Reflections on the Gulag Archipelago

Life is filled with suffering, and suffering is magnified and multiplied by the endless stream of malevolence. I am discovering this first hand as my mother lies in a hospital bed beside me, a victim of a violent assault. It's the act of evil committed upon the innocent that shatters us the most. No one is immune. The arbitrary nature of evil cannot be denied. It is self evident as there is no shortage of examples. Having acknowledged this fact, the question that each and everyone of us should ask ourselves is: how should one walk in the face of such evil?

While I sat beside my unconscious mother, I read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's 'The Gulag Archipelago,' a mammoth Nobel prize-winning book written by a Russian dissident who suffered at the hands of a brutal Communist regime. Solzhenitsyn was a soldier who had served in the Second World War. While fighting against the German army, he witnessed first hand the atrocities committed by the Red Army against German and east European civilians. The looting and raping of civilians by his comrades were the first cracks in Solzhenitsyn's long held illusion about the rulers of his motherland. Very soon he would be sent to a series of labor camps. He was convicted for his criticism of Stalin in a private letter to a classmate; the sentence was eleven years. For eleven years he would suffer like the lowest form of animal, working away like a beast without limits, and scratching away at every crumb he received whilst barely able to keep himself warm in the coldest hell on earth.

Solzhenitsyn had every reason to hate his captors. He had every reason to feel victimized and plot revenge. After all, he was an innocent man wrongly convicted for speaking the truth. But he did something that would go beyond victimism and scapegoating. He looked within himself. He searched his life and looked for how he might have contributed to the creation of such a regime that had imprisoned him.

It took him time spent inside a series of labor camps to realize that the degradation of the society and state goes hand in hand with the degradation of the individual. When the Russian revolution erupted, many innocent lives were lost at the hands of furious mobs acting at the behest of the 'oppressed' people. This coincided with the massive loss of lives on the battlefields of the first World War. Before the revolution, and before the hypnotic frenzy of the crowd, Russia had been a flawed but thoroughly devout and traditional country. She was soon to be fed from Europe an overwhelming amount of socialist and utopian ideas. The import of radical socialist ideology came after a combination of liberalism and nihilism supplanted the traditional axiom of Orthodoxy that had held the country together. Fyodor Dostoevsky would write about this era of nihilistic movements in its embryonic form in his novel 'Demons.'

Dostoevsky argued that for a morally upright society, or a society striving for moral uprightness, to sustain itself must have a foundation that is not only firm but also transcendent; and by transcendent, meaning that even Kings and Queens must subject themselves to it. For Dostoevsky, that foundation had to be God. Once that foundation is removed, the ground becomes ripe for artificial religion, i.e. hateful ideologies, to grow and spread like wildfire. Man is an innately religious animal, and he must have an axiom by which to live and exist, either devouringly or fruitfully.

That is why Solzhenitsyn echoed Dostoevsky when he said the following:
"...But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some 60 million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: "Men have forgotten God; that's why all this has happened."

What does it mean to not forget God? What does it mean to follow God? That is an interesting question, and it is closely tied to the first question about walking in the face of evil. The recognition of evil, the discovery that malevolence is when one subjects another to his/her version of an inferior man-made existence, is closely tied to what Jesus unraveled on the cross. And this unraveling of evil on the cross gives birth to conduct that treats the other, not as a piano key or spoke of a wheel, but as a worthy individual capable of having autonomy--a unique individual created in God's own image. Ideology does not provide this way of conduct, it gives us the reverse. Ideology dismisses the individual's true stature as an expression of divinity, and attempts to squeeze the individual into its utopian vision, with or without consent. This collective, coercive way of the world leads to tyranny. It leads to the Soviet Union and its Gulag system.

Solzhenitsyn wrote the following about ideology,
"Macbeth's self-justifications were feeble – and his conscience devoured him. Yes, even Iago was a little lamb, too. The imagination and spiritual strength of Shakespeare's evildoers stopped short at a dozen corpses. Ideology—that is what gives evildoing its long-sought justification and gives the evildoer the necessary steadfastness and determination. That is the social theory which helps to make his acts seem good instead of bad in his own and others' eyes, so that he won't hear reproaches and curses but will receive praise and honors. That was how the agents of the Inquisition fortified their wills: by invoking Christianity; the conquerors of foreign lands, by extolling the grandeur of their Motherland; the colonizers, by civilization; the Nazis, by race; and the Jacobins (early and late), by equality, brotherhood, and the happiness of future generations.... Without evildoers there would have been no Archipelago."

To impose one's worldview on another is to forget God. For ages, men have tried to bring about good by evil, violent means. Thieves try to provide by theft. Murderers try to fulfill life by killing. Politicians try to solve by scapegoating. Generals try to bring peace through war. Jesus called this 'satan trying to cast out satan.' While it may have worked before during pagan times, it works no longer because of the crucifixion at Calvary. The memory that men had once lynched the innocent Son of God haunts us to ends of the earth. The face of Christ is etched on the countless men, women, and children we sacrifice in war, clinics, and prisons for the sustaining of fragile society.

But the question still remains: how must we conduct ourselves? It begins with the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus sets a precedent for us: resist not evil with evil. The act of turning the other cheek is a recognition of the autonomy of the other person. Not only that, it is also the recognition that the attacker is bitterly fighting a war within himself. The decision to not reciprocate violence with more violence urges the attacker to introspect and encourages him/her to find the Christ within.

Solzhenitsyn wrote,
"Gradually it was disclosed to me that the line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either -- but right through every human heart -- and through all human hearts. This line shifts. Inside us, it oscillates with the years. And even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained. And even in the best of all hearts, there remains ... an unuprooted small corner of evil."

Solzhenitsyn also urged us to live not by lies. The greatest lie is the idea that we can bring about good from evil, that peace can come from violence. The Soviet Union believed this lie, and its leaders thought constantly and morbidly that they were only one execution away from utopia--one labor camp away from a worker's paradise. Likewise, the motto of the concentration camps in Nazi Germany was: 'Work will set you free.' The perversion of reality, that is the lie preached by authoritarian cults all around the world.

Solzhenitsyn summed this up perfectly:
"Violence can only be concealed by a lie, and the lie can only be maintained by violence... Any man, who has once proclaimed violence as his Method, is inevitably forced to take the lie as his principle."

After years of inhumane suffering in the camps, Solzhenitsyn was diagnosed with cancer. He fought and won this battle too. Years and years of living in the very depths of hell had transformed him. Earlier, he had already compared himself to the camp guards who ran the Gulags, and concluded that he was once, when serving in the Red Army, no different than them. But he could no longer keep living in a lie. He had to speak the truth. He began by jotting down his own account of time spent in the Gulags, and at the same time, he began collecting testimonies from hundreds of eye witnesses. He had already demonstrated a remarkable ability to memorize when he composed a poem comprising of thousands of verses whilst living in the Gulags.

In 1962, a novel called 'One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich' was published in the Novy Mir magazine. It detailed a single day of a Gulag inmate. The horrors of camp life became vivid in the eyes of readers across Russia. The book became enormously popular. It also earned Solzhenitsyn the wrathful eye of the totalitarian state watchdogs. Many attempts were made by the KGB to confiscate the manuscripts of his unpublished works, but by now the Gulag Archipelago had already been completed, translated, and distributed in the west. The party could no longer tolerate Solzhenitsyn; he became a non-person and was finally exiled from the country of his birth.

In 1970, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. He lived in the United States, and returned to Russia in 1994 after the communist government had fallen.

Solzhenitsyn used the greatest weapon of all: Truth. The truth need not be accompanied by violence. It is powerful of its own accord. It has the strength to bring down empires. Solzhenitsyn wrote nothing but the truth about what his country was going through and what he was going through. He spoke truth about others, but most of all, he spoke truth to himself. In today's world of superficiality it is often the trend to lie to oneself. In the lies we tell ourselves, we claim that since we have only one life we should live for the moment. We drown in our own materialism and hedonism. We trap ourselves in the prison that calls itself pleasure island. We waste away without meaning, without purpose, and the best we can come up with is the wagging of fingers and waving of placards. Solzhenitsyn said otherwise. His message transcends the superficiality of our times. Against materialism, he argued for a Stoic approach to life and finding contentment. Against finger pointing and blaming others, he encouraged a life of continued death and rebirth, for before taking on the world one must first sort himself out.

The tyranny of compulsion still exists today. Society still goes by the principle of might makes right. The lie of sacrificial violence is well and alive, but it is loosing its stranglehold on humanity thanks to the revelation of the cross. As Christians, we would do well to further the demon of state tyranny on its way to hell. We would do well to demotivate the culture of violence in society by being shining lights of peace ourselves. We can start following Solzhenitsyn's example. We can stop telling lies and start telling the truth whilst carrying the burden of existence.

"You can resolve to live your life with integrity. Let your credo be this: Let the lie come into the world, let it even triumph. But not through me."

As I wait in the hospital for my mother to regain consciousness, I decide to start small. There is no point in revenge; nothing becomes better by doing that. I have to be a better son than I was before, and I have to find meaning through responsibility. Start small, like taking care of your loved ones, and healing those nearby who are in great pain. Truth and beauty goes hand in hand. Together, they provide meaning by which we can weather the storm, and in all of this, there is an abundance of freedom as only God can provide. 

Jordan Peterson and the Devouring Mother

In one of my recent facebook posts, I pointed out that we as a society are failing our youths and we are failing drastically. When I had posted this sad observation, I expected a serious discussion on how we can help our young neighbors, but instead I got drawn into a petty argument about laws. This modern day insistense that we must have an excess of institutional supervision creates nothing but a rule of the devouring mother, and sadly it has given birth to a lot of angry and directionless boys.

The root of the problem lies deep, like ancient bones underneath enormous layers of earth. That is what many of our laws are; they are sacrificial, drawn out of the scapegoats of our ancestors. When we cling on to laws with demands that a few be sacrificed instead of the whole nation, we get kids like the Columbine and Parkland shooters.

The detached culture which we live in transforms a large portion of the youth within a society into bitter, resentful, and alienated human beings. Is it any wonder that we see murders committed in schools or playgrounds? And we look for quick fixes from institutions, where none exists at all. Even worse! We are willing to turn away from the dark alleys, where state laws have sacrificed a good portion of the population so that those who are not sacrificed can live in safety.

But enough about worldly laws, and onto the main concern. A friend of mine asked me how we can guide our young neighbors out of the cages of misery. I suggested to him that every individual in society must voluntarily help those young people who are close to them. There are many out there who are neglected in a variety of unbelievable ways. Here I will give a vivid illustration on how we can help the youngsters around us. The following is from a book that I'm currently reading.

I saw a four-year old boy allowed to go hungry on a regular basis. His nanny had been injured, and he was being cycled through the neighbours for temporary care. When his mother dropped him off at our house, she indicated that he wouldn’t eat at all, all day. “That’s OK,” she said. It wasn’t OK (in case that’s not obvious). This was the same four-year-old boy who clung to my wife for hours in absolute desperation and total commitment, when she tenaciously, persistently and mercifully managed to feed him an entire lunch-time meal, rewarding him throughout for his cooperation, and refusing to let him fail. He started out with a closed mouth, sitting with all of us at the dining room table, my wife and I, our two kids, and two neighbourhood kids we looked after during the day. She put the spoon in front of him, waiting patiently, persistently, while he moved his head back and forth, refusing it entry, using defensive methods typical of a recalcitrant and none-too-well-attended two-year old.

She didn’t let him fail. She patted him on the head every time he managed a mouthful, telling him sincerely that he was a “good boy” when he did so. She did think he was a good boy. He was a cute, damaged kid. Ten not-too-painful minutes later he finished his meal. We were all watching intently. It was a drama of life and death.

“Look,” she said, holding up his bowl. “You finished all of it.” This boy, who was standing in the corner, voluntarily and unhappily, when I first saw him; who wouldn’t interact with the other kids, who frowned chronically, who wouldn’t respond to me when I tickled and prodded him, trying to get him to play—this boy broke immediately into a wide, radiant smile. It brought joy to everyone at the table. Twenty years later, writing it down today, it still brings me to tears. Afterward, he followed my wife around like a puppy for the rest of the day, refusing to let her out of his sight. When she sat down, he jumped in her lap, cuddling in, opening himself back up to the world, searching desperately for the love he had been continually denied. Later in the day, but far too soon, his mother reappeared. She came down the stairs into the room we all occupied. “Oh, SuperMom,” she uttered, resentfully, seeing her son curled up in my wife’s lap. Then she departed, black, murderous heart unchanged, doomed child in hand. She was a psychologist. The things you can see, with even a single open eye. It’s no wonder that people want to stay blind.
--Jordan Peterson, '12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos'

It is this closeness that transforms and saves lives. It involves the 'soiling of one's own hands,' as my friend Andrea Romano says. Dostoevsky depicts this beautifully in 'Crime and Punishment' through the character of Sonya who helps and redeems a murderer with nothing but love, humility, and genuine concern.

I do not speak of a coming utopia. A utopia is not the same as the kingdom of God, for the ushering in of a utopia needs violent revolution and sacrifices of scapegoats. To say that we need more scapegoats until we are ready for Christ is to say that we're one execution away from utopia. Those who says that we are one scapegoat away from the kingdom of God are the real dreamers of utopia.

I speak of action and full participation. I speak of taking up responsibility. This way is harder. This way is the imitation of Christ. I'm speaking of the carrying of crosses and bearing the burden of suffering; this is hardly utopian. This Christ-like love which was illustrated in Dr. Peterson's book, not the love (at gunpoint) of the world, is what we need, and we need it urgently, before the cycle of vengeance comes full circle yet again. We can either behave like the black-hearted mother in Dr. Peterson's story, or we can become like Dostoevsky's Sonya. The choice is yours.

The Übermensch vs the Christ-man

Both Nietzsche and Dostoevsky lived around the same time in the late nineteenth century--a time of the fall of Christian values and the rise of rationalism and nihilism. While Nietzsche lamented the 'death of God,' Dostoevsky concluded that 'everything is permitted.' The two existentialists' thoughts ran almost parallel to each other until Nietzsche proclaimed that men must now rise above the herd and transcend beyond good and evil. Nietzsche was foreshadowing the emergence of the 'Übermensch'--the man who would forge his own values free of God. Meanwhile, Dostoevsky was formulating in advance his answer to Nietzsche's Übermensch, and this answer was modeled on none other than Jesus Christ.

In each of Dostoevsky's last novels we see the figure of Christ presented through the unlikeliest of characters. Alyosha--the troubled novice monk who must travel outside of his monastery to spread the gospel. Sonya--the self-sacrificing prostitute who brings salvation to a murderer. Both these characters are Nietschean in a certain sense. All three survive betrayal and tragedies. They survive that which 'does not kill them,' and emerge stronger. But the one who truly makes them stronger is Christ.

Dostoevsky's Übermensch is Christ. His Übermensch, in stark contrast to Nietszche, does not transcend beyond good and evil, but, rather, becomes a bridge between heaven and hell. Dostoevsky's heroes, Alyosha and Sonya, live inside the hellish realm that is the reality of the world in which we live in, yet they embody and spread all that is good and become Christ-figures to their societies. Though they cannot escape hell, they nevertheless bring light to all those who are trapped alongside them, often at the cost of themselves. Their hearts, despite enduring much pain, are entrenched in that which cannot be seen. They redeem the world through their supposed weakness--their weakness being the imitation of Christ.

Unlike Nietszche's Übermensch, Dostoevsky's Christ-man moves gracefully under the structures of authority. Whereas the Übermensch imposes his will on the structures themselves, the Christ-man transcends the structures and deals with the battle at the very root--the heart of man. The Christ-man seeks to transform the human soul, not subdue or coerce it through sheer dominance. Redemption lies in mimicking Christ, not in building up a brand new human from scratch, for the brand new human was already revealed in the form of a Jewish rabbi two thousand years ago. Jesus was and always will be the solution to the countless diseases that plague the human heart. He is the greatest example of positive mimesis--the ultimate role model.

The Gospel in 'Crime and Punishment'

In Dostoevsky's 'Crime and Punishment,' the protagonist, Rodion Raskolnikov, believes he is special and can, quite literally, get away with murder. He brutally murders two women with an axe, just to prove his point. But soon, he is torn apart by the constant battle between his conscience and rationale. This causes him great physical and mental anguish. He howls and rages in agony. He is endlessly tormented, and, as a result, lashes out against those who try to help him. One day, he meets a woman by the name of Sonya. Rodion falls in love with this overwhelmingly humble and shunned lady. He is strangely attracted to Sonya and even confesses his sins to her, albeit in pride. Sonya, upon hearing Rodion's confession, urges him to turn himself over to the authorities. But, she also says that she will follow Rodion into captivity, promising to never leave him.

Dostoevsky presents to us how mere mortals must imitate Christ in this fallen world. Rodion is the person we are before and in the state of conversion. After all, his name literally means 'schism.' Sonya, on the other hand, is how a Christ-follower is supposed to act. Astonishingly, Dostoevsky portrays the only Christian in his novel as a harlot. How ironic! Aren't we all harlots in our own unique ways? Sonya is basically us, broken and ashamed, but always striving like a child to be like Christ. When Sonya hears Raskolnikov's confession, she does not cast judgement upon him, despite the fact that one of Raskolnikov's victims was her friend. Sonya instead weeps and embraces Raskolnikov, choosing to speak to the murderer's suffering soul. She could have quite easily exposed Raskolnikov to society and thus exacted 'justice.' But she refuses to do this. Why? There is no why! It's because she truly loves Raskolnikov. She urges Raskolnikov to turn himself in so that his conversion might be complete.

When Raskolnikov is in prison, Sonya, true to her promise, keeps visiting him. However, Raskolnikov is still proud and unrepentant. He tries to justify his crime, stating that he killed only worthless human beings. But nevertheless, Sonya continues to offer compassion. One day, she falls sick and is unable to visit, and Raskolnikov becomes restless because of her absence. When Sonya resumes her visit, Raskolnikov cannot control himself. He falls to her feet in repentance. They embrace each other through tears and recognize that many years of suffering still lie ahead, but they have each other.

True repentance and reconciliation can never occur unless we are ready to travel to the deepest depths of hell with the tormented. In order to do that, we must forego all ideas of retributive justice. It isn't easy; no one said it was.