A history of Russia

Ivan III, the Great

Leo Tolstoy

Fedor Dostoevsky

Vissarion Belinsky

Ivan Turgenev

ideas can be considered creative rather than merely imitative, there is no convincing reason for dissociating Russian intellectual history of the first half of the nineteenth century from that of the rest of Europe, whether in the name of the alleged uniquely religious nature of the ideological development in Russia or in order to satisfy the peculiar Soviet nationalism.

In particular, two German philosophers, Schelling first and then Hegel, exercised strong influence on the Russians. Schelling affected certain professors and a number of poets - the best Russian expression of some Schellingian views can be found in Tiutchev's unsurpassed poetry of nature - and also groups of intellectuals and even schools of thought, such as the Slavophile. It was largely an interest in Schelling that led to the establishment of the first philosophic 'circle' and the first philosophic review in Russia. In 1823 several young men who had been discussing Schelling in a literary group formed a separate society with the study of German idealistic philosophy as its main object. The circle chose the name of 'The Lovers of Wisdom' and came to contain a dozen members and associates, many of whom were to achieve prominence in Russian intellectual life. It published four issues of a journal, Mnemosyne. The leading Lovers of Wisdom included a gifted poet, Dmitrii Venevitinov, who died in 1827 at the age of twenty-two, and Prince Vladimir Odoevsky, 1803-69, who developed interesting views concerning the decline of the West and the great future of Russia to issue from the combination and fruition of both the pre-Petrine and the Petrine heritages. The Lovers of Wisdom reflected the romantic temper of their generation in a certain kind of poetic spiritualism that pervaded their entire outlook, in their worship of art, in their pantheistic adoration of nature, and in their disregard for the 'crude' aspects of life, including politics. The group disbanded after the Decembrist rebellion in order not to attract police attention.

A decade later, the question of the nature and destiny of Russia was powerfully and shockingly presented by Peter Chaadaev. In his Philosophical Letter, published in the Telescope in 1836, Chaadaev argued, in effect, that Russia had no past, no present, and no future. It had never really belonged to either the West or the East, and it had contributed nothing to culture. In particular, Russia lacked the dynamic social principle of Catholicism, which constituted the basis of the entire Western civilization. Indeed, Russia remained 'a gap in the intellectual order of things.' Chaadaev, who was officially proclaimed deranged by the incensed authorities after the publication of the letter, later modified his thesis in his Apology of a Madman. Russia, he came to believe, did enter history through the work of Peter the Great and could obtain a glorious future by throwing all of its fresh strength into the construction of the common culture of Christendom.

Russian intellectual life grew apace in the 1840's and 1850's. Spurred

by Schelling, by an increasing Hegelian influence, and by German romantic thought in general, as well as by the new importance of Russia in Europe ever since the cataclysm of 1812 and by the blossoming of Russian culture, several ideologies emerged to compete for the favor of the educated public. Official Nationality, which we considered in an earlier chapter, represented the point of view of the government and the Right. While it cannot be included in what Herzen called 'intellectual emancipation,' it did possess influential spokesmen among professors and writers, not to mention censors and other officials, and played a prominent role on the Russian scene. On the one hand, Official Nationality may be regarded as a culmination of reactionary currents in Russia, which found earlier protagonists in such figures as Rostopchin, Shishkov, Magnitsky, and in part Karamzin. On the other hand, it too, in particular its more nationalistic wing that was typified by the Moscow University professors Michael Po-godin and Stephen Shevyrev, testified to the impact of German romanticism on Russia. The Slavophiles and the Westernizers developed the two most important independent, as opposed to government-sponsored, schools of thought. The Petrashevtsy, by contrast, had a briefer and more obscure history. But they did represent yet another intellectual approach to certain key problems of the age.

The Slavophiles were a group of romantic intellectuals who formulated a comprehensive and remarkable ideology centered on their belief in the superior nature and supreme historical mission of Orthodoxy and of Russia. The leading members of the group, all of them landlords and gentlemen-scholars of broad culture and many intellectual interests, included Alexis Khomiakov who applied himself to everything from theology and world history to medicine and technical inventions, Ivan Kireevsky who has been called the philosopher of the movement, his brother Peter who collected folk songs and left very little behind him in writing, Constantine Aksakov, a specialist in Russian history and language, Constantine's brother Ivan, later prominent as a publicist and a Pan-Slav, and George Samarin who was to have a significant part in the emancipation of the serfs and who wrote especially on certain religious and philosophical topics, on the problem of the borderlands of the empire, and on the issue of reform in Russia. This informal group, gathering in the salons and homes of Moscow, flourished in the 1840's and 1850's until the death of the Kireevsky brothers in 1856 and of Khomiakov and Constantine Aksakov in 1860.

Slavophilism expressed a fundamental vision of integration, peace, and harmony among men. On the religious plane it produced Khomiakov's concept of sobornost, an association in love, freedom, and truth of believers, which Khomiakov considered the essence of Orthodoxy. Historically, so the Slavophiles asserted, a similar harmonious integration of individuals

could be found in the social life of the Slavs, notably in the peasant commune - described as 'a moral choir' by Constantine Aksakov - and in such other ancient Russian institutions as the zemskii sobor. Again, the family represented the principle of integration in love, and the same spirit could pervade other associations of human beings. As against love, freedom, and co-operation stood the world of rationalism, necessity, and compulsion. It too existed on many planes, from the religious and metaphysical to that of everyday life. Thus it manifested itself in the Roman Catholic Church - which had chosen rationalism and authority in preference to love and harmony and had seceded from Orthodox Christendom - and, through the Catholic Church, in Protestantism and in the entire civilization of the West. Moreover, Peter the Great introduced the principles of rationalism, legalism, and compulsion into Russia, where they proceeded to destroy or stunt the harmonious native development and to seduce the educated public. The Russian future lay in a return to native principles, in overcoming the Western disease. After being cured, Russia would take its message of harmony and salvation to the discordant and dying West. It is important to realize that the all-embracing Slavophile dichotomy represented - as pointed out by Stepun and others - the basic romantic contrast between the romantic ideal and the Age of Reason. In particular, as well as in general, Slavophilism fits into the framework of European romanticism, although the Slavophiles showed considerable originality in adapting romantic doctrines to their own situation and needs and although they also experienced the influence of Orthodox religious thought and tradition.

In its application to the Russia of Nicholas I the Slavophile teaching often produced paradoxical results, antagonized the government, and baffled Slavophile friends and foes alike. In a sense, the Slavophiles were religious anarchists, for they condemned all legalism and compulsion in the name of their religious ideal. Yet, given the sinful condition of man, they granted the necessity of government and even expressed a preference for autocracy: in addition to its historical roots in ancient Russia, autocracy possessed the virtue of placing the entire weight of authority and compulsion on a single individual, thus liberating society from that heavy burden; besides, the Slavophiles remained unalterably opposed to Western constitutional and other legalistic and formalistic devices. Yet this justification of autocracy remained historical and functional, therefore relative, never religious and absolute. Furthermore, the Slavophiles desired the emancipation of the serfs and other reforms, and, above all, insisted on the 'freedom of the life of the spirit,' that is, freedom of conscience, speech, and publication. As Constantine Aksakov tried to explain to the government: 'Man was created by God as an intelligent and a talking being.' Also, Khomiakov and his friends opposed such aspects of the established