Word among words

Diane Thompson concludes her essay in Dostoevsky and the Christian Tradition with this superb description of the place of God’s Word in the words of Dostoevsky’s novels, and his characters:

“Dostoevsky’s feeling for the dynamic aspect of the Logos was

exceptionally strong, as was his gift for making it a living rejoinder in
the great dialogue of his works. He never seals off the biblical word
from other words, from the life depicted in his works, but makes
everyone, from deniers to affirmers, respond to that word, thus
maximising its sphere of contacts and opening it up to further
development, and further revelations. Dostoevsky disseminates his
characters’ and his own deeply subjective responses to Christianity
through every word he writes, turning them into the utterances of
their internal and spoken dialogues. In Bakhtin’s terms, Dostoevsky
aimed to reanimate the authoritative word of conventional Christianity,
grown calci®ed through formulaic repetition, by making it
internally persuasive, and thus authoritative at a deeper level of
psychological and spiritual complexity. He never objectifies the
biblical word, he never reifies it as an inert specimen of typical
features, as a word impenetrable to other’s meanings, intentions and
aspirations. Nor is it ever the passive, mute object of the author’s
superior understanding. The biblical word becomes a life-giving
word for there is no renewal in Dostoevsky except through that
Word. All the high turning points in his characters’ spiritual dramas
pivot on affirmative responses to the canonical words and acts of
Christ. Dostoevsky consistently follows the Christian conception of
the Logos: to encounter the truth in Christ leads to a transformation
by which one turns away from old lies and orients one’s life to the
Word” (94).

The lives of his characters begin to change when the Bible penetrates the consciousness of his characters. They become honest with themselves as the Logos urges lies. But this happens only because the Word doesn’t hold itself aloof. The Word can only work if it risks contamination among the words of human society. The Word saves only by becoming flesh.