Evidence and ineffability in the apologetics of Paul Evdokimov
Issue 172 · 1970
This article analyzes Paul Evdokimov's apologetics through two paradoxically linked themes: the evidence and the ineffability of religious experience. The study examines how this Orthodox theologian, confronted with the challenges of secularized modernity — Marxism, Freudianism, existentialism, positivism — develops a defense of the Christian faith that deliberately renounces classical rational proofs. Drawing on an apophatic rereading of the Anselmian argument, on Berdyaev's philosophy, and on the legacy of Dostoevsky, Evdokimov argues that God manifests himself with evidence in inner spiritual experience, while remaining radically unprovable to anyone who has not undergone it. The article also evaluates the limits of this approach: by situating religious experience beyond all conceptual, social, or linguistic mediation, Evdokimov risks folding faith back into an interiority that is difficult to communicate, to the detriment of the constitutive mediations of Christianity, notably the Incarnation and ecclesial tradition.
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