Page 178 - Vinkler, Jonatan, Ana Beguš and Marcello Potocco. Eds. 2019. Ideology in the 20th Century: Studies of literary and social discourses and practices. Koper: University of Primorska Press
P. 178
Ideology in the 20th Century: studies of literary and social discourses and practices
ing for Christ, exactly for His sake he wanders and prefers solitude. And
it is better, when among other people, neither to appropriate the love for
Christ nor boast of His love hypocritically” (Rustaveli 1975, 301).
The tradition of a Christian reading of The Knight in the Panther’s
Skin, which continued even under the severe pressure of Soviet ideology,
was most clearly revealed in finding intertextual relations of The Knight
in the Panther’s Skin with the Bible. Research on intertextual relations
with Bible was put forward in works by Korneli Kekelidze (1879–1962),
Kalistrate Tsintsadze,6 Viktor Nozadze, Solomon Iordanishvili (1898–
1953), and Akaki Gatserelia (1910–1996). Thus, by 1936 the issue of Sho-
ta Rustaveli’s Christian world outlook was already well grounded, but the
ideological policy of the regime held it back for three decades, and dur-
ing those years the issue was repeatedly concealed. The apologists of this
178 idea, Korneli Kekelidze and a small circle of his adherents, had to over-
come numerous struggles. For example, Solomon Iordanishvili’s work
The Search for the Christian Trace in The Knight in the Panther’s Skin was
written in 1916, but its publication only became possible in 1990. Kor-
neli Kekelidze, who had received a tertiary religious education, was also
forced to create the artificial term ‘Biblical Christianism’ and, in contrast
to his view, to write:
Speaking about Biblical Christianism, the following circumstance should
be borne in mind. Rustaveli fully rests on the first source of Christianity,
the Bible, the ‘Holy Scripture’; in this regard he is a representative of so-
called Biblical Christianism. Dogmatic-ecclesiastical Christianity, which
originated on the basis of the scholastic-mystical mental acrobatics of ec-
umenical councils and subsequent periods, is strange to him; all the bal-
last that merged with Christianity afterwards, over the centuries, against
which the forerunners of the Reformation boldly raised their voice for the
first time in the fifteenth century in western Europe, is also alien to him. In
this we should look for the reason for the fact that if, in the subsequent cen-
turies, a certain circle persecuted him on religious grounds, it persecuted
him not because he was not generally Christian, but because he was not a
follower and admirer of dogmatic Christianity (Kekelidze 1981, 204).
Kekelidze was well aware that the term ‘Biblical Christianism’ was artifi-
cial and ambiguous, which is why he indicated in brackets that “this was
a term of a relatively new period.’ It is absolutely inconceivable for the
scholar, who at the same time was a clergyman, to refer to the writings
of the founders of Christian dogmatics and theology as ‘ballast.’ It is obvi-
6 Kalistrate Tsintsadze (1866–1952) was Catholicos-Patriarch of Georgia.
ing for Christ, exactly for His sake he wanders and prefers solitude. And
it is better, when among other people, neither to appropriate the love for
Christ nor boast of His love hypocritically” (Rustaveli 1975, 301).
The tradition of a Christian reading of The Knight in the Panther’s
Skin, which continued even under the severe pressure of Soviet ideology,
was most clearly revealed in finding intertextual relations of The Knight
in the Panther’s Skin with the Bible. Research on intertextual relations
with Bible was put forward in works by Korneli Kekelidze (1879–1962),
Kalistrate Tsintsadze,6 Viktor Nozadze, Solomon Iordanishvili (1898–
1953), and Akaki Gatserelia (1910–1996). Thus, by 1936 the issue of Sho-
ta Rustaveli’s Christian world outlook was already well grounded, but the
ideological policy of the regime held it back for three decades, and dur-
ing those years the issue was repeatedly concealed. The apologists of this
178 idea, Korneli Kekelidze and a small circle of his adherents, had to over-
come numerous struggles. For example, Solomon Iordanishvili’s work
The Search for the Christian Trace in The Knight in the Panther’s Skin was
written in 1916, but its publication only became possible in 1990. Kor-
neli Kekelidze, who had received a tertiary religious education, was also
forced to create the artificial term ‘Biblical Christianism’ and, in contrast
to his view, to write:
Speaking about Biblical Christianism, the following circumstance should
be borne in mind. Rustaveli fully rests on the first source of Christianity,
the Bible, the ‘Holy Scripture’; in this regard he is a representative of so-
called Biblical Christianism. Dogmatic-ecclesiastical Christianity, which
originated on the basis of the scholastic-mystical mental acrobatics of ec-
umenical councils and subsequent periods, is strange to him; all the bal-
last that merged with Christianity afterwards, over the centuries, against
which the forerunners of the Reformation boldly raised their voice for the
first time in the fifteenth century in western Europe, is also alien to him. In
this we should look for the reason for the fact that if, in the subsequent cen-
turies, a certain circle persecuted him on religious grounds, it persecuted
him not because he was not generally Christian, but because he was not a
follower and admirer of dogmatic Christianity (Kekelidze 1981, 204).
Kekelidze was well aware that the term ‘Biblical Christianism’ was artifi-
cial and ambiguous, which is why he indicated in brackets that “this was
a term of a relatively new period.’ It is absolutely inconceivable for the
scholar, who at the same time was a clergyman, to refer to the writings
of the founders of Christian dogmatics and theology as ‘ballast.’ It is obvi-
6 Kalistrate Tsintsadze (1866–1952) was Catholicos-Patriarch of Georgia.
