Ivan Ilyin Research Articles

Ivan Ilyin: fascist or ideologue of the White Movement utopia?

Ivan Ilyin: fascist or ideologue of the White Movement utopia?

«Хвала труду» Ивана Ильина как манифест российской модерности

The article presents the results of a study of alternative versions of modernization. Along with the widespread identification of the modernization process with the Westernization of non-Western societies, the concept of multiple modernization by Shmuel Eisenstadt is analyzed. Russian religious philosophy, being in opposition to the processes that constitute the essence of the Western type of modernization, in particular the transformation of technology from a means of human existence into the goal of his existence, contains examples of a positive reaction to the transformative labor activity of people. Ivan Ilyin in his work “Praise to Labor” demonstrates a special way of demonstrating the value of everyday work as the realization of “God's idea”.

«Ревизор» Гоголя как комедия-трагедия: к проблеме жанра

The article examines Gogol’s apology for laughter in “Theatrical Travel After the Presentation of a New Comedy” (1836–1842). Gogol’s paradigmatic words that the only “honest, noble face” in “The Government Inspector” is laughter are considered in the context of the author’s intention. The play about the imaginary auditor appears as a component of two “revisions”: on the one hand, government revision, although obviously profaned in the course of the play, but inevitably implied by its ending; on the other hand, an “audit” of a “vulgar” society through laughter. The satirist writer and the official authorities, who equally carry out the task of persecuting vice, represent one-order phenomena that equally serve the spiritual improvement of society. The opinions of Gogol’s contemporaries regarding the definition of the picture depicted in the play and the genre of “The Government Inspector” itself as “comedy-tragedy” are in agreement. The article summarizes well-known and little-known reviews of the play by Stepan Shevyrev, Prince Pyotr Vyazemsky, Vasily Mezhevich, Konstantin Aksakov, Vissarion Belinsky, Konstantin Masalsky, and Ivan Ilyin, along with the opinions of the author himself.

Hegel in the Mirrors of Soviet Philosophy

The attitude to Hegel in Soviet philosophy was contradictory and depended to a considerable extent on ideological conjuncture. Waves of love and hate for Hegel alternated periodically. At different times emphasis was placed on the “revolutionary” method, dialectics, or on the “reactionary” system, the justification of the old world. On one page Lenin admired Hegel’s logical discoveries, on the next page he scolded him with harsh words for idealism, mysticism and “goddikin”. The article draws a parallel between the stylistics of Lenin’s philosophical works and the avant-garde artists and poets who gave a “slap in the face” to public taste. Philosophy becomes in Lenin’s hands the servant of politics; later on, the “principle of partisanship” became the credo of Marxist dogma and the criterion of the truth of philosophical doctrines. The Hegelian wing of Soviet Marxism was formed in the 1920s. The party leader of the “Dialecticians”, Abram Deborin, initiated the publication of Hegel’s Collected Works, which was published with a number of large and small interruptions over the course of 30 years (and the last, 15th volume never saw the light of day). After the defeat of the Deborinites in 1931, Hegel’s popularity gradually declined. However, some original studies coloured by love for Hegel appeared. Vygotsky used Hegelian concepts of “mediation” and “cunning of reason” to create a cultural-historical psychology; he believed that Hegel “walked lamely to the truth”. Mikhail Lifshits regarded Hegel as a “great conservative of mankind”, and Georg Lukács, who came to the Soviet Union, wrote his famous Young Hegel here and defended this book as his doctoral thesis (1942). Lifshits and Lukács concentrate on Hegel’s “historical dialectic” and on his comprehension of the revolutionary events of his epoch. By the end of the Great Patriotic War, Hegel’s philosophy had been declared an “aristocratic reaction to the French Revolution” (Stalin), and hatred of Hegel became reflexive. The party of persecutors of “Hegelianshchina” was led by Zinovy Beletsky, Professor at Moscow State University. It was only after Stalin’s death that serious research into Hegel’s philosophy could be resumed. E. V. Ilyenkov interpreted dialectics as “the method of ascent from the abstract to the concrete” and traced how this — materialistically reinterpreted — method works in Marx’s Das Kapital. It was Neo-Hegelians who brought to the fore the category of the concrete, understood as “diversity fused into unity” (Ivan Ilyin); in this respect, Lenin was in full solidarity with them. In parallel with European Marxists, Ilyenkov criticised the interpretation of dialectics as a universal picture of the world, a new metaphysics cultivated by “diamat” and “istmat”. He did not, however, share the anti-Hegelian sentiments of the schools of G. della Volpe and L. Althusser. For Ilyenkov, Hegel is the greatest revolutionary in logic since Aristotle. At the end of the article are the facts showing that interest in “Soviet Hegel” is still alive today.

Prose of Russian Emigration Writers (V. A. Nikiforov-Volgin, I. A. Bunin, B. K. Zaitsev) in Context of Ivan Ilyin’s Religious-Philosophical Thought

The authors of this article aim to contextualize the religious-philosophical ideas of the prominent philosopher of Russian emigration, Ivan Ilyin, with the prose of Ivan Bunin, Boris Zaitsev, and Vladimir Nikiforov-Volgin. The novelty of the research lies in identifying the typological correlation between Ilyin’s ideas about the essential characteristics of national character, manifested in the pursuit of perfection, and the artistic worldview of Russian writers who interpreted life in Russia during periods of social upheaval. The introduction of the insufficiently studied phenomenon of Vladimir Nikiforov-Volgin’s creative work into the field of prose by well-known authors is also an aspect of the novelty of this work. The analysis confirms that the writers perceptively revealed, through various life circumstances, often critical, the ability of people, regardless of their social status or age, to exhibit traits of Christian mercy and selflessness. Equally significant is the ability of individuals to live with a sense of light from Christian faith, despite external circumstances, and to transmit this feeling to others. Actions based on “virtues of the heart and conscience” — these most valuable principles of life according to Ilyin’s thought — are multifacetedly reflected on the pages of the works presented here.

Patriotism in Modern Russia: a value criterion of the level of legal consciousness

Patriotism can be valuable only when a person makes certain conscious decisions and takes concrete active actions. Thus, patriotism, like other values, can be realized through awareness of its prescriptive power and its acceptance by a person as a principle of activity. The disclosure of the essence of patriotism by Ivan Ilyin makes it possible to formulate such moral principles as respect, love and pride in one’s motherland. In addition, the essence of patriotism forms the primacy of the national legal culture (but not its exclusivity), uniformity of ways and methods of the spiritual life of the people, preservation of the established spiritual and moral way of Russian life (national character), and peculiar acts of national structure and self-determination. Patriotism also presupposes the unity of the national cultural system and the spiritual and cultural achievements of the people, the creative unity of people in the national culture, the brotherhood of peoples and the inviolability of national autonomous life. The authors proceed from the understanding that the operation of these principles is the basis of state legal consciousness and the unity of the internal life of the state union. Therefore, it requires their recognition, legal protection and regulation at the federal level.

Thinking in circles: Kojève and Russian Hegelianism

This paper analyzes Russian-French philosopher Alexandre Kojève’s dialogue with proponents of Hegelianism and phenomenology in Soviet Russia of the 1920–30s. Considering works by Dmytro Chyzhevsky, Ivan Ilyin, Gustav Shpet, and Alexandre Koyré, I retrace Hegelian themes in Kojève, focusing on the relation between method and time. I argue that original reflections on method played a key role in both Russian Hegelianism and Kojève’s work, from his famous Hegel lectures to the late fragments of a system. As I demonstrate, Kojève’s Hegelianism was significantly shaped by his encounter with Ilyin’s 1918 commentary on Hegel, a detailed study of the relation between method and the experience of time. However, in Kojève’s hands, Ilyin’s ideas were transformed, some radicalized, others abandoned. Comparatively reading texts by these thinkers in their respective contexts, I resituate and evaluate claims that Hegel’s method was less dialectical than phenomenological. I finally argue that early Soviet Hegelian discourses not only shaped the trajectory of Kojève’s Hegelianism but also radically anticipated concepts of time in French post-structuralism.

От Канта к Франку: этика долга и проблема сопротивления злу в русской мысли.

One of the key ethical debates in Russian religious thought, initiated by Leo Tolstoy, concerned the question of nonresistance to evil by force. The purpose of this article is to assess the influence of Kant’s ethics and philosophy of religion on the course of this debate and to determine the place and significance of the arguments and considerations expressed on this issue by Semyon Frank in the early and late periods (1908 and 1940s) of his work. To this end I reconstruct the general course of the debate, notably the positions and arguments of Leo Tolstoy, Vladimir Solovyov, Ivan Ilyin and Nikolai Berdyaev. Beginning with Tolstoy, Russ­ian thinkers introduced the original ethical content of the idea of nonresistance derived from the Gospel into the ethics of duty borrowed from Kant. The Tolstoy version of this idea was challenged mainly from two directions: from the Kantian grounding of the legitimacy of coercion and attempts to bring in styles of moral thinking other than the ethic of duty. Ilyin’s apolo­gia for the use of force in the struggle against evil prompted Russian émigré thinkers to take a closer look at Tolstoy’s ethical concept and pay attention to its positive content. On this basis Berdyaev and especially Frank create their version of the Christ-centered ethic of salvation which, in the perspective of “protecting the world against evil” includes the ethic of duty and links it with the possibility of using force, always a wrongful act, but one justified “in a situation of extreme need”.

О толковании художественного произведения

Author of the article focuses her attention to the issue of interpretation of works of art, including musical compositions. In works devoted to issues of aesthetics, philosophy and literary studies this issue is frequently elucidated in an abstract, sublime vein insinuating at the impossibility of total comprehension: a “trick” which “must be impenetrable to complete explanation by words” (Leo Tolstoy), “an unconsciously carried out mystery” or “the soul of the work of art” (Ivan Ilyin), or “the artistic world” possessing “inner unity” defined by the overall of a work of art or of an author, the style of a literary direction or “the style of the epoch” (Dmitri Likhachev). To what degree are these conceptions applicable to a musical composition? The author is convinced that contemporary musical practice as the result of its diversity requires the search for a corresponding method of analysis. Depending on the type of the musical composition, it must be examined through the prism of such aesthetic conceptions as the beautiful (for example, Valery Kikta’s “The Return of St. Cecilia”), “the unity of oppositions” (Pavel Karmanov’s “Favorite Hated City,” Sofia Gubaidulina’s “The Seven Last Words,” etc.). Special approaches must be found for intertextual compositions (such as, for instance, Vladimir Martynov’s Vita nova and Valentin Silvestrov’s “Mozart’s Moments”) and compositions practically not possessing content to which such aesthetical terms as “ironic play” or “artistic deceit” (Georges Aperghis’ Simulacres) may be applied. The well-known music of the past also presumes a search for new methods of analysis. As the central term for studying a musical work of art the author proposes the term “music as a text,” initially suggested, presumably, by Alexander Mikhaylov. The article demonstrates that music is capable to tell about itself by itself. As an example, analysis is made of Franz Liszt’s Ave Maria, the numerous versions of which, having appeared at various stages of the composer’s artistic path, comprise a hyper-cycle, according to the author. In this hyper-cycle becomes an event for the listener, in which it could “read” the change of the musical morphology and syntax.

Rational Faith and Believing Reason. Orthodoxy and the Works by Ivan Ilyin

This article considers Ivan Ilyin’s approach to the philosophy of religion, Orthodoxy and the Church from the viewpoint of his creative biography. The addition of new materials from the notionalist’s archive, such as memoirs and letters concerning religious issues and the use of the patristic tradition in the philosophical concept of the thinker, give this review an element of novelty. The novelty of the study is also strenghtened by the author’s focus on the question of how the philosopher understood the role and significance of Orthodoxy. The main milestones of the philosopher’s biography are considered from the viewpoint of his works revealing the evolution of his thought. This article highlights the reasons for Ilyin’s separation from the representatives of the new religious consciousness. Special attention is paid to the philosopher’s connection with representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia as well as his participation in Christian circles and meetings. The emphasis is also laid on the connection between the social and political views of the notionalist regarding the future of Russia and Orthodoxy and its importance for the building a healthy statehood. The philosopher’s method and the role of the reason in the process of the knowledge of God are revealed on the example of the philosophy of religion. The Orthodox doctrine had asserted a significant influence on the philosopher’s thinking. Although it is widely accepted that Ivan Ilyin had not yet been a believer during the Moscow period of his creative activity, and instead approached the worldview issues exclusively from the standpoint of the pure reason, facts can be demonstrated that suggest the opposite. Inspired by German philosophy, Ivan Ilyin still refused to base his philosophical method on the Hegelian approach to a man and God, and, in his search, turned instead to the legacy of the Apostolic Fathers through reflections on Socrates. According to the notionalist, the way to renew the spiritual culture from the state of deep crisis was to construct a correct religious experience based on humility and integrity of the knowledge.

Russian revolution of 1917 as interpreted by Ivan Ilyin and the eurasianists: two vectors of russian conservative journalism in the 1920s and 1930s

The article provides a comparative analysis of two interpretations of the Russian Revolution presented in the journalistic works of Ivan Ilyin and the Eurasianists. Both Ilyin and the Eurasianists saw the spiritual origins and prerequisites of the revolution in the mindset of the Russian pre-revolutionary society, primarily the Russian intelligentsia. Sharing a common attitude towards the value primacy of national identity, Ilyin and the Eurasianists radically differed in their assessments of the essence and prospects of Russian Bolshevism. This discrepancy is explained by the inconsistency of fundamental historical presumptions. Eurasianists considered the Soviet State a continuation of the centuries-old history of Russia-Eurasia. In turn, Ilyin saw in the Russian Revolution a catastrophic break in historical continuity.

The Solidaristic State as a Guarantor of Social Justice in the Philosophy of I. A. Ilyin

The article closely examines Ivan Ilyin’s views on the phenomenon of social justice in its relation to the state. The inability to establish the principles of social justice through a normative legal act as well as the contradictory nature of understanding justice by some individuals create a scenario in which the state, according to Ivan Ilyin, should result in solidarism based on the principles of natural law. In this regard, the political aspect of society is of particular importance, since the traditional way of conducting political activity is often associated with the implementation of the interests of the selected few or groups of individuals that go against the nationwide will. Among the main conclusions of this study is the idea that Ivan Ilyin highly valued the principles of the form of government, which is focused on the control of the inner processes in society, and the search for a unified national ideology for its implementation in politics. According to Ivan Ilyin, the state should not put itself above the law which it creates. Otherwise, it will not be able to take into account and express the interests of its citizens. That way social justice will forever remain unattainable and the political aspect of society will be a reason for dispute leading to the collapse of statehood itself.

The Spiritual and Religious Concept of Optimism in Philosophy and Pedagogy of Ivan Ilyin

Introduction. The spiritual and religious concept of I. Ilyin’s optimism brings a new vision of the problem of human and his qualities into philosophy and pedagogy and is of scientific interest as a kind of program of spiritual stamina. The purpose of the study is to trace the genesis of the phenomenon of optimism in the spiritual and religious concept of I. Ilyin against the background of the evolution of his philosophical views; determine the spiritual and moral foundations of optimism within the framework of this concept; to determine the methods of formation of spiritually faithful optimism as a personality trait. Results. The spiritual and religious concept of I. Ilyin’s optimism manifests itself in the moral stamina of the individual, in conscious humility with what cannot be changed and in overcoming those difficulties that are within our power; it is the ability to recognize one’s life purpose and faithfully follow it throughout life, overcoming difficulties. It is the difficulties that act as steps to overcome them and on the way to the moral self-improvement of the individual. In the spiritual and religious concept of I. Ilyin, optimism acts in two ways: both as a gift (something innate) and as an art (something acquired) of self-empowerment, which is actualized during the period of overcoming difficulties. The article traces the evolution of I. Ilyin’s philosophical views: from understanding optimism as a moral will (in the traditions of German classical philosophy) to understand optimism as an effective overcoming of suffering and courage in the best traditions of Russian Orthodoxy. The harder and bleaker life is, the more in demand is optimism as the art of spiritual victory over the suffering and hardships of life, which carry a powerful emotional charge of spiritual purification, hardening, strengthening and strengthening. Discussion and Conclusion. For our research, it is especially valuable that optimism as a quality of a person, having both innate and acquired strength, can be brought up: by prayer, by inner (cordial contemplation), by emotional comprehension, by consolation, by distraction with joy. No less valuable is the fact that the methods of his upbringing reveal the spiritual principles of optimism.

Понятие государства в философско-политических концепциях Сергея Гессена и Ивана Ильина («Правовой социализм» vs. «правовой консерватизм»)

The article is devoted to the comparative analysis of the interpretations of the state presented in the works of Sergei Gessen and Ivan Ilyin, two Russian philosophers of the first half of the 20th century. The article demonstrates that the similarity between these interpretations lies primarily in the rejection of legal nihilism and legal positivism. Both philosophers distanced themselves from the mechanistic view of society and the state, which is germane to classical liberalism, and defended the principle of the sovereignty of law in public life. Differences in the understanding of the essence of the state by Gessen and Ilyin are caused by the discrepancy between the initial axiological, worldview, philosophical, and methodological presumptions. Conceptually, Ilyin compares the state to an integral spiritual organism, while for Gessen the state is nothing more than the highest coordinating body in the system of public life. According to Ilyin, the state performs a dual function: it ensures the spiritual unity of the people and protects the spiritual autonomy of an individual. Gessen, for his part, sees the main task of the state in protecting the “impenetrability” of an individual and asserting her supra-legal status. The interpretation of the relationship between the state and law proposed by Ilyin is monistic: “law and order” equal to the “state law and order”. Gessen’s concept of “legal socialism” is pluralistic: the state legal order coexists with non-state (social) legal orders that emerge in various communities, while state power loses its role as the only source of positive legal norms.

Russia: Fascist or Conservative?

When I cracked open Marlene Laruelle’s new book, Is Russia Fascist?, I immediately wondered, who really thinks Russia is fascist? I was aware of Timothy Snyder’s study of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s glorification of the debatably fascist political theorist Ivan Ilyin, but fascist? Really? But Laruelle quickly shows in the introduction that this is not a canard or a straw man. Many reputable scholars and public intellectuals have drawn parallels between the Putin regime, its actions, and European fascism, including Snyder, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Alexander Motyl, Vladimir Inozemtsev, Gary Kasparov, Anna Politkovskaya, Madeline Albright, and Hillary Clinton. The term “fascism” has become part of the Western discussion on the nature of the Putin regime, even more so since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

РОСІЯ “РАННЬОГО ПУТІНАˮ В ПОШУКАХ НОВОЇ НАЦІОНАЛЬНОЇ ІДЕНТИЧНОСТІ: МОДЕРНА ІМПЕРСЬКА ІДЕОЛОГІЯ В ТІНІ “ГУМАНІТАРНОГОˮ “РУСЬКОГО МИРУˮ

At the beginning of the XXI century the leadership of the Kremlin significantly strengthened control over the processes in the Russian state, achieved certain successes in the implementation of integration projects in the post-Soviet space. To increase the geopolitical weight of the Russian Federation and further strengthen its position on the territory of the so-called “near abroadˮ, Kremlin political technologists developed a new imperial ideology. Ivan Ilyin, a critic of the Bolsheviks and a supporter of monarchism and fascism, acted as an ideological guide for the Russian ruling elite. A practical manifestation of the new ideological approaches was the introduction of the “Day of People’s Unityˮ associated with the traditions of tsarist Russia, which essentially replaced the celebration of the so called “Great October Socialist Revolutionˮ. In the same vein, we can consider the launch of the action called “Saint George's ribbonˮ, which is a kind of attempt to combine the legacy of the Romanovs with the pages of the history of the USSR convenient for the Kremlin. Criticizing the federal nature of the Soviet Union, the Kremlin at the same time actively used the victory of the USSR in World War II for its geopolitical purposes. To the greatest extent, this was manifested due to the active popularization of the myth of the “Great Victoryˮ and the hypertrophied celebration of “Victory Dayˮ − the so-called “Pobedobesieˮ. One of the important components of the new state ideology of the Russian Federation was the active use of the “besieged fortressˮ concept. Tough declarations of the leadership of Russia at that time were complemented by decisive steps. The use of radioactive substances on the territory of Great Britain to kill a former employee of the FSB, cyber-attacks on the governmental structure of a NATO and EU member – Estonia, a return to the Soviet practice of aviation combat duty, a missile strike on Georgian territory by a Russian aircraft demonstrated the readiness of official Moscow to raise the stakes in the framework of the struggle for the redistribution of geopolitical “chessboardˮ. The ideological project “Russian Worldˮ became the decoration for Russian imperialism and revanchism. During the second presidential term of Vladimir Putin, it was already possible to trace warming signals that unequivocally demonstrated that behind the “humanitarianˮ envelope of “Russian Worldˮ the aggressive foreign policy goals of the Russian leadership were hidden. The most openly imperial essence of the Putin regime in its early stages is reflected in the framework of the so-called “Russian doctrineˮ. This document included provisions on the messianic role of Russia, criticism of the Bolsheviks for the division of the USSR into republics, the postulate on the historical continuity of the Russian Federation from tsarist times, etc. In the context of outlining the foreign policy goals of the Russian Federation, the doctrine refers to the creation of a multipolar world, the non-recognition of the 1991 Belovezh Accords, and the beginning of the path that should lead to the “reunificationˮ of Russia with Belarus, Ukraine and Kazakhstan is declared.

Абай и русская философия: человек и его ценности

The article attempts a comparative analysis of the concepts of two national philosophies – Kazakh and Russian. The authors turn to the problem of man, try­ing to understand how Kazakh and Russian thinkers conceive human nature, what concepts, in their opinion, are defining for a human being, what place in the characterization of human nature is occupied by universal, values: life and death, good and evil, love and hatred, mercy and compassion, God and man. In this regard, the authors analyze the legacy of the outstanding Kazakh poet, thinker, public educator and public figure Abai Kunanbaev, his philosophical concept of a universal, integral person (“tolyk adam”). The аrticle reveals the worldview of Abai, whose roots go back to the Muslim humanistic tradition, the motive of his search for moral self-determination of a person. Comparing Abai’s worldview with the views of representatives of Russian religious philosophy (Vladimir Solovyov, Ivan Ilyin, Pavel Florensky), the authors come to the con­clusion that with all the differences between these two philosophies, primarily national ones, human nature is treated in a similar way in them. This primarily concerns the understanding of religious faith as a unifying, forming principle for the inner world of a person, the unifying principle around which such universal human values as mercy, compassion, honor, conscience, national dignity, mutual understanding, peace and harmony are gathered. The authors emphasize that these values, like never before, are in demand by the modern world, torn by con­flicts, contradictions, local wars, a world that has forgotten what love is and what is the genuine truth of life.

Проблема естественного права в работах Ивана Ильина и Лео Штрауса

This article provides a comparative analysis of two interpretations and methodological strategies of substantiating the idea of natural law, which belong to Ivan Ilyin and Leo Strauss. The comparative method was used in the research process, while the problem-topic method was applied to the analysis and presentation of the material. The two interpretations of natural law were compared on the basis of the following criteria: 1) interpretation of the principle of historicism and assessment of its prospects for substantiating natural legal thinking; 2) correlation between natural and positive law; 3) interpretation of the essence of philosophy, relationship between the general understanding of the nature of philosophical knowledge and the principles of natural legal thinking; 4) correlation between law and religion. Both Ilyin and Strauss saw in natural law an invariant basis of positive law. Criticism of the principle of historicism (understood as relativism) is a conceptual prerequisite for the reactualization of the idea of natural law in the works of both philosophers. However, Ilyin sees in historicism an annoying prejudice and a product of a “sick” legal consciousness, while Strauss views historicism as the main challenge facing the classical philosophical tradition. The differences in the substantiation of natural law by the two philosophers stem from the differences in their understanding of the nature of philosophical knowledge. For Ilyin, philosophy begins with studying the meaning of axioms, while for Strauss, philosophy as “knowledge of ignorance” begins with a critical formulation and comprehension of fundamental questions. The most significant differences in the philosophical and legal concepts of Ilyin and Strauss are associated with the problem of the relationship between law and religion. According to Strauss, the universal rationaltheoretical substantiation of the idea of natural law cannot refer to religious experience and be based on revelation. According to Ilyin, the reference of the philosophy of law to religious experience is necessary, because normal legal consciousness has an essentially religious nature.

Russian Silver Age Philosophy of War: Main Features

The article discusses the main features of the Russian philosophy of war that developed in the first third of the 20th century. The author shows that in Russia, the philosophy of war did not develop as a separate broad line of research but limited itself to only a few meaningful, but rather brief, experiments. Nevertheless, many Russian philosophers (Fyodor Dostoevsky, Vladimir Soloviev, Evgenii Troubetzkoy, Ivan Ilyin, Nikolai Berdyaev, Lev Karsavin and others) left deep, well-founded reasoning about war, which can be reconstructed as a consistent system of views. One of its features is the shift in the focus of considering armed violence from the sociological and political to the anthropological and ethical; the focus is not on war as a social phenomenon, but on the human’s position in war. In this regard, the attitude to war in Russian philosophy is paradoxical. On the one hand, war brings a lot of evil in the form of death of many people and destruction, but, on the other hand, it promotes to the manifestation of the best moral qualities in people, up to selflessness and heroism. Armed violence seems to be a tragedy of the Christian conscience, and each participant must independently find a justification for his participation in the war. Based on the conditions of a difficult moral choice, personal, existential justification may come from the idea that people cannot commit violence with a clear conscience. In this case, the person choosing to participate in a war perceives the battle as his own guilt that should be expiated.

Отечество в философских построениях И.А. Ильина: литературные проекции

This is the first attempt at analyzing philosophical works about Motherland by Ivan Ilyin (written in the 1920s) as the solid ideological structure, which influenced literature of the Russian emigration of the 1920s as well as Russian émigré selfawareness. The article describes the system of Ilyin’s thought in its dynamics: from his first speeches, delivered in Berlin in 1922, towards the speeches (and articles) of the second half of the 1920s. It highlights certain changes in the definition of the Motherland: in the beginning of his philosophical career, Ilyin understands Motherland as related to the Civil War and the interests of the White Army; later, he moves this concept to religious sphere; by the end of the 1920s he relegates Motherland to the context of world history and Russian culture. Several examples show how Ilyin’s philosophy influenced (or sounds in consonance with), main ideas of the early émigré literature (including novels and political articles by Ivan Bunin, Nina Berberova, Vladimir Nabokov, and Marina Tsvetaeva). That Ivan Ilyin, a former professor of law turned into the greatest ideologist of Russia Abroad is a typical sign of the time and the proof of politicization of Russian philosophy.