In a word, the concept of the Kingdom of God contains all the teaching of Christ the Saviour, all of His economy; it constitutes His glory, the whole meaning of His appearance on earth, and His entire divine mind. Hence, to be a Christian, or at least to consider oneself entitled to judge the Gospel authoritatively and not to understand clearly and definitely what the Kingdom of God is, is an impossible thing for a sensible person. This is the same as considering oneself an expert in philosophy and having no idea of Plato, Aristotle, Kant and Hegel. Nevertheless, the majority of those who reverently read the Gospel and critically analyze it are distinguished by an extremely vague, erroneous idea of the Kingdom of God.

"The Gospel directs the gaze of the believer exclusively to heaven," they usually say in such cases, "it forgets that man is created from the earth, chained to matter by his very body; This cannot be ignored. The birds to which the Gospel refers, and they build nests, take care of their chicks. Can we, who are endowed with material needs greater than birds, be completely indifferent to the immediate needs of the body? To insist on such a demand is not to go against nature, to demand the impossible with excessive rigorism? We are warmed by the bright sun, caressed by the aroma of the fields, enchanted by the starry glitter, captivated by the trills of the nightingale. Can admiration for the beauty spilled in nature, delight in the blessings of the world scattered around us be criminal? Why then was all this created, why are certain instincts invested in us"? In response to a long series of questions posed, we have to say one thing: all these convincing arguments strike into space, not into the Gospel, but into an empty place. First of all, the Gospel strictly and clearly distinguishes between the concepts of the Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of God. In the speech of Jesus Christ about the fate of the righteous beyond the grave we read: "Then shall the King say to those who are on His right hand, Come, ye blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world" (Matt. 25:34). In a farewell conversation with His disciples at the Last Supper, Jesus Christ, reassuring them before the impending separation, says: "Let not your heart be troubled... In My Father's house there are many mansions. And if it were not so, I would say to you, I am coming to prepare a place for you" (John 14:1-2). In both cases it is equally clear that the kingdom of heaven - the kingdom of the glory of the righteous, already "prepared" - is a fait accompli. But the Kingdom of God, which is spoken of in parables, in the Lord's Prayer, and in the indication of the ultimate goal of man's activity, has not yet come in its entirety; it is a matter of a more or less distant future; founded on earth by Christ the Saviour, this Kingdom is subject to further dispensation, and has yet to come. We do not say, "Thy kingdom come," or "Thy kingdom be made," but "let it come," because it has already begun, but it has not yet embraced all mankind, has not yet included us within its limits; we are still beyond its boundaries, outside the sphere of the grace-filled action of its laws. It will come when our worldview will be imbued with the spirit of the Gospel, when the whole structure of our life will contribute to the demands of divine truth, when our sympathies will breathe with the pure love of Christ; It will come for those who are oppressed by a reality depressing with vulgarity and filth, who await the blossoming of truth and goodness, who hunger and thirst for truth, who wish to conquer evil. Whether society, a whole people, or all of humanity are imbued with these aspirations, the Kingdom of God will come for a given circle of people, for a nation, for the whole world; if individuals are imbued with them, the Kingdom of God will come only for them. For those who are happy and content with the twilight of the lawlessness of the weak who reign over the earth, who place egoism and their own passions above all else, who find the striving for the infinite ridiculous and incomprehensible, for all such the Kingdom of God is incomprehensible and inaccessible. The Kingdom of God is the organization of persons, forces, and phenomena realized in history, in which God reigns and His rational holy will reigns exclusively, or, in other words, more simply: the Kingdom of God is the righteous, morally perfect life of people on earth, awakened by Christ the Savior and built according to His Gospel covenant. The triumph of such a kingdom consists in the complete victory of good over evil in the human heart. When Jesus Christ came out to preach, surveying the world life with His mind's eye and evaluating it from the moral point of view, He defined the general impression as follows: "The whole world lies in evil" (1 John 5:19). Evil in the form of widespread violence, the lack of rights of the weak, the insolent licentiousness of the rich, the bestial stupefaction of the crowd, the unbridled of egoism and base passions was a universal fact, was a law of the world. The struggle against this kingdom of evil, its overthrow and the creation of the Kingdom of God in its place became the main work of the Savior. The time has come for the fulfillment of God's first promise to people: "The seed of the woman shall bruise the head of the serpent" (Gen. 3:15). "People who languish under the burden of unrighteousness and iniquity," Jesus Christ seems to say to the world, "the life that you have created for yourselves cannot give you the happiness you seek and possible. Evil begets only evil, and true happiness, the highest is good, which is born exclusively of love and goodness. If you want to find it, if you are burdened by the oppression of the evil that reigns in the world, come to Me and learn from Me. My words will pour a healing balm into your tormented, aching hearts. I will show you the path that will bring peace to your soul. Submit wholeheartedly to My teaching, walk in the path which I have laid out before you, put My yoke upon yourselves, and you will see that My yoke is easy and My burden is light. In place of the long, hopeless, suffocating night, with My entry into the world, the dawn of a bright, quiet day dawns. Hitherto, in the midst of the general depressing lawlessness, only like a spark in the hearts of the few chosen ones of the earth lurked great hope for a better future. Now it is destined to come true. Times have come true. The Kingdom of God is at hand. It is near, it is here, beside you, around you, but it is necessary that it penetrate and embrace your heart, the source of all activity and the guiding principle of human life. Clear the place for God in your heart, give space to truth and goodness in your life, free yourself from the lies, violence and gross selfishness that reign in you, repent." "Repent" was the first word with which the Gospel addressed humanity. The possibility of the desired renewal of life, the coming of the Kingdom of God among people, is conditioned primarily by repentance. If you do not repent, said the Divine Herald of a new life, you cannot enter the Kingdom of God." The Russian word "repent" is not sufficiently expressive, does not set off the necessary thought with the proper relief; It does not have the desired brightness. In the original, in the Greek text of the Gospel, the meaning of the word is outlined more prominently, its content appears more sharply. There we read: "methanofatef"; Literally, it means: change your mind, change your thoughts, change your basic point of view. In this case, the words of Jesus Christ, His requirement of repentance for entry into the Kingdom of God, acquire the following meaning.

If they are not systematically stifled in oneself, if they are given space, development and strengthened in the soul, they will illuminate life with a dazzling, enchanting brilliance. Life will become unrecognizable: the power of evil will be replaced by the charm of love. And this Kingdom of God in people can come at any given moment. Only such people as are available are not fit for a new life; they need to be renewed in spirit. It is necessary that they make a radical reassessment of all their aspirations, be imbued with a new trend, the spirit of all-embracing evangelical love, the pacifying meekness of Christ, an irrepressible and insatiable attraction to the truth. The future bright life depicted by Jesus Christ sets an indispensable condition for people to reflect in themselves the Gospel image of man, to become accustomed to relate to life and respond to its various manifestations as Jesus Christ Himself treated and responded to it. The Gospel has brought to the fore with special force the idea, unfortunately often not understood even now, that just as the potter determines the quality of his pots by his skill, his diligence and attention to work, so man determines the character and direction of his life by his own strength, his qualities, and the nature of his nature. The latter cannot take on a different character unless the basic properties, the very nature of man, change, take on a different character. No coercive influence from outside, no blind obedience to authority is capable of producing a complete and, above all, irreversible change in life. For a radical change in life, for its complete turn towards the Kingdom of God, it is necessary to have a clear understanding of the greatness of the moral ideal of the Gospel, a vividly felt disgust for the former way of life, based on serving the animal inclinations of our coarse, base nature, and a thirst to find satisfaction of the higher needs of the spirit. For the clarification and substantiation of this idea, the conversation between Jesus Christ and Nicodemus is especially characteristic and instructive. One of the leaders of the Jews, a man named Nicodemus, came to Jesus by night and said to Him, "Rabbi! we know that you are a teacher who came from God; for no one can do such miracles as you do, unless God is with him. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God" (John 3:1-3). If we think more carefully about the above passage of the conversation, compare the content of Nicodemus' words with the speech of Jesus Christ, we will see that Jesus does not respond to Nicodemus, does not further develop the thought of his nocturnal interlocutor, but abruptly interrupts him, giving the conversation a sharp turn in the other direction. Nicodemus says: "Although my fellow Pharisees hate You, are hostile to Your teaching among the people, I cannot but acknowledge You as a Divine Teacher, and bow down before You. Your miracles convince me that you are sent by God; I am Thy disciple, and I have come to Thee to bear witness to it." - "If you think so," Jesus interrupts him, "I cannot recognize you as my disciple.

My task is to suppress the evil, depraved will in people and to subordinate the entire structure of their personal and social life to the most holy will of the Higher Mind and the Highest Love, the will of the Heavenly Father. "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord! Lord!" shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven" (Matt. 7:21). Have you understood all this? Whoever wants to follow Me must renounce all that is base, shameful, evil, die to sin, and enter into a new life purified, imbued with an exalted spirit; "Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God" (John 3:3). Life is what people create it; its distinctive character is determined by the properties of the spiritual nature of man. If humanity wants life to change for the better, so that the sum of goodness and truth in the world increases, it must be reborn spiritually, raise its own level, and strengthen its energy in the service of truth and love. That is why Jesus Christ in the Sermon on the Mount emphasizes with particular insistence the rise of moral obligations that is obligatory for the sons of the Kingdom of God.

Part 2

Ye have heard that it was said unto them of old time, saith he, Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not deprive a man of life. But I say to you: Do not offend your neighbor with vain anger, be afraid to offend him even with speech, to deprive him of the dignity of a person in words. You have heard that it was said to them of old time: Do not be dissolute, do not turn the body, which was destined to be the receptacle of the Spirit of God, into an instrument of service to the worst instincts of the flesh. But I say to you, beware of even filthy thoughts, turn your eyes away from that which may defile the purity of your thoughts. Ye have heard that it was said to them of old time, Thou shalt keep thy oaths before the Lord, and fear to appear as a transgressor of them. But I say unto you, that ye keep every word of yours sacredly, that ye may always speak one truth without an oath; if yes, then yes, and if not, then no. You have heard that it is said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, that is, if you take revenge on your neighbor, do not take revenge on him with interest; Do not repay a wound with death, as Lamech did, seventy times seven times for an injury (Gen. 4:24), but for a wound with a wound, and for a wound with a plague. But I say: do not pay evil for evil at all; When someone strikes you on your right cheek, do not respond in kind, but without fervent challenge, without offensive reproaches, give yourself over to the will of the offender. Revenge adds evil to evil, pours oil into the fire and fanns the flames of enmity; meekness and gentleness disarm hatred, subdue rage, and confuse brutal violence. Ye have heard that it was said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and hate thy enemy. But I say unto you, Love all men, and hate only their evil deeds; drive away malice, destroy lies, smash violence and pharisees like a fiend of hell, and have pity on those who serve all this; the persecutors are more miserable than the persecuted: the Kingdom of God is no longer accessible to them; their hearts are hardened, their minds are hardened; they do not know what they are doing. Pray for them and do good to those who hate you. Remember that in life, as in a common treasury, not a single human deed, not a single word, not a single thought, not a single movement of the heart is lost without a trace. Everything leaves its mark, everything in one way or another, for better or for worse, affects the general character of the life around us. Therefore, be faithful to the moral law in small things, as well as in great things. "Always and everywhere seek first of all the Kingdom of God and his righteousness." This, in a few words, is the legislative work of Jesus. If it does not enter into the flesh and blood of man, does not transform his spiritual nature, does not become his life force, and if this power does not spring up, the Kingdom of God will not come for this. For the Kingdom of God, one repentant publican, one sinner who washes the feet of Jesus with tears, is a greater gain than ninety-nine majestically calm, haughty righteous men who imagine themselves to have reached the pinnacle of virtue. In them, the stream of life stopped its movement, froze and had already managed to twitch with mud; in the publican and the sinner, the spring of eternal life, long restrained, littered with a heap of vicious passions and desires, broke through to freedom at the touch of the Savior's hand, suddenly overflowed in a wide stream, washed away all the spiritual impurity accumulated over the years, and in its crystal streams reflected all the brilliance, all the beauty of the Gospel life, and the farther, the deeper it lays its channel into the heart of the villain and harlot. The Gospel is sparse in words for details that do not directly relate to the work of Jesus, but even those few features that we find in the story of the repentance of the publican or the forgiveness of the harlot are enough to vividly imagine the act of complete spiritual rebirth that took place in them. Let us recall the parable of the publican and the Pharisee. Two people entered the church to pray; One was a Pharisee, the other a publican. The Pharisee is an honorable regular visitor to the temple; He knows everything here and everyone knows him. With his head majestically raised, with a majestic step, he passes among the pilgrims parting before him and stands on a dais, in the first place. His deeds of virtue, like he himself now, are in the sight of everyone: he is in church at prayer, and in fasting, and in charity always and everywhere in front. Aware of this, with a feeling of deep self-satisfaction, he says: "God, I thank You that I am not like others, like the publican at the doorstep." Here the goal is achieved: the wretched moral and religious ideal is realized; There is nowhere else to go, he remains in frozen immobility to proudly admire himself. He Who said of Himself, "I am Life," does not find His life in the Pharisee; the Pharisee was not born for the Kingdom of God. The publican is a different matter. He is undoubtedly a vicious man; his whole life is full of grave crimes; Everyone despises him, and he does not think highly of himself. Under some accidental suggestion, he entered the church today together with others. He had not been here for a long time; everything is alien to him, unfamiliar to him. He surveyed the vaults and walls of the church and, not daring to go further, timidly stopped at the threshold. From these sacred walls, which had not been seen for a long time, a swarm of past memories flooded over him. He remembered how he had come here with his parents every holiday as a child; here his mother first taught him to fold his hands in prayer; he then loved to merge with the crowd of thousands in one prayerful cry of Israel, in the singing of the touching psalms of David. How clearly his childish voice sounded, how much spiritual purity, ecstatic love for God was heard in every sound! With what sinking heart he listened to the fiery words of the writings of the ancient prophets; how he was indignant with them at the iniquities of the wicked, and in the spirit and power of Elijah, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, he dreamed of serving Jehovah! What happened to all this? Years after years rush through my memory in a string, and the further time passes, the darker my soul becomes. Both the mother's speeches and the church with prayer are forgotten; Both conscience and childhood dreams are forgotten. Like leaves, picked up by bad weather, images of the past flash in the memory and crush it like a heavy stone, oppressing the head on the chest. A callous heart trembled, Remembered the forces that died shamefully, Youth was a pity; Burning tears welled up in his eyes, and, pouring down in an irrepressible stream, like a rainstorm in a hot season, refreshed the weary soul of the publican; malice and hatred for people melted away in him, spiritual dirt was washed away with tears, the vicious heart was renewed, reborn. The publican came to the temple as a great sinner, and came out as a son of the Kingdom of God. "Verily, truly," teaches the Gospel, "unless you turn and repent like the publican, you cannot enter into the kingdom of God." Consequently, the coming of the Kingdom of God on earth, the improvement of human life is possible only under the condition of the spiritual rebirth of people; without the penetration of individuals by the spirit of Christ, the renewal of society is impossible, and no social progress is conceivable. "The kingdom of heaven," says its Founder, "is like leaven, which a woman took and put into three measures of flour, until all was leavened" (Matt. 13:33). And "the Kingdom of God shall not come in a visible way, and they shall not say, Behold, it is here, or, behold, it is there. For behold, the Kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:20-21). Thus, the history of the Kingdom of God, strictly speaking, is the history of the human soul. It originates in the recesses of the human heart and must first take root within us. The external conditions of life play a secondary role in the fate of the Kingdom of God; The success of its emergence and growth depends primarily on the internal qualities of a person. A certain moral preparation is necessary, as if it were a spiritual means. "No man can come to me," says Jesus Christ, "if thou shalt come unto me? the Father shall not draw him" (John 6:44), if he himself does not have at least a vague attraction to the Father. This explains why sometimes, despite all the seemingly advantageous conditions for the perception of truth, one person does not recognize it, and, on the contrary, another, under all the most disadvantageous conditions, without any apparent reason, gives himself entirely to it. The parable of the sower serves as a beautiful illustration (Matt. 13:3-8 and 18-23). The sower scatters the seed over the clearing with a wide swing of his hand; The seed is equally viable, but the result is different. On the trampled road, the seed did not penetrate the ground and was trampled; on a stony place withered; The thorns died out. And only the fourth seed, which fell on good ground, bore abundant fruit. The reason for the difference in success is not in the grain, but in the soil. So it is with the Kingdom of God, with his seed! Once sown in the world, it will not die out. We may not notice its development (for us, the slaves of the moment, the work that has been going on for centuries may seem to have stopped in development), but it is growing. "The kingdom of God is like this, as if a man cast seed into the ground, and he sleeps, and rises night and day; and how the seed sprouts and grows, he does not know, for the earth of itself brings forth first greenery, then an ear, then a full grain in the ear" (Mark 4:26-28). The seed is full of powerful vital juices; it is fraught with immense powers; In a small seed lies the germ, the beginning of the life of a large tree, and through it a whole shady grove, if only the seed finds a suitable environment, an appropriate soil. It is exactly the same with the word of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is "like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown in the ground, is the least of all the seeds on the earth; but when it is sown, it sprouts, and becomes greater than all crops, and sends forth great branches, so that the birds of the air may take refuge under its shade" (Mark 4:32). A few decades ago, a pharaoh's mummy was found in one of the pyramids of Egypt. In the room where the remains of the once powerful lord of the Nile rested, there were many items of ancient Egyptian utensils and, by the way, a vessel with wheat grain. A papyrus scroll found there stated that this wheat had lain in the pyramid for more than three thousand years. When it was sown, it gave a wonderful harvest. The seed of the Kingdom of God, the seed of truth, the inspired word of the call to good, preserves in itself, of course, not less, but greater vitality. Received by the heart, sooner or later it will bear rich fruit. The whole question is: is only the heart capable of accepting this seed, is the inner world of man, his inclinations, a convenient soil for the growth of Christ's seed? If not, this soil must be created: the road trampled by the feet of passers-by should be loosened with a plough and harrow, a stony place should be covered with a layer of alluvial fat earth, thorns and weeds should be cleared from an abandoned wasteland. It is the most sacred duty of all those who consciously desire the coming of the Kingdom of God in relation to those who are indifferent to its fate and dispensation, both in word and deed, to repeat to them tirelessly, like John, the Forerunner of Christ: "Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight" (Luke 3:4). True, there are people who are irretrievably lost to the Kingdom of God; the world of bright ideals and lofty impulses is inaccessible to them; their souls are eaten through by the vulgarity and coarseness of base instincts. Jesus Christ Himself said of them: "Do not give holy things to dogs, and he does not know, for the earth of itself brings forth first greenery, then an ear, then a full grain in the ear" (Mark 4:26-28). The seed is full of powerful vital juices; it is fraught with immense powers; In a small seed lies the germ, the beginning of the life of a large tree, and through it a whole shady grove, if only the seed finds a suitable environment, an appropriate soil. It is exactly the same with the word of the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God is "like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown in the ground, is the least of all the seeds on the earth; but when it is sown, it sprouts, and becomes greater than all crops, and sends forth great branches, so that the birds of the air may take refuge under its shade" (Mark 4:32). A few decades ago, a pharaoh's mummy was found in one of the pyramids of Egypt. In the room where the remains of the once powerful lord of the Nile rested, there were many items of ancient Egyptian utensils and, by the way, a vessel with wheat grain. A papyrus scroll found there stated that this wheat had lain in the pyramid for more than three thousand years. When it was sown, it gave a wonderful harvest. The seed of the Kingdom of God, the seed of truth, the inspired word of the call to good, preserves in itself, of course, not less, but greater vitality. Received by the heart, sooner or later it will bear rich fruit. The whole question is: is only the heart capable of accepting this seed, is the inner world of man, his inclinations, a convenient soil for the growth of Christ's seed? If not, this soil must be created: the road trampled by the feet of passers-by should be loosened with a plough and harrow, a stony place should be covered with a layer of alluvial fat earth, thorns and weeds should be cleared from an abandoned wasteland. It is the most sacred duty of all those who consciously desire the coming of the Kingdom of God in relation to those who are indifferent to its fate and dispensation, both in word and deed, to repeat to them tirelessly, like John, the Forerunner of Christ: "Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight" (Luke 3:4). True, there are people who are irretrievably lost to the Kingdom of God; the world of bright ideals and lofty impulses is inaccessible to them; their souls are eaten through by the vulgarity and coarseness of base instincts. Jesus Christ Himself said of them: "Give not holy things to dogs, neither cast your pearls before swine" (Matt. 7:6). Once you have finally become convinced [1] that a person is deaf to any good call, does not yield to any moral influence, do not waste your enthusiasm on him; direct the heat of your soul to another, more grateful goal. But such moral freaks are few; They are not a common phenomenon in humanity, but a sad exception - cripples, monsters, idiots. Usually people are always people and nothing human is alien to them; if they often display the extreme coarseness and vulgarity of their base nature, they are also at times capable of displaying extraordinary greatness of spirit. It is not for nothing that Pascal called man both the pride and the abomination of the universe. It happens that the life of desperate villains and ordinary vulgars flashes for a moment with such moral beauty that it is impossible not to bow down and not to think seriously. Just as volcanic eruptions reveal to us the secrets of the interior of the globe, so these accidental, exceptional outbursts of noble enthusiasm speak of the presence in the spiritual world of man, albeit hidden, luminous forces of love and goodness. You just need to be able and willing to call them to life, to give them space. We know that "tearing a heap of manure, the rooster found a pearl seed." In the soul of a person, probably, a more valuable find can be made. Let the human heart often be a disgusting moral cesspool, but if we diligently rummage through it, we will find there not one, but a handful of pearls of rare play and beauty. That is why the Saviour said: "Take heed, despise not one of these little ones" (Matt. 18:10). If, with the appropriate expenditure of labor and skill, we transform swampy swamps into flowering fields by drainage and drainage ditches, and sun-scorched deserts into cultivated lands by irrigation, then will it be possible that by proper work on the souls of our neighbors corresponding successes will not be achieved in this field as well? The great geometer and mechanic Archimedes said: "Give me a foothold outside our planet, and I will turn the earth over for you." The Gospel also says: "Give me in people a heart imbued with love for man and for truth, and I will turn your morals, customs, and entire social life upside down." The modern, even intelligent masses in their moral development are strikingly behind their intellectual and aesthetic development. One cannot be sufficiently surprised at how little attention is paid to the terrible contrast between rapid intellectual and artistic progress on the one hand, and the almost complete immobility of the moral level on the other. With a smile of regret, not to say the least, we look at the scholasticism of the Middle Ages; admiring the art of Raphael, the virtuosity of Rubinstein and Sarasate, we consider the harmony of the Suzdal bogomoses to be a relic of uncultured antiquity; and at the same time, in our moral views, we are guided and content with the ancient pagan law of the fist. Not long ago, one might say, the other day we heard how the royal representative of the nation of Kant and Hegel sent a brother to the pagans to defend the Gospel with a fist dressed in armor. There is nowhere to go further than this. Jesus Christ, sending His disciples out to preach, said: "I send you out as sheep among wolves; be ye meek as doves" (Matt. 10:16). In the modern peculiar apostolic mission, sheep are replaced by armadillos, and pigeons are replaced by the product of Krupna. And the attitude of the cultural world to such a blasphemous perversion of the basic commandments of Christ is characteristic. If someone were to pour sulphuric acid on the Sistine Madonna, as was done with one of Vereshchagin's paintings in Vienna, if he smashed the statue of Apollo Belvedere or the Venus de Milo, if he destroyed the Vatican, the whole enlightened world would be horrified, how he would be indignant at gross vandalism; what thunder and lightning he would throw at the new Herostratus! An insolent insult to the Highest Truth and Love, thrown openly before the whole world for the sake of idle chatter, does not disturb anyone's conscience, does not distort the moral sense; at best, it causes a shrug of the shoulders. Is this not convincing proof of the moral stupidity of our cultured crowd? How, consequently, the entire mass of mankind is still far from the Kingdom of God, and how workers imbued with the spirit of Christ are needed in order to carry this mass along with them, to clarify in their consciousness the charm of the life of the Gospel! "Love, as much love as possible! The Kingdom of God has already begun on earth, but it is still hidden from the majority of people by a thick canopy of lies, violence and egoism. May the sun of unselfish, self-sacrificing love dispel this darkness before them.

Such work to prepare the ground for the Gospel, to explain to the environment what the Kingdom of God is, and to awaken an exciting interest in it, is all the more necessary since, along with the Savior's preaching about the nearness to us of the Kingdom of God on earth under the condition of repentance, there is a teaching about the possibility of achieving a golden age of general contentment and well-being by means of a radical reorganization of social life by means of an external, legislative (peaceful or violent, revolutionary) way. Supporters of this opinion assert that it is enough to change the laws regulating life, to rebuild society on new economic and political principles worked out by them, and people will change themselves, that social progress invariably entails moral improvement. In short, they shift the center of gravity from inside to outside. In their opinion, it is not a person, not his moral personality that determines the surrounding life, but on the contrary, the external conditions of life: political rights, economic dependence are developed by this or that type of citizens. By themselves, by nature, people differ little from one another. Their distinctive features derive from differences in upbringing and living conditions; In reality, however, the difference in innate faculties in men is not at all so great as we imagine. The difference between men who devote themselves to the most opposite occupations, such as a philosopher and an ordinary porter, depends much less on their nature than on their education, and in general on the conditions in which they are placed. Therefore, if all people are placed in the same conditions of life, if they are surrounded from childhood by a common environment, the whole of humanity will be the same as only a select minority is now. The Gospel reveals in detail the method of influencing man in order to convert him to the Kingdom of God. If your brother sins, rebuke him in private, and if he hearkens to you, you have gained your brother. If he does not listen, take with you one or two more, you may not have been able to approach him, resort to the help of others. If he does not listen to them, tell the church, ask for the assistance of all the members of the community of Christ; and if even then he will not listen, then let him be to you as a heathen and a publican (cf. Matt. 18:15-17)^

Part 3

In the modern social system, the distribution of rights and duties is extremely unequal and illegal: some are entrusted with duties and almost no rights; Others have all rights and privileges and no obligations. For some, life is a spoiled mother, for others it is a fierce stepmother. This arrangement causes discontent among the disadvantaged; envy is born, the desire to get at all costs at least a grain of good, which is used in abundance by the darlings of fate. This desire is often realized by criminal means, and thus, due to the imperfection of the social structure, a significant number of people become vicious: the very order of life creates criminals. The latter circumstance would absolutely not have taken place if society had not been abnormally divided into parasites-exploiters and exploited workers. Let people always have a secure piece of bread, let everyone equally participate in work and in the pleasures of life, and then there will be no murderers or robbers; envy and greed will disappear; Equality, fraternity will reign, and a golden age will come. All this will take place, say the apostles of the expounded teaching, when the main evil that gives rise to inequality between people, private property, is abolished, when there will be no individual entrepreneurs and capitalists, and all productivity will be concentrated in the hands of society itself, the state, which will evenly distribute among individuals both labor and remuneration for it. The quantity of labour will therefore increase considerably, because all will work; It will be possible for all, and not only the chosen ones, to widely enjoy the benefits of life. By demanding of all according to their ability, society will be able to give to each according to his needs. This view is very ancient, and in the ranks of its followers there are hundreds of outstanding minds of various epochs and all cultured nations. The Greek philosopher Plato, the English Chancellor of State Thomas More, the Italian learned monk Campanella, and a number of French, German, and American politicians and writers of the nineteenth century elaborated in great detail the plan for the regeneration of mankind through a radical reorganization of social life. In particulars, each author has his own peculiarities, but in general almost all of them agree on the recognition of the need to transform the whole people into one common industrial army of labor, the sole owner and entrepreneur of which is the state; the state is supposed to be the rightful arbiter and organizer of both the family and even personal life of individual citizens. The state determines each of his occupations, assigns a place of residence, brings up children; he even arranges marriages at his own discretion (Campapella's The Solar State). In a word, the personality is eliminated completely; it is finally absorbed by society, the state. A vivid picture of such an economic system of society, as it is drawn by its supporters now, is presented by Bellamy's novel "Looking Back, or the Next Century", which made a lot of noise around the world. In this fascinatingly and vividly written novel, it is surprising to provide for the arrangement of dwellings under the new order of life, and the distribution of work so that all of them - clean and dirty, easy and difficult - are performed in the same way, and the common use of all kinds of pleasures; One thing is forgotten: the person himself, the nature of his inner world.

The sad death of the Cabet colonies in Texas and Illinois, Owen's settlements in Indiana, phalansteries according to Fourier's plan in France and many others convincingly confirms the opinion of the famous Belgian politician and economist Lavelle about the novel "The Future Century". "Bellamy's dreams will forever remain a utopia until the very heart of man is completely changed." M. Le Bon, the author of The Psychology of Peoples and Masses, says: "Only in the minds of the ignorant masses and in the narrow thought of some fanatics can the idea still hold that important social changes can be effected by decree. The only useful role of institutions is to give legal sanction to changes which have already been accepted by mores and public opinion. They follow these changes, but do not precede them. To believe that the forms of government are of decisive importance in the fate of the people is to indulge in childish dreams. The people cannot get rid of what follows from their mental makeup. Only in himself is his destiny, but not in external circumstances" [1], or, in other words, only the heart of man is the source of all his activity; The determining principle of the character of people's life is its moral nature. A perfect form of social life can be created only by morally perfect people. In the book of the Acts of the Apostles we read: "And the multitude of those who believed had one heart and one soul; and no one called anything of his possessions his own, but they had everything in common... There was no one needy among them; for all who owned lands or houses, when they sold them, brought the price of what was sold, and laid them at the feet of the Apostles; and to each was given what he had need of" (Acts 4:32, 34-35). How far from this first Christian community, created by Galilean fishermen and Jewish ploughmen, to our modern cultured societies, which represent the last word in social wisdom! No matter how the forms of government change, no matter how more and more new economic and political theories are born, and the predatory struggle for existence does not lose its acuteness, man does not cease to be a wolf for man. So it has been and will be until the coarse animal instincts in man give way to the lofty feelings of universal love and pacifying meekness, until the animal heart is taken out of man and the tarnished image of God is clarified in him. "Be ye perfect, even as our Father in heaven is perfect," said Jesus Christ, "and ye shall have a perfect life." In thus resolving the question of the means of improving the future of mankind, the Gospel places the center of gravity of human interests in the moral, spiritual world, and not in the material, external world. The efforts of people who desire the improvement of human life should be directed primarily to the clarification, assimilation and confession of the truth, to the establishment of the Kingdom of God in themselves and in their neighbors. "Seek ye first of all the Kingdom of God and His righteousness," says the Saviour, "and all other things shall be added unto you, and shall inevitably come of their own accord" (Matt. 6:33). The Gospel does not say: "Seek only the Kingdom of God and righteousness," but "seek first of all. Concern for the Kingdom of God, striving for life in truth should be primary in our consciousness, but they do not eliminate the possibility and legitimacy of caring for our bodily needs and needs. According to the teaching of Jesus Christ, the use of material goods, the enjoyment of them in themselves are not necessarily absolutely immoral; Immorality consists in subordinating all one's aspirations and thoughts to material interests. If the Gospel says that a man does not live by bread alone, then it also teaches us to pray: "Give us this day our daily bread" (Matt. 6:II). The needs of the body must be satisfied, but they must not turn into excesses; nor should whims become needs. Food, drink, shelter, and clothing are necessary for man, and by satisfying such a need, man does not become vicious; it is a different matter if this necessity turns into licentiousness. Even Socrates said: "One must eat in order to live"; People would often be willing to live solely to eat. Many people are looking for food not only for nutrition, but also for pleasant taste sensations. The need is complicated by a mass of whims, which become a kind of deity that absorbs a lot of a person's spiritual strength for shameful service to himself and humiliates us to bestial indifference to the needs and sorrows of our neighbors. Oysters and Strasbourg cake, washed down with fine wines, in the presence of starving poverty, are as shameful and criminal a phenomenon as a frenzied dance on a conflagration, drunken merriment at the bedside of the sick. The same thing is repeated with drinking, and with housing, and with clothing, and with many other things. Housing and clothing, necessary as protection from the destructive effects of the elements, turn into a means of vain vanity. Not content with thirst-quenching drinks, man endlessly invents meads, beers, wines, ciders, and liqueurs, which he no longer drinks to quench thirst. Again the need has turned into excess, and excess becomes an implacable tyrant, to whom the best inclinations of the soul are often sacrificed. All these excesses (these are only an insignificant part of them), growing to the extreme, fill the whole soul of man with their shameful and coarse inclinations, drown out in him all that is sublime and holy, and turn him into an animal. Warning against this, the Gospel convinces: "Do not be anxious, and do not say what we shall eat? Or drink? or what to wear? for all these things the Gentiles seek" (Matt. 6:31-32). Only pagans, that is, people with a coarse heart, with an unawakened moral sense, can be satisfied with exclusive concerns about material interests, see in them the only goal, the service of which absorbs all the higher forms of life that have yet to develop. For the sons of the Kingdom of God, the entire external world with all its material goods should be only a means to an end that lies outside and above it. They should not turn away from it, but rise above it. All their thoughts and hopes, all sympathies and labors should be directed primarily and first to the Kingdom of God, to its organization, to the strengthening of God's truth on earth. As for material goods and their enjoyments, their presence or absence, in satisfying the immediate needs of the body, which are few, is of no significant importance for the followers of the Gospel. The marble portico of the Jerusalem Temple, the stone by the well, and the fishing boat on the lake are equally suitable for preaching the gospel of love and truth to people. The mercy of the Samaritan, the repentance of the publican, the devotion of the myrrh-bearing women, and the faith of the Canaanite woman were not determined by the quality and cover of their garments. The speech of Jesus Christ always resounded with authority and captivated with moral beauty, whether he sat at the supper of the rich Pharisees at a selected meal, whether he was at a humble wedding in Cana, whether he shared the meager meal of the Galilean fishermen. In the harsh, scorched heat of the Jordanian desert, on the shore of the emerald Tiberias, among the noisily jubilant crowd at the entrance to Jerusalem, under the yoke of the cross on the sorrowful path, and finally, on Golgotha itself, the heart of the Savior is equally full of boundless, all-forgiving love for people, sorrow for their hardened hearts, and confidence in their renewal of spirit. Calling man to serve higher, spiritual goals, the Gospel wants to place us above the material situation, but nowhere ever teaches us to despise it, does not call it a crime to use it. The One Who spoke of the beauty of the lilies of the field, Who in difficult moments of spiritual sorrow retired under the shade of the cedars and olives of Gethsemane and prayed there amidst the fragrance of fragrant flowers bathed in the radiance of the gentle moon, could not forbid the enjoyment of the beauties of nature. Nor does He condemn the reasonable, appropriate enjoyment of the blessings of nature, if He Himself with such tender kindness received from a woman the anointing with precious myrrh and at the same time added: "Verily I say unto you, Wherever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, it shall be spoken in the remembrance of what she has done" (Mark 14:9). No, the Gospel does not completely turn man away from the external world, from its joys and blessings, does not demand a complete break with it; it only wants to elevate the spiritual principle over the material, it says: "Love not the world, nor the things that are in the world" (1 John 2:15), do not attach your heart to its goods; Let the heart of man, destined to be the altar of pure love and eternal truth, be free from the coarse idols of the flesh. Christianity directly asserts: "Whoever loves the world (of course, with all his heart, with all his soul, with all his being), in him is not the love of the Father"; but nowhere does it demand enmity towards His creation for the sake of love for the Creator. Jesus Christ said: "Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself" (Matt. 16:24), that is, free himself from coarse instincts, from base attachments, renounce his old animal self, become a new spiritual being; but He did not say: "Renounce, completely distance yourself from everything around you." In its final conclusion, the Gospel commands us: "All things are created for the benefit and joy of man, but nothing created should have dominion over us." Therefore, one must either not know the Gospel at all, or not understand it, in order to say that Christianity is hostile to the bright, cheerful impressions of existence. Kotlyarevsky in the preface to his book "World Sorrow" writes: "The new news coming from Jerusalem was joyful for those who knew how to refuse the joys of life. She taught to suffer and endure, she promised a reward in heaven for this, she could make a person happy, but not here, not on earth. Eternal inextinguishable light shone for the Christian in heaven, but this light somehow did not fall on the earthly valley of sorrow, and the brighter the flame of faith burned in the heart of man, the more cheerless was his view of this vale of the sinful world. Let us recall the ascetic ideals of the first centuries of the Christian era and the Middle Ages; Let us recall the religious rigorism of the Reformation movements. Joy in the Lord was not joy in life." In the same author, two pages later, we read more: "The epoch of the first centuries of Christianity and the epoch of the Reformation movements were marked by a very strong development of a pessimistic mood and a world outlook. The fear of the evil of the world was then so great in people, and the consciousness of their sinfulness was so strong, that all the joy of life, all its even innocent joy and beauty, were devalued, and, in the consciousness of his weakness and criminality, man looked upon earthly existence not as a goal, but as a transitional stage to another, heavenly and already sorrowless life. In her eternity, both the meaning and the charm of her earthly moment were drowned for him" [2]. Such a judgment about the character of Christianity is fundamentally flawed. A correct understanding of the Gospel, on the contrary, convinces us that among all philosophical and religious teachings there is no brighter and more cheerful worldview than the Christian one. The Savior's preaching begins and ends with the call of all those who labor and are burdened to the fullest, most perfect joy. At the Last Supper, summing up the results of His three-year preaching before His disciples, Jesus Christ said to them: "These things have I said to you, that My joy may abide in you, and that your joy may be complete" (John 15:II). If the Gospel says a lot about the cross, about sufferings, about the inevitability of sorrows for a Christian, then all this is not actually an inalienable part of the Kingdom of God, but the result of opposition to the latter on the part of the kingdom of evil. The Apostle Paul writes to the Corinthians: "There must also be differences of opinion among you" (1 Cor. II, 19). Here, of course, we are not talking about a desirable necessity, but about a sad inevitability. The path to truth is difficult, it goes through mistakes and delusions; one cannot do without disputes - differences of opinion are inevitable. The same is true of the path to the Kingdom of God. It cannot be passed without thorns. Evil is strong in the world; He will not give up his power without a fight. Against the champions of love and truth, it will bring forward all the forces of hell. Sufferings, physical and moral torments, what is called the common name of the cross, will be inevitable here. They are not hushed up by the Golgotha Sufferer. "They persecuted me," he said, "they will persecute you also"; but these persecutions should not darken the bright hopes: they cannot destroy the work they have begun, they cannot stop the building of the Kingdom of God. As the darkness of the night thins before the sunrise, so evil disappears before the charm of good. Swamp fog, the smoke of burning straw sometimes cover the bright sun for a while, but time passes, the wind blows away clouds and clouds of smoke, and the heavens shine again with eternal beauty. Hypocrisy, unrighteousness, and violence crucified Christ on Golgotha, buried Him in the grave with a heavy stone, affixed seals, set up guards, and in malicious ecstasy celebrated the victory over Him; but two days passed, and the triumph crumbled: Christ was risen, and with Him goodness and righteousness were resurrected. There is no power that would completely overcome the truth; there is no obstacle that would stop forever the march in the world of triumphant love. What can be brighter and more cheerful than this faith in the ultimate triumph of truth, love and goodness? Full of this faith, people with rapturous eyes will look death in the face, with joy in their hearts they will go to the stakes, and in the hands of the executioners they will say: "It is better to suffer with the righteous than to enjoy with the wicked." In their confidence in the triumph of the idea of eternal truth, they will find a counterbalance to the crushing power of personal failures. Look at the ancient Christian catacombs: there lie the remains of thousands of martyrs, broken by torture, torn apart by beasts, charred at the stake, and among the numerous sacred images on the walls and tombs there is not a single hint of the bitterness of the life of the deceased, of the horrors of their death. Gentle doves, a good shepherd, a lamb, lilies, a vine - all bright pacifying images. Thus, even here, under the arches of the tombs of the sufferers, individual mournful sighs dissolved into a joyful hymn of triumphant love. Contemplation of the dawn of the Gospel day studying over the world makes Christians forget their sorrows and failures. They know that the Kingdom of God is taken by force, won with great difficulty, with many sacrifices, and that only those who use force receive it, and therefore they are not afraid of struggle and personal suffering. At the cost of every tear and drop of sweat shed for the Kingdom of God, they win a new span for him, and this rewards their labors a hundredfold. Just as a brilliant artist, seeing that under his hands the clay takes the desired form, that the conceived idea comes to life in a statue, experiences a feeling of delight, so the evangelical worker, shaping life according to the model given by the Savior, has a source of inexhaustible bliss in the success of the Kingdom of God. In comparison with this cheerfulness of Christians, how pitiful and vulgar is the cheerfulness of the ancient world, entwined with roses and surrounded by bacchantes with cups of wine. And how would this contentment with life increase, what a broad wave it would envelop the whole world, if the Kingdom of God in the hearts of people came in all its fullness and power? In the polar countries, the sun warms only a few times a year, and this is enough to suddenly buzz with life. The tundra is covered with a continuous carpet of berries, millions of birds flock to the berries, herds of reindeer run together. If the sun did not change its position to the tundra, they would be covered with rich vegetation in a few years, turn into rich pastures, and be built up with cities. It's the same with our lives. If the love and truth of Christ were not accidental guests in it, if they did not brighten it up with rare glimpses, but were in it the basic law, a constant driving force, the unsetting sun of radiant joy would shine over the world, the heart of man would become the Kingdom of God. May Thy Kingdom come to us, O Lord! Le Bon. "Psychology of Peoples and Masses", pp. 62, 83 ^ Kotlyarevsky. The World's Sorrow, pp. X, XII ^

Afterword. Priest Gregory Petrov and his book

Among the famous spiritual writers of the 20th century, the name of Archpriest Grigory Spiridonovich Petrov (1868-1925) stands in a prominent place. And this place is assigned to him, first of all, by the book "The Gospel as the Basis of Life", published for the first time in 1898 and in the next decade withstood 20 editions! In those years, there was no such huge demand for one church book among readers. But at that time Russian society was offered many different foundations of life, and all sorts of unscrupulous liberators, trustees of the world behind the scenes, as well as sectarians, sought to get into the role of teachers. In the book of the priest Gregory Petrov, the only unclouded and ever-flowing source of life is indicated - the Holy Gospel, the gospel of the Giver of life Himself - our Lord Jesus Christ. Only from this source are drawn healthy vital forces - spiritual, moral, physical, and abiding in the truth of the Gospel makes a person's existence full-fledged and expedient. This fountain is not cut off or grows old, and its grace will remain as long as the earth stands. It would seem that this is a simple truth, and it was not discovered by Father Gregory. But the attractiveness of his book lies precisely in the fact that it reminded Orthodox people with a powerful and inspired word of the salvific path along which alone they should go. And people appreciated the book of the young priest. Father Gregory was also known as a brilliant preacher of the word of God. His sermons gathered a multitude of people, and they were compared in power with the sermons of the Kronstadt lamp, Fr. John Sergiev. A book was even published about them (see: I. V. Preobrazhensky, New and Traditional Spiritual Orators Fr. Grigory Petrov and Ioann Sergiev, Kronstadt, St. Petersburg, 1902). All this speaks of the great popularity of Archpriest Gregory Petrov in those years of his activity. Unfortunately, later, after the election of Fr. Gregory to the Second State Duma in 1907, a sad time of infatuation with politics began in his life, and, not heeding the warnings of the Synod, he was deprived of his priestly rank. And only in 1918, by the decision of the Holy Local Council of the Russian Church, Gregory Petrov was restored to his rank. Then he emigrated, lived and served in Serbia, then in Paris, where he died in 1925. Of course, Fr. Gregory's book "The Gospel as the Basis of Life", written at the time of his spiritual and creative take-off, when he, a graduate of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, a talented theologian, tried to serve Orthodoxy with all his heart, does not bear the imprint of the subsequent difficulties of his path. And it is impossible to put the works recognized by the hierarchy and accepted by the Orthodox people in direct connection with the biography of the author: what was created in accordance with the Church no longer belongs to the individual, but to the Church. As a person, the author could be mistaken, and for this he is responsible before God. And this book, which has given so much spiritual consolation to many people in the past, will be read with benefit now. Alexander Strizhev