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Faith In Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov

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Every individual, especially those devotedly religious, has a differing perspective on God and the true nature of faith. Fyodor Dostoyevsky, in The Brothers Karamazov, bluntly displays the exploration into opposing notions of faith’s essence through two distinctly divergent religious characters, Zosima and Father Ferapont. Zosima represents a traditional, moral center that preaches love and faith as the catalyst to miracles where as Father Ferapont highlights the unorthodox through the expression of a physical and regimented approach to faith by propagating the importance of obeying religious rituals. Throughout interactions with other characters, Zosima displays an orthodox, spiritual hub. In the simplest of terms, he believes in humility …show more content…

He does not visualize undying faith as the spark for miracles, but in fact, laws and/or miracles conceptualize an individual’s faith. To illustrate, Father Ferapont follows the fasting process blindly and religiously because he believes following these laws is what revives a sense of faith within those doubting. For the concept of God or evil, he endows a more materialistic approach than Zosima; Father Ferapont is in the market for a simple explanation for complex ideas. He expresses that he can in fact see devils “sitting on one monk’s chest” (Dostoyevsky 168). In addition, slamming the door on a devil’s tail and drawing a cross on his back can easily defeat him. In other words, Father Ferapont desires to use physicality to explain faith. Furthermore, he deduces that evil has a physical presence in the world and that it is an external force. Although Father Ferapont is a monk, his ideals on faith are not representative of a typical holy leader. Fyodor Dostoyevsky experiments and expresses the differing opinions of faith, God, and evil’s nature through Zosima and Father Ferapont. Zosima is a leader within the religious community and a proponent of love and faith; Father Ferapont is a monk who follows rituals completely to delineate his faith and remains adrift from

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