Ce citimKaramazov.ro: libertate, religie, economiehttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim.feed2024-03-29T06:21:44ZJoomla! 1.5 - Open Source Content ManagementThe Ways of the Mother of God: A Paschal Story with an Epilogue* 2023-04-20T19:02:39Z2023-04-20T19:02:39Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/741-the-ways-of-the-mother-of-god-a-paschal-story-with-an-epilogue-or-before-a-after-the-grand-inquisitor-.htmlDostoievski et al.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/izv_istambul_2.jpg" width="250" height="376" alt="izv_istambul_2" style="float: right;" /><em>- or, Before & After the Grand Inquisitor:</em></p>
<p><br /><em>The Wanderings of Our Lady through Hell</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>In France, clerks, as well as the monks in the monasteries, used to give regular performances in which the Madonna, the saints, the angels, Christ, and God himself were brought on the stage. In those days it was done in all simplicity. In Victor Hugo’s Notre Dame de Paris an edifying and gratuitous spectacle was provided for the people in the Hôtel de Ville of Paris in the reign of Louis XI. in honor of the birth of the dauphin. It was called Le bon jugement de la très sainte et gracieuse Vierge Marie, and she appears herself on the stage and pronounces her bon jugement. Similar plays, chiefly from the Old Testament, were occasionally performed in Moscow too, up to the times of Peter the Great. But besides plays there were all sorts of legends and ballads scattered about the world, in which the saints and angels and all the powers of Heaven took part when required. In our monasteries the monks busied themselves in translating, copying, and even composing such poems—and even under the Tatars. There is, for instance, one such poem (of course, from the Greek), The Wanderings of Our Lady through Hell, with descriptions as bold as Dante’s. Our Lady visits hell, and the Archangel Michael leads her through the torments. She sees the sinners and their punishment. There she sees among others one noteworthy set of sinners in a burning lake; some of them sink to the bottom of the lake so that they can’t swim out, and ‘these God forgets’—an expression of extraordinary depth and force. And so Our Lady, shocked and weeping, falls before the throne of God and begs for mercy for all in hell—for all she has seen there, indiscriminately. Her conversation with God is immensely interesting. She beseeches Him, she will not desist, and when God points to the hands and feet of her Son, nailed to the Cross, and asks, ‘How can I forgive His tormentors?’ she bids all the saints, all the martyrs, all the angels and archangels to fall down with her and pray for mercy on all without distinction. It ends by her winning from God a respite of suffering every year from Good Friday till Trinity Day, and the sinners at once raise a cry of thankfulness from hell, chanting, ‘Thou art just, O Lord, in this judgment.’ Well, my poem would have been of that kind if it had appeared at that time... (Constance Garnett, tr.) </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p align="center">*****</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.holy-transfiguration.org/poetry/poetry_moth.html" target="_blank">The Secret Ladder</a> (<a href="https://archive.ph/YUTts#selection-643.0-642.3" target="_blank">A legend</a>)</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;">The Lord called Peter the apostle to a reckoning<br /> And said: “How negligent you have become!<br /> No longer do you execute your sacred duty,<br /> No longer do you follow My command.<br /> <br /> The keys to paradise I’ve given to you, Peter,<br /> For you to meet the souls of all who die,<br /> To judge their earthly lives with strict impartiality<br /> And only let the righteous come inside.<br /> <br /> What do I see now, Peter? Millions of sinners<br /> Sing praises, glorifying God in Eden!<br /> Do you sleep sweetly at the pearly gates of heaven?<br /> What can you say to Me in your defense?”<br /> <br /> Apostle Peter stood there helplessly, declaring:<br /> “I know not how they could have come inside!<br /> The gates of heaven I have rigorously guarded<br /> And stood here day and night, and held the keys.”<br /> <br /> Then, looking at the sinners’ faces with alarm:<br /> “I did not see these faces at the gates!<br /> They have arrived here by some other way perhaps;<br /> I did not let them through the pearly gates!<br /> <br /> Allow me to inspect all Eden’s hidden corners<br /> And find the secret path to paradise.”<br /> “So be it as you wish!” – the Lord said then, arising:<br /> “I, too, would like to know this matter’s truth.<br /> <br /> Give me the keys and I shall walk with you together,<br /> And carefully inspect all heaven’s corners.<br /> But if I find you have been lax in duty, Peter,<br /> Then I will have to tax you most severely!”….<br /> <br /> The Lord then walked through Eden with Apostle Peter,<br /> Already they have passed through all its lanes,<br /> Already they have reached the other, furthest end,<br /> But nowhere was a loophole to be found.<br /> <br /> The Lord regarded Peter with reproachful eyes,<br /> Not knowing how to solve this strangest puzzle.<br /> His head bowed down, Apostle Peter stood and trembled,<br /> And dared not raise his eyes for fear and sorrow….</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;">***</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;">Then very suddenly…. A tiny rustling noise<br /> Was heard among the shadows in the bushes….<br /> They stopped to listen…. And with firm and quiet steps<br /> Approached…. And glanced behind the quivering bushes.<br /> <br /> There stood the Holy Virgin, bent over an opening,<br /> Her kindly eyes were firmly fixed upon it….<br /> A silken rope snaked thinly in Her tender hands,<br /> Descending straight into the pit of Hades.<br /> <br /> And out of Hades many sinners climbed this rope,<br /> And quietly came into heaven’s haven.<br /> Their tired eyes were filled with boundless hope and joy,<br /> And glistened with the tears of their repentance.<br /> <br /> Their Intercessor they approached with sacred hope,<br /> And overwhelmed with penitence and tears,<br /> They fell down on their knees with purifying prayer<br /> And bitter crying over all their sins.<br /> <br /> She covered all the sinners with Her Holy Veil,<br /> And blessed their penitence and bitter tears,<br /> And sinful souls shone forth as gold, anewly gleaming,<br /> All pure and cleansed by Her divinest tears.<br /> <br /> The Holy Virgin prayed for all repentant sinners,<br /> And lifting quietly Her precious Veil,<br /> With an embrace She blessed them, made the Cross’ sign,<br /> And gently let them into paradise….<br /> <br /> ***<br /> <br /> “Let us go now!” – the Lord said, covering His eyes,<br /> “We must not know of what is going on!<br /> What She achieves here with Her divine tears of grace,<br /> We have no right or power to impede!<br /> <br /> Pick up your keys and forthwith show no mercy, Peter!<br /> And only let the righteous come inside!<br /> But by this quiet path of genuine contrition,<br /> Let all repentants enter paradise!”</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>(*) The first story is Ivan's introduction to his "Legend of the Grand Inquisitor", from Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, Constance Garnett, tr. It is, among other things, a dostoevskian Paschal story, and a possible key, or framework, for the whole novel, if not for the author's complete works. The second reads almost like its continuation in verse. Could it be Ivan's dream, or vision, from a sequel to the Brothers Karamazov, where <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank">he becomes a hermit</a>, a kind of Arsenius the Great, or Isaac the Syrian, capable of raising the likes of Smerdyakov from spiritual death? A small poem, somehow written and shared by Dostoevsky from beyond the grave? Or just something eligible by Anna Dostoevskaya as the definitive preface to the heavenly edition of Dostoevsky for Children (cf. <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=Raffaella+Vassena+%D0%94%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%B5%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9+%D0%94%D0%BB%D1%8F+%D0%94%D0%B5%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%B9&client=firefox-b-d&ei=F_I7ZPutCpq6sAe45IGYBA&ved=0ahUKEwi7lYiWu67-AhUaHewKHThyAEMQ4dUDCA4&uact=5&oq=Raffaella+Vassena+%D0%94%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%B5%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9+%D0%94%D0%BB%D1%8F+%D0%94%D0%B5%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%B9" target="_blank">Dr. Raffaella Vassena</a> on the historical editions; and our online sampling of stories, plus a few more, <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/734-the-protection-of-the-mother-of-god-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-ii.html" target="_blank">here</a>)? Also see <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html&source=gmail&ust=1697354100118000&usg=AOvVaw1WWG55ho15LFMPtBbjmzcd">here</a>.</p>
<p> </p><p><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/izv_istambul_2.jpg" width="250" height="376" alt="izv_istambul_2" style="float: right;" /><em>- or, Before & After the Grand Inquisitor:</em></p>
<p><br /><em>The Wanderings of Our Lady through Hell</em></p>
<p> </p>
<p>In France, clerks, as well as the monks in the monasteries, used to give regular performances in which the Madonna, the saints, the angels, Christ, and God himself were brought on the stage. In those days it was done in all simplicity. In Victor Hugo’s Notre Dame de Paris an edifying and gratuitous spectacle was provided for the people in the Hôtel de Ville of Paris in the reign of Louis XI. in honor of the birth of the dauphin. It was called Le bon jugement de la très sainte et gracieuse Vierge Marie, and she appears herself on the stage and pronounces her bon jugement. Similar plays, chiefly from the Old Testament, were occasionally performed in Moscow too, up to the times of Peter the Great. But besides plays there were all sorts of legends and ballads scattered about the world, in which the saints and angels and all the powers of Heaven took part when required. In our monasteries the monks busied themselves in translating, copying, and even composing such poems—and even under the Tatars. There is, for instance, one such poem (of course, from the Greek), The Wanderings of Our Lady through Hell, with descriptions as bold as Dante’s. Our Lady visits hell, and the Archangel Michael leads her through the torments. She sees the sinners and their punishment. There she sees among others one noteworthy set of sinners in a burning lake; some of them sink to the bottom of the lake so that they can’t swim out, and ‘these God forgets’—an expression of extraordinary depth and force. And so Our Lady, shocked and weeping, falls before the throne of God and begs for mercy for all in hell—for all she has seen there, indiscriminately. Her conversation with God is immensely interesting. She beseeches Him, she will not desist, and when God points to the hands and feet of her Son, nailed to the Cross, and asks, ‘How can I forgive His tormentors?’ she bids all the saints, all the martyrs, all the angels and archangels to fall down with her and pray for mercy on all without distinction. It ends by her winning from God a respite of suffering every year from Good Friday till Trinity Day, and the sinners at once raise a cry of thankfulness from hell, chanting, ‘Thou art just, O Lord, in this judgment.’ Well, my poem would have been of that kind if it had appeared at that time... (Constance Garnett, tr.) </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p align="center">*****</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.holy-transfiguration.org/poetry/poetry_moth.html" target="_blank">The Secret Ladder</a> (<a href="https://archive.ph/YUTts#selection-643.0-642.3" target="_blank">A legend</a>)</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;">The Lord called Peter the apostle to a reckoning<br /> And said: “How negligent you have become!<br /> No longer do you execute your sacred duty,<br /> No longer do you follow My command.<br /> <br /> The keys to paradise I’ve given to you, Peter,<br /> For you to meet the souls of all who die,<br /> To judge their earthly lives with strict impartiality<br /> And only let the righteous come inside.<br /> <br /> What do I see now, Peter? Millions of sinners<br /> Sing praises, glorifying God in Eden!<br /> Do you sleep sweetly at the pearly gates of heaven?<br /> What can you say to Me in your defense?”<br /> <br /> Apostle Peter stood there helplessly, declaring:<br /> “I know not how they could have come inside!<br /> The gates of heaven I have rigorously guarded<br /> And stood here day and night, and held the keys.”<br /> <br /> Then, looking at the sinners’ faces with alarm:<br /> “I did not see these faces at the gates!<br /> They have arrived here by some other way perhaps;<br /> I did not let them through the pearly gates!<br /> <br /> Allow me to inspect all Eden’s hidden corners<br /> And find the secret path to paradise.”<br /> “So be it as you wish!” – the Lord said then, arising:<br /> “I, too, would like to know this matter’s truth.<br /> <br /> Give me the keys and I shall walk with you together,<br /> And carefully inspect all heaven’s corners.<br /> But if I find you have been lax in duty, Peter,<br /> Then I will have to tax you most severely!”….<br /> <br /> The Lord then walked through Eden with Apostle Peter,<br /> Already they have passed through all its lanes,<br /> Already they have reached the other, furthest end,<br /> But nowhere was a loophole to be found.<br /> <br /> The Lord regarded Peter with reproachful eyes,<br /> Not knowing how to solve this strangest puzzle.<br /> His head bowed down, Apostle Peter stood and trembled,<br /> And dared not raise his eyes for fear and sorrow….</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;">***</p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;"> </p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center;">Then very suddenly…. A tiny rustling noise<br /> Was heard among the shadows in the bushes….<br /> They stopped to listen…. And with firm and quiet steps<br /> Approached…. And glanced behind the quivering bushes.<br /> <br /> There stood the Holy Virgin, bent over an opening,<br /> Her kindly eyes were firmly fixed upon it….<br /> A silken rope snaked thinly in Her tender hands,<br /> Descending straight into the pit of Hades.<br /> <br /> And out of Hades many sinners climbed this rope,<br /> And quietly came into heaven’s haven.<br /> Their tired eyes were filled with boundless hope and joy,<br /> And glistened with the tears of their repentance.<br /> <br /> Their Intercessor they approached with sacred hope,<br /> And overwhelmed with penitence and tears,<br /> They fell down on their knees with purifying prayer<br /> And bitter crying over all their sins.<br /> <br /> She covered all the sinners with Her Holy Veil,<br /> And blessed their penitence and bitter tears,<br /> And sinful souls shone forth as gold, anewly gleaming,<br /> All pure and cleansed by Her divinest tears.<br /> <br /> The Holy Virgin prayed for all repentant sinners,<br /> And lifting quietly Her precious Veil,<br /> With an embrace She blessed them, made the Cross’ sign,<br /> And gently let them into paradise….<br /> <br /> ***<br /> <br /> “Let us go now!” – the Lord said, covering His eyes,<br /> “We must not know of what is going on!<br /> What She achieves here with Her divine tears of grace,<br /> We have no right or power to impede!<br /> <br /> Pick up your keys and forthwith show no mercy, Peter!<br /> And only let the righteous come inside!<br /> But by this quiet path of genuine contrition,<br /> Let all repentants enter paradise!”</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>(*) The first story is Ivan's introduction to his "Legend of the Grand Inquisitor", from Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, Constance Garnett, tr. It is, among other things, a dostoevskian Paschal story, and a possible key, or framework, for the whole novel, if not for the author's complete works. The second reads almost like its continuation in verse. Could it be Ivan's dream, or vision, from a sequel to the Brothers Karamazov, where <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank">he becomes a hermit</a>, a kind of Arsenius the Great, or Isaac the Syrian, capable of raising the likes of Smerdyakov from spiritual death? A small poem, somehow written and shared by Dostoevsky from beyond the grave? Or just something eligible by Anna Dostoevskaya as the definitive preface to the heavenly edition of Dostoevsky for Children (cf. <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=Raffaella+Vassena+%D0%94%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%B5%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9+%D0%94%D0%BB%D1%8F+%D0%94%D0%B5%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%B9&client=firefox-b-d&ei=F_I7ZPutCpq6sAe45IGYBA&ved=0ahUKEwi7lYiWu67-AhUaHewKHThyAEMQ4dUDCA4&uact=5&oq=Raffaella+Vassena+%D0%94%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D0%B5%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9+%D0%94%D0%BB%D1%8F+%D0%94%D0%B5%D1%82%D0%B5%D0%B9" target="_blank">Dr. Raffaella Vassena</a> on the historical editions; and our online sampling of stories, plus a few more, <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/734-the-protection-of-the-mother-of-god-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-ii.html" target="_blank">here</a>)? Also see <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html&source=gmail&ust=1697354100118000&usg=AOvVaw1WWG55ho15LFMPtBbjmzcd">here</a>.</p>
<p> </p>Cartea lui Iov ca o povestire pascală2023-04-15T15:29:59Z2023-04-15T15:29:59Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/739-cartea-lui-iov-ca-o-povestire-pascal.htmlF.M. Dostoievskininel.ganea@gmail.com<img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/Job1.jpg" width="250" height="436" alt="Job1" style="float: right;" />
<p>Din timpul cât am huzurit acasă nu mi-au rămas decât amintiri frumoase, căci nimic nu-i mai de preţ pe lume pentru om decât amintirea copilăriei petrecute în căminul părintesc, dacă dragostea şi buna înţelegere sălăşluiesc cât de cât în casă. Cât de păcătoasă ar fi o familie, aducerile aminte pe care ţi le lasă petrecerea în sânul ei au încă duioşia lor, dacă sufletul tău este destoinic să se înduioşeze. In rândul amintirilor păstrate din casa părintească se află şi Sfânta Scriptură, către care am simţit multă curiozitate încă de când eram un prichindel. Aveam pe atunci o carte – istoria sfântă – împodobită cu poze de toată frumuseţea, căreia îi spunea: O sută patru cucernice povestiri din „Vechiul” şi „Noul Testament”. Pe ea am deprins să citesc. Şi am ținut-o cu grijă până în ziua de azi, uite-o colo, pe policioară, ca pe un scump giuvaier. Nici nu împlinisem opt ani însă, când am simţit pentru întâiaşi dată că se aprinde ca o lumină în sufletul meu; pe vremea aceea nu apucasem încă să învăţ buchile, într-o zi, ducându-se să asculte liturghia, mama a mers numai cu mine la biserică (fratele meu nu ştiu pe unde era). Asta se întâmpla într-o luni, în Săptămâna patimilor. Era o zi însorită şi parcă văd şi acum ca aievea cum se ridica egal din cădelniţă fumul de tămâie, urcând spre bolta înaltă, în timp ce de acolo, de sus, printr-o ferestruică îngustă, se revărsau peste capetele noastre razele luminii cereşti în care fumul îmbălsămat părea să se mistuie. Priveam pătruns de tot ce vedeam şi pentru întâia oară în viaţă am înţeles şi am primit în adâncul inimii cuvântul lui Dumnezeu. Un tinerel a ieşit mai apoi în mijlocul bisericii cu o carte în braţe, o carte atât de mare, încât mi s-a părut că abia putea s-o ducă; ţâncul a asezat-o pe analoghion, a deschis-o şi a început să citească. Atunci am desluşit pentru întâia oară tâlcul scripturilor slomnite în locaşul Domnului. „Era în ţinutul Uz un om drept şi cucernic şi omul acesta avea atâtea şi atâtea cămile, atâtea şi atâtea oi şi măgari şi copiii lui cei odrăslise se desfătau, iar el îi iubea ca pe ochii din cap şi mult se ruga pentru ei Celui de Sus, gândind că poate vor fi greşit cumva desfătându-se. Şi iată că satana a venit dimpreună cu îngerii lui Dumnezeu şi, înfăţişându-se stăpânului ceresc, i-a spus că a cutreierat lumea în lung şi-n lat, umblând pe pământ şi pe sub pământ. «Văzutu-l-ai pe robul meu Iov?» l-a întrebat Domnul. Şi lăudatu-s-a în faţa lui cu robul său cel plin de har Iov. Iară diavolul a zâmbit la cuvintele sale, grăind: «Lasă-l pe mâna mea şi vedea-vei atunci că robul tău va cârti împotriva ta şi glăsuind te va blestema în gura mare». Şi Dumnezeu l-a lăsat pe robul său drept şi iubit pe mâna satanei şi diavolul dosăditu-l-a, lovind în copiii şi vitele lui şi i-a spulberat toată avuţia, ca şi când trăsnetul din ceruri s-ar fi abătut mistuind-o. Iar Iov, rupând veşmintele de pe el, s-a aruncat cu faţa la pământ şi a dat glas: «Gol am ieşit din pântecele mumei şi gol mă voi întoarce în ţărână. Domnul a dat, Domnul a luat – fie numele Domnului binecuvântat!» „Sfinţiile voastre, iertaţi-mi, rogu-vă, lacrimile, dar toată pruncia mi se înfiripă acum ca aievea în faţa ochilor şi parcă din nou în pieptu-mi freamătă suflarea copilului de opt anişori şi inima mi-e pătrunsă de acelaşi fior, de aceeaşi uimire şi bucurie ca şi atunci. În ziua aceea toate erau făcute să mă uluiască: şi cămilele şi satana, care se încumeta a grăi către Dumnezeu şi Dumnezeu, care se îndurase a da pieirii pe robul său şi robul însuşi, care strigase: „Lăudat fie numele Tău, cu toate că mă pedepseşti!” şi tot aşa m-a mişcat zvonirea domoală şi dulce de cântec ce împânzea biserica: „împlinească-se ruga mea!” şi fumul de tămâie pe care-l cădelniţa preotul şi rugăciunea murmurată în genunchi. Şi până în ziua de azi, ori de câte ori mi-a fost dat să citesc această istorisire din Sfânta Scriptură, mi-au curs lacrimile. Nu mai departe decât ieri, bunăoară. Câtă măreţie şi ce nepătrunse taine pentru mintea noastră! Am aflat mai târziu în gura celor care iau în deşert numele lui Dumnezeu şi-şi bat joc de credinţă cuvinte pline de trufie: „Cum de s-a înduplecat Dumnezeu, zic ei, să lase pe cel mai iubit dintre aleşii lui în ghearele diavolului, cum de a încuviinţat necuratului să-i prăpădească vlăstarele şi să-l năpăstuiască, lovindu-l cu o boală atât de ticăloasă, încât îşi curăţa cu un ciob rănile de puroi? Şi pentru ce? Ca să se poată mai apoi lăuda faţă de satană: «Vezi dară cât se învredniceşte a răbda pentru mine alesul meu!» „Măreţia şi taina sălăşluiesc tocmai în faptul că aici adevărul pieritor al lumii acesteia şi adevărul cel veşnic stau faţă în faţă. Şi adevărul veşnic se dovedeşte a fi mai presus decât adevărul lumii acesteia. Ca-n vremea de început a facerii, când Dumnezeu îşi încheia truda fieştecărei zile zicând: „Făcut-am şi ce am făcut e bine”, ziditorul s-a uitat la Iov şi s-a lăudat cu zidirea sa. Iar Iov, aducându-i slavă, nu l-a slujit numai pe dânsul, ci scris a fost a sluji în veci de veci fieştecăreia dintre zidirile sale, din seminţie în seminţie, căci pentru ăsta a fost plămădit. Doamne, ce izvod şi ce învăţătură! Ce minunat izvod e Sfânta Scriptură, ce har şi ce putere fostau dăruite o dată cu ea omului! Parcă lumea întreagă şi omul şi firea lui cea lăuntrică sunt săpate în piatră, totul e arătat, totul capătă un nume şi asta pentru vecie! Câte taine dezghiocate şi mărturisite: Dumnezeu îl ridică din nou pe Iov din mişelie şi-i dă înapoi bogăţia părăduită; anii trec şi Iov e binecuvântat cu alte vlăstare, pe care aşijderea le iubeşte… Doamne! Cum poate el oare să-i mai iubească pe nou-născuți, când ceilalţi copii nu mai sunt, când ceilalţi i-au fost luaţi? Oare când îşi aduce aminte de ei mai poate el să fie fericit cu aceştia din urmă, aşa cum era odinioară între ai săi, să fie cu adevărat fericit, oricât de dragi i-ar fi cei odrăsliţi acum? Da, poate, fireşte că poate; e însăşi marea taină a vieţii ce preschimbă cu timpul durerea de demult în blândă şi înduioşată bucurie; în locul clocotitoarei tinereţi se aşterne bătrâneţea, cu blajina ei seninătate; nu e zi de la Dumnezeu în care să nu binecuvântez răsăritul soarelui, slăvindu-l ca şi altădată în sufletul meu, dar şi mai drag îmi este asfinţitul, ce-şi prefiră pieziş razele-i lungi de lumină, amintirile duioase şi învăluitoare, chipurile scumpe ce înfloresc lunga şi blagoslovita cale a vieţii mele. Şi peste tot pogoară adevărul divin, ce mângâie, împacă şi apleacă inima spre iertare!</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>(*) Rânduri în mare parte autobiografice, incluse de autor - el însuși suferind şi, sugerează unii biografi, presimțindu-și, poate, apropiata adormire - în "Amintirile Starețului Zosima", din Fraţii Karamazov. In românește de Ovidiu Constantinescu și Isabella Dumbravă)</p>
<p> </p>
<br /><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/Job1.jpg" width="250" height="436" alt="Job1" style="float: right;" />
<p>Din timpul cât am huzurit acasă nu mi-au rămas decât amintiri frumoase, căci nimic nu-i mai de preţ pe lume pentru om decât amintirea copilăriei petrecute în căminul părintesc, dacă dragostea şi buna înţelegere sălăşluiesc cât de cât în casă. Cât de păcătoasă ar fi o familie, aducerile aminte pe care ţi le lasă petrecerea în sânul ei au încă duioşia lor, dacă sufletul tău este destoinic să se înduioşeze. In rândul amintirilor păstrate din casa părintească se află şi Sfânta Scriptură, către care am simţit multă curiozitate încă de când eram un prichindel. Aveam pe atunci o carte – istoria sfântă – împodobită cu poze de toată frumuseţea, căreia îi spunea: O sută patru cucernice povestiri din „Vechiul” şi „Noul Testament”. Pe ea am deprins să citesc. Şi am ținut-o cu grijă până în ziua de azi, uite-o colo, pe policioară, ca pe un scump giuvaier. Nici nu împlinisem opt ani însă, când am simţit pentru întâiaşi dată că se aprinde ca o lumină în sufletul meu; pe vremea aceea nu apucasem încă să învăţ buchile, într-o zi, ducându-se să asculte liturghia, mama a mers numai cu mine la biserică (fratele meu nu ştiu pe unde era). Asta se întâmpla într-o luni, în Săptămâna patimilor. Era o zi însorită şi parcă văd şi acum ca aievea cum se ridica egal din cădelniţă fumul de tămâie, urcând spre bolta înaltă, în timp ce de acolo, de sus, printr-o ferestruică îngustă, se revărsau peste capetele noastre razele luminii cereşti în care fumul îmbălsămat părea să se mistuie. Priveam pătruns de tot ce vedeam şi pentru întâia oară în viaţă am înţeles şi am primit în adâncul inimii cuvântul lui Dumnezeu. Un tinerel a ieşit mai apoi în mijlocul bisericii cu o carte în braţe, o carte atât de mare, încât mi s-a părut că abia putea s-o ducă; ţâncul a asezat-o pe analoghion, a deschis-o şi a început să citească. Atunci am desluşit pentru întâia oară tâlcul scripturilor slomnite în locaşul Domnului. „Era în ţinutul Uz un om drept şi cucernic şi omul acesta avea atâtea şi atâtea cămile, atâtea şi atâtea oi şi măgari şi copiii lui cei odrăslise se desfătau, iar el îi iubea ca pe ochii din cap şi mult se ruga pentru ei Celui de Sus, gândind că poate vor fi greşit cumva desfătându-se. Şi iată că satana a venit dimpreună cu îngerii lui Dumnezeu şi, înfăţişându-se stăpânului ceresc, i-a spus că a cutreierat lumea în lung şi-n lat, umblând pe pământ şi pe sub pământ. «Văzutu-l-ai pe robul meu Iov?» l-a întrebat Domnul. Şi lăudatu-s-a în faţa lui cu robul său cel plin de har Iov. Iară diavolul a zâmbit la cuvintele sale, grăind: «Lasă-l pe mâna mea şi vedea-vei atunci că robul tău va cârti împotriva ta şi glăsuind te va blestema în gura mare». Şi Dumnezeu l-a lăsat pe robul său drept şi iubit pe mâna satanei şi diavolul dosăditu-l-a, lovind în copiii şi vitele lui şi i-a spulberat toată avuţia, ca şi când trăsnetul din ceruri s-ar fi abătut mistuind-o. Iar Iov, rupând veşmintele de pe el, s-a aruncat cu faţa la pământ şi a dat glas: «Gol am ieşit din pântecele mumei şi gol mă voi întoarce în ţărână. Domnul a dat, Domnul a luat – fie numele Domnului binecuvântat!» „Sfinţiile voastre, iertaţi-mi, rogu-vă, lacrimile, dar toată pruncia mi se înfiripă acum ca aievea în faţa ochilor şi parcă din nou în pieptu-mi freamătă suflarea copilului de opt anişori şi inima mi-e pătrunsă de acelaşi fior, de aceeaşi uimire şi bucurie ca şi atunci. În ziua aceea toate erau făcute să mă uluiască: şi cămilele şi satana, care se încumeta a grăi către Dumnezeu şi Dumnezeu, care se îndurase a da pieirii pe robul său şi robul însuşi, care strigase: „Lăudat fie numele Tău, cu toate că mă pedepseşti!” şi tot aşa m-a mişcat zvonirea domoală şi dulce de cântec ce împânzea biserica: „împlinească-se ruga mea!” şi fumul de tămâie pe care-l cădelniţa preotul şi rugăciunea murmurată în genunchi. Şi până în ziua de azi, ori de câte ori mi-a fost dat să citesc această istorisire din Sfânta Scriptură, mi-au curs lacrimile. Nu mai departe decât ieri, bunăoară. Câtă măreţie şi ce nepătrunse taine pentru mintea noastră! Am aflat mai târziu în gura celor care iau în deşert numele lui Dumnezeu şi-şi bat joc de credinţă cuvinte pline de trufie: „Cum de s-a înduplecat Dumnezeu, zic ei, să lase pe cel mai iubit dintre aleşii lui în ghearele diavolului, cum de a încuviinţat necuratului să-i prăpădească vlăstarele şi să-l năpăstuiască, lovindu-l cu o boală atât de ticăloasă, încât îşi curăţa cu un ciob rănile de puroi? Şi pentru ce? Ca să se poată mai apoi lăuda faţă de satană: «Vezi dară cât se învredniceşte a răbda pentru mine alesul meu!» „Măreţia şi taina sălăşluiesc tocmai în faptul că aici adevărul pieritor al lumii acesteia şi adevărul cel veşnic stau faţă în faţă. Şi adevărul veşnic se dovedeşte a fi mai presus decât adevărul lumii acesteia. Ca-n vremea de început a facerii, când Dumnezeu îşi încheia truda fieştecărei zile zicând: „Făcut-am şi ce am făcut e bine”, ziditorul s-a uitat la Iov şi s-a lăudat cu zidirea sa. Iar Iov, aducându-i slavă, nu l-a slujit numai pe dânsul, ci scris a fost a sluji în veci de veci fieştecăreia dintre zidirile sale, din seminţie în seminţie, căci pentru ăsta a fost plămădit. Doamne, ce izvod şi ce învăţătură! Ce minunat izvod e Sfânta Scriptură, ce har şi ce putere fostau dăruite o dată cu ea omului! Parcă lumea întreagă şi omul şi firea lui cea lăuntrică sunt săpate în piatră, totul e arătat, totul capătă un nume şi asta pentru vecie! Câte taine dezghiocate şi mărturisite: Dumnezeu îl ridică din nou pe Iov din mişelie şi-i dă înapoi bogăţia părăduită; anii trec şi Iov e binecuvântat cu alte vlăstare, pe care aşijderea le iubeşte… Doamne! Cum poate el oare să-i mai iubească pe nou-născuți, când ceilalţi copii nu mai sunt, când ceilalţi i-au fost luaţi? Oare când îşi aduce aminte de ei mai poate el să fie fericit cu aceştia din urmă, aşa cum era odinioară între ai săi, să fie cu adevărat fericit, oricât de dragi i-ar fi cei odrăsliţi acum? Da, poate, fireşte că poate; e însăşi marea taină a vieţii ce preschimbă cu timpul durerea de demult în blândă şi înduioşată bucurie; în locul clocotitoarei tinereţi se aşterne bătrâneţea, cu blajina ei seninătate; nu e zi de la Dumnezeu în care să nu binecuvântez răsăritul soarelui, slăvindu-l ca şi altădată în sufletul meu, dar şi mai drag îmi este asfinţitul, ce-şi prefiră pieziş razele-i lungi de lumină, amintirile duioase şi învăluitoare, chipurile scumpe ce înfloresc lunga şi blagoslovita cale a vieţii mele. Şi peste tot pogoară adevărul divin, ce mângâie, împacă şi apleacă inima spre iertare!</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>(*) Rânduri în mare parte autobiografice, incluse de autor - el însuși suferind şi, sugerează unii biografi, presimțindu-și, poate, apropiata adormire - în "Amintirile Starețului Zosima", din Fraţii Karamazov. In românește de Ovidiu Constantinescu și Isabella Dumbravă)</p>
<p> </p>
<br />Till They Have Faces - The Missing Icons in Dostoevsky2023-03-20T07:43:19Z2023-03-20T07:43:19Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/736-till-they-have-faces-the-missing-icons-in-dostoevsky.htmlD.C.C.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i><a href="https://histoire-russie.fr/icone/ecoles04.html"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/imagine2.jpg" width="172" height="250" alt="imagine2" style="float: right;" /></a><a href="https://histoire-russie.fr/icone/ecoles04.html"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/imagine.jpg" width="168" height="250" alt="imagine" style="float: right;" /></a></i></span><em>Dostoevsky said that 'beauty will save the world.'... When these words were spoken, Russia did not yet know what artistic treasures it possessed.... [Yet, our ancient] icon painters saw this beauty, by which the world will be saved, and immortalized it in paints." (<a href="https://archive.is/1eG4D" target="_blank">E. Trubetskoi,</a> 1915; machine translation)</em></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p>If there is in Dostoevsky a longing for the incipient appropriation of the gifts of the Resurrection even in this life, for the transcending of any merely created, or rather, of any merely naturalist, finite, and therefore ultimately boring and recurrently self-immolating kind of "beauty", that would be unworthy of our author's own dictum (quoted by Trubetskoi), then the following makes sense. Indeed, it could be quite close to what he himself might have said, had he lived to see the recovery of the splendor of the old Russian icons, at the turn of the century. And to witness the synergy (cooperation without confusion or contradiction) of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#selection-259.982-259.1141">uncreated grace and nature</a>, so perfectly expressed and <a href="https://archive.ph/26xKW#selection-259.983-259.1141">embodied</a> in them. (As <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/733-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xid-the-duel-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-i.html">previously</a> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html">noted</a>, the cleaning of old Russian icons by expert-restorers, and thus their literal rediscovery, was a momentous process begun soon after Dostoevsky’s repose, soon to be followed by the rediscovery of the Palamite vocabulary, that was best fitted to express it...) If such a longing existed, if it was even a strong, manifest quest for the real Russian (Orthodox) icon of the inner faces and likenesses of our author's beloved Russian (Orthodox) people, then, in a way, he already "saw" what the best ancient hesychast iconographers saw, better than the toll that he sometimes payed to the still Raphaelite/naturalist fashion of his day would otherwise let us guess:</p>
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<p>"The characterization afforded in the <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/%D0%91%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%81_%D0%B8_%D0%93%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%B1_%D1%81_%D0%B6%D0%B8%D1%82%D0%B8%D0%B5%D0%BC_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg" target="_blank">Kolomna hagiographical icon of </a><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/%D0%91%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%81_%D0%B8_%D0%93%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%B1_%D1%81_%D0%B6%D0%B8%D1%82%D0%B8%D0%B5%D0%BC_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg" target="_blank">St. Boris and St. Gleb</a> with Scenes from Their Lives.[...] There is nothing here to disturb the spiritual accord that they have attained or to deter them from their resolution to embrace every trial and ordeal, even anticipation of impending death from their brother Sviatopolk. Only St. Gleb's bearing, his slightly overcast, heavy face will perhaps betray that he has yet to betray a certain degree of weariness. Note that the style also reveals many archaic elements, such as the by no means traditional proportions of the figures, with their low-hung hips, or the flat representations of the hagiographical border scenes. However, the sparse composition, the refined brushwork and, chiefly, the type of saints, indicate that the said icon could not have been painted earlier than the end of the fourteenth century. The ideal expressed in the icon is one confidently and calmly discharging one's spiritual duty, of overcoming the fear of agony and torture, of displaying merciful compassion and infinite, patient love for mankind. These characteristics of the two saints fully accord with those quotations from the scriptures that are repeated time and again in the legend about the two saints, namely: "perfect love casteth out fear" (1 John 4:18) and "Vanity of vanities; all is vanity, and we commend ourselves by the innocence of our behaviour, our grasp of truth, our patience and kindliness" (after Eccl. and 2 Cor.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"The face of St Boris on the Kolomna icon is one of the finest creations of early Russian painting. A true blue-eyed blond Slav, he seems porcelain-fragile, almost ethereal. The sensitiveness and humility, the inspired love that his features convey are all facets of the Russian national ideal as evolved in the culture of Moscow. The salient feature of this image is the heightened emotional quality, contrasting with the refined intellectuality of the Byzantine type. The artist who painted the Kolomna icon, though hardly aware of the then innovative stylistical concepts of Byzantine culture, which the leading workshops of Moscow were themselves only too familiar with, was nevertheless able to display rare vision in communicating the very essence of the [hesychast] spiritual ideal of the time. The face reveals something that raises above the vicissitudes of the contemporary artistic trends. This portrayal is a forerunner in a way of the major characters in modern Russian culture, characters that were representative of a similar ideal, such as Dostoevsky's philanthropic Alexei Karamazov and Prince Myshkin....</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"Artistically, the <a href="https://archive.ph/NNRBC/6581c3de239139cb3dc50f97b04e368ddefcc503.jpg" target="_blank">Kolomna Descent into Limbo</a>, along with the hagiographical icon of St. Boris and St. Gleb, best accord with that spiritual mood which St. Sergius of Radonezh introduced into Moscow culture by his teaching."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Engelina Smirnova, Moscow Icons: 14th - 17th Centuries, Aurora Art Publishers, Moscow, 1989, pp. 16, 19)</p>
<p> </p><p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i><a href="https://histoire-russie.fr/icone/ecoles04.html"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/imagine2.jpg" width="172" height="250" alt="imagine2" style="float: right;" /></a><a href="https://histoire-russie.fr/icone/ecoles04.html"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/imagine.jpg" width="168" height="250" alt="imagine" style="float: right;" /></a></i></span><em>Dostoevsky said that 'beauty will save the world.'... When these words were spoken, Russia did not yet know what artistic treasures it possessed.... [Yet, our ancient] icon painters saw this beauty, by which the world will be saved, and immortalized it in paints." (<a href="https://archive.is/1eG4D" target="_blank">E. Trubetskoi,</a> 1915; machine translation)</em></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p>If there is in Dostoevsky a longing for the incipient appropriation of the gifts of the Resurrection even in this life, for the transcending of any merely created, or rather, of any merely naturalist, finite, and therefore ultimately boring and recurrently self-immolating kind of "beauty", that would be unworthy of our author's own dictum (quoted by Trubetskoi), then the following makes sense. Indeed, it could be quite close to what he himself might have said, had he lived to see the recovery of the splendor of the old Russian icons, at the turn of the century. And to witness the synergy (cooperation without confusion or contradiction) of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#selection-259.982-259.1141">uncreated grace and nature</a>, so perfectly expressed and <a href="https://archive.ph/26xKW#selection-259.983-259.1141">embodied</a> in them. (As <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/733-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xid-the-duel-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-i.html">previously</a> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html">noted</a>, the cleaning of old Russian icons by expert-restorers, and thus their literal rediscovery, was a momentous process begun soon after Dostoevsky’s repose, soon to be followed by the rediscovery of the Palamite vocabulary, that was best fitted to express it...) If such a longing existed, if it was even a strong, manifest quest for the real Russian (Orthodox) icon of the inner faces and likenesses of our author's beloved Russian (Orthodox) people, then, in a way, he already "saw" what the best ancient hesychast iconographers saw, better than the toll that he sometimes payed to the still Raphaelite/naturalist fashion of his day would otherwise let us guess:</p>
<div align="center">
<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
</tr>
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<p> </p>
<p>"The characterization afforded in the <a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/%D0%91%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%81_%D0%B8_%D0%93%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%B1_%D1%81_%D0%B6%D0%B8%D1%82%D0%B8%D0%B5%D0%BC_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg" target="_blank">Kolomna hagiographical icon of </a><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/%D0%91%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%81_%D0%B8_%D0%93%D0%BB%D0%B5%D0%B1_%D1%81_%D0%B6%D0%B8%D1%82%D0%B8%D0%B5%D0%BC_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg" target="_blank">St. Boris and St. Gleb</a> with Scenes from Their Lives.[...] There is nothing here to disturb the spiritual accord that they have attained or to deter them from their resolution to embrace every trial and ordeal, even anticipation of impending death from their brother Sviatopolk. Only St. Gleb's bearing, his slightly overcast, heavy face will perhaps betray that he has yet to betray a certain degree of weariness. Note that the style also reveals many archaic elements, such as the by no means traditional proportions of the figures, with their low-hung hips, or the flat representations of the hagiographical border scenes. However, the sparse composition, the refined brushwork and, chiefly, the type of saints, indicate that the said icon could not have been painted earlier than the end of the fourteenth century. The ideal expressed in the icon is one confidently and calmly discharging one's spiritual duty, of overcoming the fear of agony and torture, of displaying merciful compassion and infinite, patient love for mankind. These characteristics of the two saints fully accord with those quotations from the scriptures that are repeated time and again in the legend about the two saints, namely: "perfect love casteth out fear" (1 John 4:18) and "Vanity of vanities; all is vanity, and we commend ourselves by the innocence of our behaviour, our grasp of truth, our patience and kindliness" (after Eccl. and 2 Cor.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"The face of St Boris on the Kolomna icon is one of the finest creations of early Russian painting. A true blue-eyed blond Slav, he seems porcelain-fragile, almost ethereal. The sensitiveness and humility, the inspired love that his features convey are all facets of the Russian national ideal as evolved in the culture of Moscow. The salient feature of this image is the heightened emotional quality, contrasting with the refined intellectuality of the Byzantine type. The artist who painted the Kolomna icon, though hardly aware of the then innovative stylistical concepts of Byzantine culture, which the leading workshops of Moscow were themselves only too familiar with, was nevertheless able to display rare vision in communicating the very essence of the [hesychast] spiritual ideal of the time. The face reveals something that raises above the vicissitudes of the contemporary artistic trends. This portrayal is a forerunner in a way of the major characters in modern Russian culture, characters that were representative of a similar ideal, such as Dostoevsky's philanthropic Alexei Karamazov and Prince Myshkin....</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"Artistically, the <a href="https://archive.ph/NNRBC/6581c3de239139cb3dc50f97b04e368ddefcc503.jpg" target="_blank">Kolomna Descent into Limbo</a>, along with the hagiographical icon of St. Boris and St. Gleb, best accord with that spiritual mood which St. Sergius of Radonezh introduced into Moscow culture by his teaching."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(Engelina Smirnova, Moscow Icons: 14th - 17th Centuries, Aurora Art Publishers, Moscow, 1989, pp. 16, 19)</p>
<p> </p>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children: (XIe) The Protection of the Mother of God - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part II2022-12-30T15:20:21Z2022-12-30T15:20:21Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/734-the-protection-of-the-mother-of-god-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-ii.htmlDostoievski et al.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/dionisie.jpg" width="250" height="173" alt="dionisie" style="float: right;" />Previously in the </span><i style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"> series:</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Varenka's Memoirs</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>Poor Folk</i>, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">An Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>Stories of a Man of Experience</i>, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Nellie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Insulted and Injured</i>, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Marie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Idiot</i>, 1868 [suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya in correspondence pertaining to the 1897 anthology, DPC X])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">At The Select Boarding School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">The Merchant's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">The Peasant Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Foma Danilov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">From the novel <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i> (1881, [1883, 1897, DPC XI] - enlarged selection)</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> a) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Alyosha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> b) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Obedience. Elder Zossima</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> c) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Peasant Women Who Have Faith</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> d) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/733-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xid-the-duel-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-i.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">The Duel - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part I</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present <i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i> (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and as the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> our brief introduction to the original <i>Dostoevsky for Children</i> anthologies, and to this English online version.}</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">--//--</span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">'The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone'</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">'At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven'</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">'Prayer is an education ... Brothers, love is a teacher; but one must know how to acquire it, for it is hard to acquire, it is dearly bought, it is won slowly by long labor.' (Elder Zossima, in Dostoevsky's <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>) </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Precious few comments, even by otherwise close readers, find the space to notice the prayer to the Mother of God, before her icon, of the main man of prayer in <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, and indeed, perhaps in all of Dostoevsky's work.[1]</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Even though all crimes averted in the novel are averted by prayer. By Dimitri's own assessment, such was the case of both his two potential parricides (that were almost, but not actually committed, against Fyodor Pavlovich and Grigory, Dimitri's natural and moral fathers, respectively).</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But the swiftest and most effective tamer of criminals is, of course, revealed directly by the Elder himself, in the story of his first spiritual son, the mysterious visitor Mikhail - his Raskolnikov and Rogojin, all in one, to whom the young Zinovy (later Elder Zossima) is Sonia and Myshkin, all in one. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And this tamer is revealed in the salvific prayer of Zinovy/Zossima, at the critical time that would otherwise have been that of the taking of his life: the Mother of God.[2, 3] The Protection (<i>Pokrov</i>) of the Most Holy Mother of God. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Indeed, the Protection of the Mother of God, in <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, is far from being confined to wise (prayerful) natural mothers and sons. Although it is that, too, as we have already <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">seen</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. But the central case, as also <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">previously</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> intimated, is the case of the Mother-of-God-oriented wise Elders, and of their spiritual sons, at their school of prayer.[4]</span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The Protection of the Mother of God is all over <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>: in Heaven (The Wedding in Cana) and Hell (Ivan's "Journey of the Mother of God..."). In the "social mission" of the Church ("like a tender, loving mother, [she] holds aloof from active punishment herself, as the [convicted] sinner is too severely punished already by the civil law, and there must be at least some one to have pity on him"), as in the heartfelt prayer of Elder Zossima for the salvation of the criminal Mikhail, that becomes the salvation of his own life. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And the salvation of both him and his first spiritual son, each in his own way, from the world of distractions and temptations, that repels the Grace filled tears of repentance, and the abiding joy that is hidden in the Cross. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yes! In today's memorable opening section, Dostoevsky lifts, for a quick instant, the "rosy" veil that he otherwise seems to have so successfully thrown on his story, to make it <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">palatable for worldly "Petrashevites"</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of all persuasions, and for other radical Westernizers to bite his Karamazovian hook.[5] The jury is still out, debating whether we can forgive him for that.[6]</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">In the meantime, we cannot but ask ourselves: might the lives of old Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov, and of his bastard parricide and suicidal son, Smerdyakov, also have been spared, had the fictional Elder Zossima remained truer to the experience of his younger self? Had he kept Alyosha in the monastery, in quietly sustained heartfelt prayer to the Mother of God, for his much tempted brothers, father, and all their ailing world?</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Met. Anthony Khrapovisky essentially<a href="https://vtoraya-literatura.com/publ_2109.html"> suggests</a> as much, when he writes that Dostoevsky must have actually thought of Alyosha as remaining in the monastery, but for a poetic licence in view of his unprepared readers. He might, perhaps, have only added that, while the co-suffering love that is our author's main theme is, of course, Christ-filled love, found not in the legalistic-retributive West, but in <a href="https://archive.ph/ke265#selection-7215.0-7233.1">St. Isaac the Syrian and those with him,</a> the practical path for both the Russian people and the Hesychastic Oecumene, has always been that of close communion with the <i>Bogoroditse</i>, and of the acquisition of her motherly love. And Dostoevsky felt this.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Last but not least, perhaps even Alyosha's angelic face (that so many characters in the story seem to notice) was pointing to the path of being 'like the angels in heaven'. If so, it was also pointing to the path of the Mother of God, the height of monastic and hesychast spirituality, according to the Eastern Orthodox tradition. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">We can only guess what iconic fragrance might the Cana of Galilee Wedding have evoked, had the more real elder envisioned by Met. Anthony been allowed to guide Alyosha on the path of his angelic calling to the end, for his own benefit, and that of his kin...</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">P.S. With our potentially interested English-speaking readers in view, we include here a brief outline of the ToC of our (God willing) forthcoming Romanian printed edition of <i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i>. We have tried to organize it so as to minimize the editorial interventions. It suggests our interpretation, while hopefully preserving both the spirit and the freedoms suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya and her editorial associates' approach to the three different but related original versions of the book (see <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">the opening</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of this series for references). A second Romanian volume should complete the integral of the short pieces and excerpts included or suggested by the Dostoevskys and their collaborators for this inspiring editorial project.</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</span></i></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Table of Contents of the forthcoming Romanian edition (outline)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I. Icons of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Wise (Spiritual) Motherhood</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Sophia Dolgoruky</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">II. The Struggles (<i>Podvig</i>) of Wise Motherhood</span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Merchant Skotoboinikov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Nellie</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">III. The Mystery of Friendship</span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Varenka</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Marie</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">IV. The Protection of the Mother of God</span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Alyosha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Elder</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> Zossima</span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://archive.is/K48vz" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Iliusha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Notes (for in depth seekers, esp.:)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[1] A good summary of what may still be the dominant reading among academic scholars is given by Jefferson Gatrall, in a pioneering paper, revealing the inherently important distinction between paintings (described in Dostoevsky) and icons (<i>not</i> described by Dostoevsky, though perhaps this silence needs to be interpreted in the larger context of his other reverent understatements and silences, as indicating not so much something missing, but something quasi-unspeakable, an eminently effective, yet apophatic presence, awaiting, so to speak, the rediscovery of the <a href="https://archive.ph/emzln#selection-121.133-121.293">Palamite</a> <a href="https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2014/11/saint-gregory-palamas-resource-page.html">vocabulary</a> to be properly approached). Concerning our present subject, however, Gatrall writes: '[Sophie] Ollivier's generalization that "<i>only women pray before the icons in Dostoevsky's works</i>"... seems to hold for all of Dostoevsky's works except House of the Dead, in which even hardened criminals at times pause to pray before icons on barracks walls...' ("THE ICON IN THE PICTURE: REFRAMING THE QUESTION OF DOSTOEVSKY'S MODERNIST ICONOGRAPHY", 2004, n. 17, italics added. Gatrall's title, as we understand it, seems to connote the supposedly all absorbing power of Dostoevsky's literary-poetic, secular "iconography", but this need not detain us here.) We cannot here begin to measure how the retrieving of Elder Zossima's prayer before the icon of the Mother of God could refine and/or reshape the otherwise outstanding readings of either Gatrall or Ollivier ("Icons in Dostoevsky's Works", 2001), and other equally remarkable ones. But those wishing to do so may find it relevant to also review <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">some</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of our <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">previous</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/733-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xid-the-duel-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-i.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">notes</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. </span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[2] No less spectacularly and importantly, in Dostoevsky, the Mother of God and her closest followers (those who achieve a sufficient measure of inner communion with her, by means of sustained prayer to her and the veneration of her icon), are the tamers, if not directly of the angry, ever offended, and<a href="https://archive.ph/axwF5#selection-523.12-531.334"> "rationally" vengeful Western God</a>, at least of his images and likenesses, the Dostoevskian "demons". Like the Western God, they are impostors ("false Dmitris", as someone previously deceived by one of "the demons" suggests, in the homonymous novel - someone close to the Mother of God, but presumably not as close as not to be deceived in the first place). The implied parallel between the equally split personalities of the "perfect" worldly criminal Mikhail and the speculative Ivan mirrors that between "perfect" worldliness and "demonic" rationalism, as likenesses of the Western God. Both, aspects of the Western disease, in need of the same cure, from a Dostoevskian perspective. Cf. esp. <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/religie/735-met-anthony-khrapovitsky-on-zacchaeus-the-mystery-of-co-suffering-love-in-everyday-life-and-dostoevsky.html">Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky.</a> </span><span style="font-family: 'times new roman', times; font-size: 10pt;">Our readers will notice that, at the heart of Zossima's approach, co-suffering love - the cure for all those who will be cured - is organically bound with prayer to the Mother of God: "I fell on my knees before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy Mother of God, our swift defender and helper."</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[3] The <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">already mentioned</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> inspiring work of Diane Oenning Thompson is one of the precious few that does actually note the Elder's prayer before the icon of the Mother of God. However, it seems to relegate it to a secondary status, making the prayer of Alyosha's natural mother, Sophia, the central case. Thus, we feel, it unfortunately reverses the natural and Dostoevskian order. Which, it seems to us, is not chronological, or merely natural, but qualitative in a higher sense. Such reversal, we fear, actually deemphasizes the true value of both <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">spiritual eldership and natural motherhood</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> in <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Dostoevsky's world</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. </span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[4] Prince Myshkin also belonged to that School: "Exactly as is a mother’s joy when her baby smiles for the first time into her eyes, so is God’s joy when one of His children turns and prays to Him for the first time, with all his heart!" (<i>The Idiot</i>) Unlike Zossima, however, as <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">we have briefly discussed</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, the Prince may have occasioned grievous misunderstanding, perhaps for his not treading the angelic path of the Mother of God to the end.</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[5] "Keep thy mind in the hell of fallen human nature, and always rejoice, in the Risen Christ", as we have <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html">previously</a> tried to summarize it, in the light of life and teaching of the Peasant-Hesychast Saint Silouan.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[6] Cf. Caryl Emerson, 'Zosima's “Mysterious Visitor”: Again Bakhtin on Dostoevsky, and Dostoevsky on Heaven and Hell' (2004)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">***</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">F.M. Dostoevsky </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The Protection of the Mother of God - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part II</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(From <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, 1881, books VI-VII. Translation by Constance Garnett. Russian original </span></b><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#selection-30757.7-30757.34" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></b></a><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">.)</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(d) The Mysterious Visitor</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He had long been an official in the town; he was in a prominent position, respected by all, rich and had a reputation for benevolence. He subscribed considerable sums to the almshouse and the orphan asylum; he was very charitable, too, in secret, a fact which only became known after his death. He was a man of about fifty, almost stern in appearance and not much given to conversation. He had been married about ten years and his wife, who was still young, had borne him three children. Well, I was sitting alone in my room the following evening, when my door suddenly opened and this gentleman walked in. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I must mention, by the way, that I was no longer living in my former quarters. As soon as I resigned my commission, I took rooms with an old lady, the widow of a government clerk. My landlady’s servant waited upon me, for I had moved into her rooms simply because on my return from the duel I had sent Afanasy back to the regiment, as I felt ashamed to look him in the face after my last interview with him. So prone is the man of the world to be ashamed of any righteous action. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have,” said my visitor, “with great interest listened to you speaking in different houses the last few days and I wanted at last to make your personal acquaintance, so as to talk to you more intimately. Can you, dear sir, grant me this favor?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I can, with the greatest pleasure, and I shall look upon it as an honor.” I said this, though I felt almost dismayed, so greatly was I impressed from the first moment by the appearance of this man. For though other people had listened to me with interest and attention, no one had come to me before with such a serious, stern and concentrated expression. And now he had come to see me in my own rooms. He sat down. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You are, I see, a man of great strength of character,” he said; “as you have dared to serve the truth, even when by doing so you risked incurring the contempt of all.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Your praise is, perhaps, excessive,” I replied. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“No, it’s not excessive,” he answered; “believe me, such a course of action is far more difficult than you think. It is that which has impressed me, and it is only on that account that I have come to you,” he continued. “Tell me, please, that is if you are not annoyed by my perhaps unseemly curiosity, what were your exact sensations, if you can recall them, at the moment when you made up your mind to ask forgiveness at the duel. Do not think my question frivolous; on the contrary, I have in asking the question a secret motive of my own, which I will perhaps explain to you later on, if it is God’s will that we should become more intimately acquainted.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">All the while he was speaking, I was looking at him straight into the face and I felt all at once a complete trust in him and great curiosity on my side also, for I felt that there was some strange secret in his soul. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You ask what were my exact sensations at the moment when I asked my opponent’s forgiveness,” I answered; “but I had better tell you from the beginning what I have not yet told any one else.” And I described all that had passed between Afanasy and me, and how I had bowed down to the ground at his feet. “From that you can see for yourself,” I concluded, “that at the time of the duel it was easier for me, for I had made a beginning already at home, and when once I had started on that road, to go farther along it was far from being difficult, but became a source of joy and happiness.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I liked the way he looked at me as he listened. “All that,” he said, “is exceedingly interesting. I will come to see you again and again.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And from that time forth he came to see me nearly every evening. And we should have become greater friends, if only he had ever talked of himself. But about himself he scarcely ever said a word, yet continually asked me about myself. In spite of that I became very fond of him and spoke with perfect frankness to him about all my feelings; “for,” thought I, “what need have I to know his secrets, since I can see without that that he is a good man? Moreover, though he is such a serious man and my senior, he comes to see a youngster like me and treats me as his equal.” And I learned a great deal that was profitable from him, for he was a man of lofty mind. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“That life is heaven,” he said to me suddenly, “that I have long been thinking about”; and all at once he added, “I think of nothing else indeed.” He looked at me and smiled. “I am more convinced of it than you are, I will tell you later why.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I listened to him and thought that he evidently wanted to tell me something. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Heaven,” he went on, “lies hidden within all of us—here it lies hidden in me now, and if I will it, it will be revealed to me to‐morrow and for all time.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I looked at him; he was speaking with great emotion and gazing mysteriously at me, as if he were questioning me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“And that we are all responsible to all for all, apart from our own sins, you were quite right in thinking that, and it is wonderful how you could comprehend it in all its significance at once. And in very truth, so soon as men understand that, the Kingdom of Heaven will be for them not a dream, but a living reality.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“And when,” I cried out to him bitterly, “when will that come to pass? and will it ever come to pass? Is not it simply a dream of ours?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What then, you don’t believe it,” he said. “You preach it and don’t believe it yourself. Believe me, this dream, as you call it, will come to pass without doubt; it will come, but not now, for every process has its law. It’s a spiritual, psychological process. To transform the world, to recreate it afresh, men must turn into another path psychologically. Until you have become really, in actual fact, a brother to every one, brotherhood will not come to pass. No sort of scientific teaching, no kind of common interest, will ever teach men to share property and privileges with equal consideration for all. Every one will think his share too small and they will be always envying, complaining and attacking one another. You ask when it will come to pass; it will come to pass, but first we have to go through the period of isolation.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What do you mean by isolation?” I asked him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Why, the isolation that prevails everywhere, above all in our age—it has not fully developed, it has not reached its limit yet. For every one strives to keep his individuality as apart as possible, wishes to secure the greatest possible fullness of life for himself; but meantime all his efforts result not in attaining fullness of life but self‐destruction, for instead of self‐realization he ends by arriving at complete solitude. All mankind in our age have split up into units, they all keep apart, each in his own groove; each one holds aloof, hides himself and hides what he has, from the rest, and he ends by being repelled by others and repelling them. He heaps up riches by himself and thinks, ‘How strong I am now and how secure,’ and in his madness he does not understand that the more he heaps up, the more he sinks into self‐destructive impotence. For he is accustomed to rely upon himself alone and to cut himself off from the whole; he has trained himself not to believe in the help of others, in men and in humanity, and only trembles for fear he should lose his money and the privileges that he has won for himself. Everywhere in these days men have, in their mockery, ceased to understand that the true security is to be found in social solidarity rather than in isolated individual effort. But this terrible individualism must inevitably have an end, and all will suddenly understand how unnaturally they are separated from one another. It will be the spirit of the time, and people will marvel that they have sat so long in darkness without seeing the light. And then the sign of the Son of Man will be seen in the heavens.... But, until then, we must keep the banner flying. Sometimes even if he has to do it alone, and his conduct seems to be crazy, a man must set an example, and so draw men’s souls out of their solitude, and spur them to some act of brotherly love, that the great idea may not die.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Our evenings, one after another, were spent in such stirring and fervent talk. I gave up society and visited my neighbors much less frequently. Besides, my vogue was somewhat over. I say this, not as blame, for they still loved me and treated me good‐humoredly, but there’s no denying that fashion is a great power in society. I began to regard my mysterious visitor with admiration, for besides enjoying his intelligence, I began to perceive that he was brooding over some plan in his heart, and was preparing himself perhaps for a great deed. Perhaps he liked my not showing curiosity about his secret, not seeking to discover it by direct question nor by insinuation. But I noticed at last, that he seemed to show signs of wanting to tell me something. This had become quite evident, indeed, about a month after he first began to visit me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do you know,” he said to me once, “that people are very inquisitive about us in the town and wonder why I come to see you so often. But let them wonder, for <i>soon all will be explained</i>.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Sometimes an extraordinary agitation would come over him, and almost always on such occasions he would get up and go away. Sometimes he would fix a long piercing look upon me, and I thought, “He will say something directly now.” But he would suddenly begin talking of something ordinary and familiar. He often complained of headache too. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">One day, quite unexpectedly indeed, after he had been talking with great fervor a long time, I saw him suddenly turn pale, and his face worked convulsively, while he stared persistently at me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What’s the matter?” I said; “do you feel ill?”—he had just been complaining of headache. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I ... do you know ... I murdered some one.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He said this and smiled with a face as white as chalk. “Why is it he is smiling?” The thought flashed through my mind before I realized anything else. I too turned pale. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What are you saying?” I cried. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You see,” he said, with a pale smile, “how much it has cost me to say the first word. Now I have said it, I feel I’ve taken the first step and shall go on.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">For a long while I could not believe him, and I did not believe him at that time, but only after he had been to see me three days running and told me all about it. I thought he was mad, but ended by being convinced, to my great grief and amazement. His crime was a great and terrible one. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fourteen years before, he had murdered the widow of a landowner, a wealthy and handsome young woman who had a house in our town. He fell passionately in love with her, declared his feeling and tried to persuade her to marry him. But she had already given her heart to another man, an officer of noble birth and high rank in the service, who was at that time away at the front, though she was expecting him soon to return. She refused his offer and begged him not to come and see her. After he had ceased to visit her, he took advantage of his knowledge of the house to enter at night through the garden by the roof, at great risk of discovery. But, as often happens, a crime committed with extraordinary audacity is more successful than others. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Entering the garret through the skylight, he went down the ladder, knowing that the door at the bottom of it was sometimes, through the negligence of the servants, left unlocked. He hoped to find it so, and so it was. He made his way in the dark to her bedroom, where a light was burning. As though on purpose, both her maids had gone off to a birthday‐party in the same street, without asking leave. The other servants slept in the servants’ quarters or in the kitchen on the ground‐floor. His passion flamed up at the sight of her asleep, and then vindictive, jealous anger took possession of his heart, and like a drunken man, beside himself, he thrust a knife into her heart, so that she did not even cry out. Then with devilish and criminal cunning he contrived that suspicion should fall on the servants. He was so base as to take her purse, to open her chest with keys from under her pillow, and to take some things from it, doing it all as it might have been done by an ignorant servant, leaving valuable papers and taking only money. He took some of the larger gold things, but left smaller articles that were ten times as valuable. He took with him, too, some things for himself as remembrances, but of that later. Having done this awful deed, he returned by the way he had come. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Neither the next day, when the alarm was raised, nor at any time after in his life, did any one dream of suspecting that he was the criminal. No one indeed knew of his love for her, for he was always reserved and silent and had no friend to whom he would have opened his heart. He was looked upon simply as an acquaintance, and not a very intimate one, of the murdered woman, as for the previous fortnight he had not even visited her. A serf of hers called Pyotr was at once suspected, and every circumstance confirmed the suspicion. The man knew—indeed his mistress did not conceal the fact—that having to send one of her serfs as a recruit she had decided to send him, as he had no relations and his conduct was unsatisfactory. People had heard him angrily threatening to murder her when he was drunk in a tavern. Two days before her death, he had run away, staying no one knew where in the town. The day after the murder, he was found on the road leading out of the town, dead drunk, with a knife in his pocket, and his right hand happened to be stained with blood. He declared that his nose had been bleeding, but no one believed him. The maids confessed that they had gone to a party and that the street‐door had been left open till they returned. And a number of similar details came to light, throwing suspicion on the innocent servant. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">They arrested him, and he was tried for the murder; but a week after the arrest, the prisoner fell sick of a fever and died unconscious in the hospital. There the matter ended and the judges and the authorities and every one in the town remained convinced that the crime had been committed by no one but the servant who had died in the hospital. And after that the punishment began. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">My mysterious visitor, now my friend, told me that at first he was not in the least troubled by pangs of conscience. He was miserable a long time, but not for that reason; only from regret that he had killed the woman he loved, that she was no more, that in killing her he had killed his love, while the fire of passion was still in his veins. But of the innocent blood he had shed, of the murder of a fellow creature, he scarcely thought. The thought that his victim might have become the wife of another man was insupportable to him, and so, for a long time, he was convinced in his conscience that he could not have acted otherwise. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At first he was worried at the arrest of the servant, but his illness and death soon set his mind at rest, for the man’s death was apparently (so he reflected at the time) not owing to his arrest or his fright, but a chill he had taken on the day he ran away, when he had lain all night dead drunk on the damp ground. The theft of the money and other things troubled him little, for he argued that the theft had not been committed for gain but to avert suspicion. The sum stolen was small, and he shortly afterwards subscribed the whole of it, and much more, towards the funds for maintaining an almshouse in the town. He did this on purpose to set his conscience at rest about the theft, and it’s a remarkable fact that for a long time he really was at peace—he told me this himself. He entered then upon a career of great activity in the service, volunteered for a difficult and laborious duty, which occupied him two years, and being a man of strong will almost forgot the past. Whenever he recalled it, he tried not to think of it at all. He became active in philanthropy too, founded and helped to maintain many institutions in the town, did a good deal in the two capitals, and in both Moscow and Petersburg was elected a member of philanthropic societies. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At last, however, he began brooding over the past, and the strain of it was too much for him. Then he was attracted by a fine and intelligent girl and soon after married her, hoping that marriage would dispel his lonely depression, and that by entering on a new life and scrupulously doing his duty to his wife and children, he would escape from old memories altogether. But the very opposite of what he expected happened. He began, even in the first month of his marriage, to be continually fretted by the thought, “My wife loves me—but what if she knew?” When she first told him that she would soon bear him a child, he was troubled. “I am giving life, but I have taken life.” Children came. “How dare I love them, teach and educate them, how can I talk to them of virtue? I have shed blood.” They were splendid children, he longed to caress them; “and I can’t look at their innocent candid faces, I am unworthy.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At last he began to be bitterly and ominously haunted by the blood of his murdered victim, by the young life he had destroyed, by the blood that cried out for vengeance. He had begun to have awful dreams. But, being a man of fortitude, he bore his suffering a long time, thinking: “I shall expiate everything by this secret agony.” But that hope, too, was vain; the longer it went on, the more intense was his suffering. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He was respected in society for his active benevolence, though every one was overawed by his stern and gloomy character. But the more he was respected, the more intolerable it was for him. He confessed to me that he had thoughts of killing himself. But he began to be haunted by another idea—an idea which he had at first regarded as impossible and unthinkable, though at last it got such a hold on his heart that he could not shake it off. He dreamed of rising up, going out and confessing in the face of all men that he had committed murder. For three years this dream had pursued him, haunting him in different forms. At last he believed with his whole heart that if he confessed his crime, he would heal his soul and would be at peace for ever. But this belief filled his heart with terror, for how could he carry it out? And then came what happened at my duel. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Looking at you, I have made up my mind.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I looked at him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Is it possible,” I cried, clasping my hands, “that such a trivial incident could give rise to such a resolution in you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“My resolution has been growing for the last three years,” he answered, “and your story only gave the last touch to it. Looking at you, I reproached myself and envied you.” He said this to me almost sullenly. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But you won’t be believed,” I observed; “it’s fourteen years ago.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have proofs, great proofs. I shall show them.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then I cried and kissed him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Tell me one thing, one thing,” he said (as though it all depended upon me), “my wife, my children! My wife may die of grief, and though my children won’t lose their rank and property, they’ll be a convict’s children and for ever! And what a memory, what a memory of me I shall leave in their hearts!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I said nothing. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“And to part from them, to leave them for ever? It’s for ever, you know, for ever!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I sat still and repeated a silent prayer. I got up at last, I felt afraid. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Well?” He looked at me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Go!” said I, “confess. Everything passes, only the truth remains. Your children will understand, when they grow up, the nobility of your resolution.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He left me that time as though he had made up his mind. Yet for more than a fortnight afterwards, he came to me every evening, still preparing himself, still unable to bring himself to the point. He made my heart ache. One day he would come determined and say fervently: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I know it will be heaven for me, heaven, the moment I confess. Fourteen years I’ve been in hell. I want to suffer. I will take my punishment and begin to live. You can pass through the world doing wrong, but there’s no turning back. Now I dare not love my neighbor nor even my own children. Good God, my children will understand, perhaps, what my punishment has cost me and will not condemn me! God is not in strength but in truth.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“All will understand your sacrifice,” I said to him, “if not at once, they will understand later; for you have served truth, the higher truth, not of the earth.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And he would go away seeming comforted, but next day he would come again, bitter, pale, sarcastic. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Every time I come to you, you look at me so inquisitively as though to say, ‘He has still not confessed!’ Wait a bit, don’t despise me too much. It’s not such an easy thing to do, as you would think. Perhaps I shall not do it at all. You won’t go and inform against me then, will you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And far from looking at him with indiscreet curiosity, I was afraid to look at him at all. I was quite ill from anxiety, and my heart was full of tears. I could not sleep at night. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have just come from my wife,” he went on. “Do you understand what the word ‘wife’ means? When I went out, the children called to me, ‘Good‐by, father, make haste back to read <i>The Children’s Magazine</i> with us.’ No, you don’t understand that! No one is wise from another man’s woe.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">His eyes were glittering, his lips were twitching. Suddenly he struck the table with his fist so that everything on it danced—it was the first time he had done such a thing, he was such a mild man. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But need I?” he exclaimed, “must I? No one has been condemned, no one has been sent to Siberia in my place, the man died of fever. And I’ve been punished by my sufferings for the blood I shed. And I shan’t be believed, they won’t believe my proofs. Need I confess, need I? I am ready to go on suffering all my life for the blood I have shed, if only my wife and children may be spared. Will it be just to ruin them with me? Aren’t we making a mistake? What is right in this case? And will people recognize it, will they appreciate it, will they respect it?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Good Lord!” I thought to myself, “he is thinking of other people’s respect at such a moment!” And I felt so sorry for him then, that I believe I would have shared his fate if it could have comforted him. I saw he was beside himself. I was aghast, realizing with my heart as well as my mind what such a resolution meant. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Decide my fate!” he exclaimed again. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Go and confess,” I whispered to him. My voice failed me, but I whispered it firmly. I took up the New Testament from the table, the Russian translation, and showed him the Gospel of St. John, chapter xii. verse 24: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I had just been reading that verse when he came in. He read it. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“That’s true,” he said, but he smiled bitterly. “It’s terrible the things you find in those books,” he said, after a pause. “It’s easy enough to thrust them upon one. And who wrote them? Can they have been written by men?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“The Holy Spirit wrote them,” said I. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It’s easy for you to prate,” he smiled again, this time almost with hatred. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I took the book again, opened it in another place and showed him the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter x. verse 31. He read: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He read it and simply flung down the book. He was trembling all over. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“An awful text,” he said. “There’s no denying you’ve picked out fitting ones.” He rose from the chair. “Well!” he said, “good‐by, perhaps I shan’t come again ... we shall meet in heaven. So I have been for fourteen years ‘in the hands of the living God,’ that’s how one must think of those fourteen years. To‐morrow I will beseech those hands to let me go.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I wanted to take him in my arms and kiss him, but I did not dare—his face was contorted and somber. He went away. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Good God,” I thought, “what has he gone to face!” I fell on my knees before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy Mother of God, our swift defender and helper. I was half an hour praying in tears, and it was late, about midnight. Suddenly I saw the door open and he came in again. I was surprised. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Where have you been?” I asked him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I think,” he said, “I’ve forgotten something ... my handkerchief, I think.... Well, even if I’ve not forgotten anything, let me stay a little.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He sat down. I stood over him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You sit down, too,” said he. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I sat down. We sat still for two minutes; he looked intently at me and suddenly smiled—I remembered that—then he got up, embraced me warmly and kissed me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Remember,” he said, “how I came to you a second time. Do you hear, remember it!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And he went out. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“To‐morrow,” I thought. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And so it was. I did not know that evening that the next day was his birthday. I had not been out for the last few days, so I had no chance of hearing it from any one. On that day he always had a great gathering, every one in the town went to it. It was the same this time. After dinner he walked into the middle of the room, with a paper in his hand—a formal declaration to the chief of his department who was present. This declaration he read aloud to the whole assembly. It contained a full account of the crime, in every detail. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I cut myself off from men as a monster. God has visited me,” he said in conclusion. “I want to suffer for my sin!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then he brought out and laid on the table all the things he had been keeping for fourteen years, that he thought would prove his crime, the jewels belonging to the murdered woman which he had stolen to divert suspicion, a cross and a locket taken from her neck with a portrait of her betrothed in the locket, her notebook and two letters; one from her betrothed, telling her that he would soon be with her, and her unfinished answer left on the table to be sent off next day. He carried off these two letters—what for? Why had he kept them for fourteen years afterwards instead of destroying them as evidence against him? </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And this is what happened: every one was amazed and horrified, every one refused to believe it and thought that he was deranged, though all listened with intense curiosity. A few days later it was fully decided and agreed in every house that the unhappy man was mad. The legal authorities could not refuse to take the case up, but they too dropped it. Though the trinkets and letters made them ponder, they decided that even if they did turn out to be authentic, no charge could be based on those alone. Besides, she might have given him those things as a friend, or asked him to take care of them for her. I heard afterwards, however, that the genuineness of the things was proved by the friends and relations of the murdered woman, and that there was no doubt about them. Yet nothing was destined to come of it, after all. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Five days later, all had heard that he was ill and that his life was in danger. The nature of his illness I can’t explain, they said it was an affection of the heart. But it became known that the doctors had been induced by his wife to investigate his mental condition also, and had come to the conclusion that it was a case of insanity. I betrayed nothing, though people ran to question me. But when I wanted to visit him, I was for a long while forbidden to do so, above all by his wife. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It’s you who have caused his illness,” she said to me; “he was always gloomy, but for the last year people noticed that he was peculiarly excited and did strange things, and now you have been the ruin of him. Your preaching has brought him to this; for the last month he was always with you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Indeed, not only his wife but the whole town were down upon me and blamed me. “It’s all your doing,” they said. I was silent and indeed rejoiced at heart, for I saw plainly God’s mercy to the man who had turned against himself and punished himself. I could not believe in his insanity. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">They let me see him at last, he insisted upon saying good‐by to me. I went in to him and saw at once, that not only his days, but his hours were numbered. He was weak, yellow, his hands trembled, he gasped for breath, but his face was full of tender and happy feeling. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It is done!” he said. “I’ve long been yearning to see you, why didn’t you come?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I did not tell him that they would not let me see him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“God has had pity on me and is calling me to Himself. I know I am dying, but I feel joy and peace for the first time after so many years. There was heaven in my heart from the moment I had done what I had to do. Now I dare to love my children and to kiss them. Neither my wife nor the judges, nor any one has believed it. My children will never believe it either. I see in that God’s mercy to them. I shall die, and my name will be without a stain for them. And now I feel God near, my heart rejoices as in Heaven ... I have done my duty.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He could not speak, he gasped for breath, he pressed my hand warmly, looking fervently at me. We did not talk for long, his wife kept peeping in at us. But he had time to whisper to me: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do you remember how I came back to you that second time, at midnight? I told you to remember it. You know what I came back for? I came to kill you!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I started. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I went out from you then into the darkness, I wandered about the streets, struggling with myself. And suddenly I hated you so that I could hardly bear it. Now, I thought, he is all that binds me, and he is my judge. I can’t refuse to face my punishment to‐morrow, for he knows all. It was not that I was afraid you would betray me (I never even thought of that), but I thought, ‘How can I look him in the face if I don’t confess?’ And if you had been at the other end of the earth, but alive, it would have been all the same, the thought was unendurable that you were alive knowing everything and condemning me. I hated you as though you were the cause, as though you were to blame for everything. I came back to you then, remembering that you had a dagger lying on your table. I sat down and asked you to sit down, and for a whole minute I pondered. If I had killed you, I should have been ruined by that murder even if I had not confessed the other. But I didn’t think about that at all, and I didn’t want to think of it at that moment. I only hated you and longed to revenge myself on you for everything. The Lord vanquished the devil in my heart. But let me tell you, you were never nearer death.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A week later he died. The whole town followed him to the grave. The chief priest made a speech full of feeling. All lamented the terrible illness that had cut short his days. But all the town was up in arms against me after the funeral, and people even refused to see me. Some, at first a few and afterwards more, began indeed to believe in the truth of his story, and they visited me and questioned me with great interest and eagerness, for man loves to see the downfall and disgrace of the righteous. But I held my tongue, and very shortly after, I left the town, and five months later by God’s grace I entered upon the safe and blessed path, praising the unseen finger which had guided me so clearly to it. But I remember in my prayer to this day, the servant of God, Mihail, who suffered so greatly. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(e) The Russian Monk and his possible Significance</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, what is the monk? In the cultivated world the word is nowadays pronounced by some people with a jeer, and by others it is used as a term of abuse, and this contempt for the monk is growing. It is true, alas, it is true, that there are many sluggards, gluttons, profligates and insolent beggars among monks. Educated people point to these: “You are idlers, useless members of society, you live on the labor of others, you are shameless beggars.” And yet how many meek and humble monks there are, yearning for solitude and fervent prayer in peace! These are less noticed, or passed over in silence. And how surprised men would be if I were to say that from these meek monks, who yearn for solitary prayer, the salvation of Russia will come perhaps once more! For they are in truth made ready in peace and quiet “for the day and the hour, the month and the year.” Meanwhile, in their solitude, they keep the image of Christ fair and undefiled, in the purity of God’s truth, from the times of the Fathers of old, the Apostles and the martyrs. And when the time comes they will show it to the tottering creeds of the world. That is a great thought. That star will rise out of the East. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">That is my view of the monk, and is it false? is it too proud? Look at the worldly and all who set themselves up above the people of God, has not God’s image and His truth been distorted in them? They have science; but in science there is nothing but what is the object of sense. The spiritual world, the higher part of man’s being is rejected altogether, dismissed with a sort of triumph, even with hatred. The world has proclaimed the reign of freedom, especially of late, but what do we see in this freedom of theirs? Nothing but slavery and self‐destruction! For the world says: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You have desires and so satisfy them, for you have the same rights as the most rich and powerful. Don’t be afraid of satisfying them and even multiply your desires.” That is the modern doctrine of the world. In that they see freedom. And what follows from this right of multiplication of desires? In the rich, isolation and spiritual suicide; in the poor, envy and murder; for they have been given rights, but have not been shown the means of satisfying their wants. They maintain that the world is getting more and more united, more and more bound together in brotherly community, as it overcomes distance and sets thoughts flying through the air. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alas, put no faith in such a bond of union. Interpreting freedom as the multiplication and rapid satisfaction of desires, men distort their own nature, for many senseless and foolish desires and habits and ridiculous fancies are fostered in them. They live only for mutual envy, for luxury and ostentation. To have dinners, visits, carriages, rank and slaves to wait on one is looked upon as a necessity, for which life, honor and human feeling are sacrificed, and men even commit suicide if they are unable to satisfy it. We see the same thing among those who are not rich, while the poor drown their unsatisfied need and their envy in drunkenness. But soon they will drink blood instead of wine, they are being led on to it. I ask you is such a man free? I knew one “champion of freedom” who told me himself that, when he was deprived of tobacco in prison, he was so wretched at the privation that he almost went and betrayed his cause for the sake of getting tobacco again! And such a man says, “I am fighting for the cause of humanity.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">How can such a one fight? what is he fit for? He is capable perhaps of some action quickly over, but he cannot hold out long. And it’s no wonder that instead of gaining freedom they have sunk into slavery, and instead of serving the cause of brotherly love and the union of humanity have fallen, on the contrary, into dissension and isolation, as my mysterious visitor and teacher said to me in my youth. And therefore the idea of the service of humanity, of brotherly love and the solidarity of mankind, is more and more dying out in the world, and indeed this idea is sometimes treated with derision. For how can a man shake off his habits? What can become of him if he is in such bondage to the habit of satisfying the innumerable desires he has created for himself? He is isolated, and what concern has he with the rest of humanity? They have succeeded in accumulating a greater mass of objects, but the joy in the world has grown less. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The monastic way is very different. Obedience, fasting and prayer are laughed at, yet only through them lies the way to real, true freedom. I cut off my superfluous and unnecessary desires, I subdue my proud and wanton will and chastise it with obedience, and with God’s help I attain freedom of spirit and with it spiritual joy. Which is most capable of conceiving a great idea and serving it—the rich man in his isolation or the man who has freed himself from the tyranny of material things and habits? The monk is reproached for his solitude, “You have secluded yourself within the walls of the monastery for your own salvation, and have forgotten the brotherly service of humanity!” But we shall see which will be most zealous in the cause of brotherly love. For it is not we, but they, who are in isolation, though they don’t see that. Of old, leaders of the people came from among us, and why should they not again? The same meek and humble ascetics will rise up and go out to work for the great cause. The salvation of Russia comes from the people. And the Russian monk has always been on the side of the people. We are isolated only if the people are isolated. The people believe as we do, and an unbelieving reformer will never do anything in Russia, even if he is sincere in heart and a genius. Remember that! The people will meet the atheist and overcome him, and Russia will be one and orthodox. Take care of the peasant and guard his heart. Go on educating him quietly. That’s your duty as monks, for the peasant has God in his heart. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(<i>f</i>) <i>Of Masters and Servants, and of whether it is possible for them to be Brothers in the Spirit</i></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Of course, I don’t deny that there is sin in the peasants too. And the fire of corruption is spreading visibly, hourly, working from above downwards. The spirit of isolation is coming upon the people too. Money‐ lenders and devourers of the commune are rising up. Already the merchant grows more and more eager for rank, and strives to show himself cultured though he has not a trace of culture, and to this end meanly despises his old traditions, and is even ashamed of the faith of his fathers. He visits princes, though he is only a peasant corrupted. The peasants are rotting in drunkenness and cannot shake off the habit. And what cruelty to their wives, to their children even! All from drunkenness! I’ve seen in the factories children of nine years old, frail, rickety, bent and already depraved. The stuffy workshop, the din of machinery, work all day long, the vile language and the drink, the drink—is that what a little child’s heart needs? He needs sunshine, childish play, good examples all about him, and at least a little love. There must be no more of this, monks, no more torturing of children, rise up and preach that, make haste, make haste! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But God will save Russia, for though the peasants are corrupted and cannot renounce their filthy sin, yet they know it is cursed by God and that they do wrong in sinning. So that our people still believe in righteousness, have faith in God and weep tears of devotion. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is different with the upper classes. They, following science, want to base justice on reason alone, but not with Christ, as before, and they have already proclaimed that there is no crime, that there is no sin. And that’s consistent, for if you have no God what is the meaning of crime? In Europe the people are already rising up against the rich with violence, and the leaders of the people are everywhere leading them to bloodshed, and teaching them that their wrath is righteous. But their “wrath is accursed, for it is cruel.” But God will save Russia as He has saved her many times. Salvation will come from the people, from their faith and their meekness. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, watch over the people’s faith and this will not be a dream. I’ve been struck all my life in our great people by their dignity, their true and seemly dignity. I’ve seen it myself, I can testify to it, I’ve seen it and marveled at it, I’ve seen it in spite of the degraded sins and poverty‐stricken appearance of our peasantry. They are not servile, and even after two centuries of serfdom they are free in manner and bearing, yet without insolence, and not revengeful and not envious. “You are rich and noble, you are clever and talented, well, be so, God bless you. I respect you, but I know that I too am a man. By the very fact that I respect you without envy I prove my dignity as a man.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">In truth if they don’t say this (for they don’t know how to say this yet), that is how they act. I have seen it myself, I have known it myself, and, would you believe it, the poorer our Russian peasant is, the more noticeable is that serene goodness, for the rich among them are for the most part corrupted already, and much of that is due to our carelessness and indifference. But God will save His people, for Russia is great in her humility. I dream of seeing, and seem to see clearly already, our future. It will come to pass, that even the most corrupt of our rich will end by being ashamed of his riches before the poor, and the poor, seeing his humility, will understand and give way before him, will respond joyfully and kindly to his honorable shame. Believe me that it will end in that; things are moving to that. Equality is to be found only in the spiritual dignity of man, and that will only be understood among us. If we were brothers, there would be fraternity, but before that, they will never agree about the division of wealth. We preserve the image of Christ, and it will shine forth like a precious diamond to the whole world. So may it be, so may it be! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, a touching incident befell me once. In my wanderings I met in the town of K. my old orderly, Afanasy. It was eight years since I had parted from him. He chanced to see me in the market‐place, recognized me, ran up to me, and how delighted he was! He simply pounced on me: “Master dear, is it you? Is it really you I see?” He took me home with him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He was no longer in the army, he was married and already had two little children. He and his wife earned their living as costermongers in the market‐place. His room was poor, but bright and clean. He made me sit down, set the samovar, sent for his wife, as though my appearance were a festival for them. He brought me his children: “Bless them, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Is it for me to bless them? I am only a humble monk. I will pray for them. And for you, Afanasy Pavlovitch, I have prayed every day since that day, for it all came from you,” said I. And I explained that to him as well as I could. And what do you think? The man kept gazing at me and could not believe that I, his former master, an officer, was now before him in such a guise and position; it made him shed tears. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Why are you weeping?” said I, “better rejoice over me, dear friend, whom I can never forget, for my path is a glad and joyful one.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He did not say much, but kept sighing and shaking his head over me tenderly. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What has became of your fortune?” he asked. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I gave it to the monastery,” I answered; “we live in common.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">After tea I began saying good‐by, and suddenly he brought out half a rouble as an offering to the monastery, and another half‐rouble I saw him thrusting hurriedly into my hand: “That’s for you in your wanderings, it may be of use to you, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I took his half‐rouble, bowed to him and his wife, and went out rejoicing. And on my way I thought: “Here we are both now, he at home and I on the road, sighing and shaking our heads, no doubt, and yet smiling joyfully in the gladness of our hearts, remembering how God brought about our meeting.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I have never seen him again since then. I had been his master and he my servant, but now when we exchanged a loving kiss with softened hearts, there was a great human bond between us. I have thought a great deal about that, and now what I think is this: Is it so inconceivable that that grand and simple‐hearted unity might in due time become universal among the Russian people? I believe that it will come to pass and that the time is at hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And of servants I will add this: In old days when I was young I was often angry with servants; “the cook had served something too hot, the orderly had not brushed my clothes.” But what taught me better then was a thought of my dear brother’s, which I had heard from him in childhood: “Am I worth it, that another should serve me and be ordered about by me in his poverty and ignorance?” And I wondered at the time that such simple and self‐ evident ideas should be so slow to occur to our minds. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is impossible that there should be no servants in the world, but act so that your servant may be freer in spirit than if he were not a servant. And why cannot I be a servant to my servant and even let him see it, and that without any pride on my part or any mistrust on his? Why should not my servant be like my own kindred, so that I may take him into my family and rejoice in doing so? Even now this can be done, but it will lead to the grand unity of men in the future, when a man will not seek servants for himself, or desire to turn his fellow creatures into servants as he does now, but on the contrary, will long with his whole heart to be the servant of all, as the Gospel teaches. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And can it be a dream, that in the end man will find his joy only in deeds of light and mercy, and not in cruel pleasures as now, in gluttony, fornication, ostentation, boasting and envious rivalry of one with the other? I firmly believe that it is not and that the time is at hand. People laugh and ask: “When will that time come and does it look like coming?” I believe that with Christ’s help we shall accomplish this great thing. And how many ideas there have been on earth in the history of man which were unthinkable ten years before they appeared! Yet when their destined hour had come, they came forth and spread over the whole earth. So it will be with us, and our people will shine forth in the world, and all men will say: “The stone which the builders rejected has become the corner‐stone of the building.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And we may ask the scornful themselves: If our hope is a dream, when will you build up your edifice and order things justly by your intellect alone, without Christ? If they declare that it is they who are advancing towards unity, only the most simple‐hearted among them believe it, so that one may positively marvel at such simplicity. Of a truth, they have more fantastic dreams than we. They aim at justice, but, denying Christ, they will end by flooding the earth with blood, for blood cries out for blood, and he that taketh up the sword shall perish by the sword. And if it were not for Christ’s covenant, they would slaughter one another down to the last two men on earth. And those two last men would not be able to restrain each other in their pride, and the one would slay the other and then himself. And that would come to pass, were it not for the promise of Christ that for the sake of the humble and meek the days shall be shortened. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">While I was still wearing an officer’s uniform after my duel, I talked about servants in general society, and I remember every one was amazed at me. “What!” they asked, “are we to make our servants sit down on the sofa and offer them tea?” And I answered them: “Why not, sometimes at least?” Every one laughed. Their question was frivolous and my answer was not clear; but the thought in it was to some extent right. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(<i>g</i>) <i>Of Prayer, of Love, and of Contact with other Worlds</i></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Young man, be not forgetful of prayer. Every time you pray, if your prayer is sincere, there will be new feeling and new meaning in it, which will give you fresh courage, and you will understand that prayer is an education. Remember, too, every day, and whenever you can, repeat to yourself, “Lord, have mercy on all who appear before Thee to‐day.” For every hour and every moment thousands of men leave life on this earth, and their souls appear before God. And how many of them depart in solitude, unknown, sad, dejected that no one mourns for them or even knows whether they have lived or not! And behold, from the other end of the earth perhaps, your prayer for their rest will rise up to God though you knew them not nor they you. How touching it must be to a soul standing in dread before the Lord to feel at that instant that, for him too, there is one to pray, that there is a fellow creature left on earth to love him too! And God will look on you both more graciously, for if you have had so much pity on him, how much will He have pity Who is infinitely more loving and merciful than you! And He will forgive him for your sake. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Brothers, have no fear of men’s sin. Love a man even in his sin, for that is the semblance of Divine Love and is the highest love on earth. Love all God’s creation, the whole and every grain of sand in it. Love every leaf, every ray of God’s light. Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in things. Once you perceive it, you will begin to comprehend it better every day. And you will come at last to love the whole world with an all‐ embracing love. Love the animals: God has given them the rudiments of thought and joy untroubled. Do not trouble it, don’t harass them, don’t deprive them of their happiness, don’t work against God’s intent. Man, do not pride yourself on superiority to the animals; they are without sin, and you, with your greatness, defile the earth by your appearance on it, and leave the traces of your foulness after you—alas, it is true of almost every one of us! Love children especially, for they too are sinless like the angels; they live to soften and purify our hearts and as it were to guide us. Woe to him who offends a child! Father Anfim taught me to love children. The kind, silent man used often on our wanderings to spend the farthings given us on sweets and cakes for the children. He could not pass by a child without emotion. That’s the nature of the man. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At some thoughts one stands perplexed, especially at the sight of men’s sin, and wonders whether one should use force or humble love. Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on that once for all, you may subdue the whole world. Loving humility is marvelously strong, the strongest of all things, and there is nothing else like it. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Every day and every hour, every minute, walk round yourself and watch yourself, and see that your image is a seemly one. You pass by a little child, you pass by, spiteful, with ugly words, with wrathful heart; you may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you, and your image, unseemly and ignoble, may remain in his defenseless heart. You don’t know it, but you may have sown an evil seed in him and it may grow, and all because you were not careful before the child, because you did not foster in yourself a careful, actively benevolent love. Brothers, love is a teacher; but one must know how to acquire it, for it is hard to acquire, it is dearly bought, it is won slowly by long labor. For we must love not only occasionally, for a moment, but for ever. Every one can love occasionally, even the wicked can. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">My brother asked the birds to forgive him; that sounds senseless, but it is right; for all is like an ocean, all is flowing and blending; a touch in one place sets up movement at the other end of the earth. It may be senseless to beg forgiveness of the birds, but birds would be happier at your side—a little happier, anyway—and children and all animals, if you were nobler than you are now. It’s all like an ocean, I tell you. Then you would pray to the birds too, consumed by an all‐embracing love, in a sort of transport, and pray that they too will forgive you your sin. Treasure this ecstasy, however senseless it may seem to men. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">My friends, pray to God for gladness. Be glad as children, as the birds of heaven. And let not the sin of men confound you in your doings. Fear not that it will wear away your work and hinder its being accomplished. Do not say, “Sin is mighty, wickedness is mighty, evil environment is mighty, and we are lonely and helpless, and evil environment is wearing us away and hindering our good work from being done.” Fly from that dejection, children! There is only one means of salvation, then take yourself and make yourself responsible for all men’s sins, that is the truth, you know, friends, for as soon as you sincerely make yourself responsible for everything and for all men, you will see at once that it is really so, and that you are to blame for every one and for all things. But throwing your own indolence and impotence on others you will end by sharing the pride of Satan and murmuring against God. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Of the pride of Satan what I think is this: it is hard for us on earth to comprehend it, and therefore it is so easy to fall into error and to share it, even imagining that we are doing something grand and fine. Indeed, many of the strongest feelings and movements of our nature we cannot comprehend on earth. Let not that be a stumbling‐block, and think not that it may serve as a justification to you for anything. For the Eternal Judge asks of you what you can comprehend and not what you cannot. You will know that yourself hereafter, for you will behold all things truly then and will not dispute them. On earth, indeed, we are as it were astray, and if it were not for the precious image of Christ before us, we should be undone and altogether lost, as was the human race before the flood. Much on earth is hidden from us, but to make up for that we have been given a precious mystic sense of our living bond with the other world, with the higher heavenly world, and the roots of our thoughts and feelings are not here but in other worlds. That is why the philosophers say that we cannot apprehend the reality of things on earth. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">God took seeds from different worlds and sowed them on this earth, and His garden grew up and everything came up that could come up, but what grows lives and is alive only through the feeling of its contact with other mysterious worlds. If that feeling grows weak or is destroyed in you, the heavenly growth will die away in you. Then you will be indifferent to life and even grow to hate it. That’s what I think. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(h) Can a Man judge his Fellow Creatures? Faith to the End</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Remember particularly that you cannot be a judge of any one. For no one can judge a criminal, until he recognizes that he is just such a criminal as the man standing before him, and that he perhaps is more than all men to blame for that crime. When he understands that, he will be able to be a judge. Though that sounds absurd, it is true. If I had been righteous myself, perhaps there would have been no criminal standing before me. If you can take upon yourself the crime of the criminal your heart is judging, take it at once, suffer for him yourself, and let him go without reproach. And even if the law itself makes you his judge, act in the same spirit so far as possible, for he will go away and condemn himself more bitterly than you have done. If, after your kiss, he goes away untouched, mocking at you, do not let that be a stumbling‐block to you. It shows his time has not yet come, but it will come in due course. And if it come not, no matter; if not he, then another in his place will understand and suffer, and judge and condemn himself, and the truth will be fulfilled. Believe that, believe it without doubt; for in that lies all the hope and faith of the saints. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Work without ceasing. If you remember in the night as you go to sleep, “I have not done what I ought to have done,” rise up at once and do it. If the people around you are spiteful and callous and will not hear you, fall down before them and beg their forgiveness; for in truth you are to blame for their not wanting to hear you. And if you cannot speak to them in their bitterness, serve them in silence and in humility, never losing hope. If all men abandon you and even drive you away by force, then when you are left alone fall on the earth and kiss it, water it with your tears and it will bring forth fruit even though no one has seen or heard you in your solitude. Believe to the end, even if all men went astray and you were left the only one faithful; bring your offering even then and praise God in your loneliness. And if two of you are gathered together—then there is a whole world, a world of living love. Embrace each other tenderly and praise God, for if only in you two His truth has been fulfilled. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">If you sin yourself and grieve even unto death for your sins or for your sudden sin, then rejoice for others, rejoice for the righteous man, rejoice that if you have sinned, he is righteous and has not sinned. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">If the evil‐doing of men moves you to indignation and overwhelming distress, even to a desire for vengeance on the evil‐doers, shun above all things that feeling. Go at once and seek suffering for yourself, as though you were yourself guilty of that wrong. Accept that suffering and bear it and your heart will find comfort, and you will understand that you too are guilty, for you might have been a light to the evil‐doers, even as the one man sinless, and you were not a light to them. If you had been a light, you would have lightened the path for others too, and the evil‐doer might perhaps have been saved by your light from his sin. And even though your light was shining, yet you see men were not saved by it, hold firm and doubt not the power of the heavenly light. Believe that if they were not saved, they will be saved hereafter. And if they are not saved hereafter, then their sons will be saved, for your light will not die even when you are dead. The righteous man departs, but his light remains. Men are always saved after the death of the deliverer. Men reject their prophets and slay them, but they love their martyrs and honor those whom they have slain. You are working for the whole, you are acting for the future. Seek no reward, for great is your reward on this earth: the spiritual joy which is only vouchsafed to the righteous man. Fear not the great nor the mighty, but be wise and ever serene. Know the measure, know the times, study that. When you are left alone, pray. Love to throw yourself on the earth and kiss it. Kiss the earth and love it with an unceasing, consuming love. Love all men, love everything. Seek that rapture and ecstasy. Water the earth with the tears of your joy and love those tears. Don’t be ashamed of that ecstasy, prize it, for it is a gift of God and a great one; it is not given to many but only to the elect. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(i) Of Hell and Hell Fire, a Mystic Reflection</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, I ponder, “What is hell?” I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love. Once in infinite existence, immeasurable in time and space, a spiritual creature was given on his coming to earth, the power of saying, “I am and I love.” Once, only once, there was given him a moment of active <i>living</i> love, and for that was earthly life given him, and with it times and seasons. And that happy creature rejected the priceless gift, prized it and loved it not, scorned it and remained callous. Such a one, having left the earth, sees Abraham’s bosom and talks with Abraham as we are told in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, and beholds heaven and can go up to the Lord. But that is just his torment, to rise up to the Lord without ever having loved, to be brought close to those who have loved when he has despised their love. For he sees clearly and says to himself, “Now I have understanding, and though I now thirst to love, there will be nothing great, no sacrifice in my love, for my earthly life is over, and Abraham will not come even with a drop of living water (that is the gift of earthly active life) to cool the fiery thirst of spiritual love which burns in me now, though I despised it on earth; there is no more life for me and will be no more time! Even though I would gladly give my life for others, it can never be, for that life is passed which can be sacrificed for love, and now there is a gulf fixed between that life and this existence.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">They talk of hell fire in the material sense. I don’t go into that mystery and I shun it. But I think if there were fire in material sense, they would be glad of it, for I imagine that in material agony, their still greater spiritual agony would be forgotten for a moment. Moreover, that spiritual agony cannot be taken from them, for that suffering is not external but within them. And if it could be taken from them, I think it would be bitterer still for the unhappy creatures. For even if the righteous in Paradise forgave them, beholding their torments, and called them up to heaven in their infinite love, they would only multiply their torments, for they would arouse in them still more keenly a flaming thirst for responsive, active and grateful love which is now impossible. In the timidity of my heart I imagine, however, that the very recognition of this impossibility would serve at last to console them. For accepting the love of the righteous together with the impossibility of repaying it, by this submissiveness and the effect of this humility, they will attain at last, as it were, to a certain semblance of that active love which they scorned in life, to something like its outward expression.... I am sorry, friends and brothers, that I cannot express this clearly. But woe to those who have slain themselves on earth, woe to the suicides! I believe that there can be none more miserable then they. They tell us that it is a sin to pray for them and outwardly the Church, as it were, renounces them, but in my secret heart I believe that we may pray even for them. Love can never be an offense to Christ. For such as those I have prayed inwardly all my life, I confess it, fathers and teachers, and even now I pray for them every day. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Oh, there are some who remain proud and fierce even in hell, in spite of their certain knowledge and contemplation of the absolute truth; there are some fearful ones who have given themselves over to Satan and his proud spirit entirely. For such, hell is voluntary and ever consuming; they are tortured by their own choice. For they have cursed themselves, cursing God and life. They live upon their vindictive pride like a starving man in the desert sucking blood out of his own body. But they are never satisfied, and they refuse forgiveness, they curse God Who calls them. They cannot behold the living God without hatred, and they cry out that the God of life should be annihilated, that God should destroy Himself and His own creation. And they will burn in the fire of their own wrath for ever and yearn for death and annihilation. But they will not attain to death.... </span></p>
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<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Here Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov’s manuscript ends. I repeat, it is incomplete and fragmentary. Biographical details, for instance, cover only Father Zossima’s earliest youth. Of his teaching and opinions we find brought together sayings evidently uttered on very different occasions. His utterances during the last few hours have not been kept separate from the rest, but their general character can be gathered from what we have in Alexey Fyodorovitch’s manuscript. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder’s death came in the end quite unexpectedly. For although those who were gathered about him that last evening realized that his death was approaching, yet it was difficult to imagine that it would come so suddenly. On the contrary, his friends, as I observed already, seeing him that night apparently so cheerful and talkative, were convinced that there was at least a temporary change for the better in his condition. Even five minutes before his death, they said afterwards wonderingly, it was impossible to foresee it. He seemed suddenly to feel an acute pain in his chest, he turned pale and pressed his hands to his heart. All rose from their seats and hastened to him. But though suffering, he still looked at them with a smile, sank slowly from his chair on to his knees, then bowed his face to the ground, stretched out his arms and as though in joyful ecstasy, praying and kissing the ground, quietly and joyfully gave up his soul to God. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The news of his death spread at once through the hermitage and reached the monastery. The nearest friends of the deceased and those whose duty it was from their position began to lay out the corpse according to the ancient ritual, and all the monks gathered together in the church. And before dawn the news of the death reached the town. By the morning all the town was talking of the event, and crowds were flocking from the town to the monastery. But this subject will be treated in the next book; I will only add here that before a day had passed something happened so unexpected, so strange, upsetting, and bewildering in its effect on the monks and the townspeople, that after all these years, that day of general suspense is still vividly remembered in the town [...]</span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Cana Of Galilee</span></b></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It was very late, according to the monastery ideas, when Alyosha returned to the hermitage; the door‐keeper let him in by a special entrance. It had struck nine o’clock—the hour of rest and repose after a day of such agitation for all. Alyosha timidly opened the door and went into the elder’s cell where his coffin was now standing. There was no one in the cell but Father Païssy, reading the Gospel in solitude over the coffin, and the young novice Porfiry, who, exhausted by the previous night’s conversation and the disturbing incidents of the day, was sleeping the deep sound sleep of youth on the floor of the other room. Though Father Païssy heard Alyosha come in, he did not even look in his direction. Alyosha turned to the right from the door to the corner, fell on his knees and began to pray. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">His soul was overflowing but with mingled feelings; no single sensation stood out distinctly; on the contrary, one drove out another in a slow, continual rotation. But there was a sweetness in his heart and, strange to say, Alyosha was not surprised at it. Again he saw that coffin before him, the hidden dead figure so precious to him, but the weeping and poignant grief of the morning was no longer aching in his soul. As soon as he came in, he fell down before the coffin as before a holy shrine, but joy, joy was glowing in his mind and in his heart. The one window of the cell was open, the air was fresh and cool. “So the smell must have become stronger, if they opened the window,” thought Alyosha. But even this thought of the smell of corruption, which had seemed to him so awful and humiliating a few hours before, no longer made him feel miserable or indignant. He began quietly praying, but he soon felt that he was praying almost mechanically. Fragments of thought floated through his soul, flashed like stars and went out again at once, to be succeeded by others. But yet there was reigning in his soul a sense of the wholeness of things—something steadfast and comforting—and he was aware of it himself. Sometimes he began praying ardently, he longed to pour out his thankfulness and love.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But when he had begun to pray, he passed suddenly to something else, and sank into thought, forgetting both the prayer and what had interrupted it. He began listening to what Father Païssy was reading, but worn out with exhaustion he gradually began to doze. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee;</i>” read Father Païssy. “<i>And the mother of Jesus was there; And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, to the marriage.</i>” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Marriage? What’s that?... A marriage!” floated whirling through Alyosha’s mind. “There is happiness for her, too.... She has gone to the feast.... No, she has not taken the knife.... That was only a tragic phrase.... Well ... tragic phrases should be forgiven, they must be. Tragic phrases comfort the heart.... Without them, sorrow would be too heavy for men to bear. Rakitin has gone off to the back alley. As long as Rakitin broods over his wrongs, he will always go off to the back alley.... But the high road ... The road is wide and straight and bright as crystal, and the sun is at the end of it.... Ah!... What’s being read?”... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine</i>” ... Alyosha heard. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Ah, yes, I was missing that, and I didn’t want to miss it, I love that passage: it’s Cana of Galilee, the first miracle.... Ah, that miracle! Ah, that sweet miracle! It was not men’s grief, but their joy Christ visited, He worked His first miracle to help men’s gladness.... ‘He who loves men loves their gladness, too’ ... He was always repeating that, it was one of his leading ideas.... ‘There’s no living without joy,’ Mitya says.... Yes, Mitya.... ‘Everything that is true and good is always full of forgiveness,’ he used to say that, too” ... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what has it to do with thee or me? Mine hour is not yet come.</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it</i>” ... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do it.... Gladness, the gladness of some poor, very poor, people.... Of course they were poor, since they hadn’t wine enough even at a wedding.... The historians write that, in those days, the people living about the Lake of Gennesaret were the poorest that can possibly be imagined ... and another great heart, that other great being, His Mother, knew that He had come not only to make His great terrible sacrifice. She knew that His heart was open even to the simple, artless merrymaking of some obscure and unlearned people, who had warmly bidden Him to their poor wedding. ‘Mine hour is not yet come,’ He said, with a soft smile (He must have smiled gently to her). And, indeed, was it to make wine abundant at poor weddings He had come down to earth? And yet He went and did as she asked Him.... Ah, he is reading again”.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim.</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And he saith unto them, Draw out now and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it.</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was; (but the servants which drew the water knew;) the governor of the feast called the bridegroom,</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, that which is worse; but thou hast kept the good wine until now.</i>” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But what’s this, what’s this? Why is the room growing wider?... Ah, yes ... It’s the marriage, the wedding ... yes, of course. Here are the guests, here are the young couple sitting, and the merry crowd and ... Where is the wise governor of the feast? But who is this? Who? Again the walls are receding.... Who is getting up there from the great table? What!... He here, too? But he’s in the coffin ... but he’s here, too. He has stood up, he sees me, he is coming here.... God!”... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yes, he came up to him, to him, he, the little, thin old man, with tiny wrinkles on his face, joyful and laughing softly. There was no coffin now, and he was in the same dress as he had worn yesterday sitting with them, when the visitors had gathered about him. His face was uncovered, his eyes were shining. How was this, then? He, too, had been called to the feast. He, too, at the marriage of Cana in Galilee.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Yes, my dear, I am called, too, called and bidden,” he heard a soft voice saying over him. “Why have you hidden yourself here, out of sight? You come and join us too.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It was his voice, the voice of Father Zossima. And it must be he, since he called him! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder raised Alyosha by the hand and he rose from his knees. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“We are rejoicing,” the little, thin old man went on. “We are drinking the new wine, the wine of new, great gladness; do you see how many guests? Here are the bride and bridegroom, here is the wise governor of the feast, he is tasting the new wine. Why do you wonder at me? I gave an onion to a beggar, so I, too, am here. And many here have given only an onion each—only one little onion.... What are all our deeds? And you, my gentle one, you, my kind boy, you too have known how to give a famished woman an onion to‐day. Begin your work, dear one, begin it, gentle one!... Do you see our Sun, do you see Him?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I am afraid ... I dare not look,” whispered Alyosha. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do not fear Him. He is terrible in His greatness, awful in His sublimity, but infinitely merciful. He has made Himself like unto us from love and rejoices with us. He is changing the water into wine that the gladness of the guests may not be cut short. He is expecting new guests, He is calling new ones unceasingly for ever and ever.... There they are bringing new wine. Do you see they are bringing the vessels....” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Something glowed in Alyosha’s heart, something filled it till it ached, tears of rapture rose from his soul.... He stretched out his hands, uttered a cry and waked up. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Again the coffin, the open window, and the soft, solemn, distinct reading of the Gospel. But Alyosha did not listen to the reading. It was strange, he had fallen asleep on his knees, but now he was on his feet, and suddenly, as though thrown forward, with three firm rapid steps he went right up to the coffin. His shoulder brushed against Father Païssy without his noticing it. Father Païssy raised his eyes for an instant from his book, but looked away again at once, seeing that something strange was happening to the boy. Alyosha gazed for half a minute at the coffin, at the covered, motionless dead man that lay in the coffin, with the ikon on his breast and the peaked cap with the octangular cross, on his head. He had only just been hearing his voice, and that voice was still ringing in his ears. He was listening, still expecting other words, but suddenly he turned sharply and went out of the cell. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He did not stop on the steps either, but went quickly down; his soul, overflowing with rapture, yearned for freedom, space, openness. The vault of heaven, full of soft, shining stars, stretched vast and fathomless above him. The Milky Way ran in two pale streams from the zenith to the horizon. The fresh, motionless, still night enfolded the earth. The white towers and golden domes of the cathedral gleamed out against the sapphire sky. The gorgeous autumn flowers, in the beds round the house, were slumbering till morning. The silence of earth seemed to melt into the silence of the heavens. The mystery of earth was one with the mystery of the stars.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha stood, gazed, and suddenly threw himself down on the earth. He did not know why he embraced it. He could not have told why he longed so irresistibly to kiss it, to kiss it all. But he kissed it weeping, sobbing and watering it with his tears, and vowed passionately to love it, to love it for ever and ever. “Water the earth with the tears of your joy and love those tears,” echoed in his soul. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">What was he weeping over? </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Oh! in his rapture he was weeping even over those stars, which were shining to him from the abyss of space, and “he was not ashamed of that ecstasy.” There seemed to be threads from all those innumerable worlds of God, linking his soul to them, and it was trembling all over “in contact with other worlds.” He longed to forgive every one and for everything, and to beg forgiveness. Oh, not for himself, but for all men, for all and for everything. “And others are praying for me too,” echoed again in his soul. But with every instant he felt clearly and, as it were, tangibly, that something firm and unshakable as that vault of heaven had entered into his soul. It was as though some idea had seized the sovereignty of his mind—and it was for all his life and for ever and ever. He had fallen on the earth a weak boy, but he rose up a resolute champion, and he knew and felt it suddenly at the very moment of his ecstasy. And never, never, all his life long, could Alyosha forget that minute. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Some one visited my soul in that hour,” he used to say afterwards, with implicit faith in his words. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Within three days he left the monastery in accordance with the words of his elder, who had bidden him “sojourn in the world.” </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/dionisie.jpg" width="250" height="173" alt="dionisie" style="float: right;" />Previously in the </span><i style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;">Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 12pt;"> series:</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Varenka's Memoirs</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>Poor Folk</i>, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">An Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>Stories of a Man of Experience</i>, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Nellie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Insulted and Injured</i>, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Marie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Idiot</i>, 1868 [suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya in correspondence pertaining to the 1897 anthology, DPC X])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">At The Select Boarding School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">The Merchant's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">The Peasant Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Foma Danilov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">From the novel <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i> (1881, [1883, 1897, DPC XI] - enlarged selection)</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> a) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Alyosha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> b) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Obedience. Elder Zossima</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> c) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Peasant Women Who Have Faith</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> d) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/733-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xid-the-duel-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-i.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">The Duel - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part I</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present <i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i> (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and as the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> our brief introduction to the original <i>Dostoevsky for Children</i> anthologies, and to this English online version.}</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">--//--</span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">'The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone'</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">'At the resurrection people will neither marry nor be given in marriage; they will be like the angels in heaven'</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">'Prayer is an education ... Brothers, love is a teacher; but one must know how to acquire it, for it is hard to acquire, it is dearly bought, it is won slowly by long labor.' (Elder Zossima, in Dostoevsky's <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>) </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Precious few comments, even by otherwise close readers, find the space to notice the prayer to the Mother of God, before her icon, of the main man of prayer in <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, and indeed, perhaps in all of Dostoevsky's work.[1]</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Even though all crimes averted in the novel are averted by prayer. By Dimitri's own assessment, such was the case of both his two potential parricides (that were almost, but not actually committed, against Fyodor Pavlovich and Grigory, Dimitri's natural and moral fathers, respectively).</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But the swiftest and most effective tamer of criminals is, of course, revealed directly by the Elder himself, in the story of his first spiritual son, the mysterious visitor Mikhail - his Raskolnikov and Rogojin, all in one, to whom the young Zinovy (later Elder Zossima) is Sonia and Myshkin, all in one. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And this tamer is revealed in the salvific prayer of Zinovy/Zossima, at the critical time that would otherwise have been that of the taking of his life: the Mother of God.[2, 3] The Protection (<i>Pokrov</i>) of the Most Holy Mother of God. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Indeed, the Protection of the Mother of God, in <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, is far from being confined to wise (prayerful) natural mothers and sons. Although it is that, too, as we have already <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">seen</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. But the central case, as also <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">previously</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> intimated, is the case of the Mother-of-God-oriented wise Elders, and of their spiritual sons, at their school of prayer.[4]</span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The Protection of the Mother of God is all over <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>: in Heaven (The Wedding in Cana) and Hell (Ivan's "Journey of the Mother of God..."). In the "social mission" of the Church ("like a tender, loving mother, [she] holds aloof from active punishment herself, as the [convicted] sinner is too severely punished already by the civil law, and there must be at least some one to have pity on him"), as in the heartfelt prayer of Elder Zossima for the salvation of the criminal Mikhail, that becomes the salvation of his own life. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And the salvation of both him and his first spiritual son, each in his own way, from the world of distractions and temptations, that repels the Grace filled tears of repentance, and the abiding joy that is hidden in the Cross. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yes! In today's memorable opening section, Dostoevsky lifts, for a quick instant, the "rosy" veil that he otherwise seems to have so successfully thrown on his story, to make it <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">palatable for worldly "Petrashevites"</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of all persuasions, and for other radical Westernizers to bite his Karamazovian hook.[5] The jury is still out, debating whether we can forgive him for that.[6]</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">In the meantime, we cannot but ask ourselves: might the lives of old Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov, and of his bastard parricide and suicidal son, Smerdyakov, also have been spared, had the fictional Elder Zossima remained truer to the experience of his younger self? Had he kept Alyosha in the monastery, in quietly sustained heartfelt prayer to the Mother of God, for his much tempted brothers, father, and all their ailing world?</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Met. Anthony Khrapovisky essentially<a href="https://vtoraya-literatura.com/publ_2109.html"> suggests</a> as much, when he writes that Dostoevsky must have actually thought of Alyosha as remaining in the monastery, but for a poetic licence in view of his unprepared readers. He might, perhaps, have only added that, while the co-suffering love that is our author's main theme is, of course, Christ-filled love, found not in the legalistic-retributive West, but in <a href="https://archive.ph/ke265#selection-7215.0-7233.1">St. Isaac the Syrian and those with him,</a> the practical path for both the Russian people and the Hesychastic Oecumene, has always been that of close communion with the <i>Bogoroditse</i>, and of the acquisition of her motherly love. And Dostoevsky felt this.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Last but not least, perhaps even Alyosha's angelic face (that so many characters in the story seem to notice) was pointing to the path of being 'like the angels in heaven'. If so, it was also pointing to the path of the Mother of God, the height of monastic and hesychast spirituality, according to the Eastern Orthodox tradition. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">We can only guess what iconic fragrance might the Cana of Galilee Wedding have evoked, had the more real elder envisioned by Met. Anthony been allowed to guide Alyosha on the path of his angelic calling to the end, for his own benefit, and that of his kin...</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">P.S. With our potentially interested English-speaking readers in view, we include here a brief outline of the ToC of our (God willing) forthcoming Romanian printed edition of <i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i>. We have tried to organize it so as to minimize the editorial interventions. It suggests our interpretation, while hopefully preserving both the spirit and the freedoms suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya and her editorial associates' approach to the three different but related original versions of the book (see <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">the opening</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of this series for references). A second Romanian volume should complete the integral of the short pieces and excerpts included or suggested by the Dostoevskys and their collaborators for this inspiring editorial project.</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</span></i></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Table of Contents of the forthcoming Romanian edition (outline)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I. Icons of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Wise (Spiritual) Motherhood</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Sophia Dolgoruky</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">II. The Struggles (<i>Podvig</i>) of Wise Motherhood</span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Merchant Skotoboinikov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Nellie</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">III. The Mystery of Friendship</span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Varenka</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">A Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Marie</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">IV. The Protection of the Mother of God</span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Alyosha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Elder</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> Zossima</span></li>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://archive.is/K48vz" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Iliusha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Notes (for in depth seekers, esp.:)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[1] A good summary of what may still be the dominant reading among academic scholars is given by Jefferson Gatrall, in a pioneering paper, revealing the inherently important distinction between paintings (described in Dostoevsky) and icons (<i>not</i> described by Dostoevsky, though perhaps this silence needs to be interpreted in the larger context of his other reverent understatements and silences, as indicating not so much something missing, but something quasi-unspeakable, an eminently effective, yet apophatic presence, awaiting, so to speak, the rediscovery of the <a href="https://archive.ph/emzln#selection-121.133-121.293">Palamite</a> <a href="https://www.johnsanidopoulos.com/2014/11/saint-gregory-palamas-resource-page.html">vocabulary</a> to be properly approached). Concerning our present subject, however, Gatrall writes: '[Sophie] Ollivier's generalization that "<i>only women pray before the icons in Dostoevsky's works</i>"... seems to hold for all of Dostoevsky's works except House of the Dead, in which even hardened criminals at times pause to pray before icons on barracks walls...' ("THE ICON IN THE PICTURE: REFRAMING THE QUESTION OF DOSTOEVSKY'S MODERNIST ICONOGRAPHY", 2004, n. 17, italics added. Gatrall's title, as we understand it, seems to connote the supposedly all absorbing power of Dostoevsky's literary-poetic, secular "iconography", but this need not detain us here.) We cannot here begin to measure how the retrieving of Elder Zossima's prayer before the icon of the Mother of God could refine and/or reshape the otherwise outstanding readings of either Gatrall or Ollivier ("Icons in Dostoevsky's Works", 2001), and other equally remarkable ones. But those wishing to do so may find it relevant to also review <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">some</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of our <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">previous</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/733-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xid-the-duel-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-i.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">notes</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. </span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[2] No less spectacularly and importantly, in Dostoevsky, the Mother of God and her closest followers (those who achieve a sufficient measure of inner communion with her, by means of sustained prayer to her and the veneration of her icon), are the tamers, if not directly of the angry, ever offended, and<a href="https://archive.ph/axwF5#selection-523.12-531.334"> "rationally" vengeful Western God</a>, at least of his images and likenesses, the Dostoevskian "demons". Like the Western God, they are impostors ("false Dmitris", as someone previously deceived by one of "the demons" suggests, in the homonymous novel - someone close to the Mother of God, but presumably not as close as not to be deceived in the first place). The implied parallel between the equally split personalities of the "perfect" worldly criminal Mikhail and the speculative Ivan mirrors that between "perfect" worldliness and "demonic" rationalism, as likenesses of the Western God. Both, aspects of the Western disease, in need of the same cure, from a Dostoevskian perspective. Cf. esp. <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/religie/735-met-anthony-khrapovitsky-on-zacchaeus-the-mystery-of-co-suffering-love-in-everyday-life-and-dostoevsky.html">Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky.</a> </span><span style="font-family: 'times new roman', times; font-size: 10pt;">Our readers will notice that, at the heart of Zossima's approach, co-suffering love - the cure for all those who will be cured - is organically bound with prayer to the Mother of God: "I fell on my knees before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy Mother of God, our swift defender and helper."</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[3] The <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">already mentioned</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> inspiring work of Diane Oenning Thompson is one of the precious few that does actually note the Elder's prayer before the icon of the Mother of God. However, it seems to relegate it to a secondary status, making the prayer of Alyosha's natural mother, Sophia, the central case. Thus, we feel, it unfortunately reverses the natural and Dostoevskian order. Which, it seems to us, is not chronological, or merely natural, but qualitative in a higher sense. Such reversal, we fear, actually deemphasizes the true value of both <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">spiritual eldership and natural motherhood</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> in <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Dostoevsky's world</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. </span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[4] Prince Myshkin also belonged to that School: "Exactly as is a mother’s joy when her baby smiles for the first time into her eyes, so is God’s joy when one of His children turns and prays to Him for the first time, with all his heart!" (<i>The Idiot</i>) Unlike Zossima, however, as <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">we have briefly discussed</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, the Prince may have occasioned grievous misunderstanding, perhaps for his not treading the angelic path of the Mother of God to the end.</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[5] "Keep thy mind in the hell of fallen human nature, and always rejoice, in the Risen Christ", as we have <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html">previously</a> tried to summarize it, in the light of life and teaching of the Peasant-Hesychast Saint Silouan.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[6] Cf. Caryl Emerson, 'Zosima's “Mysterious Visitor”: Again Bakhtin on Dostoevsky, and Dostoevsky on Heaven and Hell' (2004)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">***</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">F.M. Dostoevsky </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The Protection of the Mother of God - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part II</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(From <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, 1881, books VI-VII. Translation by Constance Garnett. Russian original </span></b><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#selection-30757.7-30757.34" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></b></a><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">.)</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(d) The Mysterious Visitor</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He had long been an official in the town; he was in a prominent position, respected by all, rich and had a reputation for benevolence. He subscribed considerable sums to the almshouse and the orphan asylum; he was very charitable, too, in secret, a fact which only became known after his death. He was a man of about fifty, almost stern in appearance and not much given to conversation. He had been married about ten years and his wife, who was still young, had borne him three children. Well, I was sitting alone in my room the following evening, when my door suddenly opened and this gentleman walked in. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I must mention, by the way, that I was no longer living in my former quarters. As soon as I resigned my commission, I took rooms with an old lady, the widow of a government clerk. My landlady’s servant waited upon me, for I had moved into her rooms simply because on my return from the duel I had sent Afanasy back to the regiment, as I felt ashamed to look him in the face after my last interview with him. So prone is the man of the world to be ashamed of any righteous action. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have,” said my visitor, “with great interest listened to you speaking in different houses the last few days and I wanted at last to make your personal acquaintance, so as to talk to you more intimately. Can you, dear sir, grant me this favor?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I can, with the greatest pleasure, and I shall look upon it as an honor.” I said this, though I felt almost dismayed, so greatly was I impressed from the first moment by the appearance of this man. For though other people had listened to me with interest and attention, no one had come to me before with such a serious, stern and concentrated expression. And now he had come to see me in my own rooms. He sat down. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You are, I see, a man of great strength of character,” he said; “as you have dared to serve the truth, even when by doing so you risked incurring the contempt of all.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Your praise is, perhaps, excessive,” I replied. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“No, it’s not excessive,” he answered; “believe me, such a course of action is far more difficult than you think. It is that which has impressed me, and it is only on that account that I have come to you,” he continued. “Tell me, please, that is if you are not annoyed by my perhaps unseemly curiosity, what were your exact sensations, if you can recall them, at the moment when you made up your mind to ask forgiveness at the duel. Do not think my question frivolous; on the contrary, I have in asking the question a secret motive of my own, which I will perhaps explain to you later on, if it is God’s will that we should become more intimately acquainted.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">All the while he was speaking, I was looking at him straight into the face and I felt all at once a complete trust in him and great curiosity on my side also, for I felt that there was some strange secret in his soul. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You ask what were my exact sensations at the moment when I asked my opponent’s forgiveness,” I answered; “but I had better tell you from the beginning what I have not yet told any one else.” And I described all that had passed between Afanasy and me, and how I had bowed down to the ground at his feet. “From that you can see for yourself,” I concluded, “that at the time of the duel it was easier for me, for I had made a beginning already at home, and when once I had started on that road, to go farther along it was far from being difficult, but became a source of joy and happiness.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I liked the way he looked at me as he listened. “All that,” he said, “is exceedingly interesting. I will come to see you again and again.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And from that time forth he came to see me nearly every evening. And we should have become greater friends, if only he had ever talked of himself. But about himself he scarcely ever said a word, yet continually asked me about myself. In spite of that I became very fond of him and spoke with perfect frankness to him about all my feelings; “for,” thought I, “what need have I to know his secrets, since I can see without that that he is a good man? Moreover, though he is such a serious man and my senior, he comes to see a youngster like me and treats me as his equal.” And I learned a great deal that was profitable from him, for he was a man of lofty mind. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“That life is heaven,” he said to me suddenly, “that I have long been thinking about”; and all at once he added, “I think of nothing else indeed.” He looked at me and smiled. “I am more convinced of it than you are, I will tell you later why.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I listened to him and thought that he evidently wanted to tell me something. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Heaven,” he went on, “lies hidden within all of us—here it lies hidden in me now, and if I will it, it will be revealed to me to‐morrow and for all time.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I looked at him; he was speaking with great emotion and gazing mysteriously at me, as if he were questioning me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“And that we are all responsible to all for all, apart from our own sins, you were quite right in thinking that, and it is wonderful how you could comprehend it in all its significance at once. And in very truth, so soon as men understand that, the Kingdom of Heaven will be for them not a dream, but a living reality.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“And when,” I cried out to him bitterly, “when will that come to pass? and will it ever come to pass? Is not it simply a dream of ours?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What then, you don’t believe it,” he said. “You preach it and don’t believe it yourself. Believe me, this dream, as you call it, will come to pass without doubt; it will come, but not now, for every process has its law. It’s a spiritual, psychological process. To transform the world, to recreate it afresh, men must turn into another path psychologically. Until you have become really, in actual fact, a brother to every one, brotherhood will not come to pass. No sort of scientific teaching, no kind of common interest, will ever teach men to share property and privileges with equal consideration for all. Every one will think his share too small and they will be always envying, complaining and attacking one another. You ask when it will come to pass; it will come to pass, but first we have to go through the period of isolation.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What do you mean by isolation?” I asked him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Why, the isolation that prevails everywhere, above all in our age—it has not fully developed, it has not reached its limit yet. For every one strives to keep his individuality as apart as possible, wishes to secure the greatest possible fullness of life for himself; but meantime all his efforts result not in attaining fullness of life but self‐destruction, for instead of self‐realization he ends by arriving at complete solitude. All mankind in our age have split up into units, they all keep apart, each in his own groove; each one holds aloof, hides himself and hides what he has, from the rest, and he ends by being repelled by others and repelling them. He heaps up riches by himself and thinks, ‘How strong I am now and how secure,’ and in his madness he does not understand that the more he heaps up, the more he sinks into self‐destructive impotence. For he is accustomed to rely upon himself alone and to cut himself off from the whole; he has trained himself not to believe in the help of others, in men and in humanity, and only trembles for fear he should lose his money and the privileges that he has won for himself. Everywhere in these days men have, in their mockery, ceased to understand that the true security is to be found in social solidarity rather than in isolated individual effort. But this terrible individualism must inevitably have an end, and all will suddenly understand how unnaturally they are separated from one another. It will be the spirit of the time, and people will marvel that they have sat so long in darkness without seeing the light. And then the sign of the Son of Man will be seen in the heavens.... But, until then, we must keep the banner flying. Sometimes even if he has to do it alone, and his conduct seems to be crazy, a man must set an example, and so draw men’s souls out of their solitude, and spur them to some act of brotherly love, that the great idea may not die.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Our evenings, one after another, were spent in such stirring and fervent talk. I gave up society and visited my neighbors much less frequently. Besides, my vogue was somewhat over. I say this, not as blame, for they still loved me and treated me good‐humoredly, but there’s no denying that fashion is a great power in society. I began to regard my mysterious visitor with admiration, for besides enjoying his intelligence, I began to perceive that he was brooding over some plan in his heart, and was preparing himself perhaps for a great deed. Perhaps he liked my not showing curiosity about his secret, not seeking to discover it by direct question nor by insinuation. But I noticed at last, that he seemed to show signs of wanting to tell me something. This had become quite evident, indeed, about a month after he first began to visit me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do you know,” he said to me once, “that people are very inquisitive about us in the town and wonder why I come to see you so often. But let them wonder, for <i>soon all will be explained</i>.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Sometimes an extraordinary agitation would come over him, and almost always on such occasions he would get up and go away. Sometimes he would fix a long piercing look upon me, and I thought, “He will say something directly now.” But he would suddenly begin talking of something ordinary and familiar. He often complained of headache too. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">One day, quite unexpectedly indeed, after he had been talking with great fervor a long time, I saw him suddenly turn pale, and his face worked convulsively, while he stared persistently at me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What’s the matter?” I said; “do you feel ill?”—he had just been complaining of headache. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I ... do you know ... I murdered some one.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He said this and smiled with a face as white as chalk. “Why is it he is smiling?” The thought flashed through my mind before I realized anything else. I too turned pale. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What are you saying?” I cried. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You see,” he said, with a pale smile, “how much it has cost me to say the first word. Now I have said it, I feel I’ve taken the first step and shall go on.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">For a long while I could not believe him, and I did not believe him at that time, but only after he had been to see me three days running and told me all about it. I thought he was mad, but ended by being convinced, to my great grief and amazement. His crime was a great and terrible one. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fourteen years before, he had murdered the widow of a landowner, a wealthy and handsome young woman who had a house in our town. He fell passionately in love with her, declared his feeling and tried to persuade her to marry him. But she had already given her heart to another man, an officer of noble birth and high rank in the service, who was at that time away at the front, though she was expecting him soon to return. She refused his offer and begged him not to come and see her. After he had ceased to visit her, he took advantage of his knowledge of the house to enter at night through the garden by the roof, at great risk of discovery. But, as often happens, a crime committed with extraordinary audacity is more successful than others. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Entering the garret through the skylight, he went down the ladder, knowing that the door at the bottom of it was sometimes, through the negligence of the servants, left unlocked. He hoped to find it so, and so it was. He made his way in the dark to her bedroom, where a light was burning. As though on purpose, both her maids had gone off to a birthday‐party in the same street, without asking leave. The other servants slept in the servants’ quarters or in the kitchen on the ground‐floor. His passion flamed up at the sight of her asleep, and then vindictive, jealous anger took possession of his heart, and like a drunken man, beside himself, he thrust a knife into her heart, so that she did not even cry out. Then with devilish and criminal cunning he contrived that suspicion should fall on the servants. He was so base as to take her purse, to open her chest with keys from under her pillow, and to take some things from it, doing it all as it might have been done by an ignorant servant, leaving valuable papers and taking only money. He took some of the larger gold things, but left smaller articles that were ten times as valuable. He took with him, too, some things for himself as remembrances, but of that later. Having done this awful deed, he returned by the way he had come. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Neither the next day, when the alarm was raised, nor at any time after in his life, did any one dream of suspecting that he was the criminal. No one indeed knew of his love for her, for he was always reserved and silent and had no friend to whom he would have opened his heart. He was looked upon simply as an acquaintance, and not a very intimate one, of the murdered woman, as for the previous fortnight he had not even visited her. A serf of hers called Pyotr was at once suspected, and every circumstance confirmed the suspicion. The man knew—indeed his mistress did not conceal the fact—that having to send one of her serfs as a recruit she had decided to send him, as he had no relations and his conduct was unsatisfactory. People had heard him angrily threatening to murder her when he was drunk in a tavern. Two days before her death, he had run away, staying no one knew where in the town. The day after the murder, he was found on the road leading out of the town, dead drunk, with a knife in his pocket, and his right hand happened to be stained with blood. He declared that his nose had been bleeding, but no one believed him. The maids confessed that they had gone to a party and that the street‐door had been left open till they returned. And a number of similar details came to light, throwing suspicion on the innocent servant. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">They arrested him, and he was tried for the murder; but a week after the arrest, the prisoner fell sick of a fever and died unconscious in the hospital. There the matter ended and the judges and the authorities and every one in the town remained convinced that the crime had been committed by no one but the servant who had died in the hospital. And after that the punishment began. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">My mysterious visitor, now my friend, told me that at first he was not in the least troubled by pangs of conscience. He was miserable a long time, but not for that reason; only from regret that he had killed the woman he loved, that she was no more, that in killing her he had killed his love, while the fire of passion was still in his veins. But of the innocent blood he had shed, of the murder of a fellow creature, he scarcely thought. The thought that his victim might have become the wife of another man was insupportable to him, and so, for a long time, he was convinced in his conscience that he could not have acted otherwise. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At first he was worried at the arrest of the servant, but his illness and death soon set his mind at rest, for the man’s death was apparently (so he reflected at the time) not owing to his arrest or his fright, but a chill he had taken on the day he ran away, when he had lain all night dead drunk on the damp ground. The theft of the money and other things troubled him little, for he argued that the theft had not been committed for gain but to avert suspicion. The sum stolen was small, and he shortly afterwards subscribed the whole of it, and much more, towards the funds for maintaining an almshouse in the town. He did this on purpose to set his conscience at rest about the theft, and it’s a remarkable fact that for a long time he really was at peace—he told me this himself. He entered then upon a career of great activity in the service, volunteered for a difficult and laborious duty, which occupied him two years, and being a man of strong will almost forgot the past. Whenever he recalled it, he tried not to think of it at all. He became active in philanthropy too, founded and helped to maintain many institutions in the town, did a good deal in the two capitals, and in both Moscow and Petersburg was elected a member of philanthropic societies. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At last, however, he began brooding over the past, and the strain of it was too much for him. Then he was attracted by a fine and intelligent girl and soon after married her, hoping that marriage would dispel his lonely depression, and that by entering on a new life and scrupulously doing his duty to his wife and children, he would escape from old memories altogether. But the very opposite of what he expected happened. He began, even in the first month of his marriage, to be continually fretted by the thought, “My wife loves me—but what if she knew?” When she first told him that she would soon bear him a child, he was troubled. “I am giving life, but I have taken life.” Children came. “How dare I love them, teach and educate them, how can I talk to them of virtue? I have shed blood.” They were splendid children, he longed to caress them; “and I can’t look at their innocent candid faces, I am unworthy.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At last he began to be bitterly and ominously haunted by the blood of his murdered victim, by the young life he had destroyed, by the blood that cried out for vengeance. He had begun to have awful dreams. But, being a man of fortitude, he bore his suffering a long time, thinking: “I shall expiate everything by this secret agony.” But that hope, too, was vain; the longer it went on, the more intense was his suffering. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He was respected in society for his active benevolence, though every one was overawed by his stern and gloomy character. But the more he was respected, the more intolerable it was for him. He confessed to me that he had thoughts of killing himself. But he began to be haunted by another idea—an idea which he had at first regarded as impossible and unthinkable, though at last it got such a hold on his heart that he could not shake it off. He dreamed of rising up, going out and confessing in the face of all men that he had committed murder. For three years this dream had pursued him, haunting him in different forms. At last he believed with his whole heart that if he confessed his crime, he would heal his soul and would be at peace for ever. But this belief filled his heart with terror, for how could he carry it out? And then came what happened at my duel. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Looking at you, I have made up my mind.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I looked at him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Is it possible,” I cried, clasping my hands, “that such a trivial incident could give rise to such a resolution in you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“My resolution has been growing for the last three years,” he answered, “and your story only gave the last touch to it. Looking at you, I reproached myself and envied you.” He said this to me almost sullenly. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But you won’t be believed,” I observed; “it’s fourteen years ago.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have proofs, great proofs. I shall show them.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then I cried and kissed him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Tell me one thing, one thing,” he said (as though it all depended upon me), “my wife, my children! My wife may die of grief, and though my children won’t lose their rank and property, they’ll be a convict’s children and for ever! And what a memory, what a memory of me I shall leave in their hearts!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I said nothing. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“And to part from them, to leave them for ever? It’s for ever, you know, for ever!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I sat still and repeated a silent prayer. I got up at last, I felt afraid. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Well?” He looked at me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Go!” said I, “confess. Everything passes, only the truth remains. Your children will understand, when they grow up, the nobility of your resolution.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He left me that time as though he had made up his mind. Yet for more than a fortnight afterwards, he came to me every evening, still preparing himself, still unable to bring himself to the point. He made my heart ache. One day he would come determined and say fervently: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I know it will be heaven for me, heaven, the moment I confess. Fourteen years I’ve been in hell. I want to suffer. I will take my punishment and begin to live. You can pass through the world doing wrong, but there’s no turning back. Now I dare not love my neighbor nor even my own children. Good God, my children will understand, perhaps, what my punishment has cost me and will not condemn me! God is not in strength but in truth.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“All will understand your sacrifice,” I said to him, “if not at once, they will understand later; for you have served truth, the higher truth, not of the earth.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And he would go away seeming comforted, but next day he would come again, bitter, pale, sarcastic. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Every time I come to you, you look at me so inquisitively as though to say, ‘He has still not confessed!’ Wait a bit, don’t despise me too much. It’s not such an easy thing to do, as you would think. Perhaps I shall not do it at all. You won’t go and inform against me then, will you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And far from looking at him with indiscreet curiosity, I was afraid to look at him at all. I was quite ill from anxiety, and my heart was full of tears. I could not sleep at night. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have just come from my wife,” he went on. “Do you understand what the word ‘wife’ means? When I went out, the children called to me, ‘Good‐by, father, make haste back to read <i>The Children’s Magazine</i> with us.’ No, you don’t understand that! No one is wise from another man’s woe.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">His eyes were glittering, his lips were twitching. Suddenly he struck the table with his fist so that everything on it danced—it was the first time he had done such a thing, he was such a mild man. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But need I?” he exclaimed, “must I? No one has been condemned, no one has been sent to Siberia in my place, the man died of fever. And I’ve been punished by my sufferings for the blood I shed. And I shan’t be believed, they won’t believe my proofs. Need I confess, need I? I am ready to go on suffering all my life for the blood I have shed, if only my wife and children may be spared. Will it be just to ruin them with me? Aren’t we making a mistake? What is right in this case? And will people recognize it, will they appreciate it, will they respect it?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Good Lord!” I thought to myself, “he is thinking of other people’s respect at such a moment!” And I felt so sorry for him then, that I believe I would have shared his fate if it could have comforted him. I saw he was beside himself. I was aghast, realizing with my heart as well as my mind what such a resolution meant. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Decide my fate!” he exclaimed again. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Go and confess,” I whispered to him. My voice failed me, but I whispered it firmly. I took up the New Testament from the table, the Russian translation, and showed him the Gospel of St. John, chapter xii. verse 24: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I had just been reading that verse when he came in. He read it. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“That’s true,” he said, but he smiled bitterly. “It’s terrible the things you find in those books,” he said, after a pause. “It’s easy enough to thrust them upon one. And who wrote them? Can they have been written by men?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“The Holy Spirit wrote them,” said I. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It’s easy for you to prate,” he smiled again, this time almost with hatred. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I took the book again, opened it in another place and showed him the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter x. verse 31. He read: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He read it and simply flung down the book. He was trembling all over. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“An awful text,” he said. “There’s no denying you’ve picked out fitting ones.” He rose from the chair. “Well!” he said, “good‐by, perhaps I shan’t come again ... we shall meet in heaven. So I have been for fourteen years ‘in the hands of the living God,’ that’s how one must think of those fourteen years. To‐morrow I will beseech those hands to let me go.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I wanted to take him in my arms and kiss him, but I did not dare—his face was contorted and somber. He went away. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Good God,” I thought, “what has he gone to face!” I fell on my knees before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy Mother of God, our swift defender and helper. I was half an hour praying in tears, and it was late, about midnight. Suddenly I saw the door open and he came in again. I was surprised. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Where have you been?” I asked him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I think,” he said, “I’ve forgotten something ... my handkerchief, I think.... Well, even if I’ve not forgotten anything, let me stay a little.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He sat down. I stood over him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You sit down, too,” said he. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I sat down. We sat still for two minutes; he looked intently at me and suddenly smiled—I remembered that—then he got up, embraced me warmly and kissed me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Remember,” he said, “how I came to you a second time. Do you hear, remember it!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And he went out. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“To‐morrow,” I thought. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And so it was. I did not know that evening that the next day was his birthday. I had not been out for the last few days, so I had no chance of hearing it from any one. On that day he always had a great gathering, every one in the town went to it. It was the same this time. After dinner he walked into the middle of the room, with a paper in his hand—a formal declaration to the chief of his department who was present. This declaration he read aloud to the whole assembly. It contained a full account of the crime, in every detail. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I cut myself off from men as a monster. God has visited me,” he said in conclusion. “I want to suffer for my sin!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Then he brought out and laid on the table all the things he had been keeping for fourteen years, that he thought would prove his crime, the jewels belonging to the murdered woman which he had stolen to divert suspicion, a cross and a locket taken from her neck with a portrait of her betrothed in the locket, her notebook and two letters; one from her betrothed, telling her that he would soon be with her, and her unfinished answer left on the table to be sent off next day. He carried off these two letters—what for? Why had he kept them for fourteen years afterwards instead of destroying them as evidence against him? </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And this is what happened: every one was amazed and horrified, every one refused to believe it and thought that he was deranged, though all listened with intense curiosity. A few days later it was fully decided and agreed in every house that the unhappy man was mad. The legal authorities could not refuse to take the case up, but they too dropped it. Though the trinkets and letters made them ponder, they decided that even if they did turn out to be authentic, no charge could be based on those alone. Besides, she might have given him those things as a friend, or asked him to take care of them for her. I heard afterwards, however, that the genuineness of the things was proved by the friends and relations of the murdered woman, and that there was no doubt about them. Yet nothing was destined to come of it, after all. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Five days later, all had heard that he was ill and that his life was in danger. The nature of his illness I can’t explain, they said it was an affection of the heart. But it became known that the doctors had been induced by his wife to investigate his mental condition also, and had come to the conclusion that it was a case of insanity. I betrayed nothing, though people ran to question me. But when I wanted to visit him, I was for a long while forbidden to do so, above all by his wife. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It’s you who have caused his illness,” she said to me; “he was always gloomy, but for the last year people noticed that he was peculiarly excited and did strange things, and now you have been the ruin of him. Your preaching has brought him to this; for the last month he was always with you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Indeed, not only his wife but the whole town were down upon me and blamed me. “It’s all your doing,” they said. I was silent and indeed rejoiced at heart, for I saw plainly God’s mercy to the man who had turned against himself and punished himself. I could not believe in his insanity. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">They let me see him at last, he insisted upon saying good‐by to me. I went in to him and saw at once, that not only his days, but his hours were numbered. He was weak, yellow, his hands trembled, he gasped for breath, but his face was full of tender and happy feeling. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It is done!” he said. “I’ve long been yearning to see you, why didn’t you come?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I did not tell him that they would not let me see him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“God has had pity on me and is calling me to Himself. I know I am dying, but I feel joy and peace for the first time after so many years. There was heaven in my heart from the moment I had done what I had to do. Now I dare to love my children and to kiss them. Neither my wife nor the judges, nor any one has believed it. My children will never believe it either. I see in that God’s mercy to them. I shall die, and my name will be without a stain for them. And now I feel God near, my heart rejoices as in Heaven ... I have done my duty.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He could not speak, he gasped for breath, he pressed my hand warmly, looking fervently at me. We did not talk for long, his wife kept peeping in at us. But he had time to whisper to me: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do you remember how I came back to you that second time, at midnight? I told you to remember it. You know what I came back for? I came to kill you!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I started. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I went out from you then into the darkness, I wandered about the streets, struggling with myself. And suddenly I hated you so that I could hardly bear it. Now, I thought, he is all that binds me, and he is my judge. I can’t refuse to face my punishment to‐morrow, for he knows all. It was not that I was afraid you would betray me (I never even thought of that), but I thought, ‘How can I look him in the face if I don’t confess?’ And if you had been at the other end of the earth, but alive, it would have been all the same, the thought was unendurable that you were alive knowing everything and condemning me. I hated you as though you were the cause, as though you were to blame for everything. I came back to you then, remembering that you had a dagger lying on your table. I sat down and asked you to sit down, and for a whole minute I pondered. If I had killed you, I should have been ruined by that murder even if I had not confessed the other. But I didn’t think about that at all, and I didn’t want to think of it at that moment. I only hated you and longed to revenge myself on you for everything. The Lord vanquished the devil in my heart. But let me tell you, you were never nearer death.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A week later he died. The whole town followed him to the grave. The chief priest made a speech full of feeling. All lamented the terrible illness that had cut short his days. But all the town was up in arms against me after the funeral, and people even refused to see me. Some, at first a few and afterwards more, began indeed to believe in the truth of his story, and they visited me and questioned me with great interest and eagerness, for man loves to see the downfall and disgrace of the righteous. But I held my tongue, and very shortly after, I left the town, and five months later by God’s grace I entered upon the safe and blessed path, praising the unseen finger which had guided me so clearly to it. But I remember in my prayer to this day, the servant of God, Mihail, who suffered so greatly. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(e) The Russian Monk and his possible Significance</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, what is the monk? In the cultivated world the word is nowadays pronounced by some people with a jeer, and by others it is used as a term of abuse, and this contempt for the monk is growing. It is true, alas, it is true, that there are many sluggards, gluttons, profligates and insolent beggars among monks. Educated people point to these: “You are idlers, useless members of society, you live on the labor of others, you are shameless beggars.” And yet how many meek and humble monks there are, yearning for solitude and fervent prayer in peace! These are less noticed, or passed over in silence. And how surprised men would be if I were to say that from these meek monks, who yearn for solitary prayer, the salvation of Russia will come perhaps once more! For they are in truth made ready in peace and quiet “for the day and the hour, the month and the year.” Meanwhile, in their solitude, they keep the image of Christ fair and undefiled, in the purity of God’s truth, from the times of the Fathers of old, the Apostles and the martyrs. And when the time comes they will show it to the tottering creeds of the world. That is a great thought. That star will rise out of the East. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">That is my view of the monk, and is it false? is it too proud? Look at the worldly and all who set themselves up above the people of God, has not God’s image and His truth been distorted in them? They have science; but in science there is nothing but what is the object of sense. The spiritual world, the higher part of man’s being is rejected altogether, dismissed with a sort of triumph, even with hatred. The world has proclaimed the reign of freedom, especially of late, but what do we see in this freedom of theirs? Nothing but slavery and self‐destruction! For the world says: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You have desires and so satisfy them, for you have the same rights as the most rich and powerful. Don’t be afraid of satisfying them and even multiply your desires.” That is the modern doctrine of the world. In that they see freedom. And what follows from this right of multiplication of desires? In the rich, isolation and spiritual suicide; in the poor, envy and murder; for they have been given rights, but have not been shown the means of satisfying their wants. They maintain that the world is getting more and more united, more and more bound together in brotherly community, as it overcomes distance and sets thoughts flying through the air. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alas, put no faith in such a bond of union. Interpreting freedom as the multiplication and rapid satisfaction of desires, men distort their own nature, for many senseless and foolish desires and habits and ridiculous fancies are fostered in them. They live only for mutual envy, for luxury and ostentation. To have dinners, visits, carriages, rank and slaves to wait on one is looked upon as a necessity, for which life, honor and human feeling are sacrificed, and men even commit suicide if they are unable to satisfy it. We see the same thing among those who are not rich, while the poor drown their unsatisfied need and their envy in drunkenness. But soon they will drink blood instead of wine, they are being led on to it. I ask you is such a man free? I knew one “champion of freedom” who told me himself that, when he was deprived of tobacco in prison, he was so wretched at the privation that he almost went and betrayed his cause for the sake of getting tobacco again! And such a man says, “I am fighting for the cause of humanity.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">How can such a one fight? what is he fit for? He is capable perhaps of some action quickly over, but he cannot hold out long. And it’s no wonder that instead of gaining freedom they have sunk into slavery, and instead of serving the cause of brotherly love and the union of humanity have fallen, on the contrary, into dissension and isolation, as my mysterious visitor and teacher said to me in my youth. And therefore the idea of the service of humanity, of brotherly love and the solidarity of mankind, is more and more dying out in the world, and indeed this idea is sometimes treated with derision. For how can a man shake off his habits? What can become of him if he is in such bondage to the habit of satisfying the innumerable desires he has created for himself? He is isolated, and what concern has he with the rest of humanity? They have succeeded in accumulating a greater mass of objects, but the joy in the world has grown less. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The monastic way is very different. Obedience, fasting and prayer are laughed at, yet only through them lies the way to real, true freedom. I cut off my superfluous and unnecessary desires, I subdue my proud and wanton will and chastise it with obedience, and with God’s help I attain freedom of spirit and with it spiritual joy. Which is most capable of conceiving a great idea and serving it—the rich man in his isolation or the man who has freed himself from the tyranny of material things and habits? The monk is reproached for his solitude, “You have secluded yourself within the walls of the monastery for your own salvation, and have forgotten the brotherly service of humanity!” But we shall see which will be most zealous in the cause of brotherly love. For it is not we, but they, who are in isolation, though they don’t see that. Of old, leaders of the people came from among us, and why should they not again? The same meek and humble ascetics will rise up and go out to work for the great cause. The salvation of Russia comes from the people. And the Russian monk has always been on the side of the people. We are isolated only if the people are isolated. The people believe as we do, and an unbelieving reformer will never do anything in Russia, even if he is sincere in heart and a genius. Remember that! The people will meet the atheist and overcome him, and Russia will be one and orthodox. Take care of the peasant and guard his heart. Go on educating him quietly. That’s your duty as monks, for the peasant has God in his heart. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(<i>f</i>) <i>Of Masters and Servants, and of whether it is possible for them to be Brothers in the Spirit</i></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Of course, I don’t deny that there is sin in the peasants too. And the fire of corruption is spreading visibly, hourly, working from above downwards. The spirit of isolation is coming upon the people too. Money‐ lenders and devourers of the commune are rising up. Already the merchant grows more and more eager for rank, and strives to show himself cultured though he has not a trace of culture, and to this end meanly despises his old traditions, and is even ashamed of the faith of his fathers. He visits princes, though he is only a peasant corrupted. The peasants are rotting in drunkenness and cannot shake off the habit. And what cruelty to their wives, to their children even! All from drunkenness! I’ve seen in the factories children of nine years old, frail, rickety, bent and already depraved. The stuffy workshop, the din of machinery, work all day long, the vile language and the drink, the drink—is that what a little child’s heart needs? He needs sunshine, childish play, good examples all about him, and at least a little love. There must be no more of this, monks, no more torturing of children, rise up and preach that, make haste, make haste! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But God will save Russia, for though the peasants are corrupted and cannot renounce their filthy sin, yet they know it is cursed by God and that they do wrong in sinning. So that our people still believe in righteousness, have faith in God and weep tears of devotion. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is different with the upper classes. They, following science, want to base justice on reason alone, but not with Christ, as before, and they have already proclaimed that there is no crime, that there is no sin. And that’s consistent, for if you have no God what is the meaning of crime? In Europe the people are already rising up against the rich with violence, and the leaders of the people are everywhere leading them to bloodshed, and teaching them that their wrath is righteous. But their “wrath is accursed, for it is cruel.” But God will save Russia as He has saved her many times. Salvation will come from the people, from their faith and their meekness. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, watch over the people’s faith and this will not be a dream. I’ve been struck all my life in our great people by their dignity, their true and seemly dignity. I’ve seen it myself, I can testify to it, I’ve seen it and marveled at it, I’ve seen it in spite of the degraded sins and poverty‐stricken appearance of our peasantry. They are not servile, and even after two centuries of serfdom they are free in manner and bearing, yet without insolence, and not revengeful and not envious. “You are rich and noble, you are clever and talented, well, be so, God bless you. I respect you, but I know that I too am a man. By the very fact that I respect you without envy I prove my dignity as a man.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">In truth if they don’t say this (for they don’t know how to say this yet), that is how they act. I have seen it myself, I have known it myself, and, would you believe it, the poorer our Russian peasant is, the more noticeable is that serene goodness, for the rich among them are for the most part corrupted already, and much of that is due to our carelessness and indifference. But God will save His people, for Russia is great in her humility. I dream of seeing, and seem to see clearly already, our future. It will come to pass, that even the most corrupt of our rich will end by being ashamed of his riches before the poor, and the poor, seeing his humility, will understand and give way before him, will respond joyfully and kindly to his honorable shame. Believe me that it will end in that; things are moving to that. Equality is to be found only in the spiritual dignity of man, and that will only be understood among us. If we were brothers, there would be fraternity, but before that, they will never agree about the division of wealth. We preserve the image of Christ, and it will shine forth like a precious diamond to the whole world. So may it be, so may it be! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, a touching incident befell me once. In my wanderings I met in the town of K. my old orderly, Afanasy. It was eight years since I had parted from him. He chanced to see me in the market‐place, recognized me, ran up to me, and how delighted he was! He simply pounced on me: “Master dear, is it you? Is it really you I see?” He took me home with him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He was no longer in the army, he was married and already had two little children. He and his wife earned their living as costermongers in the market‐place. His room was poor, but bright and clean. He made me sit down, set the samovar, sent for his wife, as though my appearance were a festival for them. He brought me his children: “Bless them, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Is it for me to bless them? I am only a humble monk. I will pray for them. And for you, Afanasy Pavlovitch, I have prayed every day since that day, for it all came from you,” said I. And I explained that to him as well as I could. And what do you think? The man kept gazing at me and could not believe that I, his former master, an officer, was now before him in such a guise and position; it made him shed tears. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Why are you weeping?” said I, “better rejoice over me, dear friend, whom I can never forget, for my path is a glad and joyful one.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He did not say much, but kept sighing and shaking his head over me tenderly. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What has became of your fortune?” he asked. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I gave it to the monastery,” I answered; “we live in common.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">After tea I began saying good‐by, and suddenly he brought out half a rouble as an offering to the monastery, and another half‐rouble I saw him thrusting hurriedly into my hand: “That’s for you in your wanderings, it may be of use to you, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I took his half‐rouble, bowed to him and his wife, and went out rejoicing. And on my way I thought: “Here we are both now, he at home and I on the road, sighing and shaking our heads, no doubt, and yet smiling joyfully in the gladness of our hearts, remembering how God brought about our meeting.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I have never seen him again since then. I had been his master and he my servant, but now when we exchanged a loving kiss with softened hearts, there was a great human bond between us. I have thought a great deal about that, and now what I think is this: Is it so inconceivable that that grand and simple‐hearted unity might in due time become universal among the Russian people? I believe that it will come to pass and that the time is at hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And of servants I will add this: In old days when I was young I was often angry with servants; “the cook had served something too hot, the orderly had not brushed my clothes.” But what taught me better then was a thought of my dear brother’s, which I had heard from him in childhood: “Am I worth it, that another should serve me and be ordered about by me in his poverty and ignorance?” And I wondered at the time that such simple and self‐ evident ideas should be so slow to occur to our minds. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is impossible that there should be no servants in the world, but act so that your servant may be freer in spirit than if he were not a servant. And why cannot I be a servant to my servant and even let him see it, and that without any pride on my part or any mistrust on his? Why should not my servant be like my own kindred, so that I may take him into my family and rejoice in doing so? Even now this can be done, but it will lead to the grand unity of men in the future, when a man will not seek servants for himself, or desire to turn his fellow creatures into servants as he does now, but on the contrary, will long with his whole heart to be the servant of all, as the Gospel teaches. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And can it be a dream, that in the end man will find his joy only in deeds of light and mercy, and not in cruel pleasures as now, in gluttony, fornication, ostentation, boasting and envious rivalry of one with the other? I firmly believe that it is not and that the time is at hand. People laugh and ask: “When will that time come and does it look like coming?” I believe that with Christ’s help we shall accomplish this great thing. And how many ideas there have been on earth in the history of man which were unthinkable ten years before they appeared! Yet when their destined hour had come, they came forth and spread over the whole earth. So it will be with us, and our people will shine forth in the world, and all men will say: “The stone which the builders rejected has become the corner‐stone of the building.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And we may ask the scornful themselves: If our hope is a dream, when will you build up your edifice and order things justly by your intellect alone, without Christ? If they declare that it is they who are advancing towards unity, only the most simple‐hearted among them believe it, so that one may positively marvel at such simplicity. Of a truth, they have more fantastic dreams than we. They aim at justice, but, denying Christ, they will end by flooding the earth with blood, for blood cries out for blood, and he that taketh up the sword shall perish by the sword. And if it were not for Christ’s covenant, they would slaughter one another down to the last two men on earth. And those two last men would not be able to restrain each other in their pride, and the one would slay the other and then himself. And that would come to pass, were it not for the promise of Christ that for the sake of the humble and meek the days shall be shortened. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">While I was still wearing an officer’s uniform after my duel, I talked about servants in general society, and I remember every one was amazed at me. “What!” they asked, “are we to make our servants sit down on the sofa and offer them tea?” And I answered them: “Why not, sometimes at least?” Every one laughed. Their question was frivolous and my answer was not clear; but the thought in it was to some extent right. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(<i>g</i>) <i>Of Prayer, of Love, and of Contact with other Worlds</i></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Young man, be not forgetful of prayer. Every time you pray, if your prayer is sincere, there will be new feeling and new meaning in it, which will give you fresh courage, and you will understand that prayer is an education. Remember, too, every day, and whenever you can, repeat to yourself, “Lord, have mercy on all who appear before Thee to‐day.” For every hour and every moment thousands of men leave life on this earth, and their souls appear before God. And how many of them depart in solitude, unknown, sad, dejected that no one mourns for them or even knows whether they have lived or not! And behold, from the other end of the earth perhaps, your prayer for their rest will rise up to God though you knew them not nor they you. How touching it must be to a soul standing in dread before the Lord to feel at that instant that, for him too, there is one to pray, that there is a fellow creature left on earth to love him too! And God will look on you both more graciously, for if you have had so much pity on him, how much will He have pity Who is infinitely more loving and merciful than you! And He will forgive him for your sake. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Brothers, have no fear of men’s sin. Love a man even in his sin, for that is the semblance of Divine Love and is the highest love on earth. Love all God’s creation, the whole and every grain of sand in it. Love every leaf, every ray of God’s light. Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in things. Once you perceive it, you will begin to comprehend it better every day. And you will come at last to love the whole world with an all‐ embracing love. Love the animals: God has given them the rudiments of thought and joy untroubled. Do not trouble it, don’t harass them, don’t deprive them of their happiness, don’t work against God’s intent. Man, do not pride yourself on superiority to the animals; they are without sin, and you, with your greatness, defile the earth by your appearance on it, and leave the traces of your foulness after you—alas, it is true of almost every one of us! Love children especially, for they too are sinless like the angels; they live to soften and purify our hearts and as it were to guide us. Woe to him who offends a child! Father Anfim taught me to love children. The kind, silent man used often on our wanderings to spend the farthings given us on sweets and cakes for the children. He could not pass by a child without emotion. That’s the nature of the man. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">At some thoughts one stands perplexed, especially at the sight of men’s sin, and wonders whether one should use force or humble love. Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on that once for all, you may subdue the whole world. Loving humility is marvelously strong, the strongest of all things, and there is nothing else like it. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Every day and every hour, every minute, walk round yourself and watch yourself, and see that your image is a seemly one. You pass by a little child, you pass by, spiteful, with ugly words, with wrathful heart; you may not have noticed the child, but he has seen you, and your image, unseemly and ignoble, may remain in his defenseless heart. You don’t know it, but you may have sown an evil seed in him and it may grow, and all because you were not careful before the child, because you did not foster in yourself a careful, actively benevolent love. Brothers, love is a teacher; but one must know how to acquire it, for it is hard to acquire, it is dearly bought, it is won slowly by long labor. For we must love not only occasionally, for a moment, but for ever. Every one can love occasionally, even the wicked can. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">My brother asked the birds to forgive him; that sounds senseless, but it is right; for all is like an ocean, all is flowing and blending; a touch in one place sets up movement at the other end of the earth. It may be senseless to beg forgiveness of the birds, but birds would be happier at your side—a little happier, anyway—and children and all animals, if you were nobler than you are now. It’s all like an ocean, I tell you. Then you would pray to the birds too, consumed by an all‐embracing love, in a sort of transport, and pray that they too will forgive you your sin. Treasure this ecstasy, however senseless it may seem to men. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">My friends, pray to God for gladness. Be glad as children, as the birds of heaven. And let not the sin of men confound you in your doings. Fear not that it will wear away your work and hinder its being accomplished. Do not say, “Sin is mighty, wickedness is mighty, evil environment is mighty, and we are lonely and helpless, and evil environment is wearing us away and hindering our good work from being done.” Fly from that dejection, children! There is only one means of salvation, then take yourself and make yourself responsible for all men’s sins, that is the truth, you know, friends, for as soon as you sincerely make yourself responsible for everything and for all men, you will see at once that it is really so, and that you are to blame for every one and for all things. But throwing your own indolence and impotence on others you will end by sharing the pride of Satan and murmuring against God. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Of the pride of Satan what I think is this: it is hard for us on earth to comprehend it, and therefore it is so easy to fall into error and to share it, even imagining that we are doing something grand and fine. Indeed, many of the strongest feelings and movements of our nature we cannot comprehend on earth. Let not that be a stumbling‐block, and think not that it may serve as a justification to you for anything. For the Eternal Judge asks of you what you can comprehend and not what you cannot. You will know that yourself hereafter, for you will behold all things truly then and will not dispute them. On earth, indeed, we are as it were astray, and if it were not for the precious image of Christ before us, we should be undone and altogether lost, as was the human race before the flood. Much on earth is hidden from us, but to make up for that we have been given a precious mystic sense of our living bond with the other world, with the higher heavenly world, and the roots of our thoughts and feelings are not here but in other worlds. That is why the philosophers say that we cannot apprehend the reality of things on earth. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">God took seeds from different worlds and sowed them on this earth, and His garden grew up and everything came up that could come up, but what grows lives and is alive only through the feeling of its contact with other mysterious worlds. If that feeling grows weak or is destroyed in you, the heavenly growth will die away in you. Then you will be indifferent to life and even grow to hate it. That’s what I think. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(h) Can a Man judge his Fellow Creatures? Faith to the End</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Remember particularly that you cannot be a judge of any one. For no one can judge a criminal, until he recognizes that he is just such a criminal as the man standing before him, and that he perhaps is more than all men to blame for that crime. When he understands that, he will be able to be a judge. Though that sounds absurd, it is true. If I had been righteous myself, perhaps there would have been no criminal standing before me. If you can take upon yourself the crime of the criminal your heart is judging, take it at once, suffer for him yourself, and let him go without reproach. And even if the law itself makes you his judge, act in the same spirit so far as possible, for he will go away and condemn himself more bitterly than you have done. If, after your kiss, he goes away untouched, mocking at you, do not let that be a stumbling‐block to you. It shows his time has not yet come, but it will come in due course. And if it come not, no matter; if not he, then another in his place will understand and suffer, and judge and condemn himself, and the truth will be fulfilled. Believe that, believe it without doubt; for in that lies all the hope and faith of the saints. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Work without ceasing. If you remember in the night as you go to sleep, “I have not done what I ought to have done,” rise up at once and do it. If the people around you are spiteful and callous and will not hear you, fall down before them and beg their forgiveness; for in truth you are to blame for their not wanting to hear you. And if you cannot speak to them in their bitterness, serve them in silence and in humility, never losing hope. If all men abandon you and even drive you away by force, then when you are left alone fall on the earth and kiss it, water it with your tears and it will bring forth fruit even though no one has seen or heard you in your solitude. Believe to the end, even if all men went astray and you were left the only one faithful; bring your offering even then and praise God in your loneliness. And if two of you are gathered together—then there is a whole world, a world of living love. Embrace each other tenderly and praise God, for if only in you two His truth has been fulfilled. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">If you sin yourself and grieve even unto death for your sins or for your sudden sin, then rejoice for others, rejoice for the righteous man, rejoice that if you have sinned, he is righteous and has not sinned. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">If the evil‐doing of men moves you to indignation and overwhelming distress, even to a desire for vengeance on the evil‐doers, shun above all things that feeling. Go at once and seek suffering for yourself, as though you were yourself guilty of that wrong. Accept that suffering and bear it and your heart will find comfort, and you will understand that you too are guilty, for you might have been a light to the evil‐doers, even as the one man sinless, and you were not a light to them. If you had been a light, you would have lightened the path for others too, and the evil‐doer might perhaps have been saved by your light from his sin. And even though your light was shining, yet you see men were not saved by it, hold firm and doubt not the power of the heavenly light. Believe that if they were not saved, they will be saved hereafter. And if they are not saved hereafter, then their sons will be saved, for your light will not die even when you are dead. The righteous man departs, but his light remains. Men are always saved after the death of the deliverer. Men reject their prophets and slay them, but they love their martyrs and honor those whom they have slain. You are working for the whole, you are acting for the future. Seek no reward, for great is your reward on this earth: the spiritual joy which is only vouchsafed to the righteous man. Fear not the great nor the mighty, but be wise and ever serene. Know the measure, know the times, study that. When you are left alone, pray. Love to throw yourself on the earth and kiss it. Kiss the earth and love it with an unceasing, consuming love. Love all men, love everything. Seek that rapture and ecstasy. Water the earth with the tears of your joy and love those tears. Don’t be ashamed of that ecstasy, prize it, for it is a gift of God and a great one; it is not given to many but only to the elect. </span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(i) Of Hell and Hell Fire, a Mystic Reflection</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fathers and teachers, I ponder, “What is hell?” I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love. Once in infinite existence, immeasurable in time and space, a spiritual creature was given on his coming to earth, the power of saying, “I am and I love.” Once, only once, there was given him a moment of active <i>living</i> love, and for that was earthly life given him, and with it times and seasons. And that happy creature rejected the priceless gift, prized it and loved it not, scorned it and remained callous. Such a one, having left the earth, sees Abraham’s bosom and talks with Abraham as we are told in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, and beholds heaven and can go up to the Lord. But that is just his torment, to rise up to the Lord without ever having loved, to be brought close to those who have loved when he has despised their love. For he sees clearly and says to himself, “Now I have understanding, and though I now thirst to love, there will be nothing great, no sacrifice in my love, for my earthly life is over, and Abraham will not come even with a drop of living water (that is the gift of earthly active life) to cool the fiery thirst of spiritual love which burns in me now, though I despised it on earth; there is no more life for me and will be no more time! Even though I would gladly give my life for others, it can never be, for that life is passed which can be sacrificed for love, and now there is a gulf fixed between that life and this existence.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">They talk of hell fire in the material sense. I don’t go into that mystery and I shun it. But I think if there were fire in material sense, they would be glad of it, for I imagine that in material agony, their still greater spiritual agony would be forgotten for a moment. Moreover, that spiritual agony cannot be taken from them, for that suffering is not external but within them. And if it could be taken from them, I think it would be bitterer still for the unhappy creatures. For even if the righteous in Paradise forgave them, beholding their torments, and called them up to heaven in their infinite love, they would only multiply their torments, for they would arouse in them still more keenly a flaming thirst for responsive, active and grateful love which is now impossible. In the timidity of my heart I imagine, however, that the very recognition of this impossibility would serve at last to console them. For accepting the love of the righteous together with the impossibility of repaying it, by this submissiveness and the effect of this humility, they will attain at last, as it were, to a certain semblance of that active love which they scorned in life, to something like its outward expression.... I am sorry, friends and brothers, that I cannot express this clearly. But woe to those who have slain themselves on earth, woe to the suicides! I believe that there can be none more miserable then they. They tell us that it is a sin to pray for them and outwardly the Church, as it were, renounces them, but in my secret heart I believe that we may pray even for them. Love can never be an offense to Christ. For such as those I have prayed inwardly all my life, I confess it, fathers and teachers, and even now I pray for them every day. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Oh, there are some who remain proud and fierce even in hell, in spite of their certain knowledge and contemplation of the absolute truth; there are some fearful ones who have given themselves over to Satan and his proud spirit entirely. For such, hell is voluntary and ever consuming; they are tortured by their own choice. For they have cursed themselves, cursing God and life. They live upon their vindictive pride like a starving man in the desert sucking blood out of his own body. But they are never satisfied, and they refuse forgiveness, they curse God Who calls them. They cannot behold the living God without hatred, and they cry out that the God of life should be annihilated, that God should destroy Himself and His own creation. And they will burn in the fire of their own wrath for ever and yearn for death and annihilation. But they will not attain to death.... </span></p>
<div align="center" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><hr size="2" width="100%" align="center" /></div>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Here Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov’s manuscript ends. I repeat, it is incomplete and fragmentary. Biographical details, for instance, cover only Father Zossima’s earliest youth. Of his teaching and opinions we find brought together sayings evidently uttered on very different occasions. His utterances during the last few hours have not been kept separate from the rest, but their general character can be gathered from what we have in Alexey Fyodorovitch’s manuscript. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder’s death came in the end quite unexpectedly. For although those who were gathered about him that last evening realized that his death was approaching, yet it was difficult to imagine that it would come so suddenly. On the contrary, his friends, as I observed already, seeing him that night apparently so cheerful and talkative, were convinced that there was at least a temporary change for the better in his condition. Even five minutes before his death, they said afterwards wonderingly, it was impossible to foresee it. He seemed suddenly to feel an acute pain in his chest, he turned pale and pressed his hands to his heart. All rose from their seats and hastened to him. But though suffering, he still looked at them with a smile, sank slowly from his chair on to his knees, then bowed his face to the ground, stretched out his arms and as though in joyful ecstasy, praying and kissing the ground, quietly and joyfully gave up his soul to God. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The news of his death spread at once through the hermitage and reached the monastery. The nearest friends of the deceased and those whose duty it was from their position began to lay out the corpse according to the ancient ritual, and all the monks gathered together in the church. And before dawn the news of the death reached the town. By the morning all the town was talking of the event, and crowds were flocking from the town to the monastery. But this subject will be treated in the next book; I will only add here that before a day had passed something happened so unexpected, so strange, upsetting, and bewildering in its effect on the monks and the townspeople, that after all these years, that day of general suspense is still vividly remembered in the town [...]</span></p>
<p align="center" style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Cana Of Galilee</span></b></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It was very late, according to the monastery ideas, when Alyosha returned to the hermitage; the door‐keeper let him in by a special entrance. It had struck nine o’clock—the hour of rest and repose after a day of such agitation for all. Alyosha timidly opened the door and went into the elder’s cell where his coffin was now standing. There was no one in the cell but Father Païssy, reading the Gospel in solitude over the coffin, and the young novice Porfiry, who, exhausted by the previous night’s conversation and the disturbing incidents of the day, was sleeping the deep sound sleep of youth on the floor of the other room. Though Father Païssy heard Alyosha come in, he did not even look in his direction. Alyosha turned to the right from the door to the corner, fell on his knees and began to pray. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">His soul was overflowing but with mingled feelings; no single sensation stood out distinctly; on the contrary, one drove out another in a slow, continual rotation. But there was a sweetness in his heart and, strange to say, Alyosha was not surprised at it. Again he saw that coffin before him, the hidden dead figure so precious to him, but the weeping and poignant grief of the morning was no longer aching in his soul. As soon as he came in, he fell down before the coffin as before a holy shrine, but joy, joy was glowing in his mind and in his heart. The one window of the cell was open, the air was fresh and cool. “So the smell must have become stronger, if they opened the window,” thought Alyosha. But even this thought of the smell of corruption, which had seemed to him so awful and humiliating a few hours before, no longer made him feel miserable or indignant. He began quietly praying, but he soon felt that he was praying almost mechanically. Fragments of thought floated through his soul, flashed like stars and went out again at once, to be succeeded by others. But yet there was reigning in his soul a sense of the wholeness of things—something steadfast and comforting—and he was aware of it himself. Sometimes he began praying ardently, he longed to pour out his thankfulness and love.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But when he had begun to pray, he passed suddenly to something else, and sank into thought, forgetting both the prayer and what had interrupted it. He began listening to what Father Païssy was reading, but worn out with exhaustion he gradually began to doze. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee;</i>” read Father Païssy. “<i>And the mother of Jesus was there; And both Jesus was called, and his disciples, to the marriage.</i>” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Marriage? What’s that?... A marriage!” floated whirling through Alyosha’s mind. “There is happiness for her, too.... She has gone to the feast.... No, she has not taken the knife.... That was only a tragic phrase.... Well ... tragic phrases should be forgiven, they must be. Tragic phrases comfort the heart.... Without them, sorrow would be too heavy for men to bear. Rakitin has gone off to the back alley. As long as Rakitin broods over his wrongs, he will always go off to the back alley.... But the high road ... The road is wide and straight and bright as crystal, and the sun is at the end of it.... Ah!... What’s being read?”... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine</i>” ... Alyosha heard. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Ah, yes, I was missing that, and I didn’t want to miss it, I love that passage: it’s Cana of Galilee, the first miracle.... Ah, that miracle! Ah, that sweet miracle! It was not men’s grief, but their joy Christ visited, He worked His first miracle to help men’s gladness.... ‘He who loves men loves their gladness, too’ ... He was always repeating that, it was one of his leading ideas.... ‘There’s no living without joy,’ Mitya says.... Yes, Mitya.... ‘Everything that is true and good is always full of forgiveness,’ he used to say that, too” ... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what has it to do with thee or me? Mine hour is not yet come.</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it</i>” ... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do it.... Gladness, the gladness of some poor, very poor, people.... Of course they were poor, since they hadn’t wine enough even at a wedding.... The historians write that, in those days, the people living about the Lake of Gennesaret were the poorest that can possibly be imagined ... and another great heart, that other great being, His Mother, knew that He had come not only to make His great terrible sacrifice. She knew that His heart was open even to the simple, artless merrymaking of some obscure and unlearned people, who had warmly bidden Him to their poor wedding. ‘Mine hour is not yet come,’ He said, with a soft smile (He must have smiled gently to her). And, indeed, was it to make wine abundant at poor weddings He had come down to earth? And yet He went and did as she asked Him.... Ah, he is reading again”.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim.</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And he saith unto them, Draw out now and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it.</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made wine, and knew not whence it was; (but the servants which drew the water knew;) the governor of the feast called the bridegroom,</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“<i>And saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, that which is worse; but thou hast kept the good wine until now.</i>” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But what’s this, what’s this? Why is the room growing wider?... Ah, yes ... It’s the marriage, the wedding ... yes, of course. Here are the guests, here are the young couple sitting, and the merry crowd and ... Where is the wise governor of the feast? But who is this? Who? Again the walls are receding.... Who is getting up there from the great table? What!... He here, too? But he’s in the coffin ... but he’s here, too. He has stood up, he sees me, he is coming here.... God!”... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yes, he came up to him, to him, he, the little, thin old man, with tiny wrinkles on his face, joyful and laughing softly. There was no coffin now, and he was in the same dress as he had worn yesterday sitting with them, when the visitors had gathered about him. His face was uncovered, his eyes were shining. How was this, then? He, too, had been called to the feast. He, too, at the marriage of Cana in Galilee.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Yes, my dear, I am called, too, called and bidden,” he heard a soft voice saying over him. “Why have you hidden yourself here, out of sight? You come and join us too.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It was his voice, the voice of Father Zossima. And it must be he, since he called him! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder raised Alyosha by the hand and he rose from his knees. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“We are rejoicing,” the little, thin old man went on. “We are drinking the new wine, the wine of new, great gladness; do you see how many guests? Here are the bride and bridegroom, here is the wise governor of the feast, he is tasting the new wine. Why do you wonder at me? I gave an onion to a beggar, so I, too, am here. And many here have given only an onion each—only one little onion.... What are all our deeds? And you, my gentle one, you, my kind boy, you too have known how to give a famished woman an onion to‐day. Begin your work, dear one, begin it, gentle one!... Do you see our Sun, do you see Him?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I am afraid ... I dare not look,” whispered Alyosha. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Do not fear Him. He is terrible in His greatness, awful in His sublimity, but infinitely merciful. He has made Himself like unto us from love and rejoices with us. He is changing the water into wine that the gladness of the guests may not be cut short. He is expecting new guests, He is calling new ones unceasingly for ever and ever.... There they are bringing new wine. Do you see they are bringing the vessels....” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Something glowed in Alyosha’s heart, something filled it till it ached, tears of rapture rose from his soul.... He stretched out his hands, uttered a cry and waked up. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Again the coffin, the open window, and the soft, solemn, distinct reading of the Gospel. But Alyosha did not listen to the reading. It was strange, he had fallen asleep on his knees, but now he was on his feet, and suddenly, as though thrown forward, with three firm rapid steps he went right up to the coffin. His shoulder brushed against Father Païssy without his noticing it. Father Païssy raised his eyes for an instant from his book, but looked away again at once, seeing that something strange was happening to the boy. Alyosha gazed for half a minute at the coffin, at the covered, motionless dead man that lay in the coffin, with the ikon on his breast and the peaked cap with the octangular cross, on his head. He had only just been hearing his voice, and that voice was still ringing in his ears. He was listening, still expecting other words, but suddenly he turned sharply and went out of the cell. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He did not stop on the steps either, but went quickly down; his soul, overflowing with rapture, yearned for freedom, space, openness. The vault of heaven, full of soft, shining stars, stretched vast and fathomless above him. The Milky Way ran in two pale streams from the zenith to the horizon. The fresh, motionless, still night enfolded the earth. The white towers and golden domes of the cathedral gleamed out against the sapphire sky. The gorgeous autumn flowers, in the beds round the house, were slumbering till morning. The silence of earth seemed to melt into the silence of the heavens. The mystery of earth was one with the mystery of the stars.... </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha stood, gazed, and suddenly threw himself down on the earth. He did not know why he embraced it. He could not have told why he longed so irresistibly to kiss it, to kiss it all. But he kissed it weeping, sobbing and watering it with his tears, and vowed passionately to love it, to love it for ever and ever. “Water the earth with the tears of your joy and love those tears,” echoed in his soul. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">What was he weeping over? </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Oh! in his rapture he was weeping even over those stars, which were shining to him from the abyss of space, and “he was not ashamed of that ecstasy.” There seemed to be threads from all those innumerable worlds of God, linking his soul to them, and it was trembling all over “in contact with other worlds.” He longed to forgive every one and for everything, and to beg forgiveness. Oh, not for himself, but for all men, for all and for everything. “And others are praying for me too,” echoed again in his soul. But with every instant he felt clearly and, as it were, tangibly, that something firm and unshakable as that vault of heaven had entered into his soul. It was as though some idea had seized the sovereignty of his mind—and it was for all his life and for ever and ever. He had fallen on the earth a weak boy, but he rose up a resolute champion, and he knew and felt it suddenly at the very moment of his ecstasy. And never, never, all his life long, could Alyosha forget that minute. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Some one visited my soul in that hour,” he used to say afterwards, with implicit faith in his words. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Within three days he left the monastery in accordance with the words of his elder, who had bidden him “sojourn in the world.” </span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children: (XId) The Duel - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part I2022-11-12T08:36:59Z2022-11-12T08:36:59Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/733-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xid-the-duel-recollections-and-exhortations-of-elder-zossima-part-i.htmlDostoievski et al.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/zosima.jpg" alt="zosima" style="float: right;" width="250" height="334" />Previously in the Dostoevsky for Parents and Children series:</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Varenka's Memoirs</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>Poor Folk</i>, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">An Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>Stories of a Man of Experience</i>, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Nellie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Insulted and Injured</i>, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Marie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Idiot</i>, 1868 [suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya in correspondence pertaining to the 1897 anthology, DPC X])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">At The Select Boarding School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The Merchant's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The Peasant Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Foma Danilov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">From the novel <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i> (1881, [1883, 1897, DPC XI] - enlarged selection)</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> a) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Alyosha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> b) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Obedience. Elder Zossima</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> c) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Peasant Women Who Have Faith</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present <i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i> (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and as the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> our brief introduction to the original <i>Dostoevsky for Children</i> anthologies, and to this English online version.}</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">--//--</span></p>
<p style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">If such a thing as "the ideology of Dostoevsky" existed (something perhaps doubtful, but assuming it existed), it would seem important not to confuse it with the <i>practical</i> spiritual value<i> </i>of our author's writings. What is the practical value of Elder Zossima's deathbed memories and teachings, that we begin reading today, as if from the reverent pen of Alyosha Karamazov, the foremost Dostoevskian character?</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">What, in particular, is the practical value of Zossima's most treasured memory - that of his long-since departed elder brother, Markel? The innermost nested remembrance among Zossima's recollections is his most precious. Markel is to the Elder what <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Mujik Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> is <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/712-bicentenar-dostoievski-i-nu-dezndjdui.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">to Dostoevsky</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">. His defining first encounter with completely Christ-filled love. With motherly co-suffering "for all", akin to that of the Mother of God.(*) With the joyful mourning hidden in the Paschal Cross. Zossima's (and perhaps everyone's) exit ticket from the universal House of the Dead that is our fallen nature. Yet, is it real? Is the ticket valid?</span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The danger, here, seems to idolize fictional imagination. So exquisite, so quotable and memorable are the fictional Markel's story and teaching, that they seem real. And the fictional young Zossima's first victories based on them – or, rather, Markel's posthumous victories, in his younger brother Zinovy (the future Zossima), against the proud 'school' of dueling, hypocrisy and crime - seem real-life lessons in the practical discernment of "active love". Indeed, they are deep early rumblings announcing the Karamazovian storm, but also, or even more, poetical reverberations of <i>The Idiot</i> and <i>Crime and Punishment</i>, with their first principles spelled out in unforgettable words, bound to illuminate all of Dostoevsky's work, and far beyond.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The danger (for Dostoevsky's friends and foes alike), however, seems to be spellbound by Dostoevsky's art and imagination alone. By Markel, Markel and Zossima, or Markel, Zossima and Alyosha, etc., <i>alone</i>. To read Dostoevsky outside the living experience of those in obedience to Holy Tradition and its Golden Chain of Spiritual Elders, that he himself is pointing at, in his last stroke of genius, as to the ultimate framework.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">What is spiritually viable, then, is not Dostoevsky taken in isolation, but Dostoevsky in dialogue with real life. In other words, Markel and his <i>fictional</i> descent are only Dostoevsky's <i>literary</i> voice. It can, and does come to life, only at the practical School of the Mother of God,(**) where it intersects the world of true life-shaping obedience to Holy Tradition and Holy Elders. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Practical wisdom needs to be tested in the real-life context of unbroken tradition. It seems to follow, then, that the practical-oriented reader need not be detained long by scholarly disputes - fascinating as they may be - over the extent to which Dostoevsky himself "proved" the spiritual viability of Markel. Literary genius and scholarship are simply not enough to practically prove and calibrate such things. It takes a living spiritual tradition. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">This is why it seems to us important that Met. Anthony and his close followers have successfully exemplified the who, when, and how of Dostoevskian co-suffering love, for clergy and laypeople alike, indeed for the whole world, with apostolic calling and unabated faith in the spiritual mission of Holy Russia. That we have a true and tested bearer of the fragrance of Orthodoxy, like Prof. Ivan Andreyev, to teach us how to use Zossima's exhortations and the mystery of communal guilt to find salvific tears of joyful sorrow in the Cross of Modern Times. That we can also find a real peasant-<i>and</i>-hesychast understanding of blessed obedience, like that of St. Silouan, with whom Dostoevsky's practical posterity could cry: "Keep your mind in the hell of fallen human nature - and rejoice always, for Christ is Risen and Adam is Redeemed."</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Notes: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(*) A sine-qua-non of her perfect communion with the co-suffering Christ, i.e., of her <a href="https://classicalchristianity.com/2013/11/29/on-deification-by-grace/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">deification by Grace</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">; cf. also St. Isaac the Syrian, quoted <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">. But the explicit clarification of this aspect, it seems to us, came hand in hand with the gradual reemergence of Orthodox theology out of its <a href="https://archive.ph/y53oL#selection-631.157-631.345">"<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Western captivity</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">". A long process in which, as we see it, Dostoevsky himself played a role, followed by Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky and the generation of his spiritual sons. A multifaceted process, also related to the recovery of the <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20051214074728/http:/www.pelagia.org/htm/b16.en.saint_gregory_palamas_as_a_hagiorite.09.htm" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Palamite</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20051218073537/http://www.pelagia.org/htm/b16.en.saint_gregory_palamas_as_a_hagiorite.00.htm" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">vocabulary,</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> and to the fascinating story of <a href="https://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0115/ch8.xhtml" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">the restoration of Russia’s historical icons, such as the Vladimir Mother of God</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">. In the meantime, popular piety beautifully captured the practical essence of the matter, as in Ivan Karamazov’s<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> story of the<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Journey of the Mother of God Through Hell”, discussed <a href="https://www.academia.edu/36862114/The_Journey_of_the_Mother_of_God_Through_Hell_Dostoevsky_The_Brothers_Karamazov"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> by Pieter Dirk Dekker. But Ivan’s speculative mind is obviously split, and cannot find rest or practical guidance in this kind of simple wisdom.<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> His dominant speculative side suffered from the Western captivity, as perhaps did that of Dostoevsky's younger friend Vladimir Soloviev, our author's inspiration for Ivan, according to Anna Dostoevskaya. See also the introductory remarks to <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">the previous installment</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> in this series.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">(**) <span style="font-family: times new roman, times;">As we have <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">previously</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"> called the key aspect of both monastic hesychasm and popular piety that, we feel, is closest to the heart and work of our author. The best introductory discussion of the Orthodox veneration of the Mother of God is probably by <a href="https://ortodoks.dk/ortodoks-tro-og-praksis/de-hellige/the-orthodox-veneration-of-mary-the-birthgiver-of-god" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">St. John Maximovitch</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;">. </span><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"></span><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;">However, at this time we are not aware of any comprehensive discussion of the role of the Mother of God in Dostoevsky <i>from a consistently </i><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://archive.ph/POb1I">hesychast perspective</a></span></i></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"><a href="https://archive.ph/POb1I"> </a>(one that would, presumably, include a disambiguation of the naturalist, Western/Raphaelite elements of <span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=pseudomorphosis+site:www.bulgarian-orthodox-church.org">pseudomorphosis</a></span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"><a href="https://archive.ph/GTSCr#The_%22Western_Captivity%22"> </a>felt in much of the Church piety and art of Dostoevsky’s age, and of their relative impact on our author.)</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'; background: white;"><a href="https://archive.ph/GTSCr#The_%22Western_Captivity%22"> </a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">***</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">F.M. Dostoevsky </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The Duel - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part I</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(From <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, 1881, book VI. Translation by Constance Garnett. Russian original </span></b><a href="https://archive.ph/UYs2F#selection-26789.0-26789.12" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></b></a><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">.)</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">When with an anxious and aching heart Alyosha went into his elder’s cell, he stood still almost astonished. Instead of a sick man at his last gasp, perhaps unconscious, as he had feared to find him, he saw him sitting up in his chair and, though weak and exhausted, his face was bright and cheerful, he was surrounded by visitors and engaged in a quiet and joyful conversation. But he had only got up from his bed a quarter of an hour before Alyosha’s arrival; his visitors had gathered together in his cell earlier, waiting for him to wake, having received a most confident assurance from Father Païssy that “the teacher would get up, and as he had himself promised in the morning, converse once more with those dear to his heart.” This promise and indeed every word of the dying elder Father Païssy put implicit trust in. If he had seen him unconscious, if he had seen him breathe his last, and yet had his promise that he would rise up and say good‐by to him, he would not have believed perhaps even in death, but would still have expected the dead man to recover and fulfill his promise. In the morning as he lay down to sleep, Father Zossima had told him positively: “I shall not die without the delight of another conversation with you, beloved of my heart. I shall look once more on your dear face and pour out my heart to you once again.” The monks, who had gathered for this probably last conversation with Father Zossima, had all been his devoted friends for many years. There were four of them: Father Iosif and Father Païssy, Father Mihaïl, the warden of the hermitage, a man not very old and far from being learned. He was of humble origin, of strong will and steadfast faith, of austere appearance, but of deep tenderness, though he obviously concealed it as though he were almost ashamed of it. The fourth, Father Anfim, was a very old and humble little monk of the poorest peasant class. He was almost illiterate, and very quiet, scarcely speaking to any one. He was the humblest of the humble, and looked as though he had been frightened by something great and awful beyond the scope of his intelligence. Father Zossima had a great affection for this timorous man, and always treated him with marked respect, though perhaps there was no one he had known to whom he had said less, in spite of the fact that he had spent years wandering about holy Russia with him. That was very long ago, forty years before, when Father Zossima first began his life as a monk in a poor and little monastery at Kostroma, and when, shortly after, he had accompanied Father Anfim on his pilgrimage to collect alms for their poor monastery. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The whole party were in the bedroom which, as we mentioned before, was very small, so that there was scarcely room for the four of them (in addition to Porfiry, the novice, who stood) to sit round Father Zossima on chairs brought from the sitting‐room. It was already beginning to get dark, the room was lighted up by the lamps and the candles before the ikons. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Seeing Alyosha standing embarrassed in the doorway, Father Zossima smiled at him joyfully and held out his hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Welcome, my quiet one, welcome, my dear, here you are too. I knew you would come.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Alyosha went up to him, bowed down before him to the ground and wept. Something surged up from his heart, his soul was quivering, he wanted to sob. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Come, don’t weep over me yet,” Father Zossima smiled, laying his right hand on his head. “You see I am sitting up talking; maybe I shall live another twenty years yet, as that dear good woman from Vishegorye, with her little Lizaveta in her arms, wished me yesterday. God bless the mother and the little girl Lizaveta,” he crossed himself. “Porfiry, did you take her offering where I told you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He meant the sixty copecks brought him the day before by the good‐humored woman to be given “to some one poorer than me.” Such offerings, always of money gained by personal toil, are made by way of penance voluntarily undertaken. The elder had sent Porfiry the evening before to a widow, whose house had been burnt down lately, and who after the fire had gone with her children begging alms. Porfiry hastened to reply that he had given the money, as he had been instructed, “from an unknown benefactress.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Get up, my dear boy,” the elder went on to Alyosha. “Let me look at you. Have you been home and seen your brother?” It seemed strange to Alyosha that he asked so confidently and precisely, about one of his brothers only—but which one? Then perhaps he had sent him out both yesterday and to‐day for the sake of that brother. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“I have seen one of my brothers,” answered Alyosha. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“I mean the elder one, to whom I bowed down.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“I only saw him yesterday and could not find him to‐day,” said Alyosha. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Make haste to find him, go again to‐morrow and make haste, leave everything and make haste. Perhaps you may still have time to prevent something terrible. I bowed down yesterday to the great suffering in store for him.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He was suddenly silent and seemed to be pondering. The words were strange. Father Iosif, who had witnessed the scene yesterday, exchanged glances with Father Païssy. Alyosha could not resist asking: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Father and teacher,” he began with extreme emotion, “your words are too obscure.... What is this suffering in store for him?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Don’t inquire. I seemed to see something terrible yesterday ... as though his whole future were expressed in his eyes. A look came into his eyes—so that I was instantly horror‐stricken at what that man is preparing for himself. Once or twice in my life I’ve seen such a look in a man’s face ... reflecting as it were his future fate, and that fate, alas, came to pass. I sent you to him, Alexey, for I thought your brotherly face would help him. But everything and all our fates are from the Lord. ‘Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.’ Remember that. You, Alexey, I’ve many times silently blessed for your face, know that,” added the elder with a gentle smile. “This is what I think of you, you will go forth from these walls, but will live like a monk in the world. You will have many enemies, but even your foes will love you. Life will bring you many misfortunes, but you will find your happiness in them, and will bless life and will make others bless it—which is what matters most. Well, that is your character. Fathers and teachers,” he addressed his friends with a tender smile, “I have never till to‐day told even him why the face of this youth is so dear to me. Now I will tell you. His face has been as it were a remembrance and a prophecy for me. At the dawn of my life when I was a child I had an elder brother who died before my eyes at seventeen. And later on in the course of my life I gradually became convinced that that brother had been for a guidance and a sign from on high for me. For had he not come into my life, I should never perhaps, so I fancy at least, have become a monk and entered on this precious path. He appeared first to me in my childhood, and here, at the end of my pilgrimage, he seems to have come to me over again. It is marvelous, fathers and teachers, that Alexey, who has some, though not a great, resemblance in face, seems to me so like him spiritually, that many times I have taken him for that young man, my brother, mysteriously come back to me at the end of my pilgrimage, as a reminder and an inspiration. So that I positively wondered at so strange a dream in myself. Do you hear this, Porfiry?” he turned to the novice who waited on him. “Many times I’ve seen in your face as it were a look of mortification that I love Alexey more than you. Now you know why that was so, but I love you too, know that, and many times I grieved at your mortification. I should like to tell you, dear friends, of that youth, my brother, for there has been no presence in my life more precious, more significant and touching. My heart is full of tenderness, and I look at my whole life at this moment as though living through it again.” </span></p>
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<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Here I must observe that this last conversation of Father Zossima with the friends who visited him on the last day of his life has been partly preserved in writing. Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov wrote it down from memory, some time after his elder’s death. But whether this was only the conversation that took place then, or whether he added to it his notes of parts of former conversations with his teacher, I cannot determine. In his account, Father Zossima’s talk goes on without interruption, as though he told his life to his friends in the form of a story, though there is no doubt, from other accounts of it, that the conversation that evening was general. Though the guests did not interrupt Father Zossima much, yet they too talked, perhaps even told something themselves. Besides, Father Zossima could not have carried on an uninterrupted narrative, for he was sometimes gasping for breath, his voice failed him, and he even lay down to rest on his bed, though he did not fall asleep and his visitors did not leave their seats. Once or twice the conversation was interrupted by Father Païssy’s reading the Gospel. It is worthy of note, too, that no one of them supposed that he would die that night, for on that evening of his life after his deep sleep in the day he seemed suddenly to have found new strength, which kept him up through this long conversation. It was like a last effort of love which gave him marvelous energy; only for a little time, however, for his life was cut short immediately.... But of that later. I will only add now that I have preferred to confine myself to the account given by Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov. It will be shorter and not so fatiguing, though of course, as I must repeat, Alyosha took a great deal from previous conversations and added them to it. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Notes of the Life of the deceased Priest and Monk, the Elder Zossima, taken from his own words by Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(a)</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> <i>Father Zossima’s Brother</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Beloved fathers and teachers, I was born in a distant province in the north, in the town of V. My father was a gentleman by birth, but of no great consequence or position. He died when I was only two years old, and I don’t remember him at all. He left my mother a small house built of wood, and a fortune, not large, but sufficient to keep her and her children in comfort. There were two of us, my elder brother Markel and I. He was eight years older than I was, of hasty irritable temperament, but kind‐hearted and never ironical. He was remarkably silent, especially at home with me, his mother, and the servants. He did well at school, but did not get on with his schoolfellows, though he never quarreled, at least so my mother has told me. Six months before his death, when he was seventeen, he made friends with a political exile who had been banished from Moscow to our town for freethinking, and led a solitary existence there. He was a good scholar who had gained distinction in philosophy in the university. Something made him take a fancy to Markel, and he used to ask him to see him. The young man would spend whole evenings with him during that winter, till the exile was summoned to Petersburg to take up his post again at his own request, as he had powerful friends. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was the beginning of Lent, and Markel would not fast, he was rude and laughed at it. “That’s all silly twaddle, and there is no God,” he said, horrifying my mother, the servants, and me too. For though I was only nine, I too was aghast at hearing such words. We had four servants, all serfs. I remember my mother selling one of the four, the cook Afimya, who was lame and elderly, for sixty paper roubles, and hiring a free servant to take her place. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">In the sixth week in Lent, my brother, who was never strong and had a tendency to consumption, was taken ill. He was tall but thin and delicate‐ looking, and of very pleasing countenance. I suppose he caught cold, anyway the doctor, who came, soon whispered to my mother that it was galloping consumption, that he would not live through the spring. My mother began weeping, and, careful not to alarm my brother, she entreated him to go to church, to confess and take the sacrament, as he was still able to move about. This made him angry, and he said something profane about the church. He grew thoughtful, however; he guessed at once that he was seriously ill, and that that was why his mother was begging him to confess and take the sacrament. He had been aware, indeed, for a long time past, that he was far from well, and had a year before coolly observed at dinner to our mother and me, “My life won’t be long among you, I may not live another year,” which seemed now like a prophecy. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Three days passed and Holy Week had come. And on Tuesday morning my brother began going to church. “I am doing this simply for your sake, mother, to please and comfort you,” he said. My mother wept with joy and grief. “His end must be near,” she thought, “if there’s such a change in him.” But he was not able to go to church long, he took to his bed, so he had to confess and take the sacrament at home. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was a late Easter, and the days were bright, fine, and full of fragrance. I remember he used to cough all night and sleep badly, but in the morning he dressed and tried to sit up in an arm‐chair. That’s how I remember him sitting, sweet and gentle, smiling, his face bright and joyous, in spite of his illness. A marvelous change passed over him, his spirit seemed transformed. The old nurse would come in and say, “Let me light the lamp before the holy image, my dear.” And once he would not have allowed it and would have blown it out. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Light it, light it, dear, I was a wretch to have prevented you doing it. You are praying when you light the lamp, and I am praying when I rejoice seeing you. So we are praying to the same God.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Those words seemed strange to us, and mother would go to her room and weep, but when she went in to him she wiped her eyes and looked cheerful. “Mother, don’t weep, darling,” he would say, “I’ve long to live yet, long to rejoice with you, and life is glad and joyful.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Ah, dear boy, how can you talk of joy when you lie feverish at night, coughing as though you would tear yourself to pieces.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Don’t cry, mother,” he would answer, “life is paradise, and we are all in paradise, but we won’t see it, if we would, we should have heaven on earth the next day.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Every one wondered at his words, he spoke so strangely and positively; we were all touched and wept. Friends came to see us. “Dear ones,” he would say to them, “what have I done that you should love me so, how can you love any one like me, and how was it I did not know, I did not appreciate it before?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">When the servants came in to him he would say continually, “Dear, kind people, why are you doing so much for me, do I deserve to be waited on? If it were God’s will for me to live, I would wait on you, for all men should wait on one another.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Mother shook her head as she listened. “My darling, it’s your illness makes you talk like that.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Mother, darling,” he would say, “there must be servants and masters, but if so I will be the servant of my servants, the same as they are to me. And another thing, mother, every one of us has sinned against all men, and I more than any.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Mother positively smiled at that, smiled through her tears. “Why, how could you have sinned against all men, more than all? Robbers and murderers have done that, but what sin have you committed yet, that you hold yourself more guilty than all?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Mother, little heart of mine,” he said (he had begun using such strange caressing words at that time), “little heart of mine, my joy, believe me, every one is really responsible to all men for all men and for everything. I don’t know how to explain it to you, but I feel it is so, painfully even. And how is it we went on then living, getting angry and not knowing?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">So he would get up every day, more and more sweet and joyous and full of love. When the doctor, an old German called Eisenschmidt, came: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Well, doctor, have I another day in this world?” he would ask, joking. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You’ll live many days yet,” the doctor would answer, “and months and years too.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Months and years!” he would exclaim. “Why reckon the days? One day is enough for a man to know all happiness. My dear ones, why do we quarrel, try to outshine each other and keep grudges against each other? Let’s go straight into the garden, walk and play there, love, appreciate, and kiss each other, and glorify life.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Your son cannot last long,” the doctor told my mother, as she accompanied him to the door. “The disease is affecting his brain.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The windows of his room looked out into the garden, and our garden was a shady one, with old trees in it which were coming into bud. The first birds of spring were flitting in the branches, chirruping and singing at the windows. And looking at them and admiring them, he began suddenly begging their forgiveness too: “Birds of heaven, happy birds, forgive me, for I have sinned against you too.” None of us could understand that at the time, but he shed tears of joy. “Yes,” he said, “there was such a glory of God all about me: birds, trees, meadows, sky; only I lived in shame and dishonored it all and did not notice the beauty and glory.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You take too many sins on yourself,” mother used to say, weeping. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Mother, darling, it’s for joy, not for grief I am crying. Though I can’t explain it to you, I like to humble myself before them, for I don’t know how to love them enough. If I have sinned against every one, yet all forgive me, too, and that’s heaven. Am I not in heaven now?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And there was a great deal more I don’t remember. I remember I went once into his room when there was no one else there. It was a bright evening, the sun was setting, and the whole room was lighted up. He beckoned me, and I went up to him. He put his hands on my shoulders and looked into my face tenderly, lovingly; he said nothing for a minute, only looked at me like that. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Well,” he said, “run and play now, enjoy life for me too.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I went out then and ran to play. And many times in my life afterwards I remembered even with tears how he told me to enjoy life for him too. There were many other marvelous and beautiful sayings of his, though we did not understand them at the time. He died the third week after Easter. He was fully conscious though he could not talk; up to his last hour he did not change. He looked happy, his eyes beamed and sought us, he smiled at us, beckoned us. There was a great deal of talk even in the town about his death. I was impressed by all this at the time, but not too much so, though I cried a good deal at his funeral. I was young then, a child, but a lasting impression, a hidden feeling of it all, remained in my heart, ready to rise up and respond when the time came. So indeed it happened. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(b) Of the Holy Scriptures in the Life of Father Zossima</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I was left alone with my mother. Her friends began advising her to send me to Petersburg as other parents did. “You have only one son now,” they said, “and have a fair income, and you will be depriving him perhaps of a brilliant career if you keep him here.” They suggested I should be sent to Petersburg to the Cadet Corps, that I might afterwards enter the Imperial Guard. My mother hesitated for a long time, it was awful to part with her only child, but she made up her mind to it at last, though not without many tears, believing she was acting for my happiness. She brought me to Petersburg and put me into the Cadet Corps, and I never saw her again. For she too died three years afterwards. She spent those three years mourning and grieving for both of us. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">From the house of my childhood I have brought nothing but precious memories, for there are no memories more precious than those of early childhood in one’s first home. And that is almost always so if there is any love and harmony in the family at all. Indeed, precious memories may remain even of a bad home, if only the heart knows how to find what is precious. With my memories of home I count, too, my memories of the Bible, which, child as I was, I was very eager to read at home. I had a book of Scripture history then with excellent pictures, called <i>A Hundred and Four Stories from the Old and New Testament</i>, and I learned to read from it. I have it lying on my shelf now, I keep it as a precious relic of the past. But even before I learned to read, I remember first being moved to devotional feeling at eight years old. My mother took me alone to mass (I don’t remember where my brother was at the time) on the Monday before Easter. It was a fine day, and I remember to‐day, as though I saw it now, how the incense rose from the censer and softly floated upwards and, overhead in the cupola, mingled in rising waves with the sunlight that streamed in at the little window. I was stirred by the sight, and for the first time in my life I consciously received the seed of God’s word in my heart. A youth came out into the middle of the church carrying a big book, so large that at the time I fancied he could scarcely carry it. He laid it on the reading desk, opened it, and began reading, and suddenly for the first time I understood something read in the church of God. In the land of Uz, there lived a man, righteous and God‐fearing, and he had great wealth, so many camels, so many sheep and asses, and his children feasted, and he loved them very much and prayed for them. “It may be that my sons have sinned in their feasting.” Now the devil came before the Lord together with the sons of God, and said to the Lord that he had gone up and down the earth and under the earth. “And hast thou considered my servant Job?” God asked of him. And God boasted to the devil, pointing to his great and holy servant. And the devil laughed at God’s words. “Give him over to me and Thou wilt see that Thy servant will murmur against Thee and curse Thy name.” And God gave up the just man He loved so, to the devil. And the devil smote his children and his cattle and scattered his wealth, all of a sudden like a thunderbolt from heaven. And Job rent his mantle and fell down upon the ground and cried aloud, “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return into the earth; the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord for ever and ever.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Fathers and teachers, forgive my tears now, for all my childhood rises up again before me, and I breathe now as I breathed then, with the breast of a little child of eight, and I feel as I did then, awe and wonder and gladness. The camels at that time caught my imagination, and Satan, who talked like that with God, and God who gave His servant up to destruction, and His servant crying out: “Blessed be Thy name although Thou dost punish me,” and then the soft and sweet singing in the church: “Let my prayer rise up before Thee,” and again incense from the priest’s censer and the kneeling and the prayer. Ever since then—only yesterday I took it up—I’ve never been able to read that sacred tale without tears. And how much that is great, mysterious and unfathomable there is in it! Afterwards I heard the words of mockery and blame, proud words, “How could God give up the most loved of His saints for the diversion of the devil, take from him his children, smite him with sore boils so that he cleansed the corruption from his sores with a pot‐sherd—and for no object except to boast to the devil! ‘See what My saint can suffer for My sake.’ ” But the greatness of it lies just in the fact that it is a mystery—that the passing earthly show and the eternal verity are brought together in it. In the face of the earthly truth, the eternal truth is accomplished. The Creator, just as on the first days of creation He ended each day with praise: “That is good that I have created,” looks upon Job and again praises His creation. And Job, praising the Lord, serves not only Him but all His creation for generations and generations, and for ever and ever, since for that he was ordained. Good heavens, what a book it is, and what lessons there are in it! What a book the Bible is, what a miracle, what strength is given with it to man! It is like a mold cast of the world and man and human nature, everything is there, and a law for everything for all the ages. And what mysteries are solved and revealed! God raises Job again, gives him wealth again. Many years pass by, and he has other children and loves them. But how could he love those new ones when those first children are no more, when he has lost them? Remembering them, how could he be fully happy with those new ones, however dear the new ones might be? But he could, he could. It’s the great mystery of human life that old grief passes gradually into quiet, tender joy. The mild serenity of age takes the place of the riotous blood of youth. I bless the rising sun each day, and, as before, my hearts sings to meet it, but now I love even more its setting, its long slanting rays and the soft, tender, gentle memories that come with them, the dear images from the whole of my long, happy life—and over all the Divine Truth, softening, reconciling, forgiving! My life is ending, I know that well, but every day that is left me I feel how my earthly life is in touch with a new infinite, unknown, that approaching life, the nearness of which sets my soul quivering with rapture, my mind glowing and my heart weeping with joy. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Friends and teachers, I have heard more than once, and of late one may hear it more often, that the priests, and above all the village priests, are complaining on all sides of their miserable income and their humiliating lot. They plainly state, even in print—I’ve read it myself—that they are unable to teach the Scriptures to the people because of the smallness of their means, and if Lutherans and heretics come and lead the flock astray, they let them lead them astray because they have so little to live upon. May the Lord increase the sustenance that is so precious to them, for their complaint is just, too. But of a truth I say, if any one is to blame in the matter, half the fault is ours. For he may be short of time, he may say truly that he is overwhelmed all the while with work and services, but still it’s not all the time, even he has an hour a week to remember God. And he does not work the whole year round. Let him gather round him once a week, some hour in the evening, if only the children at first—the fathers will hear of it and they too will begin to come. There’s no need to build halls for this, let him take them into his own cottage. They won’t spoil his cottage, they would only be there one hour. Let him open that book and begin reading it without grand words or superciliousness, without condescension to them, but gently and kindly, being glad that he is reading to them and that they are listening with attention, loving the words himself, only stopping from time to time to explain words that are not understood by the peasants. Don’t be anxious, they will understand everything, the orthodox heart will understand all! Let him read them about Abraham and Sarah, about Isaac and Rebecca, of how Jacob went to Laban and wrestled with the Lord in his dream and said, “This place is holy”—and he will impress the devout mind of the peasant. Let him read, especially to the children, how the brothers sold Joseph, the tender boy, the dreamer and prophet, into bondage, and told their father that a wild beast had devoured him, and showed him his blood‐ stained clothes. Let him read them how the brothers afterwards journeyed into Egypt for corn, and Joseph, already a great ruler, unrecognized by them, tormented them, accused them, kept his brother Benjamin, and all through love: “I love you, and loving you I torment you.” For he remembered all his life how they had sold him to the merchants in the burning desert by the well, and how, wringing his hands, he had wept and besought his brothers not to sell him as a slave in a strange land. And how, seeing them again after many years, he loved them beyond measure, but he harassed and tormented them in love. He left them at last not able to bear the suffering of his heart, flung himself on his bed and wept. Then, wiping his tears away, he went out to them joyful and told them, “Brothers, I am your brother Joseph!” Let him read them further how happy old Jacob was on learning that his darling boy was still alive, and how he went to Egypt leaving his own country, and died in a foreign land, bequeathing his great prophecy that had lain mysteriously hidden in his meek and timid heart all his life, that from his offspring, from Judah, will come the great hope of the world, the Messiah and Saviour. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Fathers and teachers, forgive me and don’t be angry, that like a little child I’ve been babbling of what you know long ago, and can teach me a hundred times more skillfully. I only speak from rapture, and forgive my tears, for I love the Bible. Let him too weep, the priest of God, and be sure that the hearts of his listeners will throb in response. Only a little tiny seed is needed—drop it into the heart of the peasant and it won’t die, it will live in his soul all his life, it will be hidden in the midst of his darkness and sin, like a bright spot, like a great reminder. And there’s no need of much teaching or explanation, he will understand it all simply. Do you suppose that the peasants don’t understand? Try reading them the touching story of the fair Esther and the haughty Vashti; or the miraculous story of Jonah in the whale. Don’t forget either the parables of Our Lord, choose especially from the Gospel of St. Luke (that is what I did), and then from the Acts of the Apostles the conversion of St. Paul (that you mustn’t leave out on any account), and from the <i>Lives of the Saints</i>, for instance, the life of Alexey, the man of God and, greatest of all, the happy martyr and the seer of God, Mary of Egypt—and you will penetrate their hearts with these simple tales. Give one hour a week to it in spite of your poverty, only one little hour. And you will see for yourselves that our people is gracious and grateful, and will repay you a hundred‐fold. Mindful of the kindness of their priest and the moving words they have heard from him, they will of their own accord help him in his fields and in his house, and will treat him with more respect than before—so that it will even increase his worldly well‐being too. The thing is so simple that sometimes one is even afraid to put it into words, for fear of being laughed at, and yet how true it is! One who does not believe in God will not believe in God’s people. He who believes in God’s people will see His Holiness too, even though he had not believed in it till then. Only the people and their future spiritual power will convert our atheists, who have torn themselves away from their native soil. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And what is the use of Christ’s words, unless we set an example? The people is lost without the Word of God, for its soul is athirst for the Word and for all that is good. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">In my youth, long ago, nearly forty years ago, I traveled all over Russia with Father Anfim, collecting funds for our monastery, and we stayed one night on the bank of a great navigable river with some fishermen. A good‐ looking peasant lad, about eighteen, joined us; he had to hurry back next morning to pull a merchant’s barge along the bank. I noticed him looking straight before him with clear and tender eyes. It was a bright, warm, still, July night, a cool mist rose from the broad river, we could hear the plash of a fish, the birds were still, all was hushed and beautiful, everything praying to God. Only we two were not sleeping, the lad and I, and we talked of the beauty of this world of God’s and of the great mystery of it. Every blade of grass, every insect, ant, and golden bee, all so marvelously know their path, though they have not intelligence, they bear witness to the mystery of God and continually accomplish it themselves. I saw the dear lad’s heart was moved. He told me that he loved the forest and the forest birds. He was a bird‐catcher, knew the note of each of them, could call each bird. “I know nothing better than to be in the forest,” said he, “though all things are good.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Truly,” I answered him, “all things are good and fair, because all is truth. Look,” said I, “at the horse, that great beast that is so near to man; or the lowly, pensive ox, which feeds him and works for him; look at their faces, what meekness, what devotion to man, who often beats them mercilessly. What gentleness, what confidence and what beauty! It’s touching to know that there’s no sin in them, for all, all except man, is sinless, and Christ has been with them before us.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Why,” asked the boy, “is Christ with them too?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“It cannot but be so,” said I, “since the Word is for all. All creation and all creatures, every leaf is striving to the Word, singing glory to God, weeping to Christ, unconsciously accomplishing this by the mystery of their sinless life. Yonder,” said I, “in the forest wanders the dreadful bear, fierce and menacing, and yet innocent in it.” And I told him how once a bear came to a great saint who had taken refuge in a tiny cell in the wood. And the great saint pitied him, went up to him without fear and gave him a piece of bread. “Go along,” said he, “Christ be with you,” and the savage beast walked away meekly and obediently, doing no harm. And the lad was delighted that the bear had walked away without hurting the saint, and that Christ was with him too. “Ah,” said he, “how good that is, how good and beautiful is all God’s work!” He sat musing softly and sweetly. I saw he understood. And he slept beside me a light and sinless sleep. May God bless youth! And I prayed for him as I went to sleep. Lord, send peace and light to Thy people! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(c) Recollections of Father Zossima’s Youth before he became a Monk. The Duel</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I spent a long time, almost eight years, in the military cadet school at Petersburg, and in the novelty of my surroundings there, many of my childish impressions grew dimmer, though I forgot nothing. I picked up so many new habits and opinions that I was transformed into a cruel, absurd, almost savage creature. A surface polish of courtesy and society manners I did acquire together with the French language. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">But we all, myself included, looked upon the soldiers in our service as cattle. I was perhaps worse than the rest in that respect, for I was so much more impressionable than my companions. By the time we left the school as officers, we were ready to lay down our lives for the honor of the regiment, but no one of us had any knowledge of the real meaning of honor, and if any one had known it, he would have been the first to ridicule it. Drunkenness, debauchery and devilry were what we almost prided ourselves on. I don’t say that we were bad by nature, all these young men were good fellows, but they behaved badly, and I worst of all. What made it worse for me was that I had come into my own money, and so I flung myself into a life of pleasure, and plunged headlong into all the recklessness of youth. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I was fond of reading, yet strange to say, the Bible was the one book I never opened at that time, though I always carried it about with me, and I was never separated from it; in very truth I was keeping that book “for the day and the hour, for the month and the year,” though I knew it not. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">After four years of this life, I chanced to be in the town of K. where our regiment was stationed at the time. We found the people of the town hospitable, rich and fond of entertainments. I met with a cordial reception everywhere, as I was of a lively temperament and was known to be well off, which always goes a long way in the world. And then a circumstance happened which was the beginning of it all. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I formed an attachment to a beautiful and intelligent young girl of noble and lofty character, the daughter of people much respected. They were well‐to‐do people of influence and position. They always gave me a cordial and friendly reception. I fancied that the young lady looked on me with favor and my heart was aflame at such an idea. Later on I saw and fully realized that I perhaps was not so passionately in love with her at all, but only recognized the elevation of her mind and character, which I could not indeed have helped doing. I was prevented, however, from making her an offer at the time by my selfishness, I was loath to part with the allurements of my free and licentious bachelor life in the heyday of my youth, and with my pockets full of money. I did drop some hint as to my feelings however, though I put off taking any decisive step for a time. Then, all of a sudden, we were ordered off for two months to another district. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">On my return two months later, I found the young lady already married to a rich neighboring landowner, a very amiable man, still young though older than I was, connected with the best Petersburg society, which I was not, and of excellent education, which I also was not. I was so overwhelmed at this unexpected circumstance that my mind was positively clouded. The worst of it all was that, as I learned then, the young landowner had been a long while betrothed to her, and I had met him indeed many times in her house, but blinded by my conceit I had noticed nothing. And this particularly mortified me; almost everybody had known all about it, while I knew nothing. I was filled with sudden irrepressible fury. With flushed face I began recalling how often I had been on the point of declaring my love to her, and as she had not attempted to stop me or to warn me, she must, I concluded, have been laughing at me all the time. Later on, of course, I reflected and remembered that she had been very far from laughing at me; on the contrary, she used to turn off any love‐making on my part with a jest and begin talking of other subjects; but at that moment I was incapable of reflecting and was all eagerness for revenge. I am surprised to remember that my wrath and revengeful feelings were extremely repugnant to my own nature, for being of an easy temper, I found it difficult to be angry with any one for long, and so I had to work myself up artificially and became at last revolting and absurd. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I waited for an opportunity and succeeded in insulting my “rival” in the presence of a large company. I insulted him on a perfectly extraneous pretext, jeering at his opinion upon an important public event—it was in the year 1826<a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#fn-5" target="_blank"><sup>[5]</sup></a>—and my jeer was, so people said, clever and effective. Then I forced him to ask for an explanation, and behaved so rudely that he accepted my challenge in spite of the vast inequality between us, as I was younger, a person of no consequence, and of inferior rank. I learned afterwards for a fact that it was from a jealous feeling on his side also that my challenge was accepted; he had been rather jealous of me on his wife’s account before their marriage; he fancied now that if he submitted to be insulted by me and refused to accept my challenge, and if she heard of it, she might begin to despise him and waver in her love for him. I soon found a second in a comrade, an ensign of our regiment. In those days though duels were severely punished, yet dueling was a kind of fashion among the officers—so strong and deeply rooted will a brutal prejudice sometimes be. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was the end of June, and our meeting was to take place at seven o’clock the next day on the outskirts of the town—and then something happened that in very truth was the turning‐point of my life. In the evening, returning home in a savage and brutal humor, I flew into a rage with my orderly Afanasy, and gave him two blows in the face with all my might, so that it was covered with blood. He had not long been in my service and I had struck him before, but never with such ferocious cruelty. And, believe me, though it’s forty years ago, I recall it now with shame and pain. I went to bed and slept for about three hours; when I waked up the day was breaking. I got up—I did not want to sleep any more—I went to the window—opened it, it looked out upon the garden; I saw the sun rising; it was warm and beautiful, the birds were singing. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“What’s the meaning of it?” I thought. “I feel in my heart as it were something vile and shameful. Is it because I am going to shed blood? No,” I thought, “I feel it’s not that. Can it be that I am afraid of death, afraid of being killed? No, that’s not it, that’s not it at all.”... And all at once I knew what it was: it was because I had beaten Afanasy the evening before! It all rose before my mind, it all was as it were repeated over again; he stood before me and I was beating him straight on the face and he was holding his arms stiffly down, his head erect, his eyes fixed upon me as though on parade. He staggered at every blow and did not even dare to raise his hands to protect himself. That is what a man has been brought to, and that was a man beating a fellow creature! What a crime! It was as though a sharp dagger had pierced me right through. I stood as if I were struck dumb, while the sun was shining, the leaves were rejoicing and the birds were trilling the praise of God.... I hid my face in my hands, fell on my bed and broke into a storm of tears. And then I remembered my brother Markel and what he said on his death‐bed to his servants: “My dear ones, why do you wait on me, why do you love me, am I worth your waiting on me?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Yes, am I worth it?” flashed through my mind. “After all what am I worth, that another man, a fellow creature, made in the likeness and image of God, should serve me?” For the first time in my life this question forced itself upon me. He had said, “Mother, my little heart, in truth we are each responsible to all for all, it’s only that men don’t know this. If they knew it, the world would be a paradise at once.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“God, can that too be false?” I thought as I wept. “In truth, perhaps, I am more than all others responsible for all, a greater sinner than all men in the world.” And all at once the whole truth in its full light appeared to me; what was I going to do? I was going to kill a good, clever, noble man, who had done me no wrong, and by depriving his wife of happiness for the rest of her life, I should be torturing and killing her too. I lay thus in my bed with my face in the pillow, heedless how the time was passing. Suddenly my second, the ensign, came in with the pistols to fetch me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Ah,” said he, “it’s a good thing you are up already, it’s time we were off, come along!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I did not know what to do and hurried to and fro undecided; we went out to the carriage, however. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Wait here a minute,” I said to him. “I’ll be back directly, I have forgotten my purse.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And I ran back alone, to Afanasy’s little room. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Afanasy,” I said, “I gave you two blows on the face yesterday, forgive me,” I said. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He started as though he were frightened, and looked at me; and I saw that it was not enough, and on the spot, in my full officer’s uniform, I dropped at his feet and bowed my head to the ground. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Forgive me,” I said. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Then he was completely aghast. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Your honor ... sir, what are you doing? Am I worth it?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And he burst out crying as I had done before, hid this face in his hands, turned to the window and shook all over with his sobs. I flew out to my comrade and jumped into the carriage. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Ready,” I cried. “Have you ever seen a conqueror?” I asked him. “Here is one before you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I was in ecstasy, laughing and talking all the way, I don’t remember what about. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He looked at me. “Well, brother, you are a plucky fellow, you’ll keep up the honor of the uniform, I can see.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">So we reached the place and found them there, waiting us. We were placed twelve paces apart; he had the first shot. I stood gayly, looking him full in the face; I did not twitch an eyelash, I looked lovingly at him, for I knew what I would do. His shot just grazed my cheek and ear. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Thank God,” I cried, “no man has been killed,” and I seized my pistol, turned back and flung it far away into the wood. “That’s the place for you,” I cried. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I turned to my adversary. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Forgive me, young fool that I am, sir,” I said, “for my unprovoked insult to you and for forcing you to fire at me. I am ten times worse than you and more, maybe. Tell that to the person whom you hold dearest in the world.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I had no sooner said this than they all three shouted at me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Upon my word,” cried my adversary, annoyed, “if you did not want to fight, why did not you let me alone?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Yesterday I was a fool, to‐day I know better,” I answered him gayly. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“As to yesterday, I believe you, but as for to‐day, it is difficult to agree with your opinion,” said he. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Bravo,” I cried, clapping my hands. “I agree with you there too. I have deserved it!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Will you shoot, sir, or not?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“No, I won’t,” I said; “if you like, fire at me again, but it would be better for you not to fire.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The seconds, especially mine, were shouting too: “Can you disgrace the regiment like this, facing your antagonist and begging his forgiveness! If I’d only known this!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I stood facing them all, not laughing now. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Gentlemen,” I said, “is it really so wonderful in these days to find a man who can repent of his stupidity and publicly confess his wrongdoing?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“But not in a duel,” cried my second again. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“That’s what’s so strange,” I said. “For I ought to have owned my fault as soon as I got here, before he had fired a shot, before leading him into a great and deadly sin; but we have made our life so grotesque, that to act in that way would have been almost impossible, for only after I have faced his shot at the distance of twelve paces could my words have any significance for him, and if I had spoken before, he would have said, ‘He is a coward, the sight of the pistols has frightened him, no use to listen to him.’ Gentlemen,” I cried suddenly, speaking straight from my heart, “look around you at the gifts of God, the clear sky, the pure air, the tender grass, the birds; nature is beautiful and sinless, and we, only we, are sinful and foolish, and we don’t understand that life is heaven, for we have only to understand that and it will at once be fulfilled in all its beauty, we shall embrace each other and weep.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I would have said more but I could not; my voice broke with the sweetness and youthful gladness of it, and there was such bliss in my heart as I had never known before in my life. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“All this as rational and edifying,” said my antagonist, “and in any case you are an original person.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You may laugh,” I said to him, laughing too, “but afterwards you will approve of me.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Oh, I am ready to approve of you now,” said he; “will you shake hands? for I believe you are genuinely sincere.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“No,” I said, “not now, later on when I have grown worthier and deserve your esteem, then shake hands and you will do well.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">We went home, my second upbraiding me all the way, while I kissed him. All my comrades heard of the affair at once and gathered together to pass judgment on me the same day. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“He has disgraced the uniform,” they said; “let him resign his commission.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Some stood up for me: “He faced the shot,” they said. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Yes, but he was afraid of his other shot and begged for forgiveness.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“If he had been afraid of being shot, he would have shot his own pistol first before asking forgiveness, while he flung it loaded into the forest. No, there’s something else in this, something original.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I enjoyed listening and looking at them. “My dear friends and comrades,” said I, “don’t worry about my resigning my commission, for I have done so already. I have sent in my papers this morning and as soon as I get my discharge I shall go into a monastery—it’s with that object I am leaving the regiment.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">When I had said this every one of them burst out laughing. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You should have told us of that first, that explains everything, we can’t judge a monk.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">They laughed and could not stop themselves, and not scornfully, but kindly and merrily. They all felt friendly to me at once, even those who had been sternest in their censure, and all the following month, before my discharge came, they could not make enough of me. “Ah, you monk,” they would say. And every one said something kind to me, they began trying to dissuade me, even to pity me: “What are you doing to yourself?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“No,” they would say, “he is a brave fellow, he faced fire and could have fired his own pistol too, but he had a dream the night before that he should become a monk, that’s why he did it.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was the same thing with the society of the town. Till then I had been kindly received, but had not been the object of special attention, and now all came to know me at once and invited me; they laughed at me, but they loved me. I may mention that although everybody talked openly of our duel, the authorities took no notice of it, because my antagonist was a near relation of our general, and as there had been no bloodshed and no serious consequences, and as I resigned my commission, they took it as a joke. And I began then to speak aloud and fearlessly, regardless of their laughter, for it was always kindly and not spiteful laughter. These conversations mostly took place in the evenings, in the company of ladies; women particularly liked listening to me then and they made the men listen. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“But how can I possibly be responsible for all?” every one would laugh in my face. “Can I, for instance, be responsible for you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You may well not know it,” I would answer, “since the whole world has long been going on a different line, since we consider the veriest lies as truth and demand the same lies from others. Here I have for once in my life acted sincerely and, well, you all look upon me as a madman. Though you are friendly to me, yet, you see, you all laugh at me.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“But how can we help being friendly to you?” said my hostess, laughing. The room was full of people. All of a sudden the young lady rose, on whose account the duel had been fought and whom only lately I had intended to be my future wife. I had not noticed her coming into the room. She got up, came to me and held out her hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Let me tell you,” she said, “that I am the first not to laugh at you, but on the contrary I thank you with tears and express my respect for you for your action then.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Her husband, too, came up and then they all approached me and almost kissed me. My heart was filled with joy, but my attention was especially caught by a middle‐aged man who came up to me with the others. I knew him by name already, but had never made his acquaintance nor exchanged a word with him till that evening. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (to be continued)</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/zosima.jpg" alt="zosima" style="float: right;" width="250" height="334" />Previously in the Dostoevsky for Parents and Children series:</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Varenka's Memoirs</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>Poor Folk</i>, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">An Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>Stories of a Man of Experience</i>, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Nellie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Insulted and Injured</i>, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Marie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Idiot</i>, 1868 [suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya in correspondence pertaining to the 1897 anthology, DPC X])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">At The Select Boarding School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The Merchant's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from the novel <i>The Adolescent</i>, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The Peasant Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Foma Danilov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from <i>The Diary Of A Writer</i>, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">From the novel <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i> (1881, [1883, 1897, DPC XI] - enlarged selection)</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> a) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Alyosha</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> b) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Obedience. Elder Zossima</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> c) <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Peasant Women Who Have Faith</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present <i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children</i> (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and as the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> our brief introduction to the original <i>Dostoevsky for Children</i> anthologies, and to this English online version.}</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">--//--</span></p>
<p style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">If such a thing as "the ideology of Dostoevsky" existed (something perhaps doubtful, but assuming it existed), it would seem important not to confuse it with the <i>practical</i> spiritual value<i> </i>of our author's writings. What is the practical value of Elder Zossima's deathbed memories and teachings, that we begin reading today, as if from the reverent pen of Alyosha Karamazov, the foremost Dostoevskian character?</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">What, in particular, is the practical value of Zossima's most treasured memory - that of his long-since departed elder brother, Markel? The innermost nested remembrance among Zossima's recollections is his most precious. Markel is to the Elder what <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Mujik Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> is <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/712-bicentenar-dostoievski-i-nu-dezndjdui.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">to Dostoevsky</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">. His defining first encounter with completely Christ-filled love. With motherly co-suffering "for all", akin to that of the Mother of God.(*) With the joyful mourning hidden in the Paschal Cross. Zossima's (and perhaps everyone's) exit ticket from the universal House of the Dead that is our fallen nature. Yet, is it real? Is the ticket valid?</span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The danger, here, seems to idolize fictional imagination. So exquisite, so quotable and memorable are the fictional Markel's story and teaching, that they seem real. And the fictional young Zossima's first victories based on them – or, rather, Markel's posthumous victories, in his younger brother Zinovy (the future Zossima), against the proud 'school' of dueling, hypocrisy and crime - seem real-life lessons in the practical discernment of "active love". Indeed, they are deep early rumblings announcing the Karamazovian storm, but also, or even more, poetical reverberations of <i>The Idiot</i> and <i>Crime and Punishment</i>, with their first principles spelled out in unforgettable words, bound to illuminate all of Dostoevsky's work, and far beyond.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The danger (for Dostoevsky's friends and foes alike), however, seems to be spellbound by Dostoevsky's art and imagination alone. By Markel, Markel and Zossima, or Markel, Zossima and Alyosha, etc., <i>alone</i>. To read Dostoevsky outside the living experience of those in obedience to Holy Tradition and its Golden Chain of Spiritual Elders, that he himself is pointing at, in his last stroke of genius, as to the ultimate framework.</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">What is spiritually viable, then, is not Dostoevsky taken in isolation, but Dostoevsky in dialogue with real life. In other words, Markel and his <i>fictional</i> descent are only Dostoevsky's <i>literary</i> voice. It can, and does come to life, only at the practical School of the Mother of God,(**) where it intersects the world of true life-shaping obedience to Holy Tradition and Holy Elders. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Practical wisdom needs to be tested in the real-life context of unbroken tradition. It seems to follow, then, that the practical-oriented reader need not be detained long by scholarly disputes - fascinating as they may be - over the extent to which Dostoevsky himself "proved" the spiritual viability of Markel. Literary genius and scholarship are simply not enough to practically prove and calibrate such things. It takes a living spiritual tradition. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">This is why it seems to us important that Met. Anthony and his close followers have successfully exemplified the who, when, and how of Dostoevskian co-suffering love, for clergy and laypeople alike, indeed for the whole world, with apostolic calling and unabated faith in the spiritual mission of Holy Russia. That we have a true and tested bearer of the fragrance of Orthodoxy, like Prof. Ivan Andreyev, to teach us how to use Zossima's exhortations and the mystery of communal guilt to find salvific tears of joyful sorrow in the Cross of Modern Times. That we can also find a real peasant-<i>and</i>-hesychast understanding of blessed obedience, like that of St. Silouan, with whom Dostoevsky's practical posterity could cry: "Keep your mind in the hell of fallen human nature - and rejoice always, for Christ is Risen and Adam is Redeemed."</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Notes: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(*) A sine-qua-non of her perfect communion with the co-suffering Christ, i.e., of her <a href="https://classicalchristianity.com/2013/11/29/on-deification-by-grace/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">deification by Grace</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">; cf. also St. Isaac the Syrian, quoted <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">. But the explicit clarification of this aspect, it seems to us, came hand in hand with the gradual reemergence of Orthodox theology out of its <a href="https://archive.ph/y53oL#selection-631.157-631.345">"<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Western captivity</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">". A long process in which, as we see it, Dostoevsky himself played a role, followed by Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky and the generation of his spiritual sons. A multifaceted process, also related to the recovery of the <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20051214074728/http:/www.pelagia.org/htm/b16.en.saint_gregory_palamas_as_a_hagiorite.09.htm" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Palamite</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20051218073537/http://www.pelagia.org/htm/b16.en.saint_gregory_palamas_as_a_hagiorite.00.htm" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">vocabulary,</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> and to the fascinating story of <a href="https://books.openbookpublishers.com/10.11647/obp.0115/ch8.xhtml" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">the restoration of Russia’s historical icons, such as the Vladimir Mother of God</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">. In the meantime, popular piety beautifully captured the practical essence of the matter, as in Ivan Karamazov’s<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> story of the<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Journey of the Mother of God Through Hell”, discussed <a href="https://www.academia.edu/36862114/The_Journey_of_the_Mother_of_God_Through_Hell_Dostoevsky_The_Brothers_Karamazov"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> by Pieter Dirk Dekker. But Ivan’s speculative mind is obviously split, and cannot find rest or practical guidance in this kind of simple wisdom.<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> His dominant speculative side suffered from the Western captivity, as perhaps did that of Dostoevsky's younger friend Vladimir Soloviev, our author's inspiration for Ivan, according to Anna Dostoevskaya. See also the introductory remarks to <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">the previous installment</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> in this series.</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">(**) <span style="font-family: times new roman, times;">As we have <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">previously</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"> called the key aspect of both monastic hesychasm and popular piety that, we feel, is closest to the heart and work of our author. The best introductory discussion of the Orthodox veneration of the Mother of God is probably by <a href="https://ortodoks.dk/ortodoks-tro-og-praksis/de-hellige/the-orthodox-veneration-of-mary-the-birthgiver-of-god" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;">St. John Maximovitch</span></a></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;">. </span><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"></span><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;">However, at this time we are not aware of any comprehensive discussion of the role of the Mother of God in Dostoevsky <i>from a consistently </i><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://archive.ph/POb1I">hesychast perspective</a></span></i></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"><a href="https://archive.ph/POb1I"> </a>(one that would, presumably, include a disambiguation of the naturalist, Western/Raphaelite elements of <span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=pseudomorphosis+site:www.bulgarian-orthodox-church.org">pseudomorphosis</a></span></span><span style="font-size: 12pt; background: white; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: times new roman, times;"><a href="https://archive.ph/GTSCr#The_%22Western_Captivity%22"> </a>felt in much of the Church piety and art of Dostoevsky’s age, and of their relative impact on our author.)</span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'; background: white;"><a href="https://archive.ph/GTSCr#The_%22Western_Captivity%22"> </a></span></p>
<p style="text-align: center; line-height: normal;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">***</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">F.M. Dostoevsky </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The Duel - Recollections and Exhortations of Elder Zossima, part I</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(From <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, 1881, book VI. Translation by Constance Garnett. Russian original </span></b><a href="https://archive.ph/UYs2F#selection-26789.0-26789.12" target="_blank"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">here</span></b></a><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">.)</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"></span></b></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">When with an anxious and aching heart Alyosha went into his elder’s cell, he stood still almost astonished. Instead of a sick man at his last gasp, perhaps unconscious, as he had feared to find him, he saw him sitting up in his chair and, though weak and exhausted, his face was bright and cheerful, he was surrounded by visitors and engaged in a quiet and joyful conversation. But he had only got up from his bed a quarter of an hour before Alyosha’s arrival; his visitors had gathered together in his cell earlier, waiting for him to wake, having received a most confident assurance from Father Païssy that “the teacher would get up, and as he had himself promised in the morning, converse once more with those dear to his heart.” This promise and indeed every word of the dying elder Father Païssy put implicit trust in. If he had seen him unconscious, if he had seen him breathe his last, and yet had his promise that he would rise up and say good‐by to him, he would not have believed perhaps even in death, but would still have expected the dead man to recover and fulfill his promise. In the morning as he lay down to sleep, Father Zossima had told him positively: “I shall not die without the delight of another conversation with you, beloved of my heart. I shall look once more on your dear face and pour out my heart to you once again.” The monks, who had gathered for this probably last conversation with Father Zossima, had all been his devoted friends for many years. There were four of them: Father Iosif and Father Païssy, Father Mihaïl, the warden of the hermitage, a man not very old and far from being learned. He was of humble origin, of strong will and steadfast faith, of austere appearance, but of deep tenderness, though he obviously concealed it as though he were almost ashamed of it. The fourth, Father Anfim, was a very old and humble little monk of the poorest peasant class. He was almost illiterate, and very quiet, scarcely speaking to any one. He was the humblest of the humble, and looked as though he had been frightened by something great and awful beyond the scope of his intelligence. Father Zossima had a great affection for this timorous man, and always treated him with marked respect, though perhaps there was no one he had known to whom he had said less, in spite of the fact that he had spent years wandering about holy Russia with him. That was very long ago, forty years before, when Father Zossima first began his life as a monk in a poor and little monastery at Kostroma, and when, shortly after, he had accompanied Father Anfim on his pilgrimage to collect alms for their poor monastery. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The whole party were in the bedroom which, as we mentioned before, was very small, so that there was scarcely room for the four of them (in addition to Porfiry, the novice, who stood) to sit round Father Zossima on chairs brought from the sitting‐room. It was already beginning to get dark, the room was lighted up by the lamps and the candles before the ikons. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Seeing Alyosha standing embarrassed in the doorway, Father Zossima smiled at him joyfully and held out his hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Welcome, my quiet one, welcome, my dear, here you are too. I knew you would come.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Alyosha went up to him, bowed down before him to the ground and wept. Something surged up from his heart, his soul was quivering, he wanted to sob. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Come, don’t weep over me yet,” Father Zossima smiled, laying his right hand on his head. “You see I am sitting up talking; maybe I shall live another twenty years yet, as that dear good woman from Vishegorye, with her little Lizaveta in her arms, wished me yesterday. God bless the mother and the little girl Lizaveta,” he crossed himself. “Porfiry, did you take her offering where I told you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He meant the sixty copecks brought him the day before by the good‐humored woman to be given “to some one poorer than me.” Such offerings, always of money gained by personal toil, are made by way of penance voluntarily undertaken. The elder had sent Porfiry the evening before to a widow, whose house had been burnt down lately, and who after the fire had gone with her children begging alms. Porfiry hastened to reply that he had given the money, as he had been instructed, “from an unknown benefactress.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Get up, my dear boy,” the elder went on to Alyosha. “Let me look at you. Have you been home and seen your brother?” It seemed strange to Alyosha that he asked so confidently and precisely, about one of his brothers only—but which one? Then perhaps he had sent him out both yesterday and to‐day for the sake of that brother. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“I have seen one of my brothers,” answered Alyosha. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“I mean the elder one, to whom I bowed down.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“I only saw him yesterday and could not find him to‐day,” said Alyosha. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Make haste to find him, go again to‐morrow and make haste, leave everything and make haste. Perhaps you may still have time to prevent something terrible. I bowed down yesterday to the great suffering in store for him.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He was suddenly silent and seemed to be pondering. The words were strange. Father Iosif, who had witnessed the scene yesterday, exchanged glances with Father Païssy. Alyosha could not resist asking: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Father and teacher,” he began with extreme emotion, “your words are too obscure.... What is this suffering in store for him?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Don’t inquire. I seemed to see something terrible yesterday ... as though his whole future were expressed in his eyes. A look came into his eyes—so that I was instantly horror‐stricken at what that man is preparing for himself. Once or twice in my life I’ve seen such a look in a man’s face ... reflecting as it were his future fate, and that fate, alas, came to pass. I sent you to him, Alexey, for I thought your brotherly face would help him. But everything and all our fates are from the Lord. ‘Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.’ Remember that. You, Alexey, I’ve many times silently blessed for your face, know that,” added the elder with a gentle smile. “This is what I think of you, you will go forth from these walls, but will live like a monk in the world. You will have many enemies, but even your foes will love you. Life will bring you many misfortunes, but you will find your happiness in them, and will bless life and will make others bless it—which is what matters most. Well, that is your character. Fathers and teachers,” he addressed his friends with a tender smile, “I have never till to‐day told even him why the face of this youth is so dear to me. Now I will tell you. His face has been as it were a remembrance and a prophecy for me. At the dawn of my life when I was a child I had an elder brother who died before my eyes at seventeen. And later on in the course of my life I gradually became convinced that that brother had been for a guidance and a sign from on high for me. For had he not come into my life, I should never perhaps, so I fancy at least, have become a monk and entered on this precious path. He appeared first to me in my childhood, and here, at the end of my pilgrimage, he seems to have come to me over again. It is marvelous, fathers and teachers, that Alexey, who has some, though not a great, resemblance in face, seems to me so like him spiritually, that many times I have taken him for that young man, my brother, mysteriously come back to me at the end of my pilgrimage, as a reminder and an inspiration. So that I positively wondered at so strange a dream in myself. Do you hear this, Porfiry?” he turned to the novice who waited on him. “Many times I’ve seen in your face as it were a look of mortification that I love Alexey more than you. Now you know why that was so, but I love you too, know that, and many times I grieved at your mortification. I should like to tell you, dear friends, of that youth, my brother, for there has been no presence in my life more precious, more significant and touching. My heart is full of tenderness, and I look at my whole life at this moment as though living through it again.” </span></p>
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<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Here I must observe that this last conversation of Father Zossima with the friends who visited him on the last day of his life has been partly preserved in writing. Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov wrote it down from memory, some time after his elder’s death. But whether this was only the conversation that took place then, or whether he added to it his notes of parts of former conversations with his teacher, I cannot determine. In his account, Father Zossima’s talk goes on without interruption, as though he told his life to his friends in the form of a story, though there is no doubt, from other accounts of it, that the conversation that evening was general. Though the guests did not interrupt Father Zossima much, yet they too talked, perhaps even told something themselves. Besides, Father Zossima could not have carried on an uninterrupted narrative, for he was sometimes gasping for breath, his voice failed him, and he even lay down to rest on his bed, though he did not fall asleep and his visitors did not leave their seats. Once or twice the conversation was interrupted by Father Païssy’s reading the Gospel. It is worthy of note, too, that no one of them supposed that he would die that night, for on that evening of his life after his deep sleep in the day he seemed suddenly to have found new strength, which kept him up through this long conversation. It was like a last effort of love which gave him marvelous energy; only for a little time, however, for his life was cut short immediately.... But of that later. I will only add now that I have preferred to confine myself to the account given by Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov. It will be shorter and not so fatiguing, though of course, as I must repeat, Alyosha took a great deal from previous conversations and added them to it. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Notes of the Life of the deceased Priest and Monk, the Elder Zossima, taken from his own words by Alexey Fyodorovitch Karamazov. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(a)</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> <i>Father Zossima’s Brother</i> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Beloved fathers and teachers, I was born in a distant province in the north, in the town of V. My father was a gentleman by birth, but of no great consequence or position. He died when I was only two years old, and I don’t remember him at all. He left my mother a small house built of wood, and a fortune, not large, but sufficient to keep her and her children in comfort. There were two of us, my elder brother Markel and I. He was eight years older than I was, of hasty irritable temperament, but kind‐hearted and never ironical. He was remarkably silent, especially at home with me, his mother, and the servants. He did well at school, but did not get on with his schoolfellows, though he never quarreled, at least so my mother has told me. Six months before his death, when he was seventeen, he made friends with a political exile who had been banished from Moscow to our town for freethinking, and led a solitary existence there. He was a good scholar who had gained distinction in philosophy in the university. Something made him take a fancy to Markel, and he used to ask him to see him. The young man would spend whole evenings with him during that winter, till the exile was summoned to Petersburg to take up his post again at his own request, as he had powerful friends. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was the beginning of Lent, and Markel would not fast, he was rude and laughed at it. “That’s all silly twaddle, and there is no God,” he said, horrifying my mother, the servants, and me too. For though I was only nine, I too was aghast at hearing such words. We had four servants, all serfs. I remember my mother selling one of the four, the cook Afimya, who was lame and elderly, for sixty paper roubles, and hiring a free servant to take her place. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">In the sixth week in Lent, my brother, who was never strong and had a tendency to consumption, was taken ill. He was tall but thin and delicate‐ looking, and of very pleasing countenance. I suppose he caught cold, anyway the doctor, who came, soon whispered to my mother that it was galloping consumption, that he would not live through the spring. My mother began weeping, and, careful not to alarm my brother, she entreated him to go to church, to confess and take the sacrament, as he was still able to move about. This made him angry, and he said something profane about the church. He grew thoughtful, however; he guessed at once that he was seriously ill, and that that was why his mother was begging him to confess and take the sacrament. He had been aware, indeed, for a long time past, that he was far from well, and had a year before coolly observed at dinner to our mother and me, “My life won’t be long among you, I may not live another year,” which seemed now like a prophecy. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Three days passed and Holy Week had come. And on Tuesday morning my brother began going to church. “I am doing this simply for your sake, mother, to please and comfort you,” he said. My mother wept with joy and grief. “His end must be near,” she thought, “if there’s such a change in him.” But he was not able to go to church long, he took to his bed, so he had to confess and take the sacrament at home. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was a late Easter, and the days were bright, fine, and full of fragrance. I remember he used to cough all night and sleep badly, but in the morning he dressed and tried to sit up in an arm‐chair. That’s how I remember him sitting, sweet and gentle, smiling, his face bright and joyous, in spite of his illness. A marvelous change passed over him, his spirit seemed transformed. The old nurse would come in and say, “Let me light the lamp before the holy image, my dear.” And once he would not have allowed it and would have blown it out. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Light it, light it, dear, I was a wretch to have prevented you doing it. You are praying when you light the lamp, and I am praying when I rejoice seeing you. So we are praying to the same God.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Those words seemed strange to us, and mother would go to her room and weep, but when she went in to him she wiped her eyes and looked cheerful. “Mother, don’t weep, darling,” he would say, “I’ve long to live yet, long to rejoice with you, and life is glad and joyful.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Ah, dear boy, how can you talk of joy when you lie feverish at night, coughing as though you would tear yourself to pieces.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Don’t cry, mother,” he would answer, “life is paradise, and we are all in paradise, but we won’t see it, if we would, we should have heaven on earth the next day.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Every one wondered at his words, he spoke so strangely and positively; we were all touched and wept. Friends came to see us. “Dear ones,” he would say to them, “what have I done that you should love me so, how can you love any one like me, and how was it I did not know, I did not appreciate it before?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">When the servants came in to him he would say continually, “Dear, kind people, why are you doing so much for me, do I deserve to be waited on? If it were God’s will for me to live, I would wait on you, for all men should wait on one another.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Mother shook her head as she listened. “My darling, it’s your illness makes you talk like that.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Mother, darling,” he would say, “there must be servants and masters, but if so I will be the servant of my servants, the same as they are to me. And another thing, mother, every one of us has sinned against all men, and I more than any.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Mother positively smiled at that, smiled through her tears. “Why, how could you have sinned against all men, more than all? Robbers and murderers have done that, but what sin have you committed yet, that you hold yourself more guilty than all?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Mother, little heart of mine,” he said (he had begun using such strange caressing words at that time), “little heart of mine, my joy, believe me, every one is really responsible to all men for all men and for everything. I don’t know how to explain it to you, but I feel it is so, painfully even. And how is it we went on then living, getting angry and not knowing?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">So he would get up every day, more and more sweet and joyous and full of love. When the doctor, an old German called Eisenschmidt, came: </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Well, doctor, have I another day in this world?” he would ask, joking. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You’ll live many days yet,” the doctor would answer, “and months and years too.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Months and years!” he would exclaim. “Why reckon the days? One day is enough for a man to know all happiness. My dear ones, why do we quarrel, try to outshine each other and keep grudges against each other? Let’s go straight into the garden, walk and play there, love, appreciate, and kiss each other, and glorify life.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Your son cannot last long,” the doctor told my mother, as she accompanied him to the door. “The disease is affecting his brain.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The windows of his room looked out into the garden, and our garden was a shady one, with old trees in it which were coming into bud. The first birds of spring were flitting in the branches, chirruping and singing at the windows. And looking at them and admiring them, he began suddenly begging their forgiveness too: “Birds of heaven, happy birds, forgive me, for I have sinned against you too.” None of us could understand that at the time, but he shed tears of joy. “Yes,” he said, “there was such a glory of God all about me: birds, trees, meadows, sky; only I lived in shame and dishonored it all and did not notice the beauty and glory.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You take too many sins on yourself,” mother used to say, weeping. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Mother, darling, it’s for joy, not for grief I am crying. Though I can’t explain it to you, I like to humble myself before them, for I don’t know how to love them enough. If I have sinned against every one, yet all forgive me, too, and that’s heaven. Am I not in heaven now?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And there was a great deal more I don’t remember. I remember I went once into his room when there was no one else there. It was a bright evening, the sun was setting, and the whole room was lighted up. He beckoned me, and I went up to him. He put his hands on my shoulders and looked into my face tenderly, lovingly; he said nothing for a minute, only looked at me like that. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Well,” he said, “run and play now, enjoy life for me too.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I went out then and ran to play. And many times in my life afterwards I remembered even with tears how he told me to enjoy life for him too. There were many other marvelous and beautiful sayings of his, though we did not understand them at the time. He died the third week after Easter. He was fully conscious though he could not talk; up to his last hour he did not change. He looked happy, his eyes beamed and sought us, he smiled at us, beckoned us. There was a great deal of talk even in the town about his death. I was impressed by all this at the time, but not too much so, though I cried a good deal at his funeral. I was young then, a child, but a lasting impression, a hidden feeling of it all, remained in my heart, ready to rise up and respond when the time came. So indeed it happened. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(b) Of the Holy Scriptures in the Life of Father Zossima</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I was left alone with my mother. Her friends began advising her to send me to Petersburg as other parents did. “You have only one son now,” they said, “and have a fair income, and you will be depriving him perhaps of a brilliant career if you keep him here.” They suggested I should be sent to Petersburg to the Cadet Corps, that I might afterwards enter the Imperial Guard. My mother hesitated for a long time, it was awful to part with her only child, but she made up her mind to it at last, though not without many tears, believing she was acting for my happiness. She brought me to Petersburg and put me into the Cadet Corps, and I never saw her again. For she too died three years afterwards. She spent those three years mourning and grieving for both of us. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">From the house of my childhood I have brought nothing but precious memories, for there are no memories more precious than those of early childhood in one’s first home. And that is almost always so if there is any love and harmony in the family at all. Indeed, precious memories may remain even of a bad home, if only the heart knows how to find what is precious. With my memories of home I count, too, my memories of the Bible, which, child as I was, I was very eager to read at home. I had a book of Scripture history then with excellent pictures, called <i>A Hundred and Four Stories from the Old and New Testament</i>, and I learned to read from it. I have it lying on my shelf now, I keep it as a precious relic of the past. But even before I learned to read, I remember first being moved to devotional feeling at eight years old. My mother took me alone to mass (I don’t remember where my brother was at the time) on the Monday before Easter. It was a fine day, and I remember to‐day, as though I saw it now, how the incense rose from the censer and softly floated upwards and, overhead in the cupola, mingled in rising waves with the sunlight that streamed in at the little window. I was stirred by the sight, and for the first time in my life I consciously received the seed of God’s word in my heart. A youth came out into the middle of the church carrying a big book, so large that at the time I fancied he could scarcely carry it. He laid it on the reading desk, opened it, and began reading, and suddenly for the first time I understood something read in the church of God. In the land of Uz, there lived a man, righteous and God‐fearing, and he had great wealth, so many camels, so many sheep and asses, and his children feasted, and he loved them very much and prayed for them. “It may be that my sons have sinned in their feasting.” Now the devil came before the Lord together with the sons of God, and said to the Lord that he had gone up and down the earth and under the earth. “And hast thou considered my servant Job?” God asked of him. And God boasted to the devil, pointing to his great and holy servant. And the devil laughed at God’s words. “Give him over to me and Thou wilt see that Thy servant will murmur against Thee and curse Thy name.” And God gave up the just man He loved so, to the devil. And the devil smote his children and his cattle and scattered his wealth, all of a sudden like a thunderbolt from heaven. And Job rent his mantle and fell down upon the ground and cried aloud, “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return into the earth; the Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord for ever and ever.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Fathers and teachers, forgive my tears now, for all my childhood rises up again before me, and I breathe now as I breathed then, with the breast of a little child of eight, and I feel as I did then, awe and wonder and gladness. The camels at that time caught my imagination, and Satan, who talked like that with God, and God who gave His servant up to destruction, and His servant crying out: “Blessed be Thy name although Thou dost punish me,” and then the soft and sweet singing in the church: “Let my prayer rise up before Thee,” and again incense from the priest’s censer and the kneeling and the prayer. Ever since then—only yesterday I took it up—I’ve never been able to read that sacred tale without tears. And how much that is great, mysterious and unfathomable there is in it! Afterwards I heard the words of mockery and blame, proud words, “How could God give up the most loved of His saints for the diversion of the devil, take from him his children, smite him with sore boils so that he cleansed the corruption from his sores with a pot‐sherd—and for no object except to boast to the devil! ‘See what My saint can suffer for My sake.’ ” But the greatness of it lies just in the fact that it is a mystery—that the passing earthly show and the eternal verity are brought together in it. In the face of the earthly truth, the eternal truth is accomplished. The Creator, just as on the first days of creation He ended each day with praise: “That is good that I have created,” looks upon Job and again praises His creation. And Job, praising the Lord, serves not only Him but all His creation for generations and generations, and for ever and ever, since for that he was ordained. Good heavens, what a book it is, and what lessons there are in it! What a book the Bible is, what a miracle, what strength is given with it to man! It is like a mold cast of the world and man and human nature, everything is there, and a law for everything for all the ages. And what mysteries are solved and revealed! God raises Job again, gives him wealth again. Many years pass by, and he has other children and loves them. But how could he love those new ones when those first children are no more, when he has lost them? Remembering them, how could he be fully happy with those new ones, however dear the new ones might be? But he could, he could. It’s the great mystery of human life that old grief passes gradually into quiet, tender joy. The mild serenity of age takes the place of the riotous blood of youth. I bless the rising sun each day, and, as before, my hearts sings to meet it, but now I love even more its setting, its long slanting rays and the soft, tender, gentle memories that come with them, the dear images from the whole of my long, happy life—and over all the Divine Truth, softening, reconciling, forgiving! My life is ending, I know that well, but every day that is left me I feel how my earthly life is in touch with a new infinite, unknown, that approaching life, the nearness of which sets my soul quivering with rapture, my mind glowing and my heart weeping with joy. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Friends and teachers, I have heard more than once, and of late one may hear it more often, that the priests, and above all the village priests, are complaining on all sides of their miserable income and their humiliating lot. They plainly state, even in print—I’ve read it myself—that they are unable to teach the Scriptures to the people because of the smallness of their means, and if Lutherans and heretics come and lead the flock astray, they let them lead them astray because they have so little to live upon. May the Lord increase the sustenance that is so precious to them, for their complaint is just, too. But of a truth I say, if any one is to blame in the matter, half the fault is ours. For he may be short of time, he may say truly that he is overwhelmed all the while with work and services, but still it’s not all the time, even he has an hour a week to remember God. And he does not work the whole year round. Let him gather round him once a week, some hour in the evening, if only the children at first—the fathers will hear of it and they too will begin to come. There’s no need to build halls for this, let him take them into his own cottage. They won’t spoil his cottage, they would only be there one hour. Let him open that book and begin reading it without grand words or superciliousness, without condescension to them, but gently and kindly, being glad that he is reading to them and that they are listening with attention, loving the words himself, only stopping from time to time to explain words that are not understood by the peasants. Don’t be anxious, they will understand everything, the orthodox heart will understand all! Let him read them about Abraham and Sarah, about Isaac and Rebecca, of how Jacob went to Laban and wrestled with the Lord in his dream and said, “This place is holy”—and he will impress the devout mind of the peasant. Let him read, especially to the children, how the brothers sold Joseph, the tender boy, the dreamer and prophet, into bondage, and told their father that a wild beast had devoured him, and showed him his blood‐ stained clothes. Let him read them how the brothers afterwards journeyed into Egypt for corn, and Joseph, already a great ruler, unrecognized by them, tormented them, accused them, kept his brother Benjamin, and all through love: “I love you, and loving you I torment you.” For he remembered all his life how they had sold him to the merchants in the burning desert by the well, and how, wringing his hands, he had wept and besought his brothers not to sell him as a slave in a strange land. And how, seeing them again after many years, he loved them beyond measure, but he harassed and tormented them in love. He left them at last not able to bear the suffering of his heart, flung himself on his bed and wept. Then, wiping his tears away, he went out to them joyful and told them, “Brothers, I am your brother Joseph!” Let him read them further how happy old Jacob was on learning that his darling boy was still alive, and how he went to Egypt leaving his own country, and died in a foreign land, bequeathing his great prophecy that had lain mysteriously hidden in his meek and timid heart all his life, that from his offspring, from Judah, will come the great hope of the world, the Messiah and Saviour. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Fathers and teachers, forgive me and don’t be angry, that like a little child I’ve been babbling of what you know long ago, and can teach me a hundred times more skillfully. I only speak from rapture, and forgive my tears, for I love the Bible. Let him too weep, the priest of God, and be sure that the hearts of his listeners will throb in response. Only a little tiny seed is needed—drop it into the heart of the peasant and it won’t die, it will live in his soul all his life, it will be hidden in the midst of his darkness and sin, like a bright spot, like a great reminder. And there’s no need of much teaching or explanation, he will understand it all simply. Do you suppose that the peasants don’t understand? Try reading them the touching story of the fair Esther and the haughty Vashti; or the miraculous story of Jonah in the whale. Don’t forget either the parables of Our Lord, choose especially from the Gospel of St. Luke (that is what I did), and then from the Acts of the Apostles the conversion of St. Paul (that you mustn’t leave out on any account), and from the <i>Lives of the Saints</i>, for instance, the life of Alexey, the man of God and, greatest of all, the happy martyr and the seer of God, Mary of Egypt—and you will penetrate their hearts with these simple tales. Give one hour a week to it in spite of your poverty, only one little hour. And you will see for yourselves that our people is gracious and grateful, and will repay you a hundred‐fold. Mindful of the kindness of their priest and the moving words they have heard from him, they will of their own accord help him in his fields and in his house, and will treat him with more respect than before—so that it will even increase his worldly well‐being too. The thing is so simple that sometimes one is even afraid to put it into words, for fear of being laughed at, and yet how true it is! One who does not believe in God will not believe in God’s people. He who believes in God’s people will see His Holiness too, even though he had not believed in it till then. Only the people and their future spiritual power will convert our atheists, who have torn themselves away from their native soil. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And what is the use of Christ’s words, unless we set an example? The people is lost without the Word of God, for its soul is athirst for the Word and for all that is good. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">In my youth, long ago, nearly forty years ago, I traveled all over Russia with Father Anfim, collecting funds for our monastery, and we stayed one night on the bank of a great navigable river with some fishermen. A good‐ looking peasant lad, about eighteen, joined us; he had to hurry back next morning to pull a merchant’s barge along the bank. I noticed him looking straight before him with clear and tender eyes. It was a bright, warm, still, July night, a cool mist rose from the broad river, we could hear the plash of a fish, the birds were still, all was hushed and beautiful, everything praying to God. Only we two were not sleeping, the lad and I, and we talked of the beauty of this world of God’s and of the great mystery of it. Every blade of grass, every insect, ant, and golden bee, all so marvelously know their path, though they have not intelligence, they bear witness to the mystery of God and continually accomplish it themselves. I saw the dear lad’s heart was moved. He told me that he loved the forest and the forest birds. He was a bird‐catcher, knew the note of each of them, could call each bird. “I know nothing better than to be in the forest,” said he, “though all things are good.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Truly,” I answered him, “all things are good and fair, because all is truth. Look,” said I, “at the horse, that great beast that is so near to man; or the lowly, pensive ox, which feeds him and works for him; look at their faces, what meekness, what devotion to man, who often beats them mercilessly. What gentleness, what confidence and what beauty! It’s touching to know that there’s no sin in them, for all, all except man, is sinless, and Christ has been with them before us.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Why,” asked the boy, “is Christ with them too?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“It cannot but be so,” said I, “since the Word is for all. All creation and all creatures, every leaf is striving to the Word, singing glory to God, weeping to Christ, unconsciously accomplishing this by the mystery of their sinless life. Yonder,” said I, “in the forest wanders the dreadful bear, fierce and menacing, and yet innocent in it.” And I told him how once a bear came to a great saint who had taken refuge in a tiny cell in the wood. And the great saint pitied him, went up to him without fear and gave him a piece of bread. “Go along,” said he, “Christ be with you,” and the savage beast walked away meekly and obediently, doing no harm. And the lad was delighted that the bear had walked away without hurting the saint, and that Christ was with him too. “Ah,” said he, “how good that is, how good and beautiful is all God’s work!” He sat musing softly and sweetly. I saw he understood. And he slept beside me a light and sinless sleep. May God bless youth! And I prayed for him as I went to sleep. Lord, send peace and light to Thy people! </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">(c) Recollections of Father Zossima’s Youth before he became a Monk. The Duel</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I spent a long time, almost eight years, in the military cadet school at Petersburg, and in the novelty of my surroundings there, many of my childish impressions grew dimmer, though I forgot nothing. I picked up so many new habits and opinions that I was transformed into a cruel, absurd, almost savage creature. A surface polish of courtesy and society manners I did acquire together with the French language. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">But we all, myself included, looked upon the soldiers in our service as cattle. I was perhaps worse than the rest in that respect, for I was so much more impressionable than my companions. By the time we left the school as officers, we were ready to lay down our lives for the honor of the regiment, but no one of us had any knowledge of the real meaning of honor, and if any one had known it, he would have been the first to ridicule it. Drunkenness, debauchery and devilry were what we almost prided ourselves on. I don’t say that we were bad by nature, all these young men were good fellows, but they behaved badly, and I worst of all. What made it worse for me was that I had come into my own money, and so I flung myself into a life of pleasure, and plunged headlong into all the recklessness of youth. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I was fond of reading, yet strange to say, the Bible was the one book I never opened at that time, though I always carried it about with me, and I was never separated from it; in very truth I was keeping that book “for the day and the hour, for the month and the year,” though I knew it not. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">After four years of this life, I chanced to be in the town of K. where our regiment was stationed at the time. We found the people of the town hospitable, rich and fond of entertainments. I met with a cordial reception everywhere, as I was of a lively temperament and was known to be well off, which always goes a long way in the world. And then a circumstance happened which was the beginning of it all. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I formed an attachment to a beautiful and intelligent young girl of noble and lofty character, the daughter of people much respected. They were well‐to‐do people of influence and position. They always gave me a cordial and friendly reception. I fancied that the young lady looked on me with favor and my heart was aflame at such an idea. Later on I saw and fully realized that I perhaps was not so passionately in love with her at all, but only recognized the elevation of her mind and character, which I could not indeed have helped doing. I was prevented, however, from making her an offer at the time by my selfishness, I was loath to part with the allurements of my free and licentious bachelor life in the heyday of my youth, and with my pockets full of money. I did drop some hint as to my feelings however, though I put off taking any decisive step for a time. Then, all of a sudden, we were ordered off for two months to another district. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">On my return two months later, I found the young lady already married to a rich neighboring landowner, a very amiable man, still young though older than I was, connected with the best Petersburg society, which I was not, and of excellent education, which I also was not. I was so overwhelmed at this unexpected circumstance that my mind was positively clouded. The worst of it all was that, as I learned then, the young landowner had been a long while betrothed to her, and I had met him indeed many times in her house, but blinded by my conceit I had noticed nothing. And this particularly mortified me; almost everybody had known all about it, while I knew nothing. I was filled with sudden irrepressible fury. With flushed face I began recalling how often I had been on the point of declaring my love to her, and as she had not attempted to stop me or to warn me, she must, I concluded, have been laughing at me all the time. Later on, of course, I reflected and remembered that she had been very far from laughing at me; on the contrary, she used to turn off any love‐making on my part with a jest and begin talking of other subjects; but at that moment I was incapable of reflecting and was all eagerness for revenge. I am surprised to remember that my wrath and revengeful feelings were extremely repugnant to my own nature, for being of an easy temper, I found it difficult to be angry with any one for long, and so I had to work myself up artificially and became at last revolting and absurd. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I waited for an opportunity and succeeded in insulting my “rival” in the presence of a large company. I insulted him on a perfectly extraneous pretext, jeering at his opinion upon an important public event—it was in the year 1826<a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#fn-5" target="_blank"><sup>[5]</sup></a>—and my jeer was, so people said, clever and effective. Then I forced him to ask for an explanation, and behaved so rudely that he accepted my challenge in spite of the vast inequality between us, as I was younger, a person of no consequence, and of inferior rank. I learned afterwards for a fact that it was from a jealous feeling on his side also that my challenge was accepted; he had been rather jealous of me on his wife’s account before their marriage; he fancied now that if he submitted to be insulted by me and refused to accept my challenge, and if she heard of it, she might begin to despise him and waver in her love for him. I soon found a second in a comrade, an ensign of our regiment. In those days though duels were severely punished, yet dueling was a kind of fashion among the officers—so strong and deeply rooted will a brutal prejudice sometimes be. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was the end of June, and our meeting was to take place at seven o’clock the next day on the outskirts of the town—and then something happened that in very truth was the turning‐point of my life. In the evening, returning home in a savage and brutal humor, I flew into a rage with my orderly Afanasy, and gave him two blows in the face with all my might, so that it was covered with blood. He had not long been in my service and I had struck him before, but never with such ferocious cruelty. And, believe me, though it’s forty years ago, I recall it now with shame and pain. I went to bed and slept for about three hours; when I waked up the day was breaking. I got up—I did not want to sleep any more—I went to the window—opened it, it looked out upon the garden; I saw the sun rising; it was warm and beautiful, the birds were singing. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“What’s the meaning of it?” I thought. “I feel in my heart as it were something vile and shameful. Is it because I am going to shed blood? No,” I thought, “I feel it’s not that. Can it be that I am afraid of death, afraid of being killed? No, that’s not it, that’s not it at all.”... And all at once I knew what it was: it was because I had beaten Afanasy the evening before! It all rose before my mind, it all was as it were repeated over again; he stood before me and I was beating him straight on the face and he was holding his arms stiffly down, his head erect, his eyes fixed upon me as though on parade. He staggered at every blow and did not even dare to raise his hands to protect himself. That is what a man has been brought to, and that was a man beating a fellow creature! What a crime! It was as though a sharp dagger had pierced me right through. I stood as if I were struck dumb, while the sun was shining, the leaves were rejoicing and the birds were trilling the praise of God.... I hid my face in my hands, fell on my bed and broke into a storm of tears. And then I remembered my brother Markel and what he said on his death‐bed to his servants: “My dear ones, why do you wait on me, why do you love me, am I worth your waiting on me?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Yes, am I worth it?” flashed through my mind. “After all what am I worth, that another man, a fellow creature, made in the likeness and image of God, should serve me?” For the first time in my life this question forced itself upon me. He had said, “Mother, my little heart, in truth we are each responsible to all for all, it’s only that men don’t know this. If they knew it, the world would be a paradise at once.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“God, can that too be false?” I thought as I wept. “In truth, perhaps, I am more than all others responsible for all, a greater sinner than all men in the world.” And all at once the whole truth in its full light appeared to me; what was I going to do? I was going to kill a good, clever, noble man, who had done me no wrong, and by depriving his wife of happiness for the rest of her life, I should be torturing and killing her too. I lay thus in my bed with my face in the pillow, heedless how the time was passing. Suddenly my second, the ensign, came in with the pistols to fetch me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Ah,” said he, “it’s a good thing you are up already, it’s time we were off, come along!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I did not know what to do and hurried to and fro undecided; we went out to the carriage, however. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Wait here a minute,” I said to him. “I’ll be back directly, I have forgotten my purse.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And I ran back alone, to Afanasy’s little room. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Afanasy,” I said, “I gave you two blows on the face yesterday, forgive me,” I said. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He started as though he were frightened, and looked at me; and I saw that it was not enough, and on the spot, in my full officer’s uniform, I dropped at his feet and bowed my head to the ground. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Forgive me,” I said. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Then he was completely aghast. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Your honor ... sir, what are you doing? Am I worth it?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">And he burst out crying as I had done before, hid this face in his hands, turned to the window and shook all over with his sobs. I flew out to my comrade and jumped into the carriage. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Ready,” I cried. “Have you ever seen a conqueror?” I asked him. “Here is one before you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I was in ecstasy, laughing and talking all the way, I don’t remember what about. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">He looked at me. “Well, brother, you are a plucky fellow, you’ll keep up the honor of the uniform, I can see.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">So we reached the place and found them there, waiting us. We were placed twelve paces apart; he had the first shot. I stood gayly, looking him full in the face; I did not twitch an eyelash, I looked lovingly at him, for I knew what I would do. His shot just grazed my cheek and ear. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Thank God,” I cried, “no man has been killed,” and I seized my pistol, turned back and flung it far away into the wood. “That’s the place for you,” I cried. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I turned to my adversary. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Forgive me, young fool that I am, sir,” I said, “for my unprovoked insult to you and for forcing you to fire at me. I am ten times worse than you and more, maybe. Tell that to the person whom you hold dearest in the world.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I had no sooner said this than they all three shouted at me. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Upon my word,” cried my adversary, annoyed, “if you did not want to fight, why did not you let me alone?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Yesterday I was a fool, to‐day I know better,” I answered him gayly. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“As to yesterday, I believe you, but as for to‐day, it is difficult to agree with your opinion,” said he. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Bravo,” I cried, clapping my hands. “I agree with you there too. I have deserved it!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Will you shoot, sir, or not?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“No, I won’t,” I said; “if you like, fire at me again, but it would be better for you not to fire.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">The seconds, especially mine, were shouting too: “Can you disgrace the regiment like this, facing your antagonist and begging his forgiveness! If I’d only known this!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I stood facing them all, not laughing now. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Gentlemen,” I said, “is it really so wonderful in these days to find a man who can repent of his stupidity and publicly confess his wrongdoing?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“But not in a duel,” cried my second again. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“That’s what’s so strange,” I said. “For I ought to have owned my fault as soon as I got here, before he had fired a shot, before leading him into a great and deadly sin; but we have made our life so grotesque, that to act in that way would have been almost impossible, for only after I have faced his shot at the distance of twelve paces could my words have any significance for him, and if I had spoken before, he would have said, ‘He is a coward, the sight of the pistols has frightened him, no use to listen to him.’ Gentlemen,” I cried suddenly, speaking straight from my heart, “look around you at the gifts of God, the clear sky, the pure air, the tender grass, the birds; nature is beautiful and sinless, and we, only we, are sinful and foolish, and we don’t understand that life is heaven, for we have only to understand that and it will at once be fulfilled in all its beauty, we shall embrace each other and weep.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I would have said more but I could not; my voice broke with the sweetness and youthful gladness of it, and there was such bliss in my heart as I had never known before in my life. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“All this as rational and edifying,” said my antagonist, “and in any case you are an original person.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You may laugh,” I said to him, laughing too, “but afterwards you will approve of me.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Oh, I am ready to approve of you now,” said he; “will you shake hands? for I believe you are genuinely sincere.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“No,” I said, “not now, later on when I have grown worthier and deserve your esteem, then shake hands and you will do well.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">We went home, my second upbraiding me all the way, while I kissed him. All my comrades heard of the affair at once and gathered together to pass judgment on me the same day. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“He has disgraced the uniform,” they said; “let him resign his commission.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Some stood up for me: “He faced the shot,” they said. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Yes, but he was afraid of his other shot and begged for forgiveness.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“If he had been afraid of being shot, he would have shot his own pistol first before asking forgiveness, while he flung it loaded into the forest. No, there’s something else in this, something original.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">I enjoyed listening and looking at them. “My dear friends and comrades,” said I, “don’t worry about my resigning my commission, for I have done so already. I have sent in my papers this morning and as soon as I get my discharge I shall go into a monastery—it’s with that object I am leaving the regiment.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">When I had said this every one of them burst out laughing. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You should have told us of that first, that explains everything, we can’t judge a monk.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">They laughed and could not stop themselves, and not scornfully, but kindly and merrily. They all felt friendly to me at once, even those who had been sternest in their censure, and all the following month, before my discharge came, they could not make enough of me. “Ah, you monk,” they would say. And every one said something kind to me, they began trying to dissuade me, even to pity me: “What are you doing to yourself?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“No,” they would say, “he is a brave fellow, he faced fire and could have fired his own pistol too, but he had a dream the night before that he should become a monk, that’s why he did it.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">It was the same thing with the society of the town. Till then I had been kindly received, but had not been the object of special attention, and now all came to know me at once and invited me; they laughed at me, but they loved me. I may mention that although everybody talked openly of our duel, the authorities took no notice of it, because my antagonist was a near relation of our general, and as there had been no bloodshed and no serious consequences, and as I resigned my commission, they took it as a joke. And I began then to speak aloud and fearlessly, regardless of their laughter, for it was always kindly and not spiteful laughter. These conversations mostly took place in the evenings, in the company of ladies; women particularly liked listening to me then and they made the men listen. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“But how can I possibly be responsible for all?” every one would laugh in my face. “Can I, for instance, be responsible for you?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“You may well not know it,” I would answer, “since the whole world has long been going on a different line, since we consider the veriest lies as truth and demand the same lies from others. Here I have for once in my life acted sincerely and, well, you all look upon me as a madman. Though you are friendly to me, yet, you see, you all laugh at me.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“But how can we help being friendly to you?” said my hostess, laughing. The room was full of people. All of a sudden the young lady rose, on whose account the duel had been fought and whom only lately I had intended to be my future wife. I had not noticed her coming into the room. She got up, came to me and held out her hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">“Let me tell you,” she said, “that I am the first not to laugh at you, but on the contrary I thank you with tears and express my respect for you for your action then.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';">Her husband, too, came up and then they all approached me and almost kissed me. My heart was filled with joy, but my attention was especially caught by a middle‐aged man who came up to me with the others. I knew him by name already, but had never made his acquaintance nor exchanged a word with him till that evening. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> (to be continued)</span></p>
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<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', 'serif';"> </span></p>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children: (XIb-c) On Elders. Elder Zossima and Peasant Women Who Have Faith2022-10-14T17:45:21Z2022-10-14T17:45:21Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/732-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xib-c-on-elders-elder-zossima-and-peasant-women-who-have-faith.htmlDostoievski et al.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/staret.jpg" width="250" height="144" alt="staret" style="float: right;" />And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and the Mother of Jesus was there..."</i></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">" Whenever a person gazes upon an object he receives in himself an image of that object. Those who gaze at the true God receive in themselves the properties of the divine nature. Those who attend to the vanity of idols are changed into what they behold and become stone instead of men.” </span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(St. Gregory of Nyssa quoted <a href="http://www.annunciationri.info/frbakerwriting.cfm" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> and <a href="https://www.saintsophiadc.org/seeing-becoming-mirror-contemplation-st-gregory-nyssas-commentary-song-songs/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, and paraphrased: "We become what we behold")<i> </i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Is Zossima the literary embodiment of Hesychast Eldership? Or is he not? From the early salvos of <span style="color: black;">Leontiev vs Rozanov <a href="https://orthochristian.com/134783.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">to this day</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, much ink has flown around this question. Our tentative answer, based on mere pedestrian thoughts about the practical issues involved, is yes, and no, and let us, readers, fill in the blanks and do our homework. </span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yes: for, as we have <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">previously</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">intimated</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, Elder Zossima is a foremost bearer of the Mystery of Wise Motherhood. He stands for the angelic heirs, bearers and bestowers of the all-forgiving, co-suffering, loving ways of the Mother of God. His prayers and demeanor point to Our Lady. He is close to her. And she brings to him many wise natural mothers, and many God-seeking humbled and injured. Their eyes are turned to her. They seek her protection. In the novel, as in the real world of Dostoevsky. The eyes of Dostoevsky's own wise mother, as the eyes of Alyosha's mother were turned to her. Their sons found the Elders: Our Lady's closest ones, who unceasingly behold the Maternal icon of co-suffering love. Who, in so doing, become icons of co-suffering love [1] . Here is the heart of Dostoevsky. Here is his key. The practical red line that runs through all our author's work (also see Met. Anthony Krhapovitsky.) </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And no: for, while the worlds of Hesychast Eldership and Wise Motherhood mutually presuppose and support each other, they are not, strictly speaking, the same. And, while making it clear that the former is his indispensable framework, so to speak, Dostoevsky always focuses on the latter. He focuses on what he knows best, and has experienced first hand, for more than the two days of his Optina sojourn [2]. It is as if the Elders had blessed the establishment of a School for children and youth, perhaps especially for young mothers [3], under monastic supervision, in the vicinity of the monastery. (Elder Ambrose of Optina is actually known to have blessed projects akin to this.) Alyosha's real life followers - Dostoevsky's readers - are simply introduced to the lay School of the Mother of God, as an alternative to the <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/713-bicentenar-dostoievski-adolescentul-fragment-.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Touchard</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">.[4] So as to become good parents, and good sons of Holy Russia, rather than <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/724.html">radical</a> and <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/economie-politica/656-a-tale-of-two-cities.html">technocratic</a> 'devils'.</span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And finally, for the Dostoevskian homework: as a simple starting point, we note an important blank left in Elder Zossima's famous autobiography (as reverently rendered in Alyosha's notes, to follow this posting shortly). Psychologically, let alone spiritually, there is a glaring blank in it: there seems to be no remembrance, no mention of the elder's own monastic elder! Essentially, there are only reverent and precious pre-monastic memories, and further equally precious spiritual advice for the 'post-monastic' Alyosha. </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yet, the first person that any elder would reverently turn to, and remember, every morning and evening, along with the Mother of God and the Saints, would be his own spiritual Elder, his own beloved "Zossima''. Just as Alyosha does (in direct confirmation of the undying filial piety always reserved in his heart for his natural mother, while even completing and surpassing it, in a spiritual sense.) Just as the real Optina Elders did, according to their Optina biographies, written by those who knew them well.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Indeed, this is what Filial Piety in the context of The Golden Chain of Eldership (Dostoevsky's indispensable framework) would seem to imply: "A man who does not express a desire to link himself to the latest of the saints (in time) in all love and humility, owing to a certain distrust in himself, will never be linked to the preceding saints and will not be admitted to their succession, even though he thinks he possesses all possible faith and love for God and for all His saints." (St. Symeon the New Theologian)</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Psychologically, and spiritually, a writer of Dostoevsky's stature could not have overlooked such a gap. Unless it was to direct his readers to the actual Lives of the Elders (also see <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">note 1 </span></a><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">), as if telling them: you need to check my framework directly, you really need to fill in the blanks, perhaps to refine some things, and finish the homework. [5]</span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Notes:</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The notes can safely be omitted at a first reading, but perhaps at some point they could be of use to those interested to further explore how things fit in, in the interpretation sketched above:</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[1] Therefore, to various degrees, so do their followers. Thus, Elder Zossima becomes not only the spiritual father, but also, and crucially, the angelic second mother of Alyosha. So that Alyosha, in turn, becomes not only a brother, but like a wise mother to his abandoned brothers, whose memories of their natural mothers are painfully lost or broken. While writing this we came across the outstanding interpretation of Diane Oenning Thompson (<i>The Brothers Karamazov and the Poetics of Memory, 1991</i>). In many ways, we feel, it complements what we are trying to say, and it includes many of the most relevant citations. In other ways, perhaps she doesn't push the maternal and spiritual ideas far enough. Cf. also <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">these</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/712-bicentenar-dostoievski-i-nu-dezndjdui.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">discussions</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of Mujik Marey, <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, <span style="color: black;">etc. </span></span></span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[2] Dostoevsky's Optina experience is also duly valued, however, even in today's reading. We highlight the relevant passage in an endnote to the reading, adding to it Anna Dostoevskaya's moving explanation, from her <i>Dostoevsky Reminiscences</i>. See below.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[3] Also see St. Nektarios of Aegina on wise motherhood <a href="https://saintkosmas.org/st-nektarios-mothers-and-the-upbringing-of-children" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, archived <a href="https://archive.ph/740c8" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> ( "Mothers and the Upbringing of Children." Translation of "Ἡ ἀγωγὴ τῶν παίδων καὶ αἱ Μητέρες", by Thomas Carroll.)</span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[4] That is, to the School of those beholding an idol: the proud Western God. Military-like and dueling; ever offended and retributive; half "Euclidean" - half "Romantic"; rationalist like a clockmaker in some ways and capricious like the passions in others; legalistic and egotistic; cold and distant like the father of an "accidental family" in need of a mother-like civilizing hero to be reborn in Christ. Innerly split Dostoevskian personalities like Ivan of course belong to both Schools, to various extents. (So do the author and his readers, after all: we all are, to some degree or other, in prey of delusion, a real Elder noted.) So did even Elder Zossima, in his distant youth. As we understand him, he now teaches, based on personal experience and that of the Spiritual Golden Chain, that unification can be achieved, but only around the Mother of God. But let our diligent readers check for themselves.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[5] How would Dostoevsky have written had he lived to see the age of the rediscovery of the hesychast icon, starting with the Vladimir Mother of God and the "Golden Age" of Rublev's Trinity? Or: could he have honestly been expected to refute Ivan's "distant god" concerns ("where parallel lines meet", in Oenning Thompson's keen deciphering of the non-Euclidean metaphor) in the Palamite language of Fr. Dumitru Staniloae and the generation of Fr. George Florovsky's students? Wasn't it natural for him to keep close to the Mother of God and her practical School, which every mudjik could understand? Or: would he have treated miracles based on the discrimination of the spirits, rather than on mere denial of sense experince (potentially leading his 'realist' hero straight to solipsism, if not, by uneducated reaction to "surprises", to more exotic forms of prelest...), had he met such wonderworkers as St. John of Shanghai or St. Arsenios the Cappadocian? These and other attractive review questions must be left to our diligent readers. Some of them have at least partially been tackled, e.g. by <a href="https://publicorthodoxy.org/2020/09/22/remembering-sergey-sergeevich-horujy/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">S</span></a><a href="https://publicorthodoxy.org/2020/09/22/remembering-sergey-sergeevich-horujy/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. Horujy</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> [relevant <a href="https://synergia-isa.ru/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/hor_karamazov_boston_2008_eng.pdf" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">pdf here</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">], among others.</span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">F.M. Dostoevsky</span></b></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">From <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, 1880 </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Translation by Constance Garnett</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">On Elders. Elder Zossima</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Some of my readers may imagine that my young man was a sickly, ecstatic, poorly developed creature, a pale, consumptive dreamer. On the contrary, Alyosha was at this time a well‐grown, red‐cheeked, clear‐eyed lad of nineteen, radiant with health. He was very handsome, too, graceful, moderately tall, with hair of a dark brown, with a regular, rather long, oval‐shaped face, and wide‐set dark gray, shining eyes; he was very thoughtful, and apparently very serene. I shall be told, perhaps, that red cheeks are not incompatible with fanaticism and mysticism; but I fancy that Alyosha was more of a realist than any one. Oh! no doubt, in the monastery he fully believed in miracles, but, to my thinking, miracles are never a stumbling‐block to the realist. It is not miracles that dispose realists to belief. The genuine realist, if he is an unbeliever, will always find strength and ability to disbelieve in the miraculous, and if he is confronted with a miracle as an irrefutable fact he would rather disbelieve his own senses than admit the fact. Even if he admits it, he admits it as a fact of nature till then unrecognized by him. Faith does not, in the realist, spring from the miracle but the miracle from faith. If the realist once believes, then he is bound by his very realism to admit the miraculous also. The Apostle Thomas said that he would not believe till he saw, but when he did see he said, “My Lord and my God!” Was it the miracle forced him to believe? Most likely not, but he believed solely because he desired to believe and possibly he fully believed in his secret heart even when he said, “I do not believe till I see.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I shall be told, perhaps, that Alyosha was stupid, undeveloped, had not finished his studies, and so on. That he did not finish his studies is true, but to say that he was stupid or dull would be a great injustice. I’ll simply repeat what I have said above. He entered upon this path only because, at that time, it alone struck his imagination and presented itself to him as offering an ideal means of escape for his soul from darkness to light. Add to that that he was to some extent a youth of our last epoch—that is, honest in nature, desiring the truth, seeking for it and believing in it, and seeking to serve it at once with all the strength of his soul, seeking for immediate action, and ready to sacrifice everything, life itself, for it. Though these young men unhappily fail to understand that the sacrifice of life is, in many cases, the easiest of all sacrifices, and that to sacrifice, for instance, five or six years of their seething youth to hard and tedious study, if only to multiply tenfold their powers of serving the truth and the cause they have set before them as their goal—such a sacrifice is utterly beyond the strength of many of them. The path Alyosha chose was a path going in the opposite direction, but he chose it with the same thirst for swift achievement. As soon as he reflected seriously he was convinced of the existence of God and immortality, and at once he instinctively said to himself: “I want to live for immortality, and I will accept no compromise.” In the same way, if he had decided that God and immortality did not exist, he would at once have become an atheist and a socialist. For socialism is not merely the labor question, it is before all things the atheistic question, the question of the form taken by atheism to‐day, the question of the tower of Babel built without God, not to mount to heaven from earth but to set up heaven on earth. Alyosha would have found it strange and impossible to go on living as before. It is written: “Give all that thou hast to the poor and follow Me, if thou wouldst be perfect.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha said to himself: “I can’t give two roubles instead of ‘all,’ and only go to mass instead of ‘following Him.’ ” Perhaps his memories of childhood brought back our monastery, to which his mother may have taken him to mass. Perhaps the slanting sunlight and the holy image to which his poor “crazy” mother had held him up still acted upon his imagination. Brooding on these things he may have come to us perhaps only to see whether here he could sacrifice all or only “two roubles,” and in the monastery he met this elder. I must digress to explain what an “elder” is in Russian monasteries, and I am sorry that I do not feel very competent to do so. I will try, however, to give a superficial account of it in a few words. Authorities on the subject assert that the institution of “elders” is of recent date, not more than a hundred years old in our monasteries, though in the orthodox East, especially in Sinai and Athos, it has existed over a thousand years. It is maintained that it existed in ancient times in Russia also, but through the calamities which overtook Russia—the Tartars, civil war, the interruption of relations with the East after the destruction of Constantinople—this institution fell into oblivion. It was revived among us towards the end of last century by one of the great “ascetics,” as they called him, Païssy Velitchkovsky, and his disciples. But to this day it exists in few monasteries only, and has sometimes been almost persecuted as an innovation in Russia. It flourished especially in the celebrated Kozelski Optin Monastery. When and how it was introduced into our monastery I cannot say. There had already been three such elders and Zossima was the last of them. But he was almost dying of weakness and disease, and they had no one to take his place. The question for our monastery was an important one, for it had not been distinguished by anything in particular till then: they had neither relics of saints, nor wonder‐working ikons, nor glorious traditions, nor historical exploits. It had flourished and been glorious all over Russia through its elders, to see and hear whom pilgrims had flocked for thousands of miles from all parts. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">What was such an elder? An elder was one who took your soul, your will, into his soul and his will. When you choose an elder, you renounce your own will and yield it to him in complete submission, complete self‐ abnegation. This novitiate, this terrible school of abnegation, is undertaken voluntarily, in the hope of self‐conquest, of self‐mastery, in order, after a life of obedience, to attain perfect freedom, that is, from self; to escape the lot of those who have lived their whole life without finding their true selves in themselves. This institution of elders is not founded on theory, but was established in the East from the practice of a thousand years. The obligations due to an elder are not the ordinary “obedience” which has always existed in our Russian monasteries. The obligation involves confession to the elder by all who have submitted themselves to him, and to the indissoluble bond between him and them. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The story is told, for instance, that in the early days of Christianity one such novice, failing to fulfill some command laid upon him by his elder, left his monastery in Syria and went to Egypt. There, after great exploits, he was found worthy at last to suffer torture and a martyr’s death for the faith. When the Church, regarding him as a saint, was burying him, suddenly, at the deacon’s exhortation, “Depart all ye unbaptized,” the coffin containing the martyr’s body left its place and was cast forth from the church, and this took place three times. And only at last they learnt that this holy man had broken his vow of obedience and left his elder, and, therefore, could not be forgiven without the elder’s absolution in spite of his great deeds. Only after this could the funeral take place. This, of course, is only an old legend. But here is a recent instance. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A monk was suddenly commanded by his elder to quit Athos, which he loved as a sacred place and a haven of refuge, and to go first to Jerusalem to do homage to the Holy Places and then to go to the north to Siberia: “There is the place for thee and not here.” The monk, overwhelmed with sorrow, went to the Œcumenical Patriarch at Constantinople and besought him to release him from his obedience. But the Patriarch replied that not only was he unable to release him, but there was not and could not be on earth a power which could release him except the elder who had himself laid that duty upon him. In this way the elders are endowed in certain cases with unbounded and inexplicable authority. That is why in many of our monasteries the institution was at first resisted almost to persecution. Meantime the elders immediately began to be highly esteemed among the people. Masses of the ignorant people as well as men of distinction flocked, for instance, to the elders of our monastery to confess their doubts, their sins, and their sufferings, and ask for counsel and admonition. Seeing this, the opponents of the elders declared that the sacrament of confession was being arbitrarily and frivolously degraded, though the continual opening of the heart to the elder by the monk or the layman had nothing of the character of the sacrament. In the end, however, the institution of elders has been retained and is becoming established in Russian monasteries. It is true, perhaps, that this instrument which had stood the test of a thousand years for the moral regeneration of a man from slavery to freedom and to moral perfectibility may be a two‐edged weapon and it may lead some not to humility and complete self‐control but to the most Satanic pride, that is, to bondage and not to freedom. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder Zossima was sixty‐five. He came of a family of landowners, had been in the army in early youth, and served in the Caucasus as an officer. He had, no doubt, impressed Alyosha by some peculiar quality of his soul. Alyosha lived in the cell of the elder, who was very fond of him and let him wait upon him. It must be noted that Alyosha was bound by no obligation and could go where he pleased and be absent for whole days. Though he wore the monastic dress it was voluntarily, not to be different from others. No doubt he liked to do so. Possibly his youthful imagination was deeply stirred by the power and fame of his elder. It was said that so many people had for years past come to confess their sins to Father Zossima and to entreat him for words of advice and healing, that he had acquired the keenest intuition and could tell from an unknown face what a new‐comer wanted, and what was the suffering on his conscience. He sometimes astounded and almost alarmed his visitors by his knowledge of their secrets before they had spoken a word. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha noticed that many, almost all, went in to the elder for the first time with apprehension and uneasiness, but came out with bright and happy faces. Alyosha was particularly struck by the fact that Father Zossima was not at all stern. On the contrary, he was always almost gay. The monks used to say that he was more drawn to those who were more sinful, and the greater the sinner the more he loved him. There were, no doubt, up to the end of his life, among the monks some who hated and envied him, but they were few in number and they were silent, though among them were some of great dignity in the monastery, one, for instance, of the older monks distinguished for his strict keeping of fasts and vows of silence. But the majority were on Father Zossima’s side and very many of them loved him with all their hearts, warmly and sincerely. Some were almost fanatically devoted to him, and declared, though not quite aloud, that he was a saint, that there could be no doubt of it, and, seeing that his end was near, they anticipated miracles and great glory to the monastery in the immediate future from his relics. Alyosha had unquestioning faith in the miraculous power of the elder, just as he had unquestioning faith in the story of the coffin that flew out of the church. He saw many who came with sick children or relatives and besought the elder to lay hands on them and to pray over them, return shortly after—some the next day—and, falling in tears at the elder’s feet, thank him for healing their sick. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Whether they had really been healed or were simply better in the natural course of the disease was a question which did not exist for Alyosha, for he fully believed in the spiritual power of his teacher and rejoiced in his fame, in his glory, as though it were his own triumph. His heart throbbed, and he beamed, as it were, all over when the elder came out to the gates of the hermitage into the waiting crowd of pilgrims of the humbler class who had flocked from all parts of Russia on purpose to see the elder and obtain his blessing. They fell down before him, wept, kissed his feet, kissed the earth on which he stood, and wailed, while the women held up their children to him and brought him the sick “possessed with devils.” The elder spoke to them, read a brief prayer over them, blessed them, and dismissed them. Of late he had become so weak through attacks of illness that he was sometimes unable to leave his cell, and the pilgrims waited for him to come out for several days. Alyosha did not wonder why they loved him so, why they fell down before him and wept with emotion merely at seeing his face. Oh! he understood that for the humble soul of the Russian peasant, worn out by grief and toil, and still more by the everlasting injustice and everlasting sin, his own and the world’s, it was the greatest need and comfort to find some one or something holy to fall down before and worship. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Among us there is sin, injustice, and temptation, but yet, somewhere on earth there is some one holy and exalted. He has the truth; he knows the truth; so it is not dead upon the earth; so it will come one day to us, too, and rule over all the earth according to the promise.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha knew that this was just how the people felt and even reasoned. He understood it, but that the elder Zossima was this saint and custodian of God’s truth—of that he had no more doubt than the weeping peasants and the sick women who held out their children to the elder. The conviction that after his death the elder would bring extraordinary glory to the monastery was even stronger in Alyosha than in any one there, and, of late, a kind of deep flame of inner ecstasy burnt more and more strongly in his heart. He was not at all troubled at this elder’s standing as a solitary example before him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“No matter. He is holy. He carries in his heart the secret of renewal for all: that power which will, at last, establish truth on the earth, and all men will be holy and love one another, and there will be no more rich nor poor, no exalted nor humbled, but all will be as the children of God, and the true Kingdom of Christ will come.” That was the dream in Alyosha’s heart. [...]</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Peasant Women Who Have Faith</span></b></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Near the wooden portico below, built on to the outer wall of the precinct, there was a crowd of about twenty peasant women. They had been told that the elder was at last coming out, and they had gathered together in anticipation. [...]</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Father Zossima, on entering the portico, went first straight to the peasants who were crowded at the foot of the three steps that led up into the portico. Father Zossima stood on the top step, put on his stole, and began blessing the women who thronged about him. One crazy woman was led up to him. As soon as she caught sight of the elder she began shrieking and writhing as though in the pains of childbirth. Laying the stole on her forehead, he read a short prayer over her, and she was at once soothed and quieted. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I do not know how it may be now, but in my childhood I often happened to see and hear these “possessed” women in the villages and monasteries. They used to be brought to mass; they would squeal and bark like a dog so that they were heard all over the church. But when the sacrament was carried in and they were led up to it, at once the “possession” ceased, and the sick women were always soothed for a time. I was greatly impressed and amazed at this as a child; but then I heard from country neighbors and from my town teachers that the whole illness was simulated to avoid work, and that it could always be cured by suitable severity; various anecdotes were told to confirm this. But later on I learnt with astonishment from medical specialists that there is no pretense about it, that it is a terrible illness to which women are subject, specially prevalent among us in Russia, and that it is due to the hard lot of the peasant women. It is a disease, I was told, arising from exhausting toil too soon after hard, abnormal and unassisted labor in childbirth, and from the hopeless misery, from beatings, and so on, which some women were not able to endure like others. The strange and instant healing of the frantic and struggling woman as soon as she was led up to the holy sacrament, which had been explained to me as due to malingering and the trickery of the “clericals,” arose probably in the most natural manner. Both the women who supported her and the invalid herself fully believed as a truth beyond question that the evil spirit in possession of her could not hold out if the sick woman were brought to the sacrament and made to bow down before it. And so, with a nervous and psychically deranged woman, a sort of convulsion of the whole organism always took place, and was bound to take place, at the moment of bowing down to the sacrament, aroused by the expectation of the miracle of healing and the implicit belief that it would come to pass; and it did come to pass, though only for a moment. It was exactly the same now as soon as the elder touched the sick woman with the stole. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Many of the women in the crowd were moved to tears of ecstasy by the effect of the moment: some strove to kiss the hem of his garment, others cried out in sing‐song voices. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He blessed them all and talked with some of them. The “possessed” woman he knew already. She came from a village only six versts from the monastery, and had been brought to him before. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But here is one from afar.” He pointed to a woman by no means old but very thin and wasted, with a face not merely sunburnt but almost blackened by exposure. She was kneeling and gazing with a fixed stare at the elder; there was something almost frenzied in her eyes. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“From afar off, Father, from afar off! From two hundred miles from here. From afar off, Father, from afar off!” the woman began in a sing‐song voice as though she were chanting a dirge, swaying her head from side to side with her cheek resting in her hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">There is silent and long‐suffering sorrow to be met with among the peasantry. It withdraws into itself and is still. But there is a grief that breaks out, and from that minute it bursts into tears and finds vent in wailing. This is particularly common with women. But it is no lighter a grief than the silent. Lamentations comfort only by lacerating the heart still more. Such grief does not desire consolation. It feeds on the sense of its hopelessness. Lamentations spring only from the constant craving to reopen the wound. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You are of the tradesman class?” said Father Zossima, looking curiously at her. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Townfolk we are, Father, townfolk. Yet we are peasants though we live in the town. I have come to see you, O Father! We heard of you, Father, we heard of you. I have buried my little son, and I have come on a pilgrimage. I have been in three monasteries, but they told me, ‘Go, Nastasya, go to them’—that is to you. I have come; I was yesterday at the service, and to‐day I have come to you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What are you weeping for?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It’s my little son I’m grieving for, Father. He was three years old—three years all but three months. For my little boy, Father, I’m in anguish, for my little boy. He was the last one left. We had four, my Nikita and I, and now we’ve no children, our dear ones have all gone. I buried the first three without grieving overmuch, and now I have buried the last I can’t forget him. He seems always standing before me. He never leaves me. He has withered my heart. I look at his little clothes, his little shirt, his little boots, and I wail. I lay out all that is left of him, all his little things. I look at them and wail. I say to Nikita, my husband, ‘Let me go on a pilgrimage, master.’ He is a driver. We’re not poor people, Father, not poor; he drives our own horse. It’s all our own, the horse and the carriage. And what good is it all to us now? My Nikita has begun drinking while I am away. He’s sure to. It used to be so before. As soon as I turn my back he gives way to it. But now I don’t think about him. It’s three months since I left home. I’ve forgotten him. I’ve forgotten everything. I don’t want to remember. And what would our life be now together? I’ve done with him, I’ve done. I’ve done with them all. I don’t care to look upon my house and my goods. I don’t care to see anything at all!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Listen, mother,” said the elder. “Once in olden times a holy saint saw in the Temple a mother like you weeping for her little one, her only one, whom God had taken. ‘Knowest thou not,’ said the saint to her, ‘how bold these little ones are before the throne of God? Verily there are none bolder than they in the Kingdom of Heaven. “Thou didst give us life, O Lord,” they say, “and scarcely had we looked upon it when Thou didst take it back again.” And so boldly they ask and ask again that God gives them at once the rank of angels. Therefore,’ said the saint, ‘thou, too, O mother, rejoice and weep not, for thy little son is with the Lord in the fellowship of the angels.’ That’s what the saint said to the weeping mother of old. He was a great saint and he could not have spoken falsely. Therefore you too, mother, know that your little one is surely before the throne of God, is rejoicing and happy, and praying to God for you, and therefore weep not, but rejoice.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The woman listened to him, looking down with her cheek in her hand. She sighed deeply. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“My Nikita tried to comfort me with the same words as you. ‘Foolish one,’ he said, ‘why weep? Our son is no doubt singing with the angels before God.’ He says that to me, but he weeps himself. I see that he cries like me. ‘I know, Nikita,’ said I. ‘Where could he be if not with the Lord God? Only, here with us now he is not as he used to sit beside us before.’ And if only I could look upon him one little time, if only I could peep at him one little time, without going up to him, without speaking, if I could be hidden in a corner and only see him for one little minute, hear him playing in the yard, calling in his little voice, ‘Mammy, where are you?’ If only I could hear him pattering with his little feet about the room just once, only once; for so often, so often I remember how he used to run to me and shout and laugh, if only I could hear his little feet I should know him! But he’s gone, Father, he’s gone, and I shall never hear him again. Here’s his little sash, but him I shall never see or hear now.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">She drew out of her bosom her boy’s little embroidered sash, and as soon as she looked at it she began shaking with sobs, hiding her eyes with her fingers through which the tears flowed in a sudden stream. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It is Rachel of old,” said the elder, “weeping for her children, and will not be comforted because they are not. Such is the lot set on earth for you mothers. Be not comforted. Consolation is not what you need. Weep and be not consoled, but weep. Only every time that you weep be sure to remember that your little son is one of the angels of God, that he looks down from there at you and sees you, and rejoices at your tears, and points at them to the Lord God; and a long while yet will you keep that great mother’s grief. But it will turn in the end into quiet joy, and your bitter tears will be only tears of tender sorrow that purifies the heart and delivers it from sin. {And I shall pray for the peace of your child’s soul. What was his name?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Alexey, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“A sweet name. After Alexey, the man of God?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Yes, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What a saint he was! I will remember him, mother, and your grief in my prayers, and I will pray for your husband’s health. It is a sin for you to leave him. Your little one will see from heaven that you have forsaken his father, and will weep over you. Why do you trouble his happiness? He is living, for the soul lives for ever, and though he is not in the house he is near you, unseen. How can he go into the house when you say that the house is hateful to you? To whom is he to go if he find you not together, his father and mother? He comes to you in dreams now, and you grieve. But then he will send you gentle dreams. Go to your husband, mother; go this very day.”}(*)</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I will go, Father, at your word. I will go. You’ve gone straight to my heart. My Nikita, my Nikita, you are waiting for me,” the woman began in a sing‐song voice; but the elder had already turned away to a very old woman, dressed like a dweller in the town, not like a pilgrim. Her eyes showed that she had come with an object, and in order to say something. She said she was the widow of a non‐commissioned officer, and lived close by in the town. Her son Vasenka was in the commissariat service, and had gone to Irkutsk in Siberia. He had written twice from there, but now a year had passed since he had written. She did inquire about him, but she did not know the proper place to inquire. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Only the other day Stepanida Ilyinishna—she’s a rich merchant’s wife—said to me, ‘You go, Prohorovna, and put your son’s name down for prayer in the church, and pray for the peace of his soul as though he were dead. His soul will be troubled,’ she said, ‘and he will write you a letter.’ And Stepanida Ilyinishna told me it was a certain thing which had been many times tried. Only I am in doubt.... Oh, you light of ours! is it true or false, and would it be right?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Don’t think of it. It’s shameful to ask the question. How is it possible to pray for the peace of a living soul? And his own mother too! It’s a great sin, akin to sorcery. Only for your ignorance it is forgiven you. Better pray to the Queen of Heaven, our swift defense and help, for his good health, and that she may forgive you for your error. And another thing I will tell you, Prohorovna. Either he will soon come back to you, your son, or he will be sure to send a letter. Go, and henceforward be in peace. Your son is alive, I tell you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Dear Father, God reward you, our benefactor, who prays for all of us and for our sins!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But the elder had already noticed in the crowd two glowing eyes fixed upon him. An exhausted, consumptive‐looking, though young peasant woman was gazing at him in silence. Her eyes besought him, but she seemed afraid to approach. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What is it, my child?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Absolve my soul, Father,” she articulated softly, and slowly sank on her knees and bowed down at his feet. “I have sinned, Father. I am afraid of my sin.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder sat down on the lower step. The woman crept closer to him, still on her knees. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I am a widow these three years,” she began in a half‐whisper, with a sort of shudder. “I had a hard life with my husband. He was an old man. He used to beat me cruelly. He lay ill; I thought looking at him, if he were to get well, if he were to get up again, what then? And then the thought came to me—” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Stay!” said the elder, and he put his ear close to her lips. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The woman went on in a low whisper, so that it was almost impossible to catch anything. She had soon done. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Three years ago?” asked the elder. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Three years. At first I didn’t think about it, but now I’ve begun to be ill, and the thought never leaves me.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Have you come from far?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Over three hundred miles away.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Have you told it in confession?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have confessed it. Twice I have confessed it.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Have you been admitted to Communion?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Yes. I am afraid. I am afraid to die.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Fear nothing and never be afraid; and don’t fret. If only your penitence fail not, God will forgive all. There is no sin, and there can be no sin on all the earth, which the Lord will not forgive to the truly repentant! Man cannot commit a sin so great as to exhaust the infinite love of God. Can there be a sin which could exceed the love of God? Think only of repentance, continual repentance, but dismiss fear altogether. Believe that God loves you as you cannot conceive; that He loves you with your sin, in your sin. It has been said of old that over one repentant sinner there is more joy in heaven than over ten righteous men. Go, and fear not. Be not bitter against men. Be not angry if you are wronged. Forgive the dead man in your heart what wrong he did you. Be reconciled with him in truth. If you are penitent, you love. And if you love you are of God. All things are atoned for, all things are saved by love. If I, a sinner, even as you are, am tender with you and have pity on you, how much more will God. Love is such a priceless treasure that you can redeem the whole world by it, and expiate not only your own sins but the sins of others.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He signed her three times with the cross, took from his own neck a little ikon and put it upon her. She bowed down to the earth without speaking. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He got up and looked cheerfully at a healthy peasant woman with a tiny baby in her arms. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“From Vyshegorye, dear Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Five miles you have dragged yourself with the baby. What do you want?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I’ve come to look at you. I have been to you before—or have you forgotten? You’ve no great memory if you’ve forgotten me. They told us you were ill. Thinks I, I’ll go and see him for myself. Now I see you, and you’re not ill! You’ll live another twenty years. God bless you! There are plenty to pray for you; how should you be ill?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I thank you for all, daughter.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“By the way, I have a thing to ask, not a great one. Here are sixty copecks. Give them, dear Father, to some one poorer than me. I thought as I came along, better give through him. He’ll know whom to give to.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Thanks, my dear, thanks! You are a good woman. I love you. I will do so certainly. Is that your little girl?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“My little girl, Father, Lizaveta.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“May the Lord bless you both, you and your babe Lizaveta! You have gladdened my heart, mother. Farewell, dear children, farewell, dear ones.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He blessed them all and bowed low to them. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(*) Editor's note: The passage that begins with the phrase: 'And I shall pray for the peace of your child’s soul.', and ends with: 'Go to your husband, mother; go this very day.”', is quoted by Anna G. Dostoevskaya, the author's wife, in her <i>Notes to Literary Works of F. M. Dostoevsky</i> (1904-1906), according to Beatrice Stillman, translator and editor of the "Dostoevsky Reminiscences" by the same author (1918 [Liveright, NY: 1975, p 404]). In the latter work (pp. 292-94) Dostoevskaya adds a moving explanation, part of which is rendered below:</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"As for me, the death of our darling little boy [Alexey, on May 16, 1878, aged three] was shattering. I so lost my bearings, mourned and cried so much that I was unrecognizable. My customary cheerfulness vanished together with my normal flow of energy, which gave way to apathy. I grew impassive to everything: the management of the household, our business affairs, and even my own children; and I gave myself utterly to my memories of the last three years. Fyodor Mikhailovich recorded many of my doubts, thoughts, and even words in the chapter of the <i>Brothers Karamazov</i> called "Women of Faith", in which a woman who has lost her child unburdens her grief to Father Zossima. [...]</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"My husband returned from Optina seemingly at peace and much calmer, and told me a great deal about the customs of the hermitage where he had passed two days. He met with the renowned elder, Father Ambrosius, three times: once in the presence of others and twice alone. These talks had a profound and lasting effect on him. When he told the elder about the loss we had suffered and about my violent grief, the latter asked whether I was a believer. And when Fyodor Mikhailovich said that I was, the elder asked him to convey his blessing to me as well as those words which later, in [<i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>] Father Zossima spoke to the grief-stricken mother... It was clear from my husband's stories about him what a profound seer and interpreter of human heart this universally respected elder was."</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><i><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/staret.jpg" width="250" height="144" alt="staret" style="float: right;" />And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee; and the Mother of Jesus was there..."</i></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">" Whenever a person gazes upon an object he receives in himself an image of that object. Those who gaze at the true God receive in themselves the properties of the divine nature. Those who attend to the vanity of idols are changed into what they behold and become stone instead of men.” </span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(St. Gregory of Nyssa quoted <a href="http://www.annunciationri.info/frbakerwriting.cfm" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> and <a href="https://www.saintsophiadc.org/seeing-becoming-mirror-contemplation-st-gregory-nyssas-commentary-song-songs/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, and paraphrased: "We become what we behold")<i> </i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Is Zossima the literary embodiment of Hesychast Eldership? Or is he not? From the early salvos of <span style="color: black;">Leontiev vs Rozanov <a href="https://orthochristian.com/134783.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">to this day</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, much ink has flown around this question. Our tentative answer, based on mere pedestrian thoughts about the practical issues involved, is yes, and no, and let us, readers, fill in the blanks and do our homework. </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yes: for, as we have <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">previously</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">intimated</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, Elder Zossima is a foremost bearer of the Mystery of Wise Motherhood. He stands for the angelic heirs, bearers and bestowers of the all-forgiving, co-suffering, loving ways of the Mother of God. His prayers and demeanor point to Our Lady. He is close to her. And she brings to him many wise natural mothers, and many God-seeking humbled and injured. Their eyes are turned to her. They seek her protection. In the novel, as in the real world of Dostoevsky. The eyes of Dostoevsky's own wise mother, as the eyes of Alyosha's mother were turned to her. Their sons found the Elders: Our Lady's closest ones, who unceasingly behold the Maternal icon of co-suffering love. Who, in so doing, become icons of co-suffering love [1] . Here is the heart of Dostoevsky. Here is his key. The practical red line that runs through all our author's work (also see Met. Anthony Krhapovitsky.) </span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And no: for, while the worlds of Hesychast Eldership and Wise Motherhood mutually presuppose and support each other, they are not, strictly speaking, the same. And, while making it clear that the former is his indispensable framework, so to speak, Dostoevsky always focuses on the latter. He focuses on what he knows best, and has experienced first hand, for more than the two days of his Optina sojourn [2]. It is as if the Elders had blessed the establishment of a School for children and youth, perhaps especially for young mothers [3], under monastic supervision, in the vicinity of the monastery. (Elder Ambrose of Optina is actually known to have blessed projects akin to this.) Alyosha's real life followers - Dostoevsky's readers - are simply introduced to the lay School of the Mother of God, as an alternative to the <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/713-bicentenar-dostoievski-adolescentul-fragment-.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Touchard</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">.[4] So as to become good parents, and good sons of Holy Russia, rather than <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/724.html">radical</a> and <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/economie-politica/656-a-tale-of-two-cities.html">technocratic</a> 'devils'.</span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">And finally, for the Dostoevskian homework: as a simple starting point, we note an important blank left in Elder Zossima's famous autobiography (as reverently rendered in Alyosha's notes, to follow this posting shortly). Psychologically, let alone spiritually, there is a glaring blank in it: there seems to be no remembrance, no mention of the elder's own monastic elder! Essentially, there are only reverent and precious pre-monastic memories, and further equally precious spiritual advice for the 'post-monastic' Alyosha. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Yet, the first person that any elder would reverently turn to, and remember, every morning and evening, along with the Mother of God and the Saints, would be his own spiritual Elder, his own beloved "Zossima''. Just as Alyosha does (in direct confirmation of the undying filial piety always reserved in his heart for his natural mother, while even completing and surpassing it, in a spiritual sense.) Just as the real Optina Elders did, according to their Optina biographies, written by those who knew them well.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Indeed, this is what Filial Piety in the context of The Golden Chain of Eldership (Dostoevsky's indispensable framework) would seem to imply: "A man who does not express a desire to link himself to the latest of the saints (in time) in all love and humility, owing to a certain distrust in himself, will never be linked to the preceding saints and will not be admitted to their succession, even though he thinks he possesses all possible faith and love for God and for all His saints." (St. Symeon the New Theologian)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Psychologically, and spiritually, a writer of Dostoevsky's stature could not have overlooked such a gap. Unless it was to direct his readers to the actual Lives of the Elders (also see <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">note 1 </span></a><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">), as if telling them: you need to check my framework directly, you really need to fill in the blanks, perhaps to refine some things, and finish the homework. [5]</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Notes:</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The notes can safely be omitted at a first reading, but perhaps at some point they could be of use to those interested to further explore how things fit in, in the interpretation sketched above:</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[1] Therefore, to various degrees, so do their followers. Thus, Elder Zossima becomes not only the spiritual father, but also, and crucially, the angelic second mother of Alyosha. So that Alyosha, in turn, becomes not only a brother, but like a wise mother to his abandoned brothers, whose memories of their natural mothers are painfully lost or broken. While writing this we came across the outstanding interpretation of Diane Oenning Thompson (<i>The Brothers Karamazov and the Poetics of Memory, 1991</i>). In many ways, we feel, it complements what we are trying to say, and it includes many of the most relevant citations. In other ways, perhaps she doesn't push the maternal and spiritual ideas far enough. Cf. also <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">these</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/712-bicentenar-dostoievski-i-nu-dezndjdui.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">discussions</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> of Mujik Marey, <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, <span style="color: black;">etc. </span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[2] Dostoevsky's Optina experience is also duly valued, however, even in today's reading. We highlight the relevant passage in an endnote to the reading, adding to it Anna Dostoevskaya's moving explanation, from her <i>Dostoevsky Reminiscences</i>. See below.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[3] Also see St. Nektarios of Aegina on wise motherhood <a href="https://saintkosmas.org/st-nektarios-mothers-and-the-upbringing-of-children" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, archived <a href="https://archive.ph/740c8" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> ( "Mothers and the Upbringing of Children." Translation of "Ἡ ἀγωγὴ τῶν παίδων καὶ αἱ Μητέρες", by Thomas Carroll.)</span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[4] That is, to the School of those beholding an idol: the proud Western God. Military-like and dueling; ever offended and retributive; half "Euclidean" - half "Romantic"; rationalist like a clockmaker in some ways and capricious like the passions in others; legalistic and egotistic; cold and distant like the father of an "accidental family" in need of a mother-like civilizing hero to be reborn in Christ. Innerly split Dostoevskian personalities like Ivan of course belong to both Schools, to various extents. (So do the author and his readers, after all: we all are, to some degree or other, in prey of delusion, a real Elder noted.) So did even Elder Zossima, in his distant youth. As we understand him, he now teaches, based on personal experience and that of the Spiritual Golden Chain, that unification can be achieved, but only around the Mother of God. But let our diligent readers check for themselves.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">[5] How would Dostoevsky have written had he lived to see the age of the rediscovery of the hesychast icon, starting with the Vladimir Mother of God and the "Golden Age" of Rublev's Trinity? Or: could he have honestly been expected to refute Ivan's "distant god" concerns ("where parallel lines meet", in Oenning Thompson's keen deciphering of the non-Euclidean metaphor) in the Palamite language of Fr. Dumitru Staniloae and the generation of Fr. George Florovsky's students? Wasn't it natural for him to keep close to the Mother of God and her practical School, which every mudjik could understand? Or: would he have treated miracles based on the discrimination of the spirits, rather than on mere denial of sense experince (potentially leading his 'realist' hero straight to solipsism, if not, by uneducated reaction to "surprises", to more exotic forms of prelest...), had he met such wonderworkers as St. John of Shanghai or St. Arsenios the Cappadocian? These and other attractive review questions must be left to our diligent readers. Some of them have at least partially been tackled, e.g. by <a href="https://publicorthodoxy.org/2020/09/22/remembering-sergey-sergeevich-horujy/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">S</span></a><a href="https://publicorthodoxy.org/2020/09/22/remembering-sergey-sergeevich-horujy/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. Horujy</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> [relevant <a href="https://synergia-isa.ru/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/hor_karamazov_boston_2008_eng.pdf" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">pdf here</span></a><span style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">], among others.</span></span></span></p>
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<p align="center" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">***</span></p>
<p align="center" style="margin-bottom: 0in; text-align: center; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">F.M. Dostoevsky</span></b></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">From <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, 1880 </span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Translation by Constance Garnett</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 0in; line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">On Elders. Elder Zossima</span></b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></p>
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<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Some of my readers may imagine that my young man was a sickly, ecstatic, poorly developed creature, a pale, consumptive dreamer. On the contrary, Alyosha was at this time a well‐grown, red‐cheeked, clear‐eyed lad of nineteen, radiant with health. He was very handsome, too, graceful, moderately tall, with hair of a dark brown, with a regular, rather long, oval‐shaped face, and wide‐set dark gray, shining eyes; he was very thoughtful, and apparently very serene. I shall be told, perhaps, that red cheeks are not incompatible with fanaticism and mysticism; but I fancy that Alyosha was more of a realist than any one. Oh! no doubt, in the monastery he fully believed in miracles, but, to my thinking, miracles are never a stumbling‐block to the realist. It is not miracles that dispose realists to belief. The genuine realist, if he is an unbeliever, will always find strength and ability to disbelieve in the miraculous, and if he is confronted with a miracle as an irrefutable fact he would rather disbelieve his own senses than admit the fact. Even if he admits it, he admits it as a fact of nature till then unrecognized by him. Faith does not, in the realist, spring from the miracle but the miracle from faith. If the realist once believes, then he is bound by his very realism to admit the miraculous also. The Apostle Thomas said that he would not believe till he saw, but when he did see he said, “My Lord and my God!” Was it the miracle forced him to believe? Most likely not, but he believed solely because he desired to believe and possibly he fully believed in his secret heart even when he said, “I do not believe till I see.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I shall be told, perhaps, that Alyosha was stupid, undeveloped, had not finished his studies, and so on. That he did not finish his studies is true, but to say that he was stupid or dull would be a great injustice. I’ll simply repeat what I have said above. He entered upon this path only because, at that time, it alone struck his imagination and presented itself to him as offering an ideal means of escape for his soul from darkness to light. Add to that that he was to some extent a youth of our last epoch—that is, honest in nature, desiring the truth, seeking for it and believing in it, and seeking to serve it at once with all the strength of his soul, seeking for immediate action, and ready to sacrifice everything, life itself, for it. Though these young men unhappily fail to understand that the sacrifice of life is, in many cases, the easiest of all sacrifices, and that to sacrifice, for instance, five or six years of their seething youth to hard and tedious study, if only to multiply tenfold their powers of serving the truth and the cause they have set before them as their goal—such a sacrifice is utterly beyond the strength of many of them. The path Alyosha chose was a path going in the opposite direction, but he chose it with the same thirst for swift achievement. As soon as he reflected seriously he was convinced of the existence of God and immortality, and at once he instinctively said to himself: “I want to live for immortality, and I will accept no compromise.” In the same way, if he had decided that God and immortality did not exist, he would at once have become an atheist and a socialist. For socialism is not merely the labor question, it is before all things the atheistic question, the question of the form taken by atheism to‐day, the question of the tower of Babel built without God, not to mount to heaven from earth but to set up heaven on earth. Alyosha would have found it strange and impossible to go on living as before. It is written: “Give all that thou hast to the poor and follow Me, if thou wouldst be perfect.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha said to himself: “I can’t give two roubles instead of ‘all,’ and only go to mass instead of ‘following Him.’ ” Perhaps his memories of childhood brought back our monastery, to which his mother may have taken him to mass. Perhaps the slanting sunlight and the holy image to which his poor “crazy” mother had held him up still acted upon his imagination. Brooding on these things he may have come to us perhaps only to see whether here he could sacrifice all or only “two roubles,” and in the monastery he met this elder. I must digress to explain what an “elder” is in Russian monasteries, and I am sorry that I do not feel very competent to do so. I will try, however, to give a superficial account of it in a few words. Authorities on the subject assert that the institution of “elders” is of recent date, not more than a hundred years old in our monasteries, though in the orthodox East, especially in Sinai and Athos, it has existed over a thousand years. It is maintained that it existed in ancient times in Russia also, but through the calamities which overtook Russia—the Tartars, civil war, the interruption of relations with the East after the destruction of Constantinople—this institution fell into oblivion. It was revived among us towards the end of last century by one of the great “ascetics,” as they called him, Païssy Velitchkovsky, and his disciples. But to this day it exists in few monasteries only, and has sometimes been almost persecuted as an innovation in Russia. It flourished especially in the celebrated Kozelski Optin Monastery. When and how it was introduced into our monastery I cannot say. There had already been three such elders and Zossima was the last of them. But he was almost dying of weakness and disease, and they had no one to take his place. The question for our monastery was an important one, for it had not been distinguished by anything in particular till then: they had neither relics of saints, nor wonder‐working ikons, nor glorious traditions, nor historical exploits. It had flourished and been glorious all over Russia through its elders, to see and hear whom pilgrims had flocked for thousands of miles from all parts. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">What was such an elder? An elder was one who took your soul, your will, into his soul and his will. When you choose an elder, you renounce your own will and yield it to him in complete submission, complete self‐ abnegation. This novitiate, this terrible school of abnegation, is undertaken voluntarily, in the hope of self‐conquest, of self‐mastery, in order, after a life of obedience, to attain perfect freedom, that is, from self; to escape the lot of those who have lived their whole life without finding their true selves in themselves. This institution of elders is not founded on theory, but was established in the East from the practice of a thousand years. The obligations due to an elder are not the ordinary “obedience” which has always existed in our Russian monasteries. The obligation involves confession to the elder by all who have submitted themselves to him, and to the indissoluble bond between him and them. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The story is told, for instance, that in the early days of Christianity one such novice, failing to fulfill some command laid upon him by his elder, left his monastery in Syria and went to Egypt. There, after great exploits, he was found worthy at last to suffer torture and a martyr’s death for the faith. When the Church, regarding him as a saint, was burying him, suddenly, at the deacon’s exhortation, “Depart all ye unbaptized,” the coffin containing the martyr’s body left its place and was cast forth from the church, and this took place three times. And only at last they learnt that this holy man had broken his vow of obedience and left his elder, and, therefore, could not be forgiven without the elder’s absolution in spite of his great deeds. Only after this could the funeral take place. This, of course, is only an old legend. But here is a recent instance. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A monk was suddenly commanded by his elder to quit Athos, which he loved as a sacred place and a haven of refuge, and to go first to Jerusalem to do homage to the Holy Places and then to go to the north to Siberia: “There is the place for thee and not here.” The monk, overwhelmed with sorrow, went to the Œcumenical Patriarch at Constantinople and besought him to release him from his obedience. But the Patriarch replied that not only was he unable to release him, but there was not and could not be on earth a power which could release him except the elder who had himself laid that duty upon him. In this way the elders are endowed in certain cases with unbounded and inexplicable authority. That is why in many of our monasteries the institution was at first resisted almost to persecution. Meantime the elders immediately began to be highly esteemed among the people. Masses of the ignorant people as well as men of distinction flocked, for instance, to the elders of our monastery to confess their doubts, their sins, and their sufferings, and ask for counsel and admonition. Seeing this, the opponents of the elders declared that the sacrament of confession was being arbitrarily and frivolously degraded, though the continual opening of the heart to the elder by the monk or the layman had nothing of the character of the sacrament. In the end, however, the institution of elders has been retained and is becoming established in Russian monasteries. It is true, perhaps, that this instrument which had stood the test of a thousand years for the moral regeneration of a man from slavery to freedom and to moral perfectibility may be a two‐edged weapon and it may lead some not to humility and complete self‐control but to the most Satanic pride, that is, to bondage and not to freedom. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder Zossima was sixty‐five. He came of a family of landowners, had been in the army in early youth, and served in the Caucasus as an officer. He had, no doubt, impressed Alyosha by some peculiar quality of his soul. Alyosha lived in the cell of the elder, who was very fond of him and let him wait upon him. It must be noted that Alyosha was bound by no obligation and could go where he pleased and be absent for whole days. Though he wore the monastic dress it was voluntarily, not to be different from others. No doubt he liked to do so. Possibly his youthful imagination was deeply stirred by the power and fame of his elder. It was said that so many people had for years past come to confess their sins to Father Zossima and to entreat him for words of advice and healing, that he had acquired the keenest intuition and could tell from an unknown face what a new‐comer wanted, and what was the suffering on his conscience. He sometimes astounded and almost alarmed his visitors by his knowledge of their secrets before they had spoken a word. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha noticed that many, almost all, went in to the elder for the first time with apprehension and uneasiness, but came out with bright and happy faces. Alyosha was particularly struck by the fact that Father Zossima was not at all stern. On the contrary, he was always almost gay. The monks used to say that he was more drawn to those who were more sinful, and the greater the sinner the more he loved him. There were, no doubt, up to the end of his life, among the monks some who hated and envied him, but they were few in number and they were silent, though among them were some of great dignity in the monastery, one, for instance, of the older monks distinguished for his strict keeping of fasts and vows of silence. But the majority were on Father Zossima’s side and very many of them loved him with all their hearts, warmly and sincerely. Some were almost fanatically devoted to him, and declared, though not quite aloud, that he was a saint, that there could be no doubt of it, and, seeing that his end was near, they anticipated miracles and great glory to the monastery in the immediate future from his relics. Alyosha had unquestioning faith in the miraculous power of the elder, just as he had unquestioning faith in the story of the coffin that flew out of the church. He saw many who came with sick children or relatives and besought the elder to lay hands on them and to pray over them, return shortly after—some the next day—and, falling in tears at the elder’s feet, thank him for healing their sick. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Whether they had really been healed or were simply better in the natural course of the disease was a question which did not exist for Alyosha, for he fully believed in the spiritual power of his teacher and rejoiced in his fame, in his glory, as though it were his own triumph. His heart throbbed, and he beamed, as it were, all over when the elder came out to the gates of the hermitage into the waiting crowd of pilgrims of the humbler class who had flocked from all parts of Russia on purpose to see the elder and obtain his blessing. They fell down before him, wept, kissed his feet, kissed the earth on which he stood, and wailed, while the women held up their children to him and brought him the sick “possessed with devils.” The elder spoke to them, read a brief prayer over them, blessed them, and dismissed them. Of late he had become so weak through attacks of illness that he was sometimes unable to leave his cell, and the pilgrims waited for him to come out for several days. Alyosha did not wonder why they loved him so, why they fell down before him and wept with emotion merely at seeing his face. Oh! he understood that for the humble soul of the Russian peasant, worn out by grief and toil, and still more by the everlasting injustice and everlasting sin, his own and the world’s, it was the greatest need and comfort to find some one or something holy to fall down before and worship. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Among us there is sin, injustice, and temptation, but yet, somewhere on earth there is some one holy and exalted. He has the truth; he knows the truth; so it is not dead upon the earth; so it will come one day to us, too, and rule over all the earth according to the promise.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Alyosha knew that this was just how the people felt and even reasoned. He understood it, but that the elder Zossima was this saint and custodian of God’s truth—of that he had no more doubt than the weeping peasants and the sick women who held out their children to the elder. The conviction that after his death the elder would bring extraordinary glory to the monastery was even stronger in Alyosha than in any one there, and, of late, a kind of deep flame of inner ecstasy burnt more and more strongly in his heart. He was not at all troubled at this elder’s standing as a solitary example before him. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“No matter. He is holy. He carries in his heart the secret of renewal for all: that power which will, at last, establish truth on the earth, and all men will be holy and love one another, and there will be no more rich nor poor, no exalted nor humbled, but all will be as the children of God, and the true Kingdom of Christ will come.” That was the dream in Alyosha’s heart. [...]</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Peasant Women Who Have Faith</span></b></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Near the wooden portico below, built on to the outer wall of the precinct, there was a crowd of about twenty peasant women. They had been told that the elder was at last coming out, and they had gathered together in anticipation. [...]</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Father Zossima, on entering the portico, went first straight to the peasants who were crowded at the foot of the three steps that led up into the portico. Father Zossima stood on the top step, put on his stole, and began blessing the women who thronged about him. One crazy woman was led up to him. As soon as she caught sight of the elder she began shrieking and writhing as though in the pains of childbirth. Laying the stole on her forehead, he read a short prayer over her, and she was at once soothed and quieted. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">I do not know how it may be now, but in my childhood I often happened to see and hear these “possessed” women in the villages and monasteries. They used to be brought to mass; they would squeal and bark like a dog so that they were heard all over the church. But when the sacrament was carried in and they were led up to it, at once the “possession” ceased, and the sick women were always soothed for a time. I was greatly impressed and amazed at this as a child; but then I heard from country neighbors and from my town teachers that the whole illness was simulated to avoid work, and that it could always be cured by suitable severity; various anecdotes were told to confirm this. But later on I learnt with astonishment from medical specialists that there is no pretense about it, that it is a terrible illness to which women are subject, specially prevalent among us in Russia, and that it is due to the hard lot of the peasant women. It is a disease, I was told, arising from exhausting toil too soon after hard, abnormal and unassisted labor in childbirth, and from the hopeless misery, from beatings, and so on, which some women were not able to endure like others. The strange and instant healing of the frantic and struggling woman as soon as she was led up to the holy sacrament, which had been explained to me as due to malingering and the trickery of the “clericals,” arose probably in the most natural manner. Both the women who supported her and the invalid herself fully believed as a truth beyond question that the evil spirit in possession of her could not hold out if the sick woman were brought to the sacrament and made to bow down before it. And so, with a nervous and psychically deranged woman, a sort of convulsion of the whole organism always took place, and was bound to take place, at the moment of bowing down to the sacrament, aroused by the expectation of the miracle of healing and the implicit belief that it would come to pass; and it did come to pass, though only for a moment. It was exactly the same now as soon as the elder touched the sick woman with the stole. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Many of the women in the crowd were moved to tears of ecstasy by the effect of the moment: some strove to kiss the hem of his garment, others cried out in sing‐song voices. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He blessed them all and talked with some of them. The “possessed” woman he knew already. She came from a village only six versts from the monastery, and had been brought to him before. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“But here is one from afar.” He pointed to a woman by no means old but very thin and wasted, with a face not merely sunburnt but almost blackened by exposure. She was kneeling and gazing with a fixed stare at the elder; there was something almost frenzied in her eyes. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“From afar off, Father, from afar off! From two hundred miles from here. From afar off, Father, from afar off!” the woman began in a sing‐song voice as though she were chanting a dirge, swaying her head from side to side with her cheek resting in her hand. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">There is silent and long‐suffering sorrow to be met with among the peasantry. It withdraws into itself and is still. But there is a grief that breaks out, and from that minute it bursts into tears and finds vent in wailing. This is particularly common with women. But it is no lighter a grief than the silent. Lamentations comfort only by lacerating the heart still more. Such grief does not desire consolation. It feeds on the sense of its hopelessness. Lamentations spring only from the constant craving to reopen the wound. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“You are of the tradesman class?” said Father Zossima, looking curiously at her. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Townfolk we are, Father, townfolk. Yet we are peasants though we live in the town. I have come to see you, O Father! We heard of you, Father, we heard of you. I have buried my little son, and I have come on a pilgrimage. I have been in three monasteries, but they told me, ‘Go, Nastasya, go to them’—that is to you. I have come; I was yesterday at the service, and to‐day I have come to you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What are you weeping for?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It’s my little son I’m grieving for, Father. He was three years old—three years all but three months. For my little boy, Father, I’m in anguish, for my little boy. He was the last one left. We had four, my Nikita and I, and now we’ve no children, our dear ones have all gone. I buried the first three without grieving overmuch, and now I have buried the last I can’t forget him. He seems always standing before me. He never leaves me. He has withered my heart. I look at his little clothes, his little shirt, his little boots, and I wail. I lay out all that is left of him, all his little things. I look at them and wail. I say to Nikita, my husband, ‘Let me go on a pilgrimage, master.’ He is a driver. We’re not poor people, Father, not poor; he drives our own horse. It’s all our own, the horse and the carriage. And what good is it all to us now? My Nikita has begun drinking while I am away. He’s sure to. It used to be so before. As soon as I turn my back he gives way to it. But now I don’t think about him. It’s three months since I left home. I’ve forgotten him. I’ve forgotten everything. I don’t want to remember. And what would our life be now together? I’ve done with him, I’ve done. I’ve done with them all. I don’t care to look upon my house and my goods. I don’t care to see anything at all!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Listen, mother,” said the elder. “Once in olden times a holy saint saw in the Temple a mother like you weeping for her little one, her only one, whom God had taken. ‘Knowest thou not,’ said the saint to her, ‘how bold these little ones are before the throne of God? Verily there are none bolder than they in the Kingdom of Heaven. “Thou didst give us life, O Lord,” they say, “and scarcely had we looked upon it when Thou didst take it back again.” And so boldly they ask and ask again that God gives them at once the rank of angels. Therefore,’ said the saint, ‘thou, too, O mother, rejoice and weep not, for thy little son is with the Lord in the fellowship of the angels.’ That’s what the saint said to the weeping mother of old. He was a great saint and he could not have spoken falsely. Therefore you too, mother, know that your little one is surely before the throne of God, is rejoicing and happy, and praying to God for you, and therefore weep not, but rejoice.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The woman listened to him, looking down with her cheek in her hand. She sighed deeply. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“My Nikita tried to comfort me with the same words as you. ‘Foolish one,’ he said, ‘why weep? Our son is no doubt singing with the angels before God.’ He says that to me, but he weeps himself. I see that he cries like me. ‘I know, Nikita,’ said I. ‘Where could he be if not with the Lord God? Only, here with us now he is not as he used to sit beside us before.’ And if only I could look upon him one little time, if only I could peep at him one little time, without going up to him, without speaking, if I could be hidden in a corner and only see him for one little minute, hear him playing in the yard, calling in his little voice, ‘Mammy, where are you?’ If only I could hear him pattering with his little feet about the room just once, only once; for so often, so often I remember how he used to run to me and shout and laugh, if only I could hear his little feet I should know him! But he’s gone, Father, he’s gone, and I shall never hear him again. Here’s his little sash, but him I shall never see or hear now.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">She drew out of her bosom her boy’s little embroidered sash, and as soon as she looked at it she began shaking with sobs, hiding her eyes with her fingers through which the tears flowed in a sudden stream. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“It is Rachel of old,” said the elder, “weeping for her children, and will not be comforted because they are not. Such is the lot set on earth for you mothers. Be not comforted. Consolation is not what you need. Weep and be not consoled, but weep. Only every time that you weep be sure to remember that your little son is one of the angels of God, that he looks down from there at you and sees you, and rejoices at your tears, and points at them to the Lord God; and a long while yet will you keep that great mother’s grief. But it will turn in the end into quiet joy, and your bitter tears will be only tears of tender sorrow that purifies the heart and delivers it from sin. {And I shall pray for the peace of your child’s soul. What was his name?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Alexey, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“A sweet name. After Alexey, the man of God?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Yes, Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What a saint he was! I will remember him, mother, and your grief in my prayers, and I will pray for your husband’s health. It is a sin for you to leave him. Your little one will see from heaven that you have forsaken his father, and will weep over you. Why do you trouble his happiness? He is living, for the soul lives for ever, and though he is not in the house he is near you, unseen. How can he go into the house when you say that the house is hateful to you? To whom is he to go if he find you not together, his father and mother? He comes to you in dreams now, and you grieve. But then he will send you gentle dreams. Go to your husband, mother; go this very day.”}(*)</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I will go, Father, at your word. I will go. You’ve gone straight to my heart. My Nikita, my Nikita, you are waiting for me,” the woman began in a sing‐song voice; but the elder had already turned away to a very old woman, dressed like a dweller in the town, not like a pilgrim. Her eyes showed that she had come with an object, and in order to say something. She said she was the widow of a non‐commissioned officer, and lived close by in the town. Her son Vasenka was in the commissariat service, and had gone to Irkutsk in Siberia. He had written twice from there, but now a year had passed since he had written. She did inquire about him, but she did not know the proper place to inquire. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Only the other day Stepanida Ilyinishna—she’s a rich merchant’s wife—said to me, ‘You go, Prohorovna, and put your son’s name down for prayer in the church, and pray for the peace of his soul as though he were dead. His soul will be troubled,’ she said, ‘and he will write you a letter.’ And Stepanida Ilyinishna told me it was a certain thing which had been many times tried. Only I am in doubt.... Oh, you light of ours! is it true or false, and would it be right?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Don’t think of it. It’s shameful to ask the question. How is it possible to pray for the peace of a living soul? And his own mother too! It’s a great sin, akin to sorcery. Only for your ignorance it is forgiven you. Better pray to the Queen of Heaven, our swift defense and help, for his good health, and that she may forgive you for your error. And another thing I will tell you, Prohorovna. Either he will soon come back to you, your son, or he will be sure to send a letter. Go, and henceforward be in peace. Your son is alive, I tell you.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Dear Father, God reward you, our benefactor, who prays for all of us and for our sins!” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But the elder had already noticed in the crowd two glowing eyes fixed upon him. An exhausted, consumptive‐looking, though young peasant woman was gazing at him in silence. Her eyes besought him, but she seemed afraid to approach. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“What is it, my child?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Absolve my soul, Father,” she articulated softly, and slowly sank on her knees and bowed down at his feet. “I have sinned, Father. I am afraid of my sin.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The elder sat down on the lower step. The woman crept closer to him, still on her knees. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I am a widow these three years,” she began in a half‐whisper, with a sort of shudder. “I had a hard life with my husband. He was an old man. He used to beat me cruelly. He lay ill; I thought looking at him, if he were to get well, if he were to get up again, what then? And then the thought came to me—” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Stay!” said the elder, and he put his ear close to her lips. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">The woman went on in a low whisper, so that it was almost impossible to catch anything. She had soon done. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Three years ago?” asked the elder. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Three years. At first I didn’t think about it, but now I’ve begun to be ill, and the thought never leaves me.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Have you come from far?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Over three hundred miles away.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Have you told it in confession?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I have confessed it. Twice I have confessed it.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Have you been admitted to Communion?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Yes. I am afraid. I am afraid to die.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Fear nothing and never be afraid; and don’t fret. If only your penitence fail not, God will forgive all. There is no sin, and there can be no sin on all the earth, which the Lord will not forgive to the truly repentant! Man cannot commit a sin so great as to exhaust the infinite love of God. Can there be a sin which could exceed the love of God? Think only of repentance, continual repentance, but dismiss fear altogether. Believe that God loves you as you cannot conceive; that He loves you with your sin, in your sin. It has been said of old that over one repentant sinner there is more joy in heaven than over ten righteous men. Go, and fear not. Be not bitter against men. Be not angry if you are wronged. Forgive the dead man in your heart what wrong he did you. Be reconciled with him in truth. If you are penitent, you love. And if you love you are of God. All things are atoned for, all things are saved by love. If I, a sinner, even as you are, am tender with you and have pity on you, how much more will God. Love is such a priceless treasure that you can redeem the whole world by it, and expiate not only your own sins but the sins of others.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He signed her three times with the cross, took from his own neck a little ikon and put it upon her. She bowed down to the earth without speaking. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He got up and looked cheerfully at a healthy peasant woman with a tiny baby in her arms. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“From Vyshegorye, dear Father.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Five miles you have dragged yourself with the baby. What do you want?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I’ve come to look at you. I have been to you before—or have you forgotten? You’ve no great memory if you’ve forgotten me. They told us you were ill. Thinks I, I’ll go and see him for myself. Now I see you, and you’re not ill! You’ll live another twenty years. God bless you! There are plenty to pray for you; how should you be ill?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“I thank you for all, daughter.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“By the way, I have a thing to ask, not a great one. Here are sixty copecks. Give them, dear Father, to some one poorer than me. I thought as I came along, better give through him. He’ll know whom to give to.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“Thanks, my dear, thanks! You are a good woman. I love you. I will do so certainly. Is that your little girl?” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“My little girl, Father, Lizaveta.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">“May the Lord bless you both, you and your babe Lizaveta! You have gladdened my heart, mother. Farewell, dear children, farewell, dear ones.” </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">He blessed them all and bowed low to them. </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(*) Editor's note: The passage that begins with the phrase: 'And I shall pray for the peace of your child’s soul.', and ends with: 'Go to your husband, mother; go this very day.”', is quoted by Anna G. Dostoevskaya, the author's wife, in her <i>Notes to Literary Works of F. M. Dostoevsky</i> (1904-1906), according to Beatrice Stillman, translator and editor of the "Dostoevsky Reminiscences" by the same author (1918 [Liveright, NY: 1975, p 404]). In the latter work (pp. 292-94) Dostoevskaya adds a moving explanation, part of which is rendered below:</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"As for me, the death of our darling little boy [Alexey, on May 16, 1878, aged three] was shattering. I so lost my bearings, mourned and cried so much that I was unrecognizable. My customary cheerfulness vanished together with my normal flow of energy, which gave way to apathy. I grew impassive to everything: the management of the household, our business affairs, and even my own children; and I gave myself utterly to my memories of the last three years. Fyodor Mikhailovich recorded many of my doubts, thoughts, and even words in the chapter of the <i>Brothers Karamazov</i> called "Women of Faith", in which a woman who has lost her child unburdens her grief to Father Zossima. [...]</span></p>
<p style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"My husband returned from Optina seemingly at peace and much calmer, and told me a great deal about the customs of the hermitage where he had passed two days. He met with the renowned elder, Father Ambrosius, three times: once in the presence of others and twice alone. These talks had a profound and lasting effect on him. When he told the elder about the loss we had suffered and about my violent grief, the latter asked whether I was a believer. And when Fyodor Mikhailovich said that I was, the elder asked him to convey his blessing to me as well as those words which later, in [<i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>] Father Zossima spoke to the grief-stricken mother... It was clear from my husband's stories about him what a profound seer and interpreter of human heart this universally respected elder was."</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>Thoughts on Dostoevsky, Filial Piety, and the Motherly Touch of Spiritual Eldership2022-09-08T18:53:07Z2022-09-08T18:53:07Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/731-thoughts-on-dostoevsky-filial-piety-and-the-motherly-touch-of-spiritual-eldership.htmlD.C.C.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/vladimir.jpg" alt="vladimir" style="float: right;" width="250" height="391" />Motto: "In the face of such icons as the Vladimir one, it is easiest to understand why the veneration of the Mother of God plays such an exceptional role in the history of Christianity... Mankind in the image of the Mother, grieving for the crucified Son, saw the most complete embodiment of that element of the spirit, which is called love and only love and which knows neither the law of justice, nor the law of retribution - no laws, except the law of pity and compassion" - Aleksandr I. Anisimov(*)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Excerpted below are a few thoughts from two spiritual guides: Fr. Rafail Noica, and St. Seraphim of Sarov. They seem to us to illuminate certain important aspects of _<i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>_, and conversely. They help us see the theme of Filial Piety as one of the Commandments, understood in a wide, ontological, spiritual and practical context. And how, in the end, the heart of Spiritual Fatherhood is really akin to Wise Motherhood, and conversely (compare the final excerpts below with the relevant introductory remarks and Dostoevsky paragraphs given <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">). This, we feel, is where the Brothers Karamazov (and Dostoevsky in general, and Mujik Marey, and many other stories in the _<i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children_</i> collection in particular) crucially touches on, or points to, the heart of St. Seraphim of Sarov. And yes, even of St. Ambrose of Optina, perhaps the most "Motherly" of all the Optina Elders. Even if the essential correctness of Dostoevsky's most competent critics is otherwise granted, and he leaves to his readers important blanks to fill in and homework to do... </span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fr. Rafail Noica on Filial Piety:</span></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"Saint Paul draws our attention that the commandment to honor your father and your mother, of the ten commandments, is the first commandment with a promise. What promise is that? That your days may be many in the land that the Lord your God will give you (…) What is the connection between honoring my parents and the many days I hope to spend on this earth? I don't know either, but I'll tell you the little that I've begun to understand: my life is FLOWING from my father and my mother, BUT IT'S NOT THAT "IT HAS FLOWN", and THAT'S IT, now, mine are in the other world and, I hope, they're fine, BUT IT GOES ON FLOWING... to dishonor father and mother is not only a moral abomination, because those who gave me life, I now reject them; it is an essential abomination - cut the thread of life! – and the great trick of the modern devils was just that, to tear the family apart, and maybe that is one of the reasons why there is so much sickness, although science has progressed unbelievably… because the life energy is no longer working in us – I don't know how!... we're talking spiritually, it's a secret... we should know and if I were a more educated person I might know, one of the Fathers probably talked about it... but that's all I understood and I think it's enough to start a good understanding. It's always the case in the Church... you know that I told you in one or more sermons that we shouldn't stop at the moral level, it's a good but primitive level of repentance, that is, of our longing for eternity. The essential level, i.e. being, i.e. life is what matters and the Church speaks to us about Life, not about correct behavior or behaviorism, patterning and so on... So, to dishonor parents is to cut the thread of life to a degree, between us and the One who gave us life, God after all, through our parents (...)" (minimally revised automatic translation<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">;<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> Romanian original <a href="https://calindraganblog.wordpress.com/2018/08/02/par-rafail-noica-viata-noastra-nu-s-a-tras-ci-se-trage-din-tatal-meu-si-din-mama-mea/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">M<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">oralism (the "Euclidean" path) is not enough:<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">God's commandment is not something that God morally expects us to fulfill: because He knows that we cannot fulfill it, because it is not a moral commandment, but it is a revelation [of] what God Himself is. God's command is the divine life that we cannot touch in any way, but we can cry: Lord! Lord, I love your commandment, but you see that I cannot live it, as Fr. Sophrony used to say: "Come, You, and dwell in me, and work in me what is beyond the power of man." God's command is God's confession to Adam, because Adam, understanding - may the Lord give us eyes within our understanding so that we can see the beauty of that Face, so that we can no longer resist not being like this and then let a prayer be raised from us , be it [even] hopeless, a hopeless hope, so to speak, that God will give to us. And God will give! And as I told several people last year, some young people from abroad: when you feel that it is so difficult to reach some divine virtue, know that it is not difficult, it is impossible; your nature confesses to you, gives you inner testimony that that word is impossible for you; but from our God, we should expect nothing less than the impossible! Nothing less than the impossible, because if our God is God, then the impossible is what we expect from Him and what only He can do, for to Him nothing is impossible. And that impossible thing, for the love and for the power of God, you will see it working in you; and I pray to God that He may receive this word and as an encouragement of your faith - from a little believer who knows what little faith means - and as a prayer for me and for you. So God's command is a divine revelation to intoxicate us, to sweeten us with the beauty of His face, to attract us to His Kingdom. But it is an impossible thing and this impossible thing, for the love of God and for his omnipotence, we expect to see him working in us. (idem, excerpted from the original Romanian posted<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="https://rafailnoica.wordpress.com/2008/12/24/parintele-rafail-noica-despre-poruncile-lui-dumnezeu-si-deznadejdea-noastra-predica-tinuta-la-1-decembrie-2002-bucuresti-biserica-studentilor-sf-nicolae/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"The negative side... is when you often feel like you're struggling, [yet you wonder] how you'll ever get to the end. It is probably the testimony that you are on the wrong path, which really will not lead you anywhere. [That is] there is a heresy somewhere. You pull to the right where God calls you to the left. I would like to give you a concrete example, but I can't. But the parable is like pulling a cart up a hill and saying: "Of course I can't pull! I don't have much strength and the cart is heavy". Yes, but when you pull against the direction of the wheels, then, of course, you don't move it. But, pull it in the direction of the wheels and, even if it is heavy, something moves. When you start, when you find, when you discover a struggle, a little adjustment in your effort of struggle means that you have started to find the right, the working path. Every time there will be another way out of the heresy you live in. I would just like to show you the signs by which you detect heresy. That is, the fact that it is unworkable, that no matter how much goodwill [you have], it doesn't seem to work, you even feel a kind of despondency, a kind of hopelessness that you will never get there [to the end]. You are probably in trouble, in a way of thinking that I call heretical and for which you must find the right equivalent. And this, you know, is not always the opposite, i.e. [as] industriousness is for laziness. Yes, but otherwise seen, as I was saying a moment ago about greed, man is right when he seeks bread to survive, to live. But the bread of the belly, the daily bread - that helps him to a limited extent - [is not what man is really looking for]. But what is he looking for, and the bread did not satisfy him? He is looking for the Word of God. For the drunkard, alcohol can do him good, it can soothe him to a certain extent, but what is he looking for? He seeks the Spirit. So sometimes we have to look not only for the opposite of what we are doing, but also [to change] the direction. There are many examples that I could give, many that I thought of telling you. Maybe with time, if the Lord wants, or maybe the Lord will tell you. So there is no formula for how to get out, but we must ask the Lord and, in principle, we must try with the priest. But, sometimes, the answer can come to you through a book, through a person, through an incident, through who knows [what]. God has many, many means to open man's eyes, so that we understand. [And] when God answered us, [to make us understand] that he answered us, [because] many times the answer passes under our noses and we don't notice it". (idem, from the original Romanian posted <a href="https://rafailnoica.wordpress.com/2008/12/08/video-criza-bisericii-daca-ea-exista/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)</span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fr. Rafail on Wise Motherhood<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">:</span></span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Sometimes, Saint Paul also says, [there is] a prayer in which we do not know what to ask or what to pray for and the Spirit of God helps us with unutterable sighs. Sighs that we ourselves don't know why [we have]: something hurts, we need something... Our Maker knows what we want! As the mother with the newborn baby knows... I was amazed many times [when] young women of my age became mothers and, with the baby in her arms - the baby was crying, "screaming"... And at some point the mother says: "Oh, he is hungry, forgive me". She goes and feeds the baby, nurses him. After which, the baby "whined" again, and the mother: "Something hurts!" And he turns him face down, upside down, I don't know what, in the end, his stomach "growls" - and... the baby calms down. And after that, the baby screamed again. And the mother says: "Oh, look! He's whimsical!" Oh, mother, how do you know all this? I only hear a baby crying! But maybe I understand my mother more now, because since I became a priest I have also become a mother in a way. But God gives intuition to the mother to understand. The baby only knows how to "scream" when it is not well. And the mother knows what to do. The baby does not need to write a treatise on philosophy to know how to act God who made the mother, God who "invented" the mother, He is more... Mother than anyone else... And our unspeakable sighs, even... our non-sighs, God hears them and collects them in His treasuries. And he knows how to answer us! (idem, taken from <a href="https://rafailnoica.wordpress.com/category/pentru-ce-ne-pregateste-filocalia-2002/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">St. Seraphim of Sarov on Spiritual Guidance and Wise Motherhood:<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A certain abbot, being by chance in Sarov Monastery, when meeting Fr Seraphim asked his advice on how to direct the brethren. Fr Seraphim gave him the following instruction:</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">_Let every abbot become and remain always in his relation to those subject to him as a wise mother._</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /> <br /> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A mother who loves her children lives not to satisfy herself, but to satisfy her children. The infirmities of her infirm children she bears with love: those who have fallen into filth she cleans, washes them calmly, clothes them in new white garments, puts their shoes on, warms them, feeds them, looks after them, comforts them, and from all sides strives to pacify their spirit so that she never hears the slightest cry from them; and such children are well disposed to their mother. Thus should every abbot live not to satisfy himself, but to satisfy those subject to him – he should be condescending to their weaknesses; bear with love the infirmities of the infirm; heal their sinful diseases with the plaster of mercifulness; raise with kindness those who have fallen into transgression; quietly cleanse those who have come sullied with the filth of some vice an wash them by placing upon them fasting and prayer above the ordinary amount which is set forth for all; clothe them, by instruction and by one’s own exemplary life, in garments of virtues; keep constant watch over them; by every means comforting them, and from all sides defend their peace and repose to such an extent that the slightest cry or murmuring will never be heard from them; and then they will zealously strive to procure for the abbot peace and repose. <span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(Translated by Fr. Seraphim Rose)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Note:</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(*) Machine translation taken from <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#selection-6803.85-6807.294"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. Outstanding art historian, restorer, and one of the forefathers of the recovery of the traditional Orthodox icon, Anisimov was shot on Sep. 2, 1937, on charges of being a<i> “</i>glaring monarchist, fascist sympathizer, and slanderer of Soviet literature and art.<i>” Cf. </i>Shirley Glade<i>, </i>“Anisimov and the Rediscovery of the Old Russian Icons”, 2010; also see Irina Kyzlasova, “On Patriarch Tikhon's Blessing of the Work of Cultural Workers in Protecting and Restoring Works of Early Painting”, 2009. (Added on Sep. 2/15, 2022.)</span></span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/vladimir.jpg" alt="vladimir" style="float: right;" width="250" height="391" />Motto: "In the face of such icons as the Vladimir one, it is easiest to understand why the veneration of the Mother of God plays such an exceptional role in the history of Christianity... Mankind in the image of the Mother, grieving for the crucified Son, saw the most complete embodiment of that element of the spirit, which is called love and only love and which knows neither the law of justice, nor the law of retribution - no laws, except the law of pity and compassion" - Aleksandr I. Anisimov(*)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Excerpted below are a few thoughts from two spiritual guides: Fr. Rafail Noica, and St. Seraphim of Sarov. They seem to us to illuminate certain important aspects of _<i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>_, and conversely. They help us see the theme of Filial Piety as one of the Commandments, understood in a wide, ontological, spiritual and practical context. And how, in the end, the heart of Spiritual Fatherhood is really akin to Wise Motherhood, and conversely (compare the final excerpts below with the relevant introductory remarks and Dostoevsky paragraphs given <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">). This, we feel, is where the Brothers Karamazov (and Dostoevsky in general, and Mujik Marey, and many other stories in the _<i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children_</i> collection in particular) crucially touches on, or points to, the heart of St. Seraphim of Sarov. And yes, even of St. Ambrose of Optina, perhaps the most "Motherly" of all the Optina Elders. Even if the essential correctness of Dostoevsky's most competent critics is otherwise granted, and he leaves to his readers important blanks to fill in and homework to do... </span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fr. Rafail Noica on Filial Piety:</span></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"Saint Paul draws our attention that the commandment to honor your father and your mother, of the ten commandments, is the first commandment with a promise. What promise is that? That your days may be many in the land that the Lord your God will give you (…) What is the connection between honoring my parents and the many days I hope to spend on this earth? I don't know either, but I'll tell you the little that I've begun to understand: my life is FLOWING from my father and my mother, BUT IT'S NOT THAT "IT HAS FLOWN", and THAT'S IT, now, mine are in the other world and, I hope, they're fine, BUT IT GOES ON FLOWING... to dishonor father and mother is not only a moral abomination, because those who gave me life, I now reject them; it is an essential abomination - cut the thread of life! – and the great trick of the modern devils was just that, to tear the family apart, and maybe that is one of the reasons why there is so much sickness, although science has progressed unbelievably… because the life energy is no longer working in us – I don't know how!... we're talking spiritually, it's a secret... we should know and if I were a more educated person I might know, one of the Fathers probably talked about it... but that's all I understood and I think it's enough to start a good understanding. It's always the case in the Church... you know that I told you in one or more sermons that we shouldn't stop at the moral level, it's a good but primitive level of repentance, that is, of our longing for eternity. The essential level, i.e. being, i.e. life is what matters and the Church speaks to us about Life, not about correct behavior or behaviorism, patterning and so on... So, to dishonor parents is to cut the thread of life to a degree, between us and the One who gave us life, God after all, through our parents (...)" (minimally revised automatic translation<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">;<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> Romanian original <a href="https://calindraganblog.wordpress.com/2018/08/02/par-rafail-noica-viata-noastra-nu-s-a-tras-ci-se-trage-din-tatal-meu-si-din-mama-mea/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">M<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">oralism (the "Euclidean" path) is not enough:<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">God's commandment is not something that God morally expects us to fulfill: because He knows that we cannot fulfill it, because it is not a moral commandment, but it is a revelation [of] what God Himself is. God's command is the divine life that we cannot touch in any way, but we can cry: Lord! Lord, I love your commandment, but you see that I cannot live it, as Fr. Sophrony used to say: "Come, You, and dwell in me, and work in me what is beyond the power of man." God's command is God's confession to Adam, because Adam, understanding - may the Lord give us eyes within our understanding so that we can see the beauty of that Face, so that we can no longer resist not being like this and then let a prayer be raised from us , be it [even] hopeless, a hopeless hope, so to speak, that God will give to us. And God will give! And as I told several people last year, some young people from abroad: when you feel that it is so difficult to reach some divine virtue, know that it is not difficult, it is impossible; your nature confesses to you, gives you inner testimony that that word is impossible for you; but from our God, we should expect nothing less than the impossible! Nothing less than the impossible, because if our God is God, then the impossible is what we expect from Him and what only He can do, for to Him nothing is impossible. And that impossible thing, for the love and for the power of God, you will see it working in you; and I pray to God that He may receive this word and as an encouragement of your faith - from a little believer who knows what little faith means - and as a prayer for me and for you. So God's command is a divine revelation to intoxicate us, to sweeten us with the beauty of His face, to attract us to His Kingdom. But it is an impossible thing and this impossible thing, for the love of God and for his omnipotence, we expect to see him working in us. (idem, excerpted from the original Romanian posted<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <a href="https://rafailnoica.wordpress.com/2008/12/24/parintele-rafail-noica-despre-poruncile-lui-dumnezeu-si-deznadejdea-noastra-predica-tinuta-la-1-decembrie-2002-bucuresti-biserica-studentilor-sf-nicolae/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"The negative side... is when you often feel like you're struggling, [yet you wonder] how you'll ever get to the end. It is probably the testimony that you are on the wrong path, which really will not lead you anywhere. [That is] there is a heresy somewhere. You pull to the right where God calls you to the left. I would like to give you a concrete example, but I can't. But the parable is like pulling a cart up a hill and saying: "Of course I can't pull! I don't have much strength and the cart is heavy". Yes, but when you pull against the direction of the wheels, then, of course, you don't move it. But, pull it in the direction of the wheels and, even if it is heavy, something moves. When you start, when you find, when you discover a struggle, a little adjustment in your effort of struggle means that you have started to find the right, the working path. Every time there will be another way out of the heresy you live in. I would just like to show you the signs by which you detect heresy. That is, the fact that it is unworkable, that no matter how much goodwill [you have], it doesn't seem to work, you even feel a kind of despondency, a kind of hopelessness that you will never get there [to the end]. You are probably in trouble, in a way of thinking that I call heretical and for which you must find the right equivalent. And this, you know, is not always the opposite, i.e. [as] industriousness is for laziness. Yes, but otherwise seen, as I was saying a moment ago about greed, man is right when he seeks bread to survive, to live. But the bread of the belly, the daily bread - that helps him to a limited extent - [is not what man is really looking for]. But what is he looking for, and the bread did not satisfy him? He is looking for the Word of God. For the drunkard, alcohol can do him good, it can soothe him to a certain extent, but what is he looking for? He seeks the Spirit. So sometimes we have to look not only for the opposite of what we are doing, but also [to change] the direction. There are many examples that I could give, many that I thought of telling you. Maybe with time, if the Lord wants, or maybe the Lord will tell you. So there is no formula for how to get out, but we must ask the Lord and, in principle, we must try with the priest. But, sometimes, the answer can come to you through a book, through a person, through an incident, through who knows [what]. God has many, many means to open man's eyes, so that we understand. [And] when God answered us, [to make us understand] that he answered us, [because] many times the answer passes under our noses and we don't notice it". (idem, from the original Romanian posted <a href="https://rafailnoica.wordpress.com/2008/12/08/video-criza-bisericii-daca-ea-exista/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)</span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Fr. Rafail on Wise Motherhood<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">:</span></span></li>
</ul>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Sometimes, Saint Paul also says, [there is] a prayer in which we do not know what to ask or what to pray for and the Spirit of God helps us with unutterable sighs. Sighs that we ourselves don't know why [we have]: something hurts, we need something... Our Maker knows what we want! As the mother with the newborn baby knows... I was amazed many times [when] young women of my age became mothers and, with the baby in her arms - the baby was crying, "screaming"... And at some point the mother says: "Oh, he is hungry, forgive me". She goes and feeds the baby, nurses him. After which, the baby "whined" again, and the mother: "Something hurts!" And he turns him face down, upside down, I don't know what, in the end, his stomach "growls" - and... the baby calms down. And after that, the baby screamed again. And the mother says: "Oh, look! He's whimsical!" Oh, mother, how do you know all this? I only hear a baby crying! But maybe I understand my mother more now, because since I became a priest I have also become a mother in a way. But God gives intuition to the mother to understand. The baby only knows how to "scream" when it is not well. And the mother knows what to do. The baby does not need to write a treatise on philosophy to know how to act God who made the mother, God who "invented" the mother, He is more... Mother than anyone else... And our unspeakable sighs, even... our non-sighs, God hears them and collects them in His treasuries. And he knows how to answer us! (idem, taken from <a href="https://rafailnoica.wordpress.com/category/pentru-ce-ne-pregateste-filocalia-2002/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<ul>
<li style="line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">St. Seraphim of Sarov on Spiritual Guidance and Wise Motherhood:<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></li>
</ul>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A certain abbot, being by chance in Sarov Monastery, when meeting Fr Seraphim asked his advice on how to direct the brethren. Fr Seraphim gave him the following instruction:</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">_Let every abbot become and remain always in his relation to those subject to him as a wise mother._</span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"><br /> <br /> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">A mother who loves her children lives not to satisfy herself, but to satisfy her children. The infirmities of her infirm children she bears with love: those who have fallen into filth she cleans, washes them calmly, clothes them in new white garments, puts their shoes on, warms them, feeds them, looks after them, comforts them, and from all sides strives to pacify their spirit so that she never hears the slightest cry from them; and such children are well disposed to their mother. Thus should every abbot live not to satisfy himself, but to satisfy those subject to him – he should be condescending to their weaknesses; bear with love the infirmities of the infirm; heal their sinful diseases with the plaster of mercifulness; raise with kindness those who have fallen into transgression; quietly cleanse those who have come sullied with the filth of some vice an wash them by placing upon them fasting and prayer above the ordinary amount which is set forth for all; clothe them, by instruction and by one’s own exemplary life, in garments of virtues; keep constant watch over them; by every means comforting them, and from all sides defend their peace and repose to such an extent that the slightest cry or murmuring will never be heard from them; and then they will zealously strive to procure for the abbot peace and repose. <span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(Translated by Fr. Seraphim Rose)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Note:</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 12pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(*) Machine translation taken from <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/#selection-6803.85-6807.294"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. Outstanding art historian, restorer, and one of the forefathers of the recovery of the traditional Orthodox icon, Anisimov was shot on Sep. 2, 1937, on charges of being a<i> “</i>glaring monarchist, fascist sympathizer, and slanderer of Soviet literature and art.<i>” Cf. </i>Shirley Glade<i>, </i>“Anisimov and the Rediscovery of the Old Russian Icons”, 2010; also see Irina Kyzlasova, “On Patriarch Tikhon's Blessing of the Work of Cultural Workers in Protecting and Restoring Works of Early Painting”, 2009. (Added on Sep. 2/15, 2022.)</span></span></p>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children: (XIa) Alyosha Karamazov2022-08-25T16:30:07Z2022-08-25T16:30:07Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/730-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-xia-alyosha-karamazov.htmlDostoievski et al.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/lios.jpg" alt="lios" style="float: right;" width="250" height="416" /></span>Previously in the Dostoevsky for Parents and Children series:</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank">Varenka's Memoirs</a> (from the novel Poor Folk, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank">An Honest Thief</a> (from Stories of a Man of Experience, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank">Nellie's Story</a> (from The Insulted and Injured, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank">Marie's Story</a> (from The Idiot, 1868 [suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya in correspondence pertaining to the 1897 anthology, DPC X])</p>
<p><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank">At The Select Boarding School</a> (from the novel The Adolescent, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank">The Merchant's Story</a> (from the novel The Adolescent, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</a> (from The Diary Of A Writer, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank">The Peasant Marey</a> (from The Diary Of A Writer, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank">A Centenarian</a> (from The Diary Of A Writer, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank">Foma Danilov</a> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from The Diary Of A Writer, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</p>
<p> </p>
<p>{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present Dostoevsky for Parents and Children (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and as the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank">here</a> our brief introduction to the original Dostoevsky for Children anthologies, and to this English online version. Accompanying photo: Vladimir Gotovtsev in the role of Alyosha, 1910}</p>
<p> </p>
<p align="center">--//--</p>
<p align="center"> </p>
<p>"Let every abbot become and remain always in his relation to those subject to him as a wise mother."</p>
<p align="right">(St. Seraphim of Sarov, Fr. Seraphim Rose transl.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>In his monumental biography of Dostoevsky, Joseph Frank inspiringly compares The Brothers Karamazov to the best works of Dante, Shakespeare, Milton and Goethe. At one point, even to Beethoven's 9th! Dostoevsky's final novel is, indeed, in many ways, his grandest tour de force: majestic and deep, complex and spellbinding. And each facet of it illuminates every other…</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Obviously, no introduction or anthology can do justice to such a work! Even so, we hope that what follows can be of some use.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Here are some of the main themes and questions posed with existential intensity in the book: </p>
<p> </p>
<p>The Mystery of Filial Piety - natural and spiritual - and the implications of its denial. The Mystery of Eldership, or the Golden Chain of mentoring in the ways of Holy Tradition. The Mystery of co-suffering love, including how to feel, think, pray, and act according to the insight that "all are guilty for all". The impact of doing or not doing so, on man, family and community, especially on the "smallest ones" (children, mudjiks, "the people"...) The ways and implications of putting one's faith in the <a href="http://orthodoxinfo.com/general/kingdomofheaven.aspx" target="_blank">Economy of Salvation</a> (reflecting the author's growing interest in the Scriptures, the Lives of the Saints, St. Tikhon of Zadonsk, the nowadays seemingly neglected <a href="https://www.academia.edu/35755543/PARFENY_AGEEV_AND_RUSSIAN_PILGRIMAGE_TO_MOUNT_ATHOS" target="_blank">Tales of the Wanderings of the Athonite Monk Parfeny</a>, the Optina elders, and St. Isaac the Syrian, among others). Or, in something else. Active faith versus mere speculative faith. And the haunting question of Utopia: can the rare and painstakingly won inner and communal harmony of the virtuous souls be extended beyond the confines of an almost ideal Russian monastery? To a small, Jane Austen-like community, around the monastery? To the Great Modern Society at large? All this, and more, closely weaved in a literary masterpiece.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>For our part, we would also compare the novel to Confucius, the father of classical Chinese thought and civilization, who essentially taught that <a href="https://archive.ph/QxNUK" target="_blank">filial piety moves Heaven and Earth</a>, while the lack of it antagonizes both - which is the exact teaching verified by Dostoevsky, with a spiritual dimension added, in his central character, Alyosha Karamazov, and all around him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And, among the philosophies of our times, to those which (like that of A. MacIntyre) essentially point out that there is no rationality outside of tradition. I.e., no practical rationality, and indeed no justice, in the ancient sense, of giving to each his due, starting from each of the powers of one's own soul.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Indeed, Dostoevsky is pointing to the transmissible ways of Eldership, of mentorship according to Holy Tradition, as the great unifier that calls everything good to fruition, harmony and balance. Starting with the root virtue of Filial Piety. In doing so, our author makes Alyosha his civilizing hero.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>A hero capable to inspire the real-life path of Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky: the path from The Brothers Karamazov (the core of all the Metropolitan's practical-oriented Dostoevskian interpretations), to the Metropolitan's blessed pastoral efforts, crowned by the mentoring of many Confessors and Saints, such as Vladika John of Shanghai and San Francisco.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, the Brothers Karamazov points towards a path of redeeming practical wisdom and rationality as no other work of fiction we are aware of. Including enough practical tips for those seriously interested, to find the next steps themselves. It is the case of Metropolitan Anthony, but also of Prof. Ivan Andreyev, of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/729-before-and-after-elder-zossima-the-brothers-karamazov.html" target="_blank">Fr. Gheorghe Calciu,</a> and others. Including, it seems, more than one actor, from more than one country, who played the role of Alyosha Karamazov in some screen or theatrical adaptation, and then went on to become an actual monk... </p>
<p> </p>
<p>To repeat and emphasize: in Alyosha Karamazov, whose story we begin to read today, we see Dostoevsky's foremost civilizing hero. In the West, his saga may evoke Beethoven's greatest symphony. To the <a href="https://archive.ph/2ylyZ" target="_blank">Chinese mind</a> he would probably evoke <a href="https://pages.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/chin/shiaw/shiawcontents.html" target="_blank">Shun, first among the archetypes of heroic Filial Piety</a> brought to completion with the blessing of Heaven, and therefore the ideal Man and Emperor. Still, only a mythical Emperor. However, to the heart of Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky and other Eastern Orthodox, Alyosha has inspired the path to real-life Sainthood, via Christ-like pastorship and Christ-filled love, according to the tested ways of Holy Tradition.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Our diligent homeschooling readers will, perhaps, also wish to compare Alyosha to other key Dostoevsky characters. Compared to Prince Myshkin (the “Idiot”), for instance, he seems to us what the Apostle is to a holy fool for Christ. Also rare and exceptional, but invaluable in a very special way: because he is the evocation of a link in the "Golden Chain" of Holy Tradition - in the unbroken spiritual chain of those capable to receive and hand down the ways of holiness. Something "repeatable" and refinable by the ones inspired, each according to their calling and circumstances, as suggested above.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Let us also emphasize that the relevant comparison between Myshkin and Alyosha, it seems to us, is not so much a matter of greater worldly achievement by either of them, as has sometimes been suggested. Indeed, the mature Dostoevsky's practical test and concern seems to us the impact of worldviews on children and youth (something adumbrated at least since <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank">The Idiot</a>, if not since <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank">The Insulted</a><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"> and Injured</a>, though something perhaps too easily overlooked by those readers who, not unlike some of our author’s heroes, tend to see only Scholastic disputatios, where basic practical discernment is clearly the issue). "By their fruit you shall know them..."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Yet, in terms of impact on children, Prince Myshkin's experience is quite as uplifting as, and commensurable with, that of Alyosha Karamazov. Except that Myshkin's redeeming impact on the "smallest ones'', and on their small community, comes at the beginning of The Idiot (in <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank">the story of Marie</a>), freeing the Quichotesque Prince to take on the Great Russian Society, next - something Alyosha was supposed to do only in a sequel novel, left unwritten due to Dostoevsky's repose.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>In short, by Dostoevsky's "final'' criterion and concern, as we understand it, The Brothers Karamazov ends where The Idiot begins: with the spiritual redemption of a group of children and their close ones. Indeed, The Idiot could almost be read as The Brothers Karamazov's sequel. A poetic, and some would say less didactic, even less "didacticist" (Leatherbarrow) sequel.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Yet, as we have said, Dostoevsky manages to weave everything in a spellbinding masterpiece, and Alyosha touches on the mystery of practical mentorship, of practical wisdom and rationality, as no other Dostoevsky character does, unless we count his mentor, Elder Zosima, and, in the end, Alyosha's own "novices", especially the children, as we shall soon see. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>What about the unforgettable and in a sense forever irreplaceable <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/714-bicentenar-dostoievski-inaintea-tatlui-fiului-risipitor.html" target="_blank">Marmeladov</a>, his daughter Sonia, or even the <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank">Honest Thief</a>? Compared to them, Alyosha is of course still like an Apostle is to the Good Thief, or to the humble Publican (who are, in turn, perhaps closer to the holy fool "type", than to the civilizing hero).</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Finally, it seems to us that it was Dostoevsky's final stroke of genius to emphasize (as much as he could, but enough to immortalize this important insight) that besides the mudjik Christ-bearers of a fragile ancestral world, like Makar and <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank">Sophia Dolgoruky</a>, or <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank">Peasant Marey</a>, there is an essentially monastic, long tested chain of hesychast bearers and bestowers of Holy Tradition, at the core of the Church that the gates of hell shall not conquer. And they are essentially always there, or within living memory, for anyone seriously interested.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Over and over again, their "golden chain" can properly strengthen or adjust, unify, refine and harmonize everything good in those like Alyosha, like his mentor Zosima, and like all those similarly "called". And, to a remarkable extent, in those around them.[1] "Acquire the Peace of God, and thousands around you will be saved!" (St. Seraphim of Sarov.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Met. Anthony beautifully emphasizes how this applies to Alyosha, and the hesychast undertone of it all:</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"Such is the almost involuntary spiritual imprint that Dostoevsky´s favourite hero, Alyosha Karamazov, leaves on everybody, not only and not so much by means of relaying some ideas of facts, but rather by his very presence in the vicinity of the morally diseased, like both his brothers, partly his father, the high school boys and the three women. They all sense his compassionate love, they all know what he would like to tell them, what to caution against and what to call to: it is as if some life-giving water would moisten their hearts in his presence; the repenting ones have in him a moral support, while the obstinate and wavering ones like the boy Kolia, his old father and his brother Ivan, dash about but tremble beneath the rays of his love, like the possessed seeing the Saviour." (Pastoral Study of People and Life from the Works of F.M. Dostoevsky, 1893, translated by Ludmila Koehler)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, Filial Piety, spiritual and natural, and their every fruit, or the lack of them and their contraries, is what is tested, under both mild weather and burning fire, in Dostoevsky's last novel. Positively, in the meek but great-souled Alyosha - and negatively, in his swept by the Modern winds brothers, and community.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Nevertheless, it has been noted that the Karamazov brothers are all one, and we should think of the possibility of seeing them all reunited, like a person made whole. Thus read, the novel is also a parable. The parable of a distorted-by-abstraction mind (Ivan Karamazov), of an untended Romantic soul (Dimitry Karamazov), and of a repressed but true to God conscience or spirit (Alyosha). And, perhaps, even of an ailing body (Smerdyakov). So we are left with the question: what will make them all one again, and reconciled to their conscience? What would heal the broken Karamazovian person, and make it whole?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Dostoevsky's general answer would be Christ, of course. Synergy in Christ, as the learned would say. But what is the common solution, the common denominator, so to speak, of all four Karamazovian "equations"? Without going into details, here, we propose it is the "nostalgia for the desert". The almost perfectly hidden, but always present, even in the first family reunion, even in the criminal, nostalgia for the desert. Not for the civilizing hero, not even for the fool for Christ, but for the desert, and the saintly desert dweller.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Let us imagine, for a moment, that Dostoevsky would receive a divine commission to write the sequel to the Brothers Karamazov, from beyond the grave, after all. Who, among the Karamazovs, is the potential hermit? Where is this nostalgia for the desert Saint most burning? </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Not so much in the civilizing hero, we would suggest. Not even in his mentor Zosima. But in he who is like burning fire, waiting only to be reoriented. In the sequel volume he could perhaps be a second Arseny the Great, if not a second Isaac the Syrian. We speak of Ivan Karamazov, of course. Whose eschatological imagery seems, at times, already more inspired by St. Isaac and otherworldly than even Zosima's (Met. Anthony notes it, but perhaps too hastily assigns it to some supposedly Origenist influence, although the novelist hints only at St. Isaac the Syrian.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, when the existing novel mentions copies of St. Isaac's Ascetic Homilies in unexpected places (one at the good simple peasant-servant Grigory and another at the otherwise deeply troubled Smerdyakov!), we can only see the written symbol of a common Karamazovian longing, for the desert hermit. It is the one hopeful thing they all secretly share in the household.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>For, Isaac was not at all meant for, or popular among, the very simple, as far as we are aware. Back then, it was a rare book, and almost reserved to elite spiritual strugglers. But then, they all share the faith in the desert hermit (or only a longing, in the case of Ivan). Therefore, Dostoevsky makes even the simple ones own and display their mysterious copies of the foremost practical guide for experienced desert dwellers.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>In brief, in The Brothers Karamazov the Homilies of St. Isaac the Syrian simply symbolize the mantle of the truest desert ascetic. And everyone's tacit longing, perhaps even the author's, for the day and hour when Ivan will finally bring them all under its protection. Even his alter ego ('the devil') hints at such a course...</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, what begins with Filial Piety, tested or lost, continues with Filial Piety (almost) regained, by the repenting Dimitry and Ivan, in the last pages of the existing volumes, under the prayerful influence of the "Golden Chain". But in some sense it could only end (we suggest, in the author's perhaps not even fully acknowledged hopes) under the mantle of St. Isaac the Syrian.[2]</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Finally, we now turn back to the first steps of Alyosha. As we begin the story, please also note his special relationship with his natural Mother, beautifully counted by Met. Anthony among Dostoevsky's quasi-hesychast women:</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"A loving and simultaneously a humble woman is a formidable force. Love deprived of humility causes domestic discord and grief, hence the stronger this love is, and not only for a husband, but also for the children, the more harm it causes if it lacks humility. Proud love is the cause of adultery and hard drinking of husbands, the suicide of bridegrooms and the sufferings of children: the love of Katerina Ivanovna - the [would-be] bride (The Brothers Karamazov), and of Katerina Ivanovna - the mother and wife (Crime and Punishment), the love of Lisa - daughter and [would-be] bride, the love of Grushenka (The Brothers Karamazov), of The Meek One [!] and of Nelly (The Insulted and The Injured) of Katia (Netochka Nezvanova), the wife of Shatov (The Possessed) and of all the proud characters in general is the source of evil and unnecessary sufferings. The love of the humble and self-abashing ones, on the contrary, is the source of peace and repentance. Such are the mother of Raskolnikov and Sonia (Crime and Punishment) who was worshipped even by the convicts who had divined her humble and contrite heart, such is Natasha's mother (The Insulted and The Injured) and the mother of the "Adolescent," the paralyzed sister of Iliusha (The Brothers Karamazov), Netochka Nezvanova, Aliosha Karamazov's mother, and many others. They do not insist on having it their own way at all costs, but they are able to achieve, in almost all cases, by means of love, tears, forgiveness and prayerful repentance and the conversion of their beloved husbands, parents or children. While taking the difficult step of renouncing their former life, their beloved ones find inspiration in this constant example of self-denial, they absorb, as it were, the power of self-denial, while the love of a humble being turns the very feat of a formerly proud man into a sweet task." (Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky, Pastoral Study..., Ludmila Koehler transl.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>This is also one of the most carefully drawn lists of proud v. genuinely meek and humble Dostoevskian loves. To understand its point is, perhaps, to understand the heart of Motherhood and the Golden Chain, all at once (cf. also the motto, above). The heart of the Civilizing Hero, the Holy Fool, and the Hermit. The heart of Dostoevsky.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Notes:</p>
<p> </p>
<p>[1] Our abstract-inclined readers will notice, here: this means even the overstretched "Euclidean" side of Ivan Karamazov, the story's rebellious "rationalist" ferment, must have been redeemable. It only needed adjustment to a larger context. As exemplified in A. Khomiakov, the famous mathematician, scientist and Church philosopher, and a major influence on Dostoevsky's generation. In other words, the issue wasn't so much “Reason vs. Faith”, as it was “Euclidean” reductionism, versus a more comprehensive and practical kind of rationality and wisdom.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>[2] The proper context of The Brothers Karamazov, then, until its sequel reaches this side of Eternity, might be Confucius, The Optina Series, and St. Isaac. We would suggest the Slingerland, Platina, and Boston editions, respectively. With due attention to the practical side that such works seem to have in view (cf. also this <a href="https://archive.ph/snbkA">bookreview by Dana R. Miller</a>, translator of St. Isaac.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p align="center">***</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>F.M. Dostoevsky</p>
<p> </p>
<p>ALYOSHA KARAMAZOV</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(from The Brothers Karamazov, 1880, book I, part I, chap. IV. Translation by Constance Garnett. Russian original <a href="https://archive.ph/cL866#selection-301.0-301.21">here</a>.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He was only twenty, his brother Ivan was in his twenty‐fourth year at the time, while their elder brother Dmitri was twenty‐seven. First of all, I must explain that this young man, Alyosha, was not a fanatic, and, in my opinion at least, was not even a mystic. I may as well give my full opinion from the beginning. He was simply an early lover of humanity, and that he adopted the monastic life was simply because at that time it struck him, so to say, as the ideal escape for his soul struggling from the darkness of worldly wickedness to the light of love. And the reason this life struck him in this way was that he found in it at that time, as he thought, an extraordinary being, our celebrated elder, Zossima, to whom he became attached with all the warm first love of his ardent heart. But I do not dispute that he was very strange even at that time, and had been so indeed from his cradle. I have mentioned already, by the way, that though he lost his mother in his fourth year he remembered her all his life—her face, her caresses, “as though she stood living before me.” Such memories may persist, as every one knows, from an even earlier age, even from two years old, but scarcely standing out through a whole lifetime like spots of light out of darkness, like a corner torn out of a huge picture, which has all faded and disappeared except that fragment. That is how it was with him. He remembered one still summer evening, an open window, the slanting rays of the setting sun (that he recalled most vividly of all); in a corner of the room the holy image, before it a lighted lamp, and on her knees before the image his mother, sobbing hysterically with cries and moans, snatching him up in both arms, squeezing him close till it hurt, and praying for him to the Mother of God, holding him out in both arms to the image as though to put him under the Mother’s protection ... and suddenly a nurse runs in and snatches him from her in terror. That was the picture! And Alyosha remembered his mother’s face at that minute. He used to say that it was frenzied but beautiful as he remembered. But he rarely cared to speak of this memory to any one. In his childhood and youth he was by no means expansive, and talked little indeed, but not from shyness or a sullen unsociability; quite the contrary, from something different, from a sort of inner preoccupation entirely personal and unconcerned with other people, but so important to him that he seemed, as it were, to forget others on account of it. But he was fond of people: he seemed throughout his life to put implicit trust in people: yet no one ever looked on him as a simpleton or naïve person. There was something about him which made one feel at once (and it was so all his life afterwards) that he did not care to be a judge of others—that he would never take it upon himself to criticize and would never condemn any one for anything. He seemed, indeed, to accept everything without the least condemnation though often grieving bitterly: and this was so much so that no one could surprise or frighten him even in his earliest youth. Coming at twenty to his father’s house, which was a very sink of filthy debauchery, he, chaste and pure as he was, simply withdrew in silence when to look on was unbearable, but without the slightest sign of contempt or condemnation. His father, who had once been in a dependent position, and so was sensitive and ready to take offense, met him at first with distrust and sullenness. “He does not say much,” he used to say, “and thinks the more.” But soon, within a fortnight indeed, he took to embracing him and kissing him terribly often, with drunken tears, with sottish sentimentality, yet he evidently felt a real and deep affection for him, such as he had never been capable of feeling for any one before.</p>
<p>Every one, indeed, loved this young man wherever he went, and it was so from his earliest childhood. When he entered the household of his patron and benefactor, Yefim Petrovitch Polenov, he gained the hearts of all the family, so that they looked on him quite as their own child. Yet he entered the house at such a tender age that he could not have acted from design nor artfulness in winning affection. So that the gift of making himself loved directly and unconsciously was inherent in him, in his very nature, so to speak. It was the same at school, though he seemed to be just one of those children who are distrusted, sometimes ridiculed, and even disliked by their schoolfellows. He was dreamy, for instance, and rather solitary. From his earliest childhood he was fond of creeping into a corner to read, and yet he was a general favorite all the while he was at school. He was rarely playful or merry, but any one could see at the first glance that this was not from any sullenness. On the contrary he was bright and good‐tempered. He never tried to show off among his schoolfellows. Perhaps because of this, he was never afraid of any one, yet the boys immediately understood that he was not proud of his fearlessness and seemed to be unaware that he was bold and courageous. He never resented an insult. It would happen that an hour after the offense he would address the offender or answer some question with as trustful and candid an expression as though nothing had happened between them. And it was not that he seemed to have forgotten or intentionally forgiven the affront, but simply that he did not regard it as an affront, and this completely conquered and captivated the boys. He had one characteristic which made all his schoolfellows from the bottom class to the top want to mock at him, not from malice but because it amused them. This characteristic was a wild fanatical modesty and chastity. He could not bear to hear certain words and certain conversations about women. There are “certain” words and conversations unhappily impossible to eradicate in schools. Boys pure in mind and heart, almost children, are fond of talking in school among themselves, and even aloud, of things, pictures, and images of which even soldiers would sometimes hesitate to speak. More than that, much that soldiers have no knowledge or conception of is familiar to quite young children of our intellectual and higher classes. There is no moral depravity, no real corrupt inner cynicism in it, but there is the appearance of it, and it is often looked upon among them as something refined, subtle, daring, and worthy of imitation. Seeing that Alyosha Karamazov put his fingers in his ears when they talked of “that,” they used sometimes to crowd round him, pull his hands away, and shout nastiness into both ears, while he struggled, slipped to the floor, tried to hide himself without uttering one word of abuse, enduring their insults in silence. But at last they left him alone and gave up taunting him with being a “regular girl,” and what’s more they looked upon it with compassion as a weakness. He was always one of the best in the class but was never first.</p>
<p>At the time of Yefim Petrovitch’s death Alyosha had two more years to complete at the provincial gymnasium. The inconsolable widow went almost immediately after his death for a long visit to Italy with her whole family, which consisted only of women and girls. Alyosha went to live in the house of two distant relations of Yefim Petrovitch, ladies whom he had never seen before. On what terms he lived with them he did not know himself. It was very characteristic of him, indeed, that he never cared at whose expense he was living. In that respect he was a striking contrast to his elder brother Ivan, who struggled with poverty for his first two years in the university, maintained himself by his own efforts, and had from childhood been bitterly conscious of living at the expense of his benefactor. But this strange trait in Alyosha’s character must not, I think, be criticized too severely, for at the slightest acquaintance with him any one would have perceived that Alyosha was one of those youths, almost of the type of religious enthusiast, who, if they were suddenly to come into possession of a large fortune, would not hesitate to give it away for the asking, either for good works or perhaps to a clever rogue. In general he seemed scarcely to know the value of money, not, of course, in a literal sense. When he was given pocket‐money, which he never asked for, he was either terribly careless of it so that it was gone in a moment, or he kept it for weeks together, not knowing what to do with it.</p>
<p>In later years Pyotr Alexandrovitch Miüsov, a man very sensitive on the score of money and bourgeois honesty, pronounced the following judgment, after getting to know Alyosha:</p>
<p>“Here is perhaps the one man in the world whom you might leave alone without a penny, in the center of an unknown town of a million inhabitants, and he would not come to harm, he would not die of cold and hunger, for he would be fed and sheltered at once; and if he were not, he would find a shelter for himself, and it would cost him no effort or humiliation. And to shelter him would be no burden, but, on the contrary, would probably be looked on as a pleasure.”</p>
<p>He did not finish his studies at the gymnasium. A year before the end of the course he suddenly announced to the ladies that he was going to see his father about a plan which had occurred to him. They were sorry and unwilling to let him go. The journey was not an expensive one, and the ladies would not let him pawn his watch, a parting present from his benefactor’s family. They provided him liberally with money and even fitted him out with new clothes and linen. But he returned half the money they gave him, saying that he intended to go third class. On his arrival in the town he made no answer to his father’s first inquiry why he had come before completing his studies, and seemed, so they say, unusually thoughtful. It soon became apparent that he was looking for his mother’s tomb. He practically acknowledged at the time that that was the only object of his visit. But it can hardly have been the whole reason of it. It is more probable that he himself did not understand and could not explain what had suddenly arisen in his soul, and drawn him irresistibly into a new, unknown, but inevitable path. Fyodor Pavlovitch could not show him where his second wife was buried, for he had never visited her grave since he had thrown earth upon her coffin, and in the course of years had entirely forgotten where she was buried.</p>
<p>Fyodor Pavlovitch, by the way, had for some time previously not been living in our town. Three or four years after his wife’s death he had gone to the south of Russia and finally turned up in Odessa, where he spent several years. He made the acquaintance at first, in his own words, “of a lot of low Jews, Jewesses, and Jewkins,” and ended by being received by “Jews high and low alike.” It may be presumed that at this period he developed a peculiar faculty for making and hoarding money. He finally returned to our town only three years before Alyosha’s arrival. His former acquaintances found him looking terribly aged, although he was by no means an old man. He behaved not exactly with more dignity but with more effrontery. The former buffoon showed an insolent propensity for making buffoons of others. His depravity with women was not simply what it used to be, but even more revolting. In a short time he opened a great number of new taverns in the district. It was evident that he had perhaps a hundred thousand roubles or not much less. Many of the inhabitants of the town and district were soon in his debt, and, of course, had given good security. Of late, too, he looked somehow bloated and seemed more irresponsible, more uneven, had sunk into a sort of incoherence, used to begin one thing and go on with another, as though he were letting himself go altogether. He was more and more frequently drunk. And, if it had not been for the same servant Grigory, who by that time had aged considerably too, and used to look after him sometimes almost like a tutor, Fyodor Pavlovitch might have got into terrible scrapes. Alyosha’s arrival seemed to affect even his moral side, as though something had awakened in this prematurely old man which had long been dead in his soul.</p>
<p>“Do you know,” he used often to say, looking at Alyosha, “that you are like her, ‘the crazy woman’ ”—that was what he used to call his dead wife, Alyosha’s mother. Grigory it was who pointed out the “crazy woman’s” grave to Alyosha. He took him to our town cemetery and showed him in a remote corner a cast‐iron tombstone, cheap but decently kept, on which were inscribed the name and age of the deceased and the date of her death, and below a four‐lined verse, such as are commonly used on old‐fashioned middle‐class tombs. To Alyosha’s amazement this tomb turned out to be Grigory’s doing. He had put it up on the poor “crazy woman’s” grave at his own expense, after Fyodor Pavlovitch, whom he had often pestered about the grave, had gone to Odessa, abandoning the grave and all his memories. Alyosha showed no particular emotion at the sight of his mother’s grave. He only listened to Grigory’s minute and solemn account of the erection of the tomb; he stood with bowed head and walked away without uttering a word. It was perhaps a year before he visited the cemetery again. But this little episode was not without an influence upon Fyodor Pavlovitch—and a very original one. He suddenly took a thousand roubles to our monastery to pay for requiems for the soul of his wife; but not for the second, Alyosha’s mother, the “crazy woman,” but for the first, Adelaïda Ivanovna, who used to thrash him. In the evening of the same day he got drunk and abused the monks to Alyosha. He himself was far from being religious; he had probably never put a penny candle before the image of a saint. Strange impulses of sudden feeling and sudden thought are common in such types.</p>
<p>I have mentioned already that he looked bloated. His countenance at this time bore traces of something that testified unmistakably to the life he had led. Besides the long fleshy bags under his little, always insolent, suspicious, and ironical eyes; besides the multitude of deep wrinkles in his little fat face, the Adam’s apple hung below his sharp chin like a great, fleshy goiter, which gave him a peculiar, repulsive, sensual appearance; add to that a long rapacious mouth with full lips, between which could be seen little stumps of black decayed teeth. He slobbered every time he began to speak. He was fond indeed of making fun of his own face, though, I believe, he was well satisfied with it. He used particularly to point to his nose, which was not very large, but very delicate and conspicuously aquiline. “A regular Roman nose,” he used to say, “with my goiter I’ve quite the countenance of an ancient Roman patrician of the decadent period.” He seemed proud of it.</p>
<p>Not long after visiting his mother’s grave Alyosha suddenly announced that he wanted to enter the monastery, and that the monks were willing to receive him as a novice. He explained that this was his strong desire, and that he was solemnly asking his consent as his father. The old man knew that the elder Zossima, who was living in the monastery hermitage, had made a special impression upon his “gentle boy.”</p>
<p>“That is the most honest monk among them, of course,” he observed, after listening in thoughtful silence to Alyosha, and seeming scarcely surprised at his request. “H’m!... So that’s where you want to be, my gentle boy?”</p>
<p>He was half drunk, and suddenly he grinned his slow half‐drunken grin, which was not without a certain cunning and tipsy slyness. “H’m!... I had a presentiment that you would end in something like this. Would you believe it? You were making straight for it. Well, to be sure you have your own two thousand. That’s a dowry for you. And I’ll never desert you, my angel. And I’ll pay what’s wanted for you there, if they ask for it. But, of course, if they don’t ask, why should we worry them? What do you say? You know, you spend money like a canary, two grains a week. H’m!... Do you know that near one monastery there’s a place outside the town where every baby knows there are none but ‘the monks’ wives’ living, as they are called. Thirty women, I believe. I have been there myself. You know, it’s interesting in its own way, of course, as a variety. The worst of it is it’s awfully Russian. There are no French women there. Of course they could get them fast enough, they have plenty of money. If they get to hear of it they’ll come along. Well, there’s nothing of that sort here, no ‘monks’ wives,’ and two hundred monks. They’re honest. They keep the fasts. I admit it.... H’m.... So you want to be a monk? And do you know I’m sorry to lose you, Alyosha; would you believe it, I’ve really grown fond of you? Well, it’s a good opportunity. You’ll pray for us sinners; we have sinned too much here. I’ve always been thinking who would pray for me, and whether there’s any one in the world to do it. My dear boy, I’m awfully stupid about that. You wouldn’t believe it. Awfully. You see, however stupid I am about it, I keep thinking, I keep thinking—from time to time, of course, not all the while. It’s impossible, I think, for the devils to forget to drag me down to hell with their hooks when I die. Then I wonder—hooks? Where would they get them? What of? Iron hooks? Where do they forge them? Have they a foundry there of some sort? The monks in the monastery probably believe that there’s a ceiling in hell, for instance. Now I’m ready to believe in hell, but without a ceiling. It makes it more refined, more enlightened, more Lutheran that is. And, after all, what does it matter whether it has a ceiling or hasn’t? But, do you know, there’s a damnable question involved in it? If there’s no ceiling there can be no hooks, and if there are no hooks it all breaks down, which is unlikely again, for then there would be none to drag me down to hell, and if they don’t drag me down what justice is there in the world? Il faudrait les inventer, those hooks, on purpose for me alone, for, if you only knew, Alyosha, what a blackguard I am.”</p>
<p>“But there are no hooks there,” said Alyosha, looking gently and seriously at his father.</p>
<p>“Yes, yes, only the shadows of hooks, I know, I know. That’s how a Frenchman described hell: ‘J’ai vu l’ombre d’un cocher qui avec l’ombre d’une brosse frottait l’ombre d’une carrosse.’ How do you know there are no hooks, darling? When you’ve lived with the monks you’ll sing a different tune. But go and get at the truth there, and then come and tell me. Anyway it’s easier going to the other world if one knows what there is there. Besides, it will be more seemly for you with the monks than here with me, with a drunken old man and young harlots ... though you’re like an angel, nothing touches you. And I dare say nothing will touch you there. That’s why I let you go, because I hope for that. You’ve got all your wits about you. You will burn and you will burn out; you will be healed and come back again. And I will wait for you. I feel that you’re the only creature in the world who has not condemned me. My dear boy, I feel it, you know. I can’t help feeling it.”</p>
<p>And he even began blubbering. He was sentimental. He was wicked and sentimental.</p>
<p>(To be continued.)</p><p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/lios.jpg" alt="lios" style="float: right;" width="250" height="416" /></span>Previously in the Dostoevsky for Parents and Children series:</p>
<p> </p>
<p><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank">Varenka's Memoirs</a> (from the novel Poor Folk, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank">An Honest Thief</a> (from Stories of a Man of Experience, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank">Nellie's Story</a> (from The Insulted and Injured, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank">Marie's Story</a> (from The Idiot, 1868 [suggested by Anna Dostoevskaya in correspondence pertaining to the 1897 anthology, DPC X])</p>
<p><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank">At The Select Boarding School</a> (from the novel The Adolescent, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank">The Merchant's Story</a> (from the novel The Adolescent, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</a> (from The Diary Of A Writer, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank">The Peasant Marey</a> (from The Diary Of A Writer, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank">A Centenarian</a> (from The Diary Of A Writer, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</p>
<p><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank">Foma Danilov</a> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from The Diary Of A Writer, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</p>
<p> </p>
<p>{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present Dostoevsky for Parents and Children (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and as the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank">here</a> our brief introduction to the original Dostoevsky for Children anthologies, and to this English online version. Accompanying photo: Vladimir Gotovtsev in the role of Alyosha, 1910}</p>
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<p align="center">--//--</p>
<p align="center"> </p>
<p>"Let every abbot become and remain always in his relation to those subject to him as a wise mother."</p>
<p align="right">(St. Seraphim of Sarov, Fr. Seraphim Rose transl.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>In his monumental biography of Dostoevsky, Joseph Frank inspiringly compares The Brothers Karamazov to the best works of Dante, Shakespeare, Milton and Goethe. At one point, even to Beethoven's 9th! Dostoevsky's final novel is, indeed, in many ways, his grandest tour de force: majestic and deep, complex and spellbinding. And each facet of it illuminates every other…</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Obviously, no introduction or anthology can do justice to such a work! Even so, we hope that what follows can be of some use.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Here are some of the main themes and questions posed with existential intensity in the book: </p>
<p> </p>
<p>The Mystery of Filial Piety - natural and spiritual - and the implications of its denial. The Mystery of Eldership, or the Golden Chain of mentoring in the ways of Holy Tradition. The Mystery of co-suffering love, including how to feel, think, pray, and act according to the insight that "all are guilty for all". The impact of doing or not doing so, on man, family and community, especially on the "smallest ones" (children, mudjiks, "the people"...) The ways and implications of putting one's faith in the <a href="http://orthodoxinfo.com/general/kingdomofheaven.aspx" target="_blank">Economy of Salvation</a> (reflecting the author's growing interest in the Scriptures, the Lives of the Saints, St. Tikhon of Zadonsk, the nowadays seemingly neglected <a href="https://www.academia.edu/35755543/PARFENY_AGEEV_AND_RUSSIAN_PILGRIMAGE_TO_MOUNT_ATHOS" target="_blank">Tales of the Wanderings of the Athonite Monk Parfeny</a>, the Optina elders, and St. Isaac the Syrian, among others). Or, in something else. Active faith versus mere speculative faith. And the haunting question of Utopia: can the rare and painstakingly won inner and communal harmony of the virtuous souls be extended beyond the confines of an almost ideal Russian monastery? To a small, Jane Austen-like community, around the monastery? To the Great Modern Society at large? All this, and more, closely weaved in a literary masterpiece.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>For our part, we would also compare the novel to Confucius, the father of classical Chinese thought and civilization, who essentially taught that <a href="https://archive.ph/QxNUK" target="_blank">filial piety moves Heaven and Earth</a>, while the lack of it antagonizes both - which is the exact teaching verified by Dostoevsky, with a spiritual dimension added, in his central character, Alyosha Karamazov, and all around him.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>And, among the philosophies of our times, to those which (like that of A. MacIntyre) essentially point out that there is no rationality outside of tradition. I.e., no practical rationality, and indeed no justice, in the ancient sense, of giving to each his due, starting from each of the powers of one's own soul.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Indeed, Dostoevsky is pointing to the transmissible ways of Eldership, of mentorship according to Holy Tradition, as the great unifier that calls everything good to fruition, harmony and balance. Starting with the root virtue of Filial Piety. In doing so, our author makes Alyosha his civilizing hero.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>A hero capable to inspire the real-life path of Metropolitan Anthony Khrapovitsky: the path from The Brothers Karamazov (the core of all the Metropolitan's practical-oriented Dostoevskian interpretations), to the Metropolitan's blessed pastoral efforts, crowned by the mentoring of many Confessors and Saints, such as Vladika John of Shanghai and San Francisco.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, the Brothers Karamazov points towards a path of redeeming practical wisdom and rationality as no other work of fiction we are aware of. Including enough practical tips for those seriously interested, to find the next steps themselves. It is the case of Metropolitan Anthony, but also of Prof. Ivan Andreyev, of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/729-before-and-after-elder-zossima-the-brothers-karamazov.html" target="_blank">Fr. Gheorghe Calciu,</a> and others. Including, it seems, more than one actor, from more than one country, who played the role of Alyosha Karamazov in some screen or theatrical adaptation, and then went on to become an actual monk... </p>
<p> </p>
<p>To repeat and emphasize: in Alyosha Karamazov, whose story we begin to read today, we see Dostoevsky's foremost civilizing hero. In the West, his saga may evoke Beethoven's greatest symphony. To the <a href="https://archive.ph/2ylyZ" target="_blank">Chinese mind</a> he would probably evoke <a href="https://pages.ucsd.edu/~dkjordan/chin/shiaw/shiawcontents.html" target="_blank">Shun, first among the archetypes of heroic Filial Piety</a> brought to completion with the blessing of Heaven, and therefore the ideal Man and Emperor. Still, only a mythical Emperor. However, to the heart of Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky and other Eastern Orthodox, Alyosha has inspired the path to real-life Sainthood, via Christ-like pastorship and Christ-filled love, according to the tested ways of Holy Tradition.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Our diligent homeschooling readers will, perhaps, also wish to compare Alyosha to other key Dostoevsky characters. Compared to Prince Myshkin (the “Idiot”), for instance, he seems to us what the Apostle is to a holy fool for Christ. Also rare and exceptional, but invaluable in a very special way: because he is the evocation of a link in the "Golden Chain" of Holy Tradition - in the unbroken spiritual chain of those capable to receive and hand down the ways of holiness. Something "repeatable" and refinable by the ones inspired, each according to their calling and circumstances, as suggested above.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Let us also emphasize that the relevant comparison between Myshkin and Alyosha, it seems to us, is not so much a matter of greater worldly achievement by either of them, as has sometimes been suggested. Indeed, the mature Dostoevsky's practical test and concern seems to us the impact of worldviews on children and youth (something adumbrated at least since <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank">The Idiot</a>, if not since <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank">The Insulted</a><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"> and Injured</a>, though something perhaps too easily overlooked by those readers who, not unlike some of our author’s heroes, tend to see only Scholastic disputatios, where basic practical discernment is clearly the issue). "By their fruit you shall know them..."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Yet, in terms of impact on children, Prince Myshkin's experience is quite as uplifting as, and commensurable with, that of Alyosha Karamazov. Except that Myshkin's redeeming impact on the "smallest ones'', and on their small community, comes at the beginning of The Idiot (in <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.html" target="_blank">the story of Marie</a>), freeing the Quichotesque Prince to take on the Great Russian Society, next - something Alyosha was supposed to do only in a sequel novel, left unwritten due to Dostoevsky's repose.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>In short, by Dostoevsky's "final'' criterion and concern, as we understand it, The Brothers Karamazov ends where The Idiot begins: with the spiritual redemption of a group of children and their close ones. Indeed, The Idiot could almost be read as The Brothers Karamazov's sequel. A poetic, and some would say less didactic, even less "didacticist" (Leatherbarrow) sequel.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Yet, as we have said, Dostoevsky manages to weave everything in a spellbinding masterpiece, and Alyosha touches on the mystery of practical mentorship, of practical wisdom and rationality, as no other Dostoevsky character does, unless we count his mentor, Elder Zosima, and, in the end, Alyosha's own "novices", especially the children, as we shall soon see. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>What about the unforgettable and in a sense forever irreplaceable <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/714-bicentenar-dostoievski-inaintea-tatlui-fiului-risipitor.html" target="_blank">Marmeladov</a>, his daughter Sonia, or even the <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank">Honest Thief</a>? Compared to them, Alyosha is of course still like an Apostle is to the Good Thief, or to the humble Publican (who are, in turn, perhaps closer to the holy fool "type", than to the civilizing hero).</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Finally, it seems to us that it was Dostoevsky's final stroke of genius to emphasize (as much as he could, but enough to immortalize this important insight) that besides the mudjik Christ-bearers of a fragile ancestral world, like Makar and <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank">Sophia Dolgoruky</a>, or <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank">Peasant Marey</a>, there is an essentially monastic, long tested chain of hesychast bearers and bestowers of Holy Tradition, at the core of the Church that the gates of hell shall not conquer. And they are essentially always there, or within living memory, for anyone seriously interested.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Over and over again, their "golden chain" can properly strengthen or adjust, unify, refine and harmonize everything good in those like Alyosha, like his mentor Zosima, and like all those similarly "called". And, to a remarkable extent, in those around them.[1] "Acquire the Peace of God, and thousands around you will be saved!" (St. Seraphim of Sarov.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Met. Anthony beautifully emphasizes how this applies to Alyosha, and the hesychast undertone of it all:</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"Such is the almost involuntary spiritual imprint that Dostoevsky´s favourite hero, Alyosha Karamazov, leaves on everybody, not only and not so much by means of relaying some ideas of facts, but rather by his very presence in the vicinity of the morally diseased, like both his brothers, partly his father, the high school boys and the three women. They all sense his compassionate love, they all know what he would like to tell them, what to caution against and what to call to: it is as if some life-giving water would moisten their hearts in his presence; the repenting ones have in him a moral support, while the obstinate and wavering ones like the boy Kolia, his old father and his brother Ivan, dash about but tremble beneath the rays of his love, like the possessed seeing the Saviour." (Pastoral Study of People and Life from the Works of F.M. Dostoevsky, 1893, translated by Ludmila Koehler)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, Filial Piety, spiritual and natural, and their every fruit, or the lack of them and their contraries, is what is tested, under both mild weather and burning fire, in Dostoevsky's last novel. Positively, in the meek but great-souled Alyosha - and negatively, in his swept by the Modern winds brothers, and community.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Nevertheless, it has been noted that the Karamazov brothers are all one, and we should think of the possibility of seeing them all reunited, like a person made whole. Thus read, the novel is also a parable. The parable of a distorted-by-abstraction mind (Ivan Karamazov), of an untended Romantic soul (Dimitry Karamazov), and of a repressed but true to God conscience or spirit (Alyosha). And, perhaps, even of an ailing body (Smerdyakov). So we are left with the question: what will make them all one again, and reconciled to their conscience? What would heal the broken Karamazovian person, and make it whole?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Dostoevsky's general answer would be Christ, of course. Synergy in Christ, as the learned would say. But what is the common solution, the common denominator, so to speak, of all four Karamazovian "equations"? Without going into details, here, we propose it is the "nostalgia for the desert". The almost perfectly hidden, but always present, even in the first family reunion, even in the criminal, nostalgia for the desert. Not for the civilizing hero, not even for the fool for Christ, but for the desert, and the saintly desert dweller.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Let us imagine, for a moment, that Dostoevsky would receive a divine commission to write the sequel to the Brothers Karamazov, from beyond the grave, after all. Who, among the Karamazovs, is the potential hermit? Where is this nostalgia for the desert Saint most burning? </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Not so much in the civilizing hero, we would suggest. Not even in his mentor Zosima. But in he who is like burning fire, waiting only to be reoriented. In the sequel volume he could perhaps be a second Arseny the Great, if not a second Isaac the Syrian. We speak of Ivan Karamazov, of course. Whose eschatological imagery seems, at times, already more inspired by St. Isaac and otherworldly than even Zosima's (Met. Anthony notes it, but perhaps too hastily assigns it to some supposedly Origenist influence, although the novelist hints only at St. Isaac the Syrian.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, when the existing novel mentions copies of St. Isaac's Ascetic Homilies in unexpected places (one at the good simple peasant-servant Grigory and another at the otherwise deeply troubled Smerdyakov!), we can only see the written symbol of a common Karamazovian longing, for the desert hermit. It is the one hopeful thing they all secretly share in the household.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>For, Isaac was not at all meant for, or popular among, the very simple, as far as we are aware. Back then, it was a rare book, and almost reserved to elite spiritual strugglers. But then, they all share the faith in the desert hermit (or only a longing, in the case of Ivan). Therefore, Dostoevsky makes even the simple ones own and display their mysterious copies of the foremost practical guide for experienced desert dwellers.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>In brief, in The Brothers Karamazov the Homilies of St. Isaac the Syrian simply symbolize the mantle of the truest desert ascetic. And everyone's tacit longing, perhaps even the author's, for the day and hour when Ivan will finally bring them all under its protection. Even his alter ego ('the devil') hints at such a course...</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Thus, what begins with Filial Piety, tested or lost, continues with Filial Piety (almost) regained, by the repenting Dimitry and Ivan, in the last pages of the existing volumes, under the prayerful influence of the "Golden Chain". But in some sense it could only end (we suggest, in the author's perhaps not even fully acknowledged hopes) under the mantle of St. Isaac the Syrian.[2]</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Finally, we now turn back to the first steps of Alyosha. As we begin the story, please also note his special relationship with his natural Mother, beautifully counted by Met. Anthony among Dostoevsky's quasi-hesychast women:</p>
<p> </p>
<p>"A loving and simultaneously a humble woman is a formidable force. Love deprived of humility causes domestic discord and grief, hence the stronger this love is, and not only for a husband, but also for the children, the more harm it causes if it lacks humility. Proud love is the cause of adultery and hard drinking of husbands, the suicide of bridegrooms and the sufferings of children: the love of Katerina Ivanovna - the [would-be] bride (The Brothers Karamazov), and of Katerina Ivanovna - the mother and wife (Crime and Punishment), the love of Lisa - daughter and [would-be] bride, the love of Grushenka (The Brothers Karamazov), of The Meek One [!] and of Nelly (The Insulted and The Injured) of Katia (Netochka Nezvanova), the wife of Shatov (The Possessed) and of all the proud characters in general is the source of evil and unnecessary sufferings. The love of the humble and self-abashing ones, on the contrary, is the source of peace and repentance. Such are the mother of Raskolnikov and Sonia (Crime and Punishment) who was worshipped even by the convicts who had divined her humble and contrite heart, such is Natasha's mother (The Insulted and The Injured) and the mother of the "Adolescent," the paralyzed sister of Iliusha (The Brothers Karamazov), Netochka Nezvanova, Aliosha Karamazov's mother, and many others. They do not insist on having it their own way at all costs, but they are able to achieve, in almost all cases, by means of love, tears, forgiveness and prayerful repentance and the conversion of their beloved husbands, parents or children. While taking the difficult step of renouncing their former life, their beloved ones find inspiration in this constant example of self-denial, they absorb, as it were, the power of self-denial, while the love of a humble being turns the very feat of a formerly proud man into a sweet task." (Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky, Pastoral Study..., Ludmila Koehler transl.)</p>
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<p>This is also one of the most carefully drawn lists of proud v. genuinely meek and humble Dostoevskian loves. To understand its point is, perhaps, to understand the heart of Motherhood and the Golden Chain, all at once (cf. also the motto, above). The heart of the Civilizing Hero, the Holy Fool, and the Hermit. The heart of Dostoevsky.</p>
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<p>Notes:</p>
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<p>[1] Our abstract-inclined readers will notice, here: this means even the overstretched "Euclidean" side of Ivan Karamazov, the story's rebellious "rationalist" ferment, must have been redeemable. It only needed adjustment to a larger context. As exemplified in A. Khomiakov, the famous mathematician, scientist and Church philosopher, and a major influence on Dostoevsky's generation. In other words, the issue wasn't so much “Reason vs. Faith”, as it was “Euclidean” reductionism, versus a more comprehensive and practical kind of rationality and wisdom.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>[2] The proper context of The Brothers Karamazov, then, until its sequel reaches this side of Eternity, might be Confucius, The Optina Series, and St. Isaac. We would suggest the Slingerland, Platina, and Boston editions, respectively. With due attention to the practical side that such works seem to have in view (cf. also this <a href="https://archive.ph/snbkA">bookreview by Dana R. Miller</a>, translator of St. Isaac.)</p>
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<p align="center">***</p>
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<p>F.M. Dostoevsky</p>
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<p>ALYOSHA KARAMAZOV</p>
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<p>(from The Brothers Karamazov, 1880, book I, part I, chap. IV. Translation by Constance Garnett. Russian original <a href="https://archive.ph/cL866#selection-301.0-301.21">here</a>.)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>He was only twenty, his brother Ivan was in his twenty‐fourth year at the time, while their elder brother Dmitri was twenty‐seven. First of all, I must explain that this young man, Alyosha, was not a fanatic, and, in my opinion at least, was not even a mystic. I may as well give my full opinion from the beginning. He was simply an early lover of humanity, and that he adopted the monastic life was simply because at that time it struck him, so to say, as the ideal escape for his soul struggling from the darkness of worldly wickedness to the light of love. And the reason this life struck him in this way was that he found in it at that time, as he thought, an extraordinary being, our celebrated elder, Zossima, to whom he became attached with all the warm first love of his ardent heart. But I do not dispute that he was very strange even at that time, and had been so indeed from his cradle. I have mentioned already, by the way, that though he lost his mother in his fourth year he remembered her all his life—her face, her caresses, “as though she stood living before me.” Such memories may persist, as every one knows, from an even earlier age, even from two years old, but scarcely standing out through a whole lifetime like spots of light out of darkness, like a corner torn out of a huge picture, which has all faded and disappeared except that fragment. That is how it was with him. He remembered one still summer evening, an open window, the slanting rays of the setting sun (that he recalled most vividly of all); in a corner of the room the holy image, before it a lighted lamp, and on her knees before the image his mother, sobbing hysterically with cries and moans, snatching him up in both arms, squeezing him close till it hurt, and praying for him to the Mother of God, holding him out in both arms to the image as though to put him under the Mother’s protection ... and suddenly a nurse runs in and snatches him from her in terror. That was the picture! And Alyosha remembered his mother’s face at that minute. He used to say that it was frenzied but beautiful as he remembered. But he rarely cared to speak of this memory to any one. In his childhood and youth he was by no means expansive, and talked little indeed, but not from shyness or a sullen unsociability; quite the contrary, from something different, from a sort of inner preoccupation entirely personal and unconcerned with other people, but so important to him that he seemed, as it were, to forget others on account of it. But he was fond of people: he seemed throughout his life to put implicit trust in people: yet no one ever looked on him as a simpleton or naïve person. There was something about him which made one feel at once (and it was so all his life afterwards) that he did not care to be a judge of others—that he would never take it upon himself to criticize and would never condemn any one for anything. He seemed, indeed, to accept everything without the least condemnation though often grieving bitterly: and this was so much so that no one could surprise or frighten him even in his earliest youth. Coming at twenty to his father’s house, which was a very sink of filthy debauchery, he, chaste and pure as he was, simply withdrew in silence when to look on was unbearable, but without the slightest sign of contempt or condemnation. His father, who had once been in a dependent position, and so was sensitive and ready to take offense, met him at first with distrust and sullenness. “He does not say much,” he used to say, “and thinks the more.” But soon, within a fortnight indeed, he took to embracing him and kissing him terribly often, with drunken tears, with sottish sentimentality, yet he evidently felt a real and deep affection for him, such as he had never been capable of feeling for any one before.</p>
<p>Every one, indeed, loved this young man wherever he went, and it was so from his earliest childhood. When he entered the household of his patron and benefactor, Yefim Petrovitch Polenov, he gained the hearts of all the family, so that they looked on him quite as their own child. Yet he entered the house at such a tender age that he could not have acted from design nor artfulness in winning affection. So that the gift of making himself loved directly and unconsciously was inherent in him, in his very nature, so to speak. It was the same at school, though he seemed to be just one of those children who are distrusted, sometimes ridiculed, and even disliked by their schoolfellows. He was dreamy, for instance, and rather solitary. From his earliest childhood he was fond of creeping into a corner to read, and yet he was a general favorite all the while he was at school. He was rarely playful or merry, but any one could see at the first glance that this was not from any sullenness. On the contrary he was bright and good‐tempered. He never tried to show off among his schoolfellows. Perhaps because of this, he was never afraid of any one, yet the boys immediately understood that he was not proud of his fearlessness and seemed to be unaware that he was bold and courageous. He never resented an insult. It would happen that an hour after the offense he would address the offender or answer some question with as trustful and candid an expression as though nothing had happened between them. And it was not that he seemed to have forgotten or intentionally forgiven the affront, but simply that he did not regard it as an affront, and this completely conquered and captivated the boys. He had one characteristic which made all his schoolfellows from the bottom class to the top want to mock at him, not from malice but because it amused them. This characteristic was a wild fanatical modesty and chastity. He could not bear to hear certain words and certain conversations about women. There are “certain” words and conversations unhappily impossible to eradicate in schools. Boys pure in mind and heart, almost children, are fond of talking in school among themselves, and even aloud, of things, pictures, and images of which even soldiers would sometimes hesitate to speak. More than that, much that soldiers have no knowledge or conception of is familiar to quite young children of our intellectual and higher classes. There is no moral depravity, no real corrupt inner cynicism in it, but there is the appearance of it, and it is often looked upon among them as something refined, subtle, daring, and worthy of imitation. Seeing that Alyosha Karamazov put his fingers in his ears when they talked of “that,” they used sometimes to crowd round him, pull his hands away, and shout nastiness into both ears, while he struggled, slipped to the floor, tried to hide himself without uttering one word of abuse, enduring their insults in silence. But at last they left him alone and gave up taunting him with being a “regular girl,” and what’s more they looked upon it with compassion as a weakness. He was always one of the best in the class but was never first.</p>
<p>At the time of Yefim Petrovitch’s death Alyosha had two more years to complete at the provincial gymnasium. The inconsolable widow went almost immediately after his death for a long visit to Italy with her whole family, which consisted only of women and girls. Alyosha went to live in the house of two distant relations of Yefim Petrovitch, ladies whom he had never seen before. On what terms he lived with them he did not know himself. It was very characteristic of him, indeed, that he never cared at whose expense he was living. In that respect he was a striking contrast to his elder brother Ivan, who struggled with poverty for his first two years in the university, maintained himself by his own efforts, and had from childhood been bitterly conscious of living at the expense of his benefactor. But this strange trait in Alyosha’s character must not, I think, be criticized too severely, for at the slightest acquaintance with him any one would have perceived that Alyosha was one of those youths, almost of the type of religious enthusiast, who, if they were suddenly to come into possession of a large fortune, would not hesitate to give it away for the asking, either for good works or perhaps to a clever rogue. In general he seemed scarcely to know the value of money, not, of course, in a literal sense. When he was given pocket‐money, which he never asked for, he was either terribly careless of it so that it was gone in a moment, or he kept it for weeks together, not knowing what to do with it.</p>
<p>In later years Pyotr Alexandrovitch Miüsov, a man very sensitive on the score of money and bourgeois honesty, pronounced the following judgment, after getting to know Alyosha:</p>
<p>“Here is perhaps the one man in the world whom you might leave alone without a penny, in the center of an unknown town of a million inhabitants, and he would not come to harm, he would not die of cold and hunger, for he would be fed and sheltered at once; and if he were not, he would find a shelter for himself, and it would cost him no effort or humiliation. And to shelter him would be no burden, but, on the contrary, would probably be looked on as a pleasure.”</p>
<p>He did not finish his studies at the gymnasium. A year before the end of the course he suddenly announced to the ladies that he was going to see his father about a plan which had occurred to him. They were sorry and unwilling to let him go. The journey was not an expensive one, and the ladies would not let him pawn his watch, a parting present from his benefactor’s family. They provided him liberally with money and even fitted him out with new clothes and linen. But he returned half the money they gave him, saying that he intended to go third class. On his arrival in the town he made no answer to his father’s first inquiry why he had come before completing his studies, and seemed, so they say, unusually thoughtful. It soon became apparent that he was looking for his mother’s tomb. He practically acknowledged at the time that that was the only object of his visit. But it can hardly have been the whole reason of it. It is more probable that he himself did not understand and could not explain what had suddenly arisen in his soul, and drawn him irresistibly into a new, unknown, but inevitable path. Fyodor Pavlovitch could not show him where his second wife was buried, for he had never visited her grave since he had thrown earth upon her coffin, and in the course of years had entirely forgotten where she was buried.</p>
<p>Fyodor Pavlovitch, by the way, had for some time previously not been living in our town. Three or four years after his wife’s death he had gone to the south of Russia and finally turned up in Odessa, where he spent several years. He made the acquaintance at first, in his own words, “of a lot of low Jews, Jewesses, and Jewkins,” and ended by being received by “Jews high and low alike.” It may be presumed that at this period he developed a peculiar faculty for making and hoarding money. He finally returned to our town only three years before Alyosha’s arrival. His former acquaintances found him looking terribly aged, although he was by no means an old man. He behaved not exactly with more dignity but with more effrontery. The former buffoon showed an insolent propensity for making buffoons of others. His depravity with women was not simply what it used to be, but even more revolting. In a short time he opened a great number of new taverns in the district. It was evident that he had perhaps a hundred thousand roubles or not much less. Many of the inhabitants of the town and district were soon in his debt, and, of course, had given good security. Of late, too, he looked somehow bloated and seemed more irresponsible, more uneven, had sunk into a sort of incoherence, used to begin one thing and go on with another, as though he were letting himself go altogether. He was more and more frequently drunk. And, if it had not been for the same servant Grigory, who by that time had aged considerably too, and used to look after him sometimes almost like a tutor, Fyodor Pavlovitch might have got into terrible scrapes. Alyosha’s arrival seemed to affect even his moral side, as though something had awakened in this prematurely old man which had long been dead in his soul.</p>
<p>“Do you know,” he used often to say, looking at Alyosha, “that you are like her, ‘the crazy woman’ ”—that was what he used to call his dead wife, Alyosha’s mother. Grigory it was who pointed out the “crazy woman’s” grave to Alyosha. He took him to our town cemetery and showed him in a remote corner a cast‐iron tombstone, cheap but decently kept, on which were inscribed the name and age of the deceased and the date of her death, and below a four‐lined verse, such as are commonly used on old‐fashioned middle‐class tombs. To Alyosha’s amazement this tomb turned out to be Grigory’s doing. He had put it up on the poor “crazy woman’s” grave at his own expense, after Fyodor Pavlovitch, whom he had often pestered about the grave, had gone to Odessa, abandoning the grave and all his memories. Alyosha showed no particular emotion at the sight of his mother’s grave. He only listened to Grigory’s minute and solemn account of the erection of the tomb; he stood with bowed head and walked away without uttering a word. It was perhaps a year before he visited the cemetery again. But this little episode was not without an influence upon Fyodor Pavlovitch—and a very original one. He suddenly took a thousand roubles to our monastery to pay for requiems for the soul of his wife; but not for the second, Alyosha’s mother, the “crazy woman,” but for the first, Adelaïda Ivanovna, who used to thrash him. In the evening of the same day he got drunk and abused the monks to Alyosha. He himself was far from being religious; he had probably never put a penny candle before the image of a saint. Strange impulses of sudden feeling and sudden thought are common in such types.</p>
<p>I have mentioned already that he looked bloated. His countenance at this time bore traces of something that testified unmistakably to the life he had led. Besides the long fleshy bags under his little, always insolent, suspicious, and ironical eyes; besides the multitude of deep wrinkles in his little fat face, the Adam’s apple hung below his sharp chin like a great, fleshy goiter, which gave him a peculiar, repulsive, sensual appearance; add to that a long rapacious mouth with full lips, between which could be seen little stumps of black decayed teeth. He slobbered every time he began to speak. He was fond indeed of making fun of his own face, though, I believe, he was well satisfied with it. He used particularly to point to his nose, which was not very large, but very delicate and conspicuously aquiline. “A regular Roman nose,” he used to say, “with my goiter I’ve quite the countenance of an ancient Roman patrician of the decadent period.” He seemed proud of it.</p>
<p>Not long after visiting his mother’s grave Alyosha suddenly announced that he wanted to enter the monastery, and that the monks were willing to receive him as a novice. He explained that this was his strong desire, and that he was solemnly asking his consent as his father. The old man knew that the elder Zossima, who was living in the monastery hermitage, had made a special impression upon his “gentle boy.”</p>
<p>“That is the most honest monk among them, of course,” he observed, after listening in thoughtful silence to Alyosha, and seeming scarcely surprised at his request. “H’m!... So that’s where you want to be, my gentle boy?”</p>
<p>He was half drunk, and suddenly he grinned his slow half‐drunken grin, which was not without a certain cunning and tipsy slyness. “H’m!... I had a presentiment that you would end in something like this. Would you believe it? You were making straight for it. Well, to be sure you have your own two thousand. That’s a dowry for you. And I’ll never desert you, my angel. And I’ll pay what’s wanted for you there, if they ask for it. But, of course, if they don’t ask, why should we worry them? What do you say? You know, you spend money like a canary, two grains a week. H’m!... Do you know that near one monastery there’s a place outside the town where every baby knows there are none but ‘the monks’ wives’ living, as they are called. Thirty women, I believe. I have been there myself. You know, it’s interesting in its own way, of course, as a variety. The worst of it is it’s awfully Russian. There are no French women there. Of course they could get them fast enough, they have plenty of money. If they get to hear of it they’ll come along. Well, there’s nothing of that sort here, no ‘monks’ wives,’ and two hundred monks. They’re honest. They keep the fasts. I admit it.... H’m.... So you want to be a monk? And do you know I’m sorry to lose you, Alyosha; would you believe it, I’ve really grown fond of you? Well, it’s a good opportunity. You’ll pray for us sinners; we have sinned too much here. I’ve always been thinking who would pray for me, and whether there’s any one in the world to do it. My dear boy, I’m awfully stupid about that. You wouldn’t believe it. Awfully. You see, however stupid I am about it, I keep thinking, I keep thinking—from time to time, of course, not all the while. It’s impossible, I think, for the devils to forget to drag me down to hell with their hooks when I die. Then I wonder—hooks? Where would they get them? What of? Iron hooks? Where do they forge them? Have they a foundry there of some sort? The monks in the monastery probably believe that there’s a ceiling in hell, for instance. Now I’m ready to believe in hell, but without a ceiling. It makes it more refined, more enlightened, more Lutheran that is. And, after all, what does it matter whether it has a ceiling or hasn’t? But, do you know, there’s a damnable question involved in it? If there’s no ceiling there can be no hooks, and if there are no hooks it all breaks down, which is unlikely again, for then there would be none to drag me down to hell, and if they don’t drag me down what justice is there in the world? Il faudrait les inventer, those hooks, on purpose for me alone, for, if you only knew, Alyosha, what a blackguard I am.”</p>
<p>“But there are no hooks there,” said Alyosha, looking gently and seriously at his father.</p>
<p>“Yes, yes, only the shadows of hooks, I know, I know. That’s how a Frenchman described hell: ‘J’ai vu l’ombre d’un cocher qui avec l’ombre d’une brosse frottait l’ombre d’une carrosse.’ How do you know there are no hooks, darling? When you’ve lived with the monks you’ll sing a different tune. But go and get at the truth there, and then come and tell me. Anyway it’s easier going to the other world if one knows what there is there. Besides, it will be more seemly for you with the monks than here with me, with a drunken old man and young harlots ... though you’re like an angel, nothing touches you. And I dare say nothing will touch you there. That’s why I let you go, because I hope for that. You’ve got all your wits about you. You will burn and you will burn out; you will be healed and come back again. And I will wait for you. I feel that you’re the only creature in the world who has not condemned me. My dear boy, I feel it, you know. I can’t help feeling it.”</p>
<p>And he even began blubbering. He was sentimental. He was wicked and sentimental.</p>
<p>(To be continued.)</p>Before and After Elder Zossima (The Brothers Karamazov)2022-07-25T17:40:36Z2022-07-25T17:40:36Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/729-before-and-after-elder-zossima-the-brothers-karamazov.htmlKaramazovninel.ganea@gmail.com<p><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/p-gh-calciu.jpg" alt="p-gh-calciu" style="float: right;" width="250" height="312" />{From the fact that in real life certain people, at a certain stage of spiritual development, and presumably after a certain number of ascending steps taken on the Ladder of askesis and/or suffering, can embody the 'all are guilty for all ethics' <em>profitably</em> for themselves and others, it does not seem to follow that anyone, at any time, can immediately do so. <em>The Idiot,</em> perhaps, suggests this <em>practical</em>, 'non-Euclidean' caveat, better than is usually acknowledged...}</p>
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<p>***</p>
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<p> </p>
<p>From The Great Paterikon</p>
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<p>A certain brother was in a community and carried on his shoulders all the duties of the brethren. Even for lust he condemned himself: I have done this! Some of the brethren, not knowing his work, began to murmur against him, saying: How many evil things has he done, and he neither works! And Abba, knowing his deed, said to the brethren: I want one mat from this one, made with a contrite conscience, rather than your many, made with pride. Do you want to receive notice from God? And he brought three mats of those, and a mat of the brother. And lighting fire, he threw them into it, and they burned all, but the brother's mat. And seeing this, the brethren were frightened, and put to that one metania, and had him afterwards as a parent.</p>
<p>(minimally revised automatic translation of the<a target="_blank" href="https://archive.ph/bf3xE#selection-25929.0-25929.3"> Romanian version</a>)</p>
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<p>***</p>
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<p>Father Gheorghe Calciu-Dumitreasa</p>
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<p>Lenten Words (Great Lent, 1978)<br /> <br /> Sermons to young people </p>
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<p>Given under the Ceausescu Regime, at the Chapel of the Romanian Orthodox Church Seminary (Radu-Voda Monastery), Bucharest, Romania. Translation by Keston College, Kent, England. A brief introduction followed by the complete translations can be found in the Orthodox Word #<a href="https://archive.org/details/100101V17N05061981SepOctNovDec/102%20V18N01%201982%20Jan%20Feb/page/n15/mode/2up">102</a><a href="https://archive.org/details/100101V17N05061981SepOctNovDec/102%20V18N01%201982%20Jan%20Feb/page/n15/mode/2up">-</a><a target="_blank" href="https://archive.org/details/100101V17N05061981SepOctNovDec/103%20V18N02%201982%20Mar%20Apr/page/n25/mode/2up">103</a> (1982)</p>
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<p>FIFTH MEDITATION</p>
<p>Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchisadec. Hebrews 5:6</p>
<p>Perhaps you have been asking yourself, my young friend, why I have even been addressing you, and by what authority? What right do I have to give this message which is disturbing you and obliging you to face up to disturbing questions? Why have I come to confirm you in your own misunderstood terror and to open up to you certain perspectives which are both new and unexpected? Why do I also break down your fragile balance of defenses?</p>
<p>Probably by uncovering for you the purity and innocence which you did not recognize, I have made you even more vulnerable in this wicked world. I have made you more open to suffering, and it is natural that you should ask what is the purpose of suffering. Is it a finality, a blind happening, a fate traced by the stars, a blinding ocean in which you swim without hope of reaching any shore?</p>
<p>I speak to you in the name and authority of Christ and His Church, in the name of the priesthood to which Christ called me, because nothing in this world is an interplay of unconscious, arbitrary happenings. All things stem from a cause and hold fast towards an end which stands outside this world. The cause is God, the end is God. He is the Beginning and the End, the Alpha and Omega.</p>
<p>But what is this world? What certainty does it offer us, what happiness awaits us at the unknown corners of life, like comfort in misfortune? I will not begin with death, nor life, nor with the beginning nor the end; but with the given: that which happens to us every day.</p>
<p>Have you asked yourself, young person, what is your purpose in the world and whether everything is reduced simply to that? If we were born to be slaves of matter —and this is only a philosophical proposition — then the end of your life is slavery. If your freedom is reduced to need and logic — which in the last analysis is the same thing — then your freedom is slavery. If all our knowledge is reduced to a sterile and never-realized understanding of the laws of matter, our knowledge is slavery. If your love is reduced to the struggle for existence, and our sacrifice is for the perpetuating of the species, then these things too are but slavery. And finally, if all our convictions spring from an imposed, official doctrine, then they too are slavery. And in all this series, young friend, where is the place for your soul?</p>
<p>You sense that there exists, away from all the materialism with which you have been intoxicated, and far from the atheism which has been imposed upon you like a violent ideology, something vaster, more authentic and yet closer to you personally than all that which suffocates you in this materialist bath. Your spirit within you propels you towards that “something”, as towards a world only envisioned and suspected.</p>
<p>This world, like the blue sky glistening in the sun, sees its own image through the grid of prohibitions which this society raises up to you.</p>
<p>Know, friend, that neither an atheist ideology, nor the materialist order, no matter how authoritatively it might be imposed upon you, is in any state to raise up an absolutely impregnable wall against you and the spiritual world. The soul cannot be made prisoner. This is a law which the materialists refuse to recognize at their own peril. On the spiritual level there is no captivity without hope.</p>
<p>Your teachers speak to you of atheism and secretly go to church. Behold a crack through which the golden light of the spiritual dimension reaches you. Your ideological leaders thunder and lighten against religion, uttering the most foul curses, yet at the moment of disaster they make the sign of the cross, asking for God’s help — as, for example, during the earthquake of March 4, 1977. Behold another crack through which the soul escapes the suffocating locker with the official ideology builds up by and by. In atheist meetings those obliged to speak condemn those who believe or who were caught in the criminal act of going to church. Yet away from the lying words, far from their false-toned platform proclamations, you discern their fear of being discovered as also having a religious belief. The lie in which they so lamentably swim breaks down once more the wall of your incarceration, and you say as the sweet light breaks through: “Whence this unnatural light? It is a light foreign to this world.”</p>
<p>I spoke to you about these things in my previous four sermons, I will continue to speak further about them —for I am a priest of Christ. God has discovered us through the sacramental love of His works, and Jesus has commanded me to make it known to you so that you will not say further: “I did not know it.”</p>
<p>I speak to you that you might know that you can fly, and that only spiritual flight is truly exalted. The flight of materialism is flight with broken wings. The Church of Christ has come out of the catacombs. She shines blindingly on the soil of this country which is highly esteemed in our hearts.</p>
<p>The Enea Church was destroyed — but who among us, Romanian and Christian, can forget it? A beer hall, a symbol of a concept which considers the Church a plague, will be put in its place. A beer hall — so once more the people will be happy! Woe to the architect who builds there, binding his name forever with the destruction of something that was a demonstration of the Romanian genius of construction and faith. Woe to the officials who believe that they can win glory and power by destroying a church and building a beer hall. Woe to the concept that considers an Agapia Inn more valuable than the Agapia Monastery. Woe to those who consider that the Romanian Patriarchate is a piece of history which can be placed in a museum, and who have not understood that it has a real life which is always present. It is not a historical relic but a living soul.</p>
<p>Woe to those who bow to force, allowing destruction which will never be accepted by history.</p>
<p>I have said all these things to you because I am a priest. And because we are priests and we listen to the command of God which says that a burning light cannot be hid under a bushel but must shine before all (Matt. 5:15). I have said these things, young friends, that you might judge if it is right before God to listen to men rather than God (Acts 4:19). For He Who gave Himself upon the Cross for the salvation of the world, commanded us not to hide the divine truth. I have said all these things to you that you might understand that through faith we shatter walls and break down the bonds of prejudice and abuse, even if we shall have tribulation in this world (John 16:33).</p>
<p>There is a continual battle between good and evil, between right and wrong, between freedom and captivity of ideas, between purity and corruption. All these battles take place on the one single field of combat — the heart of man. I, the priest of Christ, address this heart; for as Pascal has said: “The heart has its own way of thinking, which reason ignores.”</p>
<p>What, then does the priesthood mean? It means to be an enduring witness to human suffering and to take it upon your own shoulders. To be the one who warms the leper at the breast and who gives to the miserable life through the breath from his own mouth. To be a strong comfort to every unfortunate one, even when you yourself are overwhelmed with weakness. To be a ray of shining light to unhappy hearts when your own eyes long ago ceased to see any light. To carry mountains of suffering on your shoulders, while your own being screams out with the weight of its own suffering.</p>
<p>Your flesh rebels and says: “This is absurd, impossible. Where is such a man, where is the priest you describe so that I may put my own suffering upon him?” Yet nevertheless he exists! From time to time there awakens within us the priest of Christ who, like the Good Samaritan, will kneel down by the side of the man fallen among thieves and, putting him upon his own donkey, will bring him to the Church of Jesus for healing. From time to time the priest of Christ in us forgets ourselves and comforts you, the man of suffering.</p>
<p>Who else could be moved by your suffering? Who else would bear your burden, say words of comfort to you? From whom else would you hear the words of Christ to you today: “Come to me, all who are burdened and heavy ladened.”</p>
<p>I have seen you, my young friend, bullied by your elders, mocked and insulted for the simple crime of being young. I spoke to you then as one in weakness and pain, as a sensitive and defenseless being. Then I saw you, to my horror and joy, bow and kiss my hand, humbling yourself in your unexpected gesture which flowed from the depth of your wounds. For you did not kiss my hand, but that of a priest of Christ who brought you comfort.</p>
<p>Because you have overcome death, to which atheist doctrine had condemned you, because you have been exalted above the ruins of fallen materialism through your youth and faith, I speak to you the words which Jesus spoke through the Apostle to the Gentiles. They sound absurd to the prisoner of matter and materialism, to those who substitute beer halls for churches and indecency for suffering. But to you they will resound full of spiritual meaning and truth.</p>
<p>The preaching of the Cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved, it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? (I Cor. 1:18–20).</p>
<p>Where are all these men, my friends? There are none of them left. But you have remained here alive and whole in the Church of Christ, a holy people, won by God, a foundation stone on which the Orthodox spirit of the Romanian people is built. You are its single salvation and preservation through this age.</p>
<p>[At the time of this writing, in 1983] Father George is a prisoner for his Faith in Romania — see the December, 1982 issue of The Word, page 20.</p>
<p><a href="https://archive.ph/OHsBt" target="_blank">https://archive.ph/OHsBt</a></p>
<p> </p><p><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/p-gh-calciu.jpg" alt="p-gh-calciu" style="float: right;" width="250" height="312" />{From the fact that in real life certain people, at a certain stage of spiritual development, and presumably after a certain number of ascending steps taken on the Ladder of askesis and/or suffering, can embody the 'all are guilty for all ethics' <em>profitably</em> for themselves and others, it does not seem to follow that anyone, at any time, can immediately do so. <em>The Idiot,</em> perhaps, suggests this <em>practical</em>, 'non-Euclidean' caveat, better than is usually acknowledged...}</p>
<p> </p>
<p>***</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>From The Great Paterikon</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>A certain brother was in a community and carried on his shoulders all the duties of the brethren. Even for lust he condemned himself: I have done this! Some of the brethren, not knowing his work, began to murmur against him, saying: How many evil things has he done, and he neither works! And Abba, knowing his deed, said to the brethren: I want one mat from this one, made with a contrite conscience, rather than your many, made with pride. Do you want to receive notice from God? And he brought three mats of those, and a mat of the brother. And lighting fire, he threw them into it, and they burned all, but the brother's mat. And seeing this, the brethren were frightened, and put to that one metania, and had him afterwards as a parent.</p>
<p>(minimally revised automatic translation of the<a target="_blank" href="https://archive.ph/bf3xE#selection-25929.0-25929.3"> Romanian version</a>)</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>***</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Father Gheorghe Calciu-Dumitreasa</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Lenten Words (Great Lent, 1978)<br /> <br /> Sermons to young people </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Given under the Ceausescu Regime, at the Chapel of the Romanian Orthodox Church Seminary (Radu-Voda Monastery), Bucharest, Romania. Translation by Keston College, Kent, England. A brief introduction followed by the complete translations can be found in the Orthodox Word #<a href="https://archive.org/details/100101V17N05061981SepOctNovDec/102%20V18N01%201982%20Jan%20Feb/page/n15/mode/2up">102</a><a href="https://archive.org/details/100101V17N05061981SepOctNovDec/102%20V18N01%201982%20Jan%20Feb/page/n15/mode/2up">-</a><a target="_blank" href="https://archive.org/details/100101V17N05061981SepOctNovDec/103%20V18N02%201982%20Mar%20Apr/page/n25/mode/2up">103</a> (1982)</p>
<p> </p>
<p>FIFTH MEDITATION</p>
<p>Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchisadec. Hebrews 5:6</p>
<p>Perhaps you have been asking yourself, my young friend, why I have even been addressing you, and by what authority? What right do I have to give this message which is disturbing you and obliging you to face up to disturbing questions? Why have I come to confirm you in your own misunderstood terror and to open up to you certain perspectives which are both new and unexpected? Why do I also break down your fragile balance of defenses?</p>
<p>Probably by uncovering for you the purity and innocence which you did not recognize, I have made you even more vulnerable in this wicked world. I have made you more open to suffering, and it is natural that you should ask what is the purpose of suffering. Is it a finality, a blind happening, a fate traced by the stars, a blinding ocean in which you swim without hope of reaching any shore?</p>
<p>I speak to you in the name and authority of Christ and His Church, in the name of the priesthood to which Christ called me, because nothing in this world is an interplay of unconscious, arbitrary happenings. All things stem from a cause and hold fast towards an end which stands outside this world. The cause is God, the end is God. He is the Beginning and the End, the Alpha and Omega.</p>
<p>But what is this world? What certainty does it offer us, what happiness awaits us at the unknown corners of life, like comfort in misfortune? I will not begin with death, nor life, nor with the beginning nor the end; but with the given: that which happens to us every day.</p>
<p>Have you asked yourself, young person, what is your purpose in the world and whether everything is reduced simply to that? If we were born to be slaves of matter —and this is only a philosophical proposition — then the end of your life is slavery. If your freedom is reduced to need and logic — which in the last analysis is the same thing — then your freedom is slavery. If all our knowledge is reduced to a sterile and never-realized understanding of the laws of matter, our knowledge is slavery. If your love is reduced to the struggle for existence, and our sacrifice is for the perpetuating of the species, then these things too are but slavery. And finally, if all our convictions spring from an imposed, official doctrine, then they too are slavery. And in all this series, young friend, where is the place for your soul?</p>
<p>You sense that there exists, away from all the materialism with which you have been intoxicated, and far from the atheism which has been imposed upon you like a violent ideology, something vaster, more authentic and yet closer to you personally than all that which suffocates you in this materialist bath. Your spirit within you propels you towards that “something”, as towards a world only envisioned and suspected.</p>
<p>This world, like the blue sky glistening in the sun, sees its own image through the grid of prohibitions which this society raises up to you.</p>
<p>Know, friend, that neither an atheist ideology, nor the materialist order, no matter how authoritatively it might be imposed upon you, is in any state to raise up an absolutely impregnable wall against you and the spiritual world. The soul cannot be made prisoner. This is a law which the materialists refuse to recognize at their own peril. On the spiritual level there is no captivity without hope.</p>
<p>Your teachers speak to you of atheism and secretly go to church. Behold a crack through which the golden light of the spiritual dimension reaches you. Your ideological leaders thunder and lighten against religion, uttering the most foul curses, yet at the moment of disaster they make the sign of the cross, asking for God’s help — as, for example, during the earthquake of March 4, 1977. Behold another crack through which the soul escapes the suffocating locker with the official ideology builds up by and by. In atheist meetings those obliged to speak condemn those who believe or who were caught in the criminal act of going to church. Yet away from the lying words, far from their false-toned platform proclamations, you discern their fear of being discovered as also having a religious belief. The lie in which they so lamentably swim breaks down once more the wall of your incarceration, and you say as the sweet light breaks through: “Whence this unnatural light? It is a light foreign to this world.”</p>
<p>I spoke to you about these things in my previous four sermons, I will continue to speak further about them —for I am a priest of Christ. God has discovered us through the sacramental love of His works, and Jesus has commanded me to make it known to you so that you will not say further: “I did not know it.”</p>
<p>I speak to you that you might know that you can fly, and that only spiritual flight is truly exalted. The flight of materialism is flight with broken wings. The Church of Christ has come out of the catacombs. She shines blindingly on the soil of this country which is highly esteemed in our hearts.</p>
<p>The Enea Church was destroyed — but who among us, Romanian and Christian, can forget it? A beer hall, a symbol of a concept which considers the Church a plague, will be put in its place. A beer hall — so once more the people will be happy! Woe to the architect who builds there, binding his name forever with the destruction of something that was a demonstration of the Romanian genius of construction and faith. Woe to the officials who believe that they can win glory and power by destroying a church and building a beer hall. Woe to the concept that considers an Agapia Inn more valuable than the Agapia Monastery. Woe to those who consider that the Romanian Patriarchate is a piece of history which can be placed in a museum, and who have not understood that it has a real life which is always present. It is not a historical relic but a living soul.</p>
<p>Woe to those who bow to force, allowing destruction which will never be accepted by history.</p>
<p>I have said all these things to you because I am a priest. And because we are priests and we listen to the command of God which says that a burning light cannot be hid under a bushel but must shine before all (Matt. 5:15). I have said these things, young friends, that you might judge if it is right before God to listen to men rather than God (Acts 4:19). For He Who gave Himself upon the Cross for the salvation of the world, commanded us not to hide the divine truth. I have said all these things to you that you might understand that through faith we shatter walls and break down the bonds of prejudice and abuse, even if we shall have tribulation in this world (John 16:33).</p>
<p>There is a continual battle between good and evil, between right and wrong, between freedom and captivity of ideas, between purity and corruption. All these battles take place on the one single field of combat — the heart of man. I, the priest of Christ, address this heart; for as Pascal has said: “The heart has its own way of thinking, which reason ignores.”</p>
<p>What, then does the priesthood mean? It means to be an enduring witness to human suffering and to take it upon your own shoulders. To be the one who warms the leper at the breast and who gives to the miserable life through the breath from his own mouth. To be a strong comfort to every unfortunate one, even when you yourself are overwhelmed with weakness. To be a ray of shining light to unhappy hearts when your own eyes long ago ceased to see any light. To carry mountains of suffering on your shoulders, while your own being screams out with the weight of its own suffering.</p>
<p>Your flesh rebels and says: “This is absurd, impossible. Where is such a man, where is the priest you describe so that I may put my own suffering upon him?” Yet nevertheless he exists! From time to time there awakens within us the priest of Christ who, like the Good Samaritan, will kneel down by the side of the man fallen among thieves and, putting him upon his own donkey, will bring him to the Church of Jesus for healing. From time to time the priest of Christ in us forgets ourselves and comforts you, the man of suffering.</p>
<p>Who else could be moved by your suffering? Who else would bear your burden, say words of comfort to you? From whom else would you hear the words of Christ to you today: “Come to me, all who are burdened and heavy ladened.”</p>
<p>I have seen you, my young friend, bullied by your elders, mocked and insulted for the simple crime of being young. I spoke to you then as one in weakness and pain, as a sensitive and defenseless being. Then I saw you, to my horror and joy, bow and kiss my hand, humbling yourself in your unexpected gesture which flowed from the depth of your wounds. For you did not kiss my hand, but that of a priest of Christ who brought you comfort.</p>
<p>Because you have overcome death, to which atheist doctrine had condemned you, because you have been exalted above the ruins of fallen materialism through your youth and faith, I speak to you the words which Jesus spoke through the Apostle to the Gentiles. They sound absurd to the prisoner of matter and materialism, to those who substitute beer halls for churches and indecency for suffering. But to you they will resound full of spiritual meaning and truth.</p>
<p>The preaching of the Cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved, it is the power of God. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? (I Cor. 1:18–20).</p>
<p>Where are all these men, my friends? There are none of them left. But you have remained here alive and whole in the Church of Christ, a holy people, won by God, a foundation stone on which the Orthodox spirit of the Romanian people is built. You are its single salvation and preservation through this age.</p>
<p>[At the time of this writing, in 1983] Father George is a prisoner for his Faith in Romania — see the December, 1982 issue of The Word, page 20.</p>
<p><a href="https://archive.ph/OHsBt" target="_blank">https://archive.ph/OHsBt</a></p>
<p> </p>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children: (X) Marie's Story2022-06-25T14:10:29Z2022-06-25T14:10:29Zhttp://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/728-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-x-maries-story.htmlDostoievski et al.ninel.ganea@gmail.com<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/sophie.jpg" alt="sophie" style="float: right;" width="250" height="167" />Previously in the _<i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children_</i> series:<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">Varenka's Memoirs</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from the novel _<i>Poor Folk_</i>, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">An Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>Stories of a Man of Experience_</i>, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">Nellie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>The Insulted and Injured_</i>, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">At The Select Boarding School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from the novel _<i>The Adolescent_</i>, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">The Merchant's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from the novel _<i>The Adolescent_</i>, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>The Diary Of A Writer_</i>, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">The Peasant Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>The Diary Of A Writer_</i>, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from _<i><span style="color: black;">The Diary Of A Writer_</span></i><span style="color: black;">, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: red;">Foma Danilov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from _<i><span style="color: black;">The Diary Of A Writer_</span></i><span style="color: black;">, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present _<i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children_</i> (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and was the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> our brief introduction to the original _<i>Dostoevsky for Children_</i> anthologies, and to this English online version. Accompanying picture: grave of Sophya ("Sonia") Dostoevskaya (+1868, Geneva); memorial plaque donated by the International Dostoevsky Society}<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; text-align: center; line-height: 15.6pt;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">--//--<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"But you should know that [he] is right even when he is wrong." </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: right; line-height: normal;" align="right"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(Dostoevsky on Belinsky, as quoted in K. Lantz, _<i>The Dostoevsky Encyclopedia_</i>)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"Marie's Story" from _<i>The Idiot_ </i>(1868) was intended by Anna Dostoyevskaya for publication in a further _<i>Dostoevsky for Children</i>_ volume, a tome that remained unpublished. We include her short story here. Like many pieces we have read, it has the inherent charm and savor of a short story entirely understandable on its own. It is a self-sufficient gem. </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is true that Marie's name is not always found in the indexes of the most outstanding works on Dostoevsky. It tends to be forgotten. Like other pages in this collection, and indeed, like all of Anna Dostoevskaya's "children's books". Perhaps because of their subdued, some might say "kenotic", family air.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Nevertheless, today's story is also a kind of key to _<i>The Idiot_. </i>And _<i>The Idiot_</i> is a key to any understanding of Dostoevsky's work and persona. In particular, Marie's story might be the finest embodiment of our author's "Russian Idea", and of his lifelong Slavophile Idea. We glimpsed at this idea before, from <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">a less happy angle</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. Today's story, however, suggests that what Dostoevsky said of Belinsky might well apply to himself: "you should know that [he] is right even when he is wrong."</span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">For, here is the key to love and friendship, a central theme in Dostoevsky since as early on as _<i>Poor Folk_</i>, “An Honest Thief”, or “Nellie's Story”. Marie's story at first seems only a redeeming pastoral of the innocent and of the innerly pure. It is that, and that makes any reading of it profitable.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But it is more than that. In it, there are already "two kinds of love" implied, Joseph Frank discerns: essentially, the worldly and the otherworldly. Egotistic love, versus co-suffering love. And only innocent children may be allowed to ignore the difference, the story suggests.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Later on in the novel, confusion between the "two kinds of love" brings down two unforgettable Dostoevskian leading ladies, also ending the saga on this side of eternity of Prince Myshkin, their potential rescuer, and perhaps the most memorable alter ego of the author himself. Myskin's plight, in this interpretation, echoes that of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Vanya Petrovich, Nellie's rescuer</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, in _<i>The Insulted and Injured_</i>. The innocent may be excused, but in their rescuers spiritual clarity seems needed!</span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Perhaps deeper insight into the ideal of monasticism might have cleared this confusion. Dostoevsky was naturally led to explore this direction later, in the _<i>Brothers Karamazov_</i>. But even Alyosha Karamazov leaves the monastery, so the issue of worldly v. otherworldly was left to somehow be settled by his posterity, as previously intimated in this series.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Be this as it may, the essence of Dostoevsky's Russian Idea is before us in the short story of Marie. The Karamazovs, the “Dream of a Ridiculous Man”, even the “Pushkin Speech”, etc., can all be seen as gravitating around this central case, with their refinements and accidents illuminated by it. </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">For here is _<i>Russian_</i> love and friendship successfully _<i>universalized abroad_,</i> in an almost hesychast fashion, as in no other Dostoevsky story we can think of. And perhaps there are more kinds of love than two implied - how many can <i>you</i> count?</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Here are almost epigenetically inherited aristocracy and humility fused in one (the Russian quality without a name?) and rescuing a whole Arcadian community from the clutches of... well, of the Western God of pride and legalistic satisfaction (the same god that pervades every Dostoevskian instantiation of the ever offended Romantic Ego, and its “Underground”.) </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; background: white none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">True enough, only a small, almost Jane Austen-like, pastoral setting is rescued. But doesn’t this only make the story _<i>more_</i> "Slavophile"? More innerly free, and less dependent on "the Roman Idea"? (comp. Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky quoted <a href="https://archive.ph/kkm2Q#selection-855.0-855.26" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue; background: white none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; background: white none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">.)<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Having adumbrated some of our author's ambiguities, a note of caution: For the spiritual edification of our homeschooling readers, we have tried to capitalize on the _<i>practically_</i> tested, if somewhat overlooked, readings of these stories (by Met. Anthony, Prof. Andreyev, etc.) But, as on any Ladder, this is only one of the options available to every reader, at each step. In this connection, it is perhaps relevant how St. Isaac the Syrian (later to occasion Dostoevsky's last riddle, as we hope we shall see) counsels against lazy delay in the twilight, hinting at the kind of "accidents" that can happen, even to the "elect": </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">Without wine no one can get drunk, nor will his heart leap with joy; and without inebriation in God, no one will obtain by the natural course of events the virtue that does not belong to him, nor will it remain in him serenely and without compulsion. </span></i><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #3c4043;">Now there is one who is serene in his nature and compassionate, and he loves everyone with ease , having compassion on every (created ) nature - not just human beings, but domestic animals, birds and wild animals and so on as well: there do exist such souls, but there are times when they are perturbed too, if certain causes of anguish pass by them, originating from someone (else). In the case of the person who had been worthy to taste of divine love, that person customarily forgets everything (else) by (reason of) its sweetness, (for) it is something at whose taste all visible things seem despicable: such a person gladly draws near to a luminous love of humanity, without distinguishing (between good and bad); he is never overcome by the weakness to be found in people, nor is he perturbed. He is just as the blessed Apostles were as well: people who in the midst of all the bad things they endured from others, were (nonetheless) utterly incapable of hating them or of being fed up with showing love for them. This was manifested in actual deed, for after all the other things they even accepted death in order that these people may be retrieved. These were men who only a little previously had begged Christ that fire might descend from heaven upon the Samaritans just because they had not received them into their village! But once they had received the gift and tasted the love of God, they were made perfect even in love for wicked man: enduring all kinds of evils in order to retrieve them, they could not possibly hate them." </span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #3c4043;">(this specific passage translated by S. Brock from the Syriac was not available to Dostoevsky, but perhaps much of it was implied in what was available.)<i> </i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">***</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">F.M. Dostoevsky</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">MARIE'S STORY</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">(from <i>The Idiot</i>, 1868, part I, chap. VI. <span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Constance Garnett transl., 1913.<span style="color: black;"> Russian original <a href="https://archive.ph/5mtTG#selection-3247.0-3247.2"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">.)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Here you all are,” began the prince, “settling yourselves down to listen to me with so much curiosity, that if I do not satisfy you you will probably be angry with me. No, no! I’m only joking!” he added, hastily, with a smile.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Well, then—they were all children there, and I was always among children and only with children. They were the children of the village in which I lived, and they went to the school there—all of them. I did not teach them, oh no; there was a master for that, one Jules Thibaut. I may have taught them some things, but I was among them just as an outsider, and I passed all four years of my life there among them. I wished for nothing better; I used to tell them everything and hid nothing from them. Their fathers and relations were very angry with me, because the children could do nothing without me at last, and used to throng after me at all times. The schoolmaster was my greatest enemy in the end! I had many enemies, and all because of the children. Even Schneider reproached me. What were they afraid of? One can tell a child everything, anything. I have often been struck by the fact that parents know their children so little. They should not conceal so much from them. How well even little children understand that their parents conceal things from them, because they consider them too young to understand! Children are capable of giving advice in the most important matters. How can one deceive these dear little birds, when they look at one so sweetly and confidingly? I call them birds because there is nothing in the world better than birds!</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“However, most of the people were angry with me about one and the same thing; but Thibaut simply was jealous of me. At first he had wagged his head and wondered how it was that the children understood what I told them so well, and could not learn from him; and he laughed like anything when I replied that neither he nor I could teach them very much, but that <i>they</i> might teach us a good deal.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“How he could hate me and tell scandalous stories about me, living among children as he did, is what I cannot understand. Children soothe and heal the wounded heart. I remember there was one poor fellow at our professor’s who was being treated for madness, and you have no idea what those children did for him, eventually. I don’t think he was mad, but only terribly unhappy. But I’ll tell you all about him another day. Now I must get on with this story.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“The children did not love me at first; I was such a sickly, awkward kind of a fellow then—and I know I am ugly. Besides, I was a foreigner. The children used to laugh at me, at first; and they even went so far as to throw stones at me, when they saw me kiss Marie. I only kissed her once in my life—no, no, don’t laugh!” The prince hastened to suppress the smiles of his audience at this point. “It was not a matter of <i>love</i> at all! If only you knew what a miserable creature she was, you would have pitied her, just as I did. She belonged to our village. Her mother was an old, old woman, and they used to sell string and thread, and soap and tobacco, out of the window of their little house, and lived on the pittance they gained by this trade. The old woman was ill and very old, and could hardly move. Marie was her daughter, a girl of twenty, weak and thin and consumptive; but still she did heavy work at the houses around, day by day. Well, one fine day a commercial traveller betrayed her and carried her off; and a week later he deserted her. She came home dirty, draggled, and shoeless; she had walked for a whole week without shoes; she had slept in the fields, and caught a terrible cold; her feet were swollen and sore, and her hands torn and scratched all over. She never had been pretty even before; but her eyes were quiet, innocent, kind eyes.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“She was very quiet always—and I remember once, when she had suddenly begun singing at her work, everyone said, ‘Marie tried to sing today!’ and she got so chaffed that she was silent for ever after. She had been treated kindly in the place before; but when she came back now—ill and shunned and miserable—not one of them all had the slightest sympathy for her. Cruel people! Oh, what hazy understandings they have on such matters! Her mother was the first to show the way. She received her wrathfully, unkindly, and with contempt. ‘You have disgraced me,’ she said. She was the first to cast her into ignominy; but when they all heard that Marie had returned to the village, they ran out to see her and crowded into the little cottage—old men, children, women, girls—such a hurrying, stamping, greedy crowd. Marie was lying on the floor at the old woman’s feet, hungry, torn, draggled, crying, miserable.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When everyone crowded into the room she hid her face in her dishevelled hair and lay cowering on the floor. Everyone looked at her as though she were a piece of dirt off the road. The old men scolded and condemned, and the young ones laughed at her. The women condemned her too, and looked at her contemptuously, just as though she were some loathsome insect.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Her mother allowed all this to go on, and nodded her head and encouraged them. The old woman was very ill at that time, and knew she was dying (she really did die a couple of months later), and though she felt the end approaching she never thought of forgiving her daughter, to the very day of her death. She would not even speak to her. She made her sleep on straw in a shed, and hardly gave her food enough to support life.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Marie was very gentle to her mother, and nursed her, and did everything for her; but the old woman accepted all her services without a word and never showed her the slightest kindness. Marie bore all this; and I could see when I got to know her that she thought it quite right and fitting, considering herself the lowest and meanest of creatures.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When the old woman took to her bed finally, the other old women in the village sat with her by turns, as the custom is there; and then Marie was quite driven out of the house. They gave her no food at all, and she could not get any work in the village; none would employ her. The men seemed to consider her no longer a woman, they said such dreadful things to her. Sometimes on Sundays, if they were drunk enough, they used to throw her a penny or two, into the mud, and Marie would silently pick up the money. She had began to spit blood at that time.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“At last her rags became so tattered and torn that she was ashamed of appearing in the village any longer. The children used to pelt her with mud; so she begged to be taken on as assistant cowherd, but the cowherd would not have her. Then she took to helping him without leave; and he saw how valuable her assistance was to him, and did not drive her away again; on the contrary, he occasionally gave her the remnants of his dinner, bread and cheese. He considered that he was being very kind. When the mother died, the village parson was not ashamed to hold Marie up to public derision and shame. Marie was standing at the coffin’s head, in all her rags, crying.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“A crowd of people had collected to see how she would cry. The parson, a young fellow ambitious of becoming a great preacher, began his sermon and pointed to Marie. ‘There,’ he said, ‘there is the cause of the death of this venerable woman’—(which was a lie, because she had been ill for at least two years)—‘there she stands before you, and dares not lift her eyes from the ground, because she knows that the finger of God is upon her. Look at her tatters and rags—the badge of those who lose their virtue. Who is she? her daughter!’ and so on to the end.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“And just fancy, this infamy pleased them, all of them, nearly. Only the children had altered—for then they were all on my side and had learned to love Marie.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“This is how it was: I had wished to do something for Marie; I longed to give her some money, but I never had a farthing while I was there. But I had a little diamond pin, and this I sold to a travelling pedlar; he gave me eight francs for it—it was worth at least forty.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I long sought to meet Marie alone; and at last I did meet her, on the hillside beyond the village. I gave her the eight francs and asked her to take care of the money because I could get no more; and then I kissed her and said that she was not to suppose I kissed her with any evil motives or because I was in love with her, for that I did so solely out of pity for her, and because from the first I had not accounted her as guilty so much as unfortunate. I longed to console and encourage her somehow, and to assure her that she was not the low, base thing which she and others strove to make out; but I don’t think she understood me. She stood before me, dreadfully ashamed of herself, and with downcast eyes; and when I had finished she kissed my hand. I would have kissed hers, but she drew it away. Just at this moment the whole troop of children saw us. (I found out afterwards that they had long kept a watch upon me.) They all began whistling and clapping their hands, and laughing at us. Marie ran away at once; and when I tried to talk to them, they threw stones at me. All the village heard of it the same day, and Marie’s position became worse than ever. The children would not let her pass now in the streets, but annoyed her and threw dirt at her more than before. They used to run after her—she racing away with her poor feeble lungs panting and gasping, and they pelting her and shouting abuse at her.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Once I had to interfere by force; and after that I took to speaking to them every day and whenever I could. Occasionally they stopped and listened; but they teased Marie all the same.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I told them how unhappy Marie was, and after a while they stopped their abuse of her, and let her go by silently. Little by little we got into the way of conversing together, the children and I. I concealed nothing from them, I told them all. They listened very attentively and soon began to be sorry for Marie. At last some of them took to saying ‘Good-morning’ to her, kindly, when they met her. It is the custom there to salute anyone you meet with ‘Good-morning’ whether acquainted or not. I can imagine how astonished Marie was at these first greetings from the children.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Once two little girls got hold of some food and took it to her, and came back and told me. They said she had burst into tears, and that they loved her very much now. Very soon after that they all became fond of Marie, and at the same time they began to develop the greatest affection for myself. They often came to me and begged me to tell them stories. I think I must have told stories well, for they did so love to hear them. At last I took to reading up interesting things on purpose to pass them on to the little ones, and this went on for all the rest of my time there, three years. Later, when everyone—even Schneider—was angry with me for hiding nothing from the children, I pointed out how foolish it was, for they always knew things, only they learnt them in a way that soiled their minds but not so from me. One has only to remember one’s own childhood to admit the truth of this. But nobody was convinced... It was two weeks before her mother died that I had kissed Marie; and when the clergyman preached that sermon the children were all on my side.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When I told them what a shame it was of the parson to talk as he had done, and explained my reason, they were so angry that some of them went and broke his windows with stones. Of course I stopped them, for that was not right, but all the village heard of it, and how I caught it for spoiling the children! Everyone discovered now that the little ones had taken to being fond of Marie, and their parents were terribly alarmed; but Marie was so happy. The children were forbidden to meet her; but they used to run out of the village to the herd and take her food and things; and sometimes just ran off there and kissed her, and said, ‘<i>Je vous aime, Marie!</i>’ and then trotted back again. They imagined that I was in love with Marie, and this was the only point on which I did not undeceive them, for they got such enjoyment out of it. And what delicacy and tenderness they showed!</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“In the evening I used to walk to the waterfall. There was a spot there which was quite closed in and hidden from view by large trees; and to this spot the children used to come to me. They could not bear that their dear Leon should love a poor girl without shoes to her feet and dressed all in rags and tatters. So, would you believe it, they actually clubbed together, somehow, and bought her shoes and stockings, and some linen, and even a dress! I can’t understand how they managed it, but they did it, all together. When I asked them about it they only laughed and shouted, and the little girls clapped their hands and kissed me. I sometimes went to see Marie secretly, too. She had become very ill, and could hardly walk. She still went with the herd, but could not help the herdsman any longer. She used to sit on a stone near, and wait there almost motionless all day, till the herd went home. Her consumption was so advanced, and she was so weak, that she used to sit with closed eyes, breathing heavily. Her face was as thin as a skeleton’s, and sweat used to stand on her white brow in large drops. I always found her sitting just like that. I used to come up quietly to look at her; but Marie would hear me, open her eyes, and tremble violently as she kissed my hands. I did not take my hand away because it made her happy to have it, and so she would sit and cry quietly. Sometimes she tried to speak; but it was very difficult to understand her. She was almost like a madwoman, with excitement and ecstasy, whenever I came. Occasionally the children came with me; when they did so, they would stand some way off and keep guard over us, so as to tell me if anybody came near. This was a great pleasure to them.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When we left her, Marie used to relapse at once into her old condition, and sit with closed eyes and motionless limbs. One day she could not go out at all, and remained at home all alone in the empty hut; but the children very soon became aware of the fact, and nearly all of them visited her that day as she lay alone and helpless in her miserable bed.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“For two days the children looked after her, and then, when the village people got to know that Marie was really dying, some of the old women came and took it in turns to sit by her and look after her a bit. I think they began to be a little sorry for her in the village at last; at all events they did not interfere with the children any more, on her account.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Marie lay in a state of uncomfortable delirium the whole while; she coughed dreadfully. The old women would not let the children stay in the room; but they all collected outside the window each morning, if only for a moment, and shouted ‘<i>Bon jour, notre bonne Marie!</i>’ and Marie no sooner caught sight of, or heard them, and she became quite animated at once, and, in spite of the old women, would try to sit up and nod her head and smile at them, and thank them. The little ones used to bring her nice things and sweets to eat, but she could hardly touch anything. Thanks to them, I assure you, the girl died almost perfectly happy. She almost forgot her misery, and seemed to accept their love as a sort of symbol of pardon for her offence, though she never ceased to consider herself a dreadful sinner. They used to flutter at her window just like little birds, calling out: ‘<i>Nous t’aimons, Marie!</i>’</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“She died very soon; I had thought she would live much longer. The day before her death I went to see her for the last time, just before sunset. I think she recognized me, for she pressed my hand.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Next morning they came and told me that Marie was dead. The children could not be restrained now; they went and covered her coffin with flowers, and put a wreath of lovely blossoms on her head. The pastor did not throw any more shameful words at the poor dead woman; but there were very few people at the funeral. However, when it came to carrying the coffin, all the children rushed up, to carry it themselves. Of course they could not do it alone, but they insisted on helping, and walked alongside and behind, crying.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“They have planted roses all round her grave, and every year they look after the flowers and make Marie’s resting-place as beautiful as they can. I was in ill odour after all this with the parents of the children, and especially with the parson and schoolmaster. Schneider was obliged to promise that I should not meet them and talk to them; but we conversed from a distance by signs, and they used to write me sweet little notes. Afterwards I came closer than ever to those little souls, but even then it was very dear to me, to have them so fond of me.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Schneider said that I did the children great harm by my pernicious ‘system’; what nonsense that was! And what did he mean by my system? He said afterwards that he believed I was a child myself—just before I came away. ‘You have the form and face of an adult’ he said, ‘but as regards soul, and character, and perhaps even intelligence, you are a child in the completest sense of the word, and always will be, if you live to be sixty.’ I laughed very much, for of course that is nonsense. But it is a fact that I do not care to be among grown-up people and much prefer the society of children. However kind people may be to me, I never feel quite at home with them, and am always glad to get back to my little companions. Now my companions have always been children, not because I was a child myself once, but because young things attract me. On one of the first days of my stay in Switzerland, I was strolling about alone and miserable, when I came upon the children rushing noisily out of school, with their slates and bags, and books, their games, their laughter and shouts—and my soul went out to them. I stopped and laughed happily as I watched their little feet moving so quickly. Girls and boys, laughing and crying; for as they went home many of them found time to fight and make peace, to weep and play. I forgot my troubles in looking at them. And then, all those three years, I tried to understand why men should be for ever tormenting themselves. I lived the life of a child there, and thought I should never leave the little village; indeed, I was far from thinking that I should ever return to Russia. But at last I recognized the fact that Schneider could not keep me any longer. And then something so important happened, that Schneider himself urged me to depart. I am going to see now if can get good advice about it. Perhaps my lot in life will be changed; but that is not the principal thing. The principal thing is the entire change that has already come over me. I left many things behind me—too many. They have gone. On the journey I said to myself, ‘I am going into the world of men. I don’t know much, perhaps, but a new life has begun for me.’ I made up my mind to be honest, and steadfast in accomplishing my task. Perhaps I shall meet with troubles and many disappointments, but I have made up my mind to be polite and sincere to everyone; more cannot be asked of me. People may consider me a child if they like. I am often called an idiot, and at one time I certainly was so ill that I was nearly as bad as an idiot; but I am not an idiot now. How can I possibly be so when I know myself that I am considered one?</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When I received a letter from those dear little souls, while passing through Berlin, I only then realized how much I loved them. It was very, very painful, getting that first little letter. How melancholy they had been when they saw me off! For a month before, they had been talking of my departure and sorrowing over it; and at the waterfall, of an evening, when we parted for the night, they would hug me so tight and kiss me so warmly, far more so than before. And every now and then they would turn up one by one when I was alone, just to give me a kiss and a hug, to show their love for me. The whole flock went with me to the station, which was about a mile from the village, and every now and then one of them would stop to throw his arms round me, and all the little girls had tears in their voices, though they tried hard not to cry. As the train steamed out of the station, I saw them all standing on the platform waving to me and crying ‘Hurrah!’ till they were lost in the distance.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I assure you, when I came in here just now and saw your kind faces (I can read faces well) my heart felt light for the first time since that moment of parting. I think I must be one of those who are born to be in luck, for one does not often meet with people whom one feels he can love from the first sight of their faces; and yet, no sooner do I step out of the railway carriage than I happen upon you!</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I know it is more or less a shamefaced thing to speak of one’s feelings before others; and yet here am I talking like this to you, and am not a bit ashamed or shy. I am an unsociable sort of fellow and shall very likely not come to see you again for some time; but don’t think the worse of me for that. It is not that I do not value your society; and you must never suppose that I have taken offence at anything.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“You asked me about your faces, and what I could read in them; I will tell you with the greatest pleasure. You, Adelaida Ivanovna, have a very happy face; it is the most sympathetic of the three. Not to speak of your natural beauty, one can look at your face and say to one’s self, ‘She has the face of a kind sister.’ You are simple and merry, but you can see into another’s heart very quickly. That’s what I read in your face.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“You too, Alexandra Ivanovna, have a very lovely face; but I think you may have some secret sorrow. Your heart is undoubtedly a kind, good one, but you are not merry. There is a certain suspicion of ‘shadow’ in your face, like in that of Holbein’s Madonna in Dresden. So much for your face. Have I guessed right?</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“As for your face, Lizabetha Prokofievna, I not only think, but am perfectly <i>sure</i>, that you are an absolute child—in all, in all, mind, both good and bad—and in spite of your years. Don’t be angry with me for saying so; you know what my feelings for children are. And do not suppose that I am so candid out of pure simplicity of soul. Oh dear no, it is by no means the case! Perhaps I have my own very profound object in view.”</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p><p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"><img src="http://www.karamazov.ro/images/stories/sophie.jpg" alt="sophie" style="float: right;" width="250" height="167" />Previously in the _<i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children_</i> series:<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">Varenka's Memoirs</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from the novel _<i>Poor Folk_</i>, 1846 [1883, 1887, 1897, DPC I])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/720-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-v-an-honest-thief.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">An Honest Thief</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>Stories of a Man of Experience_</i>, 1848 [suggested by the Introduction to the 1897 anthology, DPC V])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">Nellie's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>The Insulted and Injured_</i>, 1861 [1883, 1887, DPC VI])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/component/content/article/717-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ii-at-the-select-boarding-school.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">At The Select Boarding School</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from the novel _<i>The Adolescent_</i>, 1875 [1883, 1897, DPC II])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/719-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iv-merchant-skotoboinikovs-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">The Merchant's Story</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from the novel _<i>The Adolescent_</i>, 1875 [1897, DPC IV])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/722-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vii-a-little-boy-at-christs-christmas-tree.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">A Little Boy at Christ's Christmas Tree</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>The Diary Of A Writer_</i>, January 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VII])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/dostoievski/718-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-iii-the-peasant-marey.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">The Peasant Marey</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> (from _<i>The Diary Of A Writer_</i>, February 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC III])<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/723-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-viii-a-centenarian.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #e20000;">A Centenarian</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> (from _<i><span style="color: black;">The Diary Of A Writer_</span></i><span style="color: black;">, March 1876 [1883, 1897, DPC VIII])</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: red;">Foma Danilov</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> - The Russian Hero Tortured to Death (from _<i><span style="color: black;">The Diary Of A Writer_</span></i><span style="color: black;">, 1877 [1883, 1897, DPC IX])</span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> <span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">{In square brackets we indicate the original Anna Grigorievna Dostoevskaya anthologies in which each story appeared, followed by its order of posting in the present _<i>Dostoevsky for Parents and Children_</i> (DPC) collection. Thus [1883, 1897, DPC II] means the story appeared in the first (1883) and third (1897), but not in the second (1887) Anna Dostoevskaya anthology, and was the second in this series of postings. Please find <a href="https://karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/716-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-i-varenkas-memoirs.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;"> our brief introduction to the original _<i>Dostoevsky for Children_</i> anthologies, and to this English online version. Accompanying picture: grave of Sophya ("Sonia") Dostoevskaya (+1868, Geneva); memorial plaque donated by the International Dostoevsky Society}<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; text-align: center; line-height: 15.6pt;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">--//--<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"But you should know that [he] is right even when he is wrong." </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: right; line-height: normal;" align="right"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">(Dostoevsky on Belinsky, as quoted in K. Lantz, _<i>The Dostoevsky Encyclopedia_</i>)</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">"Marie's Story" from _<i>The Idiot_ </i>(1868) was intended by Anna Dostoyevskaya for publication in a further _<i>Dostoevsky for Children</i>_ volume, a tome that remained unpublished. We include her short story here. Like many pieces we have read, it has the inherent charm and savor of a short story entirely understandable on its own. It is a self-sufficient gem. </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">It is true that Marie's name is not always found in the indexes of the most outstanding works on Dostoevsky. It tends to be forgotten. Like other pages in this collection, and indeed, like all of Anna Dostoevskaya's "children's books". Perhaps because of their subdued, some might say "kenotic", family air.</span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Nevertheless, today's story is also a kind of key to _<i>The Idiot_. </i>And _<i>The Idiot_</i> is a key to any understanding of Dostoevsky's work and persona. In particular, Marie's story might be the finest embodiment of our author's "Russian Idea", and of his lifelong Slavophile Idea. We glimpsed at this idea before, from <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/726-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-ix-foma-danilov-the-russian-hero-tortured-to-death.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">a less happy angle</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">. Today's story, however, suggests that what Dostoevsky said of Belinsky might well apply to himself: "you should know that [he] is right even when he is wrong."</span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">For, here is the key to love and friendship, a central theme in Dostoevsky since as early on as _<i>Poor Folk_</i>, “An Honest Thief”, or “Nellie's Story”. Marie's story at first seems only a redeeming pastoral of the innocent and of the innerly pure. It is that, and that makes any reading of it profitable.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">But it is more than that. In it, there are already "two kinds of love" implied, Joseph Frank discerns: essentially, the worldly and the otherworldly. Egotistic love, versus co-suffering love. And only innocent children may be allowed to ignore the difference, the story suggests.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Later on in the novel, confusion between the "two kinds of love" brings down two unforgettable Dostoevskian leading ladies, also ending the saga on this side of eternity of Prince Myshkin, their potential rescuer, and perhaps the most memorable alter ego of the author himself. Myskin's plight, in this interpretation, echoes that of <a href="http://www.karamazov.ro/index.php/ce-citim/721-dostoevsky-for-parents-and-children-vi-nellies-story.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">Vanya Petrovich, Nellie's rescuer</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">, in _<i>The Insulted and Injured_</i>. The innocent may be excused, but in their rescuers spiritual clarity seems needed!</span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Perhaps deeper insight into the ideal of monasticism might have cleared this confusion. Dostoevsky was naturally led to explore this direction later, in the _<i>Brothers Karamazov_</i>. But even Alyosha Karamazov leaves the monastery, so the issue of worldly v. otherworldly was left to somehow be settled by his posterity, as previously intimated in this series.</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Be this as it may, the essence of Dostoevsky's Russian Idea is before us in the short story of Marie. The Karamazovs, the “Dream of a Ridiculous Man”, even the “Pushkin Speech”, etc., can all be seen as gravitating around this central case, with their refinements and accidents illuminated by it. </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">For here is _<i>Russian_</i> love and friendship successfully _<i>universalized abroad_,</i> in an almost hesychast fashion, as in no other Dostoevsky story we can think of. And perhaps there are more kinds of love than two implied - how many can <i>you</i> count?</span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Here are almost epigenetically inherited aristocracy and humility fused in one (the Russian quality without a name?) and rescuing a whole Arcadian community from the clutches of... well, of the Western God of pride and legalistic satisfaction (the same god that pervades every Dostoevskian instantiation of the ever offended Romantic Ego, and its “Underground”.) </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; background: white none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">True enough, only a small, almost Jane Austen-like, pastoral setting is rescued. But doesn’t this only make the story _<i>more_</i> "Slavophile"? More innerly free, and less dependent on "the Roman Idea"? (comp. Met. Anthony Khrapovitsky quoted <a href="https://archive.ph/kkm2Q#selection-855.0-855.26" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue; background: white none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; background: white none repeat scroll 0% 0%;">.)<span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Having adumbrated some of our author's ambiguities, a note of caution: For the spiritual edification of our homeschooling readers, we have tried to capitalize on the _<i>practically_</i> tested, if somewhat overlooked, readings of these stories (by Met. Anthony, Prof. Andreyev, etc.) But, as on any Ladder, this is only one of the options available to every reader, at each step. In this connection, it is perhaps relevant how St. Isaac the Syrian (later to occasion Dostoevsky's last riddle, as we hope we shall see) counsels against lazy delay in the twilight, hinting at the kind of "accidents" that can happen, even to the "elect": </span></p>
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<p style="margin-bottom: 3.75pt; line-height: 15.6pt;"><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">Without wine no one can get drunk, nor will his heart leap with joy; and without inebriation in God, no one will obtain by the natural course of events the virtue that does not belong to him, nor will it remain in him serenely and without compulsion. </span></i><i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #3c4043;">Now there is one who is serene in his nature and compassionate, and he loves everyone with ease , having compassion on every (created ) nature - not just human beings, but domestic animals, birds and wild animals and so on as well: there do exist such souls, but there are times when they are perturbed too, if certain causes of anguish pass by them, originating from someone (else). In the case of the person who had been worthy to taste of divine love, that person customarily forgets everything (else) by (reason of) its sweetness, (for) it is something at whose taste all visible things seem despicable: such a person gladly draws near to a luminous love of humanity, without distinguishing (between good and bad); he is never overcome by the weakness to be found in people, nor is he perturbed. He is just as the blessed Apostles were as well: people who in the midst of all the bad things they endured from others, were (nonetheless) utterly incapable of hating them or of being fed up with showing love for them. This was manifested in actual deed, for after all the other things they even accepted death in order that these people may be retrieved. These were men who only a little previously had begged Christ that fire might descend from heaven upon the Samaritans just because they had not received them into their village! But once they had received the gift and tasted the love of God, they were made perfect even in love for wicked man: enduring all kinds of evils in order to retrieve them, they could not possibly hate them." </span></i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: #3c4043;">(this specific passage translated by S. Brock from the Syriac was not available to Dostoevsky, but perhaps much of it was implied in what was available.)<i> </i><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></p>
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<p style="text-align: center;" align="center"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">***</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">F.M. Dostoevsky</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">MARIE'S STORY</span></p>
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<p><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">(from <i>The Idiot</i>, 1868, part I, chap. VI. <span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;">Constance Garnett transl., 1913.<span style="color: black;"> Russian original <a href="https://archive.ph/5mtTG#selection-3247.0-3247.2"><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: blue;">here</span></a><span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">.)<span style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif;"></span></span></span></span></span></p>
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<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Here you all are,” began the prince, “settling yourselves down to listen to me with so much curiosity, that if I do not satisfy you you will probably be angry with me. No, no! I’m only joking!” he added, hastily, with a smile.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Well, then—they were all children there, and I was always among children and only with children. They were the children of the village in which I lived, and they went to the school there—all of them. I did not teach them, oh no; there was a master for that, one Jules Thibaut. I may have taught them some things, but I was among them just as an outsider, and I passed all four years of my life there among them. I wished for nothing better; I used to tell them everything and hid nothing from them. Their fathers and relations were very angry with me, because the children could do nothing without me at last, and used to throng after me at all times. The schoolmaster was my greatest enemy in the end! I had many enemies, and all because of the children. Even Schneider reproached me. What were they afraid of? One can tell a child everything, anything. I have often been struck by the fact that parents know their children so little. They should not conceal so much from them. How well even little children understand that their parents conceal things from them, because they consider them too young to understand! Children are capable of giving advice in the most important matters. How can one deceive these dear little birds, when they look at one so sweetly and confidingly? I call them birds because there is nothing in the world better than birds!</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“However, most of the people were angry with me about one and the same thing; but Thibaut simply was jealous of me. At first he had wagged his head and wondered how it was that the children understood what I told them so well, and could not learn from him; and he laughed like anything when I replied that neither he nor I could teach them very much, but that <i>they</i> might teach us a good deal.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“How he could hate me and tell scandalous stories about me, living among children as he did, is what I cannot understand. Children soothe and heal the wounded heart. I remember there was one poor fellow at our professor’s who was being treated for madness, and you have no idea what those children did for him, eventually. I don’t think he was mad, but only terribly unhappy. But I’ll tell you all about him another day. Now I must get on with this story.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“The children did not love me at first; I was such a sickly, awkward kind of a fellow then—and I know I am ugly. Besides, I was a foreigner. The children used to laugh at me, at first; and they even went so far as to throw stones at me, when they saw me kiss Marie. I only kissed her once in my life—no, no, don’t laugh!” The prince hastened to suppress the smiles of his audience at this point. “It was not a matter of <i>love</i> at all! If only you knew what a miserable creature she was, you would have pitied her, just as I did. She belonged to our village. Her mother was an old, old woman, and they used to sell string and thread, and soap and tobacco, out of the window of their little house, and lived on the pittance they gained by this trade. The old woman was ill and very old, and could hardly move. Marie was her daughter, a girl of twenty, weak and thin and consumptive; but still she did heavy work at the houses around, day by day. Well, one fine day a commercial traveller betrayed her and carried her off; and a week later he deserted her. She came home dirty, draggled, and shoeless; she had walked for a whole week without shoes; she had slept in the fields, and caught a terrible cold; her feet were swollen and sore, and her hands torn and scratched all over. She never had been pretty even before; but her eyes were quiet, innocent, kind eyes.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“She was very quiet always—and I remember once, when she had suddenly begun singing at her work, everyone said, ‘Marie tried to sing today!’ and she got so chaffed that she was silent for ever after. She had been treated kindly in the place before; but when she came back now—ill and shunned and miserable—not one of them all had the slightest sympathy for her. Cruel people! Oh, what hazy understandings they have on such matters! Her mother was the first to show the way. She received her wrathfully, unkindly, and with contempt. ‘You have disgraced me,’ she said. She was the first to cast her into ignominy; but when they all heard that Marie had returned to the village, they ran out to see her and crowded into the little cottage—old men, children, women, girls—such a hurrying, stamping, greedy crowd. Marie was lying on the floor at the old woman’s feet, hungry, torn, draggled, crying, miserable.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When everyone crowded into the room she hid her face in her dishevelled hair and lay cowering on the floor. Everyone looked at her as though she were a piece of dirt off the road. The old men scolded and condemned, and the young ones laughed at her. The women condemned her too, and looked at her contemptuously, just as though she were some loathsome insect.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Her mother allowed all this to go on, and nodded her head and encouraged them. The old woman was very ill at that time, and knew she was dying (she really did die a couple of months later), and though she felt the end approaching she never thought of forgiving her daughter, to the very day of her death. She would not even speak to her. She made her sleep on straw in a shed, and hardly gave her food enough to support life.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Marie was very gentle to her mother, and nursed her, and did everything for her; but the old woman accepted all her services without a word and never showed her the slightest kindness. Marie bore all this; and I could see when I got to know her that she thought it quite right and fitting, considering herself the lowest and meanest of creatures.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When the old woman took to her bed finally, the other old women in the village sat with her by turns, as the custom is there; and then Marie was quite driven out of the house. They gave her no food at all, and she could not get any work in the village; none would employ her. The men seemed to consider her no longer a woman, they said such dreadful things to her. Sometimes on Sundays, if they were drunk enough, they used to throw her a penny or two, into the mud, and Marie would silently pick up the money. She had began to spit blood at that time.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“At last her rags became so tattered and torn that she was ashamed of appearing in the village any longer. The children used to pelt her with mud; so she begged to be taken on as assistant cowherd, but the cowherd would not have her. Then she took to helping him without leave; and he saw how valuable her assistance was to him, and did not drive her away again; on the contrary, he occasionally gave her the remnants of his dinner, bread and cheese. He considered that he was being very kind. When the mother died, the village parson was not ashamed to hold Marie up to public derision and shame. Marie was standing at the coffin’s head, in all her rags, crying.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“A crowd of people had collected to see how she would cry. The parson, a young fellow ambitious of becoming a great preacher, began his sermon and pointed to Marie. ‘There,’ he said, ‘there is the cause of the death of this venerable woman’—(which was a lie, because she had been ill for at least two years)—‘there she stands before you, and dares not lift her eyes from the ground, because she knows that the finger of God is upon her. Look at her tatters and rags—the badge of those who lose their virtue. Who is she? her daughter!’ and so on to the end.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“And just fancy, this infamy pleased them, all of them, nearly. Only the children had altered—for then they were all on my side and had learned to love Marie.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“This is how it was: I had wished to do something for Marie; I longed to give her some money, but I never had a farthing while I was there. But I had a little diamond pin, and this I sold to a travelling pedlar; he gave me eight francs for it—it was worth at least forty.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I long sought to meet Marie alone; and at last I did meet her, on the hillside beyond the village. I gave her the eight francs and asked her to take care of the money because I could get no more; and then I kissed her and said that she was not to suppose I kissed her with any evil motives or because I was in love with her, for that I did so solely out of pity for her, and because from the first I had not accounted her as guilty so much as unfortunate. I longed to console and encourage her somehow, and to assure her that she was not the low, base thing which she and others strove to make out; but I don’t think she understood me. She stood before me, dreadfully ashamed of herself, and with downcast eyes; and when I had finished she kissed my hand. I would have kissed hers, but she drew it away. Just at this moment the whole troop of children saw us. (I found out afterwards that they had long kept a watch upon me.) They all began whistling and clapping their hands, and laughing at us. Marie ran away at once; and when I tried to talk to them, they threw stones at me. All the village heard of it the same day, and Marie’s position became worse than ever. The children would not let her pass now in the streets, but annoyed her and threw dirt at her more than before. They used to run after her—she racing away with her poor feeble lungs panting and gasping, and they pelting her and shouting abuse at her.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Once I had to interfere by force; and after that I took to speaking to them every day and whenever I could. Occasionally they stopped and listened; but they teased Marie all the same.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I told them how unhappy Marie was, and after a while they stopped their abuse of her, and let her go by silently. Little by little we got into the way of conversing together, the children and I. I concealed nothing from them, I told them all. They listened very attentively and soon began to be sorry for Marie. At last some of them took to saying ‘Good-morning’ to her, kindly, when they met her. It is the custom there to salute anyone you meet with ‘Good-morning’ whether acquainted or not. I can imagine how astonished Marie was at these first greetings from the children.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Once two little girls got hold of some food and took it to her, and came back and told me. They said she had burst into tears, and that they loved her very much now. Very soon after that they all became fond of Marie, and at the same time they began to develop the greatest affection for myself. They often came to me and begged me to tell them stories. I think I must have told stories well, for they did so love to hear them. At last I took to reading up interesting things on purpose to pass them on to the little ones, and this went on for all the rest of my time there, three years. Later, when everyone—even Schneider—was angry with me for hiding nothing from the children, I pointed out how foolish it was, for they always knew things, only they learnt them in a way that soiled their minds but not so from me. One has only to remember one’s own childhood to admit the truth of this. But nobody was convinced... It was two weeks before her mother died that I had kissed Marie; and when the clergyman preached that sermon the children were all on my side.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When I told them what a shame it was of the parson to talk as he had done, and explained my reason, they were so angry that some of them went and broke his windows with stones. Of course I stopped them, for that was not right, but all the village heard of it, and how I caught it for spoiling the children! Everyone discovered now that the little ones had taken to being fond of Marie, and their parents were terribly alarmed; but Marie was so happy. The children were forbidden to meet her; but they used to run out of the village to the herd and take her food and things; and sometimes just ran off there and kissed her, and said, ‘<i>Je vous aime, Marie!</i>’ and then trotted back again. They imagined that I was in love with Marie, and this was the only point on which I did not undeceive them, for they got such enjoyment out of it. And what delicacy and tenderness they showed!</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“In the evening I used to walk to the waterfall. There was a spot there which was quite closed in and hidden from view by large trees; and to this spot the children used to come to me. They could not bear that their dear Leon should love a poor girl without shoes to her feet and dressed all in rags and tatters. So, would you believe it, they actually clubbed together, somehow, and bought her shoes and stockings, and some linen, and even a dress! I can’t understand how they managed it, but they did it, all together. When I asked them about it they only laughed and shouted, and the little girls clapped their hands and kissed me. I sometimes went to see Marie secretly, too. She had become very ill, and could hardly walk. She still went with the herd, but could not help the herdsman any longer. She used to sit on a stone near, and wait there almost motionless all day, till the herd went home. Her consumption was so advanced, and she was so weak, that she used to sit with closed eyes, breathing heavily. Her face was as thin as a skeleton’s, and sweat used to stand on her white brow in large drops. I always found her sitting just like that. I used to come up quietly to look at her; but Marie would hear me, open her eyes, and tremble violently as she kissed my hands. I did not take my hand away because it made her happy to have it, and so she would sit and cry quietly. Sometimes she tried to speak; but it was very difficult to understand her. She was almost like a madwoman, with excitement and ecstasy, whenever I came. Occasionally the children came with me; when they did so, they would stand some way off and keep guard over us, so as to tell me if anybody came near. This was a great pleasure to them.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When we left her, Marie used to relapse at once into her old condition, and sit with closed eyes and motionless limbs. One day she could not go out at all, and remained at home all alone in the empty hut; but the children very soon became aware of the fact, and nearly all of them visited her that day as she lay alone and helpless in her miserable bed.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“For two days the children looked after her, and then, when the village people got to know that Marie was really dying, some of the old women came and took it in turns to sit by her and look after her a bit. I think they began to be a little sorry for her in the village at last; at all events they did not interfere with the children any more, on her account.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Marie lay in a state of uncomfortable delirium the whole while; she coughed dreadfully. The old women would not let the children stay in the room; but they all collected outside the window each morning, if only for a moment, and shouted ‘<i>Bon jour, notre bonne Marie!</i>’ and Marie no sooner caught sight of, or heard them, and she became quite animated at once, and, in spite of the old women, would try to sit up and nod her head and smile at them, and thank them. The little ones used to bring her nice things and sweets to eat, but she could hardly touch anything. Thanks to them, I assure you, the girl died almost perfectly happy. She almost forgot her misery, and seemed to accept their love as a sort of symbol of pardon for her offence, though she never ceased to consider herself a dreadful sinner. They used to flutter at her window just like little birds, calling out: ‘<i>Nous t’aimons, Marie!</i>’</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“She died very soon; I had thought she would live much longer. The day before her death I went to see her for the last time, just before sunset. I think she recognized me, for she pressed my hand.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Next morning they came and told me that Marie was dead. The children could not be restrained now; they went and covered her coffin with flowers, and put a wreath of lovely blossoms on her head. The pastor did not throw any more shameful words at the poor dead woman; but there were very few people at the funeral. However, when it came to carrying the coffin, all the children rushed up, to carry it themselves. Of course they could not do it alone, but they insisted on helping, and walked alongside and behind, crying.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“They have planted roses all round her grave, and every year they look after the flowers and make Marie’s resting-place as beautiful as they can. I was in ill odour after all this with the parents of the children, and especially with the parson and schoolmaster. Schneider was obliged to promise that I should not meet them and talk to them; but we conversed from a distance by signs, and they used to write me sweet little notes. Afterwards I came closer than ever to those little souls, but even then it was very dear to me, to have them so fond of me.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“Schneider said that I did the children great harm by my pernicious ‘system’; what nonsense that was! And what did he mean by my system? He said afterwards that he believed I was a child myself—just before I came away. ‘You have the form and face of an adult’ he said, ‘but as regards soul, and character, and perhaps even intelligence, you are a child in the completest sense of the word, and always will be, if you live to be sixty.’ I laughed very much, for of course that is nonsense. But it is a fact that I do not care to be among grown-up people and much prefer the society of children. However kind people may be to me, I never feel quite at home with them, and am always glad to get back to my little companions. Now my companions have always been children, not because I was a child myself once, but because young things attract me. On one of the first days of my stay in Switzerland, I was strolling about alone and miserable, when I came upon the children rushing noisily out of school, with their slates and bags, and books, their games, their laughter and shouts—and my soul went out to them. I stopped and laughed happily as I watched their little feet moving so quickly. Girls and boys, laughing and crying; for as they went home many of them found time to fight and make peace, to weep and play. I forgot my troubles in looking at them. And then, all those three years, I tried to understand why men should be for ever tormenting themselves. I lived the life of a child there, and thought I should never leave the little village; indeed, I was far from thinking that I should ever return to Russia. But at last I recognized the fact that Schneider could not keep me any longer. And then something so important happened, that Schneider himself urged me to depart. I am going to see now if can get good advice about it. Perhaps my lot in life will be changed; but that is not the principal thing. The principal thing is the entire change that has already come over me. I left many things behind me—too many. They have gone. On the journey I said to myself, ‘I am going into the world of men. I don’t know much, perhaps, but a new life has begun for me.’ I made up my mind to be honest, and steadfast in accomplishing my task. Perhaps I shall meet with troubles and many disappointments, but I have made up my mind to be polite and sincere to everyone; more cannot be asked of me. People may consider me a child if they like. I am often called an idiot, and at one time I certainly was so ill that I was nearly as bad as an idiot; but I am not an idiot now. How can I possibly be so when I know myself that I am considered one?</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“When I received a letter from those dear little souls, while passing through Berlin, I only then realized how much I loved them. It was very, very painful, getting that first little letter. How melancholy they had been when they saw me off! For a month before, they had been talking of my departure and sorrowing over it; and at the waterfall, of an evening, when we parted for the night, they would hug me so tight and kiss me so warmly, far more so than before. And every now and then they would turn up one by one when I was alone, just to give me a kiss and a hug, to show their love for me. The whole flock went with me to the station, which was about a mile from the village, and every now and then one of them would stop to throw his arms round me, and all the little girls had tears in their voices, though they tried hard not to cry. As the train steamed out of the station, I saw them all standing on the platform waving to me and crying ‘Hurrah!’ till they were lost in the distance.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I assure you, when I came in here just now and saw your kind faces (I can read faces well) my heart felt light for the first time since that moment of parting. I think I must be one of those who are born to be in luck, for one does not often meet with people whom one feels he can love from the first sight of their faces; and yet, no sooner do I step out of the railway carriage than I happen upon you!</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“I know it is more or less a shamefaced thing to speak of one’s feelings before others; and yet here am I talking like this to you, and am not a bit ashamed or shy. I am an unsociable sort of fellow and shall very likely not come to see you again for some time; but don’t think the worse of me for that. It is not that I do not value your society; and you must never suppose that I have taken offence at anything.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“You asked me about your faces, and what I could read in them; I will tell you with the greatest pleasure. You, Adelaida Ivanovna, have a very happy face; it is the most sympathetic of the three. Not to speak of your natural beauty, one can look at your face and say to one’s self, ‘She has the face of a kind sister.’ You are simple and merry, but you can see into another’s heart very quickly. That’s what I read in your face.</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“You too, Alexandra Ivanovna, have a very lovely face; but I think you may have some secret sorrow. Your heart is undoubtedly a kind, good one, but you are not merry. There is a certain suspicion of ‘shadow’ in your face, like in that of Holbein’s Madonna in Dresden. So much for your face. Have I guessed right?</span></p>
<p style="margin: 3pt 0in; text-align: justify; text-indent: 12pt; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman', serif; color: black;">“As for your face, Lizabetha Prokofievna, I not only think, but am perfectly <i>sure</i>, that you are an absolute child—in all, in all, mind, both good and bad—and in spite of your years. Don’t be angry with me for saying so; you know what my feelings for children are. And do not suppose that I am so candid out of pure simplicity of soul. Oh dear no, it is by no means the case! Perhaps I have my own very profound object in view.”</span></p>
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