Abstract

This book presents a critical analysis of one of the currents of Russian religious philosophy in the early twentieth century. The timeliness of this study is beyond question. Over the past ten to fifteen years the contemporary Orthodox church has been using the heritage of Russian religious philosophy in its search for a deeper foundation for its religious teachings. As the one-thousandth anniversary of the Christianization of Rus' approaches, contemporary theologians are stepping up their religious propaganda; hence, the elucidation of the reactionary social essence and theoretical untenability of Orthodox ideology is an important task for atheistic counterpropaganda. Studies of religious idealistic tendencies in Russia have made considerable progress recently in Soviet historical and philosophical literature, although not all the problems have yet been solved. In this respect, N. S. Semenkin's book has made an important contribution to one of the least studied areas of the history of Russian philosophy.