Tolstoy's religion Collier 1911 Flashcards
when these questions of the value of life first beset his feet,
that there was nothing left to stand on
no mortal matter can satisfy the demands of
the immortal spirit. it has no peace until it turns to the business of infinity
it had come to Tolstoy that all those things which hedge a man round, which separate him from other men
mean spiritual bloodshed
whatsoever things bind a man to other men and to other form s of life are
enlargement and healing, are the upbuilding of the immortal spirit
because of his powerful endowment of genius and fortunate circumstances, it is impossible
to account for his sufferings by external conditions
with every possible reason for happiness, Tolstoi felt the
unreason and misery of mortal life
he found a solution to the problem and that without any appeal to
the supernatural or any demand upon an unfounded faith
he was a forerunner of the
new religion of the spirit
[religion of the spirit] this is a religion which is begetting a new consciousness in us a consciousness which
will allow no man to feel his neighbours burden ir suffering more lightly than his own
we have in the last half-century abolished the doctrine of eternal damnation,
a theory which was received by our grandmothers and grandfathers
he found amongst the peasants a certain simple untroubled acceptance of life and its ills, (…)
which seemed to him a practical religion, disease and death which seemed to him a practical religion and he began by accepting their tenets
Tolstoy came to feel that church dogma, far from coinciding with the teachings of christ
was designed to divert men’s minds from the very things Christ taught and lived for
though such doctrines as withstand the simplest common sense, such as a belief in a triune God, and so fourth, meant something genuine, undoubtedly to the original formulators,
he rightfully discarded them as aids to conduct in the present day
Jesus’s five commandments -in original form
Thou shalt not kill
thou shalt not commit adultery
thou shalt not forswear thyself
resist not him that is evil
love your enemies
[Jesus’ commandments] the commandments are simple, and yet to practice them would be a
complete reversal of civilisation
this goes to show that what christ taught was a
complete reversal of the natural order
once accepting christ determined to adjust his life as far as he could
to his teachings
left the Church, on the double grounds that it
made not attempt to practice what it preached
Tolstoy once more took up the task of finding adequate reason for the
faith that was in him
he refused to make assertions of God, His nature
the creation or schemes of salvation and redemption
we each have a conscience which came to us from somewhere
we did not invite it ourselves
dormant or active there is in each one of us
a higher nature, a spiritual divine prompting
to the church people he was an
atheist and a heretic
Jesus identified Himself utterly with this
higher nature
he denounced all metaphysical dogma, all
belief in the miraculous and the unreasonable, as being whether true or not futile and confusing
his consciousness of himself as part and parcel of the infinite so grew upon him that toward the end he could not conceive of consciousness as
ending with the body
transferred all the powers and interests of his personality from his own service to
the service of god- that is, to matters of universal interest
even in his last years he refused to admit that he really believed in what is known as a personal
God and reiterated that man is virtuous and happy, in so far as he unites himself to the whole
Tolstoys door to the mysteries was simply a
life of self-forgetful labor in the love of and the service of humanity
men, he reiterated live not by seeking their advantage but by
Kindliness and love
Tolstoys effort to make his life conform to his theory was
thoroughgoing and sincere
of his daughters, the eldest, tanya, accepted his doctrines more or less; the second Mary and the youngest Alexandra accepted them entirely
and all three were absolutely devoted to their father
he insisted equally upon a life of physical labor and refused to believe that any one had a right to give his entire time to mental or spiritual matters
to the exclusion of manual industry
[Jesus] but if the story of martha and Mary is reliable we have His own word that
the meditative life is higher than the busy care for things
Tolstoy has completely understood that true living is
compatible only with the acknowledgement of oneness with all life
