“Inimitable Marvellous Whole”: Reflecting the Ideas of the Epoch in Thanksgiving and Prayer Chanting in Commemoration of the Deliverance from the Invasion of Gauls and Twenty Nations with Them, by St. Philaret (Drozdov)

In 1814 on the order of Emperor Alexander I the outstanding theologian, future Metropolitan Philaret (Drozdov) of Moscow created a prayer service dedicated to the victory over Napoleon. St. Philaret consciously backed out of many statutory principles in order to emphasize how unique this service is and to express the ideas of the Tsar. The prayer service is a solemn and extended service that combines memorial and homiletic features. Using references to biblical stories and images, the author of the service compared the events of 1812–1814 with the trials suffered by God’s people in the Old Testament because of their deviation from God. The service reflected the thoughts expressed by Emperor Alexander in his public manifestos, in the text of the Holy Alliance Treaty as well as popular ideas of the epoch, including the belief in the manifest interference of Almighty God in human destinies and the eschatological significance of the victory over Napoleon for the whole world.