Rest and Trust

How do abusive fathers affect their sons? Svetlana Alliluyeva, Stalin’s daughter, spoke in a BBC interview in the 1980s about her father’s early childhood. Joseph Stalin was born into the home of a poor Georgian peasant, Besarion Jughashvili, who was a violent alcoholic.

He beat his wife, Keke, regularly, and he beat young Joseph “mercilessly.” According to Svetlana, the boy once tried to defend his mother by throwing a knife at his father — but missed.

While watching the interview, I felt an uncanny sense of déjà vu. Ivan the Terrible’s childhood was surprisingly similar. After the death of his both parents, the boy fell into the hands of the feuding boyars who neglected him and often left him without food and clothing.

Then another story came to mind — that of the Polish journalist Krystyna Kurczab-Redlich, who conducted independent research into Vladimir Putin’s past. After speaking directly with his mother, who was still alive in the 1990s, she published a book containing details that never entered the official narrative.

To cut the long story short, Vladimir grew up essentially without a father. His mother later married a Georgian man who adopted him. This stepfather, too, was a violent drunkard. He beat both the boy and his mother regularly. Young Vladimir had to learn judo and other “survival” techniques simply to protect himself and her.

Eventually, because of the beatings, his mother sent him to her maternal grandparents in Saint Petersburg.

What happens to a boy’s psyche when his father — the one who is supposed to protect him — instead forces him into daily survival mode? Unconsciously, the child develops the deep, instinctual desire to “kill the father” and take his place.

This is what Freud meant by the Oedipus complex. Freud used the Greek myth of Oedipus, who unknowingly killed his father and married his mother, as a model for psychological development in boys. According to him, every boy unconsciously wants to kill his father and marry his mother.

Is this true? Partly. What Freud never emphasizes is that this “desire to eliminate the father” becomes acute precisely in boys who seek a bright father in their earthly father — but find none.

When a father is absent, violent, drunk, or indifferent, a boy experiences a collapse of the inner world. He seeks light but finds only darkness. Deep resentment settles in his heart. Without realizing it, he begins to dream of replacing the father — in any way possible.

We all instinctively know what a “bright father” is supposed to be. That’s why the Romans named their chief god Jupiter. The Latin “Iūpiter” means Father Jove. The first part of the word — Iū — is derived from the Proto-Indo-European “dyew” which means (to be bright, day sky), and “piter” is related to the Latin “pater” (father).

Jupiter, the largest planet in the Solar system (and the biggest bright spot in the night sky also known as the Great Red Spot), was associated by the ancients with the Father. In ancient consciousness, a father is the one who shines. A father is the light of your day. In Roman lore, Jupiter, Jove, is the epitome of joviality — he is full of joy and the energy of being.

When a boy never encounters that kind of brightness in his earthly father, he grows resentful — and profoundly unsure of himself. He tries to compensate through force, aggression, and the pursuit of what he imagines masculinity must look like. The result is not strength but a brittle, armored soul.

This could easily have been the fate of Telemachus, Odysseus’s son — but for Athena.

Telemachus grew up without a father. Odysseus had left for the Trojan War when Telemachus was still a baby and had been gone for twenty years. As a result, Telemachus became an uncertain and inexperienced young man, watching helplessly as countless suitors courted his mother, Penelope, in his father’s absence. He longed to save her — desperately, instinctively — but didn’t know how.

Then, Athena appeared to him, disguised as a Mentor, and inspired him to set out on a journey to find his father. Eventually, Telemachus learned that his father, Odysseus, was alive but trapped on the island of Calypso. Through his reunion with his father, Telemachus transforms from a passive, uncertain youth into a confident and capable young man.

Curiously, Athena — a goddess of wisdom and war — does not advise Telemachus to become a man of war to “protect his mother” or to compensate for the loss of his father. That would have been a false masculinity. In her wisdom, she tells him to go and look for his father. Ancient stories are infinitely wise.

The disease of dictatorship is often rooted in fatherlessness — when a child cannot find the “bright father” in his earthly father, he “kills” him in his heart. To reverse this curse, there must be someone wise enough in his life who can nudge him to look up — to peer intently into the night sky.

There, in the impenetrable darkness, there is always a bright spot — someone who embodies the jovial Father in Heaven and beckons him to a life that’s worth living.