Catherine Evtuhov

Vladimir Soloviev’s thought is so rich and protean almost to defy description; this chapter examines specifically the religious-philosophical dimensions of his work. While Soloviev’s fundamental idea postulating a universal Christianity remained constant throughout his life, it is possible to delineate three phases of engagement with this idea. These were, first, his evolution from a classic nineteenth-century struggle of faith and reason to a statement of the universality of Christ as Godman (until 1882); second, an engagement with Christian politics and the Universal Church (1882–1894); and finally, the formulation of a moral philosophy, part of whose pathos was a vehement opposition to Nietzsche (1894–1900). Soloviev’s unwavering commitment to Christianity’s most basic belief in Christ, combined with deep immersion in German philosophy, enabled him to articulate a universal Christianity that was distinctly modern.

made the book’s argument more powerful. For example, since the Ottoman Empire took captives from many European countries, study of captivity narratives provides an opportunity to evaluate what distinguished Russian understandings of captivity from that of other countries. Taki includes Linda Colley’s influential Captives: Britain, Empire, and the World 1600–1850 (2002) in his bibliography (although with her name misspelled) but does not engage it in his text. Taki is right to suggest in his conclusion that “Orientalist discourse does not necessarily present the Other as immutable, stagnant, or ahistorical” (211). Taki’s careful work through much rich material illuminates well Russia’s changing understanding of itself and the Ottoman Empire.

... few years until the theory of relativity completely overturned notions of real space and time ... Vvedensky's concern, in a time of immense productivity of and interest in natural science, was ... the Kant of modernist writers and thinkers like Andrei Bely and Pavel Florensky; one wonders ...

A couple of years ago, I received an invitation from Sergei Liubichankovskii to participate in an online forum on local government and administration in the postreform Russian Empire, focusing on what organizers defined as the "Volga-Ural region." I was struck by the originality of the format and the importance of the issues at hand and thought I could be most useful by helping to bring that discussion to the attention of Kritika readers. How are issues of provincial life and local governance inscribed in larger narratives of Russian history? The two cycles of this online discussion reflect the encounter of two distinct traditions in history writing. The first, more intimate conversation focusing on the Volga-Ural region in particular builds on the practice of local studies or kraevedenie--an idiographic approach to the investigation of a particular region. The second cycle, by generalizing the questions addressed, as well as nationalizing and internationalizing the list of participants, seeks to inscribe the discussion in "grand narratives" of nation and empire. How was Russia governed? The multiplicity of answers--and significant lack of consensus among the discussants--reveals a remarkably dim overall understanding of this fundamental (and oft-posed) question. (1) Was the empire a highly centralized autocracy with a sprawling and inefficient bureaucracy peopled by lazy officials drowning in a sea of paperwork? Were the provinces left to their own devices, managing their local affairs as best they could in the absence of central directives? How did decisive measures, most notably the reforms of the 1860s, reach fruition on the ground--or did they? How much autonomy did local officials have, and were there differences depending on distance from the center and presence or absence of local institutions? What were the differences between the "metropole" of zemstvo European Russia and the "colonial" borderlands and peripheries? The nature of respondents' answers clearly depends first of all on the particular area that interests them: I see a fairly clear subdivision into the central European provinces, the "liminal" Volga-Ural region, and finally the imperial borderlands. Central Russia The central Russian provinces were in fact the focal point of the reforms of the 1860s; understanding the mechanisms at work in this core area is arguably the first step in evaluating governance in the larger empire. Represented here by Orel, Kaluga, Iaroslavl', Saratov, Nizhnii Novgorod, and Belgorod, the central provinces were distinguished by a relatively complex architecture of local government institutions with potentially overlapping jurisdictions. The governor--whose office was centrally appointed--stood at the apex. After 1864, each district (uezd) elected a district zemstvo whose business was discharged for most of the year by a zemstvo board; these institutions culminated in a similarly structured provincial zemstvo for the province as a whole. Parallel to the provincial system, municipal dumas were elected in the cities, while peasant townships (volosti) had their own councils of elders. The judicial reform, in the meantime, established courts at the district and provincial level, while consolidating a separate township system for the peasant estate; ecclesiastical courts functioned alongside secular institutions, attending to crucial matters of family life. Elena Morozova makes the important point that the 1864 legislation itself was very vague on the precise mechanisms and interrelations of the various institutions and most certainly did not introduce a concept of "self-government" at the local level. How then did this structure actually work in practice? Alexander Herzen made the inimitable observation that "the power of the governor increases directly in proportion to distance from Petersburg, but geometrically in such places where there is no nobility, such as Perm', Viatka, and Siberia. …

The literature on Vladimir Solov év has experienced a quiet explosion over the past 20 years, beginning with the “revival of forgotten names” (vozvrashchenie zabytykh imen) of the perestroika years and continuing with a plethora of new publications and studies. Among the most noteworthy have been, in the early years, A. F. Losev and A. V. Gulyga’s green two-volume late Soviet edition of selected writings (1988), followed by the wonderful Moscow re-edition of S. M. Luk ́ianov’s biography, complete with a third volume reconstructed from the author’s notes. Manon de Courten wrote a significant study of Solov év’s social philosophy and view of history, and a substantial edited volume, Solov́ ev as Reconciler and Polemicist, included a variety of articles reevaluating Solov év and proposing a “deconstruction and normalization” of Solov év’s thought. The Solov év Society based at Nijmegen—the soil that partially nourished the above two books—has provided a fertile milieu for discussion of Solov év; in addition, at least four major studies have been published in Poland and a Solov év Society founded in Granada, Spain. Many of these writers and researchers have doubtless been

... I would have to write another book to detail the ways in which I am grateful to Maria Amelina, Alain Blum, Alon Confino, Boris Gasparov, Bob Geraci, David Goldfrank, Andrzej Kaminski, Francisco LaRubia-Prado, John McNeill, David Moon, Susan Morrissey, Aviel Roshwald ...

... Philosophy of Economy The World as Household Sergei Bulgakov Translated, Edited, and with an Introduction by Catherine Evtuhov Yale University Press New Haven and London ... Bulgakov's sophi-ology was condemned as heresy in  by the Moscow patri-archate. ...

One of the most important events of the summer of 1917 was the opening of the All–Russian Council of the Orthodox church on 15 August in Moscow. In a dramatic opening ceremony, solemn processions from all the churches of Moscow converged on Red Square for the service led by Metropolitan Tikhon. The council had been convened by a 5 July order of the Holy Synod and its chief procurator, V. N. L'vov, with the concurrence of the Provisional Government. The calling of a church council–the first since Peter's establishment of the collegial system of administration–was a substantive change in church governance and also had a symbolic meaning. In pre-Petrine Russia, the councils not merely had played an ecclesiastical role but had formed an integral part of national government. (For example, Ivan IV and the church council had worked together to implement changes in the secular code of law as well as in spiritual and ecclesiastical matters.)