Background
Solov’ev, Vladimir Sergeevich was born on January 16, 1853 in Moscow.
mystic Religious philosopher poet
Solov’ev, Vladimir Sergeevich was born on January 16, 1853 in Moscow.
University of Moscow and Moscow Theological Academy.
Taught at the Universities of Moscow and St Petersburg. Ceased in 1882 following his public call for the pardon of the assassins of Alexander II.
Son of an eminent historian of Russia, Solov'ev was not only a philosopher and mystic, but also a noted poet and controversial writer on ecclesiastical politics who in the 1880s advocated the reunion of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches under the Pope and the Tsar. An eccentric and ascetic personality, Solov'ev experienced visions, most notably of a woman he took to be Sophia, the personification of divine wisdom. Sophia, sometimes defined as the ‘eternal feminine’, inspired his best-known poetry, and is one of the most influential concepts in his religious philosophy; it is, however, one of the most ambiguous, and some commentators accord it secondary importance in Solov’ev’s metaphysics. Despite the fantastic and mystical elements in his writings, Solov’ev should be remembered as the first systematic Russian philosopher. Although his work demands careful periodization, it can be characterized overall as an attempt to synthesize science, German idealism and Christianity by reference to the ultimate metaphysical category of total-unity. His debt to Hegel and Schelling is evident in his choice of concepts and his taste for triads; and also in his vision of a fallen world of particularity seeking to regain its original unity. He was nevertheless critical of the one-sidedness of Western empiricism and rationalism, and saw Hegelian objective idealism as displaying the limitations of the latter. Solov’ev’s goal was ‘integral knowledge’; reason and experience were necessary but not sufficient, and knowledge of the absolute was only possible through 'mystical intuition’. In typically Russian fashion, Solov'ev sought a moral and social significance from his synthetic philosophy; nothing less than the progressive transfiguration of the world through love, and the spiritual regeneration of humanity, captured in the notion of Godmanhood. He rejected the radicalism of the intelligentsia, and regarded socialism as taking to extremes the one-sided vew of humanity inherent in capitalism. But he was no reactionary, and shocked religious conservatives in the 1890s by giving credit to the intelligentsia for their concern with human brotherhood, a concern improperly neglected by the Church.