Alexey Ivanovich Vvedensky: Between Kantianism and Neo-Kantianism

To date, in the history of Russian philosophy, Professor Alexei Ivanovich Vvedensky of the Moscow Theological Academy is a little-studied figure, which may be due to the fact that he did not leave behind any original philosophical system, being a supporter of V.D. Kudryavtsev-Platonov’s ‘system of transcendental monism’. But at the same time, Vvedensky deserves attention because he left a trace in Russian Kantianism that neither his contemporaries nor contemporary researchers have noticed. Hence, the aim of the present study is to determine Vvedensky’s relation to the Kantian and neo-Kantian traditions on the basis of a number of his works. For this purpose, Vvedensky’s views on cognition and metaphysics are analysed, his attitude towards Kant and Neo-Kantianism is determined, and finally, the philosophical attitudes of the Russian philosopher are examined through the prism of the criteria of German and Russian Neo-Kantianism. It is established that Vvedensky proposed to return to Kant’s ideas to revise them in the light of the latest scientific data. At the same time, to understand Kantian texts, the Russian philosopher turns to neo-Kantian interpreters G. Feichinger and G. Cogen. It is shown that Vvedensky conducted the revision of Kantian intuitions with the support of A.F. Trendelenburg’s and V.D. Kudryavtsev-Platonov’s criticism of Kantian subjectivism, as well as of H. Helmholtz’s and A. Riehl’s views on the origin of spatial representations. It is revealed that Vvedensky criticised neo-Kantianism in the person of F.A. Lange for epistemological scepticism and the gap between moral and aesthetic feeling and cognitive ability, which can be overcome by the transformed voluntarism of G.R. Lotze. As a result of examining Vvedensky’s philosophical attitudes through the prism of the criteria of German and Russian Neo-Kantianism, it is concluded that he can be referred to Neo-Kantianism in a broad sense as a thinker who proclaimed a return to Kant, who sought to correct and supplement Kant, and who actively appealed to the texts of the Neo-Kantians.