Katerina Khokhlakova is a fairly minor character
in Dostoevsky’s the Brothers Karamazov. She is the mother of Lise, the little
girl who begins the novel as an invalid, but who later develops a close loving
relationship with Alyosha. Madame Khokhlakova in the end is not an especially
sympathetic character. She is vain and foolish and is used at times as a sort
of comic relief. But the chapter in which she first appears in conversation
with Father Zosima is very interesting as it involves a discussion of faith. In
this chapter “A lady of little faith” (p. 53-59) she is not referred to by
name. The reader only later finds out who she is. Perhaps this is intentional.
Her surname sounds slightly ridiculous, like a parody of Ukrainian. It goes
well with her later ridiculousness, but she does not at all appear ridiculous
in this initial conversation. Rather she puts forward concerns that must touch
many readers.
Madame Khokhlakova says to Father Zosima that
she suffers from lack of faith. She does not quite dare say that she lacks
faith in God, but she lacks faith in the idea of life after death. Really this
is just a matter of politeness, for the one issue goes with the other. From a
Christian perspective, to cease to believe in life after death is to cease to
believe in God. If a person believes in a Christian God, a belief in life after
death follows as a matter of course. Although she believed, mechanically as a
child, she wonders now if faith came about because of the fear of death, thus
that it is a product of man’s fear and unwillingness to accept that after death
there is nothing. She wonders if when she dies there will simply be a grave and
nothing more. She comes to Father Zosima looking for proof. She wants him to
convince her.
Zosima immediately says that there is no
question of proof, but that it is possible to be convinced. He says “Try to
love your neighbors actively and tirelessly. The more you succeed in loving,
the more you’ll be convinced of the existence of God and the immortality of the
soul. And if you reach complete selflessness in the love of your neighbor, then
undoubtedly you will believe, and no doubt will even be able to enter your
soul” (p. 56)
How can it be that by loving others a person
will be convinced about the existence of God and immortality? One way to
understand this is through an appreciation of the work of Søren Kierkegaard and
the Epistle of James. In the Epistle of James the emphasis is on actions. The
author of James writes, for instance, “What doth it profit, my brethren, though
a man say he hath faith and have not works? … faith if it hath not works is
dead” (James 2: 14-16). Kierkegaard throughout his
authorship shows a great deal of respect for the Epistle of James, which in
itself is somewhat surprising as he was brought up a Lutheran and Luther
notoriously called James an epistle of straw.
In the first discourse of For self examination
(p. 13-51) Kierkegaard looks closely a text in the first chapter of James which
includes the following:
“But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers
only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a
doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and
straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the
perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful
hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.” (James
1: 22-25)
Kierkegaard asks himself “What is required in
order to look at oneself with true blessing in the mirror of the Word?” He
answers “The first requirement is that you must not look at the mirror, observe
the mirror, but must see yourself in the mirror” (p. 25). How though can a
person see himself in a mirror without observing the mirror? If however, we
reflect that the mirror is God’s word there may be an answer? Kierkegaard is
saying that a person must not look at God’s word and only see the words; rather
he must see himself in the words, or see that the words apply to him. What this
means is that the words require something of him, and that thing is action.
There are all sorts of ways of putting off
action. One of these is to interpret. He writes “God’s Word is indeed the
mirror … but how enormously complicated.” (p. 25) He reflects on the fact that
the Bible is complicated that there are many interpretations. We don’t know
which books are authentic, who wrote them. But if a person looks at the mirror
in this way, it will always remain confusing. The task is to see yourself
in the mirror, but what prevents this is if the person continues endlessly to
interpret. The problem with scholarship is that it is a way to avoid acting.
The scholar can always reflect that he will just come up with a slightly better
interpretation of this or that passage before acting on it. The crucial thing
however, is not to interpret, but to realise that the text applies to me.
Kierkegaard writes that “when you are reading God’s Word, it is not the obscure
passages that bind you but what you understand, and with that you are to comply
at once” (p. 29). The amount of scholarship required to act according to God’s
word is so minimal that all that is required has already been done. We have had
for hundreds of years a reasonably accurate translation of the Bible and this
contains enough clear statements of required actions to last a lifetime.
The task for Kierkegaard is to take the Bible
personally. Thus he writes “If you are to read God’s Word in order to see
yourself in the mirror, then during the reading you must incessantly say to
yourself. It is I to whom it is speaking.” (p. 40) The reason why this is
crucial is that it is instrumental in creating the Christian self. He writes:
“If God’s Word is for you merely a doctrine
something impersonal then it is no mirror - an objective doctrine cannot be
called a mirror, it is just as impossible to look at yourself in an objective
doctrine as to look at yourself in a wall. And if you want to relate
impersonally to God’s Word, there can be no question of looking at yourself in
mirror, because it takes a personality, an I, to look at yourself in a mirror;
a wall can be seen in a mirror, but a wall cannot see itself or look at itself
in a mirror” (p. 43-44)
If a person reads objectively he cannot see
himself in God’s word for there is no self to see. Reading personally creates the
“I” and thus creates the Christian self. Recognising that the Bible applies to
the self is instrumental in creating the self which recognises that the Bible
applies to it. When the self is objective, like a wall, it can be seen, but it
is not self-conscious because it is not conscious of itself as a spirit or a
soul and thus it cannot see itself. The self is created when it relates itself
to God through relating itself to God’s word. To do this however the self must
be personal and it achieves this through relating itself to itself. The
self-relation is achieved through the recognition that God’s word applies to
it. The self relates to the self that it sees in the mirror of God’s word and
thus at the same time relates to itself and to God. The whole passage about
correct reading as opposed to scholarship is about how the Kierkegaardian self
is created. It is by following God’s word by loving one’s neighbours that the
sense of self, the sense of spirit is created. By relating myself to God’s
word, I relate myself to God. I see myself in the mirror, relate myself to
myself, but also relate myself to another.
Kierkegaard writes that the “The demonstration
of Christianity really lies in imitation” (p. 68) From a perspective that sees
belief as a matter of reason this is absurd. Kierkegaard is saying that through
imitation a doubter will lose his doubts. But if a person doubted due to lack
of reasons, why would he imitate? Kierkegaard though is looking at the matter
in a different way. By imitating Christ a person demonstrates that he is a
Christian. Moreover if Christian belief (faith) is action, which is what has
been learned from James, then if a person does not act, he does not really
believe it. If he does not believe, then he doubts. The only solution to doubt
is action. To act is to cease to doubt, and to cease doubting is to cease looking
for reasons.
We can now see an interpretation of how Father
Zosima’s advice to Madame Khokhlakova can help her to have faith. If we see
faith as a matter of action, then by acting, by loving others, the person
automatically has faith. Faith that just contemplates, that fails to act, is a
lifeless thing. No wonder then that she does not feel it.
Moreover if Kierkegaard is right, it is through
action, through loving others, that the spiritual self, (the self that relates
itself to itself and relates itself to others and indeed God) is created. If a
person fails to act, if he fails to follow God’s word, he will lack any sense
of the spiritual. Only when a person relates to God’s word does he relate to
God and in doing so create the soul.
In this sense it may even be that the atheist is
right. He does not believe in the soul, he does not believe in immortality. He
is right as for him these things are not. Only by acting in a loving manner
does a person develop faith and with it the sense of himself as a soul, as a
spiritual being. Perhaps only in this way does he enable God to create this
immortal soul. If this is so, then how we live our lives really is decisive.
Not because God will punish us, but because if we have not related to him at
all, there is nothing for him to save.
We see as the conversation between Madame
Khokhlakova and Father Zosima continues that she is attempting to avoid action.
She dreams of great, kind deeds. She dreams of being a nun of giving up
everything, of not being frightened by sores and dirt. Father Zosima brings her
back down to earth by saying maybe one day you will actually do a fine deed.
She realises that her dreams of acting kindly would fail as soon as someone
showed ingratitude. Father Zosima comes up with a similar anecdote of a Doctor
who hates people individually but loves humanity. Again we see someone who
loves in theory but not in practice. What is to do be done? Zosima is very kind
and gentle. He thinks that it is a lot if the person is already aware of
his fault, aware of his lack of action. The key is to begin acting. He says “Do
what you can and it will be reckoned unto you. You have already done much if
you can understand yourself so deeply and so sincerely” (p. 57). This however
only works if the person is sincere and genuinely repentant about his lack of
action.
Zosima compares active love with acting in
dreams. This is similar to the idea in Kierkegaard about someone who follows
Christianity in theory and someone who follows it in practice. But whereas
Kierkegaard can be strict Zosima is very very gentle. He accepts that we are
weak. Active love is difficult. It is a matter of action, and day to day
action, not just one glorious act. It needs perseverance and endurance and
patience. But even if someone is as weak as Madame Khokhlakova, there is hope
for her. Even if she finds in the end that all her efforts at active love have
failed, that she is as far as ever from her goal, then she will find that the
miraculous and mysterious power of God is enough to save her and that He always
has been guiding her.
In Zosima’s view it is enough to strive to love
actively. He expects so very little of us. No more than the mere act of
striving. This striving is like Grushenka’s story (later in the novel) of the
gift of an onion. The solitary good act in a life of wickedness can be enough
to pull us out of the pit. God perhaps then does not need more than our
striving to be doers of the word. Perhaps this is enough to create the self for
him to save. Perhaps in the striving alone there is enough self-relation and
enough relation to another for the Christian self to come into existence.
Zosima’s account is very gentle as compared to
Kierkegaard’s strictness. But that is not to say that Kierkegaard would not
have sympathised with Zosima’s view. After all Kierkegaard continually
recognised our inability in the face of Christianity’s demands, our
powerlessness in the face of Christ’s example. Madame Khokhlakova is powerless.
She thinks that she can do nothing. But so long as she tries just a little and
so long as she does not use this sense of powerlessness as an excuse, she like
all of us can gain faith. Dostoevsky’s account of faith is very gentle. In the
end we only need to give the tiniest thing. One good dead is enough to save us.
But this gentleness only works if we do not deceive ourselves. It is for this
reason that Zosima warns above all against lies. How can a self look in
Kierkegaard’s mirror if it is not honest with itself? A lie destroys the self’s
relation to itself and if a person can not even find himself in the mirror
how can he expect to find God?
The Brothers Karamazov, translated by Pevear and
Volokhonsky, Vintage, 1992.
For Self-Examination, translated by Hong and
Hong, Princeton University Press, 1990.
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