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In  the Lectures on Godmanhood, ‘the connecting link  between  the divine
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       and natural worlds is the human being’.  Eternal Wisdom/Sofia, identified with
       the World  Soul, ‘is the origin of  humanity;  it is the ideal or normal human’.
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       Although  the  human  appears to  be temporal  as an  earthly ‘fact’  – ‘science…
       shows that our natural or earthly human appeared on the earth at a  particular
       point in time, as the conclusive link of organic development’  – his/her being is
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       therefore necessarily eternal and all-embracing as an  expression of this eternal
       Wisdom/Sofia.  These ideas  combine  an  evolutionary  outlook  with Origenist
       metaphysics. 34
            Although  Solovyov’s  proposal  that human  spiritual development takes
       place  through  evolution  requires  that  evil  is  included  in  a  dialectic  of
       becoming,  just as in Teilhard’s system,  Solovyov differs from Teilhard in his
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       neutral rather than positive understanding of the natural world.  ‘Nature is by
       itself  just  a  collection  of  indifferent  processes  –  peaceful  and  uninterested
       being’.  This is despite their both seeing humans as ‘fulfilling’ the natural world
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       and revealing its ultimate significance. Solovyov tells us: ‘It is not humans who
       receive from  nature something that they do  not have,  that  could  satisfy and
       fulfil their existence – conversely he himself  brings to  nature that which she
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       does  not  have,  that  he  derives  from  himself’.  Although  at  this  stage  in
       Solovyov’s  writing,  he  has  an  optimistic  view of  the  progress of  the  natural
       world,  in  Appendix  10  of  Origins  of  Religion,  Men  remarks  on  the
       apocalyptic/negative nature of Solovyov’s later works (e.g.  Three Conversations).
       Here we  see a  tension  between  two  competing  views  of  the progress  of  the
       universe, a tension  which Men  retains in his own thought, as we have already
       considered in our discussion of Teilhard.
            The divine world, originally created as Wisdom, does not correspond to
       the  imperfect  natural  world  that  we  see. This  world,  when  realised  in  ideal
       spiritual contemplation,  must be recognised  as perfect. Conversely,  the world


       31  Solovyov, Vladimir. Lectures on Godmanhood, p170. Соловьёв, Владимир. Чтения о
       Богочеловечестве. [Азбука-Классика, Санкт-Петербург, 2014] [Azbuka-Klassika, St.
       Petersburg, 2014] – contains Russia and the Universal Church
       32  Solovyov, Lectures on Godmanhood, p171
       33  Parallels the noosphere of Teilhard – Solovyov, Lectures on Godmanhood, p171
       34  Introduction by Zaikin, Solovyov Lectures on Godmanhood, p23
       35  Krasitsky, Yan. God, the Human and Evil: An Investigation into the Philosophy of Vladimir Soloviev,
       p128. Красицкий, Ян. Бог, Человек и Зло: Исследование Философии Владимира Соловьева
       [Прогресс-Традиция, Москва, 2009] [Progress-Tradition, Moscow, 2009]
       36  Solovyov, Lectures on Godmanhood, p82
       37  Solovyov, Lectures on Godmanhood, p84


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