www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News EWTN program on the Ruthenians today, but I didn't know it until we saw it on there

Nonna,

Many modern languages are the sum of various closely related (true) regional dialects. Not only did the French do it, the Germans, Italians, and others created 'modern languages' from various dialects. The Rusyns did the same thing, and created a modern language known as Ukrainian which was the 'nickname' that the largest group had taken on in order not to be confused with Russians (Muscovites).

I.F.

Dear Jean Francois:

You seem to be assuming that all Ukranians are Rusyn. That is not correct.

Dr. Paul Magosci is an expert on Ukrainian and Rusyn cultures and languages. These are some good books we should all read:
A new Slavic language is born. The Rusyn literary language in Slovakia. Ed. Paul Robert Magocsi. New York 1996.

Magocsi, Paul Robert. Let's speak Rusyn. Бісідуйме по-руськы. Englewood 1976.

Дуличенко, Александр Дмитриевич. Jugoslavo-Ruthenica. Роботи з рускей филолоґиї. Нови Сад 1995.

But I found the Wikipedia explanation enlightening:
Rusyn is an East Slavic language (along with Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian) close to Ukrainian.

It is spoken in the Transcarpathian Region of Ukraine, in eastern Slovakia, southern Poland (where it is often called łemkowski 'Lemko', from their characteristic word lem/лєм 'only'), and Hungary. The Pannonian Rusyn language in Serbia is sometimes considered part of the Rusyn language, although some linguists consider that language to be West Slavic. In Ukraine, Rusyn is often considered a dialect of Ukrainian, but speakers are frequently reported to consider themselves distinct from Ukrainians.

Attempts to standardize the language suffer from its being divided between four countries, so that in each of these countries there has been devised a separate orthography (in each case with Cyrillic letters) and grammatical standard, based on different Rusyn dialects. The cultural centres of Carpatho-Rusyn are Pre�ov in Slovakia, Uzhhorod and Mukacheve in Ukraine, Krynica and Legnica in Poland, and Budapest in Hungary. Many very active Rusyns also live in Canada and the USA.

It is very difficult to count the speakers of Rusyn, but their number is sometimes estimated at almost a million, most of them in Ukraine and Slovakia. The first country to officially recognize Rusyn, more exactly Pannonian Rusyn, as an official language was former Yugoslavia. In 1995, Rusyn has been recognized as a minority language in Slovakia, enjoying the status of official language in municipalities where more than 20% of the inhabitants speak Rusyn.

In the introduction to the book "Slavic languages," written in 1973, ten years before glasnost, Samuel Bernshtein writes about "western Ukrainians" and the "literary language" which they "until recently [i.e., 1973]" had.

Thank you Nonna for that information.

I will be an offical elections monitor at the upcoming federal elections in Ukraine. For some silly reason they have assigned me to Zakarpatska Oblast / Zakarpattia / Sub-Carpathian Rus/ Carpatho-Rus / Carpatho-Ukraine / ... etc...

I promise a full report when I return, and if I have access to a PC (which I should) I may even send a couple pictures with reports. Who knows, maybe I will even bump into the esteemed Prof. Magosci.

I.F.

Here is another point of view:


Ruthenians. A historic name for Ukrainians corresponding to the Ukrainian rusyny. The English �Ruthenians� (sometimes �Ruthenes�) is derived from the Latin Rutheni (singular Ruthenus), which also gave rise to the German Ruthenen and similar words in other languages. Originally the Latin name Rut(h)eni was applied to a Celtic tribe (see Celts) of ancient Gaul (their town Segodunum later became known as Rodez). The name Rutheni came to be applied to the inhabitants of Kyivan Rus� as a result of the medieval practice of giving newly encountered peoples the names of extinct ancient peoples. Boris Unbegaun has suggested that the attested Latin Rucenus, a rendering of the Old Ukrainian rusyn, was instrumental in the selection of the name Ruthenus. The first use of the word Ruteni in reference to the inhabitants of Rus� was in the Annales Augustiani of 1089. For centuries thereafter Rutheni was used in Latin as the designation of all East Slavs, particularly Ukrainians and Belarusians. In the 16th century the word more clearly began to be associated with the Ukrainians and Belarusians of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth as distinct from the Russians, who were designated Moscovitae.

After the partitions of Poland (1772�95) the term �Ruthenian� underwent further restriction. It came to be associated primarily with those Ukrainians who lived under the Habsburg monarchy, in Galicia, Bukovyna, and Transcarpathia. In 1843, at the request of the Greek Catholic metropolitan of Halych, Mykhailo Levytsky, the Austrian authorities established the term Ruthenen as the official name of the Ukrainians within the Austrian Empire. In the 1870s the central-Ukrainian political theorist Mykhailo Drahomanov, as well as his Galician disciples Ivan Franko and Mykhailo Pavlyk, used the term rutentsi (a Ukrainianized version of Ruthenen) to denote narrow-minded, provincial, and Habsburg-true members of the Galician Ukrainian intelligentsia. Although the term Ruthenen remained in official use until the collapse of the Habsburg monarchy in 1918, Galician Ukrainians themselves began to abandon that name (from around 1900) and its Ukrainian equivalent, rusyny, in favor of the self-designation ukraintsi (Ukrainians).

In the last decades of the existence of the Habsburg monarchy there was a massive wave of Ukrainian emigration from there to the Americas. In their new countries the emigrant Ukrainians were often referred to and referred to themselves as �Ruthenians.� In the interwar era the name �Ruthenian� became even more restricted: it was generally used to refer to the inhabitants of Transcarpathia and to Transcarpathian emigrants in the United States. Since the Second World War the term �Ruthenian� has been used as a self-designation almost exclusively by descendants of Transcarpathian emigrants in the United States, but since the 1970s even they have begun to abandon it in favor of the designation �Rusyn� or �Carpatho-Rusyn.� In official Catholic ecclesiastical language the term Rutheni was used in a wide sense, to denote all East Slavs of the Eastern church rite (Ukrainians of Galicia and Transcarpathia as well as Belarusians) until the early 1960s. Since then the term Rutheni has been used to refer only to Byzantine rite Catholics of Transcarpathian origin in the United States.

In 1991 the government of Slovakia recognized Ruthenians as a distinct national minority. The regional variation of Ukrainian, after several years of study, was proclaimed a new Slavic language in 1995 by the Rusyn Renaissance Society of Slovakia.

J.-P. Himka

Therefore, it would appear that the Byzantine Catholic Church here in the United States is misnamed. Wouldn't it be more accurately named the Rusyn Catholic Church?
Byzantine is much too general a term especially since Ukrainians, Russians, Slovaks, Hungarians, Melkites, etc. are technically all members of the Byzantine Church.
Is it time for a name change?

Dear Pavloosh,

Well not necessarily. I can tell you though that there are already churches in the U.S. with Rusyn in their name.

for example I found on the internet:
Christ the Savior Seminary of the American Carpatho-Rusyn Orthodox Church, Johnstown, PA

And I recall seeing it elsewhere.

Many churches retain a specific ethnic identity and express it in their name. What's wrong with that?

Plus there's this: (URL posted at the end)
"Undaunted, Father Ardan pushed for a convention of the recently organized Association of Rusyn Church Communities to settle the question of a separate exarchy for America's Greek-Catholics once and for all. At a conclave held on March 26, 1902, nine Galician priests (Ardan, Bonczevsky, Dmytriw, Konstankevych, Makar, Nizhankovskyj, Pidhoretsky, Simialo and Tymkevych) and 16 lay delegates representing eleven communities, discussed a total of nine questions regarding the future of the Greek-Catholic Church, including the most crucial one: "Should we American Rusyns recognize the pope of Rome as the head of the Rusyn Church or not?" After much heated debate, they resolved that: "Those gathered here consider the matter of breaking with Rome to be absolutely essential for the future good of the Rusyn Church and people in America. Nevertheless, due to the gravity of such a step, we think it necessary to carefully consider all of the nuances of such an action in an open discussion with the entire community before any further action is taken."

Other resolutions adopted demanded the formal acceptance of the name Ruska Cerkov (in English) for all Rusyn churches. Names such as "Greek Catholic," "Hungarian Greek Catholic," and "United Greek Catholic," all used by Rome and local Latin-rite bishops in the past, were rejected. They also asked for a guarantee of Rusyn Catholic Church autonomy with complete independence from Latin-rite Catholic bishops and priests; the immediate nullification of all guidelines set down by the Congregation de Propaganda Fide which governed the Rusyn Catholic Church in America; and the appointment of a Rusyn bishop in the United States elected by Rusyn priests and representatives of church lay councils and directly responsible to the pope and not to the Congregation de Propaganda de Fide. The resolutions passed at the Harrisburg conference elicited much discussion in articles which appeared in Svoboda between April 3 and June 5.

Rome attempted to mitigate the growing conflict with acts of token recognition. The appointment of Father Andrew Hodobai, an Uhro-Rusyn, as the "Apostolic Visitor" to Rusyn Catholics in 1902 was boycotted both by the Galician and, eventually, the Uhro-Rusyn priests. The battle for a bishop continued for the next five years with the American Circle and Svoboda leading the way. In "Pro Popivskyi Galir" (About Priest's Collars), Father Makar defended the right of Rusyn Catholic priests to eschew the wearing of "Roman" collars. Demands for a Rusyn bishop were repeated once again in Union in America, a publication of the Rusyn Church Association on October 12, 1902, and at a congress of Rusyn-Galicians in Yonkers, on December 26, 1903...In the end, efforts by the American Circle, Svoboda, and the RNS membership to establish an independent Catholic Church in the United States succeeded. On March 26, 1907, Rome appointed Father Soter Ortynsky, a Basilian monk from Galicia, the first bishop for Rusyn Catholics in America. Consecrated at St. George's Cathedral in Lviv on May 12, Bishop Ortynsky arrived in the United States on August 27.
http://www.ukrweekly.com/Archive/2004/200412.shtml

And check out what I found just googling "carpatho byzantine"
http://www.carpatho-rusyn.org/bogdan2.htm

Cher Jean Francois,

N'oublie pas que c'est le peuple soi-meme qui veut etre reconnu Rusyn, et qui veut que leur langue est reconnu Rusyn.

amitie,
Nonna
(mon francais n'est pas le meilleur!)

p.s. I certainly look forward to hearing about your experiences as election judge.

Sometimes I get the feeling it's like talking to a wall.
I give up!

Some days after visiting various forums I would rather talk to a wall...

james

My dear Ukrainian friends,

As you know, there are over 95 cultural groups in Ukraine who have been there for hundreds of years.

They have their own languages, institutions, in many cases distinct religions etc.

The Carpatho-Rusyns must be recognized and respected for who THEY say they are and want to be, not how anyone else says so.

Have we Ukrainians, after so many years of colonial occupation, not learned the meaning of "let us be ourselves?"

Alex

Dipping my toe into the mix...

This arguement seems to be a bit similar to the one that keeps going on - on various levels - between Macedonians and Bulgarians....

And that's all I am saying!

Anton

If you go to http://www.acrod.org you can see that they use the term "Carpatho-Russian" and not "Carpatho-Rusyn" in their official title.

Dave

Dear Anton,

If you Bulgarians don't leave the Macedonians alone, the spirit of Alexander the Great, their Slavic ancestor, will get you!

Alex

"Is it time for a name change?"

No, our jurisdiction does not just include Rusyns but Slovaks, Hungarians, and Croatians as well.

Fr. Deacon Lance

Dear Dave,

Yes you are right. In my experience (as a full-blooded Carpatho-rusyn/russian) Rusyn and Russian are used pretty interchangeably.

What people choose to call themselve is always an exercise in defining identity and history.

When it comes to what churches call themselves perhaps its an exercise in identifying the dominant ethnicity of the founding congregants and the jurisdiction of the founding Patriarchate.

with love and a wish for peace,
Nonna