When Russian academic, theologist and poet Sergei Averintsev died in Vienna two weeks ago, many people said that Russia's intellectual landscape would never be the same.

Averintsev was a quaint figure on the Russian literary and scholarly scene. Perhaps the most curious thing was that he was never actually "on the scene." He was soft-spoken and quiet; he quoted Greek and German authors to his students without translation, hoping that everyone knew such obvious things as Greek and German, or, perhaps, never giving it a thought. His teachers and old friends loved to say that he had always been like that, reading "The Iliad" while his friends played sports and coming back to reality only when hit on the head by a soccer ball. With his glasses, ill-fitting jackets and cumbersome briefcases, he was a typical, almost comical representative of the intelligentsia.

But behind this facade, Averintsev could not be manipulated or diverted from his beliefs. And in this case, "beliefs" should be taken in the most literary sense, because he was a devout Christian at a time when religion was generally considered the domain of semi-literate babushkas. His doctoral dissertation on Byzantine literature was published at the height of Leonid Brezhnev's stagnation period, when authorities were airing American blockbusters during Easter to prevent people from going to church.

Averinstev ignored the anti-religious atmosphere, writing about the defining role of Christianity for our civilization and quoting sacred texts at length. The black-market price of his scholarly book skyrocketed. Averintsev was lauded for asserting that literary scholarship was a "service of understanding," meaning that people in his line of work should never countenance rigid dogmas. For Soviet students who were taught that there was just one correct way of looking at things, such ideas were a shock.

During a brief spell of post-Soviet romanticism, in the early years under Mikhail Gorbachev, Averintsev put aside his dislike of public life and became a member of the newly elected Soviet parliament together with rebels like Andrei Sakharov and Boris Yeltsin. Soon afterward, he was invited to teach in Vienna; the calmer and healthier climate of Austria probably prolonged his life for several years. But last spring, he suffered a massive heart attack from which he never completely recovered.

Averinstev was more than just one of the most knowledgeable scholars in his field. For many Russians, he embodied the nation's conscience, remaining throughout his life a completely free person.