Search results

More than sixty years after it has been written yet another novel about Jesus and diabolical temptation in the Russian capital of the twenties appeared in the journal Druzhba narodov. The history of the manuscript that first was burnt by a friend of the author and after its restoration got lost in the era of Stalinism is highly intriguing as is the biography of its author Jakov Golosovker. Due to his preoccupation with the works of Dostoevsky and the German philosophers, especially Kant, Golosovker Alexsander Graf Slavica tergestina 6 (1998) 144 in his novel gave the literary answer to the novel by Dostoevsky that had the highest impact on him: the Brothers Karamazov. In three successive nights in a Moscow clinic for mental illness a patient discusses with his alter ego, an appearence of Jesus himself, the ways of Christianity and the eternal questions of how Good could triumph in the world. The main issue is the question to which extent modern man is in need of Jesus and whether he needs him at all. The illustration of the philosophical discussions are four scenes on the streets of Moscow where in a highly sarcastic and ironic way judgement is pronounced on the state of mind of Soviet citizens and the power of the Idea of socialism. At the same time Golosovker reacts to various political statements of his fellow writers and tries to explain how it come that Jesus finds out that he is not needed anymore in a city widely subdued to a mistaken interpretation of the Christian teachings.