Bøger af Vladimir Solovyov

"Is evil only a natural defect, an imperfection disappearing by itself with the growth of good, or is it a real power, ruling our world by means of temptations, so that, to fight it successfully, assistance must be found in another sphere of being? This vital question can be fully examined and solved only in a complete system of metaphysics." -- Vladimir Solovyov (preface)In this prophetic, millennial work, written by Russia's greatest philosopher at the end of the last century, the great task facing humanity as progress races to end history is the resistance to evil. Solovyov addresses what seem to him the three main trends of our time: economic materialism, Tolstoyan abstract moralism, and Nietzschean hubris--the first is already present, the second imminent, while the last is the apocalyptic precursor of the Antichrist."In War, Progress, and the End of History: Three Conversations, Solovyov remained faithful to his belief in the final triumph of true Christianity, but he made a detour through the vast deserts of time under the control of the Prince of This World. Made cautious by historical tragedy, which has caught in its grip innumerable inhabitants of our planet, we should read Solovyov's testament today as a letter addressed to us, one still of actuality." -- Czeslaw Milosz (introduction)

"The meaning and worth of love as a feeling is that it really forces us, with all our being, to acknowledge for another the same absolute significance that, because of the power of egoism, we are conscious of only in our own selves. Love is important, not only as one of our feelings but as the transfer of all our interest in life from ourselves to another, as the shifting of the very center of our lives...."The meaning of human love, speaking generally, is the justification and salvation of individuality through the sacrifice of egoism. On this general basis we can also ... explain the meaning of sexual love" (Vladimir Solovyov) What is the meaning of love's intense emotion? Solovyov points to the spark of divinity that we see in another human being and shows how this "living ideal of Divine love, antecedent to our love, contains in itself the secret of the idealization of our love."According to Solovyov, love between men and women has a key role to play in the mystical transfiguration of the world. Love, which allows one person to find unconditional completion in another, becomes an evolutionary strategy for overcoming cosmic disintegration.

Vladimir Solovyov (1853-1900) was one of the most remarkable figures of the 19th century. He was the most important Russian speculative thinker of that century, publishing major works on theoretical philosophy, the philosophy of religion, and ethics. He also produced sensitive literary criticism and incisive essays on current political, social, and ecclesiastical questions. He published one important work after another in his twenties, including The Crisis of Western Philosophy: Against the Positivists (1874), The Philosophical Principles of Integral Knowledge (1877), and Lectures on Divine Humanity (1877-1881). By the early 1880s Solovyov had turned to a new project: the reunification of the churches. During his last decade he wrote a highly original book on love, The Meaning of Love (1897), and a treatise on ethics and social philosophy, The Justification of the Good (1892-1894). In the last years of his life, obsessed by a gathering sense of the palpable power of evil in the world, he wrote his final work, Three Conversations Concerning War, Progress, and the End of History, Including a Short Tale of the Antichrist (1900). Solovyov is also regarded as the founder of the Sophiological current in modern Russian philosophy. His Sophiology was further developed by, among others, the philosophers Pavel Florensky (1882-1937), and Sergius Bulgakov (1871-1944). His visions of Sophia were also a source of inspiration for Russian symbolist poets such as Alexander Blok (1880-1921) and Andrei Belyi (1880-1934).The present volume represents the first published overview of Solovyov's writings, and has the unique advantage of having been selected and introduced by S. L. Frank (1877-1950), himself regarded as one of the greatest Russian philosophers of the last century. Solovyov's writings have become better known in recent years, but this first presentation by one of his own gifted countrymen still stands as the best available introduction to Solovyov's uniquely wide range of insight.

This volume contains several late works of Vladimir Solovyov, representing his final speculations about matters crucial to the destiny of humanity and of the world. As Solovyov's life was coming to an end at the close of the 19th century, his thoughts were turned toward three things: the end of the world (the Antichrist), the beauty and wisdom of the world (Sophia), and the nature of God. A completely new translation of the famous "Short Tale About the Antichrist" is presented here, along with revised versions of "At the Dawn of Mist-Shrouded Youth," "Three Meetings," and "The Concept of God." "An indispensable survey of Solovyov's 'late' and most visionary works. Boris Jakim is our most distinguished translator of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Russian religious thought, and this volume is further evidence of the fact."--DAVID BENTLEY HART, author of The Experience of God and Atheist Delusions "A Short Tale About the Antichrist is Vladimir Solovyov's last philosophical work, and to my mind his best. Its combination of profundity and wit is matchless, and its vision of the 21st century begins to have a haunting sense of prophetic truth. With this excellent new translation, combined with revised versions of other late works by Solovyov, Boris Jakim adds new dimensions to the English reader's understanding of one of the major Russian thinkers."--RICHARD PEVEAR, translator of War and Peace and The Brothers Karamazov "This volume brings together some of the last and most significant writings of the nineteenth-century Russian writer who is widely regarded as the greatest of Russian philosophers and religious thinkers--Vladimir Solovyov. The works selected by Boris Jakim for this volume are perfectly chosen to demonstrate both the breadth and the principal concerns of Solovyov's mature thought, reflecting as they do not only his literary genius in poetry, prose fiction, and philosophical essays, but also his life-forming mystical experiences and his fascination with 'Sophia, ' or the feminine principle, in everything from his own biography to the structure of reality. Readers will welcome the scrupulous accuracy of Jakim's translations and their stylistic fidelity to the original Russian."--JAMES P. SCANLAN, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, Ohio State University

Vladimir Solovyov (1853-1900) was one of the most remarkable figures of the 19th century. He was the most important Russian speculative thinker of that century, publishing major works on theoretical philosophy, the philosophy of religion, and ethics. He also produced sensitive literary criticism and incisive essays on current political, social, and ecclesiastical questions. He published one important work after another in his twenties, including The Crisis of Western Philosophy: Against the Positivists (1874), The Philosophical Principles of Integral Knowledge (1877), and Lectures on Divine Humanity (1877-1881). By the early 1880s Solovyov had turned to a new project: the reunification of the churches. During his last decade he wrote a highly original book on love, The Meaning of Love (1897), and a treatise on ethics and social philosophy, The Justification of the Good (1892-1894). In the last years of his life, obsessed by a gathering sense of the palpable power of evil in the world, he wrote his final work, Three Conversations Concerning War, Progress, and the End of History, Including a Short Tale of the Antichrist (1900). Solovyov is also regarded as the founder of the Sophiological current in modern Russian philosophy. His Sophiology was further developed by, among others, the philosophers Pavel Florensky (1882-1937), and Sergius Bulgakov (1871-1944). His visions of Sophia were also a source of inspiration for Russian symbolist poets such as Alexander Blok (1880-1921) and Andrei Belyi (1880-1934).The present volume represents the first published overview of Solovyov's writings, and has the unique advantage of having been selected and introduced by S. L. Frank (1877-1950), himself regarded as one of the greatest Russian philosophers of the last century. Solovyov's writings have become better known in recent years, but this first presentation by one of his own gifted countrymen still stands as the best available introduction to Solovyov's uniquely wide range of insight.

Vladimir Solovyov, one of nineteenth-century Russia's greatest Christian philosophers, was renowned as the leading defender of Jewish civil rights in tsarist Russia in the 1880s. The Burning Bush: Writings on Jews and Judaism presents an annotated translation of Solovyov's complete oeuvre on the Jewish question, elucidating his terminology and identifying his references to persons, places, and texts, especially from biblical and rabbinic writings. Many texts are provided in English translation by Gregory Yuri Glazov for the first time, including Solovyov's obituary for Joseph Rabinovitch, a pioneer of modern Messianic Judaism, and his letter in the London Times of 1890 advocating for greater Jewish civil rights in Russia, printed alongside a similar petition by Cardinal Manning. Glazov's introduction presents a summary of Solovyov's life, explains how the texts in this collection were chosen, and provides a survey of Russian Jewish history to help the reader understand the context and evaluate the significance of Solovyov's work. In his extensive commentary in Part II, which draws on key memoirs from family and friends, Glazov paints a rich portrait of Solovyov's encounters with Jews and Judaism and of the religious-philosophical ideas that he both brought to and derived from those encounters. The Burning Bush explains why Jews posthumously accorded Solovyov the accolade of a "e;righteous gentile,"e; and why his ecumenical hopes and struggles to reconcile Judaism and Christianity and persuade secular authorities to respect conscience and religious freedom still bear prophetic vitality.