GOOD AND EVIL • Great Russian Encyclopedia

Concepts of good and evil in Chinese culture

expressed by the correlative pair of words “shan” and “e/u”, closely related to the pair “i – li” (“duty/justice – benefit/benefit”) and representing two broader ranges of meanings: “happiness, beauty, skill, usefulness” , kindness" and "misfortune, ugliness, harmfulness, damage, depravity."

Etymologically, the character “shan” goes back to the image of a ram as a food delicacy and a sacrificial gift (hence “sacrifice, a good omen” - xiang). In the first, explanatory and etymological. in Xu Shen’s dictionary “Shuo wen jie zi” (“Explanation of signs and analysis of hieroglyphs,” ca. 100 AD), “shan” is defined by the mantically significant term “ji” (“happiness, luck”) and is placed in general synonymy. a row with the characters “i” (“due justice”) and “mei” (“beauty”); its likeness is Greek. Kalokagathia is reflected in the Mo Tzu: “Serving goodness determines beauty.”

Philosophy understanding of “shan” as a universal (and not just ethical), normative, evaluative and ontological. categories are given in the I Ching, where good is considered as a “continuation” of the Way-Tao, and its design is considered as individual “nature” (xing). Explaining this position, the patriarch of neo-Confucianism Zhu Xi distinguished ontological. and anthropologist. aspects of good: “On the plane of Heaven and Earth, good is antecedent, and [individual] nature is subsequent... on the human plane, nature is antecedent, and good is subsequent.” Dai Zhen, the author of the general treatise “Yuan Shan” (“Appeal to the Beginning of Good”), called goodness “the great scales of the Celestial Empire,” consisting of humanity (ren), decency (li), due justice, specifying that “the goodness of every deed means its consistency with Heaven,” that is, harmony with the natural-divine universe. The relationship between the categories “shan” and “xing” specified in the “I Jing” determined the centuries-long process of discussing one of the centers. problems whale philosophy - the good or evil nature of man, the origins of which were the largest followers of Confucius - Mencius and Xunzi. In socio-political sphere, Confucianism derived from the good nature of man the priority of decency in governing people based on grace (de), and legalism (fa jia) from his evil nature - the opposite priority of law (fa) in governing based on punishments and rewards.

The correlation between “shan” and “e/u” is also codified in the I Jing: “A noble man (jun zi) resists evil and promotes good, is submissive to Heaven and happy with predestination (ming).” “E/u” etymologically goes back to the combination of the signs “I” (a pictogram of a cross with the meaning “square, outback, couple”) and “xin” (“heart, thought”), apparently originally expressing the idea of either hated evil coming from outside, from outside or from the backwaters of the square-structured world, state, city and home, or the malice of double-mindedness, double-mindedness, double-heartedness. In “Shuo wen jie zi” it is defined as “excess, violation” (guo).

The hieroglyph "e/u" with the negative meaning of "evil" combines the positive meaning of "hatred", which Confucius considered one of the fundamentals. attributes of humanity (“Only the humane is capable of loving and hating people”), and Mencius – due justice. In Da Xue (Great Teaching), both meanings of “e/u” are present in “hatred of the evil stench” as an image of an involuntary impulse that must be followed in order to “make one’s thoughts sincere” and achieve “settlement on the perfect good.” . Zhu Xi, developing Mencius's thesis about the innateness of the desire for good and hatred of evil and asserting that “sympathy and compassion are the good of humanity, shame and hatred are the good of due justice,” gave “perfect good” the highest ontology. status: “The Great Limit (Tai Chi) is only the [corresponding] Way-Tao principle of the extremely good and the completely good.” Wang Yangming began to interpret “perfect goodness” as an absolute characteristic of the original human nature and the “meaningful” (liang zhi) essence of the heart, surpassing the interrelated good and evil.

Historical change in moral concepts

As cultures and societies develop, people's ideas about good and evil change, but the nature of this transformation remains a matter of speculation.

Thus, some believe that our recent history is a history of demoralization. From this perspective, societies become increasingly less prim and judgmental. We have become more accepting of other people, rational, non-religious and trying to scientifically justify how we approach questions of right and wrong.

The opposite view involves a re-moralization that our culture is becoming more and more critical. We are offended and outraged by more and more things, and the growing polarization of opinions reveals the extremes of righteousness.

The authors of the study mentioned above decided to explore which of these views best reflects the change in morality over time, using a new field of research - culturomics. Culturomics uses very large text databases to track changes in cultural beliefs and values, since changing patterns of language use over time can reveal changes in how people understand their world and themselves. The study used data from Google Books, which contains more than 500 billion words from 5 million scanned and digitized books.

Each of the five types of morality was represented by large, well-founded sets of words reflecting virtues and vices. The results of the analysis showed that basic moral terms (“conscience”, “honesty”, “kindness” and others) began to be used in books much less frequently as we moved deeper into the 20th century, which corresponds to the narrative of demoralization. But, interestingly, around 1980, an active rise back began, which may mean an astonishing remoralization of society. On the other hand, the five types of morality individually show radically different trajectories:

Purity morality shows the same decline and rise as the basic terms. Ideas of holiness, piety and purity, as well as sin, pollution and obscenity, fell until about 1980 and then rose.
The egalitarian morality of justice has shown neither consistent growth nor decline.
Power morality , based on hierarchy, fell gradually during the first half of the century and then rose sharply when a looming power crisis rocked the Western world in the late 1960s. However, it retreated again just as sharply during the 1970s.
Group morality , reflected in the general rhetoric of loyalty and unity, shows the most obvious upward trend in the 20th century. The marked increase in the periods around the two world wars indicates a transient rise in "us and them" morality in threatened communities.
Finally, harm-based morality represents a complex but intriguing trend. Its prominence declines from 1900 to the 1970s, interrupted by small increases during wartime when themes of suffering and destruction became understandably pressing. At the same time, a sharp increase has been occurring since about 1980, and against the backdrop of the absence of a single dominant global conflict.

Arguably, the decades since 1980 can be seen as a period of renewed moral concern, and the research that has been conducted points to some important cultural transformations.

The way we tend to think about good and evil today is different from how we once thought and, if trends are to be believed, from how we will think in the future

However, what exactly leads to these transformations is a question open to debate and speculation. Perhaps one of the main engines of moral change is human contact. When we interact with other people and share common goals, we show affection towards them. Today we communicate with many more people than our grandparents and even our parents.

As our social circle expands, so does our “moral circle.” However, such a “contact hypothesis” is limited and does not take into account, for example, how our moral attitudes may change towards those with whom we never communicate directly: some donate money and even blood to people with whom they have no contact and little in common.

On the other hand, perhaps it is all about the stories that circulate in societies and arise because people come to certain views and seek to pass them on to others. Although few of us write novels or make films, people are natural storytellers and use storytelling to influence others, especially their own children.

Concepts of good and evil in Indian thought

originally inscribed in nature. the cyclical course of development of both the Universe (the theory of four world periods - the south), and society and the individual, therefore there was no dualism there. concepts of D. and Z., nor the idea of the battle between good and evil in the name of ending. victories of good on earth. Although good was associated with order (rita, sat, dharma), virtue (dharma, punya), ritual purity (shubha), well-being (shri), and evil, respectively, with chaos (anrita, asat), non-virtue (adharma), wickedness (ashubha ), a sin (dad), there was no strict and unambiguous distribution of roles between the forces of good and the forces of evil. In Vedic mythology, both gods (devas) and demons (asuras, etc.), although the former are associated with light, prosperity, life, and the latter with darkness, hunger and death, are quite ambivalent in relation to D. and Z. Traditional the confrontation between devas and asuras did not imply differences in the nature of these creatures, who were equally insidious and dishonest; only their functions differed: whatever the devas did, the asuras had to hinder them, and this rivalry was constantly renewed in the interests of both sides.

The establishment of karma as a mechanism of moral retribution and the parallel development of asceticism as complete liberation from the action of karmics. laws (moksha, nirvana) contributed to the maximum generalization of the idea of evil: earthly existence in the cycle of rebirth (samsara), which is the result of good or bad karma, is that absolute evil, overcoming which one can achieve a perfect state without any oppositions, including opposition D. and Z. The doctrine of karma, explaining the unfortunate fate of a person by his actions in past rebirths, shifted all responsibility for evil onto the individual himself, but this did not result in a real sense of responsibility and guilt (it is impossible to feel guilty for an offense that you do not remember). In the light of the doctrine of karma, the human condition as such, with all its inherent adversities, is a consequence of human desires and actions, and not of world evil or the fall of the human race.

The idea of karma and rebirth (samsara) is closely related to the opposition of dharma and adharma - righteous and unrighteous, but dharma is not necessarily high morality, and adharma is the absence of it. Hinduism clearly prefers sva-dharma - the duty of one's own - to the universal dharma, which consists in generally valid moral principles such as non-harm (ahimsa), truthfulness, non-covetousness, etc. class (varna) or stage of life (ashram), which can consist of murder (for the class of warriors - kshatriyas), and theft (for the caste of thieves), and other “unclean” activities (for the corresponding lower castes). According to the Bhagavad Gita, a poorly executed property is better. dharma than someone else's well-executed one. Lack of clearly defined limits of D. and Z. makes dharma a realm of relative and ultimately illusory experience, which is contrasted with the absolute value of renunciation.

In theistic In the religions of Hinduism, it is God who gives evil its place in the world order: thus, according to the Puranas, Vishnu first created the brahmins, the Vedas and the goddess Sri, and then the lower beings outside the Veda and adharma. Trying to combine the idea of an omnipotent and all-good personal God with the idea of karma, ind. thinkers, on the one hand, make God a kind of karmic instrument. rewards, on the other hand, place him above karma: devotion to personal God (bhakti) frees him from karmics. punishment (thanks to such devotion, even demons can be freed from their demonic state). In Buddhism, the Mahayana identification of rebirth and liberation (samsara and nirvana) is opposed to the absolutization of their opposites as “evil” and “good” in Hinayana (Theravada).

Personal values and moral principles of society

What values you have, and how they align with the moral values of your community and your own actions, directly influence your sense of belonging and, more broadly, life satisfaction.

Personal values are principles you believe in and have invested in. Values are the goals you strive for; they largely determine the essence of personality. But more importantly, they are a source of motivation for self-improvement. People's values determine what they want personally, while morals determine what the society around those people wants for them.

Humanistic psychologists suggest that people have an innate sense of values and personal preferences that tend to be hidden beneath layers of social demands and expectations (social morality). Part of the human journey involves the gradual rediscovery of those innate and highly personal desires that are unconsciously hidden when they are found to conflict with the demands of society. However, if one takes an inventory of values, most well-socialized people will find that there is a high degree of correspondence between what they want and what society wants.

Yes, certain behaviors are considered desirable and others are not, but for the most part, as we have seen, morality is not set in stone and often reflects local cultural characteristics and historical aspects that tend to change.

Anna Veselko

The concepts of good and evil in antiquity

In ancient ethics, with its characteristic division of goods and evils into external (wealth and poverty, glory and shame, etc.), bodily (health and illness, beauty and ugliness, etc.) and mental (moral virtues and vices) ) (Plato, Gorgias, 477bc; Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, I, 1098b) the possession of the totality of all goods was considered happiness, which itself was considered the highest good and the goal of human activity. Accordingly, the specific meaning of eudaimonism in ancient ethics changed depending on which of the indicated types of goods and evils was recognized as the most significant. Stoics and that means. Platonists reduced good to virtue, evil to vice, physical and external good and evil, as well as pleasure and suffering were considered “indifferent” (adiaphora). From this it was concluded that a virtuous person would be happy in any circumstances. The Peripatetics, putting spiritual goods in first place, still recognized the need for external and bodily goods for happiness. In hedonistic teachings, for example among the Epicureans, where good was identified with pleasure and evil with suffering, virtue turned out to be only a means of achieving happiness.

Important for the subsequent tradition was the distinction developed by ancient ethics between “true” and “apparent” good. This distinction was already assumed in Socrates’ thesis on the identity of knowledge and virtue, according to which a person’s will is always aimed at good and therefore he can commit evil only by accepting it as good, that is, as a result of error, but cannot commit evil knowing that it is evil. Aristotle rejected this thesis, but, defining good as an object of aspiration, he faced the danger of radical relativism, since from here it could be concluded that for everyone what he actually strives for is good. Contrasting the “true good,” i.e., an object of aspiration consistent with nature and morally acceptable, with a good that “seems” so to a specific subject, but is unacceptable from a moral point of view, Aristotle considered the practical criterion for distinguishing them to be the opinion of a virtuous person (“Nicomachean Ethics,” III, 1113ab).

For antiquity D. and z. not just ethical. concepts related to the field of human behavior; as a rule, they also have a cosmological and ontological. aspects (the transcendental idea of the Good in Plato, etc.). Extraethical aspects of these concepts were most clearly manifested in the formulation of the problem of evil, that is, the question of where evil as such comes from in the world. One of the solutions to this problem was dualism, that is, the idea of D. and Z. like two people are independent. principles of existence, the struggle of which determines the course of world history. Dualism is characteristic of the teachings of Zoroastrianism about the struggle of two twin deities - the good Ahuramazda (Ormuzd) and the evil Angro Mainyu (Ahriman) (Yasna, 30, 3-5); in the future it will become a fundamental principle in a number of areas of Gnosticism and in Manichaeism with his concept of the struggle between Light and Darkness, which should end in their final separation. Ancient culture was characterized by less radical forms of dualism, in which evil was seen as an eternal element of the cosmos. of being, localized in its lower spheres and unequal to good. In the Platonic tradition, this approach determined its characteristic ideal of “escape” from the sensory world, sometimes combined with the idea that the source of evil is eternal, formless matter or the evil World Soul. The Stoics argued that evil is logically necessary for the existence of good, since opposites cannot exist without each other, but in epistemological terms. aspect - that good cannot be known by the subject if the knowledge of evil is inaccessible to him.

Dualism removes from the good beginning all responsibility for evil, but does not allow the value-based justification of objective existence as a whole, since evil turns out to be its integral component. An alternative to dualism were monistic cosmo- and theodicies, one way or another reducing evil to good or denying its very existence: 1) the widespread idea in Platonism and Stoicism that evil exists only in particular cases and, perhaps, only from a limited point of view subject, is necessary for the good of the whole (Marcus Aurelius, “To Himself”, 3, 2) or is its insignificant side effect (Stoics); 2) a privative concept characteristic of Neoplatonism (from the Latin privatio - deprivation), according to which evil is non-existence or the absence of a proper good, and not something positively existing (in Plotinus this theory was also combined with the dualistic idea of the rootedness of evil in matter, understood as “non-being” - Enneads, 1, 8, 3 and 5); 3) shifting attention from non-moral to moral evil, in which the first is either interpreted in the Stoic spirit as indifferent, or even interpreted as a kind of good, and only the second is declared to be a true evil, depending on the subject and causally determining the non-moral evil itself.

Within the framework of the latter approach, non-moral evil could be recognized as a moral good as a fair punishment for moral evil already committed by the person himself - for example, in a previous life (Plotinus, Enneads, 3, 2, 13). Moreover, non-moral evil could be regarded as a moral good as a means of morality. re-education or healing of the suffering subject (Plato, Republic, II, 380b). Often the suffering of one individual was interpreted as a means to correct not only himself, but also other people (Plato, “Gorgias”, 525bc). Finally, even if the subject has not yet committed moral evil, misfortune could be declared good for him because it contributes to the realization of his virtues (Seneca, “On Providence”, 4, 6).

What is GOOD

Good is a philosophical term equivalent to the term good, but the latter is usually understood more broadly: goods can be material and spiritual, while good is understood for the most part only as moral good.

Something positive, good, useful, the opposite of evil; good deed. Wish someone well. Not good (foreshadows bad things; colloquial). Do a lot of good for people. Remember with kindness (remember with gratitude, with a good feeling).

About someone. bad, worthless (colloquial disdainful). There is no need for such kindness and for nothing.

Welcome - a greeting to a guest, participants of something, arriving somewhere. Welcome to our city for the festival!

To give (receive) the go-ahead for something (colloquial and special) - to give (receive) permission, consent. Give the go-ahead for departure.

Synonyms:

good (useful) deed, benefit, benefit, charity, donation, service, favor, generosity, goodness,

Verb compatibility:

Give good, do good, good wins, desire good, do good, want good, be not good, do good, remember with good...

Epithet:

Absolute, active, objective, moral, useful, true, family, perfect, world, small, social, eternal, great, divine, pure, moral, universal, human.

Concepts of good and evil in the Middle Ages

For the Abrahamic religions are characterized by the idea of the absolute goodness of God, which was considered in Christianity as one of His most important attributes along with absolute power and absolute wisdom, and in Islam was reflected in one of the “beautiful names” of Allah - al-Latif (“The Good”). According to the Christian tradition, substantial goodness belongs only to God, and all created beings are not good in themselves, but receive goodness as a gift from God (Origen, “On Principles,” 1, 5). In comprehending the relationship between moral and non-moral moral and moral values, the Church Fathers largely relied on the conceptual possibilities developed by ancient thought. Thus, Origen distinguished between “evil in the proper sense,” i.e., moral vice, and “evil in the figurative sense,” i.e., “bodily” and “external” (“Against Celsus,” 6, 54–55). In Basil the Great (“On the fact that God is not the author of evil”) and John of Damascus (“An exact exposition of the Orthodox faith,” 4, 19), non-moral evil was actually identified with suffering, which should be recognized as “apparent” evil because otherwise we would have to recognize pleasure as a genuine good. Among Lat. fathers dichotomous the concept of evil was adhered to by Tertullian, who distinguished between malum culpae (the evil of guilt) and malum poenae (the evil of punishment) (“Against Marcion,” 2, 14), and especially Augustine (“On Free Decision,” 1, 1, 1). Dualism is Stoic. type found in Lactantius, the affirmation of the need for partial evil for the good of the whole - in Augustine (“On the City of God”, 11, 18 and 23), the “medical-pedagogical” interpretation of non-moral evil - in Clement of Alexandria, Origen, etc. Particularly popular in both patristics, and in scholasticism the privative theory of evil was used. A number of Arab-Muslim representatives. Peripatetism (falsaf) and Sufism defined pure good (khair mahd) as being (wujud), and pure evil (sharr mahd) as non-existence (adam).

The concepts bonum et malum morale (moral good and evil) and bonum et malum naturale (natural or physical good and evil) used by Thomas Aquinas will become very popular in the modern European tradition. By moral evil, Thomas meant the vicious orientation of the will, and by physical evil, natural defects (blindness, etc.) rather than suffering (the latter corresponds to the term malum contristativum, i.e. “evil that brings grief” - “Summa theology", Ia–II ae q. 41 a. 3 co.; q. 42 a. 2 co.).

A specifically Christian approach to the problem of evil was that the interpretation of non-moral evil as a punishment for moral evil was applied to the biblical mythology of the Fall of Adam and Eve (Gen. 3), as a result of which the sin of the first man was seen as the cause of the susceptibility of all human nature to suffering and death ( Rom. 5:12–19). To this concept of inheritances. punishment, originally present in Greek-speaking Christianity, in lat. tradition, starting with Augustine, the doctrine of original sin was added, according to which people inherit from Adam the susceptibility not only to non-moral, but also to moral evil. The most relevant in this context was the question of the origin of moral evil. God is not responsible for evil, for it is the result of a free choice made at the beginning of cosmic history by Satan or Adam. Since all subsequent individual expressions of will in favor of evil are also free, in this regard, the problem of freedom, understood as the ability to choose between good and evil (probably starting with Philo of Alexandria), acquired paramount importance, as a result of which questions about the relationship between freedom and Divine providence and predestination. At the same time, Catholicism of the Augustinian type and later, especially Lutheranism and Calvinism, emphasize that one of the consequences of original sin in man was “slavery of the will,” that is, the inability to make an independent choice in favor of good, the appeal to which becomes possible only with the help of Divine grace.

Explanation on the direction “Good and Evil” from FIPI

The conflict between good and evil forms the basis of most plots of world literature and folklore, and is embodied in works of all types of art. The eternal confrontation between the two poles of human existence is reflected in the moral choice of the heroes, in their thoughts and actions. The knowledge of good and evil, determining the boundaries between them is an integral part of every human destiny. Refraction of the student’s reading experience from this perspective will provide the necessary material for revealing any of the topics in this direction.

The problem of good and evil in modern times

The approaches to this problem developed in antiquity and the Middle Ages in one form or another continued to remain relevant for religions. and philosopher traditions up to the 20th century. In the 17th–18th centuries. a formal classification of goods and evils became widespread, which, along with the moral and physical, also recognized metaphysical rights and wrongs. (G. W. Leibniz, “Theodicy”, 1, 21; S. Clark, “Discourse on the Being and Attributes of God”, 10; W. King, “On the Origin of Evil”, 2, 2). Thus, G. W. Leibniz defined moral D. and Z. as virtue and vice (sin), physical good and evil - as happiness (pleasure) and unhappiness (suffering), and metaphysical - as perfection and imperfection. These types of goods and evils are interconnected: the transition from lesser to greater perfection is subjectively perceived as pleasure, the reverse transition is perceived as suffering, and virtue always contributes to the happiness (i.e., lasting pleasure) of the subject. At the same time metaphysical. evil is inherent in creation simply due to its inevitable limitations: God could not make it absolutely perfect, since this would essentially mean the creation of another God. He could only choose the “best of possible worlds,” that is, realize such a combination of ideas of finite beings in which the maximum possible good is achieved, although at the same time there is evil arising precisely from the imperfection of these ideas, eternally existing in the mind of God, but not depending on His will (“Theodicy”, 2, 149). Sami D. and Z. are conceived as objective entities that do not depend on either human or Divine will (cf. R. Kedworth, “Treatise on Eternal and Immutable Morality,” 1, 2). In the latter case, the theological concept found in Duns Scotus, R. Descartes and others is denied. voluntarism, according to which the essence of good is determined by Divine arbitrariness, so that if God wanted, He could establish a moral law that is completely different in content.

However, in the secularized culture of modern times there was also a rejection of metaphysics. understanding of D. and Z., denial of their existence as objective characteristics inherent in the things themselves, regardless of subjective perception (T. Hobbes, B. Spinoza, etc.). Moral D. and z. began to be interpreted only as a specific object. pleasure or displeasure inherent in the “moral sense” (D. Hume, “Treatise of Human Nature”, 3, 1). In the context of this approach, the essence of moral D. and z. was made dependent on physical good and evil to such an extent that in the absence of the latter it was considered impossible to form a k.-l. idea of virtue and vice (D. Diderot, “Continuation of the apology of the Abbé De Prade”, 12). This dependence could be understood in different ways. In "selfish." In the variant, virtue and vice are simply those forms of human activity that contribute to his happiness or misfortune, respectively (Spinoza, “Ethics”, part 4, vol. 18, scholium). In "altruistic." option moral D. and z. there is such behavior of a person that contributes to the happiness and unhappiness of other people (F. Hutcheson, “An Inquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of Beauty and Virtue,” 2, 3, 3), and with this kind of definition of the very concepts of moral justice and virtue. could be combined: a) the idea that motivation is altruistic. human actions are actually selfish. character (for example, B. Mandeville or P. A. Holbach); b) the statement of the actually altruistic. motivation for his actions as the only valuable thing in morality. attitude (moral feeling of benevolence in F. Hutcheson, sympathy in D. Hume and A. Smith, compassion in J. J. Rousseau and A. Schopenhauer, etc.). Finally, in utilitarianism the criterion of moral D. and z. becomes “maximum happiness of the maximum number of people” (the so-called principle of I. Bentham - J. S. Mill, partly anticipated by Hutcheson and Hume), i.e., human behavior that contributes to maximum physical activity is recognized as morally correct. the benefit of all subjects whose interests are affected by its action. The very term “moral evil” in this context sometimes no longer meant a vice, but that type of suffering that is the result of the activity of rational beings, and under “physical. “evil” in this case meant suffering, the source of which is natural factors (E. Dühring, “The Value of Life,” Chapter 7).

In deontological In the ethics of I. Kant, the essence of moral goodness, on the contrary, is completely independent of pleasure and suffering and consists in the formal conformity of the act with laws, i.e. in logical. the possibility (or desirability) of the maxim of this act being a universal law of nature (“Fundamentals of the Metaphysics of Morals,” section 2). The tendency to prefer as a principle of behavior not an objective moral duty, but something emanating from eudaimonistic principles. motives, selfishness is the original “radical evil” inherent in human nature (“Religion within the limits of reason alone”, parts 1, 3). It is egoism, understood metaphysically. level as the isolation of private will or individual consciousness, opposing themselves to the “universal”, or the totality of being, was often considered as the essence of evil in the subsequent tradition of German. classical philosophy (G. W. F. Hegel, “Philosophy of Law”, part 5, 139). In “Philosophical Studies on the Essence of Human Freedom” by F. W. Schelling, this approach was combined with the idea of the rooting of evil in the divine “ground” of being in the spirit of J. Boehme’s theosophy.

Dr. option for determining the essence of D. and z. regardless of pleasure and pain is characteristic of intuitionist ethics. F. Brentano, defining the good - in line with the Aristotelian-scholastic. tradition - as the object of correct love (“On the Origin of Moral Knowledge,” 23), believed that the very correctness of this love is established directly. the intuition of its obviousness. In English philosophy 1st half. 20th century similar views were expressed by J. E. Moore, W. Ross and others. Thus, Moore believed that goodness is a simple, irreducible quality of phenomena that is seen directly and cannot be defined. The moral correctness of an action is determined by the fact that it “provides the greatest possible amount of good in the universe” (“Principles of Ethics”, 5, 89). In the spirit of the so-called Hume's thesis, according to which a judgment of ought cannot be deduced from a judgment of fact, Moore formulated the famous criticism of “naturalism.” delusions,” i.e., confusing an indefinable good with any other real quality (for example, pleasure or existence as such), arguing that the essence of good cannot in principle be determined based on ontological. structures of reality. Similar ideas about the independence of value from being are characteristic of representatives of phenomenology (M. Scheler, N. Hartmann, etc.), while criticism of morality by F. Nietzsche is based on the interpretation of morality as an epiphenomenon determined by extra-moral factors (a similar interpretation is also characteristic of Marxism, Freudianism and various post-structuralist movements). Speaking of historical. the origin of morality, Nietzsche distinguished between “good” and “bad” (gut und schlecht), corresponding to the aristocratic. the values of noble and vitally strong people, and, on the other hand, “good” and “evil” (gut und böse), expressing the interests of vitally weak and socially oppressed people (“Genealogy of Morals”, 1, 4–11). Overcoming altruistic a morality that seeks to minimize suffering in the name of a new “superhuman” morality of self-affirmation lies at the heart of Nietzsche’s call to stand “beyond good and evil.”

In Russian philosophy problem D. and z. Vl. was considered most systematically. S. Solovyov. Defining “good” as “an ideal norm of will”, and “good” as “an object of actual desire” (“Justification of Good”, 1, 6, 1), Solovyov saw the highest good in their coincidence. The traditions remained relevant. solutions to the problem of evil - as an “ontological illusion” by S. N. Bulgakov (“Never-Evening Light”, 3, 4), as arising from created freedom in personalistic. metaphysics of N. O. Lossky (“God and World Evil”, Chapter 3). This was combined in Russian. religious-philosophical thoughts with a keen awareness of the insufficiency of any rational theodicy (F. M. Dostoevsky in “The Brothers Karamazov”, N. A. Berdyaev, L. Shestov, S. L. Frank). In the field of practical ethics lively debate in con. 19 – beginning 20th centuries caused the teaching of L. N. Tolstoy about “non-resistance to evil by force” (I. A. Ilyin’s work “On Resistance to Evil by Force” was devoted to criticism of it).

Part two. Commandments of the Lord

Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy; six days thou shalt work and do all thy work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: on it thou shalt not do any work, neither thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor [ your ox, nor your donkey, nor any of your livestock, nor the stranger who is within your gates; For in six days the Lord created heaven and earth, the sea and everything in them, and rested on the seventh day; Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and sanctified it.

God commands us to work honestly for His glory for six days, and to devote the seventh day to the Creator. In the Old Testament, such a special day of God was Saturday, on which believers remembered the week of Creation and the deliverance of the Jews from Egyptian slavery. And now we continue to honor the Sabbath, although not in the same way as in ancient times, for Christ freed us from the literal fulfillment of the Old Testament laws. On this day, the Church always performs the Sacrament of Holy Communion, strict fasting is prohibited on this day (as on Sunday), and prostrations in churches are canceled.

But a special holiday for us now is Sunday. On this day, God first created the world from nothingness, and on the same day He restored our perishing nature by His Resurrection. And in fulfillment of the words of Scripture, “This is the day the Lord has made: let us rejoice and be glad in it!” (Ps. 117:24) On Sunday we rejoice and rejoice in Christ the Savior, the Conqueror of death.

In fulfillment of this Commandment, we always gather in the temple of God on Saturday evening and Sunday morning (the liturgical day begins in the evening, when the creation of the universe began). After Sunday service, Christians abstain from work until the evening, studying the Word of God and doing good deeds. We can work these days only to help the poor, the orphan, the widow, the sick, the temple of the Lord, but in no case for ourselves.

Christians also celebrate other holidays. Of these, the most important is Easter, followed by twelve main holidays:

. Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary - September 8 according to the Julian calendar (old style) / September 21 according to the Gregorian calendar (new style).

. Exaltation of the Life-Giving Cross of the Lord - September 14 / September 27.

. Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary into the temple - November 21 / December 4.

. Christmas – December 25 / January 7.

. Epiphany (Epiphany) – January 6 / January 19.

. Presentation of the Lord - February 2 / February 15.

. Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary - March 25 / April 7.

. Transfiguration of the Lord – August 6 / August 19.

. Dormition of the Blessed Virgin Mary – August 15 / August 28.

. The Entry of the Lord into Jerusalem is a week before Easter.

. The Ascension of the Lord is forty days after Easter.

. Pentecost, the Day of the Holy Trinity (Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles), - fifty days after Easter.

In addition to holidays, this Commandment commands us to observe the fasts established by the Church, in accordance with the words and example of Christ. Fasting helps defeat the devil, strengthens prayer and makes it possible to control your heart. During fasting, one must abstain from meat and dairy foods (fish is also prohibited during strict fasts), as well as from overeating and drunkenness (unacceptable, however, always). By mutual agreement, marital communication also ceases at this time. During fasting, one must refrain from empty entertainment, remain in prayer, read the Bible, and give more alms. Of course, fasting does not apply to the sick, pregnant, nursing, in the army, in prison, and traveling. They fast to the best of their ability.

The Church has four large (multi-day) fasts and one-day fasts.

Multi-day posts:

. Lent begins seven weeks before Easter and ends on Easter night.

. Petrovsky (apostolic fast) begins a week after the day of the Holy Trinity and lasts until the feast of the apostles Peter and Paul (June 29 / July 12).

. The Assumption Fast begins on August 1/14 and ends on the day of the Dormition of the Blessed Virgin Mary (August 15/28).

. Christmas (Filippov) fast - begins on November 15/28 and continues until the Nativity of Christ (December 25/January 7).

One-day fasts are primarily Wednesday and Friday throughout the year (except for Bright Week - the week after Easter, Trinity Week - after Pentecost, Christmastide - the period from Christmas to Epiphany, the Week of the Publican and the Pharisee - the third week before Lent and Maslenitsa - weeks before Lent). On Wednesday and Friday, Christians fast, fulfilling the words of Christ: “The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days” (Mark 2:20).

Remembering the betrayal of the Lord by Judas, we fast on Wednesday, and on Friday we mourn the Crucifixion of the Lord. According to the Rule of the Holy Apostles, anyone who does not fast on Wednesday and Friday and during Lent without good reason is excommunicated from the Church.

Other one-day fasts are: the day of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (September 14/27) - also the day of remembrance of the Crucifixion; The beheading of St. John the Baptist (August 29/September 1) and Epiphany Christmas Eve (January 5/18).

These are the requirements of the fourth Commandment.

It is clear that violation of these requirements is a sin. Sins against the Fourth Commandment include parasitism, working on holidays, breaking fasts, and spending holidays in ungodly activities - drunkenness, debauchery. But the Bible says: “And you shall keep the Sabbath, for it is holy to you: whoever defiles it shall surely be put to death; whoever begins to do business in it, that soul must be destroyed from among his people; For six days let them do work, and on the seventh a Sabbath of rest, dedicated to the Lord: whoever does work on the Sabbath day shall be put to death” (Ex. 31:14-15).

But now another terrible sin has appeared against this Commandment, such as celebrating the holidays of the devil instead of (or together with) the days of God - various pagan celebrations. This includes the celebration of the “Eastern New Year”, and participation in the “Day of Neptune”, in various solemn days of other religions. This includes the performance of numerous pagan rituals, such as the burning of Maslenitsa, and the following of Eastern traditions for the New Year. All these actions are blatant atheism and a grave sin against the Creator. The early Christians went to their death to avoid doing what their descendants so easily allow themselves to do. According to church rules, those who do such things are excommunicated from Communion for six years! And if a person does not repent of these evil deeds, then his fate is to be with idolaters.

Evil good or good evil?

Is it good to be a traitor? "What a question?! - the respectable reader will be indignant. - Of course not!". And he will be right. But, alas, today not everyone thinks so, thanks to the active propaganda of betrayal propagated by cinema. Why is this happening?

Black and white cinema. The topic of betrayal and betrayal was clearly condemned by society until recently. To be a coward, a deserter, and therefore a scoundrel and a scoundrel was considered shameful and brought general and indelible contempt upon the head of the bearer of these low qualities. And this was brought up from childhood.

I remember mine, which happened in the 70s of the last century (oh, how quickly time flies!), when in outdoor games of “war” no one wanted to voluntarily become a fascist or Vlasovite, and in games of “mothers and daughters” among girls there were no people willing to have a lover or hand over their dolls to an orphanage - essentially becoming the same traitor.

Why is this and not otherwise? Such a question was not asked then, because the answer was “staken out” in the subconscious, where our gene code is recorded. Betrayal was equated to the most terrible Judas sin of selling Christ, comparable in Soviet times only to treason to the Motherland.

Therefore, good remained good, and evil remained evil, respectively, without mixing into halftones. And this is not our merit, but those who, while raising us, shaped our traditions and culture, including by composing epics, fairy tales and songs, and making films.

Over the past 40 years, a lot has changed (oh, how quickly time flies!), there is neither the country that produced those very films, nor the very concept of “children’s cinema,” and today it has been seriously supplanted by the Internet. However, what is being filmed today, especially abroad, is increasingly difficult to classify as masterpieces, but can be compared with sophisticated propaganda of evil, when it dresses up in the familiar white clothes of goodness, truth and justice.

This is easier to understand if we recognize that the main supplier to the market of such film sabotage is the “dream factory” Hollywood, controlled by the Pentagon and the CIA, which has long ago transformed from a supplier of quite decent “happy endings” into a producer of increasingly aggressive films, thoroughly saturated with anti-Soviet and Russophobic propaganda. But today the creators of dreams have already overcome this level - on the agenda are supranational, religious and, if you like, universal values, to which war has been declared.

Their aim and precisely calculated blow includes such important categories for our national identity as heroism, loyalty, love, duty, and self-sacrifice. The technology here is quite simple and is designed for the gradual assimilation of new “truths” through the introduction of a new type of heroes into the plot, since the well-known old ones are not suitable for this role.

Or a conscious reformatting is done, when a former negative character, without getting rid of old habits, is endowed with positive qualities, and the positive character accordingly becomes a carrier of negativity, i.e. black becomes white and vice versa. Moreover, there is every reason to believe that this is being done quite consciously.

Wow heroes! This is also consciously realized by those who received the vaccine from Arina Rodionovna and the “good old cinema”, that is, the older generation, where I include myself. That's why we notice, looking at the screen, that something is wrong here! After all, we know that “a fairy tale is a lie, but there is a hint in it...”. In our folklore and classical works, unlike life, there has always been a moral element, where evil is fully exposed and most often punished. The forces of good, personified by quite sympathetic heroes, won, and the carriers of evil and traitors were punished. But sometimes, through their repentance, they were forgiven and then reconciliation began - here is “... a lesson for good fellows.”

But in Hollywood film opuses of recent decades, everything is often mixed up or turned upside down. In almost every second film, a positive hero is clearly visible - a traitor. The plot is increasingly being built according to one familiar template, so that the viewer does not have the opportunity to think and judge, but can simply take his side. Heroes here increasingly become traitors, and traitors become heroes, but this is presented as a natural choice, without Shakespeare’s torment and the moral torment of Dostoevsky’s heroes, as an uncontested necessity.

Convenient characters for justifying murders and betrayals have become, for example, favorite characters from the popular TV series Guardians of the Galaxy and Pirates of the Caribbean. Yondu, a tough guy who has earned the sympathy of the audience and the head of a gang of space pirates, contrary to established stereotypes, mercilessly kills his entire crew - characters loyal to him, albeit unsympathetic. There is no regret, no repentance - and the viewer involuntarily agrees with him, they say, the evil has been punished. But by whom? True, the soulless villain actually does the right thing - he saves his own son...

For the sake of his treasures, the filibuster Hector Barbossa, who symbolizes in the film a leader endowed with clearly positive, masculine qualities: daring, courage, daring, quite easily betrays his team and friend Jack “Sparrow”. But money is still more important! True, in the end he saves his daughter from death... Both pirates die, showing self-sacrifice, and the aura of good heroes is assigned to them. Forgiveness of betrayal is simplified to the point of indecency: without regret, repentance, or even the slightest attempt!

The film "Fast and Furious 6" from the popular series of the same name represents another attempt to mix the previous canons of the genre. The leader of the gang, Owen Shaw, an inhuman and cruel killer with signs of a maniac, obsessed with the idea of mastering a chip that opens up great opportunities, and his brother Deckart, who has repeatedly stepped over the corpses of the people he killed, still end up in prison, thanks to the main positive hero Toretto. Has justice been served? No. According to the scriptwriter's idea, the evil that still exists in the world can only be overcome with the help of released killers who have the special charisma of “real men.”

It is they, unrepentant criminals who have not served their time in prison, who save the world from the next villains. And even the son of their enemy, Toretto, who was taken hostage by them. Manipulating children is generally a favorite move of screenwriters, because for the sake of a child’s tears, you can neglect everything else! How “humane” this is and almost according to Dostoevsky! The viewer who shed a tear forgets who these saviors were before and applauds the noble heroes! The child’s father is also grateful to them; as a result, the former enemies, the policeman and the gangster, shake hands, the key word sounds: “Brotherhood!” Evil is punished by evil and good hurries towards it to fraternize.

Not only the viewer, but also the characters should have a short memory. The villain, without any reason, suddenly joins the ranks of the defenders of good, and the good heroes descend to low and vile actions. This can be seen in the series about the mythical Asgard and the god brothers Thor and Locke. They, of course, like the main characters in Transformers, are not entirely human, so there is little demand for them. So they allow themselves to change their behavior: yesterday they destroyed cities, and today they declare themselves the saviors of humanity, without removing the horned helmet from their heads! A good savior - isn’t this the cinematic forerunner of the Antichrist described in the Apocalypse of John the Theologian? What is the conclusion? There is nothing permanent and sacred - there are emotions, feelings, passions that rule the world!

Often in such films there is a woman - a temptress who, having gained power over the positive hero, forces him to betray his ideals and friends. And he does this not even for the sake of love, but often for the sake of banal profit, profit or saving his own skin. Wow hero!

A fairy tale is a lie. Now let’s imagine in the place of the viewer not a corrosive pensioner, but a teenager or child who watch these films uncritically! What will they take away from them? That good is a relative and transitory category, and that evil can be “very good,” especially if in time it goes over to the side of... well, this very... good.

However, children and teenagers were taken care of separately and, what is especially sad, not by overseas, but by our filmmakers. I would like to show this using the example of the film “The Last Hero,” which was released in 2021 and filmed in the tradition of Russian fairy tales. (Script writers: Vitaly Shlyappo, Dimitry Yan, Vasily Kutsenko, Pavel Danilov, Igor Tudvasev. Stage director: Dmitry Dyachenko). It’s a shame that the scale of the Russian fairy tale is purely overseas, worked on by a certain George Callis.

A characteristic feature of this film is the unusual presentation of heroes traditional for this genre. Here Koschey the Immortal, Baba Yaga, and Vodyanoi are shown as quite sympathetic personalities, ready to selflessly help our contemporary Ivan, who accidentally ended up in the fairy-tale country of Belogoria. He needs to find a treasure sword to return home.

Where have the positive heroes gone – our heroes? But they are precisely shown as unexpectedly cruel and pragmatic people who do not evoke any sympathy among young viewers. They are at enmity with each other, constantly quarrel and betray old friends. In this way, they are trying to instill in them the idea that the characters traditional for Russian folk tales, symbolizing dark forces, are in essence not so bad and are capable of generous deeds and even heroic deeds. But the heroes of the national epic and epics, Ilya Muromets and Dobrynya Nikitich, evoke rejection, hostility and condemnation.

A mature person will figure out where the truth is and where the evil fiction is, but what about a teenager? Will he, after this very opportunistic and tolerant presentation of evil, begin to consider that Hitler, Bandera, and Chikatilo are not such villains, but people who can also be understood, forgiven and justified? But our real heroes, no longer fairy-tale ones, but those with whose portraits we walk around the “Immortal Regiment”, and those to whom we lay flowers on May 9, maybe not such heroes after all? And I immediately remembered “the boy Kolya from Urengoy”, who, speaking in the Bundestag, took pity on the captured Germans from the Stalingrad cauldron.

And finally - the main character of the fairy tale, Ivan, in whose image the modern teenager is conceived. He is not heroically funny, he messes up at every step, constantly lets his friends down and makes him smile, which is not so scary, because the classic Ivanushka the fool had problems with this. But now the goal has been achieved - he has the sought-after treasure sword.

And then he needs to make a decision: the fairy-tale Vasilisa, who has fallen in love with him, ends up in the hands of his enemies, whom, according to all the canons of Russian fairy tales and epics, he must save! But it was not to be, this Ivan turns out to be not a fool at all and is not going to save some fool, but prefers to save himself, his beloved, avoiding the feat, the action prescribed for the hero! This is no good anymore, because there is betrayal, which, however, does not in the least bother the creators of such a masterpiece, filmed with our money!

Doesn’t this lay out a clear program for betrayal, treason, pragmatism and concentrated egoism? But what about Suvorov’s “perish yourself and save your comrade”, and the feat of the crew of the cruiser “Varyag”, who preferred death in battle to the shame of captivity? Or the current Heroes of Russia who acted similarly - pilot Roman Filipov, intelligence officer Alexander Prokhorenko or policeman Magomed Nurbagandov? The basis of their feat is the cult of self-sacrifice and right heroes instilled in them from childhood. According to the plot of the fairy tale film, it turns out that all this is complete nonsense and the main task of the hero, using other people, is to save his own skin! Do we need a movie like this?

So the question “is it good to be a traitor” has not lost its relevance; it must be asked. And not only for children and teenagers, but also for fully grown men responsible for the appearance of such films on our screens.

Roman Alekseevich Ilyushchenko, reserve lieutenant colonel, member of the Moscow Union of Journalists, religious scholar