User talk:Spirit-Wrestler

Doukhobours
Hi, you seem to be quite knowledgeable about Doukhobours, and the article could definitely use some improvement by an expert. I'm sure everyone would appreciate your contributions, but you need to figure out the basic wikipedia formatting codes, explained in the MOS, before you edit. It might help to start small, editing one sentence at a time, rather than re-writing the whole article. That way it's easy for everyone to see what has changed. Thanks in advance. - TheMightyQuill 07:04, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia. We invite everyone to contribute constructively to our encyclopedia. Wikipedia has a Manual of Style that should be followed to maintain a consistent, encyclopedic appearance. Using different styles throughout the encyclopedia makes it harder to read. Take a look at the welcome page to learn more about contributing to this encyclopedia.

Thanks for using Wikipedia! ZacBowling 19:44, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Hello:

I would like to make a major correction to the section on the Doukhobors. I am a retired anthropologist and scholar who for the past 55 years has researched the Doukhobors worldwide. I have published some dozen books on the subject with the latest one being Spirit Wrestlers: Doukhobor Pioneers' Strategies for Living (2002).

My decision to completely revise the article came from an American writer who suggested that I should do this to update the article in a sustantial way. What follows below is my new version using your format throughout.

Best wishes, Koozma J. Tarasoff email: tarasoff@spirit-wrestlers.com Or k.kristova@sympatico.ca Website: www.spirit-wrestlers.com

Doukhobor From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please improve this article or discuss the issue on the talk page.

The Doukhobors or Doukhabors (Dukhobory, Dukhobortsy) (Russian: Духоборы/Духоборцы) are a Christian dissenting group of Russian origin. Contents [hide] •	1 History •	2 Current status •	3 See also •	4 External links •	5 References

[edit] History The origin of the Doukhobors dates to 16th and 17th century Russia. The term Doukhobors means "spirit wrestlers." The Doukhobors are a social movement who long ago rejected the Russian Orthodox priests, icons, all church ritual, the Bible and the divinity of Jesus. As pacifists, they also ardently rejected the institutions of militarism and wars. For them the Spirit of God dwells in each individual and is practically synonymous with love, beauty and justice. It is similar or identical to what the Society of Friends or Quakers call the ‘Light Within’. From this Spirit of the inner worth and dignity stems the notion that it is wrong to kill another human being. For in so doing, you kill the abode of God. This notion has been a moral compass for them for over three centuries by their refusal to bear arms against another human being. Their goal is to create a nonkilling society. For these reasons, the Doukhobors were harshly repressed in Russia. Both the tsarist state and church authorities were involved in the torture and exile of these dissidents, as well as taking away their normal freedoms. At the end of the nineteenth century one-third of the Doukhobors left Russia en masse. They chose Canada for its isolation, peacefulness, and the fact that the Canadian government welcomed them, and migrated there in 1899. The Doukhobors' passage across the Atlantic Ocean was largely paid for by Quakers and Tolstoyans, who sympathized with their plight, and by the writer Leo Tolstoy, who arranged for the royalties from his novel Resurrection to go to the migration fund. He also raised money from wealthy friends. In Canada, the Doukhobors established a communal life style, similar to the Hutterites. Perhaps the most dynamic leader of the Doukhobors to date was Peter Vasilevich Verigin (1859-1924). Verigin was killed in a still-unsolved Canadian Pacific Railway train explosion on October 29, 1924 near Farron, between Castlegar and Grand Forks, British Columbia. In 1903 a radical faction calling themselves Svobodniki (Freedomites) or the 'Sons of Freedom' (SOF), also known as zealots, embraced Verigin's writings in a zealous manner. A small group of the SOF participated in mass nudity and arson as means of protesting against materialism, the land seizure by the government, compulsory education in government schools and wars. This led to many confrontations with the Canadian government and the RCMP which continued into the 1960s and later. As a general tactic, they hijacked the Doukhobor movement. The main groups of Doukhobors are the independents, who rejected hereditary leadership and communal living as being not essential to true Doukhoborism and took up homesteads in Saskatchewan, and the community Doukhobors, who, loyal to their spiritual leader Peter Vasilevich Verigin, moved to British Columbia to continue communal living. Many of the independent and community Doukhobors believed that the Freedomites violated the central Doukhobor principle of non-violence (with arson and bombing) and therefore have automatically excluded themselves from the Doukhobor movement. [edit] Current status Today an estimated 40,000 Doukhobors live in Canada, and perhaps another 40,000 live in Russia. The Union of Spiritual Communities of Christ, also known as Orthodox Doukhobors or Community Doukhobors, was formed by Peter P. Verigin (son of Peter V. Verigin) in 1938. It is the largest and most active Doukhobor organization, and is headquartered in British Columbia, Canada. The Doukhobors no longer live communally. Their prayer meetings and gatherings are dominated by the singing of a cappella psalms, hymns and spiritual songs in Russian. Doukhobors do not practice baptism. They reject several items considered orthodox among Christian churches, including church organization & liturgy, the inspiration of the scriptures, the literal interpretation of resurrection, the literal interpretation of the Trinity, and the literal interpretation of heaven and hell. Some avoid the use of alcohol, tobacco, and animal products for food, and involvement in partisan politics. Doukhobors believe in the goodness of man and reject the idea of original sin.

In the face of mainstream assimilation and secularization, these Canadian citizens, now residing mostly in Western Canada, have survived remarkably well. Their sobranies (gatherings of people for spiritual, social and business purposes) in community homes or rented facilities still persist in places such as Saskatoon and Verigin, Saskatchewan, Calgary and Cowley in Alberta, and Castlegar, Grand Forks, Vancouver, Victoria, Kelowna, Salmo and Creston in British Columbia. Unique a cappella singing can be heard in their homes or on CDs. Two heritage villages and museums in Saskatchewan and British Columbia serve as focal points for annual Peace Days commemorating the 1895 arms burning in Russia. An Annual Youth Festival brings thousands of visitors each May to the Castlegar district of BC. A bilingual Russian and English journal Iskra in British Columbia has been in existence since the early 1940s. The Dove is a recent journal that is published in Saskatchewan. Several websites provide an outreach for the Doukhobors. As an expression of their inner values, Canadian Doukhobors continue to take part in peace gatherings, they support petitions for nonviolent actions, help children of Chernobyl by inviting them into their homes and provide them with healthful time to heal themselves, and they have build a retreat facility in northern British Columbia for cultural, family, peace and nonviolent gatherings. Significant is the fact that Doukhobors see themselves as bridge-builders between the East and the West whether during the Cold War and at present. One of their members served as a photojournalist at the 1980 XXII Olympics in Moscow, and helped show the value of the Olympic movement to world understanding and peacemaking. In the mid-1990s, the Canadian Museum of Civilization mounted a major exhibit on this very small group because of their unique qualities of providing hope to an ailing planet. And in September 2005, Canadian Doukhobors in cooperation with Russian people opened a joint bakery-restaurant and communications complex on the site of the Lev Tolstoy Yasnaya Polyana Estate in the Tula province three hours south of Moscow. Doukhobors are often associated with the Molokans, who originated in the same circumstances in Russia. At the end of the 17th century the protest movement against the official church split into Molokans and Doukhobors. These groups are distinguished more by their original social composition than by any major theological differences. Also, the Molokans chose a leadership of elders rather than a single authoritative leader as with the Orthodox Doukhobors. [edit] See also •	Christian anarchism •	Peace church •	Simple living •	Spiritual Christians •	List of pacifist faiths

[edit] External links •	Doukhobor Genealogy Website •	www.spirit-wrestlers.com, a Canadian site with international roots •	ISKRA, a Canadian bilingual Doukhobor magazine •	www.Doukhobor-Museum.org •	Canadian Museum of Civilization Exhibit on the Doukhobors •	CBC Archives: Doukhobor bomb blast ignites fear in the Kootenays •	Ivan Sysoev, prolific and well-known Doukhobor poet and hymnist •	Explosion on the Kettle Valley Line: The Death of Peter Verigin - Great Unsolved Mysteries in Canadian History [edit] References •	Spirit Wrestlers: Doukhobor Pioneers' Strategies for Living, by Koozma J. Tarasoff •	Plakun Trava: The Doukhobors, by Koozma J. Tarasoff •	Spirit Wrestlers: centennial papers in honour of Canada's Doukhobor Heritage, by Koozma J. Tarasoff and Robert B. Klymasz •	Traditional Doukhobor Folkways; an Ethnographic and Biographic Record of Prescribed Behaviour, by Koozma J. Tarasoff •	The Doukhobor Centenary in Canada. A Multi-disciplinary Perspective on Their Unity and Diversity, compiled and edited by Andrew Donskov, John Woodsworth and Chad Gaffield •	History of the Doukhobors in the Archives of Vladimir D. Bonch-Bruevich – 1886-1950s, by Svetlana A. Inikova •	The Community Doukhobors: A People in Transition, by John W. Friesen and Michael M. Verigin •	Songs of the Doukhobors: an introductory outline, collected and edited by Kenneth Peacock •	The Doukhobors of British Columbia, by Harry B. Hawthorn •	The Doukhobors: their history in Russia; their migration to Canada, by Joseph Elkinton •	The Doukhobors, by George Woodcock and Ivan Avakumovic •	 Doukhobor Place Names by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff •	Guide to Doukhobor Names & Naming Practices by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff •	Doukhobor Historical Maps by Jonathan J. Kalmakoff •	 Spirit-Wrestlers website by Koozma J. Tarasoff This article incorporates text from Koozma J. Tarasoff, a Canadian Doukhobor scholar who has spent over 50 years studying the Doukhobor movement in the world. Prepared January 2007. Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doukhobor"

The Doukhobors or Doukhabors (Dukhobory, Dukhobortsy) (Духоборы/Духоборцы) are a Christian dissenting sect of Russian origin.

History
The origin of the Doukhobors dates to 16th and 17th century Russia. The term Doukhobors means "spirit wrestlers."

The Doukhobors were a Christian sect, now a social movement, who long ago rejected secular government, the Russian Orthodox priests, icons, all church ritual, the Bible and the divinity of Jesus. As pacifists, they also ardently rejected the institutions of militarism and wars. For these reasons, the Doukhobors were harshly repressed in Russia. Both the tsarist state and church authorities were involved in the torture and exile of these dissidents, as well as taking away their normal freedoms. At the end of the nineteenth century two-thirds of the Doukhobors left Russia en masse. They chose Canada for its isolation, peacefulness, and the fact that the Canadian government welcomed them, and migrated there in 1899. The Doukhobors' passage across the Atlantic Ocean was largely paid for by Quakers and Tolstoyans, who sympathized with their plight, and by the writer Leo Tolstoy, who arranged for the royalties from his novel Resurrection to go to the migration fund. He also raised money from wealthy friends. In Canada, the Doukhobors established a communal life style, similar to the Hutterites.

Perhaps the most dynamic leader of the Doukhobors to date was Peter Vasilevich Verigin (1859-1924). Verigin was killed in a still-unsolved Canadian Pacific Railway train explosion on October 29, 1924 near Farron, between Castlegar and Grand Forks, British Columbia.

In 1903 a radical faction of the Doukhobours calling themselves Svobodniki (Freedomites) or the 'Sons of Freedom' (SOF) embraced Verigin's writings in a zealous manner. A small group of the SOF participated in mass nudity and arson as means of protesting against materialism, the land seizure by the government, compulsory education in government schools and Verigin's assassination. This led to many confrontations with the Canadian government and the RCMP which continued into the 1960s and later.

The other two factions of Doukhobors are the independents, who rejected hereditary leadership and communal living as being not essential to true Doukhoborism and took up homesteads in Saskatchewan, and the community Doukhobors, who, loyal to their spiritual leader Peter Vasilevich Verigin, moved to British Columbia to continue communal living. Many of the independent and community Doukhobors believed that the Freedomites violated the central Doukhobor principle of non-violence (with arson and bombing) and therefore do not deserve to be called Doukhobors.

Current status
Today an estimated 30,000 Doukhobors live in Canada, and perhaps another 30,000 live in Russia. The Union of Spiritual Communities of Christ, also known as Orthodox Doukhobors or Community Doukhobors, was formed by Peter P. Verigin (son of Peter V. Verigin) in 1938. It is the largest and most active Doukhobor organization, and is headquartered in British Columbia, Canada.

The Doukhobors no longer live communally. Their prayer meetings and gatherings are dominated by the singing of a cappella psalms, hymns and spiritual songs in Russian. Doukhobors do not practice baptism. They reject several items considered orthodox among Christian churches, including church organization & liturgy, the inspiration of the scriptures, the literal interpretation of resurrection, the literal interpretation of the Trinity, and the literal interpretation of heaven and hell. Some avoid the use of alcohol, tobacco, and animal products for food, and involvement in partisan politics. Doukhobors believe in the goodness of man and reject the idea of original sin.

The religious philosophy of the Doukhobors is based on the two commandments cited by Jesus in Matthew 12:28-31: "Love God with all thy heart, mind and soul" and "Love thy neighbour as thyself." The Doukhobors have several important slogans. One of the most popular, "Toil and Peaceful Life," was coined by Peter V. Verigin.

Doukhobors are often associated with the Molokans, who originated in the same circumstances in Russia. At the end of the 17th century the protest movement against the official church split into Molokans and Doukhobors. These groups are distinguished more by their original social composition than by any major theological differences. Also, the Molokans chose a leadership of elders rather than a single authoritative leader as with the Orthodox Doukhobors.