Bells at Harvard

Monks seek 17th century bells from Harvard

By Associated Press, 1/11/2004

MOSCOW -- The Danilov Monastery's original 17th century bells ended up at Harvard University 73 years ago -- spared the destruction of a state atheism campaign. Now the monks are hoping to get them back.

The 18 bells stopped ringing in Russia after dictator Josef Stalin closed the monastery in 1930 and turned it into a camp for orphans as part of his campaign against religion. All but three of its monks were later executed.

The bells, however, were saved from being melted down when American industrialist Charles R. Crane bought and then donated them to Harvard in Cambridge.

Soon after the monastery was restored to the faithful in 1983, the monks began to petition Harvard, but had no success.

The bell tower over the monastery's St. Simon of the Stylites Church, razed during Soviet times, has been rebuilt, and life has returned to the monastery.

At a meeting with monastery representatives at Harvard last month, university officials agreed to finance a study of the feasibility and costs of removing and replacing the bronze bells.

During the visit, the monastery's chief bell ringer, Heirodeacon Roman Ogryzkov, got his first chance to ring the bells, the oldest of which was cast in 1682.

"Ringing them made a great impression on me, especially as during their pealing, I understood that these were the very same bells that our forefathers, our brothers, had rung, that they are witnesses to the history of our monastery," he said.

The Danilov Monastery, named for its 13th-century founder, Prince Daniil of Moscow, does not dispute Harvard's legal ownership of the bells.

The monks express gratitude to the institution for providing a haven for them during Stalin's repression of the dominant Russian Orthodox Church.

The dictator had thousands of bells from churches and monasteries across the Soviet Union smelted. Churches that were not torn down were used as breweries, factories, and secret police offices, among other facilities.

Restrictions on religion were relaxed in the late 1980s, and relations have vastly improved between the government and the church since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Seventeen of the bells -- including the largest, weighing more than 13 tons -- were placed in a specially constructed bell tower at Lowell House. The 18th was housed in the business school.

A resident tutor at Lowell House, Ian MacMullen, said students are fond of the bells and the traditions behind them. The resident "klappermeisters" who ring the bells on Sundays and special occasions take their duties seriously, he said.

The monks, however, view the bells not as musical instruments, but as sacred objects that have helped generations of monks communicate with God.

"Bells are the church instrument for calling believers to prayers. From them emanate the voice of heaven on earth," said the head of the monastery, archimandrite Alexy Polykarpov.

The Danilov bells are probably one of only five surviving pre-Revolutionary sets.

As beloved as the bells have become to Lowell House, MacMullen said he feels they should be returned to Russia. Any set of comparable bells would serve the residence just as well, he said.

"If we could press a button and the switch were to happen without any inconvenience, cost, or disruption, then I think Lowell House would not know the difference," he said.

Should a final agreement be reached, the Russian side would pay all the transportation costs and for replacing the bells at Harvard.

The monastery already has launched a fund-raising campaign, but Polykarpov knows it will be difficult.

"We are praying for it. We are asking God, asking our protector Prince Daniil, that he make us this gift," Polykarpov said.