Dostoevsky Was an Antisemite. I Still Think You Should Read Him

Over the long winter, I spent many hours finishing The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky’s thousand-page masterpiece, regarded by many as the greatest novel ever written. Like generations of Jewish readers before me, I found myself both mesmerized by its psychological depth and moral vision, and unsettled by occasional antisemitic remarks scattered throughout its pages.

How could one of modernity’s most powerful voices of compassion and humanity succumb to one of history’s oldest and ugliest hatreds? What am I supposed to do with a book like this, one that moves me to my core, yet disturbs me morally? Should I treasure it, allow it to shape my inner world, or just push it away entirely?

How could one of modernity’s most powerful voices of compassion and humanity succumb to one of history’s oldest and ugliest hatreds?

Dostoevsky’s literary genius has already left its mark on me. But alongside its profound impact, I cannot ignore the hostility toward Jews that exists like a virus. To navigate this contradiction, I think Jewish readers of Dostoevsky need to appreciate both the beauty of his writing and the blind spot of his life.

The Beauty

The Brothers Karamazov is an unusual book by contemporary standards. Originally published in monthly installments in a Russian magazine over two years (1879–1880), it tells the story of three feuding brothers and their abusive, alcoholic father. On the surface, it slowly builds toward a climactic murder trial to determine which brother is guilty of patricide.

But beneath this narrative lies something far more ambitious. Dostoevsky uses the novel as a vehicle to explore the most fundamental religious and philosophical questions of human existence—faith and doubt, suffering and justice, freedom and responsibility.

Dostoevsky, a deeply devout Christian, often allows his characters to carry out these explorations through extended dialogues. One of the most famous chapters in Western literature is a section in which Ivan, the brother who represents intellect absent faith, reads a composition he wrote entitled the “Grand Inquisitor.” It is a haunting meditation on whether human beings truly want the freedom that religion and politics often cry for, or whether they would prefer comfort, security, and authority instead.

For many readers, especially for those drawn to religious life, the most compelling figure is Alyosha, the youngest brother and a novice monk. Through Alyosha and his relationship with the elder monk Father Zosima, Dostoevsky presents a vision of radical compassion, humility, and love.

One of Zosima’s most famous teachings is that “Each of us is responsible for all, and for everything, and I more than all the others.” This counter-intuitive statement urges personal responsibility for the suffering of others and for each person to see themselves as bound up in the fate of all humanity. It had a profound impact on the Jewish philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, who would later describe ethics as an infinite, asymmetrical responsibility for the other.

The Blind Spot

And yet, at the very moment that Dostoevsky articulates such a sweeping vision of compassion and moral responsibility, a troubling inconsistency emerges. The universal ethic he so powerfully describes does not seem to extend to Jews.

In one scene, during a discussion about the inexplicable suffering of children, Alyosha is confronted with a question reflecting a widespread and destructive myth: is it true “that at Passover the Yids (Jews) steal and slaughter children?” Rather than rejecting the outrageous claim, he responds uncertainly: “I don’t know.” For a character who otherwise embodies moral clarity and spiritual sensitivity, the answer is disturbing to say the least.

Biographer Joseph Frank concluded that Dostoevsky was a “guilty antisemite”, a thinker whose moral and spiritual commitments did not fully overcome the prejudices he inherited.

While some have tried to dismiss this repugnant reply as part of the author’s artistic license, a wider view of Dostoyevsky’s life only makes the case for antisemitism stronger. His journalistic work that was compiled into Diary of a Writer describes the Jews as a “state within a state,” associates them with financial exploitation, and questions their belonging in Russian society. As the biographer Joseph Frank concluded, Dostoevsky was a “guilty antisemite”, a thinker whose moral and spiritual commitments did not fully overcome the prejudices he inherited.

And this is not only a historical problem. Dostoevsky’s immense popularity has ensured that his ideas continue to resonate. For some readers, his writings served not as a source of genuine insight, but as a troubling source of validation for longstanding prejudices about Jews.

The Path Forward

It is worth noting that Dostoevsky did not see himself as a simple hater of Jews. In his own life, he denied being an antisemite, at times advocated for the extension of rights to Jews in Russia, and maintained correspondence with Jewish acquaintances. Scholars debate if he changed his views towards Jews by the end of his life.

Dostoevsky also endured immense personal suffering. As a young man, he was arrested and brought before a firing squad, only to be spared at the last moment and sent instead to years of hard labor in Siberia. Later in life, he was devastated by the death of his young son Alyosha, an event that haunted him deeply and shaped the emotional and spiritual world of The Brothers Karamazov. His writing emerges from a life marked by trauma, guilt, and an ongoing search for meaning.

And yet, none of this fully resolves the contradiction. The presence of antisemitic ideas in his work remains difficult to reconcile with the moral vision he so powerfully articulates. In some sense, The Brothers Karamazov itself is a novel about the struggle to live up to one’s highest ideals in a broken and complicated world.

Perhaps that is where the deepest lesson lies. As Jews, we are called to be a light unto the nations, to strive toward a vision of justice, compassion, and moral clarity. But we also know how difficult it is to live up to that calling. We are not judged only by the ideals we proclaim, but by the extent to which we succeed in embodying them.

Dostoevsky’s greatness, then, does not lie in his perfection, but in the seriousness with which he grappled with the human condition. We can learn from his insights but also from his failures. And in doing so, we are reminded that true moral and spiritual growth requires not only vision, but the courage to apply it consistently, even when it challenges our deepest assumptions.