While reading Tolstoy’s The Kreutzer Sonata, I was struck by the looming nature of religion. In the beginning of the novella, the old man characterizes marriage as an institution ordained by God. As an holy ordained institution, marriage therefore cannot be subjected to the debauchery that Tolstoy’s novella explores. However, while reading the novella, religion seemed to be a looming subject. I could not grasp the connection between individual purity, debauchery and marriage. As a result, I decided to investigate Tolstoy’s religious beliefs.
Understanding someone’s religious beliefs is difficult. It is not like a church that lists their beliefs in books of tenets and doctrine. However, Tolstoy was kind enough to write his down in his books: What I Believe and Confession. In Confession, Tolstoy recounted how he grew up in the Russian Orthodox Church, but as his child, his faith was false and wavering. Tolstoy fell out of faith early in his life. However, his lack of faith did not lead him to denial of belief; instead, Tolstoy “did not deny God”. Since Tolstoy teetered between agnosticism and atheism, it is reasonable to suggest that God’s existence remained a question that pressed against Tolstoy’s mind during his period of unbelief.
Tolstoy’s period of unbelief is not important in the sense of what he did during it. Instead, it is important because of how he reflected on it. Much like Pozdnyshev describes in The Kreutzer Sonata, Tolstoy recounted his early life as one filled with debauchery and more: “I cannot recall these years without horror, disgust and sickness of heart. I killed men in war, I challenged them in order to kill them; I squandered money at cards, I ate up the toils of peasants; I punished them; I fornicated, I deceived.” Each element of his self-disgust – the violence, the fornication, the gambling and opportunism – would be refuted by his faith later in life.
As a man swept in Russian culture and the icon of 19th century Russian literature, Tolstoy was clearly a man who actively thought about himself and the world around him. This introspection was one of the factors that led him into spiritual renewal. Another factor were the questions that he posed himself: “Why should I live, why should I desire anything, why should I do anything”. In his search for answers to his existential question, Tolstoy found solace in Schopenhauer, a contemporary German philosopher, Socrates, Solomon and the teachings of Buddha and Jesus.
In each of these thinkers and religious figures, Tolstoy found the same answer to his question: life on earth is futile, death is better than life, the problem of existence is to find an escape from existence. These answers are rather disappointing and suggest suicidal ends. However, Tolstoy examined how people escape their torturous existence. In his examination, he concluded four ways. First, ignorance, because if one does not “understand that life is evil and meaningless” they will not worry about it. Second, Epicureanism, or the indulgence in fleeting pleasures – as Tolstoy had earlier in life. Third, suicide. Fourth, resisting suicide and living despite understanding life’s futility.
After discovering the ways humans cope with life, Tolstoy began to to search for the answer to his next question: what is the meaning outside of the world? To find his answer, Tolstoy distanced himself from rich people and lived with peasants. The reason for this change is because he believed that the faith of rich people was Epicurean while the peasants’ faith, although more superstitious, was more intimately entangled to their daily lives. Tolstoy found his answer in the peasants. Unlike the rich, who only acted to pamper their appetites, Tolstoy believed the peasants made life significant in their constant toil. Peasants did not only seek to indulge their senses like the Epicurean rich – they created life to survive.
Tolstoy’s fondness for peasants’ lifestyle can be viewed as the result of the lessons of Buddha and Jesus that he had been reading. After all, Tolstoy realized that Buddha was born a prince and chose to live in poverty to obtain spiritual fulfillment. Similarly to Jesus, Jesus taught that “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.” Voluntary poverty, therefore, became the method in which Tolstoy believed rich people, such as himself, could reach spiritual fulfillment.
Admittedly, this blog post does not cover all of Tolstoy’s religious beliefs. To cover all of them would require a book. Instead of covering all of his religious beliefs, I chose to cover those that related to The Kreutzer Sonata. Much like Pozdnyshev, Tolstoy regretted his early life of debauchery. He also regretted taking advantage of peasants and indulging in temporary pleasures. All of these regrets manifested themselves in his religious renewal, as he found renunciation of these acts in Schopenhauer, and the teachings of Buddha and Jesus. If you would like to learn more about Tolstoy’s religious beliefs, I suggest reading his books, What I Believe and Confession.