Notes on Tolstoy, What is Art? Ch. 6

Originally Written Feb. 29, 2008 in the Journal

What is Art?
Chapter 6

The estimation of the value of art depends on the man's perception of the meaning of life. It depends on what they find good and what they find evil. What is good and evil is determined by religion.

There have been men that understood the meaning of life more lucidly and more generally than others. Their expression of the meaning of life, together with superstitions, traditions and ceremonies that surround the memory of these men is what is called religion.

"Religions are the highest exponents of the highest comprehension of life" (Maude, 127). It is for this reason that religions have and always will serve as the basis for the valuation of all human sentiments.

If art coincides with the laws, feelings and tradition of the prevailing religion then it is good art. If not, then it is bad art.

In the beginning of Christianity followers of Christ followed a true version. Subsequently a Church-Christianity arose which paganized and perverted the true religion. The art that arose from Church-Christianity, veneration of saints, paintings of the blessed Virgin and the like were perversions of Christ's teachings but high art nonetheless as it corresponded to the prevailing religion.

When the upper classes saw the contradiction between Church-Christianity and the teachings of Christ they stopped believing the dogma of the Church, but encouraged the lower classes to still follow it blindly as suited their needs. But having wealth and leisure they produced art that was inconsistent with Church-Christianity.

Men like Hus, Luther, Calvin and Wycliffe stripped Christianity of non-Christ teachings.

Those that doubted in the Middle Ages had to seek out an entirely new religion because there was no way to revamp the old mythology. They needed to rid themselves of the perversions of Church-Christianity and follow true Christianity.

But, the upper classes could not or would not do this because it would mean universal brotherhood, and they could not stand for this. These men had no religion. They believed in nothing. But, as they were in possession of the wealth and power, the controlled leisure and thus, art. Under their rule art was borne, not of men's religious feeling, but of the beauty or in other words, the pleasure they received of it.

These men had detected the falsehood of the Church but were unwilling to accept the true Christianity. They returned to the pleasure seeking, to paganism. Then the Renaissance happened: a denial of every religion and the denial of the necessity of religion.

"As soon as doubt arose with the regard to the infallibility of the Pope (and this doubt was then in the minds of all educated people), doubt inevitably followed as to the truth of tradition. But doubt as to the truth of tradition is fatal not only to popery and Catholicism but also to the whole Church creed with all its dogmas; the divinity of Christ, the resurrection, and the Trinity; and it destroys the authority of the Scriptures, since they were considered to be inspired only because the tradition of the Church so decided" (Maude, 134).

These people had no religion and no means of which to decide what was good or bad art except by their own pleasure receptors. Thus, the failing of their aesthetic theories.