EDUCATION OF THE SOUTH SLAVS AT KIEV THEOLOGICAL ACADEMY

The article fully characterises education of the South Slavs at the Kiev Theological Academy according to thestudying new archival documents. It was found the content of the educational process, the problems facedby foreign students and how they were solved in the academy. It is shown the Russian Empire authorities’interest in the preparation of the clergy for the Balkans. It is exposed the solidarity of the South Slavic youthwith the Ukrainian people concerning the non-acceptance of gendarmerie-police management methodsin Ukraine. The fates of graduates after studying in Kiev are studied.The purpose of this study is to determine the reasons of education of the South Slavs at the Kiev TheologicalAcademy, the content of the educational process and participation of the South Slavic youth in the publicrealities of contemporary Ukraine. In the early twentieth century and before the establishment of Soviet authorityin Ukraine, the South Slavs received higher and professional education here. A small number of educationalestablishments at homeland, economic and political instability in the Balkans almost to the end of the First WorldWar contributed to the moving of young people to foreign countries for education. The situation was usedby countries, who inculcated their ideology on foreign students during the study process, justifying and ensuringthe successful penetration of their policies on the lands of the South Slavs. Those students who studied in Ukraine,had to become the spokesmen for the interests of the Russian Empire in the Balkans. Actually, educationalinstitutions successfully coped with these tasks. Thus, the Kiev Theological Academy defended and propagatedthe imperial ideas of tsarist Russia through education of foreigners in it. Selection of candidates from other countriesfor studying was not accidental.The religious factor was the leading in lobbying foreign policy interests of the Russian Empire. The SouthSlavs were represented by Bulgarians, Serbs, Montenegrins, Macedonians and Bosnians with Herzegovinians.The Croats and Slovenes were called Austrian Slavs at that time in Russia, and since they belonged to theCatholic world, the work with them was in other spheres. The South Slavs who studied at the KTA were plungedinto the social and political processes that took place in Ukraine, and together with the Ukrainian intelligentsiaand studentship formed the international educational process that lasted in Ukraine till the establishmentof the Bolshevik regime. The content of unsent letters to the home of Balkan students indicated an understandingof the difference between what the higher-education teaching personnel of the Academy said and what theysaw and heard on the Kyiv streets and other cities of Ukraine. The South Slavic youth expressed solidaritywith the Ukrainian people concerning the non-acceptance of the gendarmerie-police management methodsin Ukraine. The ideas of the Slavic consolidation and equality, declared by the Russian Empire and determinedas the core of foreign policy activity, were not supported by the authorities on its lands. Understandingthese circumstances, the South Slav students were cooled to imperial propaganda that Russia is the centreof Slavic unity and a fighter for the independence of the Balkan Slavs. Public moods of Ukrainian communitysignificantly influenced the formation of such a position of the South Slavs.