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The Grand Inquisitor Essay

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The Grand Inquisitor Essay
“The Grand Inquisitor” is one of the hardest chapters to read in the novel, in it the existence of God is affirmed by Ivan only to ask why if he exists and created man, he watches from afar as children are tortured, as mankind is mislead, through its own constructs and freedoms given through the rejection of the three deadly temptations. Here the question of whether God truly loves mankind is posed by implying, if God loves humans why does he let “turmoil, confusion and unhappiness continue, for these are the present state of mankind” (Dostoevsky 256). And why did he reject the three temptations which would have provided man with a force with authority, an ability to perform miracles and a mystery about them to follow, (Dostoevsky 256).

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