Respect for the service was more important to Peter than the form of the service. To the despair of many of his countrymen— especially the leaders of the Russian church—Peter's tolerance of other Christian sects was greater than ever experienced before in Holy Orthodox Russia. Peter had early understood that if he was to recruit foreigners in sufficient numbers, he would have to permit them to worship according to their own traditions. This view was reinforced in 1697 by his first visit to Amsterdam, which allowed people of all nations to practice any form of religion as long as they did not disturb the established church or the churches of other foreigners. "It is our belief that the religious ceremonies of those who have come to reside among us are of little consequence to the state, providing that they contain nothing contrary to our law," Witsen had explained. This toleration, Peter noted later, "contributed greatly to the influx of foreigners and consequently increased public revenues," adding, "I intend to imitate Amsterdam in my city of St. Petersburg."
As much as possible, he did so. Foreigners in Russia were permitted to have their own councils to rule on marriages and other eccelesiastical matters without being subject to Russian laws or the control of the Russian church. Late in his reign, Peter issued decrees recognizing the validity of Protestant and Catholic baptisms and permitting marriages between Russian Orthodox believers and members of other faiths, providing the children were brought up as Orthodox. Both these laws eased the path of
Swedish prisoners now settled in Russia who desired to marry Russian women. Toleration was also state policy toward members of other religions, Christian or non-Christian, in other parts of the Russian empire. In the Baltic provinces conquered from Sweden, Peter agreed that the Lutheran religion should be preserved as the state church, and this guarantee became an article in the Treaty of Nystad. In the vast khanate of Kazan and other regions where the majority of the people were Moslem, Peter made no effort to convert them to Christianity; he knew that such an effort would probably fail and might provoke rebellion.
To a considerable degree, Peter was even tolerant of Old Believers, whom the church vociferously condemned and persecuted. For Peter, the crucial point was whether their religious beliefs helped or harmed the state; their desire to cross themselves with two fingers instead of three mattered little to him. Thousands of Old Believers, fleeing persecution, had formed new settlements in the forests of northern Russia. In 1702, when Peter was traveling south from Archangel with five battalions of the Guard, he was to pass through this region, and the Old Believers, assuming that they were to be attacked, gathered in their wooden churches, locked the doors and prepared to burn themselves to death rather than recant. But Peter had no such intention. "Let them live as they like," he said, and moved south to fight the Swedes. Subsequently, when iron ore was discovered nearby in the vicinity of Olonets, a number of Old Believers went to work in the mines and forges and proved to be a good workmen. This was even more to Peter's liking; it was a useful fruit of toleration. "Let them believe what they like, for if reason cannot turn them from their superstitions, neither fire nor sword can do it. It is foolish to make them martyrs. They are unworthy of the honor and would not in this way be of use to the state."
Granted this latitude, the Old Believers continued to live quietly in remote regions, refusing to submit to church authority, but paying taxes and living irreproachable lives. In time, however, as the war made huge demands on Russian labor, Peter began to see their withdrawal into the forests not just as religious conservatism but also as political opposition. In February 1716, he decreed that a census of Old Believers be taken, that they be subjected to a double tax and that, in order to encourage public derision and shame them back into the arms of the established church, they be required to wear a bit of yellow cloth on their backs. Inevitably, the result was that the Old Believers exhibited the badge proudly, their numbers increased and, to escape taxes, they fled even farther from the reach of government control. Toward the end of his life, Peter's tolerance of them had largely faded. In an exasperated effort to diminish their numbers, he began sending them to Siberia, then rescinded that order because "there are enough of them there already." In 1724, all Old Believers except peasants who wished to keep their beards were required to wear a copper medallion that depicted a beard—and for this medallion they paid handsomely.
Although Peter tolerated a wide variety of religious worship in Russia, there was one Christian order which he disliked: the Jesuits. (Other brotherhoods of Catholic priests and monks were welcome in Russia; the Franciscans and the Capuchins even possessed small monasteries.) Originally, the Jesuits also had been free to hold services in Moscow and to travel freely through Russia on their way to the court of the great Manchu Emperor of China, K'ang-hsi. In time, however, Peter began to suspect that their religious zeal was largely a facade behind which they were reaching for political power. Confirmation of Jesuit worldliness, in Peter's view, came from the close relationship between the order and the Imperial government in Vienna, and eventually he decreed that "all Jesuits are earnestly commanded by virtue of these Letters Patent to quit the Russian dominions within four days after notice having given them, the world being sufficiently apprised of their dangerous machinations, and how common it is for them to meddle with politic affairs." Yet, Peter did not demand the closing of the Catholic church in St. Petersburg. He permitted the parish to send for replacement priests, insisting only that they not be Jesuits and that they not claim protection from the court of Austria.
In other countries, Peter's well-known tolerance inspired in the heads of other churches the hope that, through him, their own faith might gain a foothold or even predominance in Russia. There was no possibility of this. Peter's interest in other Christian faiths was a matter of curiosity about the service and the institutions of administration. He never considered any form of religious conversion. Nevertheless, in 1717, while Peter was in Paris, a group of divines at the Faculty of Divinity at the Sorbonne proposed uniting the churches of Rome and Moscow by "observing a certain moderation of doctrine on both sides." The project worried some of the Protestant envoys in St. Petersburg because of the political implications of any such unity. Thus, it was with satisfaction that Weber reported that the proposal stood little chance. "Neither is it probable that the Tsar, after having suppressed the Patriarchal Authority in Russia, will subject himself and his dominions to a far greater dependency on the Pope. ... It is needless to mention that difficulty concerning the marriage of priests which is looked upon in Russia as sacred, and other controverted points, about which both churches are never likely to agree."
In preserving the predominance of Orthodoxy in Russia, Peter demanded of the church that it make itself useful to society. In his view, the most useful thing that Russian priests could do, besides saving souls, was to teach. There were no schools, and priests were the only channel by which enlightenment could come to the Russian peasantry scattered across the immense land. But, for this purpose, the clergy seemed a woefully inadequate instrument. Many priests were hopelessly ignorant and unshakably lazy. Some were as superstitious as their parishioners. Few had any knowledge of how to preach, and therefore such education and morality as they did possess could not be transmitted. Attempting to overcome this deficiency, Peter sent a number of country priests to Kiev and other theological schools to learn not just theology, but how to speak in public.
Beyond what might be called the innocent ignorance of the Russian clergy, there was another failing which drove the Tsar into a rage. This was the widespread superstition of the Russian people and the playing on this trait by certain unscrupulous people, including members of the clergy. The common people believed in everyday miracles—believed that by the intercession of a specific icon of Christ, the Virgin Mary or one of the special Russian saints, a miraculous personal advantage might be obtained. Unquestioning belief made fertile ground for charlatans. When Peter came upon this kind of unscrupulous priest, his anger flared. One priest in St. Petersburg, for example, persuaded the people that a picture of the Virgin Mary which he kept in his house could work miracles, but only those who could pay were allowed access. "Though he carried on this trade with great circumspection in the night-time and took all imaginable care in recommending secrecy to his customers, yet the Tsar got information of it," said Weber. "The priest's house was searched and the miraculous image fetched away, which the Tsar caused to be brought to him in order to see whether it could perform miracles in His Majesty's presence. But the priest, at the sight of it, threw himself at the Tsar's feet and confessed his imposture, for which he was carried to the fortress and suffered heavy corporal punishment, and was afterward degraded from his office in order to be made an example to his brethren."