Ivan IV and Andrey Kurbsky: the philosophy of the dispute
- Authors: Frolova E.A.1
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Affiliations:
- Lomonosov Moscow State University
- Issue: No 1 (2025)
- Pages: 59-67
- Section: Legal, political, philosophical and religious thought
- URL: https://journals.rcsi.science/1026-9452/article/view/285529
- DOI: https://doi.org/10.31857/S1026945225010047
- ID: 285529
Open Access
Access granted
Abstract
The article analyzes the dispute over the issues of state governance between one of the most striking and controversial figures in Russian history, Ivan the Terrible, and the boyar Andrey Kurbsky. It is shown that Ivan IV’s political views were largely determined by his personal qualities. According to his views, the tsar is responsible only to God, his subjects cannot discuss his orders, and he bears no responsibility to them. Andrey Kurbsky, on the contrary, defended the state order based not on the personal discretion of the ruler, but on the participation of the boyar council in governance – the “synclitus”. The ideological component of the dispute, reflected in Kurbsky’s messages, consisted in the very fact of protest against the policy of autocratic power.
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About the authors
Elizaveta A. Frolova
Lomonosov Moscow State University
Author for correspondence.
Email: theory.law.msu@gmail.com
Doctor of Law, Professor, Head of the Department of Theory of State and Law and Political Science, Faculty of Law
Russian Federation, 1, bld. 13 (4th academic building), Leninskie Gory, 119991 MoscowReferences
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