«Антирелигиозная политика в Монголии нужна и возможна…»: по материалам сборника «Монголия в документах из архивов ФСБ России (1922–1936 гг.)»

Abstract

The article analyzes the antireligious policy of the Mongolian Party and government in 1920s–1930s of the XX century. At the beginning of the 1920s the party and state authorities’ attitude towards religion and clergy was loyal, but from the beginning of 1926 with the adoption of the law about separation of religion from the state, the time of its gradual tightening up began. The attacks on the monasteries manifested in deprivation of their economic independence, taxation, forced conversion of the lamas to laymen, open campaign for “total confiscation of possessions of lamas and monasteries”. These actions of the party and the government obviously aroused protests from the clergy and church that lead to uprising and rebellions. In relation to this the recording of the conversation of the USSR Central Executive Committee presidium member S. E. Chutskaev with the head of the organizational department of the Central Committee of Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party D. Luvsansharav, former lama, is of great interest. The study is based on the archive materials about Buddhist clergy and church that are presented in the collection of documents “Mongolia in documents from the archives of the Federal Security Service of Russia (1922–1936)”. Out of 163 documents, included into the book, 35 documents are about lamas and the clergy, they introduce a wide range of problems.