The roots of high-profile political trials of dissidents, which had an ideological and edifying background, go back centuries of Russian history. The clergymen and Ivan the Terrible against the monk-preacher Artemy; the omnipotent patriarch Filaret against the poets of Prince Ivan Hvorostinin and Anthony Podolsky; absolute monarch - "sun" - Alexei Mikhailovich with a host of Russian and foreign Orthodox hierarchs against Archpriest Avvakum; the super-powerful punitive apparatus of the Petrine state and the "wise fighters" led by Patriarch Joachim against the enlightener Sylvester Medvedev - here is an incomplete list of events and heroes of the book. Designed for a wide range of readers.