Translated by Michael Millerman. Founder of http://MillermanSchool.com - online philosophy and politics courses on Plato, Aristotle, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Dugin, Strauss, and more.
A People Without a Philosophy
Debris analysis
Before embarking on a more careful study of the question of the possibility of Russian philosophy and its prerequisites, it is worthwhile to briefly examine the object that we today by inertia and without critical consideration call “Russian philosophy.” Before creating something, it is necessary to carry out two preliminary operations: “debris analysis” and “garbage disposal.” We will not be able to make a single step on the path to Russian philosophy, if we assume that “we already have it.” If it existed, then it would just have to develop. So to enter the initial positions of the study, we must show that it does not exist, and that what stands in its place is rubbish and misunderstanding. This is by no means gloating: it is simply that philosophy does not tolerate any exaggeration and obviously requires our devotion only to the truth, even if it turns out to be bitter. In addition, everything is not so sad: if it turns out that there is no Russian philosophy, then this can be interpreted not simply as the inability of Russians to create this philosophy, but perhaps as a sign that the terms for this have not yet come and the conditions are not right. In the end, it may turn out that Russians don’t need philosophy at all, and its absence is an expression of the norm, and not a defect or misunderstanding. If it turns out that we, Russians, are not a philosophical people, so much the worse for philosophy, not for the people. It cannot be ruled out that we will come to this in the course of our research, but here we should not get ahead of ourselves. We must act gradually and consistently.
Hegel said that, “a great people begets great philosophers.” We, Russians, without any doubt, are a great people. But we have not spawned our real — great — philosophers. How can we resolve this contradiction?
The first version: everything lies ahead. The second: Hegel was wrong. The third: we are not a great people. The latter is rejected at the outset, since, looking at our culture as a whole, at our history, at our accomplishments, at our lands and our spirituality, we will see that the Russians are a great people, operating on a grand scale. Two versions remain: either everything lies ahead, or philosophy is not the destiny of the people, or at least it is the destiny not of every people.
Philosophy and Indo-European world. Indian philosophy
The second hypothesis (“Hegel was mistaken”) comes up against the following historico-linguistic observation. If we take a look at the family of Indo-European peoples and, more broadly, those cultures that are built on the basis of Indo-European languages, we will see that all of them, in one way or another, have developed their own philosophical schools. And these schools are impressive, monumental phenomena of world history and culture.
Often, “philosophy” is understood only as Western European philosophy, from the pre-Socratics to Nietzsche (as Heidegger thought). This, in fact, is the philosophy of the European, Romano-German segment of the Indo-European world, its far-Western part. Without doubt, Western European philosophy is most revealing and explicit in terms of the development of the principles and foundations laid in it, which gradually acquired a striking, distinct, and impressive form. But the other, Eastern branches of Indo-Europeans created, though qualitatively different, yet no less convincing philosophical schools, opening whole continents of philosophical thought.
Take, for example, Indian philosophy. Built on the basis of one of the Indo-European languages, this philosophy is a monumental, unique, and original palace of thought, which includes hundreds of schools and trends, a host of outstanding thinkers, and an amazing variety of methods, approaches, and principles. In Indian philosophy there is everything: both a general spirit or style, allowing one to speak about it as an integral phenomenon, and a wide range of ideas and theories that are extremely contradictory and differ from each other both in the main and in particular.
Take at least the opposite schools of Vedanta: Dvaita and Advaita. The first is based on the dualistic, the second on the non-dualistic interpretation of the Vedas. It would seem a complete contradiction, but the Indian spirit overcomes it, finding a place for both thoughts within the framework of a common philosophical field. 1
Looking at Indian philosophy more broadly, besides the six classical “darśanas” (philosophical systems) we will see a whole layer of “heterodox” philosophical systems, from the gigantic field of Buddhist philosophy and Jainism to Lokāyata and Charvaka.
Indian philosophy is a well established and extremely developed phenomenon, a gigantic intellectual edifice of rationality that has been subjected to consistent and systematic reflection. In this philosophy, there are anthropological, epistemological, and ontological aspects, as well as aesthetics, ethics, and socio-political parts. The general structure of this philosophy is fundamentally different from Western European philosophy in its presuppositions, methods, and generally accepted principles but in no way inferior to it in the development of the rationalistic apparatus and the depth of self-reflection. So at the two poles of the IndoEuropean world, in the West and in the East of Eurasia, we encounter two vivid types of philosophical thinking, deeply incorporated into culture, society, politics, and religion.2 If we take into account the quality and scale of the influence of these phenomena on the cultures of the West and the East, as well as their dissemination to nearby societies, the connection of Indo-European cultures and peoples with philosophy will reveal itself to us as a kind of fundamental regularity, and philosophy itself will appear as a global phenomenon concentrated in Indo-European societies and described mainly in Indo-European languages: Sanskrit, Pali, Hindi, in one case, and Greek, Romance and Germanic, in another.
Iranian philosophy
We also encounter one more giant stratum of philosophizing Indo-Europeans in Iran and in that cultural area on which Iran’s culture has had a direct impact over the centuries. Some nomadic Iranian-speaking tribes should also be included here. And again, as in India, we are dealing with a developed philosophy, but one with a completely distinct philosophical spirit, different from the Indian and Western European.
Unlike Indian integrality and inclusiveness and Western European pluralism and fragmentation, Iranian philosophy focuses on the dualism of the world and operates with it in different ways. This applies to ancient Iranian culture, Mazdaism, Zoroastrianism, Mithraism, and later Iranian Shiite Islam, including diverse sects, such as Manichaeism or Bábism. All these philosophical and religious teachings went far beyond Iran itself, spreading among the peoples of Asia Minor, among the Slavs and Europeans right up to Western Europe (where we find echoes of Iranian dualism and Manichaeism in medieval Gnostic sects among the Cathars, Albigens, and Waldenses, and among early Protestants, the Czech Hussites and German followers of Thomas Müntzer).
Iranian thought is built around a fundamental dichotomy: light/darkness, up/down, good/evil, purity/dirt, gods/demons, etc. This dichotomy predetermines the most diverse philosophico-religious, social, political, and cultural constructions, developed by Iranians in different phases of their history At all stages of the history of Iran, we are dealing precisely with a philosophy, perhaps not as explicitly developed as in India or Europe, but nevertheless completely original, clearly formulated, and reaching back into history for several millennia. Iranian philosophy is an indubitable and original phenomenon.
In addition to Hindus and Europeans, we see that another huge sector of Indo-European ethnic groups - Iranians and peoples close to them - has developed its own philosophical traditions and laid it out in its own language.
Philosophy in the Arab world and in China
Attention should be paid to the fact that outside the Indo-European context there are also at least two cultures that gave birth to full-fledged philosophical schools and trends and claim to be global: Chinese culture and IslamicArab culture. These are the two poles of distinctive philosophical spirit, which also had a great influence on the thinking of entire peoples.
Over the millennia of its history, China has created a unique type of intellectual culture in which several layers can be distinguished:
- Archaic cults of ancestors and spirits,
- The ethical-administrative and ritual philosophy of Confucius, combining political standards and establishments with ritual and moral values,
- Taoist teachings of followers of Lao Tzu, built on the paradoxes between the finite (collectively "de", "good") and infinite (Tao),
- Indian Buddhism reworked in the Chinese way (Chan Buddhism), in which we are dealing with the influence of the Indo-European religious and philosophical system.
Despite all the diversity and sometimes contradictions, all strata of Chinese culture constitute a single whole, united by a specific style of thinking, contemplation, and ethical principles. Here, the duality (yin-yang), in contrast to the Iranian approach, does not lead to an unremovable opposition, but is integrated into a nuanced dialectical complex. Chinese philosophy, in turn, fundamentally influenced the culture of nearby peoples: Tibetans and Mongols in the North, Japanese, Koreans, Vietnamese and Thais in the East, as well as many Pacific ethnic groups in the South.
Arab Islamic philosophy is completely independent phenomenon, based on interpretations and commentaries on the Koran, the Muslim holy text, and representing a peculiar development of the Semitic cultural principle, rooted in Assyria and Phoenicia, but with unique distinctive features. The great influence on Islamic philosophy of the Greek tradition — Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics — became known in the Arab world largely due to the school of nonChristian Neo-Platonists in Haran, where they settled after their expulsion from Byzantium by Emperor Justinian in 529. In the Middle Ages, Western Europe received information about pre-Christian philosophy largely through reverse translations from Arabic.
In some cases, for example, in Iran, the imposition of the Arabic-Islamic, Neo-Platonic, and Iranian philosophical heritage proper led to the emergence of new original philosophies (the most striking example of this is the medieval philosopher Shahāb ad-Dīn Yahya ibn Habash Suhrawardī).
Be that as it may, in addition to the obvious and very serious influences of Indo-European philosophies, both the Chinese and the Arabs elaborated comprehensive, unique, and original philosophies, diverse and with many vectors, but united by a common spiritual style and common manner of thinking, with a sophisticated philosophical language, methodologies, and structures of concepts.
Slavic asymmetry
It is important for us, first of all, that the majority of IndoEuropean peoples and linguistic cultures corresponding to them have created extensive and persuasive philosophical complexes representing large-scale and cultivated traditions.
Against this background, a certain asymmetry is immediately apparent: the Slavs, on the one hand, are a large segment of the Indo-European linguistic and cultural community located in the territories between Western Europe and the East, but, on the other hand, there is no Slavic philosophy. In some cases, this can be explained by the fact that the Slavic peoples of Eastern Europe were for centuries under the influence of other philosophical traditions - Greek (in the case of Orthodox peoples) or RomanGerman (in the case of Catholic Slavs and later Protestants, for example, Czechs). But the case of Russia, the numerically and territorially largest Slavic power, shows that the Slavs do not pay much attention to philosophy even when they create independent and distinctive cultures, empires, and sovereign states
Undoubtedly, Slavic culture exists and has certain general characteristics and significant features. But the place of philosophy in this culture is either insignificant or lacking altogether.
This asymmetry is striking. If philosophy is related to the structure of the language (which could be assumed, given the philosophical scale of the majority of IndoEuropean peoples, although the Arab world and China give us other examples),3 then why was such a large and culturally original segment of Indo-Europeans as the Slavs able to build, to protect and increase powerful independent powers (Russia, and once Serbia Nemanjicz or Ancient Bulgaria), but did not develop something even remotely resembling the philosophy of other Indo-European societies or societies that were under their spiritual influence? The superficial answer (with a fair amount of racism), along the lines that, “the Slavs are not ethnically pure Indo-Europeans,” has no meaning: Indian society is much more heterogeneous in a racial sense and the influence of the autochthonous population is much more noticeable there, yet the philosophical culture – and what a culture it is! – was created and has developed harmoniously to this day. Obviously, the real reason for the deferment of philosophy in Slavic societies does not lie on the surface. Perhaps, in the course of our research on the possibility of Russian philosophy, we will manage to get closer to it. In the meantime, we restrict ourselves to establishing this circumstance, which is a phenomenological statement: matters stand precisely so and not otherwise. And this indisputable observation will serve as our starting point.
But, be that as it may, we see: the Slavic segment of the Indo-Europeans lies fallow in relation to philosophy. It is a resting field, which not only did not bear fruit, but, apparently, is also not yet sown. And if someone did try to sow something here, it ended in failure; the seeds fell on the stony ground, or were pecked by the birds of the sky, or were covered by weeds. This is a Slavic, Russian field, extremely enchanting, clearly cultivated, and waiting for something, but so far philosophically fruitless.
1. Heidegger M. 1943. Heraklit 1. Die Anfang des abenländischen Denkens. Heidegger M. 1944. 2. Logik, Heraklits Lehre vom Logos. Heidegger, Vorträge und Aufsätze. Fink E. 1970. Heraklit: Seminar mit Martin Heidegger. Frankfurt am Main.
2. Dugin A.G. Sociology of the Imagination. Introduction to Structural Sociology. Moscow: Academic Project, 2010; Dugin A.G. Logos and Mythos. Sociology of the Depths. Moscow: Academic Project, 2010; Bachelard G. Earth and Revelries of Will: An Essay on the Imagination of Matter (Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, 2002; Corbin H. L’Imagination créatrice dans le soufisme d’Ibn Arabî. R.: Flammarion, 1977, and especially: Durand G. Les Structures anthropologiques de l’imaginaire. Paris, 1960.
3. Dugin A.G. 2011. Arheomodern. Dugin A.G. 2009. The Radical Subject and its Double. Moscow: The Eurasian Movement, pp. 285-381. Dugin, 2009. Video lectures on Arheomodern from the course “The Sociology of Russian Society,” Moscow State University. http://evrazia.tv/content/sociologiya-russkogo-obshchestva-lekciya-2-arheomodern
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