Work · Russian Religious Philosophy
The Justification of the Good
A moral philosophy grounded in the feelings of shame, pity and reverence, extended into a theory of law, the state and the unity of humanity.
Introduction
“The Justification of the Good” (1897, revised 1899) is Solovyov’s systematic moral philosophy. He finds the roots of morality in three primary feelings: shame, which raises the human being above animal nature; pity, which binds it to other living beings; and reverence, which relates it to what is higher. From these he develops an ethics that he holds to be relatively independent of metaphysics, and then a Christian view of history in which the good is gradually realised in society. Law is the minimum of the good that the state may enforce, and the state exists to make the life of all bearable until it can be transformed by love. The book argues against the death penalty and for the unity of humanity, and it was widely discussed in the Russian debates on liberalism and natural law.
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