Boris Perchatkin

Vladimir Martsinkovsky. The Meaning of Suffering

· Evangelical Christians, Lutsk, Vestibule

  1. All People Suffer

Each of us can say about ourselves the words that begin the third chapter of the Lamentations of Jeremiah: «I am the man who has seen affliction». Dostoevsky also said that «the earth from crust to core is soaked with blood and tears». By this he confirmed the apostle Paul’s words: «the whole creation groans and suffers until now». When sword, fire, famine, and turmoil passed over the whole earth, suffering gripped man even more. Walking down the street, one so rarely meets a joyful smile. Of course, there are smiles on faces, but how much bitterness, mockery, and at that, aimed at oneself, they contain. And how much invisible grief lurks beneath these outwardly calm faces and behind the walls of elegant houses. Sometimes a person hides behind a smile so that his grief will not be noticed. And sympathy, often insincere or useless, often irritates him. The recent death of the world-famous clown Max Linder (1925) comes to mind, who amused the crowd with inexhaustible humor and at the same time concealed within himself a deep wound of suffering, which ultimately led him to suicide.

We live in days when, if not the sun, then the human face has dimmed, so much sorrow is reflected on its brow, its premature wrinkles and gray hair!

All suffer — those who have done much evil, and innocent children, and young people who have not yet tasted life. Good people suffer, and the better a person is, the deeper he grieves. «The sum of the soul’s sufferings is proportional to the degree of its perfection», says Amiel in his diary. And Dostoevsky asserts that great people experience great sorrow.

People suffer in body — from hunger, cold, sickness, and overwhelming labor. They suffer in soul from slander and envy, from themselves and others, from proximity with their neighbors, they pine in the anguish of loneliness and being misunderstood, poisoned by the bitterness of disappointment, tormented by betrayed love or sorrow over the loss of loved ones. How many heavy moments are caused us by the awareness of our imperfection, and likewise the imperfection of the world, which Solomon expressed: «Vanity of vanities; all is vanity». It is not for nothing that A. Tolstoy acknowledges that Beethoven «overheard» the sounds of his funeral march in the sobs of nature. And perhaps the greatest suffering consists in the absence of suffering, just as the heaviest labor is the absence of labor.

A chilling emptiness freezes the soul, blowing from the horror of aimlessness that gives birth to the worst of sufferings — boredom, heavy, strangely enough, precisely because there is in it no suffering, no pain, no bitterness, no anguish — but a lifeless desert, oppressing the consciousness. For not to suffer means not to participate in life, in its toil, to be «superfluous» and useless.

Does suffering have meaning?

Once Buddha was asked: «Why does suffering occur?» He answered with a story: » A hunter in the forest fell, struck by an arrow. Did he or those around him at that moment ask where the arrow came from or what it was made of? Of course not. But first of all they tried to extract the arrow.» So we too are mortally wounded by the arrow of suffering; and the most important thing is to draw out the arrow.

It is necessary to know the cause of suffering in order to avoid it another time; we need to know the purpose of our trials,

In life the law is constantly fulfilled: “by what a man sins, by that he is punished.”

These sufferings teach us not to do to others what we do not want for ourselves. In this way we can discover and become aware of the moral order of life—even at the cost of suffering—and sense ourselves within a rational universe, not in chaos but in a cosmos. That is why David’s exclamation becomes clear: “It was good for me to be afflicted, that I might learn Your statutes.”

  1. Suffering cleanses the soul.

The human need for purifying sorrow is so great that a person often seeks retribution, punishment for crimes, merely to satisfy his conscience, to soothe inner agony with bodily suffering. By such voluntary suffering a man refines his soul and prepares it to receive divine cleansing, because the work of redemption must also involve human effort, testifying to the sincerity of his repentance.

“Bear fruit worthy of repentance,” John the Baptist preached.

Suffering is for us a source of moral values and positive spiritual gains; it leads us to faith, love, and spiritual strength. We live on this earth in order to work on the beauty of our soul, and life is a vast workshop in which the soul is made ready for a new heaven and a new earth.

“Through a great furnace of doubts my hosanna came forth,” says Dostoevsky. That furnace included the terrifying expectation of execution when he stood on the scaffold in 1849, the horrors of four years of hard labor, life in the “house of the dead,” and the grave illness of epilepsy.

“Why are you so gentle, Luka?” they ask one of the characters in Gorky’s drama The Lower Depths.

“I am gentle because they have kneaded me much.” And have you not experienced how suffering makes us more forbearing toward another, cultivates sensitivity to another’s grief and an understanding of the human soul? And is not the most terrible thing the loss of the ability to love? For hell, according to Elder Zosima, is the suffering of being no longer able to love.”

Our bodily sufferings can contribute to our moral liberation, for “he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin” (1 Peter 4:1).

“Yet man is born to trouble as surely as sparks fly upward” (Job 5:7).

This present suffering of yours, which frightens you so much—it will inscribe a new trait of beauty upon your soul, upon your image; it is hammering out your ideal likeness in the image of God—only bear it!

Do not fear the blows of the great chisel that cuts away from the marble the fragments obscuring a wondrous beauty—a beauty the Divine Artist sees with His foreseeing eye.

  1. Suffering prepares for great service.

Suffering not only makes us better, but also develops in us the ability to make others better. Joseph went through this school, experiencing betrayal and prison; David, enduring persecution and wandering; and indeed all the prophets and righteous. In this school of poverty, abandonment, loneliness, and rejection, people receive a new heart that makes them capable of serving great things.

“For gold is tested in the fire, and those acceptable to God in the furnace of humiliation.” Therefore God sends to the Apostle Paul “a thorn in the flesh,” so that he would not become conceited, would not exalt himself because of the abundance of revelations, but would understand the great mystery of humility: “My strength is made perfect in weakness.”

Suffering leads not only to strength but also to wisdom. It refines one’s vision, deepens the capacity for revelations. The Apostle John, suffering for the word of God, was imprisoned on the island of Patmos, and to the gaze of his spirit the revelation of Christ appeared.

To break the hard rock of the human heart with a word, one must oneself experience what it means to have a broken heart. Yet is it not terrible when the heart breaks, but when it turns to stone. Is this not the secret of Christ’s eternal appeal? That is why He is able to sympathize with our weaknesses: “He was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin.” He Himself walked the path of human suffering: “He took up our infirmities and bore our diseases.”

  1. Incomprehensible sufferings.

Merezhkovsky expressed his faith in wisdom and providence with these words:

Through struggle and wild chaos, Through suffering and falsehood, You lead an exhausted people To great harmony.

But there are sufferings whose cause is vainly sought in punishment for sin, and whose purpose is equally incomprehensible. Their mystery unfolds on another, transcendent plane of being; they are sent not as punishment but as testing. The book of Job speaks of such testing.

Job was tested in every way and proved faithful. This kind of suffering is caused not by a person’s sin, but by that mystery of being of which Dostoevsky speaks: “The devil battles with God, and the field of battle is the human heart.” These sufferings are given to a person not through his own fault—“that the works of God might be made manifest in him,” and that man may be justified, and consequently God who created him.

The victory of good in the human soul, his justification, requires that a person freely and disinterestedly choose righteousness even when there is no reward for it, and even when he endures innocent suffering. For Christ desired man’s free love. Will man endure this test? Will he bless God, bless goodness, and say from the depths of his suffering, as Job said: “Blessed be the name of the Lord,” or in the words of Ivan Karamazov: “You are right, O Lord, for Your ways have been revealed!”

  1. Acceptance of suffering.

So here is the meaning of suffering, why and for what purpose it occurs. It has an efficient cause—namely, deviation from the norm and meaning of life, from rational life.

It also has its goal—to return man to normal life, to his true purpose: to educate man in disinterested love for goodness.

And since the cause of suffering is departure from God, its consequence is a return to God, and through Him to nature and to people, and even more: the deification of all things, so that “God may be all in all.” And this is the purpose of existence. From this, the saying of the Belgian poet Maeterlinck becomes understandable: “Though angels are more beautiful than people, in their eyes there are no tears.” Yet by no means do all people overcome suffering. Many are crushed by it. In them it gives birth not to praise but to blasphemy, not to blessing but to murmuring and cursing.

  1. How to overcome suffering.

True wisdom lies not merely in the analysis of suffering and its explanation, but in the ability to overcome it. And herein lies one of life’s most important tasks. For to accept life means to accept suffering, and to know how to live means to know how to suffer.

Practically, we relate to suffering in two ways: either we flee from it, or we accept it.

The first attitude is revealed by Buddha: he realizes that reality is bad and desires are bad; he is powerless to change either, and therefore he sees the only way out in departing from all desires, from personality, from self-consciousness into nirvana (non-being). This path is flight, an escape from life, a thirst for desirelessness. Buddha said what he could say, being merely a man and, moreover, living six centuries before the appearance of Jesus Christ in the world. He came to the conviction that life is deeply spoiled and distorted, that this life is not worth living, and it is better not to live any life at all. And therefore he preached spiritual self-annihilation. And many in our day, weary of life, wish in this way to flee from sufferings and life.

A more thoughtless flight from suffering occurs when people, the majority of whom seek to drown life’s bitterness in the pursuit of momentary pleasure, to forget themselves in the madness of a “feast during the plague” or a dance on the brink of death. “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”

Another attitude toward suffering is its acceptance. “I want to live, that I may think and suffer,” says A.S. Pushkin.

But even in accepting suffering not everything is resolved. One can simply endure dully, gritting one’s teeth. Or one can overcome and transfigure suffering. It can be a stone pressing down the soul, but it can also become a rock on which we stand as on a firm support.

When the prophet Jeremiah, weeping over his people and hated by this people for his constant reproofs, loses heart and complains to God: “Woe is me, my mother, that you have borne me, a man of strife and contention to the whole earth. O Lord… You know that for Your sake I bear reproach. Why is my pain perpetual and my wound incurable, which refuses to be healed? Will You surely be to me as a deceptive brook, as waters that fail?”

God answers him: “If you take out the precious from the vile, you shall be as My mouth” (Jer. 15), i.e., you will possess authority, the creative power of the Divine word. It is precisely this ability—to extract the precious from the worthless—that constitutes the secret of all creativity, of Divine work. Is it not this that, in nature’s chemical laboratory, grows a fragrant flower from rotting refuse? Is it not this that an artist, taking “the contemptible from life,” elevates it “into the pearl of creation” (Gogol)?

Is this not the power, in essence, that the alchemists of the Middle Ages called the philosopher’s stone, which would turn base metals into gold? And it is this power that creates an emerald from clay and a diamond from coal.

Indeed, all greatness enters this world through the gates of suffering. We admire a pearl—how is it born? In the Indian Ocean lives a mollusk in a bivalve shell. A grain of sand enters the shell, irritating the mollusk’s body. Then, for self-defense, it secretes a mother-of-pearl fluid that coats the grain of sand. This work goes on for years. Thus is born the pearl, the beauty of crowns and necklaces.

But not every suffering is capable of producing it. And therefore, turning now to the sufferings we ourselves experience, we must first of all distinguish two kinds of them.

  1. Suffering for unrighteousness.

There are sufferings for the violation of righteousness, those that flow from the discrepancy between reality and our evil desires. In this case reality is good, but our desires are sinful. The miser withers from greed, the alcoholic languishes finding no stimulating drink, the cruel man cannot sleep at night because his revenge fails, the depraved man is tormented by the impure passion that consumes him. After all, these too are sufferings.

“Tribulation and anguish upon every soul of man who does evil” (Rom. 2).

O how many of these, these martyrs in the name of “the teaching of the world,” says L.N. Tolstoy. There are far more of them than for the teaching of Christ, and these sufferings are much heavier, because they are meaningless. They cannot have meaning, because they spring from the violation of life’s meaning, of the laws of nature, love, and purity.

They arise from the struggle against Christ in the name of sin, against meaning, reason (Logos), in the name of meaninglessness. Their temporary negative meaning consists only in that they testify to a deviation from the true, eternal meaning of life and show how one should not live. So once Christ warned Saul who was resisting Him: “It is hard for you to kick against the goads”!

All these physical and mental illnesses are merely signal lights with which nature has fenced off the edges of yawning abysses and marshy bogs to protect man. This is self-defense, the immunity of nature. And the greatest of these sufferings is boredom, which testifies to man’s highest calling, to the fact that the nature of his soul cannot endure emptiness, and that no material fantasies, however grand, can fill this emptiness, for “the immortal soul can be satisfied only by God.”

These sufferings we must not endure, but eliminate, by removing their cause—sin. All the force of sacred wrath and uncompromising protest of which a man is capable, he must direct against these enslavers of the soul: pride, cruelty, impurity—which, promising sweetness to man, bring to his lips only “the cup of death full of poison”; “worldly sorrow produces death” (2 Cor. 7:10). These sufferings are not worth a single tear, a single sigh. Therefore, “let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us” (Heb. 12:1), says Scripture. And these words always ring out as a call to that deep spiritual upheaval which is called the revolution of the spirit.

  1. Suffering for righteousness.

If you suffer for a misdeed—repent; if you suffer undeservedly—rejoice. But there is another kind of suffering: for righteousness, for the triumph of love, the purity of life, obedience to God—the sufferings of Christ. Here the highest desires of the spirit collide with the hostile reality of carnal life, both in others and in ourselves. This is the struggle against sin in the name of Christ. This is “godly sorrow, which produces repentance leading to salvation.”

On the path to truth stand selfishness, self-assertion, coarse sensitivity within myself, and I declare war on them, “I torment the one who torments me,” as Ephrem the Syrian says, concerning the spiritualization of the flesh. This is a struggle, an inevitable stage on the path to happiness. And since these obstacles from my fleshly “I” and the people of the world rise up against my higher desires, I suffer.

People “do not forgive goodness,” strange as it may seem. People crucified Christ, and they persecute Him even now. In this world where our Lord was crucified, we must be persecuted if we are not in friendship with this world.

And anyone following Christ without a cross is unworthy of Him. Because “all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.”

We struggle against sin in people, we struggle “for the person against the person” – and such a struggle is not forgiven, not only by the spirit of darkness but also by those people who “loved darkness rather than light.” And suffering for confessing the name of Christ and the Gospel in word and deed is precisely “participation in the sufferings of Christ.” This is the true Christian faith that gave the world the beauty of martyrdom: “But rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ’s sufferings, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy. If you are reproached for the name of Christ, blessed are you, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you. On their part He is blasphemed, but on your part He is glorified.

But let none of you suffer as a murderer, a thief, an evildoer, or as a busybody in other people’s matters. Yet if anyone suffers as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this matter. Therefore let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to Him in doing good, as to a faithful Creator.“ /1 Pet. 4:13-19/

These sufferings will cease only in the Kingdom of God, when it appears in all its power – and it is precisely for this Kingdom of joy to come that we must suffer. Suffering for Christ is not a heavy lot, but a joyful privilege. And therefore it is said: “For to you it has been granted on behalf of Christ, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake” /Phil. 1:29/.

These are sufferings for the meaning of life, for the Logos, for Christ. Of these sufferings Christ said: “Your sorrow will be turned into joy.” “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

How then can we distinguish suffering for truth from suffering for violating truth? For this we must introduce into our life the highest standard (criterion) of good and evil, accept the One who is the Meaning of life, who said of Himself: “I am the light of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.”

And in this light we will not only distinguish destructive sufferings from good ones. And they will not only illuminate with their light but will also burn with purifying fire the sufferings for falsehood, removing their cause – dark, base desires, while the sufferings for truth they will transform into joy and beauty.

  1. Christ and Suffering.

Indeed, did not Christ come into this world to free man from the weight of suffering? Is this not the good, joyful news of the New Testament?

Outside of Christ, man diligently strives to resolve the question of suffering.

As has been said, the teaching of Buddha seeks to eliminate suffering by destroying desires in man, but in doing so makes man dispassionate, insensible, indifferent, impersonal… and together with suffering, Buddha also eliminates consciousness and life.

But Christ transforms bad desires into good ones, for only bad, evil desires cause destructive sufferings to man. He removes from desires only their death-bearing sting – sin, but the very person of man, his conscious, spiritual life, He affirms. Christ did not give a single funeral oration. When He encountered funerals, He simply stopped them, raising the dead.

Suffering is the fundamental question of man crying out to God. Christ is God’s answer to that cry. Christ brought the Gospel of mercy, healing, peace, and love. People will always love this book, for in it they will find an echo of all human sorrows – beginning from the bitter tears of Peter who denied Him, to the inexpressible grief of the Virgin Mary, standing at the cross with a heart pierced by the sword of anguish for her Son.

And finally here we encounter the sufferings of the Lord that surpass our experience. For He Himself walked the entire heavy path of man, and moreover, bore our sorrows without guilt. What then does Christ give to a person burdened with suffering for unrighteousness? First of all, He gives “sight to the blind,” i.e., He teaches how to distinguish suffering for falsehood from suffering for truth. He forgives guilt and frees from the punishment for unrighteousness, from the torments of conscience, and thereby unites us with God.

Those who have experienced bonds and prison for confessing the Gospel know from experience that with Christ, even in prison there is freedom, and without Christ, even in freedom there is prison.

Let us recall what the merciful Samaritan did. He poured oil and wine on the wounds of the unfortunate man. So we need the oil of consolation to soften the pain of the sorrowful, sick person – perhaps a word of comfort, or an attentive, sensitive attitude, a word of compassion. Not like how Job’s friends consoled him: “God has punished you.” We must pity every person, even the one who has fallen deeply. “For every sinful person – that is also you,” says an Eastern Sanskrit saying.

A person must be loved and pitied, not his sin; the sick one, not his sickness. But the help of the Gospel pours on the wounds not only oil but also wine, to protect from decay, to disinfect. It comforts the person, but at the same time it scourges his sin. Christ says to the sinner: “Neither do I condemn you” – and in this kindness there is the oil. But then He adds: “Go and sin no more” – this is the wine, preserving from destruction.

“On some have compassion, but others save with fear.”

Only the good news transforms sorrows into joy, malice into love, and leads to the heavenly feast at Cana of Galilee.

  1. Participation in the Sufferings of Christ.

How can a person have participation in the sufferings of Christ? Why did the Apostle Paul attach such tremendous importance to this experience? But first we must clarify what is meant by the expression “the sufferings of Christ”? We are so inclined to understand by this His torments in the Garden of Gethsemane and His redemptive death on Golgotha. But these were far from exhausting them. Were not the last three years of His earthly life an unbroken chain of sufferings?

Let us remember how hard it was for Christ, the Holy Son of God, to live among sinful people, in constant contact with their needs and continually having before His eyes their moral degradation and the destructive consequences of sin. How burdensome it was to always be spiritually alone, little understood, continually misunderstood even by those who were closest and most beloved. To have no time to eat or sleep, to endure hunger and privations of every kind, to have no place “to lay His head.” To be subjected to the severest temptations, and for all this to reap slander, hatred, and persecution. How agonizing it was to be forsaken by all, even by His close disciples, to be subjected to mockery, torture, and finally—the terrible death of the cross.

Christ’s death on Golgotha was only the culmination of an entire life of service and suffering. Let us not forget that these sufferings of His were voluntary sufferings. “Therefore my Father loves me,” says Christ, “because I lay down My life, that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again.”

This means that no one—neither God nor men—forced Him to choose such a life for Himself. At any time He had the full ability to live for Himself and let us perish. But, moved by love for us, He preferred to sacrifice His life for our salvation. It is precisely this that gave His sufferings the character of sacrifice.

What was the purpose of these sufferings, and what was their cause? Their purpose was the spread of the good Kingdom of God, and thereby the salvation of the human race. Their cause is the great principle of payment, which manifests itself equally in the moral world and the physical world, and operates with the same unfailing consistency as the law of gravity. “Nothing is given for free.” There is no progress without labor, without effort, without sacrifices. Let us imagine a grain of wheat lying calmly and cozy in its neat little chamber in the ear of grain in the field; it enjoys the sunshine, the breeze, the proximity of many other such grains on that ear and in that field. How terrible it must seem to the grain to fall into the cold, damp, dirty, dark earth, to lie there in solitude, to decay and perish. Yet only at such a price is a harvest given.

Could the Apostle Paul not have lived with some comforts, remained a believer, have his own home corner, and occasionally step forward with an edifying sermon? But when he heard the call of Christ, he did not waver to walk the path that Christ had marked out for him. “I consider nothing, nor do I count my life dear to myself,” he says, and therefore we see him “in labors…, in stripes above measure, in prisons, in deaths often, in perils, in weariness, often in watchings, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness” /2 Cor. 11:23-28/.

It is difficult to imagine the succession of self-denial, efforts, struggle, and suffering that his life represented. Moved by love for Christ, he voluntarily devoted himself to Christ’s work and willingly took upon himself his share of the cost of that undertaking. This was “participation in the sufferings of Christ.” The Apostle Paul highly valued participation in Christ’s sufferings. “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for His body’s sake.” Did not the thought that all these sufferings were voluntary for Christ’s sake gladden him? From this a new, strong, and close bond grew between him and Christ. Moreover, he learned by experience that the path of suffering for Christ is a precious school in which he learned much. He learned to rely not on his own strength, but on the power of God, “which is made perfect in weakness.” The sorrows he endured for Christ’s sake brought with them heavenly comfort, so that he could say of himself: “as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so also our consolation abounds through Christ” /2 Cor. 1:5/.

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Vladimir Filimonovich Martsinkovsky

Vladimir Martsinkovsky (1884–1971) — servant of Jesus Christ, prisoner, Christian preacher, writer

V. F. Martsinkovsky was born in 1884 in the village of Derman in Volhynia (northwestern Ukraine). Father – Filimon Martsinkovsky (d. 1915). Mother – née Maiboroda (d. 1923).

  1. — The family moved to Grodno. Graduated with a silver medal from the Grodno gymnasium.

1902–1907. — Studied at the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University. Graduated from the university with honors. Met Baron Pavel Nikolayevich Nikolai, leader of the Christian Student Movement in Russia (1903). In 1904 he met Christ Jesus. Attended a study circle. Joint study of the Gospel. Trips with the circle to Finland, Estonia, Shlisselburg. Attended meetings of the V.S. Solovyov Religious-Philosophical Society.

After graduating from the university, fruitful years of activity followed: as a gymnasium teacher, founder and leader of student circles for the study of the Bible and Christian literature, and also simply as a colporteur, evangelist, Sunday school teacher, etc. He organized lectures at factories and plants, visited prisons, and spread the Word of God “in season and out of season.”

1907–1913. — Worked as a teacher of Russian language and literature at the Grodno gymnasium. In 1913, P. N. Nikolai invited him to dedicate his whole life to work among students. Martsinkovsky heeded his call and exchanged the honored position of a state official with a guaranteed pension for the service of secretary of the Christian Student Movement, whose material support rested solely on faith.

1914–1919. — Departure to Moscow. Participation in the Christian Student Movement in Russia. Lecturing and presenting papers on ethics and religion at universities and other higher educational institutions in Moscow, Petrograd, Kiev, Odessa, Samara. Travels with lectures to various corners of Russia. Everywhere he organized groups of lovers of Scripture study, and these tender seedlings he supported and preserved even through the storms and troubles of the First World War and the years of revolution. In 1919, the university in the city of Samara invited him to take the position of professor in the department of ethics.

During the revolutionary years, the Christian Student Movement organized public lectures all over the country, at which V.F. Martsinkovsky spoke in the majority of cases. Large posters hung on the streets of cities, towns, and villages attracted thousands of people, who eagerly filled auditoriums, halls, and prayer houses.

1919, May 18 – autumn. — Arrest in Samara after a lecture. Release on his own recognizance not to leave town. Typhus. Obtaining permission to depart for Moscow.

1919, autumn. — Lectures in Bogorodsk and Podolsk. Visit to the Patriarch in Moscow at the Trinity Metochion. Exemption from military service by decision of the people’s court. Attendance at the trial concerning the uncovering of the relics of Savva of Zvenigorod. Attending an anti-religious lecture by A.V. Lunacharsky. Participation in debates at the Polytechnic Museum. Election as professor-lecturer at the department of ethics of Samara University.

  1. — Visit to the Patriarch as part of a group of Orthodox laypeople with “a memorandum on the renewal of the Orthodox Church.” Conversation with the Patriarch. Conducting seminar sessions at Samara University. Participation in the congress of Christian Student Circles.

1921, March 4. — Arrest. Search. Brought to Lubyanka. Imprisonment in the prison subdivision of the Cheka on Kiselny Lane. Composition of prisoners. Preaching the Gospel in prison.

1921, April 11. — Transfer to Taganka Prison. Conditions of detention. Composition of prisoners. Meeting with Professor N.D. Kuznetsov. Learning bookbinding. Studying English and Hebrew. Reading Sacred books in the original languages. Giving a lecture on beauty in prison. Prison customs. Conducting worship services in prison. Conversations with Metropolitan Kirill, Bishop Feodor, and Bishop Gury. Celebration of Pascha. Brought to Lubyanka. Interrogations. Intercessions from Christian communities for his release.

1921, October 14. — Release. Repair and opening of the Student House.

1922, winter. — Appeal to the Kremlin for the legalization of the Christian Student Union.

1922, March – November. — Lecturing in Petrograd, Moscow, Odessa. Work in the manuscript department of the All-Russian Public Library. Participation in a meeting of the Moscow Community of Evangelical Christians (November 22). Visiting a community of Jewish-Christians in Odessa.

1922, December. — Return to Moscow. Report of a search of his apartment. Summons to Lubyanka. Interrogation. Release on a written undertaking not to leave town. A sacred music evening in the Moscow Evangelical community. Summons to the investigator. Sentence: exile for 3 years to Germany jointly with V.F. Bulgakov and V.G. Chertkov. Assistance from the Czech embassy in obtaining a visa to Prague.

Each time he was set free, he fearlessly continued to lecture about the only path to happiness, i.e., faith in the saving power of the Lord Jesus Christ. Although the authorities recognized him as “apolitical,” in 1923 he was nonetheless expelled from the USSR and settled in Prague.

When Martsinkovsky was being expelled from Russia for three years, he was told that after that time even the word “God” would no longer appear in literature… Decades have passed since then, but the name of God has not disappeared from the pages of books, and it is all the more alive in people’s hearts.

1923, April 20 – 1927. — Departure abroad. Lecturing in Riga. Arrival in Prague. Meeting with friends. Lecturing at universities and churches of Europe. Writing books. Checking translations of the Bible into Ukrainian and Russian. Under his editorship, a new Ukrainian translation of the Bible was published.

  1. — Work on memoirs.

After his expulsion, Vladimir Filimonovich continued his work, lectured at universities and churches in Europe, wrote books, and checked translations of the Bible into Ukrainian and Russian.

  • My address is a third-class non-smoking compartment,” he would say. “Why third?”
  • “Because there is no fourth class,” he would reply.

In 1928 (1930), the Lord led him to Palestine, and his deep interest in the people of Israel found full satisfaction. In Palestine he married the daughter of the American archaeologist Gottlieb Schumacher, who in 1903 excavated Megiddo (Armageddon, Rev. 16:16) — the site of the last great battle mentioned in the Bible. Martsinkovsky and his wife settled on Mount Carmel. When the State of Israel was established, he became a citizen.

Living in Palestine, he preached the Gospel to Jews and Arabs alike, and for many years he led a congregation in the city of Haifa. The small evangelical congregations in different parts of Israel are evidence that these two peoples (Jews and Arabs) can live peacefully and happily together, sitting in brotherly fellowship at the Lord’s Table.

A sister from Germany gave him a tape recorder, and from then on Professor Martsinkovsky was able to transmit the gospel message via the radio station in Monte Carlo, which broadcast the Gospel to the Soviet Union in Russian. In this way he could reach the hearts and souls of the Russian people he loved.

On September 9, 1971, the faithful servant of God was called to higher service. His illness was brief but severe; he had just turned 87 years old.

“And those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky above; and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever” (Dan. 12:3).

Bibliography:

M.’s main works belong to the field of homiletic exegesis.

  • Is the Gospel Reliable?: Based on Original Sources. — Prague, 1926
  • Notes of a Believer. Prague, 1927
  • A Handbook for Studying the Gospel of John. — Lodz, 1937This book, intended for group study of the Gospel, was written after the pattern of a similar guide on Mark compiled by Nicolai. The author frequently refers to the analysis of the Greek text of the Gospel.
  • The Essence of Christianity. — Rovno, [n.d.]. — 22 p.
  • Crucifixion and Resurrection. — 25 p.
  • Strings of the Soul: A Collection of Verses. — Vilna, 1938.
  • The Meaning of Suffering. — New York, 1955. — 64 p.
  • Solovyov and the Gospel. — Korntal: Light in the East, 1973. — 62 p.
  • Science and Religion. — Korntal: Light in the East, 1989. 41 p.
  • Christ and the Jews. — St. Petersburg, 1992. — 64 p. (2nd ed. — Ulm: Light in the East, 1995. — 111 p.).
  • Christ and the Rabbis. — Ulm: Light in the East. — 30 p.
  • The Meaning of Life. — St. Petersburg: Bible for All, 1995. — 269 p.

Works of Vladimir Martsinkovsky in the library of Yakov Krotov

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