How a Wedding Stopped a War
A young princess of Sluck was given in marriage so that two magnate families would not drown the city in blood. Soon afterwards, the Uniate Metropolitan complained that Orthodoxy had come back to life in Sluck.
On December 31, 1600, the Uniate Metropolitan Hypatius Potiy sat down to write a sorrowful letter. Bad news had come from Sluck: the new master, Prince Janusz Radziwiłł, had expelled the Uniate governor from the Trinity Monastery and handed the monastery over to the Orthodox. Potiy lamented the revival of the «accursed schism» in Sluck and linked the change to the influence of the prince's young wife.
This young wife, Princess Sophia of Sluck, was then about fifteen years old. Today the Church venerates Sophia as a holy righteous woman, and behind her short biography lies a story in which money, cannons, high politics, and the firmness of a very young woman were all intertwined.
The Bride Who Ended the Bloodshed
Sophia was the richest heiress of the Principality of Sluck. The girl's fate was decided by her guardians from the Chodkiewicz family. In 1594, an agreement was concluded on her marriage to the son of Prince Krzysztof Radziwiłł. It was above all about lands, castles, and money, not about great love.
What happened next is what often happens after profitable deals. The guardians and the groom's father quarreled over estates. By the beginning of 1600, the dispute had reached the breaking point. The Radziwiłłs brought troops to Vilna, and the Chodkiewiczes turned their stone house into a fortress and placed cannons in it. According to one version, up to 20,000 people could have died in the event of a clash. Royal envoys tried to reconcile the sides, and Metropolitan Potiy tried to do so as well. No one succeeded.
The way out was found in the decision of the bride herself. The young princess consented to the marriage, and the matter ended with a wedding rather than a battle. The Life of St. Sophia calls this step a feat accomplished «in the name of peace.» Historians may argue about her motives, but, thank God, blood was never shed on the streets of Vilna.
A Calvinist on the Side of Orthodoxy
Sophia's husband was Janusz Radziwiłł – a Calvinist. It would seem that such a marriage promised nothing good for the Orthodox. But the documents paint a different picture.
Already at the end of 1600, just months after the wedding, the prince returned the Trinity Monastery to the Orthodox, which is exactly what Potiy lamented. Later Janusz became one of the leaders of the rokosz of 1606–1607, which opposed the restriction of the rights of non-Catholics. And in his will he left an instruction that his descendants were obliged to carry out: «The churches and monasteries of the Old Rus' religion in my domains must be preserved as before, and my descendants must see to it that no change occurs in this regard.»
The popular retelling paints a story of a pious wife defending her faith before a heretic husband. Historical sources do not reflect such a confrontation.
The prince respected his wife's will and himself supported the Orthodox in his domains. The conflict in this story unfolded only around the family, not within it.
The Most Illustrious Sister of the Brotherhood
Since 1586, the Orthodox Transfiguration Brotherhood had existed in Sluck. It was founded back in the time of Sophia's father, and under her it was revived – according to some sources in 1606, according to others around 1610. The princess became its patroness and, as she was called, the «most illustrious sister of the brotherhood.»
In those years, brotherhoods were the main support of Orthodoxy in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.
They maintained schools, helped the poor, published books, and resisted the pressure of the Union. The Sluck brotherhood had a monastery, a school, and a library, and, if the Life of St. Sophia is to be believed, also a hospital and a printing house.
The princess, unfortunately, lived a short life and died in 1612, before reaching the age of thirty.
A Dispute That Has Not Fallen Silent to This Day
The biography of Sophia of Sluck was not as unambiguous as it seems at first glance. Church tradition considers the princess Orthodox, but some historians disagree. They cite documents according to which, on February 6, 1600, in court Sophia herself called herself a Catholic, and her father-in-law that same summer guaranteed her a Catholic priest. The seventeenth-century writer Okolski called her a Catholic whom her «heretic husband» buried in a Russian church. Quite an unexpected twist.
Supporters of the Orthodox version respond with their own arguments: a Catholic priest refused to conduct her funeral service, and no document of the princess's Catholic baptism has been found. The dispute over the saint's faith is still not closed. Something else is beyond dispute: during her lifetime, the Orthodox of Sluck regained their monastery, and the brotherhood received the protection of the authorities.
A Holy Preacher from Kyiv
The brotherhood outlived its patroness. Sixty-five years after her death, in 1677, a monk from Makarov near Kyiv came to the Sluck Transfiguration Monastery as a preacher. He lived and preached there until the beginning of 1679, and then, at the wish of Hetman Samoylovych, returned to Ukraine. The Church would later glorify him as St. Demetrius of Rostov, the compiler of the Great Menaion Reader (Chetii-Minei), from which the Orthodox still read the lives of the saints.
The Orthodox population of Sluck then suffered great oppression from the Uniates. The pressure grew with each passing year. The Orthodox were prevented from repairing their wooden churches, and in 1696 the Jesuits came to the city. The Trinity Monastery held out until 1930, when it was closed and destroyed. The relics of the princess returned to Minsk only during the years of the German occupation.
The fate of the righteous Sophia of Sluck is often retold as a simple story of faith triumphing over unbelief. The real story is more complex and more interesting.
A young girl whose marriage was a subject of bargaining helped stop bloodshed with her consent. Her Calvinist husband bequeathed to his descendants the duty to protect Orthodox churches. And the brotherhood she patronized gave shelter to a future saint from near Kyiv. That is how help for the Church sometimes comes from those from whom it is least expected.
