Nicholas Alexandrovich Berdyaev (1874-1948) was a Russian philosopher and religious thinker. He was a leading exponent of Christian existentialism and bridged the gap between religious thought in Russia and the West.

Nicholas Berdyaev was born on March 19, 1874, in Kiev of noble parents (his grandfather had been a leader of the Don Cossacks). At the age of 12 he entered the Kiev Cadet Corps, a school for future officers of the emperor's Life Guard. He hated military life and 6 years later transferred to Kiev University, where he became a radical Marxist and a political activist. He left his aristocratic family and in 1898 was expelled from the University, arrested, and sentenced to 2 years of banishment in Vologda, in northern Russia.

It was during this period, a time of great intellectual activity, that Berdyaev broke with the Marxists. He read widely in philosophy and began a lifelong association with the Orthodox Church...