Из жизни старообрядцев / Lives of the Old believers: 1894-1897

Из жизни старообрядцев
Фотографии Максим Дмитриев
1894 - 1897

Lives of the Old believers
Photographs by Maxim Dmitriev
1894-1897

Music:
Nocturne in D Minor, No.3 by M. Balakirev, who was born in Nizhny Novgorod

"Old Believers" are Russian Orthodox Christians who maintain the liturgical and ritual practices of the Russian Orthodox Church as they existed prior to the reforms of Patriarch Nikon of Moscow between 1652 and 1666.
The main differences between Old Believers and post-Nikon Russian Orthodoxy is:
Old Believers use two fingers while making the Sign of the Cross
Old Believers reject any changes and emendations of liturgical texts and rituals introduced by the reforms of Patriarch Nikon.
Old Believers only recognise performing baptism through three full immersions, in agreement with the Greek practice....
Old Believers perform the Liturgy with seven prosphora ( a small loaf of leavened bread), instead of five as in new-rite Russian Orthodoxy...
Old Believers chant the alleluia verse after the psalmody two times rather than the three used in the Nikonian reforms.
Old Believers do not use polyphonic singing as the new-style Russian practice, but only monodic, unison singing.

Modern-day Old Believers live all over the world, having fled Russia under tsarist persecution and after the Russian Revolution of 1917.