The Spiritual Meaning of War and the Metamorphosis of Collective Responsibility in the Socio-philosophical Concept of I.A. Ilyin

Abstract

The article reveals the problem of collective responsibility in the works of the Russian philosopher I.A. Ilyin, shows the dynamics of the development of his ideas from early work to articles of the emigrant period. Responsibility is con­sidered by I.A. Ilyin as a key concept that ensures the interconnection of the past and the future, which is especially acute in a situation of war. The First World War was supposed to be a source of spiritual uplift for the Russian people, but the ensuing revolution led to the emergence of a new socio-historical situation. According to I.A. Ilyin, traditional patriotism is replaced by its new form, in which responsibility for preserving Russian society forces neutrality in the armed con­frontation between communist Russia and Nazi Germany. A key element of such a choice is moral justification, which forces us to abandon the idea of overthrow­ing the regime at the cost of the life of the people, but, at the same time, does not allow us to side with this regime. I.A. Ilyin notes the key mistakes of Nazi ideol­ogy that do not allow us to make a choice in its favor: sectarianism, right-wing totalitarianism, party monopoly, nationalism, nationalization of the economy, idolatrous Caesarism. As a result, the Russian thinker considers authoritarian regimes based on traditional social institutions and preserving the primacy of morality over rationality to be the most optimal form of political structure. The article justifies that the ideas of I.A. Ilyin demonstrate the complexity and ambiguity of understanding patriotism in the context of the transformation of collective subjects of responsibility, when there is an inconsistency between the images of historical memory and the real configuration of the political and social space.