His fundamentalism drives me nuts! He gets mad at Ivan for trying to express his atheism in his Grand Inquisitor poem while still the narrator is constantly trying to uphold his (fake) image of not judging anyone. Also, like Ivan and Dmitri, he never acknowledges Smerdyakov as his brother because he is illegitimate yet he never stops thinking about Fyodor, arguably the most horrible character in the book, as his father, meaning that Alyosha's for the incredibly old-fashioned "bastards are not family" type of hypocritical mentality yet the fathers who rape people and act horrendously are family? I'm not arguing Smerdyakov hasn't done anything bad, I am arguing that Fyodor was worse, as one character in fact in Dmitri's trial very soundly argues Fyodor of having renounced all his duties as a father, even mocked them. And as a cherry on the top, there is his heinous rape of a mentally disabled character who actually happens to be Smerdyakov's mother. I don't remember if it is outright stated if Smerdyakov knew about Fyodor's rape of his mother but considering it appears to be public knowledge in the town I think he does.
I've also studied Dostoevsky's religious views in his Writer's Diary which included his enthusiastic support of murdering Turks, the so called "infidels". Dostoevsky represents the absolute worst aspects of Christianity and he never loses an opportunity to express his obsession in his books. I still like Dostyevsky as a writer but I mostly like from his characters those who express atheism as opposed to faith. His Christian characters are often either incredibly bland or outright annoying.
FWIW, I am an agnostic atheist.
