title: History of writing

text: According to Denise Schmandt-Besserat writing had its origins in the counting and cataloguing of agricultural produce, and then economic transactions involving the produce. Government tax rolls followed thereafter. Written documents became essential for the accumulation, accounting, of wealth by individuals, the state, and religious organizations as well as the transactions of trade, loans, inheritance, and documentation of ownership. With such documentation and accounting larger accumulations of wealth became more possible, along with the power that accompanied wealth, most prominently to the benefit of royalty, the state, and religions. Contracts and loans supported the growth of long-distance international trade with accompanying networks for import and export, supporting the rise of capitalism. Paper money (initially appearing in China in the 11th century CE) and other financial instruments relied on writing, initially in the form of letters and then evolving into specialized genres, to explain the transactions and guarantees (from individuals, banks, or governments) of value inhering in the documents. With the growth of economic activity in late Medieval and Renaissance Europe, sophisticated methods of accounting and calculating value emerged, with such calculations both carried out in writing and explained in manuals. The creation of corporations then proliferated documents surrounding organization, management, the distribution of shares, and record-keeping.


title: History of writing

text: Economic theory itself only began to be developed in the latter eighteenth century through the writings of such theorists as Francois Quesnay and Adam Smith. Even the concepts of an economy and a national economy were established through their texts and the texts of their colleagues. Since then economics has developed as a field with many authors contributing texts to the professional literature, and governments collecting data, instituting policies and creating institutions to manage and advance their economies. Diedre McCloskey has examined the rhetorical strategies and discursive construction of modern economic theory. Graham Smart has examined in depth how the Bank of Canada uses writing to cooperatively produce policies based on economic data and then to communicate strategically with relevant publics.


title: History of writing

text: The identification of sacred religious texts or scriptures, often claimed to be of divine origin, codified distinct belief systems associated with particular divine texts, and became the basis of the modern concept of religion. The reproduction and spread of these texts became associated with these scriptural religions and their spread, and thus were central to proselytizing. These sacred books created obligations of believers to read, or to follow the teachings of priests or priestly castes charged with the reading, interpretation and application of these texts. Well-known examples of such scriptures are the Torah, the Bible (with its many different compilations of books of the Old and New Testaments), the Quran, the Vedas, the Bhaghavad Gita, and the Sutras, but there are far more religious texts through the histories of different religions with many still in current use. These texts, because of their spread tended to foster generalized guides for moral and ethical behavior, at least for all members of the religious community, but often these guidelines were considered applicable to all humans, as in the ten commandments.


title: History of writing

text: Private legal documents for the sale of land appeared in Mesopotamia in the early third millennium BCE, not long after the initial appearance of cuneiform writing. The first written legal codes followed shortly thereafter around 2100 BCE, with the most well known being the Code of Hammurabi, inscribed on stone stellae throughout Babylon circa 1750 BCE.  While Ancient Egypt did not have codified laws, legal decrees and orivate contracts did appear in the Old Kingdom around 2150 BCE. The Torah, or the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, particularly Exodus and Deutoronomy, codified the laws of Ancient Israel. Many other codes were to follow in Greece and Rome, with Roman law to serve as a model for church canon law and secular law throughout much of Europe during later periods.


title: History of writing

text: In China the earliest indications of written codifications of law or book of punishments" are inscriptions on bronze vessels in 536 BCE. The earliest extant full set of laws dates back to the Qin and Han Dynasties, which set out a full system of social control and governance, with criminal procedures and accountability for both government officials and citizens. These laws required complex reporting and documenting procedures to facilitate hierarchical supervision from the village up to the imperial center.


title: History of writing

text: While Common Law developed in a mostly oral environment in England after the Romans left, with the return of the church and then the Norman invasion, customary law began to be inscribed as were precedents of the courts; however, many elements remained oral, with documents only memorializing public oaths, wills, land transfers, court judgments, and ceremonies. During the late Medieval period, however, documents gained authority for agreements, transactions, and laws. With the founding of the United States laws were created as statutes within written codes and controlled by central documents, including the federal and state Constitutions, with all such legislative documents printed and distributed. Also court judgments were presented in written opinions which then were published and served as precedents for reasoning in consequent judgments in states and nationally. Courts of Appeals in the United States only consider documents relating to records of prior proceedings and judgements and do not take new testimony,


title: History of writing

text: Writing has been central to expanding many of the core functions of governance through law, regulation, taxation, and documentary surveillance of citizens; all dependent on growth of bureaucracy which elaborates and administers rules and policies and maintains records (see red tape). These developments which rely on writing increase the power and extent of states. At the same time writing has increased the ability of citizens to become informed about the operations of the state, to become more organized in expressing needs and concerns, to identify with regions and states, and to form constituencies with particular views and interests; the rise and fate of journalism is closely linked to citizen information, regional and national identity, and expression of interests. These changes have greatly influenced the nature of states, increasing the visibility of people and their views no matter what the form of governance is.


title: History of writing

text: Extensive bureaucracies arose in the ancient Near East and China which relied on the formation of literate classes to be scribes and bureaucrats. In the Ancient Near East this was carried out through the formation of scribal schools, while in China this led to a series of written imperial examinations based on classic texts which in effect regulated education over millennia. Literacy remained associated with rise in the government bureaucracy, and printing as it emerged was tightly controlled by the government, with vernacular texts only emerging later and then being limited in their range up through the early twentieth century and the fall of the Ching dynasty. In ancient Greece and Rome, class distinctions of citizen and slave, wealthy and poor limited education and participation. In Medieval and early modern Europe church dominance of education, both before and for a time after the reformation, expressed the importance of religion in the control of the state and state bureaucracies.


title: History of writing

text: In Europe and the colonies in the Americas the introduction of the printing press and decreasing cost of paper and printing allowed for greater access of ordinary citizens to gain information about the government and conditions in other regions within the jurisdictions. The Reformation with an emphasis on individual reading of sacred texts, eventually increased the spread of literacy beyond the governing classes and opened the door to wider knowledge and criticism of government actions. Divisions in English society during the sixteenth century, the Civil War of the seventeenth century, and the increased role of parliament that followed, along with the splitting of political religious control were accompanied by pamphlet wars.


title: History of writing

text: Newspapers and journalism, having origins in commercial information, soon was to offer political information and was instrumental to the formation of a public sphere. Newspapers were instrumental in the sharing of information, fostering discussion, and forming political identities in the American revolution, and then the new nation.  The circulation of newspapers also created urban, regional, and state identification in the latter nineteenth century and after. A focus on national news that followed telegraphy and the emergence of newspapers with national circulation along with scripted national radio and television news broadcasts also created horizons of attention through the twentieth century, with both benefits and costs.


title: History of writing

text: Much of what we consider knowledge is inscribed in written text and is the result of communal processes of production, sharing, and evaluation among social groups and institutions bound together with the aim of producing and disseminating knowledge-bearing texts; in the contemporary world we identify such social groups as disciplines and their products disciplinary literatures. The invention of writing facilitated the sharing, comparing, criticizing, and evaluating of texts, resulting in knowledge becoming a more communal property across wider geographic and temporal domains. Sacred scriptures formed the common knowledge of scriptural religions, and knowledge of those sacred scriptures became the focus of institutions of religious belief, interpretation, and schooling, as discussed in the section on writing and religion in this article. Other sections in this article are devoted to knowledge specific to the economy, the law, and governance. This section is devoted to the development of secular knowledge and its related social organizations, institutions, and educational practices in other domains.


title: History of writing

text: In Mesopotamia and Egypt, scribes became important for roles beyond the initiating roles in the economy, governance and law. They became the producers and stewards of astronomy and calendars, divination, and literary culture. Schools developed in tablet houses, which also archived repositories of knowledge. In ancient India, the Brahman caste became stewards texts that aggregated and codified oral knowledge. Those texts then became the authoritative basis for a continuing tradition of oral education. A case in point is the work of Pāṇini the linguist, who analyzed and codified knowledge of Sanskrit syntax, prosody and grammar. Mathematics, astronomy and medicine were also subjects of classic Indian learning and were codified in classic texts. Less is known about Mayan, Aztec, and other Mesoamerican learning because of the destruction of texts by the conquistadors, but it is known that scribes were revered, elite children attended schools, and the study of astronomy, map making, historical chronicles, and genealogy flourished.


title: History of writing

text: In China, after the Qin dynasty attempted to remove all traces of the competing Confucian tradition, the Han dynasty made philological knowledge the qualification for the government bureaucracy, so as to restore knowledge that was in danger of vanishing. The Imperial civil service examination system, which was to last for two millennia, consisted of a written exam based on knowledge of classical texts.  To support students obtaining government positions through the written examination, schools focused on those same texts and the associated philological knowledge. These texts covered philosophical, religious, legal, astronomical, hydrological, mathematical, military, and medical knowledge. Printing as it emerged largely served the knowledge needs of the bureaucracy and the monastery, with substantial vernacular printing only emerging around the fifteenth century CE.


title: History of writing

text: Ancient Greece gave rise to much written knowledge that influenced western learning for two millennia. Although Plato thought writing an inferior means of transmission of learning (recounted in the Phaedrus), we know of his works through Socrates' written accounts of his dialogues. Havelock, as well, has seen the philosophic works of Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle as arising from literacy and the ability to compare accounts from different regions and to develop systematic critical reasoning through the inspection of documents and writing coherent accounts. Aristotle wrote treatises and lectures which were the core of education at the Lyceum, along with the may volumes collected in the Lyceum's library. Other philosophers such as the Stoics and Epicureans also wrote and taught during the same period in Athens, although we now have only fragments of their works.


title: History of writing

text: Greek writers were the founding writers of many other fields of knowledge. Herodotus and Thucydides writing during the fifth century BCE in Athens are considered the founders of history, transforming genealogy and mythic accounts into systematic investigations of events. Thucydides developed a more critical, neutral history through the examination of documents, transcription of speeches, and interviews. Hippocrates during the same period authored several major works of medicine codifying and advancing the knowledge of this field. In the second century CE the Greek trained physician Galen went to Rome where he wrote numerous works that dominated European medical though the Renaissance. Hellenized writers in Egypt also produced compendia of knowledge using the resources of the great library at Alexandria, such as Euclid whose "Elements" of geometry remains a standard reference to today. Ptolemy's work on astronomy dominated through the Middle Ages.


title: History of writing

text: Scholars in Rome continued the practice of writing compendia of knowledge, including Varro, Pliny the Elder, and Strabo. While much of Roman accomplishment was in material culture of construction, Vitruvius documented much of the contemporary practice to influence design until today. Agriculture also became an important area for manuals, such as Palladius' compendium. Numerous manuals of rhetoric and rhetorical education that were to influence future generations also appeared, such as the anonymous "Rhetorica ad Herennium", Cicero's "de Oratore" and Quintilian's "Institutio Oratoria."


title: History of writing

text: With the fall of Rome, the Middle East became the crossroads for learning, with knowledge bearing texts from the West and East meeting in Byzantium, Damascus, and then Baghdad. In Baghdad a research institute (or House of Wisdom) with a large library was founded, where Greek works of medicine, philosophy, mathematics and astronomy were translated into Arabic, along with Indian works on mathematics and therapeutics. To these texts, philosophers such as Al-Kindi and Avicenna and astronomers such as Al-Farqhani made new contributions. Al-Kharazami authored the first work on algebra, drawing on both Greek and Indian resources. The centrality of the Quran to the new Islamic religion also led to growth of Arabic Linguistics. From Baghdad knowledge and texts were to flow back to South Asia and down through Africa, with a large collection of books and an educational center around the Sankhore Mosque in Timbuktu, the seat of the Songhai Empire. During this period the deposed Abbasid Caliphate moved its seat of power and learning to Córdoba, now in Spain, where they founded a major library which reintroduced many of the classic texts back into Europe along with texts of Arab learning.


title: History of writing

text: The reintroduction of classic texts into Europe through the library and intercultural intellectual culture in Córdoba, including works of Plato, Aristotle, Euclid, Ptolemy and Galen, along with Arabic texts such as by Avicenna and Al-Kharazami created a need for interpretation, lectures, and scholarship to make those works more accessible to scholars in monasteries and urban centers. During the twelfth century universities emerged from these clusters of scholars in Italy at Bologna; in Spain at Salamanca, in France at Paris and in England at Oxford. By 1500 there were at least sixty universities throughout Europe enrolling at least three quarters of a million students. Each of the four faculties (Liberal Arts, Theology, Law, and Medicine) was devoted to the transmission of classic texts rather than the production of fresh knowledge beyond lectures and commentaries. This form of scholastic education continued well into the seventeenth century and beyond in some locations and disciplines.


title: History of writing

text: Johannes Gutenberg’s European introduction of the moveable type printing press around 1450 created new opportunities for the production and widespread distribution of books, fostering much new writing, with particular consequences for the development of knowledge, as documented by Elizabeth Eisenstein. The production and distribution of knowledge was no longer tied to monasteries or universities with their libraries and collections of scribal copies. In the ensuing centuries a politically and increasingly religiously divided Europe, no single authority was able to censor or control the production of books. While universities remained attached to disseminating traditional texts, publishing houses became the new centers of knowledge production, and publishing houses in different jurisdictions led to a diversity of ideas becoming available as books moved across borders and scholars came to see themselves as citizens of the Republic of Letters.


title: History of writing

text: The comparison of multiple editions of traditional texts led to improved textual scholarship. The ability to share and compare results from many regions and enlist more people into the production of science soon led to the development of early modern science. Books of medicine began to incorporate observations from contemporary surgery and dissections, including printed plates providing graphic displays, to improve knowledge of anatomy. With many copies of traditional books and new books appearing, debates arose over the value of each in what became known as the battle of the books. Maps and discoveries of exploration and colonization also were recorded in books and governmental records, often with the purpose of economic exploitation as in the Archives of the Indies in Seville but also to satisfy curiosity about the world.


title: History of writing

text: Printing also made possible the invention and development of scientific journals, with the "Journal des sçavans" appearing in France and The Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society in England both in 1665. Over the years these journals proliferated and became the basis of disciplines and disciplinary literatures. Genres reporting experiments and other scientific observations and theories developed over the ensuing centuries to produce modern practices of disciplinary publication with the extensive intertexts which represent the collective pursuits of disciplinary knowledge. The availability of scientific and disciplinary books and journals also facilitated the development of modern practices of scientific reference and citation. These developments from the impact of printing on the growth of knowledge contributed to the scientific revolution, science in the Renaissance and science in the Age of Enlightenment.


title: History of writing

text: In the eighteenth century a few Scottish and English dissident universities began offering some more practical and contemporary studies offered instruction in rhetoric and writing to enable their non-elite students to influence contemporary events. Only in the nineteenth century, however, did universities in some countries begin creating place for the writing of new knowledge, turning them in the ensuing years from primarily disseminating classic knowledge through the reading of classic texts to becoming institutions devoted to both reading and writing. The creation of research seminars and the associated seminar papers in history and philology in German Universities were a significant starting point for the reform of the university. Professorships in philology, history, economy, theology, psychology, sociology, mathematics and the sciences were to emerge over the century, and the German model of disciplinary research university was to influence the organization of universities in England and the United States, with another model developing in France. Both, however, prized the production of new knowledge by faculty and to be learned by students. In elite British universities writing instruction was supported by the tutorial system with weekly writing by students for their tutors, while in the United States regular courses in writing were often required starting in the late nineteenth century, with writing across the curriculum becoming an increasing focus, particularly towards the end of the twentieth century.


title: History of writing

text: Military knowledge of strategies and devices date back to the ancient worlds of Egypt, India, China, Greece, and Rome, with both historical accounts and manuals for conducting war. After printing was introduced in the West, manuals for construction of fortifications and battle strategies were widely reproduced, as nations frequently were in conflict. With the growth of chemistry and other sciences, however, knowledge of new weaponry was frequently restricted to secret documents. Other documents also of limited distribution developed around policies, production, and distribution of the new weaponry. By World War I, both the Allied and Axis powers applied new technologies based on scientific advances to military uses, particularly chemical weapons, with over 5000 scientists engaged in developing and producing weaponry, while attempting to limit access to the information in secret documents. The drive towards secret knowledge, including novel research and not just applications of prior knowledge, became especially intense with the race to develop nuclear weapons in World War II as in the U.S. Manhattan Project. Aviation, rocketry, radar, encryption, and computing were also the subject of classified documents. This system of classification of knowledge continued after WWII ended as the Cold War ensued. The tension between the needs for military secrecy, open scientific research, and citizen deliberation over military policy led in the United States led to the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, which created civilian control, but through a continuing regime of classified knowledge .


title: History of writing

text: The history of literature followed after the development of writing in Sumer, which was initially used for accounting purposes. The very first writings from ancient Sumer by any reasonable definition do not constitute literature. The same is true of some of the early Egyptian hieroglyphics and the thousands of ancient Chinese government records. Scholars have disagreed concerning when written record-keeping became more like literature, but the oldest surviving literary texts date from a full millennium after the invention of writing. The earliest literary author known by name is Enheduanna, who is credited as the author of a number of works of Sumerian literature, including "Exaltation of Inanna", in the Sumerian language during the 24th century BCE. The next earliest named author is Ptahhotep, who is credited with authoring "The Maxims of Ptahhotep", an instructional book for young men in Egyptian composed in the 23rd century BCE. The Epic of Gilgamesh is an early notable poem, but it can also be seen as a political glorification of the historical King Gilgamesh of Sumer whose natural and supernatural accomplishments are recounted.


title: History of writing

text: Walter Ong, Jack Goody, and Eric Havelock were among the earliest to systematically argue for the psychological and intellectual consequences of literacy. Ong argued that the introduction of writing changed the form of human consciousness from sensing the immediacy of the spoken word to the critical distance and systematization of words, which could be graphically displayed and ordered, such as in the works of Peter Ramus. Havelock attributed the emergence of Greek philosophic thought to the use of the written word which allowed the comparison of beliefs and belief systems and the critical examination of concepts. Jack Goody argued that written language fostered such practices as categorization, making lists, following formulas, developing recipes and prescriptions, and ultimately making and recording experiments. These practices changed the intellectual and psychological orientation of those who engaged with them.


title: History of writing

text: While recognizing the possibilities of all these psychological and intellectual changes that accompanied these literate practices, Sylvia Scribner and Michael Cole argued that these changes did not come universally or automatically with literacy, but rather were dependent on the social uses made of literacy in their local contexts. They carried out field observation and experiments among the Vai people of West Africa, who have three different psychological of literacy following the social practices associated with three different kinds of language. European language literacies were associated with European style schooling, and fostered among other things syllogistic reasoning and logical problem solving. Arabic literacy was associated with the religious training of Madrasas and fostered, among other things, heightened rote memory. Literacy in the written forms of Vai associated with daily practices of making requests and explaining tasks, increased anticipation of audience knowledge and needs along with rebus solving (as the written language used rebus-like icons).


title: History of writing

text: Following a different line of Inquiry, James Pennebaker and colleagues have carried out many experiments establishing that writing about traumas can relieve anxiety, improve mental well-being, and improve physical health measures and outcomes.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: An ongoing outbreak of monkeypox, a viral disease, was confirmed in May 2022. The initial cluster of cases was found in the United Kingdom, where the first case was detected in London on 6 May 2022 in a patient with a recent travel history from Nigeria (where the disease is endemic). On 16 May, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) confirmed 4 new cases with no link to travel to a country where monkeypox is endemic. All four cases appeared to have been infected in London. From 18 May onwards, cases were reported from an increasing number of countries and regions, predominantly in Europe but also in North and South America, in Asia, in Africa, and in Oceania. The outbreak marks the first time monkeypox has spread widely outside Central and West Africa.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 23 July, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, declared the outbreak a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC). As of 14 November, there had been a total of 79,151 confirmed cases in over 111 countries.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Monkeypox is a viral infection that manifests a week or two after exposure with fever and other non-specific symptoms, and then produces a rash with lesions that usually last for 2–4 weeks before drying up, crusting and falling off. While monkeypox can cause large numbers of lesions, in the current outbreak, some patients experience only a single lesion in the mouth or on the genitals, making it more difficult to differentiate from other infections. In infections before the current outbreak, 1–3 percent of people with known infections have died (without treatment). Cases in children and immunocompromised people are more likely to be severe.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Monkeypox spreads through close, personal, often skin-to-skin contact. The disease can spread through direct contact with rashes, or body fluids from an infected person, by touching objects and fabrics that have been used by someone with monkeypox or through respiratory secretions. Given the unexpected and vast geographical spread of the disease, the actual number of cases is likely to be underestimated. While anyone can get monkeypox, to date the majority of confirmed cases outside of the endemic regions in Africa occurred in young or middle-aged men who have sex with men (MSM) who had recent sexual contact with new or multiple partners. On 28 July, the WHO Director-General advised MSM to limit exposure by reducing the number of sexual partners, reconsidering sex with new partners, and maintaining contact details to allow for epidemiological follow-up. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has emphasized the importance of reducing stigma in communicating about the demographic aspects of monkeypox, specifically with regards to gay and bisexual men.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: In March 2021, the Nuclear Threat Initiative led a tabletop exercise at the Munich Security Conference simulating hypothetical public health responses to the release of a genetically manipulated strain of monkeypox.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 23 July 2022, the World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus declared the 2022 outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention had alerted several members of the African Union in May 2022 about cases of monkeypox. The director of the Africa CDC, Ahmed Ogwell, said that Cameroon, Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria have reported 1,405 endemic cases with 62 deaths during the first five months of 2022. The case fatality rate in these four African countries combined was 4.4%.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: In an article in "The Conversation", Oyewale Tomori pointed out that the number of monkeypox infections in Nigeria through 2021 is likely to be under-reported because much of the Nigerian population has been avoiding healthcare facilities due to fear of contracting COVID-19. Nigeria's surveillance of various diseases, including monkeypox, had to focus on the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021, missing many cases and resulting in a drop in official statistics. As British health authorities reported the first case of monkeypox in the UK in May 2022, the Nigerian government has released to the public information and statistics on reported cases and deaths in the country. In the report of 9 May 2022, the NCDC stated that 230 cases were confirmed across 20 states and the Federal Capital Territory between 2017 and 2022. Rivers State was the most affected, followed by Bayelsa and Lagos. In the span from 2017 to 2022, the NCDC reported six deaths in six different states, making for a 3.3% case fatality ratio. On 30 May, the first death from monkeypox was reported in Nigeria during 2022; the last time a death was reported in the country from this disease was in 2019.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Monkeypox is endemic to West and Central Africa. Prior to the 2022 outbreak, the United Kingdom had recorded only seven previous cases of monkeypox, all of which were imported cases from Africa or healthcare workers involved in their treatment. The first three such cases were in 2018, followed by a further case in 2019 and three more in 2021. The only major monkeypox outbreak to be recorded in a Western country prior to 2022 was the 2003 Midwest monkeypox outbreak in the United States, which did not feature community transmission.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Phylogenomic characterization of the first monkeypox virus outbreak genome sequences, found the "presumably slow-evolving" DNA virus has evolved roughly 6–12-fold more mutations than one would expect and 15 SNP mutations since the beginning of the outbreak.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: As of June 2022, ring-vaccinations and pre-exposure vaccination of MSM are strategies being advanced in some countries to contain the outbreak. Local transmission leading to sizeable clusters may have gone unnoticed for some time.<ref name="10.1093/ofid/ofac310"></ref> Two vaccines are currently available. A short review suggests supportive care may typically be sufficient and that several antivirals and vaccinia immune globulin intravenous (VIGIV) are available as treatments. Better understanding of the new monkeypox variant is important for accelerating the development of vaccines and drugs.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: The UK Human Animal Infections and Risk Surveillance (HAIRS) group warned that the virus could reach wildlife and become endemic as a result. There is a concern that if the ongoing outbreak is prolonged, it "could establish new ecological niches in wild animals" in regions outside of Africa.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Scientists are investigating circulating lineages (and potential variants) of the monkeypox virus and are comparing them against the African endemic lineages.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: In July 2022, scientists reported that the window to be able to contain the outbreak is closing or has closed.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: An analysis of studies by a journalist indicates that "about 10-to-15% of cases have been hospitalized, mostly for pain and bacterial infections that can occur as a result of monkeypox lesions". Studies published a month later, in August indicated hospitalizations of small cohorts of early patients were 8% and 13%.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: In the beginning of May 2022, a case of monkeypox in a British resident who had travelled to Lagos and Delta State in Nigeria, in areas where monkeypox is considered to be an endemic disease, was reported. The person developed a rash on 29 April while in Nigeria and flew back to the United Kingdom, arriving on 4 May, and presented to hospital later the same day. Monkeypox infection was immediately suspected, and the patient was hospitalised at a specialist clinical unit of the Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust and isolated, then tested positive for the virus on 6 May. Testing of patient swab samples by polymerase chain reaction revealed the outbreak to be of clade II of monkeypox, which is the less deadly of the two known monkeypox variants with a case fatality rate of around 1%. The genomic sequence of the virus associated with this outbreak was first published on 19 May by Portuguese researchers.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Extensive contact tracing of people who had been in contact with the index case both on the international flight from Nigeria to the United Kingdom and within the country following their arrival was carried out, with potential contacts advised to remain aware of the symptoms of monkeypox and immediately isolate if any were to develop within 21 days of the contact event. Following this contact tracing effort, the World Health Organization (WHO) considered further transmission of the virus within the United Kingdom to be of "minimal" risk. Contact tracing was extended to Scotland on 14 May according to Public Health Scotland. A "small number" of people in Scotland were ordered to self-isolate following close contact with the person initially reported to have been infected, although overall risk to the general public remained "very low".


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 12 May two new cases of monkeypox were confirmed by the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), both in London, living together in the same household, with no known link between either of them and either the index case or travel to endemic regions. One of the new cases was hospitalised at St Mary's Hospital, while the other case with milder symptoms was said to be self-isolating at home. On 17 May, another four cases of monkeypox were confirmed by the UKHSA in three Londoners and a person in North East England who had previously travelled to London.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Unusually, none of these new cases had any known contact history with the previous three confirmed cases, which suggested a kind of transmission that had not been seen before, a wider community transmission of the virus in the London area. The UKHSA stated that the risk to the general public remained "very low". Patients with active monkeypox infection were confirmed to be hospitalised at the Royal Victoria Infirmary in Newcastle upon Tyne and at the Royal Free Hospital and Guy's Hospital in London.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Also on 20 May, UK Health Secretary Sajid Javid reported that another eleven cases had been confirmed, bringing the total in the country to twenty. UKHSA reported on 10 June that 311 of the 314 cases where sex was known were men, and that all of the 151 infected persons who filled out an additional questionnaire and answered questions about sexual practices were men who have sex with men, abbreviated MSM. Dr. Susan Hopkins from the UKHSA urged watchfulness among men who have sex with men. The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) advised people who have had close contact with a person infected with monkeypox to self-isolate for 21 days.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Further cases in multiple countries outside the endemic area were reported through the second half of May 2022. On 18 May, Portugal reported 14 cases of monkeypox. In Spain, there were seven confirmed cases as of 18 May. On the same day, the United States confirmed its first 2022 case of monkeypox and Canada reported 13 suspected cases.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 19 May, Sweden, Belgium and Italy confirmed their first cases. On 20 May, Australia, Germany, France and the Netherlands confirmed their first cases. For the remainder of May, multiple European countries and Israel confirmed their first cases. The United Arab Emirates and Mexico also confirmed their first cases.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 23 May, David Heymann, an advisor for the World Health Organization, said that the likely theory of how the outbreak started is transmission during sexual intercourse of gay and bisexual men at two raves in Belgium and Spain. On 25 May, "The Guardian" stated that many scientists suspect the disease was circulating across Europe before reaching the MSM community, possibly misdiagnosed or detected only in isolated cases; four cases were diagnosed in 2018 and 2019, all in individuals who recently arrived from Nigeria.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: In addition to more common symptoms, such as fever, headache, swollen lymph nodes, and rashes or lesions, some patients have also experienced proctitis, an inflammation of the rectum lining. CDC has also warned clinicians to not rule out monkeypox in patients with sexually transmitted infections since there have been reports of co-infections with syphilis, gonorrhea, chlamydia, and herpes.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: The first death outside of endemic Africa was reported in Brazil on 29 July 2022, in a 41-year-old man with underlying comorbidities. On the same day Spain reported its first death, a 44-year-old man in Alicante, with the cause of death being encephalitis associated with monkeypox infection. Spain reported its second monkeypox-related death on 30 July 2022, in a 31-year-old man in Córdoba, who had also suffered from encephalitis according to reports. On 1 August 2022 India confirmed its first monkeypox death, a 22-year-old male who died in Thrissur, Kerala on 30 July. On the same day, Peru reported the death of a monkeypox-affected 45-year-old male, who also had HIV and septic shock.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 30 August 2022 a Texan from Harris County became the first American to die of the monkeypox epidemic.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: A large portion of those infected had not recently travelled to areas of Africa where monkeypox is endemic, such as Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo as well as central and western Africa. It is transmitted by close contact with infected people, with extra caution for those individuals with lesions on their skin or genitals, along with their bedding and clothing. The disease can spread via respiratory secretions or by direct contact with rashes, body fluids or by touching objects and fabrics that have been used by someone with monkeypox. The CDC has also stated that individuals should avoid contact and consumption of dead animals such as rats, squirrels, monkeys and apes along with wild game or lotions derived from animals in Africa.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: The 2022 outbreak initially had a different pattern of spread compared to prior monkeypox outbreaks outside Africa. Genetic evidence suggest the outbreak likely started in Nigeria. Given the unusually high frequency of human-to-human transmission observed in this event, and the probable community transmission without history of traveling to endemic areas, spread of the virus through close contact is more likely, with transmission during sexual activities being the most common route. Most cases have been in men. A significant proportion of cases, although not all, are in men who have sex with men (MSM), notably in Canada, Spain, and the UK, with many cases diagnosed in sexual health clinics. Cases are mostly in young and middle-aged men. This points to transmission due to close contact during sex as being the main route of transmission. In May 2022, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) considered the monkeypox virus to be moderately transmissible among humans. According to the centre, among MSM who contracted the virus, the most common means of transmission is likely through sexual activity due to intimate contact with infectious skin lesions. The ECDC rated likelihood of transmission due to close contact, including sexual contact, as "high", but, without close contact, as low. In "Nature", Anne Rimoin and Raina MacIntyre speculate that the higher percentage of MSM affected is a result of coincidental introduction to the community and then sexual activity constituting "close contact" rather than the virus itself becoming sexually transmitted. However, in a study published in August 2022, infectious monkeypox virus was able to be isolated from semen samples, and the prolonged shedding of virus in seminal fluids raised the possibility of a genital reservoir for human monkeypox.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 21 July, a study on a sample of 528 infections diagnosed between 27 April and 24 June outside endemic regions in Africa indicated that: 99% cases were in men; 98% of cases occurred in the community of men who have sex with men (MSM), mainly those who have multiple sex partners (median of 5 partners in the previous 3 months); 75% were white; 41% had HIV/AIDS, of which 96% were on antiretroviral therapy, while 57% of the persons who were not known to have HIV infection were on pre-exposure prophylaxis; 29% had another concomitant sexually transmitted infection; and in the previous month, 32% attended a sex on premises venue and 20% engaged in chemsex.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 2 August, data collected by the Joint ECDC-WHO Regional Office for Europe Monkeypox Surveillance indicated that 99% (15,439/15,572) of the cases reported throughout the European region were among males, with 44% among MSM, 1% among heterosexuals and another 55% in males whose sexual orientation is unknown. Among cases with known HIV status, 36% (2,690/7,487) were HIV-positive.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: A preprint suggests that cases "where a small fraction of individuals have disproportionately large numbers of partners, can explain the sustained growth of monkeypox cases among the MSM population".


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: The reproduction number during the initial phase of the 2022 global outbreak of monkeypox was estimated to be 1.29.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: As the monkeypox outbreak developed, nosocomial and other forms of human-to-human spread became apparent, with a notable example being a doctor in an Israeli hospital becoming infected probably while removing protective clothing after examining monkeypox patients. Contaminated surfaces within hospitals and households may be infectious, with widespread contamination of surface and air samples taken from monkeypox isolation rooms in UK hospitals being documented.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: In August, the first known case of probable human-to-dog transmission was reported with the canine exhibiting very similar signs and symptoms of monkeypox infection to that of humans. A preprint indicates there can be (rare) asymptomatic infections.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: A study from the Faculty of Medicine, Chulalongkorn University, reported Multiple traces of monkeypox were detected in non-sewered wastewater with sparse sampling collected from both the Bangkok, Thailand with increasing concentrations from June to August 2022. This is the first dataset related to Monkeypox viral DNA in wastewater in Bangkok. Monkeypox viral DNA was first detected in wastewater in the second week of June 2022. From the first week of July, the number of viral DNA copies increased. Sanger sequencing confirmed the identification of the monkeypox virus and its relation to the 2022 monkeypox outbreak.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Smallpox vaccines containing vaccinia such as Imvanex (Jynneos) and ACAM2000 can provide around 85% effectiveness against monkeypox. This protection level is calculated from studies using smallpox vaccines tested in late 1980 in Africa. According to the CDC the vaccination with Jynneos/Imvanex is "[a]dministered as two subcutaneous injections four weeks apart." while the vaccination with ACAM2000 is "administered as one percutaneous dose via multiple puncture technique with a bifurcated needle." However, ACAM2000 is not recommended for potentially immunocompromised persons due to high replication competency of vaccinia while Imvanex (Jynneos) is recommended for potentially immunocompromised persons due it containing an attenuated, non-replicating orthopoxvirus, Modified Vaccinia Ankara-Bavarian Nordic (MVA-BN). The UKHSA has begun using Imvanex as post-exposure prophylaxis for close contacts of known cases.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 25 May, disease experts from the NICD in South Africa said they saw no need for mass vaccination, because they believe cases will not explode as they did in the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: In reaction to the current outbreak of monkeypox, a number of countries have stated they are buying vaccines and/or releasing vaccines from national stockpiles for use in the outbreak. In May 2022, the US, Spain, Germany and the UK all announced purchases of smallpox vaccine.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 24 May, Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Deputy Director Jennifer McQuiston confirmed the United States is releasing some of their Jynneos vaccine supply from their Strategic National Stockpile for people who are "high-risk".


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 23 June, the New York City Department of Health announced a clinic at the Chelsea Sexual Health Clinic would offer the two-dose Jynneos vaccine to "...all gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (cisgender or transgender) ages 18 and older who have had multiple or anonymous sex partners in the last 14 days." By July 27, the federal government had distributed 300,000 doses to state and local health authorities, with distribution at clinics nation-wide, and was planning to release 786,000 more that week.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Bavarian Nordic is the only manufacturer of Jynneos in the world, and its manufacturing facility closed in spring 2022 to be refitted to make vaccines for other diseases using the MVA-BN technology. The company projects Jynneos manufacturing will restart in 2023, except for 15 million doses that just need final "fill and finish" repackaging.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: The United States helped fund the development of Jynneos, leading to concerns that existing contracts will lead to vaccine nationalism and hoarding, and prompting calls for allocating doses to lower-income countries via GAVI.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 9 August, the FDA gave emergency use authorization for intradermal (rather than subcutaneous) monkeypox vaccination using a lower dose of Jynneos, which would increase the number of available doses up to five-fold. The vaccination would still be given in two doses, 28 days apart. A 2015 study had tested a regimen of one-fifth dose given intradermally.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Another monkeypox vaccine, the modern LC16m8 vaccine was developed in Japan as a national asset, and the manufacturer said it could not assist other countries.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: As of May 2022, public health authorities have aimed to target resources and education to affected groups, but avoid stigma which could discourage people with symptoms or who have been exposed from seeking help. LGBT rights groups have issued statements advising media to avoid stigmatising marginalised groups such as men who have sex with men. On 22 May, UNAIDS urged communicators to avoid stigma by taking an evidence-based approach, reiterated that the disease can affect anyone and that risk is by no means limited to men who have sex with men.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 24 May, "The Washington Post" published an article that pointed out the lack of global attention to the disease when it only affected Africans, compared to the attention directed at it when a small number of cases started affecting Western countries. Some also objected to pictures used in media coverage of mild illnesses in Europe that featured severe cases in sub-Saharan Africans.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 26 July, Owen Jones of "The Guardian" argued that the focus needs to be on testing, awareness and vaccination, that targeted health messages help protect as many people as possible from the virus, and that those most at risk should be protected without stigma, noting that some members of the LGBT community have already started to adjust behaviors to reduce risk.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 30 July, Rod Dreher of "The American Conservative" criticized public health officials for not shutting down gay sex clubs in response to the outbreak. Similarly, many conservative commentators have accused public health officials of hypocrisy for implementing harsh restrictions on everyday life in response to the COVID-19 pandemic while not encouraging similar restrictions in response to monkeypox, such as shutting down sex parties and practicing abstinence. In response, public health officials have "reject[ed] comparisons to the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, when they mandated masks and shut down public spaces. They noted that the novel coronavirus was unfamiliar, far deadlier and airborne, with hospitals overrun with patients at various points over the past two years." and that "Monkeypox has known treatments and vaccines, although they have been challenging to access; it also has not killed anyone in the United States, and hospitalizations are uncommon."


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: An August survey by the CDC found that gay and bisexual men have significantly reduced sexual encounters in response to the monkeypox outbreak.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: Misinformation and conspiracy theories spread online in various social media networks. In an article published by the BBC in May 2022 countering misinformation about the monkeypox outbreak, journalist Rachel Schraer noted that social media accounts and news outlets from different countries including China, Russia, Ukraine and the United States have been promoting the idea that the outbreak was caused by a lab leak or that monkeypox is being used as a bioweapon. The Institute for Strategic Dialogue described this as "Reviving the spread of a set of cut-and-paste... conspiracies", referring to conspiracy theories used during the COVID-19 pandemic. The BBC also made it clear that the genetic sequences of the virus, as far as is known, date back to a West African strain.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: On 20 May, the World Health Organization (WHO) convened an emergency meeting of independent advisers to discuss the outbreak and assess the threat level. Initial assessments expressed the expectation of the outbreak to be contained, and of low impact to the general population in affected countries. Its European chief, Hans Kluge, expressed concern that infections could accelerate in Europe as people gather for parties and festivals over the summer. On 1 June, a WHO statement acknowledged that undetected transmission had occurred for some time, and called for urgent action to reduce transmission. On 14 June, the WHO announced plans to rename the monkeypox virus in order to combat stigma and racism surrounding the disease. A meeting convened on 23 June determined that the outbreak did not constitute a public health emergency of international concern for the time being, but that decision was overturned by a later meeting on 23 July.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: This is a table of confirmed and suspected monkeypox cases in countries and territories during 2022. Countries whose 2022 timeline precede the May 6 index case are shaded orange. The table does not include countries where suspected cases were reported but later discarded.


title: 2022 monkeypox outbreak

text: "Countries listed below had only suspected cases at the time of reporting. Some countries reported confirmed cases after reporting suspected cases (i.e. Greece, Morocco, Turkey, Ecuador, Peru). Countries listed several times reported suspected cases again after they discarded suspected cases before."


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: The third season of the American television drama series "Breaking Bad" premiered on March 21, 2010, and concluded on June 13, 2010. It consisted of 13 episodes, each running about 47 minutes. AMC broadcast the third season on Sundays at 10:00 pm in the United States. The complete third season was released on Region 1 DVD and Region A Blu-ray on June 7, 2011.


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: Season 3 saw actors Bob Odenkirk, Giancarlo Esposito and Jonathan Banks, who play Saul, Gus and Mike respectively, upgraded to main cast status after guest starring the previous season, although they are not credited for every episode until season 4.


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: Unlike the second season, when the "Breaking Bad" writers planned the storyline for the entire season in advance of filming, the writing staff did not fully plan out the third season before production and instead developed the storyline as the episodes progressed. The third episode is dedicated to Shari Rhodes (the location casting director for "Breaking Bad") who died due to breast cancer during the filming.


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: Gennifer Hutchison and Thomas Schnauz were added to the writing staff this season, both of whom had worked previously with Vince Gilligan on "The X-Files". With the exception of John Shiban, who would leave at the end of the season to executive produce "Hell on Wheels", the writing staff for season three would remain on the show until its conclusion in 2013.


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: The third season was released on DVD in Region 1 and on Blu-ray in Region A on June 7, 2011, in Region 4 on November 24, 2010 and in Region 2 in Germany on May 19, 2011.


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: Also included are a gag reel, deleted scenes, and "Better Call Saul" commercials and testimonials. Exclusive to the Blu-ray release is the "Breaking Bad" cast and crew photo collection.


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: The third season of "Breaking Bad" scored 89 out of 100 on review aggregator site Metacritic indicating "universal acclaim". On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the third season has an approval rating of 100% based on 35 reviews, with an average rating of 9.14/10. The site's critics consensus reads: ""Breaking Bad"s well-toned storytelling flares up this season with dramatic story changes and calculated direction." "Time" proclaimed "It's a drama that has chosen the slow burn over the flashy explosion, and it's all the hotter for that choice." "Newsday" stated "Breaking Bad" was still TV's best series and it stayed true to itself. Tim Goodman praised the writing, acting, and cinematography, pointing out the "visual adventurousness" of the series. Goodman went on to call the show's visuals as "a combination of staggering beauty – the directors make use of numerous wide-angle landscape portraits — and transfixing weirdness." After the finale aired, "The A.V. Club" said that season three was "one of television's finest dramatic accomplishments. And what makes it so exciting — what makes the recognition of the current golden age so pressing — is that the season has not been, as [another reviewer] put it in another context, 'television good.' The heart-in-the-throat quality of this season comes as much from the writers' exhilarating disregard for television conventions as from the events portrayed."


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: The third season received numerous awards and nominations, including seven Primetime Emmy Award nominations with two wins. Bryan Cranston won his third consecutive award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series and Aaron Paul won for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series after being nominated the previous year. The series received its second consecutive nomination for Outstanding Drama Series; Michelle MacLaren was nominated for Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series for "One Minute". Michael Slovis was nominated for Outstanding Cinematography for a One Hour Series for "No Más"; Skip Macdonald received his second nomination for Outstanding Single Camera Picture-Editing for a Drama Series for "No Más", and it was also nominated for Outstanding Sound Editing for "One Minute".


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: The series received four nominations for the Television Critics Association Awards, winning for Outstanding Achievement in Drama. Bryan Cranston and Aaron Paul were each nominated for Individual Achievement in Drama, with the series being nominated for Program of the Year. Cranston received his first Golden Globe nomination for Best Actor in a Drama Series. Cranston also received a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series. Cranston won his third consecutive Satellite Award for Best Actor in a Drama Series, with the series winning the award for Best Drama Series for the second year in a row. Paul was nominated for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television. The series received four nominations for the Saturn Awards, winning the award for Best Syndicated/Cable Television Series for the second year in a row. Cranston was nominated for Best Actor on Television, Paul and Dean Norris were nominated for Best Supporting Actor on Television, and Giancarlo Esposito was nominated for Best Guest Starring Role on Television. The series received three Writers Guild of America Award nominations, for Best Drama Series, George Mastras for Best Episodic Drama for "I.F.T.", and Gennifer Hutchison for Best Episodic Drama for "I See You".


title: Breaking Bad (season 3)

text: James Poniewozik of "TIME" named "One Minute" as the fourth-best television episode of 2010. He also included "Fly", "Half Measures" and "Full Measure" on his list of honorable mentions. The Futon Critic listed "Full Measure" as the sixth-best episode of 2010, saying that "No show has played with the expectations of we've come to expect from television more than "Breaking Bad". IGN named "Breaking Bad" the best television series of 2010.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Religion in Russia is diverse, with Christianity, especially Russian Orthodoxy, being the most widely professed faith, but with significant minorities of non-religious people and adherents of other faiths. A 1997 law on religion recognises the right to freedom of conscience and creed to all the citizenry, the spiritual contribution of Orthodox Christianity to the history of Russia, and respect to "Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Judaism and other religions and creeds which constitute an inseparable part of the historical heritage of Russia's peoples", including ethnic religions or paganism, either preserved, or revived. According to the law, any religious organisation may be recognised as "traditional", if it was already in existence before 1982, and each newly founded religious group has to provide its credentials and re-register yearly for fifteen years, and, in the meantime until eventual recognition, stay without rights.


title: Religion in Russia

text: The Russian Orthodox Church, though its influence is thin in some parts of Siberia and southern Russia, where there has been a perceptible revival of pre-Christian religion, acts as the "de facto," if not "de jure," privileged religion of the state, claiming the right to decide which other religions or denominations are to be granted the right of registration. Some Protestant churches which were already in existence before the Russian Revolution have been unable to re-register, and the Catholic Church has been forbidden to develop its own territorial jurisdictions. According to some Western observers, respect for freedom of religion by Russian authorities has declined since the late 1990s and early 2000s. For example, the activities of the Jehovah's Witnesses are currently banned in Russia. According to International Christian Concern, during 2021 "crackdowns on religious freedom have intensified in Russia."


title: Religion in Russia

text: Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 there has been a revival and spread of Siberian shamanism (often mixed with Orthodox elements), and the emergence of Hinduism and new religious movements throughout Russia. There has been an "exponential increase in new religious groups and alternative spiritualities", Eastern religions and Neopaganism, even among self-defined "Christians"—a term which has become a loose descriptor for a variety of eclectic views and practices. Russia has been defined by the scholar Eliot Borenstein as the "Southern California of Europe" because of such a blossoming of new religious movements, and the latter are perceived by the Russian Orthodox Church as competitors in a "war for souls". However, the multiplicity of religions in Russia has been a traditional component of Russian identities for hundreds of years, contributing to a long-established ethno-cultural pluralism.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Before the tenth century, Russians practised Slavic religion. As recalled by the "Primary Chronicle", Orthodox Christianity was made the state religion of Kievan Rus' in 987 by Vladimir the Great, who opted for it among other possible choices as it was the religion of the Byzantine Empire. Since then, religion, mysticism, and statehood remained intertwined elements in Russia's identity. The Russian Orthodox Church, perceived as the glue consolidating the nation, accompanied the expansion of the Russian Empire in the eighteenth century. Czar Nicholas I's ideology, under which the empire reached its widest extent, proclaimed "Orthodoxy, autocracy, and nation" ("Pravoslavie", "samoderzhavie", "narodnost"') as its foundations. The dominance of the Russian Orthodox Church was sealed by law, and, as the empire incorporated peoples of alternative creeds, religions were tied to ethnicities to skirt any issue of integration. Until 1905, only the Russian Orthodox Church could engage in missionary activity to convert non-Orthodox people, and apostasy was treated as an offense punishable by law. Catholicism, Islam and other religions were tolerated only among outsider ("inoroditsy") peoples but forbidden from spreading among Russians.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Throughout the history of early and imperial Russia there were, however, religious movements which posed a challenge to the monopoly of the Russian Orthodox Church and put forward stances of freedom of conscience, namely the Old Believers—who separated from the Russian Orthodox Church after Patriarch Nikon's reform in 1653 (the "Raskol")—, and Spiritual Christianity (or Molokanism). It is worth noting that the Russian Orthodox Church itself never forbade personal religious experience and speculative mysticism, and Gnostic elements had become embedded in Orthodox Christianity since the sixth century, and later strengthened by the popularity of Jakob Böhme's thought in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Orthodox seminaries.


title: Religion in Russia

text: By the end of the eighteenth century, "dvoeverie" ("double faith"), popular religion which preserved Slavic pantheism under a Christianised surface, found appreciation among intellectuals who tried to delineate Russian distinctiveness against the West. On April 17, 1905, Tsar Nicholas II decreed that religious minorities had the right to publicly celebrate their respective liturgies. At the dawn of the twentieth century, esoteric and occult philosophies and movements, including Spiritualism, Theosophy, Anthroposophy, Hermeticism, Russian cosmism and others, became widespread. At the same time the empire had begun to make steps towards the recognition of the multiplicity of religions that it had come to encompass, but they came to an abrupt end with the Russian Revolution in 1917. After the revolution, the Russian Orthodox Church lost its privileges, as did all minority religions, and the new state verged towards an atheist official ideology. Under the Soviet Union, the Russian Orthodox Church lived periods of repression and periods of support and cooptation by the state. Despite the policies of state atheism, censuses reported a high religiosity among the population; in 1929, 80% of the population were believers, and in 1937 two-thirds described themselves as believers, of whom three-fourths as Orthodox Christians. The Russian Orthodox Church was supported under Joseph Stalin in the 1940s, after the Second World War, then heavily suppressed under Nikita Khrushchev in the 1960s, and then revived again by the 1980s. While it was legally reconstituted only in 1949, throughout the Soviet period the church functioned as an arm of the KGB; many hierarchs of the post-Soviet church were former KGB agents, as demonstrated by the opening of KGB archives in the 1990s.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1987–1991, the Russian Orthodox Church has struggled to regain its erstwhile monopoly of religious life, despite it and other Christian churches which existed since before the Revolution have found themselves in a radically transformed context characterised by a religious pluralism unknown before 1917. During the Soviet period, religious barriers were shattered, as religions were no longer tied to ethnicity and family tradition, and an extensive displacement of peoples took place. This, together with the more recent swift ongoing development of communications, has resulted in an unprecedented mingling of different religious cultures.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In the study of religions in Russia, the "ethnic principle" is based on the assumption that the entire number of people belonging to a given ethnic group are adherents of that group's traditional religion. This principle is often used to estimate the magnitude of very small groups, for instance Finnish Lutheranism at 63,000, assuming that all the 34,000 Finns and 28,000 Estonians of Russia are believers in their historical religion; or German Lutheranism at 400,000, assuming that all Germans in Russia believe in their historical religion. However, whether for small or larger groups, this approach may lead to gross mistakes.


title: Religion in Russia

text: The ethnic principle is sometimes misused to deliberately inflate the prevalence of certain religions, especially the larger ones, for political aims. For instance, Islamic and Orthodox leaders routinely claim that their religions have respectively 20 million and 120 million adherents in Russia, by counting all the individuals belonging to the ethnic groups which historically belonged to these religions. By applying the ethnic principle, people who are indifferent to religion or are outspoken atheists, those who have converted to a different faith to that assigned by nationality, and people who participate in religions which historically have not been associated to specific ethnic groups in Russia—namely Old Believers, new Russian converts to Protestantism, Catholicism and Eastern religions, and others—are automatically excluded from the calculations.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Another criterion to count religious populations in Russia is that of "religious observance". Based on this principle, very few Russians would be religious. It has been found that between 0.5% and 2% of people in big cities attend Easter services, and overall just between 2% and 10% of the total population (3 to 15 million people) are actively practising Orthodox Christians. The proportion of practising Muslims among ethnic groups which are historically Islamic is larger, 40% to 90% depending on the group, and yet smaller than any assumption based on the ethnic principle.


title: Religion in Russia

text: The most accurate criterion to count religious populations in Russia is that of "self-identification", which allows to count also those people who identify themselves with a given religion but do not actually practise it. This principle provides a picture of how much given ideas and outlooks are widespread among the people. Nevertheless, it has been noted that different people often give different meanings to the same identity markers; for instance, large percentages of people who self-identify as "Orthodox" have been found to believe that God is a "life force", to believe in reincarnation, astral connections, and other New Age ideas.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Another method that has sometimes been used to determine the magnitude of religions in Russia is to count the number of their officially registered organisations. Such criterion, however, leads to inaccurate assumptions for various reasons. There is not the same arithmetic relationship between religions' number of local organisations and the number of their believers, as different religions have different organisational structures. Furthermore, different religions have different attitudes towards the registration of their organisations, and secular authorities register some without difficulties while hinder the registration of others. For instance, the Russian Orthodox Church is eager to register its communities when they are still at the embryonal stage, and many of them are actually inactive; the Old Believers traditionally do not consider registration as essential, and some branches reject it in principle; and Protestant churches have the largest number of unregistered congregations, probably around ten thousand, most of them extremely small groups, and while many denominations discourage registration, they often also face a negative disposition from secular authorities.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In the August of 2012 the first large-scale survey and mapping of religions in Russia based on self-identification was published in the "Sreda Arena Atlas", an extension of the 2010 Census, with data on seventy-nine out of eighty-three of the federal subjects of Russia. On a rounded total population of 142,800,000 the survey found that 66,840,000 persons, or 47.4% of the total population, were Christians. Among them, 58,800,000 or 41.1% of the population were believers in the Russian Orthodox Church, 5,900,000 or 4.1% were Christians without any denomination, 2,100,000 or 1.5% were believers in Orthodox Christianity without belonging to any church or (a smaller minority) belonging to non-Russian Orthodox churches (including Armenian and Georgian), 400,000 or 0.2% were Orthodox Old Believers, 300,000 or 0.2% were Protestants, and 140,000 (less than 0.1%) were Catholics. Among the non-Christians, 9,400,000 or 6.5% of the population were Muslims (including Sunni Islam, Shia Islam, and a majority of unaffiliated Muslims), 1,700,000 or 1.2% were pagans (including Rodnovery, Assianism, and other religions) or Tengrists (Turco-Mongol Shamanic religions and new religions), 700,000 or 0.5% were Buddhists (mostly of the Tibetan schools), 140,000 or 0.1% were Hindus (including Krishnaites), and 140,000 were religious Jews. Among the not religious population, 36,000,000 people or 25% declared to "believe in God (or in a higher power)" but to "not profess any particular religion", 18,600,000 or 13% were atheists, and 7,900,000 or 5.5% did not state any religious, spiritual or atheist belief.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Christianity was the religious self-identification of 47.1% of the Russian population in 2012. Other polls give different results: In the same year 2020 the Levada Center estimated that 63% of Russians were Christians; in 2020 the Public Opinion Foundation estimated that 63% of the population was Christian; in 2011 the Pew Research Center estimated that 71% of Russians were Christians; in 2011 Ipsos MORI estimated that 69% of Russians were Christians; and in 2021 the Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) estimated that ~67% of Russians were Christians.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Orthodox Christianity is the dominant religion of the country, and, besides it, Old Believers and Lutheranism also have had a considerable role in the multiethnic history of Russia. Evangelicalism and Catholicism (among Russians) are relatively recent additions to Christianity in Russia.


title: Religion in Russia

text: According to the Arena Atlas Survey, Orthodox Christian believers constituted 42.6% of the total population of Russia in 2012, while according to survey by the Pew Forum in 2017, Orthodox Christian believers constituted 71% of the total population of Russia. Most of them were members of the Russian Orthodox Church, while small minorities were Old Believers and Orthodox Christian believers who either did not belong to any church or belonged to non-Russian Orthodox churches (including the Armenian Apostolic Church and the Georgian Orthodox Church). Unaffiliated Orthodox Christians or non-Russian Orthodox Christians were 1.5% (2,100,000) of the total population. Minor Orthodox Christian churches are represented among ethnic minorities of Ukrainians, Georgians and Armenians. Unaffiliated Orthodox Christians and minorities of non-Russian Orthodox Christians comprised over 4% of the population in Tyumen Oblast (9%), Irkutsk Oblast (6%), the Jewish Autonomous Oblast (6%), Chelyabinsk Oblast (5%), Astrakhan Oblast (4%) and Chuvashia (4%). Cossacks, historically and some of them also in modern Russia, are among the fiercer supporters of Orthodox theocratic monarchism.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In 2012, 58,800,000 people or 41% of the total population of Russia declared to believe in the Russian Orthodox Church. It was the religion of 21% to 40% of the population in most of the federal subjects of the country, with peaks of 41% to over 60% in Western Russia, including 41% to 60% in Yamalia and Perm Krai and over 60% in Kursk Oblast (69%), Voronezh Oblast (62%), Lipetsk Oblast (71%), Tambov Oblast (78%), Penza Oblast (63%), Ulyanovsk Oblast (61%), Mordovia (69%) and Nizhny Novgorod Oblast (69%).


title: Religion in Russia

text: The contemporary Russian Orthodox Church (the Moscow Patriarchate; "Russkaia Pravoslavnaia Tserkov<nowiki>'</nowiki>"), despite legally dating back only to 1949, claims to be the direct successor of the pre-revolutionary Orthodox Russian Church ("Pravoslavnaia Rossiskaia Tserkov<nowiki>'</nowiki>"). They have a slightly different name reflecting the distinction between "Russkiy", ethnic Russians, and "Rossiyane", citizens of Russia whether ethnic Russians or belonging to other ethnic groups. There are also a variety of small Orthodox Christian churches which claim as well to be the direct successors of the pre-revolutionary religious body, including the Russian Orthodox Catholic Church and the Russian Orthodox Autonomous Church. There have often been disputes between these churches and the Russian Orthodox Church over the reappropriation of disused churches, with the Russian Orthodox Church winning most cases thanks to the complicity of secular authorities.


title: Religion in Russia

text: The Old Believers constituted 0.2% (400,000) of the total population of the country in 2012, with proportions higher than 1% only in Smolensk Oblast (1.6%), the Altai Republic (1.2%), Magadan Oblast (1%) and Mari El (1%). The Old Believers are the religious group which experienced the most dramatic decline since the end of the Russian Empire and throughout the Soviet Union. In the final years of the empire they constituted 10% of the population of Russia, while today their number has shrunk to far less than 1% and there are few descendants of Old Believers' families who feel a cultural link with the faith of their ancestors.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Catholicism was the religion of 140,000 Russian citizens, about 0.1% of the total population, in 2012. They are concentrated in Western Russia with numbers ranging between 0.1% and 0.7% in most of the federal subjects of that region. The number of "ethnic Catholics" in Russia, that is to say Poles and Germans, and smaller minorities, is continually declining due to deaths, emigration, and secularisation. At the same time there has been a discrete rise of ethnic Russian converts to the Catholic Church.


title: Religion in Russia

text: The Archdiocese of Moscow administers the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church in Russia. Further suffragan bishoprics exist in Irkutsk, Novosibirsk and Saratov. The Diocese of Irkutsk is in fact the largest Catholic bishopric on earth, covering an area of 9,960,000 squared kilometres. Almost all Russian Catholics adhere to the Latin Rite. However, the Catholic Church recognises the extremely small Russian Greek Catholic Church as a Byzantine Rite church "sui juris" ("of its own jurisdiction") in full communion with the Catholic Church.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Various denominations of Protestantism, both historical and Evangelical, as well as Pentecostalism, were the religion of 0.2% (300,000) of the population of Russia in 2012. Their number was slightly more than 1% only in Tuva (1.8%), Udmurtia (1.4%) and the Altai Republic (1%). Lutheranism has been on a continuous decline among Finnish and German ethnic minorities, while it has seen some Russian converts, so that some traditionally Finnish churches, like the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ingria, today have more Russian than Finnish believers. Adventists, Baptists, Methodists and Pentecostals are of relatively recent introduction, having at most 120 years of history in Russia.


title: Religion in Russia

text: People who considered themselves Christians without affiliation to any church or denomination formed 4.1% (5,900,000) of the population, with numbers ranging between 1% to 8% in most of Russia's federal subjects, and over 8% only in Nenetia (14%), North Ossetia–Alania (10%), Tver Oblast (9%) and the Jewish Autonomous Oblast (9%). Jehovah's Witnesses were estimated to have 255,000 believers in Russia in the mid-2000s.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Islam is the second largest religion in Russia after Orthodox Christianity. It is the historically dominant religion among some Caucasian ethnic groups (notably the Chechens, the Ingush and the Adyghe), and some Turkic peoples (notably the Tatars and the Bashkirs).


title: Religion in Russia

text: In the 2012 Arena Atlas survey, Muslims in Russia were 9,400,000 or 6.5% of the total population. However, the "Arena Atlas" did not survey the populations of two federal subjects with Islamic majorities which together had a population of nearly 2 million, namely Chechnya and Ingushetia, thus the total number of Muslims may be slightly larger. The Muslim community in Russia continues to grow, having reached 25 million in 2018, according to the grand mufti of Russia, Sheikh Rawil Gaynetdin. Among these Muslims, 6,700,000 or 4.6% of the total population of Russia were not affiliated with any Islamic schools and branches. This is mainly because it is not essential for Muslims to be affiliated with any specific sect or organisation. Those who are unaffiliated are mostly Sunni Muslims. These unaffiliated Muslims constitute significant percentages of over 10% in Kabardino-Balkaria (50%), Bashkortostan (60%), Karachay-Cherkessia (50%), Tatarstan (52%), Dagestan (36%), Yamalia (13%), Orenburg Oblast (11%), Adygea (23%) and Astrakhan Oblast (11%). Most of the regions of Siberia have an unaffiliated Muslim population of 1% to 2%.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Sunni Islam was the religion of 2,400,000 of the Muslims, or 1.6% of the total population of Russia. It had significant following of more than 10% of the population only in Dagestan (60%) and Karachay-Cherkessia (13%). Percentages higher than 2% are found in Kabardino-Balkaria (10%), Yugra (Khantia-Mansia) (5%), Yamalia (4%), Astrakhan Oblast (3%), Chelyabinsk Oblast (3%) and Tyumen Oblast (2%). Yakutia had a population of Sunnis ranging between 1% and 2%. Many other federal subjects had a Muslim population of 0.1% to 0.9%. Shia Islam, otherwise, was a branch of 300,000 people, or 0.2% of the total population of Russia. It was primarily represented in Dagestan (2%), Adygea (1%), Karachay-Cherkessia (1%), Kabardino-Balkaria (1%), Novgorod Oblast (1%), Penza Oblast (1%), Tatarstan (1%) and Yugra (1%).


title: Religion in Russia

text: The federal subjects of Russia with an Islamic absolute majority—more than 50%—were Chechnya, Ingushetia, Dagestan (98%), Kabardino-Balkaria (60%), Tatarstan (53%), Karachay-Cherkessia (64%) and Bashkortostan (60%). Significant percentages (over 5%) were found in(38.6%), Yamalia (17.4%), Astrakhan Oblast (14.6%), Adygea (24%), Orenburg Oblast (13.9%) and Yugra (10.9%).


title: Religion in Russia

text: In 2012 there were 140,000 religious Jews in Russia, while the number of ethnic Jews was significantly larger. Indeed, most ethnic Jews in Russia are not Jewish by religion, Judaism being the religion of just a minority of ethnic Jews; most of them are atheists and not religious, many are Christians, and a significant proportion of them are Buddhists. According to the Arena Atlas survey In 2012, only 13% of ethnic Jews believed in Judaism, 13% were Orthodox Christians, 4% simply Christians, 27% atheists, 25% believers but not affiliated with an organized religion, 4% Buddhists and 3% Pagans. Religious Jews were mostly concentrated in Kamchatka Krai (0.4%), Saint Petersburg (0.4%), Kursk Oblast (0.4%), Khabarovsk Krai (0.3%), Stavropol Krai (0.3%), Buryatia (0.2%), the Jewish Autonomous Oblast (0.2%), Kalmykia (0.2%) and Kabardino-Balkaria (0.2%).


title: Religion in Russia

text: Paganism and Tengrism, counted together as "traditional religions of the forefathers" were the third-largest religious group after Christianity and Islam, with 1,700,000 believers or 1.2% of the total population of Russia in 2012. These religions are protected under the 1997 law, whose commentary specifies that "other religions and creeds which constitute an inseparable part of the historical heritage of Russia's peoples" also applies to "ancient Pagan cults, which have been preserved or are being revived". Tengrism is a term which encompasses the traditional ethnic and shamanic religions of the Turkic and Mongolic peoples, and modern movements reviving them in Russia. Paganism in Russia is primarily represented by the revival of the ethnic religions of the Russian Slavic people and communities, the Ossetians (Scythian), but also by those of Caucasian and Finnic ethnic minorities.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In 2012, Slavic Native Faith (Rodnovery), Caucasian Neopaganism, and Ossetian Assianism were represented by significant numbers of believers in North Ossetia–Alania (29%), Karachay-Cherkessia (12%), Kabardino-Balkaria (3%), Orenburg Oblast (over 3%), Kemerovo Oblast (over 3%), 2% to 3% in Dagestan, Astrakhan Oblast, Kaluga Oblast, Tyumen Oblast, Irkutsk Oblast and Magadan Oblast. The Slavic Native Faith was also present in many of the federal subjects of Western Russia in percentages ranging between 1% and 2%.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Rodnovery alone represented 44% of the followers of the "traditional religions of the forefathers", thus approximately 750,000 people. Rodnover organisations include the Union of Slavic Rodnover (Native Faith) Communities headquartered in Kaluga. The Moscow Community was the first to be registered by the state in 1994. Russian Rodnovers believe in Rod, the supreme God, and in lesser deities who include Perun and Dazhbog. Russian centers of Rodnovery are situated also in Dolgoprudny, Pskov and other cities, and Moscow has several shrines.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Uralic Neopaganism is practised by the Finnic ethnic minorities (primarily the Mari, the Mordvins, the Udmurts and the Komi). Among these peoples, paganism survived as an unbroken tradition throughout the Soviet period. The Mari Native Faith was practised by 6% of the population of Mari El in 2012. Other studies reported a higher proportion of 15%. Paganism was practised by between 2% and 3% of the population of Udmurtia (Udmurt Vos) and Perm Krai, and by between 1% and 2% of the population of the Komi Republic.


title: Religion in Russia

text: There are Rodnover groups that mix Finnic and Slavic elements, while other Rodnover organisations also cater to people who follow Scandinavian (Heathen) and Greek (Hellenic) traditions.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Paganism is supported by the governments of some federal subjects, for instance Mari El. Although paganism often faces the hostility of the Orthodox clergy, Patriarch Alexy II stressed that Protestant missionaries pose a greater danger than ethnic religions, and the latter should be respected. Pagans have faced violence in some Islamic regions of the Caucasus. For instance, Aslan Tsipinov was murdered by Islamists in 2010, in Kabardino-Balkaria. Months before his death, Tsipinov was intimated by the extremists to stop his work of popularisation of Circassian (Kabardian) Pagan rituals.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Tengrism and Turco-Mongol shamanic religions are found primarily in Siberia and the Russian Far East. In 2012, 13% of the inhabitants of the Altai Republic believed in indigenous religions—which include Burkhanism or "White Faith"—, like 13% in Yakutia, 8% in Tuva, 3% in Kalmykia, between 2% and 3% in Khakassia, Buryatia and Kamchatka. The "Arena Atlas" did not count the population of Chukotka, where much of the Chukchi practise their indigenous religion.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In 2012, Buddhism was practised by 700,000 people in Russia, or 0.5% of the total population. It is the traditional religion of some Turkic and Mongolic ethnic groups in Russia such as (the Kalmyks, the Buryats and the Tuvans). In 2012 it was the religion of 62% of the total population of Tuva, 38% of Kalmykia and 20% of Buryatia. Buddhism also has believers accounting for 6% in Zabaykalsky Krai, primarily consisting in ethnic Buryats, and of 0.5% to 0.9% in Tomsk Oblast and Yakutia. Buddhist communities may be found in other federal subjects of Russia, between 0.1% and 0.5% in Sakhalin Oblast, Khabarovsk Krai, Amur Oblast, Irkutsk Oblast, Altay, Khakassia, Novosibirsk Oblast, Tomsk Oblast, Tyumen Oblast, Orenburg Oblast, Arkhangelsk Oblast, Murmansk Oblast, Moscow and Moscow Oblast, Saint Petersburg and Leningrad Oblast, and in Kaliningrad Oblast. In cities like Moscow, Saint Petersburg and Samara, often up to 1% of the population identify as Buddhists.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Buddhism in Russia is almost exclusively of the Tibetan Vajrayana schools, especially Gelug but increasingly also Nyingma and Kagyu (Diamond Way Buddhism). There are many Russian converts, and the newer schools have been often criticised by representatives of the Gelug as the result of a Russianised ("Rossiysky") Buddhism and of Western Buddhist missionaries.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Hinduism, especially in the forms of Krishnaism, Vedism and Tantrism, but also in other forms, has gained a following among Russians since the end of the Soviet period, primarily through the missionary work of itinerant gurus and swamis, and organisations like the International Society for Krishna Consciousness and the Brahma Kumaris. The Tantra Sangha originated in Russia itself. The excavation of an ancient idol representing Vishnu in the Volga region in 2007 fueled the interest for Hinduism in Russia.


title: Religion in Russia

text: However, Russian Hare Krishna face the hostility of the Russian Orthodox Church. In 2011, prosecutors in Tomsk unsuccessfully tried to outlaw the "Bhagavad-Gītā As It Is", the central text of the Krishnaite movement, on charge of extremism. Russian Krishnaites in Moscow have long struggled for the construction of a large Krishna temple in the capital, which would compensate premises which were assigned to them in 1989 and later confiscated for municipal construction plans; the allocation of land for the temple has been repeatedly hindered and delayed, and Archbishop Nikon of Ufa asked the secular authorities to prevent the construction "in the very heart of Orthodox Russia" of an "idolatrous heathen temple to Krishna". In August 2016, the premises of the Divya Loka monastery, a Vedic monastery founded in 2001 in Nizhny Novgorod, were dismantled by local authorities after having been declared illegal in 2015.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Hinduism in Russia was practised by 140,000 people, or 0.1% of the total population, in 2012. It constituted 2% of the population in the Altai Republic, 0.5% in Samara Oblast, 0.4% in Khakassia, Kalmykia, Bryansk Oblast, Kamchatka, Kurgan Oblast, Tyumen Oblast, Chelyabinsk Oblast, 0.3% in Sverdlovsk Oblast, 0.2% to 0.3% in Yamalia, Krasnodar Krai, Stavropol Krai, Rostov Oblast, Sakhalin Oblast, and 0.1% to 0.2% in other federal subjects.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Sikhism is practised in Russia by a number of immigrants from the Indian state of Punjab and from Afghanistan, though there is a small number of Russian converts. There are three Sikh organisations in Russia: the "Gurudwara Komiti" of Moscow, catering to Afghan-Indian Sikhs, founded in the 1990s and officially registered in 2000; "Amrit Nam Sarovar", an international orthodox Sikh missionary organisation which teaches Kundalini Yoga; and "Radhasoami Satsang Beas", an international unorthodox Sikh organisation which believes in its own living teachers.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Taoism in Russia is practised by Chinese immigrants and some Russian converts. It started to be disseminated in Russia after the end of the Soviet Union, particularly through the work of Master Alex Anatole, a Russian himself and Taoist priest, founder of the Center of Traditional Taoist Studies, which has been active in Moscow since 2002. The "Victor Xiao's Studio of Taiji" in Moscow represents Longmen Taoism. Another branch present in Russia is Wuliu Taoism, headquartered in Saint Petersburg as the "Dao De Taoist Centre" since 1993, with branches in Moscow, Rostov-on-Don and Nizhny Novgorod. The "Shen Taoist Centre", headquartered in Moscow, with branches in Novosibirsk and Krasnodar, is a branch of the international organisation "Universal Healing Tao" of Mantak Chia.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Yazidism is practised by a minority that established itself in Russia already during the Russo-Turkish wars and especially during the First World War, though their number has grown in the 2010s with new immigrants from Iraq fleeing anti-Yazidi persecution by Muslims. Yazidi communities are registered in Yekaterinburg, Irkutsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Samara, Tula, Ulyanovsk, Yaroslavl and Krasnodar Krai. In 2016, the Research Institute of Yazidi History and Religion was established as a branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.


title: Religion in Russia

text: Zoroastrianism is practised in Russia by a number of recent Russian converts, though the religion was historically influent in the region of the Northern Caucasus, among the Scythians and later in Alania and Caucasian Albania. There are two Russian Zoroastrian organisations: the "Zoroastrian Community of Saint Petersburg" registered in 1994 and originally founded at the beginning of the 1990s by Pavel Globa as the "Avestan School of Astrology"; and the "Russian Anjoman", headquartered in Moscow with branches in several other cities, that collaborates with the "Anjoman Bozorg Bazgasht", an organisation of Iranian Zoroastrian immigrants in Europe. The Russian Anjoman calls its faith "Blagovery", and in general Zoroastrianism in Russia has close links with Rodnovery.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In modern Russia, "all kinds of occult, Pagan and pseudo-Christian faiths are widespread". Some of them are "disciplined organisations with a well-defined membership". The scholars of religion Sergei Filatov and Roman Lunkin, estimated in the mid-2000s that well-organised new religious movements had about 300,000 members. Nevertheless, well-organised movements constitute only "a drop in the 'new religious' ocean". Most of them are indeed "amorphous, eclectic and fluid", difficult to measure, concerned with health, healing, and lifestyle, made up of fragments borrowed from Eastern religions like Buddhism, Hinduism and yoga. According to Filatov and Lunkin, these movements, albeit mostly unorganised, represent a "self-contained system" rather than a "transitional stage on the way to some other religion".


title: Religion in Russia

text: Native new religious movements of Russia are Bazhovism, Ivanovism, Roerichism, Ringing Cedars' Anastasianism, and others. The Fourth Way, the Theosophical Society, and the Anthroposophical Society are also represented. Roerichism, which was started before the "perestroika", is a paradigmatic example of a movement which adapts Eastern religious beliefs to the conditions of contemporary Russia. It is not a centrally structured movement, but takes the form of a dust of clubs and associations. Another movement, Ivanovism, is a system of healing through cold and relationship between humanity and nature founded by the mystic Porfiry Ivanov (1898–1983), called "messenger of the Cosmos" by his followers. His disciples, the Ivanovites, are recognisable by their lightweight clothing and sandals worn in winter. Ringing Cedars' Anastasianism is a new religious, spiritual, and social movement close to Rodnovery that began in 1997 in Central Russia, based on the series of ten books entitled "The Ringing Cedars of Russia" written by Vladimir Megre. Other movements rely upon astrology, which is believed by about 60% of Russians, emphasising the imminent start of the Age of Aquarius, the end of the world as it is currently known, and the formation of a superior "Aquarian race".


title: Religion in Russia

text: According to some Western commentators, respect for freedom of religion by secular authorities has declined in Russia since the late 1990s and early 2000s. In addition, the government continues to grant privileges to the Russia Orthodox Church not accorded to any other church or religious association. In 2006, a Mari Pagan priest, Vitaly Tanakov, was successfully convicted of extremism and sentenced to 120 hours of compulsory labour for having published a politico-religious tract, "A Priest Speaks" ("Onajeng Ojla"), which in 2009 was added to the federal list of material deemed "extremist".


title: Religion in Russia

text: In 2011 there was an unsuccessful attempt to ban the "Bhagavad-Gītā As It Is" on the same charge. In August 2016, the premises of a Vedic monastery founded in 2001 in Nizhny Novgorod were demolished by local authorities after having been declared illegal in 2015. It has been observed that the categories of "extremist" and "totalitarian sect" have been consistently used to try to outlaw religious groups which the Russian Orthodox Church classifies as "not traditional", including the newest Protestant churches and Jehovah's Witnesses. There is a ban of Jehovah's Witnesses activities in Russia.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In 2017, a report from the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom stated that: "The Russian government views independent religious activity as a major threat to social and political stability, an approach inherited from the Soviet period". Thus, for the first time, the USCIRF classified Russia as one of the world's worst violators of freedom of religion, a "country of particular concern" under the International Religious Freedom Act. The report also affirmed that Russia "is the sole state to have not only continually intensified its repression of religious freedom ..., but also to have expanded its repressive policies. ...Those policies, ranging from administrative harassment to arbitrary imprisonment to extrajudicial killing, are implemented in a fashion that is systematic, ongoing, and egregious". Many other countries and international organizations have spoken out on Russia's religious abuses.


title: Religion in Russia

text: In 2011, a group linked to the Russian Orthodox Church demanded a ban of the "Bhagavad-Gītā As It Is", the book of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, in Tomsk Oblast, on charge of extremism. The case was eventually dismissed by the federal judge on 28 December 2011.