The Brothers Karamazov

This section covers the following chapters: “The Elder Zosima and His Visitors,” “From the Life of the Hieromonk and Elder Zosima,” and “From Talks and Homilies of the Elder Zosima.”

Alyosha returns to the monastery to visit Zosima, who is still weak but now sitting up and alert. Others are also in the room talking with the elder. Zosima urges Alyosha to go back to his family because doing so may prevent something terrible from happening. He also explains to Alyosha that earlier, when Zosima had bowed to Dmitri, he’d done so to acknowledge Dmitri’s suffering; Dmitri’s face had had an ominous expression, and it had worried Zosima.

The narrator explains that Zosima dies soon after this conversation, but the narrator first explains that before Zosima’s death, Alyosha combines Zosima’s last words with notes from earlier stories from his life and homilies to create a portrait of the elder’s life and thoughts. The chapter “From the Life of the Hieromonk and Elder Zosima,” describes Zosima’s life as a child and young man and how these experiences led him to become a monk:

When Zosima was a child, he had an older brother Markel who died at the age of 17. Zosima remarks that when Markel was slowly dying, he began to view religion differently and talk about God and spirituality frequently.