Editing Nikolai Berdyaev (section)

== Social activities ==
In 1899, his first article "F. A. Lange and Critical Philosophy in their relation to Socialism" was published in the magazine "[[Die Neue Zeit]]".

In the following years, before his expulsion from the USSR in 1922, Berdyaev wrote numerous articles and several books, of which, according to him, he later truly appreciated only two — "The Meaning of Creativity" and "The Meaning of History."

A fiery 1913 article, entitled "Quenchers of the Spirit", criticising the rough purging of [[Imiaslavie]] Russian monks on [[Mount Athos]] by the [[Holy Synod]] of the [[Russian Orthodox Church]] using tsarist troops, caused him to be charged with the crime of [[blasphemy]], the punishment for which was exile to [[Siberia]] for life. The [[World War I|World War]] and the [[Bolshevik Revolution]] prevented the matter coming to trial.<ref name="ReferenceA">''Self-Knowledge: An Essay in Autobiography'', by Nicolas Berdyaev (Author), Katharine Lampert (Translator), Boris Jakim (Foreword) {{ISBN|1597312584}}.</ref>

Berdyaev's disaffection culminated, in 1919, with the foundation of his own private academy, the ''"Free Academy of Spiritual Culture"''. It was primarily a forum for him to lecture on the hot topics of the day and to present them from a Christian point of view. He also presented his opinions in public lectures, and every Tuesday, the academy hosted a meeting at his home because [[Persecution of Christians in the Soviet Union|official Soviet anti-religious activity was intense]] at the time and the official policy of the Bolshevik government, with its [[Soviet anti-religious legislation]], strongly promoted [[state atheism]].<ref name = "Markovic"/>

In 1920, Berdiaev became professor of philosophy at the [[University of Moscow]]. In the same year, he was accused of participating in a conspiracy against the government; he was arrested and jailed. 
[[Felix Dzerzhinsky]], the feared head of the [[Cheka]], personally interrogated him,<ref name="Gulag1">{{cite book | last = Solzhenitsyn | first = Aleksandr | author-link = Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn | title = The Gulag Archipelago, 1918–1956: An Experiment in Literary Investigation, I–II | year = 1973 | publisher = [[Harper & Row]] | chapter = Chapter 3 The Interrogation | isbn = 978-0060803322 | chapter-url-access = registration | chapter-url = https://archive.org/details/gulagarchipelago00solz_0 }}</ref>{{rp|130}} and he gave his interrogator a solid dressing down on the problems with Bolshevism.<ref name = "Markovic"/>{{rp|32}} Novelist [[Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn]] in his book ''[[The Gulag Archipelago]]'' recounts the incident as follows:
<blockquote>
[Berdyaev] was arrested twice; he was taken in 1922 for a midnight interrogation with [[Felix Dzerzhinsky|Dzerjinsky]]; [[Lev Kamenev|Kamenev]] was also there.... But Berdyaev did not humiliate himself, he did not beg, he firmly professed the moral and religious principles by virtue of which he did not adhere to the party in power; and not only did they judge that there was no point in putting him on trial, but he was freed. Now there is a man who had a "point of view"!<ref>Cited by Markovic, op. cit., p.33, footnote 36.</ref>
</blockquote>

After his expulsion from the USSR on September 29, 1922, on the so—called "[[Philosophers' ships]]", Berdyaev and other émigrés went to [[Berlin]], where he founded an academy of philosophy and religion, but economic and political conditions in the [[Weimar Republic]] caused him and his wife to move to [[Paris]] in 1923. He transferred his academy there, and taught, lectured and wrote, working for an exchange of ideas with the [[France|French]] and European intellectual community, and participated in a number of international conferences.<ref>{{Cite web |title=A Conference in Austria |url=http://www.berdyaev.com/berdiaev/berd_lib/1927_323.html |access-date=21 July 2022 |website=www.berdyaev.com}}</ref>

[[File:Tombe Berdiaev2.JPG|thumb|Berdyaev's grave, Clamart (France).]]
<!-- this isn't part of his biography...
Primary source biographical works in English are Berdyaev's intellectual autobiography, published originally under the title ''Dream and Reality'', and Donald A. Lowrie's 1960 book, ''Rebellious Prophet: A Life of Nikolai Berdyaev'', written in close collaboration with Berdyaev's sister-in-law, Evgenia Rapp, and others of their close acquaintance under the auspices of the Berdiaev Société.<ref>Vide Lowrie, "Rebellious Prophet", Preface, p. ix–x</ref>
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