The Struggle for Spiritual Supremacy: Dostoevsky's Philosophy or History and Eschatology

Upon taking stock of the world around him, the keen twentieth century observer attains a heightened awareness of the dynamism of history; of the continual interplay among the differing strands of human faith and ideology, which give rise to the omnipresent swirls and eddies of social, political and philosophical ideas and structures. In the midst of this ceaseless flux, it is difficult to avert one's gaze from Russia and her traditional European and Asiatic spheres of influence, regions of strategic import and ideological and spiritual efflorescence, where recent events emblematize the grand complex scheme of historical change. As a being potentially of broad curiosity and intellectual horizons, man often is concerned with understanding the past precedents, contemporary ramifications and future implications of the historical trends and events which he discerns. The thought and writings of Russian author and religious philosopher Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky manifest these concerns at their most fundamental levels. Dostoevsky was deeply steeped in the study of the then-current state and historical role of his contemporary nineteenth century Russian society. He perceived a Russia, which, through the distinct spiritual, cultural, nationalistic, mystical and metaphysical characteristics of its civilization, would play a pivotal part in driving universal history.