Live and believe

It’s my wife’s birthday. Guests, calls, congratulations by e-mail, text messages. One poetic text message from a colleague ended like this: “May your saint help you live and believe.” This “live and believe” seemed painfully familiar to me. This was the motto of my childhood. Moreover, “to live” here meant not just a biological existence, but a life filled with ideals and meanings, of course.

The facades of houses are hung with slogans: «The current generation of Soviet people will live under communism!» The expression «will live» was synonymous with the word «believe». Mayakovsky: “I know — the city will be, I know — the garden will bloom …” The word “know” is a synonym for “I believe”, and together they meant “I live”. That’s why I live because I know and believe. There is no more knowledge in this, as if someone said: «I know there is a God.»

And also a song from the era of the first flights into space:

Living and believing is wonderful.

Before us are unprecedented paths:

Astronauts and dreamers say,

That Mars will bloom apple trees.

It was sincerely performed by Vladimir Troshin. And again: the dreamers claim. Funny! Not everyone had refrigerators and TVs yet. Communal apartments without hot water and bathroom. Public baths, public laundries in the yards. What, it would seem, to these people to the apple trees that will bloom on Mars? The song, however, was popular.

I already wanted to conclude that this expression is a phenomenon of exclusively Soviet ideology. But no. On the Internet, I immediately got to the translation of the FIFA World Cup song. The interlinear is not very clever, but the meaning is clear: “Give me fire, give me freedom. Give me a reason to live and believe. In this world full of negativity, it’s time to find an alternative for a showdown. Give me strength, reasons to laugh. Love in the whole world is like a medicine…” And so on. In general, we will alternatively sort things out on the football field, and faith, freedom, love and joy should reign in the world.

One way or another, if the matter is in ideology, then not in the first place. Each of us needs faith, even the most pragmatic and businesslike. This is something like a life-giving vitamin, without which the soul begins to feel first anxiety and discomfort, then falls into melancholy, then dies. And psychologically, the very state of faith is more important than its content. In the 20s and 30s, the majority believed in communism. Almost everything is in progress and science. They were supposed to bring to life not only prosperity, but also happiness. However, in the same years, Ilf wrote sadly: “Everyone said: radio, radio … And now — there is radio, but there is no happiness.”

Mayakovsky dreamed that a big-browed chemist would resurrect him: “Here he is, a big-browed quiet chemist, wrinkled his forehead before the experiment. The book — «The Whole Earth» — looks for a name. Twentieth century. Resurrect who? — Mayakovsky here … Let’s look for a brighter face — the poet is not handsome enough. — I will shout from this, from the current page: — Do not turn the pages! Resurrect! I assure you it was not a poetic figure. Believed! However, it is also obvious that progress did not bring any tablecloths, happiness, or immortality. During the Great Patriotic War, people believed in victory. At what cost is another question. But it is clear that without faith we would not have won.

Today, yesterday’s atheists, the children of those who destroyed churches and threw down crosses from bell towers, suddenly turned to the church. Many believe that this is just following fashion. I don’t think. After the violent destruction of all values ​​and ideals, the church immediately filled the resulting void. “Guys, you have to believe in miracles,” as another Soviet song sang. In miracles or not in miracles, but you have to believe. In my youth I was a communard in the Leningrad commune. The movement was powerful, capturing several hundred thousand teenagers across the country. Alternative to Komsomol and pioneers. He was eventually covered up. We believed that we could change the country and society. Haven’t changed. But maybe they shifted it by some tenth of a degree? It was a happy time, happy according to the state of faith. But what can I say? All great things come from faith. Temples were built that way. Faith is imagination. The temple arose first in the imagination of the creator, and then it was already built of brick. Rublev. Bach. After all, he heard his fugues, being alone with himself, then wrote down. Perhaps the most wonderful things in human relationships are held by faith? Love, for example. What can you know, calculate, calculate? Only believe. Or not to believe. Two diametrically different plots of life are obtained. Today, this childish theme (belief in love) has come out of the conversation, we are all adults and reserved, and confidently smart for such conversations. But even what I said is a fact.

The state of faith, I repeat, is subjectively more important than its content, but in life it is the content that determines the success or failure of life. Fascist fanatics also believed in the superiority of one race over another. What happened is known. The sectarians who engaged in collective suicide also did it out of faith. Alas! Marx once said that a person is responsible not only to his convictions, but also to his convictions. However, I am not writing a fable. I can’t put a moral at the end. But I agree with Marx.

My friend is undergoing surgery. Some say that this should not be done or, if done, then only in Germany. He decided on the operation, and not in Germany, but here in Russia. I trusted the doctors. This. It is said that in heart disease, faith almost decides the outcome. The future, of course, will show.

But there is faith in the infinite and, by definition, unrealizable. In the fact, for example, that life, despite all its grimaces, ugliness and cruelty, is beautiful. Sloppy? Fool? Maybe. But just this faith, I think, will not fail.