Gregory Skovoroda

Gregory Skovoroda, also Hryhorii Skovoroda (Latin: Gregorius Scovoroda, Ukrainian: Григорій Савич Сковорода 3 December 1722 — 9 November 1794) was a Ukrainian and Russian philosopher, poet, teacher and composer. Skovoroda was of a Cossack background in current day Ukraine, who lived in the Russian Empire and made important contributions to Russian philosophy and culture. He lived and worked in Sloboda Ukraine, which is today partly in modern Ukraine and partly in Russia. Skovoroda was so important for Russian culture and development of Russian philosophical thought, that he has been referred to as the "Russian Socrates."

Skovoroda received his education at the Kiev Mogila Academy in Kiev. Haunted by worldly and spiritual powers, the philosopher led a life of an itinerant thinker-beggar. In his tracts and dialogs, biblical problems overlap with those examined earlier by Plato and the Stoics. Skovoroda's first book was issued after his death in 1798 in Saint Petersburg. Skovoroda's complete works were published for the first time in Saint Petersburg in 1861. Before this edition many of his works existed only in manuscript form.