The main ideas of the soil workers are considered a direct continuation of the concept of the Slavophiles. They arose and began to spread in the second half of the 19th century. Especially actively studied are the main topics of soil cultivars in the literature of the 10th grade . Let us further consider the features of soil cultivation.
General information
The views of the soil workers are reflected in the works of such famous personalities as Apollo Grigoriev, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Nikolai Danilevsky. In the writings of the first two, the concept was especially pronounced, according to which history was presented as a spontaneous process that could not be rationalized.
Soil farmers are people who proclaim faith in the people, soil, soil.
Theory Background
In the middle of the 19th century, the idea that every culture, every nation was unique was widespread. They cannot be reduced to a single world model.
In Western European philosophical thought, this idea is reflected in the works of Rickert, and in Russian - in the works of Grigoriev and Pogodin. The latter was the first to express the idea that Russia and Western Europe belong to different types of cultures. Pogodin regarded Europe as the heiress of the Western, and Russia as the Eastern Roman Empire.
Grigoryev called his worldview organic. His ideas were based on the fact that world life is developing in the aggregate of "cycles". They have their own image, form. Grigoriev considered each era to be an "organism", as well as a single nation. He fixed several terms and ideas, which subsequently found expression in the concept of cultural-historical types created by Danilevsky.
The essence of ideas
Several distinguishing features of the concept proposed by the soil workers should be highlighted . This is , first of all, recognition of the special role of Russian people. According to the theory, the people fulfill a mission to save all of humanity.
An educated society must become closer to the people. This is exactly what the soil workers promoted in their writings. In this case, rapprochement should occur on a religious and ethnic basis.
The main ideas put forward by the soil workers are :
- Elimination of serfdom and bureaucracy.
- Development of trade, industry.
- Freedom of the press and personality.
The ideas of representatives of soil cultivation were close to the concept proposed by the Slavophiles. The soil workers, adopting the culture of Europe, simultaneously exposed the West in its lack of spirituality, bourgeoisie. They rejected materialism, socialist and revolutionary ideas, opposed them to Christian ideals.
Cultural diversity concept
It was first formulated by Danilevsky. He developed a system of types of cultures and explained the mechanism of their appearance, development, change in the framework of various historical events. In his studies, he relied on the laws of nature.
Danilevsky considered the cultural-historical type to be peculiar and independent plans for industrial, domestic, social, artistic, scientific, religious, that is, in general, historical development. He argued that the essence of world history is the formation of 10 types of cultures:
- Assyro-Babylonian;
- Romano-Germanic;
- Iranian
- Indian
- ancient Semitic;
- Chinese
- Egyptian
- New Arabian;
- Ancient Roman
- ancient Greek.
However, he also identified 2 types of cultures that existed in pre-Columbian America: Peruvian and Mexican. According to Danilevsky, they did not have time to develop, since they were destroyed by the conquerors of Spain. Slavic type, according to the ideas of the author, is in the process of becoming.
Opposition to Eurocentrism
The achievement of the soil workers can be called the fact that they formulated a concept that does not correspond to the universalist theories of human history. At the same time, the latter had a pronounced Eurocentric character.
Eurocentrism was expressed in the idea of a linear, one-dimensional course of history and was based on rationalistic ideas. Danilevsky accurately defined it as "the identification of the fate of the Roman-Germanic tribe and of all mankind."
Criticism of the soil workers was substantiated and illustrated the contradictions of Eurocentrism to the requirements of scientific methodology. This contradiction was expressed in the fact that the model of world history accepted in society does not meet any requirement of scientific systematization: the division of history into ancient, middle, and new united diverse events into one group, and related ones, on the contrary, divided them.
The main argument of Danilevsky was that, within the framework of the Eurocentric approach, no explanation was given of either Russian history or the history of the peoples of the East. They actually turned into a kind of annex to the European development process.
Danilevsky offers the idea of polycentrism of cultural types, the multivariance of historical development.
The concept of Dostoevsky
As mentioned above, the activities of the soil workers were aimed at bringing the educated population closer to the common people on the basis of religious and ethnic values. At the same time, individual representatives began their research with questions of the relationship between man and God, the world and God.
Dostoevsky, unlike many of his contemporaries, believed that outside the divine idea as a higher principle, moral foundations in a man himself, developing only at the expense of his own forces, are conditional. Only religion, according to the author, fully substantiates morality.
Dostoevsky said that Christianity gives its moral principle and orders to believe that it is normal, single, and all conventions are absent. In his works, Dostoevsky studies all the negative consequences that the rejection of God entails.
Theory of Man
According to Dostoevsky, man is a great secret. He says that there is nothing more expensive and more significant than man, but at the same time, there is nothing worse than him. Dostoevsky ridicules rationalistic ideas about a person according to which the behavior of an individual is determined by considerations of profit and reason.
The writer believed that man is an irrational being. Accordingly, it is impossible to know its nature in a rational way. A thought will not be able to embrace the whole person, since there is always an irrational remnant that makes up that very secret meaning. In the individual, according to Dostoyevsky, an act of creativity is hiding, which brings joy and suffering to human life. However, they cannot understand, the mind cannot redo them.
The paradox of freedom
In his research, Dostoevsky says that freedom is always a person’s choice between evil and good. The question is, can an individual, guided solely by his human attitudes, make a choice? Dostoevsky shows that by abandoning God, man logically concludes that the Most High is absent, which means that everything is allowed. There is no God, therefore, there is no sin and immortality, there is no sense of life either.
It is impossible for a man, according to Dostoevsky, to live without God. Otherwise, he will turn into an immoral creature. For a subject who has abandoned God, self-destruction of a person is inevitable.
European socialism in the works of Dostoevsky
The writer considers European socialism as a product of Western European culture. He says that the key to learning is the economic problem.
Meanwhile, according to Dostoevsky, the problem of socialism is more atheistic. He says that the new European teaching eliminates Christianity and cares, first of all, for daily bread. The socialism of the West, the writer concludes, thus eliminates not capitalism, but religion. In this version, the idea of historical development is assessed by Dostoyevsky as "diabolical", not taking into account the spiritual origin of people.
The writer contrasts the atheistic socialism of the West with the idea of Russian socialism, uniting everything. The basis of this concept is the desire of the Russian people to unite with other cultures.