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Strauss’s Machiavelli and Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor1 2 3Strauss’s Machiavelli andDostoyevsky’s Grand InquisitorA l e x a n dru R ac uUniversity of Ottawaalexracu2013@gmail.com1. IntroductionWe learn from a fairly recent article by a brilliant commentator of Joseph deMaistre’s work that “if one wanted to find in the Catholic tradition a discoursethat resembled the one that Dostoyevsky gave to the Grand Inquisitor…onewould undoubtedly turn to Joseph de Maistre,” 1 a reactionary thinker whowas characterized as “the Machiavelli of theocracy” by the Romanian essayistEmil Cioran. 2 The intersection of the two interpretations of Maistre raisesthe question of the relation between Machiavelli and the famous characterfrom The Brothers Karamazov. While Machiavelli’s thought has been thesubject of many diverging interpretations, it is clear that Cioran’s reference toMachiavelli is premised on the popular vision of Machiavelli as “an evil man”and a “teacher of evil,” although, unlike Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor,1Jean-Yves Pranchère, “Joseph de Maistre’s Catholic Philosophy of Authority,” in Joseph de Maistre’sLife, Thought and Influence: Selected Studies, ed. Richard Lebrun (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2001), 131. In his private correspondence, Maistre makes the followingstatement: “Since it is sufficiently well proven by history that peoples need a religion, and that theSermon on the Mount will always be regarded as a functional moral code, it is important to maintainthe religion that has preached this code. If its dogmas are fables, there has to be at least a unity offables, something that will never happen unless there is unity of doctrine and authority. …If I werean atheist and a sovereign, I would declare the Pope infallible by public decree for the establishmentand preservation of peace in my estates” (Joseph de Maistre, Œuvres complètes, 13:185ff., quoted inRobert Triomphe, Joseph de Maistre: Étude sur la vie et la doctrine d’un matérialiste mystique [Geneva:Librairie Droz, 1968], 333–34 [my translation]).2Emil Cioran, “Joseph de Maistre: Essai sur la pensée réactionnaire,” in Exercices d’admiration:Essais et portraits (Paris: Gallimard, 1968), 56.© 2015 Interpretation, Inc.