Life is Paradise. The Theology of Joy in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov in the Light of the Gospel of John

Tekstualia ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (67) ◽  
pp. 49-68
Author(s):  
Elżbieta Mikiciuk
Keyword(s):  
Gospel Of John ◽  
The Self ◽  
The Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Brothers Karamazov ◽  
The One

The idea that „life is paradise”, in The Brothers Karamazov expressed by Markel, Zinovy-Zosima, and Mikhail, is read from the perspective of the theology of joy, which is present in the Gospel of John as the theology of death (cf John 12:24), as losing the „self”, especially in the l ight of the following words of Jesus: „I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die” (John 11:25). Thus understood, life is neither bios nor psyche, but zoe, living for God, life beyond death. The characters’ conversion signifi es a „return to paradise”, symbolized by the motif of the reviving garden, and the vision of the Cana of Galilee revolves around the „restitution of paradise” and the joy that becomes communion (the picture of the community drinking the „wine of new joy”).

scholarly journals «Два романа одного жизнеописания»: «Три года» А.П. Чехова и «Братья Карамазовы» Ф.М. Достоевского

SlavVaria ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
ДИАНА КОМЯТИ
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Intertextual Connections ◽  
The One

“Two novels of one biography”: “Three years” by A.P. Chekhov and “The Brothers Karamazov” by F.M. Dostoevsky. In contemporary Chekhov studies the significance of Dostoevsky’s creative heritage in Chekhov’ artistic world is increasingly comprehended. They attempt to reveal and interpret intertextual connections with Dostoevsky’s novels, embedded in the subtext of Chekhov’s works. On the one hand, common themes and problems that bring writers closer together are revealed, on the other hand, Chekhov’s polemical rethinking of Dostoevsky’s legacy is noted. Connected with this tendency the article deals with comparative analysis of Chekhov’s story “Three Years” and Dostoevsky’s novel “The Brothers Karamazov”. In this work we try to identify and interpretate the allusions and parallels hidden in Chekhov’s story.

scholarly journals Ivan Karamazov as a Philosophical Type—but which one?

2021 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 54-75
Author(s):  
Kåre Johan Mjør
Keyword(s):  
Structural Organization ◽  
The Other ◽  
Close Reading ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Reported Speech ◽  
Direct Speech ◽  
Moral Sensibility ◽  
The Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Brothers Karamazov ◽  
The One

The article analyses a set of philosophical statements made by and attributed to Ivan Karamazov in Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, in order to answer the question as to what kind of philosophy Ivan may be said to express in the novel. My close reading reveals that there is a significant distinction between, on the one hand,  Ivan's most radical statements, that is his rational egoism and the idea that "everything is permitted," which are always given in reported speech, and on the other the “Ivan of direct speech,” a character characterized by far more moral sensibility (e.g. in the Pro et contra part). On the basis of these findings the article seeks to bring together two traditions in the reception of Dostoevsky—the philosophical and the narratological. By letting these approaches inform one another I suggest ways in which the structural organization of the text is itself a bearer of philosophical meaning. Moreover, the article takes seriously Bakhtin's claim that Dostoevsky's heroes are not merely stable representations of ideas, but engage with them through dialogue and encounters with others, as exemplified by Ivan Karamazov himself as well as by other characters' responses to his articulations. 

scholarly journals AMNESTIE BEI DOSTOEVSKIJ

2021 ◽  
Vol XII (38) ◽  
pp. 185-204
Author(s):  
Sebastian Kornmesser
Keyword(s):  
Social Injustice ◽  
International Peace ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
The Core ◽  
The Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Political Events ◽  
Brothers Karamazov ◽  
The One ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Sense Of Justice

The term amnesty means the waiving of punishment (to a group of people) without, however, erasing the guilt. Amnesties are usually granted in connection with political events such as national or international peace amnesties in times of political change or wars. However, there are also waivers of criminal prosecutions, popularly known as "mercy before justice". Amnesties can therefore be seen, on the one hand, as a humane act of mercy, but on the other hand they can also cause problems in the population's sense of justice, since punishments are treated differently, and the principle of equality is shaken. The concepts of punishment, guilt and innocence, as well as their representation, offer a basis for the question of how amnesties are formed in Dostoevsky's texts. Dostoevsky's characters are usually ambivalent and challenge a reflective reading as well as an ethical judgement. By making social injustice an important theme in his texts, the author focuses on the restoration of justice through amnesty. A co-responsibility in society as well as a co-guilt in a higher sense form the core of his argumentation, both as a contrast to justice, which considers the guilt of the individual, and as a consideration of man's hereditary guilt and his responsibility to the community. A comparison with ancient Greek jurisprudence also shows that amnesties were closely connected with the collective, with emotion and ritual. This results in new ways of looking at prominent texts by Dostoevsky, as will be shown with the example of The Brothers Karamazov and other works. This will provide a brief overview of how Dostoevsky understands guilt and innocence, what function punishment has in his texts and how amnesty emerges as a result

THE SYMBOLIST CONCEIT: VLADIMIR SOLOV′EV'S POSTHUMOUS CAREER, THE POLITICS OF RECEPTION, AND THE LEGACY OF THE RUSSIAN EMIGRATION, 1892–1956

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 471-501
Author(s):  
SEAN GILLEN
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Fin De Siecle ◽  
The Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Mass Politics ◽  
Fin De Siècle ◽  
Brothers Karamazov ◽  
Cultural Developments

For nearly a century, the interpretation of Vladimir Sergeevich Solov′ev (1853–1900) has been locked in a “mythopoeic method” of the Symbolist conceit rooted in Europe-widefin de sièclecultural developments. Solov′ev's posterity has come to see him as a mystic prophesying the folly of reason and mass politics, whereas his contemporaries saw him as the model for both Ivan and Alyosha Karamazov in Fedor Dostoevskii'sThe Brothers Karamazov—a dramatization of the “politics of the self” within the secularization frame. The story of the gap between these two images reveals the historicity of the Symbolist conceit. More broadly, it shows how the Russian authors of this myth participated in transnational prewar and interwar discourses about mass politics, culture, and violence that expand the typical chronological and geographical boundaries associated with these developments.

Stories and the Self

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 47-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Krause ◽  
Markus Appel
Keyword(s):  
Meta Analysis ◽  
The Self ◽  
The Other ◽  
Lower Degree ◽  
Contrast Effects ◽  
Self Perception ◽  
Self Perceptions ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One ◽  
Implicit And Explicit

Abstract. Two experiments examined the influence of stories on recipients’ self-perceptions. Extending prior theory and research, our focus was on assimilation effects (i.e., changes in self-perception in line with a protagonist’s traits) as well as on contrast effects (i.e., changes in self-perception in contrast to a protagonist’s traits). In Experiment 1 ( N = 113), implicit and explicit conscientiousness were assessed after participants read a story about either a diligent or a negligent student. Moderation analyses showed that highly transported participants and participants with lower counterarguing scores assimilate the depicted traits of a story protagonist, as indicated by explicit, self-reported conscientiousness ratings. Participants, who were more critical toward a story (i.e., higher counterarguing) and with a lower degree of transportation, showed contrast effects. In Experiment 2 ( N = 103), we manipulated transportation and counterarguing, but we could not identify an effect on participants’ self-ascribed level of conscientiousness. A mini meta-analysis across both experiments revealed significant positive overall associations between transportation and counterarguing on the one hand and story-consistent self-reported conscientiousness on the other hand.

Maximus

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Byers
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Action ◽  
American Art ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Self ◽  
Postwar Period ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Art Practices ◽  
The One

This concluding chapter charts the continuing significance of the early postwar moment in Olson’s later work, particularly The Maximus Poems. The philosophical and political concerns of the American avant-garde between 1946 and 1951 play out across The Maximus Poems just as they inform later American art practices. The search of the early postwar American independent left for a source of political action rooted in the embodied individual is seen, on the one hand, to have been personified in the figure of Maximus. At the same time, Maximus’s radical ‘practice of the self’ charts a sophisticated alternative to the Enlightenment humanist subject widely critiqued in the United States in the immediate postwar period.

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