page_title: Zinaida Gippius
section_title: The New Church
hierarchical_section_title: Zinaida Gippius / Biography / The New Church
caption_attribution_description: Русский: «Портрет Зинаиды Гиппиус» 1906 Карандаш, мел, бумага на картоне
context_page_description: Zinaida Nikolayevna Gippius was a Russian poet, playwright, novelist, editor and religious thinker, one of the major figures in Russian symbolism. The story of her marriage to Dmitry Merezhkovsky, which lasted 52 years, is described in her unfinished book Dmitry Merezhkovsky.
  She began writing at an early age, and by the time she met Dmitry Merezhkovsky in 1888, she was already a published poet. The two were married in 1889. Gippius published her first book of poetry, Collection of Poems. 1889–1903, in 1903, and her second collection, Collection of Poems. Book 2. 1903-1909, in 1910. After the 1905 Revolution, the Merezhkovskys became critics of Tsarism; they spent several years abroad during this time, including trips for treatment of health issues. They denounced the 1917 October Revolution, seeing it as a cultural disaster, and in 1919 emigrated to Poland.
  After living in Poland they moved to France, and then to Italy, continuing to publish and take part in Russian émigré circles, though Gippius's harsh literary criticism made enemies.
context_section_description: In 1899—1901, encouraged by the group of authors associated with Mir Iskusstva, the magazine she had become close to, Gippius published critical essays in it using male pseudonyms, Anton Krainy being the best known. Analyzing the roots of the crisis that Russian culture had fallen into, Gippius (somewhat paradoxically, given her 'demonic' reputation) suggested as a remedy the 'Christianization' of it, which in practice meant bringing the intelligentsia and the Church closer together. Merging faith and intellect, according to Gippius, was crucial for the survival of Russia; only religious ideas, she thought, would bring its people enlightenment and liberation, both sexual and spiritual.
  In 1901 Gippius and Merezhkovsky co-founded the Religious and Philosophical Meetings. This 'gathering for free discussion', focusing on the synthesis of culture and religion, brought together an eclectic mix of intellectuals and was regarded in retrospect as an important, if short-lived attempt to pull Russia back from the major social upheavals it was headed for. Gippius was the driving force behind the Meetings, as well as the magazine Novy Put (1903–04), launched initially as a vehicle for the former. By the time Novy Put folded (due to a conflict caused by the newcomer Sergei Bulgakov's refusal to publish her essay on Alexander Blok), Gippius (as Anton Krainy) had become a prominent literary critic, contributing mostly to Vesy (Scales).
  After the Meetings were closed in 1903, Gippius tried to revive her initial idea in the form of what was regarded as her 'domestic Church', based on the controversial Troyebratstvo (Brotherhood of Three), composed of herself, Merezhkovsky, and Dmitry Filosofov, their mutual close friend and, for a short while, her lover. This new development outraged many of their friends, like Nikolai Berdyaev who saw this bizarre parody on the Trinity, with its own set of quasi-religious rituals, as profanation bordering on blasphemy.
caption: Portrait of Gippius by Leon Bakst, 1906
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