Russian national mentality can be expressed. Characteristic features of the Russian mentality

Mentality is a system of uniqueness of the mental life of people belonging to a particular culture, a qualitative set of features of their perception and assessment of the world around them, which are supra-situational in nature, conditioned by the economic, political, historical circumstances of the development of this particular community and manifested in unusual behavioral activity. “Mentality” means something common that underlies the conscious and unconscious, logical and emotional, a deep, difficult to reflect source of thinking, ideology, faith, feelings and emotions.

2.1 Religiosity

The main, most profound character trait of the Russian people, distinguished by Russian philosophers, is its religiosity and the associated search for absolute good, therefore, such good that is feasible only in the Kingdom of God. Perfect goodness without any admixture of evil and imperfections exists in the Kingdom of God because it consists of individuals who fully implement in their behavior the two commandments of Jesus Christ: love God more than yourself and your neighbor as yourself. Members of the Kingdom of God are completely free from egoism, and therefore they create only absolute values moral goodness, beauty, knowledge of truth, indivisible and indestructible benefits, serving the whole world.

2.2 Superstition

Despite all the religiosity, the Russian people are characterized by such a trait as superstition. A black cat crossing your path cannot be ignored; try not to spill salt or break mirrors; if you are going to an exam, do not forget to put a nickel under your heel... And this is only a small part of all superstitions, and there are a huge number of them.

The latest fashion - eastern calendars. At the beginning of each year, Russians excitedly ask each other whose year it is: the Tiger, the Horse or the Monkey... Even a completely reasonable lady can seriously declare that since she was born in the year of the Rat, she cannot marry this man, because that his year of birth is not compatible with hers.

2.3 Love of freedom

Among the primary properties of the Russian people, along with religiosity, the search for absolute good and willpower, is the love of freedom and its highest expression - freedom of spirit. This property is closely related to the search for absolute good. In fact, perfect good exists only in the Kingdom of God, it is super-earthly, therefore, in our kingdom of egoistic beings only half-good is always realized, a combination of positive values ​​with some imperfections, that is, good in combination with some aspect of evil. When a person determines which of the possible paths of behavior to choose, he does not have mathematically reliable knowledge about the best way actions. Therefore, one who has freedom of spirit is inclined to test every value not only in thought, but also in deed.

2.4 Panhumanity

Among the constants of the national mentality, it is necessary to note the “all-humanity” of the Russian soul, its openness to other cultures and influences, which Dostoevsky spoke about. This manifests itself, in particular, in very high level interethnic tolerance, the ability to adapt to different ethnocultural conditions, a keen interest in the experience of other countries and peoples, accompanied by a willingness to try and apply it at home. Historically, such traits contributed to the successful creation of a huge multinational empire, the “building blocks” of which were cemented by the Russians’ ability to find mutual language with representatives of the most different cultures and religions. The ethnopsychology of Russians has always been characterized by the ability to accept people from any other national groups, which gave Russian state expansion a very specific character. In any case, no other empire has ever been built on this.

2.5 Sense of justice

Many Russian thinkers recognized the archetypal feature of the “Russian soul” as the ardent desire to get “to the root”, to find the “real truth”, perceived as a kind of absolute. Moreover, on the way to this absolute, Russians are often ready to mercilessly destroy what until recently seemed sacred, correct, or at least completely acceptable.

2.6 Kindness, responsiveness

Among the primary, fundamental properties of the Russian people is their outstanding kindness. It is supported and deepened by the search for absolute good and the associated religiosity of the people.

3.7 Equalizing aspirations

Over the centuries, this trend has become one of the dominant values ​​in the people’s consciousness, actively resisting individual efforts to strengthen private property- enrichment, without at all stimulating distribution according to work. It is necessary to pay attention to the Russian proverb: “from the labors of the righteous you will not make stone chambers.”

The following can be classified as socially shaped features of the Russian mentality.

1. Collectivism and conciliarity, developed by centuries of life in a rural community. The community did not appear suddenly, but as a historically formed necessity of existence, as a reaction to low soil fertility, low yields Agriculture and harsh climatic conditions, in which it was easier to survive in a community and using mutual assistance than alone. Russian history has shown that its course is determined not by socio-economic theories of changing social formations, but by the habit of the Russian population to a certain image life, especially the habit of the rural population to live in the community. At the same time, it should be taken into account that the stability of socially-formed mentality traits is lower than genetic and nature-formed ones, therefore urbanization and the rapid reduction of the rural population in Russia may in the near future lead to the degradation of the mentioned collectivist tradition and the undermining of one of the main foundations of Russian civilization.

2. A heightened sense of injustice among the Russian people, social inequality that infringes on the interests of the poor. This trait can be seen as a manifestation of collectivism. Hence the ancient feeling of social compassion for people who are spiritually and physically damaged: the poor, holy fools, cripples, etc., and the egalitarian tendencies in the Russian understanding of social justice.

3. The religiosity of the Russian people, nurtured by the church and government for almost a thousand years. Religion in Russia has always gone hand in hand with secular power. The Tsar was considered the representative of God's power on earth and Russian national idea For several centuries it was expressed in the formula “God, Tsar and Fatherland.” The specific form of Russian religiosity was Orthodoxy, introduced into Rus' again by secular authorities in the person of Prince Vladimir. Social essence Orthodoxy, based on the concepts of social justice, goodness, the primacy of the spirit over the flesh, embodied in the church biographies of Orthodox saints, as well as the forms of Orthodox religious rites - fasting, religious festivals, etc. turned out to be most consistent with the historically established conditions of existence, the way of life and the mentality generated by them Russian people. This correspondence explains the stability of the Orthodox faith among the Russian people.

4. Cult of the leader. Deep religiosity, understood as hope for a deliverer from life’s hardships, contributed to the formation of such a socially oriented Russian trait as the cult of the leader. All Russian history passed under the sign of first the power of the prince, then the king, and in Soviet period under the banner of the personality cult of the leader of the Communist Party. In all cases, it was the sole power of the leader (prince, king, general secretary) and the people blindly relied on him. It can be noted that the cult of the leader is also promoted by collectivism, one of the manifestations of which is the subconscious subordination of the individual to the collective, and in his person to the one who expresses collective interests, that is, the leader, personifying the collective in mass consciousness. Hence the currently observed lack of initiative of the main part of the population, political infantilism, inability to politically self-organize, and reluctance to take responsibility for socially significant actions.

5. National and religious tolerance. Almost one and a half hundred people have lived peacefully on Russian territory for many centuries. different nations. In Russia there has never been racial hostility, religious wars, or bans on interethnic marriages. The country, with few exceptions, has historically been formed as a voluntary multinational association. This could not but give rise to such a socially formed Russian trait as national and religious tolerance.

6. Finally, one cannot help but say about Russian patriotism. Patriotism exists in any country, but the basis of patriotism is different countries different. Russian patriotism is patriotism based on the people's awareness of their community. The rise of the Russian patriotic spirit always arose in years of difficult trials, not for individual people, classes or groups of the population, but for the entire people, when they began to become acutely aware of themselves as historical community, which is in great danger - enslavement or destruction.

In general, mentality is the prevailing schemes, stereotypes and patterns of thinking. Russians are not necessarily Russians. Individual person may be proud of being a “Cossack”, “Bashkir” or “Jew” within Russia, but outside its borders all Russians (past and present) are traditionally called (regardless of origin) Russians. There are reasons for this: as a rule, they all have similarities in their mentality and behavioral patterns.

Russians have something to be proud of, we have a huge and strong country, we have talented people and deep literature, while we ourselves know our own weak sides. If we want to become better, we must know them.

So, let's look at ourselves from the outside, namely from the outside strictly scientific research. What cultural researchers note as specific features Russian mentality?

1. Sobornost, the primacy of the general over the personal: “we are all our own,” we have everything in common and “what will people say.” Conciliarity results in the absence of the concept of privacy and the opportunity for any neighbor’s grandmother to intervene and tell you everything she thinks about your clothes, manners and the upbringing of your children.

From the same opera, the concepts of “public” and “collective”, which are absent in the West. “The opinion of the collective”, “don’t separate from the team”, “what will people say?” - conciliarity in pure form. On the other hand, they will tell you if your tag is sticking out, your shoelace is untied, your pants are stained, or your grocery bag is torn. And also - they flash their headlights on the road to warn about the traffic police and save you from a fine.

2. The desire to live in truth. The term "truth", often found in ancient Russian sources, means legal norms, on the basis of which the trial was carried out (hence the expressions “to judge the right” or “to judge in truth”, that is, objectively, fairly). Sources of codification are norms of customary law, princely judicial practice, as well as borrowed norms from authoritative sources - primarily the Holy Scriptures.

Outside Russian culture more often they talk about law-abidingness, rules of decency, or following religious commandments. In the Eastern mentality, Truth is not talked about; in China, it is important to live according to the precepts left by Confucius.

3. When choosing between reason and feeling, Russians choose feeling: sincerity and sincerity. In the Russian mentality, “expediency” is practically synonymous with selfish, selfish behavior and is not held in high esteem, like something “American.” It is difficult for the average Russian citizen to imagine that one can act intelligently and consciously not only for oneself, but also for the sake of someone, therefore selfless actions are identified with actions “from the heart,” based on feelings, without the head.

Russian - dislike of discipline and methodicality, life according to one's soul and mood, change of mood from peacefulness, forgiveness and humility to merciless rebellion to complete destruction - and vice versa. The Russian mentality lives rather according to female model: feeling, gentleness, forgiveness, reacting with crying and rage to the consequences of such a life strategy.

4. A certain negativism: most Russians more often see flaws in themselves rather than virtues. Abroad, if a person accidentally touches another person on the street, the standard reaction of almost everyone is: “Sorry,” an apology and a smile. That's how they were raised. It’s sad that in Russia such patterns are more negative, here you can hear “Well, where are you looking?”, and something more harsh. Russians understand well what melancholy is, despite the fact that this word is untranslatable into other European languages. On the streets, it is not customary for us to smile, look into the faces of others, make indecent acquaintances, or simply start talking.

5. A smile in Russian communication is not a mandatory attribute of politeness. In the West, the more a person smiles, the more polite he is. In traditional Russian communication, priority is given to the requirement of sincerity. A smile among Russians demonstrates a personal affection for another person, which, naturally, does not apply to everyone. Therefore, if a person smiles not from the heart, it causes rejection.

You can ask for help - most likely they will help. It's normal to beg for both a cigarette and money. Man with constantly good mood arouses suspicion - either sick or insincere. Anyone who usually smiles affably at others is, if not a foreigner, then, of course, a sycophant. Of course, insincere. He says “Yes”, agrees - a hypocrite. Because sincere Russian man will definitely disagree and object. And in general, the truest sincerity is when you swear! Then you trust the person!

6. Love of controversy. In Russian communication it is traditional great place are occupied by disputes. Russian people love to argue on a variety of issues, both private and general. Love for global debates, philosophical issues - bright line Russian communicative behavior.

Russian people are often interested in argument not as a means of finding the truth, but as a mental exercise, as a form of emotional, sincere communication with each other. That is why in Russian communicative culture those arguing so often lose the thread of the argument and easily deviate from the original topic.

At the same time, it is completely uncharacteristic to strive for compromise or to let the interlocutor save face. Uncompromisingness and conflict are manifested very clearly: our person is uncomfortable if he did not argue, could not prove that he was right. “How did you formulate this quality English teacher: “A Russian always bets to win.” And vice versa, the characteristic “conflict-free” rather has a disapproving connotation, like “spineless”, “unprincipled”.

7. Russian people live by faith in the good that will one day descend from heaven(or simply from above) to the long-suffering Russian land: “Good will definitely defeat evil, but then, someday.” At the same time, his personal position is irresponsible: “Someone will bring us the truth, but not me personally. I can’t do anything myself and I won’t do anything.” For several centuries now, the main enemy of the Russian people has been the state in the form of a serving-punitive class.

8. The “keep your head down” principle. In the Russian mentality disdain to politics and democracy as a form of political structure in which the people are the source and controller of the activities of power. Characteristic is the conviction that people don’t really decide anything anywhere and democracy is a lie and hypocrisy. At the same time, tolerance and habit of lies and hypocrisy of their authorities due to the conviction that it is impossible otherwise.

9. Habit of theft, bribery and deception. The conviction that everyone steals everywhere, and that it is impossible to earn big money honestly. The principle is “if you don’t steal, you don’t live.” Alexander I: “In Russia there is such theft that I’m afraid to go to the dentist - I’ll sit in a chair and they’ll steal my jaw...” Dahl: “Russian people are not afraid of the cross, but they’re afraid of the pestle.”

At the same time, Russians are characterized by a protest attitude towards punishment: punishing for minor violations is not good, somehow petty, it is necessary to “forgive!” will sigh for a long time until he gets angry and starts a pogrom.

10. A characteristic feature of the Russian mentality that follows from the previous paragraph is the love of freebies. Movies need to be downloaded via torrent, pay for licensed programs - it’s a waste, the dream is the joy of Leni Golubkov in the MMM pyramid. Our fairy tales depict heroes who lie on the stove and eventually receive a kingdom and a sexy queen. Ivan the Fool is strong not because of his hard work, but because of his intelligence, when Pike, Sivka-Burka, Little Humpbacked Horse and other wolves, fish and firebirds do everything for him.

11. Taking care of health is not a value, sports are strange, getting sick is normal, but it is categorically not allowed to abandon the poor, and it is also considered morally unacceptable to leave those who did not care about their health and, as a result, became essentially helpless and disabled. Women look for the rich and successful, but love the poor and sick. “How can he live without me?” - hence codependency as a norm of life.

12. In us, pity takes the place of humanism. If humanism welcomes care for people, placing them on the pedestal of the free, developed, strong man, then pity directs care to the unfortunate and sick. According to statistics from Mail.ru and VTsIOM, helping adults is in fifth place in popularity after helping children, the elderly, animals and environmental problems. People feel more sorry for dogs than for people, and among people, out of a sense of pity, it is more important to support non-viable children, rather than adults who could still live and work.

In the comments to the article, someone agrees with similar portrait, someone accuses the author of Russophobia. No, the author loves Russia and believes in it, having been engaged in educational and educational activities for your country. There are no enemies here and there is no need to look for them here, our task is different: namely, to think about how we can raise our country and raise children - our new citizens.

GOU VPO

"Voronezh State Medical Academy named after. N.N. Burdenko"

Abstract on the topic:

“Characteristics of the peculiarities of the Russian mentality.”

Completed by: student P-509

Lyamina O. S.

Voronezh 2009

Mentality is one of the basic concepts of modern humanitarian knowledge. It includes the main characteristics of an ethnic group and is one of the leading criteria when comparing nations with each other.

Mentality is the subject of consideration in several humanities, each of which brings its own feature to the definition of this concept. The modern Philosophical Encyclopedic Dictionary interprets mentality as a way of thinking, the general spiritual disposition of a person or group, limiting itself only to the study of thinking. Encyclopedic Dictionary Terra Lexicon This concept implies a certain way of thinking, a set of mental skills and spiritual attitudes inherent in an individual or a social group. In this interpretation, there is no mention of language as an important component of mentality, and among cultural characteristics, only behavioral characteristics are probably taken into account.

One-sided interpretation is not a feature of modern science alone. Mentality as an independent subject of research began to be considered in the 20-30s. XX century At the beginning of the 20th century, the term “mentality” appears to have been used in two ways. In ordinary speech, this somewhat fashionable term preferably denoted collective systems of attitude and behavior, “forms of the spirit.” At the same time, it also appears in the scientific lexicon, but again as a “way of thinking” or “peculiarities of attitude.”

There are many definitions of what mentality is, here are some of them:

Mentality is a special “psychological equipment” (M. Blok), “symbolic paradigms” (M. Eliade), “dominant metaphors” (P. Ricoeur), “archaic remains” (S. Freud) or “archetypes” (K. Jung), “... whose presence is not explained by the individual’s own life, but follows from the primeval innate and inherited sources of the human mind.”

The term mentality originated in France. It is found already in individual works of R. Emerson in 1856. In addition, W. Raulf, based on an analysis of French journalism turn of XIX-XX centuries came to the conclusion that the semantic charge of the word mentality was formed before [Raulf W. History of mentalities. Toward the reconstruction of spiritual processes. Digest of articles. - M., 1995. P. 14], as the term appeared in everyday speech.

It is generally accepted that the category of mentality was one of the first to be introduced into the scientific terminology apparatus by the French psychologist and ethnographer L. Lévy-Bruhl after the publication of his works. In its essence, mentality is historically processed archetypal ideas, through the prism of which the main aspects of reality are perceived: space, time, art, politics, economics, culture, civilization, religion. Consideration of the mental characteristics of the consciousness of a particular social group allows one to penetrate into the “hidden” layer of social consciousness, which more objectively and deeply conveys and reproduces the mentality of the era, to reveal a deeply rooted and hidden slice of reality - images, ideas, perceptions, which in most cases remains unchanged even when one ideology changes to another. This is explained by the greater stability of mental structures compared to ideology.

Even J. Le Goff noted that “mentalities change more slowly than anything else, and their study teaches how slowly history moves”[ Disputes about the main thing: Discussions about the present and the future historical science around the French school "Annals". - M., 1993.- P.149]. If ideology, with certain deviations, generally develops progressively, so to speak linearly, then within the framework of mentality, ideas change in the form of oscillations of various amplitudes and rotations around a certain central axis. The basis of such a movement and development of mentality is a certain way of life.

So, mentality is a concept very rich in content, reflecting the general spiritual mood, way of thinking, worldview of an individual person or social group, which is not sufficiently conscious, in which the unconscious occupies a large place.

The mental characteristics of Russian culture are characterized by a number of specific features, which are due to the fact that any attempt to present Russian culture as an integral, historically continuously developing phenomenon, with its own logic and expressed national identity, encounters great internal difficulties and contradictions. Each time it turns out that at any stage of its formation and historical development, Russian culture seems to double, revealing at the same time two faces that are different from each other. European and Asian, sedentary and nomadic, Christian and pagan, secular and spiritual, official and oppositional, collective and individual - these and similar pairs of opposites have been characteristic of Russian culture since ancient times and have actually persisted to the present day. Double faith, double thinking, dual power, schism - these are just a few of the concepts that are significant for understanding by the historian of Russian culture, identified already at the stage of ancient Russian culture. Such stable inconsistency of Russian culture generates, on the one hand, increased dynamism of its self-development, and on the other, periodically escalating conflict. inherent in the culture itself; constitutes its organic originality, typological feature and is called by researchers binary (from Lat. duality).

Binary nature in the structure of Russian culture is an undoubted result of the border geopolitical position of Rus'-Russia between East and West. Russia, throughout its history and geography, for centuries has been a Eurasian society, either striving to get closer to its European neighbors, or gravitating throughout its entire system of life towards the Asian world. [Semennikova L.I. Russia in the world community of civilizations. - M., 1994.]

It was (since the times of the Golden Horde) a country of border civilization. Western cultural figures perceived Russia as a country of a different, non-European order. Thus, G. Hegel did not even include Russians in his list of Christian peoples of Europe. Many observers have come to the conclusion that Russia is a kind of Eurasian hybrid, in which there are no clear signs of either part of the world. Oswald Spengler argued that Russia is a centaur with a European head and an Asian body. With the victory of Bolshevism, Asia reclaims Russia after Europe annexed it in the person of Peter the Great [Quote from the book Russia and the West: Dialogue of Cultures. M., 1994].

In addition, cultural and historical paradigms in Russian history were layered on top of each other: one stage has not yet ended, while the other has already begun. The future sought to come true when the conditions for this had not yet developed, and, on the contrary, the past was in no hurry to go away. historical scene, clinging to traditions, norms and values. A similar historical layering of stages, of course, is found in other world cultures - Eastern and Western, but in Russian culture it becomes a constant, typological feature: paganism coexists with Christianity, the traditions of Kievan Rus are intertwined with Mongol innovations in the Muscovite kingdom, in Peter's Russia there is a sharp modernization combined with the deep traditionalism of pre-Petrine Rus', etc. Russian Culture for centuries was at the historical crossroads, on the one hand, of the modernization paths of civilizational development characteristic of Western European culture, on the other, of the paths of organic traditionalism characteristic of the countries of the East. Russian culture has always strived for modernization, but modernization in Russia was slow, difficult, constantly weighed down by the unambiguousness and setness of traditions, every now and then rebelling against them and breaking them. Hence the numerous heretical mass movements, and the daring thirst for will (robbers, Cossacks), and the search for alternative forms of power (imposture), etc.

The mental characteristics of Russian culture historically naturally developed as a complex, disharmonious, unstable balance of forces of integration and differentiation of contradictory tendencies of the national-historical existence of the Russian people, such as a sociocultural balance (often on the verge of a national catastrophe or in connection with its approaching danger), which declared itself in the most decisive, crisis moments of the history of Russia and contributed to the survival of Russian culture in extremely difficult for it, and sometimes seemingly simply impossible socio-historical conditions and everyday circumstances as the high adaptability of Russian culture to any, including directly anti-cultural factors of its more than thousand years of history.

The Russian mentality is characterized by absolutism - which is reflected even in the Russian language: the frequency of words such as “absolutely”, “perfectly” - as well as synonymous words “terribly”, “terribly” - is more than ten times higher in the Russian language, than, say, in English. And the very synonymy of these and other concepts paints an image of global, stunning and extreme changes. Sometimes they go beyond the rational and reasonable, since the collective mind, like ideology, is the preservation of the existing - and for the sake of radical change it is necessary to overturn it too.

The constant need for something fundamentally new gives rise to the desire to actively adopt someone else’s (just as quickly consigning one’s own to oblivion: neglecting it as outdated). Russian thought has often been accused of turning to foreign heritage for the lack of its own. However, they did not indicate the other side of the coin: the ability to assimilate and implement other people's ideas as universal ones. It is the constant desire for something fundamentally different, new, as well as the perception of the universalism (objectivity) of ideas that makes it possible to cultivate them on our own soil.

The second Russian trait is going beyond one’s own boundaries: not only at the level of society, but above all at the level of the individual, which manifests itself in overcoming interpersonal barriers. This trait is clearly visible to everyone who has been abroad: Russians strive to unite their own and others, organizing collective interaction in any conditions. They easily manage to do this, unlike representatives of other nations, and this is due to the lack of fear and the presence of the habit of invading the very essence of someone else's life, crossing the personal barrier and overcoming the isolation of individuality. This quality is usually referred to as “Russian soulfulness.” Foreigners often perceive it as aggression: an attack on a person. For the vast majority of nations, the boundaries of the individual are sacred, and the psychological barrier between souls is insurmountable.

The concept of morality is inextricably linked with the very significant concept of truth for the Russian mentality - which is confirmed by the Russian language. The Russian word “pravda” not only has a high frequency in the Russian language compared to others, but also the epithet “mother” (truth-uterus, truth-mother), depicting the blood closeness of truth to a person, his original womb and refuge. And also the synonym “truth”, meaning the highest truth: the truth in spiritual sense, which connects it with the concept of the source of morality and ideal.

We can safely say that the desire to unite people/nations with an ideal or some universal idea is typical of our character. By playing such a role, Russia (Russian people) has a face in front of other nations (people).

Also important for the Russian mentality are the concepts of the soul: as a special internal, meaningful world- and fate, which correlates with humility and the expression “nothing can be done.” Such concepts of soul and fate are unique: inherent only in the Russian language.

This character trait in physical terms is confirmed by more than six months of hibernation of nature and external passivity during this period - against the background of which there is an internal, unconscious fermentation of the psyche, predisposing to deep religious perception (in Lately Studies have emerged showing that short daylight hours promote meditation, but also depression). The consequence of this is the philosophical depth of mental life, manifested primarily not even in philosophers, but in writers whose works have gained worldwide fame (Tolstoy or Dostoevsky). When the clear mind is silent, images speak. The fact that Russian philosophy expresses itself in fiction more clearly than in rational-logical concepts has been repeatedly pointed out by historians of Russian philosophy, among them E.L. Radlov and A.F. Losev.

Nations deprived of such a long-term forced decline in physical activity (inevitable in our climate, no matter how it is influenced by the now intense, violent social rhythm of life) do not develop such emotional and spiritual philosophical depth.

Russian Orthodoxy also played a huge role in the formation of the mental characteristics of Russian culture. It has given internal certainty to the mentality of the Russian people and over the last millennium has determined the spiritual potential of the nation. The Orthodox faith plays the role of a spiritual core or spiritual substance for the Russian national mentality. Orthodoxy did not preach the idea of ​​predestination. And therefore, responsibility for sins committed of one’s own free will fell on the sinner. This was understandable and acceptable. Orthodoxy in this context is identical to the emotional and artistic structure of the Russian mentality: it reflects the Russian commitment to absolute spiritual values, maximalism, and the figurative and symbolic construction of the Russian national culture.

Historical conditions of existence, spatial environment, Orthodox religion and the Russian Orthodox Church as sociocultural institute left an indelible mark on Russian national mentality.

The Orthodox faith is a special, independent and great word in the history and system of Christianity. The Russian national spirit and national morality, respect and love for all tribes and peoples are based on Orthodoxy.

The moral and religious dominant gives rise to a number of features of the Russian cultural mentality. Firstly, not a single people had a Christian idea at the national-state level, only the Russians. Secondly, the Russian people are capable of religious and philosophical thinking. Thirdly, only Russians tend to understand the world through religious intuition, unlike the West. Fourthly, of all European peoples The Slavs and especially the Russians are the most prone to religion, for in ancient times they believed in one God, and in our monotheistic paganism there was a premonition of Christ and the Mother of God, and Christian concepts such as God, heaven, hell, and demon were originally Slavic.

The mental characteristics of Russian culture, which was determined by Orthodoxy, are the peculiarities of the attitude towards private property, wealth and justice in the Russian mentality. The economic experience of the Russians was dominated not by economic interest, but by the established moral economy, which has survival as its main goal. Therefore, people abandoned economic success and the risk associated with it, those values ​​that seem natural in modern liberal civilization. Property relations for the bulk of the population were of a labor nature, and achieving material well-being was not an end in itself. Hence, in the character of Russians, there is a relative indifference to material wealth and individual property. The absence of traditions of private property in Russia is the Orthodox view of wealth, which is not the result of labor, it is sent by God and is given not for accumulation and storage, but for beneficial use to others. The focus is on the righteous use of wealth rather than the acquisition of it. Wealth should serve a person, and not vice versa. Income was not an end in itself.

In Russia, the Orthodox ethics of entrepreneurship and commodity-money relations was created, while Western Christianity cultivated pragmatism, hoarding, and a passion for money and wealth in people. In the Russian mentality, the category of wealth acquires the greatest value, as a measure of spirituality in connection with wealth. Entrepreneurs looked at their activities differently than in the West, not so much as a source of profit, but as the fulfillment of a task assigned to them by God or fate. Entrepreneurship was seen as a certain type of creativity and self-affirmation.

Wealth in Orthodox ethics was perceived as a violation of fair mechanisms. And if a market economy is based on the principles of rationality and expediency, then in Russia they give priority to the ideas of justice. In the historical mentality, Russians have developed an egalitarian understanding of justice, associated with the harsh climatic conditions of Russia and the need for the physical survival of people. Here there was no objective possibility of ensuring the distribution of produced material goods in proportion to the merits of each person to society. Ideas about equality in the Russian mentality are predominantly moral, not legal, in nature.

Under the influence of Orthodoxy, a moral tradition of world development and management was formed in the Russian mentality, which persists even where conscious religiosity was lost. The Russian world development is characterized by the principles of a religious and ethical approach to the development of life.

Many researchers note the indifference of Russians to the organization of their earthly life, some strange disregard for the material layer, comfort, and ease of existence. When a culture is oriented towards eternity, then human existence in it is perceived as especially brief and ephemeral. In the “Cherubim Song” there are the words: “Put aside every care of this life...”, which means pushing into the background all the troubles associated with ensuring material well-being and order in this world. At the same time, the world for such a person is only a temporary refuge, and the leading type of attitude is “the delicate patience of a guest.”

The focus of culture on eternity explains why it has a poorly developed time perspective and orientation towards the future. Therefore, it is incredibly difficult to reform anything in such cultures. They strongly resist any changes, and if they occur, they are revolutionary, or rather apocalyptic in nature.

Another mental characteristic of Russian culture is self-sacrifice. Self-sacrifice is an absolute value in our culture. Quite strange things have happened several times in history - on the eve and during terrible disasters that threatened humanity with destruction, many European countries, their unique, original cultures and peoples were saved by the voluntary bloody sacrifice of Russia.

Of course, the original Russian culture and its spiritual center - Orthodoxy - are difficult for representatives of other countries to understand. national cultures. Pushkin said this brilliantly: “the Greek religion, separate from all others, gives us a special national character.” It is not surprising that the West does not know or understand us; it is much more important that we ourselves know and understand our culture and mentality.

Bibliography

1. Anufriev E. A., Lesnaya L. V. Russian mentality as a socio-political phenomenon // SPZh., 1997. No. 4

2. Gurevich A.Ya. Medieval merchant // Odysseus. Man in history. (Personality and society. - M., 1990.

3. Goryunov E.V. The relationship between folk and scientific culture of the Middle Ages in the mirror of church rituals and sacred objects // Odyssey. Man in history. (Picture of the world in the popular and scientific consciousness). - M., 1994.

4. Culturology: theory and history of culture. - M.: Knowledge, 1998.

5. Raulf W. History of mentalities. Toward the reconstruction of spiritual processes. Digest of articles. - M., 1995.

6. Russia and the West: Dialogue of Cultures. M., 1994.

7. Stelmashuk G.V. Culture and values ​​// Current problems of philosophy, sociology and cultural studies. - SPb.: Leningrad State University named after. A.S. Pushkin.- 2000.

The time has come to determine the main, in my opinion, features of the Russian mentality.

One of the primary properties of the Russian people is their kindness. Kindness in all its layers is expressed in the absence of rancor. Often a Russian person, being passionate and prone to maximalism, experiences a strong feeling of repulsion from another person, but when meeting him, if specific communication is necessary, his heart softens, and he somehow involuntarily begins to show his spiritual softness towards him, even sometimes condemning himself for it if he thinks that this person does not deserve to be treated kindly.

“Life according to the heart” creates openness in the soul of a Russian person and ease of communication with people, simplicity of communication, without conventions, without external instilled politeness, but with those virtues of politeness that arise from sensitive natural delicacy...

However, positive qualities There are often negative sides too. The kindness of a Russian person sometimes prompts him to lie due to the reluctance to offend his interlocutor, due to the desire for peace and good relations with people at all costs.

The Russian people amaze us with the versatility of their abilities. He is characterized by high religious talent, the ability for higher forms of experience, observation, theoretical and practical intelligence, creative ingenuity, ingenuity, a subtle perception of beauty and the aristocracy associated with it, expressed as Everyday life, and in the creation of great works of art.

Among the especially valuable properties of the Russian people is their sensitive perception of strangers. states of mind. This results in live communication between even unfamiliar people. “...The Russian people have highly developed individual personal and family communication. In Russia there is no excessive replacement of individual relationships with social ones, there is no personal and family isolationism. Therefore, even a foreigner, having arrived in Russia, feels: “I am not alone here” (of course, I am talking about normal Russia, and not about life under the Bolshevik regime). Perhaps these are the properties main source recognition of the charm of the Russian people, so often expressed by foreigners who know Russia well...”

Passion and powerful willpower can be considered among the basic properties of the Russian people. The willpower of the Russian people is revealed in the fact that a Russian person, having noticed any shortcoming of his and morally condemning it, obeying a sense of duty, overcomes it and develops a quality that is completely opposite to it. Passion is a combination of strong feelings and willpower directed towards a loved or hated value. Naturally, the higher the value, the more strong feelings and it causes energetic activity in people with strong will. This explains the passion of the Russian people, manifested in political life, and even greater passion in religious life. Maximalism, extremism and fanatical intolerance are the products of this passion.

Love of freedom. Among the primary properties of the Russian people, along with religiosity, the search for absolute good and willpower, one can include the love of freedom and its highest expression - freedom of spirit. He who has a free spirit is inclined to put every value to the test, not only in thought, but even in experience. Due to the free search for truth, it is difficult for Russian people to come to terms with each other. Therefore in public life The love of freedom of Russians is expressed in a tendency towards anarchy, in repulsion from the state.

Cruelty. Kindness is the predominant feature of the Russian people. But at the same time, it cannot be denied that there are also many manifestations of cruelty in Russian life. There are many types of cruelty and some of them can be found, paradoxically, even in the behavior of people who are not at all evil by nature. The cruelty can be explained by the prevalence of poverty in Russia by a variety of grievances and oppressions. Until the last quarter of the 19th century, the system family life merchants, townspeople and peasants was patriarchal. The despotism of the head of the family was often expressed in actions close to cruelty.

Laziness, “Oblomovism”. Russian people are characterized by a desire for an absolutely perfect kingdom of existence and at the same time excessive sensitivity to any shortcomings of their own and others’ activities. From here arises a cooling towards the work begun and an aversion to continuing it; the idea and general outline of it are often very valuable, but its incompleteness and therefore inevitable imperfections repel the Russian person, and he is lazy to continue finishing the little things. Thus, “Oblomovism” exists in many cases reverse side high qualities of the Russian person - the desire for complete perfection and sensitivity to the shortcomings of our reality.

Unhealthy Lifestyle

As sad as it may be, the inhabitants of the country... Favorite phrase of Russians: “It will go away on its own!” It is not customary for us to trust doctors, but rather to use prescriptions traditional medicine. Some even treat cancer with herbs and magic devices.

This happens because for such a long period of the country’s existence, we have not focused on health. We are not educated in this area and misunderstand the meaning of the saying: “What does not kill us makes us stronger.” Love for an idle lifestyle leads Russian people to.

Fortunately, today the younger generation is beginning to take an interest in their health, is interested in sports, and goes to Gym to gain beautiful figure. But this is just the beginning long way after realizing that Russia was sliding down.

Life "by connections"

Another established distinguishing feature of the Russian people is bribery. 200 years ago in Russia it was customary to give officials a fee for services, but even when this right was abolished, the habit remained.

The officials had settled into such comfortable conditions that they never wanted to lose financial contributions from the people. Therefore, issues are still being resolved not according to the law, but “through pull.”

Eradicate this trait at this point historical stage Russia is impossible, since there are others global problems, but the struggle has already begun and is bringing success.

Endurance

Historical events such as uprisings, wars, blockades and permanent shifts rulers led to troubles for the Russian people. This made it possible to cultivate endurance, patience and the ability to withstand adversity in people.

Russian people are only recently getting used to comfort. Previously, we spent a lot of time in the fields to feed our family; there were often lean years, so we had to work without sleep or rest.

Weather conditions also influenced the formation of the Russian mentality. Foreigners are terribly afraid of the cold. For them, 0 degrees is already a reason to wear a sheepskin coat. The Russian people are accustomed to such temperatures and tolerate them well. One has only to remember the tradition of diving into an ice hole at Christmas. Some Russians actually practice winter swimming all winter.

Today Russia is emerging from the crisis, and the people are facing new challenges. Therefore, the mentality is gradually changing, acquiring new features. But some of them will forever remain in Russian souls and will help them remain invincible and undaunted in the face of dangerous enemies.