Since the twenties of the last century in various fields of the Greek culture one may see development of a tendency which may be characterized in a first approximation as “Neo-Byzantinism. In a measure with movement might be connected with a failure of the political project that had its beginning in the Greek revolution of 1821 and its tragic result in the destruction of Greek communities in Asia Minor in 1923. In general the principle of Neo-Byzantinism might be formulated as (...) following: Greece is not an ordinary nation and cannot build its identity according to the model of a neo-European national state. Paradoxically the fundamental principle of Greek culture is recognized in Byzantine Orthodoxy as supra-territorial and moreover supra-ethnic cultural model. Many of mentioned Greek authors find the detailed development of philosophical, theological, artistic aspects of this model in the writings of Russian religious philosophers and byzantinists of 19 and 20th c. from the early Slavophiles up to Russian emigrate authors like G. Florovsky, V. Lossky, L. Ouspensky. It’s very meaningful that Greek intellectuals “recognize in writings of representatives of “the Third Rome the image of “the Second Rome’s culture; they receive it as own. So Basil Tatakis discovers the Byzantine type of spirituality in the works of I. Kirejevsky, F. Dostoevsky, N. Berdiaeff. So Ch. Yannaras recognizes the Byzantine type of sociality in a Russian Orthodox parish in Paris. (shrink)

The author justifies the need to return to an analysis of the meaning of such words as “philosophy” and “philosopher” in the Kyivan Rus’ written sources of the 11th–14th centuries. In the author’s view, this is explained not only by the inaccuracies the earlier research committed but also by the necessity to take contemporary achievements of Byzantine philosophical historiography into account. The author concludes that the preserved Kyivan Rus’ written sources reflect certain Byzantine interpretations of the words “philosopher” and “philosophy” (...) as understood within particular interpretive frameworks: philosophy may refer to a specifically “Christian” or “external” philosophy, presuppose rational or mystical comprehension of divine wisdom, become verbalized or not. Some sources probably espouse an understanding of philosophy as a practice of true life. The word “philosopher” had different connotations, as well. It referred to advisers or officeholders at the court of the Byzantine emperor, wise princes, church intellectuals, connoisseurs of biblical books, etc. The author invalidates the idea that in Kyivan Rus’, there existed a holistic understanding of philosophy and philosophers. Instead, one should interpret these words as having a limited plurality of meanings. (shrink)