The Spiritual Works of Leo Tolstoy

In the 1870s Tolstoy experienced a profound moral crisis, followed by what he regarded as an equally profound spiritual awakening, as outlined in his non-fiction work A Confession. His literal interpretation of the ethical teachings of Jesus, centering on the Sermon on the Mount, caused him to become a fervent Christian anarchist and pacifist. Tolstoy's ideas on nonviolent resistance, expressed in such works as The Kingdom of God Is Within You, were to have a profound impact on such pivotal 20th-century figures as Mohandas Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., and James Bevel. Table of Contents Introduction Leo Tolstoy: A Short Biography «Tolstoy the Artist» and «Tolstoy the Preacher» by Ivan Panin Books The Kingdom of God is Within You What I Believe The Gospel in Brief A Confession Christianity and Patriotism Reason and Religion Patriotism or Peace Letter to Ernest Howard Crosby Bethink Yourselves! Why do People Stupefy Themselves? A Letter to a Hindu Correspondences with Gandhi Persecution of Christians in Russia Help! Thoughts on God 'Thou Shalt Not Kill' Two Wars Reason and Morality Church and State Religious Relation to Life Letter to a Kind Youth Reply to Critics Reminiscences Reminiscences of Tolstoy, by His Son by Graf Ilia LvovichTolstoi My Visit to Tolstoy by Joseph Krauskopf Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy or Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) was a Russian writer who is regarded as one of the greatest authors of all time. Born to an aristocratic Russian family in 1828, he is best known for the novels War and Peace (1869) and Anna Karenina (1877) which are often cited as pinnacles of realist fiction.