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Part 1, Chapter 1, Section 8
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Demons, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Politics and Self-Interest
Ideology and Extremism
Morality and Nihilism
Herd Mentality
Atheism vs. Belief in God
Summary
Analysis
New rumors say that the provincial town is a hotbed of liberalism and atheism. Anton thinks those rumors are overblown. In reality, people like Stepan and his friends gather and discuss liberal ideas, but they do so in the spirit of debate. They have no expectation that any action will follow. They debate the fate of the peasants and serfs in Russia and the burgeoning idea of “public opinion.” In one of those discussions, Stepan says that he believes in God, though he’s not a Christian. Instead, he’s a pagan like Goethe or the ancient Greeks. Shatov says that “anyone without a people has no God” and explains that he means that without a national or collective identity, people will lose faith in those who came before, which will lead them to atheism or indifference.
Shatov supports a view of Christianity that is explicitly tied to national identity. In Shatov’s view, collective faith leads to a collective idea of morality. With that in mind, according to Shatov, atheism is tantamount to a rejection of morality. The novel will later explore the idea of whether atheism is compatible with morality in greater depth. Stepan’s assertion that he’s a pagan makes it clear that he is also willing to eschew the norms of Christianity, which he was brought up to believe in.
Themes
