About morality in general

Contents Properties of moral law and moral actions Origin of moral law. Conclusions: about salvation in Christ and the law of the kingdom of God. A person not only lives and acts in this world, not only receives impressions from it, but has the ability to evaluate these impressions and his actions. They call some of them good, and others bad. This assessment can be made from very different points of view. Accordingly, the meaning of the words “good” and “bad” will be different. We call a well-known phenomenon good because it is pleasant to us: it’s good to enter a bright and warm room after a frosty night and warm up. Medicine turns out to be good because it is useful to us. One can evaluate phenomena from the point of view of beauty; so good is the picture, that’s what we call good, a beautiful known species in nature. But besides this assessment, in addition to the listed measures of pleasantness, benefit and beauty, we have another assessment, another standard by which we measure phenomena, regardless of their pleasantness or unpleasantness, benefit or beauty. We sometimes evaluate phenomena, and mainly the actions of a person, according to their inner dignity, from the point of view of what should and should not - we call what should be good, and what should not be called bad. If an action agrees with what it ought, we call it a good deed; if it requires a special effort of a person’s spiritual strength, we call it a feat. Otherwise, the act will be an atrocity, a sin, a transgression. So: feed the hungry, give alms to the beggar, help the sick, etc. there will be good deeds; to offend someone, to deceive, to steal will be crimes. If the properties of the human soul are assessed, then the properties that are commendable should be called virtues, while those opposite to them should be called vices. Mercy, meekness, chastity, justice are virtues; cruelty, laziness, deceit, cowardice are vices. We usually make this assessment directly - we directly feel that a given action is good or not good, should have been done or should not have been done. This shows that our soul is inherent in consciousness or a sense of some kind of norm, a law that determines what should and what should not. This is the law about which the ap. Paul said that the pagans by nature do the law, they know good by their very nature. Unlike written laws, i.e. given in Holy Scripture or state, civil, this internal law, written in the heart, is called the moral law. When our behavior is in accordance with this invisible law, we feel contentment and satisfaction within ourselves. When we violate the law, we feel discord in our souls, anxiety. In common parlance this is expressed: “conscience is at peace” or “conscience is not at peace”, torment of conscience, etc. In the same way, when we see the actions of others, we immediately feel their moral dignity, and involuntarily pronounce praise or blame in our souls. The ability to feel the moral worth of one's own or others' actions is called moral sense. Conscience is the name given to the inner eye, which allows us to see all our spiritual content, everything that is in our soul. Conscience, on the one hand, always has the moral law before it, as an immutable and binding rule of our life, and, on the other hand, it sees our actions, and, comparing them with the law, thereby makes us understand where the discord in our soul comes from, why we are currently experiencing self-satisfaction or internal shame, torment. Finally, everything that is subordinate to conscience, that constitutes its content, is called morality: this includes the law, and the fulfillment of the law and the assessment of one’s moral state. The basic concept of this entire area is, undoubtedly, the moral law. Where does it come from in a person? Our very idea of ​​our mental life and even of the very vocation and dignity of a person depends on this or that answer to this question. This is the answer we will try to outline in general terms in this reading. Properties of moral law and moral actions At the first thought about the moral law, we realize that in this case we are dealing with a phenomenon of a much higher order than all other phenomena - an assessment from the point of view of this law is a higher assessment than any other assessment. The highest dignity of the moral law is revealed from what phenomena, to what area of ​​world life it is applied. Meanwhile, how pleasant everything can be, even just the food that we see; meanwhile, not only a person can be useful, but also the animal that carries him, and the carriage on which he rides - only a person can be morally good or evil, only he alone can be guilty, responsible for his behavior. True, sometimes we tend to consider animals to blame, especially when they directly cause us some harm. We are angry at a dog that has bitten us or ruined our dress, and are ready to demand punishment for it. But in such cases, a moment’s reflection is enough for this inappropriate assessment of the animal’s action to seem strange, if not funny, to us: a dog is not a person, it is not responsible for its actions. You cannot demand the same from her as from a person. Moreover, not everything in a person is subject to the moral law, but again only the highest, most important and essential area. A person is guilty only if and as long as he is aware of his actions, and he is responsible for himself only to the extent that he is aware of himself. Therefore, for example, no one blames mentally ill people, although they sometimes commit crimes. In the same way, we do not blame children with the same severity as adults, precisely because they are still children, that their consciousness has not yet developed to the proper extent. Further, in a self-conscious person, only such actions and states are subject to moral law in which the highest dignity of man in comparison with the rest of the world appears with particular clarity: free actions, in which man is the master of himself and nature, and only to the extent and as long as these actions are free, as long as they are at the disposal of man. The beating of the heart, blood circulation, digestion, and other bodily processes are never blamed on a person, because they are performed against his will. A person is also not blamed for actions that he commits by yielding to some kind of physical violence, or better said, that are committed for him by other people. For example, Origen was forcibly forced to bring incense to idols: they grabbed his hand and, putting incense into it, dragged Origen to the altar and thus performed incense. A slave who does the will of a master, or a soldier who follows the orders of his superior, are less responsible in their actions than the master or superior. The moral law, therefore, is subject to only conscious and free actions. On the other hand, only then is the true dignity of a person revealed, only then is he a real person, when we apply a moral assessment to him. He may be beautiful, but we still don’t know what he is like in himself, and if he devotes his entire life to serving his beauty (especially when a man does this), then we can hardly feel anything other than contempt for such a person. A person can bring us a lot of pleasure, he can be very useful to us, and not only to us, but also to society; despite all this, we still ask the same question: what is this person like in himself, good or bad? A useful craftsman may be a deceiver; the most gifted figure can be an egoist and a thief. Beauty, pleasantness or usefulness do not yet constitute the true dignity of a person; this dignity is given to him only by one way or another of his attitude to the moral law. The greatness of the moral law is revealed with particular clarity when we pay attention to the nature of its commands, to how the inner consciousness of a person relates to this law. People are often guided in their actions by a feeling of pleasure: they act this way because it is pleasant; They spend their time doing nothing, having fun and gossiping, because it’s nice to spend time that way. Some people live their whole lives for pleasure. Often the lure of pleasure is so strong and seductive that only with effort can one refrain from doing something. However, when acting for pleasure, a person never thinks that he is obliged to do so. If he does not obey his feelings, if he misses pleasure, then, at most, he feels annoyed with himself in his soul, but does not at all recognize himself as guilty before someone. In exactly the same way, many people are guided by calculation and the search for their own benefit. For some, this is the only reasonable goal of action. And yet they realize that they themselves decided this, they set this goal for themselves. If they ever act, perhaps by mistake, contrary to this goal, they will be annoyed, but again they do not recognize themselves as guilty before anyone. Pleasure and benefit, thus, present their demands to the human will, but these demands seem to go from lower to higher. Even if some passion overwhelms a person and deprives him of freedom of action and reason, even then the person does not lose his highest dignity - he feels rather humiliated, crushed by some external, as if physical force, than fulfilling someone’s highest obligatory will. This is not the attitude of a person to the requirements of the moral law, to the voice of conscience. Violation of the demands of conscience does not lead to any direct punishment, is not accompanied by physical pain, material damage, or anything that in itself would frighten a person. The voice of conscience does not impose on a person’s will to act one way and not another. And yet, a person constantly listens to this voice and, having violated its command, not only gets annoyed with himself, but, what is especially characteristic, feels guilty before someone and even tries in every possible way to justify himself to someone. Take Macbeth, who is haunted by the shadows of the people he killed, or Boris Godunov, who would like to put an end to his entire former life (“today - Tsar Boris - there is no more Godunov”): the pathetic little thing - Dimitri does not let him sleep. These people, who were powerless during life, now receive, as it were, higher power and drag their murderers before the supreme court. Let us remember Raskolnikov, who, according to his reasoning, did a completely reasonable thing, almost saving society from a malignant parasite. How thievingly he then vainly sought justification before his conscience! In the pleasure and benefit of a person, he heard the voices of his inferiors and, like a king, he could fulfill or not fulfill the request of slaves - here he himself stands in the face of the Supreme Judge, impartially and authoritatively pronouncing his sentence. A person may or may not follow the verdict of this Judge, his will is not bound, but he is aware that he must, is obliged to follow, and will feel guilty if he does not follow. A person cannot cancel the requirements of the moral law: they have an unconditionally binding force for him. The obligatory nature of the moral law, its unconditional significance and power over our soul are especially obvious when in life we ​​have to encounter some sincere servant of the idea, some righteous person. Often this righteous man is unbearable to us in his manners, in his appearance, often we cannot tolerate his unceremonious denunciations, etc. With all this, we cannot but respect the man of ideas. When the dust of wounded pride passes, our conscience speaks and presents to us the holy man in his true light - we will mentally bow before him. We may not always obey the inner voice of our soul, but we will make a correct assessment of virtue, we will still feel its truth and greatness. This idea about the unconditional value of virtue, that it is dear to a person in itself and cannot be humiliated or devalued by any external shell, was expressed, among other things, by gr. L.N. Tolstoy in his famous work “The Power of Darkness”, namely in the person of the peasant Akim. In appearance, this is the most comical, almost caricatured type in the entire work, and at the same time, he embodies the highest idea, the clearest consciousness of the moral law, conscience. Some critics, I remember, were extremely perplexed and especially could not imagine how the role of Akim would be performed on stage: how, by performing all these “tae” exactly, one could protect this highest type from his inevitable comedy. Some performers, judging by the reviews, really strained all their efforts to ensure that Akim only preached and did not make people laugh. Meanwhile, the plan of L.N. This seems to be the purpose of presenting true virtue in a funny form, so that a person will laugh at virtue. Then, when a person calms down from his laughter, he realizes that the truth is still on the side of the funny Akim, and having realized this, he will come to the thought that it is not what is noble, honorable, not wealth, fame and contentment, not even visible culture - truth and justice, and this is not the true dignity and calling of a person, that a person is great when he lives according to his conscience, when he fulfills the dictates of the moral law: virtue in itself has eternal significance and is superior to everything. Disagreeing with gr. Tolstoy in the most important thing, in the very “hope”, we cannot help but give him justice in this case: in this plan, indeed, the artistic genius of the writer was reflected. This is the thought that the apostle expresses when he says that God has chosen the foolish, the ignorant of this world, to put to shame the wise and noble. We are so accustomed to living according to calculation, for our own benefit and pleasure, that we cannot imagine any other meaning in life, other tasks for activity. Virtue itself is ready to be valued and respected only as long as it is held in high esteem. Giving a person a chance to reflect on Akim, gr. Tolstoy wants to remind a person where the true good and the true meaning of life are. The same idea about the unconditional value of virtue, that a person will bow before it in his soul, although he will not follow it, although he will even laugh at it, was constantly preached by Dostoevsky in his works - only he expressed it even more directly and clearly. For example, let’s take his novel “The Brothers Karamazov”, in particular in this novel the story of Elder Zosima. 1 The young officer started a quarrel with his rival. Their duel is scheduled for tomorrow. All this is very common in the life of officers and none of them sees anything reprehensible in it. But with this officer, “something fatal happened here”... “In the evening,” he says, returning home, fierce and ugly, I became angry with my orderly Afanasy and hit him with all my might twice in the face, so that his face bled. He had served with me for a long time and it had happened before that I had hit him, but never with such brutal cruelty. And believe me, dear ones, forty years have passed since that time, but I still remember it with shame and torment. I went to bed, fell asleep for about three hours, got up, and the day had already begun. I suddenly got up, I didn’t want to sleep anymore, I went to the window, opened it - it opened into my garden, I saw the sun rising, it was warm, beautiful, the birds were ringing. What is it, I think, that I feel in my soul, as if something shameful and base? Is it not because I am going to shed blood? No, I don’t think that’s why. Is it because I’m afraid of death, afraid of being killed? No, not at all, not at all... And suddenly I immediately realized what the matter was: that I had beaten Afanasy in the evening.” The young officer stands before the court of his conscience and listens to its inexorable verdict. “It all suddenly seemed to me again, as if it were happening again: he’s standing in front of me, and I’m hitting him with a full swing right in the face, and he’s holding his hands at his sides, his head straight, his eyes bulging as if in front, he’s flinching with every blow, and he doesn’t even dare raise his arms to shield himself - and this is a man who’s been driven to this point, and this is a man who’s beating a man! What a crime! It was as if a sharp needle had pierced my entire soul. I’m standing there, stunned, and the sun is shining, the leaves are rejoicing and sparkling, and the birds, the birds are praising God... I covered my face with both palms, fell on the bed and cried my heart out.” Having felt all his guilt in this and fallen on his face before the powerful denunciations of his conscience, the officer begins to reflect further and gradually comes to the conclusion that his whole life is going wrong, not what is set out in it by the goal and the law, that in particular the duel itself is a crime. “And suddenly the whole truth presented itself to me, in all its enlightenment: what am I going to do? I’m going to kill a kind, intelligent, noble man, innocent of anything before me, and thereby deprive his wife of happiness forever, torture and kill him.” Having learned the truth, he decides to act on it. In the morning his second came for him. They went to get into the carriage together. “Wait here for a while,” I tell him, “I’ll run away in a moment, I forgot my wallet.” And he ran back into the apartment alone, straight into Afanasy’s closet: Afanasy, I said, yesterday I hit you twice in the face, forgive me, I say. He shuddered, as if he was frightened, he looked - and I saw that this was not enough, not enough, but suddenly, since he was wearing epaulettes, he hit him at his feet, forehead to the ground: Forgive me, I say. At this point he was completely stupefied. Your honor, father, master, how are you... am I still standing? ... and suddenly he began to cry, just like I had earlier, covered his face with both palms, turned to the window and began to shake all over with tears.” This bow, so unusual, almost criminal according to officer standards, came out of him completely unexpectedly: he saw it directly and realized that he had to bow to his orderly and ask him for forgiveness. And having bowed, he immediately felt that he had taken the right path, and his whole being rejoiced from this feeling. “I flew into the carriage, “take it,” I shout. I saw that I was shouting the winner, and here he is in front of you.” I’m so delighted, I laugh all the way, I say, I don’t remember what I said.” With such delight he performs his next feat: having withstood the shot of his opponent, he cheerfully threw his revolver into the forest and asked for forgiveness for the previous one. To the objections of his seconds and opponent, he makes an enthusiastic speech, repeating to them everything that his awakened conscience taught him that night. “I wanted to continue, but I couldn’t, it took my breath away, it was so sweet, so youthful, and in my heart there was such happiness as I had never felt in my whole life.” One can hardly expect greater admiration for virtue and greater satisfaction from the consciousness that one has taken the true path. Having fulfilled the command of his conscience and having decided from now on to serve it alone, a person experiences “happiness such as he has never felt in his entire life.” Virtue for his consciousness is highest and most blissful. And at the same time, on the back of the next sheet (p. 259) we read: “On the same day that I returned from the duel, I escorted Athanasia back to the company, for it was a shame to look him in the eye after what I had done to him earlier, so inclined is an unprepared worldly man to be ashamed even of his other most just deed.” On the one hand, he is breathtaking with happiness that he decided to live according to his conscience, and on the other, he cannot raise his eyes from shame that he acted according to his conscience. Meanwhile, his act was not some kind of fleeting flash, from which nothing remains in his soul except shame for her: this was the first beginning of his irrevocable decision to follow a new path. He, therefore, bowed before virtue, despite the fact that he still stood on his previous point of view, still saw in it something indecent and humiliating. The same divided attitude met his actions in other people. “All this is prudent and his opponent responds piously, mockingly to his enthusiastic speech - and in any case, you are an original person.” These words do not contain a condemnation of an act; they contain the same ancient, mocking and at the same time, sorrow-filled question of the disappointed Pilate: what is truth? The seeker of truth himself remains pure and holy for him, but it is not for us to achieve this truth. So it is here: mockery does not mean a denial of the holiness of the act itself, but only that the mocker himself does not dare to do the same, that under the existing conditions of life, he does not hope for the opportunity to live according to his conscience; an officer for him is a dreamer, although sincere and deserving of love. “Laugh, I laugh at him too, and then praise yourself. “Yes, I’m ready now to say, to praise, if you please, I’ll extend my hand to you, because it seems that you are a truly sincere person.” His comrades reacted to the act in the same way: they could not digest it at all. “He asked for forgiveness at the barrier!.. He soiled his uniform, let him resign.” And at the same time, no one could accuse him of anything truly shameful, for example, cowardice, etc. Everyone understood that “something else had come out here, something original,” but they did not dare to call this original by its own name: it was too contrary to all their current concepts, it was too indecent and ridiculous to openly bow before it and recognize it as an example for everyone. Therefore, as soon as the young officer announced to his comrades that he had already resigned because he was becoming a monk, the picture immediately changed. “As soon as I said that, every single one of them burst out laughing. Yes, you should have notified from the very beginning, well, now everything is explained, you can’t judge a monk”... The obstacle that prevented everyone from speaking according to their conscience has been removed: the comrade who acted funny is no longer an officer, you don’t have to apply an officer’s standard to him, now everyone can treat him like a person in general. Everyone praises his action, because everyone’s conscience cannot disapprove of this action. “Everyone laughs, they don’t stop, and not mockingly at all, but they laugh so affectionately, cheerfully, suddenly everyone fell in love with me, even the most ardent accusers, and then all this month, until my resignation came out, it was as if they were carrying me in their arms: “Oh, you, monk,” they say. And everyone would say a kind word to me, they began to dissuade me, even feel sorry for me: “What are you doing to yourself?” - “No, they say he’s brave with us, he withstood a shot and could shoot from his pistol, but he had a dream the day before that he would become a monk, that’s why.” Exactly the same thing almost happened in urban society. Before, they didn’t particularly notice me, but only received me with cordiality, but now everyone suddenly vied with me and began to call me: they themselves laugh at me, but they love me”... Finally, at one of the meetings, the main idea of ​​this whole story is expressed. “Where are you supposed to know this,” the young officer says to his interlocutors, “when the whole world has long since come to the other side, when we consider absolute lies to be the truth and demand the same lies from others. So once in my life I took it and acted sincerely, and well, I became like a holy fool for all of you: even though you loved me, you still laugh at me, I say.” - “How can I not love you like that? The hostess laughs out loud to me, and her meeting was very crowded.” Suddenly the same person who caused the fight came up to him. “She extended her hand: “Let me, he says, explain to you that I am not the first to laugh at you, but, on the contrary, I thank you with tears and declare my respect for you for your action at that time.” Her husband also came up here, and then suddenly everyone reached out to me, almost kissing me.” A person who acts according to his conscience seems to everyone to be some kind of holy fool, but meanwhile, “how can you not love him like that,” how can you not be touched in your soul by his behavior? A person himself would be glad to do this, if it were not so difficult, if the situation, the environment that ties his hands and will, did not interfere. A person does not lose the ability to directly understand the greatness of virtue, its unconditional value at the lowest stages of his fall and at the very height of passions. Just as often one sight of an innocent, sinless child stops a criminal hand, one meeting with him serves as the beginning of a turning point in a person’s entire life. Often an example of sincere kindness and unfeigned Christianity amazes the villain so much that he decides to repent and then lives a new life. A homeless tramp, a convict, driven out from everywhere, avoided by everyone, comes in the evening to the modest dwelling of a poor bishop. He cynically declares that he is a tramp, but despite this statement, he receives shelter and lodging for the night. This pure Christian trust in him, a tramp and a convict, obviously seemed to him sentimental, funny, and perhaps insincere: he responds to it by stealing the bishop’s silver candlesticks when he leaves in the morning. Let's see how your shallow, artificial sentimentality will be enraged at this gratitude of mine (the criminal believes in the dignity of virtue, but does not think that it is possible to fulfill it, so that in fact there will be a person who sincerely and unfailingly served it). Soon the police caught him and brought him to the same bishop. The tramp probably prepared with gloating to see whether the humble bishop would now retain his meekness. And suddenly, instead of the expected denunciations, the bishop pretends that he himself gave his candlesticks to the tramp, and orders the housekeeper to bring him the rest that he did not seize yesterday... The police set the tramp free. Now the tramp sees that the bishop, not only in words, not in appearance, but in fact, lives virtuously. This discovery so astonishes the convict that he himself decides to be virtuous, and devotes his entire life to serving his neighbors, and then voluntarily surrenders himself to the hands of justice. Until then, he thought that virtue was not a bad thing, that conscience always spoke about holy things, but he never believed that all this was so in reality, all this seemed to him only sweet words, only idle dreams. Now he sees that such a life is not a dream, but a reality, and that, therefore, it is possible for him too. Now he trustingly surrenders to the inner voice of his heart, listens to it, believes in it and breaks with the former (“Les Miserable” by Victor Hugo). Another Russian story, far from being so, perhaps well-known (I do not undertake to judge its merits, I am only taking from it the most suitable for my purpose 2), tells about another similar vagabond convict, already an old man. “This old man was a fugitive from Siberia. Who he was, what his name was, no one knew. They only knew the nickname (Branded Convict), and also the fact that this man bore the burden of many crimes in his soul. This terrible man once witnessed a real good deed. A young priest, newly ordained, was driving to his church and on the way he met a lying, dead drunk man. The coachman wanted to whip him with a whip, but the priest felt sorry for this man lying in the middle of the road. He wanted to help him, at least clean it up somewhere. A crowd has gathered. “Orthodox,” the priest spoke, “help him... After all, this is your brother, don’t leave him!” The crowd just shrugged, but still remained indifferent... There was even a restrained laugh. “You can’t spare all of them drunkards here,” someone was heard remarking, “no one told him to get drunk like that... Let him get drunk like that and lie around like a pig.” Seeing that no one was moving, the priest himself decided to put the drunken man in his cart and take him to the hut. “He put his hands under the drunken man’s arms and tried to lift him up. The man was very heavy, and immediately from the exorbitant effort sweat appeared on the forehead of the young priest... He managed to lift the drunken body halfway, but the cart was high”... For the idle crowd, the result was a scene full of comedy, no less comical than Tolstoy’s Akim himself. This time the Samaritan's mercy appeared before human eyes in the most unattractive, most indecent, and ridiculous form. But it was the same mercy, the same service to the highest truth, and it found a response in the soul of the branded convict. Having pushed the crowd aside, he lifted the drunken man onto his shoulder and quickly walked with him along the village street (120–122). Another meeting between the priest and the convict took place a little later in the field: the convict asked him for a blessing. The priest flatly refused and advised him to repent first. This infuriated the convict, the life of the priest was apparently in danger, but the matter ended with the convict making a sharp turn and leaving. The story later tells how the convict performed feats of labor for the priest several times and kept asking for blessings. Finally, he came to the priest for confession, repented, received communion, and then calmly handed himself over to the hands of justice. - This callous criminal, in a funny and humiliating scene, considered a truly good deed, a feat of sincere service to the truth, felt with his soul the entire height of such a life and bowed before it (that’s why he asked for a blessing from a weak and, from an everyday point of view, somewhat ridiculous eccentric priest, and therefore humbly endured his refusals). But once a corner of eternal paradise was revealed to him, he could not help but reach out to it, and so he came to salvation. The highest truth and holiness of a virtuous life, therefore, are equally felt by people and are equally attractive to them, no matter in what form virtue appears and no matter what stage of decline a person is at. Thus, a royal decree always remains a royal decree, whether it is brought by some nobleman or a homely beggar, and its word is equally commanding, whether it is addressed to a simple peasant or to a noble boyar. The origin of the moral law. So in our soul we feel the presence of some higher law, the commands of which we recognize as unconditionally fair and binding on ourselves. Where do we get this law from? There are three answers to this question. First of all, we can say that this law has a completely natural origin, that it was invented by people themselves as they accumulated everyday experience. At first, everyone did what they wanted, he did not feel any remorse for this, everything was fair and permissible then. But then people came together in society and began to live together. Then it became extremely inconvenient to do what everyone wanted; the desires of everyone were met by the desires of others. It was impossible for everyone to take whatever they wanted, because much of it already belonged to others. It was not always possible to indulge in anger and avenge insults, because this also violated the interests of others, etc. Every manifestation of personal tyranny and arbitrariness was immediately followed by punishment for the culprit. He saw with his own eyes that it was not always possible to do as he wanted, that there was a limit beyond which he could not go with his desires. The concept of a certain law appeared that binds the will of man within certain limits. A whole circle of rules of life and behavior was drawn up, which multiplied with the course of historical life. Antiquity finally gave them the force of an immutable law. The origin of the moral law, therefore, differs little from the origin of our ordinary everyday decency. But such an explanation would obviously be insufficient. No matter how great the power of decency is (and for some faint-hearted people it is sometimes stronger than the demands of conscience itself), it will never compare with that aura of immutability and holiness with which the commands of the moral law are surrounded in our consciousness. Yes, this is understandable. As soon as a person leaves his usual environment, as soon as he gets acquainted with the life of other societies and peoples, he will immediately see all the conventionality of his code of decency: the customs, for example, of the Chinese and the European are almost as different as heaven from earth, and yet each of them considers his own decency to be the only reasonable and possible. But ask the same Chinese, is it possible to steal? Is it possible to kill people? Is it praiseworthy to tell a lie? And you will hear from him the same answer as from a European. All people will agree on the basic requirements of the moral law. Even if some of them did not actually have some rules, they would immediately recognize them when they were explained to them. In this case, all the people of the globe have a common ground on which they can come together and understand each other. Whereas, no matter how much you explain to the Chinese that you need to greet a person by shaking his hand, that you need to stand before elders and not sit, he will never understand why this is necessary, why this is better than his Chinese customs, so solid and meaningful. True, there are exceptions to the moral law, there are people who seem to have lost their conscience, but these exceptions do not destroy the rules. No one would deny the universality of laws, for example, music, on the grounds that there are people who do not understand them at all. Another answer to the question we have posed is that the moral law is given by God. This answer is both correct and incorrect. It is wrong if we think that God gave this law to people from the outside at some specific moment, as he gave the law, for example, to Moses: at first people lived according to their own will, and then God taught them that doing evil is not good, that there is no need to steal, kill, etc. We cannot think like that simply because we cannot imagine how people could understand this law unexpectedly given to them, and not only understand, but also forever recognize it as unconditionally obligatory and the only possible law of theirs. being. You cannot become a good singer or musician without careful training, but, no matter how hard you try, you cannot teach singing to a completely deaf person or painting to a blind person. It is necessary that a person has the ability to do a well-known business. In the same way, it is impossible to instill in a person a moral law if a person does not have the ability to perceive it, if by his very nature he is not disposed to accept the commands of this law. The only correct explanation of the origin of the moral law is the one given to us in Holy Scripture. It says there. “You don’t need to go up to heaven to bring Christ together,” and learn from Him to understand good and evil, “you don’t need to go underground,” because “near you, inside, in your heart is this word,” this law. You just need to listen to the voice of your conscience, be more attentive to your inner life, and a person will discern within himself the law commanding him to do good and avoid evil. Then the external, written law given in Holy Scripture will cease to be external and extraneous: it only reminds and reveals to a person in more detail what his own heart requires of him. This means that man was created in the image of God and in the likeness. In other words, man is created akin to God. Naturally, therefore, it is his nature to live according to that law, which is also the law of Divine life. The human body, as akin to matter, is subject to the laws of matter and cannot help but suffer when it is treated contrary to these laws. In the same way, the human spirit, which is God-like in nature, only lives its real life when it acts according to the laws of God’s life. Hence it is clear why the human spirit delights in the law of God, why the latter seems to him to be the only possible, unconditionally fair and obligatory rule for everyone, why virtue is always holy in the mental eyes of a person, why, finally, a person at the lowest stages of moral decline does not lose the ability to understand it and bow before it. Conclusions: about salvation in Christ and the law of the kingdom of God. The law written on our hearts, therefore, is undoubtedly of Divine origin, and therefore its commands are eternal and immutable, just as the Divinity itself is eternal and unchangeable. But, on the other hand, this law has been innate to us since creation itself, and is an integral part of human nature itself. These two provisions give us the opportunity to explain quite a lot and very significant things in our spiritual life. If a person has broken the law, sinned, he experiences torment of conscience. Where and in what should he seek salvation? How to clear your conscience? The first thing a person would like to do in this case is to somehow correct what was broken. When a person suffers something unpleasant, he rushes to make up for this unpleasantness with something: from unpleasant impressions they look for entertainment in music, in a walk through a beautiful area, etc., they drive away the unpleasant, bitter taste of medicine with sugar. Usually the goal is completely achieved: the unpleasant impression disappears and no longer torments the person. Finally, time itself heals every grief, every trouble. When a person suffers any loss, harm, or causes damage to someone, and in this case the loss is rewarded, no trace remains of the damage suffered or caused. This is not what happens when a person violates the command of the moral law, when he sins against his conscience. A person can, of course, drown out the voice of his conscience, indulging in the insane service of passions, he can divert his attention to extraneous objects, get busy with some business, etc., but all this is only for a while, only until a certain moment, and then again his conscience will awaken, and his spiritual wounds will open again, and again an inexorable reproach for an old crime will sound in his mind. Here, time does not help either: the opened spiritual wound is just as fresh and painful, even more so than before. A person tries to calm his conscience with something, tries to reward his crime with something, performs good deeds, sometimes even feats of selflessness, and all this in order to earn forgiveness from his conscience. But he cannot be forgiven for this. “Even though you are an ascetic, even though you are a hero, even though you bring great benefit to humanity or the church, you are still a criminal, there is a burden on your soul, a deep ulcer in your heart; people do not see it, but it is all the more visible to God, from Whom nothing can be hidden.” This inexorable justice of human conscience is beautifully depicted by the same Dostoevsky and all in the same story by Elder Zosima, precisely in the person of the mysterious guest (pp. 362 - 372). “He was, says Elder Zosima, in our city for a long time in the service, he occupied a prominent place, he was respected by everyone, rich, famous for his charity, donated significant capital to an almshouse and an orphanage, and in addition did a lot of charity secretly, without publicity, which all came to light later, after his death. He was about fifty years old, had an almost stern appearance, and was taciturn; He was married for no more than ten years, with his still young wife, from whom he had three young children. The next day I was sitting at home, when suddenly my door opened and this same gentleman came in to me.” And this venerable, respected man, after much hesitation and conversations with Fr. Zosima, then a young officer (we talked about him earlier), told him that he had committed a great crime fourteen years ago. He then wanted to marry the rich widow he loved, but was refused, and then he found out that this widow was marrying another person. Unable to bear this, he skillfully plans to kill her, which he succeeds in. In the dead of night, when the careless servant was gone somewhere, he entered the house and killed the widow, completely unnoticed by anyone, and as a diversion, he seized some objects, deliberately not the most expensive, but more conspicuous (to ward off suspicion of the servants). The police actually captured the serf servant, against whom all the evidence turned out: the lady wanted to hand him over as a soldier and he knew about it, then during the investigation he went on a sleepless binge, etc. “They arrested him, began the trial, but just a week later the arrested man fell ill with a fever and died in the hospital without memory. That’s how the matter ended, they handed it over to the will of God, and everyone, the judges, the authorities, and the whole society, remained convinced that no one committed the crime but the dead servant. And for this, the elder adds, the punishment began,” and then in a wonderful story he conveys how the criminal tried to drown out the convictions of his conscience, how he wanted to reward him with something, to deserve his sin, so as not to repent of it. “At the beginning, he wasn’t even tormented by remorse at all. He was tormented for a long time, but not by that, but only by regret that he had killed his beloved woman, that she was no more, that by killing her, he had killed his love, while the fire of passion remained in his blood. But almost then he didn’t even think about past innocent blood, about killing a person. The thought that his victim could become the wife of another seemed impossible to him, and therefore for a long time he was convinced in his conscience that he could not do otherwise. At first he was tormented by the arrest of his servant, but the sudden illness and then the death of the prisoner calmed him down, for he died, in all likelihood (he reasoned then), not from arrest or fright, but from a cold, acquired precisely during the days of his flight, when he, dead drunk, lay all night on the damp ground. The stolen things and money did not bother him much, for (he still reasoned) the theft was not made for self-interest, but to divert suspicion in another direction. The amount of stolen goods was insignificant, and he quickly donated this entire amount, and even much more, to an almshouse established in our city. He did this on purpose to calm his conscience about the theft and, remarkably, for a while, and even for a long time, he really calmed down - he himself conveyed this to me. He then embarked on a great career, he himself asked for a troublesome and difficult assignment, which occupied him for two years and being of a strong character, he almost forgot the past, and when he remembered, he tried not to think about it at all. He also embarked on charity, organized and donated a lot in our city, announced himself in the capitals, and was elected both in Moscow and St. Petersburg as a member of the local charitable societies. But nevertheless, he finally began to think with agony, unable to rise to his strength. Then he fell in love with one beautiful and prudent girl, and he quickly married her, dreaming that by marriage he would drive away his solitary melancholy, and by entering a new path and zealously fulfilling his duty regarding his wife and children, he would move away from old memories altogether. But the opposite of this expectation just happened.” His wife's love embarrassed him, the sight of his children only further disturbed his spiritual wound. “I cannot look at their innocent, clear faces; I don't deserve it." Finally, he began to menacingly and bitterly imagine the blood of the murdered victim, her ruined young life, blood crying out without vengeance. He began to see terrible dreams. But being strong in heart, he endured the torment for a long time. “I will atone for everything through my secret torment.” But this hope was in vain: the further it went, the stronger the suffering became. In society they began to respect him for his charitable work, although they were increasingly afraid of his strict and gloomy character, but the more they began to respect him, the more unbearable it became for him. He admitted to me that he was thinking about killing himself. But instead of that, he began to imagine another dream - a dream that at first he considered impossible and crazy, but which finally stuck so close to his heart that it was impossible to tear it away.” Finally, the most important thought matures in his mind: his conscience demanded from him not reward, not heroic deeds in payment for the sin committed, but repentance, i.e. appealing for a petition to the One who gave him this conscience. “He dreamed like this: to rebel, go out in front of the people and announce to everyone that he had killed a man. He spent three years with this dream, and it seemed to him in different forms. Finally, he believed with all his heart that he would declare his crime, heal his soul beyond doubt, and be at peace once and for all.” However, this feat turned out to be more difficult than he thought, and he hesitated for a long time until the young officer’s determination to follow the voice of conscience, contrary to public opinion, encouraged this man too. He then publicly confessed his crime and, soon falling ill, died in blissful peace of mind. This story describes almost all the vicissitudes of this difficult, internal struggle of a person with his conscience. He is also involved in charity, he wants to be a good family man and father, he tries to devote himself entirely to fulfilling his civic duty, he tries in every possible way to do something significant, important and useful, and all this with the goal that his conscience will finally be satisfied and stop denouncing him for the past, which has long been forgotten and has been rewarded a hundredfold. But all this is in vain: the voice of conscience only becomes clearer and clearer, its verdict sounds more and more inexorable. And at the conclusion of his path of suffering, a person comes to the belief that only by confessing his sin can he free his soul from unbearable torment, in other words: only by recognizing himself as a sinner, i.e. submitting oneself to the judgment of God, a person finally finds the desired peace of forgiveness. A violation of a moral law can be corrected and made amends only by God himself, the Author of this law. This is the same thought as that of the apostle, who preached that a person is saved from the burden of sin only by faith, and not by good deeds. This does not mean that good deeds are not needed for salvation, it means that a person who recognizes himself as a sinner cannot free himself from the reproaches of his conscience and will not achieve the spiritual world on his own, on his own, no matter what feats he performs. He must turn to God, and only God can free, comfort and calm his troubled conscience. “If Abraham was justified by works, he has praise, but not before God” (Rom. 4:2). In the eyes of people, and according to their concepts, one can cover one’s sins with deeds and good deeds, but before God, a person will remain the same unrequited sinner until he turns to God for forgiveness, until he repents. This idea is perfectly expressed in the story about the branded convict that I mentioned. We saw that the convict tried to somehow earn the priestly blessing, which for him then expressed reconciliation with God and his conscience. There was a fire in the village. In the burning hut, the mother forgot her child. No one dared to save him, because they had to face almost certain death. The convict, suddenly appearing, throws himself into the fire. The roof of the hut collapses, and everyone involuntarily crosses themselves, thinking about the death of the old man. But then “among the clouds of smoke a gigantic figure of an old convict appeared... The hair on his head was smoldering, his rags were smoking, he himself was covered with soot,” and the rescued baby lay in his arms. The spectacle was touching and amazing. “Father Konstantin himself looked with delight at this man, who now seemed to him a hero”... It would seem that a sweet moment of forgiveness had come for the convict. “He approached Father Konstantin and, holding out the child to him, said in a barely audible voice: “Bless.” But oh. Constantine, taking the child from him, loudly answered: “I bless the baby”... With these words, after his blessing, he handed over the baby to the mother, who was crying with joy, and turning to the old man, he said: “Thank you very much”... This is an almost literal repetition of the apostolic words: “Abraham has praise, but not before God.” We, people, are surprised at you, we are ready to bow before you for your great feat, but we cannot forgive you, free you from the bonds of your conscience. “Repent, reconcile with the Lord, and then may you have my pastoral blessing,” Fr. answered the convict. Konstantin. The Lord gave us a conscience, the Lord alone can cleanse us from sin and free us from remorse, our salvation is only in Christ and with Christ. The second conclusion from everything that has been said about the nature of the moral law concerns our relations with our neighbors, especially with the weak and fallen among them. Usually we willingly make acquaintances and maintain communication with people who are good, useful, and as long as they remain so. A teacher or educator, also a shepherd, is happy to teach his lessons or generally work for his students and flock, when he sees diligence on their part, when they turn out to be obedient and well-mannered. But as soon as our neighbor responds to our participation with ingratitude, as soon as a student reveals his intractability to the suggestions of a mentor or educator, as soon as the flock deceives the hopes of a gullible shepherd, and instead of love, they will suffer rejection. Having noticed the evil in a person, we do not want to see his goodness, we pronounce a guilty verdict on him and consider ourselves to have the right to no longer deal with this person. We thought that he was good, we thought that he would understand our efforts to benefit him, or at least would treat us as kindly as we were going to treat him, but he turned out to be not like that: he should have been thrown out like a worthless thing, left to his own devices. It is against such a frivolous attitude towards the human soul, against neglect of our neighbors, that we must remember what this soul is, what our neighbor is in its inner dignity. If the Divine eternal law is embedded in the nature of man at his very creation, if, therefore, man by his very nature is a being akin to God and the kingdom of God; then no matter how low he may fall, to what depths of crime he may descend, still the image of God is in him, the seal of immortality and eternal life in him has not been erased. He, therefore, is still dear and honorable in the eyes of God, and should be so for every loving God. No crime, no depravity can justify the neglect of a person. Let conscience be almost silent in his soul, let the consciousness of good and evil, the thought of God barely glimmer in him, flicker with a barely noticeable spark: but still this spark has not gone out; you need to take it carefully, you need to fan it with your love and all-forgiving patience, and this spark will again light up with an eternal flame, and the person will be saved. Christ himself serves as an example of such an attitude towards man. As God, He could appear before people in all His power and greatness and demand unconditional obedience from them, and condemn everyone to death for disobedience. But such a phenomenon would either make people tremble to the point that they would lose the ability to control themselves and freely listen to the voice of God, or, on the contrary, it would embitter them even more and turn them away from God, and all people, every sinner, every opponent of God in particular, are close and dear to God, as His creation, for which He has been preparing His blessings from eternity. Therefore, Christ chose to leave His Divine majesty, His royal rights, humanly speaking, and appeared in the form of a man, “in the form of a slave,” and, living among people, as the prophet says, he did not even “quench the smoking flax,” not even “break a bruised reed.” Is it worth worrying about some spark in a tow of flax when there is something to light up the room, something to warm up around? Is it worth taking care of a broken, useless cane when there are beautiful, wide-branched trees? But Christ did not forget this reed, and did not extinguish the smoking flax. This means: no matter how insignificant the goodness in a person, no matter how weakly the spark of God lingers in him, it still exists in him, and for its sake one can forgive a person everything, all his shortcomings, all the roughness of his character, all his sometimes ingratitude, so as not to completely extinguish this spark. Until it goes out, a person has not yet completely died - and woe to the one through whose fault it goes out, who, with his exactingness, inability to sacrifice his favorite habits, inability to adapt to the weaknesses of his neighbor, extinguishes this spark. That is why the fundamental law of the kingdom of God is so decisively, so radically different from the law of worldly life. In the latter, everyone seeks their rights and only when these rights are respected do they agree to work for the common good. And Christ says: “Kings rule over nations and those who rule over them are called benefactors. But you are not so: but the greatest of you shall be the servant of all.” Here is a rule for our relations towards our neighbor: treat him as a servant would treat his master. The servant tries to please his master in everything, to earn his favor, no matter what kind of master he is. Often a master is unfair to his servant, often he does not notice and does not adequately appreciate his zeal; often, instead of gratitude, the servant hears reproaches; sometimes he has to fulfill the causeless and senseless whims of his master. And the servant endures all this, precisely because he remembers that he is a servant, that he must serve the master. When the master needs something, especially when he is sick, the servant will not make excuses that he himself is now busy, that he also needs rest, or that it is unpleasant to serve the sick - the servant will get up at night to open the door to the returning master. Thus, every Christian should be ready to serve his neighbor and endure everything from him. This is what the previously mentioned Fr. Konstantin, when he found a drunken man lying in the dust. People passed by, and no one cared about this man; Only ridicule and reproaches were heard. It never occurred to anyone that this man, who had humiliated himself to such an extent, was, after all, our neighbor, that, after all, it would be better for him to lie somewhere at home. The servant (if this man had a servant) would not have passed by him, nor would he have considered it humiliating to come up and help him. So is Fr. Konstantin, despite the ridicule of the crowd and the comedy of this whole scene, did not hesitate to come up and serve his neighbor. Likewise, the Samaritan mentioned in the parable did not consider it indecent to help a Jew beaten by robbers, although for him the Jew was an enemy and a despicable person. This is what everyone should do with those who are sick at heart, with sinners, with angry people: there is no need to be afraid of their malice or to offend them with ingratitude and injustice, you need to carefully approach the human soul and try to touch its best strings, awaken goodness in it, because it is in it. This goodness has awakened in a person’s soul, he has felt, even at the edge of his heart, all the sweetness of truth and love, then he himself, without our convictions, will go to the kingdom of truth and love, will follow Christ. The Savior calls us not to crush broken reeds with the severity of an inexorable order and Pharisaic good intentions, not to rule over people, but to serve them, just as He Himself served and gave His soul for the deliverance of many. So: a moral, unwritten law is innate in our soul, by which we distinguish good from evil. The properties of this law are such that they directly indicate its higher origin. Holy Scripture explains this law by the god-like nature of human nature: as akin to God, it tends to live according to the law of Divine life. Hence the conclusions: 1) a sinner, a transgressor of God’s law, can be saved only by turning with repentance to the Lawgiver Himself, i.e. only through Christ; and 2) a godlike person always remains godlike, capable of the kingdom of God; therefore, our duty to serve the salvation of our neighbor is never removed from us. Academy Inspector Archimandrite Sergius. According to ed. Marx 1895 XII; part I. “The Right Way” by Krasnitsky. Books “Russi. Pilgrim." January 1900 You might be interested in: