I felt that this part of the novel was rather boring. It took me a long time to read it, but, from what I understood of it, I would say that Zosima had once been a normal, worldly individual. He had made many mistakes and seemed to fall victim to his violent urges. Still, somehow, he managed to change his behavior and correct his mistakes. Instead of killing the man, whom his dearest love had fallen in love with, in a duel, he waited for the man to miss his shot, and then he discarded his weapon and apologized to the man. He risked his reputation so that he could do what he felt in his heart was the right solution. It is from this that a friendship develops between Zosima and a "mysterious visitor" who had committed a murder. This man comes to Zosima for advice and guidance. He wants to admit to everyone publicly that he was the one who had committed the crime not one of his victim's servants. However, he is unable to bring himself to do it at first. That is where Zosima comes in. Zosima gives him the right encouragement and the man takes the fall. In the end, the man dies, but he tells Zosima that he feels free. He also informs Zosima that, when he had returned to Zosima's house the second time, he was going to kill him. After all of this, the story goes into Zosima talking about the world as a whole and how the other monks need to try to make Russia a better place and how they need to love all men including the sinners. It was a very boring book, but I hope the next one will be much more intriguing.
I guess this book was boring in the sense that nothing really happened. This book and book 5 seemed like they were included so the author could tell us his religious veiws, but I thought some points the characters made were interesting and kind of made me think.