i THE ARCHANGEL'S CONSECRATED SERVANTS. AN INQUIRY IN THE RELATIONSHIP ...

343 Pages·2014·2.09 MB·English

THE ARCHANGEL’S CONSECRATED SERVANTS. AN INQUIRY IN THE
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE ROMANIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH AND THE
IRON GUARD (1930-1941)

IONUŢ FLORIN BILIUŢĂ

A DISSERTATION

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History

Presented to the Faculties of the Central European University
in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

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Supervisor of Dissertation
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Associate Professor Matthias Riedl
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Copyright in the text of this dissertation rests with the Author. Copies by any process,
either in full or part, may be made only in accordance with the instructions given by the
Author and lodged in the Central European Library. Details may be obtained from the
librarian. This page must form a part of any such copies made. Further copies made in
accordance with such instructions may not be made without the written permission of the
Author.

I hereby declare that this dissertation contains no materials accepted for any other degrees
in any other institutions and no materials previously written and/or published by another
person unless otherwise noted.
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Abstract

The relationship between the Romanian Orthodox Church and interwar Romanian
fascist movement, the Iron Guard had been a Pandora’s Box for both the lay and Church
historians. The focus of this thesis will not fall on presenting the reader with a history of
the Iron Guard or a history of the Church through the lenses of the Romanian fascist
movement. Rather, by emphasizing the interplay between different layers of authority
both in the Legion and in the Church, the present undertaking presents a net of
negotiations and careful retreats from both sides. Working around the concepts proposed
by Roger Griffin, that is fascism “as a palingenetic form of ultra-nationalism” regarding
the movement, and “religious fascism” regarding the Orthodox Church’s low clergy
derailment to the extreme right, I will show that on terms of ritual and theology the Iron
Guard and the Orthodox Church were able to meet by making compromises.
The thesis discusses the risk in assuming that the Orthodox Church acted as one,
coherent institution, with a clear cut top down decision making process in its relation to
the Iron Guard which as its turn cannot be regarded as one but a plurality inside the label.
I have thus identified at least four distinct groups, three being active in the devising of
this relationship. There is a distinction in how the low and the high clergy interact with
the Legion. With regards to the Legion I have focused on an intellectual group that
comprised religious minded individuals with direct or indirect ties with the institution of
the Church. There was a side in the Legion and also one in the Church who did not
involve itself in this relation. The most ambiguous game among all three factions was
played by the high clergy. Acting individually in support of the movement or giving the
movement the feeling that in the end they will join in officially, the high clergy used the
movement in order to further their own political agenda.
The most interesting outcome of these relations was the creation of a legionary
theology. By projecting the Christian narrative of redeeming the individual to national
proportions, the legionary priests and ideologues created something unparalleled in the
history of European fascism: a theological synthesis in which the clergy brought its ideas
and performed the sacerdotal function of the movement and the fascists brought the
promise of a national salvation in the beyond. The coexistence of Christian sacraments
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first years. Chapter 4 and chapter 5 look into the activity of the Iron Guard after 1934,
especially the working camps and the development of legionary theology. Chapter 6 and
7 will deal with the Legion confronted with Moţa-Marin burial and the National
Legionary State.

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Acknowledgements
While engaged in the research and writing process for the thesis I benefited from the
exceptionally generous institutional support of several foundations, research institutes,
and individuals. I would like to express my gratitude to the Institut für Europäische
Geschichte, Mainz, Germany, the Oxford Brookes University’s Department of History, to
the Modern European History Research Center in Oxford and the New Europe College in
Bucharest, Romania for supporting periods of work on this research project.

I would like to express my profound respect and gratitude to Professor Roger Griffin. It is
a complicated web of entanglements European fascism and he guided me through the
theory towards understanding the phenomenon as a cultural and social Weltanschauung.
Our discussions in Oxford influenced considerably this thesis’ outcome.

My professors and my readers have helped immensely in bringing this thesis to fruition. I
am particularly grateful for the advice and suggestions of Mr. Sorin Antohi, professor
Balazs Trencsenyi, professor Constantin Iordachi, professor Paschalis Kitromilides,
professor Robert Evans, professor Marius Turda, Dr. Philip Vanhaelemeersch, professor
Sergio Luzzatto, professor Leon Volovici.

I would also like to thank my friends and colleagues: Valentin Săndulescu, Cristian
Vasile, Narcis Tulbure, Răzvan Pârâianu, Narcis Taşcă, Chris Davis, Roland Clark, Oana
Mateescu, Norbert Petrovici, Mirel Bănică, and many others with whom I have discussed
my research hypotheses and the outcomes of my research.

I owe a great debt of gratitude to my supervisor, Professor Matthias Riedl who took the
pains of reading several versions of this thesis, revised and commented on pieces of
writing that were imperfect or simply impossible to understand. Much of the comments
that I have received and his input furthered my understanding of the intricate mechanism
of religion.

Finally, I would like to thank Anca for taking the time to listen and to read my text. Her
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most times my best and most exigent reader. The thesis is dedicated to her.
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Table of Contents

Introduction 1

1. Aim and Research Questions 1

2. Fascism as Political Religion – The State of the Art 8

3. Iron Guard as a Political Religion 20

4. Sources and Methodology 34

5. The Structure of the Thesis 36
I. The cultural debate in modern Romania and the rise of religious right- 40

wing radicalism

I. 1 Preliminaries 40

I. 2 “The Great Debate” over Romanian Ethnicity. Religion and 41
Nationalism in 1920s Romania

I. 3 Religious ‘Traditionalism’? The Origins of the Interwar 48
‘Traditionalist’ Movement

I. 4 Radical Political Expressions and Religion 62

I. 5 Final Remarks 70

II. Surviving Modernity? The Orthodox Church Negotiation of its
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Position in Public Life

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C the Romanian State. The Romanian Orthodox Church in the 19th Century 76
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II. 4 Final Remarks
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III. “In the Beginning was the Word!” The First Stages in the 98

Development of the Legionary Movement (1930-1933)

III. 1 In Jassy (1927-1930) 101

III. 2 Courting the High Clergy. The First Legionary Bishop? 112

III. 3 The First Political Foray 116

III. 4 Meeting Nichifor Crainic. The Movement’s First Ideologue 121

III. 5 From the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to the Tomb of a Prime 129
Minister. The Legion of Archangel Michael between 1932 and 1933

III. 6 Final Remarks
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IV. Seducing the “Bride of Christ”. Legionary Propaganda and the 144

Romanian Orthodox Church (1934-1937)

IV. 1 From Prisons to Resurrection. The Imprisoned Iron Guard and the 151
Orthodox Church

IV. 2 The Archangel’s Temples. Working Camps as Means to Seduce the 162
Orthodox Church

IV. 3 Final Remarks
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V. The Foundation of the Iron Guard’s Theology (1934-1937) 183

V. 1 On the Nature of Legionary Theology 186

V. 2 “Love Thy Neighbour”? On Legionary Violence 191
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V. 6 Final Remarks
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VI. The Moţa-Marin Burial (13th of February 1937) and the Fascization of 235

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the Romanian Orthodox Church

VI. 1 Preliminaries 235

VI. 2 From Fallen Soldiers to Martyrs for the Movement 237

VI. 3 The Proto-Martyrs. Antecedents to the Moța-Marin Burial 243

VI. 4 The Moța-Marin Funeral - Constructing the Ritual 247

VI. 5 After Moța-Marin. Nae Ionescu on National Orthodoxy 265

VI. 6 The Positive Reaction of Orthodox Hierarchy towards the Iron
Guard 271

VI. 7 Final Remarks 272

VII. “The National Funerary State.” The Iron Guard in Power 274

(September 1940-January 1941)

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VII. 1 Preliminaries

VII. 2 Taking the Political Power Seriously. The Reaction of the Orthodox 277
Clergy

VII. 3 The Sacrament of the Next World. Commemorating the Dead, 290
Indoctrinating the Youth in Martyrdom

VII. 4 Epilogue. The Break between the Legion and the High Clergy 298

VII. 5 Final Remarks 302

Final Remarks 304
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Introduction

“From now on, we are the true Orthodox Church.” These were the words Corneliu
Codreanu, the leader of the Romanian fascist movement voiced on 10th of February 1938
when hearing about the nomination of the Orthodox Patriarch Miron Cristea as Prime
Minister in the authoritarian cabinet of King Carol II of Romania. For almost 20 years,
Codreanu had been involved in shaping numerous radical right-wing movements, the
most famous being the Legion of Archangel Michael, known as the Iron Guard from
1930. This radical expression of Romanian fascism had an ideological particularity which
singled it out from the interwar family of fascist movement and parties, the profound
religious character synthesized in its ideological core. Unlike any other interwar political
movement, Codreanu’s Legion placed an important emphasis on the Christian theology
and rituals serving fascist ideology and the presence of large numbers of Orthodox priests
in the legionary political meetings and legionary rank and file assured the rapid expansion
and extension of the movement’s political agenda.

1. Aim and Research Questions

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Romanian Orthodox Church and the Fascist ideology of the Iron Guard in Romania
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Orthodox Church shaped and influenced the ideology of the Iron Guard by emphasizing
the interchange of ideological and theological motifs between the Iron Guard and the
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Church. Considered by most historians as a “mystical” fascist movement,1 the Iron Guard
remained throughout the interwar period a peculiar mix between fascism and Orthodoxy
interpreted by the traditionalist intellectual circles as a form of national revolution.2
Furthermore, the present undertaking aims to see how the Orthodox clergy and the
Romanian fascists met on theological grounds, how/ whether a theological exchange was
possible between different layers of the Romanian Orthodox Church and the Iron Guard. I
will argue collaboration between Romanian fascists and clergymen was not just a
pragmatic relation, but rather it was a process of mutual approximation unfolded over
time on both an institutional and a theological level, with different stages of reciprocal
theological exchanges and theological synthesis. Therein rests one of the key points of
originality of the thesis, in emphasizing not just the institutional interplay between the
Church and the Iron Guard, but also a conceptual back and forth circulation of intellectual
and theological ideas and rituals between the Orthodox Church and the Romanian Iron
Guard.
My initial research question deals with how the Iron Guard was perceived within
the ecclesiastic environments and the understanding of Orthodox Church by the
Romanian fascists. The main assumption takes into consideration that, at different levels
of the Church hierarchy, the perception of the Iron Guard differed. The high clergy’s
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Codreanu and his followers as a political expression of the Orthodox Church, regaining
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Iron Guard. The Mystique of Ultra-nationalism] translated by Marian Ştefănescu (Bucharest: Humanitas,
1993).
2 Orthodoxism was an intellectual trend led by the theologian and poet Nichifor Crainic (1890-1972)
emphasizing the capital role played by Christian Orthodoxy for the culture and the spiritual development of
the Romanian people. For a scholarly account, please see Keith Hitchins, “Gîndirea: Nationalism in a
Spiritual Guise” in Kenneth Jowitt (ed.), Social Change in Romania 1860–1940. A Debate on Development
in a European Nation (Berkeley: Institute of International Studies, 1978).
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the Church’s political ground lost in the 19th century, when in the process of national
building the Orthodox Church was nationalized and pushed the Church into proclaiming
its autocephaly from Constantinople. The Orthodox prelates timidly accepted to support
the movement in the beginning of the 1930s because of its Christian political agenda and
the religious revival brought about and imposed upon the youth by Codreanu’s followers.
However after a state decree in 1936 against the legionary benevolent work in the service
of the Church, the hierarchy started to distance itself from Romanian fascists, if only for a
short period.3
The Moţa-Marin burial (13th of February 1937) marked the return to a harmonious
relationship between the high clergy and the Iron Guard, a change of pace materialized in
the decisions of the Holy Synod on 11th of March 1937 condemning freemasonry and its
implications in the Romanian public life. The coming to power on 10th of February 1938
of the authoritarian and conservative dictatorship of King Carol II and the beginning of
the movement’s repression was followed subsequently by a new and more severe
distancing of the high clergy from the Legion. During the short lived National Legionary
State (14th of September 1940 - 21st/23rd of January 1941), because of the projects to
reform the Church supported by the low clergy and Iron Guard’s intellectuals, the high
clergy led by Metropolitan Nicolae Bălan of Transylvania sided with General Antonescu
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The adherence to the movement of the low clergy after 1932 was gradually
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newspapers like Calendarul, the event of 24th of January 1933 in Carol Park at the tomb

3 When speaking about the “fascist” character or the “fascist” movement, the present thesis refers only to
the Legion of Archangel Michal, also known as the Iron Guard, the Corneliu Zelea Codreanu’s Group or
the “All of Fatherland” Party (Totul Pentru Țară).
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