Nil Sorsky - Teaching and Influence

Teaching and Influence

Nil Sorsky’s teachings differed from standard Russian Orthodoxy. In his teachings, he developed mystical and ascetical ideas along the lines of Gregory Sinaite's hesychasm, asking the believers to concentrate on their inner world and personal emotional experiences of faith as means for achieving unity with God. Nil Sorsky demanded that monks participate in productive labor and spoke in support of monastic reforms on a basis of a secluded and modest lifestyle.

Nil Sorsky dedicated his efforts towards fighting against monastic landownership rights at the Synod of 1503 in Moscow. There, he raised a question about monastic estates, which comprised about one third of the territory of the whole Russian state at that time and which, in his view, had been responsible for demoralization of the Russian monastic communities. Nil Sorsky was supported by the elders of the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery and his disciple Vassian Patrikeyev. Although he spoke in favor of Ivan III’s policy of secularization of monastic lands, Sorsky did not live long enough to see the end of this struggle. Patrikeyev and Artemius of the Trinity were Nil Sorsky’s successors.