Toward a characterization of “Metaphysics of the heart” by P. D. Yurkevich

The article considers the religious and philosophical views of the largest representative of the Kiev theological and academic school of Christian anthropology Pamphil Danilovich Yurkevich (1827-1874). Estimates of the thinker’s work given by his contemporaries (both opponents and students), as well as representatives of Russian emigre and modern domestic researchers are given. The main attention is paid to the “metaphysics of the heart” - the doctrine of Yurkevich about the heart as the focus of the physical and spiritual aspects of human life. The problem of the continuity of this doctrine of the previous religious and philosophical tradition and its influence on the further development of Russian idealistic philosophy is touched upon. Yurkevich’s concept is characterized as convincing and slender, based on Orthodox creed, including physiological, ontological, epistemological and ethical aspects. It is shown that the philosopher organically develops the “metaphysics of the heart” into the “metaphysics of love” with the idea of the primacy of morality for all ontological and epistemological thoughts.