The Heritage of F.M. Dostoevsky and the Problem of Moral Interpretation of the Doctrine of the Trinity in Russian Theology of the 19th – First Third of the 20th century (Article One)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of artistic theology of F. M. Dostoevsky in the context of the tradition of moral interpretation of dogma, which developed in Russian theology in the 19th – the first third of the 20th century. A characteristic feature of this tradition was the desire to bridge the gap between the temple and the world, between dogma and ethics, to make the truth of faith the rule of life. The formation of the idea of unity of dogmas and commandments in the works of I.V. Kireevsky, N.F. Fedorov, V.S. Soloviev, Antonii Chrapovitsky is shown, parallels with F.M. Dostoevsky are drawn. Dostoevsky’s “strenuously conscious” characters (Versilov, Stavroginm Ivan Karamazov and etc.) show the gap between rhetoric talks of religious devotion, “all-reconciliation” of ideas, transformation of the state into Church and the real life “mess”; other characters (Sonechka Marmeladova, the bookpeddler in The Demons, Sofja Dolgorukaya, the peasant Marey) do not philosophize about the faith but bear evidences of it by fulfilling the commandment of love; and the absoluteness of dogma and commandment, reasoning about God and “doing in God” is shown in Tikhon, Zosima, Alyosha Karamazov. The article justifies the meaning of the philological method for understanding Dostoevsky’s theological, religious and philosophical ideas and highlights that the author’s artistic theology based on the perception of the world as a temple and a person as a living icon is similar to the liturgical theology that can be found in the samples of liturgical poetry and actively uses metaphorical and symbolic way of expressing the truths of faith.

Keywords

• artistic theology
• f.m. dostoevsky’s works
• dogmatic
• ethics
• offtemple liturgy
• moral idea of dogma