The Brothers Karamazov (6 page)

The institution of elder is not an invention based on theory but evolved in the East in more than a thousand years of practice. The obligations a man contracts toward an elder are quite different from the usual “obedience,” such as has always existed in Russian monasteries. Once accepted by an elder, a disciple must live a life of continual confession, and the bond between the two is indissoluble. Once in the early days of Christianity, according to legend, a novice failed to carry out a command imposed on him by his elder and, instead, left his monastery in Syria and went to Egypt. There, after many heroic acts of self-abnegation, he underwent torture and died a martyr for his faith. Yet when before burial his coffin stood in a church where he was already venerated as a saint, a strange thing happened: as soon as the deacon began to intone, “Depart, all ye possessed by the devil,” the coffin rose into the air and was hurled out of the church. And this was repeated three times. It was only then that they learned that this saint had broken his vow of obedience to his elder and so, despite his great exploits, had to be pardoned by his elder before he could receive Christian burial. Of course, that is only an old legend, but let me tell you a true story, of something that happened not long ago. One of our Russian monks, seeking salvation on Mount Athos, was suddenly ordered by his elder to leave Mount Athos, a holy place which he loved and where he had found a peaceful haven for his soul, and first to go on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to worship at the holy shrines, then to return to Russia and go north to Siberia, “because,” the elder told him, “your place is there and not here.” Stunned and filled with despair, the monk went to Constantinople, where he begged the Ecumenical Patriarch to release him from his vow of obedience; but the Patriarch explained that neither he nor any power on earth could ever release him from his vow of obedience, and that only the elder who had imposed the command had the power to rescind it. Thus, in some ways, elders exercise an authority that is boundless beyond understanding. That is why the institution of elder was at first opposed, even condemned, in Russian monasteries. The common people, however, showed tremendous respect for the elders right away. And soon the uneducated and the humble, the rich and the mighty, were flocking from all over Russia to see the elders of our monastery, to throw themselves at their feet, to confess their sins, to confide their doubts and torments, to seek guidance and advice. This caused the opponents of the elders to accuse them, among other things, of arbitrarily and irresponsibly degrading the sacrament of confession, although the continual baring of a novice’s or a layman’s soul before his elder was quite different from that sacrament. The institution survived, however, and it is now gradually becoming more common in Russian monasteries. It is also true, though, that this well-tested, thousand-year-old method of spiritual regeneration from slavery to freedom and moral perfection may prove to be a double-edged weapon, for some men, instead of gaining humility and ultimate self-mastery, may acquire the most satanic pride, so that they are fettered rather than free.

The elder, Zosima, was about sixty-five. He came from a family of landed gentry, and as a very young man he had been in the army, serving as an officer in the Caucasus. There was a special spiritual quality about him that must have struck Alyosha. For his part, the elder also grew very fond of the boy and allowed him to share his cell. It must be pointed out that, when he was living at the monastery, Alyosha was not yet bound by any vow, so that he could come and go as he pleased; indeed, he could stay away for days on end whenever he wished, and if he wore a cassock it was by his own choice, so as not to stand out among the others—though he obviously also liked wearing a cassock. It is also quite possible that Alyosha’s youthful imagination was greatly stirred by Zosima’s spiritual power and the fame that surrounded him. Many said of the elder that, in accepting all those who had come throughout the years to entrust their souls to him, to seek his guidance and solace, he had heard so many confessions, secrets, and tales of human despair that he had finally acquired an insight so keen that he could guess, from the very first glance at a newcomer, what he would say, what he would ask him, and even what was really tormenting his conscience. Often the visitor was surprised, confounded, and even frightened on finding that the elder knew his secret before he had even uttered a word. Alyosha also noticed that almost all who came to Zosima for the first time were filled with fear and apprehension as they entered the cell to face him alone, but that almost without exception they left smiling and serene; even the gloomiest faces emerged beaming with joy. Alyosha noted with particular interest that the elder Zosima was in no way severe, but, if anything, was always rather cheerful. The monks said that he was particularly warm toward the worst sinners and that the greater a man’s sins the greater was the elder’s love for him. Even toward the end of Zosima’s life, there were monks who hated and envied him, but there were fewer and fewer of them, and they kept their feelings to themselves, although some occupied important positions in the monastery. Such was one of the oldest monks, a man famous for the strictness of his fasts and for his long periods of silence. But without doubt the overwhelming majority of the monks were on Zosima’s side, and many of them loved him deeply and sincerely. Some were almost fanatically devoted to him and said, although not quite openly, that Zosima was a saint, that there could be no doubt about it. And, as his end was drawing near, they expected it to be followed almost at once by miracles that would shortly bring even greater glory to the monastery. Alyosha was one of those who had unquestioning faith in Zosima’s miraculous powers, as unquestioning as his acceptance of the story about the coffin that flew out of church by itself. He saw many who came with sick children or relatives to beg the elder to lay his hands on them and pray for them, and who returned, some the very next day, and, the tears running down their cheeks, prostrated themselves before the elder, thanking him for healing the sick. The question of whether this was miraculous healing or natural recovery never even occurred to Alyosha, for he had complete faith in the spiritual power of his teacher, whose glory he felt as his own personal triumph. He felt a special tremor in his heart and he radiated joy when the elder went out to the gates of the monastery to meet a group of humble folk who had flocked there from all over Russia to see him and ask for his blessing. They prostrated themselves before him, wept, kissed his feet and the earth on which he stood; wailing peasant women held up their children and led sick and hysterical village girls to him. The elder spoke to them, said a short prayer, blessed them, and sent them away in peace. Later, though, he was so weak after his bouts of illness that he hardly had the strength to leave his cell, and there were times when pilgrims had to wait several days for him to appear. Alyosha never felt the least surprise that all these people should love the elder, that they should prostrate themselves before him, weeping with emotion at the mere sight of his face. Oh, he understood very well that for the meek soul of a simple Russian, exhausted by grief and hardship and, above all, by constant injustice and sin, his own or the world’s, there was no stronger need than to find a holy shrine or a saint to prostrate himself before and to worship. “Even though sin and injustice and temptation are all around us, we know that there is on this earth a holy man, a saint who is just and knows the truth, and this means that truth and justice have not vanished from the earth and so will come to us too and rule over all the world, as has been promised.” Alyosha knew that this was what the humble folk felt, that this was how they thought. This, he knew with his reason, but that Zosima was such a saint, a guardian of divine justice—that was something Alyosha never doubted, something that he felt spontaneously, like all the weeping peasants and the sick women who held their children up to the elder. And the conviction that, after his death, Zosima would confer great glory on the monastery was, perhaps, stronger in Alyosha than in anyone else at the monastery. Indeed, a strange, profound, overwhelming ecstasy had burned in him more and more powerfully of late. He was not in the least troubled by the fact that Zosima stood before him an isolated phenomenon: “It makes no difference, he is a saint, and his heart knows the secret of regeneration for all, the power that will finally establish the rule of truth on earth. Then all men will be saints and will love one another, and there will be no poor and no rich, no mighty and no humiliated—all will be the children of God and the true kingdom of Christ will come.” This is what Alyosha felt in his heart.

The arrival of his brothers, whom, before this, he had not known at all, seemed to make a tremendous impression on Alyosha. He got to know his half brother Dmitry more quickly than his brother Ivan and felt closer to him, although Dmitry arrived later. Alyosha was very eager to get to know Ivan, but although his brother had been in town for two whole months and they saw each other quite often, they still seemed unable to really make friends. Alyosha himself was silent and reserved; he seemed a little embarrassed and as if he were expecting something from his brother, and Ivan, although at first Alyosha felt his long and scrutinizing looks resting upon him, soon appeared to lose all interest in him. Alyosha, who was rather taken aback by this change, ascribed his brother’s distant attitude to the difference in their ages and, above all, in their education. But at times he also suspected that Ivan’s lack of interest and sympathy might be due to other causes about which he knew nothing. He somehow felt that Ivan was absorbed in something within himself, something very important, that he was pursuing some goal, perhaps a very difficult goal, which simply left no room for Alyosha in his thoughts, and that this explained why he looked at him so absentmindedly. Alyosha also wondered whether the cultured atheist might not feel some contempt for a silly novice. He knew very well that his brother was an atheist and could not possibly take offense at his brother’s contempt, if contempt there was; yet he was in a state of acute discomfort, for which he himself could not account, as he waited for his brother to deign to come closer to him.

Dmitry, the oldest brother, showed tremendous respect for Ivan and spoke of him with strange emotion. It was from Dmitry that Alyosha learned the details of the important matters that had linked the two older brothers so closely and so strangely. Dmitry’s enthusiastic admiration for Ivan struck Alyosha even more forcefully since, compared with Ivan, he was almost entirely uneducated, and the two offered such a remarkable contrast in character and personality that it was hard to imagine two men more unlike.

It was at this time that a meeting, or shall we call it a gathering, of the members of this ill-assorted family took place in the elder’s cell, a gathering that was to deeply affect Alyosha. Actually, the meeting was held under a false pretext. By then, the dispute between Dmitry Karamazov and his father over the inheritance and their financial dealings had reached an impasse, and their relations had become untenable. Mr. Karamazov seems to have first suggested, and that in a jocular tone, that all the Karamazovs gather in the elder’s cell; without asking for Zosima’s direct arbitration, he felt, they could still discuss the matter more decently in the venerable presence of the elder, which might inspire respect and have a reconciliatory effect on them. Dmitry, who had never visited the elder, indeed had never set eyes on him, thought that Zosima was being used to intimidate him; but, since he secretly felt a little guilty about some of the things he had said to his father during their arguments, he accepted the challenge. (It must be noted that, unlike Ivan, Dmitry was not living with his father, but was staying in a house at the opposite end of town.) Peter Miusov, who was in town, turned out to be particularly eager that Mr. Karamazov’s suggestion should be taken up. A typical liberal of the 1840’s and 1850’s, this free-thinker and atheist took a very active interest in the business, perhaps out of boredom or perhaps just to have a little light-hearted fun. He was suddenly eager to have a look at the monastery and at “that holy man.” His lawsuit against the monastery was still dragging on and his claims over the property boundaries and the fishing and wood-cutting rights were still unsettled, so he announced that he wished to see the Father Superior to try and reach an amicable settlement with him. He obviously felt that a man visiting the monastery with such laudable intentions would be received and treated with much greater consideration than an ordinary visitor who had come out of mere curiosity. He thought all these considerations might bring pressure to bear upon the elder from within the monastery. Because of his sickness, the elder had hardly left his cell at all of late and he had been unable to see even his regular visitors. In the end, however, he consented to receive them, and the day was fixed. “I wonder who has set me up as judge over them,” was all he said, smiling at Alyosha.

When Alyosha first heard of the planned gathering, he was very perturbed. He realized that, of all the contending parties, only Dmitry would take the whole thing seriously, while the others would come to the meeting out of motives that were frivolous and perhaps insulting to the elder. Ivan and Miusov would come out of curiosity, perhaps of the crudest sort, and his father might very easily be planning some piece of buffoonery which would turn the whole thing into a farce. Oh, although he did not talk much, Alyosha knew his father well, for, I must repeat, he was not at all the uncomplicated lad that many people supposed. So it was with a heavy heart that he awaited the day. He was, of course, very anxious that the quarrels within his family should be brought to an end, but he was even more concerned about the elder. He was full of anxiety for him, for his reputation, and, as he imagined the meeting to himself beforehand, he particularly feared Miusov’s subtle and urbane sarcasms and the learned Ivan’s haughty insinuations. He even thought of warning the elder about these visitors, but he decided not to and kept silent. He only sent Dmitry word the day before, through a friend, that he was very fond of him and expected him to keep his promise. Dmitry was puzzled, for he could not think what he had promised Alyosha, but he answered by letter that he would do his best not to lose his temper in the event of “some despicable trick” and that, although he had great respect for the elder and for Ivan, he felt certain that some trap was being laid for him or that the whole thing was a farce. “Nevertheless, I’ll swallow my tongue rather than offend the venerable old man whom you respect so highly,” he said in concluding the letter. Alyosha hardly found this reassuring.