The myth of the Russian "barbarians"
Ilya Muromets and tavern goli. K. Vasiliev
Russianness
Why does the West hate Russians?
Because we are different, strikingly different from Europeans. However, the Chinese, Japanese, Vietnamese, Indian-Indians are also fundamentally different from Westerners. But why exactly are Russians hated so much?
The outstanding Russian philosopher Ivan Ilyin answered this question well. He noted that the fate of the people is hidden in his stories... She conceals not only his past, but also his future. Our story is our strength, gift, mission and calling.
“No other nation in the world has had such a burden and such a task as the Russian people. And not a single nation has endured from such trials and such torments - such strength, such originality, such spiritual depth. Our cross is heavy ”.
Our first burden is the burden of the earth - immense, unruly. We did not "take" this space and burden, it was imposed on us, forced us to take possession of it. From century to century, armies of our neighbors from the west, south and east marched against us. We had two ways: to perish or to pacify this space weapons and state power. Russia accepted this burden and bore it.
Our second burden is nature. This is an ocean of land, scarce soils in most of the territory, wealth hidden in the depths and not given to man until peaceful conditions are created. These are devastating droughts and severe frosts, endless swamps in the north, barren steppes and sands in the south.
Russia is practically the only civilization in the world that has not only survived in the harshest natural conditions (with the lowest average annual temperature, with the impossibility of normal human life in most of the country), but has become a great power, and during the Soviet era - and a superpower. This is well said about this in the excellent book by Andrey Parshev "Why Russia is not America."
Our third burden is the burden of nations. Millions of people, up to 180 different tribes and dialects. The Russians, the only great nations on the planet, did not suppress, eradicate, or enslave foreigners, but gave everyone new life, breath and a great homeland. Some were given the opportunity to bloom, others - to bloom. We have created a single spiritual, cultural and socio-legal homeland for all. The best from all tribes were involved in state and cultural and scientific construction. Russia has accepted and borne the burden of all nationalities, this is the only phenomenon in the world.
The history of Russia is the history of struggle.
“We have learned to bury our national shrine out of reach. We have comprehended the secret of the departing Kitezh, so inaccessible to the enemy and so close to us, invincible and all-sanctifying; we have learned to listen to his supersensible, secret message; in the dense spiritual more often we found a mysterious spiritual lake, eternally fenced off, forever inexhaustible, the eye of God of the Russian land, the eye of revelation.
And from him we received our wisdom; and from him our gathering of strength and our national Resurrection. This is where our Russian ability comes from - to invisibly be reborn in visible dying, may the Resurrection be glorified in us!
Hence the Russian ability to conceal in the depths inexhaustible, inexhaustible spiritual strength, the strength of the sheltered and sheltering "I". This is where our Russian art comes from - to win, retreating, not to perish in the fire of earthly fires and not to disintegrate in material devastation. "
And from him we received our wisdom; and from him our gathering of strength and our national Resurrection. This is where our Russian ability comes from - to invisibly be reborn in visible dying, may the Resurrection be glorified in us!
Hence the Russian ability to conceal in the depths inexhaustible, inexhaustible spiritual strength, the strength of the sheltered and sheltering "I". This is where our Russian art comes from - to win, retreating, not to perish in the fire of earthly fires and not to disintegrate in material devastation. "
The writer noted that
we have “freedom and lightness, which other nations do not have. The Russian spirit is characterized by spiritual freedom, inner breadth, a sense of unknown, unprecedented possibilities. We will be born in this inner freedom, we breathe it, we naturally carry it in ourselves ”.
However, the Russians lack spiritual discipline, this is our task.
The "barbarism" of the Russians
Ilyin formulated three basic reasons why Westerners do not understand and hate Russians.
First, it is language.
“And one more gift was given to us by our Motherland: this is our wondrous, our mighty, our singing language. It is all of her, our Motherland. It contains all her gifts: and the breadth of unlimited possibilities; and the wealth of sounds and words and forms; both spontaneity and tenderness; and simplicity, and scope, and soaring; both dreaminess and strength; and clarity and beauty. Everything is available to our language. He himself is submissive to everything worldly and supra-worldly, and therefore has the power to express, depict and convey everything. "
The Russian language was ousted from Europe, became alien and "difficult" for Westerners. And without language, the people to the people are "German" ("dumb").
This is well shown by the satirist Mikhail Zadornov, who dug deeply into the topic of the history of the Russian people, the Russian language and its depth, antiquity in comparison with European remakes - English, German and others. Hence Zadornov's tricks about the "stupidity" of Americans, Westerners, about their down-to-earthness and materialism. Their spiritual culture and language have lagged far behind in development, and Westerners cannot grasp the full depth and greatness of Russian culture and language. Therefore, Russian Westerners, following the guidelines of their foreign colleagues, are trying in every possible way to simplify, distort, "modernize" the Russian language. And in Ukraine (parts of the Russian world) they are trying to Ukrainianize it, to separate it from the Russian.
The second reason is that the West is alien to the Russian (Orthodox) faith, which has preserved both the foundations of the original Christianity and the pre-Christian, pagan worldview of the Slavs-Rus. In the West, Christianity is practically killed, "reformatted" under materialism, the ideology of the "golden calf". Nowadays, the West has almost completely rejected spirituality, God. Degraded to hedonism bordering on Satanism. A little more, and the West will approve the sale of drugs in pharmacies (the first steps have already been taken), the slave trade and pedophilia.
The third reason is associated with the peculiarities of the worldview, perception of the world, and psychological characteristics. The West is driven by logic, reason. A Russian person lives primarily with his heart (spirit) and imagination, and only then with will and reason. Europeans understand only what they look like, but even then they distort it in their own way. Russian for them is foreign, alien, strange, restless and dangerous. Not understanding us, Russians are looked down upon, they consider our culture insignificant, secondary from the European one.
Therefore, in the West and in Russia itself (Westerners) support theories about the "barbarism" of the Russians, about the fact that they did not accept statehood and rulers from the Viking Germans, religion and the beginnings of culture, including writing, from the Greeks. Russians are a big and mysterious "misunderstanding" for Europe.
"Strange" relatives
Thus, we differ in the Western world not in the same way as Hindus, Muslims or Chinese. They are alien to the West both in genetics and in language. But we with the Europeans are close relatives, by blood and by language. Russians (Great Russians, Little Russians-Ukrainians and Belarusians) are Aryans-Indo-Europeans, as well as Germans, French or British and Irish. Almost all of Europe is inhabited by Aryan peoples and relatives.
For example, as early as the XNUMXth-XNUMXth centuries, the Balts spoke a close Russian language, worshiped the same gods (Perun, Veles), and had the same material culture. It was later that they were Germanized, Westernized. Even earlier, there was a single Slavic-Germanic language family. And so into the very depths of millennia. At the same time, the most ancient, deep roots of the "proto-language" of the Aryans-Indo-Europeans have been preserved in the Russian language. This is the strength of the Russian language - in its origins. All Europeans are our brothers, and the younger ones.
Here is a powerful psychological basis for the burning hatred of Westerners towards Russians! Anthropologically, genetically and linguistically, we are the same Europeans as the Italians, Spaniards, Dutch and Swedes. But at the same time, our faith, culture, morality, language, society and politics are incomprehensible, incomprehensible to the West.
Russians seem to be the same white, but completely different. Disorder, you need to bring them to a common denominator. Is it possible to hate someone more than the closest relative? Such is the psychological phenomenon.
Europeans are also emotionally poorer than us. The Russians have preserved a living ancient language. In terms of wealth, flexibility and variety of forms, it is akin and even higher than very complex ancient ones: ancient Greek and Latin. Western languages are much simpler and more functional. These are the languages of merchants and pirates. Hence the obvious misunderstanding of Russians by Europeans and Americans.
Russian faith.
Western man lives by profit, his interests are purely material. At the heart of Russian civilization is "conscience", participation in the Higher message, God. This is an eternal spiritual search, the pursuit of justice, truth. Truth is above the law for Russians, the general is above the particular, the spiritual is above the material. Therefore, the West is trying to disintegrate, distort and eventually destroy the Russian faith and language. And without them there will be no Russian person.
Nature
Many Russian philosophers and publicists also note the natural factor.
This was written in 1912, for example, by the Russian general Alexei Vandam (Edrikhin) in the book "Our Situation". The Russian people, in comparison with other peoples of the white race, were in the least favorable conditions for life. Nature and geography have doomed us to a poor and secluded existence. Therefore, the Russian national character is the fruit of a very harsh nature.
Hence the differences between the Russian political and economic "superstructure" from the western one. The Russian Plain is characterized by long cold winters and short summers. Low yield. Possibility of crop death from severe frosts, droughts or rainstorms. Europe has a network of convenient communication routes; we have huge, difficult-to-pass areas with low connectivity. Hence the difference in politics, social order and methods of management.
The West, in comparison with us, developed in greenhouse conditions. Democratic-liberal traditions and individual rights arise in an atmosphere of extreme feudal fragmentation of Europe. Where there was a jumble of possessions of the monarch, dukes, counts, barons and free cities. Where there were treaties, laws, laws and lawyers everywhere. The history of medieval Europe is a struggle between various social groups and estates, feudal families and houses. These are internal conflicts and negotiations. The system of democracy has passed a long and bloody path of many wars and civil strife, intrigue and uprisings.
Such a life was possible only in the absence of a strong external threat. A powerful external enemy, while the Europeans would coordinate their interests, feudal lords and vassals dealt with each other, and parliaments would chatter, grind them to dust. Quite small forces of the Huns, crushing and mobilizing local tribes along the way, reached Gaul (France) in the XNUMXth century. In the XNUMXth century, the Avars reached Hungary. The Arabs, already on their breath, captured the Iberian Peninsula, broke through to France. The Horde, obviously, due to internal troubles and the resistance of Russia, did not go further than Poland, Hungary and the Balkans. The Ottomans almost immediately captured the fragmented and decayed Byzantium, and then the Balkans, went to Vienna. And then the Europeans could not knock them out of Europe, the Russians did it in the end.
Russians throughout their history have lived under the threat of external invasion and the need to survive in harsh natural conditions. "Winter is Coming" is the House Stark slogan from Game of Thrones, it's about us. Each year it was necessary to harvest a crop, to save oneself from hunger, to fight off the enemy - an external one or a neighbor (in conditions of fragmentation). Life in a state of constant mobilization forced the Russians to create a special military system of economic and political life. It made it possible to quickly mobilize, repulse the enemy and restore what was destroyed. All people served: the prince-tsar - the people, the servicemen - the soldiers - fought, the townspeople and peasants - they created, were engaged in production, in a difficult case they rose to battle. I had to live like this for over a thousand years. The last raids of the Crimean Tatars were repulsed in the XNUMXth century, but then they had to constantly fight with the Persians, Turks, Swedes, French, Prussians-Germans, etc.
This is how faith, language, culture, history, nature and geography turned the direct brothers-brothers of Europeans - the Russians - into a completely different civilization. It seems like Russians are so white and Christians, but some are "wrong." And this specialness of ours infuriated and still infuriates the Western world. Century after century passed, but the situation persisted. There is an abyss between us. For Westerners, we are "barbarians", "born slaves" who need to be re-educated, returned to the "civilized world" or destroyed.
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