Dostoyevsky's+Theology

=__Dostoevsky History __= Dostoevsky grew up in the Russian Orthodox Church. He grew up into a "pious Russian family". At a young age Dostoevsky started to learn Scripture lesson and prayed daily before the "icon of the Virgin Mary". "It is possible that Dostoevsky began to believe in Christ during his early childhood experience."

"His life-sparing traumatic experience before the firing squad left him feeling that he had been given new life", he stated that he was "reborn in a new form...reborn for the better".

After being released from Siberian prison, "he became a compulsive gambler and lost so much money [that] he was all but bankrupt". Photo below: This is a picture of a Russian Orthodox Cross.



=__His View of God__= Dostoevsky’s view on God is fairly [|orthodox]. He believes in the existence of God and Christ. In his books there are several characters that have atheist views. Ultimately these characters commit suicide. By doing that “Dostoevsky is saying that because these characters have forsaken Life-the One who is life-they see no meaning in this life and so end their earthly lives. Dostoevsky was also tormented by the idea of death. He wrote to his wife saying "God gave you to me so that...i might expiate my own great sins." Mainly referring to the ability to become pure again. How his wife has given him a chance to redeem himself worthy of the forgivness of sins. =__His View of Christ__= = = Dostoevsky realized that Christ did exist and was, “the One without sin."his is shown through the character Ivan Karamozov in The Brothers Karamozov. In the book Ivan states that, "Christ... was God." Although the characters in his books do not necessarly have the same beliefs as Dostoevsky they provide a great insight into his thoughts. It is recorded that Dostoevsdy said, "That if it came to a showdown between rejecting Christ and the truth, he would side with Christ over against the truth." This is basically a strange way of saying that he believes that Christ is truth. In the Bible this thought can be found in John 14:6, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life. no one comes to the Father except through me." In //The Insulted and Injured// the idea of spiritually healing power of suffering and the conflicting idea of “Heaven on earth.” //The Brothers Karamazov// a man who murdered and got away says, “I want to suffer for my sins.” Also Alyosha owns to Dmitri (after convicted wrongly with murder), "you wanted to make yourself [a new man] by suffering". Dostoevsky seemed to believe that you had to suffer for your sins, that you couldn't just be forgivin. Through his characters he seemed to incorporate suffering with spiritual regenerative power. To Dostoevsky, he saw Roman Catholicism's temporal power as the principle threat to truth and viewed it as acceding to atheistic socialism. Which basically means that soom Catholics often blinding believe and have faith. This often conflicts with the "truth" and those who do not blindly believe result in converting to atheisitc socialism. =__His View of Sin__= Dostoevsky thought of sin as, "unborn and instinctive." On the topic of sin Dostoevsky said that, "When man has not fulfilled the law of striving toward an ideal, that is, has not through love sacrificed his ego to people...he suffers and calls this condition sin." After spending time in the Siberian prison-camp and in close proximity to criminals it had, “Disabused Dostoevsky of his earlier utopianism and faith in the essential goodness of man.” Simply put, he was forced to rethink his beliefs about the power of man to do good. There are four ways that Dostoevsky depicts sin: spite, stepping over, smog, and splitness.

**__ Conclusion __** In [|Dostoevsky]'s novels there is a "stress upon a salvation by suffering that this theme raises real question about an authentic Christianity in the famous author himself.. He believed that he had a "religious mission". Dostoevsky “at the climax of his novels Christianity comes through more as a flickering light at the end of a dark tunnel”.

Dostoevsky presents Christ, of God, and sin are aligned with “theological thought of Christian orthodoxy”. He seems to except the life of purgatory.