A Holy Well in the Sazhnoye Village: The Cult Object in the Focus of Rival Traditions

Abstract

The article examines the viewpoints and discourses of various social groups involved in the process of opening up a holy well in the Sazhnoye village, Kursk region, in 1887 Different social groups tried to propagate alternative conceptions about the fact of apparition of the icon in the well. I single out three main viewpoints/ discourses: traditional, according to which the icon and water were passed for the vehicle of the holy well and grace; administrative, according to which the objects were considered as the tool of fraud employed by the clergy in order to get an income from pilgrims; and social-scientific, according to which the healing of the pilgrims was ascribed to the quality of mineral components of the water. The confrontation of these positions became the cause of a long and unfruitful struggle between different social groups for the affirmation of a definite clear-cut status of the holy well.