Person and Society in the Worldview of Archpriest Vasily Zenkovsky

Abstract

The article traces the dialectic of the interrelations between the person and society, according to Archpriest Vasily Zenkovsky. Using methods of systematization, comparison and immanent criticism, the author reconstructs Zenkovsky’s views as follows. Realization of personal freedom caused by the admission of Christianity has put the individual into opposition to the Church and family. This attempt at self-affirmation of the individual leads to paradoxical results: extreme individualism results in impersonalism and also gives rise to its opposite, collectivism. The path to resolving these contradictions lies through achieving the organic unity of the individual with supra-individual social formations. Zenkovsky regards these formations through the prism of W. Stern’s hierarchical personalism as real particular entities. The basis and paradigm of normal relations between the person and society is represented by the normal family, which provides optimal conditions for the development of introception and empathy. The interrelations between the person and the nation also play a huge role. Through introception, social goals and values become an organic part of the person, so that losing these goals and values would inevitably result for a person in «losing their true self».