The Wheel #41/42. Orthodoxy Today. Summer-Fall 2025

Prophets of Universalism? The Concept of Prophecy in Dostoyevsky’s Speech on Pushkin and Solovyov’s Funeral Speech on Dostoyevsky

In one of his insightful articles, David Bentley Hart notes that, in contrast to Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky is revered as a “prophet” and remains the hero of many new Western converts to Orthodoxy. Many Christians of other confessions and many “rigorist” believers in Eastern Orthodox countries believe similarly.Likewise, the Russian philosopher Nicolas Berdyaev (1874–1948) describes Dostoyevsky’s art as “prophetic,” as “it unveils the secret of man.”…