Съвременниците на борбата за независима българска църква – за какво всъщност говорят те (Никола Сапунов и Иван Найденов)
Two Activists in the Struggle for an Independent Bulgarian Church: What Are They Actually Saying? (Nikola Sapunov and Ivan Naydenov)

Summary/Abstract: This paper uncovers a slightly different picture of the struggle for an independent Bulgarian Church and deals with the texts of two of its participants: the memoir and diary of Nikola Sapunov (1815–1861) and the correspondence of and some other texts by Ivan Naydenov (1834–1910). Apart from patriotism, martyrdom and political plans, which are also often problematized, there are also personal partialities, hostilities, ambitions, and financial motives. For many activists, the authority of the Ottoman Sultan (who was also a Caliph, the religious leader of all Muslims) and keeping his firman in force were very important. The confessional mobility within Christianity characterized the life of Sapunov and some other activists generated tensions and polemics, but not clashes on a great scale. The relations with foreign factors, primarily Russia, were also important. They were complicated and included not only different forms of interferences, but also deliberate demands for such an intervention and efforts to provoke it and follow foreign models, mostly the Greek one. Keywords: Nikola Sapunov, Ivan Naydenov, Bulgarian Church, confessional mobility, financial motives.

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