The problem of the Christian East and West in the religious consciousness of Vladimir Soloviev

This article by Nicolas Berdyaev examines Vladimir Soloviev's thought on the relationship between Eastern and Western Christianity. The study adopts a historical, philosophical, and theological approach, tracing the evolution of Soloviev's religious consciousness from his Slavophile affinities to his final apocalyptic vision. The central idea is that Soloviev, by transcending the opposition between Slavophilism and Westernism, framed the problem of the reunification of the two Christian worlds as a fundamental spiritual requirement, grounded in mutual love rather than institutional agreements. Berdyaev shows that Soloviev underestimated the mystical dimension proper to each tradition — inner deification in the East, the loving impulse toward God in the West — and that it is in his later work, notably the "Tale of the Antichrist," that he arrives at a more accurate prophetic vision of the complementarity of the two Churches in the face of the threat of the Antichrist and pan-Mongolism.