The Russian Bible Society, founded A.D. 1813. was at first patronized by the emperor.  Under its auspices, and at the instigation of the emperor himself, there was prepared a version of the Scriptures in the Russian dialect.  In the year 1820, not less than 50,000 copies of the Gospels and the Acts were issued from the press; in 1823 the whole New Testament was finished, and in the course of eight months 20,000 copies were distributed.  For this translation the peasantry, to whom the Old Slavic church Bible was only half intelligible, showed such an eagerness, as soon to excite trouble among the clergy.  In some of the governments, remote from the capital, the readers of this version of the Bible had to encounter serious persecution.  In respect to translations into foreign languages, a kind of rivalship arose between the parent society in England and the daughter in St. Petersburg.  Besides the preparation by the latter of translations into thirty-one different languages and dialects within the limits of the Russian empire, she likewise took care of several Asiatic nations, and founded auxiliaries in the deserts of Siberia, and also in the midst of the Kozaks of the Don and the Circassian provinces.  In A.D. 1820, this society had fifty-three sections and 145 auxiliaries; and the number of copies of whole Bibles and of New Testaments distributed, exceeded 430,000.  But in 1822, the society held its last aniversary; and three years later, some of the more important Russian clergy succeeded in closing the series of annual reports.  In April 1826, the activity of the society was ultimately terminated, or, as it was expressed, was suspended, by the Ukase of the emperor Nicholas, at the instigation of the metropolitans Eugene and Seraphim.  Since that time, only the sale of the copies already printed has been permitted.[30]

The Russian Bible Society stood of course in connection with societies for Foreign Missions; but was active in this respect chiefly through the agency of the United or Moravian Brethren.  In 1823 the Moravians of Sarepta sent, with the express consent of the minister of Ecclesiastical Affairs, two missionaries to the Kalmuks; into whose language the Gospels had been translated at St. Petersburg by Schmidt.  In the same degree that they found the people susceptible for divine truth, did they meet with opposition from the priesthood.  The Khans, yielding to the influence of the priests, threatened to emigrate; and the Russian government found it advisable to withdraw the mission.  An interesting report of this mission was published in 1824, in the Journal of St. Petersburg.  In the year 1824, a mission of the Greek church, at the instigation of the bishop of Archangel, was sent to the Samoyedes.  This was the first attempt ever made to convert that savage people to Christianity; of the results we are not informed.