In turn-of-the-nineteenth-century Russia, replete as it was with subversives, the utopian anarchism of the Doukhobors attracted its share of admirers, among them the writer Leo Tolstoy. But the government was constantly jailing the group’s leaders and threatening its members with death.
An early Doukhobor leader known as Lushechka prophesied that the group would flourish in a land outside of Russia, then eventually return to the motherland. The first part of her prediction came true in 1895, after Russia’s new czar, Nicholas II, ordered his subjects to swear an oath of allegiance and instituted mandatory conscription for Russian men. Faced with the prospect of prison, many Doukhobors decided to leave the country. To fund their resettlement plan, Tolstoy donated the proceeds from his final major work, the novel Resurrection, and gathered money from other wealthy Russians. The British Society of Friends (the Quakers) contributed the remainder.
In 1898 and ‘99, the freighters Lake Huron and Lake Superior transported approximately 7,400 Doukhobors to Canada’s shores. The group went first to Saskatchewan and Alberta, but ran into trouble with provincial governments within a decade, so they packed up their experiment in anarchist socialism and moved to British Columbia’s southeastern interior. Repression persisted, however. Other Canadians resented Doukhobor antipathy toward institutions such as taxation, which led to fines and jail sentences. The Sons of Freedom were born in response.
Missing their homeland, the Doukhobors took steps to secure their ties to their Russian heritage. Successive generations taught their children to speak and read Russian, passing along old folk songs and fairy tales. Many wore traditional peasant dress during prayer services. But the BC government, in an effort to assimilate the Doukhobors, began taking the group’s children and educated them in residential schools, with the usual results. Many adults, meanwhile, were locked up in specially built prisons. Amid this mistreatment, many Doukhobors recalled Lushechka’s prophecy, prompting John Verigin to make inquiries in Russia about a return. It was in this period, the latter years of the 1970s, that he walked into Yakovlev’s office and invited him to the youth festival.
Normally, Yakovlev would have been too busy to accept. But the war in Afghanistan had limited diplomatic contact between the ussr and Canada, and he found himself with little to do. “I’ll come,” he told Verigin, “but I don’t want to stay in a hotel while I’m there. I want to stay with the people from your community. I want to see the way your people live.”
On the day they arrived in the Kootenays, Yakovlev, his wife, and his granddaughter rolled into Peter and Lucy Voykin’s gravel driveway in a shiny new Cadillac Seville coupe driven by one of Yakovlev’s advisers. Neither of the Voykins had so much as finished high school, and it would have been natural for them to have been intimidated hosting a man like Yakovlev, a high-ranking diplomat with a Ph.D. in foreign policy. But Yakovlev had insisted on not receiving special treatment, so once everyone had made their introductions the Voykins tried to go about their normal routine.
One morning that first weekend, Peter showed Yakovlev around his family’s one-hectare plot of land, set in a mountain valley above Castlegar. Voykin told the ambassador that his family grew most of their fruits and vegetables in their small garden. When the harvest was bountiful, they canned or otherwise preserved their extra produce, according to the Doukhobor ethic of self-sustenance. At one point, Voykin noticed that Yakovlev’s attention was wandering. He followed the ambassador’s gaze and saw that Yakovlev appeared to be entranced by a wooden staff tipped with a wicked-looking blade — the scythe Voykin used to tame the unfarmed areas of his lot.
He watched as Yakovlev settled his hands expertly onto the tool’s shaft, the way a long-retired clean-up hitter might heft the white ash of a baseball bat. There was a patch of clover nearby. With Voykin’s assent, Yakovlev began to attack the unruly brush. After a minute, he stopped, regarded his handiwork, and nodded. “You have to put your shoulder into it,” Yakovlev said, handing back the scythe. The ambassador explained that he had grown up wielding similar tools while working on his parents’ plot in the foothills of the Upper Volga.
Comments (9 comments)
Peter H. Peters: To Editor:
I found this to be a most interesting article. I wonder what happened to the Doukhobor community that made the cultural transition to assimilation possible so swiftly. Is the former ambassador Yakovlev till alive and if so where is he today? Facinating!
Peter H. Peters
610-1712 Portage Avenue
Winnipeg, MB May 12, 2008 08:36 EST
Ev Voykin: In my view, Mr. Shulgan has captured the very essence of faith most Doukhobors hold close to their hearts, and regardless of assimulation and drop in active members, there are thousands more of us who still maintain our beliefs, faith and heritage in our lives - regardless of where we may be living.
This is without question, one of the best articles I've read in decades on the Doukhobors - on the positive yet humble ways in which Doukhobors have impacted those throughout the world in our way of life, heritage and beliefs which we value so closely to our hearts.
In the last paragraph, Mr. Shulgan writes, "restored his faith in the benevolence of the Russian character". I know for me, your article 'reinforces in me, my neverending faith in the benevolence of my Doukhobor heritage'.
I remember when Mr. Yakovlev came to the Kootenays, and had the opportunity to meet him, along with my husband of two years, who is Mr. Voykin's nephew. It is wonderful to see this article on his trip and the impact it had on him - as in the family we all know what incredible hosts Peter and Lucy are.
June 01, 2008 00:12 EST
Laura: Very interesting article. The Doukhobor movement is still going on. Many of the Doukhobors and their descendents are participating in peace walks, communications, blogs and have a magazine,and web site which is assessible and read by the world population.
With the computer, every part of the world is assessible and maybe, someday, people will read and wake up to a better life and realize that toil and peaceful life is the answer. June 01, 2008 11:30 EST
John: This is very interesting. It might as well be interesting for the readers to eventually learn, (when the book is published) how a Canadian Doukhobor laid the foundation for the concept of multiculturalism and the eventual interculturalization that it is leading to in Canada.
Also, it was a Canadian Doukhobor who wrote the legal wording that is used to ban smoking in Canada.
As well, it was a Doukhobor who empowered the teaching of ethics to science students at UBC.
It was act of a BC Doukhobor that united the west and the east into the Canadian Peace Alliance.
It also was a Doukhobor who wrote a new, (more inspiring), anthem for Canada.
Yes, Doukhobors have enjoyed the pleasure of being instrumental in social engineering which is and will continue to help all Canadians, (through interculturalization) realize a new warless civilization.
I have fortune and pleasure of knowing when and how it was all done. In time, it will all be revealed.
June 03, 2008 23:52 EST
Stephan Samoyloff: Thanks for a very interesting article, with an interesting point of view. I and many of my friends benefited from the cultural exchanges with the Soviet Union you mentioned. Thanks especially for presenting the position of the majority of peaceful, law abiding Doukhobors, rather then painting us all with the radical brush of the minority as has been done in most other coverage. June 05, 2008 09:11 EST
V McNeil: Does anyone know if Yakovlev is still alive?
From this very brief article it seems that his views were slanted in the same direction as Tolstoy's.
It all comes down to the spirit of the person and their desire to share this spirituality with others. Spirituality and a spiritual community is so very difficult to attain and the Doukhabours at one time were successful with this. Of late their spirituality has dimmed and the finger pointed in part to asimilation in Canada. This justification is at odds when viewed in the context of other groups who's spirituality continues to thrive in Canada with assimilation.
True spirituality needs to be strengthened in the Douhabours in order to continue to catch the spirit of others like Yakovlev (and combat the Doukhabours declining numbers). June 07, 2008 10:54 EST
John Woodsworth: Ottawa, 20/6/08
As a Russian-English translator who has compiled, edited and/or translated a number of books and articles on the Doukhobors, I found Mr Shulgan's article most insightful. On my several visits to the Doukhobors, I was impressed with the considerable fluency many of them still have in Russian, even those of the third or fourth generation in Canada. This was particularly evident during a meeting with Tolstoy's great-great-grandson from Russia, Vladimir Il'ich Tolstoy, whose meeting with the Doukhobor executive (conducted entirely in Russian) I was able to attend. And the Doukhobors' philosophy and way of life have been all these years very much along the lines of Leo Tolstoy. See the book "Leo Tolstoy and the Canadian Doukhobors: an historic relationship" written by Andrew Donskov, the Director of the Slavic Research Group at the Univ. of Ottawa, with whom I have the privilege of working.
I might also mention that the community lifestyle, involving a close connection with the land, as Shulgan describes Yakovlev's discovery among the Canadian Doukhobors, is also reflected in another back-to-the-land movement popular in Russia today, thanks to nine books comprising the Ringing Cedars Series by Vladimir Megré. People are getting together to set up communities of their own 'family domains', where they are rediscovering an ages-old relationship of humanity to the land. The Series is now available in English translation - see http://www.ringingcedars.com - and I have heard of readers in the western world who are now following suit. In several talks and papers, I have taken note of the parallels between this movement and the Doukhobors, especially as related to the ideas they share in common with Tolstoy.
So the Canadian Doukhobors, at least those not completely absorbed into mainstream Canadian culture, may still be seen today as being on the cutting edge of a trend that will help many rise above dependence on oil, technology and a harmful exploitation of natural resources and rediscover an underlying humanity that finds satisfaction in living in harmony with nature instead of working against it.
June 20, 2008 19:18 EST
Patricia Khan: I met Koozma Tarasoff and his family and some of his friends in Ottawa and through him learnt about the Doukhobors. They have such strong spiritual values and a great sense of community.
One Thanksgiving, when I lived in Guyana,South America, I was asked to give a brief presentation on some aspect of Canadian life. I chose to talk about this wonderful group and it was of great interest to all present.
Koozma's book: The Spirit Wrestlers is a wonderful tribute to the Doukhobors. Check out his website for more information http://www.spirit-wrestlers.com/
Patricia Khan
Trinidad and Tobago
July 02, 2008 18:58 EST
Rachel Rilkoff: Thank you for the beautiful and interesting article. In the last few years I have reconnected with my Doukhobor heritage (my grandparents grew up traditionally, but raised their children more or less outside of the community) and it has been a wonderful, inspiring experience. Coincidently, I renewed this connection in Victoria BC, through the Victoria Doukhobor Choir, which was started by Eli Popoff's grandson, Johnny, among others. Attending the youth festival with this choir is something I would like my own children to experience.
You can hear some of our music here:
http://vidca.ca October 29, 2008 16:14 EST