Tolstoy

Recently I have come upon the writings of Leo Tolstoy. I came upon them in a circuitous manner. About a year ago I read a biography of Martin Luther King Jr. In the biography he wrote of his life path being heavily influenced by Mohandas Gandhi and his commitment to non-violence. I took this as a recommendation by King to read Gandhi's autobiography and I did so at the beginning of 2005. In Gandhi's autobiography he writes of his commitment to non-violence and how it was deeply influenced by a book he read called The Kingdom of God Is Within You by Leo Tolstoy. I took this as a recommendation by Gandhi and read Tolstoy's book in March 2005. This book with Tolstoy's comprehensive arguments had a profound affect on me. I do have two issues with Tolstoy's writings. The first issue is how inaccessible his writings are to the average person. I find this so because his writing is so often too complicated and "over the head" of the average person. I find this to be a terrible detriment to his ideas because the average person just won't take the time necessary to absorb them. Tolstoy's ideas are so powerful and comprehensive that they need to be read and understood by every person today in our United States. They are often a tremendous challenge to comprehend and take rereading several times to get the gist of what he is trying to say. I do understand that some of this could be due to the fact that Tolstoy wrote in Russian and what I am reading is a translation. Even so, he is often too complicated and this stands as a barrier to people finding and understanding his messages and who might otherwise have gained tremendous insight. The second issue that I have is that some of what he writes needs to be updated to our times and needs to include an evolution in thought from what he originally wrote as a Russian in 19th century Russia. An example of this would be in "A Confession" in his parable of the rower seeking to reach the opposite shore which is God. I think that this parable is written about a people who have been led astray from God by the powers of our society. The very base of this thinking should focus on why we are here on Earth in the first place, not after the fact of being led astray and seeking God. If we look at why we are here on Earth in the fisrt place I would say that we are here as Gods-in-embryo and learning to be as God...co-creators with Him. This is an evolution of what Tolstoy was saying. I am starting this blog in hopes of finding others that have an interest in getting Tolstoy's writings out to the general public in a form that is bit size enough for the average person to understand which I believe will help to capture the interest of the average citizen.
I hope I can find others interested in taking the journey of bringing Tolstoy's non-violent and moral writings to the average person.