The First Tsar of Russia: Ivan the Terrible - Essay Example

242492Ivan the Terrible Introduction Ivan the Terrible, born in 1533, the first Tsar of Russia, was born having been cursed by the Orthodox Patriarch in Jerusalem.1 Ivan’s father,Vasily III, had angered the Church when he married Ivan’s mother, Elana, having had trea ted the traditions of the Church with disrespect in his behavior in taking a second wife when his first wife lived and was imprisoned.2 The year 1533 was also a time when the noblemen, the Boyars, were began vying for power. When Ivan was three, his father died, and Ivan would be the next ruler of Russia, but the Boyars began plotting for control and power.3 Ivan inherited his father’s throne amidst violence, and turmoil as the Boyars ran about looting and fighting immediately following Vasily’s death when he was just three years old.4 Four of Ivan’s uncles were murdered following his father’s death, and some of the murders took place in Ivan’s presence.5. The trauma of his early years, and the loss of family, which left Ivan feeling unsafe and vulnerable, would affect him the rest of his life.6 As a result, Ivan would become known as Russia’s most violent and war mongering ruler in history: Ivan the Terrible. Ivan exhibited cruel behaviors as a young child, like throwing domestic pets from the belfry tower to watch them fall to their deaths.7 Ivan’s cruelty was a manifestation of his fears, his sense of loss, and a valid sense that he had to learn to be as violent as the Boyars who would have themselves dropped Ivan from the belfry but for the fact that they needed him.8 By the time Ivan was a young adolescent, Ivan was already taking control of his throne. He demonstrated a never before seen propensity for violence, suspicious of the Boyars and clergymen, he confiscated property under the control of the throne so that the Boyars owned nothing.9 “In 1543, at the age of thirteen, Ivan manifested some of the qualities for which he later earned the name Groznyi ("Stern," or more commonly, "the Terrible"), when he ordered that the leader of the boyar clique, Andrei Shuiskii, be summarily executed in his presence. Later he ordered that a nobleman, who was apparently rude to him, have his tongue cut out. There were other similar incidents and only the Metropolitan of Moscow, Makarii, could restrain some of these excesses. Still, during his minority the kingdom was ruled by the Glinskii family. Ivan spent his days hunting and traveling, being particularly fond of visiting remote monasteries.”10 Even with his propensity for violence, Ivan was a man with strong religious conviction.11 He was a fervent reader, was very interested in military warfare, which was helpful since he came to his throne during a time when there would be ongoing battles with the Tartars.12 Ivan grew from a boy who was intensely aware of his contentious role and position as ruler of Russia, to a man whose awareness turned to a near paranoid and suspicious of everyone around him.13 In January, 1547, when Ivan IV assumed his authority, the “Time of Troubles,” as the reign of Ivan IV was referred to, would, more so than any other tsar to follow him, be a time of change and expansion in Russian history.14 It was the reign of Ivan the Terrible that would set the course for Russia’s history going forward.15 At 16 years old, Ivan took the name of title of “Tsar,” which meant “Caesar.” It was an indication of the young man’s broad understanding of his role, and a way to make a statement of warning. All land was confiscated, and the nobles no longer held land. Ivan IV had absolute power, and this is something that would be traditional of tsars moving forward. Ivan IV set about building an empire, sending his armies out in 1552, and they took Kazan. K azan was a Tatar fortress, and it was a reversal in what had previously been the relationship between Russia and the Tatars, who had virtually held past rulers of Russia hostage, not wanting to take it over, but to exact a vast fortune in ransom and dues. Ivan declared the prince a heretic, and they exchanged letters of Ivan IV’s erratic behavior and his intense suspicion of those around him changed when he met his wife, Anstasia, who was a Romanov. Ivan IV transformed fro a tyrant to a happy man, and in 1554, his son, Ivan Ivanovich was born. In 1556, Anastasia died, leaving Ivan IV convinced that his wife had been the victim of the old conspiracy that had always swelled around. Once again, Ivan IV went on a rampage of violence. “The closer to the Tsar, the closer to death,” became the saying of the day, and that was when he began referring to himself as Ivan the Terrible. The Tsar’s close friend, Prince Andrew Kurbsky, was a general in Ivan’s army, who had fought for Ivan IV to help expand Russia. They were successful in that endeavor, but, fearing for his life when Ivan IV went on a rampage, murdering everyone around him, Kurbsky fled to Lithuania.16 From that safe haven Kurbsky sent a series of letters to the Tsar.17 The first letter, or first “epistle,” from Kurbsky, sent from Lithuania, appeals to what, as a close friend of the Tsar, Kurbsky understood was Ivan’s deep religious beliefs.18 In the letter, Kurbsky accuses Ivan of having “destroyed Israel,” with his violent and murderous ways, and that it is an abuse of the power granted him by God as God’s representative on earth in the princely robes which Ivan wears.19 Kurbsky pleads with Ivan for understanding, questioning what wrong the murdered had committed against Ivan. Kurbsky wrote: “Wherefore, O tsar, have you destroyed the strong in Israel and subjected to various forms of death the voevodas given to you by God?2 And wherefore have you spilt their victorious, holy blood in the churches of God during sacerdotal ceremonies, and stained the thresholds of the churches with their blood of martyrs? And why have you conceived against your well wishers and against those who lay down their lives for you unheard-of torments and persecutions and death, falsely accusing the Orthodox of treachery and magic and other abuses, and endeavourin with zeal to turn light into darkness and to call sweet bitter?3 What guilt did they commit before you, O tsar, and in what way did they, the champions of Christianity, anger you? Have they not destroyed proud kingdoms and by their heroic bravery made subject to you in all things those in whose servitude our forefathers formerly were? Was it not through the keenness of their understanding that the strong German towns were given to you by God? Thus have you remunerated us, [your] poor [servants], destroying us by whole families? Think you yourself immortal, O tsar? Or have you been enticed into unheard-of heresy, as one no longer wishing to stand before the impartial judge, Jesus, begotten of God, who will judge according to justice the universe and especially the vainglorious tormentors, and who unhesitatingly will question them "right to the hairs [roots?] of their sins", as the saying goes? He is my Christ who sitteth on the throne of the Cherubims at the right hand of the power of the Almighty in the highest—the judge between you and me.”20 This letter is especially insightful, because it is the first exchange, and was initiated by Kurbsky, who also takes the tone not of the betrayer to Ivan, but of the betrayed servant whose loyalty to his prince was rewarded with the possibility of facing death. Kurbsky must have been very close to Ivan, because the letter is a deliberate and calculated manipulation of Ivan’s religious beliefs, suggesting that God will judge Ivan harshly for his betrayal of loyalties. That God will judge Ivan, in the same way that God judges others. Kurbsky reminds his own mortality. He is trying to make Ivan get in touch with the destruction he has wrought on the boyars and their families. Kurbsky goes on to cite his outstanding military achievements on behalf of Ivan, and as the letter goes on, it becomes unclear as to whether or not Kurbksy was a plotter against Ivan. During this 16th century period in history, it was not uncommon for royalty, or their heirs to become the subjects of plots to oust them from their thrones or to murder them. Ivan was very aware of this. He witnessed this behavior and these dynamics going on around him from the time he was a young child. In this letter, however, Kubrsky’s first to Ivan IV, it takes the general tone of one who is both shocked and disappointed by Ivan’s betrayal of loyalty to him.21 Ivan IV addressed the people of Russia, warning them of the consequences of their actions if they attempted to join Prince Kubrsky in his treacheries against Ivan.22 The letter has the tone of anger, of a man who capable of extreme acts of vengeance, but also the tone of a man who is deeply religious, as was Ivan IV.23 Ivan begins by citing a brief history of the tsars that came before him and their relationship to God.24 Ivan wrote: “Why, O Prince, if you think that you have piety, have you cast out your very [lit. only-begotten] soul? What will you give in exchange for it on the day of the last judgment? Even if you gain the whole world, in the end death will in any case seize you! Why did you betray your soul for the sake of your body, if you [really] feared death according to the lying word of your devilish friends and spies? In all places, like devils [warring] against all the world, so too are [to be found] those who have consented to be your friends and servants, who have rejected us, having broken the oath on the Cross [i.e. of allegiance], imitating devils, in all manner of ways casting [lit. joining] nets everywhere [to catch] us, spying on us in every way possible in their devilish manner, watching our movements and words, imagining themselves to be unnoticeable [lit. fleshless], and fabricating [lit. sewing together] from this much abuse and reproach against us; and this do they bring to you, disgracing us before all the world.1 For this evil you gave them much reward with our land and our treasury, falsely calling them [our] servants. And you were filled with these devilish rumours, like a serpent with deadly poison, and having raged against me and destroyed your soul, you have even embarked upon the destruction of the Church. Consider not that it is right to give offence to God, having fallen into wrath against man. It is one thing [to give offence to] a human even if he wears the purple, but it is another thing [to offend] God! Or do you think, accursed one, that you will protect yourself from this [i.e. from offending God]? By no means! If you wage war together with them, then will you also destroy churches and trample on icons and annihilate Christians; and even if you do not dare [to act] with your hands, still with your deadly poisonous thoughts will you cause much of this evil. Consider how in a battle attack the soft limbs of infants are crushed and maimed by the legs of horses! And if the attack is in winter, then is the evil wrought still worse!2 And this your devilish scheming—how can it not be likened to the fury of Herod, manifested by his massacre of the innocents! Do you consider this—the perpetration of such evils—to be piety? Should you accuse us of warring against Christians—namely against Germans and Lithuanians—then your accusations are groundless. [For] even if there were Christians in those lands, we would [still] wage war according to the customs of our forefathers, just as has happened many times before now; but now we know that in those lands there are no Christians except for a very few ministers of the Church and secret servants of the Lord. Furthermore, even the Lithuanian struggle began because of your treachery and malevolence and your inconsiderate carelessness.”25 The letter goes on, and it does not reflect the mind of a mad man, as Ivan’s action might have caused some to think him to be at the time. Rather, he comes across as a man who, like Prince Kurbsky, is very disappointed in his friend. It gives rise to the question of whether or not there was actually a plot, because these two men, based on their early exchanges and based on the historical facts, were clearly good friends prior to the death of Ivan IV’s wife. The letters exchanged between Ivan IV and prince Kurbsky are some of the most detailed and interesting documents in the history of any country, because Ivan’s reign was one that totally transformed Russia into what it would become under subsequent tsars, including Tsar Peter the Great of Russia; and into the modern socialism that subsequently consumed Russia. Ivan goes on to caution Kurbsky, using Ivan’s sense of religious self-righteousness, that: “Think on this and reflect, that he who resists power, resists God; and who resists God is called an apostate, which is the worst sin. And these words were said concerning all power, even when power is obtained by blood and strife. But consider what I said above, that I did not take my kingdom by rape; if you then resist [such] power, all the more so do you resist God. Thus, as elsewhere the Apostle Paul said (and these words have you too scorned): "Servants, be obedient to your masters, . . . not with eye-service, as men-pleasers",1 but to God, "and not only to the good . . ., but also to the froward",2 "not only for wrath, but also for the conscience sake";3 for this is the will of God, "to suffer for welldoing."4 And if you are just and pious, why do you not permit yourself to accept suffering from me, your forward master, and [so] to inherit the crown of life?”26 The exchanges between these two men are clear in their feelings and their passions, and allow the reader to come away with a complete sense of the voice of the author of each letter. Each man comes across as very strong willed, firm in his convictions. The Tsar, however, is unrelenting in his grudge, and will not succumb to attempts to play upon his sense of religious convictions to give in to Kurbsky.27 Ivan IV’s Heir Historians agree that Ivan was deeply in love with his wife, Anastasia.28 Anastasia gave birth to a son, Dimitri, and heir of Ivan the Terrible, and it was in this son that Ivan put his hopes for the future of Russia.29 At one point, after having fallen ill and convinced that he was going to die, Ivan forced the boyars to swear allegiance to Dmitri.30 It was perhaps the most tragic event in the life of Ivan IV when, in a fit of rage, he caused the death of his son, Dimitri, and was left without an heir to his throne.31 Ivan was left distraught and filled with remorse following the death of his son.32 As he aged, Ivan IV became more and more reflective on his own life and mortality. He had a monument built to the thousand he had murdered, and had the name of each person inscribed upon it.33 In Summary Ivan IV, known as Ivan the Terrible, was changed Russia’s relationship with the Tatars, and significantly expanded Russia’s land mass.34 “Ivan was also very active in matters of foreign policy and military affairs. In 1548 he launched his first campaign against the Tatars of the Khanate of Kazan, one of the remnants of the Golden Horde of Batu, which had devastated the medieval Kievan Rus and had dominated Russian lands for two centuries. Kazan was finally taken by Ivan in 1552. From there, he moved against the Khanate of Astrakhan, eventually taking over the entire Volga River basin. Under his initiative, Muscovy also expanded eastward, into and beyond the Ural Mountains, thus beginning the rapid conquest of Siberia. He subsequently moved into the Baltic region, precipitating in 1558 the Livonian War. It lasted twenty-four years, an exhausting yet futile struggle that ended only with the intervention of Pope Gregory XIII in 1582. During this conflict, Muscovy experienced one of the most devastating raids by the Tatars of Crimea, who sacked and burned the city of Moscow in 1571.”35 Ivan was a well read man, and he was an astute military tactician. He was a statesman, and during the happy years of his marriage, he proved himself capable of being a good ruler. It was only after the death of his wife, Anastasia, that Ivan reverted to his paranoia and violent ways. He married six wives following the death of Anastasia, but those relationships did not prove fruiting, nor did Ivan find the peace of mind that he had achieved while Anastasia lived. Ivan proved that never wanted the conflict associated with the throne when he threatened to leave Russia, because he was tired of the plots and what he believed was yet another plot on his life.36 Ivan relinquished his throne and packed to leave Russia, which created more chaos for the Russian people, and they pleaded with him to return to his throne.37 This plea from the people for him to return, some historians believe, was what Ivan knew would happen, and his throne was never really at risk.38 Upon returning to the throne, Ivan was never able to find happiness again. Tormented by the death of his son, he lived in relative solitude, and, in March of 1584, at the age of 54, Ivan died during a game of chess.39 Expansion of Muscovy Encarta , found online at http://encarta.msn.com/media_461570171/expansion_of_muscovy.html, 2008. References Blumberg, A. (Ed.). (1995). Great Leaders, Great Tyrants?: Contemporary Views of World Rulers Who Made History. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=23344876 Campbell, Don (Dir) (2003). Russia: Land of the Tsars, Film Documentary, Hollydan Works, Borodino, Russia. Cherniavsky, M. (1961). Tsar and People: Studies in Russian Myths. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=72471913 Clarkson, J. D. (1961). A History of Russia. New York: Random House. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=57383117 Encarta Encyclopedia (2008), found online at http://encarta.msn.com/media_461570171/expansion_of_muscovy.html, retrieved 14 October 2008. Forsberg, R. (1984). Confining the Military to Defense as a Route to Disarmament. World Policy Journal, 1(2), 285-318. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=95717038 Perrie, M. (2001). The Cult of Ivan the Terrible in Stalins Russia. New York: Palgrave. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=101703863 Sumner, B. H. (1943). A Short History of Russia. New York: Reynal & Hitchcock. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=527273 Voyce, A. (1954). Its History, Architecture, and Art Treasures Its History, Architecture, and Art Treasures. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=99004574 Zernov, N. (1945). The Russians and Their Church. New York: The Macmillan Company. Retrieved October 16, 2008, from Questia database: http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=89807314 Read More