Scythians
Archimandrite Nikifor’s Biblical Encyclopedia
(2 Macc. 4:47; 12:29; 3 Macc. 7:5; Col. 3:11)—a collective name for nomadic peoples north of the Caspian and Black Seas and farther east. The populations so named were diverse, though ancient writers often treated them as one warlike people. The encyclopedia connects them with Japheth’s descendants and recalls their raids into western Asia. Paul’s declaration that in Christ there is neither Greek nor Jew, barbarian nor Scythian, slave nor free, overturns inherited boundaries of ethnicity and status (Col. 3:11).
Later tradition associated the Apostle Andrew’s preaching with Scythian lands, and old ecclesiastical usage spoke of Scythian and Cherson dioceses. The source’s references to the Russian Empire and its descriptions of Scythians as uncivilized reflect nineteenth-century geography and stereotypes.