Robert Hodel (University of Hamburg)
The present contribution is dedicated to the influence of L.N. Tolstoy’s late work on the philosophy of L. Wittgenstein. The problem is analyzed on three levels:
1. on the basis of the Diaries: in these notes Wittgenstein explicitly deals with Tolstoy’s Kratkoe izlozhenie Evangeliia (Gospel in Brief);
2. on the basis of the Tractatus: Wittgenstein wrote this early work at the same time at which he read the Gospel in Brief. This fact made many investigators trace the thoughts of Gospel in Brief in the Tractatus, even though there are few direct indication:
3. on the level of the Philosophical Investigations; on this level the influence becomes even more abstract as there are hardly any explicit indications for an intellectual dialogue with Tolstoy. The argument is therefore based mainly on the affinity of ideas.