Cornelius (Jakobs)

Metropolitan Cornelius (Russian: Митрополит Корнилий, Estonian: Metropoliit Kornelius or secular name Vjatšeslav Vassiljevitš Jakobs, or Vyacheslav Vasilyevich Yakobs, Russian: Вячеслав Васильевич Якобс; born 19 June 1924, Tallinn) is the Metropolitan bishop of Tallinn and All Estonia, the head of the Estonian Orthodox Church of Moscow Patriarchate.

Cornelius was born on 19 June 1924 in Tallinn into the family of a Russian army colonel. After the Russian Revolution in 1917, the family had emigrated to Estonia.

In 1943, he finished school and served as a psalm reader in the Church of the Nativity of the Mother of God in Tallinn. On 19 August 1945, he was ordained a deacon by Archbishop Paul (Dmitrovsky), and later, on 8 February 1948, he was ordained a priest by bishop Isidore (Bogoyavlensky). He was appointed rector of St Mary Magdalene Church in Haapsalu.

In 1951 he graduated from the Leningrad Theological Seminary (by correspondence). From 1951 to 1957 he belonged to the clergy of the Vologda diocese.

On 27 February 1957, he was arrested by the KGB and charged with "anti-Soviet agitation" (due to his possession of religious books and conversations with believers). On 16 May 1957, he was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment.

He served his sentence in the political camps of Mordovia (Dubravlag). On 12 September 1960, the Supreme Court of Mordovia reduced the sentence to five years, and then by the court's resolution he was released from custody ahead of time and put on probation. (He was rehabilitated on 14 October 1988).

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