Brief context. In order to understand what I mean in the title of this post, it is necessary to understand the origin of our most basic behavior. Do we choose to be good, or is it simply something we force ourselves to carry out because it is a social or legal norm? Reading Dostoyevsky can cause truly serious changes in the human psyche. And no, I am not here to give answers to anyone or to pretend that I know some things better than you do, no. However, it is impossible not to ask some truly deep questions after discovering connections we had not even noticed before.
In The Idiot, Dostoyevsky puts forward a premise that still follows us to this day. Are good people seen as such, or as idiots? If you really think about it, could you answer that question without involving idealism and prejudice? In Forrest Gump, the film, the main character is very similar to the protagonist of The Idiot, and we, the audience or reader, perceive him as someone ingenuous. Someone who does not understand the moral and cultural codes that govern society and who, therefore, is at the mercy of other matters, of those who are not as idiotic as he himself can end up being.
In the same way, many things emerge that could be said, but from that accumulation one stands out above the rest. Would you have compassion without the promise of a reward? That Christian notion which in the West has caused countless wars, massacres, proclamations, and which has shaped the political, economic, and control driven future of so many places, suddenly trembles before a simple but powerful question. Truly disruptive. Does the origin of our human perception come from the narrative offered by the promise that each religion we believe in can or cannot give us? Or are we inherently capable of practicing good despite being aware that we are not going to receive absolutely anything in return for choosing to be good?
As I said, reading Fyodor Dostoyevsky creates a before and an after. By the way, to avoid any hint of unfounded criticism based on nonsense, the Christ featured on the cover of this post is mentioned by the Russian author himself in the work I refer to here. It is by the German artist Hans Holbein, Dead Christ. It is exhibited in Basel, Switzerland, and for centuries it has impacted everyone who stops to admire it because of its visual rawness and the humanity of the wounds that a God like Jesus, his body, had to endure, as will be the destiny of each and every one of us, mortal, human. Seeing what we are capable of doing provokes the will to want to be good and not to be the executioner, the indifferent one, evil turned into inaction. I choose my humanity, even without the reward of Salvation, without the promise of Heaven. And you, what would you choose?
