Meh, it’s just a rip-off of Dune.
Tolstoy’s musings take up far, far less of the book than the fifty-fifty chapter split that you suggest here. In any case it’s pretty obvious when he is going off on one of his rants. Those few chapters are easily skipped. Just read the thing for the huge sprawling wonderful epic that it is. I agree that anglophones need to make an effort to keep track of the names.