Vladimir Solov’ëv's Justification of the Moral Good

This new English translation of Solov’ëv’s principal ethical treatise, written in his later years, presents Solov’ëv’s mature views on a host of topics ranging from a critique of individualistic ethical systems to the death penalty, the meaning of war, animal rights, and environmentalism. Written for the educated public rather than for a narrow circle of specialists, Solov’ëv’s work largely avoids technical vocabulary while illustrating his points with references to classical literature from the ancient Greeks to Goethe. Although written from a deeply held Christian viewpoint, Solov’ëv emphasizes the turn from his earlier position, now allegedly developing the independence of moral philosophy from metaphysics and revealed religion. Solov’ëv sees the formal universality of the idea of the moral good in all human beings, albeit that this idea is bereft of material content. This first new English-language translation in a century makes a unique contribution to the study of Solov’ëv’s thought. It uses the text of the second edition published in 1899 as its main text, but provides the variations and additions from the earlier versions of each chapter in running notes. Other unique features of this translation are that the pagination of the widely available 1914 edition is provided in the text, and the sources of Solov’ëv’s numerous Biblical quotations and references as well as literary and historical allusions.

“The translator of this new, highly readable edition of The Justification of the Moral Good, has used the existing English, French and German translations to inform his own, providing detailed notes about how the text changed over its various re-writes by Solovyov. His new edition is likely to serve as the source text for English language scholars and interested readers for years to come, combining an unfussy style with an expert’s insights into Solovyov’s changing writing and overall worldview.” (Andre van Loon, The Berlin Review of Books, berlinbooks.org, September, 2015)

Vladimir Solov’ëv: Generally hailed as his country’s greatest and most systematic philosophy, Vladimir Solov’ëv (1853-1900) returned to philosophy in the 1890s after a decade devoted to church and political issues. Translator Thomas Nemeth: After obtaining his PhD from the University of Louvain, Nemeth did post-doctoral work in Germany and Australia. The author of numerous articles on phenomenology, Kant and Russian philosophy, he previously translated G. Shpet’s Appearance and Sense into English and is the author of The Early Solov’ëv and His Quest for Metaphysics, also available through Springer.