Antipodes of Russian religious philosophy: Shestov and Solovyov
In: Solovʹëvskie issledovanija, Heft 1, S. 79-90
This article explores the contradictory relationship Lev Shestov had with Vladimir Solovyov's thinking, basing mostly on the main writing that he dedicated to him, i.e. the article «Speculation and Apocalypse. The Religious Philosophy of Vl. Solovyov» of 1927. However harshly critical Shestov's reading of Solovyov may have been, and considering also the objective difference between two philosophers who can hardly be compared, there is still a margin for a positive dialogue between their respective works. This is done in the larger frame of N. Berdyaev's concept of «Russian idea», where their thoughts can be brought closer together in a way that Shestov himself had actually anticipated at the end of his essay on Solovyov. In this respect, as is suggested by an interpretation of the two authors offered by N. Berdyaev and A. Losev, the ultimate meaning of both Solovyov's and Shestov's ideas would converge in an eschatological view of the truth of this world as well as in a fundamental mistrust of the Western epistemological worldview.