The Third Gospel of N. Berdyaev

Abstract

Existential thinking of N. Berdyaev is most clearly revealed in his interpretation of freedom and creativity. At the time when nothing was created, freedom to act was boundless. It revealed creative abilities and possibilities of man. These settings determine way of viewing history by the philosopher. Religious purpose coincides for him with the purpose of human existence understood in a completely new way. The introduction to all the problems of his philosophy was the “The Meaning of History”. History for Berdyaev is a movement of humanity which will come to its end; if there is no ending, there is no history. The question about the meaning of history is the question of the origin of evil in the world, of the pre-earthbound fall and of the temptation. The concept of “historical” is included in the consciousness of man, it affected all-encompassing feelings of not the immediate period, but of the entire stretch of history. The author of the article is convinced that the very idea that the life of human generations is the movement, entered, according N. Berdyaev, together with the Jewish religion; in religious views, it was connected with the hope of Messiah. He believed that the main theme is the destiny of man, which is the interaction of the human spirit and nature.

The history takes a number of steps, and on each of them a person has their own goal, their tasks, their desires. Berdyaev denies two former rather common historical concepts, though one of which he had admired before. It was Marx’s philosophy of history; now, Berdyaev argues that economic materialism takes as a basis only the external factors, not considering the life of the spirit. According to the author of the article, the accusation is not quite fair: Marx, as we know now, wrote about the life of spirit and creative impulses of the individual; however their study was carried out in the works that were not known in those years, namely in “Philosophical-economic manuscripts” of 1844 and 1857 years.

Another point of view that caused the criticism of Berdyaev is a theory of progress, associated with Marxism. It is not only that progress is contradictory, and that alongside the positive features it contains negative ones. From this point of view every previous generation is sacrificed for the next. Earlier one is taken only as a kind of stage that prepares higher level and has no independent meaning. According to Berdyaev, each stage, each era has its own meaning – and in this he was certainly right.

To understand the meaning of history, N. Berdyaev divides it into several periods, based on religious interpretations and linking the movement of human history with the divine. This raises many problems, some are common with canonical theology, and others are typical only for him. Berdyaev not always solved these problems, but their very definition and even the approach to them, testify to the originality of his thoughts.

He introduces dynamics in divine history, to explain the appearance of man and of Christ; because they were not in the beginning of the Divine life; Jesus comes to redeem human sins and spread love in the human world, and the man because he is a perfect Divine creation. Creativity is the deepest mystery of man, Berdyaev defines; he creates, as the Lord God does out of nothing. God created the Earth and everything from nothing; man creates unprecedented out of nothing, by his acts he increases existence, multiplies it. Repentance and cleansing are just one of the moments of human life; not only they are man’s fate. Berdyaev is convinced that they are only the negative side of life; the old Testament Christianity is not the complete and final truth. The second Evangelical Covenant also relates to the atonement of sin through divine love and grace. But is the final goal of life and existence in general exhaust by the mystery of the redemption, can the salvation from sin be considered the final task? – No, the author is convinced that the ultimate goals of existence are in a positive creative task. Human nature, like the Creator nature could not be created by God only to transgress, to atone his sin, and to put all their forces in the work of redemption throughout world history. This understanding, he believes, would diminish human dignity and does not correspond to the idea of the Creator.

In this context N. Berdyaev examines the phenomenon of creativity. He treats it as a path of spiritual liberation from the world, as the liberation of the human spirit from the bondage of need, as a great achievement of mankind. This is the path of spiritual authenticity and concentration. Captivity of the spirit by the world is a product of our sin. But we need to get rid of accusations that man is a sinful creature, a fallen creature, so he cannot join the path of the creative life. Rid by the atonement and repentance, one is rid from sin for a creative way. Because it is a great lie and a terrible mistake, hence grows indifference to the good, the rejection of courageous resistance to evil.

The creative act there is always liberation and overcoming. The horror, the pain, the weakness must be overcome with creativity, which is the outcome, victory. Human nature through the Absolute Man – Christ has become the nature of the New Adam and has united with the Divine. The infinite immanent help the person will find in himself, if he dares to reveal in him by the creative act all the forces of God and the world, the free world in contrast with the world of the ghosts.

Creativity in Berdyaev clearly associated with a person’s freedom. In the context of the expressed justification for the creation and redemption there is also the idea, which lead to fundamental questions – the idea of pre-eternity and pre-earth of the fall; the idea is completely non-canonical and controversial.

According to the author, the principle of creativity distinguishes N. Berdyaev from other thinkers of the Silver Age. Indeed, the world in which man lives, is the second nature, is the world created by the creative actions of people – here Marx cannot be refuted. N. Berdyaev came close to this idea, and his contribution is the discovering of the relationship of creativity with freedom, with the augmentation of the world and highlighted the role of the individual, which is of great importance in our days.