Ukrainian philosopher-mystic, theologian, poet, teacher, possibly a composer of liturgical music. He had a significant influence on contemporaries and subsequent generations with his fables, songs, philosophical works, as well as his way of life, which is why he was called "Socrates".
He studied at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (he did not get a higher education). Skovoroda's philosophical views are devoted mainly to ethics. He did not create his own philosophical system. He was not loyal to the church and secular hierarchy, rejected any coercion, disliked church rituals, preferring personal spiritual freedom. From 1769 he led the life of a recluse and traveling philosopher; traveled mainly in Slobozhanshchyna. At the same time, he began to write philosophical dialogues and treatises in which biblical issues are intertwined with the ideas of Platonism and Stoicism. He considered self-knowledge to be the main meaning of human existence.
Hryhoriy Skovoroda wrote his works in varieties of the Old Ukrainian literary language: artistic and philosophical works in Slavic Russian (Slavic Ukrainian), poetry and fables in Book Ukrainian (it has fewer Church Slavonic elements). Skovoroda also conducted part of his correspondence in Latin.
Biography
early years
He was born in the hundred-hundredth town of Chornukha of the Lubensky Regiment, now in the Poltava Region, in the Cossack family of Sava and Pelageya. Sava Skovoroda's father was an ordinary Cossack, in peacetime he was engaged in butchering and selling wine in Chornuhy; died late 1730s or early 1740s.
At the age of seven, Grigory was sent to a four-year Dyakiv school in Chornuhy.
In August 1734, Hryhoriy entered the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, which at that time was at the peak of its prosperity. In the first, ordinary class (analogy, infima) they studied the Ukrainian literary and Polish languages and gradually switched to Latin, which became the main language in subsequent classes, and also studied Church Slavonic.
In 1735-1738, Skovoroda continued his studies in the following grammar classes, studied Latin, prose and poetic works in this language. Then there were poetry and rhetoric classes, and in 1739-1740 he began to learn Greek, German and Hebrew from Simon Todorsky. Then the training scheme included a two-year philosophy class where dialectics, logic, ethics, physics, and metaphysics were studied. In this class, Skovoroda studied under the prefect of the academy Mykhailo Kozachinsky.
Court chapel (1742-1744)
In 1741, without completing the philosophy class, Skovoroda in Glukhiv passed the competitive selection to the court chapel of Empress Elizaveta Petrovna and went to St. Petersburg. In the court chapel in St. Petersburg and Moscow, he performed viola parts in operas, liturgies, and various celebrations. In particular, he sang at the coronation of Elizabeth in Moscow in the Italian opera "La clemenza di Tito" by Johann Adolf Gasse ("The Mercy of Tito").
At the end of August 1744, together with the empress Elizabeth's mail, he arrived in Kyiv, where Elizabeth was going "to worship the holy saints of God." Skovoroda did not return to the imperial court, resigned as "court official" and returned to the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy to complete a course in philosophy.
Foreign journey (1745-1750)
Memorial plaque on the wall of the church of Nicholas the Wonderworker in the city of Tokai
At the end of 1745, having completed his studies of philosophy at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy and wanting to see foreign lands and learn a wider "circle of sciences", he was recruited to the "Tokai Commission for the Procurement of Wines for the Tsar's Court" under the leadership of Major General Fyodor Stepanovych Vishnevskyi (1682-1749; by origin Serbs from Transylvania, in Russian service from 1715). All the first biographers of Skovoroda believed that he got into the commission as a deacon for the Eastern Orthodox Church, but according to Leonid Ushkalov, he most likely went to Hungary as a companion of General Vishnevsky. At the end of August 1745, the commission left Kyiv and arrived in Tokai on the 20th of September. In addition to Tokai, Skovoroda visited Pressburg, Offen, Vienna and other surrounding cities, where he communicated with learned people. There are assumptions that Skovoroda visited Italy and Germany, but there is no documentary confirmation of this, as well as a possible study at Halle University. In Pressburg, Skovoroda could familiarize himself with the mystical ideas of pietism, which came from Halle and lived in the environment of the local Lutheran community. Perhaps this was influenced by the influence of Simon Todorsky, who also taught in Orthodox schools in the territory of former Hungary in 1737-1738.
In January 1749, Vishnevsky died in Tokai; his son Gavril was appointed head of the "Tokai Commission..." Next year, Skovoroda decides to return to Ukraine. On October 10, 1750, he arrived in Kyiv with another shipment of wine, and from there to Chornukhiv, where he did not find anyone from his family alive.
Stay in Pereyaslav, Kovray (1750-1759)
One of the classes of the collegium with the figure of Skovoroda, now the Memorial Museum
In 1750-1751, the Pereyaslav bishop Nikodym (Skrebnytskyi) invited Skovorod to work as a teacher of poetics in the recently founded collegium in Pereyaslavi Skovoroda agreed, prepared his course and began classes. In three or four months, a conflict arose with Skrebnytskyi, who was not satisfied with Skovoroda's teaching methods and who insisted on following the old models. Skovoroda did not agree to change the rules for poetry written by him. Vladyka was offended, Skovoroda was expelled.
After the scandal, Skovoroda lived with a friend and suffered. In September 1751, he resumed his studies at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, enrolling in theology. The theological course was led by an outstanding poet, prefect of the academy, George Konyskyi; it provided for a 4-year study and was equated to a higher university education. Skovoroda studied for only two years. In the summer of 1753, Metropolitan Tymofiy Shcherbatsky of Kyiv, at the request of his friend Stepan Tomara (1719-1794) from Bunchuk to find a governor ("inspector") for the education of his eldest son Vasyl (1746-1819), recommended Hryhoriy Skovoroda to him as the best student. In the autumn of 1753, Skovoroda arrived in the village of Kavrai of the Pereyaslav regiment, where Tomara's estate was located.
Skovoroda lived with Tomara for about six years. In the fall of 1754, there was a conflict that interrupted Vasyl's upbringing for several months: the boy gave a bad answer to a question, for which the hot-tempered Skovoroda called him a "pig's head." This became known to Hanna's mother, Vasyl Kochubey's daughter, and she insisted on punishing the "inspector". Tomara could not refuse his wife and fired Skovoroda.
Skovoroda approached his friend, one of the Pereyaslav centurions. Under his patronage, in the first days of January 1755, together with the hieromonks Kaligraf (Vasily Kryzhanivskyi) and Iriney Bratanovich, who were appointed to the Slavic-Greek-Latin Academy, he went to Moscow, and from there to the Trinity-Sergius Lavra. Here, the governor Kyrylo Lyashevetskyi, who taught theology at the Lavra seminary and, it seems, offered to teach Skovorodi, was waiting for him. However, Grigory refused, apparently because he did not want to take the monastic tonsure, or because, as Mykhailo Kovalinsky wrote, he was tormented by "a constant aversion to this region." On the way back, Stepan Tomara persuaded him to return to teaching in his home.
In Kavrai, Skovoroda began to write poetry, in particular several poems for the collection "The Garden of Divine Songs".
In the late autumn of 1758, he saw a prophetic dream in which various layers of people with social and moral defects appeared. Regarding it as God's Revelation, Skovoroda began to reflect on the life of an ascetic.
In the summer of 1759, Skovoroda left Kavray, because Vasyl Tomara was going to study abroad in Zamosc and Vienna. He kept respect and the warmest feelings for his home teacher for the rest of his life.
Kharkiv Collegium (1759-1762)
In the summer of 1759, Skovoroda accepted the invitation of Bishop Joasaf Mytkevich of Belgorod and Oboyan to teach poetics at the Kharkiv Collegium. He left the Hetman region and moved to Slobozhan region, which he loved with all his heart. At that time, the collegium was the most advanced educational institution in all of Ukraine, here, unlike the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, preference was given to natural and exact sciences, along with Latin, Greek, German, and French were studied more. Skovoroda taught here with enthusiasm. But there was also a conflict here. Bishop Joasaf Mytkevich, intending to leave Skovoroda for spiritual service, was going to persuade him to take tonsure - this matter he entrusted to the judge of the diocesan consistory and the archimandrite of the Mykolaiv Monastery in Belgorod, Gervasiy Yakubovich, who was a friend of the philosopher from Pereyaslav. To this Skovoroda replied: "Do you want me to increase the number of Pharisees?". As a result of Yakubovich's further insistence, in the summer of 1760 Skovoroda resigned from the collegium.
Later, he lived with an unknown friend in the village of Staritsa, which belonged to the Belgorod Mykolaiv Monastery. During the years 1760-1762, he lived alone, pondered over the Divine providence and self-knowledge.
In the spring of 1762, Skovoroda, having arrived in Kharkiv for a few weeks, learned from his acquaintance Archpriest Peter Kovalinsky about his talented nephew Mykhailo Kovalinsky and specifically went to the collegium to get to know him. The young man immediately took a liking to him, and only because of that Skovoroda accepted Bishop Joasaf Mytkevich's repeated offer to teach at the Kharkiv Collegium ("After all, for your sake, frankly speaking, for your sake alone, I left my such pleasant peace, embarked on the waves of life," he later wrote to Kovalinsky in the letter).
On September 1, 1762, Skovoroda began to teach syntax in the classroom, and also led an extraordinary 2-year Greek language course. A circle of admirers formed around him — philosophy students Yakiv Pravytskyi, Vasyl Bilozerskyi, Mykola Zavodovskyi, Kovalinskyi himself with his younger brother Hryhoriy, a student of syntax, and even a 9-year-old student of infima Yakiv Yenkevich. They gathered in Skovoroda's house, read ancient authors, wrote poems, sang, walked outside the city in the gardens. Kovalynsky didn't pull immediatelysia to Skovoroda ("Loved his heart, but shunned his mind") - only after he dreamed of a teacher in 1763, from whom spiritual sparks poured everywhere. They established intense spiritual communication, a kind of "spiritual romance", correspondence. In his letters, Skovoroda expressed ideas that he later developed in his philosophical treatises. Subsequently, after the teacher's death, Kovalynskyi wrote a thorough biography of him, which is referred to by all researchers of the sage's work. He writes about his lifestyle:
He got up very early, ate once a day, without meat and fish, was always cheerful, strong, mobile, satisfied with everything, kind to everyone, ready to serve everyone. He respected and loved good people regardless of their status, visited the sick, entertained the sad, shared the last with the one who had nothing
For friendship with the young spudey Skovorodu, they began to harass him in the collegium. After Joasaf Mytkevich died, on October 29, 1763, Porfiry Kraiskyi was appointed to the post of bishop of Belgorod and Oboyan. He immediately disliked the philosopher. When the bishop arrived with an inspection in Kharkiv in November, the teachers of the collegium gave him a lavish reception. However, Skovoroda did not leave ("For a noble person, nothing is so difficult as a sumptuous banquet, especially when the first places are occupied by fools"). Since it came to accusations of moral corruption and spiritual heresy, he stopped meeting with Kovalinsky and even writing to him. As a result, on July 15, 1764, Skovoroda left the Kharkiv Collegium for the second time. In August, she and Mykhailo went to Kyiv, where Skovoroda's cousin Ivan (monk "Justin") Zviryak worked in the printing house of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. In the Lavra, familiar monks offered Skovoroda to become a monk in order to become a pillar of the church and an adornment of God. To this he replied: "It is enough for you, unhewn pillars, in the Temple of God."
At the beginning of the academic year, Kovalynskyi returned to Kharkiv, and Skovorod - a few months later. Now he lived in the vicinity of Kharkiv without any occupation. During that period, the hetman government and the autonomy of the Slobid regiments were abolished in Ukraine, which meant the rapid liquidation of Ukrainian statehood. Skovoroda, however, did not respond to these events in any way. During this period, he practically gave up writing poetry.
In the summer of 1767, while staying in the Kuryaz monastery with Archimandrite Feofan Fedorovsky, Skovoroda wrote a letter to Kovalinsky, from which it is clear that a "storm", a "whirlwind" had recently happened to him. At one time, Izmail Sreznevsky wrote down a story that supposedly happened to Skovoroda in 1765, when he lived in a farm near Valki. According to her, the daughter of retired major Olena, who lived next door and whom he taught spiritual poetry and singing, fell in love with the already elderly Skovorod, who lived at the apiary. In general, the philosopher felt too reserved in the company of beautiful girls, but it seems that he reciprocated her. However, when it seemed that it came to the wedding, Skovoroda could not answer whether he was getting married of his own free will, and ran away from under the crown.
Soon after that, the newly appointed governor of the Slobid-Ukrainian province (in 1765-1775) Yevdokym Oleksiiovich Shcherbinin (1728-1783) invited Skovoroda to teach in the "additional classes" of the Kharkiv Collegium. For this, Skovoroda wrote the treatise "The Entrance Door to a Good Christian Life" in 1766. However, the opening of "additional classes" was opposed by Porfiry Kraiskiy, and they became operational only in February 1768. In fact, it was an independent educational institution for the children of the nobility. On the day of Kraiskyi's death, July 7, 1768, Skovoroda submitted a request to be appointed a catechism teacher.
However, in December 1768, Samuel Myslavsky, with whom Skovoroda studied in the theology class at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, was appointed bishop of Belgorod and Oboyan. He was indignant that a secular person was reading the catechism course, and he also did not like certain provisions of Skovoroda's treatise, for example, disrespect for ritual. As a result, Skovoroda resigned from the position of teacher - sometime in April 1769, this time permanently. He never held any other positions.
In Slobozhanshchyna (1762-1768)
From now on, Skovoroda chose a new and previously unknown lifestyle, namely, traveling. And this journey lasted until his death - a quarter of a century. It was full of adventures, shrouded in tales and legends. In it, the philosopher was never separated from the Bible, pipe or flute, and his works. His fame spread widely, and many desired to see and hear him as the spokesman of great truth.
After his final dismissal from the Kharkiv Collegium, he settled in an apiary on the banks of the Lopan in the Guzhvin Forest 10 versts from Kharkiv and lived the life of a hermit. The forest belonged to a retired ensign (the title introduced in the Slobid regiments was equivalent to a badge comrade in the Hetman region) Vasyl Zemborskyi, the father of one of the students of the "additional classes" of the collegium. Here Skovoroda began to write philosophical fables (later they were included in the collection "Kharkov Fables", which became the first collection of fables in Ukrainian literature) and philosophical dialogues (the first of them - "Narcissus Talk about: know yourself", based on the plot of Ovid's Metamorphoses; the second is "Symphony, called the Book of Aschan, about knowing oneself", based on the Book of Joshua). Skovoroda wrote poems, songs, and fables in the Ukrainian book language and Latin, while philosophical dialogues and treatises were written in a bizarre mixture of Church Slavonic, Ukrainian, and Russian languages.
From the Guzhvinsky Forest, Skovoroda visited Kharkiv, the village of Babai, where Yakiv Pravytskyi, his former student at the Kharkiv Collegium, was a priest. In Babai, a kind of circle formed around the philosopher from among the priests of neighboring parishes, friends of Yakov Pravytskyi. Perhaps the owner of Babaiv, Petro Shcherbynin, was among them, a relative of the governor of Slobid and the future first general-governor of the Kharkiv viceroyalty (in 1780-1783), Yevdokym Shcherbynin[16]. Here Skovoroda met Oleksiy Yuriyovich Soshalskyi, an elderly loner, educated, original, like Skovoroda himself, the owner of the village of Husynka.
He stayed with Oleksiy Soshalskyi often, starting from 1770, living in the apiary in the forest in the summer, and in the manor's house in the winter; communicated with his younger brothers Osyp and George. In May 1770, together with the Soshalskys, Skovoroda went to Kyiv, staying with his cousin, Yustin (Ivan) Zviryaka, who at that time was an "elder" in the Chinaiv desert, and lived with him for 3 months. In August, a strange incident happened to Skovoroda. Somehow he suddenly felt restlessness, an indescribable desire to leave Kyiv and return to Kharkiv. Yustin dissuaded him, but Skovoroda did not listen, he went to the Soshalskys, who lived in Podil. Descending from the Mountain, not far from St. Andrew's Church, an unknown force prompted him to turn back. He went a considerable distance, then returned, but again an invisible force brought him back. Still, having gathered his resolve, Skovoroda went down the Andriiivsky carriage, but suddenly felt the stench of a corpse and ran back. He told Soshalskyi about it and quickly started to set out on the road, saying that there would be a plague in Kyiv. No one believed, but on September 3, 1770, the plague began in Kyiv. The epidemic began in Wallachia or Moldova in the Turkish army and came here with the beginning of the new Russo-Turkish war. In 3 months, 6,000 people died in Kyiv on Podil. At the end of August 1771, smallpox reached Moscow.
Skovoroda, having hurriedly left Kyiv, in two weeks was already in the Holy Trinity Monastery near the village of Chernechchyna, 4 versts from Okhtyrka. Here he received news about the plague in Kyiv, and here in the monastery garden he experienced a mystical ecstasy:
Waking up early, when my thoughts and feelings were full of reverence and gratitude to God, I went to the garden for a walk. And the first thing I felt in my heart was a kind of looseness, freedom, cheerfulness and realized hope. Having given all my will and all my desires to this mood, I felt an unusual movement in me, which filled me with an unknown power. In one moment, a sweet shower rushed into my soul, and from it my whole insides burst into flames. It seemed that a fiery current was raging in my veins. I began not to walk, but to run, as if something was carrying me, I could not feel my arms or legs, as if I were all made of fire, moving in a circle. The whole world disappeared from my eyes. Only one feeling of love, beneficence, peace, eternity enlivened my being. Tears rolled from my eyes in streams and spread a kind of touching harmony all over my body. I entered into myself, as if I felt the assurance of filial love, and from that moment I devoted myself to filial obedience to God's Spirit
he wrote to Kovalinsky.
Skovorod interpreted this state of mystical enlightenment as his rapprochement with God - until now his heart had worshiped God slavishly, but now it loved Him as the most sincere friend.
At the beginning of 1772, Skovoroda accepted the invitation of retired colonel Stepan Ivanovich Tevyashov (1718-1790), who wanted to take some home lessons from him, and arrived in Ostrogozk. Tevyashov's ancestors came from the Golden Horde nobility, were baptized in Muscovy during the time of Dmitry Donskoy and received nobility. Stepan Tevyashov was appointed Kharkiv colonel (1734-1757) and one of the last colonels of the Ostrogozka regiment (1757-1763). In his manor in Ostrogozka, Skovoroda lived for several months in 1772, here a philosophical circle arose around him: in addition to Stepan himself and his son Volodymyr (1747—ca. 1810), a small local official, the collegial registrar Opanas Pankov, and the noble Yakiv Dolganskyi (1731—?) — a representative of the former Cossack chieftain, whom Skovoroda called "a painter." On the basis of philosophical conversations with them during the spring and summer of 1772, Skovoroda wrote 6 philosophical dialogues - "Conversation one...", "Conversation two...", "Conversation about the ancient world", "Conversation of five travelers about true happiness in life", "The Ring," "The Conversation, called the Alphabet, or Primer of Peace," which is the most brilliant of them all. In "Conversation of the first..." he introduced himself, Pankov, and Dolgansky under their original names as action characters.
From Tevyashov Skovoroda traveled to Yakov Pravytskyi in Babaeat
At that time, Mykhailo Kovalynskyi, who served as a tutor in the family of the former hetman Kyril Razumovskyi, went with his sons Lev and Grigory to Göttingen and Lyon. At the beginning of 1773, they arrived in Lausanne, where they stayed for more than half a year. Here Kovalynskyi met the theologian and naturalist Jean-Pierre-Daniel Meingard (1694-1776), lived for some time in his country house. Meingard was very similar to Skovoroda in facial features, character, behavior and way of thinking. When in 1775 Kovalynskyi met with Skovoroda and told him about Meingard, it made a great impression on the philosopher; he considered him his double and even signed his works with the second name "Daniel Meingard".
In the future, Skovoroda repeatedly visited Oleksiy Soshalskyi in Husyntsi, in Kharkov to Pyotr Pyskunivskyi, a procurator, in Veliky Burluka to Yakov Donets-Zakharzhevskyi, in Valki, Izyum, Kupiansk, Liptsiy, Monachynivtsi, Okhtyrtsi. He was respected by both ordinary people and the nobility, invited to live with them. He refused. In September 1782, Mykhailo Kovalynskyi, who at that time served as the Chief Overseer of the Moscow Educational Institution, wrote:
I really want to buy a place for myself somewhere in the Ukrainian side/.../If it were possible, then, moving away from everything, I would retire and ask you to spend the rest of my life together.
There was a legend that Catherine II herself, who had heard a lot about Skovoroda, sent him an invitation to the position of court philosopher through Prince Potemkin. To this, Skovoroda, who was sitting with a flute on the side of the road and was feeding a sheep to the owner, with whom he lived at the time, seemed to answer:
Tell the queen's mother that I will not leave my homeland: a pipe and a sheep are dearer to me than a royal crown.
Mykhailo Kovalynskyi certifies the same:
When Skovoroda wrote for his region, he sometimes used the Ukrainian language and the spelling used in Ukrainian pronunciation. He always loved his native language. He loved his native land, his beloved Ukraine, and when he was away abroad, he always wanted to return there as soon as possible and wanted to die there. He expresses this in many places of his works. "Everyone must recognize his people and himself in his people."
The last journey of the philosopher
In the last year of Skovoroda's life, he lived in the village of Pan-Ivanivka in the house of his colleague Andriy Ivanovich Kovalivskyi, who happened to be the stepfather of the future founder of Kharkiv University, Vasyl Karazyn. At that time, after the death of his patron Prince Potemkin, Mykhailo Kovalynsky fell into disgrace and lived in the Khotetovo estate 25 versts south of Oryol. Old Skovoroda, after 19 years of separation, decided to visit him. "Despite the distance of the road, the extremely bad weather and the constant aversion to this region," he set out on foot from Pan-Ivanivka. He brought his works to Kovalinsky and lived with him for 3 weeks. On August 26, 1794, having given up money, he went back "to dear Ukraine, where he had lived until now and would like to die." For a certain time, due to heavy rains, he was forced to stay in Kursk in the Znamyan Monastery, where he was gladly received by Archimandrite Ambrose Gynovsky. It seems that Skovoroda was still going to visit Gusynka, but feeling that he was losing strength, he went to Pan-Ivanivka, where he lived for another month.
Death
He died on November 9 (October 29, 1794) in the village of Pan-Ivanivka (today Skovorodinivka, Zolochiv District, Kharkiv Region) in the house of Andrii Kovalivskyi.
Sreznevsky wrote the following about the death of Skovoroda:
...It was a beautiful day. Many neighbors went to my grandfather's place to go for a walk and have fun. They also had to listen to Skovoroda... At dinner, Skovoroda was unusually cheerful and talkative, he even joked, told stories about his past, his travels, and experiences. Fascinated by his eloquence, everyone got up from dinner, Skovoroda left... He went to kindergarten. He walked for a long time along the cross paths, plucked vegetables and distributed them to the boys who worked in the garden. In the evening, the owner himself went to look for Skovorod and found him under a branchy linden tree. The sun was already setting: its last rays broke through the thick foliage. With a shovel in his hand, Skovoroda was digging a hole - a narrow, long hole. — "What is it, my friend Grigory, what are you busy with?" asked the owner, approaching the old man. "It's time, my friend, to end the journey! Skovoroda answered. "And so all the hair flew off the poor head from the snoring, it's time to worry!" "And, brother, nonsense! Enough joking, let's go!" - "I'm going! But I will beg you in advance, my good man, let my last grave be here." And they went to the house. The frying pan did not stay in it for long. He went to his little room, changed his clothes, prayed to God and, putting his written works and a gray scroll under his head, lay down with his arms crossed. They waited a long time for him with dinner. The frying pan did not appear. The next day in the morning before tea, the same before lunch. This surprised the host. He dared to enter the Frying Pan to wake him; however, Skovoroda lay already cold and petrified.
On the cross above his grave, at the request of Skovoroda himself, it is written: "The world was fishing for me, but I didn't catch it...". Today you can get to itand, leaving the Kharkiv-Suma road near the village of Maksimivka (60 km from Kharkiv) and then drive 18 km to the village of Skovorodinivka.
Skovoroda did not print any of his works during his lifetime. Separate copies of the manuscripts were kept by friends, in particular, by Yakov Pravytskyi in Babai — the treatises "Narcis" and "Askhan".
Language of works
There is currently no unanimous opinion regarding the language of Hryhoriy Skovoroda's works.
On the one hand, it is suggested that Skovoroda wrote in a literary language that was based on the old Ukrainian book tradition of the end of the 16th century and the first half of the 18th century, with a focus on the Church Slavonic language (primarily in philosophical prose). According to Lidia Hnatiuk, the language of the vast majority of philosophical dialogues and Skovoroda's treatises are Slavic-Russian (Slavic-Ukrainian), poems and fables are book-Ukrainian (it has fewer Church Slavonic elements). Skovoroda also conducted part of his correspondence in Latin.
At the same time, some linguists and literary scholars classify the language used by Skovoroda as Russian or "close to Russian". This view was held by such researchers as Petro Buzuk, Yuriy Shevelyov and Valeriy Shevchuk. Thus, in his work devoted to Skovoroda's language, entitled Prolegomena to the study of the language and style of Hryhoriy Skovoroda (1990), Yurii Shevelyov concluded that "Skovoroda's language - if you subtract its strong biblical and church influences, its bright poetic and individual features - is , basically, a Slobojan version of the standard Russian language spoken in educated circles at the time. Skovoroda constantly communicated with these circles, it was in them that he found his readers and like-minded people. He depended on them even materially. These people (and not the peasants) were his special environment." A similar conclusion was given by Petro Buzuk in his work devoted to the language of Skovoroda, entitled Language and spelling in the works of Grigoriy Skovoroda (1923), where Buzuk noted that "the main basis of Skovoroda's language is the Russian written language of the 18th century, although we find there are also Ukrainian, Polish and Old Slavic first-borns".
Creative heritage
Theological views
Skovoroda's works were not published during his lifetime, as the then censorship found them "contrary to the Holy Scriptures and offensive to monasticism." Brought up in the spirit of philosophical and religious education, Skovoroda rebelled against dead church scholasticism and the spiritual oppression of Moscow "Orthodoxy", basing his philosophy on the Bible. Skovoroda taught that the kingdom of man is inside him and
"To know God, one must know oneself. As long as a person does not know God in himself, it is time to look for Him in the world. »
"Believing in God does not mean believing in His existence, but means surrendering to Him and living according to His law. »
"The sanctity of life consists in doing good to people. »
The official Moscow religion divided humanity into those more blessed by God and those less blessed, and even those who were under a curse, that is, serfs. And Skovoroda taught that "all work is blessed by God", and he called sharing places near God an unforgivable sin. Moscow Orthodoxy and, in general, the entire Moscow clergy was intolerant of everything foreign as heretical, "non-Orthodox". Skovoroda taught that the greatest and, in fact, the only task of philosophy is to search for truth and strive for it. But in the conditions of human life, this goal is unattainable, and the happiness of a person lies precisely in the fact that he must always seek the truth. This goal can be reached in different ways, and therefore intolerance of those who think differently is not justified. In the same way, religious intolerance does not find justification, because the eternal truth is manifested in this world in various forms. Being completely uncompromising in his attitude towards himself and having, as a result, achieved complete harmony between his science and his life, Skovoroda was extremely gentle and considerate in his attitude towards others.
The theme of friendship
Skovoroda points to friendship as a source of joy, and hence mental health. However, you should choose your friends very carefully, avoiding sycophants and crooked people. Because often insincere friends attract a young person to immoderation, tempting them with assurances that everything is pure for the pure; in such cases, one must resolutely overcome shyness and firmly refuse, and in the future, refuse to communicate with such people at all, the mentor warns. If "we willingly keep company with people who are still healthy, but whose minds are damaged and saturated with poisonous teaching," we run the risk of falling into their position.
The concept of related work
The concept of related work is one of the most important provisions of the concept of relatedness of Grigoriy Skovoroda, and the justification of a person's need for related work occupies a prominent place in his creative work, namely in the dialogue Conversation, called the alphabet, or the primer of the world. Related work, according to the philosopher, is both a need of the human body and a spiritual need - it amuses the spirit, brings satisfaction and pleasure. Related activities are useful not only for those who have found their vocation, but also for society. It is the unity of social and personal interest that distinguishes related workI am from work chosen for reasons of benefit, glory or pride. Taking care of one's own spiritual world, paying attention to oneself, believes Skovoroda, will be important for other people as well. Achieving freedom, according to the philosopher, is possible only under the condition of working for one's own benefit, acquiring what one needs for oneself. The pan sees human happiness not in work in general, but in "natural" ("related") work.
Attitude to life
Drawing of a frying pan. The fountain "Unequal equality for all" is depicted on the 500 hryvnia banknote
In one of his later letters, Skovoroda tells about a meeting with a monk who
"the demon of sadness torments terribly, and which is usually called the devil of melancholy. (…) Giving advice to this person, I almost lost myself. (…) It is very important who you communicate with on a daily basis and who you listen to. Because while we listen, we absorb their spirit. »
This story looks especially instructive, since the teacher, admitting that he himself succumbed to sadness, shows how he overcame this state: in a dream, he turned to the Almighty for help:
"If God is everywhere, if he is present in this shard (at the same time, I picked up the shard from the ground), then why are you looking for consolation in other places, and not in yourself? After all, you are the best of all creations. »
It is noteworthy that, unlike many sages, Hryhoriy Skovoroda does not oppose soul and body, realizing that a person is a combination of one and the other, and therefore, he must treat both parts of his nature with equal care. In many exhortations, Skovoroda compares the soul and the body and their functions: "be sure and every day toss a word or saying into the soul, as into the stomach", "...what you see and hear, turn into consumable and saving juice, like an animal , which should be sacrificed to God" about communication with different people he says: "food is good, but what if your stomach does not like it" etc.
Skovoroda himself shows considerable familiarity with the medical theories of ancient doctors: he notes that Galen, thinking about health, advised boys and young men to eat colder food, and older people - warmer food, and interprets this opinion as follows: excess moisture develops from hot food, and from here — catarrh, runny nose, pus, dampness thickened by heat. Plutarch also considered excess moisture in the body to be the cause of all diseases:
"disease, any contagion and inflammation cannot be inoculated when the body is cold, devoid of mucus and light as a cork (...), then make it thinner by reducing excessive food and avoiding the fire generated by wine, from which all the vices of the soul come, and of the last, in turn, all diseases of the body. »
Skovoroda concretizes the connection between spiritual and physical ailments: a person who abuses meat and alcohol dwells for a long time on an anxious thought - "hence premature aging, if not something worse." In the 26th letter to Mykhailo Kovalinsky, skilfully using Latin clinical terminology, he lists the diseases and conditions that, according to his observations, are the most common among people: scabies, febris, hydrops, epilepsy , cough (tussis), exhaustion (lassitudo), etc.
Only in 1798, his first work "Narcissus, or Know Yourself" was published in St. Petersburg, and even then without his surname. In 1806, the journal "Zionskyi Vestnyk" printed some more of his works. Then in Moscow in 1837–1839, some of his works were published separately, and only in 1861 the first, but completely incomplete, collection of his works was printed. A better and larger collection, but also not complete, was published in 1896 in Kharkiv under the editorship of Professor D. Bagaliya. 16 works were printed here, 9 of them for the first time. In addition, Skovoroda's biography and some of his poems are printed here. Another edition of Grigory Skovoroda's works was published in 1912 in St. Petersburg under the editorship of V. Bonch-Bruyevich. Several works of the philosopher and his biography by M. Kovalinskyi, who was a student of Skovoroda, are printed here. But there is still no complete edition of the philosopher's works, because his various manuscripts are in different archives and libraries.
Musical creativity
Skovoroda played the violin, bandura, harp, and flute. Many of Grigory Skovoroda's poems are set to music. Ukrainian composer Leonid Hrabovsky created the cycle "Temnere Mortem" (1991).
In addition, there is information about the compositional activity of Hryhoriy Skovoroda. In particular, he owns the songs "Oh, you yellow-sided bird", "Standing sycamore over the water".
Individual recordings of Skovoroda's music were preserved in manuscript collections of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. This music was performed by Svyatoslav Krutykov's "Camerata Taurica" ensemble, later by Konstantin Checheni's Early Music Ensemble.
Skovoroda's influence on contemporaries
Hryhoriy Skovoroda had a huge influence on his contemporaries and on the further Ukrainian citizenship, and not only by his ethical science, but mainly by his life, in which words never differed from deeds: his teachings were in complete agreement with his life. To assess this impact, as S. Efremov wrote,
...suffice it to say that his contemporaries saw him as a "traveling academy" and considered him worthy of a university; suffice it to say that when it was necessary to find in Ukraine an ideological, honest andthat person, they were looking for him among the "pan relatives", that is, students of this wonderful man and supporters of his science. And even the first university in Ukraine, Kharkiv, was not stupidly placed in Slobid Ukraine, where Skovorod lived and taught the most... Sacrifices for a new university, after the call and "dramatic gestures" of Karazin (b. 1802). poured mainly from Skovoroda's students, his acquaintances and friends, and those victims were immediately collected for a large, as at that time, sum of 400,000 karabs. Kotlyarevskyi, the father of the new Ukrainian literature, and Kvitka, the father of the Ukrainian novel, were undoubtedly influenced by Skovorody... — (History of Ukrainian writing, I, article 255).
Despite the fact that Skovoroda's works were not printed, they spread through copying. "Skovoroda did not have to look for readers - they looked for him: he had such ardent supporters and propagandists that they even announced through newspapers, inviting those willing to read the works of the Ukrainian philosopher... These works also reached the village roof: Let's recall Shevchenko's mention from the children's summer:
I will do
A small book. With crosses
And patterns with flowers
I will circle the leaves
Yes, I write off the Frying Pan, Or "Three Tsars of God"...
As you can see, Skovoroda stands here next to the very popular works of the semi-folk muse, and, indeed, many of his psalms are still sung by the blind and lyres, not knowing and knowing nothing about the author..." (ibid.).
Mykola Kostomarov also wrote about the popularity of Skovoroda:
It is not possible to point to such public figures as Skovoroda and whom the people would remember and respect so much. His portraits hang in many houses all over the area from Ostrogozka (Voronizka province) to Kyiv; every literate Ukrainian knows about him; his name is known to many of the illiterate people; his traveling life is the subject of folk tales; in some areas, the descendants of their parents and grandfathers know about the places he visited, where he liked to stay, and point to them with respect; Skovoroda's good affection for some of his contemporaries is the family pride of his grandchildren; itinerant singers learned his songs - on a temple holiday, in the marketplace, you can often meet a crowd of people surrounding these rhapsodists and listening with tears of emotion: "Every city has morals and rights"... - (Word about Skovorod. "Osnova", 1862, No. 8 (Russian)).
Publication of works
Grigory Skovorody
Skovoroda's works were never published during his lifetime. For the first time, his dialogue work "Narcissus" was printed in 1798 in St. Petersburg. In 1837, separate books appeared in Moscow: "Fables of Kharkiv", "Besѣda, новная двое", in 1839 - "Friendly conversation about spiritual peace", "The Poor Lark", "The Battle of Arch-strategist Michael with Satan", also during the 19th century some excerpts, letters and poems were published.
In 1861, the first collection of works "Compositions in verse and prose by Grigory Savvych Skovoroda. With his portrait and handwriting." The first academic collection was published in Kharkiv for the 100th anniversary of the philosopher's death in 1894, "Writings of Grigory Savvych Skovoroda, collected and edited by Prof. D. I. Bagaleem" (the seventh volume of the "Collection of the Kharkiv Historical and Philological Society").
The next attempt at an academic edition of Skovoroda's works was "Collections composed by H.S. Skovoroda. With the biography of H. S. Skovoroda and M. I. Kovalinsky, with notes and notes by V. Bonch-Bruevich" (St. Petersburg, 1912). Of the planned two volumes, only the first was published, which included almost all philosophical works.
In 1961, a collection of Skovoroda's works was published, which included all the works of the writer known at that time. The first volume contained philosophical treatises and dialogues, and the second - artistic works, epistolary, biography of Skovoroda by Pera Kovalinsky and dubia.
On the basis of this edition, the staff of the Institute of Philosophy of the Academy of Sciences of Ukraine prepared and published in 1973 "Complete Collection of Works" by Skovoroda in two volumes.
In 1972 - to the 250th anniversary of his birth, a 2-volume collection of his works was published.
1994 - the publication of all works in Ukrainian for the first time.
In the 2000s, Leonid Ushkalov prepared several editions of his works, including a complete academic collection.
Pan in culture
In cinematography
A frame from the film "Open Yourself" (1972): the monument to H.S. Skovorod in Lohvytsa
The only feature film "Gryhory Skovoroda" was directed by Ivan Kavaleridze in 1958 at the Kyiv Film Studio named after O. Dovzhenka. He did not have much success. In 1972, for the 250th anniversary of the Ukrainian philosopher, Rolan Serhiyenko shot the documentary film "Discover Yourself" at the "Ukrkinochronika" studio. For the visual series, the authors chose a bronze casting of Skovoroda's monument for Lohvytsia, on which Skovoroda's texts, voiced by Ivan Mykolaichuk, were superimposed. The Communist Party banned the film from screening, and only at the end of the 1980s was the film allowed to be released and it won the Shevchenko Prize.
In 2004, Yuriy Zmorovych's film "And the World Didn't Catch Me" was released. Three television works were carried out by the National Television Company (in 2008, 2011 and 2013): "Gryhory Skovoroda" by Oleksii Lyabach from the cycle "Great Ukrainians", "Gryhory Skovoro"yes" from the cycle "Faces of Ukrainian History" and Olena Khmyrova's TV movie "Mysterious Frying Pan". In 2020, the TV movie "Blessed are you, traces..." was released.
In painting and sculpture
A lifetime photograph or portrait of Skovoroda was not created or preserved. The image of Skovoroda is built on copies of a portrait created shortly before Skovoroda's death, but according to the artist's memory.
In painting, the image of Skovoroda was recreated by Tetiana Yablonska, Ivan Yizhakevich, Anatoliy Nasedkin, Karpo Trokhymenko, Mykhailo Zhuk, Volodymyr Slepchenko, Oleksandr Roitburd.
There are monuments, commemorative signs, memorial plaques on the territory of three memorial museums, in the cities and localities where Skovoroda visited, on the territories of educational institutions named after him, in Kyiv, Pereyaslav, Poltava, Cherkasy regions and others. The largest number of such sculptures is in Kharkiv. Outside of Ukraine, there is one sculpture in Slovenia and two memorial plaques (Slovakia and Hungary). Ivan Kavaleridze, as well as Seyfaddin Gurbanov, Mykola Malinka, Volodymyr Lutsak and others created several monuments in Skovorodi.
In fiction
The image of Skovoroda appears in fiction as early as the beginning of the 19th century. His first attempt was to portray Vasyl Narizhnyi in the novel "Russian Zhilblaz", published in 1814. In 1936, Izmail Sreznevsky published a biographical novel about Skovoroda "Major, Major!" in the pages of a Moscow magazine. In the summer of 1855, while staying in the Novopetrov Fortification, Taras Shevchenko wrote the novel "The Twins", the character of which is Skovoroda. During the 1890s, Panteleimon Kulish worked on the poem "Grytsko Skovoroda". In the 20th century, Pavlo Tychyna, Valerian Polishchuk, Maksym Rylskyi, Yuriy Klen, Vasyl Bondar, Vasyl Shevchuk and others addressed the figure of Skovoroda. There are poems with Pandoin motifs in the works of Vasyl Barka, Mykola Vingranovsky, Platon Voronek, Mykhailo Dray-Khmara, Ivan Drach, Ihor Kalinets, Lina Kostenko, Andriy Malyshko, Borys Oliynyk, Dmytro Pavlychk, Ivan Svitlychny, Vasyl Symonenko, Vasyl Stus, Arseniy Tarkovsky , Boris Chichybabin and others.
Musical works to the words of Skovoroda
The poem "Every city has manners and rights" is included in the repertoire of many modern kobzar-performers: Serhiy Zakharets, Taras Kompanichenko, Nina Matvienko, Oleksandr Trius, Yaroslav Krysko, Oleksandr Savchuk, Yulian Kitasty.
Commemoration
Skovorody oak and a memorial sign near it
Memorial events
In 1994, 1997, 2002, 2012, the anniversaries were commemorated at the state level.
Objects are named after Skovoroda
Streets and alleys in Poltava, Lokhvitsa, Kyiv, Kharkiv, Odesa, Lviv, Dnipro, Zaporizhia, Kropyvnytskyi, Chernihiv, Chernivtsi, Khmelnytskyi, Drohobych, Lubny, Melitopol, Pereyaslav, Chornuhy, Hrebinets, Zolotonoshi, Zinkiv, Horishnih are named after Skovoroda Plavnia, Reshetylivtsi, Fastovi, Brodakh, Velyka Dymerka, Lubotina, Vovchansk, Manchenka, Sheshora, Nadvirni, Stryi, Voznesensk, Zolochiv, Koveli, Zavodskoi, Vinkivtsi, Konotopi, Yagotina, Okhtyrka, Konotopi.
In honor of Skovoroda are named:
Grigory Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (Kyiv)
Kharkiv National Pedagogical University named after Hryhoriy Skovoroda
Grigory Skovoroda University in Pereyaslav
The 21st Kurin of Hryhoriy Skovoroda UPYU.
asteroid 2431 Skovoroda.
botanical sights: oaks in Skovorodynivka, in the forest park in Poltava region, in the village of Monachynivka, mulberry in Kyiv.
Museum in Chornuhy
Museums
The National Literary and Memorial Museum of H. S. Skovoroda in the village of Skovorodynivka, Kharkiv Region (the museum was destroyed on May 6, 2022, during the Russian invasion of Ukraine)
H. S. Skovoroda Memorial Museum of the National Historical and Ethnographic Reserve "Pereyaslav",
Chornukhin Literary and Memorial Museum of G. Skovoroda
Historical and cultural reserve "Hryhoriya Skovorody's Homeland", Chornukha settlement, Poltava region — creation initiated
In numismatics and philately
On June 21, 1996, the National Bank of Ukraine issued a silver jubilee coin with a denomination of 1,000,000 rubles with a dedication to Hryhoriy Skovorodi.
In 1997, Ukrposhta issued the stamp "Gryhoriy Skovoroda. 1722-1794"
On September 15, 2006, the National Bank of Ukraine issued a 500-hryvnia banknote, the obverse of which depicts Hryhoriy Skovoroda. The design of the banknote (on the front and back sides) uses two drawings by H.S. Skovoroda.
On September 22, 2022, Ukrposhta issued a postal block for the 300th anniversary of the birth of Hryhoriy Skovoroda.
Postage stamp of the USSR, dedicated to H.S. Skovorodi, 1972
Postal stamp of Ukraine, dedicated to H.S. Skovoroda, 1997
500 hryvnias of the National Bank of Ukraine of the 2006 model (front side)
The background of the central part of the banknote forms the image of a fountain with the inscription "Equality is not equal to all" - the author's drawing of Hryhoriy Skovoroda for the work "Signs of some kinships" from the Dialogue "Conversation, called the alphabet, or the primer of peace"
Postal block "To the 300th anniversary of the birth of Grigory Skovoroda. Garden of divine songs", 2022
"Gryhoriy Skovoroda"
silver memoryon a coin of the NBU 1 million rubles, 1996. Reverse
300 years since the birthday
The government resolution on commemorating the 300th anniversary of the birth of Hryhoriy Skovoroda was adopted on November 4, 2020 under number 973-IX. Among the planned measures were the renovation of the buildings of the National Literary and Memorial Museum of H.S. Skovorody, located in the village of Skovorodynivtsi; Memorial Museum of H.S. Frying pans of the National Historical and Ethnographic Reserve "Pereyaslav", located in the city of Pereyaslav, Boryspil District, Kyiv Region; Chornukhinsky Literary and Memorial Museum of H.S. Skovorody, located in the urban-type village of Chornukha, Lubensky district, Poltava region; Lokhvytskyi Museum of Local Lore named after H.S. Skovorody, located in the city of Lokhvytsi, Myrhorod district, Poltava region; creation of a modern material and technical base: Kharkiv National Pedagogical University named after H.S. Frying pans; Institute of Philosophy named after H.S. Pans of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine; Grigory Skovoroda University in Pereyaslav. Not everything that was planned could be implemented due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In particular, on May 6, 2022, at 11 p.m., a Russian missile hit the roof of the museum in Skovorodinivka, causing a fire.
The statue of Skovoroda from Skovorodinivka was included in the exposition of the exhibition and art project "The World of Skovoroda" in the Ukrainian House in Kyiv.
For the birthday, the National Bank of Ukraine issued a silver coin "Garden of Divine Songs" with a denomination of 20 hryvnias and a circulation of 2,500 pieces. On December 2, 2022, the branded passenger train of the 1st class of the Southern Railway of the "night express" category No. 17/18 on the Kharkiv - Uzhhorod route departed under the name "Skovoroda-Express".
Skvorodiyana
Ukrainian Philosophical Foundation, Center of St. Kliment "Communication and Dialogue of Cultures", the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies of the National University "Kyiv-Mohyla Academy", the Center "Practical Philosophy" periodically hold the Skovorodiniv Colloquium ("Readings at the Triochsvyatitelska")
In 2005, on the basis of Pereyaslav-Khmelnytskyi State Pedagogical University named after Hryhoriy Skovoroda, an educational and scientific Center of Skovorodino Studies was established, headed by Doctor of Philological Sciences, Professor Mykola Korpaniuk, who conducts Skovorodyno readings every two years. It aims to research and study Skovoroda's creative work, popularize his heritage, and implement it in the educational processes of secondary schools and universities.
