God and Immortality vs. Atheism and Socialism

   The Russian novelist and essayist Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881) had a plan that entailed the completion of a literary cycle titled, The Life of a Great Sinner. The plan was to involve a goal of addressing the existence of God, which he once called “the problem that has consciously and unconsciously tormented me all my life” (Great Books of the Western World, vol. 52, vi). The literary cycle was not finished, but what the great writer did complete, just prior to his death, was a masterpiece recognized by many literary scholars as one of the major achievements in world literature titled The Brothers Karamazov. First published as a serial (1879-80), it was then published in a full edition in 1880.

   The story is a philosophical and theological novel set in 19th century Russian life. Dostoevsky manifested deep concern during his life as he observed the doctrines of atheism, socialism, nihilism, rationalism, et al. attacking his view of Christian faith. He saw these ravaging skeptical philosophies as seeking to destroy Russian spiritual heritage, and his concern was especially for the results these doctrines were having on Russian youth.

   The hero in the Karamazov novel is a character with the name of Alyosha, which was the name of Dostoevsky’s son. Tragically, the writer lost his son when the boy died at age 3 from epilepsy in 1878 during the production of The Brothers Karamazov. At the beginning of the story, the character Alyosha is nineteen years old. Early in the story there is a passage concerning the youth that powerfully implies what is always at stake in the battle of theism vs. atheism. In his 1951 book, God and Man at Yale, the late William F. Buckley, Jr., correctly described this battle as “the most important [duel] in the world” (xvi). Buckley’s words remain correct even though he wrote them nearly 75 years ago. The duel between Christian theism and atheism is the most foundational battle in this world! The passage from Karamazov attests to the truth of this conclusion. It reads as follows: 

As soon as [Alyosha] reflected seriously he was convinced of the existence of God and immortality. . . . [I]f he had decided that God and immortality did not exist he would at once become an atheist and a socialist. For socialism is not merely the labour question, it is before all things the atheistic question, the question of the form taken by atheism today, the question of the tower of Babel built without God, not to mount to heaven from earth but to set up heaven on earth. (11)

    It is the same point that the prominent Communist defector Whittaker Chambers (1901-1961) was making in his autobiography Witness. He wrote, “The Communist vision is the vision of Man without God. . . . Communism is wrong because something else is right, because to the challenge: GOD or Man?, they continue to give the answer:  MAN. . . . Communism is what happens when . . . men free themselves from God. But its view of God, its knowledge of God . . . is what alone gives character to a society or a nation, and meaning to its destiny. . . . Economics is not the central problem. . . . Faith is the central problem. . . . Faith in God and the freedom it enjoins . . . (9, 13, 16-17, emp. added).

   Without God, freedom, character, and destiny are meaningless. Although we live in a different century, are a different nation and people, the doctrine of God remains life’s most foundational doctrine. May you and I take heed to ourselves and understand the implications of the doctrine in reference to ourselves, our children, unto their children’s children, and beyond! May we, by the grace of God, save ourselves and others. “So, Jesus answered and said to them, ‘Have faith in God . . .’” (Mark 11:22; cf. 2 Thessalonians 3:1-3).

Charles C. Pugh III
Executive Director