Oswald Spengler [1880-1936] was a German professor of classical languages, history and political science. His extensive and famous book is "Decline of the West", which was published in the years 1918-1921. He develops in the book the idea that every independent culture goes through cycles of growth and decline, similar to the cycle of human life. This is in contrast to the prevailing belief, according to which there is a constant positive development of civilizations, based on the conception of moral eternity.
Analysis of Western society occupy a central place in the book. This is the society where Spengler lived and the whole book is actually focused on it. Western society was born in the forests of Central Europe about a thousand years ago. It reached its peak between the 15th and 18th centuries, between the Renaissance and the Enlightenment. Now, at the beginning of the 20th century, it has degenerated and to the final stages of decline, awaiting rebirth.
The most significant sign of Western society is the energies, dynamism and activism of its people, which led to its extraordinary technological and cultural flourishing. It is a culture that strives both physically and spiritually, in devotion, out and up. An early physical and cultural sign of this aspiration is the many cathedrals built at the beginning of the "period".
Western European man has created a new religion, in which Mary mother of Jesus is the Queen of Heaven. She is superior to Jesus her son. Belief in Mary is a very important development, as Jesus represents the connection to the early severe Jewish morality, while Mary is much more forgiving and pagan. At the same time, a strong belief developed in the presence of Satan.
These two ideas have been adopted by Christian believers so seriously that it is impossible to exaggerate. As a result man is perceived as walking regularly along an abyss. Black Mary, Mary of the Fall from Heaven, is an integral part of this belief. Because of this belief, Spengler expressed "hope" that the "tragic perception" of life has not yet disappeared.
"Decline of the West" is written in a unique literary style. The central motif that Spengler repeats, as a composer of a musical symphony, is the life cycles of any familiar culture: birth, maturity, decline. They are parallel to takeoff, flight, landing. It describes the dialectic between the upper and lower classes, as it has occurred in history. Thus it has a hypnotic intellectual power, which dulls the criticism towards it.
The book became popular and influential. It was the main bestseller in the post-World War I era, particularly in Germany. Today it is still considered an important research and a significant contribution to the study of social theories.
Spengler was deeply influenced by Nietzsche. His work was intended to serve as a tool for adapting Nietzsche's aerial ideals for the use of modern, technological and cynical society. He took Nietzsche's ideas about the "desire for power" to the climax: he thought that in history power is what wins and not morality and truth. Man is a beast of prey, and dictatorship is the best form of government. Democracy is nothing but a stop on the way.
Spengler wrote: ''The forces that will affect the future will not be different from the forces of the past. These are: the will of the strong, the healthy instincts, the race, the desire for property and power. On the other hand, justice, happiness and peace are nothing but dreams, and will remain so, floating ineffectively."
Spengler was the main intellectual opponent of the Weimar Republic. He was intensely involved in politics, with the aim of replacing democracy in Germany with a dictatorship of generals and industrialists.
He directly influenced the Nazis. Goebbels copied his radical anti-Jewish ideas from the epilogue of "Decline of the West'', the title of the decisive struggle between the power of wealth and the power of blood.
The citizens of Germany consistently supported Hitler and the Nazi Party, as they presented ideas that were close to those of Spengler, who was considered the prophet of the modern age, who praised the beauty of the chimneys of factories towering into the sky.
Spengler was constantly striving for World War II. He wrote in the 1930th: ''This age is great, but the people in it are very weak. They can no longer bear tragedies, on stage or in life itself. But the fate that brought them to this period will now grip them by their collars, and will do to them what should be done, whether they like it or not ... The tragic world view is not dead yet. It will bloom again in the future as it flourished in the First World War."
No comments:
Post a Comment