Conference to mark the 190th birthday of Archimandrite Antonin (Kapustin), head of the Russian Orthodox Mission in Jerusalem

A church academic conference on the theme ‘The Founder of the Russian Palestine’ was held on December 14 at the Moscow Patriarchate’s Pilgrimage Center in Moscow to mark the 190^th birthday of Archimandrite Antonin (Kapustin, 1817-1894), an outstanding church worker and head of the Russian Orthodox Mission in Jerusalem.

The conference received messages of greetings from Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, head of the Moscow Patriarchate department for external church relations, and Bishop Antony of Borispol, rector of Kiev Seminary and Academy, who wrote in particular, ‘At a time when the Kiev Theological Academy is reviving its former traditions after decades of desolation and oblivion, it is important that the memory of its best students should be restored. And an honorary place among these students belongs to Archimandrite Antonin’.

The conference was attended by historians, archeologists, theologians and researchers from Moscow, St. Petersburg, Nizhniy Novgorod and Kiev. Among the speakers were N. Lisovoy of the Imperial Orthodox Palestinian Society, and Dr. L. Gerd of St. Petersburg University, the Pilgrimage Center press service reported.

Archimandrite Antonin was head of the Russian Orthodox Mission in Jerusalem from 1865 to 1894 and is remembers as the founder of ‘the Russian Palestine’. During the thirty years of his service, he purchased numerous plots of land in the Holy Land, organized archeological excavations, built churches and monasteries, pilgrims’ houses and schools for local Arabs. He was also known as a brilliant scholar, theologian and preacher, archeologist and collector. He wrote over 100 books and articles, which have preserved their scholarly significance today.

DECR Communication Service