July 17, 2025 at 6:42 PM

A Confession, Tolstoy

@BillBerg

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I ran into this book again on Jordan Peterson’s recommended list. Unlike a lot of Tolstoy, it is short, 119 pages. It covers Tolstoy’s struggle with the primary existential dilemma of human life: Why do I exist, and is this all there is?

Tolstoy led a fairly privileged life, attaining literary fame in his 20s and circulating among the literati of his time. He was born into a Russian Orthodox family, but as with many intelligent, educated young people, he pursued ambition, love of power, covetousness, lasciviousness, pride, anger and revenge...which his social circle agreed with.

He lived the standard worldly life of pride, taking advantage of others, drunkenness, murder…“There was no crime I did not commit.” At 27, he went to St. Petersburg and was flattered by the writers whose philosophy was that “life in general goes on developing, and in this development, we men of thought have the chief part; and among men of thought, artists, poets, writers, etc., have the greatest influence.”

I was considered an admirable artist and poet, and therefore it was very natural for me to adopt this theory. I, artist and poet, wrote and taught without myself knowing what. For this I was paid money, had excellent food, lodging, women, friends and fame, which showed that what I taught was very good.

He grew in fame and wealth, married, had a family, and by all materialist measures ought to have been happy. As the existential questions kept gnawing at him, he came to a state where …

I cannot say I “wished” to kill myself. The power which drew me away from life was stronger, fuller, and more widespread than any mere wish. It was a force similar to the former striving to live, only in a contrary direction.

Eventually, he came to realize:

Rational knowledge presented by the learned and wise, denies the meaning of life, but enormous masses of masses of men receive that meaning in irrational knowledge. And that irrational knowledge is faith, that very thing which I could not but reject. It is the God one in Three; the creation in six days; the devils and angels, and all the rest that I cannot accept as long as I retain my reason.

And then:

It came about that the life of our circle, the rich and learned, those became not merely distasteful to me, but lost all meaning in my eyes.

In current terms, he was “red pilled.” He realized that the deplorables, the bitter clingers, the idiots living in “fly-over country,” had answers to the meaning of life that he did not. So he returned to the Orthodox Church and began to practice faith without attempting to understand it through reason.

It was a struggle, and receiving the Eucharist was painful to him. Apparently he was only able to bring himself to it once. He continued to practice the rituals of the Orthodox, but “true faith” of the sort he had in materialism continued to elude him. He envied the illiterate. He kept studying and conversing with Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists, etc. He wished to be a brother with them, but...“That teaching which promised to unite all in one faith and love - that very teaching in the person of its best representatives, told me that these men were all living a lie…”

And to me, who considered that truth lay in union by love, it became self-evident that theology was itself destroying what it ought to produce

I will leave aside the exercise of reading about the dream that he had about lying on his back over an abyss. A teaser — “The immensity below repels and frightens me; the immensity above attracts and strengthens me.”

My reading A Confession right after “Augsburg and Constantinople” was an accident of my book stack...though sometimes accidents don’t feel accidental.

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Subcomandante America@TheReticulator1y

Bill Berg (View Post):
He envied the illiterate. He kept studying and conversing with Catholics. Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists, etc.. He wished to be a brother with them, but ….

Coincidentally, I learned more about Tolstoy's "etc" just this week.

The "Stundist" Ukrainians who settled around my birthplace home, west of Kief, North Dakota, had been of interest to Tolstoy when they still lived in Ukraine. Later, when they came to America, there came a time when they were desperately hungry, so they wrote to Tolstoy asking for help. He sent them some money, which was greatly appreciated.

This was sometime in the decade before Tolstoy's death in 1910, so well after Confessions was written.

These Ukrainians were not Ukrainian Catholics (aka Greek Catholics) like other North Dakota Ukrainians, but Baptists. They had gotten disillusioned with the Russian Orthodox Church and were receptive to the teachings of Lutheran Pietists and Mennonites who were living in Ukraine, but they ended up as a type of Baptist before coming to America.

Maybe I'll be able to be more precise in my description of how this came about after I finish reading all the books I picked up at the Ukrainian Cultural Institute in Dickinson ND a week ago. I am finding this to be fascinating reading, as I had long wished I knew more about the Ukrainians who settled in the area around Kief.

Both of the ND Ukrainian communities had belonged to religious groups that were formed in reaction to the Russian Orthodox Church, but the Ukrainian Catholic Church is similar to the Orthodox Church in its form of worship and other teachings, and had formed at the time of the protestant reformation. The Stundists formed their religious community in the last half of the 19th century. Catholics and Baptists (especially these Baptists) tend to have different ideas about things like alcohol, tobacco, and the use of religious icons so these two groups of Ukrainians in North Dakota were wary of each other, especially in the early days. But they all thought of themselves as Ukrainians.

Discussion (3)

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Juliana@Juliana1y
I would like to 'like' this post but the like button has gone missing.
Thank you for the summary. I have always liked reading Tolstoy but have not spent enough time with his works.
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Gary McVey@GaryMcVey1y
Of course, never having been Orthodox, as a Catholic I do not believe that I was or am "living a lie". I have noticed, and admire the recent new interest in Orthodoxy among younger people, especially men. Go for it, followers of Tolstoy! Even if I don't agree about the theological details.
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Subcomandante America@TheReticulator1y
Bill Berg (View Post):
He envied the illiterate. He kept studying and conversing with Catholics. Lutherans, Calvinists, Anabaptists, etc.. He wished to be a brother with them, but ….
Coincidentally, I learned more about Tolstoy's "etc" just this week.
The "Stundist" Ukrainians who settled around my birthplace home, west of Kief, North Dakota, had been of interest to Tolstoy when they still lived in Ukraine. Later, when they came to America, there came a time when they were desperately hungry, so they wrote to Tolstoy asking for help. He sent them some money, which was greatly appreciated.
This was sometime in the decade before Tolstoy's death in 1910, so well after Confessions was written.
These Ukrainians were not Ukrainian Catholics (aka Greek Catholics) like other North Dakota Ukrainians, but Baptists. They had gotten disillusioned with the Russian Orthodox Church and were receptive to the teachings of Lutheran Pietists and Mennonites who were living in Ukraine, but they ended up as a type of Baptist before coming to America.
Maybe I'll be able to be more precise in my description of how this came about after I finish reading all the books I picked up at the Ukrainian Cultural Institute in Dickinson ND a week ago. I am finding this to be fascinating reading, as I had long wished I knew more about the Ukrainians who settled in the area around Kief.
Both of the ND Ukrainian communities had belonged to religious groups that were formed in reaction to the Russian Orthodox Church, but the Ukrainian Catholic Church is similar to the Orthodox Church in its form of worship and other teachings, and had formed at the time of the protestant reformation. The Stundists formed their religious community in the last half of the 19th century. Catholics and Baptists (especially these Baptists) tend to have different ideas about things like alcohol, tobacco, and the use of religious icons so these two groups of Ukrainians in North Dakota were wary of each other, especially in the early days. But they all thought of themselves as Ukrainians.