Milestones

The much-acclaimed collection “Vekhi”, with its content, fully justifies the attention it aroused. You can treat him with different feelings, sympathetically or hostilely, but you cannot pass him by indifferently: he renovates too recent a dolorem, opens too fresh wounds, touches too close objects. The reviewer could briefly point out the content of each of the articles included in the collection (N. A. Berdyaeva Philosophical truth and intellectual truth; S. N. Bulgakova Heroism and asceticism; M. O. Gershenzon Creative self-consciousness; A. S. Izgoeva On intelligent youth; B. A. Kistyakovsky In defense of the right; P. B. Struve The intelligentsia and revolution and S. L. Franka Ethics of Nihilism). But such a technique is discouraged by the danger of extreme conciseness and the resulting obscurity of speech. Therefore, we prefer to focus with great attention on the best article in the collection - S. N. Bulgakov Heroism and Asceticism (from reflections on the religious nature of the Russian intelligentsia). The revolution we experienced, which did not produce what was expected of it, raises the question of the moral and religious foundations of our intelligentsia. Our intelligentsia has played an outstanding and responsible role in recent years. She spiritually shaped the instinctive aspirations of the masses, ignited them with her enthusiasm, and was the nerves and brain of the gigantic body of the revolution. In this sense, the revolution is the spiritual brainchild of the intelligentsia, and, consequently, its history is a historical trial of this intelligentsia. The most basic feature of our intelligentsia is its attitude towards religion. It is also impossible to understand the main features of the Russian revolution if we do not keep this attitude of the intelligentsia to religion in the center of attention. And the historical future of Russia is also drawn towards resolving the question of how the intelligentsia will self-determine in relation to religion. It has been repeatedly pointed out (following Dostoevsky) that the spiritual makeup of the Russian intelligentsia contains features of religiosity, sometimes even approaching Christian. A certain otherworldliness, an eschatological dream about the City of God, about the coming kingdom of truth, a sense of guilt before the people, a desire for the salvation of mankind and an unchanging readiness for all kinds of sacrifices - constitute, as we know, the constant and distinctive features of the Russian intelligentsia, brought up in it by church tradition. Here we also need to add some puritanism, rigoristic morals, a kind of asceticism, and, in general, strictness in personal life. Nevertheless, despite all this, it is known that there is no intelligentsia more atheistic than the Russian. Atheism is the general faith into which those who enter the fold of the intellectual-humanistic church are baptized, and not only from the educated class, but also from the people. And this is how it happened from the beginning, from the spiritual father of the Russian intelligentsia, Belinsky. And just as every social environment develops its own habits, its own special beliefs, so the traditional atheism of the Russian intelligentsia has become a self-evident feature of it, which is not even talked about, as if a sign of good manners. There is no more important fact in the history of Russian enlightenment than this. And at the same time, we have to admit that Russian atheism is by no means a conscious denial, the fruit of complex, painful and lengthy work of the mind, heart and will, the result of personal life. No, most often it is taken on faith and retains these features of naive religious faith, only inside out, and this does not change due to the fact that it takes militant, dogmatic, arachnid forms. This faith is based on a number of uncritical, untested and, in its dogmatic form, of course, incorrect statements, namely, that science is competent to finally resolve questions of religion and, moreover, resolves them in a negative sense; To this is added a suspicious attitude towards philosophy, especially metaphysics, which was also rejected and condemned in advance. Rejecting Christianity and the standards of life it establishes, together with atheism, or, better said, instead of atheism, our intelligentsia perceives the dogmas of the religion of man-divinity, and passes into the idolatry of this religion. The main dogma of this religion is faith in the natural perfection of man, in endless progress carried out by human forces, but, at the same time, its mechanical understanding. Since all evil is explained by the external disorder of human society, and therefore there is neither personal guilt nor personal responsibility, then the whole task of the social order lies in overcoming these external disorders, of course, with external reforms. Denying Providence and any original plan being realized in history, a person puts himself here in the place of Providence and sees in himself the savior of himself and his homeland. The intelligentsia has taken a position of heroic challenge and heroic struggle in relation to Russian history and modernity. Heroism is the word that expresses the basic essence of the intelligentsia’s worldview and ideal, moreover, the heroism of self-deification. The entire economy of her mental strength is based on this feeling of well-being. The isolated position of the intellectual in the country, his isolation from the soil, the harsh historical environment, the lack of serious knowledge and historical experience, all this inflated the psychology of this heroism. The intellectual, especially at times, fell into a state of heroic ecstasy, with a clearly hysterical tinge. Russia must be saved, and its savior can and must be the intelligentsia. Suffering and persecution most of all canonize the hero both in his own eyes and for those around him. And since, due to the sad peculiarities of Russian life, such a fate often befalls him already at a young age, this self-awareness also appears early, and further life is then only a consistent development in the accepted direction. The heroic intellectual is therefore not content with the role of a humble worker; his dream is to be the savior of humanity, or at least the Russian people. It requires not a guaranteed minimum, but a heroic maximum. Maximalism is an integral feature of intellectual heroism, which was revealed with such amazing clarity during the time of the Russian revolution. Such maximalism has signs of ideological obsession, self-hypnosis; it fetters thought and develops fanaticism, deaf to the voice of life. This also answers the historical question of why the most extreme trends triumphed in the revolution. Further, the psychology of heroism explains the elevation of party programs to the heights of a religious credo, the fanatical intransigence of factions warring among themselves. Heroism, as a generally widespread attitude, is not a gathering principle, but a separating one; it creates not collaborators, but rivals. Due to their maximalism, the intelligentsia remains inaccessible to the arguments of historical realism and scientific knowledge. This attitude is much more adapted to the storms of history than to its calm, which torments the heroes. The psychology of intellectual heroism is most impressed by such social groups and external situations in which it is most natural in the entire sequence of straightforward maximalism. The most favorable combination of these conditions is represented by our students. Thanks to youth with its physiology and psychology, the lack of life experience and scientific knowledge, replaced by ardor and self-confidence, thanks to the privileged social position - our youth expresses with the greatest completeness the type of heroic maximalism. Hence, spiritual pedocracy (the domination of children) is the greatest evil of our society, and at the same time a symptomatic manifestation of intellectual heroism, its main features, but in an emphasized and exaggerated form. Finally, the maximalism of goals among the intelligentsia is also combined with the maximalism of means, which has sadly manifested itself in recent years - the illegibility of means, this heroic “everything is allowed”... With this intellectual heroism, S. N. Bulgakov, in the second half of his article, compares the opposite spiritual image - Christian heroism, that is, Christian asceticism. A Christian ascetic believes in God the Provider. Therefore, history and a single human life appear in his eyes as the implementation of God’s construction. His attention is focused on the consciousness of personal duty and its fulfillment, on self-control, and this shifting the focus of attention to himself and his responsibilities, liberation from the false sense of well-being of the uncalled savior of the world - heals the soul, filling it with a sense of healthy Christian humility. – While heroic maximalism relates entirely to the achievement of external goals, and regarding personal life, self-discipline, it turns out to be minimalism; on the contrary, Christian asceticism is, first of all, maximalism in personal life, in the demands placed on oneself. A Christian hero or ascetic, without connecting the destinies of history and humanity with any individual effort, sees in his activity primarily the fulfillment of his duty to God, God’s commandment addressed to him. – Christian asceticism is continuous self-control, the fight against the lower, sinful sides of one’s self, asceticism of the spirit. If heroism is characterized by outbursts and the search for great deeds, then here, on the contrary, the norm is the evenness of the flow, “measuredness”, endurance, unrelenting self-discipline, patience and endurance, doing according to a sense of obedience (providence, conscience). This discipline of “obedience” should contribute to the development of historical sobriety, self-control, and endurance; it teaches to bear the historical burden, the yoke of historical obedience, it fosters a sense of connection with the past, while humanistic progress means contempt for one’s fathers, disgust for one’s past and its complete condemnation. Just as there is no internal similarity between the martyrs of early Christianity and the revolution, despite all the external identity of their feat, so between intellectual heroism and Christian asceticism, even with the external similarity of their manifestations, there remains an abyss, and it is impossible to be on both sides of it at the same time. One must die for the other to be born. For the Russian intelligentsia, there lies ahead a slow and difficult path of personal re-education, on which there are no leaps, no cataclysms, and only persistent self-discipline wins. Russia needs new leaders in all fields of life: state - to implement “reforms”, economic - to improve the national economy, cultural - to work for the benefit of Russian education, church - to raise the strength of the teaching church, its clergy and hierarchy. New people, if Russia waits for them, will look for new practical ways for their service in addition to existing programs, and they will be open to their selfless search. In its attitude towards the people, whose service the intelligentsia sets as its task, it constantly and inevitably fluctuates between two extremes - people-worship and spiritual aristocracy. The cosmopolitanism of the Russian intelligentsia is also known. The intelligentsia had not yet thought through the national problem, which occupied the minds of only Slavophiles, being content with “natural” explanations of nationality. The national idea is based not only on ethnographic and historical foundations, but primarily on religious and cultural ones; it is based on religious and cultural messianism, into which every conscious national feeling is necessarily cast. This is how it was with the greatest bearer of the religious-messianic idea - ancient Israel, and this is how it remains with every great historical people. The desire for national autonomy, for the preservation of nationality, for its protection is only a negative expression of this idea, which has value only in connection with its implied positive content. This is precisely how the greatest exponents of our national consciousness understood the national idea - Dostoevsky, the Slavophiles, Vl. Soloviev, who connected it with the world tasks of the Russian church or Russian culture. A church intelligentsia that would combine true Christianity with an enlightened and clear understanding of cultural and historical tasks, if one were to be born, would respond to an urgent historical and national need. Instead, we now see, on the one hand, a liberation-educational movement inextricably linked with a religiously negative worldview, and, on the other hand, traditional Orthodoxy, which lacks an understanding of cultural and historical tasks. The almost complete departure of the intelligentsia from the church created a sad cultural isolation for the latter. Breaking away from the people's faith, the intelligentsia inevitably breaks away from the people, and the defense of the people's faith, with an equally sad inevitability, increasingly takes on the character of a struggle not only against the intelligentsia, but also against enlightenment, since it actually spreads only through the intelligentsia - obscurantism becomes a means of religion. This unnatural situation for both sides, which has worsened in recent years, makes our current situation especially painful. It's time for the intelligentsia to return to the fence of the church. And there are features in her appearance that will make this return easier for her. Along with the antichrist principle, the highest religious potentials, a new historical flesh awaiting its spiritualization, are also felt in this intelligentsia. This intense search for the City of God, the desire to fulfill the will of God on earth, as in heaven, is deeply different from the attraction of petty-bourgeois culture to lasting earthly well-being. Ugly intellectual maximalism with its practical unsuitability is a consequence of religious perversion, but it can be overcome by religious recovery. The religious nature of the Russian intelligentsia. Dostoevsky in “Demons” compared Russia and, above all, its intelligentsia with the evangelical demoniac, who was healed only by Christ and could find health and restoration of strength only at the feet of the Savior. This comparison still holds true today. A legion of demons has entered the gigantic body of Russia and is shaking it in convulsions, tormenting and maiming. Only through a religious feat, invisible but great, is it possible to heal her, to free her from this legion. The intelligentsia rejected Christ, they turned away from His face, tore His image from their hearts, deprived themselves of the inner light of life and are paying, together with their homeland, for this betrayal, for this religious suicide. But it’s strange - she is unable to forget about this heart wound, restore peace of mind, calm down after the devastation she has caused to herself. Having abandoned Christ, she bears His stamp on her heart and rushes about in unconscious longing for Him, not knowing how to quench her spiritual thirst. And this restless anxiety, this unearthly dream of an unearthly truth puts its special imprint on her, makes her so strange, frantic, unbalanced, as if possessed. Meanwhile, the Beloved, the One for whom her soul yearns, is close. He stands and knocks on this heart, a proud, rebellious intellectual heart... Will His knock ever be heard?... This is the content of the article by S. N. Bulgakov. From it, the reader can get an idea of ​​the entire collection, although there is no doubt the individual characteristics of each article, which even give critics the opportunity to “note the numerous, sometimes funny, sometimes absurd, contradictions of individual articles.” I called S. N. Bulgakov’s article the best in the collection. And one should, first of all, appreciate the fact that the “sensational” noise that was created around “Vekhi” and in which the cries of vulgarity, stupidity, and absurdity do not yet cover other voices - this noise, as soon as criticism begins to distinguish between the individual articles of the collection, least of all arises about the article by Mr. Bulgakov, to whom no one denies seriousness of thought and deep religiosity. Then it is important that Mr. Bulgakov does not touch upon those issues that are most likely to cause street noise and are furthest away from the tasks of our magazine - on the contrary, he mainly dwells on a religious issue that is close to us. And in this regard, the article by Mr. Bulgakov provokes many thoughts. What is unclear about Mr. Bulgakov is his judgment about the religiosity of our intelligentsia: on the one hand, some features of the deep religiosity of the intelligentsia are undoubted, on the other hand, there is no intelligentsia more atheistic than the Russian. How to reconcile one with the other? And precisely to reconcile, since both of them, in particular, correspond to reality. It is true that, for example, socialism, which is an integral element in the mixtum compositum of our liberation movement, is not only a political-economic program, but has a religious character. On this issue, I will point out Mr. Berdyaev’s article “Socialism as a Religion” (in his book “New Religious Consciousness and Public”). And in the revolution itself, some of our writers, such as Mr. Merezhkovsky, saw or would like to see a religious matter. And now he still asserts: “If liberation does not already exist, it will be a religion; and religion, if it doesn’t already exist, will be liberation.” But it is also true that the first dogma of the intelligentsia’s faith is atheism, or rather, the fight against religion. The intelligentsia is religious and atheistic. And if we asked the answer to the question about this character of our intelligentsia, about this character of our revolution - from the revolutionary intelligentsia itself, then it would answer us: its political revolution was at the same time a religious revolution because in our country religion has long associated itself with certain political forms, that we had neither political freedom of religious life, nor religious freedom of political life. The root of the religious-atheistic character of the revolution is in the old habit of a religious attitude to politics and a political attitude to religion. Now let us ask: does Mr. Bulgakov reach this root? Is he taking a radically new point of view, or is his boat floating along the old stream, according to a familiar pattern? “The revolution,” he says, “failed. Therefore, we need to pray better to God.” But - excuse me - what is the transition from revolution to religion? If you move from political construction to religion with such ease, then, of course, you will also easily move from religion to political construction, that is, do you still look at religion from a utilitarian-social point of view? This is an extremely weak point in the Vekhi worldview. It would be strange if criticism did not direct its irresistible blows here. And indeed the criticism did not sleep. “The idea of ​​basing a book that claims to be of philosophical significance, which undertakes to resolve the dispute about religious and non-religious worldviews, with a summary conclusion about the success or failure of the revolution and about the culprits of such an outcome is generally absurd and essentially unconscionable. If we talk about such complex phenomena as “revolution”, “success of the revolution”, “failure of the revolution” as something simple, monosyllabic and unambiguous, then nothing at all can be proven, refuted, or even explained; and you can’t get from “revolution” to “religion” by direct paths. But, sitting precisely on the failure of the revolution, the accusers gave themselves away. They signed up for all those sins for which they so fiercely attack the intelligentsia; They showed by this that “they paint portraits” first of all of themselves. Maximalism, historical misunderstanding, political lack of efficiency - all this is collected, as if in a magic trick, in a historically incorrect, politically harmful, superficial and frivolous statement: “the revolution failed.” And what significance can we then attach to all the conversations of these people about political education, about historical experience, about historical sobriety, self-control, endurance, opposed to historical impatience, if in assessing our native reality, the most important aspects of it, they show themselves to be childishly naive, childishly ignorant? Obviously, all these are just words borrowed from soul-saving books” 1. This is what one of Vekhi’s opponents writes. But here is what we read from another 2, who seems to continue the speech of the first. “Refer to Mr. Bulgakov’s article. ... “Christian asceticism,” he says, “is continuous control, a struggle with the low, sinful sides of one’s self, asceticism of the spirit... A Christian hero in his activity sees, first of all, the fulfillment of his duty to God, God’s commandment addressed to him... One must repent, that is, reconsider, change one’s mind and condemn one’s former spiritual life in its depths and bends, in order to be reborn to a new life.””... All this is understandable, this is - the preaching of a religious person who demands heroic deeds for the sake of spiritual salvation, beyond earthly benefits, beyond the demands of external improvement. But when, next to Christian preaching and as if to justify it and in a logical connection with it, you read: “Russia needs new leaders in all fields of life: state, economic, church; new people, if Russia waits for them, will look for new practical ways for their service, in addition to existing programs, and - I believe - they will open up to their selfless search" - when you read such lines, you see that "universal truth" becomes a slave to practical goals, that there is a big difference in this regard between the utilitarian aspirations of the intelligentsia and the practical desires of those who blame the intelligentsia for utilitarianism no. You will discover this amalgam of spiritual salvation, universal truth, salvation in the monastery and circle collection not only in the above article. That is why there is no great desire to analyze the teaching of the authors of “Vekhi” on its merits. In fact, if, in pursuing certain vices, the new teaching itself makes these vices a necessary part of itself, then wouldn’t we be close to the truth if we say that, apparently, it is impossible to do without these vices, that even the thought of a better structure of the soul inevitably comes into contact with the question of “reforms,” the “clergy” and the “hierarchy” of the church, i.e., about the external organization of social life.” This old confusion of different spheres in Mr. Bulgakov’s attitude to the national question is especially sad. One cannot hesitate for a single minute to recognize with him that pedocracy and cosmopolitanism are our greatest evils. The intelligentsia's appeal to folk wisdom and national tradition is a fact of extreme importance. We have all witnessed the recent groundless, abstract pretension of our youth, before whom the ridiculed wisdom fell silent, and the cosmopolitan unrestraint that mocked the people's shrines. It’s time to stand firmly on national soil, without which no great national deed will be accomplished. And we wholeheartedly and enthusiastically welcome the appeal of our intelligentsia to the national idea, which until now has only been disgraced by the excesses of the “true Russian people.” But how does the collection we are reviewing affirm the national idea? what is it based on? On religious messianism, which flourished “in ancient Israel”... Can one not regret that such a lofty idea is established on such a fragile foundation? For who doesn’t know that cherished by Dostoevsky, the Slavophiles, Vl. Solovyov’s idea of ​​Russian messianism is completely untenable from a Christian point of view and has never brought any reconciliation to Russian society? To protect their idea, the participants in the collection took out old, rusty, worthless weapons from their arsenal. Religiously untenable, this idea is also extremely impractical. In fact, the question of our cosmopolitanism is precisely the question of the participation of Jews in our liberation movement and in our literature: this is not from the point of view of the “extreme right,” but on the merits of the matter 3 . No one else (certainly not the Poles) brings cosmopolitanism into our atmosphere. And so the participants in “Vekhi” find nothing better than to talk about messianism, which flourished “in ancient Israel.” Doesn't this mean adding fuel to the fire - awakening the messianism of the Jews?... We could talk about all this for a long time. But I would like to speak loudly about something else. In the person of the participants in the collection “Vekhi” and, most closely, in the person of S. N. Bulgakov, our intelligentsia turns to the Orthodox Church. This is a fact that cannot be overestimated. The gap that arose since the time of Peter between our intelligentsia and the church is beginning to be filled for the first time—the first steps towards this, the first experience, are being taken. How will our church react to him? Attentive, approving, perhaps. God willing. But this is not all that is required at this moment from representatives of our church. The participants of “Vekhi” on their way from Marxism, with which almost all of them began, to religion and the national idea, improved significantly. But no matter how they improve in (political and) religious terms, they will never give up one thing - freedom of theological thought. And the only way our church can respond fruitfully to this movement of the intelligentsia towards Orthodoxy is the spirit of freedom of religious thought, granting its members the right of free religious quest... This is too clear... “In Defense of the Intelligentsia” pp. 55 – 56.