Orthodox ethic and the spirit of socialism: Towards substantiation of the hypothesis

The article traces possible channels of influence of a religious factor on the formation of a specific Russian version of socialism. Using the logics of the M. Weber’s work “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism”, I. Zabaev reveals the categories that played a dominating role in the people’s consciousness in the pre-revolutionary Russia. According to his conclusion, these categories were “obedience” and “resignation”. It was obedience and resignation that assured the salvation (main value in Orthodoxy) of an Orthodox person. In everyday life such orientations were easily transformed into the readiness to obey the “superior”. Once elaborated, they turned to be quite stable and, being separated from their religious roots, ensured a sort of asceticism on the secular path. [Projekat Ministarstva nauke Republike Srbije, br. 179049: Politike dru tvenog pam enja i nacionalnog identiteta - regionalni i evropski aspekt]