The Choice of Faith
The article is the author’s text of a famous speech by L. N. Gumilev, published after decoding of audio recordings. In it the author examines the motive of the choice of faith by the Russian princes from Olga to Vladimir on a broad historical background, at the center of which is placed the classification of religions on the principle of theism-antitheism. According to the author, the era of the IX-XIII centuries. was the heyday of anti-theistic religious movements throughout Eurasia. Besides them, the danger was also the Khazar version of Judaism. In this context, the choice of Christianity of the Byzantine variant appears to the author to be the most constructive and historically motivated.