The Theme in the Work
Reason, in the novel, is less a power of knowing than a power of assembling: it gives whoever has it the ability to arrange any fact into a system that holds up, and the book looks with distrust on that ability. Ivan Fyodorovich Karamazov is the central case, a mind that declares itself limited, Euclidean, earthly, and from this limitation draws a separate refusal, that of accepting God and returning the world. Around him reason appears in other hands: Smerdyakov uses it as casuistry, to prove that renouncing Christ is not a sin; the Grand Inquisitor, to calculate how much freedom a man can bear; the prosecutor and the lawyer of the trial, to read the same facts in opposite senses. The idea that without immortality everything is permitted runs through the whole book and changes its nature in each mouth: a hypothesis for conversation, a slogan, a license to kill, the recitation of a devil. Alexei Fyodorovich Karamazov's answer is not another reason: it is an order to love before understanding, and it is this order that the novel sets before Ivan's argument.
In chapter VI of Book II, Miusov tells the cell Ivan's theory, that without immortality nothing is immoral, and Zosima reads in it an idea that has not yet been resolved in Ivan's heart.
Идея эта еще не решена в вашем сердце и мучает его. Но и мученик любит иногда забавляться своим отчаянием, как бы тоже от отчаяния., This idea has not yet been resolved in your heart, and it torments it. But the tormented man also sometimes likes to amuse himself with his despair, as if out of despair as well.
In chapter VII of Book II, Rakitin reduces the theory to a formula, with which he wants to wound Alyosha.
Нет бессмертия души, так нет и добродетели, значит, всё позволено, If there is no immortality of the soul, then there is no virtue either; therefore everything is permitted.
In chapter VII of Book III, Smerdyakov justifies the soldier who would renounce Christ, and the argument is formally perfect.
рассуждая, что с одного вола двух шкур не дерут, reasoning that two hides are not stripped from one ox.
In chapter III of Book V, Ivan presents to Alyosha the limit of his own reason, which serves him as the basis for refusing the world, and Alyosha answers with the opposite order.
у меня ум эвклидовский, земной, I have a Euclidean, earthly mind.
Непременно так, полюбить прежде логики, как ты говоришь, непременно чтобы прежде логики, и тогда только я и смысл пойму., certainly so: to love before logic, as you say, certainly before logic, and only then will I understand the meaning as well.
In chapter IV of Book V, after the collection of cases of children, Ivan puts all knowledge on the scales and says it weighs less than a tear.
весь мир познания не стоит тогда этих слезок ребеночка к «боженьке», the whole world of knowledge is then not worth these little tears of a baby to "little God."
In chapter V of Book V, the Inquisitor reduces conscience to an account of three forces.
Есть три силы, единственные три силы на земле, могущие навеки победить и пленить совесть этих слабосильных бунтовщиков, для их счастия, — эти силы: чудо, тайна и авторитет., there are three forces, the only three forces on earth able to conquer and hold captive forever the conscience of these weak rebels, for their happiness: these forces are miracle, mystery, and authority.
In chapter VIII of Book XI, Smerdyakov confesses the murder to Ivan and gives him back the lesson that the conclusion belongs to him.
Это вы вправду меня учили-с, ибо много вы мне тогда этого говорили: ибо коли бога бесконечного нет, то и нет никакой добродетели, да и не надобно ее тогда вовсе., It was you who really taught me that, for you told me so many times back then: for if there is no infinite God, then there is no virtue at all, and none is needed.
In chapter IX of Book XI, the clinical explanation Ivan gives to the visitor, that he is a part of himself, is reason defending itself against what it sees.
Ты моя галлюцинация. Ты воплощение меня самого, только одной, впрочем, моей стороны… моих мыслей и чувств, только самых гадких и глупых., you are my hallucination. You are the embodiment of myself, only of one side of me, however... of my thoughts and feelings, only the most vile and stupid ones.
The visitor recites Ivan's old article and ends on the formula the book had been playing with.
Для бога не существует закона! Где станет бог — там уже место божие! Где стану я, там сейчас же будет первое место… «всё дозволено», и шабаш!, For God there is no law! Where God stands, there is already God's place! Where I stand, there at once will be the first place... "everything is permitted," and that's that!
In chapter X of Book XII, Fetyukovich says what the prosecutor relies on and what he himself relies on.
Но ведь психология, господа, хоть и глубокая вещь, а все-таки похожа на палку о двух концах, but psychology, gentlemen, however profound a thing, is nonetheless like a stick with two ends.
In chapter XI of Book XII, he hands back to the prosecutor the word with which the accusation was built.
И такими-то романами мы готовы погубить жизнь человеческую!, and with novels like these we are ready to destroy a human life!
Who Embodies It
Ivan is the reason that knows itself limited and cannot stop reasoning; his devil is the same reason without a body. Smerdyakov is the reason that carries out what the master thought and hands back the reckoning. The Grand Inquisitor is the reason that calculates the happiness of the weak, and the prosecutor Hippolyte Kirillovich and the lawyer Fetyukovich are reason in the service of a thesis. Alyosha is its counterpoint: he does not argue, and what he answers Ivan with is a kiss, a prayer, and an order to love first.
Where It Appears
- Book II, chapter VI: Miusov relates Ivan's theory about immortality and virtue, and Zosima calls it an unresolved idea.
- Book II, chapter VII: Rakitin sums up Ivan's theory for Alyosha in the formula that, without immortality of the soul, there is no virtue and everything is permitted.
- Book III, chapter VII: Smerdyakov argues that renouncing Christ to save one's life is not a sin.
- Book V, chapter III: Ivan declares to Alyosha that he has a Euclidean, earthly mind, incapable of deciding what is not of this world, and refuses God's world.
- Book V, chapter IV: Ivan says that all knowledge is not worth a child's tears.
- Book V, chapter V: The Inquisitor reduces conscience to three forces: miracle, mystery, and authority.
- Book XI, chapter VIII: Smerdyakov confesses and says he learned from Ivan that, without God, there is no virtue.
- Book XI, chapter IX: Ivan's devil recites the theory of the man-god and ends at everything is permitted.
- Book XII, chapter X: Fetyukovich praises the prosecutor as a psychologist and reminds the jurors that psychology is a stick with two ends, which can be grasped from either side.
- Book XII, chapter XI: The lawyer accuses the prosecution of assembling novels to destroy a life.
Where the Readings Diverge
The novel admits two readings of the reason it shows. In one, reason is the villain of the book: it produces sophisticated and false arrangements, and it embodies itself in Smerdyakov and in a devil. In the other, Ivan's reason is the most honest thing in the story, because it refuses a harmony that costs a child, and what destroys him is the lack of something to sustain it.
The phrase that everything is permitted changes its function from mouth to mouth, and the change is the argument of the book. In chapter VII of Book II it is a remark made in the room, said with mockery; in chapter VIII of Book XI it is the reason for a crime, given by someone who heard it from Ivan; in chapter IX of Book XI it is an old text of Ivan's recited by heart by a hallucination. In none of these passages is it refuted by another argument: what dismantles it is seeing what it produces. Reason, thus, is neither guilty nor innocent, because the book judges it by the use made of it, and Ivan, who measures everything by reasons, receives the sentence in the form of someone else's act.