Byazrova, Juliet B.
Kavkaz Forum. 2022. Issue 11.

Abstract:
The fundamental value of Christianity, humility, was fully accepted by Orthodoxy.
At the same time, the ascetic tradition was somewhat softened, while it received
extreme forms of expression in medieval Europe. In patristic literature, a person
was considered as a unity of spirit and body, they emphasized the inadmissibility
of violence of the former over the latter. The irreconcilable form of the antithesis of
the world and God in Orthodoxy is softened in an optimistic way, which is ascribed
to the influence of folk religion. Orthodoxy opposes the dogma of the infallibility
of the pope as a criterion of truth by the collective voice of the holy fathers. In the
relationship between man and society (internal and external), Orthodoxy takes the
side of the first factor, making social transformations dependent on the moral selfimprovement
of man. However, this should not be understood as a justification of
individualism, since the “measure of all things” in a situation of choice is, ultimately,
not a person and not society, but a higher spiritual censor. Thus, the theme of the
individual and society appears in Orthodoxy as a problem of man and God.
The relevance of the research topic is determined by significant changes
taking place in the spiritual sphere of modern Russian society. Religion, evolving,
remains inextricably linked with culture and society, regardless of the ratio of
believers and non-believers in it. Analysis of the place and role of the religious
factor, its influence on the social, political and spiritual life of society remains one
of the important areas of modern science, including philosophy.

Keywords: holism, merism, «golden mean», equality, asceticism, humility as Christian virtues, the antithesis of the world and God

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