The History of Christianity / Consisting of the Life and Teachings of Jesus of Nazareth; the Adventures of Paul and the Apostles; and the Most Interesting Events in the Progress of Christianity, from the Earliest Period to the Present Time.

by John S. C. Abbott

He therefore selected ten of the wisest men in his kingdom, and sent them to visit Rome, and then Constantinople, and report in which country divine worship was conducted in a manner most worthy of the Supreme Being. The ambassadors seem to have made a very thorough investigation in both capitals. Upon their return to Kief, they reported in favor of the faith and ceremonies of the Greek Church. The king, still undecided, and impressed with the importance of the measures upon which he had entered, assembled a number of his most virtuous and distinguished nobles, and took counsel of them. Their voices also were in favor of the Greek Church.

This wonderful event is well authenticated. Nestor gives a recital of it in its minute details. An old Greek manuscript, preserved in the royal library of Paris, records the visit of these ambassadors to both Rome and Constantinople.

There must have been a commingling of many motives which influenced Vladimir in his course. He had been a very wicked man. He had sought, but in vain, to appease the gnawings of conscience by the debasing rites of paganism. Some light from Christianity had reached his mind, as Christianmissionaries occasionally traversed his semi-barbaric realms. Indeed, the gospel had been already preached in idolatrous Kief, and some converts had been won to it. Vladimir had also sufficient intelligence to perceive that the paganism into which his realms were plunged was brutalizing. It is not probable that thus far he had been the subject of a change of heart: it was merely a change of policy,—an intellectual rather than a spiritual transformation.

Having resolved to renounce paganism, and to adopt Christianity, he deemed it important that the event should be accompanied with pageantry so imposing as to produce a deep impression upon his simple and ignorant subjects. The extraordinary measures he adopted show how little he then comprehended the true spirit of Christianity.

He assembled an immense army; with it descended the Dneiper in boats; sailed across the Black Sea; and entering the Gulf of Cherson, near Sevastopol, after several bloody battles took military possession of the Crimea. Thus victorious, he sent an embassage to Basil and Constantine, the two emperors then unitedly reigning at Constantinople, announcing that he wished the young Christian Princess Anne, daughter of one of the emperors, for his bride; and that, if she were not immediately sent to him, he would advance upon Constantinople, and utterly destroy the city.

The emperors, trembling in view of this menace, which they were conscious they had not the power to avert, after much anxious deliberation returned the answer, that they would accede to his request if he would first embrace Christianity. To this proposition Vladimir cordially assented, as it was quite in accordance with his plans. He, however, demanded that the Princess Anne should be sent immediately to him, stating that he would be baptized at the time of his nuptials.

The unhappy maiden was overwhelmed with anguish in view of what appeared to her a dreadful doom. She regarded the pagan Russians as ferocious savages, and would have preferred repose in the grave to her union with Vladimir. But policy, which is the religion of cabinets, demanded the sacrifice.The princess, weeping in despair, was conducted to the camp of Vladimir, accompanied by several of the most distinguished ecclesiastics and nobles of the empire. She was received with the most gorgeous demonstrations of rejoicing. The whole army was drawn up in battle-array to add the brilliancy of military pageantry to nuptial festivities.

The ceremony of baptizing the king was performed in the church of Basil, in the city of Cherson. Immediately after this ceremony, the marriage-rites with the princess were solemnized. Vladimir ordered a large church to be built at Cherson in memory of his visit. He then returned to Kief with the bride whom the sword and diplomacy had won, taking with him several preachers distinguished for their eloquence. He also obtained from Constantinople a communion-service wrought in the most graceful proportions of Grecian art, and also several exquisite specimens of statuary, that he might inspire his subjects with a love for the beautiful.

With great docility the king accepted the Christian teachers as his guides, and devoted himself with untiring energy to the work of abolishing idolatry and establishing Christianity throughout his realms. Vigorous and sagacious measures were adopted to throw contempt upon the ancient paganism. The idols were collected, and burned in huge bonfires amidst the derisive shoutings of the people. The statue of Péroune, the most illustrious of the pagan gods, was dragged ignominiously through the streets with a rope round its neck, followed by the hooting multitude pelting it with mud and scourging it with whips; until at last, battered and defaced, it was dragged to the top of a precipice, and tumbled headlong into the river.

Vladimir now issued a decree to all the inhabitants of the capital and of all the adjoining region to repair to the banks of the Dneiper, in the vicinity of Kief, to be baptized. The rich and the poor, the nobles and the serfs, were alike summoned. At the appointed day the multitude assembled by tens of thousands, and crowded the banks of the stream. The emperor himself at length appeared, accompanied by a large number of ecclesiastics from Constantinople. He took hisseat upon an elevated throne that he might witness the imposing ceremonies.