Between “tomorrow” and “eternity”: the polemic of Fyodor A. Stepun and Semyon L. Frank on the essence and objectives of Christian politics

Abstract

This article examines the consideration of the idea of ​​“Christian politics” by religious philosophers of the Russian emigration Fyodor Stepun and Semyon Frank. The article reconstructs the epistolary and publicistic polemic between Stepun and Frank in the mid-1920s about the absolute and relative significance of politics, which was sparked by the publication of Frank’s The Downfall of Idols. The paper compares the theoretical justification of the essence and objectives of Christian politics, presented by Stepun in the article Christianity and Politics (1933), and by Frank in post-war texts: the treatise The Light in the Darkness (1949) and the essay Christian Conscience and Politics (~1946), which was not published during his lifetime. The author shows that Stepun of­fers a concept of social Christianity and makes as the basis of Christian politics “a living sense of the sinfulness of all earthly affairs”, and politics itself makes the duty of a Chris­tian who is obliged to strive for a sphere where evil is intensified to “take the inevitable evil on his Christian conscience.” In contrast, Frank adheres to Vl. Solovyov teaching and keeps the precepts and norms of Christian ethics as the basis. He resolves the contradic­tion between the principles of private and socio-political life of people by articulating the significance of the practical sphere – morals and everyday life. Both philosophers for­mulate their concept as a critique of Western European secularized society. Considering Christian ideas of man’s sinful nature, they demonstrate a different way of improving so­cial existence, the beginning of which are changes in the inner world of the personality.