Pavel Florensky

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Pavel (Paul) Alexandrovich Florensky (Russian: Павел Александрович Флоренский, January 21 N.S. 1882 - December 1937 by the other sources) was a Russian Orthodox theologian, philosopher, mathematician and electrical engineer, sometimes compared by his followers to Leonardo da Vinci.

[edit] Biography

Pavel Alexandrovich Florensky was born to the family of a Railroad engineer in town Yevlakh currently western Azerbaijan on January 22 N.S. 1882. His father was from a family of Russian Orthodox priests and his mother was from Armenian nobility. After graduating from Tiflis gymnasium he entered the Department of Mathematics of Moscow State University. In parallel he studied Philosophy.

After graduating from Moscow State University in 1904, Florensky refused to take a teaching position at the University but instead decided to study theology at the Ecclesiastical Academy in Sergiyev Posad. Together with his fellow students Ern, Svenitsky and Brikhnichev he created the society Union of Christian Struggle (Союз Христинской Борьбы) aiming to revolutionarly rebuild the Russian society according to the ideas of Vladimir Solovyov. He was arrested for membership in this society in 1906. Later he lost his interest in the Radical Christianity movement.

Mikhail Nesterov Philosophers Pavel Florensky and Sergei Bulgakov 1917

During his studies at the Ecclesiastical Academy his interests included Philosophy, Religion, Art, Folklore. He became a prominent member of the Russian Symbolism movement, started his friendship with Andrei Bely, published works in the magazines New Way (Новый Путь) and Libra (Весы). He also started his main philosophical work The Pillar and Ground of the Truth: An Essay in Orthodox Theodicy in Twelve Letters. The complete book was published only in 1924 but most of it was finished at the time of his graduation from the Academy in 1908.

The book is a series of twelve letters to a "brother" or "friend," who may be understood symbolically as Christ. Central to Florensky's work is an exploration of the various meanings of Christian love, which is viewed as a combination of philia (friendship) and agape (universal love). Florensky is perhaps the first modern writer to explore the so-called same-sex unions, which, for him, are not sexual in nature. He describes the ancient Christian rites of the adelphopoiesis (brother-making), joining male friends in chaste bonds of love. In addition, Florensky is one of the first thinkers in the twentieth century to develop the idea of the Divine Sophia, who has become one of the central concerns of feminist theologians.

After graduating from the Academy he taught philosophy there and lived at Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra until 1919. In 1911 he was ordained into the priesthood. In 1914 he wrote his dissertation About Spiritual Truth. He published works on Philosophy, Theology, Art Theory, Mathematics, Electrodynamics. Between 1911 and 1917 he was the chief editor of the most authoritative Orthodox Theologian publication of that time Bogoslovskiy Vestnik. He was also a spiritual teacher of the controversial Russian writer Vasily Rozanov urging him to conciliate with the Orthodox Church.

After the October Revolution he formulated his position as : I am of a Philosophical and scientific world outlook developed by me, which contradicts the vulgar interpretation of communism... but that does not prevent me to honestly work for the state service. After the closing down, by the Bolsheviks, of the Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra (1918) and Sergievo-Posad Church (1921), where he was the priest, he moved to Moscow to work on the State Plan for Electrification of Russia. (ГОЭЛРО) Under the recommendation of Leon Trotsky who strongly believed in Florensky's ability to help the government to electrificate Russia. According to contemporaries, Florensky in his priest's cassock, working alongside other leaders of a Government department, was an astonishing sight to behold.

In 1924 he published a large monograph on Dielectrics, as well as his The Pillar and Ground of the Truth An Essay in Orthodox Theodicy in Twelve Letters. He also worked simultaneously as the Scientific Secretary of Historical Commission on Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra and published his works on Ancient Russian Art. He was also rumored to be the main organizer of the plot to save the relics of St. Sergii Radonezhsky which had been ordered destroyed by the government.

In the second half of the 20s he mostly worked on physics and electrodynamics, publishing his main "hard science" work Imaginary numbers in Geometry devoted to the geometrical interpretation of the Albert Einstein's theory of relativity. Among other things he proclaimed that the geometry of imaginary numbers predicted by the theory of relativity for a body moving faster than light is the geometry of the kingdom of God.

In 1928 Florensky was exiled to Nizhny Novgorod. After the intercession of Ekaterina Peshkova (wife of Maxim Gorky), Florensky was allowed to return to Moscow. In 1933 he was arrested again and sentenced to ten years in the Labor Camps by the infamous article fifty eight of Stalin's criminal code (clauses ten and eleven - agitation against the Soviet system and publishing agitation materials against the Soviet system). The published agitation materials were the monograph about the theory of relativity.

He served at the Baikal Amur Mainline camp, until 1934 when he was moved to Solovki, there he conducted research into producing iodine and agar out of the local seaweed. In 1937 he was transferred to Saint Petersburg (then known as Leningrad) where he was sentenced by an extrajudicial NKVD troika to execution. According to a legend he was sentenced for the refusal to disclose the location of the head of St. Sergii Radonezhsky that the communists wanted to destroy. The Saint's head was indeed saved and in 1946 the Troitse-Sergiyeva Lavra was opened again. The relics of St. Sergii became fashionable once more. The Saint's relics where returned to Lavra by Pavel Golubtsov, later known as archbishop Sergiy.

Official Soviet information stated, that Florensky died December 8, 1943 somewhere in Siberia, but a study of the NKVD archives after the disbanding of the Soviet Union have shown that information to be false. Florensky was shot immediately after the NKVD troika session in December 1937. Most probably he was executed at the Rzhevsky artillery range, near Toksovo, which is located about twenty kilometers north-east to Saint Petersburg and was buried in a secret grave in Koirangakangas near Toksovo together with 30,000 others who were executed by NKVD at the same time.

The Russian Orthodox Church Abroad through its First Hierarch Metropolitan Vitaly made the following statement concerning the supposed glorification of priest Pavel Florensky: "In the name of the Bishops' Council and Synod the editorial office of this Messenger makes a categorical announcement that the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad did not even consider and could not bring itself to make such a glorification. An annoying error of purely iconographic character has taken place. On the icon of the New Martyrs of Russia the name of Pavel Florensky was inscribed.

If one makes an analysis of Fr. Pavel Florensky's book with a pretentious title "The Pillar and an Affirmation of Truth" and of his other works then an Orthodox reader is confronted with an image of this outstanding priest with a turbulent soul who threw himself into the sea of theology without a compass and who is sailing towards a goal which is not known to anyone including himself". (Metropolitan Vitaly, The Orthodox Messenger, a monthly publication of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, USA and Canada, No. 30/31, pp.5-6.)