Vytis, depicted on the Lithuanian coat of arms, personified the deity. In ancient times, it was believed that each tribe had its own ancestor in the form of an animal. For example, the Luticians worshiped wolves, considering them sacred.

Unlike the eastern peoples, they did not build sanctuaries. All idols for worship were placed in pagan temples. Only priests had access to the temple. While the Eastern Slavs could freely approach the shrine.

Among modern Western Slavic peoples, Orthodoxy has taken root to a lesser extent. In Poland, up to 95% are Catholics. In the Czech Republic and Slovakia this figure exceeds 60%.

In religious preferences, the South Slavs differ from the Western and Eastern Slavs as much as in the genetic aspect. Ancestors believed that snakes ruled over nature. Human images are represented among the southern Slavs in the form of female warlike deities. The tribes believed that people who sinned during life turned into animals. Therefore, the animals fully understood human speech.

The South Slavs at different historical periods depended on the influence of Byzantium and the Ottoman Porte. Therefore, Islam and Orthodoxy are widespread in many countries today. Macedonia is 68% Christian, but Croatia and Slovenia are up to 80% Catholic. Residents of Bosnia and Herzegovina profess Islam.

Especially for those who are interested in the history and culture of the Slavs,
narration.

Despite the fact that the concepts of “people” and “nation” are used by different authors in different meanings, we will still proceed from the generally accepted and most used meanings in world science and in socio-political practice. The concept of “people” has a more ordinary meaning. As a rule, this refers to the population of the country. British, Spanish, Brazilian, Canadian, Australian, Chinese peoples - the population of the respective states. These names are no different from the variants “people of Great Britain”, “people of Australia”. The same meaning applies to the linguistic designations of the inhabitants of a country by its name (polytonyms) - Australians, Brazilians, British, Spaniards, Canadians, etc. They refer to all residents of the country of different ethnic origins, including people of immigrant origin. Conventionally, this community can be called a state people, i.e. people across the state. In certain situations or for political and administrative purposes, immigrants (especially if they are not citizens) are not considered part of the people concerned. In Russia, the concept of the Russian people does not include temporary labor immigrants, and a Russian is someone who has a Russian passport, as well as the children of this citizen.

However, the concept of “people” is used equally in relation to ethnic communities (in Russia, in the last two or three decades, the term “ethnos” has also been used in such cases). Therefore, there are the concepts of “Armenian”, “Russian”, “Tatar”, “Chechen”, “Chuvash” and other peoples, and there is the concept of “peoples of Russia” along with the concept of “Russian people”. In total, in the Russian Federation, according to the 2002 population census, there are 158 peoples or ethnic groups, and together with subgroups (for example, Cossacks and Pomors as part of the Russians, Kryashens and Siberian Tatars as part of the Tatars, Kubachi-tsy and Kaytaschi as part of the Largins) the total number of ethnic “units” is about 2001. In 1994, the encyclopedia “Peoples of Russia” was published, which contains information about the ethnic communities inhabiting the country - the peoples. In 2009, a unique publication “Peoples of Russia. Atlas of Cultures and Religions". Sometimes the concept of “nationality” can be synonymous. But this is only in Russia. In the rest of the world, the concept of “nationality” means citizenship of a particular country. Russians have already learned to answer the question about nationality with the word “Russia” on visa applications, but within the country, nationality still means ethnicity.

The concept of “nation” is more strict. It is loaded with symbolic and emotional meanings, but in essence it implies a people in the form of a state territorial community. A nation is a category of social classification for the exclusive possession of which two forms of human communities—ethnic and state—are fighting. As a category and as a political instrument, it does not contribute much to the understanding and management of society, but the doctrines and practices generated on its basis, called nationalism, are one of the most significant phenomena of modern and modern history. But if at present it is impossible to abandon the use of the concept “nation,” then it seems acceptable to call both ethnic communities (ethno-nations) and state communities (communities) nations. At the same time, the latter have more resources and arguments for recognizing this designation. Therefore, the most acceptable formula for political management is “Russia is a nation of nations.”

A similar formula dominates in world political practice. This is the modern scientific view of the nation. According to the American anthropologist K. Verdery, “a nation is an aspect of the political and symbolic/ideological order, as well as the world of social interaction and feeling. For many centuries it was an important element of the system of social classification."1 Since the root meaning of this word is “to be born,” nations were understood as a variety of communities: guilds and corporations, communities in ancient universities, feudal estates, masses of people and groups with a common culture and history. This concept initially served as a selection tool, because it united some people into a common mass who needed to be distinguished from others existing side by side with these first ones. Selection criteria varied depending on time and context. “In the modern era,” writes C. Verdery, “the nation has become a powerful symbol and basis of classification in the international system of nation-states. It denotes the relations between states and their subjects, as well as between some states and others; it is an ideological construct that plays an important role in determining the positions of subjects both within the modern state and within the international order. This means that the nation is of decisive importance in determining the way the state communicates with its subjects, which distinguishes them from the subjects of other states, as well as for its external environment."

The connection between the concepts of “nation” and “state” is reflected in the complex category of nation-state. This is the generally accepted designation of all sovereign states of the world that are members of the United Nations. There are no sovereign member states of the UN that do not consider themselves nation states, even if their constitutions and doctrines recognize the complex nature of the population and its individual groups also call themselves nations. As the French political sociologist D. Colas writes, “a nation is a product of certain social conditions and is not a continuation of nature in other ways. A nation is nothing more than a nation-state: the political form of territorial sovereignty over subjects and the cultural (linguistic and/or religious) homogenization of a group, overlapping each other, give rise to a nation.”

Particularly noteworthy are the views on the nature of the nation of the German philosopher J. Habermas, who, in particular, notes: “The world community, as its name implies - “United Nations” - today politically consists of nation states. This is by no means a trivial fact. The historical type of state that first emerged with the French and American Revolutions spread throughout the world. After the Second World War, thanks to the processes of decolonization, a third generation of nation states emerged. This trend continued with the collapse of the Soviet empire. Nation states have proven their advantages both over city-states (or federations of such) and over the modern successors of old empires (the last of which, China, as we see, is now undergoing a process of deep transformation).”

According to Habermas, the national states of the latest generation are the “successors of empires” that emerged from their composition and, by this very fact, have proven their advantages over the states that are the “successors of the old empires.” In this case, Russia, of course, is among the last, and Georgia, Ukraine and the rest of the “successors,” apparently, by the very fact of legal continuity, are part of national states with all their advantages. How multi-ethnic Ukraine, Georgia, Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan differ from Russia from the point of view of nation-building is unclear. What advantages these states have demonstrated over Russia is even more unclear. Neither from the point of view of the economic and social situation, nor from the point of view of the consolidation of the governed population and the effectiveness of the central government, nor from the point of view of the establishment of national identity and respect for the rights of minorities, nor in any other respect can these countries be called among the successful ones, let alone more “exemplary” states for Russia. Russia is a much more successful self-defined nation-state than most of those that Habermas counts among the nation-states that emerged after the collapse of the USSR.

As for China, for all its multi-ethnicity, it is one of the most powerful and successful national states in the world precisely from the point of view of a “legally formalized and highly differentiated administrative apparatus”, as well as from the point of view of having an armed force and a police force that maintains internal and external autonomy state and has a monopoly on violence within the state. In Russia, as in China, all these signs, in addition to organizational unity and control over their own territories, are evident. The problem of separatism that Russia faced in Chechnya, and China faced with Tibet, cannot in any way be considered circumstances that exclude these countries from the list of national states. Thus, there is no reason why these two large and powerful entities cannot be considered modern (that is, national) states.

Today we all live in national societies that owe their identity to the political unity of states. However, modern states began to emerge before the emergence of “nations” in the modern sense. Two political entities - the modern state and the modern nation - fused into the form of the national state no earlier than the end of the 18th century. But in legal and political contexts, we usually use the terms “nation” and “people” interchangeably. Although, in addition to its direct legal and political meaning, the term “nation” indicates a community formed according to the criterion of unity of origin, culture and history, and often also a common language. Therefore, it is not by chance that the concept of “nation” has a double meaning - Volknation and Staatsnation - “cultural nation” (or ethnonation) and state (or civil) nation.

Habermas recalls that in Roman usage, nation referred to a community of people of the same origin, not yet united in the political form of the state, but connected by a common settlement, a common language, customs and traditions. It was used in this meaning until the beginning of modern times. However, one should not think that the “community of people” or “joint settlement” was devoid of hierarchical, class exceptions. The "nations" in the old German Empire were merely the ruling classes from the various dominions ("countries"), and it was the aristocracy that came into political existence as a "nation". And the rest were just “private subjects.” A nation of nobility turned into a nation of people (“third estate”) as a result of the efforts of scientists, intellectuals, and representatives of the urban educated middle classes. If you like, modern nations emerged precisely as a result of the ideology of nationalism, and not vice versa. Habermas highlights the specificity and unique achievement of the nation-state, which was made possible by the unifying idea of ​​the nation: “This first modern form of collective identity served as a catalyst for the transformation of the early modern state into a democratic republic. The national self-awareness of the people constituted the cultural context that contributed to the growth of political activity of citizens. It was the national community that gave birth to a new type of relationship between individuals who were previously completely alien to each other. Thus, the nation-state was able to solve two problems at once: it established a democratic mode of legitimation on the basis of a new and more abstract form of social integration."

The endowment of the population with political rights, the transition from the status of subjects to the status of citizens continues to this day. It is impossible to deny the varying degrees of social integration within modern nations. Nations with absolutely loyal citizens, completely in solidarity with each other and with the authorities, without internal conflicts and even open conflicts, simply do not exist in the world. We will not find on the political map of the world such a state that would correspond to the ideal idea of ​​a nation state. There has been a separatist underground operating in Great Britain and Spain for many years; in Canada and Belgium there are bi- and tri-communal multilingual parts of the country and rigid separatists; in Argentina, Chile and Greece, under the regime of military juntas, political oppositionists were imprisoned and killed, etc. Asian countries have their own rather specific ideas about human rights, and in Muslim countries it is difficult to talk about the sovereign personal status of women. Nevertheless, all these countries are counted among nation states.

A nation should be understood as a mass-accepted idea of ​​sovereign and solidary co-citizenship, and not as the literal presence of all its inherent attributes. It follows from this that legal membership in a state community, in itself membership in a civil nation, gives “additional political and cultural meaning to the newly acquired belonging to a community of full citizens who actively contribute to its strengthening” (Habermas). It is the idea of ​​the nation that touches the hearts and minds of people more than the abstract concepts of human rights and popular sovereignty.

Note that in the historical Russian state (Russian Empire - USSR - Russian Federation), the concept of citizenship since its appearance in the era of Peter I and Catherine II was also not limited to legal status. It meant simultaneously belonging to a single historical and cultural community (the Russian or Soviet people) and the desire to “actively contribute to its strengthening,” i.e. serve the Fatherland and defend the Motherland.

But those who themselves are recorded in censuses as “Russians” live differently, they have different customs and traditions, and sometimes even religion.

Ethnographers argue whether to consider Russians a nation or an ethnic group. These terms have a lot in common. Sometimes the concept of “ethos” is also included in scientific usage. In relation to Russians, they denote that very “Russian soul” - the worldview that distinguishes a Russian person from a Western one.

I am Russian

In Soviet times, the term “ethnos” was very popular. In its most general form, an ethnos is a group of people who are united by a common origin, language, cultural and economic practices. However, there are no “pure” ethnic groups; some characteristics always differ.

But for the sake of harmony in the picture, the term “ethnic group” is sometimes declared identical to the concept “people”. Thus, ethnolinguistic groups are distinguished, and within them – separate parts-peoples. For example, the Slavic group includes Russians, Ukrainians, Poles and other peoples with related Slavic languages.

Each ethnic group included in the group has common features with other ethnic groups - in rituals, folklore, history. But there is also an individual past, a specific way of life, a desire to draw boundaries - “we are like this, we live this way, and they live differently.” A child begins to realize his ethnicity at the age of 8-9 based on knowledge about the country, native language, and parents’ lifestyle.

A group of people becomes an ethnic group, and then a nation, when it realizes its commonality with others and at the same time its dissimilarity from them. An important role in this is played by the connection with a certain geographical territory and the emergence of the construct of the homeland in a broad sense.

Moreover, you can become a member of an ethnic group. In the process of assimilation, an emigrant can so accept the customs, traditions, and history of his new fellow citizens that he begins to call himself “Russian,” “American,” or “Finn.” This is called “changing ethnic identity.”

Russian mental code

Speaking about interconnected ethnic processes, many scientists go further, using the concept of “ethos”. They denote the similarity of habits, morals and mentality.

A person’s appearance, his self-awareness, culture and way of life speak about belonging to a particular nationality. One of the most striking manifestations of the Russian national character is their lifestyle, which is radically different from Western norms.

The special cultural orientation, social activities and accepted hierarchy of values ​​of people living in Russia prove their belonging to a certain ethos. Understanding moral principles depends solely on the will of the people and is not related to the instructions of the authorities.

Before becoming a nation, you need to recognize yourself as a people

“Nation” refers to the socio-economic and cultural-political unity of people. A nation can be created by different ethnic groups or by one. People living in the same country may have different languages, lifestyles, appearance, religion, but they are united by culture, ideology, and politics.

A nation is a rational and artificially created mechanism inextricably linked with statehood. This concept arose quite late, when it was necessary to find “cementing” terms to strengthen the positions of existing states and to found new ones.

The term “people” arose much earlier than the concept of “nation”. It can be argued that it is the ethnos that forms the state, and then the state artificially develops the nation. The principles of kinship are not important for her, and this completely excludes the possibility of her organic and living development.