A Harmony and Translation of the Four Gospels

“This composition is an overview of theology and an analysis of the Gospels—it is the best work of my mind, the one book that (as they say) a person writes throughout his entire life,” proclaimed Leo Tolstoy himself.

In this work, one of the greatest writers sets out the history of his religious inquiries and attempts to grasp the true essence of Christian teaching and faith. To do so, he studied the history of the creation and church translations of the Gospels. Tolstoy compared the Greek text and its variations with the canonical translation, studied the views of well-known theologians, philosophers, linguists, and scholars. Having rejected some theological interpretations, Leo Nikolayevich lost confidence in the accuracy of the Church’s translation and interpretation of the Gospels. Moreover, he began to criticize the foundations of church dogma and rejected them, because, in his view, they contradict the demands of reason.

The writer had to translate the sacred texts himself from scratch. With special attention, he approached the passages that seemed to him the most understandable, instructive, and aligned with the overall spirit of Christianity.