The question of human in the philosophy of archimandrite Theophan (Avsenev)

Abstract

The article deals with the philosophical anthropology of the original Russian thinker, Archimandrite of the Russian Orthodox Church Theophan (Avsenev). He formulated the original philosophical doctrine of human, based on patristic theology, philosophy of Platonism and schellingian philosophical anthropology. The philosopher distinguishes between the human body, the physical component that connects human with the inorganic being and the world of plants and the spirit that connect human with the God. The worldly inclinations of the soul connect human with animals. And the spirit aspiring to God is the true essence of human. But since God is immense and unattainable in his essence, human reveals Godly perfection in the world as truth, beauty, and goodness. Theophan (Avsenev) reveals in philosophical anthropology an important moral aspect of his philosophical system, considering human mortality as a result of the deviation of existence from the original plan for it. Therefore, the philosophical system of Theophan (Avsenev) is considered in the context of the soteriological line of Russian moral philosophy. In philosophy Theophan (Avsenev) not only human, but the being needs to be saved. Thus, in the philosophy of Theophan (Avsenev) received an expression of all the most substantial features of the original Russian philosophy: desire for sobornost, ontologism, cosmologism, appeal to the person, the rejection of absolute death. Nevertheless, the original philosophical system of one of the most original representatives of the Kiev theological academic school of Archimandrite Theophan (Avsenev), which stood at the origins of the Russian religious and philosophical Renaissance, has not been studied and is a white spot on the map of the history of Russian philosophical culture. Of course, without addressing the gaps cannot build the big context of Russian philosophy, the relevance of the construction of which now pay attention to many important contemporary historians of Russian philosophy: for example, S. Khoruzhii, V. Varava, etc. It should be pointed out that a special role in the formation of the original Russian philosophy was played by the Russian theological academic tradition, which was a truly original and unique phenomenon. Thus, the study of philosophy Theophan (Avsenev) is not only important in the context of the history of Orthodox theology and Russian philosophy, but in the process of finding prospects of Russian philosophy and the ways of its development.