Putin ordered to return the miraculous icon “Trinity” by Andrei Rublev to the Russian Orthodox Church

Russian President Vladimir Putin gave the order to transfer to the Russian Orthodox Church the world-famous miraculous icon “Trinity”, painted in the early 15th century by Andrei Rublev.

“In response to numerous requests from Orthodox believers, President of the Russian Federation V.V. Putin decided to return to the Russian Orthodox Church the miraculous icon “Trinity”, painted by St. Andrei Rublev”, – the publication says.

While the icon is stored in the Tretyakov Gallery. During this year, it will be transferred to the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, and after that it will take its historical place in the Holy Trinity Sergius Lavra.

According to the head of the Patriarchal Council for Culture, Metropolitan of Pskov and Porkhov Tikhon (Shevkunova)you first need to create the necessary conditions and prepare the icon by fulfilling the museum requirements.

According to the currently generally accepted version, based on church tradition, the icon was painted “in praise of Sergius of Radonezh» by order of his disciple and successor hegumen Nikon. Before the revolution of 1917, the Trinity was in the Trinity Cathedral of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, but then it was transferred for restoration to the Central State Restoration Workshops. A decree of the Council of People’s Commissars dated April 20, 1920 transferred it to the People’s Commissariat of Education “in order to democratize art and historical buildings by turning these buildings and collections into a museum.” In 1929, the icon “Trinity” of the Sergiev Posad Museum entered the collection of the State Tretyakov Gallery. Instead of the 500-year-old original, a list made by Nikolai Baranov was placed in the iconostasis.

The icon left the walls of the Tretyakov Gallery only in 1941 during the evacuation during the Second World War, to Novosibirsk, where the exhibits of the gallery were placed in the building of the Opera House. In 2022, the icon was exhibited at the Trinity-Sergius Lavra on the occasion of the 600th anniversary of finding the relics of St. Sergius of Radonezh.