in a letter written in 1955 to her friend Betty Hester flaner oconor insisted quote the truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it emotionally a higher Paradox confounds emotion as well as reason and there are long periods in the lives of all of us and of the Saints when the truth as revealed by faith is hideous emotionally disturbing downright repulsive witness The Dark Night of the soul in individual Saints right now now the whole world seems to be going through a Dark Night of the Soul close quote and in his 1978 commencement speech at Harvard University Soviet dissident Alexander sanen brooded quote there is a disaster which has already been underway for quite some time I referring to the Calamity of a despir and irreligious human consciousness close quote Professor Gary sa Morrison on the hard truths offered in Alexander sanon's famous 197 78 Harvard Commencement Address a world split apart [Music] now my name is Todd Warner and this is the evangelization culture podcast from word on fire Gary Sal Morrison is the Lawrence B Duma press professor of the Arts and Humanities and professor of Slavic languages at Northwestern University he has written or edited 21 books on Russian literature the nature of time the role of quotations in culture the affer is M as a literary genre and other topics his most recent book and an extraordinary one at that is Wonder confront certainty Russian writers on the Timeless questions and why their answers matter Saul welcome oh thank you so much for having me segment one who was Alexander sanen in the opening lines of his 1978 Harvard address a world split apart Alexander Souls began with a warning he said quote Harvard's motto is Veritas many of you have already found out and others will find out in the course of their lives that truth eludes us if we do not concentrate with total attention on its Pursuit and even while it eludes us the illusion still lingers of knowing it and leads to many misunderstandings also truth is seldom Pleasant it is almost invariably bitter there is some bitterness in my speech today too but I want to stress that it comes not from an adversary but from a friend close quote so Saul let's begin with that obvious question who was Alexander saniton well Alexander saniton was one of the most remarkable figures of the 20th century he uh was in the tradition of the great Russian writers uh but he was really inspired by the time he spent in the Soviet prison can system the log system for which he was arrested you know when he was an army officer for writing something he shouldn't have written in in a letter and gradually he realized that his purpose in life was to show the world what the Soviet system was like what the gulock was like and uh when he was released uh for Reef while he was in favor with the regime because Nikita kushev the first Secretary of the party was uh conducting a d stalinization campaign and allowed one remarkable story of soci to be published named uh one day in the life of Ivan denisovich Ivan denisovich is ordinary person um uh who had been a soldier during the war and you know been you know Behind Enemy Lines been in a German prison camp and all those people were automatically sent to Soviet camps because anyone who' seen in the west has done so right so he was there and it describes this ordinary person's feelings about you know the struggle for survival and the efforts he know to build something and um you know it's just an an ordinary an ordinary day um and it was quite shocking because nothing like that had ever been described you know I remember when the book came out I mean um you know it was a I'm old enough to remember that when it first appeared and you know it was on everybody's reading this for for a brief one um and it uh made Soul niton world famous but things started uh becoming much more restrictive particularly after uh Kev fell and and brv took over um and so he found it impossible to publish anything else and he was in worse and worse odor uh meanwhile he was he had been writing quite a number of things which couldn't be published um you know some stories a wonderful novel called in the first Circle um uh some of these were smuggled out and published in in the West MH which also do not make him any friends in in so um and you know it made him even even more world famous but he um Turned out to have been collecting material from many many people and many sources to produce a book about the Soviet prison can system book is called the gulag archipelago it is one of the most remarkable books of the last 100 years I'm sure it will be read a hundred years from now and longer it is a an absolute Masterpiece you would think that you know describing the three thick volumes everything he had learned you know from Mostly from testimonies of inmates which managed to survive um it might get boring all these and pain but it is really this is because he's a literary genius able to do that right um and of course he couldn't get it published in usar he didn't even try but the book was smuggled out and published in 1973 um English translation 1974 so just 50 years ago and uh it took the world my storm like nothing else I mean as a result of this uh book um communism Marxism ceased to be modish in France that was its biggest you know biggest effect and some everywhere France in particular and uh what the Soviets finally did was you know he was too famous for them just to shoot him or put him back pron so instead one day they showed up at his house and of course they never tell you what they're doing they take they bundle you off you on a plane and when you cross the border they tell you that you have been stripped of your Soviet citizenship and expelled from the Soviet Union unable to return and so he spent some time in Europe trying to figure out where he would be um all he has wonderful memoirs about this about how you know people simply didn't understand what was going on and he didn't understand a great deal about you know about the West like you know okay in the Soviet Union there was no law at all but in the west there was you know everything was sort of legalism and every Ed legal nuance and you had to have lawyers to do everything and people this was the exact the exact opposite right it's if one extreme to the other um and you know he thought that since well Soviet journalists always told lies Western ones would be honest but he yeah um eventually he he moved to the United States uh he found a place in remote part of Vermont which sort of reminded him about Russia you know with its snow and all that isolated and he spent the rest of his life writing the only breaks he took were a few times to give lectures including this one at Harvard which he did 1978 um you know he gave a I don't know eight or 10 lectures which have been collected in in a recent book uh called we have ceased to see the purpose um and uh mostly he worked on his other gigantic Masterpiece you know the Gul of archipel was three gigantic volumes longer and he called it the red wheel and it is several novels historical novels all about the Russian Revolution what led up to the revolution what made Russia go down that disastrous path when it could chosen otherwise could have been elsewhere and so there the first one is said in 1914 and then gradually you know um it goes uh as we get closer and closer to the revolution like for just February 197 I think there were four volumes was supposed to continue but just after April he just he knew he would never finish it um so that's his other big some you know one critic his two big Cathedrals meaning gulg and the red wheel yeah and but he many other things like I say I really like that novel in the first Circle uh he is a I mean he had his like every writer he has some strengths and weaknesses uh but his strengths um make him you know one of the truly great writers of the past 100 years so one thing I want to ask you is um you know you talk about the notion of um how seismic of an of an event it was for the gulag archipelago um or and the and then the publication of the one day in the life of um Ivan denisovich would have on Soviet Society but also Western Society you you think about from 1917 with the Bolshevik Revolution when it when it when it occurred to 1991 with the fall of the Soviet Union I would you say that the for instance the the release of the gulag archipelago does that rival only say kof's thaw speech you know in 1956 kind of De kind of condemning Stalin on certain excesses and so on are there can you think of any other moments of sheer uh uh cracks in the edifice I'm not talking about the Prague spring and the Hungarian Uprising and solidarity and so on but I'm saying kind of within the Soviet command structure itself or Soviet Society itself is the release of the gulag archipelago spirited out of of the society and does is that in kusf thaw speech the two most seismic shift shakes of the of the Soviet Enterprise from 17 to 91 is is that is that being too grandiose no I think so I mean there are other I mean a few others like you know um some other dissents like Andre sakarov sure you know Natan sheron's books made but I I think actually the soier niton one was more much more shocking than the Cru yeah because the cruise chip speech didn't really come to terms most of solon's crimes sure focused on the fact that he arrested hundreds of thousands of innocent Communists Communist party members who were completely loyal right it didn't for example you know um go into any detail about the collectivization of agriculture which cost you know maybe 20 million lives but after all those were just peasants who cares about peasants right um you know it was quite Limited in in what it actually discussed there was no detailed description you know the prison camp system of the goog you know the kind of tortures that were implied um it was shocking enough because Stalin was gone you know at the time and to criticize St so it was very shocking but it really was not revealing most of what you need to be revealed whereas that was done by sanist and not just of his own impression because he collected from many many you know other people's or testimonies of course you have to keep their names secret yeah it's an extraordinary read I mean it's it's and it's just it's it's like a hammer hitting in the head for at least the one I've read 6 50 pages just over and over again just and you just see this it's just from the from the arrest to the interrogation to the imprisonment to the mental manipulations and the rationalizations and so on it's it's a it's a shocking expose um um of exposes let me let me ask you this um Saul so here we are five years after four or five years after the release of Gulag archipelago Solan as you said is moved I think from Europe now he's living in Vermont in 1978 um kind of can you say a little bit about the state of the Cold War in 1978 um I I think we're at the points of Carter's president and maybe a little bit of the legacy of dayon from uh Nixon and Ford what's the state of the Cold War as Souls nson is sort of giving this speech at Harvard could you say a little bit about that that's really interesting yes it we were still in the period of Dayton that is you know um originally you know under Nixon and Henry Kissinger yep the idea that listen we don't have to fight so much let's soften the ideological battle you know we'll negotiate on on arms and you know if we're just nice to each other things will work out fine no we won't interfere in your Internal Affairs you know talk about violations of human rights very rarely you know and you know I mean the disident you know in the Soviet Union of course regarded this as something horrible yeah wanted to you know talk talk about human rights and that is why you know you know just a few years later um when Ronald Reagan became president you can imagine theh felt abandoned by the Americans because of day hun and then you know there you had Reagan referring to the Soviet Union as what everybody knew it really was you know the evil empire yeah um and then going to the Berlin wall and saying Mr gorber you have tear down this wall that people out right it was absolutely thrilling now in the west of course I don't call an evil empire well maybe they are but it's really not po it's only unsophisticated people evil yeah right I mean you might as well be in church if you're gonna do that don't talk like that you know the Washington Post and yeah we don't use phrases like Reagan was just an embarrassment but in for Soviet disident and Other Des around the world it was what gave them inspiration and hope yeah so so so sa how did how did Souls nsen you know Harvard knows what Souls nen thinks in the gulag archipelago and and his other released work and so on how did they come to invite him to to speak do you do you know the backstory on that no I don't know the details of it but it's not hard to imagine I mean he'd won a Nobel Prize literator yeah he was you know as the most famous writer in the world sort of like the way Leo tell story had been you know at one time um and you know he was he was nearby and you know this would be wonderful and besides you know the the you know the the Viewpoint that you would expect you know about Advanced you know professors and University administrators in Harvard they were not pro- Soviet yeah I mean they were not communist so they didn't mind him criticizing that they didn't like it either so there was no reason not to invite until until they did did you get now is his Souls needs in the eyes of the Soviets now he's living in America do the Soviets look at him as this existential threats that's going that's you know he's going to be his his voice out there could could shake our foundations or is see this nuisance poet you know writer who's just let him do his thing over there do they do they understand the gravity of what what they were dealing with with soulan niten on the outside and did Americans look at him as just being again he's going to come up and give a speech it's going to be Rah West capitalism America and boo to the Soviet Union you know did was everybody under on both sides did everybody underestimate sanen yeah I think I think they did I mean the Soviets were closer because they knew the sort of things he was out yeah um uh you know I mean I mean the most danger would be of course if the Russian people themselves the Soviet people right but that was not they could control that once he was out of the country um uh but yes it was still you know uh dangerous for them and I mean there wasn't anything more he could reveal that wasn't in yeah poo so there was no I guess there was no more danger except people getting to know it but um westerners you know they just assumed that soier niton was one of them what else could you be if you're a smart a great writer you know um someone who is you know against tyranny aren't we all against against tyranny he he's just just one of us that's all and then he turned out not to be one segment two the message in his 1978 Harvard Commencement Address Alexander Solon declared quote a loss of Courage may be the most striking feature which an outside Observer notices in the West in our days the Western world has lost its civil courage both as a whole and separately in each country each government each political party and of course in the United Nations such a decline in Courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling groups and the intellectual Elite causing an impression of loss of Courage by the entire Society Solan would go on and say quote and Decline and courage is ironically emphasized by occasional explosions of anger and inflexibility on the part of the same bureaucrats when dealing with weak governments and weak countries not supported by anyone or with currents which cannot offer any resistance but they get tongue tied and paralyzed when they deal with powerful governments and threatening forces with aggressors and international terrorists should one point out that from ancient times Decline and courage has been considered the beginning of the end close quote so Saul as a as a scholar in Russian literature and as an active mind engaged on the world scene and as somebody who remembers when this all played out in real time what do you remember most vividly about souls and eon's message well I remember you know I was much younger and of course um that thinking well how can we say how can he say we don't confront tyranny we just fought the Vietnam War a few year few years earlier right lost but we we had fought it it wasn't you know we um so it didn't show a lack of courage and not long before that of course there had been you know um you know the Cuban Missile Crisis more about the Korean War but La lack of Courage um but he saw something that has become more and more apparent as the years have gone by right I mean I would never have expected back then that you would you know see on college campuses around the country you know demonstrator shouting death to America you know like the way the Iranian slogan and this is you know within the realm of of you know acceptable acceptable opinion yeah it's quite striking um you know or you know before that I was you know rather shocked that um you know uh Bernie Sanders would be so popular after all he was twice the cand you know a delegate you know uh for um a marus leninist party you know in the presidential election means he's a communist yeah yeah you know um and he never repudiated it you know and you know he had a honeymoon in in the Soviet Union no Nobody Does it for the [Laughter] weather so I was sh and when I mention this to people they say what are you a red Banger you know you know Saul let me ask you this so Souls need explored a number of themes in his speech I want to touch on a few of them one of them was was material comfort so George Bernan know called the meaningful but suffering life of the Saint the only adventure and fler oconor shakes her head about people's misunderstanding of the life of Faith as a big electric blanket when she says of course it is the cross so what happens to the soul of a nation and the soul of a person who considers material comfort and pleasure to be the highest ends well that that was his point right I mean if you really here's imagine this person who has just seen the depths of evil beyond anything America yeah imagine knows just not not just him right um and then comes to America and find out that the the greatest wisdom the most sophisticated view is that the purpose of life is individual happiness I mean even in 19th century Russia that would have regarded as so shallow you'd be embarrassed to say it even if you it this was way before the Soviets just too shallow to think of right I mean some undoubtedly you think people believed it but no one you know s so shallow you didn't say it right yeah um well and then he this seemed you know the full effects of this take time to work themselves out because even though people think they all also have other values which they've been taught larger values but as that becomes more and more the dominant value and the other values are Way Beyond memory your great great grandparents well how do you get people to risk their lives defending their country if they think that their own lives and the happiness of it is all that matters yeah you won't do it let somebody else don't do it right is what what you'll say and as he points out you know and then even if you're not risking your life listen you know a higher military budget War you know will lower the GDP and lower your standard of living do we really want that if our highest goals in will happiness you know it doesn't matter so how many Advanced weapons you may have if people don't have any courage yeah and that that you know again even when I was growing up I would have I you know thought well that's kind of exaggerated rhetoric isn't it but it it was at the time he was looking for the future and he you know he was seeing a trend which uh nobody else saw in the United States I certainly didn't but which has you know come to be yeah so Solen and also barites uh structure of positive law of legalism you mentioned legalism earlier he said a society with no other scale but the legal one is not quite worthy of man a society which is based on the letter of the law never reaches any higher is taking very scarce advantage of the high level of human possibilities whenever the tissue of life is woven of legalistic relations there's an atmosphere of moral mediocrity paralyzing man's noblest impulses so why does a higher Criterion Saul for right and wrong beyond the simple law matter so much to souls of needs and and why should it matter to us well you need law or you wind up in in the Soviet Union right yeah but if the way most moral social problems are handled was is by passing laws and that's all there is if you know it's either a matter of the criminal law or contract and that expresses our view of life then you know what does law do law you know says don't do this do that rewards this punishes that it comes very if that's all it is and your mind is you know constantly working on the details of the law you know your energy is how do I avoid this tax or I get around that yeah um all of those things you're not asking that's they seem important which means real moral questions real life purpose questions don't seem you know important they don't they don't come up you know um you know I'm just looking at this book from about 10 years ago called excellent sheep yeah American you know this what he what he's talking about you know you're not more of college ought to be devoted to well the questions asked in russan in Russian literature right which people are embarrassed I I can tell you I have a lot of students who are not embarrassed you know um but um that that's the sort of thing he has in mind when you're you know there it's a kind of blinkers to think only in legalistic but that doesn't mean you know law is not important it means an you know it's better to have extreme legalism than to have what the Soviets at know right right but it's still not very good yeah well and and and so Freedom also Freedom has become the ultimate value another another notion that that Souls need to explores rights exceed duties individual individualism outpaces the common good leading to the Triumph of mediocrity and what Souls n dubs the abyss of human decadence so he goes on soulson in his speech goes on to say such a tilt of freedom in the direction of evil has come about gradually but it was evidently born primarily out of a humanistic and benevolent concept According to which there is no evil inherent to human nature the world belongs to Mankind and all the defects of Life are caused by the wrong social systems which must be corrected so Saul what does unrestrained freedom do to society and the soul and and further kind of exploring what Soul's needs is saying there how does a worldview sensing the notion of original sin staining the human person or kind of an innate Brokenness how does that differ from the notion that mankind is perfect with problems that can be fixed with just the right kind of social system you know this is what he considers you know the prime um error which has led to everything else yeah you know and this view you know you can read about it in 19th century Russian literature the car with it the idea that crime is simply the result of bad social conditions yeah um you know so you change the social conditions bad education you re-educate people you know the wrong economic you create a socialist economic system and then then you'll do away right um it's a benevolent view evil is superficial that's all and if you start thinking this way you always think the best of others and sometimes thinking the best you know of communist or Nazis isn't the isn't the best way of handl you're you're inclined to think listen it's just a misunderstanding you know you know you know let's be nice to you know the Soviets the maist you know the Iranians more Adroid diplomacy you know open ourselves up don't threaten them and things and you know told n said if only you could hear you know the Soviet you know they ACC to the state department people laughing when they read these you know these statements and anyone could be that naive you know right they just you know but it doesn't feel naive you understand to the people who are saying it it feels sophisticated and that we got to fight these evil guys that's just see you know that's a barh housee brawl idea we don't you sophisticated people don't don't think that um and so what seems naive and will produce bad results it comes across as just what you should be thinking if you are are you know one of the elites um and had good education right um in in America and and in Western Europe but evil you don't will not doubt the existence of evil radical evil which will you know can go to depths that Americans couldn't have imagined if you have experienced the Gul you know and and describe it right we take that book seriously and people people who took that book seriously wouldn't be able to think that what we call sophistication is it all you know Saul how how does H so you've done delve so deeply into the great Russian literature of DV and COV and TV and tolto and and and so on and others many others and one of the themes that you return to again and again is the the intelligencia who who were kind of the um you know materialist atheistic um you know kind of social engineering types and so on that the Russian literature rebutted time and time and time again you know and and and my question is how does the modern the modern intelligency or how does the Harvard uh and I know intelling doesn't always mean the ivy league and all this stuff but how did the Harvard types or the New York Times writing or the post Po in 1978 when they're criticizing uh uh Souls n's words and we'll get into that in a minute H how do they get how do they in all the education they've gotten in all the Insight they apparently purport to have how do they get it so wrong how do they get it so fundamentally wrong in these assumptions that would make the lowest you know member of the Soviet Society scoff at such naive that the American higher ups would be so credulous over these things what's your sense about that well think let me project you into a situation let's say a university a Washington's Post Newsroom you want to be regarded as one of them you don't regarded as an IDI and so you learn the things that you say and you don't say and since the only way to do that consistently is actually to believe in you get yourself to believe because the alternative is to be ostracized I me alternative is to be something like like I don't know like Barry WIS you know you know yeah you know um you know J bachia you yes there are good strong or Joshua cat strange people who do that but very few will do that they most want to be you know accepted they want their career depends on it but most of all their comfort depends on it they want to think of themselves as one of the good people right and so they get themselves to think and you can get the people to think anything that way literally think of the worst thing in the world you know you could think of you know um justifying the worst things in the world you if that is you know Harvard and New York Times editorial room and so forth are thinking and you want to be them you will get yourself thing except in that that's how it has and there's no limit to how awful it can be much worse you know than what soul was talking about you know it's it's amazing when you say that because it makes me think of of a elementary school Lun room you know I mean to think uh to think about the notion of wanting to sit at the cool kids table and you know and you're and you're like you got to be kidding me we we have people that have spent you know nowadays hundreds of thousands of dollars on Elite educations they're working they're working in sophisticated workplaces they're going to the to the the the in parties and talking with sages of the age those are the cool kids they're the cool kids and and and being a cool kid you you like you said you you you bend your so do you think this is sort of willful ignorance or do you feel like it's it I mean is it is it cynical is it like well it's not that way but this is the way I get my P my paycheck or is it sort of like no these are people that hear one line and have decided to actively not explore the other line and therefore they become one of them yeah no it's it's not um cynical at all I mean you couldn't do it very well if it was cynical yeah good one it would betray itself right uh uh you know you you'd seek out other cynical people to love that would give you yourself away you it's not you have to get yourself really to believe this is by the way just what um you know people like ches Milo described in the book Captain mind where you get yourself to believe you know the official Comm right but there it's the government for you know fostering it here it's not right I mean it will be I suppose enough if enough people get try to get it to do it but so far it's you know it's just the social Elite right um and that's quite powerful enough that's amazing I think it was either Pago or Milos that said something like a word of Truth uh in a in a in a conspiring room sounds like a pistol shot you know that that when someone said someone's in the New York Times office and they say well you know Trump had a point on this or whatever case you want to be you want to make it's like you know the record scratched no no one you know you've just you've just crossed this line by saying this so it's it's an amaz it's an amazing group think that you'd think my gosh everybody's read George Orwell you know everybody the archives are out the gulag archipelago made its way out you should know better than this but it's it seems striking how generation after generation people fall sway to being at the cool kids table yeah I mean and of course you mentioning Orwell Orwell was almost a model person who didn't want being with the cool kids who wanted the truth yeah and you know all was writing about that not just 1984 but it's increasingly becoming the case not yet but that if you really sophisticate these institutions you don't talk that over yeah yeah so Sol spared no criticism of the Free Press and and though it wasn't absolutely controlled in the sense of the Soviet press um it was dangerous in its Supreme and unchecked power this is the Western press he was saying the Western press was dangerous in its Supreme and unchecked power its decadence bias sloppiness superficiality and its tendency towards disinformation this is in 1978 how much do so Den's criticisms of the 1978 press apply to the Press today well I think there's one reason why it it's accelerated and that is um okay if you go back to 1978 there were three TV channels they all had the evening news and people watched all three and they tried to at least come off as nonpartisan right so that you would not you know get even if you took one point of you would present the other one right you know Walter kide for example people didn't know what his politics were until he reti yeah yeah um and even you know partisan news magazines you know Newsweek time with one way or the other they still were like that right there was no way you could Escape knowing how people other than you thought there's no way you could think that anybody who disagrees with me is simply you know evil or stupid they're mistaken maybe but um they don't understand certain things that we do but they're not evil to St um now you know quite the opposite is the case you know you're taught in you know journalism school and these news rooms that you must always stick to the narrative and any he contradicts it you don't report it and this is regarded as the highest idealism because you're your highest loyalty it is to social justice not the truth yeah and that's the switch the main switch has been from in education and journalism from truth above all yes of course social justice too but truth above all we don't lie for social to social justice is and the truth only in so far as it supports that that's that's been you know the biggest change that and it's considered much more idealistic after all there's no truth anyway so you know you know this is are yeah yeah you know um and once you do that you can justify anything literally anything Christine Rosen I think it was in commentary magazine this might have been around the time that Barry Weiss wrote her open letter and left but she talked about somebody at the New York Times uh uh kind of the editorial one of the leaders making mention that that objectivism is a tired old standard and it's run its course effectively and it has no place and now we have to write from a point of moral Clarity and and and and but that that that doesn't mean you know fairness doesn't mean objective it doesn't necessarily mean truth it's moral Clarity according to my my definition of moral Clarity which like you said now you've got a spinning compass in terms of you know a Criterion for truth is sort of both the Nazis and and the Soviets could could have used the language of moral Clarity right yeah yeah moral Clarity right where it leads to I mean yeah and doesn't it doesn't take a long time it leads to very C so solson Ethan said through he said this through intense suffering our Russian country has now achieved a spiritual development of such intensity that the Western system in its present state of spiritual exhaustion does not look attractive so Saul what does suffering do in your estimation to spiritual Vigor and how does decadence contribute to spiritual flabbiness well you know if you've been through the sort of things that soulis describes um the idea of all of life is a Crow happiness let look for the the next pleasure just seems it's shattered it's just ridiculous in conditions like that it requires soft conditions think that way on the other hand if you're in content soft conditions where there aren't any real any significant suffering you know you call suffering something that would be a joke you know place that really has it um well then you're not called upon to think in terms of larer purposes right you laugh at them you laugh at truth oh come on there's no truth there's only come on we sophisticate it we know there's just you know you know what we want and satisfaction you know and the higher GDP and that's all and are getting it you know we know that's it anybody else is sort of what should we say um well let the author slesinger you know who is the great historian of the time preeminent one you know called souls in it's a Puritan you know and today you would you know may do the same you know sort of like those what do you say you know those naive Bible thumping you know you know anti-evolutionist people who believe in good that's how you counter right yeah yeah um you know there you want be one of M you know that you know or you have I heard one of my colleague Express ones um any fool he said can defend his own country that's patriotism what any fool would do but we educated people must always find a way to take the other side that's our job is so you always criticize J this is by the way a very eminent and first great historian said this I mean he's you know I read his works with great pleasure this is what he thought wow wow we touched on this before Saul I said I want to ask you about if you have any other words on this the Western propensity for self-deception and rationalization so souls and iton lambasted those who professed infinitely Humane sentiment and yet whose preferred policies contributed to the enslavement torture and death of millions and speaking of the rationalization of imposed communism in Eastern Europe Souls nson said do those convinced pacifists hear the moans coming from there do they understand their responsibility today and so I would add you know voices like Robert conquest and Malcolm mugrage and Vos of hav were apoplectic at the self- delusion of Western fellow Travelers so in your essay Souls needs at Harvard which which is in the in the coming evangelization culture Journal um for this Autumn you asked quote had the civilization that had been led by Churchill the gall and Truman only three decades before Souls nson speech turned into a land of what lenon famously called useful idiots so so can what's what's the answer Saul you know in in in in our self deception on the nature of evil um have we in the West in 1978 it's much less the current ERA Have We Become useful idiots to these um abhorent ideologies yeah you know I sometimes think it it's like tell St uses this image at one point to talk about self-deception you know you know the children's game it goes um getting warmer yeah warmer okay when it starts getting certain degree warmer not when you've got there got getting there would be knowing something you don't know when it starts getting warmer you know to Swerve off going to air conditioning so you don't have to get there you have this warm so you ni can always say to you didn't know prevent yourself from knowing right that I think that's pretty much how it works you have before you can you there are warning bells that go off right and you and you're taught to recognize those bills right you know wow that's unbelievable I that's that's that's that it's so scary to think about someone almost being trained and adopting a posture so as to run away from the truth and not towards it it's a it's not truth but moral Clarity yeah yeah boy one last question in this segment Souls Souls closes his speech warning that quote we have lost the concept of a supreme complete entity which used to restrain our passions and our irresponsibility we have placed too much hope in political and social reforms only to find out that they were being deprived of most precious possession our spiritual life in the East it is destroyed by the dealings and and minations of the ruling party in the West Commercial interests tend to suffocate it this is the real crisis close quote actually so would continue man's task on Earth has to be the Fulfillment of a permanent Earnest Duty so that one's life Journey may become an experience of moral growth so that one may leave a better human being than one started it Saul where would Souls anden um have a start what's what's what's the way in 1978 what was the way out of this conundrum um to your understanding of Souls and eon's perspective it has to be you know a complete we evaluation of values use NE phrase right you'd have to I mean education have to cease to be about making simply making you professionally successful it could Al should also be about this is the time in your life when you can ask questions right um you ask big questions there's a new move that title ask big question yeah um you know uh you have to have a sense this has to be part of the culture that you must have a higher purpose for life to be worth thaning that's stuffing your isn't living um and what can do that well you know in Russia where the greatest thing in the world is literature you can hope for literature to do that in America I don't know if Hollywood would change maybe you know we would do that I mean you know inde you know occasionally you do get you know films like that but they're always in fantastic mode like Lord of the Rings yeah yeah this clearly is about you know something higher right right makes no sense but you know it's a fats elves and Orcs you know things like that yeah um if that would to change maybe it would change you know Mass entertainment if um you know some courageous journalism schools would start but it pervs a great deal and anyone who tried would have a really rough time doing it um people are things of you know know some of the various sites on subst you not all of them of course but some of them are there um they're not just about you know politics if that's all it is it doesn't work it has to be the Val politics doesn't work unless the value that's what they're appealing to so it's more about cultural things than that um I they want to change thinking I wanted I'm one of the few well I shouldn't say one of the few I'm one of the few non students who's had the pleasure to come down to Northwestern and sit in your class as you're teaching on uh the brothers care mazov um for those who are unfamiliar uh Saul is legendary um in his not only his understanding and his distillation of the Russian greats like again dusto tolto and others but also the the the Vivid uh enactment of some of the pivotal dialogues in class and so on and and to my way of thinking and wonder confront certainty which I want to do a full podcast on that magnum opus of yours I'm sure you'll have even further Magnum OPI in the future but it's it's it's tremendous tremendous work um but you really keenly put your finger on the notion that the Russian literary great this was this these questions of purpose and meaning and Transcendence um they suffused the entire reason for being um of those stories so so so would you say just a word or two about what DKI and tolto and turv and Czech off and and others of the Russian literary tradition what they can do to help answer fill the void of of purpose and meaning revaluing of values in in the world that Solan is creating is uh is uh criticizing you know one of the things I mentioned in that book is a wonderful essay by Virginia Wolf the Russian point of view about why Russian literature took Western countries by storm they encountered in it something they've never seen you know it's All About Soul pure soul and you know he intense things that can you know it can feel the meanings that it seeks the soul is the hero you know soul in that sense right finding your ultimate self right that's what these books are about and asking ultimate question is what you do it's you know it's you know it's not something to be oh yeah just a [ __ ] session say I no it's it is the most important most important thing so you know great literature can can do that if if you allow it that's why I think it's so tragic that um so many of our literature departments don't actually teach literature yeah yeah either they just teach political Theory or they teach literature not necessarily great literature as you know from that perspective um you really have to look so you know one of my recent students who you know wanted to become a go to graduate school to study English literature and discovered that there really weren't any places where most of what you studed was really English stud what you study you know she loved George Elliott right Eng just didn't do that you know now you could still do it in Russian departments then you have to know Russia yeah you know um but that's takes away that whole purpose of great literature is to live in great moral questions you know Greek tragedy you know Shakespeare Milton they're asking these they're asking in different ways they're giving different answers you know great literature over the Millennia and across different cultures you know from the Far East to you know to the Far West or okay one giant Symposium hi I'm Todd Warner managing editor of evangelization and culture the Journal of the word on fire Institute word on fire is a global Evangelical community that exists to provide our members with the resources they need to Proclaim Christ to a secular culture our award-winning quarterly journal evangelization and culture is offered exclusively to Word on Fire Institute members it's a tangible representation of our mission and goal to lead with Beauty in order to bring others to the knowledge of Truth inside each issue you'll find writing from Premier Scholars and inspiring pieces on literature culture and daily life from fellow missionaries on the journey to know and serve Christ get a copy of the current issue of the evangelization culture journal for free by visiting wordonfire.org Journal thank you and join us in bringing Christ to a hungry culture segment three the legacy of souls Nan speech in his essay souls and E at Harvard Gary s morison concludes quote in words that seem all the more pertinent now Souls n warned the forces of evil have begun their offensive they may well bury Western Civilization forever close quote uh Professor Morrison then asks can a culture that does not appreciate evil resist it so Saul I want to start with a question about not just soulen but other dissidents how important is the role of dissidents like soulen havl lasa kakowski and Saints like maximilan col um uh Edith Stein John Paul II how important are they in challenging us to think clearly about the threats to the Dignity of man I mean they they are absolutely crucial to the world world today because they clearly are not unsophisticated right they are not someone who can be written off as you know uncultured boor they have shown courage that the people who might want to reject them couldn't imagine so they stand as moral beacons that cannot be completely ignored over you triy um you know I would say that you know in addition to Russian literature the great gift of Russian culture in the last let's say 50 years um has been the tradition of the dissonance the courage that they have sh I mean yeah some a lot of them die under torture as you know right um you know there's Americans have forgotten the practice of imprisoning dissidents in psychiatric institution well if you disagree with the regime you must be crazy and the diagnosis is the typic one was sluggish schizophrenia they call um or delusions of grand and um you know can't remember one of my recent essays I I quote something from a recent book on the diss um about a person who for six months was subject to insulin injection treatment and another cure his belief in God jeez now you have to be crazy to believe where materialist you you know and people stood up for that if you read you know um Natan shansky not just you know his wonderful book fear the Weevil but he recently has autobiography just out called never alone and the first part of it is just about his experience you know in in the Soviet Union um you know he's isolated in prison for 11 years no communication with his wife with anyone and he has talks about how he maintains the courage not to give him wow assures himself that he is not alone you know in this case that there are you know people supporting the Jewish refusion around the world although of course he was also part of the general Human Rights Movement you know his me Mentor was Andre sakur um and so there were human rights actors around the world you know both who were you know he who are that they were supporting right and he was right right um and that's you know a lot of these incredible Memoirs of the demon MOSI you know they just one after you know another of these you know testimonies to strength and courage of A Sort we you see I I'm moved to recall a recent story you know when um naal you know having been poisoned was somehow man just it it Miss fire we wound up in you know in the German Hospital yeah he recovered and what did he do he after recovering he went back and of course he was arrested and eventually died and when he went back he European journalist asked Natan shansky why did he go back didn't he know what would happen to him is he that naive and shonky replies that I'm afraid I was rather Ru I answer and I said her if your only goal is survival you are right it was naive to go back but don't you understand that that wasn't his goal his goal was the salvation of his people and he wanted to say to them I'm not afraid you don't be afraid either you know that's what you know that's what that tradition of Russian dis did course you not only Russian equest as you mentioned there were several there were some in Poland some in in in the Czech Republic some all over Eastern Europe but the core of it of course was you know sah and soulan MIT Ginsburg and one after another um incredibly brave men you know from a tradition that begins in 1960 really yeah yeah it's incredible to I I came obviously later to this than than obviously you did but to read the writings of of sharansky a havl a souls and it's in Isaiah John Paul I second you know who was formed in The Crucible of of you know Nafi Poland and then communist dominated Poland um there is a in that Crucible there's a purification of truth there's a there's a there's a there there seems to be among the strongest and most courageous individuals the ability to dismiss the the the uh the irrelevance and and the distraction and to focus purely on the notion of the nature of man and and the Transcendence of God and and the enduring arities that are being crushed in the vice of an IDE ideological materialist atheistic um you know totalitarian state that that that so it's so you know in a in a in a strange way but also in a very obvious way the suffering you know it's it's the old Canard of you know the the Diamond that gets under incredible pressure comes out of the coal or what have you so it's it's it's I don't know it's incredible and I it's my way of thinking you have been one of the great champions of not not only the the the varities and enduring truths of Russian literature but also souls nsen and others that have spoken out against the modern ideological or totalitarian movements and so on and I think those are under appreciated sources and I appreciate you you calling them out the distance matter yeah you know I'm hoping that you know in teaching great Russian novels I will appeal the students to look at their lives more broadly there's something I mean it's fine you know you know to be oriented towards your F your career and your future but also you need realize that can be a trivial life you haven't thought about bigger questions right yeah and know how to do it because you also have to overcome the habit of always going along with what you're because that's what you have to know how to think so what you write a model out in the classes you know ending with a couple of uh two two more questions are are there any notable I don't want to there's never you can never you know replicate a Souls e but are there voices today that you'd say that speak clearly intelligently um productively constructively um that could be a little bit Souls andsen like in our modern increasingly ideological age are there anybody any people that you read or admire their work in in what they're saying uh today well of course there's notan shansky writing right um I just read his autobiography that's why it's so you know yeah you know but there are you know this group of courageous people in you know um Dr V you know there and you know there's Jonathan height Joshua you know you know they stand for different things but they all stand for very wise for moral courage M um and questioning yeah and of course when people are questioners they're not all going to agree with each other but that's the point that's yeah yeah I don't know do you know who comes to mind for you well you do you're for no I mean I mean that's not flattery but I'm just saying you're you're a foremost and the the greatest thing about it is you utilize the great lessons of Timeless Russian literature to shine a bright lights on the Brokenness and the glory of what it means to be human and simultaneously the the the best laid plans that are LED astray when it comes to utopian thinking and like you've described in the POs you know the possessed and and you know Ivan kazav and and so on so I just I just think you you have simultaneously introd you've been introduced to a generation of students simultaneously the Beauty and the pleasure of enjoying great Russian literature and simultaneously the profoundly relevant philosophical insights that comes from these works that are relevant for navigating our way in the mindfield of an ideological age today and I think there are few people on the scene that write as well as you do and teach as well as you do on matters that are as important as what you're teaching so I'm going to leave that right there in front of you and you can't say anything because I'm the host of the show so that's all no but I you really deserve those accolades and I I recommend so many people to read everybody should read your work read it in evangelization culture this coming this coming issue uh or this current issue uh uh Soul Souls at Harvard but also be sure to read Gary s Morrison's uh Wonder confront certainty I want to ask one last question Sol for you of you and that is um looking back how were you personally changed the the with the souls needs and speech how were you how were you changed at the time how have you been changed by the example of a of a person who could condemn what he went through in the Soviet Union but could come back with Clarity and say you know there's some things over here that we need to be careful of too what what what how are you impacted how are you changed what lessons do you derive from that speech well you know it's not someone F speech as his example the example of you knowski and Shoni and then in I remember h in Czechoslovakia for me what they meant whenever I was wondering about well should I risk you know saying this sort of thing my the thought that would always occur to me look what you know soulan niton and hav risked how can I what am I risking how can I not do this so for me that was you know their importance right and I I think that movement of the moral stature and courage of these people that's you know an icon for wonderful Gary s Morrison Professor writer and modern voice of reason in an offen ideological age thank you so much for taking the time to be with us it's been a pleasure talking with you thank [Music] you so I've been thinking it was in 2002 during my second year of my Internal Medicine Residency that I first came across Alexander sanon's Harvard commencement address it came from a dear friend and Mentor Dr Michael Cummings who as my attending physician happened upon a conversation I was having with other residents about a book called Fast Food Nation realizing that an an inquisitive sort like myself was wasting time on a vapid mck raker book of the month might constructively Place soul and eats and speech in my hands and I've been different ever since let me explain up to that point in my life other than seeing a 1974 Gray Harper Collins edition of the gulag archipelago in my father's Library I had no idea who Alexander soliton was or why he mattered even more I was intrigued as to why my attending physician would direct me away from the topic dour and toward a 24-year-old speech from an impossibly old old looking Russian dissident and so I read the speech and I was thunder struck for a Russian who endured years of Horrors in the Soviet prison system who penned an intricate bombshell tell all Memoir speed out through the underground in 1974 and who shocked the world with his Revelations it is not surprising that Souls niten would have Myriad criticisms of the communist state after all this man was exiled from the Soviet Union and took residence first in Western Europe and ultimately in the United States to have soulen and speak at Harvard should have been nothing less than a pleasing Victory lap for democracy and the west but that isn't how it unfolded while Solan spared no condemnation of the Soviet system that sought to crush him he also to the dismay of many listeners withheld no criticism of the West to be sure Western democracies righteously denunciate the brutal ideology and practice of the Soviet evil empire and their own and Allied countries continue to Champion a system of freedoms checks and balances to resist Devolution to a dark police state but soulan niten wasn't satisfied furthermore he wanted to preemptively assure his audience that his critique comes not as an adversary but as a friend the West Souls said to my ever widening eyes had grown arrogant decadent and Godless with a penchant for hyper legalism and rights Obsession and with aity of Truth tellers the West had lost its soul and in losing its Soul its citizens risk losing their own Eternal reward while Western societies teetered precariously on the verge of moral collapse What Becomes of Freedom he seemed to ask when its Champions are slaves to their Pleasures What Becomes of Duty when its Defenders are bloated with selfishness What Becomes of virtue if God virtue source is dead Edmond Burke in his 1770 Treatise thoughts on the cause of the present discontents warned quote when bad men combine the good must associate else they will fall one by one and unpitied sacrifice in a cont temptable struggle close quote how do the good associate when they are atomized in their bickering superficial self-satisfaction how in times of great moral trial do the mediocre conceivably become mighty in response to his speech szenen was ravaged by a hoty sniffing media Elite deemed ungrateful retrograde and parochial he was brushed aside as another crank a Cassandra with a backward vision and an unenlightened agenda to push while while still a powerful voice among the oppressed Alexander saniton was marginalized by the West's best and brightest the very people one may add who had fostered the moral and cultural crisis soulen and lamented the truth hurts that is something my dad often told me we may not like it and there may be aspects with which we disagree but in the end there it is and sometimes the best person to share the painful truth is a friend because maybe just maybe that is when we begin to change and one last thing read Alexander sanon's 1978 Harvard commencement speech but also dive into the gulag archipelago to be sure it is tough reading but it is a vital testimony to the endurance of the human Spirit amid the most inhuman circumstances soulen didn't lose faith in God in the gulg he gained it in this work of Works read about the dark dangers of ideology and the glory of the spirit that outshines it for sure you will be alarmed but you will also be changed thank you once again for joining me on the the evangelization and culture podcast I'm Todd Warner and until we meet again keep bringing Christ to a hungry culture [Music] [Applause] [Music]